Shooting Schedule

Destroyer 79: Shooting Schedule

By Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir

Prologue

Nemuro Nishitsu knew that the emperor would one day die.

Many Japanese refused to think about it. Almost no one believed in Emperor Hirohito's immortality anymore. That he was immortal was no more logical than the belief that the emperor's father had been immortal or his grandfather before him and on back to the fabled Jimmo Tennu, the first of his line to sit on the Chrysanthemum Throne. And the first Japanese emperor to die.

That the emperor was divine was without question. Nemuro Nishitsu believed it on the day he left for Burma on a troop transport in 1942. He believed it all through the monsoon rains that beat on his helmet and his resolve through the endless days fighting the British and Americans.

He believed it in 1944, when Merrill's Marauders captured General Tanaka's Eighteenth Army. Then-Sergeant Nemuro Nishitsu managed to escape. He took his faith in his emperor into the jungles, where he would fight on, even if he was the last Japanese to hold out. He would never surrender.

Nemuro Nishitsu learned to eat from the monkeys. What they ate, he knew was safe. What they avoided, he assumed was poison. He learned to subsist on bamboo shoots and stolen yams, and to use the jungle maggots to clean out the pus from the ulcers that infected his legs. Sometimes he would eat the maggots after they had done their duty to the emperor.

He killed anyone wearing an unfriendly uniform. Months passed and the uniforms became fewer and fewer. But Nemuro Nishitsu fought on.

They found him in a ditch during monsoon season.

The water cascading around his body was an unhealthy diarrhea yellow. Nishitsu had malaria.

British soldiers took him to an interment camp, where he recovered well enough to enter the general POW population.

It was in this camp that Nemuro Nishitsu first heard the whispers among his unit-the traitorous suggestion that Japan had surrendered to the Americans after some mighty military blow.

Nemuro Nishitsu had scoffed at such a thing. No blow could bring the emperor to surrender. It was not possible. The emperor was divine.

Then they were told they were going home. Not as the victors, but as the vanquished.

Japan was no longer Japan, Nemuro Nishitsu discovered, to his horror. The emperor had renounced his birthright. Japan had surrendered. It was unthinkable. Americans ran the country under the mandate of an American Constitution that prohibited the mere existence of a Japanese army. Tokyo was a sea of rubble. And his home town, Nagasaki, was a desolation of shame.

What astonished Nemuro Nishitsu more than anything else was the meekness of his formerly proud countrymen.

He discovered this the day in late 1950, the twenty-fifth year of the emperor's reign, when a drunken SCAP bureaucrat nearly ran him over while Nishitsu was crossing the ruined Ginza to the little stall where he sold sandals in order to eat.

Nishitsu was not hurt. A Japanese policeman came upon the accident scene, and instead of berating the obviously drunken American, asked him if he wanted to press charges against Nishitsu. Or would he settle for restitution?

The drunken American settled for Nishitsu's sandal stock and every yen on his person.

On that day, Nemuro Nishitsu tasted the bitterness Japan had spread throughout Asia, and it galled him. "Where is your rage?" he would ask his friends. "They have humbled us."

"That is the past," his friends would say in furtive whispers. "We have no time for that. We must rebuild."

"And after you have rebuilt, will you find your anger then?"

"After we rebuild, we must build upon our accomplishments. We must catch up to the Americans. They are better than us."

"They have conquered us," Nishitsu had retorted hotly. "That doesn't make them superior, only fortunate."

"You were not here when the bombs fell. You do not understand. "

"I understand that I fought for my nation and my emperor and I have returned to find my people have lost their manhood," he spat contemptuously.

Nemuro Nishitsu was disgusted by all he saw. Shame blanketed Japan like the smog that came as the industries were rebuilt and revitalized. When he awoke in the morning, he could smell it-in the air. It etched the faces of the young men, and the fine women. No Japanese could escape it. Yet they all tried. And their faith was not Bushido, not Shinto, but American. Everyone wanted to be like the Americans, who were so mighty that they had humbled the once-invincible Japanese.

Nemuro Nishitsu knew that he never wanted to be like the Americans. He also understood that the destiny of Japan lay not in the past, but in the future. He joined his countrymen in building that future until even he gradually lost his bitterness and hatred in the great rebuilding frenzy.

It took years. The great Zaitbatsu companies had been dismembered by the Occupation government. Work was hard to come by. But opportunities awaited the bold. Slowly Nishitsu started a radio business to fill the manufacturing void. It grew, thanks to American transistors. It prospered, thanks to American markets. It diversified, thanks to American microchips-until Nemuro Nishitsu's bitterness faded as he was hailed as one of the rebuilders of Japan's postwar economy, friend of the emperor, and winner of Japan's highest honor, the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Sacred Treasure. He became an oyaji, an "old man with power." And he was content.

The bitterness all came back when the emperor died.

Nemuro Nishitsu was in his Tokyo office, with its view of the Akihabara area, the electronics district he had helped turn into one of the most expensive stretches of real estate in the world, when his secretary came in and bowed twice before informing him of the emperor's death. He was surprised to see the tears in her eyes, for she was of the younger generation who never knew a time when the emperor was universally believed divine.

Nemuro Nishitsu took the news in silence. He waited until the secretary had left the room before succumbing to weeping.

He wept until he had no tears left.

The invitation to attend the funeral was not unexpected. He turned it down. He preferred, instead, to watch the funeral procession from the street, with the multitudes. As the one-ton cedar coffin rolled by, carried by black-gowned pallbearers, he let the rain fall on his face. And in his heart, he felt that it had wiped away the years since he had gone off to war in his emperor's name.

It was not too late to redeem his faith, Nemuro Nishitsu decided as tears of release mixed with the softly falling rain.

He spent the next week going through the employment records of the Nishitsu Group. He spoke with his office managers and vice-presidents in quiet, forceful tones. Those who gave the correct answers to his artfully crafted questions were asked to find others who thought as they did.

Months went by. The wisteria blooms of spring gave way to the heat of the summer. By fall, he had culled the most trustworthy employees of the Nishitsu group, from the highest officers to the lowliest salarymen.

They were called to a meeting. Some came from the halls of the Nishitsu Group world headquarters in Tokyo, on the island of Honshu. Others came from Shikoku or Kyushu. Some came from abroad, even as far away as America, where they managed Nishitsu car factories. They had many names, as many faces, and skills in plenty, for the Nishitsu Group was the largest conglomerate in the world, and it hired only the best.

The chosen ones sat on the floor in their identical white shirts and black ties. Their faces were impassive as Nemuro Nishitsu stepped up to the bare floor at the head of the room. The room was the conference assembly hall of the Nishitsu Group, where every morning the workers joined in morning calisthenics.

"I have called you here," Nemuro Nishitsu said in his throaty but subdued voice, "because you are all right thinkers. "

Heads bowed in acknowledgment.

"I am of the generation that restored Japan to the economic state that it enjoyed in the world. I remember the old days. I do not cling to them. But neither will I forget them.

"You are the generation that made Japan strong again. I salute your industriousness. For my generation was the generation that allowed itself to be humbled by American military power. Your generation is the generation that will humble America economically."

Nemuro Nishitsu paused, his head quivering with age.

"In two months," he continued, "it will be the first anniversary of the emperor's passing. What a gift to his spirit it would be if we were to erase forever the shame of our military defeat. I have devised a way to do this. It will summon no retaliation on our shores, for like you, I would do nothing to bring the terrible nuclear fist down on our people again.

"Give me your faith, as I gave my emperor my faith when I was as young as you men. Give me your trust, and I will hand America a military defeat so shameful they will dare not admit it to the world."

Nemuro Nishitsu looked upon the sea of faces before him. They were set, resolute. There was neither joy nor fear evident in their features. But he knew from their eyes that they were with him. He also knew that they had doubts, though they were unwilling to voice them.

"I have given much thought to my plan. I have selected a man who will assist us in implementing it. You know his name. You will recognize his face. Some of you have met him, for he has worked as a Nishitsu spokesman in the past."

Nemuro Nishitsu pointed his cane at a wiry young man standing off to one side of a massive projection screen.

"Jiro," he said.

The Japanese addressed as Jiro quickly hit a switch. The lights dimmed. In the rear a slide projector blinked on, throwing a dusty beam over the heads of the squatting assemblage.

And over the head of Nemuro Nishitsu appeared a still image of a bare-chested muscular man with flowing black hair held in place by a headband. He cradled a portable Nuclear missile in his arms. Above his head, in English, was a legend in red block letters:

BRONZINI IS GRUNDY

The stony faces of the Japanese reacted instantly. They broke into smiles of recognition. Some clapped, a few whistled.

And through the crowd raced a name. It was repeated over and over again until it became a chant. "Grundy! Grundy! Grundy!" they shouted.

And Nemuro Nishitsu smiled. All around the world, in palaces and jungle huts, people universally reacted that way. The Americans would be no different.

Chapter 1

When it was all over, after all the bodies had been buried and the last foreign soldiers had been driven from what was, for three days in December, Occupied Arizona, world public opinion was in agreement on only one thing.

Bartholomew Bronzini was not to blame.

The United States Senate passed a formal resolution declaring Bronzini's innocence. The President of the United States awarded Bronzini a posthumous Congressional Medal of Honor, as well as burial in Arlington National Cemetery. This despite the fact that Bronzini had never served in any branch of the United States Armed Services, served had ever held public office.

Various groups protested the Arlington burial offer, but the President hung tough. He knew the controversy would blow over. Unless someone recovered Bronzini's remains, which no one ever did.

On the day that began the last week of his life, Bartholomew Bronzini sent his Harley Davidson blasting through the gates of Dwarf-Star Studios with the wind tearing at his long black ponytail and a plastic-covered script tucked into his black leather jacket.

He was not stopped at the gate. The guard knew his face. Everyone knew his face. At one time or another, it had been on every supermarket tabloid cover, magazine, and billboard in the world.

Everyone knew Bartholomew Bronzini. Yet no one did. The receptionist asked for his autograph at the front desk. Bronzini grunted amiably when she slid a mustardstained paper napkin across the desk.

"Got anything white?" he asked in his flat, slightly nasal voice.

The receptionist jumped up from her chair and slid out of her panties.

"White enough for you, Mr. Bronzini?" she asked brightly.

"They'll do," he said, signing his name on the warm cloth.

"Make it out to Karen." Bronzini paused.

"That you?"

"No, my girlfriend. Really."

Bronzini automatically added a "For Karen" above his signature. He passed the underpants back to the receptionist with a shy smile but absolutely no readable emotion in his brown eyes.

"I hope your girlfriend has a sense of humor," he said as the receptionist read the inscription with dazzled gray eyes.

"What girlfriend?" she asked dazedly.

"Never mind," Bronzini sighed. They never admitted it was for them. Only kids did that. Sometimes Bartholomew Bronzini thought that his only true fans were children. Especially these days.

"Mind telling Bernie I'm here?" he prompted. He had to snap his fingers to get her attention again.

"Yes, yes, of course, Mr. Bronzini," she said, coming out of her trance. She picked up the phone and hit a button. "He's here, Mr. Kornflake."

The receptionist looked up. "Go right in, Mr. Bronzini. They're ready for you now. '

Bartholomew Bronzini pulled the script from his jacket as he walked down the fern-decorated corridor. The ferns were festooned with expensive Christmas ornaments. Despite being handcrafted of silver and gold, they looked tacky, Bronzini thought. And there was nothing tackier than Christmas in Southern California.

He was, Bronzini thought for not the first time in his long career, a long way from Philadelphia. Back home, the snow didn't scratch your skin.

Bronzini didn't knock before he entered the sumptuous Dwarf-Star Studios conference room. No one ever expected Bartholomew Bronzini to knock. Or to speak fluent French, or to know his salad fork from a shellfish fork, or do anything a civilized person would do. His image had been indelibly burned into the consciousness of the world, and nothing he could say or do would ever change that image. If he could have cured cancer, they would have whispered that Bronzini had hired someone to cure cancer just to hog the credit. Yet if he started swinging from the chandelier, no one would have batted an eye.

Every head came up when he entered the room. Every eye was on him as he paused at the open door. Bartholomew Bronzini was nervous, but no one would guess that. Their preconceived ideas would reinterpret everything he said or did to fit their image of him.

"Hi," he said quietly. That was all. The men in the room would read a world of meaning into that one word.

"Bart, baby," one of them said, rushing to his feet to guide Bronzini to the only empty chair, as if he was too stupid to sit down without assistance. "Glad you could make it. Take a seat."

"Thanks." Bronzini took his time walking to one end of the conference table. Every eye followed him.

"I think you know everyone,' the man at the opposite end of the table said in a too-bright voice. He was Bernie Kornflake, the new president of Dwarf-Star Studios. He looked about nineteen years old. Bronzini swept the faces at the table with his sullen, heavylidded eyes. A birth accident had damaged his facial nerves so that only yearly plastic surgery kept them from closing completely. Women found them fascinating, and men, threatening.

Bronzini noticed that every one of the executives was under twenty-five. Their faces were as unlined and devoid of character as Play-Doh fresh from the can. Their hair was moussed into a variety of rock-garden shapes, and red suspenders showed from under their unbuttoned Armani coats. The business had come to this. Fetuses in expensive silk suits.

"So, what can we do for you, Bart?" Kornflake asked in a voice as smooth and colorless as vegetable oil.

"I have this script," Bronizi said slowly, flopping it on the immaculate tabletop. It slowly uncurled like a Venus's flytrap. Every eye went to the script as if Bartholomew Bronzini had laid down a soiled diaper instead of four agonizing months of writing.

"That's great, Bart. Isn't it great?"

Everyone agreed that it was great that Bartholomew Bmnzini had brought them a script. The phoniness in their voices made Bronzini want to puke. Fifteen years ago every one of these pansies had cheered him on in one of his now-classic roles, each one of them burning with a single desire: to make movies.

"But, Bart, baby, before we get to your perfectly wonderful script, it just so happens we have this idea we think would, really, really fit your current profile," Bernie Kornflake said.

"This script is different," Bronzini said slowly, an edge creeping into his voice.

"So's our idea. You know, we're about to turn the corner into the nineties. It'll be a whole new ball game in the nineties."

"Movies are movies," Bronzini said flatly. "They haven't changed in one hundred years. Sound came in and title cards went out. Color replaced black and white. But the principle is still the same. You tell a solid story and people will pack the theaters. Movies will be the same in the nineties as they were in the eighties. Take my word for it."

"Wow! That's profound, Bart. Isn't that profound?" Everyone agreed that it was profound.

"But we're not here to talk to you about movies, Bart, baby. Movies are out. We figure by 1995, 1997 tops, movies are going to be passe."

"That means old," a grinning blond man on Bronzini's right said helpfully. Bronzini thanked him for the clarification.

"TV is the next big thing." Bernie Kornflake beamed.

"TV is old," Bronzini countered. His face, flat-cheeked and sad, grew stony. What kind of a game were they trying to run on him?

"You're thinking of old TV," Kornflake said pleasantly. "The new technology coming in means every home will have wide-screen high-definition television. Why go to a sticky-floored movie house when you have the next-best thing in the privacy of your own home? This is the new trend, staying home. It's called cocooning. That's why Dwarf-Star is opening a new home-video operation. And we want you to be our first big star."

"I'd like to talk about the script first."

"Okay, let's. Give me the concept."

"There's no concept," Bronzini said, sliding the script across the table. "It's a Christmas movie. An old-fashioned-"

Kornflake's hands came up like pale flags. "Whoa! Old is out. We can't have old. It's too retro."

"This is classic old. This is quality. That means good," Bronzini added to the blond man. The blond man thanked him through perfectly set teeth.

Dwarf-Star president Bernie Kornflake leafed through the script. Bronzini could tell by his glazed eyes that he was simply checking to see that there were words on the pages. His eyes had that shine that comes from pulling white powder into the brain through the nostrils.

"Keep talking, Bart," Kornflake said. "This script looks good. I mean, check out all these words. A lot of scripts we see these days, they're mostly white space."

"It's about this autistic boy," Bronzini said intently. "He lives in a world of his own, but one Christmas he wanders out into the snow. He gets lost."

"Hold up, I'm getting lost. This sounds complicated, not to mention heavy. Think you could give this to me in six or seven words?"

"Seven words?"

"Five would be better. Just. give me the high concept. That's what it's all about now. You know, like Nun on a Skateboard. I Was a Teenage Dumpster Diver. Housewife Hookers in Vietnam. Like that."

"This isn't a concept film. It's a story. About Christmas. It's got feeling and emotion and characterization."

"Does it have tits?" someone asked.

"Tits?" Bronzini said in an offended tone.

"Yeah, tits. Boobs. Knockers. You know, if there's enough boom-cheechee in this thing we can maybe get around the fact that the audience has to sit through a story. You know, kinda take their mind off it. We expect escapism to be very major in the nineties."

"What do you think I built my career on?" Bronzini snarled. "Ballet? And I don't want them to take their minds off the story. The story is what they're paying to see. That's what movie making is about!" Bartholomew Bronzini's voice rose like a thermometer in August.

Every man in the room got very, very still. A few edged their chairs away from the table in order to give them leg room so they could bolt if, as some of them imagined, Bartholomew Bronzini pulled an Uzi from under his black leather jacket and started spraying the room. They knew he was capable of such atrocities because they had seen him mow down entire armies in his Grundy films. It could not have been acting. Everyone knew what a terrible actor Bronzini was. Why else was he the top-grossing actor of all time, but had never won a best-actor Oscar?

"All right, all right," Bronzini told them, throwing up his hands. A few people ducked, thinking he had tossed a grenade.

When no one exploded, the room relaxed. Bernie Kornflake extracted a plastic nasal-spray bottle from his coat pocket and took a couple of hits. His blue eyes were sixty candlepower shinier after he put it away. Bronzini knew that it was not filled with a commercial antihistamine.

"I want to make this movie," Bronzini told them seriously.

"Of course you do, Bart," Kornflake said soothingly. "That's what we're all here for. That's what life is about, making movies."

Bartholomew Bronzini could have told them making movies was not what life was about. But they wouldn't have understood. Every man in the room believed that making movies was what life was about. Every one of them was in the movie-making business, as was Bartholomew Bronzini. There was just one difference. Every man at the table had the drive and ambition and connections to make movies. None of them had the talent. They had to steal their ideas, or option books and change them so much that the authors no longer recognized them.

Bartholomew Bronzini, on the other hand, knew how to make movies. He could write screenplays. He could direct them. He could star. He could also produce-not that that was even a skill, never mind a talent.

None of the men in the room could do any of those things. Except produce, which in their case was the same as unskilled labor. And each of them hated Bartholomew Bronzini because he could.

"I have an idea!" Kornflake cried. "Why don't we cut a deal? Bart, come in with us on this TV thing, and during the summer hiatus we can knock out this little Easter film of yours."

"Christmas. And I'm not some frigging TV actor."

"Bart, baby, sweetheart, listen to me. If Milton Berle had said that, he'd never have become Uncle Miltie. Think of it."

"I don't want to be the next Berle," Bronzini said. "Then you can be the next Lucille Ball!" someone shouted with the enthusiasm usually reserved for scientific breakthroughs.

Bronzini fixed the man with his sad eyes.

"I don't want to be the next anyone," he said firmly. "I'm Bartholomew Bronzini. I'm a superstar. I've made over thirty films. And every one of them made millions."

"Uh-uh, Bart, baby. Don't kid us. You forgot Gemstone."

"That one only broke even. So shoot me. But Ringo grossed over fifty million bucks at a time when nobody went to prizefight films. Ringo II topped that. Even Ringo V outgrossed nine out of any ten films you could name. "

"That's if you include foreign markets," Kornflake pointed out. "Domestically speaking, it was a dud."

"Half the world's population saw it, or will."

"That's wonderful, Bart. But the Filipinos don't give Oscars. Americans do."

"I don't pick my fans. And I don't care who they are or where they live."

"You know, Bart," Kornflake said solicitously, "I think you made a mistake killing off that boxer of yours in that last Ringo. You could have ridden him another five sequels. Extended your film career a little."

"You make me sound dead," Bronzini challenged.

"You've peaked. Variety said so last week."

"I'm sick of Ringo," Bronzini retorted. "And Grundy and Viper and all these other action-film characters. I spent fifteen years doing action films. Now I want to do something different. I want to do a Christmas film. I want to do the next It's a Wonderful Life."

"I never heard of that one," Kornflake said doubtfully. "Did it hit?"

