Master's Challenge

"Whose orders?" Smith asked.

"Theirs."

"Who ordered them?"

"1 don't know."

"Think," Smith suggested.

"I don't know."

Smith heard the terror in the voice. He did not like this dirty work. He did not like to see men afraid of him or dying, but he had spent much of his life doing things that he did not like, things that he knew he had to do.

He made an obvious motion of cocking the old pistol.

"With me," he said, "You're dead now. With your bosses back in the States, maybe you'll get lucky and live."

"We just get orders."

"From whom?"

123

"Our leader. That's all. She phones."

"Dr. Pensoitte?" Smith asked.

"I don't know. Just a woman's voice."

"Are you paid or what?"

"No. Not paid. Money is evil. You can't be paid for being part of the earth. I don't want to die, mister."

"Neither does the president, but you men have tried twice to kill him."

"We follow orders," the youth said.

"How did you infiltrate the Secret Service?"

"I don't know what you mean," the man said.

"Why doesn't the Secret Service act when its computers pick up threats against the president?" Smith repeated.

"Oh," the young man said, his tone indicating he had an answer and thought he might use it to bargain with. Smith's steely gaze changed his mind. The man pointed to one of his dead companions. "Him, I guess. He was with the Secret Service, working with their computer system. He must have been able to jigger it up so it could ignore warnings or stuff.''

"Where is your group based?" Smith asked.

"The whole world's our home."

"Where did you get your training?" Smith asked.

"All over."

"Give me an address."

"Marigot," said the young man, and Smith knew it was the main French city on the island. "I live here."

Smith waved his pistol at the two other men. "Did they live here too?"

"No. They flew down for this job. I live with my father.''

"Is he part of it too?"

"No. He thinks we're crazy."

"You're very close to death, son. What do you think?"

"I think I'm scared," said the young man.

124

"Get the bodies outside," Smith said.

Both were dead now, heads flopping, banging harmlessly on the volcanic rock floor of the entrance to the small cave. Smith helped move the bodies and realized what he was doing. He was encouraging the young man to make a run at him so he could shoot him quickly, so he didn't have to look at the terror and shoot its eyes out.

He realized he had always hated killing. It was easier to die, he thought, than to kill. The dead mind nothing. But he had no right to die now; he had no right to risk his life. There was a country he had to protect.

When the two bodies were out into the salt marshes, the young man said, "Okay?"

"Yes," Smith said.

The young man had a condominium just outside Marigot, the French capital city. It overlooked a stretch of pure sea water facing the very flat island of Anguilla. The sun set behind that island.

The apartment looked like a library for Eaith Goodness, Inc. There was a tract on why democracy was evil. The title was "When the Grass Votes, then We'll Vote."

"What phone do you get your orders on?" Smith said. He knew St. Martin's communications system was primitive, and there might be a radio hookup to the telephone that he could trace.

The boy shrugged.

"The phone," Smith repeated. "They called you, you said."

"Well, kind of," said the young man, and his eyes flashed for just an instant. Smith whirled and fired at the same time. A large blond hulk of a man was lunging at him with a lead pipe. And all the training Smith had believed was gone with time came back in an instant. The shot entered the man's chest, and he fell forward, knock-

125

ing Smith to the floor, dying on top of the CURE director, but Smith held onto the gun.

And from the floor, he pointed it up at the other young man's groin.

"Good-bye," he said. He cocked the revolver.

"The Earth Goodness Society, Inc.," the young man said. "It's at 115 Pismo Beach Drive, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Mizz Robin Feldmar, student advisor. I was one of her students at Du Lac College. So were those other two guys. Him too. That one on you. She always called me. I stay here with my dad."

"As 1 said," Smith repeated. "Good-bye."

He fired one shot and sent Daddy's little bundle of presidential assassin off on his first leg to an expensive cemetery somewhere in America.

By dawn, Smith was on a first-class Eastern flight out of Julianna Airport on the Dutch side of the island, heading toward Minneapolis. If he could find the link between Dr. Pensoitte and that student advisor, he could work down from the top and end it all.

Did he want to find that link though?

He was an old man, and he was tired and he didn't care. He had killed again, and the death was on him, even though he had left his bloodied jacket and shirt back in St. Martin's. He flew first-class so that he could sleep, but he didn't sleep.

Back in St. Martin's, the French police reported an amazing four suicides in different parts of the island, two just outside Grand Case near the gravel works, and two in Marigot. All four suicides used the same gun, which was not found.

Chapter Thirteen

After the dusty cliffs of Mali, London was like another planet. A welcome planet, Remo decided, in a friendly galaxy where everyone spoke English.

He'd managed to make it off the African continent in one piece and, thanks to a three-day stint breaking stallions in Morocco, even had enough money in 'his pocket for dinner and a bed in a half-star hotel.

It had been more than two weeks since he'd left Sinanju. Two tough, sad, mixed-up weeks. God only knew how much longer the Master's Trial would take. How much of it he could take. He had wrestled with thoughts of life and death and honor every waking moment for the past two weeks. He was tired. He needed a rest from his own thoughts.

He wasn't going to leave for the wilds of Wales until morning. So, he decided, for tonight he wouldn't think. Not about Ancion, or Kiree, or what was to come. For tonight, he would give himself a celebration of soap and water and a clean bed and dinner in the Cafe Royal.

It was obviously a waste of money to have dinner in one

126

127

of London's best restaurants, since Remo's digestive system couldn't handle anything but rice and fish and water, but he didn't care. This was his night. He duked the headwaiter five pounds and got the best table in the place, with squishy red leather banquettes to sit on and real English roses to look at beneath the painted Edwardian ceiling. A perfect table.

Except that it was a table for two, and there was only one of him.

"Well, what did you expect?" he asked himself. "You don't know anyone here. You don't know anyone anywhere. You want to be surrounded by friends, kid, you're in the wrong profession."

He guessed he was, but there wasn't anything he could do about it. Loneliness was part and parcel of the life that had been foisted on him. He had dreamed, once, of finding a woman and making a normal life for himself. His fantasies included every corny cliche he could imagine, from kids in the rumpus room to a white picket fence. With time, though, he grew to realize that even such an ordinary ambition would be impossible for him.

He was different. His very body was different. His nervous system was more complex than other men's, the result of years of exercises on his senses. His digestive processes had simplified to the point where he could no longer ingest meat or alcohol, relegating him to a constant diet of unappetizing foods. The training of Sinanju had made him one of the best assassins who had ever lived, but it had also deprived him of any possibility of ever connecting with another human being.

He sipped his water and watched the other diners, romantic couples and merry groups.

Only one person came in unattended. Not for long, Remo guessed. There had to be some guy with a fat cigar and a fatter bankroll waiting for her. She was easily the

128

most beautiful woman in the room. Her gold-blonde hair was pulled back into an elegant knot at the nape of her neck, setting off the classic, poetry-and-polo features of her face. She wore a white dress with a little cape of sheer stuff around her shoulders. Probably owns a castle somewhere, Remo thought. The Lady Griselda, raised on horseback and weaned on high tea.

The woman's eye caught his own. Involuntarily Remo smiled. She stopped where she stood, leaving the head-waiter to wend his way halfway around the room before noticing that he'd lost her. She took in Remo with a deep, studious glance. It wasn't sexual, just curious, as if Remo were an interesting exhibit in a museum.

"I'd like to sit over there," she told the impatient waiter. With a curt nod, he led her in Remo's direction.

"HeHo, Remo," she said, kissing him lightly on the cheek.

She had the most compelling eyes he'd ever seen. They were light, but beyond that, he couldn't decide on their color. The irises seemed to shift from gray to pale blue to turquoise to yellow-green and deep emerald, with a hundred shades in between.

"It's so nice to see you. Do you mind if I join you?"

She spoke with a slight accent. So she wasn't English, after all. And she knew Remo's name. He racked his brains trying to remember who she was, but nothing registered.

"Uh-I'd be delighted," he said, rising.

No, he didn't know her, he decided. There was no way he could have forgotten those eyes.

When the waiter had gone, she said, "I hope you don't mind my barging in on you like this. I hate to dine alone. Don't you?"

And a mind-reader, too, he thought. "I've gotten used to it."

129

"Yes," she said appreciatively. "I imagine you have."

The wine steward came over with a list. Remo asked the woman if she felt like something to drink, hoping she knew enough about wine to make her own selection. It had been so long since Remo had touched alcohol that he'd forgotten the names on the labels.

"I'll have vodka," the woman said.

The waiter nodded. "A martini?"

"A bottle. And a water glass."

The unflappable waiter left. Remo smiled. "We've never met," he said.

"No."

"How did you know my name?"

"I guessed."

What kind of a con is this, he thought. "What's yours?"

"What would you like it to be?"

He sighed. A call girl. "I've got fifty-two dollars," he said flatly. "That's it."

"Good for you."

He was embarrassed. "I only meant-"

The waiter showed up with the vodka and a large tumbler, which he filled to the brim.

"Have you decided on a name for me yet?" she asked, raising her glass.

"How about Sam?" he asked drily. "I knew a guy named Sam once who drank vodka by the bucket."

"Sam it is, then." She downed the glass in one draught.

"Who are you?" Remo asked.

"I thought we just decided on that."

"Come off it. My guess is you're some kind of bored society dame acting cute with the hoi-polloi-"

She laughed. "Not at all. I'm new in London. I walked in here alone, saw you, and sat down. Does everything have to be so complicated?"

"Have it your way," Remo said. "Are you hungry?"

130

"Starving."

"Figures." He eyed the prices on the menu. His fifty-two dollars might stretch as far as one meal and two bottles, all for her. Another breakfast of berries along the side of the road.

"I'd like fish," she said. "Raw."

He sat still for a moment, then leaned over toward her. "How much do you know about me?"

"Why should I know anything about you? Are you famous?"

"The fish."

"It's much better raw. You ought to try it."

Well, maybe it was just a coincidence, he said to himself. He sat back, trying frantically to remember where he might have met her before. It was useless. "All right," he said.

The waiter set down their platter of raw fish at arm's length, regarding his two customers as if he expected them to jump wildly onto the tables at any moment.

The woman sent him away with a haughty stare. She picked up a sliver of fish with her fingers and slid it delicately into her mouth.

"Do you have something against silverware?" Remo asked.

"Useless," she said, offering a piece to Remo. Her nails were short and unpainted. She wore no makeup. And those eyes of hers were driving Remo crazy.

"What color are they?" he blurted.

"My eyes?" She shrugged. "Blue. Gray. Green. They change."

"Really strange," he muttered.

"How flattering. You've encountered your share of strange people, I suppose?"

"You have no idea."

"I think I do." She downed another tumbler of vodka.

131

"Get some rice for yourself. That's what you eat, isn't it?"

He threw his napkin on the table. "Okay. Come clean. What are you doing here?"

"Calm down, Remo."

"Bulldookey!"

"Bulldookey?"

"There's no way you could have guessed my name."

"You sound like Rumplestiltskin. Eat your fish. You must be exhausted."

"1 am exhausted. But you don't have any business knowing that."

She leaned over and kissed him full on the mouth. Stunned, he felt as if his spine had just turned into an electric eel. The temperature in the room seemed to rise to the level of a pizza oven. When their lips finally broke away, he noticed that people all over the restaurant were staring at them. "What was that for?" he asked, dazed. "Not that I minded. Maybe you'd like to try it again for practice."

"Later," she said, resuming her meal.

"Later," Remo grumbled. She was playing some kind of game, but he was too tired to figure it out. And why bother, anyway, he decided. She was nuts, end of discovery. Still, kissing her beat eating restaurant rice at a table for one any day.

"I'm staying at Claridge's. Will you come with me?"

He gulped, standing up instantly. "Twisted my arm," he said.

Inside the doorway of her darkened room, she put her arms around him. He tried to gear himself up for the fifty-two steps to ecstasy, but something was different. Her touch was warm, electrifying, comforting. There was no naughty boom-boom about this girl. Even without speaking.

132

he felt as if he had known her all his life, this girl whose name he didn't even know.

Remo had loved many women in his time. And yet none of them had felt like this one. There was something sure about it, as if their flesh belonged together, and always had. But he was being an idiot, he told himself. Any woman who wouldn't even give her name to a man she was going to spend the night with wasn't exactly in the market for true love.

"1 suppose you're being so mysterious just so you can avoid talking to me if we ever bump into each other again."

She let her arms fall from around his neck. "Your ways are too worldly for me to understand," she said simply. "I cannot tell you who I am because I cannot. That is all there is to know. And 1 wish to make love with you because my body longs for you. Is it not enough?"

Strange bird. Even in the darkness he could see the changing tones of her eyes. Remo kissed her gain. "It's enough," he said. And for some reason he didn't understand, going to bed with this woman seemed to be more important to him than breathing.

He made love to her like a schoolboy, frightened, delighted, surprised at his own artlessness. He forgot everything about the sexual techniques that worked with other women, because this nameless girl was like no other woman he had ever been with. They laughed together and played and wrestled and touched each other like incalculably precious things, and Remo told her stories about the orphanage where he'd grown up, and she sang him lewd Viking songs about the glories of raping and looting in the land of the Francs, and when they finally came together, it was as if he'd never made love to anyone before.

He held her close until she slept.

"Sam?"

133

She didn't answer. Her breathing was slow and regular.

"I think I love you," he whispered, shocked at his own words, grateful that she hadn't been awake to hear them.

Her mouth curved into a smile.

"You faker!" he muttered, pushing her away. He could feel himself blushing.

She entwined herself around him and found his lips again. "Bulldookey," she said.

Chapter Fourteen

He shook her awake. "Sam. I've got to go."

She squinted, turning toward the window. The first red streaks of dawn showed. "Where?"

"Wales," he said.

She sat up, rubbing her eyes. Her hair was still in its knot, dangling down the side of her neck. She was so pretty that Remo was half afraid to look at her. He knew that the more time he spent with her, the more he would want to stay. He got up and dressed quickly.

"Can I go with you?"

"No." .

"Why not?"

"Because I say so."

"Oh." She sounded hurt

"Hah. It hurts when the shoe's on the other foot, doesn't it?"

"What shoe?"

"It's just an American expression. What country are you from, anyway? Ah-ah-ah, just testing. I know you aren't going to tell me."

134

135

She stretched herself like a cat. The sight of her naked body in daylight gave Remo a pang of sadness. He dropped his shoe and stood for a few moments, watching her, wondering if he would ever see her again.

"Let's quit this," he said, disgusted.

"What?"

"This secrecy crap. I want us to see each other again. Tell me how I can reach you."

"I'll follow you," she said.

He shook his head. He didn't trust himself to talk.

"Why not?" she asked.

"You can't, that's all. Not where I'm going."

"Oh, I see. You think I'm too frail and delicate for your rowdy life."

"You're about as frail as a Sherman tank." He slipped on his T-shirt. It smelled of her.

She walked over to him and took his hands.

"Don't, okay?" He broke away from her, suddenly angry. "You can't go, and I can't tell you why, and this is the last time I'm going to see your funny face because, for some reason, you want us to keep on being strangers. So don't make it any harder than it already is." He walked to the door.

"Remo ..." She came to him and kissed him. And again, it felt as if she had been with him all his life.

"Tell me who you are," he whispered. "I don't care if you're on the run from somebody, or married, or whatever. I don't even care how you know about me. I just want to be able to find you when I get back."

She gazed at him for a long time. Then, frowning, she lowered her eyes.

He waited in silence for what seemed an eternity. Finally he spoke, burning with shame. "Just asking," he said bitterly.

"Please-"

136

"Hey. No need to make excuses. Believe me, I don't want any strings, either. It was a swell one-night stand."

He ran down the hotel steps, hot-wired the first unguarded car he saw, and laid a strip of rubber a mile long.

"Bitch," he muttered, speeding out of the city. He was never going to get mixed up with women again. He would limit himself to tarts and dumbbells. If no tarts or dumbbells were available, he'd settle for cold showers.

What was so special about what's-her-name, anyway, he asked himself. He'd just been lonesome and horny. As a matter of fact, she was as ordinary as they came. Couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. And her nose was crooked. Didn't even know how to use a fork.

She was freaking weird, when it came right down to it. Eyes that kept changing colors, like a kaleidoscope. Muscles like a damned stevedore under that silky skin. Probably lifted weights on her lunch hour. He wouldn't be surprised if she was a dyke. Or worse. One of those Scandinavian sex-change jobs. By God, that was why she wouldn't give him her name! Call me Harry, darling. Hell, he was glad to be rid of her.

But oh, the taste of her lips.

Forget it. What was done was done. Even if it never started.

He made it to Wales in record time. Stopping at a village to buy some gas with all the money he had left, he considered buying a map of the area, but discarded the idea. Michelin didn't include places like the Valley of the Forest Primeval on its maps. He was too embarrassed even to ask directions to such a ridiculous-sounding place, even if Chiun did insist that it was the correct address.

He headed north. It seemed like the more primeval route. By the time the roads changed from stone to earth, and the rickety wooden signposts touted places like Llanfairfechan and Caernarfon as major metropolises hun-

137

dreds of kilometers distant, the late afternoon mist was beginning to settle along the mossy banks where he drove. The trees were huge here, lush pines stretching to the clouds. Insects and hidden forest animals seemed to be everywhere, chattering endlessly. The air was thick and sweet.

Remo drove the car down the narrowing road, overgrown almost to invisibility by grass, until the road petered off into a footpath and then, in the distance, disappeared altogether.

"Great," Remo said out loud. "Just freaking great." He must have come fifty miles on that road. "Valley of the Forest Primeval. I've got to be out of my gourd."

He slammed the gears into reverse and backed up. "Look on the bright side," he explained to the steering wheel. "The one good thing about having a rotten day is that after a certain point it doesn't get any worse, right?"

He was looking over his shoulder when the rock smashed his windscreen.

"Wrong," he muttered, getting out of the car.

There was a rustling somewhere in the forest. He ran toward it.

Nothing. Everything was still once he reached the shadows of the pines. The chipmunks and squirrels kept up their angry chatter.

Must have been a freak accident, he decided, coming back to the road. A rock that got spun up by the tires . . .

He closed his eyes, hoping it was all a bad dream, then opened them again. No dream. All four tires were flat.

He examined one. A puncture. A very neat puncture, executed by a sharp metal instrument. The others were the same.

