Warren Murphy: High Priestess

"We Mongols have always followed the Bunji Lama. This is well-known, White Tiger."

Chiun said, "Remo must be forgiven, for he is an orphan and raised by virgins."

"You Mongols are Buddhists?" Remo blurted.

"Of course. This is well-known, too."

"I thought Buddhists were pacifists."

Kula laughed roughly. "Tibetan Buddhists are pacifists. Not Mongol Buddhists. We are fighting Buddhists, proud to slay and conquer in the name of the Buddha of Infinite Compassion, knowing that those who die will be reincarnated anyway, so that Mongols can conquer and slay them all over again. It is a very good system. There is always something to do."

"In times past, Mongols were the protectors of Tibet," said Lobsang Drom.

"So why are you running around looking for the Bunji Lama instead of fighting to free Tibet?" wondered Remo.

"If Mongolia enters the fighting openly, there will be war between Mongolia and China. The Chinese would lose, of course. They only outnumber us five hundred soldiers to one Mongol horseman. But it will take time to defeat China. Better if the Chinese are demoralized by a Tibetan people led by the new Bunji Lama. Then when we strike, they will surrender without resistance, for they will know if they cannot defeat peaceful Tibetans, what chance have they against the new Golden Horde?"

"Fighting Buddhists, huh?" said Remo.

"We also worship ancestors," said Kula.

"Ancestor worship is a good thing," spoke Chiun.

"Do you worship your ancestors?" Kula asked Remo.

"No," said Remo.

Remo found himself the recipient of thin almond gazes that might have accused him of breaking wind loudly.

"He is an orphan," Chiun explained. "He does not know his ancestors and therefore cannot worship them. If he knew who they were, he would make offerings to them nightly."

"It is a sad thing to be an orphan," clucked Kula.

"And Christian, too," murmured Lobsang Drom, shaking his shaved head.

Remo rolled his eyes and prayed to his nameless ancestors for midnight to hurry up.

AT MIDNIGHT the Master of Sinanju closed his eyes and began to chant in Korean. Neither Kula nor Lobsang Drom spoke Korean, so only Remo knew that Chiun was heaping abuse, recriminations and dire warnings of what pain would be inflicted on him if he again spoke out of turn and jeopardized Chiun's promised roomful of gold.

Remo sat quietly, not saying anything when the old Korean began making passes in the air before the TV with his right hand while surreptitiously activating the remote control hidden in the folds of his lap with the left.

The set winked on.

Lobsang Drom gasped in surprise. Kula's eyes narrowed, and he leaned forward on his mat.

"We will behold the Bunji Lama with our own eyes," he hissed.

Remo bit his tongue.

Happy-sounding music emerged from the speaker while the set warmed up. The brightening colors on the screen resolved into a free-spirited black woman dancing in and out of a free-floating graphic that read, "The Poopi Silverfish Show."

"Is that a sorcerer?" asked Lobsang Drom.

"It is Poopi Silverfish," said Chiun. "A famous wizard of this land."

"Her skin is as black as a corpse, and her hair hangs in mats," Lobsang muttered. "I have never see the like of it."

"Wasn't her show cancelled last year?" Remo asked.

"I told you this was a magic television," said Chiun.

"Or a rerun," grumbled Remo.

The credits faded, and the happy music segued to wind chimes. The picture became a darkened living room where Poopi Silverfish lounged on an overstuffed couch catercorner with a settee on which a redheaded figure sat sprawled.

The camera moved in closer.

And the voice of the Master of Sinanju lifted to proclaim, "Behold! Behold the long-lost Bunji Lama. "

Gasps came from the lips of Lobsang Drom and Kula the Mongol.

"It cannot be!" the Tibetan gasped.

"If you do not trust your eyes, Tibetan, then listen well with your ears."

"So, tell me," Poopi Silverfish was saying in a voice like a smoky cat's purr, "exactly how many lives have you lived?"

And the answer brought the eyes bugging out of Lobsang Drom's head.

"If you count the Moovian princess and the time I shared a Siamese soul with Mae West, thirty-two. I don't know why I keep coming back to this world, Poopi, but there must be a good reason."

"Maybe there's something you really need to do on this earth that you can't remember," suggested Poopi.

"That's exactly what my last guru told me!"

The Most Holy Lobsang Drom Rinpoche wrenched his stricken eyes from the screen. "Master of Sinanju," he said thickly, "how can this be?"

Chapter 5

"Wait a minute!" Remo blurted. "You know who that is? Squirrelly Chicane! She's a professional fruitcake."

Kula demanded, "You know this flame-haired woman, White Tiger?"

"Not personally. She's an actress. She also writes books about her life."

"More than one book?"

Remo shrugged. "She's got in her head that she's lived more than one life. And people eat it up."

Kula nodded somberly. "She is spreading the Buddha's teaching. That is a sign she has found the true path, even though she has had the misfortune to be born white."

Lobsang Drom wore a drained expression. "But she is a female," he said. "The Bunji Lama would not come back as a woman"

"Do not question the oracle," said the Master of Sinanju in a loud voice. "Watch and learn. Listen and believe, for the words spoken by the flame-haired incarnation of the Buddha to come will convince you with their sweet grace and forcefulness."

"Laying it on a little thick, aren't you, Little Father?" whispered Remo.

The Master of Sinanju reached over to take his incorrigible pupil by the hand and squeezed a wrist nerve that would test his ability to withstand pain.

Remo gritted his teeth and tried to pull away. Chiun exerted greater force. Remo squeezed his eyes shut but emitted no dishonorable sounds of surrender.

When he was satisfied that his willful white pupil would neither succumb to the overwhelming temptation to shout out his pain nor speak out of turn after it abated, Chiun released him.

Thereafter Remo sat quietly and watched the screen.

"I never heard of a Siamese soul," said Poopi Silverfish, shaking her head so her dreadlocks seemed to rattle. With her high cheekbones, very white teeth and animated eyes, she resembled a human marionette swayed by the tug of unseen strings.

"I may be the first human being in history to evolve a Siamese soul," said Squirrelly Chicane. "I think it's because my soul was searching for something important and knew it needed two bodies to do it."

"Do you know what it was, this important thing?"

"No. And frankly, Poopi, I'm becoming worried. I turn-dare I say it-sixty pretty soon. My Mae West body is dead, and now this one is getting a little frayed around the edges."

"Oh, don't say that! You look great. And you're still the best hoofer in the business."

"Hoofer?" said Kula.

Remo swallowed the urge to crack that the speaker was half-yak.

Squirrelly Chicane beamed, and mischievous gleams came into her blue eyes. "Why, thank you for saying so, Poopi. But on the cosmic scale, I have only a twinkling of time left in this body. I'm afraid I'll have to wait for my next incarnation and I start the search all over again. Whatever it is."

"It is the Bunji Lama," breathed Kula.

"No, no," said Lobsang, shaking his head stubbornly. "It cannot be. She is white."

Kula frowned. "The age is correct. By her own words, she has seen nearly sixty yak-foaling seasons. The last Bunji Lama has been missing for that span. And her hair is like a flame."

"No, no, it cannot be. The Bunji Lama is fated to lead Tibet to greatness. That person is communing with a creature that might have climbed out of Hell itself."