Blood Ties

Destroyer 69: Blood Ties

By Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir

Prologue

Chiun, reigning Master of Sinanju, aged head of an ancient house of assassins that had served the world's rulers since before the time of Christ, said wearily, "I am confused."

"I knew if I waited long enough, you would come around to my way of thinking," said Remo Williams, his pupil.

"Silence, white thing. Why is it that everything must be a joke with you?"

"I wasn't joking," Remo said.

"I will speak to you at another time when you can manage to keep a civil tongue in your ugly head," Chiun said.

"Suit yourself," Remo wanted to say. But he knew that if he said that, his life would be made miserable and he would still wind up listening to what it was that had confused Chiun. So instead he said, "Forgive me, Little Father. What is it that has you confused?"

"Very well," Chiun said. "I do not understand about Aids."

"What don't you understand?" Remo said.

"If Aids is so terrible, why does everyone want to have Aids?" Chiun asked.

"I don't know of a single person who wants to have Aids," Remo said.

"Don't tell me that. You think I am a fool? People are always getting together to have Aids. I have seen it many times with my own eyes."

"Now, I'm confused," Remo said.

"With my own eyes," Chiun insisted. "On television, often interfering with regular programming. All these famous, fat, ugly people running around, singing and dancing for Aids."

Remo thought about this for a long time while Chiun drummed his long fingernails on the high-polished wood floor in the living room of their hotel suite.

Finally, Remo said, "You mean things like Live Aid and Farm Aid and Rock Aid?"

"Exactly. Aids," Chiun said.

"Chiun, those have nothing to do with Aids, the disease. Those are concerts to raise money for the poor and hungry."

It was Chiun's turn to ponder. Then he said, "Who are these poor and hungry?"

"Many people," Remo said. "In America and around the world, poor people without enough to eat. Poor people who don't even have clothes to wear."

"You say America. You have such poor in America?" Chiun said suspiciously.

"Yes. Some," Remo said.

"I don't believe it. Never have I seen a nation which wasted more on less. There are no poor in America."

"Yes, there are," Remo said.

Chiun shook his head. "I will never believe that," he said. He turned toward the window. "I could tell you about poor. In the olden days . . . " And because Remo knew he was now going to get for the thousandth time the story of how the village of Sinanju in North Korea was so poor its men were forced to hire themselves out as assassins, Remo sneaked out the hotel-room door.

* * *

When he came back, he paused in the hotel hallway outside the door to their suite. From inside, he heard a sobbing sound. Even softer than that, he heard singing.

He opened the unlocked door. Chiun sat on a tatami mat in front of the television set. He looked up at Remo, tears glistening in his hazel eyes.

"I finally understand, Remo," he said.

"Understand what, Little Father?"

"What you were talking about. What a terrible problem poverty and hunger are in the United States."

He pointed to the television set where a man was singing. "Look at that poor man," Chiun said. "He cannot even afford trousers which are not torn. He must wear rags around his head. He probably cannot afford a haircut or even soap, and yet he keeps trying to sing through the pain of it all. Oh, the terrible pervasiveness of poverty in this evil, uncaring land. Oh, the majesty of that poor man trying to bear up under it."

Thus Chiun lamented.

Remo said, "Little Father, that's Willie Nelson."

"Hail, Nelson," Chiun said, brushing away a tear. "Hail, the brave and indomitable poor man."

"Willie Nelson, for your information, is rich enough to buy most of America," Remo said.

Chiun's head snapped toward Remo. "What?"

"He's a singer. He's very rich."

"Why is he dressed in rags?"

Remo shrugged. "This is Farm Aid. It's a concert to raise money for farmers," he said.

Chiun examined the singer on television again. "Perhaps he would be delighted to have a concert for something that will ensure this dirty thing"---he waved at the television set-"a place of honor in the history of the world. "

"I'm waiting," Remo said.

"Assassin Aid," Chiun said. "This creature can present a concert with the proceeds to go to me."

"Good plan," Remo said.

"I am glad you think so," Chiun said. "I will leave it to you to make all the arrangements."

"Gee, Little Father," Remo said. "I would love to." Chiun looked at him suspiciously. "But unfortunately I called Smith while I was out and he has an assignment for me. "

Chiun dismissed it with a wave of his hand. "A mere trifle," he said. "Assassin Aid. Now this is a major thing."

"We'll talk about it when I get back," Remo said. When he left the suite, he heard Chiun yelling to him. "A concert. And I will recite a poem, an Ung poem, written especially for the occasion. 'Hail, Nellie Wilson, Savior of the Poor.' He will love it."

"Why me, God?" Remo mumbled.

Chapter 1

Maria had a gift. Others might have called it a talent or a power, but Maria was a religious woman, a devout Catholic who took Communion every day at St. Devin's Church and she believed that all good things came from God. To Maria, her ability to see into the future was just simply a gift from the Almighty.

The gift had saved her life once before. And as she pulled away from the florist's shop with a bouquet of spring flowers on the seat beside her, it was about to save her life again.

But not for long.

Maria drove with a string of black rosary beads clutched between her right hand and the steering wheel. She kept looking into the rearview mirror for the silver sedan she half-expected to be following her and when it was not there, she exhaled a sigh, whispered a quick "Hail Mary" and counted off another bead on the rosary that had belonged to her mother, and to her mother before her, back in Palermo, back in the old country.

I never should have confronted him, she thought. I should have gone straight to the police.

Maria was almost out of Newark when she had the vision. There was a quiet intersection ahead and suddenly Maria felt light-headed. Her field of vision turned a flat gray and then there were the familiar thin black crisscrossing lines she had seen so many times before and never understood. She braked to a stop. When her vision cleared an instant later, she saw the intersection again-but not as it was. She saw it as it would be.

There was the little Honda she was driving. Maria could see it as it approached the intersection, paused, and started through. It never reached the other side. The car was obliterated by a monster of a tractor trailer which rolled right through the car before skidding to a stop. Maria saw a hand sticking out of the shattered windshield of the small car and with a sick shock she recognized the black rosary entwined in the lifeless fingers. Her lifeless fingers.

As the vision faded, Maria pulled over to the side of the road and parked. A metallic-gold van passed her, heading toward the intersection. She had only seconds to bury her head in the steering wheel before the chilling squeal of brakes forced her head up.

Ahead, the van slewed to a ragged stop, then spun around. There came a dull crump as the trailer, the same one she had seen in her vision, sideswiped the van's front end and roared on.

"Oh, God."

Maria jumped from her car and ran to the damaged gold van. A young man in jeans climbed out on wobbly legs. "Are you all right?" Maria asked.

"Yeah . . . yeah, I think so," the man said. He looked at the crumpled front of his van. "Wow. I guess I was lucky. "

"We were both lucky," Maria said and went back to her own car, leaving the young man standing in the middle of the road with a puzzled expression on his face.

It was the second time the gift had saved Maria. She had been driving the first time it happened too, on her way to Newark Airport to catch a flight. But there was traffic on Belmont Avenue and while she fretted and waited, the same black crisscrossing lines swept her vision and suddenly she saw a jetliner lift into the sky, then drop like a brick across the bay to crash and burn in Bayonne Park. Maria knew that it was her flight: She didn't know how she knew; she just knew. She also knew that the flight had not actually taken off yet and there was still time.

Maria had leapt from her car, ignoring the honking horns and the cursing of motorists, and frantically called the airline terminal from a pay phone. But no one at the airport wanted to believe that a jetliner was about to burn on takeoff. Was there a bomb on the plane? they asked her. No.

Was she reporting an attempted hijacking? No.

Then how did she know the plane was going to crash when it took off?

"I saw it in a vision," she blurted, knowing that it was the wrong thing to say.

Oh, the people at the airport said. Thank you very much for calling. And the line went dead.

Maria walked back to her car, tears streaming from her eyes, knowing it would have been better to have lied, to have said anything else, just so they delayed the flight. She should have told them that she was a hijacker and demanded a ransom.

She eased her car out of traffic and turned around to return home. She had gone only a few blocks when the plane appeared in the sky. It looked like any other jet but Maria knew it wasn't just any other jet. The plane climbed laboriously, hesitated, the sun flashing on its tipping wings. For a moment, she thought everything would be all right. Then it fell. Maria squeezed her eyes tightly, twisting the steering wheel in her hands, trying to block out the sound. But she couldn't. It was a dull faraway explosion that might have been distant thunder.

All 128 passengers died that day, but Maria was not one of them.

For Maria, the gift had begun in childhood with the ability to know who was on the other end of a ringing telephone. As she grew, the gift got stronger, but she did not take it seriously until her senior year in high school.

Then, in art class, Mr. Zankovitch had assigned everyone to work in clay. Maria found a soothing pleasure in kneading the moist gray material in her hands and out of her imagination fashioned the bust of a young man with deepset eyes, high cheekbones, and strong handsome features. Everyone was amazed at the realistic quality of the face, including Maria, who had never worked with clay before.

Maria took the fired-clay head home and set it on a bookshelf and did not give it another thought until the day she brought her fiance home to meet her family. Her mother had remarked at the close resemblance the young man bore to that familiar bust. Before the young man became her husband, Maria destroyed the small statue, lest the young man ask embarrassing questions to which, truthfully, Maria had no answers.

She misjudged her husband. He would have asked no questions, just as he answered none about his "business" that kept him away more than he was home. They were intimate strangers and when Maria could bear it no longer, she shocked and humiliated her family by getting a divorce. There had been a baby but he went with the father and Maria never saw her son after that. And now he lay buried in a small New Jersey cemetery, with only Maria to bring flowers to his grave.

She was fifty-six, black-haired, with the full figure of a thirty-five-year-old. Her eyes were the color of Vermont maple syrup and there was pain and wisdom in them in equal measure. She wore a pale lavender coat as she stepped from her car at the entrance to Wildwood Cemetery, slipped past the wrought-iron gates and down the grass-lined path she had walked so many times before. She clutched the flowers tightly in her arm. The air was sweet with the scent of fresh pines. And as she walked, she thought about death.

Much of her life, she realized, had involved death, because of the gift. It had been a mixed blessing, her ability to see into the future. Sometimes it had been useful, but when she began to foresee the deaths of friends and relatives-often years before the fact-it could be depressing. Maria had known the exact hour of her mother's death three years before the cancer claimed her. Three long years of holding that terrible secret in her heart while she pleaded with her mother to go for that long-deferred physical examination. By the time Maria had gotten her mother to the doctor, it was already too late.

So Maria had learned to keep her visions to herself, learned that some things were just meant to be. But she had seen her own death twice and had avoided it both times. Yet one day, Maria knew, death would not be denied.

Maria passed behind a man standing with his head bowed before a grave, but she scarcely noticed him. She was thinking of another death-her son's. The gift had not been with her then and she had not foreseen it, never imagined that her son would be arrested and die in prison for a crime he never committed.

There was nothing she could have done. She had let her husband have the boy when they were divorced, thinking he would be better able to give his son the advantages he needed to succeed. At that time she told herself it was for the best. Who could have foreseen that it would turn out like this?

I should have, Maria said to herself.

One final visit to the grave and she would go to the police. After that, it wouldn't matter. Nothing would. Maria's heels clicked on the black asphalt as she came to the fork in the cemetery path. She knew it well. There was the desiccated old oak tree and beyond it, the marble shaft with the name DeFuria cut on its face. The sight of it meant she should leave the path.

She picked her way to the grave of her son.

As she walked toward the familiar stone, measured footsteps sounded behind her and Maria, stirred by an, impulse that was at first surprise and then intuition, turned on her heel and saw death walking toward her.

Death was a tall man in a gabardine topcoat, a man with deep-set eyes and a hard face, made harder by a scar that ran along his right jawline. She had never seen his face look so uncaring before.

"You followed me," she said. Now there was no surprise in her voice, only resignation.

"Yes, Maria. I knew you would be here. You always are at this time. You never could let go of the past."

"It's my past to do with as I will," she said.

"Our past," the man with the scar said. "Our past, Maria. And we're stuck with it. I can't let you go to the police. "

"You killed our . . . my son."

"You know better than that."

"You could have saved him," Maria said. "You knew the truth. He was innocent. And you stood by. You let him die."

"I'm sorry I ever told you about it. I wanted you back. I thought you'd understand."

"Understand?" The tears were flowing now. "Understand? I understand I let you have the boy and you let him be slaughtered."

The tall man held his gloved hands out, palms up. "All I wanted was a second chance, Maria." He smiled at her. "We're not young anymore, Maria. It makes me sad to see you like this." His smile was wistful and sad. "I thought we could be together again."

Maria held the flowers to her chest as the man casually drew a long-barreled pistol from under his coat.

"If I didn't know you so well, my Maria, I would trade you your life for a promise of silence. I know your word would be good. But you would not give me your promise, would you?"

The smooth fleshy pouch under Maria's chin trembled, but her voice was clear, firm, unafraid.

"No," she said.

"Of course not," the tall man said.

At that moment, the black lines crisscrossed in her sight and Maria saw the vision. She saw the gun flash, witnessed the bullets thudding into her body, and saw herself fall. And she knew that this time, the premonition had come too late. This time there could be no escape. But instead of fear, Maria felt a calm suffuse her body. For she saw beyond her death, beyond this cool fall afternoon with the sun dying behind the pines. She saw the fate of the man, her ex-husband, her murderer, with a clarity of vision she had never before experienced and she intoned her last words:

"A man will come to you. Dead, yet beyond death, he will carry death in his empty hands. He will know your name and you will know his. And that will be your death warrant."

The smile left the tall man's face like an exorcised ghost.

"Thanks for the prediction," he said. "I know you too well to ignore it, but I'll worry about that when I come to it. Meanwhile, there's now. I'm sorry it had to be like this." He raised the black pistol to his eye. "Good-bye, Maria."

He fired twice. Two coughing reports, like mushy firecrackers, slipped from the silenced weapon. Maria skipped back under the impact and lost one open-toed shoe. Her body twisted as she fell and the bosom of her lavender coat darkened with blood. She was already dead when her head struck the gravestone.

Death wasn't what Maria had expected. She did not feel herself slip from her body. Instead, she felt her mind contract within her head; contract and shrink, tighter and tighter, until her head felt as small as a pea, then as small as the head of a pin, then smaller still until her entire consciousness was reduced to a point as infinitesimally tiny as an atom. And when it seemed that it could compress no tighter, her consciousness exploded in a burst of white-gold light, showering the universe with radiance.

Maria found herself floating in a pool of warm golden light and it was like being back in the womb, which for some reason she could suddenly recall with perfect clarity. She could see in all directions at once and it was wonderful. It was not like seeing with eyes but more like seeing in the visions she had experienced while she lived. Maria could not understand how she could see without eyes, without a body, but she could. And in every direction, the golden light stretched forever and ever. Far away, tiny specks shone. Somewhere, far beyond the golden light, she knew there were stars.

But Maria did not care about the stars. She just floated at peace in the warm amniotic light, waiting. Waiting to be born again. . . .

At Wildwood Cemetery, the man in the gabardine coat knelt and watched the light go out of Maria's syrup-brown eyes. Stripping off a glove, he closed her eyes with gentle fingers. A tear fell from his face to her forehead as a parting benediction.

He stood up. And then he noticed the bouquet of flowers-peonies mixed with the white pips of baby's breath-that Maria as her last act in life had dropped at the foot of the grave where she fell. It was a simple grave, a small stone of granite incised with a plain cross.

And two words. The name of a dead man. REMO WILLIAMS.

The scar-faced man left the flowers where they lay.

Chapter 2

His name was Remo and he was patiently explaining to his fellow passenger that he actually wasn't dead at all. "Oh, really?" the other man said in an exaggeratedly bored voice while he stared out the jetliner window and wondered how long they'd be stacked up over Los Angeles International Airport.

"Really," Remo said earnestly. "Everybody thinks I'm dead. I've even got a grave. Legally dead, yes. But actually dead, no."

"Is that so?" the other man said absently.

"But sometimes people ignore me as if I were actually dead. Like right now. And it bothers me. It really does. It's a form of discrimination. I mean, if I weren't legally dead, would people like you stare off into space when I'm taking to them?"

"I'm sure I don't know or care."

"Deathism. That's what it is. Some people are sexist and some people are racist. But you, you're a deathist. You figure that just because there's a headstone back in New Jersey with my name on it, you don't have to talk to me. Well, you're wrong. Dead people have rights too."

"Absolutely," said the other man, whose name was Leon Hyskos Junior. He was a casual young man in a Versace linen jacket and no tie, with mild blue eyes and blown-dry sandy hair. He had been sitting in the smoking section in the rear of the 727 by himself, minding his own business, when this skinny guy with thick wrists suddenly plopped into the empty seat beside him. The skinny guy had said his name was Remo Williams but not to repeat it to anybody because he was legally dead. Hyskos had given this Remo, who was dressed like a bum in a black T-shirt and chinos, a single appraising glance and decided he was squirrel food. He had turned away but the man had not stopped talking since then. He was still talking.

"You're just humoring me," Remo said. "Admit it."

"Get lost."

"See? Just what I said. You know, I don't tell this story to just anybody. You ought to be flattered. It all started back when I was a beat cop in New Jersey. . . ."

"You're a cop?" Leon Hyskos Junior asked suddenly, his head snapping around. He noticed Remo's eyes for the first time. They were dark, deep-set, and flat. They looked dead.

"I was a cop," Remo said. "Until they executed me."

"Oh," Hyskos said vaguely. He looked relieved. "They found a drug pusher beaten to death in an alley and my badge was lying next to him. But I didn't touch him. I was framed. Before I figured out that it wasn't a show trial put on for the benefit of community relations or something, they were strapping me in the electric chair. But the chair was rigged. When I woke up, they told me that from now on, I didn't exist."

Maybe talking to him would make him go away, Hyskos thought. He said, "That must have been hard on your family."

"Not really. I was an orphan. That was one reason they picked me for the job," Remo said.

"Job?" said Hyskos. He had to admit, it was an interesting story. Maybe it was those dead dark eyes.

"Yeah, job. This is where it gets complicated. See, back awhile one of the Presidents decided that the country was going down the tubes. The government was losing the war on crime. Too many crooks were twisting the Constitution to get away with raping the nation. It was only a matter of time before organized crime put one of their own into the White House and then, good-bye America. Well, what could this President do? He couldn't repeal the Constitution. So instead, he created this supersecret agency called CURE and hired a guy named Smith to run it."

"Smith? Nice name," Hyskos said with a smirk.

"Nice fella too," Remo said. "Dr. Harold W. Smith. It was his job to fight crime outside the Constitution. Violate the laws in order to protect the rule of law. That was the theory. Anyway, Smith tried it but after a few years he realized that CURE would have to do some of its own enforcement. You couldn't count on the courts to send anybody to jail. That's where I came in."

"You do enforcement?" Hyskos said.

Remo nodded. "That's right. One man. You don't think they run my tail off?"

"Too big a job for one man," Hyskos said.

"One ordinary man anyway," Remo said. "But see, I'm not ordinary."

"Not normal either," Hyskos said.

"There you go again. More deathism," Remo said. "See, CURE hired the head of a Korean house of assassins to train me. His name is Chiun and he's the last Master of Sinanju."

"What's Sinanju?"

"Sinanju is the name of the fishing village in North Korea where this house of assassins began thousands of years ago. The land there is so poor that a lot of times they didn't even have food for their babies and they used to have to throw them in the West Korea Bay. They called it 'sending the babies home to the sea.' So they started hiring themselves out to emperors as assassins. They've been doing that for centuries. They even worked for Alexander the Great. As time went on, they developed the techniques of what they called the art of Sinanju."

"I thought you said the village was Sinanju," Hyskos said. The story was getting boring again.

