The Queen and King is a mystery short story by Isaac Asimov.
Part of the Union Club series, it was first published in the December 1984 issue of Espionage magazine.
Summary[]
In the Union Club, Griswold is prompted to recount an espionage case involving two American movie stars, widely known as the "King and Queen" of the films. The Department had recruited the couple, referred to as Oscar and Emmy, to deliver microfilm to a dissident contact while on a cultural tour in a rival nation, "Eastland." The amateurish plan, devised by Emmy, involved hiding the microfilm in a distinctively wrapped cookie, which was to be passed to the contact at a party. However, the specific cookie vanished from the plate before the transfer could occur, forcing the couple to abort their tour.
Later, an American agent embedded within Eastland intelligence managed to send a cryptic, two-part message before his death: "Q. K". The Department consulted Griswold, believing the message referred to the movie stars. Griswold noted that the order was wrong for cards, where the King precedes the Queen. He reinterpreted the message not as "Queen and King," but as "Queen and Knave," recalling the nursery rhyme from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland: "The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts, The Knave of Hearts, he stole them away." Griswold deduced that the message identified a traitor within the stars' entourage, the "Knave" who had stolen the "tart," or cookie.
Based on this reasoning, the Department investigated the couple's trusted factotum, Francis Biddeford. Under questioning, Biddeford confessed to being the traitor who had intercepted the cookie and betrayed the operation to Eastland intelligence.
Characters[]
- Griswold
- Club Member (the narrator)
- Baranov
- Jennings
- Harrison
- Oscar
- Emmy
- Francis Biddeford
- The Eastland Official
- The American Agent
Literary Figures Mentioned[]
- The Queen of Hearts (Nursery Rhyme / Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
- The Knave of Hearts (Nursery Rhyme / Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
See Also[]
List of short stories by Isaac Asimov
External Links[]
- Full text (pdf -Espionage magazine, December 1984 issue)