Last Call td-35

by Warren Murphy

  " 'And what is that?' asked the warlord.

  " 'The Master of Sinanju,' said Ung who then proceeded skillfully and quickly to kill the warlord. Because, Remo, you see, this was his contract from the four lords whose lands surrounded

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  those of the troublesome one. They wanted him dead, along with his bloodthirsty sons so they could be assured that they would live in peace. And this was how Ung chose to do it. The Great Ung himself had been responsible for the nightly attacks upon the warlord."

  Then Chiun was silent, still staring out the window at the plane's left wing.

  "So?" asked Remo.

  "So? What so?" said Chiun.

  "You can't stop a story like that," Remo said. "What does it mean?"

  "Is it not obvious?" asked Chiun, finally turning his hazel eyes toward Remo.

  "The only thing obvious is that the Masters of Sinanju are always mean, duplicitous men who can't be trusted," Remo said.

  "Trust you to misunderstand," Chiun said. "Sometimes I don't know why I bother. The moral of the story is that it is hard to defend yourself against an assassin when you do not know who the assassin is."

  "Chiun, that doesn't tell me a damn thing I didn't already know. We know how hard it's going to be to protect the ambassador when we don't know who the button man is."

  "You see nothing else in that story?" Chiun asked.

  "Not a damn thing," Remo said.

  "There is another moral," Chiun said.

  "Namely?"

  "Danger comes wearing no banners. And the closer it is, the more silent it will be."

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  Remo thought for a moment. "Who will watch the watchman?" he suggested.

  "Exactly," said Chiun, turning back to the window.

  "Little Father?" said Remo.

  "Yes, my son," Chiun said.

  "That story stinks."

  "One cannot describe a stone wall to a stone wall," Chiun said mildly.

  It was damp and cold when Remo and Chiun stepped into a cab in the heart of London. Water dripped from Lord Nelson, his statue black in the night, high over the black stone lions of Trafalgar Square.

  "How much to the Russian embassy?" Remo asked the cabbie, a warted man with a sweat-soaked cotton cap.

  The embassy was only nine blocks away on Dean Street, but the cabbie recognized the American accent.

  "Four pounds, lad," he said.

  "Take me to Scotland Yard," Remo said. "The taxi fraud office."

  "All right, mate. Two pounds and not a penny less. And you'll not get a better price anywhere this foul night."

  "Okay," Remo said. "Get it moving."

  To make it look good, the cab driver took them through Leicester Square and past Covent Gardens before doubling back to Dean Street.

  "Here ye be, lad," the drive said when he pulled up in front of a three-story brick building on the quiet cobblestoned street. A cluster of

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  metal piping hung down a wall of the building and a television antenna reached out awkwardly into the black nighttime sky.

  "Wait a minute, Chiun," Remo said. "You, too," he told the cabbie.

  Remo hopped out of the cab and walked up the three brick steps to the building's front door. The bell was the old-fashioned kind that required manual cranking and Remo gave it three full spins around, setting off the cluster of squawks inside.

  A man in a business suit answered the door.

  "Is this the ambassador's residence?" Remo said.

  "That is correct." The man's English was precise but had a faint trace of a European accent.

  "Well, get him out here. I want to talk to him," Remo said.

  "I'm sorry, sir, but he is not at home."

  Remo reached out his right hand and caught the man's left earlobe between his thumb and index finger.

  "Now where is he?" Remo asked. Through the partially opened door, he could see men lounging in chairs in the hallway. They were armed, because their bodies had the slight off-balance tilt caused by heavy handguns in shoulder holsters.

  The man grimaced with pain. "He's at his summer place in Waterbury, sir. Stop, please."

  Remo kept squeezing. "Where?"

  "His summer place in Waterbury. He will be there for the week."

  "Okay," Remo said.

  He released the man's ear.

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  "Is there a message, sir?" the man asked. He rubbed his ear with the palm of his hand.

  "No message," Remo said. "I'll see him when he gets back."