"It is. But it's also the name of the killing art they originated. "

"I guess those Koreans don't like to waste a good word, do they?" Hyskos said.

Remo shrugged. "Guess not. But let me finish. We'll be landing soon. You've heard of karate and kung-fu and ninja stuff. Well, they're all stolen from Sinanju. Sinanju is the original, the sun source, the real thing, and if you survive the training, a person can realize his full physical and mental potential. His senses are heightened. His strength is increased. With Sinanju, you can do things that seem impossible to normal people. It's sort of like being Superman, except you don't have to dress up. That's what happened to me because of Sinanju."

"Aren't you the lucky one? To be so perfect and all," Hyskos said.

"Yeah, well, don't think it's all peaches and cream. I can't eat processed food. I eat rice. I can't have a drink. Do you know what I'd give to be able to have a beer? And all the time, yap, yap, yap, Chiun's complaining that I'm an incompetent white who can't do anything right."

"He doesn't like you?" Hyskos said.

"No, it's not that. He just expects perfection all the time. Chiun thinks I'm the fulfillment of some freaking Sinanju legend about some dead white man who's really the incarnation of Shiva, some kind of silly-ass Hindu god, and after Chiun dies, I'm going to be the next Master of Sinanju. Dealing with him's not easy. Do you know he wants me to get Willie Nelson to run a benefit concert for him? And Chiun's already one of the richest men in the world. Can you believe that?"

"Not that, I'm afraid, or anything else," Leon Hyskos Junior said.

"Too bad, because it's all true."

"Why tell me?" Hyskos said.

"Well, Chiun couldn't come on this mission with me because he's getting ready to renegotiate his contract, so I had to do this job alone and I guess I just felt like talking to someone. And you seemed like the logical person, Leon. "

Hyskos noticed that his arms had started trembling when Remo unexpectedly called him by name. He hadn't mentioned his name. He was sure of it. He took hold of both armrests to steady them. It helped. Now only his biceps shook.

"You're on a mission now?" Hyskos asked in a thin voice.

"That's right. And for once, it's an assignment that's close to my heart. I'm representing dead people. I think that's appropriate, a dead man representing other dead people. Would you like to see pictures of my constituents?"

"No thanks," Hyskos said, tightening his seat belt. "I think we're about to land."

"Here. Let me help you with that," Remo said, taking the short end of the seat belt and pulling it tight with such force that the fabric smoked and Leon Hyskos Junior felt the contents of his bowels back up into his esophagus.

"Uuuuuumppp," Hyskos said, his face turning guppygray.

"That's better," Remo said. "We wouldn't want you to faw down, go boom." He pulled out his wallet, and a chain of photos in clear plastic holders tumbled out. Remo held the chain up to Hyskos' sweating face and began counting them off like a proud parent.

"This is Jacqui Sanders when she was sixteen. Pretty, huh? Unfortunately, she never reached seventeen. They found her body in a ravine outside of Quincy, Illinois. She'd been raped and strangled."

Leon Hyskos Junior tried to say something but only a series of foul-smelling burps came out.

"And this girl used to be Kathy Walters. I say used to be because she was dead when this picture was taken. She was found in a ravine too. Same deal, but a different ravine. The same thing happened to this next young lady too. Beth Andrews. Her body turned up in a Little Rock sand pit. I guess they don't have ravines in Little Rock."

Remo tapped two more pictures in quick succession. "And these were the Tilley twins. You can see the resemblance. But there wasn't much of a resemblance when their bodies were found in an Arkansas ravine. The guy who did a job on them smashed in their heads with a flat rock. But maybe you recognize the faces. They were in all the papers last week. Or maybe you recognize them for a different reason."

Remo looked away from the pictures and his eyes met those of Leon Hyskos Junior. And there was death in Remo's eyes.

Hyskos slipped a hand into his coat pocket and pulled out a small automatic. He pointed it at Remo's stomach. "Hey, you're not supposed to have those on airplanes," Remo said. "Put it away before the stewardess catches you. "

Hyskos let out a loud belch and some of the color returned to his face. "How did you know?" he asked.

"That you're the Ravine Rapist?" Remo said. "Well, remember I told you about CURE? All these killings you did made you a priority item. So the computers were fed all the facts about the killings and worked out your trail path and then, don't you know, your name kept turning up on a gas credit card all along that path. Then you did a really dumb thing. You booked this flight out of New Orleans and Smith sent me to intercept you and-ta-dah-here I am."

Remo smiled.

"You're supposed to kill me. Is that what you're saying?" Hyskos said.

"Exactly. So what do you say? Should I strangle you or what? Normally, I don't do strangulations but this is a special case."

"You're not going to do anything except what I tell you. Don't forget, I'm holding the gun."

"Oh, the gun. I meant to ask. How'd you get it past the metal detector?"

"New kind of gun. Plastic alloy."

"No fooling? Let me see," Remo said. He dropped the wallet, and before Hyskos could react, Remo's right hand snapped out and Hyskos felt his gun hand go numb. There was no pain, just a sensation as if the tissues of his hand were filling with novocaine. And suddenly, Remo had the flat pistol in his hands. He examined it closely. Remo jacked back the slide, but it caught. Remo pulled it anyway and the safety catch snapped. Then the ejector mechanism came off in his hands.

"Shoddy workmanship," he muttered.

"It's supposed to be stronger than steel," Hyskos said. Remo grunted. He tried cocking the weapon with his thumb but managed to break off the hammer. "I'm not so good with guns," he said, handing it back. "I think I broke it. Sorry."

The Ravine Rapist took the pistol and pulled the trigger three times. It didn't even click. He dropped it.

"I surrender," he said, throwing up his hands.

"I don't take prisoners," Remo said.

Hyskos looked around wildly for a stewardess. He opened his mouth to call for help but found he could make no sound because his mouth was suddenly filled with the pieces of the new non-metallic-alloy pistol that was stronger than steel.

"You look kind of faint," Remo said. "I know just what to, do for that. Just stick your head between your knees until your head clears. Like this."

And Remo took Leon Hyskos Junior by the back of the neck and slowly pushed his head downward, slowly, inexorably, and Hyskos felt his spinal column slowly, gradually begin to separate. He heard a pop. Then another. Then a third. It felt as if his head was exploding.

"If we weren't landing," Remo whispered, "I could make the pain last longer. And in your case I'd like to. But we're all slaves of the clock."

Hyskos felt his teeth break as, in his pain, he bit down hard on the gun in his mouth. And then he heard another pop, this one louder than the rest, and then he heard or felt nothing more.

Remo put the wallet of photos into the man's jacket pocket, and fastened his own seat belt as the airliner's tires barked as they touched the runway.

"My goodness, what's wrong with him?" a stewardess asked Remo when she saw Hyskos hunched over in his seat.

Remo gave her a reassuring smile. "That's just one of my constituents. Don't worry about him. He's just decomposing after his long flight."

The stewardess smiled back. "You mean decompressing, sir."

"If you say so," Remo said and left the aircraft. He went into the terminal and grabbed the handiest flight, not caring where it was going so long as it was in the air within five minutes.

No, Remo didn't want a drink. He still wasn't hungry either. He thought he had made that clear the last three times the stewardess had come to his seat to ask.

"Yes, sir," the stewardess said. "I just like to make sure. My job is to look after the needs of my passengers." She was a willowy blonde in a tight blue uniform set off by a bright yellow scarf. Her eyes were such an intense blue that it almost hurt to look at them. Under other circumstances, Remo thought he might have become interested in her---other circumstances being when she wasn't practically shoving her perfumed breasts in his face every five minutes to ask the same question.

"Why don't you check the other passengers?" Remo suggested.

"They're fine," she said, batting her sparkling blue eyes.

"No, we're not," several people chorused at once.

"What?" the stewardess asked. Her nametag said Lorna.

"We're thirsty. Some of us are hungry. When are you going to stop messing around with that guy and take care of us?" This from a matronly woman in the third row.

Lorna looked up. Most of the forward rows of the aircraft were filled with unhappy faces. They were all pointed in her direction. The drink-serving cart was blocking the aisle, preventing anyone from getting to the rest room.

"Oh," she said. Her pouting face flushed with color. "I'm sorry. Please be patient."

She looked back down at Remo and immediately forgot her embarrassment. A pleasured smile swept her face. "Where were we?" she asked Remo.

"I was telling you that I was fine and you were having trouble with your ears," said Remo, who didn't like all the attention coming his way. It wasn't the stewardess's fault. All women reacted to him like that. It was one of the side effects of Sinanju training. Chiun had once explained that when a pupil reached a certain level in the art of Sinanju, all aspects of his being began to harmonize with themselves and others could sense it. Men reacted with fear; women with sexual appetite.

But as women's appetite for him increased, Remo found he was less and less interested in them. Part of it was the Sinanju sexual techniques Chiun had taught him. They reduced sex to a rigid but monotonous series of steps that sent women into frenzies but sent Remo reaching for a book. The other part was psychology: when you could have any woman you wanted, anytime, anywhere, you didn't want any woman.

That had always bothered Remo. When he had reached that level, he had asked Chiun, "What good is being so desirable if you lose interest in sex?"

Chiun had sat him down. "A master of Sinanju has two purposes: to support his village and to train the next Master. "

"Yeah?"

"It is obvious, Remo."

"Not to me, Chiun. What does that have to do with sex?"

Chiun had thrown up his hands. "To train a new Master, you must have the raw material. A pupil. In your case, that is the rawest material of all, but I hope when it is time for you to train a new master, you have better material. A member of my village, preferably one belonging to the bloodline of my family."

"I still don't get it."

"You are very dense, Remo," Chiun had said. "When it is time for you to train your successor, you must take a Sinanju maiden for your wife. You will have a son and you will train him."

"What has that got to do with anything?"

Chiun sighed and folded his hands in his lap. Finally, he said, "I will try to make this simple enough for even you to follow. When it is time for you to select a maiden from my village to produce your successor, nothing must stand in the way of that selection. Therefore you have learned the ways to make a woman want to breed with you. Do you understand now?"

"Oh, I get it. The all-important next Master comes first. It doesn't matter what the girl thinks about it, does it?"

Chiun raised a long-nailed finger. "The secrets Sinanju has taught you will conveniently sweep aside all obstacles to your happiness."

"I think that sucks," Remo said. "I don't want some woman to breed with me because some trick of mine makes her think I'm irresistible. I want it to be a woman who loves me for myself."

"There are no blind maidens in my village," Chiun said. "Heh-heh. There are no blind maidens in Sinanju." And pleased with his little joke, Chiun had left Remo alone with his disappointment over his new sexual powers.

Over the years, it had only gotten worse. So when Remo had found an attractive stewardess practically crawling into his lap, his interest totally vanished.

"Are you sure there's nothing?" Lorna asked again.

"Well, there's one thing," Remo said.

"Anything. Just name it."

"Would you buy a ticket for a concert to aid assassins?" Remo asked.

"Will you be there?"

"Sure. Me and Willie Nelson."

"I'll go. So will my friends. Put me down for a hundred tickets. "

"Thank you," Remo said. "That's very encouraging."

"Anytime. Anything else?"

"Yes. Where's this flight going?"

"You bought the ticket. Don't you know?"

"I was in a hurry. Where?"

"Salt Lake City. Have you been there before?"

"I'll let you know when I get there," said Remo, who had traveled so much over the last decade that all cities kind of blurred together.

"Do that," Lorna said. "And if you need a place to stay, just let me know."

But they never got to Salt Lake City. Over Utah, a man went into the washroom and came out with a machine pistol.

"This is a hijacking," the man said. And to show he was serious, he fired a short burst through the cabin ceiling. The jet instantly began losing pressure. The seat-belt sign came on and the overhead panels popped open to disgorge the yellow plastic oxygen masks. The pilot threw the plane into a steep dive, leveling off at fourteen thousand feet, where the air was still thin but breathable. Dust and grit flew into the cabin. The cold air misted and turned white.

"Please stay calm," Lorna said over the sound system. "Slip the mask firmly over your mouth and pull on the plastic tube. Breathe normally." She demonstrated the proper method even as the jetliner lost altitude at an alarming rate.

There was no panic. Except for the hijacker. He was panicking.

"What is happening? What is happening?" he repeated, waving his machine pistol.

"We're about to crash," said Remo, who appeared suddenly beside him.

"I won't allow it," said the skyjacker. "Tell the pilot not to crash. My death will not aid the cause."

"What is your cause anyway?" Remo asked.

"Serbo-Croatian genocide," said the frightened man.

"Causing or avenging?" Remo said.

"Avenging."

"How does hijacking an American jet solve a European problem?"

"Because it is wonderful public relations. American press gets me coverage all over the world and most of the reporters find some way to blame it all on America. It is the new way," the skyjacker said.

"This is an even newer way," Remo said, and with a blurring motion, he took the hijacker's weapon and blended it into a new shape, a sort of fuzzy metallic ball with the man's two hands firmly encased inside.

"Please. Everyone, sit down. We are about to land." It was Lorna's voice and she was standing in the aisle as if they were about to land at an airport and not in the open spaces of Utah. Remo felt a wave of admiration for her courage. He slapped the hijacker into a seat.

"I'll settle with you later," Remo said and plopped into a seat on the other side of the aisle.

For a long time, there was no sound. But the ground got closer. Then there was a grinding noise as the jetliner hit. It seemed to go on forever.

And then there was silence.

Chapter 3

Chiun, reigning Master of Sinanju, last of an unbroken line that dated from before the days of the Great Wang, first of the major Sinanju assassins, sat unmoving on his woven mat. His hazel eyes were closed. His impassive countenance, the exact color and texture of Egyptian papyrus, might have been molded from clay by delicate fingers. Even his wispy beard moved not, so deep was his meditation.

For three hours he had sat thus, serene and unmoving. For three hours, he had searched his thoughts, prayed his prayers, and silently asked the counsel of his ancestors, the great line of Sinanju. Three hours, and Chiun-hopefully to be known to future generations as Chiun the Great Teacher-found that the decision still eluded him like a spring butterfly eluded the net.

At length, the tufts of hair over his ears trembled. The eyes of the Master of Sinanju opened like uncovered agate stones, clear and bright and ageless. He floated to his feet in a smooth motion. The decision had been made.

He would wear the gray silk kimono and not the blue one with the orange tigers worked on the breast.

Chiun padded silently to the fourteen steamer trunks resting in a far corner of the apartment. The trunks were never unpacked because of the dismal-no, the odious-work to which the Master had committed himself in this barbarian land of America. Odious. Yes. That would be the word he would use. Emperor Smith would understand Chiun's displeasure if he used that word. After all, Smith was white, and in Korean, in the old language of Chiun's ancestors, "odious" was a synonym for "whiteness." He would not mention that to Smith, however. He would only tell him that it was odious that Chiun must move from hotel room to hotel room like a vagrant, never having a place to rest his head, never having a home in which to unpack his fourteen steamer trunks. It was no way for a Master of Sinanju to live.

Chiun found the gray silk kimono and even though he was alone in the hotel suite, he went into the bedroom to change, taking care to close the door tightly and to pull the shades. He emerged moments later and left the hotel, which was near Central Park.

On the street, he hailed a cab. The first three drove past without stopping.

Chiun responded by calmly walking into the path of the fourth cab to approach. The taxi screeched to a halt, the bumper coming to within a millimeter of Chiun's knees.

The driver stuck his head out the window and yelled, "Hey! What's with you?"

"Nothing is with me. I am alone. I would hire this conveyance."

"This is a cab, dummy, not a conveyance," said the driver. He pointed to his roof light. "See that. It's turned off. That means I'm already hired."

Chiun looked at the light, sniffed, and said, "I will pay you more."

"Huh?"

"I said I will pay you more than your present passenger. What price?"

"Buddy, I don't know what boat you fell off, but that ain't the way it's done in America. First come, first served. Now get out of my way."

"I see," said Chiun, seeming to drop the golden coin he had plucked from his kimono as an inducement for the driver. The coin bounced, rolled, and came to a stop beside the cab's front tire. Chiun swept out a long-nailed finger and retrieved the coin. The taxicab suddenly listed to port, air escaping from the settling left-front tire with a lazy hissing.

"What gives?" said the driver.

"Your tire," said Chiun. "It gives up its life. Too bad. Your fault for buying American."

The driver climbed out and looked at the flat tire. "Dammit," he said. "I musta run over a nail back there. Hey, lady, come on out of there. I'm gonna have to change this."

A middle-aged woman with oversize glasses and an undersize dress draping her big body stepped out of the cab.

"I'm late already," she said. "I can't wait."

"Suit yourself," said the driver, yanking a tire jack and lug wrench from his trunk. Muttering to himself, he scrunched down beside the offending wheel and began working to loosen the lug nuts. He looked up when he heard the passenger door slamming shut.

"Hey? What do you think you're doing?"

From the back of the cab came a squeaky voice. "I am in no rush," said the Master of Sinanju pleasantly. "I will wait for you to finish."

"My lucky day," grumbled the driver.

"It is fate," said Chiun, delicately flicking a shred of vulcanized rubber from his fingernail, where it had caught after he had withdrawn it from the unfortunate tire.

Three hours later, the cab dropped Chiun off at the stone entrance to Folcroft Sanitarium in Rye, New York, north of Manhattan. At first the driver had not wanted to take Chiun that far, but after some haggling and an examination of the old Oriental's gold coins, the driver had agreed. "This is a different route," said Chiun as they passed the city limits of Asbury Park. "I have never come this way before."

"New road," said the driver, who was sure that the old gook did not know that Asbury Park was due south of New York while Rye was due north. He was getting double the fare shown on his meter and had visions of taking the rest of the week off after this one fare. "We're almost there."

"You have said that before," Chiun said.

"It was true before. It's true now. Just hang on." After touring Hoboken, Newark, and the shopping malls of Paramus, New Jersey, the driver finally wended his way toward Rye. He was very courteous when he let Chiun off at his destination.

"That'll be $1,356. Not counting tip, of course."

"That is more than I paid the last time," Chiun said.

"Rates've gone up."

"Have they tripled?"

"Could be," said the driver. He smiled politely. He was thinking of the rest of the week off. Maybe going to a ball game.

"I will make you a deal," said Chiun, counting the coins in his change purse.

"No deals," protested the driver. "You agreed to double the meter."

"True," said Chiun. "But I did not agree to a tour of the provinces south and west of New York."

The driver shrugged. "I got a little lost. It happens."

"And I did not agree not to destroy your wheels."

"Destroy my . . . You've gotta be kidding."

Chiun stepped from the cab and kicked the right-rear tire. "What will you give me in return for this wheel?" he asked. "It is a good wheel, firm and sturdy. It will carry you far along your difficult return journey."

"I won't give you squat. That's my tire."

Chiun reached over and drove an index finger into the tire. When he removed his finger, the tire let go with a bang. The car settled suddenly.

"Hey! What'd you do to my tire?"

"No matter. You can change it. A man who charges $1,356 for a simple ride must have many extra wheels." The driver watched as the little Oriental-he had to be nearly eighty, the driver thought-walked to the front of the cab and thoughtfully surveyed both front tires.

"Will you take $947 for the pair?" asked Chiun.

"That's robbery."

Chiun shook a long-nailed finger in the air.

"No," he said. "It is haggling. You haggled with me. Now I haggle with you. Quickly. Do you accept?"

"All right. Yes. Don't blow the tires. I gotta drive all the way back to the city."

"Through Asbury Park," said Chiun, walking to the left-rear wheel. "Good. Now I still owe you $409 for your services. Will you give $500 for this remaining wheel?"

"But then I'd owe you ninety-one dollars," the driver protested.

"No checks," said Chiun.

