Warren Murphy: Voodoo Die

"The problems of poverty-"

"It wasn't a poverty problem. It was a police problem. There's right and wrong in the world and you people and people like you fudge up the whole damned thing with your sociology. Everyone knows right and wrong except you politicians." Remo looked away in anger.

Chiun assured the President that Remo's sudden outburst was nothing to worry about.

"As a student nears perfection, there is often a throwback to pretraining ideas. The Great Wang himself, when he was close to the height of his powers, would play with a toy wagon his father had made him, and this while in service to Cathay."

Chiun wondered if he could interest the President in something closer to home. Perhaps the kidnaping of his vice president's favorite child. This often assured an emperor that the one destined to take his throne in case of an accident would remain loyal.

"Ambition," said Chiun sadly, "is our greatest enemy. Let us cure the vice president of this woeful malady."

"That's not what I want," said the President. He did not take his eyes off Remo.

"A congressman," offered Chiun. "Perhaps a painful death at a public monument with a cry of 'death to all traitors, long live our divine President.' That is always a good one."

"No."

"A senator horribly mutilated while he sleeps and the word discreetly spread among other senators that

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he was plotting treason." Chiun gave a big happy wink. "A most popular item, that one."

"Remo," said the President. "The Central Intelligence Agency is afraid to get its hands dirty anymore, assuming it could ever do what we need done. There is a madman on an island close to America and he's got something that fries people to the consistency of Crest toothpaste. The Russians are interested in it. So are the Chinese, the Cubans, the British, and God knows who else, but our people sit back here terrified of making a mistake. We are incapable of dealing with a menace close to home. Do you think I would have asked you here to beg you to take an assignment? We're in trouble. Not just me, not just the office, not just the government. Every man, woman, and child in this country and possibly the world is in trouble because somehow some killer got hold of one of the most frightening weapons I have ever heard of. I am asking you to get control of that weapon on behalf of the human race."

"No," said Remo.

"He doesn't mean that," said Chiun.

"I think he does," said the President.

"At one time, Greek fire was a strange and frightening weapons, O Imperial Glory of the American People. Yet, it died, and why?" asked Chiun.

"I don' know why," said the President. He stared at Remo, who did not lift his eyes to make contact.

"Because that Byzantine emperor, the last to control the formula for the fire that burns when you add water, insulted the House of Sinanju and his fire proved no menace to the hands of Sinanju. He died with his supposedly invincible weapon. If you want something done along that line, it would be simple."

"Done," said the President.

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"You'll be sorry," said Remo.

"No sorrier than I am now," the President said.

"Would you like the Baqian tyrant's head for the White House gate?" asked Chiun. "It is a traditional finish to this sort of assignment. And, I might add, a most fitting one."

"No. We just want the weapon," the President said.

"A splendid selection," said Chiun.

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CHAPTER THREE

When the Third World Conference on Material Resources left Baqia after a triumphal unanimous declaration that Baqia had an inalienable right to that big word on page three, Generalissimo Sacristo Cora-zon declared a general amnesty to all prisoners, in honor of Third World brotherhood.

The Baqian jail had forty cells but only three prisoners because of a very efficient system of justice. Criminals were either hung, sent to the mountains to work in the great tar pits, which provided 29 percent of the world's asphalt, or released with apologies.

The apologies came after a $4,000 contribution to the Ministry of Justice. For $10,000, one got "profuse" apologies. An American lawyer once asked Corazon why they didn't just declare a person innocent.

"That's what we do when we buy off a judge," the lawyer said.

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"It lack class. For ten tousan', you got to give something," Corazon answered.

Now, in the hot dusty road leading from the main highway to the prison compound, set back in a dry powdery field that looked like a desert, Corazon waited with his black box at his side. It was on wheels now and had padlocks and a new profusion of dials. The dials were not attached to anything; Corazon had attached them himself in the darkest part of the night. If Generalissimo Corazon knew anything, it was how to survive as ruler of Baqia.

His new minister of justice and all his generals were there. It was a hot day. The new minister of justice waited outside the prison's high gates for the signal from Corazon to release the prisoners.

"Umibia votes yes," called out someone drunkenly. It was a delegate who had missed his plane back to Africa and joined the Corazon caravan, thinking it was a taxi to the airport.

"Get that fool out of the way," snapped Corazon.

"Umibia votes yes to that," called out the man. He wore a white, glistening suit, sprinkled with the refuse of two days of heavy drinking. He held a bottle of rum in his right hand and a gold chalice some fool had left in a little stone box in a Western religion church.

He poured the rum toward the gold chalice. Sometimes he made it into the bowl. Sometimes the rum added a new flavor to his suit. He wanted to drink his suit but the buttons kept getting in the way.

This was his first diplomatic assignment and he was celebrating its success. He had voted "yes" at least forty times more than anyone else. He expected a medal. He saw himself being honored at another conference as the finest delegate in the entire world.

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And then he made his first serious mistake. He saw the big dark face of Generalissimo Corazon with all his medals gleaming in the noon sun. He saw his Third World brother. And he wanted to kiss him. He was also standing upwind of the Generalissimo. The Umibian delegate smelled like a saloon that hadn't opened its windows since Christmas.

"Who is that man?" asked Corazon.

"One of the delegates," answered the minister for foreign affairs and head chauffeur.

"Is he important?"

"His country doesn't have oil, if that's what you mean. And it has no foreign agents," whispered the minister.

Corazon nodded.

"Beloved defenders of Baqia," he boomed. "We have declared an amnesty in honor of our Third World brothers. We have shown mercy. But now there are those who confuse mercy with weakness."

"Bastardos," called out the generals.

"We are not weak."

"No, no, no," called out the generals.

"But some think we are weak," said Corazon.

"Death to all who think we are weak," shouted one general.

"I am a slave to your will, oh, my people," said Generalissimo Corazon.

He estimated the drunken weave of the Umibian ambassador. He knew everyone watched. And so he carefully began turning the dials he had attached the night before. Because if his government ever found out that all you had to do was point the machine and start the engine that did whatever it did, one might be tempted to jump the Generalissimo and become the new leader. Corazon understood a very simple

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rule of governing. Fear and greed. Make them frightened enough and satisfied with their stealing enough and you had stable government. Let any one of those things get out of whack and you had trouble.

"One point seven," said Corazon loudly and turned the blue dial a bit. He saw two ministers and a general move their lips. They were repeating the number to themselves. It was the ones who could memorize without moving their lips that he had to fear.