  The door closed quickly behind Remo as he went back to the cab and hopped inside.

  "Drive to the corner, James," he said. He leaned closed to Chiun. "It's all right. He's here."

  "How do you know?"

  "I didn't squeeze him hard enough to force out the truth," Remo said. "He told me what he was supposed to tell me. And if they're shipping people out to Waterbury, wherever that is, that means he's hiding out here. Particularly when there are a bunch of guys with guns hanging around."

  At the corner where the road hung left in a series of steps toward Greater Marlborough Street, Remo and Chiun got out.

  Remo gave the driver five American dollars.

  "That's about three pounds now," Remo said. "Hold it for twelve hours and at your usual inflation rate, it'll probably be up to five pounds. Hold it a week and you can buy a house."

  As he drove away, the driver muttered, "I'll hold it a month and buy a bomb to stick up your blinking bum, smartass Yank."

  As Chiun and Remo walked back down the rain-slicked street toward the ambassador's residence, Chiun asked, "Are we anywhere near London Bridge?"

  "No."

  "Where is it?"

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  "I think it's in Arizona. They sold the thing and somebody moved it to Arizona."

  "Did he buy the river too ?" asked Chiun.

  "Don't be silly. Of course not."

  "Why would he buy a bridge and move it to Arizona?" Chiun asked.

  "I don't know," Remo said. "Maybe he's got a water problem out there. I don't know."

  "I am always amazed by the depth and breadth of the things you do not know," Chiun said.

  Remo had an idea. Chiun did not seem interested.

  "It's a pretty good idea, Chiun," Remo said.

  Chiun said nothing. He looked around the third-floor bedroom, which they had entered by forcing a window after sliding up the outside drainpipe from the sidewalk below.

  "This is it," Remo said. "The idea."

  Chiun looked at him.

  "You ready?" Remo asked.

  Chiun sighed.

  Remo said, "See, we've got no orders on what to do with this guy except keep him alive. So what we'll do is bundle him up, take him on the plane with us back to the U.S. Then we give him to Smitty and that way nothing can happen to him. What do you think?"

  "Even the most subtle languages begin somewhere with a grunt," Chiun said.

  But Remo was not listening. He had crossed the bedroom and was peering through a crack in the door.

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  Outside was a drawing room and a man in shirtsleeves was sitting at a table playing solitaire.

  There were five other men in the room. Four of them wore the too-tight-in-the-chest, too-loose-in-the-hips blue business suits of the KGB. They took turns walking to the windows and looking outside, opening the door to the hall and glancing around, checking behind the long drapes in case someone was hiding there. And when one finished making those rounds-windows, door, drapes- another began. Windows, door, drapes. The fifth man in the room stood near the man who was playing cards, emptying the man's almost-empty ashtray, refilling his almost-full drinking glass, shuffling the cards for him after each game.

  Remo recognized the seated man as the ambassador. He had golden blond curls that framed his broad forehead and his face had the healthy tan of sun and summer and Remo wondered where he had managed to find either in London. The man wore a tapered shirt that hugged his trim bod
y. Smith had given Remo a brief folder with the photograph and background of Ambassador Semyon Begolov. It had described him as the Casanova of the world's diplomatic corps and Remo could see why.

  Begolov was asking the KGB men to play poker with him.

  "We cannot play cards with you, Excellency," one of the four KGB men said. "There was that American who came calling for you a little while ago. We must be on the alert lest he return. And someone who is playing at games is not working

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  at his duties for the motherland." He was a grim and smug twerp giving the ambassador a lesson in being a good dedicated Communist.

  Begolov played a red ten on a black jack and winked to the man who stood behind him.

  "You know, if I'm killed, it'll be the salt mine for all of you. I think I'll commit suicide. I'll shoot myself and drop the gun out the window as I'm falling to the floor. Then they'll blame it on some American CIA assassin and you'll all go to Siberia. I can do it, you know, and get away with it."

