THE TOMMY-RED SEED

THE TAMARIND SEED (1974)
dir: Blake Edwards

MAD #174, April 1975
w: Dick DeBartolo
a: Angelo Torres

Feodor Sverdlov (Omar Sharif) and Judith Farrow (Julie Andrews) are Soviet and British spies who have fallen in love while in Barbados.

Their budding personal relationship does not go unnoticed by British intelligence. Judith is enchanted by a story that the seeds of a tamarind tree on a certain plantation take the form of the head of a slave hanged from a tamarind, a tale mocked by Sverdlov. Returning to London, Judith finds a surprise gift from Sverdlov: an envelope containing a tamarind seed.

Convinced Sverdlov is recruiting Judith to be a spy, British intelligence officer Jack Loder (Anthony Quayle) has his hands full with a clandestine Russian spy, code-named "Blue", when he learns his assistant, George MacLeod (Bryan Marshall), is having an affair with the wife of a British diplomat, Fergus Stephenson (Dan O-Herlihy), who is a conduit of state secrets. Loder cautions Judith, who is to contact him if she hears from Sverdlov. Meanwhile Sverdlov, assigned to the Soviet Embassy in Paris, suspects his boss,

General Golitysn (Oscar Homoka), distrusts him, and insists Judith can be recruited as a spy, a story he shares with Judith when he visits her in London. Amidst drumbeat of suspicions on the cusp of betrayal and blackmail, a gaggle of real and possible double-agents abound in a tangled web amidst a budding Sverdlov-Judith love story that could also be a ruse. Sverdlov pleads with Golitsyn for more time to recruit demure Judith, a ploy that’s wearing thin with the suspicious General. Sverdlov steals the "Blue" file, his bargaining chip with London to get asylum in Canada, and he finagles a romantic stop in Barbados where he’s to meet Judith.

Sverdlov eludes an assassination attempt by Golitsyn’s agents at London Airport and meets Judith in Barbados where they are sequestered in a beachside bungalow, where they eventually consummate their relationship. But the General is hot on his tail and jets a group of Soviet agents disguised as wealthy businessmen on holiday to attack the bungalow with napalm, an explosive bullet-riddled event that kills most of the agents, reportedly kills Sverdlov, destroys the "Blue" file, and traumatizes Judith, who narrowly escapes with her life.

Loder now knows "Blue" is Fergus Stephenson, a double agent he can now manipulate with low-grade information for Moscow, until the Soviets eventually believe Stephenson is a double agent against themselves and kill him, Loder postulates. Loder meets convalescing shell-shocked Judith in Barbados where he divulges that newspaper accounts of Sverdlov’s death were a false cover; seconds before the explosion Sverdlov was whisked away to Canada by MacLeod. Her doubts dissolve when Loder gives her an envelope that contains a tamarind seed.

Later on, in a bucolic Canadian mountain valley, Judith and Sverdlov share a lovers' embrace.

You probably already knew it, but the last panel is a reference to The Sound of Music