"I can't believe it," he said. He'd always thought of vandalism as an urban problem. But there wasn't even a

138

road here, and his tires had been slashed by a knife. He looked around. Not a footprint.

Where did they come from? Maybe the people out here imported hoodlums, like oranges. Maybe somewhere in Llanfairfechan there was a company that brought gang members from Chicago or New York by the truckload, snarling and slashing at travelers to make sure the area didn't get overrun by tourists.

He leaned against the car and slid down to a sitting position. He hadn't seen a house for thirty miles, and he'd passed the last garage four hours ago.

Hell, what was he thinking about? He didn't have any money to pay for tires even if he found them. There was nothing he could do now except wait it out till morning and then carry on on foot.

Maybe it was for the best, he thought sleepily. He hadn't gotten much rest the night before, what with squandering his one evening of relaxation on a girl. It wouldn't hurt to catch forty winks. He closed his eyes.

Ping.

"Wazzat," he said, leaping to his feet. On the car's fender, just beside the place where his head had been, was a small dent. From the angle of the mark, its trajectory had been from above.

He looked up at the trees. "Okay, you little bastards," he yelled.

Ping.

He caught it with a slap of his hand. A pebble. And another, whizzing through his hair.

He stalked through the forest, crouching, moving so that his feet didn't disturb the leaves beneath them. About fifty yards away, he caught sight of a pair of short, skinny legs in ragged pants shinnying down the trunk of a tree. A little torso covered by a leather jerkin followed, and two arms, one of them clutching a homemade slingshot. The last part

139

down was a tiny, dirt-smeared face, its eyes wide and alert, searching in all directions.

"Graaagh," Remo yelled, snatching the boy by the scruff of the neck.

The boy screamed and kicked, his grimy limbs dangling in midair. "Let me down, you great filthy beast."

"Look who's talking," Remo said. "They can smell you in Albuquerque."

"Fight me fair, and I'll kill you, Chinee." He looked at Remo, puzzled. "You are the Chinee, aren't you?" '

Remo lifted him until his face was level with his own. "How Chinee do 1 look?"

The boy's mouth set defiantly. "Well, you musta used magic to cover yourself up, like. Swine of a yellow Chinee, I know who y'are. Set me down and fight like a man."

"Oh, jeez," Remo said. He dropped the boy, who rolled a few feet in the moss like a dirty leather ball, then righted himself, his fists high. "Go on, fight me, villain."

Remo tapped him on the stomach with one finger.

"Oof." The boy fell backward. "Lucky punch, that was. Do it again. Dare you, pig."

Remo tweaked his leg. The boy somersaulted onto his back.

"I'm not down yet, Chinee," he panted, staggering to his feet. He blew a lock of unruly black hair off his forehead.

"Look, before we continue this fight to the death, suppose you tell me why you threw that rock into my windshield and cut up my tires."

"Fool. Had to get you to stop, didn't I?" He put up his fists.

'' You could have asked.''

The boy snorted. "And let you run away from me like the ruddy yellow coward y'are?"

140

"We all have to take our chances," Remo said. "How do you think I'm going to get out of this place?"

"You're not leaving alive, if that's what you have in mind."

"Oh, that's right. I forgot. You're going to finish me off here and now."

"That's right. There's nought but one winner in the Master's Trial."

"Prepare to die."

The boy lunged. Remo swept him up under his arm. Now things had really gone too far. Fighting a dwarf had been bad enough. But if Chiun expected him to murder a ten-year-old kid, he could take his traditions and shove them up the old archives.

"You've got to be kidding," he said.

"By the gods ..." The boy was flailing for all he was worth. Remo let him wear himself out. After a long, wild bout, the boy drooped exhausted, suspended by his midsection, twitching occasionally and sniffling. "By the gods, you'll not kill my father," he squeaked.

Remo set him down.

The boy wiped his nose with his sleeve. "I will fight ya," he said, his tears cutting little white rivulets down his cheeks. "Just need a minute to get m'strength back."

"Sure," Remo said gently, putting his arm around the boy. He didn't resist. "Suppose you tell me who your father is."

"Emrys ap Llewellyn," he said, digging his fists into his eyes. "Son of Llewellyn. I'm Griffith. Griffith ap Emrys. Son of Emrys."

"So that's how it works."

"Who're you?"

"Remo ap nobody, I guess. I'm an orphan."

141

The boy nodded. "I'm half an orphan. My ma's gone. Remo don't sound like a Chinee name."

"Griffith doesn't sound like the name of a killer."

"A man's got to fight, if he's a man. That's what my da says."

"Only if he's got no choice."

"What about you? You never even met my da, and you come all this way to kill him."

"I'm not going to kill your father. I've come here to tell him that."

"You're lying."

"Cross my heart."

The boy looked hopeful for a moment. Then his frown returned.

"But you'll fight him."

"Nope. Not unless he attacks me."

The boy squirmed. "Da's a funny man," he said.

"How's that?"

"He might attack you. It's the Trial Riles, you know, to fight. But he can't kill you."

"Why not?"

The boy scrutinized Remo suspiciously. "Maybe I shouldn't say. It'll be giving you unfair advantage."

Remo couldn't argue. The kid was a dirtball, but he was no dummy.

"Unless you promise not to kill him, no matter what."

"Okay. That's a deal."

"No, a real promise. With this." He produced a pocketknife.

"Exhibit A," Remo said.

"Come on, hold out your finger."

"Oh, no you don't. I can't stand the sight of blood."

"It'll just be a prick on your finger. To promise." The boy waited expectantly.

"Well, all right. But not too deep."

142

The boy gave him an expert stab on the end of his index finger. "Okay, now swear you won't hurt my da."

"1 swear."

"Swear by all the ancient gods, by Mryddin and Cos and the Lady of the Lake-"

"All right, all right already," Remo said. "Why won't your father kill me?"

The boy leaned close to Remo's ear and whispered: "Because he's going blind."

Remo straightened up. "Are you serious?" .

"It's my fault. Last year, during the Midsummer Eve Feast, I climbed up a tree and couldn't get down. I was scared, you see. I'm a weak one, really, not like the other boys. I was showing off, to prove to my da . . ." His voice trailed off in shame.

"Hey," Remo said, hoisting the boy onto his lap. "Everybody gets scared. You wouldn't be normal if you didn't."

The boy stared hard at the ground, his cheeks red. "So my da came after me," he continued softly. "I was stuck on a high branch, and it was a long way down. It wasn't so strong. When my da climbed up on it to get hold of me, the branch give way. While we was falling, he put me on top of him so's I wouldn't hit ground. His head struck a great rock. He was like as dead for a fortnight or more. I prayed to all the gods there are to make him well, and he come out of it, but his eyes ain't never been the same again. And lately they been getting worse. You see, it's my fault."

"Griffith-"

" 'Tis! And now, if he fights you, he'll die sure. Don't you see, it'll be like me killing him myself. The gods are pointing at me for being a coward that day in the tree. They're going to take my da from me, like they took my ma, and then . . . And then ..."

143

"Shh," Remo said, rubbing the boy's head.

"That's why it's me that's got to fight you. If you kill me, I'll deserve it. But not my da."

"Nobody's going to kill anybody, okay? There's not going to be any fight. I gave you my promise, didn't I?"

Griffith took Remo's finger and examined it. "Your sacred promise. Witnessed in blood."

"The most sacred. Now how about taking me to your dad so we can talk things over."

Griffith eyed him worriedly, "T'was your most sacred-"

"I get it, okay?"

The boy smiled. "I'll get you a horse in the morning. They're wild in these parts, and they're better than cars. I can tame them quick."

"I'd appreciate that," Remo said.

Chapter Fifteen

The boy took Remo into a green valley in the deepest part of the forest. There, tucked beneath a cluster of massive trees, stood a cottage with a newly thatched roof. Remo had to stoop to enter through the low arched doorway.

A man was inside, sharpening a knife on an oilstone. Even though he was sitting down and his back was to the door, he was a giant of a man.

"Da?" the boy said.

Emrys turned, smiling. "Well, I thought those goblins you're always talking to had ate you right this time." His smile disappeared when he saw Remo. In the dim light of the cottage, Remo could see that the man's eyes were clouded and mottled.

"Da, it's-"

"I know who it is," he said, rising. He nodded curtly to Remo. "There's but one who'd be coming to the valley now."

"He's not a true Chinee," Griffith said hopefully. "Y'see, Remo here has promised-"

144

145

"I suppose you'll want to be starting," Emrys said, ignoring his son.

"No," Remo said quickly. "As a matter of fact-"

"You're not welcome to the hospitality of my home."

"Da, let him talk. Please."

"You hold your tongue, Griffith." He strode over to the door with large, thundering steps and threw it open. "We'll talk outside. You stay in and mind your silence." He locked the door behind him.

"Da . . ."

"I've chosen a place. You can see if it suits you," he told Remo as they walked toward a clearing in the glen.

Remo could hear the boy's voice calling frantically from inside the cottage. "You promised, Remo! Don't forget your promise. T'was made in blood!".

The big man removed the sheepskin vest he wore and draped it neatly over a rock. From inside the hollow of an oak he took a piece of bark covered with strange words. "A message for my son," he said, laying the scrap of wood on top of the vest. From his trousers pocket, he extracted the carved jade stone Chiun had given him and threw it at Remo's feet. "There's the rock. It's begun now."

Remo breathed deeply. "Emrys, I'm not going to fight you."

The man's mouth turned down into a bitter scowl. "What's Griffith been telling you?"

"That you have no more reason to go through with this farce than I do," Remo said. "Tradition or not, I've seen enough of the Master's Trial to know it's a crock. Let's end it here and now. For everybody's sake." He extended his hand.

Emrys shoved past him. "I won't have it," he growled. "If you don't have the guts to fight me in the Master's Trial, then fight me as a man."

146

"What difference would that make?"

Emrys stared at him, his nostrils distended. "I might let you live," he said menacingly.

"Forget it. I've promised not to fight you."

"A promise to a babe."

"Who's got more sense than his father."

"Fight, damn you!"

"You'd lose, can't you see that?" Remo shouted. "You'd lose to a man half your size, let alone me. How far gone are your eyes? Just a little blurriness around the edges, or are shapes all you can make out?"

"Make your move, you spineless coward!"

"No. I said I wouldn't fight."

Emrys's face was contorted into a mask of rage and shame. "Then you'll die. I'll not be pitied by you."

He lunged for Remo and swung wildly, missing him by a foot. The missed blow sent him sprawling on the ground.

"Now look here," Remo said, going over to him and touching his shoulder. Just as he was about to speak, Emrys took him by surprise with a powerful roundhouse right to the jaw. Remo felt as if all his teeth had jarred loose at once.

"Who's blurry around the edges now, chopstick pecker?" He laughed, a big, hearty guffaw filled with pride.

Remo rubbed his jaw. "Very funny."

"Where'd you learn to fight, anyway, some Chinee opium den?"

Remo rolled his eyes. "My training comes from Sinanju. That's in Korea, peabrain. Not China."

He attacked. Remo ducked. "Son of a yellow whore."

"Oh, come off it."

"So that's how you fight over in Sin and Goo. With your mouth," Emrys taunted. "It's a big one, too. To make up for your lack of balls, I'll wager." He came at

147

Remo in a flying tackle, clutching Remo's legs with a viselike grip.

"Hey-"

Emrys flipped him over and jabbed two knuckles at his eyeballs. Before they struck, Remo took hold of the big man's arms and threw him.

"That's more like it, dogmeat," Emrys said, grinning. He leaped at Remo. Remo caught him, and the two of them wrestled, unyielding, until they were both slathered in sweat.

Remo's wrists were aching. They'd been grappling, stuck to each other like Siamese twins, for twenty minutes or more. He should have known better than to underestimate Emrys, he realized. His opponent's eyes might be failing, but he was strong as a bull.

"I know . . . how you got here," Emrys grunted.

"Ng," Remo said.

"Your . . . friend . . . Chiun ..."

"Yeah?" He shook a bead of sweat off his nose. "What about him?"

"He shits white boys like you for turds."

Remo laughed. "You've got to be the grossest-"

Emrys used the opportunity to slam Remo in the belly, shooting him across the glen into a tree trunk.

Feeling his lungs collapse, Remo rolled out of the way of Emrys's oncoming body.

"Sorry, Griffith, but all bets are off," he mumbled, striking out with a left hook. It sliced the Welshman across the shoulder. With a howl, Emrys came at him again, throwing him into the center of the clearing like a sack of bricks.

Remo closed his eyes as he landed, grateful that Chiun wasn't around to see him fighting like a barroom brawler with a half-blind lunatic. And losing.

148

"This is it," Remo said, stumbling to his feet. "I'm beginning to lose patience with you."

"Arggh," Emrys gurgled, staggering forward, his fists weaving in front of him. Remo stepped out of the way. Emrys tripped on a rock and fell face down with a thud.

"You're the one who wanted to fight," Remo said, trying to focus.

"So I do." The Welshman charged.

Remo charged.

And they both fell down.

"What was that?" Remo said, cranking himself upward into a sitting position.

Emrys brushed some dust off his bare chest. "I na ken it. Summat struck me fierce upon the head. And just when I was about to finish you off, too."

"Finish me off?" Remo objected. "That's a-wait a second." He crawled a few feet and retrieved a long slender pole tipped by an iron arrow wound around the stick by a strip of leather. "It's a spear. I think."

Emrys searched himself for wounds. "Am I hit?"

"No. Neither am I. But it knocked both of us off our feet."

"Oh, na," Emrys moaned, his voice quavering. "We done something wrong."

"Like what?" Remo said irritably. "What are you talking about?"

Emrys pointed. "A great white form yonder. 'Tis the gods, come to seek vengeance."

Remo looked in the direction where Emrys was pointing. Through the foliage of the forest, he could make out the shape of a white horse.

"I should have listened to Griffith," Emrys said, his voice filled with doom and wonder. "He talks to the wood spirits. I never believed they was for true, but the boy knew. Now it's too late."

149

"It's only a horse, for crying out loud: Get yourself a pair of glasses."

"A horse that throws spears?"

Remo fingered the iron-tipped pole uncertainly "Somebody's standing behind the horse."

"You great Chinee lummox. You're blinder'n I am."

The horse galloped into the clearing, then slowed to a halt some fifty yards from the two men. The rider was a woman. She dismounted, the flowing robes she wore billowing gracefully. When she was on her feet, she gave the animal a sharp slap on the rump and sent him galloping into the wood. Then she walked forward purposefully toward the two men.

Remo looked, shook his head, looked again. "It can't be," he said slowly.

"Oh, gar," Emrys lamented.

She was the same woman Remo had spent the night with in London, but radically different. She was dressed in a loose gown of sea green, fastened at her shoulders by two large gold medallions. In her belt were a small ax and a knife. Her golden hair hung to below her waist and moved like water with each step she took. As she drew nearer, the sun caught the thin gold circlet around her forehead, making her look like a barbarian princess. Her eyes, green and gray and blue, regarded him somberly. She did not speak.

"It's you," Remo said.

She picked up the spear. Without a word, she hurled it into the forest and followed it.

"Is she real?" Emrys whispered, afraid to turn his head.

"Yeah," Remo said, then thought better of it. "Maybe."

She returned with the still warm carcass of a rabbit, a red wound where its eye had been. Silently she offered it to Emrys.

The Welshman accepted it, swallowing hard. "Well, I

150

suppose we could all do with a little dinner," he same lamely. He cleared his throat.

She turned to Remo, her head held high.

"Sam." He said it so softly it was almost a sigh.

"I am Jilda of Lakluun," the woman said. "Here for the Master's Trial." Then, slowly, the strange eyes twinkling, she inclined her head to Remo in a formal bow.

Chapter Sixteen

"I prayed," Griffith said, staring into the hearth. The cottage was filled with the warm, smoky aroma of the rabbit cooking over the open fire.

Roasting meat was not one of Remo's favorite smells, but he'd learned through the years to hold his tongue in a world full of carnivores. He stayed neaf the window and tried to breathe shallowly.

"I asked Mryddin and all the ancient gods and the spirits to bring you both back safe, and they did. The Lady of the Lake herself brought you home. And a good fat hare, too."

"Uh," Remo said, feeling nauseated. He leaned out the window. Outside, Jilda was stalking the forest, spear in hand. "The High Executioner of the animal kingdom, you mean."

Griffith gasped. "Remo, take it back, quick. What you said was a sacrilege."

"Don't be bossing our guest, boy," Emrys said. To Remo's dismay, he was nailing the rabbit skin up to dry on the cottage wall. "Jilda's no spirit. She's a friend of Remo's."

151

152

"But she is! 'Tis the Lady of the Lake."

"Griffith!"

The boy crouched. "Yes, Da."

"Leave us now." Griffith slinked outside. "He holds to the old religion more than most," Emrys explained. "Sometimes I worry about him. Too much like his ma, all air and dreams. I don't know how I'll get him ready."

"For what?" Remo said.

Emrys put down his hammer and stepped back to admire the bloody pelt on the wall. "Why, for his turn at the Master's Trial, don't you know."

"What? I thought that was all over."

Emrys looked surprised. "Between us? How could it be over? 1 like you, Remo. Don't get me wrong now. But both of us are still alive. That's against the rules."

"Nei skynugur," Jiida muttered, bursting into the room with another rabbit hanging limply between her fingers.

"What's that you say, missy?"

"It is a Norse expression describing what I feel about the precious Master's Trial. Translated, it means 'bull-dookey.' "

She cleaned the rabbit expertly, tossing the intestines out the window, inches from Remo's face.

"Do you mind?" he said testily.

"Mind what?" Jilda asked.

Remo prepared himself for an explanation of the social unacceptability of slapping one's associates with animal organs, then waved the idea away. Even the most rudimentary forms of etiquette would be wasted on Jilda. He winced as she pulled off the rabbit's skin with a jerk and tossed it to Emrys, who nailed it happily to the wall.

"The Trial was originally begun so that our people would not make war on one another," she said. "1 believe that was because someone thought that one day we might all need to band together.''

153

"Live with a bunch of bloodthirsty Vikings?" Emrys said, genuinely surprised.

Jilda's dagger was out of her belt in a flash.

"Whoa," Remo said. "No murders till after dinner, okay?"

Jilda replaced the knife scornfully. "Anyway, I was saying we ought to be friends."

"Great start you've made," Remo said.

"But abolishing the Trial," Emrys protested.