  The four KGB men looked at him, startled and shocked. Remo shook his head. The KGB had no sense of humor at all.

  "Now I can promise you that I will not do that," Begolov said.

  "But of course you would not do that," said the KGB stiff.

  "I might, though," said Begolov. "Anything is possible. However, if you were to play poker with me, well, then I would be so much in your debt that you would have my promise never to do such a thing."

  Remo left the door open a crack and went back to tell Chiun it would be some time before they could spirit Begolov away without KGB interference. Outside, he heard Begolov tell someone, probably the tall, thin-faced valet, to get the poker chips.

  It took an hour.

  Remo heard the chairs push away from the table.

  "Since you men seem to have run out of

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  money," Begolov said, "I have suddenly become tired. It is time for bed."

  "We will stand guard through the night out here, Excellency," the stiff said.

  "Please do. I would rather not have you in bed with me."

  Remo waited behind the door as Begolov entered the bedroom. He clapped a hand over the man's mouth as the door closed and whispered crisply in the ambassador's ear.

  "Don't make a sound," he said. "I'm not going to hurt you. Just listen. I'm from the United States. I know you're in danger and I've been sent to protect you. What we want is for you to sneak out with us and fly to Washington. An assassin'll never track you down there."

  He felt Begolov relax slightly.

  "Think about it," Remo said. "Here, they might get you any time. Like they did those guys in Rome and Paris. But in Washington? Not a chance. What do you say ?"

  Begolov mumbled; Remo felt the vibrations against the fingers of his hand.

  "No yelling," Remo said. "Just soft talkie-talk."

  Begolov nodded and Remo released his mouth slightly.

  "It seems an interesting idea," the ambassador said. "Anything would be better than spending much more time with these secret police types."

  Remo nodded. He did not look at Chiun who was sitting on Begolov's bed, shaking his head.

  "But I couldn't go alone," Begolov said.

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  "You sure as hell can't take all those guards," Remo said. "I'm not Pan American Airlines."

  "Just Andre," said Begolov. "My valet. He is always with me."

  Remo thought a moment. "All right. Just Andre."

  Chiun shook his head again.

  "I'll call him," Begolov said.

  Remo opened the door a few inches.

  Begolov called out, "Andre, will you come here, please?"

  Andre, the tall, thin man, stepped inside the room. He closed the door behind him, saw Chiun on the bed, then turned and saw Begolov standing with Remo.

  "This is him," Begolov shouted at the top of his voice. "The American assassin. Help, Andre."

  Andre backed off a few steps. Outside the door, Remo could hear the thud of heavy feet running toward the bedroom. Andre reached into his back pocket and drew a pistol. He took careful aim and shot Begolov between the eyes.

  Chiun sat on the bedspread, shaking his head from side to side.

  Andre pointed the gun at his own chin, but before he could squeeze the trigger, Remo let Begolov's body drop to the floor and had moved over to Andre, covering the hammer of the revolver with his own hand to prevent its firing.

  The door burst open and the four KGB men rushed in, guns in hand.

  Remo took out two of the guns with a sweeping kick. The others fired. Their slugs hit Andre.

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  "Crap," said Remo. "Nothing ever goes right. I was saving him."

  He let Andre drop and moved in among the four men who spread out into a rough diamond with Remo at the center.

  "Chiun, are you going to help or are you just going to sit there?"

  "Do not invite me into your catastrophe now," Chiun said. "It is none of my doing."

  One of the KGB men turned to cover Chiun with his automatic.

  Chiun raised his hands in surrender.

  Two others grabbed Remo's arms. The third put the gun to Remo's throat.

  "All right, American," the KGB stiff said. "Now we haff you."

  "You haff nothing," Remo said. His two hands moved out from his sides where his arms were pinned by the two agents and the backs of his elbows bent and then slammed upward. Two Russian sternums were cracked and the bones driven backwards into two Russian hearts. And as Remo did it, he was falling backward, and the KGB stiff squeezed the trigger, but Remo was not there. He was under the shot and then moving up with a stiff butt of his hand into the soft under-throat of the KGB leader who dropped like a stone.

