Remo folded his arms defiantly. "Great. I'm getting near the end."
The seat-belt sign winked off, and the stewardess came up the aisle. Remo noticed that she was wearing no shoes. When she stopped at his seat and leaned down to whisper in his ears, he understood why.
"Go suck your own toes," he told her.
When the Master of Sinanju returned from his inspection of the galley facilities, Remo told him, "The stewardess invited me to suck her toes."
"Before Rome fell, its women insisted upon being on top."
"There's nothing wrong with being on top."
"If these unwholesome ideas take root, the House will have to look to Persia in the next century for its gold. Do you still possess the coins?"
"Sure."
"Let me see them."
Remo produced the coins, one from each pocket so they wouldn't jingle and give him away.
"What do they tell you, Remo?" asked Chiun.
"Spend it while the currency is still good?"
"You are hopeless."
Remo grinned. "But still on top."
Over a mountainous section of the country, Remo happened to look down and saw in life something he had seen many times in books and magazines.
"That looks like Meteor Crater," he said to Chiun. The Master of Sinanju looked out, sniffed and said, "I see a great hole surrounded by desolation."
Remo pulled from his wallet a square of paper that had been folded many times. It was sealed in plastic with Scotch tape. He undid the tape and unfolded the paper.
The black grease-pencil sketch featured a sad-eyed young woman with long dark hair, framing a handsome oval face. A police sketch artist had made it, based on Remo's description after his mother's spirit had appeared to him the first time months before. Ever since, Remo had carried it everywhere he went.
"She said my father sometimes lived among the stars and sometimes where the great star fell," Remo said softly.
"I see a hole in the ground. No star."
Remo hit the overhead stewardess-call button. Every stewardess on the plane was suddenly beside him, straightening hair and uniform skirts and moistening lipsticked mouths.
"What state are we over?" he asked the assembled stewardess crew.
"Suck my toes till they're wrinkled, and I'll tell you," offered one.
That particular stewardess was pushed to the rear and all but sat upon by the others.
"Arizona," the rest chorused helpfully.
"Thank you," said Remo, dismissing the flight crew. When they refused to dismiss, he carefully folded the drawing and replaced it in his wallet, taking his time and trying to look absorbed.
They were still there when he looked up. "Was that your mother?" one asked.
"How'd you know?" Remo asked, genuinely surprised.
"She has your eyes. Anyone could see that." Hearing that, the Master of Sinanju suddenly flew out of his seat like an angry hen and shooed the stewardesses to the back of the plane.
When he returned to his seat to receive the gratitude of his pupil, Remo had all but fallen asleep in his seat. The Master of Sinanju didn't wake him. But he did sit very close, with one ear cocked to catch any syllables Remo might speak in sleep.
RED POPPIES FILLED a valley where herons swooped. There was a clear, crystalline light that was everywhere but seemed to have no source. It was not sunlight. There was no sun in the vaulting blue sky.
Striding through the poppies, lifting his skirted legs in high, purposeful steps came a small-boned Korean. "Chiun?" Remo blurted.
But as the figure drew near, Remo saw that it was not Chiun. The man resembled Chiun. He was old, his face seamed and wrinkled and papery, his eyes the same clear, ageless hazel.
The figure walked up to Remo and stopped abruptly. No particle of warmth came over his face as he looked Remo up and down. "You are very tall."
"I'll take that as a compliment."
"I have never seen a man so tall. Or so pale."
"That's how we grow where I come from. Tall and pale."
"Is the blood in your veins as red as mine?"
"Yep," Remo said warily.
"Your blood and my blood. They are the same blood?"
"Same color anyway."
"I cannot fight one of my own blood."
"Glad to hear it," Remo said dryly, not letting his guard down.
"I have something for you."
"Yeah?"
And reaching behind his back, the old Korean grabbed the jeweled hilt of a sword that Remo could have sworn was not there a moment before.
When it came into the clear light, Remo saw that it was the Sword of Sinanju.