"It was filmed back in the forties," Bronzini told him. "It's a classic. They show it every Christmas week. You could turn on your TV right now, and somewhere, on some channel, they're showing it."

"Back in the forties?" one of the others asked. "Did they have movies then?"

"Yeah. But they were no good. All in black and white. "

"That's not true," a third man said. "I saw a film like that once. Copablanca, or something. It had some gray in it. A couple of different shades of it, too."

"Gray isn't a color. It's a ... What is gray, anyway. A tone?"

"Never mind," Kornflake snapped. "Look Bart, tell you what. I have a better idea. We can do your Christmas story here. What's it called?" He flipped to the cover. It was blank. "No title?" he asked.

"You have it upside down," Bronzini told him. Kornflake flipped it over. "Oh, so I did. Let's see . . . Johnny's Christmas Spirit. Stunning title." Bronzini leaped forward.

"It's about a little autistic kid. He gets lost in a blizzard. He can't speak or tell anyone where he lives. The whole town is looking for him, but because it's Christmas Eve, they give up too soon. But the Spirit of Christmas saves him."

"The Spirit of Christmas?"

"Santa Claus."

Kornflake turned to his secretary. "Find out who owns the rights to Santa Claus, Fred. There may be something in this."

Bronzini exploded. "What's the matter with you people? Nobody owns Santa Claus. He's public domain."

"Somebody probably got fired for letting that property go public domain, huh?" a sandy-haired executive co-producer said.

"Santa Claus is universal. Nobody created him."

"I think that's true, Bernie," a co-executive producer said. "Right now, back east there's a guy running around in a Santa suit chopping off the heads of little kids with an ax. It's on all the talk shows. I think it's in Providence. Yeah, Providence, Massachusetts."

"Providence is in Rhode Island," Bronzini said.

"No, no, Bart," the co-executive producer said. "I beg to differ. This is happening in an American city, not some nothing foreign island. I read it in People."

Bartholomew Bronzini said nothing. These were the very people who laughed at him behind his back at cocktail parties. The ones who dismissed him as a lucky musclehead. Five best-picture Oscars and they were still calling him lucky....

"I read about it too," Bernie Kornflake said. "You know, maybe we could bring that in. What do you say, Bart? Do you think you could change your script a little? Make this Christmas Spirit an evil demon. He kills the kid. No, better, he kills and eats a bunch of kids. It could be the next major trend. Maniacs killing teenagers is getting stale. But preteens, even infants . . When was the last time anybody did a movie where babies were being devoured?"

Everyone took a minute out to think. One man reached for a leather-bound book containing the synopses of every movie plot ever filmed, cross-referenced to theme and plot. He looked in the index under "Babies, devoured."

"Hey, Bart may have something here, Bernie. There isn't even a listing."

At that, everyone sat up straight.

"No listing?" Kornflake blurted. "How about reversing it? Any killer-baby movies?"

"No, there's nothing under 'Babies, Killer.' "

"How about 'Babies, Cannibal'?"

There were no cannibal babies listed in the index. Every man was out of his chair at that point. They crowded around the book, their eyes feverish.

"You mean we got something entirely new here?" Kornflake demanded. His eyes were as wide as if he'd found a tarantula on his shell-pink lapel.

"It's not based on anything I can find."

Twelve heads turned with a single silent motion. Twelve pairs of eyes looked at Bartholomew Bronzini with a mixture of newfound respect and even awe.

"Bart, baby," Bernie Kornflake croaked. "This idea of yours, this killer-baby thing. I'm sorry, babe, but we can't do it. It's too new. We can't do something this original. How would we market it? 'In the tradition of nothing anybody's ever seen before'? Never hit in a million years."

"That's not my idea," Bronzini grated. "It's yours. I want to do a fucking Christmas movie. A simple, warm story with no guns and a happy fucking ending."

"But, Bart, baby," Kornflake protested, noticing that Bronzini's street upbringing was creeping into his manner, "we can't take a chance. Look at your track record lately."

"Thirty films. Thirty box-office successes. Three of those are among the top money-makers of all fucking time. I'm a superstar. I'm Bartholomew Bronzini. I was making movies while you assholes were counting the first hairs in your crotches and wondering if you'd seen too many werewolf flicks!"

Kornflake's voice became stern. "Bart, Grundy III bombed. Domestically. You should never have used that Iran-Iraq story line. The war was over by the time you got into the theaters. It was yesterday's news. Who needed it?"

"It still made eighty million worldwide. They can't keep it in the video stores!"

"Tell you what," Kornflake said, sliding the script back across the polished table. "Put Grundy or Ringo into this script and we'll read it. If, after we kick it around, we don't think it will fly theatrically, we'll talk about turning it into a sitcom. We're going to need a gang of sitcoms for our new TV venture. Normally we only offer a thirteen-week guarantee, but for you, Bart, because we love you, we'll commit to a full season."

"Listen to me. I can act. I can write. I can direct. I've made millions for this industry. All I am asking is to do one lousy Christmas movie, and the best you can offer me is a sitcom!"

"Don't sneer at sitcoms. Do you know that Gilligan's Island has grossed over a billion dollars in syndication? A billion. That's a million with a B. None of your films ever did that, did they?"

"I'm not in Bob Denver's league. So sue me. You're talking to a superstar, not some comedy reject. My films kept this industry afloat during the seventies."

"And we're about to turn the corner into the nineties," Kornflake said flatly. "The parade is marching on. You gotta get on the train or walk the tracks."

Bronzini jumped onto the table. "Look at these muscles!" he shouted, tearing off his jacket and shirt to expose the lean tigerish muscles that had sold fifty million posters. "Nobody has muscles like these! Nobody!"

The men in the room looked at Bartholomew Bronzini's physique, then at one another.

"Think about redoing the script, Bart," Bernie Kornflake said, flashing a good-riddance smile.

"Go piss down your leg and drink from your sneaker," Bronzini snarled, scooping up his script.

As he stormed down the corridor, Bartholomew Bronzini heard Kornflake call after him. He half-turned, his dark eyes smoldering.

Kornflake approached Bronzini fawningly and flashed him a capped-tooth smile. "Before you go, Bart, baby, could I get your autograph? It's for my mother."

When Bartholomew Bronzini kicked the stand down on his Harley again, he was in his ten-car Malibu garage. He walked into his living room. It looked like an art-deco church. One entire wall was covered with custom-made hunting knives. Three of them he had used as props in the Grundy movies. The others were for display. The opposite wall was covered in authentic Chagalls and Magrittes, purchased as tax shelters.

Nobody believed that Bartholomew Bronzini had selected them because he appreciated them too, but he did. Today, he didn't even notice them.

Bronzini sank into his Spanish leather couch, feeling like a man at the end of his rope. Movies were his life. And now the public laughed at the much-larger-than-life roles that a decade ago they had applauded him in. And when he did a comedy, no one laughed. And everyone wondered why this street-kid-turned-millionaire-actor was so unhappy.

Woodenly he noticed that his message-machine light was on. He flipped a switch. His agent's voice boomed out.

"Bart, baby, it's Shawn. I've been trying to get you all afternoon. I may have something for you. Call me soonest. Remember, you're loved."

"I'm fucking half your income, too," Bronzini growled. Bartholomew Bronzini came to life. He lunged for the phone and hit the speed-dial button marked "Agent."

"Yo! Got your message. What's the deal?"

"Someone wants to film your Christmas movie, Bart."

"Who?"

"Nishitsu."

"Nishitsu?"

"Yeah. They're Japanese."

"Hey, I may be having a bad streak, but I haven't sunk to doing cheap foreign films. Yet. You know better than that."

"These guys aren't cheap. They're big. The biggest."

"Never heard of them."

"Nishitsu is the biggest Japanese conglomerate in the entire world. They're into VCR's, home computers, cameras. They're the ones who landed the contract to produce the Japanese version of the F-16."

"The F-16!"

"That's what their representative told me. I think it's a camera."

"It's a fighter jet. Top-of-the-line Air Force combat model. "

"Wow! They are big."

"Damn straight," Bartholomew Bronzini said, noticing for the first time that his message machine had the word NISHITSU on the front.

"They have money to burn and they want to go into films. Yours will be the first. They want to take a meeting with you soonest."

"Set it up."

"It's already set up. You're on the red-eye to Tokyo." I am not going to Tokyo. Let them come to me."

"That's not how it's done over there. You know that. You did those ham commercials for Japanese TV."

"Don't remind me," Bronzini said, wincing. When his film career had started to slip, he accepted a deal to do food commercials for the Japanese market, on the understanding that they never appear on U. S. TV. The National Enquirer broke the story as "Bartholomew Bronzini Goes to Work in Slaughterhouse. "

"Well, that ham company is a Nishitsu subsidiary. They've got their hands in everything."

Bronzini hesitated. "They want to do my script, huh?"

"That's not the best part. They're offering you one hundred million to star. Can you believe it?"

"How many bucks equals one hundred million yen?"

"That's the beauty of it. They're paying in dollars. Are these Japs crazy, or what?"

Bartholomew Bronzini's first reaction was, "Nobody pays that much to any actor." His second was, "What about points?"

"They're offering points."

"Against net or gross?" Bronzini asked suspiciously. "Gross. I know it sounds insane."

"It is insane and you know it. I'm not going near this."

"But it gets better, Bart, baby. They lined up Kurosawa to direct."

"Akira Kurosawa? He's a fucking master. I'd kill to work with him. This can't be real."

"There are a few strings," Shawn admitted. "They want to make a few script changes. Tiny ones. I know you usually get complete creative control, but I gotta tell you, Bart, there may be a lot of fish out there, but this is the only one biting."

"Tell me about it. I just came back from Dwarf-Star."

"How'd it go?"

"It was a bad scene."

"You didn't tear off your shirt again, did you?"

"I lost my head. It happens."

"How many times do I gotta tell you, that won't work anymore. Muscles are eighties. But okay, done is done. So are you on that plane or what? And before you answer, I gotta tell you it's gonna be either this, or you'd better start thinking seriously about Ringo VI: Back from the Dead."

"Anything but that," Bronzini said with a rueful laugh. "He fought more rounds than Ali. Okay, I guess beggars can't be choosers."

"Great. I'll set it up. Ciao. You're loved." Bartholomew Bronzini hung up the phone. He noticed that although the phone said MANGA on it, the corporate symbol matched that of the Nishitsu symbol on his message machine.

He went to his personal computer and began typing in instructions to his flock of servants. He noticed the keyboard carried the Nishitsu brand name too.

Bartholomew Bronzini grunted an explosive laugh. "Good thing we won the war," he said, not realizing the irony of his own words.

Chapter 2

His name was Remo, and, he was going to kill Santa Claus if it was the last thing he ever did.

There was snow falling on College Hill, overlooking Providence, Rhode Island. Big puffy flakes of it. They fell with a faint hiss that only one possessing Remo s acute hearing could detect. The snow had just started, but already it formed a pristine blanket under his feet.

It remained pristine after Remo walked over it. His Italian loafers made no imprint. He walked deserted Benefit Street, as quietly and stealthily as a jungle cat. His T-shirt was so white that only his skinny arms with their unusually thick wrists showed against the falling flakes. Remo's chinos were gray. Snow clung to them in patches so that they too were predominantly white. The camouflage effect made Remo almost invisible.

Camouflage had nothing to do with not leaving footprints, however.

Remo paused in mid-stride and ran his eyes along the silent rows of well-preserved Colonial-style homes with their distinctive glass fanlights. There were no cars on Benefit Street. It was after eleven P.m. Providence goes to bed early. But this week, the week before Christmas, it was not the ordinary sleeping habits of this insular city that made its inhabitants retire early. It was fear-fear of Santa Claus.

Remo started off again. In the spot where he had stood there were two shallow but well-defined footprints. But none leading away. Had Remo looked back to observe this phenomenon, his high-cheekboned face might have registered surprise. Not at the two inexplicable footsteps themselves, for he took it for granted that when he walked, leaves did not crinkle under his tread, nor sand displace. But for what they represented-the fact that, officially, he no longer existed.

Once, many Christmases ago, Remo had been a New Jersey cop. A pusher's murder was blamed on him, and Remo got the chair. And a second chance. The chance effectively erased his previous existence and brought forth a new, improved Remo.

For Remo became a Master of Sinanju. Trained as an assassin, he worked for a secret arm of the United States government known only as CURE. His job was to locate and eliminate the nation's enemies.

Tonight his assignment was to kill Santa Claus. Remo had nothing against Saint Nick. In fact, he had not believed in Santa in a long time. Saint Nick was a jolly elf who symbolized childhood, a childhood that Remo had never really experienced to the full. He had been raised in an orphanage.

But while Remo had been denied a normal childhood, he did not resent it. Much. Maybe a little. Usually around this time of the year, actually, when he realized that the universal celebration of childhood, Christmas, was something he would never truly know.

This was why Remo had to kill Santa Claus. The bastard was ruining it for other children-children who had fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters. Innocent children with warm homes and Christmas trees they decorated with family instead of orphanage nuns. Remo would never see a Christmas like theirs. But he'd be damned if another little boy or girl would be denied Christmas by a fat slob in a red suit carring a fire ax. Remo finished his sweep of Benefit Street. This was the old section of Providence, where time seemed to have stood still. The streetlamps might have been standing a century ago. The houses belonged to another era. Most of the low stone steps boasted wrought-iron foot scrapers, which in the days of horse-drawn cars saw constant use. Now they were merely quaint relics.

Santa Claus didn't trouble Benefit Street tonight. No corpulent figure haunted the rooftops. No bearded face pressed to windows, tapping gently, enticingly.

Remo walked to Prospect Park. Set on an embankment, it gave a commanding view of Benefit Street and the city of Providence. Remo sat on the parapet beside the statue of Roger Williams cut from granite. He stood with one broken-fingered hand lifted helplessly as if to ask, "Why my city?"

Remo wondered that as well, as his deep-set dark eyes picked through the snow. His face, the skin tight over high cheekbones, was tense. He rotated his thick wrists unconsciously.

Usually Remo did not concern himself with the why. Not on the small hits like this. He never asked the crack dealers whose necks he broke why they sold cocaine. The Mafia hoods never tried to explain themselves before he fractured their skulls like eggs. Remo wouldn't have listened. After twenty years in this game, it had come down to the same tired old story: new people committing old crimes. That was all.

But Santa owed him an explanaton. And just this once, Remo was going to ask why.

The moon was a fuzzy snowball as seen through the swirling snow. It shone down on the golden dome of the State House. It was a beautiful city, Remo realized. He could easily imagine himself back in the nineteenth century. He wondered what his ancestors did then. He wondered who they were. He had no idea. But he could recite from memory exactly what the emissaries of a certain Korean fishing village were doing at any time in the last century. They were, like him, Masters of Sinanju. But they were his spiritual ancestors.

The unusual quiet made it possible for his highly sensitive ears to pick out conversations emanating from the picturesque homes huddled below. He turned his head from side to side like some human radar dish. Instead of trying to listen, he let the snatches of conversation drift to him.

". . . Molly, come quick! The lost episode of Murphy's Law is on! . . ."

". . . Ward! Ward Phillips! If you don't answer me right now . . . "

". . . Santa! You're early." It was a little boy's voice. Instantly, another voice joined it. A pouty girlish voice. "What is it, Tommy? You woke me up. Bad boy."

"It's Santa. He's at the window."

Tiny feet scampered. "Oh, let me see. Let me see!" Remo forced himself to relax. Tensing up would constrict the blood flow to his brain and lower his sensitivity. His head made decreasingly smaller turns as he narrowed his focus.

He got a fix on the sound of a window being raised and a thick blubbery voice saying, "Ho ho ho!"

The sound made Remo's blood run cold. He had read the newspaper reports that Upstairs had supplied him. They had made him sick, then angry, and then burning with a rage that was as hot as the sun.

It was a thirty-foot drop from the parapet down to the tangle of underbrush that was clotted with leprous snow. It was the most direct way to the house.

Remo stood up. The snow fell around him like white spiders slipping down invisible webs. His breathing keyed down to its most minimal efficiency. He felt the falling snow, its rhythms, its inexorability. And when he was at one with the snowfall, he jumped into it.

Remo felt the flakes gravitate toward him. He felt each one individually. Not as a puffy bit of emphemeral frozen water, but as strong, structurally sound ice crystals. He sensed their inner strength, their uniqueness. They clung to him like brothers, not melting when they touched his face or bare arms. His skin was as cold as they were. Remo thought like a snowflake, and like a snowflake he became.

Remo floated to the ground at the exact speed of the falling snow. He was covered in snow when his feet touched the ground. This time he made footprints. Just two. He floated down the embankment without leaving any further sign.

Remo's eyes were on a brown house with a single lighted window. Then an oblate shape fell across the light like an evil eclipse.

Cursing under his breath, Remo moved for it. Tommy Atwells had to climb onto his windowsill to reach the latch. He stood there in his pumpkin-orange Dr. Denton pajamas. His little knees trembled. "Hurry, Tommy," his sister said. "Santa's cold."

"I'm trying." And on the other side of the snowsprinkled glass the wide smiling face grew eager. Tommy used both hands to push the latch clear. It sprang with a sharp sound.

"Okay, that's it," Tommy said, climbing down.

The window squeaked as it rolled up. Tommy stepped back into a corner, near the toy box, where his sister stood with wide eyes. He had heard about Santa Claus for years. But he had never seen him with his own eyes. He was very big.

After Santa has squeezed himself through the window, a question occurred to Tommy,

"How come ... how come you're early? Mommy says Christmas isn't till next week."

"Ho ho ho," was all Santa would say. He unslung his big sack and let it slump to the floor, a long red handle sticking out of it like a shard of ribbon candy. And then he was clumping toward the shivering children, his hands outstretched, his eyes very, very bright. His vast shadow covered Tommy and his sister.

The window was already closed when Remo reached it. It was a first-floor window. The glass was held in place by dry wood putty. Remo tested the pane with the flat of his hand. It gave slightly. He pushed harder, instinctively reading the points of maximum weakness in the putty. Repositioning his hand, Remo smacked the glass, firmly but with restraint. The putty gave like stale bread. Remo caught the glass in both hands and flung it back into a growing snowbank. He went in.

Remo found himself in a children's bedroom. Both beds were rumpled but empty. The room smelled of peppermint. A half-eaten candy cane lay on a toy box.

Remo glided to the open door, every sense alert. "Oooh, presents," a girl's voice was saying.

"Can we ... can we open them now, Santa?" A boy's voice this time.

"Ho ho ho," Santa said. His laugh was very quiet, and the sound of tearing and crinkling wrapping paper overtook its echoes.

Remo eased into the hallway. His shoes made no sound on the varnished floor. Weak light spilled from a room at the end of the hall. Fresh pine scent wafted from it, carried by hot air from a floor register.

Remo came up on the door. He peered around it. At first he saw only two children. A boy he took to be five and a girl who might have been a year younger. They were on their knees at the foot of a popcorn-andtinsel-decorated Christmas tree. They were opening presents eagerly, the way Remo never had. He always got new clothes. Never toys.

Remo brushed the wistful thought from his mind. For on the far wall, next to the shadow of the bedecked tree, was another shadow. Short, round, it was a blot of darkness that any child in America would have recognized from its shape.

Except for the upraised ax in its hands.

Remo flung himself into the room as the ax came back. The children didn't see Santa, for Santa stood behind them, his too-avid eyes fixed on the backs of their fresh-scrubbed necks.

"No!" Remo shouted, for once forgetting everything he had been taught about silent attack.

Santa started. The children's heads came about. They saw Remo. Their eyes widened in surprise. They didn't see the ax descending for their skulls.

They never saw the ax. Remo's hands intercepted the chipped blade as it came down. He pulled the weapon from Santa's two-handed grip.

"Run," Remo called to them.

"Mommy, Daddy, Mommy . ." Tommy yelled as he scampered from the room. "Some strange man is trying to hurt Santa."

Remo broke the ax in two, flung both pieces away. He took Santa Claus by his rabbit-fur collar and yanked his bearded face into his own.

"Why, you bastard? I want to know why!" he said fiercely.

"Mommy, Daddy!"

Santa opened his mouth to speak. Instead, as he looked past Remo's shoulder, his thick wet lips broke into a foolish grin, showing yellow teeth like old dice.

A new voice broke the stillness. "Stand where you are! I have a gun!"

"Don't shoot! Daddy, please don't shoot Santa."