Jilda thrust the rabbit onto the spit over the fire. "It's a stupid tradition. Maybe it served a purpose a thousand years ago, but it's time we ended it. I have given this thought, and I, for one, will not kill strangers who have done me and my people no harm."

"Bingo," Remo said. "I've reached the same decision."

"But my father was killed by the great Chinee," Emrys said.

Jilda cut him off. "So was mine. That doesn't change anything."

"Well, I don't know. I'll not be called a coward."

"Don't you see?" Jilda said, waving Griffith inside. "If all three of us refuse to fight, it won't be a question of cowardice. And your boy will be spared from having to do battle."

Emrys jutted out his chin. "You talk like you think Griffith would lose."

Griffith walked in, laughing lightly. His hands were cupped. He opened them to reveal a tiny green tree frog, which bounded out the window to the boy's cries of joy.

"Well, look at him," Jilda said, obviously annoyed. "He's a kind and clever boy, but even you can't think he'd make a decent warrior."

"I'll not have you speaking that way in my house, missy."

"That's all right," Griffith said gently. "She's right."

154

"You keep your peace."

"But I'm not a good fighter. I'll never be. I'm small, and my hands aren't fast."

Emrys threw down his hammer with a crash. "By Mryddin, I never thought I'd live to see a member of my family call himself a coward."

"Hey," Remo objected. "He's not a coward. He was willing to take • me on himself to keep me from fighting you. That might be what you call a coward, but I'd rather have one guy like him on my side, alive, than a hundred terrific fighters who've gone to their reward during this asinine Master's Trial."

Emrys deliberated, his glance shifting from Jilda and Remo to the boy. Finally he said, "Well, I suppose you're right. Seeing as how we're about to share a meal together, there's not much reason to fight."

"Oh, Da," the boy said, hugging him.

Jilda nodded. "Then it's settled," she said. "Now we eat."

Remo sat a little apart from the others, contenting himself with a bowl of roots and wild grasses from the forest while they stabbed hungrily at the roast rabbits.

"Will you not have any?" Griffith asked.

Remo shook his head.

"Is that part of being a Chinee, eating no meat?"

"Sort of."

Jilda laughed, her eyes changing from blue to bright green. "Don't ask the Chinese to claim our Remo. He's an American. But his soul belongs with us."

Remo spoke to the dancing green eyes. "I feel as if I do belong with you . . . all," he added, flustered.

"We know," Emrys said.

Remo felt sleepy. The warm cabin, the safety of the woods ... It all seemed so homey, and yet in the same room with him were a man who could hold him in a

155

hammerlock for half an hour and a woman who could drop two men with the broadside of a spear.

He smiled lazily as he watched Jilda eat. The sight of her tearing off the pale meat with her fingers filled him with strange passion. She was at the same time a lady and a wild animal, beautiful and free. And he wanted her more than he had ever wanted a woman.

"You look content, my friend," Emrys said. "Although how a man can be satisfied with birds' food I'll never know."

Remo set down his bowl, making an effort to tear his gaze away from Jilda. "I am," he said. "It's funny. I feel like I'm with my own kind. I always thought Chiun and I were the only ones like us."

"And so you are," Emrys said. "What the three of us have in common is that none of us belong to the world." He took in at once the unspoken intimacy between Remo and Jilda. "But we can never be part of one another's lives without giving up our own ways. That would be worse than death. For me, at least."

Remo fought down a sudden, irrational feeling of annoyance toward the Welshman. The moment had been perfect. No questions, no thought of the future. And now Emrys had voiced a possibility Remo hadn't wanted to face: What will 1 have to give up to keep Jilda with me? "Will you be going back to Sinanju?"

"Sinanju?" Since he'd found Jilda, he hadn't given a thought to Sinanju.

"To tell Chiun what we've done with the Master's Trial," Emrys continued. "I don't think he'll be happy with the news."

"No," Remo said. "I guess not."

"What I'm saying is, I'll go with you."

"Me, too," Griffith said. "I've yearned so to see the wild Chinee."

156

"You'll be staying right here, and no argument. What do you say we go tomorrow, Remo? A partner will lighten the load on your journey."

"Tomorrow . . ." Remo said. It was so soon.

Jilda stood up and went to him. "We'll all go," she said.

Remo's heart quickened. "You, too?"

"We three have made the decision, and we three will stand by it together."

"And me too, Da," Griffith pleaded, sounding desperate. "I must go with you. I'll be needed. I can feel it."

Emrys gave him a black look, and the boy subsided.

"Come," Jilda said, laying a hand on Remo's shoulder. "There's no room for us here to spend the night. We'll sleep outdoors."

"I'd planned on giving up my bed for you, miss," Emrys said kindly. " 'T'isn't often we have female visitors."

"Not necessary," Jilda said. "I am accustomed to sleeping in the open. I like to see the stars overhead."

"Same here," Remo said quickly.

The night sky seemed to shine with a million candles. In their liquid light, her long hair spread over the moss like a cape of gold, Jilda was almost terrifyingly beautiful.

Remo lay beside her, tender and spent. Their lovemak-ing had been even better than he'd remembered. Once again, he had felt as if he had come to her for the first time. Once again, their bodies had joined like two halves of a perfect whole.

"I'm glad you're coming to Sinanju," Remo said softly, tracing a line with his finger along the smooth, moonlit skin of her leg.

"I won't leave you until I have to."

157

He found it difficult to speak. "You-you don't ever have to."

"Ah, yes I will. Look. My star." She pointed to the sky. "The golden one."

It had been a dumb attempt, Remo decided. Too soon and too awkward. He'd never been good at sweet-talking women. He let it pass. "To the north?" he asked, pretending to be interested.

"Yes. Its name is Gullikona-'Golden Lady.' My parents named me for her. 'Jilda' is the name I chose for myself when I was grown."

He touched her hair. Golden Lady. Embarrassed, he pulled his hand away. He didn't want to paw her like some lovesick adolescent. What he felt was crazy. He'd have to control it.

"According to one of our legends, Gullikona was once, in the old days, a beautiful princess with hair like spun gold. Although she was betrothed to a mighty warlord, she fell in love with a young warrior and took him to her bed. When the warlord found out about her infidelity, he assigned her lover to serve on his own ship for a long voyage to distant lands. Once at sea, the warlord tortured his rival and brutally murdered him, cutting off the young man's hand. Then he sent a special messenger on a small boat to return home to present the severed hand to the princess.

"When she received the horrible present, the princess was so overcome with grief that she went to the seashore that night and built a great bonfire. Then, clasping her lover's dismembered hand between her own, she walked into the flames so that she might be with him for all time in Valhalla.

"The legend says that her burning hair made such a beautiful fire that even the gods took notice. Freya herself, goddess of love and pleasure, found pity in her heart for the doomed lovers. She plucked the princess from,the

158

earth, fire and all, and placed her in the sky, where the dead warrior's spirit would be sure to find her. And there they remain, the flames of their love burning to the end of time."

"Gullikona," Remo whispered. "Sam-I mean Jilda-"

She laughed. "You liked Sam, didn't you? She was more refined than 1 am. Unfortunately, her high-heeled shoes were unbearable."

"What were you doing in London?"

"Why, looking for you, of course. 1 began my search in Morocco. I just missed you in Lisbon. I was afraid that you might not stop in England at all, and that I wouldn't get to meet you before my turn in the Master's Trial. But that would have been too late."

"You would have fought me?"

"I'd have had no choice. The elders of Lakluun would have been watching. That was why I had to see you before you arrived on my island."

"To talk me out of coming?"

"To see, first, if you were worthy. If you had been an arrogant boor who thought with his fists, I would have taken pleasure in fighting you. But in any case, I had to meet you alone before the battle. As I have said, I will not kill or be killed by a stranger."

"But why wouldn't you tell me who you were?"

She touched his face. "Would you not have suspected trickery if you knew I was to oppose you in combat?"

Remo thought. "Even then, I wouldn't have fought you."

"Because I'm a woman?"

Remo shook his head. "Because ..." He felt himself trembling.

Stop, he told himself. Don't let yourself fall so hard you'll never pick up the pieces again. But he didn't stop, and he brushed her lips with his own, and felt his loins

159

rush with desire, and then he didn't care if he had to spend the rest of his life regretting this moment, because it was worth whatever price he would have to pay.

His hands filled up with her. He couldn't get close enough. He belonged with her, inside her. Gently he entered her, and her hot flesh welcomed him, smooth, caressing, hungering.

/ do love you, he thought. And I don't care if you can't love me back. This is . . . almost enough. Almost everything I need. And almost was almost the best thing that had ever happened to him.

"Remo . . ." Jilda breathed, arching him deep into her. "Remo, I love you, too."

With a cry, he let himself flow into her. She held him, strong and sure, their love together burning hot enough to set fire to the stars.

And suddenly, Remo knew what he would be willing to give up to keep her with him: everything.

Chapter Seventeen

He slept until the sun was full in the sky and the night mist nearly gone. Jilda kissed him awake.

"Then it wasn't a dream," he said, tangling his fingers in her hair. "What's this?" He lifted the heavy leather cape fastened around her neck. Beneath it was the green dress he'd taken off her the night before. "You're dressed. Is it against your religion to fool around in daylight?"

"Emrys is anxious to get started. We've charted an Arctic course."

He sat up. "How long have I been sleeping?"

"You needed the rest. Everything's been prepared." She handed him a thick sheepskin wrapper. "This is for you. We're heading toward the Irish Sea, then north, over Scandinavia and Russia by water. It will be cold."

Emrys met them half a mile away, a knapsack slung over his shoulders.

"Where's Griffith?" Remo asked. "I wanted to say good-bye to him."

"At home, where he'll stay," Emrys said gruffly. "All weeping and wailing he was. Couldn't stand the sight

160

161

of him another minute." He walked briskly, his face creased. "He's a good kid," Remo said.

Emrys grunted.

They reached the shore within the hour. Jilda commandeered the project of building a watertight boat out of wood and twine, covered with animal skins from Emrys's sack.

"We can't go halfway around the world in that," Remo complained.

Jilda arched an eyebrow. "When we need another, we will build another," she said.

Never question the logic of a Viking, Remo thought.

It was noon by the time they all settled into the boat. Remo pushed it out of the shallows and jumped in. The small square sail Jilda had brought with her caught the wind and carried them quickly toward the gray, tossing waters of the deep.

Someone shouted, far away, on the shore.

"Who is that?" Jilda said, straining to make out the small figure who ran to the edge- of the water, waving his arms frantically overhead.

"By Mryddin, it's the boy," Emrys muttered, standing up shakily. "Go back!" He slapped at the air with his big hands. "Damn you, Griffith, I told you not to follow!"

"Take me with you, Da!" the boy shrieked. "I must be with you. The spirits have told me. Come back, I beg you, Da!"

Shaking a fist at his son, Emrys sat down with a thump that rocked the boat precariously. "Disobedient imp. I'm shamed by the lad, truly shamed."

"He loves you very much," Jilda said. She stood up. "Very much. Look."

Throwing off his shoes, the boy splashed into the water and started swimming the long distance to the boat.

162

"Is he in the water?" Emrys boomed, trying to rise. "I can't see that far." Jilda pushed him down. The big man's face was strained with worry. "Ah, I suppose he'll give up soon enough and go home," he said with a forced casual air.

The boy swam, a half-mile, a mile. The boat sailed further out to sea, the distance between it and Griffith growing longer with each minute, but the boy continued to flail doggedly on course.

"Is he still coming?" Emrys asked nervously.

"He is."

"Fool. Thinks he'll catch us."

Jilda watched the tiny swimmer, her dress blowing in the gusting wind. "No. He knows he cannot catch us," she said quietly. "All the same, he will not give up." She crossed her arms in front of her. "I was wrong about that one. He calls himself a coward, but his spirit has the strength of ten warriors." She watched him silently for fully another five minutes while Emrys snorted and shifted in his seat, pretending unconcern for his son. Then, without warning, Jilda stripped off the leather cape she wore around her shoulders, and her shoes of sewn skin, and the green dress that fluttered like a sail, until she stood naked on the bow of the boat.

"What in the hell are you doing?" Remo shouted. "Let's just turn the boat around, for God's sake-"

"The boy will not live long enough for that. I have seen drowning men before." She jumped high into the air and dived. She hit the water like a knife, without a ripple, emerging a hundred yards away. With smooth, long strokes she swam to him and carried him back in her arms to the boat.

"Da," Griffith gasped breathlessly as he climbed in. "The Lady of the Lake! The Lady of the Lake came for me. The spirits said I would be protected."

. 163

"Silence," Ernrys roared, swatting the boy with the back of his hand. "We've lost a whole day because of your foolish ways. Now we'll have to take you back."

"He comes with us," Jilda said.

"Ah, no. I'll not be hampered by such a one as talks to ghosts and tries to drown himself." He coughed politely, handing Jiida her dress. "I'll thank you, though, for saving his life, miss. Not that he deserved it."

Jilda took the dress, but made no attempt to put it on. "He is one of great faith. Perhaps we will need that in the days to come. My people, too, believe in spirits." She slipped on her shoes. "I will look after him," she said.

She dressed quickly, utterly unself-conscious of her nakedness. Her hair, wet and sparkling in the sunshine, looked as if it belonged to a sea nymph. Her eyes had changed color again to match the steel blue of the water.

"Sam, Jilda, Gullikona," Remo recited. "Are you the Lady of the Lake, too?"

The steel eyes smiled slyly. "I am what I must be," she said. "Like all of us."

Out of the corner of his eye, Remo saw Emrys fumbling to put his arm around the shivering, beaming boy.

Chapter Eighteen

A negotiation was underway on the campus of Du Lac College in Minnesota. The two-story ivory-colored mansion that was the home of the college president was ringed by a squad of thirty National Guardsmen, carrying rifles, and staring at a small hillock thirty yards away where two men were talking.

Behind the two men was a crowd of 300 students, dressed in the 1980s version of sixties Greenwich Village chic. There were a lot of bandanas and ripped T-shirts, along with designer jeans and hair died orange and purple and green.

Smith moved into the crowd of students who parted to make way for him, then closed in to swallow him up.

"Who are you?" a female student asked.

"Dr. Feldmar's assistant," Smith said. "She around?"

"Like I haven't seen Birdie yet. She ought to be here."

"Like this is her show, right?" Smith said.

"Yeah."

Smith looked toward the small grassy knoll halfway toward the college president's mansion.

164

165

One of the two men there was Smith's age, but he wore cutoff jeans, and a flowered shirt with a black bandana around his open throat. The other man was younger but conservatively dressed in a sports jacket, dress shirt and slacks.

Smith moved through the crowd so he could hear the two men talking.

"We want an end to racism on campus," the older man was saying. He looked bored.

Smith said to a young woman standing next to him, "Who is that guy?" The young woman was bouncing a rock the size of a chicken egg up and down on the palm of her hand.

"That's Vishnu," she said.

"Who's Vishnu?"

"Who are you anyway?" the woman asked suspiciously.

"Robin's assistant," Smith said. "I'm new here."

"Oh. I guess it's all right then. Vishnu's the chairman of the ERA movement. Vishnu's not really his name, but it was his name last year when he was God, and everybody liked the name, and he kept it even if he isn't God anymore."

"ERA?" Smith said. "Equal rights?"

"Naaah," she said in disgust. "End Racist America. It's our new movement. Turn America over to Cuba as a colony."

"Good idea," Smith said.

"Robin's idea," the woman said.

"Who's the other man?" Smith asked.

"Jeez, you don't know anything,. That's President McHale."

"He's younger than Vishnu," Smith said.

"We're against ageism," she said. "Students don't have to be young."

166

The two men on the small knoll were arguing now. The college president said, "What racism?"

"We want black professors in every department."

"We've got them," President McHale said.

"Tokens," Vishnu said. "Meaningless tokens. What about Agent Orange?"

"What about it?"

"What have you done about it?" Vishnu demanded.

"We've kept it off campus," McHale said.

"Words. More words. What about dioxin?"

"What the hell have we got to do with dioxin?" McHale demanded.

"What did you ever do about it?"

"What did you ever do about it?"

"I'm not on trial here," Vishnu said.

"I didn't know I was either," McHale said.

"What about AIDS?"

"Campus health center's got a program."

"More words. Just words," Vishnu said. "All that's necessary for evil to triumph is for people like you to do nothing.''

"What do you want me to do?" McHale asked.

"It is not for us to dictate your responses."

"Since when? You try to dictate everything else."

Smith had heard enough. He turned back to the young woman. "Where is Robin?" he asked.

"She wanted to be with us today, but she had other business."

Smith was reminded of reluctant generals in World War II who were always bemoaning the fact that they wouldn't be able to go over the top with their men when the shooting started.

"What business?" Smith asked. "I thought everything she did was here."

"Robin's a leader," the young woman said. "She's got

167

organizations all over the country. Not just this one. We're small."

The student leader turned his back on President McHale and pulled a paper from his pocket. He looked at the students massed a few yards away from him, then turned back to the college president.

"Our leader," Vishnu said, "warned us of this. She said and she told me to repeat it to you: that this fascistic, imperialistic, genocidal college administration ..."

McHale snapped, "What genocidal, for Christ's sake? This is Minnesota. What genocide?"

"You'll find out when the war crimes tribunal convenes."

"What war crimes? What war?"

"Crimes against Mother Earth; crimes against humanity in the never-ending war between evilness and lightness."

"Oh, go fuck a grass-filled duck," the college president said and stomped away, back toward the national guardsmen still standing impassively along the front of his mansion.

Vishnu turned toward the rest of the students. From this vantage point, Smith could see that Vishnu dyed his thinning hair to cover the gray.

"Our leader warned that this genocidal, fascistic college would not listen to our just pleas," Vishnu said. "And she gave me this to read to you." He cleared his throat and began to read.

" 'I had so wanted to be with you today when the forces of all that is good on earth confront the forces of all that is evil and sick in evil and sick America. I cannot be here, but you must carry on as if I was.

" There comes a time in the lives of all when they must stand for freedom. Cowards might cry peace at any price but the brave and those who would be truly free in this evil nation know that there are times when one must fight to secure persondom's rights. In the interests of

168

ERA, in the battle against dioxin and Agent Orange and other terrible poisons being injected into our bodies without our consent, in the fight against genocide against our yellow brothers, black brothers, and our Third World brothers, who hold the moral hopes of all mankind, we must never surrender. We must stand and fight. We must let our wisdom and our love shine through.' ''

Vishnu looked up and put the paper back inside his shirt.