"I give custody of this sword to you as a token of recognition that the blood in your veins is the same as the blood flowing through mine."
And the sword suddenly reversed in the old Korean's hands so the jeweled hilt was offered to Remo.
When Remo hesitated, the old Korean urged, "Take it."
"No," said Remo. "Why not?"
"I haven't earned it yet."
A warm light came into the old Korean's eyes. "That is an excellent answer. But I ask you to hold it for me because it is very heavy and I am very old."
"All right," said Remo, reaching out for the hilt. The moment he laid hands upon it, he knew he had made a mistake. Something coldly sharp pierced the pad of his thumb.
"Ah!" said Remo. "Damn it."
The other's voice turned cold and contemptuous. "You have disgraced the blood in your veins. For you do not know the lesson of Cho."
Remo looked at the blood coming from his thumb. There was a drop of it on the barb in the sword's hilt, which had sprung out the moment he applied pressure. "That had better not have been poisoned."
"It was not. But it might have been."
"You Cho?"
"No. I am Kojing."
And Master Kojing suddenly turned on his heel and stormed back into the field of red poppies.
"Kojing! Wait! Don't you have something to tell me?"
"Yes. Do not bleed over my poppies."
REMO WOKE up.
"Damn," he said.
"What is it?" asked Chiun. "I met Kojing."
"Yes?"
"He handed me the Sword of Sinanju hilt first, and I fell for it."
"I told you the lesson of Cho," Chiun hissed.
"A zillion years ago. I'm lucky to remember last Tuesday the way you're running my tail off."
Frowning, Remo looked out the window at the deeply ridged red mountains of Arizona and said to himself, "I wonder what Kojing was going to tell me?"
"Do not bleed all over the seat," sniffed Chiun.
"What did you say?"
And when he looked at his left hand, Remo saw blood coming out of his thumb. "You stuck me while I was sleeping," Remo accused.
"You have disgraced me before my great-great-great-grandfather."
"That how far back Kojing goes?"
"No, but I am in my end days and cannot spend an entire afternoon repeating the word great simply because there is no term in English to describe Kojing's relationship to me."
Remo checked the seatback pouch for something to wipe his hand and, finding nothing suitable, reluctantly hit the call button.
The first stewardess took one look at Remo's hand and offered to kiss it to make it better. Remo declined. The second bit her own hand and offered to become Remo's blood sister. Remo declined that honor, as well.
In the end he let them take turns sucking his thumb, but only after they swore they weren't Anne Rice fans.
Chapter 22
An unfortunate series of misunderstandings had forced underworld figure Vinnie "Three Dogs" Cerebrini to go underground.
Vinnie had been a soldier in the D'Ambrosia crime family, out of San Francisco. For his capo he had killed many times. No one questioned his loyalty. No one questioned his manhood. No one.
Until the Frank "the Fence" Feely hit.
Vinnie had gotten caught on camera coming out of
an Alameda warehouse five minutes after 1:00 a.m. on the night a low-life welcher named Frank Feely died. That was unfortunate, because the established time of death according to the coronor's report was 1:05 in the morning of the twenty-fifth of February. The security camera recorded both date and time. Those were the breaks.
No problem there. The D'Ambrosia family had lawyers-"Three Dogs," Don Silvio D'Ambrosia had assured him after word went out that he was a wanted man, "you will surrender. And we will get you out this very day."
"But they got me dead-bang."
It was an unfortunate choice of words. But Vinnie didn't know then. No one knew it then.
"We have lawyers, Vincenzo. Turn yourself in. We will go your bail, and the trial will end in a very good acquittal," the capo had promised.
"But what about my dogs? Who will take care of them?"
Don Silvio had slapped him lightly on the cheek. It was an affectionate slap. After all, had not Vinnie Cerebrini killed over thirty men for him? "That is the job of your wife. You should have married a long time ago. Like I been tellin' you,"
"I'll get around to it. You know I've been busy. What with whacking this guy and clipping that one, I don't got time for broads like I should."