Dr. Harold W. Smith did not like to be interrupted but when his secretary described his visitor, he pressed the concealed button that dropped the desktop computer monitor into a well in his Spartan oak desk.

It was just force of habit because while the secret computer system accessed every other major computer and information-retrieval system in the world and therefore knew all the world's secrets, Chiun would have had no idea what it all meant. Only Smith as head of the secret agency CURE understood it. Chiun couldn't, and Remo was hopeless with machinery. He had trouble dialing a telephone; a computer was beyond his reach.

"Hail, Emperor Smith," said Chiun.

"That will be all, Mrs. Mikulka," Smith said to his secretary.

"Hadn't I better call an orderly?" the gray-haired woman asked, with a sidelong glance at the old Oriental.

"Not necessary," said Smith. "And please. I'll take no calls. "

Mrs. Mikulka looked doubtful but she closed the door quietly after her.

"I didn't summon you, Chiun," said Smith.

"Yet your pleasure at my arrival is returned threefold," Chiun said.

"Remo isn't with you?" asked Smith, sitting down. He had thin white hair and the expression of a man who'd just discovered half a worm in his apple. He had been young when he had set up CURE, but now he had grown old in its service. He adjusted his Dartmouth tie.

"Remo has not yet returned from his latest mission," Chiun said. "But it is of no moment."

"Odd," said Smith. "I had a report that his target had been . . . terminated."

Chiun smiled. Smith was always uncomfortable with the language of death. "Another jewel in your crown," he said and wondered why Smith always greeted success with the same sour expression as bitter defeat.

"I wish you wouldn't call me that," said Smith. "Emperor. You know very well that I am not the emperor."

"You could be," said Chiun. "Your President has lived a full life. Perhaps it is time for younger blood."

"Thank you, no," said Smith, who had long ago grown weary of trying to explain to Chiun that he served the President and was not a pretender to the Oval Office. "Now what can I do for you, Master of Sinanju?"

Chiun looked shocked. "Have you forgotten? It is time to renegotiate the contract between the House of Sinanju and the House of Smith."

"The United States," said Smith. "Your contract is with the United States. But it's not due to expire for another six months."

"When entering into protracted and difficult dealings," said Chiun solemnly, "it is best to begin early."

"Oh. I rather thought we could simply renew the old contract. It's quite generous, as you know."

"It was magnanimously generous," agreed Chiun. "Considering the false understanding on which it was based."

"False understanding?"

Smith watched as Chiun unrolled his straw mat and placed it on the floor, carefully arranging an array of scrolls beside the mat before settling into place. Smith had to stand in order to see Chiun over his desktop.

Smith sighed. He had been through these negotiations before. Chiun would not speak another word until Smith was seated at eye level. Smith pulled a pencil and a yellow legal pad from a drawer and stiffly found a place on the floor, facing the old Korean. He balanced the pad on a knee. After so many years of writing on a computer keypad, the pencil felt like a banana in his fingers.

"I am ready," said Smith.

As Chiun opened a scroll, Smith recognized it as a copy of the last contract he had signed. It was on special rice paper edged in gold and had itself cost hundreds of dollars. Another unnecessary expense.

"Ah, here it is," Chiun said, looking up from the scroll. "The poophole."

"I beg your pardon."

"It is a legal term. Poophole. Have you never heard of it? Most contracts have them."

"You mean loophole. And our contract is ironclad. There are no loopholes."

"There is a saying in my village," said Chiun. "'Never correct an emperor. Except when he is wrong.' And you are wrong, great leader. The poophole is in the paragraph about training a white in the art of Sinanju."

"As I recall, you charged extra for that," Smith said.

"A mere pittance to wipe out what I thought was a great shame. An odious shame. But as it turns out, I made a mistake. "

"What kind of mistake?" asked Smith, who knew that Chiun's mistakes invariably wound up costing him money. "I was not training a white at all," Chiun said, beaming at the happy thought.

Smith frowned. "What do you mean? Of course Remo's white. True, we don't know who his parents were, but all you have to do is look to see that he's white."

Patiently, Chiun shook his head. "No Chinese, no Japanese, no non-Korean ever before has been able to absorb Sinanju training. Yet this supposed white has taken to Sinanju like no other in the history of my humble village."

"That's good, isn't it?" asked Smith, who could not figure out what Chiun was driving at.

"Of course," said Chiun. "It means that Remo is really Korean." He mumbled some words in the Korean language.

"What did you say?"

"Just his name. Remo the Fair. He is part Korean. There can be no other explanation."

"Perhaps Americans just naturally take to Sinanju," Smith said. "You've never had to train an American before Remo."

Chiun made a face. "You are being ridiculous. But enough. Remo is learning Sinanju faster than any Korean. Therefore Remo is not white."

"And therefore," said Smith, "your earlier demands for extra payment for training a white are no longer valid."

"Exactly," Chiun said.

Smith hesitated while he searched Chiun's face, but the expression was bland. Smith had never been able to read his face.

"Are you saying that you're willing to take less money because of that?" he asked.

"Of course not. I contracted to train a white for you, and knowing whites, you would have gotten somebody who jumped around, grunting, breaking boards with much noise. Instead, you have gotten a true Master of Sinanju. You have been getting a bargain for all these years and this will require an adjustment, not only on our next contract, but radioactive payments on all preceding contracts."

"Retroactive," Smith said. "You mean retroactive payments."

"Good. Then we are in agreement. I knew you would understand, wise Emperor."

"I do not understand," Smith snapped. "but I don't want to argue the point. Just tell me. What are your demands this time?"

Calmly, slowly, Chiun picked up another scroll and unrolled it.

"We do not have demands," he said haughtily. "We have requirements and they are these." He began to read from the scroll.

"Two jars of emeralds. Uncut.

"Twenty jars of diamonds of different cuts. No flaws.

"Eight bolts of Tang-dynasty silk. Assorted colors.

"One Persian statue of Darius. Of shittimwood.

"Rupees. Twelve bushels."

He stopped as Smith held up a hand.

"Master of Sinanju. Many of those items are priceless museum pieces."

"Yes?" said Chiun.

"Tang-dynasty silk, for example, is not easily come by."

"Of course," said Chiun. "We would not ask for it otherwise. "

"I don't think any Tang-dynasty silk exists in the modern world," Smith said.

"I have Tang-dynasty silk," said Chiun. "Back in the treasure house of my ancestors. In Sinanju."

"When why do you want more?"

"You never asked that question during previous negotiations when I asked for more gold. You never said to me, 'Master of Sinanju, why do you want more gold? You already have gold.' "

"True," said Smith. "But this is different."

"Yes," said Chiun, beaming now. "It is different. This time I am not asking for more gold. I have enough of gold, thanks to your generosity. But in times past my ancestors were paid in tribute, not always gold. Now I wish to be paid in tribute as befits my heritage."

"My government pays enough yearly tribute to feed all North Korea," Smith said evenly. "You have brought to Sinanju more wealth than it has seen in all the thousands of years of Sinanju history before you."

"No Master before me ever was forced to dwell in a foreign land-an odious land-for so long," said Chiun. "I am the first to be treated thusly."

"I am sorry," said Smith, who despite being the only person in charge of an unlimited secret operating fund kept track of his secretary's consumption of paper clips. "I think your requests are unreasonable."

"I must restore the glory of Sinanju," said Chiun. "Did you know that just yesterday Remo told me that he was planning to run a benefit concert for me. He said that he was tired of seeing me poor, hungry, and destitute and that he was going to ask Nellie Wilson to run an aid program for me. Did you know this?"

"No. Who's Nellie Wilson?"

"He is a noble singer who stands on the side of the poor in this oppressive land. Remo said he would gladly sing for me, but I told him that it would not be necessary, that Emperor Smith would not fail the House of Sinanju." His eyes looked down at the floor. "But I was wrong, I see. Still I will take no charity from anyone, even so great a man as Nellie Wilson. If America cannot help me, I will simply seek outside employment."

"The terms of our contract expressly forbid it," Smith said.

"The terms of our old contract," Chiun said with a small smile. "And it appears- there may be no new contract. "

Smith cleared his throat. "Don't be hasty," he said. "Of course, we want a new contract with you, but we cannot provide you with things that no longer exist in the world. Nor, I must point out, could any other prospective employer. "

"We are not intransigent, O great Emperor. While our heart aches at your inability to provide us with the few meager items we requested, perhaps something else could be worked out."

"I will double the amount of gold we now ship to your village."

"Triple," said Chiun.

"Double is a gift. Triple is impossible," Smith said.

"Whites are impossible," said Chiun. "Beyond that, the word does not exist in Sinanju."

"I will triple the gold," Smith said wearily. "But that's it. That's final. Nothing more."

"Done," Chiun said quickly. Smith relaxed.

"That takes care of the gold," Chiun said pleasantly. "Now on to other items. . . . "

Smith tensed. "We agreed. No other items. No other items."

"No," Chiun said. "You agreed no other items. I agreed to the gold."

"What other item?" Smith said.

"Only one. Land. Remo and I have no permanent home in this odious land of yours."

"We've been through this before, Master of Sinanju," said Smith tightly. His legs were tingling from sitting on the floor. "It's too dangerous for you and Remo to stay in one place for long."

"The land I have in mind is in a far place," said Chiun, who noticed from Smith's fidgeting that his legs were falling asleep. In negotiating, he always waited for that to happen before asking Smith for the really difficult items. "The place I have in mind is large, with many fortifications, and therefore easily defended. Remo and I would be safe there. "

"Where?" asked Smith.

"Yet it is a small parcel, compared to the lands the Egyptians once bestowed upon Sinanju."

"Can you point it out on a map?"

"And it is near no dwellings," continued Chiun. "Oh, there are some minor structures existing on the land but no one lives in them. I would not even ask that they be razed. It may be that Remo and I could make do with them, although they are not really houses."

"Can you be more specific?"

Chiun made a show of searching his scroll.

"I do not know its exact location," he said. "It is . . . yes, here it is. It is in the province of California. But it is not even on the ocean. And I understand it is overrun with mice and other vermin."

"California is a big place," said Smith.

"It has a name," said Chiun.

"Yes?"

"Ah. Here it is. It is a funny name, but I do not mind. Remo and I will learn to live with it. And the mice."

"What is the name?"

Chiun looked up from his scroll hopefully. "Disneyland it is called."

Lloyd Darton paid his $49 and accepted the room key from the desk clerk. On the seedier side of Detroit, he could have rented a room for just an hour, but that was the kind of hotel where a man could get killed just standing at the registration desk and Darton wasn't the sort to take chances. Better to waste a few dollars, especially since he was here on business. He waved off the bellhop and took the stairs to his room rather than wait for the elevator.

He carefully double-locked the door of the room, placed his single suitcase on the bed, and unlocked it with a key.

It held an assortment of weapons, locked in place by straps and plastic blocks. Satisfied that nothing had been damaged, he closed the lid and sat on the bed. It was 8:45 P.M. His customer should be along soon and Lloyd Darton hoped to be out of the room by 9:30 at the latest.

There was a knock on the door at 8:56. The man who stood there was tall, fiftyish, with the kind of eyes Lloyd Darton had seen many times before. All his customers had them. A scar was faintly visible along the right side of the man's jaw.

"Hello," Darton said.

The man just nodded as he entered the room. He waited until the door was locked again before he spoke.

"You made the changes I asked for?"

"Sure did. Over here." Darton flipped open the suitcase lid. "I fixed the sight for you too. It was a little off. Of course, that won't matter with these new add-ons."

"Skip the sales pitch," said the man with the scar, whose name Darton did not know. All his customers were nameless. They knew him, knew where to find him, but he never asked their names. It was a one-sided business relationship, but so was the money. That was one-sided too and it all fell on Darton's side of the ledger.

"Here it is," said Darton, hefting a shiny black handgun. He took an assortment of devices from the case and in a few quick motions, he attached a folding stock, a telescopic sight and barrel extension, converting the pistol to a takedown sniper's rifle. He inserted a clip, snapped back the slide to show the action at work, and presented it to the other man.

"Don't get much call for this kind of custom work," Darton said. "While you're here, why don't you look at some of the others? You might see something you like better than-"

"There's nothing better than my old Beretta Olympic," the other man interrupted, sighting down the pistol's long barrel.

"If you say so. It's just . . . it's not considered, well, a professional weapon, if you know what I mean."

"It's a target pistol. I'm going to use it on targets. What could be more professional?"

Darton nodded wordlessly. The man had a point and he certainly had the professional look to him. Except that he was sighting down the barrel with Darton at the other end. That was not professional at all. It was not even good gun safety. Or good manners for that matter.

"I can understand your affection for the Olympic," Darton said quickly. "But I find that most people in your business like to change their tools. It reduces complications."

"Don't you think I know that?" asked the man with the scar. "This piece has sentimental value for me. It reminds me of my ex-wife." He lined up on Darton's sweat-shiny forehead. Darton winced. He loved guns. He bought them, he sold them, he repaired them, he remodeled them, and he hunted with them. They were both his hobby and his business and he loved them. But he didn't like to have them pointed at him.

"Do you mind?" Darton asked, looking at the gun barrel.

The man with the scar ignored him. "You test-fire this?" he asked.

"Of course. It fires true. No bias. It's perfect for the kind of work you do."

"Oh? What kind is that?"

"You know," Darton said.

"I want to hear you say it."

"My guess--is that you kill people with it."

"You keep trying to tell me my business," said the man with the scar.

"I didn't mean anything by it, Mr.-"

"Call me Remo. "

"Mr. Remo. I just want you to have the best your money can buy, Mr. Remo."

"Good. I'm glad to hear that. Because I want this weapon and I want something else from you."

"What's that."

"I want to check the action myself. I have some serious work ahead of me and I don't like to work with a cold piece just out of the shop."

"How can I help?" asked Lloyd Darton.

"Just stand still," said the other man and split Darton's sweat-shiny forehead with a single shot. The floral bedspread behind him suddenly developed an extra pattern. In red.

"I don't like people telling me my business," said the man to himself. He disassembled the Beretta, slipped the pistol into a spring-clip holster, helped himself to extra clips, and quietly left the room with the attachments nestled in a briefcase Lloyd Darton had thoughtfully planned to throw into the bargain.

Walking down the steps, he thought of the work ahead. Detroit was a new city for him. A new start and maybe a new life. It all felt strange to him.

But he had work to do and that was the most important thing. In his pocket was a list. Four people. And the contractor wanted them hit in public places. Imagine that. Wanted the whole thing done out in the open. It was crazy, but the money was even crazier and that made it worthwhile. Even if he didn't know the name of his employer.

As he walked through the lobby, he thought of Maria. Lately, she had been on his mind a lot.

He hadn't wanted to kill her. But he was a soldier, a soldier in an army that wore no uniforms, belonged to no country, and yet had invaded almost every civilized nation. There were those who referred to the Mafia as a family but that was a myth, like claiming the Holocaust had never happened. The Mafia was no family; it was like an enormous occupying army.

As his capo, Don Pietro Scubisci, had once told him:

"We own the banks. We own the courts and the lawyers. We own pieces of the government. And because we don't dress like soldiers," he had said, tapping his chest with palsied fingers, "because we deny everything, people don't know. Our hands are at their throats and because we smile and talk of 'business interests' and donate to the Church, the fools pretend we're not there. Their foolishness is our greatest strength. Remember that. And remember, we always come first."

"Always," he had agreed.

"Your mother, your father, your wife, your children," Don Pietro had said, ticking them off on his fingers, one by one. "They come second. If we ask, you will deny them. If we tell you, you will leave them. If we order it, you will kill them."

It was true. He believed it so deeply that when it came down to his honor as a soldier and the woman he had loved, he made the right choice. The only choice. He had acted instantly, ruthlessly. Like a soldier. Maria had planned to talk, and to protect the Invisible Army of the Mafia, she had had to die. And he had come here, to Detroit, to begin a new life.

As he got behind the wheel of his rented car, he could not stop thinking of Maria and the last words she had spoken to him.

"He will know your name and you will know his. And that will be your death warrant."

"This time, Maria," he said half-aloud, "you're wrong." But he thought he heard her tinkling laugh somewhere in the night.

Chapter 4

Remo Williams smelled the fumes even before the jet skidded to a stop. He glanced up and saw the trickle of smoke insinuating itself between two of the wall panels. It was all unnaturally quiet. People were still in their seats, hunched over, stunned from the carnival-ride impact of the plane's crash landing.

Remo heard something sparking. It was an electrical fire and he knew it would start small but could spread through the cabin as if it were lined with flashpaper.

And even before that, the deadly acrid fumes of burning plastic would kill everyone aboard.

All six emergency exits were blocked by the bodies of unconscious passengers and Remo found the place in the ceiling where the hijacker had fired the warning burst that had depressurized the cabin and tossed the giant craft out of control. He could see sky through the pattern of bullet holes. Remo balanced on the top edge of a seat, inserted his fingers into as many of the holes as he could, and made two fists. The aluminum outer skin gave under the pressure of his hands, hands that instantly sensed weak points, flaws in the alloy, and exploited them. The ceiling tore with a harsh metallic shriek.

Remo ran with the tear, racing the length of the cabin from tail to cockpit, peeling the metal as if it were the lid of a sardine can.

Now the hot Utah sun filled the cabin. People were beginning to stir, coughing into their oxygen masks. He started to free the people from their seat belts in the fastest way possible, grabbing a handful of seat belt and ripping it free from its moorings.

"Okay," Remo called as he moved along the rows. "Everybody up for volleyball."

He had to get them moving. But some of them, he saw, would never move again. Their heads hung at impossible angles, their necks snapped on impact.

Behind him, the sparking of the electric fire turned into a hissing sputter. Remo turned and saw Lorna, the stewardess, turning a red fire extinguisher on the galley. The chemical foam beat down the licking flames but also sucked away the breathable air.

The young blond woman fell to her knees, her face, purpling.

Remo hauled her back and boosted her up to the roof. "Catch your breath," he called up. "I'm going to start passing people up to you."

She tried to speak but could manage only a cough. With red eyes, she made an Okay sign with her fingers.

Remo hoisted a man up out of his seat and over his head in a smooth, impossible motion. He felt Lorna take the man from his grasp.

Other passengers began to revive. They pulled off their oxygen masks and with a few quick words, Remo organized them. The strong lifting the weak. The first ones to reach the top of the fuselage pulled those who came after. In a few minutes, only Remo remained in the cabin. Even the dead had been removed.

"That's everyone," said Remo. "I think."

Lorna called down, "Make sure. Look for children on the floor."

"Right." Remo checked every seat. At the very rear of the plane, he found the hijacker, huddled under his seat. "Oh, yes. You," Remo said. "Almost forgot about you." He grabbed the man by his collar, took hold of his belt, and swung him like a bag of manure. The hijacker screamed as Remo let go, and the man sailed up and out the hole in the roof.

Remo started to reach for the ceiling but a faint sound made him stop. He opened the rest-room door. There was a little girl inside, perhaps five years old, crouched down under the tiny sink, her thumb in her mouth and her eyes squinted shut. She was moaning softly; that was the sound Remo had heard.

"It's all right, honey. You can come out now." The little girl shut her eyes more tightly.

"Don't be afraid." Remo reached in and pulled her to him and carried her from the plane just before the flames exploded into the cabin.

An hour later, the aircraft fire had burned itself out, leaving a smoking, gutted hulk lying in the coral-pink sandstone desert. The sun was starting to go down in the sky.

Lorna finished splinting a woman's broken arm. She stood up and brushed dust from what was left of her uniform. She had been using scraps of the skirt and sleeves as makeshift bandages.

"That's the last of them," she told Remo. "Have you seen anything?"

"Just flat desert in all directions," Remo said. "But there should be rescue here soon. Radar should have picked us up, right?"