"Will we be poisoned?" he yelled.

"No," the students roared.

"Will we kill as they want us to be killers?"

"No," came another roar.

"Will we surrender to this fascist regime, a representative' on our beloved campus of an even more fascist regime in Washington?"

"No, no, no," came back the roars.

"Will we fill the world with our love?" Vishnu yelled.

"Yes."

Vishnu turned and looked at the college president's home, then raised his arm over his head like a wagon master and brought it down, pointing toward the mansion.

"Then let's trash this fucking dump," Vishnu yelled.

Rocks suddenly began to fly toward the guardsmen standing near the mansion. The young woman next to Smith tossed her rock, with an obscene curse, then pulled more from the pockets of her jeans. She handed one to Smith.

"Here. You too. From the goodness of the earth."

"Thank you," Smith said. He held the rock in his hand. No one was paying any attention to him. They were tossing rocks and screaming, the crowd taking on a life of its own, seeming to swell, then recede, swell, then recede, like an engine pumping its way up to top running speed. It

169

was only a few moments, Smith thought, before they had worked themselves up into enough of a frenzy to storm the building. And maybe those inexperienced guardsmen facing them might just fire those guns. The guardsmen were now wincing and dodging as rocks began to strike them.

Vishnu was waving his arm in circles about his head. Smith saw his throat muscles working. The next thing would be a command to charge.

Smith backed off two steps, fired his rock, and walked away through the crowd. Behind him, he heard a groan. He felt the students surge past him, moving forward. Twenty yards away, he turned around.

His stone had hit the mark. Vishnu lay on the grass, unconscious, students kneeling around him, ministering to him. On the steps of his home, President McHale nodded, and an ambulance sped forward to take God to a hospital. Campus police came out of the presidential mansion and in the confusion began breaking the students up into small, manageable groups, and then dispersing them.

And Smith walked away. His tape recorders had said that "B" was in charge of the murder plans. "B" for Birdie? Robin Feldmar's students called her "Birdie."

He went back to the professor's locked office. Dr. Robin Feldmar, director, department of computer science. When he was sure no one was in the hall to watch, he slammed the heel of his shoe against the hollow-core door, and it sprang open as the flimsy wood of the frame gave way.

There was a pistol in the back of Robin Feldmar's center desk drawer. Neatly arranged on a piece of paper were two chewed pieces of gum. Apparently, Robin Feldmar chewed gum and then saved it for later. There was no address book, no appointment book, but there was a small handwritten memo.

170

"United Airlines, 9 A.M. to New York. Earth Goodness. See Mildred."

Smith left the campus for the airport.

Back to New York. And when he let his thoughts get off Robin Feldmar for a moment, he found himself looking forward to seeing Mildred Pensoitte again.

Chapter Nineteen

The Dutchman opened his eyes, frightened. Above him was smooth rock. The place he was in was fragrant. Cool cloths covered his forehead and neck. A thin, long-fingered hand brought a wooden ladle of water to his lips. He tried to push it away but was too weak. He drank.

Squinting to focus, he made out the wrinkled, frowning old Oriental face above him with its hazel eyes and white hair.

"Chiun," he whispered.

"Can you hear?"

The Dutchman nodded.

"You have been unconscious for several days. You must try to eat." Chiun brought over a bowl of rice mixed with warm tea and held it out to him.

"Why do you offer me food?" the Dutchman asked, straining to raise his head.

Chiun propped a pillow of hops and dried leaves behind his patient. "Because you are hungry."

The young man brought the bowl to his lips, his hands shaking. Chiun steadied them with his own.

171

172

"You are a fool. Don't you know who I am?"

"You have not changed so much, Jeremiah. I can guess why you have come." Chiun set down the bowl beside him.

"And you think, I suppose, that I will spare your life for a bowl of rice?"

"No," Chiun said softly.

The Dutchman let his head fall back on the pillow. "So you plan to kill me while I am too weak to use my powers. You have some sense, at least."

"I cannot."

The Dutchman's eyes flashed. "What will you do with me?"

"I will care for you until you are well." He brought over a basin of cold water and changed the towels on the Dutchman's head. There was a long silence.

"Why?" he asked, searching the old man's face.

Chiun shook his head. "I fear you would not understand."

H'si T'ang walked inside the cave, a basket of herbs in his hands.

"Who is that?" the Dutchman asked.

Chiun looked to his old teacher, afraid for him. "No one you need to know," he said.

But the blind man shuffled forward. "I am H'si T'ang," he said.

"H'si T'ang, the healer?"

"So they once called me."

"You are blind."

The old Master nodded. "In one way."

"It is said you can see the future. Why did you not set a trap for rne?"

H'si T'ang looked at him sadly. "My son, there is none living who is more trapped than you."

"Go away!" the Dutchman shouted hoarsely, his thin face ravaged. "I have no need of your useless ministrations.

173

Or the feeble philosophies of a blind old relic. I have come to kill you, and when I am able, I will kill you. I promise that!" He shivered, his teeth chattering.

H'si T'ang turned his back and walked away. Silently Chiun covered the Dutchman with a thin blanket.

"Leave me, 1 said!" His eyes were squeezed shut in a grimace. A tear trickled over the skin of his temple into his hair.

Chiun left his side, and the Dutchman slept.

He awoke after nightfall. His eyes adjusted automatically to the darkness of the cave. He tested his fingers. They worked. The rice had given him enough strength to move. He pushed aside the damp rags on his forehead. There was no fever now.

The blind one was gone. Chiun sat a few feet away in lotus position, his eyes closed. Watching him, the Dutchman carefully removed the blanket that covered him and rose. The Oriental didn't awaken.

He stole toward the sleeping figure with movements so controlled that even the air around him was not disturbed. Then, bending low, he prepared his attack.

Chiun's eyes opened wide. There was not a trace of grogginess or confusion in them. Expectant, alert, knowing, they seemed to take in the Dutchman's very thoughts at a glance.

The Dutchman stopped, his jaw dropping.

"Why do you hesitate?" Chiun said sharply.

The Dutchman felt his breathing come faster. "I-1-"

"Can you kill only sleeping victims? Have you been reduced to that?"

The Dutchman backed away, trembling. "It would have been easier," he said. "Master, I do not wish to kill you." !t was a cry of desperation. "But I must. It was my vow to Nuihc. While you live, 1 will never find rest. It was his curse upon me."

174

"Nuihc lied to you. You will not find the peace you seek by killing me."

"You are wrong," he said passionately. "He will free me then. I will be permitted to die."

Chiun looked at the miserable, thin man with his hunched shoulders. He remembered that he had once been a beautiful youth with a quick, fine mind and hands as fast as the wind.

"Even then, you wanted to die," Chiun said absently. "Did you never try to end your life?"

The Dutchman laughed, the sound thin and bitter. "1 cannot count the times. But it won't let me, this-" He pounded his chest with his fist as if it were a distasteful alien thing.

"The power," Chiun said.

"It is a greater curse than the fires of hell. It will only leave me after your death."

Chiun shook his head sadly. "Nuihc knew that you were born with abilities beyond the scope of others. By not teaching you to control your power, he guessed that it would drive you to fulfill his purpose. He tricked you, Jeremiah. There will be no rest for you. The power is too strong by now."

"Liar!" His arm struck out at Chiun. The attack was swift, with the perfect form Chiun remembered. At the moment before the side of his hand made contact with the old Oriental's face, he screamed and lurched backward, off balance. Aghast, he looked up. Behind Chiun, in a low doorway leading to an adjoining chamber of the cave, stood the blind H'si T'ang. The old man stood stock still, his face expressionless.

"The power." the Dutchman whispered. "You have it, too.''

H'si T'ang turned and walked back into the shadows, his hands clasped together.

175

The Dutchman's eyes remained fixed on the spot where the old man had stood. "But it has not ..."

"Destroyed him?" Chiun finished. "No. He has not used it as you have."

The young man's eyes widened in pain. "You mean it was not necessary ... I could have ..."

"It is too late to think of those things how," Chiun said gently.

The Dutchman swallowed. All the suffering, for nothing! It could have been prevented. The power could have been controlled, the beast silenced.

"Nuihc knew?" he asked numbly.

"Yes," Chiun said. "He knew. I am sorry."

The young man staggered backward toward the cave entrance, brushing the back of his hand across his eyes. "You were stupid to let me live," he said brokenly. "I am not strong enough to kill you now, but I will be soon. And then I will come back for you. I'll kill you then, old man, do you understand? I'll kill you."

He rushed out into the night.

H'si T'ang emerged. "You have done a good job of nursing our visitor," he said, smiling. "My poor powers were strained nearly to breaking just to halt his attack on you. I am too old to attempt these exertions. The boy is stronger than he believes."

"He knows how strong he is," Chiun said. "He could have attacked me again after you left. Or he could have used his powers against me. He spared my life because I spared his." He looked toward the cave entrance. "The pity is that he was born to be a decent man. Even Nuihc's evil could not erase all his decency."

"Will he not return?"

"Oh, he will return." Outside, he heard the Dutchman's careless, stumbling footfalls. "You see, he believes that

176

killing me is his only chance to find peace. He cannot accept that he has no chance at all."

H'si T'ang lit a candle for Chiun's benefit, and the two Masters drank tea. For a long time, past many miles, Chiun could still hear the Dutchman, weeping.

Chapter Twenty

Nuihc, you could have helped me.

The Dutchman stumbled across the sandy, grass-tufted earth, oblivious to the deep snake holes. He just wanted to run, to crawl into the night like a small blind animal.

I thought of you as my father. I spent my life trying to please you~

He had learned the exercises Nuihc had given him. He had practiced until his fingers were bloody and his body ached for months on end. He had been both son and servant to the dark-eyed man who had said he came to save him. And the whole time, he now realized, Nuihc had seen Jeremiah's torment as the boy struggled with the extraordinary mental gift he had been born with, and had ignored it.

Nuihc knew how to control the beast. And he never told me.

He draped himself over a boulder and cried.

But the old man had the power, too.

He raised his head. He wasn't the only one. H'si T'ang's old body housed a beast, too, only he could control it.

177

178

Maybe the old man's power wasn't as strong as his own, but the fact was, it belonged to him. The beast didn't own H'si T'ang.

Was it possible? The Dutchman sat up slowly, his senses tingling. Could he, too, learn how to use his gift only when he decided? It would take effort, and time . . .

His mind raced. He was sane now. Otherwise, he could never have walked out of the cave without lashing out at Chiun with the power. It was the first time he'd felt sane since before the incident with the girl in the Russian forest. It must have been the long rest, or Chiun's care, or the atmosphere of the cave itself. Whatever it was, though, it would pass quickly. He knew his beast. It would not leave him alone for long.

Think. Think quickly, while you have time.

Maybe Chiun was right. Nuihc had deceived him about his power. Maybe his promise that the Dutchman would find rest after killing Chiun was just another lie. In the past, killing had only led the Dutchman to more killing. The destructive power fed on itself. With each murder, the need for others grew in him. Why should it be any different with Chiun, who had saved his life and above all others that deserved to live?

If he could just go away somewhere, think, study. He had lived a lifetime of spartan discipline. Surely, with time, he could confront the beast and tame it. Surely . . .

He heard the commands of a North Korean patrol as they tramped over a hill. Maneuvers, he guessed. There were only six of them, carrying weapons and dressed in combat fatigues. He crouched on the ground, waiting for them to pass, but they spotted him.

"You there!" the leader called.

No. Not now, the Dutchman thought. / must be left alone now. The time was too short. He had to escape with the beast still in its flimsy cage.

179

"Your papers, please," the leader of the patrol snapped, approaching him.

"1 don't-"

"No papers? What is your purpose here?"

The Dutchman stepped backward slowly. He closed his eyes. The colors . . . "Leave me," he said, choking.

The leader laughed harshly. "Arrogant white dung. What makes you think you can walk around with no identification? Filthy spy." He shoved the Dutchman. "You're coming with us."

He shook. The colors were brighter. Wild, frightening music sang in his ears. His vision clouded, then sprang into sharp, brilliant focus.

"Look at him trembling. This is how decadent western spies fall to pieces when confronted with the people's might." He thrust his rifle butt between the Dutchman's shoulderblades.

Get away. Now. Before it's too late.

He ran. Behind him, the leader shouted orders to his men. They fired. The Dutchman set up a pattern of anti-rhythm, moving so erratically that the bullets could not reach him. He ran, with the patrol following behind shouting, their weapons echoing through the hills. When he was far enough ahead of them, he changed the pattern. Anti-rhythm was difficult. It strained his sense of balance. He loped along, following the scent of the sea. Even if he had to swim, he would leave this place immediately. There was hope, somewhere, if he could just get away.

He tripped over a deep hole and went sprawling on the grass. The fall knocked the wind out of him, but his head didn't strike ground. His hands gripped the edge of a dirt precipice. Below him, just beneath his head, slithered a swarm of snakes.

The sight startled him, but he made no move to leave the edge of the pit. There must have been more than a

180

hundred of the creatures, some as wide as his arm. Seeing him, the snakes coiled and darted in a frenzy, their mouths opening to accommodate their long, hinged vipers' teeth.

He remained, fascinated, watching, as the Korean soldiers approached from behind.

Creatures of my own kind. Like me, you inflict death as a matter of course. Like mine, your power is beyond your own understanding. But I know you, because I am like you, despised, unwelcome among the gentler beings of the earth. You and I, my friends, we are the children of fear.

He gave up. There was no point in escaping now. Quietly, deep inside him, the beast's cage clicked open and flooded him with relief.

The soldiers were close behind him now, crouching, their weapons raised. The Dutchman almost laughed out loud at their clumsy efforts to move silently. He could hear their quickened breathing, the sound of their fingers on the metal and wood of their rifles.

Leaping upward in a spiral, he knocked the weapon out of the leader's hands and kicked him in the throat. Bright blood spurted out of the Korean's mouth. He fell in a heap, his arms and legs akimbo. Rushing the other startled soldiers, the Dutchman struck a finger into a man's eye, gouging deep into the brain tissue. He caught the third by both legs and, shouting to the music ringing in his ears, tore him in two.

The others tried to run. "Oh, no," he said, smiling. He swept his arm past his field of vision. The soldiers, now aglow in pulsating light, stopped in their tracks.

"Come here," he said. The men obeyed.

He nodded, and the music focused into a pinpoint of shattering sound. The men covered their ears, shrieking. Blood oozed from between their fingers.

"Go to the snakes."

The men cried out, but their legs kept moving. One fell

181

on his knees, crawling behind the others. One by one, they drew themselves to the edge of the pit and stumbled in.

The snakes were ready.

They attacked in a mass, jerking and writhing convulsively, their yellow fangs sinking deep into the flesh of the screaming men. The Dutchman stood at the edge of the pit, his arms crossed in front of his chest. A thin stream of saliva fell from the corners of his mouth. When the last faint cries of pain had died away, he lay down slowly beside the gaping hole in the ground. The snakes seemed to throb with the rhythm of their own destructiveness.

"My brothers," he whispered, extending his hand over the pit. The vipers slowed and grew still. He raised his arm. Slowly, its eyes opening and closing sluggishly, the largest of the snakes left the ground and floated upward, weightless, out of the pit. He coiled the snake around his own body, where the creature crawled in a lethargic dance over his neck and face, around his upraised arms, between his iegs.

The Dutchman was sweating. The pleasure of the snake's movements was exquisite, better than any woman. Its dry scales carried the scent of death on them. With his tongue, the Dutchman licked the animal's belly. Moaning, he descended into the pit, the viper wound around his waist. He lay there for some time, surrounded by the staring eyes and open mouths of the dead men, while the snakes curled around him like smoke.

Chapter Twenty-One

Mildred Pensoitte smiled when Smith walked into her office in midafternoon.

"How is my resident genius now that he's back in residence?" she asked.

"I'm fine. I just had a very unusual call."

"Oh?" she said.

"Some man called for a Robin Feldmar. He said he wanted to give Earth Goodness a large donation, but he'd only give it to Robin Feldmar and only personally."

"Oh. That's odd." Her brow furrowed. "Did he say anything else?"

"He said that Robin Feldmar would know how to use the money right to get rid of imperialists." Smith said. "He said he knew her well."

"Did he give a name?" she asked.

"No. He said he'd call back." Smith shrugged. "Do you know a Robin Feldmar? I can't find a record on her anywhere."

Dr. Pensoitte was looking out the window as if Smith were not even in her office. Then she turned back to him with a slow, growing smile.

182

183

"Sure, Harry, Of course I do. She was one of my college professors. The first one who got me involved with the environment."

"And she's with Earth Goodness, Inc.?" Smith asked.

"She helped me found it in the early days," Mildred said.

"Okay," Smith said. "Is she around?" He tried a smile and realized how rarely it was that he smiled because his face felt sore as he attempted it. "We can't afford to go turning down large contributions."

"As luck would have it, she's in town," Mildred said. "We're having dinner tonight."

"Good."

"So when that man calls back, get his name and number and tell him that we'll have Birdie call him."

Smith nodded.

"What did he sound like?" Mildred asked.

"What do you mean?" asked Smith in return.

"You think he might have been a crank? Birdie gets bothered a lot by cranks."

"He sounded very substantial," Smith said.

"Good, Harry. 1 like substantial," she said. "As I said, Birdie gets bothered a lot. She even gets death threats."

"From whom?" Smith asked.

Mildred shrugged. "Cranks, 1 guess. Because she's so active in so many organizations to make America live up to its promise."

Smith thought of the young students he had seen that day in Minnesota, set up by Robin Feldmar to use as cannon fodder, and he wished he could tell Dr. Pensoitte that her friend was a faker and a fraud. But he could not do that. Not yet. Not unless he wanted to admit also that the so-called telephone message and the anonymous giver were also just lies-just to find out where Robin Feldmar could be located.

184

"Substantial," she said.

"What?" Smith asked.

"We were just talking about substantial. You know, Harry, that's what you are."

"It's what I try to be," he said. He smiled again and found it easier this time. Maybe it just took practice.

"That's why I need you," she said. "Earth Goodness needs you. You have a future here with us."

"You think so?"

"I know so. We're just starting. We're going to be one of the biggest groups in international affairs in just a few more years, and we need management to do that. We need you, Harry. Earth Goodness needs you. I need you. The world needs you."

