Warren Murphy: Skin Deep

"Thus said Marco Polo to the Master Hun Tup when they approached China," Chiun snapped. "Stop your arrogant prattling and drive us to the island."

Remo turned the boat toward the islands. "A Master of Sinanju was with Marco Polo?" he asked.

"One of the finest. You think the white man could have found anything by himself? Had Hun Tup not persisted, the expedition would have ended up on the Arctic subcontinent."

"No egg rolls for the crew, I guess."

"Polo would have been like that crazed Columbus, who claimed that your country was India. How could it be India without filth and curry and plague?"

"But Columbus didn't have a Master of Sinanju on board," Remo said, smiling.

"He did, unfortunately. Ko Wat, the Misdirected, was with him. A minor blemish on the glorious House of Sinanju. Halt," he said, pointing. "Do you see?"

As they neared the small island, Remo narrowed the focus of his eyes until he seemed to be looking through high-powered field glasses. In the fading light he saw cleverly concealed traces of human existence: broken twigs, a sweep across the sand to cover footprints, a dead tree covering what looked like a narrow path.

"You were right," Remo said.

"And you were wrong. As usual." Chiun grinned. "As usual, heh, heh."

They moored the boat. A flock of fat white gulls settled lazily along the shoreline.

"Look at the size of these birds," Remo said. He felt an uncomfortable turn in his stomach when they were joined by still more seagulls, pecking idly at the ground, their black dolls' eyes never leaving the two men. "Something's funny about these birds," Remo insisted.

But Chiun was standing completely still, gazing at the bushes farther inland. "Silence," he said softly. "We are being watched."

A twig broke. Instantly Remo's attention riveted on the bushes. His muscles tensed and then relaxed, ready for the inevitable attack. Then, with a piercing yell, it came, like a vision from Hades.

There was only one man, and he was no more than a boy, judging from the awkwardness of his movements. He was squat, with the stocky, long-torsoed build of an Oriental, and he was naked except for a loincloth against his sundarkened skin. His hair, coarse and straight and black, stood up from his head in stiff peaks. In his right hand he held a club. His left was a gnarled stump, with four fingers missing.

These were the things Remo saw first as the strange attacker leaped a foot above the tops of the bushes, screaming and wild-eyed. But a split second later, Remo no longer saw the intruder as a person. All he remembered after that moment was a face, a face so frightening and grotesque that everything else about the man became secondary.

Remo's breath caught at the sight. He ducked and spun to begin his attack, but was knocked out of the way by a tremendous force out of nowhere. It was Chiun.

"Hold," Chiun called, his yellow robe still billowing from his inexplicable assault on Remo.

"What'd you do that for?" Remo asked as in front of him the boy with the disfigured face stood unmoving, his unsightly features twisted in bewilderment.

Now Remo got a better look at him. He was an Oriental, but only vaguely so. Maybe Polynesian, Remo thought, although the scars and lesions on his skin all but obliterated his natural appearance. He was covered with sores, seeping with clear liquid, and one eyelid was swollen to half-mast, revealing the blackened remains of a dead eye beneath.

"I am the Master of Sinanju," Chiun said. "This is my son. Tell your chief we are come."

The boy's pustule-encrusted mouth opened. He dropped the club from his hand as if it were a foul thing. Then, to Remo's amazement, he emitted a small cry and fell to his knees before Chiun.

The old man touched his head. "Go," he said gently. "We will wait here."

The boy stood up, bowed again, and scurried back into the underbrush.

Remo followed him with his eyes for a few moments. When the monstrous-looking boy had disappeared into the thick jungle greenery, Remo turned to Chiun. "What was that about?" he asked, rubbing the spot on his arm where Chiun had pushed him out of the boy's way. "Do you know him?"

The old man looked sadly into the brush. "He is a leper," he said. "He knows me."

?Chapter Four

The birds were thick as snowdrifts around them.

"A leper?"

Chiun nodded. "And a Hawaiian. He is probably from the colony at Molokai, but I must see the rest of the tribe before I can be sure."

"Wait. Hold on," Remo said. "What is this about lepers? What do you know about lepers, anyway? And you've never even been to Hawaii. You told me that yourself once."

"One sand pit is like another," Chiun said. "But all Masters of Sinanju know of the lepers of Molokai. And they know us. Sit. I will tell you of the Decree of the great Master Hun Tup." He motioned toward a fallen tree.

"Hun Tup? Wasn't he the guy you said went to China with Marco Polo?"

Chiun beamed. "You remember well, for a white thing."

Remo grimaced. "The story," he said. "Can the insults."

"Long, long ago," Chiun began, using the mystic storyteller's voice that meant he was settling into one of his windier legends, "the people of my village of Sinanju in Korea were so poor, and their catch from the ocean so meager, that they were forced to conserve rations by sending their babies back to the sea."

"Yeah, yeah, I know that part about drowning the babies. What about Wing Tip?"

"Hun Tup," Chiun corrected. "I am coming to him. Do not interrupt. You have made me lose my place." His voice shifted back into the storyteller's whisper. "Long, long ago...

"I know, Chiun. They sent their babies back to the sea, and so the first Master of Sinanju had to rent himself out as an assassin to the highest bidder and send his paychecks back to the village, which is what every Master since has been doing."

Chiun fixed him with an angry, unblinking stare. "These legends are better when told properly," he said.

"Sorry. I just wanted you to get to the part about Marco Polo."

"A nobody," Chiun said. "A drunk. A meateating sailor with a nagging wife and a houseful of squealing white children. It was no wonder he wanted to go to China. It just surprised me he did not try to reach the moon."

"Was Hun Tup working for Marco Polo?" Remo asked, trying to steer Chiun back to the subject. "I mean, was he a bodyguard or something?"

"Really, Remo. Now, that is an insult. The Master of Sinanju does not work as a bodyguard. This is work for thugs, beasts. Even a white man can be a bodyguard. Perhaps even you could."

"Just asking," Remo said.

"Hun Tup went along on the expedition as the esteemed guest of Marco Polo and his sponsor, a powerful ruler of Venice, in whose service the Master had performed many valuable deeds. As no one in Europe knew where China— or, as it was then known, Cathay— was, Hun Tup agreed to show Marco Polo the way in exchange for carrying the Master's trunks of tribute from the Venetian ruler. There was much tribute. Emeralds, diamonds, fine rubies. All were to be delivered to Sinanju along with Hun Tup once China was 'discovered.' By Marco Polo, that is. The Koreans had discovered it long before."

"Hmmm," Remo agreed. "The Japanese, too, I guess."

Chiun's eyes narrowed into flinty hazel slits. "They don't count," he said.

"Okay, so Hun Tup led Marco Polo to China, and then Marco took the Master and his tribute from Italy back to Sinanju, and everybody lived happily ever after, right?"

"Wrong. When they reached China, the Europeans were greeted by the Mongol conqueror Kublai Khan himself. This upstart appeared to be a kind and generous man, sharing with the explorers the secrets of gunpowder and silk. Polo himself was having such a wonderful time that he stayed in Peking for twenty-four years. He was white. It probably took that long for him to get over his shock at seeing people who bathed."