Lorna shook her head. "Not necessarily," she said. "Sometimes you get in between the two radar coverages and you're in a dead spot. But when we don't show up on time, they'll start tracing us backward. They should get here. "

"You did good work, Lorna," Remo said.

"You did too. The others think the cabin split open on impact, you know."

"And you?" Remo said.

"I saw you tear it open. "

"You better take something for that concussion," Remo said. "You're imagining things."

"Have it your own way," she said. "Anything you want done?"

"Why me?"

"The cockpit crew died on impact. I guess you're in charge."

Remo nodded. He was watching the little girl he had pulled out at the last minute. She was kneeling in the sand beside two still figures, a man and a woman. Someone had placed a handkerchief over each of their faces.

Remo walked over and knelt alongside the girl. "Are these your parents'?" he asked.

"They're in heaven," the little girl said. There were tears in her eyes.

Remo hoisted her in his arms and brought her back to Lorna.

"Take care of her," he said.

"What are you going to do?" the stewardess asked.

"What I've been trained to do," Remo said, and he walked out into the desert alone.

The wind had shifted the sands, covering the tracks, but it made no difference to Remo. The wind followed its path and the sand moved according to subtle laws that in some way were clear to him.

There had been footprints, he knew. The way the sand had fallen in told him that, and now Remo was not tracking the footprints, but tracking the afterimages made by the footprints. Here the sand was piled too high. There it rilled and scalloped unnaturally.

He was close. Very close.

Remo Williams had killed more men in his past than he could count. Some were just targets, names punched up out of Smith's computers. Others he dispatched in self-defense or in defense of the nation. There were times he killed as casually as a surgeon scrubbed his hands and there were times Remo had been so sick of the killing that he wanted to quit CURE.

But tonight, with the dying red sun in his eyes, Remo wanted to kill for an unprofessional reason. For vengeance.

He found the hijacker standing on a low spur of rock. The man looked down when he saw Remo approach. He had worked his hands out of the mangled remains of his machine pistol.

"I do not see anything," the skyjacker said, indicating the horizon with a sweep of his arm.

"I do," said Remo through his teeth.

"Yes? What?"

Remo came up to the man with a slow purposeful gait. The sand under his shoes made no sound.

"I see an animal who places a cause over human life. I see someone less than human who, for stupidity, deprives a little girl of her parents."

"Hey. Do not shout at me. I am also a victim. I too could have been killed."

"You're about to be," said Remo.

The hijacker backed away, wide-eyed. "I surrender."

"So did everyone on that flight," Remo said.

He had been taught to kill three times in his life-in Vietnam, as a policeman, and as an assassin. Each approach was different, with only one rule in common: strike as quickly as possible.

Remo ignored the rule. He killed the hijacker carefully, silently, an inch at a time. The man died slowly and not easily. And when his final shriek had stopped reverberating, what remained of him did not look even remotely human.

When it was over, Remo dry-washed his hands with the fine red sand that rolled as far as the eye could see, like an ocean of blood.

Chapter 5

If success could be measured in newspaper headlines, Lyle Lavallette was the greatest automotive genius since Henry Ford.

The press loved him and his roomful of scrapbooks, which had become so voluminous that he had had all his clippings transferred to microfiche, were filled with references to "The Boy Genius of Detroit" or "Peck's Bad Boy of the Automotive Industry" or "Maverick Car Builder." That was his favorite.

He came by the headline coverage the old-fashioned way: he earned it. In one of the most conservative low-key industries in America, Lyle Lavallette was a breath of fresh air. He raced speedboats; he danced the night away at one fancy disco after another; his best friends were rock stars; he squired, then married, then divorced models and actresses, each successive one more beautiful and empty-headed than the one before. He was always good for a quote on any topic and three times a year, without fail, he invited all the working press he could get an invitation to, to large lavish parties at his Grosse Pointe estate.

Unfortunately for Lavallette, his bosses in Detroit were more interested in the bottom line than in the headline. So Lavallette had lasted no more than five years with each of the Big Three.

His first top-level job was as design head for General Motors. He advised them to make the Cadillac smaller. Forget the fins, he said. Nobody'll ever buy a car with fins. Fortunately, Cadillac ignored him and then fired him.

Later he showed up in Chrysler's long-range planning division. He told them to keep making big cars; people want to ride in plush-buckets, he said. When Chrysler almost went belly-up, Lavallette was fired. Some felt that it was one of the secret prices Chrysler had to pay to get a federal loan.

Lavallette worked for Ford Motors too, as head of marketing. He told the brass to forget building four-cylinder cars. They would never sell. Ford, he said, should forget about trying to compete with Japanese imports. The Japanese make nothing that doesn't fall apart. Eventually, he was fired.

It was in the nature of Detroit that none of these firings was ever called a firing. Lavallette was always permitted to resign; each resignation was an excuse for a press party at which Lavallette dropped hints of some new enterprise he was getting himself involved in and, their bellies filled with expensive food and expensive wine, the newsmen went back to their offices to write more stories about "What's Ahead for the Maverick Genius?"

What was ahead was his own car. Lavallette went to Nicaragua and convinced the government there to put up the money to open a car plant. His new car would be called, naturally, the Lavallette. Five years after he started gearing up, the first car rolled off the assembly line. Its transmission fell out before it got out of the company parking lot.

In the first year, seventy-one Lavallettes were sold. The transmissions fell out of all of them. On those sturdy enough to be driven for two months without breaking down, the bodies rusted. Fenders and bumpers fell off.

Lavallette sneaked out of Nicaragua late one night and in New York announced the closing of the Lavallette factory. He called the Lavallette "one of the great cars of all time" but said that Sandinista sabotage was behind its failure. "They didn't want us to succeed," he said. "They blocked us every step of the way," he said.

The press never noticed that he didn't really explain who "they" were. His wild accusations were enough to ensure him a spate of stories about the Maverick Genius that the Communists Tried to Crush. No one mentioned that the Nicaraguan government had lent Lavallette ninety million dollars and stood to lose its entire investment.

And now it was time to meet the press again.

In his penthouse atop the luxurious Detroit Plaza Hotel, Lyle Lavallette, president of the newly formed Dynacar Industries, primped before a full-length dress mirror.

He was admiring the crease in his two-hundred-dollar trousers. It was just the way he liked it, straight-razor sharp. His Italian-made jacket showed off his wasp-thin waist and his broad shoulders. After a moment's reflection, he decided his shoulders did not look quite broad enough and made a mental note to order more padding with his next suit. The white silk handkerchief in his breast pocket formed two peaks, one slightly higher than the other. Just right. It matched his tie and his tie matched his white hair. For years, he had told the press that his hair had turned white when he was fifteen years old. The fact was that as a teenager he was called "Red" and he now had his hair stripped and bleached every week by a hairstylist, that being the only way he could guarantee that he would not appear as a headline in the Enquirer: -MAVERICK CAR GENIUS SECRETLY A REDHEAD."

Just the thought of such a headline made Lavallette wince. He picked up a hand mirror just as his personal secretary stepped into the suite.

"The press is here, Mr. Lavallette," the secretary cooed. He had hired her out of nearly sixty applicants, all of whom he subjected to what he called "the elbow test. "

The elbow test was simple. Each applicant was taken aside and asked to clasp her hands behind her head until her elbows projected straight ahead, like a prisoner of war in an old movie.

"Now walk toward the wall," Lavallette told them.

"That's all?"

"Until your elbows touch the wall."

The applicants whose elbows touched the wall before their chests did were disqualified. Out of the seven passing applicants, the only one who hadn't tried to slap him or bring a sexual-harassment suit was Miss Melanie Blaze and he had hired her instantly. She was nothing as a secretary but she was good for his image, especially now that he was between wives. And he liked her for the way her cleavage entered a room a full half-beat before the rest of her.

"You look fine," she said. "Are you ready for the press conference?"

"It's not a press conference," Lavallette said. "That comes tomorrow."

"Yes, sir," said Miss Blaze, who could have sworn that when a businessman called in the media for the express purpose of making a formal announcement, it constituted a press conference.

"Would you please hold this mirror for me, Miss Blaze?" The young redhead sauntered on high heels to take the mirror and was immediately sorry she had.

"Aaargghh!" howled Lavallette.

"What is it? What's wrong?" she squealed. She thought he must have seen a precancerous mole on his face.

"A hair," Lavallette shrieked. "Look at it."

"I'm looking, I'm looking. If we get you to a doctor, maybe it can be cut out," she said, remembering that hair growing out of a mole was a bad sign. But she still couldn't see the mole.

"What are you yammering about, you idiot? There's a hair out of place."

"Where?"

"Back of my head. It's as plain as day."

Miss Blaze looked and looked some more. Finally, Lyle Lavallette pointed it out.

Yes, there was a hair out of place, Miss Blaze agreed. But it would take an electron microscope for anyone to see it.

"Are you making fun of me, Miss Blaze?"

"No, Sir. I just don't think anyone will notice. Besides, it's at the back of your head. The cameras will just be shooting front views, won't they?"

"And what if an Enquirer photographer is in the pack? What if he sneaks around to the side? You know how they latch on to these things. I can see the headline now: 'LYLE LAVALLETTE. HEAD OF DYNACAR INDUSTRIES. LOSING HAIR. Shocking Details Inside.' They'll have my face in between the Abominable Snowman and the woman in Malaysia who gave birth to a goat. I can't have it."

"I'll get a comb."

"No, no, no. Take a comb to this hair and we'll have to start all over again. It'll take hours. Get a tweezers. And some hair spray. Hurry."

When she returned, he said, "Good. Now carefully, really carefully, use the tweezers and put the hair back in its proper groove."

"I'm doing it. Just stop shaking, huh."

"I can't help it. This is serious. Is it in place?"

"I think so. Yeah. It is."

"Okay. Now, quickly . . . use the spray."

Miss Blaze shook the can and applied a quick jet. "More. More than that. Lard it on. I don't want that sucker popping up at a crucial moment."

"It's your hair," said his secretary, who noticed that the ingredients on the can included liquefied Krazy Glue. She emptied half the can on the back of Lavallette's snow white hair. He looked it over and permitted himself one of his dazzlingly perfect smiles. It could not have been more perfect if he still had his natural teeth.

"Okay, we're all set. Let's go get 'em," Lavallette said.

"You sure go to a lot of trouble over the way you look, Mr. Lavallette," she said.

"Image, Miss Blaze," Lavallette said. He gave his shirt cuffs a final shoot so they projected a precise half-inch beyond the jacket sleeves. "Image is everything."

"Substance too," she said lightly.

"Substance sucks. Image," Lavallette insisted.

"Who are we waiting for anyway?" a photographer asked a newsman inside the hotel's grand ballroom.

"Lyle Lavallette."

"Who's he?" the photographer asked.

"The Maverick Genius of the Car Industry," the reporter said.

"I never heard of him. What's he done?"

"Back in the old days, when there was a General Motors and a Ford and a Chrysler company, back before all the buyouts and mergers, Lavallette was the guiding genius who led them to new heights."

"I still never heard of him," the photographer said.

"Then you're a clod," the reporter said.

"I got no problem with that," the photographer said. He looked up as he heard a smattering of applause, and saw Lavallette walking to the podium behind which was mounted the ten-foot-square logo of the new Dynacar Industries.

"Is that him?" the photographer said.

"Yes. That is Lyle Lavallette. Maverick Genius."

"He bleaches his hair," the photographer said.

"Take his picture anyway," the reporter said disgustedly. Some people, he thought, had no sense of history. Lavallette was bathed in electronic light from all the photographers' strobe units flashing. He could never understand it. Why didn't the print media just hire a handful of photographers to take a few pictures and then divvy them up? Instead, they hired a zillion photographers to take a zillion pictures and only a fraction of them ever made it into print. What happened to the rest? Lavallette imagined a big file somewhere holding enough photos of himself to have a different one printed beside every definition in the dictionary.

Well, today he was glad to see all the photographers. It showed that Lyle Lavallette hadn't lost his touch with the press and he was going to give them enough to keep them interested.

He let the picture-taking go on for a full three minutes, then stepped behind the podium and raised a quieting hand.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the press," he began in a sonorous voice. "I'm happy to see you and happy to see so many old friends. In case you were wondering what happened to me, let me just tell you that Maverick Car Builders don't die and they don't fade away either. We just keep coming back."

There was a warm-spirited chuckle through the audience. "As some of you know, I've spent the last few years working in Nicaragua, fighting my lonely fight against totalitarian oppression. There are some, I know, who think I failed because the car I built there did not establish itself among the major car lines of the world." He paused and looked around the room dramatically. The errant hair, he knew, was still in place and he was pleased with the way things were going. If only they kept going just as well.

"I don't think I failed. I helped to bring some good old car-making know-how to Nicaragua and I'm sure the lives of the people will never be the same because of our efforts there. That alone would have been enough of a success for me because spreading freedom is what the auto industry is all about. But I had an even greater success while I was there." He paused again to look around.

"While I was fighting my lonely battle against oppression, I spent all my free time in my research-and-development laboratory and I'm proud to tell you today that this effort paid off. We are preparing to announce a car design so revolutionary, so important that from this time on the automobile industry as we have known and loved it will be forever changed."

A gasp rose from the crowd. The television people jostled closer, bringing their videocams in to Lavallette's tanned face. He wondered if they were trying to get prints of the retinas of his eyes. He'd read somewhere that retina prints were like fingerprints, no two being alike.

"This discovery is so world-shaking that two days ago, industry thieves broke into the new Dynacar Industries building here in Detroit and made off with what they believed was the only existing prototype of this new car," Lavallette said. He smiled broadly. "They were wrong."

He lifted his hands to still the shouted barrage of questions.

"Tomorrow in the new Dynacar building, I will unveil this great discovery. I am herewith extending an invitation to the heads of General Autos, American Autos, and National Autos-the Big Three--to attend so they can personally see what the future will be like. I will take no questions now; I will see you all tomorrow. Thank you for coming. "

He turned and stepped down from the podium.

"What did he say?" asked a reporter from GQ who had been busy taking notes on what Lavallette was wearing and had not listened to what he said.

"He said the press conference is tomorrow," said another reporter.

"Tomorrow? Then what was this?"

"Search me."

"Hey. What was this if it wasn't the press conference?" the GQ reporter called out to Miss Blaze as she walked away behind Lavallette.

She started to shrug. But instead she screamed. She screamed because, as the news people surged to record Lyte Lavallette leaving the room, two shots rang out and Lavallette was slammed against the wall.

"He's been shot. Someone shot Lavallette."

"What? Shot?"

"Someone call an ambulance," shrieked Miss Blaze.

"Where's the gunman? He must be in this room. Find him. Get his story."

A network newsman jumped up behind the podium and waved his arms frantically. "If the gunman is still in this room, I can offer an exclusive contract to appear on Nightwatch. We'll also pick up your legal fees."

"I'll double that offer," yelled someone from a cable news system.

"I didn't mention a price," said the network man. "How can you double it?"

"I'm offering a blank check," the cable man said loudly. He jumped up onto the small stage at the front of the room, yanked his checkbook from his pocket, and waved it around his head, hoping the gunman would see him. "Name your price," he shouted. "A blank check."

"A credit card," the network man shouted back. "I'm offering a network credit card. That's better than his blank check."

"Oooooh," groaned Lyle Lavallette on the floor.

"Can we quote you on that?" a woman with a microphone asked him.

The television news people had their cameras aimed in all directions. They filmed Lyle lavallette lying on the gold rug with a stupid expression on his face. They filmed Miss Blaze, his secretary, with her Grand Canyon cleavage and hot tears streaming down her cheeks. They filmed each other. They missed nothing.

Except the gunman.

After firing two shots point-blank at Lyle Lavallette's chest, the gunman had slipped his Beretta Olympic into the hollow compartment built into his video camera and pretended to shoot more footage. He did not try to run away because he knew he would not have to. In the entire history of the universe, no newsman confronted with disaster, whether natural or man-made, had ever offered assistance. They filmed people burning to death and never made an attempt to throw a blanket over the flames. They interviewed mass killers, on the run from the police, and never made any attempt to have the criminals arrested. They seemed to believe that the only people who should be apprehended and put in jail were Presidents of the United States and people who did not support school busing.

So the gunman waited until the ambulance came and took Lyle Lavallette away. He waited around while the police were there, and pretended to take film of them. When the police were done interviewing people and taking down everyone's name, he left with the other newsmen.

He heard one of them say, "It's awful. It would only happen in America. Who'd shoot a Maverick Car Genius?"

"They must have thought he was a politician. Probably the President shot him because he thought Lavallette was going to run for President."

"No," another one said. "It was big business. The capitalists. The Big Three had him shot because he was going to hurt their car sales."

The man with the scar who had shot Lyle Lavallette listened to all of them and he knew they were all wrong. Lyle Lavallette was shot simply because his was the first name on the list.

That afternoon; the Detroit Free Press received an anonymous letter. It said simply that Lavallette was only the first. One by one, the automakers of America would be killed before they had a chance to totally destroy the environment. "Enough innocent people have already died from air-polluting infernal machines," the letter said. "It is time some of the guilty died too. And they will." Harold Smith took another swig of Maalox. Beyond the big picture windows of his office, looking out on Long Island Sound, a skiff tacked close to the wind. Strong gusts blew up and pushed against the sail and the skiff listed so sharply it looked ready to capsize. But Smith knew that sailcraft were balanced so that the sail above and the keel below formed a single vertical axis. The wind could push the sail over only so far, because of the counterpressure from the keel below the water. When the sail reached its maximum tilt, the wind glanced harmlessly off. Perfect equilibrium.

Sometimes Smith felt CURE was like that. A perfectly balanced keel for the sailboat that was the United States government. But sometimes just as a really rough sea could capsize a sailboat if it was struck in just the wrong way at the wrong time-even CURE could not always hold America on an even keel.

It felt that way right now. Smith had just gotten off the telephone with the President.

"I know I can only suggest missions," the President had said. His voice was as cheerful as if he had just finished his favorite lunch.

"Yes, sir," Smith said.

"But you know about this Detroit thing."

"It looks as if it might be serious, Mr. President."

"Darned tootin' it's serious," said the President. "The car industry is just getting back on its feet. We can't have some environment cuckoo killing everybody in Detroit."

"Fortunately, Lavallette is still alive," Smith said. "He was wearing a bulletproof vest."

"I think all the rest of them need more than a bulletproof vest," the President said. "I think they need your two special men."

"I'll have to make that decision, Mr. President. This might just be the work of a vicious prankster."

"I don't think it is, though. Do you?"

"I'll let you know. Good-bye, Mr. President," Smith said and disconnected the telephone that connected directly with the White House.

Smith had disliked being abrupt but it was the tone he had taken with all the previous Presidents who had turned to CURE to solve a problem. It had been written into the initial plans for CURE: a President could only suggest assignments, not order them. This was to prevent CURE from ever becoming a controlled wing of the executive branch. There was only one presidential order that Smith would accept: disband CURE.

Smith had been abrupt for another reason too. Remo had not yet reported in after his last assignment against the Ravine Rapist on the airplane, but while checking the reports of the Lavallette assault, Smith had run across his name.

The police at the scene had dutifully taken down the name of everyone in the room where the automaker was shot.

And at the bottom of the list was printed the name of Remo Williams, photographer.

It was not the kind of name like Joe Smith or Bill Johnson that someone would just make up out of the air. Anyone who wrote down the name "Remo Williams" had to know Remo Williams . . . or be Remo Williams.

And no one knew Remo Williams.

Smith shook his head and drank some more Maalox. The conclusion was inescapable. For some reason, Remo was free-lancing and it was time for Smith to act.

Chapter 6

"I say we leave," said Lawrence Templey Johnson.