"That's very flattering," he said.

"And very true. You said you were bored. I can promise that you'll never be bored around here," she said.

"I can already see that."

She smiled at him. Her eyes were very dark. "I'll never let you be bored."

"I hope not."

"1 suspect you'll be working late tonight? As usual?" she asked and Smith nodded.

"Well, I'm going to go home. When you finish up, why don't you come over? You can meet Robin Feldmar. And if you've got that unknown benefactor's name and number, Birdie can call him right away."

Before she left, she gave Smith the address of her apartment building on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

Smith sat alone in his darkened office, a circle of light from a gooseneck lamp on his desk the only illumination for a hundred feet in each direction. Everyone else had gone. It had been his experience that the more anarchist and anti-establishment an organization's goals were, the

185

more likely its office staff would be clock-punchers. At 4:30 P.M., the workers had fled like a toilet being flushed.

He was on the telephone with the computers at Folcroft. Nobody had been killed or seriously injured at Du Lac college that day, and news reports said that fast action by the college president had succeeded in averting a major tragedy.

Smith shook his head. The real major tragedy was that so many young people in college were having their heads filled with slogans, instead of learning to think for themselves.

The computer had received no messages from the assassins' network about the four men who had died in St. Martin's. Smith thought for a moment about the men he had killed. The killing had shaken him, and he wished again that Remo and Chiun were available. Did Remo suffer like that when there was a life to be taken? Or did he just go ahead and do his job anyway?

Smith put those thoughts out of his mind and concentrated on what he had learned from the men.

One of them would have been able to monitor Secret Service security messages. That would explain why the Secret Service had not moved to protect the president when Smith had put word of the assassination attempt into their computers.

But that still didn't mean it was safe for the president to return home. Not yet, because even if they were totally on the job, the Secret Service might not be able to protect him from a dedicated assassination team. His return would still have to wait for Smith's dismantling of the assassination crew.

The dead young men's orders had come from Robin Feldmar. And Robin Feldmar had been close with Mildred Pensoitte. And Feldmar managed a computer network at Du Lac College. And she had a history of involvement

186

with radical groups. And her nickname was Birdie, and the assassin leader's initial was "B."

The more he thought of it, the more sure he was that Robin Feldmar had taken over Earth Goodness, without Mildred Pensoitte's knowledge, and used it as a base for her plot to kill the president.

He was cleaning off his desk when the telephone rang.

Mildred Pensoitte's voice crackled with fear. "Oh, Harry, I'm so glad I caught you."

"What's the matter?"

"Please come over here. There's been a terrible tragedy."

"What happened? Are you all right?"

"I'm all right. But Birdie . . . poor Birdie is dead."

Smith met Mildred in the lobby of one of New York City's largest hotels, which offered getaway weekends at special rates for people and roaches. She took his arm and led him to the elevators, but the elevator car was crowded, and she said nothing until she unlocked the door to a room on the eighth floor and stepped aside so he could enter.

Robin Feldmar had been a tall, attractive woman in her late forties. But now, with her throat cut from one ear to another in a grim, ghastly echo of a smile, she was just a tall, bloodied corpse, lying on the floor of her room near the foot of a bed.

"What happened?" Smith asked.

"I got here to pick her up and bring her to my place for dinner," Mildred said. "She didn't answer the phone, so I thought she was in the shower, and I came up. The door was open a crack, and when I pushed it open, I saw her body. She was dead. Oh, Harry." She collapsed against Smith, who held her against his chest, patting the back of her head gently, uncomfortably aware of her bosom heaving against his chest. It was an unusual feeling, holding

187

and comforting a woman. He could not ever remember having held Irma that way.

Smith looked past Mildred at the room. All the drawers were still closed, and clothing hung neatly in an open closet. There was no indication that the room had been ransacked.

"Did you call me from here?" he asked.

"No. I ran first," she said. "Then 1 thought better and called you from the lobby."

"Did you touch anything?" he said.

She looked confused, and tears coursed down her face. She shook her head. "Just the door, I guess. And the key."

"Be sure," he said. "Did you use the bathroom? Did you go in there to throw up?"

"No. No." She started to turn away from Smith, saw the body on the floor again, and turned back to him sobbing. She threw her arms over his shoulders and around his neck.

"I'm sorry. I guess I'm just no good at this."

"Here's what I want you to do," Smith said. "Dry your eyes, go downstairs, walk a few blocks away, and then take a cab home. I'll meet you there in a little while."

"What are you going to do?"

"I want to make sure that you haven't dropped anything here or left anything. Then I'll follow you."

"We're not going to call the police?" she said.

"Feldmar's dead," Smith said. "Why should you be involved? It'd only hurt the organization."

She looked at him silently, then nodded. "I guess you're right."

"I know I'm right. Go ahead. I'll meet you at your apartment."

She ran quickly from the room, and the door swung shut behind her. Smith stood with his back to the entrance door

188

and visualized what a woman might do if she came into a room and saw her friend dead on the floor, a murder victim.

He quickly stepped forward to the body and knelt alongside it. Almost without thought, his hand reached out to the wooden base of the bed to steady himself. With his handkerchief, he carefully wiped the wooden base clean of fingerprints.

Kneeling there, he looked at the body. There was a puncture wound under the left ear and then a slow jagged rip across the throat to under the right ear. He had seen that kind of wound before. It was administered by someone who came from behind the victim, threw an arm around her, and then with his right hand drove the knife into her throat and slashed from left to right. The wound was jagged, the flesh almost serrated. It had been a dull knife, and the killer had had to saw his way around Robin Feldmar's throat. It had taken a long time, and it demonstrated a lot of hate or anger, he thought.

The room key was back on the dresser where Mildred had put it, and he wiped the plastic tag free of prints. He walked back to the door, wiping his handkerchief along the edge of the dresser where Mildred might have rested a hand if she had stumbled or paused for a moment in her panic. He cleaned the doorknob, then with his handkerchief opened the door and listened for sound in the hallway. There was none, so he stepped into the hallway. The heavy door swung shut behind him and clicked. He wiped the doorknob, put his handkerchief back in his pocket, and walked quickly away down the hall.

He went out a side door of the hotel and walked for two blocks before hailing a cab to Mildred Pensoitte's apartment.

While he was riding the thirty blocks uptown, he wondered who would have wanted to kill Robin Feldmar. It would have been an easy problem if he had been one of

189

her disciples: he could have believed that she was killed by the big, repressive, all-powerful government who wanted to silence her voice. But more than anyone else in America, Smith knew that was wrong, because he was the person inside the government who authorized the killing of people because they represented a danger to that government.

The killer was someone else.

But who?

"But who would have wanted to kill her?" he asked Mildred at her apartment. She had regained her composure somewhat and had changed into a long flowing robe. They sat across a pot of coffee in her living room. Smith had declined her offer of something to eat.

"I guess I'd better tell you everything," Mildred said.

"I think so."

Mildred walked to a sideboard, poured herself a small glass of cream sherry, and when she came back, sat on the sofa alongside Smith. She sipped her drink and put it on the table in front of them.

"Birdie was more than just my friend," Mildred said. "When I was a graduate student, I worked with her at the college. I started the Earth Goodness Society, but it was her idea."

"I see," Smith said.

"And she stayed active in it. Most of our long-range planning, well, she did on her computers back at the school. She had worked out a program. . . . Well, it's much too complicated for me; I could never really understand what she was talking about. But somehow it measured the potential of various public situations and told us where we ought to concentrate our efforts to get maximum public exposure and do maximum public good."

She stopped to sip her drink, then stared away across the room.

190

"If the organization was her idea, why didn't she run it?" Smith finally asked.

"Birdie wasn't like that. She liked to plan and brainstorm and think, but she had no follow-through. She didn't want anything to do with administration. She was always starting different groups, leading different causes. She had a brilliant mind but no staying power." She hesitated, then added, "Sometimes, though, 1 thought she always kept a hand in Earth Goodness, because she often seemed to know more about what it was doing than I did."

"When did she tell you she was coming to New York?"

"I was coming to that," Mildred said. She extended her legs up onto the coffee table. Her long, shiny robe clung to the outline of her calves, and Smith forced himself to look away. "She called me yesterday," Miidred said. "This is the frightening part. She said that she had uncovered information that someone had infiltrated our organization, somebody dangerous."

"Exactly what did she say?" Smith asked.

"She said that four of our followers had just been killed in St. Martin's for no reason at all. She was afraid that they were killed by someone who had gotten their names from inside Earth Goodness."

"Did she have any idea of who infiltrated our society?" Unconsciously, Smith clenched his hands between his legs.

"No," Mildred said and his hands relaxed.

"What did you think of all this?" he asked.

Mildred turned to look at him. Her eyes were warm, and she had a small, sad smile at the corners of her mouth.

"Birdie was given sometimes to exaggeration. Honestly, I didn't think anything of it. I thought it was another one of her the-sky-is-falling stories. And now . . . now, she's dead."

She pressed her face forward against Smith, and he reached out to put his arm around her shoulder.

191

"There, there," he said. "Would you have any idea why anybody would want to infiltrate Earth Goodness?"

"No. Why would anyone?"

"There aren't any secret projects going on that might have upset some corporation bigwigs somewhere?" Smith said. "Nothing that might have created enemies for us?"

"No," she said. "We do everything in public. There wasn't anything." She hesitated. "Not unless Birdie was doing something I didn't know anything about."

He felt her sobbing gently against him.

"Easy," he said. "It'll be all right."

"She's dead. My friend's dead. I'm afraid, Harry. If someone's in our organization who's a killer, I'm afraid. Maybe I'm next."

"I won't let anything happen to you," Smith said. She felt good and warm next to him, and he squeezed her shoulder slightly.

"Stay with me," she said.

"I will."

"I mean tonight. Stay here with me."

"I don't . . ."

"I don't want to be alone," she said. "Stay with me." He felt her hands reach up to his face and touch his cheeks. She turned his head toward her and then reached up and kissed him on the mouth. For a moment, he considered his position. He was a married man. A father. A man on a mission. He had no time for such things; no right to engage in them. And another voice inside his head said, You are also a man, and he surrendered himself to Mildred Pensoitte's kiss.

"That was nice," she said when she pulled away from him.

"Yes," he said. It was nice and he was a man, but he was still a husband, a father, and a man with a mission.

192

There would be no more of that tonight, he told himself sternly.

"Do you think it was all right that we ran away from Birdie's room?" she asked.

"I think you had to do it. Otherwise you'd be dragged into the mud by the press. The society might be hurt too," he said.

"You understand things like that, Harry," she said. "Almost as if you had done them before."

"An active imagination," Smith said.

Mildred smiled at him, then rose and walked from the room, leaving Smith to sit in silence, thinking.

He was supposed to be finding a presidential assassin, and here he was playing kissy-face with a woman. And he had no excuse for it. And what of Irma? Good, sweet, kindly Irma who was back home in Rye, New York, patiently waiting for his return.

Was it fair to her?

He wished that he could reach Remo and Chiun. He had spent so long in his office that now it was a symbol of how he dealt with the world. Shut away from it, and that was best because he did not know how to deal with it. Even the one-way glass in his office windows was a symbol. It let him look out into the world, but reminded him that he should not try to be of the world.

He was sure that Remo and Chiun were enjoying themselves Dmewhere and when they got back, he would certainly have something to say to them about duty and responsibility. And about who was paying the bills.

He glanced at his wristwatch. Night had long ago dropped onto the city, and Mildred had left the room almost forty minutes ago. For a moment, he felt the pang of fear in his throat, and he walked quickly along the hallway outside the living room. He stopped outside a closed door at the end of the hall and called her name.

193

"Come in," answered her soft voice.

He opened the door. She was in her bed. The room was lit only by a small reading lamp. The sheet of her bed was pulled up to her long, lovely throat.

Her flesh was white and cool-looking.

"I thought you . . . well, I'm sorry. I was wondering if you were all right," he said.

"I thought you'd never come," she said. "Come in."

"No," Smith said. "1 just wanted to be sure that everything was okay."

"Everything is not okay."

"No? What's the matter?" he asked.

"It won't be okay until you're here with me, Harry."

He took a step inside the room. Slowly she pulled the sheet down, off her naked body, and extended her arms to him.

He took another step. Then stopped.

"I can't," he said. "I just can't."

"You said you'd stay," she said in a pouting voice. She made no effort to pull the sheet back up.

"1 will. I'll stay outside on the sofa. You'll be safe," he promised.

"But will you?" she asked.

Chapter Twenty-Two

It was mid-morning when the travelers from Wales landed in Sinanju.

"Watch for snakes," Remo said.

The boy, Griffith, holding fast to Jilda's hand, looked around at the bleak forbidding, landscape. "So this is the land of the great Chinee," he said, awestruck. "Would they be invisible, now?"

"No, boy," Emrys said. "But watch where you're walking. Hoa, what's wrong?"

The boy sank to his knees, wrapping his thin arms over his head. " 'Tis a-terrible strong force," the boy groaned.

Remo felt dizzy. "I feel it, too. Music." The air was filled with dissonant sounds that were somehow strangely familiar. "There's music coming from somewhere close."

Jilda and Emrys looked at one another. There was no music that they could hear. "Come," she said, picking up the boy in her arms. "You're both tired."

"Can't you hear it?" Remo slapped his hands over his ears. "The loudest music I ever heard. Oh ..."

He fell. Emrys rushed over to him. "What is it?"

194

195

"Can't move." He tried to sit up. Not a muscle worked. Even his fingers were immobile. And the discordant music kept roaring in his ears.

Emrys slid his burly arms beneath Remo and lifted him. "We're near the cave," he said, making his way inland at a trot.

Inside the cave, the music vanished. Griffith got to his feet as H'si T'ang laid hands on Remo. Within a few minutes, Remo sat up.

"The Chinee can make magic," the boy whispered to his father.

"Indeed," Chiun said. "But we are not Chinese. I am Chiun, Master of Sinanju, and this is H'si T'ang, past Master." He gave the boy a small bow.

Griffith returned it as best he could. "I am Griffith, sir. I meant no disrespect."

"Then call us by our proper names."

"Yes, sir," Griffith said meekly.

Remo flexed his hands. "I can't understand it," he said. "I was fine one minute, and then--"

"There are things which must be explained," Chiun said. "But first, why are you here-all of you?" He looked sternly at the four visitors.

"Well, it's uh-" Remo fumbled.

"We have decided not to carry out the Master's Trial," Jilda said.

Chiun's eyebrows rose.

Remo stood up. "That's right. I'm sorry, Little Father, but it's not for me. I beat Ancion and Kiree by luck. I wasn't a better fighter than they were, and I felt rotten afterward. They shouldn't have had to die. I think there's room for all of us on this planet. Jilda and Emrys feel the same way."

Chiun began to sputter, but H'si T'ang intervened. "As do 1, my son. I congratulate you all on your intelligence."

196

"But the Trial," Chiun said, incredulous at the effrontery of the three contestants. "It is one of the oldest traditions in Sinanju."

"The preservation of our people is the oldest tradition," H'si T'ang said, "and the most worthwhile. Do you not see, Chiun? Trial. You needed Remo, and he has come."

"Needed me? What for?"

Chiun settled himself in a sitting position beside Remo. "Do you remember the Dutchman?"

"Sure. He was killed off the coast of St. Martin's."

"No. He lives. He is here." He described his confrontation with the thin man who had arrived unconscious at the cave, and of the Dutchman's exit the night before. "I could not kill him," Chiun said, his eyes lowered. "He is my punishment for the death of Nuihc. That task must rest with you."

"Can he really make things explode just by looking at them?" Griffith asked. Emrys prodded the boy with his elbow.

"Unfortunately, yes," H'si T'ang said. "A very dangerous man."

Remo stood slowly, thinking. "It was him, then. The music, everything. He knows I'm here."

"I'm afraid so," Chiun said.

Remo sighed. "I'd better not waste any time."

Jilda rose. "No," Remo said, cutting her off before she could speak.

"But 1 didn't hear any music. He won't be after me."

"He will be if you show up."

"Oh- "

"Don't you see? You'd hear the music if he wanted you to hear it. You'd do anything he told you. You just can't fight him, Jilda."

"Can you?"

197

He looked outside, at the rocky hills beyond the cave. "I don't know," he said, and left.

"I must go with him," Jilda said, rushing after Remo. Chiun stopped her. "The Dutchman is not your adversary. You would surely die in combat with him."

"I'd have as much of a chance as Remo has!"

"No, my child. You are a fine warrior. 1 have heard of your bravery and skill. But only Remo stands a chance against this man."

"Why Remo?" Emrys asked defensively.

"Because Remo is not who he believes himself to be."

"Who is he, then?" Emrys barely concealed his disdain.

"He is a being beyond the scope of our understanding," Chiun said. "But in order to fulfill his destiny, he must first come to realize this. I had hoped that the Master's Trial would help him to arrive at this knowledge, but it has not. Perhaps he will learn now."

"A lot of mumbo-jumbo, if you ask me," Emrys muttered. "If this Dutchman fella's as much of a maniac as you say, Remo can use my help." He lumbered out of the cave.

. "Emrys, don't go!" Jilda shouted. Emrys didn't turn back. She rushed to collect her things. "I'll go, too. If there are three of us . . ." Her gaze rested on Griffith.

The boy was sitting cross-legged, staring into space. "Don't leave, Da," he said quietly. "The power 1 feel is death, and the music is the song of the beast."

Jilda bent low over him. "Griffith? What are you saying?"

Griffith continued to stare, unblinking.

"The boy understands," said H'si T'ang.

Chapter Twenty-Three

"A being beyond scope," Emrys grumbled. "Doesn't know who he is. My arse."

Remo wasn't any weirder a being than anyone else, except maybe his teachers. Masters of Sinanju or not, those Chinee were a couple of lunatics. No wonder poor Remo couldn't even eat a rabbit. Brought up by crazy men, that's what he was. And with all their magic, not a one between them to help the poor sod out in a fight.

Well, Remo had done his share on the long journey from Wales, and even if he didn't come from the valley, he was as good a friend as Emrys had. He'd find that when he needed help, Emrys would be there to lend a hand.

There he was, just ahead, a form turning the crest of the hill. "Ho, Remo," Emrys called, but his voice was drowned in a wave of swelling music.

Music?

You'd hear the music if he wanted you to hear it, Remo had said.

