Warren Murphy - The Last Alchemist

"We shall hang their heads from the Folcroft walls, and speak their pain as your glory forever," Chiun had said to Smith.

"What's happening, little father?" asked Remo.

"Nothing," said Chiun. "Don't forget to wash your nostrils. You breathe through them."

"I always wash my nostrils. Who are the people we're supposed to do in?"

"Nobody."

"But you said we'd hang heads on walls. Whose heads?"

"I don't know what Smith talks about. He's mad."

"Who?"

"No one. Some people who have surrounded the fortress he calls a sanitarium. Now don't forget your nostrils. "

"They have Folcroft surrounded? The whole thing can go under."

"There are other lunatics if you prefer."

femo moved to the phone. His legs were not quite working right and he had to force them ahead in a crude sort of walk, something he had not done since before training. He got the motel switchboard and had them place a call. He didn't know if the security codes would work on this open line, but if they took Smith and Folcroft, everything else was over anyway.

Smith answered right away. "Open line," said Remo.

"Doesn't matter. They're closing in."

"How much time?"

"Don't know. They're holding off until they can make sure I won't be able to get out. I am going to have to go into a destruct as soon as that happens, you know. In that case we won't be seeing each other, and you can terminate your service."

"Don't give up yet, Smitty. Don't take that pill I know you have with you."

"I'll have to. I can't be taken. The whole country will be compromised."

"Just hold on. I'm coming up. There's a small airport in Rye, isn't there?"

"Yes. Right near here."

"Use those magnificent computers and get me clearance on some plane that will get me up there fast. Hold on. I'm coming."

"How are you? I thought you were dead."

"Get me the plane," said Remo. He only had to wait thirty seconds before Smith had gotten him a clearance on a private government jet out of Dulles Airport.

"Where are you going?" said Chiun. "You were lying in bed helpless moments ago."

''I'm helping Smitty. And you should too. You always tell me how Sinanju has never lost an emperor. Well, he's an emperor."

"No, he is not. He is the appointed head of CURE, an organization set up to protect your country by doing things the government wouldn't dare get caught doing."

"So you do know," yelled Remo. "So you do understand. What was going on all those years with the Emperor Smith business?"

Remo found his slacks and shoes and put them on, and walked to the door.

"He's not an emperor. And besides, it is his wish to die and release you. I couldn't help overhearing what he said."

"Especially since your ear was next to mine."

"You can't go there in that condition. You're no better than a normal human being. Maybe one of their prizefighters. You could get killed."

"I'm going."

"Then I must go with you. With luck Smith will kill himself and then we can all leave, as he suggested. He did say it. Those were his words. One must obey."

"Now, one must obey," said Remo angrily.

In the cab on the way to the airport, Chiun reminded Remo how to breathe and massaged his lungs through his back. The cabbie wondered what they were doing back there. Obviously the younger man was sick. He offered to help Remo out of the back seat, hoping for a larger tip. His response was obliterated by the scream of the jet engines. The cabdriver covered his ears. So did Remo. Chiun of course could equalize the pressure within his head, as Remo used to be able to do. Chiun shook his head.

"I'll go and save mad Smith, and you stay here."

"No. I'm going. Somehow I feel he may find himself unsaved if you go alone."

On the plane they sat behind the pilot. Chiun suggested they might want to see the coast of Florida before they went to Rye, New York.

They landed within an hour. Remo grabbed another cab. Chiun joined him, making sure the driver idled his motor a few moments because, as Chiun said, he did not want Remo breathing fumes from unidled motors. "Never mind him. Get going," said Remo. "How much do you charge per meter travel?"

"It's a regular fare to the sanitarium."

"I never pay regular fares. They are unreliable," said Chiun.

"Don't worry. He'll pay. Get going," said Remo.

"He said he wouldn't."

"I'll pay," said Remo. And to Chiun: "You never give up, do you?"

Chiun raised his hands in a motion of the supplication of the innocent. His eyes widened in curiosity, as if the very suggestion of deviousness lacerated his purest of souls.

"If Emperor Smith is dead by the time we get there, it is not our fault."

"No, but it's your hope," said Remo.

"Is it a sin to want only the best for you and your skills? Is it a crime?"

Remo didn't answer. He forced his breathing. Somehow the more he breathed, the more harm that had been caused by the uranium-tainted gold eased out of his body. He practiced short finger moves, positions of his body. To the cabdriver, the passenger looked vaguely as though he itched. Remo was getting ready.

At the high brick walls of Folcroft Sanitarium, Remo saw the problem instantly. Two boats were bobbing in the sound, holding a position. They did not move with the other boat traffic but appeared to have anchored to fish where no one else was fishing. Large tractor trailers blocked both entrances to the building and men dressed as movers waited in the backs of the open vans. If they had carried screwdrivers they would have moved with lightness. But they didn't. They all moved as though they had weapons; their steps were the movements of men who maneuvered around their pieces instead of with them. No one, no matter how experienced with arms, ever moved as though the weapon was not there. Remo had not believed it in his early training; he had tested Chiun's ability to detect a concealed weapon again and again. He could have sworn that when he was just a policeman, before he was trained, he himself was seldom conscious of the gun he carried. But Chiun had said that he had always known it was there even if his mind didn't.

Remo didn't understand what Chiun was talking about until he had actually seen it in action, when he knew someone was carrying a weapon by the way the body moved, even when the person had become so used to it he forgot it was there.

Now Remo left the cab. The problem was how could he do what he knew he had to do with what he had left. He looked up to the high corner mirror windows. He hoped Smith had seen him, hoped he had not taken that pill to remove himself and the danger of exposing the organization.

He waved but did not know if there was anyone up there alive to wave back.

"You're going to die," said Chiun. "You're not ready."

"There are some things worth dying for, Chiun."

"What idiot whiteness is that? Did I train you to get killed like some white hero, like some kamikaze Japanese? There is nothing worth dying for. Who tells you this craziness?"

Chiun got out of the cab too. The driver wanted to be paid. This in itself was a task, because Chiun did not surrender money lightly. He did not believe in paying. He pulled a silk coin purse from the sleeve of his kimono. When he opened it, dust rose from its folds. "That's it?" said the driver.

"To the penny," said Chiun. Chiun also did not believe in tipping.

Four large men, dressed as movers, ambled over to Remo.

"We're moving this place today, buddy. You got to get out of here."

"Wait a minute," said Remo.

"There's no waiting. You gotta get out of here."

"Have you paid?" said Remo, turning to Chiun. He felt one of the men try to lift him. He wasn't sure what the best response was, actually how much he had to work with. So he pretended the man's arm was actually a much stronger steel beam. He needn't have. The large arm went sailing down the road like a forward pass. He had enough control.