Still holding on to the rabbit-fur collar, Remo whirled in place. Santa's black boots left the floor. When they touched down, Remo and the fat man had changed places. Remo now faced the hallway. Over Santa's redvelvet shoulder he saw a man in a terry-cloth bathrobe. He had a .45 automatic pointed in Remo's direction. The little boy clung to his leg. But the girl was still behind Remo, in the line of fire.

"Get away from my daughter," the man shouted. "Cathy, call the police."

"What is it?" a woman's twisted voice demanded. "Where's Susie?"

"Put the gun down, pal," Remo said. "This is between Santa and me. Isn't that right, Santa?" Remo shook the fat man angrily.

Santa only smiled slackly. It was a horrible, unbalanced smile.

"Susie, come here," the father prompted. "Walk around the men, honey."

"Do as he says, Susie," Remo said tightly, looking into Santa's eyes.

Susie stood unmoving, her thumb in her mouth.

"The police are coming, George," the mother's voice said. She appeared in the doorway, saw Remo and Santa Claus in a clutch, and let out a stricken scream. "Cathy! Will you get back!"

"George, for God's sake, put away that gun. You'll hit Susie!"

"Listen to her," Remo said. "I have this under control." To prove it, he lifted Santa Claus off his feet and bounced him up and down on his boots.

"See?" Remo said.

From his wide black belt, Santa pulled a switchblade. Remo sensed the knife coming up. It didn't concern him. He saw the father draw a shaky two-handed bead on the broad red back of the Santa suit and exert pressure on the trigger.

Remo pushed Santa aside. He ducked under the first wild shot. One open hand swept in and batted the muzzle up. A single shot pocked the ceiling.

Remo tripped the father. He went down. The gun ended up in Remo's hand. He yanked out the magazine and disarmed the weapon by pulling back the hammer with one strong thumb. The hammer broke off like a gingerbread man's leg.

Remo turned his attention back to Santa Claus. Santa was halfway out the door.

Remo started for the door, but felt a drag on his leg. He looked down. Little Tommy was clinging to his ankle, banging on it, hot tears streaming down his cheeks.

"Oh, you're bad. You made Santa go away."

Gently Remo bent down and pried Tommy's fingers from his pants fabric. He took the boy by his tiny shoulders and looked him in the eye.

"Take it easy," he said. "That wasn't Santa. That was the Boogey Man."

"There's no such thing as the Boogey Man. And you hit my daddy. I'll kill you! I will!"

The vehemence of the little boy's words shocked Remo. But he had no time to think about that. Outside, a car started up.

Remo released the boy. He went through the door like a cannonball. The sturdy panels flew apart.

Out on the pavement, a little foreign car spurted from the curb. Its tires slipped on the slick snow. The car was Christmas-ornament red.

The car turned the corner at high speed. Remo cut through a backyard to intercept it, but the car had already slid into the maze of College Hill when he reached the sidewalk.

Remo spotted it again at the top of Vertical Jenckes Street, so called because it was as steep as a San Francisco avenue.

The car went down slowly, brakes on. To release them would have invited disaster.

At the top of the hill, Remo put his feet together and pushed off.

Knees bent, arms at his sides, Remo went down Vertical Jenckes as if skiing from a steep slope. He caught up with the car and grabbed the bumper.

Hunched low so that he wouldn't be visible through the driver's rearview mirror, Remo locked every muscle and joint, and allowed himself to be towed. It brought back memories of his childhood in Newark, when he used to skip-hop the length of Broad Street. Back then, cars had big chrome bumpers that were easy to hold on to. The modern composition bumper afforded Remo no real purchase. So Remo's fingers dug into the plastic like claws and made his own. When he let go, there would be permanent holes.

The car weaved through College Hill with Remo attached it like a hunched-over human trailer. Snow collected at the tips of his shoes. When it got too thick, it fell away, only to start collecting all over again. Remo watched his shoes with interest. He had no idea where Santa Claus was taking him, but when the car came to a stop, the expression on Father Christmas' face was certain to be priceless. For the few seconds it would take before Remo started peeling the flesh from his skull.

Then Remo would get his answers. He might have to tear an arm off as well. Maybe he would rip off every limb and dump the bastard in a remote snowbank somewhere, where he could scream to his heart's content as he bled to death. It was a method that the man who

had trained him to kill would frown upon, but this was a special case. This was the Christmas season.

The car took Route 95 North, heading for the Massachusetts border. Remo recognized this only after the car drove past a pesticide company which displayed a huge papier-mache termite as an advertising gimmick. Remo had overheard this bug jokingly referred to as the Rhode Island state bird. He had laughed when he heard it. Now, hours later, with the snow falling like a shroud and a homicidal maniac towing him to an unknown destination, nothing seemed funny anymore.

The car turned off the highway in Taunton, Massachusetts. Remo didn't know that this was Taunton, and had he known, he would not have cared. His thoughts were red. Not Christmas-ornament red, but blood red.

The red car pulled into a blacktopped carport beside a row of snow-burdened evergreens.

Remo kept low. The car door clicked open and slammed shut. Clopping boots carried Santa Claus to the side door of a Cape Cod-style house. Remo heard a key tickle a door lock. The tumblers clicked so loudly that he heard them twenty feet away. A glass storm door clanged. Then there was only the hiss of the falling snow.

Remo got to his feet. He eased up to the door and received a shock. Staring back from the reflective glass of the storm door was an eerie sight.

It looked like a snowman. Not a jolly rotund snowman, but a lean sculptured one. There was no carrot nose, but it did have what looked like coal eyes. Remo peered closer. They were not coals, but the deathlike hollows of his own eye sockets.

Remo lifted his arms. They looked as if they had been rolled in powdered sugar. The snowman was himself. He realized that he had lowered his temperature so much that instead of melting, the snow clung to him. The reflection in the glass gave Remo an idea.

He knocked on the storm door. His knuckles left leprous patches on the glass.

A wide-eyed man's face appeared at the window. It was a round face, simple and without guile. Not the kind of face Remo expected. Not the face of a man who had chopped off the heads of seven children in the middle of the night and left their headless corpses under the trees for their parents to find.

"Who . . . who are you?" the guileless face asked. His voice had a weirdly distorted quality.

"Frosty the Snowman," Remo said seriously. "Really?"

Remo nodded. "Really. I'm canvassing the neighborhood on Santa's behalf. Here to find out if you've been naughty or nice."

The face broke into a frown.

"Santa Claus isn't real. Vincent told me so." Remo blinked.

"But Frosty is?"

The moon face puckered like a dried orange. "Vincent didn't say you weren't real. And you're here. But maybe I should ask him before I let you in. I'm not supposed to let strangers in the house, you know."

"Look, friend, I have eighty-seven thousand homes to get to by Sunday night. If you won't cooperate I'll just have to mark this house down as 'Naughty.' Thanks for your time." Remo turned to go.

The doors suddenly banged open and the moon-faced man lumbered out. He wasn't wearing a Santa suit. He looked twenty-eight. Going on twelve.

"No, no, wait!" he pleaded. "Come in. Please. I'll talk to you. I will."

Remo shrugged. "Okay." He followed the man in. Remo decided that he tipped the scales at nearly three hundred pounds. Almost none of it muscle. The guy's stomach flopped over his rope belt like a glob of marshmallow fluff. He had enough chins to distribute among the Jackson family and still have one left for himself.

And as Rema followed him into a cheerful if unkempt living room, he noticed that the guy's upper thighs rubbed together. He was wearing corduroy, and the sound was loud enough to frighten mice.

"Please sit down," the fat man said. "My name is Henry. Are you thirsty? Would you like hot chocolate?" His voice was pathetically eager to please.

"No, thanks," Remo said distractedly, looking around the room. "I'd only melt."

The living room lacked the usual Christmas decorations of the season. There was no tree. No stockings hung above the sullen fireplace logs. But in one corner stood a three-foot-tall plastic reindeer. It was plugged into a wall socket. It glowed faintly. The nose burned a cherry red. It belonged on a lawn.

"Rudolph?" Remo asked.

"Don't you recognize him?" Henry asked in an injured voice.

"Just checking," Remo said. "Now, let's get down to business. I have a report that someone in this house has been naughty."

"It wasn't me!" Henry shrieked.

A querulous voice called from another room. "Go to bed, Henry."

"I will, Mother. When I'm done talking with Frosty."

"Go to bed now!" a male voice bellowed.

"Yes, sir.... I gotta go to bed. Vincent says."

"This will only take a minute," Remo said. He noticed that his arms were melting. He felt cold watery fingers crawling down inside his T-shirt. Remo figured he had five minutes to get the answers he wanted. The rest would be easy.

"Okay," Henry said, quietly closing the door. Remo put his hand on Henry's trembling shoulder.

"Henry, is it true?" he asked.

Henry looked away. His eyes sought the plastic reindeer. "Is what true?" he asked evasively.

"Don't beat around the Christmas tree," Remo growled. He was staring into Henry's twisting face. The mouth belonged to Santa Claus. There was no mistaking that. So did the personal scent, an equal mixture of Ivory soap and underarm deodorant. It was hard to match Henry's whining voice to the sinister "Ho ho ho," Remo had heard, but there could be no mistake. "We know you're the one," Remo said flatly. "The one who's been killing little kids."

"I ... I had to," Henry said miserably.

Remo grabbed him by the shoulders. "Why, for God's sake?" he demanded angrily. "They were only kids."

"He told me to," Henry blubbered.

Remo looked. Henry pointed to the plastic Rudolph. Its flat white-and-black eyes stared back innocently. The nose flickered.

"Rudolph?" Remo asked.

"He made me do it."

"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer made you cut off the heads of seven little children. Why?"

"So they wouldn't be sad. Like me."

"Sad?"

"Vincent said there was no Santa Claus. I didn't believe him at first, but Mommy said-it was so."

"Who's Vincent?"

"My stepfather. My real father ran away. Vincent said it was because I was a retard, but Mommy hit Vincent when he said it, so I guess it's not true."

"Why did this happen?" Remo felt all his anger drain out of him. The big oaf was retarded.

"After Thanksgiving. I asked him how come we didn't have a tree. Vincent said we didn't need one."

"Keep talking. I still want to know why."

"Well, I didn't want any little kids to be hurt," Henry said, twisting his sausagelike fingers. "And Rudolph said that if a little kid died before he found out there wasn't any Santa, he would always be happy and go to heaven. But if he grew up, then he would go to hell when he died and burn forever. Like bacon."

"You killed them so they wouldn't find out there wasn't any Santa Claus?" Remo asked incredulously. "Yes, sir, Mr. Frosty. Did Vincent lie?"

Remo sucked in a hot breath. It was a long moment before he answered.

"Yes, Henry," Remo said quietly. "Vincent lied."

"I'm the one who's going to burn in hell, aren't I?" Remo answered the question without hesitating. "No, Henry. You're going to heaven. Are you ready?"

"Can I say good-bye to Rudolph?"

"No, there's no time. Just close your eyes."

"Okay." Henry obediently closed his eyes. His face squinched up and his knees knocked together. He looked so pitiful that Remo almost changed his mind. But then he remembered the news clippings of the headless children under the trees and the pathetically regretful quotes of the parents who had found them. And he remembered his own empty childhood.

Remo stepped up to Henry and with a two-fingered blow struck the padded spot over his heart.

Henry fell backward like a refrigerator. The house shook. The querulous, sexless voice called again. "Henry, go to sleep!"

It was joined by a male bellow. Vincent. "You control that idiot of yours or I'm going back to Sandra." Remo looked down at the fat man's face; It was peaceful. There was a hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth. The smile only made Remo angry. He had wanted to kill the guy slowly and painfully. He wanted him to suffer for all the suffering he had caused. He felt cheated. The Santa Claus killer was dead, and he felt no sense of accomplishment or victory. He felt nothing. Just as he felt every Christmas of his life.

He wondered if maybe he should do Vincent. Then the sexless voice was shouting again.

"Henry, if I don't hear your snoring in five seconds, I'll turn you in to the police for driving without a license. I'll put you in jail. Do you hear me? Jail!"

Remo decided that Vincent would suffer a lot more if he let him live. He walked out of the house and hotwired the Christmas-red car. He drove north to Boston and Logan Airport.

Just when the snow looked like it would fall forever, like salt onto a raw wound, it stopped.

"Sometimes I hate this job," Remo muttered into the night. "Especially this time of year."

On the flight back to New York, he hoped someone would try to hijack the plane. But no one did. Maybe when he got back, Upstairs would have a decent assignment for a change. Something big, worthy of his talents. And bloody.

He was going to get his wish.

Chapter 3

Bartholomew Bronzini was doing wrist curls in his private gym when the gym telephone whirred. Bronzini did another few reps with his left arm before he answered it. He took pride in his daily regimen of exercise. And he always gave his left side more exercise because he knew that right-handed persons developed larger muscles on the right side. Bronzini had worked out a compensating regimen so that he had nearly perfect muscular symmetry.

Bronzini scooped up the phone as he toweled off his pees. They gleamed as if greased.

"Yo!" he said briskly.

"Bart, baby, que pasa?" It was Shawn. His agent.

"What's the word?"

"Our Japanese compadres just Fedexed me the script. It looks great."

"Did they change much?"

"How do I know? I haven't read it."

"You just said it looked great."

"It does. You should see this binder. Looks like Spanish leather or something. And the pages are get this-hand-lettered. Looks like-what do they call it?-calligraphy. "

Bronzini sighed. He should have known better than to ask. Nobody in Hollywood read scripts if they could help it. They made deals and hoped for the best.

"Okay, messenger it to me. I'll look it over."

"No, Bart, sweetheart. There's a Nishitsu corporate jet waiting for you at Burbank Airport. That producer you met in Tokyo, what's his name? Sounds like a Greek sandwich shop."

"jJro something."

"That's him. He wants you in Yuma by noon."

"Yuma! Tell him no way. I spent three days in Japan with those Nishitsu guys. They gave me the creeps, always bowing and scraping and asking me where I bought my shoes and if they were for sale. They were so polite I wanted to punch them."

"Yuma isn't in Japan. It's in Arizona."

"Why do they want me there?"

"That's where you're filming. They've been scouting locations since you got back."

"This is a freaking Christmas movie. It's set in Chicago. "

"I guess this is one of the changes they made."

"They can't film Johnny's Christmas Spirit in Arizona."

"Why not?" Shawn said in a reasonable tone. "They filmed Star Wars in Southern California. Looked like outer space to me."

"It doesn't snow in Arizona," Bronzini said acidly. "They don't have evergreens. They have cacti. What are they gonna do? Decorate the cacti?"

"Don't cacti have needles too?"

"Don't you fucking start, Shawn!"

"Okay, okay. Look, talk to them. Straighten it out. But they need you to smooth things over. They're having trouble with the Yuma Chamber of Commerce or something. It's about film permits and work rules."

"What am I, head of the local? Have them take it up with the union."

"Uh, they don't want to do that, for some reason."

"What do they mean? I'm the star, not the shop steward. This is a union movie, isn't it?"

"Of course it is, Bart," Shawn said plaeatingly. "These are major, major people. They're looking for a piece of the U. S. film industry. No way they're not union."

"Good, because if this isn't a union production, I'd back out right now."

"Can't."

"Why not?"

"They got your name on the contract. Remember?"

"So let them sue."

"That's the problem. They will. And they'd win, because they'll try it in a Japanese court. They're big, a mega-corporation. They could clean you out. No more polo ponies, no more Renoirs. They'd probably bag you for your comic-book collection if they find out about it." Bartholomew Bronzini was silent for a long time. Before he could speak, his agent spoke up.

"You know what they'd do if you backed out. They'd turn around and give the part to Schwarzenegger."

"No chance!" Bronzini exploded. "That side of beef couldn't cut it in my Christmas movie. He's the only actor in the world who steps on his own lines."

"No argument there. But let's not let ft get to that. Okay? Burbank Airport. The jet's waiting." Bartholomew Bronzini hung up the phone with so much force that Donald Duck's beak fell off.

The Nishitsu jet was waiting for him when Bronzini pulled up on his Harley Davidson. A white-coated Japanese steward stood meekly by the door. He pulled it open from the top, exposing a flight of plush steps.

The steward bowed quickly when Bronzini dismounted.

"Konnichi wa, Bronzini san," he said with a tight smile.

The smile fell off when Bronzini began pushing his motorcycle up the plush steps. "No, Bronzini san. "Where I go, my bike goes," growled Bronzini. He pushed the bike up as easily as if it were a ten-speed and not a monster Harley.

The steward followed him up, and as Bronzini leaned the bike against a bulkhead, he pulled up the staircase door. The engines immediately began warming up.

When the Nishitsu jet landed at Yuma International Airport slightly more than sixty minutes later, the Japanese steward lowered the ramp stairs manually and jumped out of the way while the maniac American actor piloted his bouncing motorcycle down it at full speed.

Bartholomew Bronzini hit the tarmac with a bump, nearly wiping out. He recovered, dismounted, and walked the bike up to the Nishitsu corporate van, gunning the engine impatiently while the unhappy face which he recognized as Jiro Isuzu peered out of the side window with horrified eyes.

Finally Isuzu slid open the door and stepped out. "Bronzini san. Good of you to come."

"Save the soap," Bronzini said. "And it's plain Bronzini. So what's the problem?"

"Shooting start in two day. We have much to do."

"Two days!"

"Production on tight shooting schedule. Must hurry. Wirr you come now. Prease?"

"Lead the way," Bronzini said, kicking the bike stand up. "This is bogus."

A brief flash of anger showed in Jiro Isuzu's eyes. For a moment the Japanese looked as if he were going to say something, but he only bobbed his head repeatedly and slid the van's side door closed.

Bronzini followed the van into the city. His initial impression of Yuma was that it was flat. The highway leading into town was dotted with fast-food restaurants and discount stores. He saw very few cacti.

But when they turned into a residential area, several stubby cholla cacti decorated front yards. Most homes had Christmas decorations up. But to Bronzini, the warm desert air and lack of snow made it seem not like Christmas at all.

"How the hell are they going to film a Christmas movie in this godforsaken place?" he muttered as he passed a Pueblo-style home with the inevitable flagstone patio. There was a cow skull by the front door. It wore a Santa Claus cap.

Bronzini was still turning the question over in his mind when the van pulled up to Yuma City Hall. "What are we doing here?" he demanded of Jiro when the latter emerged from the van.

"We have appointment with mayor. I told him you would come. Now, forrow, prease."

"The mayor?" Bronzini muttered. "I hope this isn't another key-to-the-city deal. I already got enough to open up a store."

Basil Cloves had been mayor of Yuma for nearly six years. He was very proud of his city, which was one of the fastest-growing desert communities in the West.

He was proud of its three TV stations, its important military bases, and its crystal pure air.

He would never knowingly surrender it to a foreign aggressor.

But when his press secretary ushered in representatives of the Nishitsu Film Corporation, who were accompanied by the world's number-one film superstar, Bartholomew Bronzini, he broke into a baby-kissing smile.

"Mr. Bronzini!" he gushed, taking Bronzini's hand in both of his. "Wonderful of you to come. I've seen every one of your movies."

"Great. Thank you," Bronzini said quietly. Everyone in the room interpreted his comment as bored disinterest. The truth was that Bronzini was embarrassed by the sunglasses-and-autographs side of his business.

"I loved you in Conan the Mendicant. You were so... so ... muscular!"

"Nice of you to say so," Bronzini said. He decided not to mention that that was Schwarzenegger. He hated when people confused him with that Austrian water buffalo.

"Well, Mr. Bronzini," the mayor of Yuma said as he gestured everyone into seats. "Mr. Isuzu tells me that you want to film a movie in my beautiful city."

"Yes, sir," Bronzini said, and everyone in the room assumed he was being condescending when he used the word "sir." He was not.

"You can understand that when folks I don't know, no offense, gentlemen"-he indicated the representatives from Nishitsu, who sat with straight backs and stiff necks-"come to my city and apply for permits and things of that sort, I have to secure certain assurances. We don't see many flicks made in Yuma. So I told these fine gentlemen that if they could offer proof of their sincerity and good intentions, I would do what I could to get it past the city council."

Here it comes, Bronzini thought. As an occasional producer, he had gotten used to being strong-armed. You contacted the local government for permission to film on public streets and they never thought about the revenue that would be brought into the local economy, the local people who would be employed. They only wondered what was in it for them. If it wasn't the politicians, it was the teamsters or the Mafia.

"So when Mr. Isuzu told me that you'd be willing to come here and allay our fears," Mayor Cloves went on, "I said, well, that might just do it."