Another unfortunate remark, but that was life. "Bring them here. If they are your dogs, I am sure they are good dogs." And Don Silvio leaned across the kitchen table conspiratorially. "They do not piddle on the rug, do they?"
Vinnie made the sign of the cross and said, "On my mother's life, they are housebroke, Don Silvio."
"Then they are welcome in my house."
And so grateful was Vinnie "Three Dogs" that he leaned over and gave his don a very long kiss. Which was noticed.
So Vinnie Cerebrini had turned himself in, made bail and returned to his capo the next day. "The trial date's not till spring."
"Good. In the meantime, you gotta take these curs back."
"Sure. What-they been a problem for you?"
"They alla time sniffing my crotch."
"Yeah. They do that."
"What kinda queer dogs you got, Vinnie? They sniff crotches?"
"Some dogs do that. I'm sorry."
Don Silvio eyed Vinnie dubiously. "They sniff your crotch?"
Vinnie shrugged sheepishly. "All the time. Hey, what can I do? I love those dogs like brothers."
"Just get these fairy mutts outta my house. They give me the creeps. And I want you married by year's end. Capisce?"
Vinnie "Three Dogs" didn't think much of the conversation, but already the rumors were starting.
The trial went well, as promised. Evidence got suppressed, witnesses skipped town or found themselves inextricably caught up in various civic-improvement projects for which the D'Ambrosia family supplied the concrete.
"We got 'em on the run," his lawyer had confided at the end of week three.
"I just wish we could get that damn security tape quashed," Vinnie hissed back.
The lawyer shrugged. "Hey, it's circumstantial. Purely circumstantial. They can't convict on that alone."
And they hadn't. The tape was shown, and his lawyer knocked it down hard on cross-examination.
"I was taking a leak in that warehouse," Vince said solemnly from the stand. "It was dark. How was I to know the poor stiff was laying there with his mouth open?"
"But you do admit to urinating in the deceased's mouth?" the prosecuter asked when it was his turn to question the accused.
"Listen, if my piss-excuse me, Your Honor-was on that poor guy, I profoundly apologize to the family. I did not know. I swear on my mother's grave."
"But your fingerprints were found in his coat. How do you explain that?"
"Hadda wipe my hands on something. It was the only cloth in the entire joint."
In the end Vinnie pleaded no contest to the reduced charge of abusing a corpse. He was all smiles as he stepped out of the San Francisco courthouse while the press surged and jostled around.
That's when the linguini hit the propeller.
"Mr. Cerebrini, what do you have to say to these new allegations about your personal life?"
"There's ain't no such thing as the Mafia, honey. Don't you fall for that old bull."
"I was referring to the rumors of your homosexuality-"
"My which?"
"The victim was gay. Didn't you know that?"
"I didn't do nothin' to the guy," said Vinnie in an injured tone. "All I did was piss in his dead mouth. Is that a crime?"
Another reporter jumped in. "According to the security tape, you left the warehouse with your fly open."
"I told you I was taking a freaking leak. I forgot to zip up. Coulda happened to any poor mook."
"Is it true you are not-and never have been-married?"
"What are you-my godfather? I'll get around to it, okay?"
"Did you ever have relations with the dead man before he died?"
"I never knew the guy. I'm telling you. All I did was whack-I mean piss-on him. I got a weak bladder. It coulda happened to anybody. It just happened to happen to me."
And as the mob lawyer shoved him into the waiting Lincoln, Vinnie "Three Dogs" Cerebrini muttered, "What the fuck kinda rap they trying to hang on me now?"
In the car the phone rang. "Yeah?" barked Vinnie. "Three Dogs, I hear you are a free man."
"And I have you to thank, Don Silvio."
"Good. Now, Vinnnie. We been together a long time. You can tell me anything and everything. Am I right?"
"Yes, sir."
"These ugly rumors, V'mnie. There is no truth to this?"
"I swear before God, I am no fag."
"You married yet?"
"No," Vinnie said in a small voice.
