Warren Murphy: Lost Yesterday

“I will not,” said Remo.

“You would make me, your aged teacher, do the labors of servants?”

“You could carry the boat with them in it. Who are you kidding?” said Remo, glancing down into the boat and counting the fourteen black rubber bags.

“Are you sure we aren't trusting Chiun too much?” asked Beatrice.

“I'm sure. Do you know what he told me? He said I should be the only one with the formula, otherwise someone else would have my power.”

And then with deep emotion Rubin Dolomo told Chiun:

“I have learned to appreciate hiring only the professional assassin. I realize now that I have made mistakes with amateurs. I will use only you, Master of Sinanju.”

“See, Remo. Everything has ended happily.”

Chiun, of course, did not carry the bags. Instead, several Powies managed to lug the rubber bags to the north end of the island, where they placed them neatly on their racks in the rubber-lined concrete bunker.

“Your Majesties should inspect your major weapon to see that it is perfectly placed,” said Chiun, leading the Dolomos into the bunker.

“Enough,” said Remo. “I'm leaving.”

“Not yet.”

“Good-bye, Little Father. I can't stomach this,” said Remo.

“Would you wait one minute and let me walk you to the beach? Or is this how we say good-bye after these many years?” Chiun followed Remo.

From inside the rubber-lined concrete bunker came Rubin's voice:

“All here, Chiun. Now help us out.”

Chiun looked at Remo and smiled.

“I say, Chiun,” called out Beatrice. “We're down here and we need help to get out.”

“We have a choice now, son who has little faith in his teacher-father. We can leave them there forever, as mindless babies without memories, or...”

“We can make them live with each other in a Bahamian jail,” said Remo.

“Of course, let him live without his pills and her without her continuous boyfriends, only him.”

“It's truly a just end,” said Remo.

“Yes, but we would have to walk them across the island and then boat them to Eleuthera and then to Nassau,” said Chiun.

“To hell with just ends,” said Remo, who hopped down into the bunker, told the Dolomos what their fate was going to be so they could enjoy the horror of it for a moment, and then carefully emptied a bag of their own solution over them. He shut the door, covered the bunker with sand, and collected the Powies to help clean up the mess they had made on Harbor Island. The Bahamian police arrived to supervise arrests of the troublemakers, as the Powies were now called.

But in Washington, Harold W. Smith did not know things had gone quite this well.

When he entered the President's office for his half-hour check to see if any of the Dolomo's followers had somehow gotten through the defenses, the President asked him what he was doing there.

The President apparently was deep in discussion of a problem of nuclear disposal with his advisers.

“I'm here to give you your pill, sir, as you have requested by letter. You know how forgetful you are, sir,” said Smith.

“What?” said the President, somewhat annoyed that he had been interrupted.

“Your pill. You wrote me a note. Here it is,” said Smith, taking the small case from his pocket and removing the white pill from it. He placed it on the President's desk and divided it with a pocketknife.

“What are you doing with that?”

“Preparing it for you, sir. As you asked. Here's the note,” said Smith. And he placed the note in the President's hand.

“That's for if I'm stricken. I was just overloaded now. I get like that sometimes.”

“Often?”

“Sure. I have so much on my mind I forget some things. Every leader has that problem.”

“I think we have just avoided a terrible mistake. I don't think the Powies ever got to you. I think we were so distraught over how they could do so much damage that we thought they had gotten through to you at the first lapse of memory.”

“I think you're right,” said the President.

“It explains why we found no traces of it in the Oval Office or anywhere else around you. I'd better get out of here. I don't belong here, sir,” said Smith.

By the time he returned to headquarters at Folcroft Sanitarium in Rye, New York, Smith had a call waiting from Remo. They had taken care of the remaining formula. It was sealed forever with the Dolomos. And there was an even better report from Agriculture Department scientists, one that relieved Smith more than anything he had heard that day. While the formula did not break down easily in the bloodstream, which was unfortunate for those stricken, it did most certainly break down when left alone in the open air. It was so volatile that when it combined with the trace elements in the air over a long period, it became as harmless as salad dressing.

But when Smith tried to reach out to thank Chiun, Chiun was not available. He had taken with him from Harbor Island the most valuable item of any fraud cult: its mailing list.

And to those devotees who had been informed in one of the regular messages from the leader that they would now also learn Sinanju, there was a message from the Master of Sinanju.

It read:

“Dear followers: There are reasons you seek happiness, and intellectual power, and good feelings about yourself. This is not unnatural for you. There are very good reasons why you feel inadequate. You are. Do not pursue Sinanju, because you are definitely not good enough. And as a helpful hint, may I suggest you save your money on improvement programs. The world is made of many kinds of people. Some good. Some bad. Some adequate. And some like yourself, who will never be good enough for anything.”

Chiun liked the letter. He thought it had a ring to it.

“It will never raise any money,” said Remo.

“And I won't have to associate with these inferiors either,” said Chiun. “Of course, they did show me more trust than you, who I have treated like a son lo these many years.”

And Chiun said that all could be forgiven if Remo would sign the history scroll stating he had Korean ancestry.

It was the least Remo could do for Chiun, who had saved Western civilization. Remo said he would think about it.