At that moment the press secretary put his head in the door. "They're here, Mr. Mayor."

"Wonderful," said Mayor Cloves. "Come, let's go meet them."

Bronzini caught Isuzu's arm on the way out. "What is this?" he hissed.

"Quiet. This wirr be over soon."

"Oh," said Bronzini when he saw the news crews setting up their video cameras. Newspaper reporters stood with pencils poised over notepads.

"Thank you for coming, ladies and gentlemen of the press," the mayor said in a booming voice. "As you can see, the illustrious Bartholomew Bronzini, star of such modern classics as Conan the Mendicant, is in my office today. Bart's come to Yuma to ask me personally for permission to film his next blockbuster. With him is Mr. Jiro Isuzu, who is a producer with the Nishitsu Corporation. I see from the brand names on some of your video equipment that you probably know more about Nishitsu than I do."

The mayor laughed heartily, and alone. He went on. "They have selected Yuma out of dozens of American cities as the location for Bart's new film. You may now ask questions, if you'd like."

There was an embarrassing silence. The print press looked at their notebooks. The TV crews hesitated. Bronzini had seen it all over the world. His reputation intimidated even the usually bold TV crews.

"Maybe I should be asking the questions," Bronzini quipped. "Like, how hot does it get this time of year?" No one even smiled. He hated it went they didn't smile.

Finally a pert blond who identified herself as the entertainment reporter for one of the TV stations piped up. "Mr. Bronzini, tell us about your new film."

"It's a Christmas movie. It's about-"

"And what do you think of Yuma so far?"

"It's hard to form much of an impression when all you've seen is the airport and the mayor's office." Bronzini beamed sheepishly. He waited for a follow-up question, but they shifted their attention to Jiro Isuzu. "Mr. Isuzu. Why did you pick Yuma?"

"It perfect for our needs," Isuzu said.

"Mr. Isuzu, do you think that Americans will go to see a Japanese-made movie?"

"Mr. Isuzu, how do you feel about the current Japanese economic dominance in the Pacific?"

"Mr. Isuzu . . ."

And so it went. The press rattled on about every conceivable angle that had to do with Yuma and several that did not. When their stories ran, some within hours, they would all play up the banal local angle. Nowhere would it be mentioned that this role was a significant departure from Bartholomew Bronzini's flex-and-pecs screen roles. Nowhere would it be mentioned that he had written the script. He was lucky if his two declarative-sentence comments would be reported accurately.

He hated it when they did that, too.

Finally the TV people began packing up their equipment and the print reporters shuffled out of the room, casting curious glances at him over their shoulders. He overheard one woman tell another, "Can you believe it? He's going to make over a hundred million on this movie and he can barely speak three words in a row."

After the reporters had gone, the mayor of Yuma came up to him and shook his hand again.

"You were wonderful, Bart. Mind if I call you Bart?"

"Go ahead. You're already in practice."

"Thank you, Bart. I'm up for reelection next year and this is going to kick off my campaign like a football."

"You have my vote," Bronzini joked.

"Oh, are you registered in this city?"

"It was a little joke," Bronzini told him. "Very little." The mayor looked blank. His expression wondered, "Can this Neanderthal make jokes?" Bronzini hated that expression.

"Oh," Mayor Cloves said. "A joke. Well, it's good to see that you have a sense of humor."

"It's an implant," Bronzini said.

"You wirr see to permissions?" Jiro Isuzu put in quickly.

"Yes, yes, of course. And let me be the first to welcome your production to our fair city."

Bronzini shook the mayor's hand in relief. That was it? A photo op? Maybe this wouldn't be so terrible. "Oh, before you go," the mayor said quickly, "could I have your autograph?"

"Sure," Bronzini said, accepting a pen and a photograph of himself torn from a fan magazine.

"Who do I make it out to?" he asked.

"Make it out to me. But it's for my daughter."

"Yeah," Bronzini sighed as he autographed the photo. He signed it, "To the mayor of Yuma, from his good friend Arnold Schwarzenegger."

The mayor read it without batting an eye. Just as Bronzini had known he would.

Out on the street, Bronzini growled a question to Jiro Isuzu. "Is that it? Am I outta here now?"

"No, we have many more visits to make. First we go to hotel."

"Why? Is the cleaning staff demanding a lock of my hair?" Bronzini said, hopping onto his bike. Bartholomew Bronzini followed the van to the Shilo Inn, an elegant adobe hotel on Route 8. The lobby entrance was blocked by marching picketers. They carried placards and signs reading "Bronzini Unfair."

"Bronzini Is Un-American."

"Bronzini the Traitor." One man carried a Grundy III poster showing Bronzini, his long hair held in place by a headband. The tagline read "Bronzini Is Grundy." The last word was crossed out and replaced with the word "Grungy."

"What the hell is this?" Bronzini shouted.

"Union," Isuzu told me. "They protest."

"Damn it. This is supposed to be a union film."

"It is. Japanese union."

"Listen, Jiro. I can't do a nonunion film. My name will be mud. I'm a hero to the working guy."

"That was before Ringo V, when Ringo kirred in boxing match. But you are stirr big hero in Nippon. Your future is there. Not here. Americans tire of you."

Bronzini put his hands on his hips. "Stop beating around the bush, Isuzu. Why don't you come out and speak your mind?"

"So sorry. Not understand. Have spoken mind."

"You don't understand. I'm not turning my back on everything I represent. I'm Bartholomew Bronzini, the rags-to-riches personification of the American dream."

"Those are Americans," Isuzu said, indicating the marchers. "They do not carr you hero."

"That's because they think I've double-crossed them. And I won't. I'm done here." He started for his bike.

"Schwarzenegger wirr do movie for ress," Isuzu called after him. "Perhaps better."

"Then get that Black Forest bozo," Bronzini barked. "We wirr. And we will pay his sarary out of rawsuit damages from suing you for breach of contract." Bronzini froze with his hands touching the handlebars of his bike. One leg was poised to mount the saddle. He looked like he was doing an imitation of a dog about to relieve himself against a fireplug.

The thought of Sehwarzenegger being paid out of Bronzini's own pocket stopped him cold. Reluctantly he lowered his leg. He walked back to Jiro Isuzu. The Japanese's composed face looked faintly smug.

"You understand now?"

"Jiro, I'm starting not to like you."

"Production office in this hoter. We must go there. Many terephone carr to make. Much problem to work out if we are to start shooting on schedule." He pronounced it "sked-oo."

Bronzini looked at the circling pickets. "I've never crossed a picket line in my life."

"Then we go in side door. Come."

Jiro Isuzu started off, trailed by a cluster of functionaries. Bronzini looked at the picketers, who were so busy shouting slogans that they weren't aware that the , object of their displeasure was standing only yards away. Never one to back away from a challenge, Bronzini decided to reason with them. He started for the picket line, when a heavyset man noticed him.

"Hey, there he is!" the man shouted. "The Steroid Stallion himself. Bronzini!"

The catcalls followed. "Boo!" they hooted. "Bronzini! Go back to Japan."

"Hear me out," Bronzini shouted. His words were drowned out. The picketers-they belonged to IATSE, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees -interpreted Bronzini's angry face to suit themselves. "Did you hear what he called us?" one cried indignantly. That did it. They started for him en masse.

Bronzini stopped. He folded his arms. He was going to hold his ground. What was the worst they could do? The worst they could do, it turned out, was to surround him in a shouting, haranguing circle.

"Down with Bronzini! The Bronze Bambino has feet of clay!"

"Listen to me," Bronzini shouted. "I just want to talk to you about this. I think we can reason this through." He was wrong. They were not listening. Camera crews were moving up to get a picture of the worldrenowned Bartholomew Bronzini held hostage by two dozen protesters armed only with placards.

When the cameras started taping, one of the protesters called out, "Hey, watch this!"

He whacked Bronzini with his placard. The broomstick broke against Bronzini's muscular shoulder. He barely felt it, but that didn't matter. Bartholomew Bronzini had grown up in a rough Italian neighborhood where turning the other cheek was the kiss of death.

He decked his assailant with a roundhouse right. The protesters turned into a mob. They descended on Bronzini like a fury. Bronzini returned blow for blow. He started laying protesters out on the blacktop of the parking lot. A wild grin cracked his Sicilian face. This was something he understood. A bare-knuckled fight.

But as he mashed a man's nose flat, he wondered if he wasn't on the wrong side of this brawl.

The question was answered for him when the horde of Japanese men piled out of the lobby. Some of them, on orders from an excited Jiro Isuzu, pulled pistols from under their coats. Bodyguards.

"Stop them," Isuzu shrieked. "Protect Bronzini. Now!" The bodyguards waded in. The protesters turned on them too. Bronzini tried pushing his way clear of the mob, but there were too many of them. He took one of the protesters by the throat.

Then a shot rang out. The man in Bronzini's metallic grasp gasped once and went limp. He fell. His head made a cracking sound when it hit the ground.

"What the fuck!" Bronzini yelled. "Who fired that shot? Who?"

It was obvious in another moment. Bronzini felt something yank on his belt. He struggled. It was one of the Japanese bodyguards.

"Let go of me," Bronzini snarled. "He's hurt bad."

"No. You come."

"I said let me-"

Bronzini never got the next word out. The sky and ground swapped perspectives. He was suddenly on his back. The shock blew the air out of his lungs. Stunned, he wondered if he had caught a stray bullet. And as other gunshots sounded in the background, he was lifted by several husky Japanese and dumped into the waiting Nishitsu van.

He was whisked from the Shilo Inn at high speed. "What happened?" Bronzini asked the hovering Jiro Isuzu in a dazed voice.

"Judo. Necessary."

"The fuck."

Chapter 4

It was dawn when Remo Williams was dropped off in front of his Rye, New York, home by taxi.

Remo handed the driver a crisp hundred dollar bill. "Merry Christmas," Remo said. "Keep the change."

"Hey, Merry Christmas to you too, buddy. You must be expecting a whale of a holiday yourself."

"Nah. I'm on an unlimited expense account."

"Thanks just the same," the cabby said, pulling off. It was not snowing in Rye, New York. The storm that had blanketed New England had passed through New York State the previous day. The town had already cleared the sidewalk with a small tractor snow blower. Its caterpillar tracks had left their unmistakable imprints. But Remo's walkway was buried.

Remo placed one foot on the crust of snow that covered the walk. His breathing changed. His arms seemed to lift slightly from his sides as if they were filled with air instead of bone and blood and muscle.

Remo walked across the thin frozen crust of the snow without breaking through. He felt light as a feather. He was a feather. He thought like a feather, moved like a feather, and the thin hard crust reacted to him as if each foot was a feather duster.

Remo went in his front door with the expression of a man who had slogged through a sloppy wet snowbank in his stocking feet, not one who had executed a feat that other men would have scorned as impossible.

Even the novelty of having a home to come back to for the first time since he joined the organization did not lift his spirits. The living room consisted of bare walls, a hardwood floor, and a big-screen TV. Two straw mats sat on the floor before the screen.

Somehow, it was not very homey.

Remo walked to his bedroom. It, too, was only four walls and a bare floor. A futonlike mat stretched out in one corner. His wardrobe, consisting of six pairs of chinos and an assortment of black and white T-shirts, lay neatly folded at the bottom of a closet. On ,a shelf above a cluster of empty wire hangers were racked a dozen pairs of handmade Italian leather loafers.

From the other bedroom came a series of long, drawnout sounds, like a goose honking.

"Braaawwwwkkkk!"

"Hnnnnkkkkkkk!" Snoring.

Remo decided he wasn't sleepy. Turning on his heel, he made for the door.

Remo later pulled up in front of an all-night drugstore, asked the woman behind the counter if she accepted credit cards, and when he got a yes in return, he went straight to the Christmas-decoration shelf There were more bulbs, candy canes, and tinsel than he could carry at one time, so he took hold of the shelf at each end and applied pressure. The crack was instantaneous. Remo carried the entire shelf to the cash register.

"Oh, my God," the girl said.

"Put all this stuff on my card," Remo said, slipping the plastic onto the glass counter.

"You broke the shelf."

"Yeah. Sorry about that. Just add it to the bill." Outside, Remo set the shelf on the hood of his Buick. He opened the trunk, and balancing the shelf carefully, upended it over the open trunk. The packages rattled down the shelf like coal down a cellar chute.

Remo tossed the shelf into a cluster of trash barrels and closed the trunk.

His next stop was at a used-ear lot with a banner that said "Christmas Trees Cheap." The lot hadn't opened for the day, so Remo took his time examining the stock. The first one he liked looked too tall for his living room. The second left dry pine needles in his hands when he grasped one of the branches experimentally.

Remo went through every tree on the lot and decided that if the cars for sale were in the same shape as the trees, the driving public was in mortal peril. "Nobody respects Christmas anymore," Remo growled as, one by one, he picked up the trees by their bases and, like a farmer shucking corn, stripped them of their branches with one-handed sweeps.

Remo left a note that said, "I got carried away with the spirit of the season. Sorry. Send me a bill." He didn't sign it or leave an address.

Disgusted, Remo next drove to the golf course that spawled behind his house. There he picked his way among the evergreens. He found a young one he liked and, kneeling beside it, felt all around the base to get a sense of its root system. When he found a weak point, he used the side of his hand to sever the root.

By the time he was done, the evergreen came out of the frozen ground as easily as a daisy. Remo carried it to his back door over his shoulder like Paul Bunyan. He got it through the door so expertly he lost only three needles.

Remo set the tree in one corner of the room. It balanced perfectly, even without a stand. Remo had flattened out the roots to form a natural base.

Getting the decorations from the car, he proceeded to decorate the tree. He took his time with it. After two hours, the tightness began to leave his face and the beginning of a contented smile crinkled the corners of his deep-set eyes. In another minute he would have begun to hum "Little Drummer Boy."

That moment never came.

From out of the bedroom, the continued adenoidal goose honking abruptly died down, to be replaced by the rustle of silk. And then, so softly that only Remo's ears could have heard, came the shuffle of sandals.

Chiun, Reigning Master of Sinanju, looked into the room. His eyes alighted on the lean, muscular back of his adopted son. Momentary pleasure illuminated his wise hazel orbs. Remo was home. It was good to behold him once more.

Then he noticed what Remo was doing.

"Pah!" he spat. "I see that it is Jesus Time again."

"It's called Christmas," Remo said over his shoulder, "and I was just getting into the mood before you mouthed off."

"Mouthed off!" Chiun squeaked. "I did not mouth off, whatever that is." The Master of Sinanju was old. Only his eyes looked young. He was a tiny Oriental with only smoky puffs of white hair over his ears and another wisp at his chin. He wore a yellow silk kimono. His hands were joined within its linked sleeves.

"I did not mouth off," Chiun repeated when Remo ignored him and returned to stringing lengths of silver wire on the evergreen tree. Remo said nothing.

"Trees belong outdoors," Chiun added.

Remo sighed. "This is a Christmas tree. They're for indoors. And if you don't want to help, fine. Just stay out of my way. This is our first Christmas in our new home. I'm going to enjoy it. With or without you."

Chiun meditated on the matter. "This tree reminds me of those magnificent ones which dot the hillsides of my native Korea," he pointed out. "The scent is very much the same."

"Then pitch in," Remo said, mollified.

"And you have killed it for your pagan ceremony," Chiun added harshly.

"Keep it up, Chiun, and there won't be any presents under the tree with your name on them."

"Presents?" Chiun gasped. "For me?"

"Yeah. That's the tradition. I put presents under the tree for you and you put them under the tree for me." Chiun looked down at the foot of the tree. He saw no presents.

"When?" he asked sharply.

"What?"

"When will these alleged presents appear?"

"Christmas Eve. That's Sunday night."

"You have bought them?" Chiun asked skeptically.

"No, not yet," Remo answered vaguely.

"I have bought none for you, you know."

"There's time yet."

Chiun examined Remo's tight profile curiously.

"In past years you were not so obsessed by this Christmastime," he ventured.

"In past years I never had to kill Santa Claus."

"Ah," Chiun said, raising a long-nailed finger. "At last we come to the heart of the matter."

Remo said nothing. He lifted a spindle-shaped ornament from its box and plucked straw packing from dangling silver bells.

"Your mission," Chiun said expectantly, "it was successful?"

"He's dead if that's what you mean." Remo reached up and pulled the flexible treetop down. He slipped the ornament over the top. When he let go, it sprang erect. The tiny bells tinkled merrily.

"You do not look happy for one who has avenged the children of this land."

"The killer was a child himself."

Chiun gasped. "No! You did not kill a child. It is against everything I taught you. Children are sacred. Say this is not so, Remo."

"He was a child in mind, not body."

"Ah, one of the many mental defectives that populate America. It is sad. I think this stems from the hamburgers everyone devours. They destroy the brain cells."

"I wanted to kill this guy so bad it hurt."

"Your job is not to hate, but to eliminate your emperor's enemies with dispatch and professionalism."

"I did it right. He didn't suffer."

"But you did."

Remo stopped what he was doing. He put aside a box of silver-blue bulbs and sat down on a tatami mat. Quietly, fervently, he told the Master of Sinanju what he had encountered. When he was done, he asked a question: "Did I do the right thing?"

"If a tiger turns man-eater," Chiun intoned sagely, "he must be hunted down and destroyed."

"A tiger knows what he's doing. I'm not sure he did."

"If a tiger cub mauls a child, he too must be put down. It matters not whether he knows that what he did was wrong, for he has tasted blood, and the taste will never cease haunting him. So, too, was it with this unfortunate cretin. He committed great evil. Some might not judge him harshly, but in truth that is not the issue. He had tasted blood. Better that he be liberated from his physical prison and be free to return to earth in another life, to atone for his transgressions."

"You sound like Shirley MacLaine."

"I will take that as a compliment."

"Don't."

"Then I will assume it is an insult," Chiun snapped, "and leave you to your misery, you who would rather suffer in ignorance than be unshackled by wisdom."

And with that, the Master of Sinanju jumped to his feet and flounced back to his room. The door closed so hard it made a breeze that ruffled Remo's hair. Oddly, for all that violence, the door closed without a sound.

Remo went back to his tree. But his mind was troubled. The phone rang. Remo went to answer it. "Remo. I need to see you," the lemony voice of Dr. Harold W. Smith told him. Smith was the head of CURE, and Remo's boss.

"Don't you want to hear about the mission?"

"No, I assume that if it had gone awry, you would have reported it before I called."

"Take me for granted, why don't you?"

"I have something more important. Please come to Folcroft at once."

"Chiun and I will be there in a half-hour."

"No," Smith said hastily. "Just you. Please leave Chiun out of this."

The door to Chiun's bedroom opened suddenly. The Master of Sinanju appeared, his mien hard.

"I heard that!" he said loudly.

"I guess you just stepped in it, Smitty," Remo said. Harold Smith sighed.

"Contract-renewal time is coming up. I wanted to avoid premature negotiations."

"No negotiations are premature," Chiun announced, loud enough to carry to the receiver.

"Are you using a speakerphone?" Smith asked sharply.

"No. You know Chiun can hear an insult clear across the Atlantic Ocean. "

"One-half hour," Smith said. "Good-bye."

"That man is growing more impossible with each passing day," Chiun said huffily.

"What are you trying to bag him for this year? Disneyland again? Or are you still trying to get him to match Roger Clemen's salary?"

"Our Disneyland negotiations have collapsed." Remo feigned horror.

"No!" he gasped.

"Smith claims that the current owner refuses to sell," Chiun said bitterly. "I, however, may bring it up again. For too many years have I accompanied you on your missions for insufficient recompense."

"I thought we were co-equal partners, to use your own phrase."

"True, but that is an understanding that exists betweenyou and me. It has nothing to do with Smith. For the purposes of contract negotiations, I am the Master and you the pupil. I have been trying to impress this upon Emperor Smith, but to no avail. The man is invincibly dense."

"Is that why you didn't go to Providence with me?"

"Possibly. It might have helped my cause had you failed miserably. But I do not hold your uncharacteristic success against you. I am certain it is not deliberate."

"Nice of you to be so understanding, but I do feel like I failed miserably."

"May I quote you? To Smith?"

"Do what you want," Remo said. "I'm leaving." The Master of Sinanju hastily padded after him.

"And I am accompanying you," he said. "Perhaps Smith has an assignment for you of such magnitude that he will beg me to accompany you. For a suitable price, of course." Remo cast the half-decorated tree a wistful glance as he left the house. He had no inkling that by the time he would see it next, all the needles would have dried up and fallen to the floor.

