Warren Murphy - Chinese Puzzle

"And he hates them."

"And he would still take their money."

"You're going to get me killed. You haven't succeeded yet. But you'll make it."

"Are you taking the assignment?"

Remo was silent for a moment as more young, well-formed breasts set over well-formed butts, topped by well formed faces paraded out in some symmetrical dance step to the brassy blaring of the trumpets.

"Well?" said Smith.

They had taken the human body, the beautiful human body, and packaged it in tinsel and lights and noise and made the parading of it obscene. They had aimed at the exact bottom of human taste, and were right on target. Was this garbage what he was supposed to give his life for?

Or maybe it was freedom of speech? Was he supposed to stand up and salute for that? He didn't particularly want to listen to most of the things said anyway. Jerry Rubin, Abbie Hoffman, the Rev. Mclntyre?

What was so valuable about freedom of speech? It just was not worth his life to let them mouth off. And the constitution? That was just a bunch of rigmarole that he had never quite trusted.

He was-and this was Remo's secret-willing to live for CURE but not to die for it. Dying was stupid. That's why they gave people uniforms to do it in and played music. You never had to march people into a bedroom or to a fine dinner.

That was why the Irish had such great fighting songs and great singers. Like, what was his name, the singer with the too loud amplifiers in that club on third Avenue. Brian Anthony. He could make you want to march with his songs. Which is why, as any intelligence man knew, the IRA couldn't compare to the Mau Mau or any other terrorist group, let alone the Viet Cong. The Irish saw the nobility in dying. So they died.

Brian Anthony and his big happy voice and here Remo was listening to this blare when his heart could be soaring with the boys in green. That was what dying was good for. Singing about, and nothing else.

"Well?" said Smith again.

"Chiun's out," said Remo.

"But you need an interpreter."

"Get another."

"He's already been cleared. The Chinese intelligence people have his description and yours as Secret Service men."

"Great. You really take precautions, don't you?"

"Well? Will you take this assignment?"

"Aren't you going to tell me that I can refuse and no one will think any the worse of me?"

"Don't be absurd."

Remo saw a couple from Seneca Falls, New York that he had seen before with their children. This was their night of sin, their two weeks of living placed gem-like in the month setting of their lives. Or was it really the other way around, the two weeks only reinforcing their real enjoyment? What difference did it make? They could have children, they could have a home, and for Remo Williams there would never be children or a home, because too much time and money and risk had gone into producing him. And then he realized that this was the first time Smith had ever asked-asked instead of ordered- him to take an assignment. And for Smith to do that, the assignment meant something, perhaps to those people from Seneca Falls. Perhaps to their children yet to be born.

"Okay," said Remo.

"Good," said Dr. Smith. "You don't know how close this nation is to peace."

Remo smiled. It was a sad smile, a smile of oh-world-you-put-me-in-the-electric-chair.

"Did I say something funny?"

"Yes. World peace."

"You think world peace is funny?"

"I think world peace is impossible. I think you're funny. I think I'm funny. Come now. I'll take you to your flight."

"Why?" asked Smith.

"So you get back alive. You've just been set up for a kill, sweetheart."

CHAPTER SIX

"How do you know I've been set up?" Smith asked as their taxi sped down the multi-laned highway to San Juan Airport.

"How're the kids?"

"The kids? What do ... ? Oh."

Remo could see the driver's neck tense. He kept whistling the same dull tune he had begun as soon as they had left the Nacional. He undoubtedly thought the whistling would show he was relaxed and carefree and not at all part of the set-up Remo had seen form, first in the casino, and then in the nightclub. They had all telegraphed, just as the driver was telegraphing now. With them, it had been never letting their eyes settle on Remo or Smith, while continuing to move as though Remo and Smith were at one of the loci of an ellipse. It was a feel Chiun had taught Remo's senses. Remo practiced in department stores by picking up objects and holding them, until he sensed that feel from a manager or a sales clerk. The difficult part wasn't really sensing when you were the object of scrutiny. It was knowing when you were not.

The driver whistled away in his classic telegraph. The same tune with the same pitch over and over. He had dislocated his thoughts from the sound; it was the only way he could reproduce the same sound over and over. His neck was red with dark potholes like tiny moon craters, filled with perspiration and grime. His hair was heavily greased and combed back in rigid black sticks that looked like the framework of a germ nursery.

The new aluminium highway lights cut through the humidity like underwater flashlights. It was the Caribbean and it was a wonder that the poured concrete foundations of the large American hotels did not go mouldy along with the will of the people.

"We'll wait," Dr. Smith said.

"No, that's all right," Remo said. "The car's safe."

"But I thought. . . ." said Smith, glancing at the driver.

"He's all right," Remo said. "He's a dead man."

"I still feel uncomfortable. What if you should miss? Well, all right. We are compromised now. The fact that I am followed shows we are known. I'm not sure how much these people know, but I do not believe it is everything. If you understand."

The driver's head had begun to twitch, but he said nothing, intimating that he was not listening to the conversation behind him. His hand reached slowly toward the microphone of the two-way radio Remo had spotted on entering the taxi. He had been sure it was off.

Remo leaned forward over the seat. "Please don't do that," he said sweetly, "or I'll have to tear your arm out of its socket."

"Wha?" said the cab driver. "You crazy or something. I gotta phone in to the dispatcher."

"Just make the turnoff to the side road without telling anyone. Your friends will follow you."

"Hey, listen, Mister. I don't want trouble. But if you want it, you can have it."

His black eyes darted to the mirror, then back to the road. Remo smiled into the mirror and saw the man ease his right hand away from the radio to his belt. A weapon.

It was the new sort of taxi now being introduced into New York City with a bullet proof glass slide that the driver can move into place by pressing a button near his door. The doors locked from the front, and only a little microphone and a money slot connected the driver and his passengers.

Remo saw the driver's knee move and touch the hidden switch. The bullet proof shield slid quickly up into place. The locks clicked on the rear doors.

The bullet proof window had one flaw. It ran inside a metal track.

"I can't hear you too well," Remo said, and with his fingers peeled off the aluminium track from the body of the cab. The window dropped and Remo carefully set it at Smith's feet.

Remo leaned forward again. "Look, fella," he asked, "can you drive with just your left hand?"

"Yeah," said the driver. "See?" And with his right hand, he brandished a snub-nosed .38 calibre pistol.

Smith appeared mildly interested.

"That's nice," said Remo, as he grasped the driver's shoulder in his right hand, insinuating his thumb into the mass of bunched muscle and nerve. The driver lost control of his arm, then his hand, then his fingers, and they opened, dropping the gun quietly onto the rubber-matted floor.