He was a big, bluff man, the kind who ran wild in America's corporate boardrooms. Even with his suit reduced to cutoff pants and his white shirt a rag, his takecharge manner clung to him like a stale odor.

"I say we stay," said Remo quietly. "So we stay. End of discussion."

It was turning cold now on the desert. The sunbaked sand had given up the last of its stored heat, and now the chill was setting into everyone's bones.

"Why?" demanded Lawrence Templey Johnson. "I want to know why."

Remo was looking at a woman's broken arm. Lorna had put on a splint, but the woman was still in deep pain. Remo took the woman's shattered arm in his fingers and gently kneaded the flesh from wrist to elbow, not sure of what to do, but growing more confident as he worked the arm.

He could sense the breaks. Three of them, all below the elbow, and the broken pieces of bone had not been aligned correctly.

"I want to know why," Johnson repeated. He was using a foot-high rock near the hull of the burned-out jetcraft as a soapbox and he sounded like a politician in training. He was starting to get on Remo's nerves.

"How does it feel now?" Remo asked the woman.

"A little better. I think."

Remo suddenly squeezed and the woman gasped, but when the first shock subsided, both she and Remo knew the bones had been properly aligned. Remo massaged a nerve in her neck to ease the dull healing pain that would come later.

"Thank you," the woman said.

"I'm talking to you," said Lawrence Templey Johnson. "How dare you ignore me? Who do you think you are?" He looked around at the survivors, who sat, dully, on the sand near the plane. "Look at him," he told them. "Look how he's dressed. He's a nobody. He probably fixes cars for a living. I'm taking charge here and I say we're leaving."

Remo stood and casually brushed sand off the legs of his chino pants.

"We're staying because it's just a matter of time before the rescue planes come," Remo said. "If we start wandering around this desert, we might never be found."

"We've been waiting hours for these so-called rescue planes," the other man snapped. "I say we leave."

"I say we stay," Remo said coldly.

"Who appointed you cock of the walk? Let's put it to a vote," said Johnson, who had visions of a Hollywood movie chronicling how he had led his stranded fellow passengers out of the desert. Starring Roger Moore as Lawrence Templey Johnson. He would have preferred David Niven but David Niven was dead. "We'll vote. This is a democracy. "

"No," said Remo. "It's a desert. And anybody who wanders out into it is going to die."

"We'll see about that." Johnson raised his voice. "Everybody in favor of getting out of here, say 'Aye.' "

No one said "Aye." They voted with their rear ends, keeping them firmly planted in the sand.

"Fools," Johnson snapped. "Well, I'm going."

"I'm sorry. I can't let you do that," Remo said.

"Why not?"

"Because I promised myself we'd all get out of here alive. I'm not going to let you become buzzard bait." Johnson jumped off the small rock and marched toward Remo. He poked him in the chest with his index finger. "You're going to have to get a lot bigger real quick if you think you're going to stop me."

"Say good night, Johnson," Remo mumbled. And mumbled an answer to himself: "Good night Johnson." And pressed his right hand into the bigger man's throat, squeezed for a moment, then caught him as he crumpled and laid him on the sand next to the plane.

"He's not hurt, is he?" Lorna asked.

Remo shook his head. "Just asleep." He looked around at the other crash survivors, who were watching him. "He'll be okay, folks. Meantime, I think all of you ought to move closer together to try to keep each other warm. Just until the rescuers get here."

"They're really coming?" the little girl asked.

"Yes," Remo said. "I promise."

"Good. Then I'm going to sleep."

Later, with the stars wheeling in the ebony sky above their heads, Remo and Lorna slipped away from the others. "You've never told me your last name," she said, as she took his arm.

"I don't have one," Remo said. He sat on a slightly elevated dune and the young woman moved down lightly beside him.

"I thought you were a real wiseass back on the plane, even if I was attracted to you. But I was wrong. You're no wiseass."

"Don't get too close to me," he said.

"What?"

He took a long look at a big moon, perched atop a spire, miles away. It looked like a futuristic desert lamp. The wind blew a fine sand spray off the tops of the small dunes. The sand hissed.

"When the rescue planes come, I'm leaving. My own way. I'd appreciate it if you'd just not even mention me," he said.

"But you're the one who saved everybody. You got them out of the plane. You've taken care of them since then. That little girl . . . she adores you."

"Yeah. Swell. But I'm still vanishing when the planes come, so just forget about me."

"Why? Are you a criminal or something?"

"Not a criminal, but something," Remo said. "You know, I never had a family. This is the first time I ever felt I belonged with people." He laughed bitterly. "And it took a plane crash to make it happen."

"It happened though," she said.

"When do you think the planes will come for us?" he said.

"Soon," she answered. "I'm surprised they haven't arrived by now."

She put her hands to his face. "But we have a little while, don't we?" she asked quietly.

"We do," he said and brought Lorna down to the sand with him. Their lips met first, hungry and sad. Remo reached for her right wrist instinctively, ready to begin the slow finger massage that was the first of the thirty-seven steps of the Sinanju love technique.

Then he remembered how it had always been with Sinanju love techniques.

"Hell with it," he mumbled and he just took her. Their bodies joined pleasurably, unrhythmically. Each time one of them came to a peak, the other slid off it. It was long, elemental, sometimes frustrating, but natural, and when the peak did come, it came to both of them at once.

And that made it worth all the effort in the world, Remo thought.

She fell asleep in his arms and Remo looked at the sky, knowing their first time together was also their last.

The telephone had been ringing, on and off, for hours but Chiun had declined to answer it. It was probably Remo calling and if Chiun answered it and then asked him had Remo yet spoken to Nellie Wilson, Remo would have some lame excuse about how he had been too busy, and it would all just annoy Chiun, the way Remo always did. And it was also good to let Remo wait awhile, lest he develop the habit of telephoning and expecting Chiun to answer immediately, like a servant.

Three hours of intermittent telephone ringing seemed like enough punishment to Chiun so he went to the telephone in the corner of the hotel room, lifted the receiver, and said slowly, "Who is speaking?"

The receiver crackled and hissed in his ear. "Who is there? Who is there?"

More crackling and hissing and Chiun said, "Fool device."

"Chiun, this is Smith," came the voice.

"Emperor Smith. I thought you were Remo."

"Why?" asked Smith sharply. "Have you heard from Remo?"

"No, but I expect him to call at any moment."

"You don't know where he is either?" Smith asked.

"I have not heard from him," Chiun said.

"Chiun, I have a report that indicates Remo may be in Detroit. He is trying to kill America's top automobile executives."

"Good," Chiun said. "At least he is working."

"No. You don't understand. He's not on assignment."

"He is practicing then," Chiun said. "That is almost as good. "

"Chiun, I think he's free-lancing for someone else."

"Strange," Chiun said under his breath. Louder, he said, "He is perhaps trying to earn extra money to donate to the impoverished of Sinanju. That would be nice. "

"We have to stop him," Smith said.

"What do you have against the poor of Sinanju?" Chiun asked.

"Listen to me, Master of Sinanju. Remo is running amok in Detroit, I think. He may be on the other side."

Chiun spat. "There is no other side. There is only Sinanju."

"He shot a man today."

"Shot?"

"With a gun," said Smith.

"Aiiiieeee," wailed Chiun.

"Now you understand the gravity of the situation," Smith said.

"A gun," said Chiun. "To profane Sinanju with a mechanical weapon. It is not possible. Remo would not dare. "

"Someone shot the president of Dynacar Industries earlier today. People took a list of names of everyone there, and Remo's name was on the list."

"There is your proof that you are mistaken," Chiun said. "Remo cannot even write his own name."

"Chiun, you have to go to Detroit. If Remo shows up and is free-lancing, you have to stop him."

"This is outside our contracted agreements," Chiun said.

"We'll talk about that later. I'm sending a car for you and I've booked you on a flight in an hour."

"Outside our contract," Chiun repeated.

"We'll worry about that later," Smith said.

"Earlier we had discussed some land," Chiun said.

"Forget Disneyland. If Remo's acting on his own, you have to stop him. That's in the contract. And then there won't be any more contracts.

"Very well. I will go. But I tell you that Remo would never use a gun or any boom thing."

"When you get there, you can see if that's right or not," Smith said. "This would-be killer has threatened the heads of all the major auto companies."

"Then who will I guard?" Chiun asked. "How do I choose?"

"Today, the gunman tried to get Lyle Lavallette. He's a very high-profile automaker. Always in the press. It may be logical that his next target will be Drake Mangan, the head of National Autos. He's just written a book and he's on a lot of television shows. If Remo or whoever it is is trying to make a publicity splash, Mangan might be next on the list."

"I will go see this Mangan and I will bring you this impostor's head, so you can apologize to both Remo and me for your error. Good-bye."

Chiun slammed down the telephone, cracking the receiver and sending internal parts flying like popping corn. Working for a white was bad enough but working for a white lunatic was worse. Still, what if Smith were right? What if something had happened and Remo was working on his own?

Chin looked across the room at his thirteen steamer trunks. He decided he would pack light. He would not be in Detroit for long. Just six steamer trunks.

Chapter 7

Drake Mangan had become the head of the huge National Auto Company the old-fashioned way: he had married into it.

Since the beginning of the auto industry, the Cranston family-beginning with Jethro Cranston, who hooked a steam engine onto a horseless carriage back in 1898-had spearheaded virtually every major development that ran on rubber tires. When old Jethro had died, his son Grant took over and Cranston went international. And when the next son, Brant, took over, everyone knew the future of Cranston Motors was assured for at least another generation. A drunk driver in a Ford pickup changed all that when he plowed into Brant Cranston's limousine at a stop sign in 1959.

Control of the company fell then into the somewhat shaky hands of the sole surviving Cranston, Myra. At the time, Myra was twenty-two, spoiled, and on her way to earning a black belt in social drinking. Drake Mangan was her boyfriend.

They had been in a restaurant overlooking the Detroit River when the bad news came. Drake Mangan had picked the restaurant, whose wines were the priciest in the city, to break the bad news that he was calling it quits after eight months of dating Myra and not getting to first base. He waited until Myra had gone through two bottles of Bordeaux before broaching the subject. He hoped she was drunk enough not to throw a tantrum because her tantrums were famous.

"Myra, I have something very important to tell you," Mangan began. He was an impressive man of thirty, although his hooded dark eyes and aquiline nose made him look a solid ten years older. He was chief comptroller at Cranston Motors and had been attracted to Myra solely because she was the boss's daughter. But even that enticement had worn thin after eight months of dating the woman Detroit society had nicknamed the Iron Virgin.

Myra giggled. Her eyes shone with giddy alcoholic light.

"Yesh, Drake."

"We've been together for almost a year now-"

"Eight months," Myra corrected, lifting her glass in a toast. "Eight looooooong months."

"Yes. And there comes a time in every relationship when it either grows or dies. And I think that in the case of ours, it has-"

At that moment, a pair of uniformed police officers came to their table, their faces so solemnly set that they might have been a pair of walking bookends.

"Miss Cranston?" one of them said. "I regret to inform you that there's been a terrible tragedy in your family. Your brother is . . . gone."

Myra looked at the officer through an uncomprehending alcoholic haze.

"Gone," she said. "Gone where?"

The officers looked even more uncomfortable. "What I mean to say, Miss Cranston, is that he is deceased. I'm sorry."

"I don't understand," said Myra Cranston truthfully. She gave a little bubbly hiccup at that point.

Drake Mangan understood. He understood perfectly. He handed each officer a twenty-dollar bill and said, "Thank you both very much. I think I should handle this."

The officers were happy to comply and walked quickly from the restaurant.

"What was that all about?" asked Myra, filling another pair of wineglasses. She had red wine on the right and white wine on the left. She liked to drink them alternately. Sometimes she mixed them. Once she had mixed them in a saucer and sipped from it.

"I'll explain later, darling," Mangan said.

"First time you ever called me darling," Myra said with a giggle.

"That's because I've made a discovery," Drake Mangan said, summoning up all the sincerity he could muster. "I love you, Myra."

"You do?" She hiccuped.

"Passionately. And I want to marry you." He took her clammy blotched-skin hand in his. "Will you marry me, dearest?" He felt like throwing up but business was business.

"This is so sudden."

"I can't wait. Let's get married tonight. We'll find a justice of the peace."

"Tonight? With my brother gone? He'd want to be there. "

"He'll understand. Come on, let's get going." The justice of the peace was reluctant.

"Are you sure you want to marry her?" he asked dubiously.

"Of course," said Mangan. "What's wrong with her?"

"Your intended can barely stand up."

"Then we'll have the ceremony sitting down. Here's the ring. Let's get on with it, man."

"Are you sure you wish to marry this man, miss?" the justice asked Myra.

Myra giggled. "My brother's gone but he won't mind."

The justice of the peace shrugged and performed the ceremony.

There was no honeymoon. Just a funeral for Brant Cranston. Even after the funeral, there had been no honeymoon, and now, almost thirty years later, Myra Cranston Mangan was still, as far as her husband knew, a virgin.

But Drake Mangan didn't care. He now had control of Cranston Motors and he kept control of it during all the buyouts and mergers and reorganizations that got rid of the classic old Big Three and created a new Big Three: General Autos, American Autos, and National Autos, which Mangan now headed.

President of National Autos. Drawing his million-dollar-a-year salary. It was all that mattered to Drake Mangan. Except, maybe someday, getting into his wife's pants. Just to see what it was like.

After the attempt on Lyle Lavallette's life, the police had offered him protection. He turned them down. He had declined to brief the FBI about his personal life and habits. "No one is going to try to kill me. Really," he said.

His wife in a sober moment suggested he hire extra bodyguards.

"I already have two bodyguards, which is two more than I need," he told her.

The two bodyguards were a pair of former Detroit Lions linebackers. Drake Mangan had hired them for two reasons: they were tax-deductible and he was a football fan and liked to hear their war stories over lunch. The rest of the time, he kept them cooling their heels in the first-floor lobby of the National Autos building while he held sway in his twelfth-floor office. They were nice guys but when they were bored, they had a tendency to play with their guns.

Which was why, when Drake Mangan heard gunshots drifting up from the lobby via the elevator shaft, he was only mildly interested. Certainly not surprised and definitely not afraid. Things like that happened, and sometimes several times in a slow week.

Nevertheless, Mangan ordered his executive secretary to call the lobby.

"Ask Security what's going on down there."

The secretary came back into his office almost immediately, looking worried.

"Mr. Mangan, there seems to be some trouble."

"What kind of trouble? Has one of those walking sides of beef shot himself in the foot again?"

"No, Mr. Mangan. One of them shot a security guard."

"Damn. Don't they know what that does to our insurance rates?"

The secretary shrugged and Mangan said, "Well, get them up here and let's see what's going on."

"I can't. They were shot too. By the other security guards."

"What the hell's going on down there?" he said. "How many people are shot? Who did you talk to?"

"I'm not sure. He had a funny little voice. Kind of squeaky, Oriental, maybe. He said he was the one they were shooting at."

"Anything else?"

"Yes, sir. He said he was on his way up."

"Up? Up here?"

"This is the only up I have any knowledge of, Mr. Mangan."

"Don't get smart. Get the police."

At that moment, the muted hum of the elevator rose to their floor.

"It's him," said Drake Mangan, looking for a place to hide.

The elevator doors purred open. A figure glided out and appeared in the office door.

Drake Mangan leveled an accusing finger at the figure. "You! Assassin!" he shouted.

Chiun, Master of Sinanju, smiled at the rare display of recognition from a white man.

"I do not sign autographs," he said. He wore a peach kimono tastefully trimmed in black. His hazel eyes were birdlike in their survey of the room. "I will need an office if I am to stay here," Chiun said. "This one will suffice."

"This is my office," Mangan said stonily.

"For a white, your taste is almost adequate," Chiun said.

"What did you do with my bodyguards?"

"Nothing," Chiun said, examining cut flowers on a long table. "They did it to themselves. I merely informed them that I was here as a personal emissary of their government and they refused to admit me. Then they began shooting one another. They were very excitable."

Mangan looked incredulous. "They shot one another trying to shoot you?"

Chiun shrugged expressively. "I would not call it real trying."

Mangan nodded to his secretary, who slipped back out into her reception area. A push-button telephone began beeping electronically.

"What did you say about the government?" Mangan asked in a loud voice, hoping it would drown out the sound of his secretary dialing for help.

Chiun looked up from the flowers and decided to ignore the telephoning.

"You are most fortunate," he said. "Ordinarily I am employed to protect the Constitution. Today, I am protecting you."

"Protecting me? From what?"

"From wrongful assassination, of course," Chiun said. "Is there any other kind?"

Chiun spat on the Oriental rug, which he recognized had been made in Iran. "Of course. Killing with guns is wrongful. Killing without payment is wrongful. Killing-"

"Who sent you?" interrupted Mangan when his secretary poked her head back into the office and gave him a thumbs-up sign. Good. Help was on the way. He just had to stall this old fool.

"I cannot say," whispered Chiun and pressed an index finger to his lips. "But he secretly rules this land on behalf of your President. Just do not tell anyone, or your government may fall."

"I see," said Mangan who did not see at all. Gingerly, he slipped into the padded leather chair behind his massive desk. It was a big substantial desk, excellent for ducking behind in the event of shooting, which Mangan expected momentarily.

"Perhaps then someday you may explain it to me," said Chiun. "Now. Down to business. Have you had any contact with anyone calling himself Remo Williams?"

"No. Who's Remo Williams?"

"Remo Williams is my pupil. He is Korean, like me. Possibly as much as one-sixteenth Korean. But there is another who is calling himself Remo Williams. This one means you harm and I am here to protect you from him."

"And you work for the President?"

"I work for no one," Chiun snapped. "I have a contract with the emperor. He works for the President." Chiun smiled. "But I'm sure the President knows I am here. "

Just then, the elevator doors opened and four policemen ran into the office, guns drawn.

"Start shooting," Mangan yelled. "Everyone's expendable but me." As Chiun turned toward the door to the office, Mangan ran out, past his secretary's desk and into a small alcove, where he picked up a telephone.

Behind him, he heard one of the policemen say: "Now don't give us any trouble, old-timer, and you won't get hurt." He heard an answering chuckle.

"Let me talk to the President," Mangan said into the telephone.

The White House operator asked, "Is this an emergency, Mr. Mangan?"

"I'm a personal friend of the President's. I poured seven figures' worth of corporate profits into his reelection. I don't need an excuse to talk to him."

"One moment, please, sir."

Mangan held the phone, expecting to hear shooting from inside his office. But there was nothing but silence.

In a few seconds, the President of the United States was on the line. "Good to hear from you, Drake. What's on your mind?"

"I have a situation here, Mr. President. I know this is going to sound wild but did you, by any remote chance, send some Chinaman here to protect my life?"

"Describe him."

"Maybe five feet tall, maybe eighty years old. Dressed in some kind of colored dress or something. He just trashed my entire security force."

"Good. Then he's on the job," the President said.

"Sir?"

"You can relax now, Drake. You're in good hands."

"Good hands? Mr. President, He's old and wrinkled."

"It hasn't stopped me," said the President. "I had him sent there to protect you."

"From what?"

"From the same nut who shot Lavallette," the President said. "We can't very well have all of Detroit's brains wiped out, can we?"

"We use a Chinaman for protection?"

"A Korean. Never call him Chinese," the President said. "I can't be responsible. Is the young fella there too?"

"The old man's alone," Mangan said.

"Well, one of them's enough," the President said. "Let me know how this all turns out. Regards to the wife. And by the way, I wouldn't mention any of this to anyone. I've already forgotten this conversation."

"I understand, Mr. President. I think."