Bartholomew Bronzini left the Yuma police station in smoldering silence. He was escorted out by a trio of Nishitsu Corporation Lawyers. Jiro Isuzu led them.

At the bottom of the steps, Jiro Isuzu turned to Bronzini and said, "Authorities wirr not make trouble now. Don't want to roose movie. Also, promise to use porice in firm." He pronounced it "fir-em."

"Why didn't you let me speak up back there? I wanted to tell my story."

"Not necessary. Situation under contror now. Porice brame picketers."

"Hey, I had a part in that little fracas. I got in their faces. I'm as much responsible for what happened as anybody. And what the hell did you think you were doing by ordering your goons to open fire like that?"

"Your rife in danger."

"The hell it was. I was decking them reft and light -I mean left and right."

"Action necessary to save your rife. Also to discourage picketers."

"They had a right to picket. This is America.'

"Arso this is Japanese production. No bad pubricity must attach itself to our work."

"No bad publicity! Four IATSE protesters are dead. You think that won't get in the newspapers?"

"Porice have agreed to hold suspects untir firm complete. "

"What? You can't hide a thing like this forever."

"Not forever. For two week."

"Two weeks!" Bronzini exploded. "That's our shooting schedule? It's im-fuckin'-possible. Pardon my French."

"We do outdoor scenes first," Isuzu explained. "Break production into nine units, arr shoot at once. Other actors fry in to do their work. This way, we come in under budget in ress than arrotted time. Now prease forrow. "

"Where to?"

"Other probrem need fixing. Prease forrow van." The Nishitsu team loaded into the waiting van. Bronzini straddled his motorcycle, waiting for them to start.

"This isn't right. None of it," he muttered.

But when the van started off, he followed it through the gridlike streets, out of the center of town, and along a dusty desert road. They were leaving the city proper. The high battlements of the Chocolate Mountains loomed in the distance. On either side of the road, stucco and exposed-beam houses gave way to endless beds of lettuce fields, one of Yuma's principal crops. In the distance a chevron of F/A 1-18's etched silent contrails against the cloudless sky.

Then the lettuce beds gave way to scrub desert and sandhills. The hardtop road stopped but the van kept going. It wound in and around the sandhills and Bronzini wondered where they were going.

They passed through a chain-link fence guarded by Nishitsu personnel and up a dusty road. Behind a cluster of hills lay a group of candy-striped tents. Bronzini recognized it as a location base camp. But what was it doing way out here in the desert?

The van turned into the base camp and parked beside a row of Nishitsu RV's and Ninja jeeps.

"What's this all about, Jiro?" Bronzini demanded as he dismounted.

"Base camp for firm."

"No shit. Isn't this a little out-of-the-way?"

"We are firming in desert."

"You are what!" Bronzini ground out. "What are you going to do, paint the sand white and pretend it's snow? I got news for you, it won't wash. And I won't stand for working on a stupid backlot street set either. We film in the city with real buildings and local people as extras. My films are known for their authenticity."

"Crimax of firm set in desert. We wirr shoot it here." Bronzini threw up his hands.

"Wait a minute, wait one little minute here. I want to see the script."

"Script sent yesterday. You no get?"

"My agent got."

"Oh," Jiro said. "One moment, prease." He went to one of the RV's and returned with a copy of the script. Bronzini snatched it from his hands. He looked at the cover. The title was visible in a cutout window.

"Red Christmas! What happened to Johnny's Christmas Spirit?"

"Title change in rewrite."

Bronzini flipped through the pages until he found some dialogue featuring his character, whose name was Mac. The first words he came to were "Up yours, you Christless commie bastards!"

"What!" Bronzini shouted. "This isn't my script."

"It is rewrite," Isuzu said calmly. "Character names are same. Some other things changed."

"But where's the little boy, Johnny? I don't see any lines for him."

"That character die on page eight."

"Dies! He's the focus of the story. My character is just the catalyst," Bronzini shouted. He pointed to a page. "And what's this crap here? This tank fight?"

"Johnny die in tank fight. Very heroic scene. Very sad. Defends home from Red Chinese invader."

"That wasn't in my script either."

"Story improved. Now about Red Chinese invasion of Yuma. Set on Christmas Eve. Much tinser. Many carors sung. Very much rike American Christmas story. It very beautifur."

Bronzini couldn't believe his eyes. He was reading a scene in which Christmas carolers were blown apart by Chinese shock troops throwing hand grenades.

"The fuck. Why don't you just call it Grundy IV and be done with it?"

"Nishitsu not own Grundy character. We try to buy. Owner refuse to serr. It important you not wear headband in this firm. Rawsuits."

"That's the least of your problems, because I'm not doing this piece of regurgitation. If I wanted to do Grundy IV, I would have signed for Grundy IV. Savvy?"

"You sign for Christmas story. We wirr firm same."

"No chance, sake breath."

Jiro Isuzu's blank eyes narrowed at Bronzini's epithet. Bronzini raised a placating hand. "Okay, okay, okay, I take it back. I'm sorry. I got carried away. But this isn't what we agreed to."

"You sign contract," Isuzu told him blandly. "If there is something in contract you not agree to, take up with rawyer tomorrow. Today you talk to Indian chief. Make him agree to arrow firming in varrey."

"Indian chief?"

"Rand needed in Indian reservation. Onry place to firm. Chief say yes, onry if you ask personarry. We go to meet him now."

"Oh, this just gets better and better."

"I am happy you say so. Cooperation essentiar to maintain shooting schedule."

Jiro Isuzu smiled as Bartholomew Bronzini leaned against the van and set his broad forehead against its sun-heated side. He shut his eyes.

"How could I get into a situation like this?" he said hollowly. "I'm the world's number-one superstar."

"And Nishitsu soon to be world's number-one firm company," Izusu said. "You wirr have new, greater career with us. American pubric not care for you anymore. You wirr talk to chief now?"

"All right, all right. I've always been as good as my word. Or my signature."

"We knew that."

"I'll just bet you did. But as soon as I can find a phone, I'm firing my agent."

Chapter 5

Most babies are pink at birth. A few are as red as a crab.

Dr. Harold W. Smith was blue, He had blue eyes, which the doctor who had delivered him did not consider unusual. All human babies, like kittens, are born with blue eyes. Blue skin was another matter. At birth, Harold Smith-he didn't become a Ph.D. until much later in life, although it was a matter open to debate among his few friends-was as blue as a robin's egg.

The Vermont obstetrician told Smith's mother that she had given birth to a blue baby. Mrs. Nathan Smith politely informed him that she understood all babies cried at birth. She was confident her Harold's disposition would improve.

"I don't mean that he's a sad baby," the doctor said. "In fact he's the most well-behaved baby I've ever seen. I was referring to his medical condition."

Mrs. Smith had looked blank.

"Your son has a minor heart defect. It's not at all rare. Without going into the pathological details, his heart is not pumping efficiently. As a result, there's insufficient oxygen in his bloodstream. That's why his skin has that faint blue tinge."

Mrs. Smith had looked at her little Harold, who was already sucking his thumb. She firmly pulled the thumb out. Just as firmly, Harold stuck it back in.

"I thought it was these fluorescent lights," Mrs. Smith said. "Will he die?"

"No, Mrs. Smith," the doctor assured her. "He won't die. And he'll probably lose that blue tint in a few weeks. "

"What a shame. It matches his eyes."

"All newborns have blue eyes. Don't count on Harry's staying blue."

"Harold. I think Harry sounds so ... common, don't you agree, Doctor?"

"Er, yes, Mrs. Smith. But what I'm trying to tell you is that your son has impaired heart function. I'm sure he'll grow up to be a wonderful boy. Just don't expect much of him. He may be a little slow. Or he may not develop as soon as his friends, but he'll get along."

"Doctor," Mrs. Smith said firmly, "I will not allow my Harold to be a slacker." She pulled his thumb from his mouth again. After she had turned away, Harold availed himself of his other thumb. "He is heir to one of the most successful magazine publishers in this country. When he comes of age, he must be able to fulfill his responsibility to the Smith family, tradition."

"Publishing isn't very strenuous," the doctor said musingly. "I think Harold will do fine." He patted Mrs. Smith on one bony knee with a familiarity the New England matron resented deeply but was too well-bred to complain about, and walked away thanking his lucky stars that he had not been born Harold W. Smith.

He winced at the small slap that sounded from her room. Mrs. Smith had caught Harold sucking on his other thumb.

Harold Smith's eyes turned gray within a matter of days. His skin remained blue until his second year, when, as the result of exercises his mother insisted he perform every day, it assumed a more normal hue.

Normal for Harold Smith, that is. Mrs. Smith was so pleased with his fishbelly-white complexion that she kept him indoors so he wouldn't lose it prematurely.

Harold Smith never went into the family publishing business. World War II had broken out and he went off to war. His cool, detached intellect was recognized early on and he found himself in the OSS, working in the European theater of operations. After the war, he switched to the new CIA, where he remained an anonymous CIA bureaucrat right through the early sixties, when CURE was founded by a young President only months before he was cut down by an assassin's bullet.

Originally set up to fight crime outside of constitutional restrictions, CURE had over the course of two decades grown into America's secret defense against internal subversion and external threats. Operating with a vast budget and unlimited computer resources, Smith was its first and so far only director. He ran CURE as he had always done, from his shabby office in Folcroft Sanitarium, CURE's cover and nerve center.

The desk had not changed in those years. Smith still held forth in the same cracked leather chair. The computers in the basement had been upgraded several times. Presidents had come and gone. But Harold Smith went on as if embalmed and wired to his chair.

If Smith could have been accused of having sartorial concerns, a person meeting him for the first time might have assumed that he selected his gray three-piece suit to go with his hair and eyes, both of which were a neutral gray. The truth was that Smith was by nature a colorless and unimaginative person. He wore gray because it suited his personality, such as it was.

One thing had changed. As he grew older, Smith's youthful pallor had darkened. His old heart defect worsened. As a consequence, his dry skin looked as if it had been dusted with ground pencil lead.

On another man, gray skin would have looked freakish. Somehow the coloring fitted Smith. No one suspected that it was the result of a congenital birth defect, any more than anyone would have believed that this harmless-looking man was second only to the President of the United States in the raw power he wielded.

But for all his power, Smith trembled inwardly this day. It was not from the awesome responsibility that weighed on his coat-hanger-like shoulders. Smith was ordinarily fearless.

This morning, Dr. Smith dreaded the imminent appearance of the Master of Sinanju, with whom he was deep in contract negotiations. It was an annual ritual, and it wrung more from his constitution than would entering an Iron Man competition.

So when Smith heard the elevator outside his secondfloor Folcroft office hum as it ascended, he looked around his room for a place to hide.

Smith gripped the edges of his desk with whiteknuckled intensity as the door opened.

"Greetings, Emperor Smith," said Chiun gravely. His face was an austere network of wrinkles.

Smith rose stiffly. "Master Chiun," he said in his lemony New England voice. He sounded like a dishwashing liquid. "Remo. Good morning."

"What's good about it?" Remo growled, throwing himself onto a couch. Chiun bowed and Smith returned to his seat.

"I understand you have an assignment for Remo," Chiun said distantly.

Smith cleared his throat. "That is correct," he said. "It is good to keep him busy. For he could lapse into indolence at any time. As he was before I accepted the thankless responsibility of training him in the art of Sinanju."

"Er, yes. Well, the assignment I have in mind for him is rather unusual."

Chiun's hazel eyes narrowed. Smith recognized that narrowing. Chiun was looking for an opening.

"You have heard, perhaps, of Remo's most recent assignment," Chiun began.

"I understand it went well."

"I killed Santa Claus," Remo growled.

"That was your job," Smith told him.

"Yeah," Remo said vehemently, "and you have no idea how much I looked forward to it. I wanted to wring his neck!"

"Remo," Chiun said, shocked. "One does not dispose of an emperor's enemies the way one would harvest a chicken. Death is a gift. To be bestowed with grace."

"I put him down with a heart-stopping blow. And that's what it felt like, putting down a dog."

"The enemies of America are all dogs," Chiun sniffed. "And they deserve to die like dogs."

"I happen to like dogs," Remo said. "This was like drowning a puppy. It made me sick. New rule, Smitty: in the future, I don't work Christmas week. Or Easter. You'll be sending me after the Easter Bunny next."

"What has that vicious rodent done now?" Chiun asked seriously. He was ignored.

Smith cleared his throat. "The assignment I had in mind should not involve any killing."

"Too bad," Remo said sourly. "I still want to dismember him. Or somebody."

"Ignore my pupil, Emperor. These moods come upon him every year at this time."

"I had a rough childhood. So sue me."

Chiun drew himself up proudly. "Since Remo's last mission went so well, I see no reason that I accompany him on this new assignment," he said, watching for the effect this opening gambit would have on Harold Smith, the inscrutable.

Smith relaxed perceptibly. Chiun's brow wrinkled. "I am glad to hear that, Master Chiun," Smith told him. "This particular assignment is an awkward one. Your presence would be difficult to manage."

Chiun's papery lips compressed. What was this? Had Smith said such a thing merely to counter his negotiating position? How would he succeed in raising the year's tribute for his village if the Master of Sinanju's role in future assignments did not become a bargaining chip?

Chiun decided that Smith was bluffing.

"Your wisdom is insuperable," he said broadly. "For should Remo fail in his mission, should harm befall him, then I stand in readiness to complete his mission."

"Don't listen to him, Smitty," Remo warned. "He's trying to reel you in."

"Remo! I am negotiating for my village, which will be your village one day."

"You can have it."

"Such insolence!"

"Please, please," Smith pleaded. "One thing at a time. I thank you for your offer to stand in readiness, Master Chiun."

"Subject to proper compensation," Chiun added hastily.

And Smith knew there was no getting away from negotiation here and now.

"Disneyland is out of the question," Smith said quickly. "The owners say it is not for sale at any price."

"They always say that the first time," Chiun insisted.

"That was the third time."

"Those shylocks! They are trying to force you into making a wildly extravagant offer. Do not let them, Emperor. Allow me to negotiate on your behalf I am confident that they will come to terms."

"Say good-bye to Mickey Mouse," Remo said.

Chiun turned like a silk-covered top. "Hush!" he hissed.

"However," began Smith as he opened a desk drawer, "I did manage to obtain a lifetime pass."

Chiun's face widened in pleasure. He approached Smith. "For me?" he asked, impressed.

"As a token of good faith," Smith told him. "So that this year's negotiations begin on a trustworthy note."

"Done," said the Master of Sinanju. He snatched the pass from Smith's outstretched hand.

"Nice going, Smitty," Remo said. "You're learning after all these years."

Remo braced for a rebuke from Chiun, but instead he floated up and waved the pass under his nose.

"I am going to Disneyland," Chiun said solemnly. "And you are not."

"Whoopdee doo." Remo made a circle in the air.

"I hope that the assignment Smith has for you takes you to a harsh, inhospitable climate," Chiun said haughtily.

"As a matter of fact," Smith said, "I am sending Remo into the desert."

"A fitting place for one who is barren of respect and the milk of human kindness. I recommend the Gobi."

"Yuma."

"Even worse," Chiun cried triumphantly. "The Yuma Desert is so remote that even I have not heard of it."

"It is in Arizona, down by the Mexican border."

"What's down there?" Remo wanted to know.

"A movie."

"Can't I wait till it opens locally?"

"I meant that they are filming a movie in Yuma. You've heard of Bartholomew Bronzini? The actor?"

"No," Remo said, "I've heard of Bartholomew Bronzini the accountant, Bartholomew Bronzini the lingerie salesman, and Bartholomew Bronzini the sequin polisher. The actor I've never heard about. How about you, Chiun?"

"The famous Bronzini family is well-known for its many Bartholomews," Chiun said sagely. "Of course I am familiar with him."

"Well, I'm convinced," Remo said brightly.

"This is serious, Remo," Smith said. "Bronzini is filming his latest production in Yuma. There are labor troubles. The production is backed by a Japanese conglomerate. The film industry's main crafts union, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, has been frozen out of the production. They are very upset. But the Japanese production is perfectly legal. Yesterday there was an altercation between a number of IATSE picketers and Bronzini himself. Several union members were killed. Bronzini himself was roughed up."

"Knowing Bronzini, he probably started it."

"You know Bronzini?" Smith asked in surprise.

"Well, not personally," Remo admitted. "But I read things about him. When he goes to a restaurant, they have to set an extra place for his ego."

"Gossip," Smith said. "Let's deal with the facts."

Remo sat up. "This doesn't sound like our job."

"It's very important. A film of this scale involves million-dollar expenditures. If this is successful, other Japanese films may be made in the United States. It could go a long way toward correcting our current trade imbalance with the Japanese."

"I got a better idea. We ship back all their cars. They all look alike anyway."

"Racist!" Chiun hissed.

"I didn't mean it the way it came out," Remo said defensively. "But isn't this a little out of out league?"

"Do not listen to him, Emperor," Chiun said. "He is trying to get out of this obviously important mission."

"I am not. If Smith says go, I'll go. I've never seen a movie made. It might be fun."

"Good," Smith said. "Your job will be to keep an eye on Bronzini. Make certain nothing happens to him: His acting career may be on the decline, but to many people he symbolizes the American dream. It would be very damaging if he were to come to harm. I've spoken to the President about this and he agrees that we should give this high priority, despite what would seem to be a situation not within our normal operating scope."

"Okay," Remo said. "I'm a bodyguard."

"Actually," Smith put in, "we've made arrangements for you to join the production as a stunt extra. It was the easiest way. And they are desperate for professionals willing to cross the picket lines."

"Does that mean I get to be in the film?" Remo asked.

Before Smith could answer, the Master of Sinanju cried out in a stricken voice.

"Remo is going to be in the movies!"

"Yes," Smith admitted. Then he realized what he had said and to whom, and hastily added, "In a manner of speaking."

Chiun said nothing. Smith relaxed again. Then Remo came up behind Chiun and tapped him on the shoulder. When the Master of Sinanju flounced around, Remo said in a taunting voice, "I'm going to be in a movie and you're only going to Disneyland."

Chiun whirled on Smith in a flurry of silken skirts. "I demand to be in this movie as well!" he cried.

"That's impossible," Smith said sharply. He glowered at Remo through his rimless eyeglasses.

"Why?" Chiun demanded. "If Remo can go, I can go. I am a better actor than he will ever be."

Smith sighed. "This has nothing to do with acting. Remo will be a stunt extra. Their faces are never seen on the screen."

"That may be good enough for Remo. But I insist upon co-star billing."

Smith buried his pinched face in his hands. And it had gone so well until now....

"Master of Sinanju," he said wearily, "please go to Disneyland. I cannot get you onto that movie set."

"Why not? I will accept a reasonable explanation." Smith lifted his head. It appeared as bloodless as a turnip. His face was faintly lighter than his gray eyes.

"Believe it or not, most big-budget film sets have tighter security than our top military installations. Film people need to safeguard their ideas from competitors. Even the smallest film these days is a multimillion-dollar undertaking. The profits they realize can easily go to eight figures. I can get Remo onto that set because he's a white male. You, on the other hand, are Korean. "

"I asked you for a reasonable explanation and you offer me bigotry. Are you saying that these movie people are prejudiced against Koreans?"

"No, what I am saying is that you're not appropriate as a stunt person, for obvious reasons."

"The reasons are not obvious to me," Chiun insisted.

"Remo, could you please explain it to him?"

"Sure," Remo said brightly. "It's very simple, Little Father. I'm going to make a movie and you're going to Disneyland and hang out with the mice and the ducks."

"What manner of white logic is this?" Chiun shrieked. "You are both conspiring to deny me stardom."

"You're right, Chiun," Remo said flatly. "It's a plot. I think you should wring the truth out of Smith while I'm in Yuma. You both enjoy your negotation now. . . ."

Remo started for the door. Smith shot out of his seat as if it had sprouted porcupine quills.

"Remo," he begged, "don't leave me alone with him." Remo paused at the door.

"Why not? You two deserve one another."

"You'll need your contact's name," Smith pointed out.

"Damn," Remo said. He had forgotten that little detail.

"There!" Chiun cried. "Proof that Remo is incapable of fulfilling this mission without my help. He very nearly went off willy-nilly, without direction. He would no doubt have blundered into the wrong movie and ruined everything."

"Earlier, you told me that Remo didn't require you on missions," Smith pointed out in a reasonable voice.

"Ordinary missions," Chiun flung back. "This is an extraordinary mission. Neither of us has made a movie before this."

