Warren Murphy: The End of the Beginning

"Four stars or better!" Remo hollered as the CURE director left the room. Once they were alone, he turned to the Master of Sinanju. "Okay, care to tell me what or who knocked me out like a light down in D.C.?"

"No," Chiun said blandly. "Would you care to tell me why you embarrassed me in front of Smith's puppet ruler with that shoddy performance?"

"Nope," Remo said. He folded his arms and inhaled deeply. "Guess that makes us even."

At this Chiun cackled. "Even? Heh-heh-heh. You even with me? That makes us even. Heh-heh-heh. Even."

Remo felt his good mood dissipate. "Okay, jolly joker, how long till we are even?"

Chiun placed cup and saucer on the floor. He tipped his head in serious concentration.

"For an exceptional Master, trained from birth, thirty to forty years. For you, there are not numbers high enough to measure without inventing new ones." He shook his head, cackling once more as he rose to his feet. "That makes us even. You and I. Heh-heh-heh."

"If you think I'm putting up with abuse from you for thirty years, you're crazy," Remo mumbled as the Master of Sinanju disappeared, still chuckling, inside his room.

"You should be so lucky," a squeaky voice called back.

EPILOGUE

He brought the boy to the Caribbean, to the French-Dutch island of Saint Martin. There was a safe place there, a ruined castle on a craggy black rock called Devil's Mountain.

The castle had been built by a merchant from Holland two hundred years before.

The natives were superstitious. When they saw the young boy with the blond hair and the pale blue eyes, they assumed the ghost of the merchant had returned to haunt his castle.

They called the boy the Dutchman.

Nuihc didn't care what name they gave him. The boy didn't deserve a name. He was nothing more than a tool. An instrument that would be used to further his own ambitions.

The fallen Master of Sinanju stood on the stone balcony. Behind him, doors opened on the great hall. Yellow fire leaped high in the six-foot fireplace.

After events in America, Nuihc realized this would take longer than he had anticipated. His uncle was as strong as ever. Even stronger, perhaps, than he was before.

Training Nuihc hadn't restored the vitality that Chiun had lost after the death of his son. But for some reason, all these years later, on a distant shore, a spark had been ignited in the old man's eyes. Nuihc didn't know what had put it there, but he saw it clearly in Washington.

It was plain to him now that his uncle, like the traditions of Sinanju, would not be easy to kill.

As Nuihc looked up at the warm night sky, he heard a soft sobbing behind him.

Time.

It took time to bleed a man's soul. But revenge had been brewing in his family for thousands of years. Nuihc had the time.

More sobbing.

He glanced over his shoulder.

The Dutchman sat crying on the floor of the great hall. His face was slick with sweat, reflecting yellow firelight. Above him was a beautiful native girl of about fifteen. She had caught the boy's eye during a trip into town. The secret smile they had exchanged wasn't lost on Nuihc.

The girl was chained to the hearth. A rag was stuffed deep in her throat. Firelight glinted in her terrified eyes.

The boy wept at her feet.

He was obviously having trouble with the evening's exercises. The boy required instruction. "Soon," Nuihc vowed to the stars.

Turning his back on the warm night, he disappeared inside the castle.