Warren Murphy: Last Call

Remo shrugged, took his morning quota of papers, and tossed a five-dollar bill on the counter. Without waiting for change, he joined Chiun in the car.

"This is a natural for Paul Newman and Robert Redford," Chiun said. "It is just what they need to make them stars."

"I know I'm never going to read it or see it, so I suppose you better tell me about it. Otherwise, I'll never have any peace," Remo said.

"Fine. There is the world's foremost assassin, the head of an ancient house of assassins."

"You," Remo said. "Chiun, reigning Master of the House of Sinanju."

"Shush. Anyway, this poor man finds himself, against his will, working in the United States because he needs gold to feed the poor and the suf-

18

fering of his small Korean village. But do they let him practice his noble art in the United States? No. They make him become a trainer, to try to teach the secrets of Sinanju to a fat, slothful meat-eater."

"Me," Remo said. "Remo Williams." "They found this poor meat-eater working as a policeman and they fixed it up so that he went to an electrical chair but it didn't work because nothing in America works except me. So instead of being killed, he was saved so he could go to work as an assassin for a secret organization which is supposed to fight crime in America. This organization is called CURE and is headed by a total imbecile."

"Smitty," Remo said. "Dr. Harold W. Smith." "And the story tells of the many misadventures of this meat-eater and the many tragedies that befall him as he bumbles and stumbles his way through life and how the Master, unappreciated and unloved, always manages to save him at great risk to his own valued person, until one day the Master's contributions are finally recognized by a grateful nation, because even stupid countries can be grateful, and America showers him with gold and diamonds and he returns home to his native village to live out his few remaining days in peace and dignity, loved by all, because he is so gentle."

"That takes care of you," Remo said. "What happens to me? The meat-eater?"

"Actually, I have not worked out all the minor details of the movie yet," Chiun said.

19

"And for this you want Paul Newman and Robert Bedford?"

"Absolutely," Chiun said. "This is socko for Newman and Bedford."

"Who plays who ?" asked Remo.

"Newman will play the Master," Chiun said. "We can do something about those funny pale eyes of his to make them look right."

"I see. And Redford plays me."

Chiun turned in his seat and looked at Remo as if his disciple had begun speaking in tongues.

"Redford will play the head of this super-secret organization who you think resembles Smith," Chiun said.

"Then who plays me? Remo asked.

"You know, Remo, when they make a movie, they hire a woman and they call her the casting director, and she is in charge of finding actors to play all the small, unimportant parts."

"A bit part ? That's me ?"

"Exactly," Chiun said.

"You got Newman and Redford starring as you and Smith and I'm a bit part?"

"That is correct."

"I hope you meet Newman and Redford," Remo said. "I just hope you do."

"I will. That is why I go to this restaurant, because I hear they eat lunch there when they are in town," Chiun said.

"I hope you meet them. I really do."

"Thank you, Remo," Chiun said.

"I really hope you meet them," Remo said.

Chiun looked at him with curiosity. "Your feelings are hurt, aren't they?"

20

"Why shouldn't they be? You got two stars playing you and Smith. And me, I'm a bit part."

"We'll get somebody good. Somebody who looks like you."

"Yeah? Who?"

"Sidney Greenstreet. I saw him in a movie on television and he was very good."

"He's dead. And besides, he weighed three hundred pounds."

"Peter Ustinov," Chuin said.

"He doesn't talk like me. His accent's wrong."

"If you're going to pick at everything, we're never going to get this movie in the can," Chiun said.

"I don't want anything to do with this movie," Remo sniffed.

He was still sulking when he stopped his car in front of the YMCA in the center of town. It was almost noon and, across the street, the luncheon line for a small restaurant extended to the corner.

"See that mob?" Remo said. "They're all waiting to see Newman and Redford and they've all got movies to sell."

"None as good as mine," Chiun said. "Raymond Burr?"

"Too old. He can't play me," Remo said.

"Well, if you're going to be difficult," Chiun said. He got out of the car and started across the street for the restaurant's front entrance. While the line extended to the corner, Chiun did not have to wait in line. His own table was reserved for him every day in the back of the restaurant. He had resolved this, on the very first day, with

21

the restaurant owner by holding the man's head in a kettle of seafood bisque.

Halfway across the street, Chiun stopped, then walked back to the car. His face was illuminated with the joy of one who is about to perform a great and good deed.

"I have it," he said.

"Yeah?" growled Remo.

"Ernest Borgnine."

"Aaaaah," Remo said and drove away.

Through his open window, he heard Chiun calling. "Any fat white actor. Everybody knows they all look alike."

The head of the American Nazidom Party called himself Obersturmbannfiihrer Ernest Sche-isskopf. He was twenty-two years old and still had pimples. He was so skinny, the swastika armband kept sliding down the sleeve of his wash-and-wear brown shirt. He wore his black trousers bloused into the tops of his shiny high boots, but his legs were like sticks, without discernible thigh or calf muscle, and the impression the lower half of his body gave was of two pencils shoved vertically into two loaves of shiny black bread.

There was sweat on his upper lip as he faced the television cameras for his daily news conference. Remo watched, lying on the couch in the small house he had rented near Westport's Compo Beach, looking at the television.

"We understand that you dropped out of high school in the tenth grade?" a television reporter said.

22

"As soon as I was old enough to find out that the schools were trying to stuff everybody's head with Jew propaganda," Scheisskopf said.

His voice was as thin and boneless as he was. Two more Nazis in uniforms stood behind him, against a wall, their arms folded, their narrowed hating eyes staring straight ahead.

"And then you tried to join the Ku Klux Klan in Cleveland," another reporter said.

"It seemed like the only organization in America that wasn't ready to give the country to the nigger."

"Why did the Ku Klux Klan reject your membership?" he was asked.

"I don't understand all these questions," Scheisskopf said. "I am here to discuss our march tomorrow. I don't understand why this town is getting so upset about it. This is a very liberal community, at least when the rights of Jews and coloreds and other misfits are concerned. Tomorrow we are marching to celebrate the first urban renewal project in history and the only one that is known to be an unqualified success. I think all those liberals that like projects like urban renewal ought to be on the streets with us."

"What urban renewal project is that?" he was asked.

Lying on the couch, Remo shook his head. Dumb. Dumb.

"In Warsaw, Poland, twenty-five years ago," Scheisskopf said. "Some people call it the Warsaw Ghetto but all it was was an attempt to improve the living conditions of subhumans, just as all modern urban renewal projects try to do."

23

The room shuddered as Chiun came in and slammed the front door behind him.

"Do you want to hear what happened?" he demanded of Remo.

"No."

"They did not show up again."

"Who cares? I'm watching the news."