"Sorry."

"I am willing to dispense with the requirement that my presence on future assignments receive extra compensation," Chiun said stiffly.

"That's very generous of you, but my hands are tied."

"Then I will pay you. I can make up the difference when I am cast in a movie of my own."

"Nice try, Little Father," Remo said, "but I don't think it will wash. Smitty looks like he's made up his mind. "

Smith nodded. "None of us have any choice in this matter. I'm sorry, Master of Sinanju, I have no way of getting you onto the set."

"That is your final word?" Chiun asked coldly.

"I am afraid so."

"Then send this white ingrate on his way," Chiun said brusquely. "And prepare yourself for a negotiation the likes of which you have never before faced."

"Sounds grim, Smitty," Remo joked. "Better tell the wife to hold supper until the new year."

"Just be certain not to specify which year," Chiun added darkly.

Smith went ashen. Woodenly he took a folder from his desk and slid it across to Remo.

"Everything you need to know is there," Smith told him.

Remo picked up the folder and opened it.

"I didn't know I was in King Kong Lives," he said.

"You were?" Chiun asked, shocked.

"Phony background," Remo explained. "According to this, I'm Remo Durock. Well, I guess I'm off to seek my fortune."

"Break a leg," Chiun called tightly.

"They say that to actors," Remo said. "I'm a stunt man. It has a whole different meaning for stunt men."

"Then break an arm, ingrate."

Remo only laughed. The door closed after him and the Master of Sinanju abruptly turned to face Smith. The elemental fury on his visage was tightly reined in, but it was all the more frightening for that reason.

Without a word, C'hiun settled onto the bare floor. Smith took a yellow legal pad from his desk, two number-two pencils, and joined him there.

"I am ready to begin negotiations," Smith said formally.

"But are you ready to negotiate?" Chiun asked flintily. "That is the true question."

Chapter 6

Senator Ross Ralston was not above what he jokingly called "a little honest influence peddling," but he drew the line at selling out his country. Not that anyone had ever asked him to sell out America. But if they had, Senator Ralston knew what he would say. He had served his country in Korea. He still had his Purple Heart to prove it. Probably no one had been more surprised than Lieutenant Ross Ralston that day in 1953 when his Purple Heart came in.

"What's this for?" asked Ralston, who was division liquor officer in Mansan, a rear area.

"Your eye injury."

"Eye injury?" Ralston had nearly burst out laughing. He had sustained it in the mess hall while attempting to crack a soft-boiled egg. The thing wouldn't budge. He gave it a good whack with a spoon and pieces of shell flew in all directions. One got into his right eye. A medic removed it with saline solution.

"Yeah, eye injury," the major said. "According to this, you caught a shell fragment. If this is another Army snafu, we can send it back."

"No," said Lieutenant Ralston quickly. "Shell fragments. That's right. I got hit by a shell fragment. Sure. I just didn't expect a Purple Heart out of it. I was hit pretty bad, sure. But it's not like I'm blind or anything. In fact, the dizzy spells have almost stopped. So what are you waiting for? Pin that baby on."

It wasn't technically a lie. And Ross Ralston consoled himself with the knowledge that he hadn't put in for the medal. It had been automatically processed from the medic's routine notation. Ralston knew that in his plum station-arranged for by his father, Senator Grover Ralston-he couldn't hope to steal a Purple Heart.

For Ross Ralston, it had started with that Purple Heart. The little evasions, the minor distortions. A career in politics and a steady but inevitable walk to the U. S. Senate. But Arizona Senator Ralston knew where to draw the line. He did it every day. He was a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was willing to do favors, but only as long as they didn't compromise the higher interests of the United States.

Senator Ralston never realized that the trouble with being only a little dishonest was that it was like being only a little pregnant. It was either all or nothing.

So when he was asked by no less than superstar Bartholomew Bronzini to bend the Gun Control Import Act of 1968 just a hair, he had no hesitation. Everyone knew that Bronzini was a patriot. Everyone who had seen him in Grundy I, II, and III, that is. No question of conflict of interest here. The man was as American as apple pie, even if he did look like a sicilian leg-breaker with a chromosome imbalance.

"Tell me again why you need this waiver," Ralston prompted.

They were seated in Senator Ralston's well-appointed Capitol Hill office. There was a tiny Christmas tree on his desk made of glazed clay and plastic ornaments.

"Well, sir,"-Ralston smiled at the idea of being called sir by Bronzini-"it's like this. I'm making a movie in your home state. In Yuma."

"Is that in Arizona?" Ralston asked.

"Yes, sir, it is."

"Oh. I don't get back home much anymore. Washington keeps me pretty busy."

Bronzini went on. "It involves a lot of combat situations with extras firing automatic weapons and throwing hand grenades. We can't bring these weapons into the country without a waiver from the State Department."

"I thought that you people had warehouses full of these props." He emphasized the word "props" so Bronzini would know they spoke the same language.

"We do, sir, but in this particular film we need Chinese-made AK-47's."

"Ah, I see. The recent bans."

"Actually, Senator, those are semiautomatic weapons that have been banned. We need the fully automatic versions. You see, a prop rifle is usually a fully operational weapon. It's the loads that are blanks."

"Yes, I see your difficulty, Bart. May I call you Bart?"

"You can call me Mary if it will get me the waiver. I'm in a jam here. Filming starts in two days and the only way we can get these weapons to our location in time is with a State Department waiver."

Senator Ralston was amazed at Bronzini's quiet demeanor. He half-expected him to come charging into the room screaming his demands at the top of his lungs. The man knew the cardinal rule for tapping into the Washington power flow: if you can't buy it, suck up to it.

"Bart," the senator said, jumping to his feet, "I think I can do something for you on this."

"Great," Bronzini said, cracking a relieved smile.

"But you gotta do something for me in return."

"What's that?" Bronzini asked, suddenly wary.

The senator put a friendly arm around Bronzini's shoulders.

"I'm going to have to go into these infamous smoke-filled rooms we got here in the capital and go to bat for you," he said seriously. "It would help a lot if I had a lever with my fellow committee members."

"Anything," Bronzini said. "Anything I can do, I will."

Senator Ralston smiled expansively. This was going to be easier than he had expected.

"Would you mind posing for a photo with me?"

"Oh, absolutely."

"Sally, will you come in here? And bring the camera." Breathlessly the senator's secretary flew into the room, clutching an expensive Japanese camera. Brunzini noticed almost with a start that the red letters over the lens read "Nishitsu."

"Christ, what don't those people manufacture?" he mumbled.

"Stand right here," Senator Ralston was saying happily. He was thinking about how this photo would look framed on his office wall. For in Washington, power was in whom you knew. Connections. Now, an actor like Bartholomew Bronzini might not have much clout among his fellow power brokers, but impressing them was two-thirds of the game.

Bronzini posed for so many shots he began to feel like a Playgirl centerfold. The senator put his arm around him. They shook hands in three different poses. And when it was over, Senator Ralston personally saw the famous actor to the door.

"A pleasure doing business with you," he said broadly. "You'll have that waiver by close of business tomorrow."

"Thank you, sir," said Bartholomew Bronzini in his sincere but flat voice.

"Sir," Senator Ralston said to himself as he watched the actor depart, ponytail switching. "Bartholomew Bronzini called me sir."

He never dreamed that for a handful of snapshots he had just struck a deal to arm an occupying army. Bartholomew Bronzini entered his suite at the Lafayette Hotel. Jiro Isuzu was waiting for him. Jiro bounced from his chair with the expectant look of a faithful dog presenting himself to his master.

"Yes?" he asked. It sounded like a cat's hiss. Bronzini nodded.

"Yes. He promised us the waiver by tomorrow."

"This is most excerrent, Bronzini san."

"He didn't even ask me about the production."

"I tord you my presence was unnecessary. Your name arone open many door."

"Yeah, I noticed," Bronzini said dryly. "So we have the waiver. Can you get the guns to Yuma in time for the first day's shooting?"

Jiro Isuzu smiled tightly. "Yes, guns are in Mexican depot. Arrive from Hong Kong today. Easy to get across border now that waiver is certainty. Unrike tanks."

"Tanks?"

"Yes, we require many, many Chinese tanks."

"I didn't ask him about any tanks."

"Senator not one to ask, Bronzini san. Customs. We go there now. Prease to forrow."

Bronzini arrested the wiry Japanese by grabbing a handful of his coat collar.

"Hold on Jiro," he said. "We got a waiver on the machine guns only because I promised to export them when filming's over. Tanks are another matter altogether. I don't know if this is possible."

"You have used tanks in your firms before?" Isuzu said, prying Bronzini's fingers from his person.

"Sure, but I filmed Grundy III in Israel. The Israelis let me use all the tanks I wanted, but they're in a perpetual state of war over there. They're used to tanks in the streets. If you want to shoot tank scenes, I suggest we move filming to Israel."

"These tanks farse."

"Farce? Did we take a sudden turn into comedy?"

"Not farce, farse. Not real. Props. Customs men, once they see this, will happiry agree to their import."

"Oh, false! You really gotta work on your L's Jiro. It's gonna hold you back later on in life."

"Japanese take pride in not pronouncing retter L." He pronounced it "eru."

"We all have our crosses to bear. So where do we go from here-or do you want me to talk to the President while I'm in town? Maybe ask him to repeal daylightsaving time for the duration of production."

"You know American President?" Isuzu asked.

"Never met the guy. It was a little joke."

"Not see humor in terring rie," Isuzu said stiffly.

"Why should you be any different?" Bronzini muttered to himself. "So what's next?"

"We meet with customs man. Then we return to Arizona, where we wirr personarry oversee the movement of these prop tanks."

"Okay, you read, I forrow," Bronzini said, gesturing broadly to the door.

As they stepped out into the plush hotel hallway, Jiro Isuzu turned to Bartholomew Bronzini.

"You have become very cooperative since we arrive in Washington, D. C. Why change of attitude?"

"It's like this, Jiro," Bronzini said, stabbing the elevator's down button. "I don't like the way I was conned into this. No shit, okay? I do not like it. But that's my name on that contract. I'm a man of my word. If this is the movie you want, this is the movie you get."

"Honor is a very admirable trait. We Japanese understand honor, and varue it highry."

"Good. Do you understand elevators? I'm getting old waiting for this one. What's the Japanese name for elevator anyway?"

"Erevator. "

"No shit. Sounds like the American word, give or take a consonant."

"It is. Japanese take many things from American curture. Reject only what is bad."

"Which brings me to the other reason. Everywhere I turn, I see the name Nishitsu. You guys may be the wave of the future, and if you're going to be doing movies, I'm your boy."

"Yes," Jiro Isuzu said as they stepped into the elevator. "You are our boy indeed, Bronzini san."

The director of U. S. Customs was an easy man to deal with. He settled for an autograph.

"But you realize that these tanks will have to be exported when you're finished." He laughed self-consciously. "Not that we think you're trying to put one over on us-after all, what would a movie company want with actual combat vehicles? And everyone knows that the Japanese are among the most peace-loving peoples on the face of the earth. Especially after we dropped the Big One on them, eh, Mr. Isuzu?"

When Isuzu did not join in the customs director's nervous laughter, the latter recovered and went on. "But you do understand that we do have regulations that must be adhered to. I can only expedite the process. The inspection procedure must be observed. It's for everyone's benefit."

"I understand perfectly, sir," Bartholomew Bronzini assured him. He shook the man's hand.

"Nice meeting you too, Mr. Isuzu. Sorry about my little joke there."

"Don't mind Jiro," Bronzini quipped. "His funny bone was surgically removed at birth."

"Oh," the director of customs said sincerely. "Sorry to hear that."

The T-62 tanks and armored personnel carriers were stored at a Nishitsu warehouse in San Luis, Mexico. They had been dismantled and shipped to Mexico as farm equipment and assembled there by Nishitsu employees. The Mexican authorities had been paid off in Nishitsu merchandise. VCR's were the most popular. Hardly anyone took any of the Nishitsu Ninja jeeps because even the Mexicans had heard about their tendency to tip over on sharp turns. The Mexican road system was almost all sharp turns.

Customs Inspector Jack Curry's knees shook as he went through the rows of tanks in the Nishitsu warehouse with no less than Bartholomew Bronzini. They did not shake from the fearsomeness of these war machines. Although they looked pretty awesome with their long smoothbore cannon and Chinese Red Army star on the turrets. They were painted in chocolate-and-vanilla desert camouflage striations.

"This is really something," he said.

"I can hardly believe it myself," Bronzini said. "Look at these monsters."

"I didn't mean the tanks, Mr. Bronzini. I'm just so surprised that you'd actually be here in person." Bronzini recognized a cue when he heard one. "This is important to me, Mr. Curry. I just want everything to go smoothly."

"I can understand that. It's obvious that these tanks must have cost thousands of dollars apiece, even if they are props." Curry experimentally rapped the fender of one of them. It rang with a solid metallic sound.

"Our finest machinists assembre these," Jiro Isuzu put in proudly.

"Yes, well, if it wasn't for the fact that this is a movie, I'd almost think they were real."

"These Japanese copies of Chinese battre tank," Isuzu supplied. "Tanks are supposed to look ... What is word?"

"Realistic," Bronzini supplied.

"Yes, rearistic. Thank you. You inspect now?"

"Yes, of course. Let's get to work."

At a signal from Isuzu, Nishitsu mechanics fell on the tank like white ants. They popped the hatches and one of them slid into the driver's compartment. He started the engine. The tank growled and began spewing diesel exhaust in the cramped confines of the warehouse.

The tank shifted its tracks, and eased from its slot. It rolled to a halt in front of Bronzini and the others. Jack Curry entered the turret with his big flashlight. He speared light over the interior. He inspected the big cannon. It lacked a breech. Obviously a dummy. It could not possibly fire without the missing components. The turret-mounted .50-caliber machine gun was also apparently a shell. There was no firing mechanism.

Curry wriggled his way into the driver's pit. It was so cramped he got tangled in the handlebarlike steering yoke. He poked his head up from the driver's hatch.

"It looks fine," he said. "I take it these things are completely self-propelled."

"Yes," Jiro Isuzu told him. "They wirr run like rearistic tank, but cannot shoot."

"Well, in that case, there's only one thing that prevents me from passing these things."

"What that?" Isuzu asked tightly.

"I can't seem to get out of this hatch so I can sign the proper forms," Curry said sheepishly. "Would someone give me a hand here?"

Jack Curry was amazed when Bronzini himself offered him a leather-wristband-supported hand.

"Here, just take it slow," Bronzini told him. "Put your foot on that bar." Bronzini pulled. "There. Now the other one. Uhhh, there you go."

"Thank you, gentlemen," Curry said, stepping off the hull. "Guess I'm not as spry as I once was.

"Tanks buirt for Japanese extra. Much smarrer than American," Isuzu said with a rapid-fire bowing of his head.

Bronzini thought he was going to throw his head out of whack, he was bobbing it so much.

Customs Inspector Jack Curry gave the rest of the tanks and APC's a cursory glance and then he produced a sheaf of documents. He set them on the tank's fender and began stamping them with a little rubber stamp.

When he was done, he handed them to Bronzini. "There you are, Mr. Bronzini. Just have your people show these at the place of entry and you should have no trouble. By the way, how are you going to get them into the U.S.?"

"Don't ask me. That's not my department. Jiro?"

"It very simpre," the Japanese answered. "We wirr drive them across border into desert."

"There," Bronzini said. "Now, is there anything else?"

"No," Curry replied, grabbing Bronzini's hand with both of his and shaking it vigorously. "I would just like to tell you what a genuine thrill it was to meet you. I really loved that scene in Grundy II where you said; 'Blow it out your bazookas!' to the entire Iranian Navy.

"I was up two nights writing that line," Bronzini said, wondering if the guy was ever going to let go. Finally Curry disengaged and left the warehouse, walking backward. He said good-bye at least thirteen times. He was so impressed he never thought to ask Bronzini for his autograph. It was a first. Bronzini was almost disappointed. The tanks rolled across the border that night. They crossed arid desert to the checkpoint, where they stopped, forming a long snakelike column. They grumbled and coughed diesel fumes.

Customs gave the documents a cursory examination, stamped them as "Passed," and without a fight waved through the first invading force to cross into U. S. territory since the British Army took Washington in 1812.

The customs officials gathered around to watch. They smiled like boys watching a parade. The Japanese drivers, their helmeted heads poking up from the drivers' compartments like human jack-in-the-boxes, waved. Friendly salutes were exchanged. Nishitsu cameras on both sides flashed, and more than one voice asked "Do you see Bronzini? Is he in one of those things?"

Chapter 7

Remo changed planes in Phoenix for Yuma. He was not surprised, but neither was he happy to see that the Air West plane that would take him to Yuma was a small two-prop cloudhopper seating, at most, sixteen people in an incredibly narrow cabin. And no stewardess.

The plane took off and Remo settled back for the bumpy ride. He dug out Smith's folder to read his professional credits-or rather, Remo Durock's professional credits. Remo was amazed to read that he had been a stunt man in everything from Full Metal jacket to The Return of Swamp Thing. He wondered how the hell Smith could expect him to get away with that, but then remembered that one of the cardinal rules of stunt performing was to keep your face from the camera.

Remo's International Stunt Association card was clipped to the folder. He pulled it out and inserted it into his wallet. Remo was interested to read that he had won a Stuntman Award certificate for his work on Star Trek: The Next Generation. He had never watched Star Trek: The Next Generation. He looked to see if he had won an Oscar and was disappointed to find that he had not.

Less than ten minutes into the flight, the terrain under the plane's wing abruptly changed. Phoenix's suburbs gave way to desert, and the desert to mountains. The mountains were surrounded by more desert. For miles in every direction there was nothing but desolation. Only the rare ruler-straight road, passing through nothing and apparently going nowhere.

Then Yuma came into view like a surprise oasis. For the city was a virtual island in a sea of sand. It was green around the edges, thanks to the nearby Colorado River, and Remo's eyes, zeroing in on the flat lushness, recognized expansive lettuce beds fed by blue irrigation pipes. Beyond the lettuce fields, Yuma looked like any other desert community, except it was much larger than he had expected. Many of the homes had clay-red roofs. And almost every yard had a swimming pool. There were as many blue pools as red roofs.

Yuma International Airport-so called because it was a way station between the U. S. and Mexico-was much smaller than Remo had expected. The plane alighted and rolled to the tiny terminal.

Remo stepped out into the clear dry air that, even in late December, was immoderately warm. He followed the line of passengers into a terminal that seemed to consist of a gift shop around which someone had added a single ticket counter and a modest security and waiting area as an afterthought.

There was no one waiting for him in the waiting area, so Remo walked out the front entrance and looked for a studio representative.

Almost instantly a station wagon slithered up to the curb. An outdoorsy young woman with a cowboy hat over her long black hair leaned out of the window. She wore a fringed buckskin vest over a T-shirt. The shirt depicted two skeletons lounging on lawn chairs under a broiling sun and the words "But it's a dry heat."

"Are you Remo Durock?" she called in a chirping voice. Her eyes were gray in her open face.

Remo grinned. "Do you want me to be?"

She laughed. "Hop in, I'm Sheryl, unit publicist for Red Christrnas."

Remo climbed in beside her. "Where's your luggage?" she asked.

"I believe in traveling light."

"You should have brought your boots," Sheryl said as she piloted the station wagon onto the main drag.

"I thought it didn't snow in the desert," Remo remarked as he took note of the plasticky Christmas decorations that festooned the windows of every business establishment that whipped past them. They were identical to the decorations he had seen back east. Somehow, they looked tackier here in sun-soaked Arizona.

"It doesn't," Sheryl was saying. "But there are snakes and scorpions where you'll be working."

"I'll watch my step," Remo promised.

"This must be your first location shoot," Sheryl prompted.

"Actually I've been in a lot of stuff. Maybe you saw me in Star Trek: The Next Generation."

"You were in that? I've been a Trekker since I was six years old. Tell me which episode? I've seen them all." Remo thought fast.

"The one with the Martians," he ventured.

Sheryl's attractive face puckered. "Martians? I don't remember any Martians. Klingons, Romulans, Ferengi, yeah. But no Martians."

"They must not have aired that one yet," Remo said quickly. "I was the stunt double for the guy with the pointy ears."

Sheryl's eyes widened. "Not Leonard Nimoy?"

The name sounded familiar so Remo said, "Yes." He regretted it instantly.

"Leonard Nimoy's going to be in a Next Generation episode? Wow!"