Mangan dropped the receiver and ran back to his office. Christ, the old gook was from the President and Mangan had turned four Detroit cops loose on him. If he was dead already, how would Mangan explain it to the President? Chiun was not dead. He was sitting calmly behind Mangan's desk. The four police officers lay in the center of the office carpet, all their wrists bound together with their own four sets of handcuffs.

They were writhing around on the floor, trying to get loose. Once of them saw him and yelled, "Mr. Mangan. Call for reinforcements."

Mangan shook his head. "That won't be necessary, men. Heh, heh. Just a case of mistaken identity. The old gentleman here is part of my security team."

"Then get us out of here," another policeman called. Mangan dug into their pockets for the handcuff keys and freed them all, even though he did not like touching members of the proletariat.

"You sure this guy's all right?" one of the policemen asked Mangan. The officer was rubbing his wrists, trying to get circulation back into his fingers.

"Yes. He's okay. It was all my error," he said.

"You know we're going to have to file a report on this," the cop said.

Mangan smiled and said, "Maybe we can work something out."

In the hallway outside his office, he worked something out. The policemen would each be able to buy their next new cars at half-price. In return, they would just simply deal with the unfortunate shootings down in the lobby as accidental gunshots. And they would forget the old man.

He saw the policemen on to the elevator and then went back into his office.

"Mr.-"

"Chiun. Master Chiun, not Mister."

"Master Chiun. I've checked you out. You are who you say you are."

"I could have told you that and saved us both a great deal of trouble," Chiun said petulantly.

"What's done is done. If you're here to protect me, what should I do?"

"Try not to get yourself killed," Chiun said.

The rescue helicopters came during the night. Remo was the first to hear them and he quietly woke Lorna from her sleep.

"The planes are on the way," he said.

"I don't hear them," she said.

"You will in a minute."

"Good. It'll be wonderful to get back to civilization," she said.

"Truth is, I'll sort of miss you all," Remo said.

"What do you mean?"

"This is where I get off," he said. "Last stop."

"You're not going back with us?" She paused; the first whirrings of the approaching helicopters were now faintly audible over the broad desert.

"No," Remo said. "People would ask too many questions. "

"Where will you go?" she said. "This is the desert."

"I know, but trust me, I can find my way out. No problem at all."

"You can't do that."

"I have to. I just wanted to say good-bye to you. And ask a favor."

"Name it."

"Don't mention my name. You're the only one who knows it and if anybody mentions me, just don't mention my name. Let me just be a passenger who wandered off. "

"You sure you want it this way?" she said.

"I do."

She threw herself into Remo's arms. "I won't ask you any questions," she said. "But you just be careful."

"I will. And take care of that little girl," Remo said. He squeezed the woman once, then turned and ran off across the sand, just as the rescue craft's light became visible a mile away across the desert.

Remo ran just until he was out of sight, then slowed down and began loping north at a casual pace. A few miles away, Remo climbed onto an outcropping of rock and looked back. Two giant helicopters were parked on the sand, next to the burned-out jetliner. He could see people being helped aboard the two craft. He nodded to himself, in satisfaction, and turned away again.

The sun was coming up off to his right, turning the dunes to rose color. Later, as the sun went higher, it bleached the sand white. It was late afternoon when the sand gave way to rock. Remo spent the time thinking. In a curious way, he already missed the scene of the aircraft wreck. He had been raised an orphan and had never had a family; they had looked up to him; they had relied on him. It was a strange, but a pleasant, feeling, and once again he pitied himself for all that he had missed, and would always miss, in his life.

"Ah, that's the biz, sweetheart," he growled to himself and started to run northward.

He found the town just after sunset and used a pay phone in the local tavern. No matter how small a town was, he thought, it had a tavern. Maybe that's what created towns; maybe somebody built a tavern and then a town grew up around it.

He dialed Chiun's hotel in New York but got no answer in the room. Then he dialed a special code. The call went through a number in East Moline, Illinois, was rerouted through a circuit in Iola, Wisconsin, and finally rang the telephone on the desk of Dr. Harold W. Smith.

"Yes?" Smith's lemony voice said.

"Smitty, it's me," Remo said. "I'm back." There was a long silence.

"Smitty? What's the matter?" Remo said.

"Remo?" Smith said slowly. "Is Chiun with you?"

"No. I just called his number but he didn't answer. I thought you'd know where he is."

"I'm happy to hear from you, Remo," Smith said.

"Then why do you sound like you just got a call from your dead grandmother?"

"Are you still in Detroit?"

Remo looked at the receiver in his hand as if it were personally responsible for the stupid words coming through the earpiece.

"Detroit? What are you talking about? I'm in Utah."

"When did you arrive in Utah, Remo?"

"Yesterday, when my goddamn plane crashed in the desert. And stop talking to me like I'm Jack the Ripper, will you?"

At Folcroft Sanitarium, Smith keyed a one-word command into his terminal: TRACE.

The green letters blinked and a telephone number appeared almost instantly on the screen. Smith saw that it was a Utah area code. The computer also told him that Remo was calling from a pay phone.

"Hello. Smitty. Whistle if you hear me."

"I heard you, Remo," Smith said. "What was that about a plane crash?"

"My flight went down in some desert about eighty miles from here."

"Flight number?"

"Who cares about the freaking flight number? Listen, I just saved a planeload of people out in the desert. And I got out alive. Why are you being so annoying?"

Smith's computer, on command, began scrolling the facts of a Los Angeles-Salt Lake City flight that had disappeared the previous day.

"Did your flight originate in Los Angeles?"

"Of course. I did that guy, the way you wanted, and then I got out of there on another plane right away."

"And you haven't been in Detroit?"

"Why would I be in Detroit? I buy Japanese."

"Remo, I think it would be best if you returned to Folcroft right away."

"You sound like you want to stick me in a rubber room," Remo said.

"You should be debriefed on your experience."

"Debrief this. I was in the desert and it was hot and everybody's safe and I planted the skyjacker in the sand and that's that. End of debriefing."

"Don't get upset. It's just that I wanted to talk to you."

"Where's Chiun? Talk about that."

"He's away," Smith said.

"He didn't go back to Sinanju again, did he?"

"No."

"He's where, Smitty? Where is he?"

"He's on an errand," Smith said.

"An errand? Chiun wouldn't do an errand for the Shah of Iran if he came back to life. Is he on assignment?"

Smith hesitated a moment. "Something like that."

"Where is he?"

"I can't really tell you that. Now if you'll just-"

"Smitty," said Remo, "I'm going to hang up. But before I go I want you to listen carefully."

"Yes?" said Smith, leaning into the phone.

In Utah, Remo brought the palm of his hand to the telephone speaker with such force that the receiver snapped into pieces.

Smith howled in pain but he howled into a dead telephone. Remo was gone.

Chapter 8

The black car pulled up so silently that he did not hear it coming.

The tinted window on the driver's side opened just a crack. He could not see the driver.

The gunman with the scar down the right side of his jaw stepped from his own car and walked over to the other vehicle. Every window, even the windshield, was tinted so dark that in the weak light of the underground garage on the Canadian side of the Detroit River, he could not see the driver, except as a deep shadow in the deeper darkness of the car's interior.

"Williams?" the invisible driver asked.

"Call me Remo," the gunman said. "Nice car. Never saw one like it."

"I'd be surprised if you had. It's Lavallette's big surprise, the Dynacar. I stole it."

An envelope was pushed out the crack of the car window. "Here. I'm paying you for the Lavallette hit. I want Mangan taken out next. There's an address in the envelope. It's a woman Mangan visits every Thursday night. You can get him there."

"I haven't got Lavallette yet," the gunman said.

"You did fine. Follow the plan and take them in the order I give you. There's plenty of time to get Lavallette at the end of this. I don't mind if he's sweating a little bit."

"I could have finished him at the news conference," the gunman said. "I had time."

"You did right. I told you no head shots and you followed instructions. I want them all looking good for their funerals. It's not anybody's fault that Lavallette was wearing a bulletproof vest."

"I've got a reputation to live up to," the gunman said. "When I clip a guy, I don't like him planning press conferences later."

"We follow the plan. Take them in order. And no head shots. "

The gunman counted the money in the envelope, then shrugged. "It's your show," he said. "That letter to the paper. Was that your idea?"

The unseen driver said softly, "Yes. I thought we could raise a little smoke screen. It might make things a little tougher for you though."

"How's that?" the gunman said.

"They might be expecting you. Probably more security."

The gunman shook his head. "None of it matters to me. "

"I love dealing with professionals," the driver said. "Now get Mangan."

The tinted window sealed automatically and without any engine sound at all, the sporty black car slid up the garage ramp and out toward the street, like a fleet ghost.

The gunman who called himself Remo Williams got into his car and waited as he had been instructed to do.

It was a flaky contract and he did not like flaky contracts. They were unprofessional. He would have preferred a clean hit on a boat somewhere or under an overpass at night. Strictly business. This deal smelled too much like a personal vendetta.

He checked his watch. Five minutes had passed and he started his car and drove from the garage. There was no sense in spooking the client. By now he would be far enough away. A good professional watched out for the details. The details were everything. It would just be bad form to leave the garage right on his tail and two minutes later find yourself stopped next to him at a traffic light. Things like that made clients nervous.

The gunman had no curiosity at all to know the name of the man who had hired him to flatten four of Detroit's biggest wheels.

He did not, for a moment, believe that the client was some environmentalist nut who wanted the automakers dead because they were polluting the air. His bet would be that it was some kind of business rivalry, but it didn't matter. Not so long as he was being paid.

It was the business of not being able to shoot any of them in the head that bothered him the most. The client should have known that head shots were the most certain. You could shoot a guy all afternoon in the chest and he might not die.

The gunman had seen it himself, firsthand. It had been his first contract. The target was named Anthony "Big Nose" Senaro, a mastodon of a man who had cut into the don's numbers business in Brooklyn. Senaro had gotten word he was about to be hit and skipped to Chicago.

The gunman had found him there, working as a laborer in the stockyards. He waited until Senaro was eating lunch one day, walked up to him and fired three shots into Big Nose's massive chest. Big Nose had let out a bull roar and charged him.

He had fired his full clip at Senaro. There was blood everywhere but the big guy kept on coming, like a refrigerator on casters.

The gunman ran and for an hour, Senaro had chased him around the stockyard. Finally Senaro cornered him, put his big fingers around the gunman's throat, and began to squeeze. Just as the gunman was about to black out, Senaro gave a mighty sigh and collapsed from loss of blood.

The gunman scrambled away, losing a shoe to Big Nose's clutching hands. He never finished the hit. And Senaro eventually recuperated and went on to make a name for himself in Chicago.

The don had been understanding of the gunman's failure. "It is always difficult," Don Pietro had told him, "the first time, eh? The first time for everything is always an unhappy time."

"I will get him next time," the gunman had assured Don Pietro, even though his stomach quaked at the thought of facing the big man again.

"There will be no next time. Not for you and Big Nose. You are both lucky to live. Big Nose will not return to bother us but he has earned his life. And you, you have earned our respect. We will have much work for you."

The other hits had gone down better. The gunman had made a name for himself too. Using head shots. That one restriction still bothered him. It was unprofessional.

But the client was always right. At least for the time being.

Drake Mangan was on a conference telephone call with James Revell, president of the General Auto Company, and Hubert Millis, head of American Autos.

"What are we going to do?" Revell said. "That lunatic Lavallette has rescheduled his press conference for tomorrow and we're all invited. Do we go?"

Millis said, "We've got to. We can't look like we're afraid of Lavallette and his damned mystery car. Freaking thing probably won't start anyway. "

"I don't know," Mangan said. "I'm afraid someone will start pegging shots at us."

"The security people will take care of that," Millis said. "You know what sticks in my craw?"

"What's that?" said Mangan.

"At one time or another, Lavallette worked for all of us and every one of us fired him," Millis said.

"Damned right. The guy said to take the fins off the Cadillacs," Revell said. "A damned moron. He deserved firing. "

"No," said Millis. "We shouldn't have fired him. We should have killed the son of a bitch. Then we wouldn't be having all this grief."

Mangan chuckled. "Maybe it's not too late," he said. "It's agreed then. Tomorrow, we'll all be at Lavallette's press conference."

The other two men agreed and Mangan disconnected his conference call.

He'd go, but he'd be damned if he'd go without the old Oriental. If the President of the United States said that the old gook could protect Mangan, well, that was good enough for Drake Mangan. What's-his-name . . . Chiun could accompany him anywhere.

Except where he was going tonight.

The old maniac had a way with labor relations, though. Drake Mangan had to admit that.

After Mangan had evacuated the office, Chiun had decided he wanted something painted on the door. He had the secretary send up the head of the auto-body-painting division.

The door was open and Mangan heard the conversation from outside, near his secretary's desk.

"You will paint a new sign on the door," Chiun had said.

"I don't paint doors," the division head had said.

"Hold. You are a painter, are you not?" Chiun had said.

"Yes. I'm in charge of body finish on cars."

"This will be much easier than painting a car," Chiun had said.

The division head snapped, "No. Never. I don't paint doors."

"And who has given you these instructions?" Chiun asked.

"The union. I don't paint doors."

"Those instructions are no longer operative," Chiun had said. "You are now in charge of painting doors for me. Starting with this one."

"Who says? Who the hell are you anyway?"

"I am Chiun."

"I am leaving," the division head said. "The union's going to hear about this."

From his spot outside, Mangan heard a muffled sound. He craned his neck and peered through the door. The old Oriental had the division chief by the earlobe.

"I would like gold paint," he had said.

"Yes, sir. Yes, sir," the man had said. "I'll be right back with the paint."

"Five minutes," Chiun had said. "If you do not return in five minutes, I will come looking for you. You will not like that."

The division head had scurried from the office. When the elevator did not answer immediately to the button, he went running down the stairs.

Drake Mangan was impressed. Twisting ears. He had never tried that in dealing with the auto union. It was never too late to learn new things in the complicated field of labor relations.

Now the door to the office that Chiun had commandeered was closed. The division head knelt on the floor in front of it, painting the last few letters of the legend Chiun had given him.

It read: "HIS AWESOME MAGNIFICENCE."

Mangan guessed Chiun would not come out until the painting was done, so he ran over and pressed the elevator button.

"Leaving, Mr. Mangan? I'll tell Master Chiun."

"No. Don't do that."

"But he's your bodyguard."

"Not tonight. I have a very important appointment tonight. Tell him I'll see him first thing in the morning."

The elevator door opened and as soon as Mangan stepped inside, his secretary hit the intercom button.

"Master Chiun, Mr. Mangan has just left. I thought you should know."

Chiun opened the door. He paused to read the almostfinished sign on the door, then patted the painter on the head.

"You do reasonably good work," he said. "For a white. I will keep you in mind if I have other tasks to perform. "

"Okay, okay. Just no more ear-twisting, all right?"

"As long as you behave," Chiun said. "Don't forget to put stars under the words. I like stars."

"You've got stars. Count on it. You've got stars." Drake Mangan parked in front of the high-rise apartment building near St. Clair Shores, as he had almost every Thursday night since he had been married.

He rode the elevator up to the penthouse apartment he rented for his mistress. Over the years, the mistresses had changed but Mangan had kept the same apartment. He chalked it up to tradition. In his heart, he told himself, he was just a traditional sort of man.

He shut the apartment door behind him with the heel of his shoe and called out, "Agatha?" The penthouse was decorated in the worst possible taste, down to zebra-striped furniture and black velvet paintings of clowns on the wall, but the softly lit atmosphere was redolent of Agatha's favorite perfume, a musky scent that even smelled lewd. Just sniffing it made the cares of the day fall away like dead skin and Mangan could feel the juices stirring deep inside his body.

"Agatha. Daddy's home." There was no answer. "Where are you, baby?"

He shucked off his topcoat and draped it over one of the offending black-and-white sofas. The door to the bedroom was open a crack and a warm light, softer than candlelight, seeped out.

She was in the bedroom. Great. No sense wasting half the evening in small talk. He could get small talk at home. It was the only thing he ever did get at home.

"Warming up the bed for me, Agatha?" He pushed the door open.

"There you are. Come to Papa."

But Agatha did not rise from the bed. She lay on her back, dressed in red silk pajamas, staring at the ceiling. One arm was casually tucked under her wealth of blond hair. A leg hung off over the edge of the bed.

She looked like she was watching the fly that buzzed her generous chest.

But she wasn't. Mangan knew that when he saw the fly alight on the tip of her long nose. She didn't twitch. She didn't even blink.

He stepped forward and said, softly, "Agatha?"

The door slammed shut behind him. Before he turned, Mangan finally saw the hole in the red silk of Agatha's pajama top. It looked like a cigarette burn hole but the center was the livid color of raw meat and he saw a deeper red splotch surrounding it, deeper even than the red of the silk.

The man who had slammed shut the door behind him was tall and lean, with a long scar down the right side of his jaw. In one of his gloved hands he carried a black pistol, its long barrel pointing directly at Mangan's chest. The automaker's heart started beating high in his throat, and he felt as if it were going to choke him.

"Who the hell are you? What's going on here?" Mangan snapped.

The man with the scar smiled a cruel smile.

"You can call me Remo. Sorry I had to ditch the girlfriend but she wouldn't cooperate. Kept trying to call the police."

"I don't even know you. Why are you . . . why did...?"

The gunman shrugged. "It's nothing personal, Mangan. You're just a name on a list."

Slowly his finger tightened on the trigger. Mangan could not stop staring at the barrel. His mouth worked, but no sound came out.

There was a sudden screech, loud, unearthly, like a high-speed diamond drill scoring glass. It was followed by a shattering of glass that turned both the gunman's and Mangan's heads as if they were attached to a single yanking string.

Entering through a perfectly circular hole cut in the window with a long fingernail came Chiun, Master of Sinanju, a cold light in his eyes.

"It's him, Chiun," cried Drake Mangan. "The assassin. Remo Williams."

"Wrong both times," said Chiun. He looked at the gunman and said, "Lay down your weapon and you may win a painless death."

The gunman laughed, turned his pistol on the frail Oriental, and fired twice.

The bullets shattered what was left of the window behind Chiun. He had not seemed to move, yet the bullets missed him, somehow striking points that were on a direct line behind him.

The gunman took his pistol in both hands and dropped into a marksman's crouch. He sighted carefully. The little man did not even flinch. The gunman fired.

A section of the wall cracked and still the Oriental stood immobile.

Another shot and the same result. But this time, the gunman thought he saw a faint afterimage of the old Oriental, as if he had moved to one side and returned to his place in the quicksilver interval between the time the bullet left the gun barrel and the moment it buried itself in the wall.

"This is crazy," the gunman said. And then the Oriental was coming at him. It was the Big Nose Senaro hit all over again.

Drake Mangan had fallen back onto the bed to watch but now as Chiun advanced across the room, he saw his chance to make headlines: "AUTO MOGUL CAPTURES CRAZED GUNMAN; DRAKE MANGAN DISARMS ASSASSIN."

It would be great new material for the paperback edition of his autobiography when it came out.

He saw the gunman's eyes were fixed on Chiun. He got to his feet, then lunged across the floor at the man with the pistol.

"No!" Chiun shouted, but it was too late. Mangan was already in motion. The gunman wheeled toward him and squeezed the trigger, even as Chiun was trying to move between gunman and target.

The president of National Autos was hit and knocked back onto the bed by the impact. But there was no hole in his chest and Mangan groaned.

Another bulletproof vest, the gunman thought, and swiveled his pistol back on the advancing Oriental. But the old man was not advancing anymore. He was lying facedown on the floor.

The gunman saw the gleam of blood in the fringe of hair over the Oriental's ear. A ricochet. A one-in-a-million shot. The bullet had bounced off Mangan and struck the old man in the head.

The gunman laughed in relief.

On the bed, Mangan groaned atop the body of his dead mistress.

