Warren Murphy: Shooting Schedule

"I have called you here," Nemuro Nishitsu said in his throaty but subdued voice, "because you are all right thinkers. "

Heads bowed in acknowledgment.

"I am of the generation that restored Japan to the economic state that it enjoyed in the world. I remember the old days. I do not cling to them. But neither will I forget them.

"You are the generation that made Japan strong again. I salute your industriousness. For my generation was the generation that allowed itself to be humbled by American military power. Your generation is the generation that will humble America economically."

Nemuro Nishitsu paused, his head quivering with age.

"In two months," he continued, "it will be the first anniversary of the emperor's passing. What a gift to his spirit it would be if we were to erase forever the shame of our military defeat. I have devised a way to do this. It will summon no retaliation on our shores, for like you, I would do nothing to bring the terrible nuclear fist down on our people again.

"Give me your faith, as I gave my emperor my faith when I was as young as you men. Give me your trust, and I will hand America a military defeat so shameful they will dare not admit it to the world."

Nemuro Nishitsu looked upon the sea of faces before him. They were set, resolute. There was neither joy nor fear evident in their features. But he knew from their eyes that they were with him. He also knew that they had doubts, though they were unwilling to voice them.

"I have given much thought to my plan. I have selected a man who will assist us in implementing it. You know his name. You will recognize his face. Some of you have met him, for he has worked as a Nishitsu spokesman in the past."

Nemuro Nishitsu pointed his cane at a wiry young man standing off to one side of a massive projection screen.

"Jiro," he said.

The Japanese addressed as Jiro quickly hit a switch. The lights dimmed. In the rear a slide projector blinked on, throwing a dusty beam over the heads of the squatting assemblage.

And over the head of Nemuro Nishitsu appeared a still image of a bare-chested muscular man with flowing black hair held in place by a headband. He cradled a portable Nuclear missile in his arms. Above his head, in English, was a legend in red block letters:

BRONZINI IS GRUNDY

The stony faces of the Japanese reacted instantly. They broke into smiles of recognition. Some clapped, a few whistled.

And through the crowd raced a name. It was repeated over and over again until it became a chant. "Grundy! Grundy! Grundy!" they shouted.

And Nemuro Nishitsu smiled. All around the world, in palaces and jungle huts, people universally reacted that way. The Americans would be no different.

Chapter 1

When it was all over, after all the bodies had been buried and the last foreign soldiers had been driven from what was, for three days in December, Occupied Arizona, world public opinion was in agreement on only one thing.

Bartholomew Bronzini was not to blame.

The United States Senate passed a formal resolution declaring Bronzini's innocence. The President of the United States awarded Bronzini a posthumous Congressional Medal of Honor, as well as burial in Arlington National Cemetery. This despite the fact that Bronzini had never served in any branch of the United States Armed Services, served had ever held public office.

Various groups protested the Arlington burial offer, but the President hung tough. He knew the controversy would blow over. Unless someone recovered Bronzini's remains, which no one ever did.

On the day that began the last week of his life, Bartholomew Bronzini sent his Harley Davidson blasting through the gates of Dwarf-Star Studios with the wind tearing at his long black ponytail and a plastic-covered script tucked into his black leather jacket.

He was not stopped at the gate. The guard knew his face. Everyone knew his face. At one time or another, it had been on every supermarket tabloid cover, magazine, and billboard in the world.

Everyone knew Bartholomew Bronzini. Yet no one did. The receptionist asked for his autograph at the front desk. Bronzini grunted amiably when she slid a mustardstained paper napkin across the desk.

"Got anything white?" he asked in his flat, slightly nasal voice.

The receptionist jumped up from her chair and slid out of her panties.

"White enough for you, Mr. Bronzini?" she asked brightly.

"They'll do," he said, signing his name on the warm cloth.

"Make it out to Karen." Bronzini paused.

"That you?"

"No, my girlfriend. Really."

Bronzini automatically added a "For Karen" above his signature. He passed the underpants back to the receptionist with a shy smile but absolutely no readable emotion in his brown eyes.

"I hope your girlfriend has a sense of humor," he said as the receptionist read the inscription with dazzled gray eyes.

"What girlfriend?" she asked dazedly.

"Never mind," Bronzini sighed. They never admitted it was for them. Only kids did that. Sometimes Bartholomew Bronzini thought that his only true fans were children. Especially these days.

"Mind telling Bernie I'm here?" he prompted. He had to snap his fingers to get her attention again.

"Yes, yes, of course, Mr. Bronzini," she said, coming out of her trance. She picked up the phone and hit a button. "He's here, Mr. Kornflake."

The receptionist looked up. "Go right in, Mr. Bronzini. They're ready for you now. '

Bartholomew Bronzini pulled the script from his jacket as he walked down the fern-decorated corridor. The ferns were festooned with expensive Christmas ornaments. Despite being handcrafted of silver and gold, they looked tacky, Bronzini thought. And there was nothing tackier than Christmas in Southern California.

He was, Bronzini thought for not the first time in his long career, a long way from Philadelphia. Back home, the snow didn't scratch your skin.

Bronzini didn't knock before he entered the sumptuous Dwarf-Star Studios conference room. No one ever expected Bartholomew Bronzini to knock. Or to speak fluent French, or to know his salad fork from a shellfish fork, or do anything a civilized person would do. His image had been indelibly burned into the consciousness of the world, and nothing he could say or do would ever change that image. If he could have cured cancer, they would have whispered that Bronzini had hired someone to cure cancer just to hog the credit. Yet if he started swinging from the chandelier, no one would have batted an eye.

Every head came up when he entered the room. Every eye was on him as he paused at the open door. Bartholomew Bronzini was nervous, but no one would guess that. Their preconceived ideas would reinterpret everything he said or did to fit their image of him.

"Hi," he said quietly. That was all. The men in the room would read a world of meaning into that one word.

"Bart, baby," one of them said, rushing to his feet to guide Bronzini to the only empty chair, as if he was too stupid to sit down without assistance. "Glad you could make it. Take a seat."

"Thanks." Bronzini took his time walking to one end of the conference table. Every eye followed him.

"I think you know everyone,' the man at the opposite end of the table said in a too-bright voice. He was Bernie Kornflake, the new president of Dwarf-Star Studios. He looked about nineteen years old. Bronzini swept the faces at the table with his sullen, heavylidded eyes. A birth accident had damaged his facial nerves so that only yearly plastic surgery kept them from closing completely. Women found them fascinating, and men, threatening.

Bronzini noticed that every one of the executives was under twenty-five. Their faces were as unlined and devoid of character as Play-Doh fresh from the can. Their hair was moussed into a variety of rock-garden shapes, and red suspenders showed from under their unbuttoned Armani coats. The business had come to this. Fetuses in expensive silk suits.