"Engaged?"
"No."
"And you still got the queer dogs?"
"They are not queer! They happen to be African ridgebacks. They used to be used for running down escaped slaves. They are the biggest, meanest, most masculine dogs ever bred. Ask anyone."
"You like masculine dogs, huh, Vinnie?"
"I didn't mean it like that."
"You like to watch them walking around with their great big balls jigging between their furry butts, am I right?"
"I do not look at them that way."
"They lick your face?"
"Sometimes," Three Dogs admitted.
"You know what else they lick, Three Dogs? Their nethers. Their lower regions. You like tongues to lick you there, too?"
"Never. I swear. My dogs know better than to lick me there. They are moral and honorable dogs."
"Have 'em clipped."
"Shoot my own dogs?"
"No, I mean have their balls clipped. I don't want you looking at those dogs that way no more."
"I fix them dogs, they'll turn into girls."
"You don't fix them dogs, and I'll have you clipped. And I don't want no rumors around my family. I take pride in my family. We are family men. Fuck the dogs and find a wife. And another thing. I don't want you peeing on the guys you clip no more. It's unsanitary."
"It's just my way of sending them off. You know. It don't mean nothing."
"The papers are calling you an abuser of corpses. I do not want this word abuser to be connected with members of my family."
"It's all circumstantial. It don't mean nothing, Don Silvio."
"From now on you don't whip it out except in front of ceramic or lipstick. Capisce?"
"I understand," Vinnie said miserably.
When he got home, the dogs were all over him, sniffing and pawing his best suit.
"Cut that out, you three! You'll get me killed. Down, Numbnuts. Get offa me, Bonehead. You too, Fatface."
When they finally settled down, Vinnie tried to explain the facts of being mob dogs to them. "Now listen, you guys," said Vinnie, getting down on his knees on the floor. "We gotta talk about our futures together."
The dogs began licking his face.
"Don't do this to me! I'm trying to break the news to you gently,"
>
In the end he couldn't do it.
"You guys are men. Just like me. It's not right to lop off a man's balls even if he is a dog."
And so Vinnie "Three Dogs" Cerebrini made the most difficult decision of his life. He chose his dogs over his capo.
Unfortunately it wasn't that hard a choice. The rumors that he was gay were all over San Francisco. If he married triplets, he could never live them down.
Vinnie "Three Dogs" Cerebrini would have sued if he could. After all, it was slander what they were saying about him, the rat bastards. The trouble was you really couldn't sue La Cosa Nostra. Even if you were a soldier in La Cosa Nostra, suing your godfather was just not done.
The slander had gotten so out of control, Vinnie was forced to drop out of sight. Way out of sight.
Bangor, Maine, was as far out of sight of San Francisco as you could get without taking up residence in a cave. Vinnie had bought a tract of land and a mountain of old used tires. He dug the hole himself, and with his own hands and the sledgehammer he had once used to split open the skull of Salvatore "Sonny" Slobone pounded dirt into each tire until they weighed three hundred pounds each.
In the piny Maine woods he built himself the hideaway deluxe of all time. It was impregnable because it was completely underground. The buried sides and roof were made from stacks of earth-reinforced tires. Rifle bullets couldn't penetrate it. Hand grenades detonated harmlessly over it. Katushya rockets only turned the graded topsoil.
There Vinnie settled down with his dogs and his savings and figured the D'Ambrosia family would never find him here.
And for a solid year they hadn't. No one had.
Then one day in July the buried motion-sensor array picked up an intruder. Punching up his security cameras, Vinnie saw a man approaching on foot. He was lean and neat with his hair cut on the short side.
"Oh, man, what is this shit?" Vinnie moaned.
In his gray chinos and T-shirt, the guy looked like a poster boy for AIDS awareness.
"Those cocksucker fucking rumors musta spread like wildfire. Now I got the local fags sniffing around, looking for action."
Vinnie hit the loudspeaker system. "You! Get offa my property. You want people to talk?"
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