"Now for you." The gunman grabbed him by his lapel. The fabric felt stiff under his fingers.

A Kevlar suit. That explained it. The man had taken the precaution of wearing a bullet-resistant business suit. A lot of politicians were wearing them these days because they were light and reasonably comfortable, but could deflect anything short of a Teflon-coated bullet.

"What are you doing?" Mangan said when the gunman started to pull at his tie.

"They used to do it like this back in the old days.

They'd take a guy out to a secluded spot and open up his shirt before they whacked him. It used to be a tradition and I'm just bringing it back."

The gunman ripped open Mangan's shirt buttons and tore a hole in his undershirt. Then he put the muzzle of the pistol to bare skin, held the struggling man down with an arm across his clavicle, and fired a single heart-stopping round.

Drake Mangan jerked like a man who'd touched a live wire, then his body relaxed.

The gunman stood up and told the corpse, "I would have preferred giving you a head shot."

Then he quietly left the penthouse, waiting until he reached the stairs before holstering his pistol and stripping off his gloves. He took his time. It was a long walk to the street but he had all the time in the world.

He wondered if he would get a bonus for the old Oriental. Probably not. He was probably just some overpriced kung-fu guy Mangan had hired to bodyguard him. Those guys were a dime a dozen.

Chapter 9

"I still can't figure out what made the earpiece explode like that," the telephone repairman said.

"It's fixed now?" Smith asked.

"Yes. I've just got to clean up around here and I'm done. "

"You're done now. I'll clean up," Smith said.

The repairman smiled. "No. We have to clean up. Part of the total service package offered by American Telephone and Northeast Bell Communications Nynex and Telegraph Consolidated Incorporated. That's the name of the new company."

"Very interesting," Smith said. The telephone rang. He walked the repairman to the office door and pushed him outside. "Thank you very much."

"I wanted to clean up."

"I'll do it. Good-bye." Smith locked the door and ran back to the telephone.

"Hail, Emperor Smith," said Chiun.

"We must have a bad connection," Smith said. "Your voice sounds weak."

"It is a minor thing," said Chiun. "I will soon recover."

"Recover from what?"

"From the shame," Chiun said.

Smith gripped the receiver more tightly. The earpiece that the repairman had just installed was loose against his ear. He twisted it tight.

"I'm sure you will recover from the shame," he said, sensing another of Chiun's con games coming on.

"The shame of this indignity," said Chiun as if Smith had asked him for an explanation. "I am only happy that the Master who trained me did not live to see this. I would hang my head before him; his remonstrances would scourge my soul."

Smith sighed. "What shame is that?" he said. There would be no talking to Chiun until the old Oriental had gone through his full song and dance.

"In times past, Masters of Sinanju have been called upon to preserve the lives of certain personages. Kings, emperors, sultans. There was even a pharaoh of Egypt who came under the protection of a Master of Sinanju when that pharaoh ascended his throne. He was but six summers of age but the Master who protected him saw him rule until his ninety-sixth birthday. It is recorded as the longest reign in history and it would never have happened without Sinanju at his side. Now that was a trust of honor. Would that the current Master had such an illustrious charge."

Smith tensed. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

"But not Chiun," the sorrowful voice continued. "Chiun is not given kings to guard. Not even a lowly prince. Or a pretender. I could hold my head high if I were charged with guarding a pretender to a worthy throne."

"Did something happen to Drake Mangan? Is he all right?"

"Instead, I have been given a fat white merchant, a merchant whose life is not even important to his loved ones. How can one do one's best work when one is asked to work at such an unworthy task? I ask you. How?"

"Is Mangan dead?" demanded Smith.

"Pah!" spat Chiun. "He was born dead. All his life, he lived a living death, eating and drinking poisons that increased his deadness. If he is more dead now, it is merely in degree. The only difference between a living dead white man and a dead dead white man is that the latter does not bray. Although he does still smell."

"What happened?" Smith asked wearily.

Chiun's voice swelled. "A terrible creature descended upon him. Huge he was, his bigness as that of a house. A veritable giant. But the Master of Sinanju did not fear this apparition, this giant whose enormity rivaled that of a great temple. The Master of Sinanju moved forward to confront him, but it was already too late. The fat white merchant who was already dead before Sinanju ever heard of him, became still."

"All right," Smith said. "He got Mangan."

"No," said Chiun. "His weapon did. These guns are a menace, Emperor. Perhaps it is time that laws were passed."

"We'll discuss it later," said Smith. "He got Mangan. But you got him, is that correct?"

Chiun hesitated before answering. "Not precisely correct."

"What does that mean?" demanded Smith, who had seen the seemingly frail Master of Sinanju rip through a squadron of armed soldiers like a hurricane through a cornfield.

"It means what it means," said Chiun haughtily. "The Master of Sinanju is never vague."

"All right, all right. He got away. Somehow he got away from you. But you saw him. It wasn't Remo?"

"Yes and no," Chiun said.

"I'm glad you're never vague," Smith said dryly. "Either it was or it wasn't Remo. Which was it?"

Chiun's voice dropped into a conspiratorial whisper. "He gave his name. It was most strange. Amateurs seldom appreciate the value of advertising. But this one gave his name. "

"Yes?"

"He said his name was Remo Williams. But he was not the Remo Williams we know. Why would he lie?" Smith quickly brought the CURE computer system on line and began keying a search sequence.

"Maybe it wasn't all a lie," Smith said. He typed in the name REMO WILLIAMS and hit the control button. The search program was initiated, working with a speed that would have astonished the operators of the Pentagon's "numbercrunching" supercomputers; all possible public records in America were scanned for the name of Remo Williams. When Remo had been recruited to work for CURE many years ago, all files on him had been deleted. If there were now any references to a Remo Williams, it would indicate an impostor was using his name.

"Describe the man," Smith asked Chiun, activating an auxiliary computer file on which to record the description. "He was pale, like a white, and too tall, with big clumsy feet, like a white. And like most whites, he had coarse hairs growing from his chin."

"A beard?"

"No. Not like mine. I have a beard. This white thing had hair ends growing from his face."

Smith keyed the fact that the killer had needed a shave. "Age?" asked Smith as he watched the search program run on the split screen. Millions of records, glowing an electronic green, scrolled past his eyes in a blur. It hurt to look at the running program and his fingers poised to record the answer to his question.

"He is no more than fifty-five winters, perhaps less," Chiun said. "Do you know him now?"

"Master of Sinaju," said Smith slowly, "think carefully. Did this man look like Remo? Our Remo?"

There was a long silence over the line before the Master of Sinanju replied.

"Who can say? All whites look alike. Wait. He had a scar on his face, along the right side of the jaw. Our Remo has no such scar."

But Smith could tell from the tremor in Chiun's voice that the Master of Sinanju was thinking the same thing that he was, thinking that the one eventuality that the people who had originated CURE had never foreseen, finally had come about.

"Could this shooter of guns be Remo's father?" asked Chiun. "Is that what you are thinking?"

The search file stopped running before Smith could answer. The computer screen flashed: NO FILE FOUND ... PRESS: ESCAPE KEY.

Smith hit the escape key and brought up Remo's original CURE file.

"At fifty-five, the man would be the right age. But he couldn't be. Remo is supposed to be an orphan. He has no known living relatives of any description."

"Everyone has relatives," said Chiun, thinking of his wicked brother-in-law, now dead. "Whether they want them or not."

"Remo was an infant when the nuns found him on the doorstep of St. Theresa's Orphanage," said Smith, skimming the Remo file. "It's not clear who named him. Perhaps they found a note with the baby or the nuns named him. The records that might have told us-if they ever even existed-were destroyed in a fire years before Remo joined CURE. St. Theresa's is long gone, too."

"Remo must never learn of this," Chiun said.

"Agreed," said Smith, looking away from the file. Sometimes it bothered him to read it. He had done a terrible thing to a young policeman once, and even though it was for a greater purpose, that didn't make it any less of a terrible thing.

"This man who calls himself Remo Williams is your assignment, Chiun. I expect you will carry it out."

"If this man carries the same blood as Remo, then I have as much to lose as you," Chiun said coldly. "More." Smith nodded. He knew that Chiun saw Remo as the next Master of Sinanju, the heir of a tradition that went back to before the recording of history. It was one of the great conflicts in the arrangement between Smith and Chiun that each saw Remo as his own. Neither bothered to ask Remo what he thought.

"Good," said Smith. "I have heard from Remo, our Remo, but I have refused to tell him where you are. I will hold him off as long as I can and in the meantime, perhaps you can dispose of this matter."

"Consider it done, Emperor," Chiun said.

"The other two big car men are James Revell and Hubert Millis. They have announced that they will be at Lyle Lavallette's press conference tomorrow. If an attempt is to be made, it might be made there again."

"This killer's hours are numbered, O Emperor," said Chiun gravely. "You do not know where our Remo is?"

"He was in Utah. I expect he'll be coming here to find out where you are. I'll try to stall him until I have your assignment-completed call," Smith said.

"That will be fine," Chiun said and hung up.

Smith closed down Remo's file. Chiun would take care of this man who might or might not be Remo's father. And that would be the end of that and Remo would never know. Perhaps it was unjust but what was one more injustice on top of the others? When Remo Williams had become the Destroyer for CURE, he had lost all his rights, both natural and constitutional. Losing a father he never knew he had wouldn't really make much of a difference.

Remo Williams, the Destroyer, arrived in Detroit around midnight.

After Smith had refused to tell him where Chiun was, Remo had been at a loss until he remembered that Smith had mentioned Detroit. Mentioned it twice, in fact. Smith had thought Remo was calling from Detroit, and why would he have thought that?

There was only one good answer: Smith had jumped to the conclusion that Remo was in Detroit because the CURE director knew that Chiun was already in Detroit.

That was simple and it annoyed Remo that Smith would not expect him to figure it out. The more he thought about it, the more annoyed he got and when he reached the Detroit airport, he went to the car-rental counter and asked for the most expensive car they had.

In his wallet, he found a credit card for Remo Cochran. "I'm sorry, sir, but all our cars are the same rate," the clerk told him.

"Okay," Remo said. "Then I want four of them."

"Four?"

"That's right. I don't like to be seen in the same cheap car too long. It hurts my image."

"Well, is it just you?"

"Yes," Remo said. "Do I look like more than one?"

"No, sir. I was just wondering who will drive the other three cars."

"Nobody," Remo said. "I want them to sit here in the parking lot until I come back for them. Better make it a three-month rental on all four."

With discounts for long-term use and for Remo's excellent driving record, but adding in penalties for renting on a Friday which cost Remo the weekly special rate which was only good if your week started on Tuesday, and adding in the insurance which Remo insisted he wanted, the bill came to $7,461.20.

"You sure you want to do this, sir?" the clerk said.

"Yes," Remo said.

The clerk shrugged. "Well, it's your money."

"No, it's not," Remo said. Let Smith chew on that bill when he received it. "Where's your nearest phone?"

The clerk pointed to a booth three feet from Remo's left elbow.

"Didn't see it," Remo said. "Thanks."

"You want the numbers of every hotel in the city?" the information operator asked in a frightened voice.

"Just the best ones. He wouldn't stay anywhere except at the best hotels," Remo said.

"I'm sorry, sir. But making quality judgments on various hotels is not the policy of American Telephone and Greater Michigan Bell Consolidated Amalgamated Telephonic and Telegraphic Communications Incorporated."

"Gee, that's a shame," Remo said, "because now I'll just have to get the telephone numbers of every hotel in Detroit. Every hotel."

"Well, maybe you can try these," the operator said reluctantly. She gave Remo a half-dozen hotel numbers, and he started dialing.

"Hotel Prather," said the first hotel's switchboard. "Do you have an elderly Oriental staying there? He probably arrived with a bunch of lacquered steamer trunks and gave the bellboys a hard time?"

"Under what name would he be registered?"

"I don't know. It could be anything from Mr. Park to His Most Awesome Magnificence. It depends on his mood."

"Really. You don't have his name?"

"Really," Remo said. "And exactly how many Orientals fitting that description do you think you have in the hotel?"

The switchboard operator checked. No such Oriental was staying at the Hotel Prather.

Remo asked the same questions of the next three hotels. His fifth call confirmed that an Oriental fitting that description was indeed staying at the Detroit Plaza and that the bell captain who had overseen the carrying of the gentleman's trunks up twenty-five flights of stairs, because the gentleman did not wish his luggage transported by elevators that might crash, was recovering nicely from his hernia operation. Did Remo wish to ring the old gentleman's room? "No thanks," Remo said. "I want this to be a surprise." Chiun's door was locked and Remo knocked on it twice. Chiun's voice filtered through the wood. "Who disturbs me?" he asked. "Who galoomphs down the hall like a diseased yak and now pounds on my door interrupting my meditation?"

Chiun knew very well who it was, Remo knew. The old man had probably heard him when he got off the elevator a hundred feet away and had recognized his footsteps on the heavy commercial hallway carpet.

"You know damn well who it is," Remo said.

"Go away. I don't want any."

"Open the damn door before I kick it in," Remo said. Chiun unlocked the door but did not open it. When Remo pushed it open, the old man was sitting on the floor, his back to the door.

"Nice reception," Remo said. He looked around the room. It was exactly what he expected, probably the honeymoon suite. It looked perfect for starting a harem. Chiun sniffed. That was his answer.

"Don't you want to know where I've been?" Remo asked.

"No. It is enough that I know where you have not been," Chiun said.

"Oh? Where have I not been?"

"You have not been seeing Nellie Wilson to arrange for the Assassin Aid Concert. And here I have gone to all the trouble of getting permission from that lunatic, Smith."

"I didn't have time for Willie Nelson, Little Father," said Remo. "I was in a plane crash."

"Paaah." Chiun waved a long-nailed hand over his head in dismissal of such trifles.

"I realized something, Chiun."

"There is always a first time for everything," Chiun said.

"I finally understood what you mean when you say feeding your village is not just a responsibility, but a privilege too." He saw that Chiun was slowly turning around to look at him. Remo said, "I helped save the people on the plane. It was like they were family, my family for a little while, and I think I know how you feel. "

"One cannot equate the survival of my very important village with saving the lives of a bunch of worthless fat white people," Chiun said.

"I know, I know, I know," Remo said. "I know all that. It was just that the idea was the same."

"Well, perhaps you are not so hopeless as I thought," Chiun said and his hazel eyes softened. "Let me see your hands," he said suddenly.

"What for?"

Chiun clapped his hands together. The sound shook a nearby coffee table and rattled a window.

"Your hands, quickly."

Remo extended his hands, palms up. Chiun took them and stared at them. His nose wrinkled.

"Want to check behind my ears too?" Remo asked.

"You have fired no guns recently," Chiun said.

"I have fired no guns in years. You know that," Remo said. "What's with you?"

"You are," said Chiun, turning away. "But not for long. You must return to Folcroft. Emperor Smith has need of your services."

"Why do I get the impression that you're trying to chase me away from here?" Remo said.

"I have no interest in your impressions," Chiun said. "I am here on a personal matter that concerns the Master of Sinanju. Not you. Be gone. Go see Smith. Perhaps he can make use of you."

"Not so's you'd notice," Remo said. "Look . . ." he said, then stopped dead. He saw a streak of red that scored the scalp under the hair over Chiun's left ear. "Hey. You're hurt." He reached forward and Chiun slapped his hand away angrily.

"I cut it shaving," Chiun said.

"You don't shave," Remo said.

"Never mind. It is only a scratch."

"You couldn't be scratched by a rocket attack," Remo said. "What the hell is going on?"

"Nothing. A lunatic gunman. I will be done with him by tomorrow. Then we will speak of other matters. We will make plans for the concert."

"Somebody with a gun did that to you?" Remo said and whistled. "He must have been real good."

"Only his name is good," Chiun said. "Tomorrow he will be dog meat. You return to Folcroft."

"I'm staying," Remo said.

Chiun swept out his hands. His fingernails shredded the heavy damask drapes.

"I don't need you," Chiun said.

"I don't care. I'm staying."

"Then stay out here and leave me alone. I will have nothing to do with you," Chiun said and walked into the bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

"I'm staying anyway," Remo shouted through the door.

"Stay if you must. But stay out of my way," Chiun said.

Chapter 10

Remo heard the door from the bedroom to the outside hallway open, then close. Chiun was leaving. He went to the door of the suite, listened for a moment, then heard the elevator doors in the middle of the floor open and close.

Chiun was riding downstairs.

Remo ran from the room and into the stairwell, racing down the steps in giant jumps that looked effortless, but which touched only one step between each landing. It was the way a sixty-foot-tall giant would have walked down those steps.

Remo was not moving at top speed since he knew he had plenty of time to get to the lobby before the elevator arrived. Then he would hide there and follow Chiun and see just what was so important that Chiun could not tell him about it.

In the lobby, he sank into a soft wing chair and held a newspaper up in front of his face. Over the top of the newspaper, he could see the elevator's control lights. The elevator was now passing the fourth floor on its way to the lobby.

It reached the lobby; the door opened. The elevator was empty.

Where the hell was Chiun? Remo stood up and looked around. He found Chiun sitting in a wing chair directly behind his.

"Sit down, you imbecile," Chiun said. "You are drawing attention to yourself, acting like a man looking for a lost dog."

Remo grinned in embarrassment. "I heard you leave the room," he said.

"I heard you following me," Chiun said.

"I came down the steps to get here before the elevator," Remo said.

"So did I," Chiun said.

"So now what do we do?" Remo asked. "Do we play hide-and-go-seek all over Detroit?"

"No," Chiun said. "You go back to the room. Or go see Emperor Smith in Folcroft. Or go find Nellie Wilson and convince him to sing for our concert. Any would be acceptable. "

"And you?" Remo asked.

"I have business which does not concern you," Chiun said.

"Not a chance," Remo said. "You move from here and I'm going to be on your tail like burrs on a beagle."

Chiun brought his chair around and sat down next to Remo. His hazel eyes were sincere and thoughtful as he said, "Remo, there are some things you do not understand."

"That's true enough," Remo said, "but I always count on you to explain them to me. You're my teacher and I trust you."

"Then you must also trust that I have your best interests at heart when I tell you that you are not yet ready to learn something. "

"I don't buy that," Remo said. "What am I not ready to learn?"

"Many things. The proper greetings for Persian emperors. The things one must not say to a pharaoh. The proper method of negotiating a contract. Many of the legends and their deeper meanings. Many things."

"You're not trying to dodge me because I don't know how to say hello to a Persian emperor," Remo said. "This is something that concerns me and I want to know what it is. "

"You are a willful stubborn child," Chiun said angrily.

"Just so that we both understand it," Remo said.

Chiun sighed. "You may follow me. But ask no ques tions. And stay out of my way."

In the huge parking lot of Dynacar Industries, just off the Edsel Ford Parkway in Detroit, workmen were scrambling around tying a green ribbon around a package.

If it were not for the fact that the package was six feet high, six feet wide, and fifteen feet long, it would have looked like a wedding gift, even to the elegant silverywhite wrapping paper it was covered with.

Two dozen reporters and cameramen had already showed up, fifteen minutes before the scheduled press conference of Lyle Lavallette, and they milled around the big package, trying to see what it contained.

"It's a car. What do you expect? Lavallette didn't call us here to show us some goddamn refrigerator."

"Hey, listen. He got shot a few days ago and then Mangan got killed last night. For all you know, there may be a goddamn hit squad under that ribbon and they're going to blow us all away."

"I hope they start with you," the first reporter said. "It may be a car but it sure as hell stinks."

"I thought I was the only one who noticed that," another reporter said. "Maybe it's these workmen."