The music grew louder. Emrys unsheathed his knife and whirled around. Nothing.

198

199

But the music . . . Suddenly his feet shifted beneath him. He lunged, but he remained rooted where he stood. His feet were covered to the ankles in soft, bubbling mud the consistency of gruel.

"Quicksand," he whispered, unbelieving. As far as he could see, the dry, grassy soil had turned into a roiling cauldron of yellow muck. He struggled, dropping his knife. It disappeared into the liquid earth.

The figure appeared again on the hill. "Remo!" Emrys called. "By Mryddin, come get me out of this mess!"

The quicksand disappeared. In the blink of an eye, Emrys was standing once again on firm ground. His knife lay beside him in a tuft of grass.

"All the gods," he said. The figure was still standing on the hill, which, inexplicably, seemed to turn blue.

He shook his head. It was a damn good thing he hadn't fought Remo in the Master's Trial, he thought. His vision wasn't just weak, it was playing tricks on him as well.

He walked toward it. The blue of the mound changed to green, and then to violet. The hill itself appeared to change shape, into an impossibly correct geometric pyramid. The low rises around it spiked upward into perfect triangles, glowing in a spectrum of unearthly colors like some modernist stage set.

"This can't be happening," Emrys said. It must have been the sea voyage. He'd heard about sailors who'd claimed to see strange things from being too long off land. And the food had been scant and bad, and . . .

"Your eyes are failing," a voice said, seemingly from nowhere. He turned around, jabbing the air instinctively with his knife.

"Can't you see me?" The voice was smooth, mocking.

"Come out here and fight me like a man."

"But I am here." Emrys whirled back to face the

200

mountain. Where a moment before had been only empty air now stood a tall blond man with cornflower-blue eyes.

"How-how-"

"It depends on what you see," the man said. "In your case, that isn't much. Why, you're nothing but a stumbling, blind thing. A wounded animal. It would be far too easy to kill you."

"Well, now, why don't you just try it then, you motherless snake?"

The Dutchman's eyes widened. "You would do better to be afraid."

"The day I'm afraid of a skinny big-mouth fool like you is the day I'm buried in my grave," Emrys said.

"As you wish."

The Dutchman was gone. Then, instantaneously, his lone figure stood once again on the surrealistic mountain. Two birds swept near him, squawking. The Dutchman snatched out with his hands and plucked them out of the sky. Emrys stood poised for battle, beads of sweat forming on his brow.

The Dutchman released the birds. They flew like bullets in a straight line toward Emrys. Halfway to their target, the birds changed into hurtling balls of white light. Emrys swatted at them with his knife, but their speed was faster than anything he'd even seen. The glowing spheres shot into his eyes, burning them to blackened holes. The Welshman screamed once, then fell, his hands covering his head while his body convulsed in pain.

"Da!" Griffith shouted in the cave. He stood up, his hands slapping against his eyes. "My da! He's hurt."

Jilda put her arms around him.

"Let me go!" My da needs me now!" He strained toward the open mouth of the cave.

Jilda breathed deeply. "I'm going," she said.

Chiun nodded, rising.

201

"We shall all go," H'si T'ang said.

They found Emrys still writhing in pain, the ground where he had fallen kicked up from the movement of his legs.

"Da!" Griffith called, running to him.

H'si T'ang pried open the big man's hands to touch the ugly black wounds where his eyes had been.

Remo came over the hill. "I heard someone," he said. Then he saw Emrys. "Oh, God." The boy had his small arms wrapped around his father.

"Can't you do something?" Remo asked H'si T'ang.

"It is too late," the old man said. "He is dying. There is nothing to be done."

"Jilda . . . Jilda," Emrys whispered, barely able to move his lips.

Jilda knelt beside him. "I am here, my friend."

The Welshman struggled to speak. "Take care of my son," he said. Sweat poured off him. "Take him back home. See that he's safe, 1 beg you." He clutched her hand.

"I promise," Jilda said. "May the fields be sweet where you walk."

"Griffith ..."

"Yes, Da, yes," the boy sobbed.

"None of your weeping. You are to take my place, so your job is to stay well and strong."

The boy shook. "Oh, Da, I did it. Your sight's gone because of me. That day in the tree, when you fell-"

"No!" The big man's voice rose. "My blindness was not your doing."

"You fell when you tried to save me," the boy said miserably.

"It wasn't that way, son. I fell, but it was not the rock I hit that ruined my sight. My eyes were going bad long before that, but I said nothing about it. I could not admit

202

my own weakness, don't you know. I let you take the blame, to save my pride."

"No, Da-"

"Yes." His hand groped out to grip the boy's arm. "And you carried the burden like a man. A better man than I ever was. Griffith . . ." He was heaving now with the effort of breathing.

The boy pressed his head against his father's and whispered in his ear. "I can hear you, Da."

"Trust your spirits. They've made you fine. Ask them to forgive me, if you can." He kissed his son.

As gently as he could, Remo lifted up the giant and walked with him in his arms. For a moment, Emrys managed a thin smile. "You're not half bad for a Chinee," he said. His head fell back. The cave was in sight.

"He's dead," Remo said quietly.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Mildred Pensoitte was asleep. Smith had peeked into her room to be sure of it, then had closed the door tightly, and now he sat at a small desk in the far corner of the living room. He kept his back toward the front windows. If Mildred should awaken and come into the room, he could see her and hang up the telephone before she noticed anything.

He unlocked his attache case with the small brass key he kept pinned to the fabric of an inside jacket pocket. From the case, he took a small round device that looked, in shape, like a two-inch-thick slab cut from a piece of liverwurst. It was an invention of his own design. On the top of the device were keys, marked with letters and numbers, and when he telephoned into the computers at Folcroft, he could spell out questions, and they would answer back, by electronic signals, depressing the printing keys, and the answer would be recorded on micro-thin paper stored inside the unit.

The phone was a pushbutton telephone with several lines. It didn't matter. Even if Mildred should pick up an

203

204

extension in her bedroom, all she would hear would be electronic tones.

Smith dialed the local access code for the Folcroft computers. He had recently improved the design of his telephone system so now it was possible to reach his computers through a local call from anywhere in the United States. It gave him the freedom to use a borrowed telephone and make sure there would be no record on the monthly bill of what number had been called. He knew, sadly, that he would never be able to get Remo to use the system. It required remembering numbers, and Remo had no ability and even less desire to remember anything. It had taken him five years to learn the 800 area code number he now used, and Smith thought it was better to leave things alone.

He dialed CURE'S local number. The telephone buzzed, and then there was silence as the computers activated the telephone line. They made no sound, and Smith knew he had exactly fifteen seconds to press in his personal identification code before the line went dead.

He held the small round unit over the telephone mouthpiece and depressed the buttons M-C-3-1-9. There was an answering beep through the earpiece. The computer had received the code and was awaiting Smith's instructions.

He tapped out on the small hand-held sender: "LATEST REPORT ON INTERCEPTED TRANSMISSIONS."

He could feel the unit in his hand whir as different electronic circuits were being triggered, then a small sheet of heat-sensitive paper emerged from one end of the unit. When the whirring stopped, he read it.

"LATEST TRANSMISSION INTERCEPTED AT 6 P.M. READS 'THIS IS B. I WILL KILL PRESIDENT IMMEDIATELY UPON HIS RETURN.' "

B? Smith thought. But B was dead. Robin Feldmar, Birdie, had been dead several hours before 6 P.M.

205

He tapped into the telephone: "ASSUMED B WAS ROBIN FELDMAR. FELDMAR DIED AT 4 P.M. TODAY. CONCLUSION?"

The machine responded instantly: "CONCLUSION, FELDMAR NOT B, B HAS PERSONAL ACCESS TO COMPUTER MESSAGE SYSTEM. B SENT MESSAGE PERSONALLY."

Smith asked: "COULD MAIN COMPUTER SYSTEM BE LOCATED AT DU LAC COLLEGE, MINNESOTA?"

The machine waited several minutes before responding.

"AFFIRMATIVE. CONCLUSION CHECKED. COMPUTER IS AT DU LAC. CAN BE REACHED FROM ANYWHERE BY TELEPHONE HOOKUP."

Smith asked: "WHO ARE RECIPIENTS OF B'S MESSAGES?"

The computer responsed: "NOW CHECKING POTENTIAL HOOKUPS OF DU LAC COMPUTER WITH OTHER MAJOR SYSTEMS."

Smith asked: "HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?"

The answer: "THREE HOURS."

"DO IT FASTER," Smith wrote.

"THREE HOURS," the computer stubbornly replied.

Smith thought for a moment, then tapped on the machine's keyboard: "CAN YOU PLANT MESSAGE INTO DU LAC SYSTEM BY OVERRIDE?"

"YES."

Smith tapped: "PLANT THIS INFORMATION. THE TRAITOR INSIDE EARTH GOODNESS SOCIETY IS HARRY SMITH. A NEW EMPLOYEE."

"WILL DO AS SOON AS THIS CIRCUIT IS CLEARED," the computer replied.

"OUT. M-C-3-1-9," Smith typed and even as he depressed the last digit, the telephone went dead as the computer cut the connection.

206

He threw the message paper into the wastebasket. Already its edges were turning dark, and in no more than a minute, the paper would turn totally black. A minute after that, it would disintegrate into powder.

Smith put his telephone device back into his briefcase and carried it over to the couch. He took out his revolver, then locked the case, put it on a chair, and covered it with his suit jacket. He put the gun on the floor under the sofa, then lay down to rest.

The die was cast. In a few hours or a few minutes, the assassin inside Earth Goodness would know Smith was an enemy and would be coming for him. And Smith would know in three hours who the assassins were working for. Who wanted the president dead.

He felt a tingle at the base of his spine. There was danger ahead of him. He knew that, but he felt the excitement of the doer. He could take care of the danger, and he could take care of the threat to the president, and, yes, he could take care of the threat to Mildred Pensoitte.

The thought of the Englishwoman flashed, unbidden, into his mind. Lying in her bed, the skin of her throat creamy white in the dim light of the reading lamp, her arms extended to him in invitation, a smile on her face. He had never had cause before to question or to criticize the stern New England upbringing that had made him who and what he was: a hard, unyielding, narrow man with an overdeveloped sense of duty and obligation, but if he were ever to question it, it would have been now.

The feel of the rough sofa through his shirt made him think how sleek and inviting were the sheets on Mildred Pensoitte's bed. They would be not be bumpy as this sofa was; her bed would be smooth and slippery . . . her body too.

207

No. Stop.

With an effort of will, he forced her out of his thoughts and reached a hand over his head, turned off the lamp by the side of the sofa, and two minutes later was asieep.

Chapter Twenty-Five

They buried Emrys near the cave. H'si T'ang took the arrangement of pine, bamboo, and plum blossoms from the entrance and placed them on the Welshman's grave. No one spoke until Griffith gave a small cry, weaving where he stood.

"Danger." He spoke softly, his eyes fixed on the sky above.

H'si T'ang raised his hands and then tasted his fingers. "He speaks the truth. There is death in the sky."

"Get inside," Remo said. "Hurry."

Griffith pointed to a cloud bank in the distance. It moved toward them at tremendous speed, changing color from gray to black to brick red as it rolled forward, blanketing the sky. "We will not be safe inside," the boy said.

At that moment, a shaft of lightning ripped through the red clouds and struck the cave, blasting a hole into the side of the hill where it stood. Fragments of clay pots flew out of the entrance, along with burnt shards of the grass matting that coated the floor.

208

209

It began to hail. The stabbing pellets hurt Remo.

Hail? Now? It was as senseless an occurrence as the rolling red sky. He forced himself to concentrate. There was no hail. It was the Dutchman. If he could understand that, he would be safe from the visions. But what about the others?

Griffith covered his head. Chiun carefully led H'si T'ang behind a targe boulder and went to the boy. Jilda looked up, stunned, cupping her hands in front of her. They filled with small stones. One struck her wrist, scraping off the skin. Dots of blood appeared on her arms. She threw the pebbles to the ground. "Who is this man who makes it rain stones upon us?" she shrieked. Her face was a mass of bruises.

"It's his mind," Remo shouted above the din of falling rock. He tried to cover Jilda with his own body. "There aren't really any stones. Look at me." There was not a mark on his body. "They only exist if you believe they do. Don't trust your eyes. They aren't real, I tell you."

Griffith whimpered. His neck and arms were covered with blood. Chiun, doing all he could to protect the boy, shook his head. There was nothing he could do against an enemy who killed his victims from inside their minds.

"But they do believe," a voice said from near the cave. The Dutchman was standing on the hill over the entrance. He was smiling. Even at a distance, Jilda could see the terrifying power in his electric-blue eyes.

"I have come for Chiun," he said. "Let him fight me now, Chiun alone."

"I cannot fight you," the old man said. "It is against the laws of Sinanju."

"I'll fight you," Remo said.

"You are nothing to me. To kill you will bring me no satisfaction. It must be Chiun." He waved one arm slowly.

210

The stones disappeared. The sky rolled back. The sun shone.

Silently, while he spoke, Jilda picked up her spear. She hurled it so hard that her feet left the ground.

"Devil,"she muttered as the weapon flew toward him.

The Dutchman's hands moved. The spear shattered into a thousand pieces in midair.

"The girl amuses me," he said. "And she is a beauty. Perhaps she will please me later."

"See if this pleases you, scum," she shouted, taking her ax from her belt.

"Jilda-" Remo reached for the ax. Jilda kicked at him.

"He is mine," she said.

She rushed at the hill, stopping suddenly near the cave. The Dutchman watched her.

"Go ahead. Attack," he said, smiling.

Her breath was labored. She clutched the ax tightly. She turned. Her eyes were frightened, her mouth twisted.

"Jilda?" Remo asked, walking uncertainly toward her.

"Stay away," she hissed. "I can't-I don't know what he's doing." She broke into a run. When she was near Remo, she swung the ax with all her force at Remo's neck.

He leaped out of the way. It had been so close that he had felt the wake of the blade.

"Run!" she shouted. "1 cannot stop!" She attacked him again. He struggled with her, but her strength was enormous. She pulled away and swung, screaming, full force at Remo's belly.

He saw the blow coming. At the beginning of the swing, he flattened himself on the ground and rolled toward her, knocking Jilda off her feet. Then, spiraling upward, he kicked the ax away and landed on her hand, hard. He heard the small bones crack, and when she

211

moaned with the pain, he felt as if a hammerblow had been struck into his own gut.

"I couldn't let you go on," he said.

She lay on the ground, curled into a ball. The useless hand stretched in front of her. "I know," she said. She hid her face so that he could not see her tears.

Chiun watched it all in horror. He had not expected the Dutchman's power to be so complete.

The laws of Sinanju had prohibited him from killing the man when he'd had the opportunity. He had obeyed those laws. Now he realized that by letting him live, he had unleashed a beast that would destroy them all. Now it was too late to fight him. The Dutchman was too powerful. Remo had been the only hope, but Remo still did not understand that he was Shiva. He, too, had no chance. There was only one thing left to do.

Chiun walked slowly into the clearing. "It is I you want," he said. "Very well. I understand your power. I cannot fight you, for reasons known only to my village."

"Chiun!" Remo shouted. "What are you saying?"

"Take me. Let the others live."

"Oh, no, you don't," Remo said, joining the old Oriental. "You take him on, you take me, too. You might be able to kill one of us in battle, but not both of us together."

"No," Chiun insisted. "If there were even the smallest hope that we could fight him and live, I would take it. But there is none. You've seen what he can do. I am an old man, and have made my peace. Let me go."

Remo swallowed. He looked up at the Dutchman. "You don't get to him unless you take me first," he said.

"That will be no problem," the Dutchman said. From his perch on the hill, he raised both arms, his fingers curved like the talons of a bird of prey. The blue eyes glowed. From them came a wave of pure energy, as powerful as the shock waves from a nuclear blast.

212

Remo felt as if the skin on his skull were rolling back with the force. It took all his concentration to remain standing. His shoulders began to shake. His breath came shallowly. He felt a spot in the center of his chest giving way. His heart. His heart was about to burst right out of his body. He wasn't even going to get a chance to fight.

He closed his eyes. No sight, no sound. Nothing remained before him but the gaping hole of the Void.

He thought of Jilda. Her hand would heal in time, even if she couldn't fight anymore. It was just as well. She was awfully beautiful to be a warrior. He only wished he could have met her earlier. It hadn't been enough time. But then, a lifetime wouldn't have been enough time with her.

And Chiun. The pain would be tough on Chiun.

Remo tried to speak, but couldn't. His mind formed the words: I'm sorry I let you down, Father.

The pressure receded. Chiun must have heard him. It would soon be over for both of them.

But the Dutchman's force didn't only lessen. It died altogether. With a deep, involuntary breath, Remo opened his eyes. He and Chiun both stood in the shadow of H'si T'ang.

The old Master had stepped in front of them both to absorb the full power of the Dutchman alone. Chiun made a move to stop him, but H'si T'ang held out his hand.

"I can withstand him better than you," the blind man said.

The Dutchman's face contorted.

"He is weakened," Chiun said, amazed.

While the Dutchman focused his concentration on H'si T'ang, Remo ran silently behind the hill and climbed it swiftly. The Dutchman never turned. Using his strongest attack, Remo sent out both legs in a powerful thrust aimed at the Dutchman's spine.

213

The legs swung through empty air. There was no one on the hill.

Below, Remo saw H'si T'ang clutch at his chest and fall. At the same moment, the Dutchman stepped from behind a bush near the old man.

"A mirage," Remo said, feeling his heart sink. The figure on the hill had been no more than the projection of an image in the Dutchman's mind. He had been standing near them all along.

But something was wrong. Chiun wasn't watching the man coming from the bushes. He was bending over H'si T'ang, massaging the old man's chest.

"Chiun! Behind you!" Remo screamed.

But the Dutchman had already prepared his blow by then, and even though Chiun readied himself in an instant, he was too late. The Dutchman's hands moved like lightning, striking two fierce slices into Chiun's abdomen. The old Oriental seemed to fly through the air, arms windmilling. His face registered pain for the first time Remo could remember. He landed face down in the sandy grass.

The thin old body didn't move. Chiun's gown was twisted between his legs, making him look like a strange little doll that someone had discarded. His feet showed.

