Warren Murphy: Look Into My Eyes

"Could it be none of the above?" asked Smith. "Might."

"I would say three would be a real risk, and two would be a minor risk. Everyone knows that one would not do it, although almost everyone who isn't aware of nuclear strategy thinks one would do it."

"Yes, one is a warning."

"No. One is an accident. Two is a warning. "

"And I always thought one was a warning."

"No, Miss Ashford. I would estimate two was a warning. One could be an accident, and in a secret agreement made years ago between the Russian premier and an American president, each gave the other to understand that they were not going to go to nuclear war over a possible accident. I believe the Russian said: 'We're not going to destroy the Communist party for a few hundred thousand deaths.' "

"And the American president?"

"He said that while the loss of an American city would mean a staggering loss to America, he probably could explain it away to a nation numbed by fear, that it was an accident. "

"Funny, I always thought that one would at least be a message," said Vassily, remembering what he had tried in Omaha. Now he saw he would have needed at least two.

"But three, aimed directly at nuclear installations, would be more than a message. It would be war."

"But what about three unimportant cities?" asked Vassily.

"That I would estimate would be the gray area of nuclear war."

"I'd like to use the submarines."

"We have an admiral here tonight, Miss Ashford, but as you know, firing America's missiles is not an easy thing. There are safeguards upon safeguards."

"Well, Harold, work it out," said Vassily.

"Can I go to the bathroom first?" was Harold W. Smith's last question before he set the enormous network of CURE to subverting the nuclear safeguards of his nation.

It was perhaps one of the great hotwires of all time that Smith performed that evening. He first tickled out the defenses at the Strategic Air Command, and at the Naval Nuclear Strike Force.

The tickling was really seeing the defenses come into action, those passwords around the country that had to be sent in order to arm the nuclear arsenal. As a backup there had to be people physically placing keys into triggers, but Harold Smith, always an ingenious boy as well as a good boy, figured out that these keys used the same electronic codes. In other words, the physical backups were ordered by another set of electronics.

Everywhere Smith's computer encountered a code word, it marked a block. The organized mind, which Smith acutely had, understood that the way to solve a problem was not to batter one's head at an obstacle. An obstacle was just that. An obstacle. So when he came to a password defense he labeled it and moved on. Within twenty-five minutes he had a network of obstacles laid before him on his computer screen, but they also told him exactly how America's nuclear defense system could be used.

There were always two codes, each requiring the other to kick on with a yes before it went further. And they followed two distinct paths, as clear as telephone poles. Two parallel poles that were required to work in unison or the missiles would not be fired. They were the President and the military. Both had to agree along their lines of command or there would be no launch.

There had to be one high-ranking officer on one line to start the command and the President on the other. All Smith had to do was break the top password along both these lines and the rest of the orders would follow like a switch on a lamp. Bingo. He was going to light up the world.

The news was so good, he had to run to tell Miss Ashford. He almost skipped into her office.

"Harold," he heard her say. "Don't be ashamed to boast. Boasting is fine. Lets me know what I have. I think you've done good work. But we don't have to break any code at all. We have the admiral we need right here, at the party, and the President is arriving soon."

Vassily waved the happy old man out of the room with the one reward Smith had asked for.

"Sure I'll give you an A. I'll give you an A-plus. But only when the first three bombs drop. Hey, can you change one of those targets to be outside Russia? Maybe we can do Paris. Nice cloud over the Eiffel Tower and everything. Make sure you don't come anywhere near Dulsk. Not within a hundred miles. And send in the admiral for a little talk."

The talk lasted less than fifty-two seconds, whereupon he got the password from an admiral who would not even tell it to his father but would tell it to his subordinate when he believed a nuclear war had started.

Vassily removed that idea from the admiral before sending him down to the party, and then sent the first code word for what Smith had called first parallel path.

"All we need now is the President's code word to launch," came back Smith's voice over the line to his computer room in the Fifth Avenue duplex that combined two entire floors of a building. It was down the street from where Vassily had started his weight-loss/quit-smoking/improve-your-sex-life clinic.

"In a few minutes," said Vassily.

"I wonder if I might go to the bathroom again," came the voice of his computer operator.

"You've been," said Vassily, reminding himself that just because he was the most powerful man in the world didn't mean he should be the easiest to get along with. He was going to reduce the old man to one BM a day and that was it.

He walked to the large picture window. He could feel the vibrations from the dancing below. It was a very loud party, but there wasn't a neighbor important enough to complain. He looked out over Central Park. All of this might be a nuclear cinder before morning. Risk. It was a wonderful stimulant.

It made life livable. Down on Fifth Avenue he saw the motorcycle policemen lead the long dark limousine. It was the President of the United States. He wondered if he could spit down from the window and hit him. But he knew too many Secret Servicemen might panic and he could be dead. They were all over the place protecting the President, but Vassily knew they were no match for him. He had the best protection in the world.

A man moved through the Secret Servicemen like a ballet dancer through a subway crowd. They couldn't stop him. He got to the President. He pointed up toward the party. The President looked up. The man looked up. It was Vassily's only friend he met in America, Remo, the one who saved him from the Russian commandos.

The President nodded. The President turned back to his car, almost pushing his beautiful wife ahead of him. The motorcade sped off with sirens blaring, and the other password was going with him.

"Chiun. Chiun," called Vassily. "Get up here." Chiun was there so silently and so quickly, Vassily could have sworn he had been waiting all along.

"Get me the President. I want him here now. He's running away."

"Are we finally going to make Smith president, O Great Wang?"

"Just get him, and if you see Remo again, kill him. He's got to be killed. You must kill him. He's in my way. He has pushed friendship too far."

But something strange happened. The old Oriental with the great powers began to tremble, the beginning of the word "No" was coming out of his mouth, wrestled by his own mind back into his throat, and the very energy coming from the body began to vibrate the plaster off the ceiling.

"All right, all right already," yelled Vassily. "He's not Remo, but your worst enemy wanting to do battle. Is that easier? Do I have to go back to the stuff I used on you back at Sornica? All right, I've done it. I'm Mr. Easy. The guy who looks and acts like Remo is your archenemy. Now kill him in peace. Or he'll kill you. But on one condition, the same I gave you at Sornica."

Chiun listened and felt a relief of such sweetness as he had never felt before in his life. He did not know why he was relieved, but the world was now good again, devoid of the awful conflict that had racked his soul.