"It was just a cameo role," Remo said, glancing into the file folder and the glossary of movie terms Smith had provided. "I was actually the stunt cameo double."

"I never heard of such a thing."

"I pioneered the concept," Remo said soberly. "It was quite an honor. I have my heart set on an Oscar."

"You mean an Emmy. Oscars are for films, not TV."

"That's what I meant. An Emmy. I almost got an Oscar, but some guy named Smith beat me out of it." Sheryl nodded.

"Too bad," she said. "But count yourself lucky. Unit publicists don't get Emmys or Oscars or any of that stuff. Actually, this is my first film. Until last week I was a cue-card girl at one of our TV stations here. It's such a hot potato that an experienced publicist wouldn't touch it, so I applied and here I am."

"Because of the union trouble?"

"You know it. You'll see when we get out to the location. We'll be running the gauntlet. But it's worth it. This film is going to be my ticket out of Yuma."

"Is it that bad?" Remo asked as they passed through the city and out into the desert. Remo saw lettuce beds on either side of the dusty road. They were the same beds he had seen from the air.

"It's a big, growing city, but it's in the middle of nowhere. Always has been, always will be. Uh-oh." Remo had been watching Sheryl's chiseled-in-sandstone profile as they talked. He looked out the windshield to see what had brought the frown to her pretty face. The road ahead was a swirl of boiling dust. Visible through it were the backs of several ponderous tracked machines. They were barely moving.

"Are those tanks?" Remo asked.

"Tanks they are. Hang on. I'm going to try to get around these dusty brutes."

Sheryl sent the car onto the soft shoulder of the road and crept around the tanks. They had stopped now, exhaling fumes into the settling dust. Remo rolled up his window.

As they sped past, Remo watched the inscrutable faces of the tank drivers that poked up from the drivers compartments.

"Unfriendly fellows, aren't they?" Sheryl said.

"Who are they?"

"Those are the Chinese extras."

"I hate to be the one to rain on anyone's fantasy, but those guys are Japanese."

"Almost everyone on the shoot is Japanese. As for the extras, who's going to notice or care?"

"You'd think a Japanese production would be more picky about details like that. Won't Red Christmas play over there too?"

"You're right. I hadn't thought of that. But that's not my problem. I handle all U. S. publicity. Bronzini hired me himself Although so far, there hasn't been much for me to do, which is why I'm making gofer runs half the time. No offense."

"None taken. Is Bronzini as big a jerk as I've heard he is?"

"I've barely spoken two words to him. But he reminds me of Grundy. He's just like him. Except for the headband. But you know, it's funny, I read everything I could on the fella before I started, and he's swearing up and down that he'd never do another Grundy movie. So I show up the first day, and what is it? A Grundy movie! They just call the character Mac. Go figure."

"Just what I thought," Remo said. "The guy's a jerk." They cleared the line of tanks and the reason for the bottleneck became immediately apparent.

"Oh, damn, they're out in full cry today, aren't they?" Sheryl said ironically.

They stood two deep, their arms linked in front of an open chain-link fence that bisected the road. Remo wondered what a fence was doing out here in the desert, but the thought evaporated as the driver of the lead tank climbed down a track and started yelling at the picketers. He was screaming at them in Japanese. Remo didn't know Japanese, so he didn't understand what was being said. The protesters shouted back at the driver. They were making themselves perfectly understandable. They called the Japanese tank driver a gook and a slant-eyed chink. Obviously they couldn't tell a Chinese from a Japanese either.

"The little Japanese fella sure looks like he's coming to a slow boil," Sheryl mused. "Just look at his neck get red. He is not a happy camper."

"Wonder what he's going to do?" Remo asked as the driver clambered back into the tank. The tank engine started to run. Diesel exhaust spewed in noxious clouds. Jerkily the tank started inching forward.

"Someone should be filming this," Sheryl said under her breath.

Remo's eyes were on the tanks. "I don't think these guys are in any mood to back down," he said. "Which? The Japanese or the union folks?"

"Both," Remo said worriedly as the tanks churned toward the line of protesters. The protesters linked arms defiantly. If anything, they shouted louder.

As they inched past, the profiles of the drivers looked as determined and inflexible as robots. The tanks were now less than ten feet from the human bulwark.

"I don't think they're bluffing," Sheryl said in a distressed voice.

"I don't think anyone is bluffing," Remo said, suddenly grabbing the wheel. Shervl's foot was resting on the accelerator. Remo placed his foot over hers and pressed hard.

The station wagon spurted ahead. Remo spun the wheel, sending the car skidding in front of the lead tank.

"Hey! Are you trying to get us killed?" Sheryl yelled. "Hit the brake."

"Are you loco!"

Remo reached over and yanked the hand brake. The car lurched to a stop between the tank's rattling tracks and the linked pickets.

Sheryl found herself on the tank side. She saw the tank looming up on her like a wall on wheels. The turret cannon slid over the car roof.

"Oh, my God," she said, paralyzed. "They're plumb not stopping."

Remo grabbed Sheryl and kicked his door open. He yanked her out of the seat and flung her to one side. Remo spun around and sized up the situation. The tank tracks were almost on top of the station wagon. Remo had a choice. He decided it would be quicker to stop the tank than to break up the protesters.

As Sheryl gave an anguished cry, the churning tank started to climb the station-wagon flank. Thick windows crunched like glass in monster teeth. Metal squealed and folded.

Remo slipped up to one side of the tank. It was tilted nose-up, and its multiton body slowly began to compress the light car down. Tires blew. The hood ruptured. Taking care not to be seen by the drivers of the other tanks, Remo took one tread in both hands while it was momentarily immobile. The track consisted of linked metal parts. Quickly Remo ran sensitive fingers along the segments. The tracks were really just a sophisticated chain of articulated steel segments, blocks, and rubber pads. He was looking for the weakest link.

He found it. A block connection. He chopped at it. It took only one chop. The metal parted and Remo backpedaled because he knew what could happen when the track began to move again.

The first sound was surprisingly like a pop. The second was a vicious whiplike rattle. The tank, stressed, had thrown its left track. The track lashed the concrete, creating a small crater that would have taken a jackhammer two minutes to excavate.

Rolling on only one track, the tank shifted suddenly. Balanced precariously atop the station wagon, it began listing to port. Remo stepped in and gave it a push.

The driver realized his problem too late. The tank toppled. It went over on its turret like a big brown turtle. The driver tried to scramble free, but all he succeeded in doing was to push his head out of his cockpit so that when the tank went over, it hit the ground sooner than it would have. He hung out of the pit, upside down. He didn't move.

Remo slipped under the tank and felt the man's pulse. It was thready. Concussion. Remo pulled him free and stretched him out on the road.

"Is he dead?" Sheryl asked in horror. The picketers stood back, their eyes shocked. They said nothing.

"No, but he needs medical attention," Remo said. Sheryl was about to say something when the other tank drivers marched up, and one roughly pushed her to one side. Remo came to his feet as if sprung and grabbed her attacker by the arm.

"Hey! What's your problem?" he demanded.

The Japanese hissed something Remo didn't catch and slid one foot between Remo's legs. Recognizing the beginning move of an infantile ju-jitsu maneuver, Remo allowed a cool disarming smile to warp his face. The Japanese kicked. And fell over. Remo had moved his legs aside so swiftly that his opponent's foot missed.

Remo unconcernedly stepped on his chest on his way to Sheryl's side.

"You okay?" hi asked quietly.

"No, I am not all right. What the hell is going on here?" she raged. "They were going to run those union people right over. And look at the car. They pulverized it. That's my car, too, not a studio loaner."

The other drivers quietly lifted their unconscious comrade onto the back of the second tank. One of them shouted to the others. The one Remo had incapacitated picked himself up and, casting an angry glance in Remo's direction, hurried to his machine with disciplined alacrity.

The tanks started up again. This time they crawled around the disabled tank and the ruin that had been Sheryl's station wagon.

"Oh, my God. They're going to do it again," Sheryl moaned.

"Everyone link arms!" one of the picketers shouted. "We'll show them how Americans stand up to bullies." Not every protester obeyed. A few retreated.

Remo dived into the picketers.

"I've got no time to argue with you people," he said. "Another place and time, maybe. But not today." He grabbed wrists and squeezed nerves. Union members yelled and screamed as if stung. But they ran in the direction Remo propelled them. In moments, the gateway was clear of human obstruction.

The tanks wound around the road and through the open fence. Once the first one passed, no one had the stomach to get in their way again. The line seemed to go on forever. The drivers looked neither to the right nor to the left. They might have been components of their tanks, and not the operators.

"This is crazy," Sheryl said in an incredulous voice. "What got into them? This is only a movie."

"Tell them that," Remo said. 5heryl spanked dust off her hat.

"You did a nice job of breaking up those picketers, by the way," she said. "I'd swear they would have run them down like yellow dogs."

"I wonder," Remo said.

"Wonder what?"

"I wonder if we're not on the wrong side of this dispute."

He was watching the chocolate rump of the last tank as it spilled sand from its rolling tracks. It looked as inexorable as the wheel of fate.

"Well, come on, then. We'll have to hoof it on to base camp. Jiro's going to hear about this."

"Who's Jiro?"

"Jiro Isuzu. The executive producer. He's a stiffnecked SOB. Makes those tank guys seem like little old ladies. Except Jiro's so polite you want to bust him in the mouth sometimes. I know I do."

Chapter 8

"Please, Master of Sinanju," Harold Smith said in a dry, cracked voice. "It's nearly three A.M. We can continue negotiations tomorrow."

"No," replied the Master of Sinanju. "We are nearly done. Why break off such delicate talks now, when we are so close to an understanding?"

Dr. Harold W. Smith didn't feel close to an understanding. He felt close to exhaustion. For nearly nineteen hours the Master of Sinanju had led him through the most Byzantine contract negotiations of their long and difficult association. It would have been difficult enough, Smith thought, but they were conducting these negotiations on the hard floor of Smith's office because, as Chiun explained it, although Smith was the emperor and Chiun merely the royal assassin, in honest negotiations, all such distinctions were dispensed with. Smith could not sit on what Chiun insisted was his throne, and Chiun would not stand. So they sat. Without food, without water, and without bathroom breaks.

After nearly all night, Chiun still looked as fresh as an origami sunflower. Smith's leaden face was the color of a clam's shell. He felt dead. Except his stomach. The combination of no food and nervous distress had triggered a flow of stomach acid and was eating into his peptic ulcer. If this didn't end soon, Smith feared, he would have no stomach lining left.

"This year," Chiun recited, looking at the half-curled scroll that was held to the floor by tiny jade weights, "we have agreed to a modest ten-percent increase in the gold payment. In consideration of the new situation."

"Explain to me again why I must pay more gold if the new arrangement does not require you to accompany Remo on his assignments," Smith said dully. "Shouldn't that realistically mean less service on my part?"

Chiun raised a wise finger. "Less service from the Master of Sinanju, yes. But more service from Remo. You will be working him harder; therefore he is worth more."

"But shouldn't we first deduct the additional expense you insisted upon when we originally settled on your expanded role and then negotiate Remo's price?"

Chiun shook his aged head. "No. For those are the terms of the old contract. Since we are entering into an entirely new arrangement, they will only cloud the issue."

"I feel the issue is already clouded," Smith said unhappily. His patrician face looked like a lemon that had been sucked of all moisture.

"Then let me clarify it for you," Chiun went on, adding in a low voice, "once again. Ten percent more gold for Remo's added burden. And then, in the form of precious stones and bolts of silk and weights of rice, there is my new fee."

"If you are not taking part in Remo's missions," Smith wondered, "what is your part? I completely fail to understand."

"While Remo is enjoying the broadening effects of travel to exotic far-off lands like Arizona-"

"Arizona is a western state," Smith interjected sharply. "It is hardly exotic."

". . . far-off western states, exotic by Korean standards," Chiun continued, "to partake of their splendid sights . . ."

"A desert. It's in the center of wilderness and desolation. "

". . . meeting famous personalities, such as Bartholomew Banzini . . ."

Smith sighed. "Bronzini. And I wish you would stop throwing that back in my face. It was your idea that Remo undertake the Santa Claus assignment alone."

"A mistake on my part," Chiun allowed. "I am willing to admit it-if you will make certain concessions."

"I cannot-repeat, cannot-get you on that movie set," Smith said firmly. "You must understand the security problems. It's a closed set."

Chiun's parchment face fell into a frown.

"I understand. We will speak no more of it."

Smith's tensed shoulders loosened. They tightened again when Chiun resumed speaking.

"The stipulated amount is to cover my new added burdens."

Smith loosened his Dartmouth tie. "New burdens?"

"The burdens I assumed during Remo's last assignment," Chiun said, knowing that the unloosened tie was the first crack in the man's stubborn armor.

"You stayed home," Smith protested.

Chiun raised a solemn finger. Its long nail gleamed. "And worried," Chiun said morosely.

The yellow pencil in Smith's bony fingers snapped.

"Perhaps there is a way," he groaned. "There must be. "

Chiun's agate-hard eyes glistened. "There is always a way," he intoned. "For a ruler as resourceful as you."

"Allow me to use the telephone."

"I will waive the no-telephone rule," Chiun said magnanimously. "Provided it furthers swift resolution of our talks."

Smith started to push himself to his feet. He froze. He looked down at his crossed legs in constipated bewilderment.

"They won't move," he croaked. "They must have fallen asleep."

"You did not feel them falling asleep?" Chiun asked.

"No. Can you help me?"

"Certainly," said Chiun, rising. He stepped past.

Smiths offered hand and to his desk, where he reached for the telephone. He paused. "Which telephone instrument do you wish?" he inquired.

"I really wish to be helped to my feet," Smith said.

"In good time. You required a telephone. Let us deal with your paramount desire first, then the lesser ones." Smith wanted to tell the Master of Sinanju-no, he wanted to scream at the Master of Sinanju-that right at this moment, more than anything else he desired the use of his legs. But he knew that Chiun would only evade the issue. He saw the telephone as the most direct indirect path to his goal.

"Give me the ordinary phone," Smith said.

The Master of Sinanju ignored the dialless red telephone that was Smith's direct line to the White House and lifted the more elaborate office telephone. He placed it at Smith's angular knees with a magnificent flourish. Smith lifted the receiver and began dialing.

"Hello, Milburn?" he said. "Yes, I know it's three o'clock, but this could not wait until morning. Please do not shout. This is Harold."

Chiun cocked a delicate ear in the direction of the conversation.

"Your cousin Harold," Smith repeated. "Yes, that Cousin Harold. I have a very big favor to ask of you. Are you still publishing those ... er, magazines? Good. I have a person here who is interested in writing for you."

"Tell him I am an accomplished poet," Chiun hissed, not understanding what this had to do with going to Arizona, but hoping that Smith knew what he was doing and had not cracked from the strain of negotiations.

"No, Milburn. I know you don't publish poetry. This man is very versatile. If you can provide him with a press pass to his latest film, I am certain he can get an interview with Bartholomew Bronzini."

Chiun smiled happily. Smith had not cracked. Although he was babbling.

"I didn't realize there was no such thing as a press pass to get on a movie set. Oh, is that how it works? Yes, well, if you can work out the details, I can guarantee that Bronzini will accept. My friend is very, very hard to refuse."

Chiun beamed. He gave Smith the American A-okay symbol. Smith put his finger in his ear to hear better. Chiun wondered if that was a mystic countersign or an expression of annoyance.

"His name is Chiun," Smith went on. "That is his first name. I think." Smith looked up.

"It is my name," Chiun told him. "I am not a Bob or a John or a Charlie who requires an additional name so that no one will confuse him with other persons.'

"It is his pen name," Smith said, fearful of extending an already too-involved conversation. "Yes, thank you. He'll be there."

Smith hung up with nerveless fingers.

"It is all arranged," he said. "You'll have to go through the formality of an interview."

"Of course. I am certain if these people want me to write their movie script, they must be assured of my unsurpassed talents to undertake so illustrious a task."

"No, no, you don't understand. You won't be writing any such thing. My cousin Milburn publishes movie fan magazines. You will be going to the set of Red Christmas as a correspondent for one of their magazines."

"I will be writing letters?" Chiun squeaked. "To whom?"

"Not that kind of correspondent. I will be glad to explain this to you in greater detail if you will just help me to my feet."

"At once, Emperor," Chiun said happily. He knelt before Smith and inserted long fingers into the back of Smith's knees.

"I feel nothing," Smith said when Chiun's hands withdrew.

"That is good," Chiun assured him.

"It is?"

"It means that when I lift you, there will be no pain." And there wasn't. Smith didn't even feel the usual creaking in his arthritic knee when Chiun assisted him to his feet and into his leather chair. Relieved, Smith briefed the Master of Sinanju on his job interview. Then, going to his computer terminal, he began inputting through the keyboard.

"What are you doing?" Chiun asked.

"The editor who will interview you requires clips of your past articles."

"I have written no articles. Only poetry. Shall I go home and bring them?"

"No, don't even mention your poetry. My computer is faxing him copies of your articles, which will be fabrications, of course."

When Chiun opened his mouth as if to protest, Smith added hastily, "It will get you to Arizona faster."

"I will submit myself to your greater judgment."

"Good," said Smith as he shut down his computer. "Tickets will be waiting for you at the local airport. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm oing to stretch out on the couch and try to get some sleep."

"Very well, Emperor," said the Master of Sinanju, bowing as he slipped from the room in monklike silence. Smith wondered why the Master of Sinanju left without the formalities of farewell he usually overindulged in.

He found out ten minutes later when, just as he was about to drop off, he got a charley horse in his right leg.

"Argghh!" Smith howled. The pain increased until he thought he could not stand it anymore. Then his other leg began to clench up.

The cab deposited the Master of Sinanju at the address on lower Park Avenue. He took the elevator to the eighth floor and turned right until he saw the red-and-blue neon sign that said STAR FILE GROUP.

Chiun's nose wrinkled. Was this a magazine publisher or a Chinese restaurant?

Chiun approached the receptionist's desk and bowed. "I am Chiun, the author," he said gravely.

"Mr. Chiun to see you, Don," the receptionist called over her shoulder so loudly the Master of Sinanju winced with the gracelessness of it all.

"Send him in," a pleasantly grumpy voice called from an open office.

Head erect, Chiun floated into the room. He bowed to the young man who sat at a corner desk. He looked like a koala bear that had been rolled in brown sugar. Chiun saw that the illusion was helped by noticeable beard stubble. He suddenly noticed the walls. They were covered with posters of famous people. Nearly nude women wrestlers predominated. Chiun averted his eyes from the wanton display.

"Sit down, sit down," the man said diffidently.

"You are Donald McDavid, the famous editor?" Chiun inquired.

"And you must be Chiun. Happy to meet you."

"Chiun, the author," Chiun corrected with a finger.

"Milburn gave me your clips this morning. I've been looking them over. Very interesting."

"You like them?"

"The pictures are nice," Donald McDavid said.

"Pictures?" Chiun asked, wondering if he should have introduced himself as Chiun the author and artist.

He accepted a manila folder filled with magazine clippings. The photographs showed scenes from American films. The copy, however, appeared to be excerpts from a Korean personal-hygiene manual. Was Smith mad? Insulting him with such tripe?

"You do write in English, don't you?" McDavid asked as a curly-haired young man came in with a tray containing a Dr. Pepper and a mug of black coffee.

"Of course," Chiun said.

"Good, because I can't read Chinese, and neither can our readers. They're fussy about stuff like that. We'd get letters."

"This is Korean," Chiun told McDavid as he sipped his coffee experimentally. He fingered an ice cube from his Dr Pepper and plopped it into the coffee. He let both sit.

"I can't read Korean either," he said dryly.

Chiun relaxed. It was amazing. This white was nearly illiterate, yet he edited important magazines. Chiun made a mental note to take the folder with him. He would not have his reputation as a poet sullied by Smith's nonsense.

"Well, I can't tell a thing from these clips, but that's your byline on them, and Milburn says you come highly recommended. So you're hired."

"In my field, I am the best," Chiun assured him. "I've spoken with the publicity people on Red Christmas. They're not real high on letting anyone on set so early. But Bronzini overruled them. So you're in. I've put together some assignment sheets. We'll want an interview with Bronzini, as well as a set-visit piece, a director's profile, and whatever else you can get. See who's on the set when you get there. Talk to them. We'll sort it out when you get back."

Chiun leafed through the assignment sheets. His eyes narrowed when he saw the payment rates.