  The man covering Chiun wheeled around and instinctively squeezed the trigger but it was too late because Remo had twisted the gun in on the man himself, and the bullet ripped into his own chest cage.

  Remo glared at Chiun.

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  "A fine lot of help you are."

  "I tried to help you before," Chiun said. His arms were folded stubbornly over his chest. "But no. You could not learn anything from the Great Master Ung. So you let the victim invite in the assassin and then you're surprised that he is the assassin. Remo, you are hopeless."

  "That's enough carping. And that's also enough of the Great Master Wang and the Greater Master Ung and the Greatest Master of them all, Master Dingdong. No more. I'm done with all that."

  There were sounds in the hall.

  Chiun was off the bed like a windblown wisp of blue smoke.

  "Unless it is your goal to murder the entire KGB," Chiun said, "we should leave."

  Remo looked out the window, "The bobbies are already down there."

  "Then go up," said Chiun.

  With Chiun only a few inches behind him, Remo went out through the window like a pistol shot and gracefully somersaulted up onto the roof, eight feet above the window ledge. The roof was steeply pitched slate, wet and slippery in the foggy London night. They moved across it as surely as if on rails.

  They went across four roofs before they came down a fire escape on Wardour Street and Remo hailed a cab to go back to the airport.

  Remo sulked in a corner of the cab and Chiun was silent too, as if in commiseration.

  "You don't have to be quiet, just because you're feeling sorry for me," Remo said.

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  "I'm not feeling sorry for you," Chiun said. "I'm thinking."

  "About what?" Remo asked.

  "What will Ruby screech when you tell her you failed?" Chiun said.

  Remo groaned.

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  CHAPTER NINE

  Mrs. Harold W. Smith was happier than she could recall having been in years.

  At the start, she had had a moment's doubt. When her husband told her he had hired a new assistant at the sanitarium and then that the assistant was a young woman, well, she worried a little about that, because after all Harold W. Smith was a m
an and he might be reaching that age when men all seem to go temporarily or permanently crazy.

  But the worry had been short-lived. She knew her husband well. And soon, she began to wonder why Harold-even in her mind, it was always Harold, never Harry or Hal-why he had not hired an assistant years before.

  Because suddenly, Harold was getting a chance to go out in the afternoons and play golf and he was coming home for dinner for the first time in all his years of running that terrible dull sanitarium, and for the first time in many years, Mrs. Smith had other things to do with her life than meet with other members of the Ladies Aid Society and roll cancer dressings.

  She had taken her cookbooks out of the shoe box in the hall closet and had begun again to en-

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  joy working in the kitchen. Her mother had once told her that a well-cooked meal was a performance, but no performance had meaning unless it had an audience. Now, for the first time in years, she had her audience back.

  Mrs. Smith was busy now pounding thin strips of veal into paper-thin slices for veal parmigiana. She glanced at the wristwatch Harold her given her as a present thirty years before. He would be home any minute. And she would put a glass of white wine in his hand and sit him in the living room with his slippers and fifteen minutes later she would have on the table a meal fit for a king. Or an emperor.

  It had all happened very quickly. Harold W. Smith had been thinking about Remo and Chiun's failure in London. He had been fed the computer printouts of the Associated Press and United Press International wire copy filed on the mass murder at the home of the Russian ambassador in London. And he had been driving mechanically, his mind on Project Omega, rushing remorselessly to its conclusion which might just be the death of the Russian premier and the start of World War III.

  Smith stopped at a red light, before turning off the main street in Rye, New York, up into the hill section of town where he lived with his wife in a modest tract house whose value had increased in the ten years he had owned it, from $27,900 to $62,500, and on which he often congratulated himself, it being the only good personal business deal he had ever made in his life.

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  He wasn't looking and then there was a man in the car, leaning over from the backseat, with a gun stuck in Smith's ribs. He spoke with an accent.