"Chiun?" Remo whispered, unable to believe the sight before his eyes. Jilda, clutching her broken hand in the other, her face swollen from the rocks that had struck it, screamed in terror. The boy, Griffith, knelt by H'si T'ang, whose legs twitched weakly.

The Dutchman looked expectantly at the ground, then the sky. He examined his hands. He was speaking. A gust of wind carried his words to Remo on the hill.

"It is the same," he said, sounding surprised. "There is no peace from killing him. You promised me rest, Nuihc. What of your promise?"

And far away from all of them lay Chiun, lifeless and

214

still. The old man was dead. It had never before occurred to Remo that Chiun would die.

Inside him grew a sadness so deep that his body could not contain it. Remo lifted his head and wailed like a man who had saved all the frights and tears of his life for one moment.

"My father," he called.

It was time to fight the Dutchman. Alone. He walked down the hill to meet his opponent. His last opponent, most likely. If the Dutchman's power was greater than Chiun's, it surely surpassed his own.

The thoughts passed through his mind like wisps of air. It didn't matter. He cast one more glance at Chiun.

There was so little left to lose now.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Smith slid into consciousness. He was not alone. There had been some kind of a light flashing, and now there was someone in the room, and his hand started to move down toward the revolver, which he had hidden under the sofa.

But his hand stopped when it met something smooth and soft. It was fabric-satin-and it was draped over the legs of Mildred Pensoitte.

"Mildred?"

"Shhhhh."

"Are you all right?" he asked.

"Shhhhhh," she whispered again. He tried to raise himself to a sitting position, but she put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him back onto the sofa.

How long had he been asleep? He glanced at his watch. Less than two hours.

Mildred Pensoitte was wearing a long white satin robe that flickered eerily in the moonlight. Her hands were still on his shoulders, and then she moved closer to him, and then she was straddling him, looking down at him, one leg on each side of his waist.

215

216

"Did you think you were going to survive the night?" she asked. He could see her smiling in the faint light that the bright moon reflected into the room.

"Please, Mildred. We can't."

"We must," she said.

She reached down to open his shirt buttons. The moon emerged from behind a cloud and he saw her smile again, but it was a different smile now. It was a hard and cold smile, and there was no warmth in it. It was a smile he had seen before, many years ago, and she said again, "We must," and her hand went to a pocket in her satin robe, and in the moonlight he saw a knife glinting in her hand. As she plunged the knife down toward his throat, Smith spun and rolled and dumped her off him onto the floor.

Smith sprang to his feet, grabbed his revolver, and ran across the room to flick on the light switch.

Mildred Pensiotte was on the floor, her knife still in her hand. The white robe was open, and her breasts were exposed.

"Is that the knife you used to kill Robin Feldmar?" Smith asked.

"Yes." Her voice was chilled as ice.

"Why?" Smith asked.

"Because she would have talked. She talked too much. You can have cranks around when you're starting up and all you're doing is talking. But when you get to action, to doing things, those people are dangerous."

"The revolution eats its own children," Smith said softly. "When did you know it was me?"

"A few minutes ago. I called the computer at Du Lac College. It said that you were the spy in Earth Goodness. What are you? CIA? FBI?"

"None of those," Smith said. "Why-do they call you B?"

"You know about that," she said with some surprise.

217

"I should have known. From the moment you came aboard, all we've had is confusion and death and disorder. I should have known it was you."

"Why do they call you B?"

"Bunny. A childhood nickname," she said.

"I thought it meant Birdie. Feldmar," he said.

She shook her head. "She was too stupid to be real. With her antics, marching around those lunatic college children, as if they counted for anything."

She rose to her feet. The robe hung open over her opulent body. She dropped the knife in front of her on the floor and extended her arms toward Smith and came across the room to him.

"We can still have it," she said. "We can have it all."

She smiled, and Smith remembered where he had seen that smile. It was in a French farmhouse, and the girl who had smiled had been responsible for the deaths of fifteen of Smith's men. She had smiled too, and Smith had killed her.

He concentrated on the smile, and he hesitated, and Mildred Pensiotte's smile grew wider. Her hands reached to her waist and pulled her robe open wide.

The smile. The dead weren't smiling. They were in St. Martin's and Washington, and they would be all over if this woman had her way.

She smiled again and Smith smiled back.

And fired his revolver.

"Good-bye, Bunny," Smith said.

Back in his mid-town office at Earth Goodness, Inc., Smith again called the Folcroft computers.

He punched his code into the triggering device, then signaled: "WHAT HOOKUP OF DU LAC COMPUTER WITH OTHER MAJOR SYSTEMS?"

218

The computer reported back: "SYSTEM HOOKED BY MICROWAVE TO CUBAN OFFICE OF KGB."

Smith paused a moment. The Russians had been behind the plot to kill the president. Mildred Pensiotte and, to a lesser degree, Robin Feldmar, had been Soviet plants, spies working in this country to help overthrow it. The awful thing, he thought, was probably that no one would ever know.

He directed the computers: "VACUUM DU LAC," then entered his code and hung up. In moments, he knew, the giant Folcroft computers would be sweeping clean all the memories from the Du Lac computers. Who knew what might be in those files? There might be some little bit of information that one day might provide him with leverage he might not otherwise have in dealing with America's enemies.

He looked up a number in his wallet and dialed.

The secretary of the interior answered the telephone himself. He was sleepy, and his voice was thick with exhaustion.

"Yes?" he said.

"This is Smith. Tell the president it's safe to come home."

He hung up and thought again of Remo and Chiun. There they were, off, gallivanting around on a vacation, leaving it to him to protect America and the free world. They'd hear about it when they got back. They'd hear what a hell of a nerve they had leaving all the dirty work for Smith while they were off disporting themselves.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The Dutchman groveled on all fours, muttering. "You promised me, Nuihc. You said . . . you said ..."

Remo approached him like a man whose soul had died. His eyes were blank, his face expressionless. He stopped in front of the Dutchman and kicked him in the throat.

The Dutchman rolled over, startled.

"Get up," Remo said. Before the Dutchman could rise, Remo kicked him again.

"I have no quarrel with you," the blond man rasped.

"Think of one." Remo slapped him flat across the face.

The Dutchman stood to full height. "Don't do this," he warned. "I am trying-"

Remo sent two jabs to the man's belly. "I don't care if you fight me or not," Remo said quietly. "As long as 1 hurt you." He slammed an elbow into the man's hip, which sent the Dutchman sprawling.

A mist appeared instantly, settling over the landscape. The hills softened into pastel domes, like melting ice cream.

"And you can save the artwork, too. I know where you are."

219

220

"Do you?" the voice came from behind him. Remo turned. Five identical figures, all the Dutchman, peered at him through the fog. "Where am I, Remo?"

The five figures disappeared. Another materialized beside him. Remo swung at it. It faded into smoke. "Or am I everywhere?" In a flash of light, the ice cream mountain-tops glowed in phosphorescent colors. On the peak of each stood the Dutchman, hundreds of him, like tiny paper cutouts.

Remo stood still and watched. There were no birds in the sky. The fields were quiet. The Dutchman was real, he told himself, no matter how many figments of himself he could produce. And that one real being moved on two legs like anyone else. Remo shifted his eyes out of focus and concentrated entirely on his peripheral vision.

Through the fog, to the right of Remo, a figure ran, crouching. He moved swiftly and silently, using all the skill of a lifetime of training. He climbed the highest hill in the area, stopping behind a large dead tree.

Another figment appeared directly beside Remo, prepared to strike. Remo clenched his jaws and walked through it. He had things to do now.

Kiree . . . Kiree and Ancion. They had both known things that were new to Remo. Things that could help him against an enemy more powerful than himself. If he could just remember. He stooped to gather two handfuls of grass and a rock the size of a baseball. He stuffed the rock inside his belt and began to rub the blades of grass.

Lightning flashed across the sky. A high wind gusted out of nowhere. Remo ignored them, and was left untouched. He concentrated on disintegrating the grass, as Kiree had done, his hands moving so fast that the moisture in the blades evaporated instantly. He spat, slapping his hands together in rhythm.

He had to take the Dutchman by surprise. No matter

221

how fast he ran, the Dutchman would see him coming in plenty of time to perform one of his tricks. Remo knew that the changes in weather and the constantly shifting landscape were visual lies, but the Dutchman could be subtle. What if he made Jilda burst into flame? Or caused the top of Griffith's head to explode like a firecracker? They weren't invulnerable to his ugly games. No, this contest had to be between Remo and the Dutchman, one on one. Remo didn't expect to win, but he wasn't about to make anyone else take the loss with him.

"Fool," the Dutchman sneered. "You waste my time."

Remo spat into his hands again. The pulp was almost the right consistency. He pulled his hands away, and like taffy, the wire-thin fibers formed. He worked quickly, weaving the fine, transparent net around the rock. His hands were moving too fast to see.

"Your skin is burning," the Dutchman insinuated. "Your eyes are dry and withering. Blisters cover your body."

"Go eat a toad." It was ready. With'one swing, Remo wound the net around a tree and swung up. The second propelled him to a boulder. On the third orbit of the net, he flew toward the crag where the Dutchman waited and landed with both feet in the blond man's chest.

"Thanks, guys," he said to the spirits of Ancion and Kiree. Somewhere, he felt, from some unknown vantage point, they were watching.

With a whoosh of air from his lungs, the Dutchman fell down the hill. At its base, he righted himself awkwardly and ran. Remo followed him. The ground was soft and covered with holes. The snakes, Remo remembered. Watch it. He can make them come out your ears if he wants to.

But the Dutchman had no hallucination waiting. He stood beside an open pit, absorbed in its swarming interior. Remo approached, standing across the wide hole from him. The pit contained the skeletons of four men, picked

222

clean by scavengers. They were loosely draped in rags that had once been uniforms of some sort. Over them crawled more snakes than Remo had ever seen in one place.

The two men circled the pit. The Dutchman's eyes were pale and lucid, the maniacal fire in them gone. Instead, they held a look of bewilderment as he searched Remo's face.

"Who are you?" the Dutchman asked. It was a plea. Strange music came to Remo on the wind. Faint but insistent, the dissonant melody was the same as the strains he had heard when he first came to the shores of Sinanju with Jilda and the others. It had filled him with terror then, but now the music carried no more fear than a passing breeze. It was the Dutchman's music, but devoid of the Dutchman's power.

He feeds on fear, Remo thought. When he had stopped caring whether he lived or died, he had lost his fear of the Dutchman. And without the fear, he was no longer a victim.

The music swelled again, and suddenly Remo recognized it for what it was. It had sounded oddly familiar the first time he heard it, but didn't understand why. Now he knew. He had heard the same notes long ago, in a small boat setting off to carry him to the first stop in the Master's Trial. It was Chiun's music, note for note, only distorted, a perversion of the songs of Sinanju.

And as he watched the Dutchman standing in mirror image of himself, he understood the music's meaning. "I am you," he answered.

Yin and yang.

Light and shadow, good and evil, Remo and the Dutchman were opposite sides of the same being. They were born of the same traditions, both white men taken out of their societies and created anew in the ways of Sinanju. They both claimed Masters of the discipline as their fathers.

223

Only fate had kept them apart for so long. Now, together, they formed a whole that could only end in destruction.

"If I kill you, I will die," the Dutchman said, sounding almost relieved. "It was you all along. I have been seeking the wrong man."

"You killed him."

"As I must kill you," the Dutchman said.

In one perfect spiral leap, he crossed the pit and delivered a blow to Remo's chest. His ribs broke under the impact. He tried to right himself, but the Dutchman was too fast. Remo felt a shattering pain in his kneecap that sent him flying toward a boulder. He landed on his shoulder.

The Dutchman kicked him off the rock. "It can't be done quickly," he said softly. "I've waited too long. The victory must be complete."

He stepped back. Remo stirred. The Dutchman crushed his elbow with his heel. The pain flooded over Remo like a wave. His vision receded to a wash of color: black, red, iridescent blue. . . .

"You will hear me now, and obey," the Dutchman commanded.

It was the fear. Stop the fear in yourself, and his power will vanish.

But he was afraid. No man had ever attacked him so fast. No man had ever beaten him so completely. The Dutchman was better than he was, better than anyone. In the Master's Trial, the Dutchman would have conquered the world.

"Feel the knives in your legs, Remo."

Remo screamed with the pain. Thousands of blades were suddenly embedded in his skin, cutting to the bone.

"They are in your hands now, your arms. ..."

He felt his palms flatten. The knives, slicing his flesh by inches, moved up his arms. Each thrust was an agony.

224

Each knife brought him closer to the welcome numbness of death.

"Oh, Chiun," Remo whispered.

His eyes fluttered open. In the distance were three moving figures, barely visible. Remo tried to concentrate on them to lessen the pain. He was going to die, but Chiun had once told him that death did not have to be painful. "Take yourself out of the pain," Chiun had said. Chiun . . .

It was Chiun. The old man was alive, walking between Jilda and the boy. The three of them stopped beside H'si T'ang, seated on the ground. Chiun picked his teacher up and moved in a wooden gait toward the cave. As he walked, Chiun turned his head right and left, searching.

"I am here, Father," Remo said, too weak to be heard. "I, too, am still alive."

Then, from a place deep in his soul, another voice spoke:

I am created Shiva, the Destroyer; death, the shatterer of worlds;

The dead night tiger made whole by the Master of

Sinanju.

Remo rose. He was covered with the wounds he had permitted in his fear, but the knives were gone.

The Dutchman regarded him, puzzled. When he spoke, his voice was full of false confidence. "You can't fight me now. Look at you."

Blood dripped off Remo's hands in pools. But the Dutchman's eyes were afraid. He prepared to strike.

Remo attacked before the Dutchman's hands could reach him. Through the pain, despite his broken bones and the blood that covered him, he struck three times, three perfect blows. The Dutchman fell, screaming, into the snake pit.

Remo watched the sinuous creatures slither over the stunned man who sat sprawled among the bones of the

225

dead. The Dutchman made no attempt to move. Instead, a thin half-smile spread over his face. A drop of bright blood appeared at the corners of the Dutchman's lips and swelled to a stream.

"It is here at last," he said weakly. "The peace I have sought all my life. It is a great comfort."

Remo wanted to turn away, but he was unable. His eyes were locked into the Dutchman's. He felt himself weakening, warming with a flood of quiet resignation. Involuntarily, he dropped to his knees.

"Don't you see?" the Dutchman said. "We are the same being. Not men, but something else." He grimaced with a stab of pain. Remo felt it, too, at the same moment. "We grow closer now, in death. I am sorry to take you with me, but it is the only way. With you, 1 can finally find rest."

Remo nodded slowly. He understood the prophecy.

The Other will join with his own kind. Yin and yang will be one in the spring of the Year of the Tiger.

The Dutchman had to die, it was necessary. And when he died, Remo would have; to die with him. Yin and yang, light and darkness, life and death, together. It was the prophecy come to fruition.

He arranged himself in full lotus before the pit and waited, his spirit entwined with the Dutchman's, to enter the Void.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Someone slapped his face. The jolt pulled Remo out of his deep trance. Jilda, bruised and cut, was kneeling close to him.

"I've looked everywhere for you," she said, kissing him. "You'll be all right now. Put your arm around my shoulder." Gently she tried to lift him up.

Still stuporous, he picked up Jilda's rag-bandaged hand. "I'm sorry," he said.

"You had no choice. It is forgotten."

He pulled away from her. "Chiun. He's alive. I saw him."

"Yes. He lost consciousness, but he is well now."

"And H'si T'ang?"

"Chiun does not think the Venerable One will recover. It is his heart."

Remo fumbled to his knees. "Wait," he said. In the pit, the Dutchman was still sitting, motionless, his eyes frozen into a stare. The snakes were gone.

"But he couldn't have died without me." He made a move to enter the pit.

226

227

Jilda pulled him back. "Come, Remo. You have lost so much blood. What did he do to you?"

"Don't . . . remember," Remo faltered. "But he shouldn't be ... shouldn't be . . ." Confused, he followed her back to the cave.

Chiun was pale, but his eyes sparkled when he saw Remo. H'si T'ang lay on his back in a space cleared of the rubble from the Dutchman's lightning attack. The floor, stripped of its straw matting, was bare and cold, but Chiun had laid one of his brocade robes beneath his old teacher. Griffith knelt beside the old man, who smiled.

"Your return is welcome, son of my son."

"Thank you, Master," Remo said.

"There is no danger in the air. Has the Other gone to the Void?"

"Yes. 1 think so."

"You think?" Chiun asked.

Something was wrong. The knowledge that Remo and the Dutchman would die together was not a figment of anyone's imagination. They had both known it as surely as they knew the sun rose in the east. Yet Remo was still alive.

"He's dead," Remo said.

"Remo," H'si T'ang said, his ancient hands groping forward to touch him. "You are badly hurt."

"Not too badly. 1 can walk."

The old man frowned. "No power," he said. "I cannot heal you anymore."

"That's all right," Remo said, composing H'si T'ang's hands in front of him.

"But you are too weak ..."

"I'm all right. You're the one who needs to get better. You saved us both."

"Thank you," H'si T'ang said gently, "but only the young wish to live forever. I am but one step from the

228

Void. It will be an easy step, one I am eager to take." He smiled. "Besides, it is our belief that a man's spirit does not enter the Void with him. It is passed to another, and thus lives forever."

Remo remembered Kiree, who had fought so bravely in the hills of Africa. "I hope that's true," he said.

The old man coughed. His breath came in spasms, swelling the features of his face. "Chiun?" He raised his trembling hands. "Chiun, my son."

H'si T'ang struggled to speak, but no words came. In time, the withered hands stilled, and the ancient parchment-skinned face sank into blankness.

After several moments, Chiun spoke, in a quavering voice, the benediction for the death of his teacher: "And so it came to pass that in the spring of the Year of the Tiger did the Master of Sinanju die, as was foretold in the legends of ancient times. And thus did the Master become one with the spirit of all things."

Jilda led Griffith away. "What was H'si T'ang trying to say?" the boy whispered. Remo left, too, to leave Chiun alone with his grief.

"They walked slowly back toward the pit where Remo had left the Dutchman. "He's got to be dead," Remo said, hurrying.

"Of course he is," Jilda answered. "I saw him myself. There's no need to go back to that awful place."

Oh, yes there is, a nagging voice inside him said. He ran ahead, stopping at the edge of the pit.

"Well, we have to do something with ourselves, I suppose," Jilda said.

"I want to see the snakes," Griffith said.

