Warren Murphy: Balance of Power

"Because we're the same guy. You're black and ugly and I'm white and handsome, but except for that you couldn't tell us apart."

"You natter yourself," Jackson said. "So what's next?"

"I'm going to Hispania. Tonight."

"No, you're not," Jackson bellowed. "You're not leaving this bed for two days."

"I'm leaving now," Barney said.

"No way," Jackson said.

"Doc, I'm a little weak and maybe I can't take you. Actually, I guess I never could. But I can sure as hell wait until your back is turned, then punch the face off that nurse of yours. I'm going."

Doc sighed. "It can't wait? You're in no shape for a trip."

"You heard me talking under the drugs," Barney said. "You know what happened to me — what happened to Denise. I've got to start collecting some due bills. I can't wait any more."

Doc stood up with a sigh. "All right, you crazy bastard. Leave. I won't try to stop you."

"I'll need a couple of things too," Barney said. He picked up a note pad from the nightstand next to his bed. He tore off the top sheet and handed it to Jackson.

"Rope? What the hell kind of supply item is that?"

"I just need it," Barney said. He smiled at Doc. "Want to go on an island vacation?"

Doc snorted, his nostrils flaring. "That floating patch of parrot shit? Hispania? Shove it, pal."

He went to the doorway and stood there for a moment.

"The trouble with you, Barney, is that you don't know that you're an old man. It's all over for you. For me. We've just got to find something to keep us busy, something that doesn't make us feel too much like thieves. Something that lets us sleep at night."

"Like you," Barney said. "The first black everything. And your wife left you and your kid hates you. That's really something to live for."

"Better than nothing," Jackson said. "We're not thirty years old anymore. Neither of us," he said. "Wise up, Barney. Vengeance is a young man's game."

"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord," Barney recited. He smiled at Doc, who hit the side of the door with the heel of his hand.

"I'll have your goddam supplies where you want them," Doc said.

Barney hurt.

He hurt walking out of the clinic, his clothes baggy and outsized on his now-bony frame. He hurt getting into the taxi that Doc Jackson had called and was waiting out front. He hurt as he stood across the street from the gates of the Hispanian Embassy, preparing his mind for what he must do. The thumb of his right hand pressed reassuringly against the steel handle of the scalpel he had filched from an instrument tray in Doc Jackson's clinic.

Barney breathed. He concentrated. He waited.

And then Denise came to him again, a shadow in a lifetime of shadows. She spoke to him deep within the recesses of his mind.

"You have come back to me, my husband," she said. "I am proud of you this day."

And then Barney didn't hurt any more.

He walked across the street, toward the guard who was standing outside the locked gates, his rifle at port arms across his chest.

The guard stepped in front of him at the gate and pushed at Barney with the stock of the rifle. Barney's hand was out of his pocket, scalpel tightly in his fingers, and slashing across the man's throat

Before the man hit the ground, Barney had the gate key from his pocket and let himself into the embassy grounds.

Another guard inside the front door tried to stop Barney. He reached out his hands to grab the lapels of Barney's jacket.

As he grabbed, Barney's hands moved up between his and caught the man's throat. Without his even thinking, Barney's well-practiced fingers moved into the right position, his thumbs pressing hard inward on the Adam's apple. He felt the man's hands loosen and Barney kept up the pressure until he heard a cracking sound, then a gurgle, and the man slumped slowly to the floor.

Daniels looked down at the body. How did he feel about having killed again? He looked at his hands. He smiled.

He felt good and he was just getting started. There were a lot of bills to be paid.

He removed the gun from the hip holster of the guard and walked down the long hall. At the end was Estomago's office, the door closed. Barney placed the heel of his foot near the lock and kicked hard. The door flew open.

Estomago sat alone at his mahogany desk. When he saw Barney, his face showed, first, surprise. Then terror.

"It's been a long time coming, you piece of garbage," Barney said in gutter Spanish.

"Wha..."

"You have a bill to pay for the death of my honored wife, Denise Saravena. And for the boy you killed for his help to me. I have come to execute you and send you to hell."

Estomago lunged for his desk drawer, for the warm reassuring magnum that he kept in there. But he was too slow and too late.

Before he could put his hand around the gun, Barney was leaning across the desk, the barrel of the .38 police special pressed into Estomago's forehead, directly between his eyes.

"It is not going to be that easy," Barney said. With his other hand, he slapped the desk drawer shut, then he yanked Estomago roughly to his feet and shoved him toward the door.

"Where are you taking me?" Estomago squeaked, his eyes round and glassy with fright.

"To the park," Barney said. "We finish as we began. With the ritual of the bat."

The telephone rang in Smith's office. He brushed an imperceptible moustache of moisture from his upper lip as he picked up the instrument.

Remo said, "Listen, this is all some kind of bullshit about nuclear weapons in Hispania being aimed at the U.S."

"Who is behind it?" Smith asked.

"Estomago," Remo said.

"Find Estomago," Smith said coldly. "Find out if an attack is planned. If so, when. And then remove Estomago."

"Got it," Remo said. "You know something?"

"What?" asked Smith.

"This whole deal is all screwy as a can of worms," Remo said, "twisting and turning. I don't really understand it all."

"You don't have to," Smith said. "It's enough that I do."

"Gloria admitted that Daniels had been drugged by them in Hispania."

"Oh," Smith said. "What else did she say?"

"She said she could fly," Remo said.

"Could she?"

"No," Remo said as he hung up.

When Remo and Chiun reached the Hispanian embassy, a row of ambulances was lined up in front of the building.

Remo flashed a state department card and asked a police officer: "What's going on?"

"Don't know. Whole staff is dead or injured. Estomago's secretary is screaming some shit about a madman who tore in and took the ambassador, hollering something about a bat in the park."

Remo turned to Chiun and shrugged his shoulders. Making sure no one else could hear, Chiun whispered to Remo, "It is the ritual of the bat. A way of dueling practiced by many of the Spanish tongue. Daniels is no common killer."

"Daniels is in Doc Jackson's clinic," Remo said.

"Not any longer," Chiun said. "We will go to whatever park is nearest. When you find this Estomucko person, you will find Daniels."

The clearing in the wooded area near one of the smaller ponds in Central Park bore a resemblance to the Hispanian camp from which the young boy had helped Barney escape. It was nearly the same size. The shape of the clearing was identical. It was all back in Barney's head now, all the memories, the murders, the tortures, the jungle, the young bride who had gone out to buy her man coffee and never came back.

And Estomago, this savage, who had killed her and Barney's unborn child.

Doc Jackson waited for Daniels and Estomago in the clearing, the bag of supplies on the ground beside him.

"You've been followed," Jackson said, as Barney shoved Estomago into the dirt. "His goons are right behind you."