Warren Murphy: Master's Challenge

The Dutchman released the birds. They flew like bullets in a straight line toward Emrys. Halfway to their target, the birds changed into hurtling balls of white light. Emrys swatted at them with his knife, but their speed was faster than anything he'd even seen. The glowing spheres shot into his eyes, burning them to blackened holes. The Welshman screamed once, then fell, his hands covering his head while his body convulsed in pain.

"Da!" Griffith shouted in the cave. He stood up, his hands slapping against his eyes. "My da! He's hurt."

Jilda put her arms around him.

"Let me go!" My da needs me now!" He strained toward the open mouth of the cave.

Jilda breathed deeply. "I'm going," she said.

Chiun nodded, rising.

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"We shall all go," H'si T'ang said.

They found Emrys still writhing in pain, the ground where he had fallen kicked up from the movement of his legs.

"Da!" Griffith called, running to him.

H'si T'ang pried open the big man's hands to touch the ugly black wounds where his eyes had been.

Remo came over the hill. "I heard someone," he said. Then he saw Emrys. "Oh, God." The boy had his small arms wrapped around his father.

"Can't you do something?" Remo asked H'si T'ang.

"It is too late," the old man said. "He is dying. There is nothing to be done."

"Jilda . . . Jilda," Emrys whispered, barely able to move his lips.

Jilda knelt beside him. "I am here, my friend."

The Welshman struggled to speak. "Take care of my son," he said. Sweat poured off him. "Take him back home. See that he's safe, 1 beg you." He clutched her hand.

"I promise," Jilda said. "May the fields be sweet where you walk."

"Griffith ..."

"Yes, Da, yes," the boy sobbed.

"None of your weeping. You are to take my place, so your job is to stay well and strong."

The boy shook. "Oh, Da, I did it. Your sight's gone because of me. That day in the tree, when you fell-"

"No!" The big man's voice rose. "My blindness was not your doing."

"You fell when you tried to save me," the boy said miserably.

"It wasn't that way, son. I fell, but it was not the rock I hit that ruined my sight. My eyes were going bad long before that, but I said nothing about it. I could not admit

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my own weakness, don't you know. I let you take the blame, to save my pride."

"No, Da-"

"Yes." His hand groped out to grip the boy's arm. "And you carried the burden like a man. A better man than I ever was. Griffith . . ." He was heaving now with the effort of breathing.

The boy pressed his head against his father's and whispered in his ear. "I can hear you, Da."

"Trust your spirits. They've made you fine. Ask them to forgive me, if you can." He kissed his son.

As gently as he could, Remo lifted up the giant and walked with him in his arms. For a moment, Emrys managed a thin smile. "You're not half bad for a Chinee," he said. His head fell back. The cave was in sight.

"He's dead," Remo said quietly.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Mildred Pensoitte was asleep. Smith had peeked into her room to be sure of it, then had closed the door tightly, and now he sat at a small desk in the far corner of the living room. He kept his back toward the front windows. If Mildred should awaken and come into the room, he could see her and hang up the telephone before she noticed anything.

He unlocked his attache case with the small brass key he kept pinned to the fabric of an inside jacket pocket. From the case, he took a small round device that looked, in shape, like a two-inch-thick slab cut from a piece of liverwurst. It was an invention of his own design. On the top of the device were keys, marked with letters and numbers, and when he telephoned into the computers at Folcroft, he could spell out questions, and they would answer back, by electronic signals, depressing the printing keys, and the answer would be recorded on micro-thin paper stored inside the unit.

The phone was a pushbutton telephone with several lines. It didn't matter. Even if Mildred should pick up an

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extension in her bedroom, all she would hear would be electronic tones.

Smith dialed the local access code for the Folcroft computers. He had recently improved the design of his telephone system so now it was possible to reach his computers through a local call from anywhere in the United States. It gave him the freedom to use a borrowed telephone and make sure there would be no record on the monthly bill of what number had been called. He knew, sadly, that he would never be able to get Remo to use the system. It required remembering numbers, and Remo had no ability and even less desire to remember anything. It had taken him five years to learn the 800 area code number he now used, and Smith thought it was better to leave things alone.

He dialed CURE'S local number. The telephone buzzed, and then there was silence as the computers activated the telephone line. They made no sound, and Smith knew he had exactly fifteen seconds to press in his personal identification code before the line went dead.

He held the small round unit over the telephone mouthpiece and depressed the buttons M-C-3-1-9. There was an answering beep through the earpiece. The computer had received the code and was awaiting Smith's instructions.

He tapped out on the small hand-held sender: "LATEST REPORT ON INTERCEPTED TRANSMISSIONS."

He could feel the unit in his hand whir as different electronic circuits were being triggered, then a small sheet of heat-sensitive paper emerged from one end of the unit. When the whirring stopped, he read it.

"LATEST TRANSMISSION INTERCEPTED AT 6 P.M. READS 'THIS IS B. I WILL KILL PRESIDENT IMMEDIATELY UPON HIS RETURN.' "

B? Smith thought. But B was dead. Robin Feldmar, Birdie, had been dead several hours before 6 P.M.

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He tapped into the telephone: "ASSUMED B WAS ROBIN FELDMAR. FELDMAR DIED AT 4 P.M. TODAY. CONCLUSION?"

The machine responded instantly: "CONCLUSION, FELDMAR NOT B, B HAS PERSONAL ACCESS TO COMPUTER MESSAGE SYSTEM. B SENT MESSAGE PERSONALLY."

Smith asked: "COULD MAIN COMPUTER SYSTEM BE LOCATED AT DU LAC COLLEGE, MINNESOTA?"

The machine waited several minutes before responding.

"AFFIRMATIVE. CONCLUSION CHECKED. COMPUTER IS AT DU LAC. CAN BE REACHED FROM ANYWHERE BY TELEPHONE HOOKUP."

Smith asked: "WHO ARE RECIPIENTS OF B'S MESSAGES?"

The computer responsed: "NOW CHECKING POTENTIAL HOOKUPS OF DU LAC COMPUTER WITH OTHER MAJOR SYSTEMS."

Smith asked: "HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?"

The answer: "THREE HOURS."

"DO IT FASTER," Smith wrote.

"THREE HOURS," the computer stubbornly replied.

Smith thought for a moment, then tapped on the machine's keyboard: "CAN YOU PLANT MESSAGE INTO DU LAC SYSTEM BY OVERRIDE?"

"YES."

Smith tapped: "PLANT THIS INFORMATION. THE TRAITOR INSIDE EARTH GOODNESS SOCIETY IS HARRY SMITH. A NEW EMPLOYEE."

"WILL DO AS SOON AS THIS CIRCUIT IS CLEARED," the computer replied.

"OUT. M-C-3-1-9," Smith typed and even as he depressed the last digit, the telephone went dead as the computer cut the connection.

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He threw the message paper into the wastebasket. Already its edges were turning dark, and in no more than a minute, the paper would turn totally black. A minute after that, it would disintegrate into powder.

Smith put his telephone device back into his briefcase and carried it over to the couch. He took out his revolver, then locked the case, put it on a chair, and covered it with his suit jacket. He put the gun on the floor under the sofa, then lay down to rest.

The die was cast. In a few hours or a few minutes, the assassin inside Earth Goodness would know Smith was an enemy and would be coming for him. And Smith would know in three hours who the assassins were working for. Who wanted the president dead.