"What's that you said, asshole?" snarled one of the workmen. There were four of them, lying on their stomachs, clutching measuring tapes and trying to arrange the foot-wide green ribbon atop the package into a perfect floral-style bow.

"Nothing," said the reporter nervously. "I didn't say anything."

"We can smell it too," the workman said. "And we don't like it any better than you."

"It smells like rotting garbage," another reporter said. "Tell us about it. Hey, move that over a quarter of an inch. There." The workman picked up a walkie-talkie from atop the package and spoke into it. "How's that?" He looked upward as a helicopter swirled into view over the parking lot. A voice answered back through the helicopter loud enough to be heard by the reporters.

"Looks perfect. Now lock it down."

The workman set about taping the bow in place with transparent package tape.

"Damn Lavallette and his goddamn perfectionism," one of the workers grumbled.

"What do you expect from a maverick auto genius?" a reporter asked.

"Not packages that smell," the workman said.

"Just cars that stink," another workman said. Watching from an upstairs window of the Dynacar plant was Lyle Lavallette. He felt good because he knew he looked good. A new girdle, developed in Europe for pregnant women, had trimmed another half-inch off his waistline.

His personal beauty consultant, who was on the Dynacar payroll as a design coordinator, had just given him a skin-tightening-cream facial and had also cleverly found a way to cement the loose hair that had bothered Lavallette three days earlier to another hair, to guarantee that it could no longer pop up and embarrass him in front of the photographers.

"Good, good, good, good, good," he said. "The press is almost all here. No sign of Revell and Millis?" he asked Miss Blaze.

His secretary was wearing a heart-stopping tight sweater in fuchsia. She had been wearing a red sweater, but Lavallette had made her change it because he was wearing an orange tie and he thought the colors might clash. Changing at the office was no problem, however, since Lavallette had insisted that she keep a dozen different sweaters in her desk, to help entertain reporters who might come to see them.

"Mr. Revell and Mr. Millis haven't arrived yet," she said. "But I called their offices and they're on their way."

"Good. I was worried that they might cancel just because Mangan got killed last night."

"No. They're coming," Miss Blaze said.

"Okay. I want you to wait for them downstairs," Lavallette said. "And when they come, you greet them and then take them to their seats on the dais."

"Okay. Any special seats, Mr. Lavallette?"

"Yes. Seat them on the left," he said.

"Is there a reason for that?" she asked.

"Best reason of all," Lavallette said. He smiled at his secretary. "It's downwind," he said.

"Nice place you bring me to," Remo said.

"Nobody invited you to accompany me here," Chiun said.

"It smells like the town dump."

"That is because there are many white people here," Chiun said. "I have noticed that about your kind."

"Why are we at a car company anyway? Dynacar Industries. I never heard of it."

"I am here because it is my duty," Chiun said. "You are here because you are a pest."

They were stopped at the parking-lot gate of Dynacar Industries by a uniformed guard who handed them a printed list of invited guests and asked them to check off their names.

Chiun looked up and down the list, then made an X next to a name, handed it back to the guard, and walked through the open gate.

The guard looked at the clipboard of names, then at Chiun, then back at the list.

He glanced up at Remo. "He sure doesn't look like Dan Rather," he said.

"Makeup," Remo said. "He doesn't have his TV makeup on. "

The guard nodded and handed Remo the clipboard. Remo looked up and down the list and at the bottom, he saw neatly typed his own name: REMO WILLIAMS.

There was already a check mark next to it. "Somebody already checked off my name," he said. "Yeah? Let's see. Where's that?"

"Remo Williams. That's me. See? It's got an X next to it. "

The guard shrugged. "What am I supposed to do? You know, everybody who comes in here is supposed to check off his name. Now I can't let you in without you make a check mark on the list. That's the way it works and we've got to do it that way. "

"Sure," Remo said. "I understand."

He took the clipboard back and made an X next to a name and walked through the gate.

The guard read the list and called after him, "Nice to see you, Miss Walters. I watch your shows all the time." Remo caught up with Chiun as the small Oriental moved through the pack of newsmen, which had now grown to more than fifty. Chiun marched through like a general, smacking aside with an imperious hand loosely held cameras which threatened to injure his person. Cameramen started to yell at him, then stopped and ooohed a large sigh as Miss Blaze stepped out on the dais, leading James Revell, head of General Autos, and Hubert Millis, president of American Automobiles, to seats at the end of the dais.

"Look at the tits on that," one cameraman said in an awestruck voice.

"Got to admit," another one said. "Lavallette knows how to travel."

"I hope he's doing a lot of traveling up and down on that one," someone else said.

Chiun stopped near the front of the dais and shook his head.

"I never understand the fascination of your kind with milk glands," he told Remo.

"You didn't hear me say anything, did you?" Remo asked.

He looked up and saw the two men who had just sat down take our handkerchiefs and hold them in front of their faces. The stench at this spot was overpowering and Remo said, "Couldn't we find a less potent place to stand?"

"Here," Chiun said. "Slow your breathing. That will help you. And your talking. That will help me."

Remo nodded. He leaned toward Chiun. "A funny thing just happened," he said.

"I'm sure you'll tell me about it," Chiun said.

"I have never seen you so grouchy," Remo said. "Anyway, they had my name here on the guest list. Did you tell anybody I was coming?"

"No," Chiun said.

He turned to look at Remo, who said, "And somebody put an X to my name." He thought it might cheer Chiun up if he played straight man and tossed him a line that could lead to a high-quality insult, so he said, "Do you think there are two just like me in the world?"

He was surprised when Chiun did not respond in the expected way. "You saw a check mark next to your name?" he said.

Remo nodded.

"Remo, I ask you again to leave this place," said Chiun.

"No."

"As you will. But whatever happens, I do not want you to interfere. Do you understand?"

"I understand and you can count on it. I'll sit on my hands, no matter what happens," Remo said. Chiun seemed not to be listening. His eyes were scanning the crowd, and then there was a smattering of applause that brought all eyes up to the podium with its Medusa's head of microphones. Lyle Lavallette, wearing a blue blazer with the new Dynacar Industries emblem on the pocket, waved to the press and stepped toward the microphones.

"Who's that?" Remo said, as much to himself as to Chiun.

"That's Lyle Lavallette, the Maverick Genius of the Auto Industry," said a reporter next to Remo. "What are you here for if you don't know anything?"

"Basically to rip your throat out if you say another word to me," Remo said, and when his eyes locked with the reporter's the newsman gulped and turned away.

Lavallette fixed a big smile on his face and slowly turned for 180 points of the compass to make sure that every photographer had a chance to get a full-face shot of him.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I want to thank you for coming today. I apologize for the slight delay in scheduling but I was busy in a hospital being treated for gunshot wounds." He smiled again to let them know he was fully recovered and that it would take more than mere bullets to stop Lyle Lavallette. He wished now that he had joked with doctors at the hospital; that would have been good stuff for People magazine.

"And I also want to thank Mr. James Revell, the head of General Autos, and Mr. Hubert Millis, president of American Automobiles, for coming here today also. Their presence underscores the important fact that we are not here today to unveil or launch a commercial enterprise but to announce a world-shaking scientific discovery." He looked around at the reporters again before continuing.

"I would be remiss if I did not point out our deep sorrow at the tragedy that has befallen Mr. Drake Mangan, the president of National Autos. I know that Drake-my dear, good old friend Drake-with his keen interest in technology, would also have been here if death had not closed down production on him first."

Remo heard the two men, who had been introduced as Revell and Millis, speak to each other.

"Good old friend Drake?" Revell said. "Drake wanted to kill the bastard."

"Still seems like a good idea," Millis responded.

"But no further ado, ladies and gentlemen," Lavallette said. "I know you're all wondering what the Maverick Genius of the Auto Industry has up his sleeve this time. Well, it's simply this. The gasoline-powered automobile, as we know it, is dead."

There was silence until Remo said aloud, "Good."

Lavallette ignored the comment and went on. "The internal-combustion engine, the basis for the auto industry as we have known it before today, is now a museum piece. A dinosaur."

Remo clapped. No one else made a sound. Chiun said, "Be quiet. I want to hear this." But his eyes were scanning the crowd constantly and Remo knew that the Master of Sinanju had not shown up to listen to some kind of announcement about a new bomb-mobile.

"A dinosaur," Lavallette repeated. "It's ironic, perhaps, because the dinosaur has been for years the source of our wonderful car culture, in the form of decayed animal matter that we extract from under the sands of the world in the form of crude oil. Decayed dinosaurs, the leavings of the primeval world. But those supplies have been dwindling and our four-wheeled culture has been threatened with slow extinction." He paused for dramatic effect. "Until today."

Lavallette patted his white hair, reassured to find it all in place.

"While I was fighting my lonely battle against Communist tyranny in Nicaragua," he said, "I had a great deal of time to do new research on new means of powering autos. Ladies and gentlemen, here is the solution."

He looked up and the helicopter which had been hovering over a far corner of the lot spun forward. It stopped over the silver-wrapped package in front of the dais. Lavallette nodded and a man dropped on a rope from the helicopter, attached the rope to a hook in the top of the silvery package, then pulled on the rope and the helicopter began to rise.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the public unveiling of the marvel of our age, the supercar of tomorrow here today. The Dynacar."

The package was lifted into space by the rising helicopter. It had had no bottom and as it lifted off the ground, it revealed a sleek black automobile.

Behind the automobile, in a neat row, stood three shiny metal trashcans. They were filled to the brim and the faint breeze carried the noxious stench of their contents back into the faces of the press. Revell, at the end of the dais, started to cough; Hubert Millis choked, turned and retched.

Next to the garbage cans was a small black machine that looked like an industrial vacuum cleaner.

"Just as the cars of yesterday were fueled by the refuse of yesterday, the Dynacar-the car of today-will operate on the refuse of today. No more gasoline. No more oil. No more exhaust or pollution. Gentlemen. Please."

He nodded to the workmen, who stepped up to the row of trashcans and one by one began emptying them into the top of the small black device. Old newspapers, coffee grounds, chicken bones, underwear tumbled into the round black hole. Some spilled over and fell to the ground and maggots began climbing up the side of the black machine.

The workmen hastily brushed them back. When all three cans had been emptied into the black device, one of the workmen pushed a button.

Immediately, there was a whirling grinding noise, like a combination clothes drier and trash compactor working. Slowly, the mound of garbage that had topped the opening of the black machine began to move. It shook and lifted, maggots and all, then slowly disappeared into the machine's gaping maw.

"You are watching the Dynacar refuse converter in operation," Lavallette announced. "This device duplicates the same action that transformed the carcasses of the dinosaurs into fuel. But this is an instant processor and refiner all in one."

The grinding stopped and Lavallette signaled one of the workmen, who closed the top of the machine, then stood off to the side, fighting the dry heaves. That was bad for the corporate image and Lavallette made a mental note to have the man fired.

Lavallette stepped down from the platform. Remo noticed that the two automakers, Revell and Millis, were leaning forward, watching. Chiun, meanwhile, was still scanning the crowd.

Lavallette went to the base of the black machine and opened a small door. He turned around, holding above his head a grayish-brown lump about the size of a pack of cigarettes.

"Here you are, ladies and gentlemen. Those three barrels of trash you just saw dumped into the machine have now been converted into this."

"What has this got to do-with cars?" a reporter called out.

"Everything," Lavallette said. "Because this little block here is solid fuel and it's enough fuel to run my Dynacar for a week without refilling. Imagine it. Instead of putting out your trash every Tuesday, you simply dump it in the refuse converter, turn on the motor, and from the bottom you take out fuel for your auto. In one stroke, the problems of waste disposal and fuel for the family car are solved. "

A reporter called out another question. Lavallette recognized him; he was from an independent local station which had never liked Lavallette. The station had refused to call him a maverick genius of the auto industry and had in fact called him one of the car business's greatest frauds.

"My station wants to know what happens if you're a two-car family?" he asked, with a smirk.

"Those people can just stay tuned to your channel all day long. You produce enough garbage for the entire country," Lavallette said.

There was a polite ripple of laughter in the crowd. Lavellette was surprised; he had expected a belly laugh. He checked the faces of the media people and instead of the wide-eyed amazement he had anticipated, he saw perplexity, frowns, and more than a few fingers pinching nostrils closed.

"Let's get this straight, Mr. Lavallette," a network reporter asked. "This vehicle runs exclusively on garbage?"

"Refuse," Lavallette said. He didn't like the word "garbage." He could see the Enquirer headline now: "MAVERICK AUTO GENIUS UNVEILS GARBAGEMOBILE."

"Will it run on any kind of refuse?" another reporter demanded.

"Absolutely. Anything from fish heads to old comic books to- "

A reporter interrupted and Lavallette saw from his nametag that he was from Rolling Stone.

"Will it run on shit?"

"I beg your pardon," Lavallette said.

"Shit. Will it run on shit?"

"We haven't tried that," Lavallette said.

"But it might?"

"Perhaps. Actually, no reason why not."

He felt a little relieved when he realized that no respectable newspaper in America would coin the word "shitmobile." And who cared what Rolling Stone said anyway?

"We want to see the car run," the Rolling Stone reporter said. Apparently this had not occurred to any of the other media types there because they instantly started to shout: "Yeah, yeah. Let's see it run. Drive it, Lavallette."

Lavallette gestured for silence, then said, "This is the second prototype. The first was stolen last week . . . I suspect, by industry spies. But the laugh is on them. Both the refuse converter and the engine of the Dynacar are so revolutionary that they cannot be duplicated without infringing on my exclusive patents. And to make certain that the secret of its internal operating system remains exclusively the property of Dynacar, each model will come with a sealed hood, and only Dynacar licensed shops will be allowed to service them. Anyone who tampers with the seals on the hood will find that the engine has self-destructed into unrecognizable slag-as I'm sure the thieves who made off with the only other existing model have discovered by now.

"And now. A demonstration of the Dynacar in action." Lavallette felt the eyes of Revell and Millis on him as he made his way through the crowd. While the cameramen crowded around, he opened a small flap in the hood of the automobile and slid in the tiny cube of compressed garbage.

"That, ladies and gentlemen, is enough fuel to run this vehicle for a week."

He sat behind the wheel of the car and as the cameras zoomed in, he held up a golden ignition key for all to see.

At first, the reporters thought Lavallette was having trouble getting the car to start. They saw him slip the key into the ignition and turn it, but there was no answering rumble from under the hood, no throb or vibration of an engine.

But suddenly, with a cheery wave through the window, Lavallette sent the Dynacar surging ahead. The perimeter of the parking lot had been kept clear of automobiles and so it served him as a test track. One reporter timed it as moving from zero to sixty-five in ten seconds flat, which was high quality for a nonracing car. Lavallette sped the car around the lot and brought it back to the starting point to a quiet stop. Throughout the entire drive, the Dynacar had made no sound but for the squeal of its tires.

When he stepped from the car, Lavallette was grinning from ear to ear. He struck a heroic pose. On the dais, Miss Blaze started to clap. Reporters clapped too, not because they thought it was proper for them to do so, but to encourage Miss Blaze so that she would continue her bosom-bouncing ovation.

Lavallette gestured to the workmen, who came forward to stand in front of the Dynacar. One spoke into his walkie-talkie and a moment later, the helicopter popped back into view, still holding, suspended from its underside, the giant silver box that had covered the car. Swiftly, as with a well-rehearsed operation, the copter flew in and lowered the container down over the Dynacar. The workmen unfastened the ropes that held it and the helicopter chopped off, as Lavallette went back to the podium and said into the microphones, "I'll take your questions now. "

"You claim this car is nonpolluting?"

"You can see that for yourselves," Lavallette said. "There's no exhaust, no tailpipe. Not even a muffler, I might add."

"What about the smell?"

"What smell?" asked Lavallette.

"There's a distinct odor of garbage. We all smelled it when you drove past."

"Nonsense," said Lavallette. "That's just the aftersmell of the refuse that was sitting around before. And I apologize for that, but I wanted to get the worst, most rancid waste we could just to show how efficient the process was."

"You should have used shit," yelled the reporter from Rolling Stone.

"You were shot earlier this week by someone claiming to represent an environmental group. Do you think that shooting would have occurred if that group had known about the Dynacar?"

"No," Lavallette said. "This car is the answer to every environmentalist's prayers."

"What do you think, Chiun?" Remo asked.

"I think you should go home," the old Oriental said. His eyes still flicked around the crowd.

"We've been through that. What the hell are you looking for?"

"Peace of mind. And not getting it," Chiun snapped.

"Fine," Remo said. "You got it. I'll see you around."

"Remember. Do not interfere," Chiun said.

Remo walked off in a huff. He could not figure out what was troubling Chiun. All right. The old man was allowed to be disturbed because he'd been nicked by someone's lucky shot, but why take it out on Remo? And why come here? What made him think that the gunman might be here?

Behind him, as he walked through the clusters of media people, Remo heard Lavallette still answering questions. "Mr. Lavallette. While everyone knows that you're the Maverick Genius of the Auto Industry, you've never been known as an inventor. How did you manage to make the technological breakthroughs necessary for the Dynacar?"

Lavallette said smoothly, "Oddly enough, there are no technological breakthroughs in this car, except for the drive train. All the other technology is on line. In the East, some apartment buildings, even some electric plants, are powered by compressed garbage used as fuel. The trick involved adapting existing technology in a form that could be afforded by the average American family. We've done that. "

"When will you be able to go into production?"

"Immediately," Lavallette said.

"When do you think you'll be ready to compete with the Big Three automakers?"

"The question is," Lavallette said with a grin, "when will they be able to compete with me?" He turned and smiled at Revell and Millis, who sat at the end of the dais, staring at the box covering the Dynacar model.

"Actually," Lavallette said, "since the tragedy that has befallen Drake Mangan, I have been contacted by a number of people involved in the management of National Autos. There may be an opportunity there for us to pool our forces."

"You mean you'd take over National Autos?"

"No such position has been offered to me," Lavallette said, "but with Mr. Mangan's death, it may be time for that company to look in a new direction. The Dynacar is the car of today and tomorrow. Everything else is yesterday."

"Revell. Millis."

Reporters began to call out the names of the other two car executives at the end of the dais.

They looked up as if surprised in their bathtubs. "Would you consider joining forces with Lavallette to produce the Dynacar?" The two men waved away the question.

Off to the side of the dais, Remo saw a group of men in three-piece suits conferring in low voices. They were supposed to look like auto executives but Remo could tell by the way they stood, their hands floating free, that they were armed. Their hands never strayed far from the places in their belts or under their armpits where handguns could be tucked. He could even see the bulges of some of the weapons. Sloppy, he thought. They might as well have been wearing neckties with the word "Bodyguard" stitched on in Day-Glo thread.

With the amplified voice of Lyle Lavallette echoing over his head, Remo noticed a cameraman moving along the fringe of the pack of newsmen. Remo realized he was watching the man because he carried the video camera awkwardly, as if he were not used to its weight. The man was tall, with dark hair, and had a scar running down the right side of his jaw. His eyes were hard and cold and Remo thought there was something familiar about them.

As he watched, the cameraman moved through the crowd and then emerged on the other side of the pack, facing the spot on the dais where James Revell and Hubert Millis, the heads of the other two car companies, were sitting.

From the corner of Remo's eyes, he saw Chiun moving up toward the dais. Perhaps Chiun had noticed something too. Was this it? Was this what Chiun had warned him to stay out of?

He should just turn and walk away. This was none of his business, but as he made up his mind to do that, he saw the cameraman fumble with his right hand into the grip of the camera which he was carrying on his left shoulder. He was rooting around for something, and then his entire body tensed in a preattack mode that meant only one thing: a gun.

"Chiun! Watch out!" Remo called. The quickest way to the cameraman was through the reporters and Remo moved through them like a one-ton bowling ball through rubber pins.