Warren Murphy: The Final Death

Yes, that was it. They were going to knock her out with a drug in the food. Then, when she was helpless, they would use her voluptuous body any way they chose and prepare her for her last place in the branches.

This was it. She was ready. This was it. She would have to play her hand. This was it. She was prepared. This was it.

Viki swung her arm, smacking the plate from Remo's hand, the duck spinning onto the floor and the rice spreading through the air like confetti. Remo watched the plate drop to the rug and Chiun caught the falling portion of duck and put it on his dish.

Viki reached up her dress with her other hand, struggled for a moment, then pulled a snub-nosed .38 revolver from between her legs.

"No," she screamed. "You won't get me. Your plan won't work, Mr. Remo Nichols or whoever you are. Your murder spree is coming to an end right here and now."

She stopped yelling because Remo was not listening to her. He was dishing out another plate of food.

"You hear me?" Viki screamed. "You killed my parents and now I am going to kill you."

"Did not," said Remo from the bed.

"You did. Don't deny it. I know all about your Rye spy ring."

Remo looked up. "All right, kill me. Can I eat first?"

Viki felt as if she was going crazy. Her body began to shake and her skin turned cold. She tried very hard to keep her arms steady.

"No. You can't eat first. You did not let my mother eat before you cut her throat and ripped her skin from her bones and put her up in a tree."

"He would not have done that," Chiun spoke up indignantly. "He would have killed her quickly and left her there."

"Thanks for all your help," said Remo.

"It is nothing," said Chiun.

"Shut up. Both of you." Viki wailed hysterically, her hair flapping against her wet cheeks. "I just wanted you to know that I knew. Now you will die."

Remo shrugged. "If we must, we must." Chiun started to eat.

Viki stared at them in horror, as if she were just beginning to realize that the man seated before her was just seconds away from becoming a torn and bloody hunk of meat. That, seconds from now, she would put a bullet through his body that would tear through his skin and rip out his organs. That blood would spurt out, soaking into the carpet. That his sphincters would open all at once, staining his clothes and filling the lysol-protected room with a nauseating thick smell.

Viki pushed the gun in front of her body with both hands, centering it on Remo's collarbone and pulled the trigger.

A huge, clapping boom filled the room, then, automatically, as her father had taught her, she swung the gun to the next target. She centered the gun on the tiny Oriental's stomach and again pulled the trigger.

The two booms of air, rushing back down the barrel after the lead projectile, traveling faster than sound, moved out, overlapped. Viki shivered and waited until her eyes cleared.

"She did that very well," said Remo, munching on the duck.

"Yes," Chiun replied, also eating. "She is a very clever girl. Did you notice that when she could not divide us, she decided to kill us together at a time of natural weakness?"

Viki stood rooted to the spot. Her gun stayed out before her as she stared at Remo who was now hunched on the bed's pillow, and Chiun who sat six inches back from where he had been a moment ago.

On the end of the bed the cover had been scarred by an ugly black powder burn. Between Chiun's crossed legs and his plate was a small, smoking hole.

It was not possible, Viki thought. I had them pegged. They could not have gotten out of the way of a bullet fired point blank.

Automatically Viki swung to where Remo was now sitting, centered her sights between his eyes and pulled the trigger twice. Without waiting, she swung back to Chiun, blasted at his chest, then, just to be on the safe side, moved her sights up to where the top of his head should have been. She fired again.

"Her stance is solid, her aim is good, and she holds the gun so it will offer the least bucking," said Remo from the room's writing desk. "But she's holding it out instead of down at the hip. She's the second with that problem, today."

"She is not perfect," said Chiun, still sitting, still eating. "Or else why should she be using a gun? However, she shows great promise."

Viki looked at the back of the bed. Two bullet holes had splintered the wood where Remo's head should have been. Where his head was was at the writing desk, shyly smiling.

Chiun was now back to his original position. The only damage Viki could see was the spider web of cracked glass in the window beyond. But she had little doubt that just behind the Korean was another smoking bullet hole.

Slowly, in an unbelieving daze, Viki backed up. She was ready to bolt, expecting the two to charge her any second.

When they did not, she slowly let the empty gun drop from her fingers, turned, and calmly walked out the door.

Remo turned to Chiun. "I had better go get her."

"Let her be," said Chiun. "She will soon realize that we were with her at the time of her mother's death. She will return. Come, eat the duck. It is less bad than usual."

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Viki did not return. She did not return for the rest of that night or the rest of that morning or even for the rest of the next afternoon.

Remo trotted around Houston twice but found neither hide nor hair of her. No one else he talked to had seen her either. And how many beautiful brunettes in Star Trek uniforms were there in Houston?

When he returned to the hotel room Chiun was standing with his back to the door, looking out on the city through the bullet-shattered window.

As Remo took off his shoes, Chiun said: "It is truly wondrous what man has wrought in the short time that is his history."

"Is that the first line of your daytime drama?" Remo asked irritably. "Remo Williams, Remo Williams?"

"They have created toys to kill for them," Chiun continued. "Machines that destroy countries for centuries as in the Land of Herod. Living things smaller than one strand of a fly's wing that can kill an entire army as in your laboratories."

"You mean nuclear weapons and germ warfare?"

Chiun turned. "All toys to keep from learning oneself."

"Great, little father. Thank you. History lecture over now?"

"You are upset, my son."

"And you're depressing."

"You did not find the clever girl?"

"No. She may have taken a bus. Though for the life of me, I don't know where she kept her money in that outfit."

"Or perhaps she walked into the desert."

"Yeah. Or maybe she hitched a ride into Mexico."

"Or found a friendly sanctuary."

"Or an unfriendly sanctuary."

"Or is even now returning here."

"No matter," said Remo. "I'll just sic Smitty onto her. If anybody can find her, he can."

Remo went into the bathroom. The phone rang.

Remo came out of the bathroom and answered it, face dripping.

"Hello?"

"If you want to see Victoria Angus again," said a grating voice. "Listen carefully."

"Good timing," said Remo. "Who says I want to see her again?"

There was a short pause then the grating voice continued.

"If you care about Victoria Angus, you'll listen."

"Who says I care? She wasn't very nice to me last night."

"Are you going to listen or are we going to kill her?"

"You mean I have a choice?"

"If you don't listen, she's a dead girl."

"So I don't have a choice after all," Remo said.

"You come to Texas Solly's Vine Square slaughterhouse in half an hour and we'll talk. Come alone or the broad's dead."

"I wasn't planning to bring a date."

The connection was broken. Remo pressed down the receiver button and touch-toned the number of the Folcroft Sanitarium in Rye, New York. There were another eight rings and Smith answered.