"The snakes were gone. There was only . . . only ..." She walked around the open pit. There was nothing inside but some scattered bones.

"He is dead," Remo insisted, furious. He stared at the

229

bones as if he believed he could make the Dutchman materialize out of them.

Jilda lowered herself into the hole and prodded the earth with her toes.

"This is another trick of his," Remo said. His voice was harsh and rasping. He clenched and unclenched his fists, opening the congealed wounds in his hands. "He's there. We just can't see him. He's-"

"He is gone, Remo," Jilda said. She uncovered a hole beneath a large, flat rock. The hole was big enough for a man to crawl through. "That's where he went."

"No!" Remo shouted, shaking with anger. He vaulted into the pit and worked his way through the freshly dug tunnel as fast as he could. "No!" he called from inside the earth. "No!" at the tunnel's mouth beside the ocean's rocky shore.

There was nothing ahead of him but a clear expanse of blue water.

It had been a waste, all of it-H'si T'ang's death, Jilda's suffering, Chiun's humiliation, his own efforts. He had failed them all. The Dutchman was still alive and would spread his poison around the world. He had lived because Remo had been too weak to die with him.

"Why didn't you take us both?" he screamed into the empty, indifferent sea.

There was no answer.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Remo took a long time returning to the cave. Inside, Chiun, Jilda and Griffith kept watch over the body of H'si T'ang. A single candle lit the features of the dead man.

The three of them watched Remo enter, his shoulders stooped. "He's gone," he said. He walked to the far corner of the cave and sat on a heap of fallen rock.

Chiun and Jilda were silent. Only Griffith stood up. He walked to the center of the cave, to a spot where the afternoon sun poured through a hole in the rock. The light illuminated his dirty face. Without speaking, he raised his battered arms to shoulder level, palms up. In the sunlight, his wounds seemed to disappear.

Remo rose slowly. They had disappeared. The boy's skin was as smooth and brown as seasoned wood.

'"How in the-"

The boy silenced him with a look. His eyes were glassy and faraway, and carried in them an innate authority far beyond his years. Chiun motioned Remo abstractedly to sit down.

"My spirit do I bequeath to this child," Griffith began in a voice unrecognizable as his own.

230

231

"H'si T'ang," Chiun whispered. "He lives."

"Only my spirit lives, the essence of what my life has been. The boy's soul and mind shall always remain his own. My knowledge only is added to what he already possesses. He has always had the Sight in some measure, and so will use the gift wisely and well, if he is taught correctly. Tell him, when I have finished, of his legacy, for he cannot hear my words, and will be afraid of his powers. I beg you, do not permit him to grow like the Dutchman, fearful and lonely."

"I will not," Jilda said.

"My fierce and beautiful warrior," the voice inside the boy said to the woman. "You have risked much, given much. Your courage has not gone unnoticed. Be strong, Jilda, for just a short time longer. Much will depend on you."

She nodded, too overcome to speak.

Griffith turned his strange, unseeing eyes on Chiun. "You called me your father, and that I am. For though you are not my natural son, you have pleased me beyond my expectations. For you, Chiun, are the greatest of all the Masters of Sinanju who have walked this earth. It was for this reason that the charge of Shiva was placed upon you."

Chiun's eyes welled.

"It was this that I tried to tell you while I was still among you. But I was weak, and the Void called irresistibly to me. And so I tell you now. I could not have found a better son if I searched all the world until the end of time."

"Father," Chiun whispered.

Finally, the boy turned to Remo. "And you. Do you yet know who you are? What you are?"

Remo turned his head. "I've failed," he said.

"You have failed only to alter the course of destiny." H'si T'ang spoke angrily through the boy. "Is your arro-

232

gance such that you believe you can control even the forces of the universe?"

"What? No," Remo stammered. "No. It's nothing like that. Only-"

"Then you must realize that even Shiva does not possess the power to take a life before its appointed time to die."

Before its-"

"The Other lives because you must live. Yin and yang, light and darkness. Both must exist. There is a great destiny before you, Remo. Have the courage to fulfill it."

"I ... 1 ..." The boy's eyes seemed to bore into his very soul. He fell silent.

Griffith's face grew gentle. He stepped close to Remo. "You have fought well, son of.rny son." He touched Remo's hand. The knife wounds disappeared.

Remo examined himself in amazement as the boy went to Jilda and caressed her face. The bruises and cuts healed instantly. He unwrapped the bandage around her hand. Beneath it the flesh and bones and skin were once again perfect.

"And now I speak my last words to you all, for I shall not appear again," Griffith said feverishly. "Go back to your lands in peace. Keep in your hearts the balance of the universe. Live your lives in honor and wisdom."

Then the boy sank to the floor, unconscious.

Jilda cradled him in her arms. "You will not fear this gift you have, little one," she said. "The Lady of the Lake will see to that."

Chapter Thirty

Since the start of the Master's Trial, spring in Sinanju had changed almost imperceptibly into summer. Crickets and tree frogs called endlessly through the warm night, and the air was fragrant with the scent of ripening plum blossoms.

Remo lay with Jilda on a bank of cool moss. In the distance was music. Chiun was playing his belled instrument near the graves of H'si T'ang and Emrys. The melody was the same one he had played for Remo's Ritual of Parting so long ago, before the Dutchman came. Now its notes rang again, serene and beautiful, in another ritual of parting.

Remo kissed the smooth skin at the nape of Jilda's neck, still flushed with passion. Making love, even with Jilda, had never been so good as this last time, beneath the open night sky. There had been an urgency about her caresses, a hunger that she had needed him to satisfy. "You make me very happy," he said, lifting her chin. Her eyes were filled with tears. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing," she said quickly, drawing her hand over her

233

234

face. "I am happy, too. I never thought I would find you. I mean, someone like you," she added.

"No. Not someone like me or someone like you. You, the original, and me. That's the only combination that works."

Jilda looked up at the stars. Gullikona, the Golden Lady of the sky, was burning in all her glory. "Sometimes I feel as if the love we have was meant to be," she said softly. "Like the princess and the warrior of the legend."

"They don't even come close," Remo said. He looked out to sea. "Jilda, the submarine from the States is due in tomorrow."

"No!" She held him fiercely. "We will not speak of tomorrow."

"Why not?"

"I will not cross the sea in an iron fish," she said. "I have built my own boat. It is hidden near the shore."

Remo laughed. "Ever the stubborn barbarian," he said. "Look, the sub's perfectly safe, and it'll save us weeks of travel. Just trust me, okay? We'll set Griffith up with some relatives, and then-"

"I will remain with Griffith." She held his glance for a moment, then turned away. "He is an exceptional boy. His upbringing cannot be entrusted to people who do not understand him."

"Spoken like a true mother."

"It was my promise to H'si T'ang. He was a wise man. We would all do well to listen to what he has said."

"Meaning what?"

Jilda bit her lip. "It will only be necessary to spend a few years with Griffith. After he is grown, 1 will return to Lakluun. Where I belong."

"Hey," Remo said gently. "Is that what's bothering you?" He stroked her hair. "You don't have to change your life for me. I love you, funnyface, remember?" He

235

tweaked her nose. Her green eyes changed to blue and then gray and back to green again, like the shifting hues of an ocean. "God, I'll never get used to those," he said.

"Remo ..."

"Shhh. Listen to me. If you've got to stay in Wales, I'll stay with you. We'll raise Griffith together. No problem. I've always wanted a kid, anyway."

His thoughts ran to their life together in the green hills of Emrys's valley. The three of them in the Forest Primeval. Me Tarzan, you Jilda. His face flushed, and his hands grew cold. He liked the feeling. He liked it very much. "I'll build you a nice little house," he said eagerly. "With a picket fence around it. No fair spearing any animals on the fence. And we'll plant some flowers around the front, just like in the movies."

"Oh, Remo-"

"And when Griffith's good and sick of us telling him how to run his life, we'll take off in one of your crazy canoes and row ourselves to Viking Land, and swim in ice water and swill mead with the boys-''

"Stop!" She didn't bother to check her tears now.

"I don't understand," Remo said quietly. "I'm asking you to marry me." He stared at her in bewilderment. "Don't you ... I mean, I thought you wanted ..."

"Above all things, I wish to spend my life with you. But the sacrifice ... the sacrifice will be too great."

"There wouldn't have to be any sacrifice, I'm telling you."

"Not for me, Remo. For you."

"For me? You've got to be kidding. I've spent my whole life in orphanages and army barracks and motel rooms. A cottage in Wales'11 seem like a castle as far as I'm concerned."

"It is not the place," she said. "What you would be

236

giving up is something inside you, something so rare that the sages among your people have waited for millennia to see it." She took Remo's hand in hers. "You listened to the words of H'si T'ang. You have a great destiny before you. You cannot abandon that for something as selfish, as small as-"

"Small?" Remo shouted, rising to his feet. "Smalll Is that all you think of us?" He picked up a rock and threw it so hard that it whistled. "Damn it, I don't want a 'great destiny.' 1 want to be happy, and for the first time in my life, I am. 1 want this. I want ..." His voice cracked. "You."

It was a long time before Jilda spoke. "That is why I must leave you," she said quietly.

The song of the tree frogs, combined with Chiun's distant melody, seemed to fill the world.

"Whatl" he whispered.

She didn't answer. She gathered her things and dressed quickly, pretending not to see Remo standing beneath the plum tree. Her vision blurred. "Good-bye," she said.

He raced to stop her. "Tell me you don't love me."

"Remo-"

He shook her. "You can't believe in that prophecy crap any more than I do. I'll let you go if you want to go, but not because of any bullshit legend. Just tell me you don't want me, and I'll leave you alone. That's all I'll accept. Otherwise, you're stuck with me. For better or worse."

"Remo, I can't. It's not fair of you."

"Tell me! Do you love me or not?"

The moon shifted. Her face, more beautiful than Remo had ever seen it, was bathed in pearlescent light.

"Good," Remo said. "For a minute, I thought-"

"I don't love you." She pulled away from him abruptly. Remo exhaled as if someone had kicked him in the belly.

She backed away into the shadows. "I don't love you.

237

Now go to your own world, your own life, for everyone's sake. Go, be what you were meant to be."

She turned and ran. Remo watched her, too stunned to move. A sudden gust of wind blew a shower of blossoms from the plurn tree to the ground. In a moment she was gone.

Chapter Thirty-One

Smith had finished scanning the Du Lac College computer tapes, and he finally went home for dinner. He had been gone for two weeks.

Irma was cooking.

"Hello, dear," she said, without turning from the stove.

"Hello, Irma," he said and gave her a peck on the cheek. She did not ask where he had been or what he had been doing. He was home, safely, and that was all that counted.

Dinner was burned pot roast and potatoes, cooked rock-hard in the center.

Dessert was rice pudding. Smith had never liked rice pudding, but he had been trained to finish what was put in front of him, and so Irma never knew. Thirty years ago, his mother had told Irma that he didn't like rice pudding.

Irma kept serving it. She was sure it was his mother's rice pudding that Harold Smith didn't like.

238

Chapter Thirty-Two

Remo never left his cabin on the long submarine ride back to the United States. It was not until Chiun, still wearing the white robes of mourning, told him that it was time to leave that Remo even moved from his bunk.

It was dark outside when the two of them walked down the dock toward a waiting automobile.

"I'll walk," Remo said.

Chiun nodded, dismissing the car.

"You don't have to come with me."

"You have been alone long enough," the old man said. His white robes billowed in the summer breeze. Remo felt a pang of conscience.

"I'm sorry about H'si Tang," he said.

"My father lived a full life, and his spirit continues through the boy. I cannot ask for more."

The moon was bright, and the sky was ablaze with stars. Remo kept his head down. He never wanted to look at stars again.

After a long silence, Chiun spoke softly. "I have been giving thought to many things," he said. "To legends and

239

240

traditions and the continuity of life. It is good that the Master's Trial has been abolished."

Remo spat.

"Was it so distasteful to you? Did you learn nothing from it?"

"Oh, I learned, all right," Remo said bitterly. "I learned a whole lot. "

"Such as?"

"Such as I should have stuck to bashing heads for Smitty. That's about all I'm good for."

"I see," Chiun said. "Then you found nothing of value in Ancion's sense of fairness? Or Kiree's humility? Or Emrys's courage?"

Remo looked over to him. "Yeah, I guess so. They were good. Better than me, I think, in a lot of ways."

"And the Dutchman?"

Remo hung his head. "He was a lot better."

"Was he?"

Remo knew what he meant. "Little Father, is there such a thing as ... well, opposite personalities in people? I mean, different parts of the same person, only in two different bodies?"

"The principle of yin and yang holds true for all things."

"But . . ."

"He is part of you," Chiun said.

Remo made a noise. "That stuff doesn't make any sense to me."

"If the force of the universe were so simple as to be understandable to all, life would be a very uninteresting experience."

"It's been too interesting for my taste. Anyway, he's gone now. I can live with him as long as he stays away from me."

241

Chiun shrugged. "Perhaps he will, perhaps not. If he ever returns, it will be different because now you know who you are. And Jilda?"

"What about her?" He worked to keep his voice natural.

"Have you learned from her as well?"

"What's anybody learn from women? They come and they go. They're all the same in the dark."

"That is unworthy of you," Chiun snapped. "Jilda was the equal of any man in the Master's Trial."

"She was all right," Remo said dismissively. "She had weird eyes."

"She possessed great courage. Greater than you know."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Remo said angrily. "That she doesn't lead a guy on? Well, that's true. Jilda and her trusty ax, hacking her way to independence. She can write a book. The One-Minute Way to Dump on Men. The women's libbers would love her."

"She carries your child."

Remo stopped dead. "She told you that?"

"She did not have to. 1 have seen pregnant women before."

"Well, I've seen her, too," Remo said skeptically. "And at closer quarters than you."

"It was her manner, not her body. Ever since you arrived in Sinanju with her, I have observed her. It is true. I thought you would leave with her."

Remo stepped back, his face pale. "I would have. I wanted . . . I've got to get back to her." He turned back toward the dock.

"No, my son," Chiun said. "It is not what she wishes. When she came back to the cave to fetch Griffith, I confronted her with my knowledge. She made me promise never to tell you."

Remo was trembling. "Why?"

242

"Because she understands more than you what you must do. What you will become."

"Well, I don't give a rat's ass-" He tried to pull away from Chiun, but the old man gripped his arm tightly.

"Think, Remo! For once, will you think? Jilda is of an ancient people. They would never accept you as one of them, and so you would live apart, as outcasts. She would bend her ways to yours, because she is a woman, and that is their nature. But she would miss her home, and her people, and the old ways in which she was reared.In time, she would grow to resent you. Perhaps even hate you."

"Nope," Remo said. "Not that one. She wouldn't care. Besides, I'd make up for it. For God's sake, I'd do anything for her."

"It would not be enough. And you, my son, who are so eager to throw off your responsibilities to Sinanju. Without you, there will be no Master of Sinanju after me. Except ..."

Suddenly Remo understood. "The Dutchman," he said.

"And while the Dutchman wields his power, unchecked, your abilities will have diminished beyond help through lack of use. Why do you think I have you work for Emperor Smith? You are still growing in the ways of Sinanju. You must work for many more years before you may take my place as reigning Master. But after even one year of idleness-or what you think of now, in your dreams, as happiness-all 1 have taught you will be gone. You cannot rest, any more than the Dutchman."

Remo could still hear the distant waves lapping on the shore. "Did you talk Jilda into leaving me?"

"I said nothing. She is not stupid. Nor am I willing to force you to accept the destiny of Shiva as your own. But you must know the truth. That is why I have broken my

243

promise to Jilda. If you go to her now, at least you will go with some understanding of the consequences." He released Remo's arm and walked away.

Remo stood very still. The sea called to him. Green and blue and gray, the colors of Jiida's eyes. Soon there would be a child, Remo's child, with the same strange, unworldiy gaze. A beautiful child, born of a love and passion that would never be duplicated.

A child for the Dutchman to find and kill . . .

Remo covered his face with his hands, it would happen, he knew. The Dutchman would never be sane. In his search for death, he would surely come for Remo, because he understood now that their lives were permanently enmeshed. And Remo would have weakened. Even if he practiced the exercises of Sinanju every day, he would not have Chiun to guide him.

It would be so easy, with Jilda and the baby, to forget the Dutchman altogether. A peaceful life, quiet, comfortable. But one day the Dutchman would come_back for him. And Jilda. And the child. The beast inside him would see that Remo had no heirs.

He whispered, "Jilda, I can't do it."

But she had known that all along, he realized.

He turned, cold inside, from the sound of the waves and walked back to Chiun. The old man was waiting for "him.

"I wonder if I'll ever see the baby," he said.

"Do you think you could bring yourself to part with them then?"

Remo thought. "No. No, I guess not." They walked a long way. "Never, then."

"Jilda is a fine woman. She will raise a good son."

"Or daughter," Remo said. "I've always wanted a daughter.''

244

"A son," Chiun said simply.

"What makes you so sure what it'll be?" A thought occurred to him that made him feel as if his heart had just shot into his throat. "Not another one of your crazy legends."

"Some traditions must be continued," Chiun said, walking ahead.

"Oh, no. No kid of mine is going to go through this. I won't let it happen."

Chiun turned and smiled. "Then you do believe, after all."

Remo scowled. "You old conniver," he said, strolling beside him.

Jilda. Oh, Jilda, how I'll miss you.

It was a clear night, a night of beginnings and endings. Somewhere on a starlit sea a child was growing. And here, a world away, Remo was alone. Again. It broke his heart.

"I wish ..."

"Yes?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Go ahead. Sometimes it helps to talk."

Remo swallowed. "I wish things didn't have to turn out the way they do."

Chiun put his arm around him. "I know, my son," he said gently. "I know."

Remo felt in his pocket. His carved jade stone from the Master's Trial was still there. He clutched it tightly. It was all he had to remind him.

His eyes filled. "Go on without me," he said. The old man walked ahead. When Remo was alone, he turned his face to the trunk of a tall tree and wept,,For himself, for Jilda, for the child he would never see. The Golden Lady would never be his until the day he died. All he had left of her was a cold jade stone.

245

A breeze cooled his face, carrying with it the faraway scent of the sea. He looked up. Not all. He had something else, after all. For among the thousands of stars gleaming in the summer sky, one shone above all the others. GuIlikona, with its golden fire, burned only for him.