Warren Murphy - Identity Crisis

"I gotta check this out."

"Lippincott Savings Bank will confirm the movement of funds," said Smith. "Grand Cayman Trust will not, of course, without serving papers and a protracted legal struggle. You do not have the luxury of time. Whether or not you wish to trace the funds back to FEMA and embroil yourself in a high-security exposure, remains up to you. But let me urge you in the strongest terms possible to have your highest superior make the call."

Big Dick Brull licked his lips. "It's that sensitive, huh?"

"The true nature of Folcroft Sanitarium is of such cosmic importance to America's continued survival that in the past people have been killed to protect it."

Brull pushed the knot of his tie from side to side. "All right," he said. "I'll look into it. But no promises. Except this one-if anything you say doesn't pan out, you are in very big tax trouble. And that's the worst kind of trouble there is."

"And if it does, it may be you who are in trouble."

"We'll see about that," Brull said.

When he stormed off, the sound of his heels on the flooring was not very confident.

Harold Smith allowed himself a tight smile. It sat on his face like a lemon slice.

Perhaps the long-dead President who had chosen him to head CURE had been mistaken. When inspired, Harold W. Smith did possess something like an imagination.

BIG DICK BRULL WAS sweating bullets as he bowled down the corridor of Folcroft's psychiatric wing.

FEMA. Christ in a sarong! He never dreamed this was a FEMA operation. It was beyond the worst-case scenario. You could theoretically audit the President, or any member of Congress, and create less of a stink. He had unwittingly gotten the service tangled up in an interagency squabble that would make the fuss with the DEA look like a battle between the DAR and the PTA.

So Folcroft was a FEMA hardsite. God knows what really went on here. From the sound of it, they were going to be on the front lines in the reconstruction phase of the postnuke era. For all Dick Brull knew, Folcroft would be the headquarters for IRS itself after the fallout settled.

First he would have to take care of his own personal fallout.

On the way down to the elevator, Brull paused to take another look at the cell where Uncle Sam Beasley was warehoused. For the first time he noticed the door was actually marked Beasley.

Uncle Sam was slumped in his seat, staring at the cartoon-covered walls. His one good eye looked sleepy. As Brull watched, Beasley started. He had caught himself nodding off. Beasley shook his head as if to clear the cobwebs out of it. One hand lifted to his forehead and revealed a smooth, scarred stump.

"Damn," Big Dick Brull muttered to himself. "Sure hope that isn't his drawing hand."

Brull paused at the next cell door. The plate under the window read Purcell.

This was one of the padded rubber rooms. It was bare except for a low cot and the television set high in the wall where it couldn't be pulled down. The set was off.

On the cot lay what looked at first glance to be an anorexic woman. She was staring at the ceiling, her long corn-silk hair spilling over the pillow. Her arms were wrapped around her thin torso by the bound sleeves of a canvas straitjacket.

The figure lay so completely still and unmoving that Brull wondered if she were dead.

That was when he noticed she was a he. No breasts. No soft lines. And it looked like no brain, either.

Brull continued on, wearing the look of a man who had been handed a hot potato and no one to pass it on to.

Chapter 31

The Master of Sinanju insisted on being let off by the main entrance to Folcroft Sanitarium.

"You're crazy," said Remo, pulling over to the side of the lone access road. "The IRS will land on us like a ton of bricks."

"And we will land back."

"They'll seize the car. They already tried it once."

"It is time you got a new car," Chiun sniffed.

"New? I trade this in every six months. You know that."

"I meant a vehicle of quality and worth. Not an American garbage can on wheels."

"Take it up with me if we're still employed at the end of all this."

"Next time buy Korean."

"I wouldn't drive a Korean car off a cliff," said Remo, opening the door. "Now, are you getting out or not?"

"Why must I walk?"

"Because you can't fly, and neither can I. Let's go. Not that I'm looking forward to telling Smith we came up empty trying to find his wife."

Chiun emerged from the passenger side. They began walking. "You will explain that to him, not I."

"You gonna back me up?"

"Yes. I will confirm your failure if that is your wish."

"You didn't find her, either."

"That is not my fault."

"Then it's not mine, either."

"That will be for Emperor Smith to judge. But you will explain all this to him because technically you are not employed by him. You can afford to incur his displeasure. As the sole support of the House of Sinanju, I cannot."

They came to the gate. Remo got up against one of the brick gateposts and peered around it cautiously.

"The coast looks clear," he said.

"What about Fortress Folcroft?" Chiun asked.

"That's what I meant."

"And I meant the cretins who sit in boats with their guns."

"The DEA? I took care of them."

They entered through the gateposts.

Remo's eyes went skyward. He noticed that the trio of circling birds were flying lower, their great wings rising and dipping in languorous waves. It seemed impossible that the air could support them. Their wings were barely moving.

"Looks like they're back," Remo muttered.

Chiun frowned. "They seem familiar to my eyes."

"I was just thinking the same thing."

"They are not sea gulls."

"Sure aren't vultures, either."

"They resemble vultures."

"Maybe they're condors."

"Perhaps they are not birds at all," said Chiun, frowning quizzically.

"They gotta be birds. What could they be except birds?"

"I do not know, but they are an ill omen."

"No argument there," said Remo. "Come on. Let's go in the assassin's entrance."

They reached the freight entrance unseen, and the moment they entered the basement the Master of Sinanju repeated a question that had seldom left his papery lips all night long.

"Where is my gold?"

"Safe as soap."

"That is no answer."

"If it were my gold, I'd say it was the best answer there is. "

"Pah!"

They floated up the steps to the first floor and took a chance on the elevator. It was resting on the first floor, and their sharp hearing told them it was unoccupied.

The doors rolled open at the touch of the call button.

They rode it to the third floor, and Remo stuck his head out, looking both ways before he signaled for Chiun to follow.

The psychiatric wing was quiet. No doctors seemed to be on the floor.

As they passed Jeremiah Purcell's cell, Remo's face hardened.

"He remains a prisoner?" Chiun asked, noting Remo's stare.

Remo nodded. "I wish he were dead."

"Beware the wish that comes true."

"I don't believe that crap about our destinies being entwined."

Chiun sniffed derisively and said nothing.

Uncle Sam Beasley was still visible through his celldoor window when they passed him.

"I'm sure glad he's on ice again," said Remo.

Chiun nodded sagely. "Agreed."

"I'd wring Purcell's neck with pleasure, but I couldn't bring myself to take out Uncle Sam himself."

When they reached Harold Smith's cell, Remo knocked twice.

Smith had been lying on his cot, staring at the ceiling in a posture that was almost identical to Jeremiah Purcell's. At the sound of Remo's knock, he started and rolled off his cot, fumbling for his glasses.

"Remo! " said Smith when he came to the window.