"Do you publish poetry?" he asked suddenly.

"No one publishes poetry anymore."

"I do not speak of common American poetry, but the finest Korean poetry. Ung."

"God bless you."

Chiun's face expressed indignation. "Ung is its name," he said. "I have recently been composing an ode to the melting snowcap on Mount Paektusan. That is a Korean mountain. It is currently 6,089 stanzas long."

"Six thousand stanzas! At a dollar a word, it will eat up half the yearly budget on one of our magazines."

"Yes," Chiun said hopefully.

"Sorry. We don't publish poetry." McDavid indicated a corkboard on the wall over his desk.

Chiun peered up at it. Rows of cover proofs hung from hooks. The latest Star File cover showed a halfnude white female draped over a spaceship. Beside it was a magazine called Fantasmagoria. A man in a driedskin mask was butchering a young woman on that cover. It looked very real, and Chiun wondered if it was for cannibals. Beside that was something called Gorehound, which Chiun took to be aimed at pit bulls. Or possibly their owners. And next to that was Stellar Action Heroes. "Do people read these?" Chiun sniffed.

"Most just look at the pictures. That reminds me. I'd better give you a few issues so you know our house style. Write in the present tense. Lots of quotes."

Chiun accepted a stack of magazines. He surreptitiously slipped Smith's folder of spurious clippings into the stack.

"I will give these my undivided attention," Chiun promised.

"Fine," said Donald McDavid, reaching for his coffee. He took a sip.

"Ugh. It's cold," he said. He tried the Dr Pepper and pronounced it flat.

Leaning back in his chair, Donald McDavid called through the door, "Eddie, can you get me a milk?"

"Milk is bad for you," Chiun pointed out. "It suffocates the blood vessels."

"I'm working on my first heart attack," Donald MeDavid said. "One last thing. We buy all rights."

"That is your privilege," said Chiun, adding, "My right to vote is yours for a dollar a word."

Donald McDavid burst out laughing as he accepted a glass of milk from his assistant. He sipped it experimentally, made a face, and reached for a salt shaker that stood beside the telephone. As Chiun watched in horror, he salted his milk and drained it down without stopping.

"I'll want your first copy on my desk in two weeks," he said, wiping milk from a nearly invisible mustache.

"In case you are not here then, who is your next of kin?" Chiun asked.

Outside the building, Chiun hailed a taxi. The driver took him to LaGuardia Airport. At his terminal, Chiun counted out the fare in coins.

"What, no tip?" the driver barked.

"Thank you for reminding me," Chiun said. He handed the driver a stack of magazines.

"Gorehound!" the driver called after him. "What the hell am I supposed to do with these?"

"Study them. Learn from them. Perhaps you too may rise to the exalted station where a dollar a word is your lot in life."

Chapter 9

Jiro Isuzu was very, very apologetic.

"So very sorry," he said. He bowed from the waist, his eyes downcast. The wind was picking up, blowing loose desert sand into his dry mask of a face. Remo wondered if his downcast eyes reflected humility or the need to protect them from the abrasive sand. They stood in the shelter of the base-camp tents.

"They acted like they plumb owned the road," Sheryl shouted.

"Japanese extra not speak Engrish," Isuzu said. "I wirr reprimand them in crear terms."

"So what about my car?" Sheryl asked sternly. "Studio wirr reimburse. You may have car of choice. If you wirr accept a Nishitsu wagon, we will throw in furr option package."

"All right," Sheryl said in a half-mollified voice. "But I don't want one of your Ninjas. I hear they tip whenever the wind changes direction."

"Excerrent. And I am again sorry for your inconvenience. Now, if you prease, there is a problem for you to dear with. A correspondent from Star Fire magazine is on way. I did not want press, but Bronzini san insist. Stuck. You take care of this man, okay?"

"Good. I'd like to do something other than the daily Fedex run."

"Shooting schedule moved up, by the way. Camera rorr tomorrow."

"Tomorrow is two days before Christmas. This isn't going to sit well with the crew."

"You forget, crew Japanese. Not care about Christmas. If American crew unhappy, they may find work ersewhere. Firming begin tomorrow."

At that, Jiro Isuzu walked off. His spine didn't waver a millimeter from the vertical.

"What American crew?" Sheryl muttered. "There's Bronzini, the military technical adviser, the stunt coordinator, and little old me." She sighed. "Well," she said to Remo, "now you've met Jiro. Quite a piece of work, isn't he?"

"Nishitsu makes cars?" Remo asked blankly.

"They make everything. And they act like they hung the moon and optioned the sun. Well, I guess I've got a reporter to contend with. See you around the set."

"Where do I find the . . ." Remo looked into his folder. ". . . stunt coordinator?"

"You got me," Sheryl said, starting for one of the striped tents. "Find an A. D. with a walkie-talkie and ask for Sunny Joe."

Remo looked around. The tents had been set up in a shallow arroyo created by bulldozers. One was still throwing up sand to form bulkwarks against the wind. Men rushed in all directions, like ants. Every one of them was Japanese.

Remo collared one with a walkie-talkie.

"Help me out, pal," he said. "I'm looking for Sunny Joe."

"Sony Joe?"

"Close enough."

The man touched the walkie-talkie clipped to a nickelcadmium belt battery pack and began speaking in rapid guttural Japanese into the microphone suspended before his mouth. He listened to his earphones. The only thing Remo understood was the name "Sony Joe." Finally the man pointed north.

"Sony Joe that way. Okay?"

"Thanks. What does he look like?"

The Japanese shook his head curtly. "No Engrish speakuu. Okay?" Remo took that to mean he didn't speak English.

Remo trudged off in the direction indicated. He peeked into his folder and learned that an A. D. was an assistant director. He wondered how someone could be an assistant director on an English-language film and not speak English.

As he walked along, he kept his eyes open for Bartholomew Bronzini. There was no sign of the world-famous actor. Remo was also surprised to see no cacti. This was scrub desert. Just sand and the occasional dry bush. He looked back and noticed that he wasn't leaving footprints. He decided that someone might notice, so he began walking on the balls of his feet. That way, he left the same impression as a twelve-year-old boy.

Remo climbed a sandhill and was surprised to see a vast panorama of tanks and armored personnel carriers arrayed in a flat area entirely surrounded by fresh sandhills. Men in Chinese military uniforms were wiping down the machines, which had already picked up a dusting of beige sand.

Remo decided that the group of uniformed men who were practicing falls from a nearby hill were stunt men. One of them had to be the one he wanted.

As he approached, Remo saw, behind a flat rock, a man aiming a rifle. The man was white, with a weathered face and sun-squint eyes. He pulled the trigger.

Suddenly one of the Japanese extras clutched his chest. Red fluid gushed from between his fingers. Remo floated to the base of the sandhill and floated around it. He slipped up behind the man just as he squeezed off a second shot.

Remo took him by the back of the neck. He tried to bring him to his feet, but found his arms were only long enough to bring him up to eye level. The man topped him by three heads.

"Give me that," Remo growled, grabbing the weapon. It looked homemade, like an antique.

"What's your problem, friend?" the man demanded.

"I saw you shoot that man."

"Good for you. Now, if you'll give it back, I'll go shoot a few more."

"This isn't how we settle union disputes in America."

"Union! You don't think. . ." The man started laughing. "Oh, this is rich," he burst out.

"What's so funny?" Remo asked. He let the man drop and broke open the weapon. It had a stainless-steel drum magazine on top. Instead of bullets, it contained glass marblelike objects. They sloshed with reddish liquid.

"You are. You think I really shot that guy. That's an air gun."

"A BB rifle can kill if you hit a soft spot," Remo said, lifting out one of the marbles for a closer look.

"Be careful with that. The prop master will have my hide if you break it. That thing is handcrafted. Only sixteen like it in the world."

One of the Japanese extras came down the sandhill. "Sunny Joe. Why you stop?" he called. Remo saw the splash of red that marred his blouse front.

"Wait a minute," Remo blurted out. "You're Sunny Joe?"

"That's what they call me. So who are you?"

"Remo. "

The man called Sunny Joe seemed startled by the name.

"What's your last name?" he asked.

"Durock," Remo said after a pause.

Sunny Joe looked disappointed with Remo's answer. That expression gave way to an annoyed one.

"How the hell long you been in this business, son?" he barked. "Not to know an air gun when you see one?"

"Sorry," Remo said. "With all the union troubles, I guess I jumped to a conclusion."

"No harm done, I guess," Sunny Joe relented. He searched Remo's face as if looking for his soul. "And I can use a paleface. Half these damn Japs can't speak English. Come on. We're doing practice bullet hits. Let's see what kind of moves you got."

Remo followed the man up the sandhill.

"The thing you gotta remember, Remo," he was saying, "is that Bronzini likes to be as realistic as possible. You stand right here. I'll drop back and pop you one. When you take the hit, don't fall, corkscrew. Pretend you're being hit by a sledgehammer, not a bullet. We want real impact up on that screen."

Remo shrugged as Sunny Joe loped back to his shelter. He was a tall man, Remo saw. Nearly seven feet tall, and while he looked imposing, Remo noticed that he had lanky limbs. He was sixty if he was a day, but he moved like a man ten years younger.

Sunny Joe dropped into a crouch and took aim. The gun coughed. Remo's acute vision perceived the red sphere zip toward him. He set his feet.

But Remo had been trained for years to move out of the way of bullets. Even harmless ones. Reflexively he sidestepped the bullet. To cover himself, he twisted and hit the sand. He looked up.

Sunny Joe lumbered up to him, anger on his face. "What the hell happened?" he bellowed.

"I corkscrewed."

"You corkscrewed before the round struck. I didn't see the blood splatter. What's the matter with you? Bucking for an Oscar?"

"Sorry," Remo said, brushing sand off his clothes. "Try again?"

"Right. This time, wait for the round."

As they returned to their marks, a trio of helicopters clattered overhead. Their noise filled the valley floor like jangling scrap metal.

"Damn," Sunny Joe muttered. "They're gonna be doing that all through production. Choppers from the Marine Air Station, I'll bet. Joyboys with nothing better to do than overfly the shoot. They're probably asking themselves which tiny speck is Bronzini. Damn fools."

"They'll get tired of it sooner or later," Remo ventured.

"Sure, they will. But that's just the Mariues. There's an Army proving ground a few miles north, and ol' Luke Air Force Range is due east of here. We'll have F-16's up the wazoo from now till Valentine's Day."

"You don't sound like you enjoy your work much."

"Work, hell, I was retired until the Japs came along. I'm over sixty, man. This industry feeds off youth, even in the stunt profession. I came back to the reservation to wither away, so to speak. Then Bronzini came along and asked to use this part of the reservation."

"This is Indian land?"

"Damn straight. Bronzini has been pulling strings everywhere to mount this production. Had everyone eating out of his hand. Until he slammed into the chief. The chief knew who he was, of course, but wouldn't let on. He said part of the price of letting the reservation be used was my participation. I'm a proud man, but I got this business in my blood, so I said what the hell. I took it. Maybe it'll lead to something."

"You don't look Indian."

"Not many Indians look Indian anymore, if you want to know the truth of it."

"What tribe?"

"You never studied them in school, I'll tell you that much. We're practically extinct. My Indian name is Sunny Joe. It's kind of a tribal nickname, I guess you'd have to say. My legal name's Bill Roam. But call me Sunny Joe. Everyone does. That's Sunny with a U, not an O. Okay, get on your mark."

Remo took his position. This time, when the pellet gun coughed, he closed his eyes. The bullet took him square in the chest. He twisted, fell, and rolled.

"Better," Sunny Joe called out to him. "Now, one of you others give it a try."

None of the Japanese on the sandhill moved.

Sunny Joe got up from his marksman's crouch and tried to make his desires known with sign language. Finally he took one of the Japanese by the scruff of the neck and marched him to the mark.

Remo thought the Japanese extra was going to punch Sunny Joe in the stomach. He didn't look happy to be manhandled. Remo decided that he was just touchy.

He settled back to watch, thinking that he had a lot to learn if he was going to pass as a stunt professional. Bartholomew Bronzini was surprised to see that the usual IATSE protesters were not picketing the entrance gate to the Indian-reservation location site. He wondered if it had anything to do with the upended tank and the crushed station wagon.

He horsed his Harley around the wreckage and raced up the winding road to the base camp. He didn't bother stopping in front of the production tent. He slammed the Harley through the flap and crashed into a table.

Bronzini leapt free of the bike before it slid into the tent wall. The candy-striped fabric tore with a shivery rip. But no one noticed that, least of all Jiro Isuzu.

Isuzu found himself staring into the wrathful Neapolitan visage of Bartholomew Bronzini, the Bronze Bambino. And there was nothing baby-faced about him today.

"What the hell is going on?" Bronzini thundered.

"Prease to speak in respectfur tone," Jiro said. "I am producer. "

"You're the fucking line producer," Bronzini snarled. "I want to speak to the executive producer."

"That Mr. Nishitsu. Not possible to speak to him. In Tokyo. "

"They don't have phones in Tokyo? Or doesn't he speak English either?"

"Mr. Nishitsu in secrusion. Not a young man. He visit set once camera rorr. You wirr meet him then."

"Yeah? Well, you deliver him a message for me."

"Gradry. What is message?"

"I don't like being conned."

"Not know that word."

"Lied to. You understand 'lie'?"

"Prease to exprain," Jiro Isuzu said stiffly. Bronzini noticed he was not backing down. Bronzini respected that. He lowered his voice, although still angry.

"I was just on the phone to Kurosawa."

"That is breach of protocor. You not directing this firm. "

"Here's a flash, Jiro, baby." Bronzini sneered. "Neither is Kurosawa. In fact, he never heard of Red Christmas. Not only that, but he sounded pretty fucking vague about the concept of Christmas all by itself."

"Ah, I understand now. There was a probrem. Kurosawa unabre to direct Red Christmas. Have been meaning to inform you of this unhappy act. So sorry."

"Don't 'so sorry' me. I'm sick of 'so sorry.' And I'm still waiting for that explanation."

"I was assured by Mr. Kurosawa's representative that he wourd be abre to direct firm. It appears we were misinformed. Serious breach of etiquette, for which satisfaction wirr be demanded and aporogies no doubt tendered by the responsibre persons."

"Satisfaction! My only satisfaction would have been working with Kurosawa. He's a master."

"This very regrettabre. Mr. Nishitsu himserf wirr no doubt convey his regrets to you when he arrive."

"I can hardly fucking wait," Bartholomew Bronzini said acidly. He threw up his hands. "So who is directing?" Isuzu bowed.

"I have that honor," he said.

Bronzini stopped dead. His droopy dachshund eyes narrowed, if that was possible. His wildly gesticulating hands paused in the air, as if captured in amber.

His "You?" was very tiny but very, very vehement. Jiro Isuzu took an involuntary step backward.

"Yes," he said softly.

Bartholomew Bronzini stepped up to him and leaned over. Even leaning, he towered over the Japanese. And Bronzini was not very tall.

"How many films have you directed, Jiro, baby?"

"None. "

"Then it's real sporting of you to offer to pick up the pieces." Bronzini said airily. "After all, this is only a fucking six-hundred-million-dollar epic. It's only my comeback film. It's not even important. Hell, why bother with a director at all? Why don't we all just jump in the sand and play until we get enough footage to edit down into a cartoon? Because that's what this is developing into--a fucking joke."

"I wirr do good job. I promise."

"No. No chance. I'm putting my foot down now. Production stops. We do a search. We find an experienced director. Then we start. Not before. You read me?"

"No time. Camera rorr tomorrow."

"Tomorrow is the day before Christmas Eve," Bronzini told him as if speaking to a very slow child.

"Mr. Nishitsu move up schedule."

"Let me see the shooting schedule."

"Not avairabre. So sorry."

"Fine. Excellent. It's not available. There's no shooting schedule, no director. All we have is a star, more tanks than Gorbachev, and you. Wonderful. I'm going back to the hotel and ask the head chef to help me hold my head in the oven, because I'm so blind pissed off, I'd probably screw it up."

Fists clenched, Bronzini started for the tent flap. "No," Jiro said. "We need you."

Bronzini halted. He whirled. He couldn't believe Isuzu was pressing the point. The guy had nerve. "For what?" he asked flatly.

"Talk to Marines and Air Force."

"About what?"

"Because we start earry, not arr extra arrive from Japan. We wirr ask to use American servicemen. Arso, equipment. Big parachute drop shoot tomorrow."

"I don't remember a parachute drop."

"Parachute drop in new draft. Written rast night."

"Who put that in?" Bronzini asked in a suspicious voice.

"I do so."

"Why aren't I in the least surprised, Jiro? Tell me that. Why?"

Isuzu coughed into his hand. "Script mine," he said defensively. "Mine and Mr. Nishitsu's."

"Let's not forget who wrote the first draft," Bronzini said bitterly. "You remember the pre-tank draft, the one set in Chicago?"

"You will receive proper screen credit for contribution, of course. Come. Prease to forrow me."

"You want my help, you gotta help me in return."

"Beg pardon?" Isuzu said.

"This union thing. I want it solved. By tomorrow. That's my price for my cooperation."

Jiro Isuzu hesitated. "Union dispute wirr be sorved before camera rorr. Acceptabre to you?"

Bronzini blinked. "Yeah. It is," he said, taken by surprise.

Jiro Isuzu stepped from the tent smartly. Bronzini followed him with his volcanic blue eyes. With a grunt of surprise, he wrestled his Harley up from the ground and pushed it from the tent.

On his way out, he nearly ran down Sunny Joe Roam, who was trailed by several Japanese extras and one American.

"I got them to corkscrew just like you said, Mr. Bronzini," Sunny Joe rumbled.

"Fine. Now go learn Japanese," Bronzini said as he mounted the bike and kicked the starter. "Because you're going to need it."

Roam laughed. "Once you get to know him," he whispered to Remo, "he's a great kidder. Here, let me introduce you. Bart, I want you to meet Remo. He's' our stunt American. He'll be doubling for you."

Remo put out his hand, thinking that if he was going to watch over Bronzini, he'd better swallow his dislike for the man and make friends.

"I'm a big fan," he lied.

"Then why don't I feel a breeze?" Bronzini sneered, ignoring the offered hand. He roared off after a Nishitsu production van.

"Wonder what's eating him?" Sunny Joe said.

"He always acts like his jockstrap is too tight," Remo said. "I read it in a magazine."

The base commander of the Yuma Marine Air Station was stoic when Bartholomew Bronzini stepped into his office. Jiro Isuzw hung unobtrusively behind him.

"Let me say from the start," Colonel Emile Tepperman said brusquely, "that I've never seen one of your films." Bartholomew Bronzini allowed a sheepish expression to settle over his hangdog face.

"It's not too late," he quipped. "They're all on video."

His crooked grin was not returned. He wasn't sure if that was because the Marine officer was a no-nonsense type, or that this was further proof, if any was needed, that Bartholomew Bronzini's strong suit was not standup comedy. He also wasn't sure why he was playing along with this dog-and-pony show. As angry as he felt, he was a professional. He was going to finish this movie on schedule-whatever the schedule was-and get the hell out.

"Sit down and tell me what it is you want the Corps to do for you," Colonel Tepperman suggested.

"We'd like the use of your base for a day or two," Bronzini said. "Starting tomorrow."

"Funny time to be starting a film. So close to the holidays. "

"We'll be shooting through the holidays," Bronzini told him. "Can't be helped, sir. I figure it might be less disruptive with your soldiers on leave."

"I don't have the authority to grant such permission," the colonel said slowly, eyeing Isuzu. "We have an ongoing signals intelligence operation at this base."

"Who does have the authority?" Bronzini asked coolly.

"The Pentagon. But I hardly think they'd entertain-"

"So far, we have received great cooperation from your State Department, Congress, and rocal raw authorities," Jiro Isuzu broke in urgently.

The colonel considered the Japanese's words.

"I suppose I could make a phone call," he said reluctantly. "How many days would this entail?"

"Two," Isuzu said. "Not more than three. We would also require the use of uniformed personnel."

"For what?" Colonel Tepperman asked suspiciously.

"As extras."

"You want to use my people in your movie?"

"Yes, sir," Bronzini said, catching the ball. "I did it all the time in the Grundys. Hollywood extras don't move or act like real soldiers. They don't know how to handle weapons realistically."

The colonel nodded. "I stopped going to war movies years ago. Couldn't stand the imbecilic things I saw. You know, in one film they had some idiot running around with an U. S. M-120 grenade launcher attached to a Kalashnikov rifle."