Warren Murphy: The Last Temple

Chiun sat behind Remo, both of them completely level at all times while the rest of the passengers bounced up and down.

"They have let this place go to rot," Chiun said.

"Rot?" said Remo. "Look around. Just a few years ago this was desert and dust. Now it's farmland and buildings."

Chiun shrugged. "When Herod had it, it was beautiful with palaces."

Remo chose to ignore him and watch the scenery. The steamer trunks kept bouncing in and out of his view but he managed to catch the sounds and flavor of Tel Aviv.

Snatches of Hebrew mingled with the aroma of fresh roasted coffee and the tinny noise of American rock and roll on a cheap record player. The guttural Arab hawking of a sidewalk salesman weaved through the thick odor of cooking oil and boiled sweet corn over charcoal on passing street corners.

A drumming, off-tune song drifted in from the other side of the bus as a loaded military truck passed by. Rattling conversations were bursting from every direction. From under canopied balconies, inside cafes, outside espresso shops, beside crowded bookstores. And everywhere, the large bold letters of Hebrew.

The bus passed the rich turquoise of the sea, and the dusty white of new apartment complexes. The hot red and glaring blue of neon lights shot through the gray heat haze and the light green of the Israel spring.

When the bus bumped to a stop in front of the hotel, Chiun left by the back door as Remo struggled through the crowds of excited American teenagers, marked by their expensive jeans and backpacks, middle-aged couples trying to recapture their roots on a two-week vacation and Japanese tourists checking Swiss watches and shooting German cameras at anything that moved.

Remo lowered the trunks to the sidewalk in front of the Israel Sheraton as three smiling men approached from behind Chiun.

"Ah, hello, hello, Mr. Remo. Welcome to Israel, ho, ho," said one dark, smiling face.

"Ah, yes, Mr. Remo," said another smiling face, putting out his hand, "Good to see you and your part… I mean, associate, Mr. Chiun."

"We were told to meet you," said the third, "by the American consulate, to take you and Mr. Chiun to a meeting with him right away."

"Oh, yes, oh, yes," said the first. "We have a car awaiting you just around the next corner, ho, ho."

"Ah, yes," said the second. "If you two gentlemen would merely step this way, please, if you would be so kind?"

Remo did not move. He looked at the third man. "Your turn," he said.

The three kept smiling, but their eyes darted back and forth. They were all dark-skinned and curly-haired, and wore loud Hawaiian shirts with baggy black pin-striped suits, as if they had confused "Hawaii Five-O" with "The Untouchables."

"Ah, we must hurry," cried the third. "The American ambassador awaits."

"The car, if you please," said the first.

"Around the corner," said the second.

"What about my trunks?" said Chiun.

The eyes darted back and forth again. Remo rolled his skyward.

"Uh, yes," said the third. "They will be taken care of, indeed."

"Well," said Remo, "if the trunks will be well taken care of, indeed, and the American ambassador or consulate or somebody wants to see us, we can't very well refuse, can we?"

"Ah, yes, ah, yes, very good," said all three, ushering Remo and Chiun around the corner in a "V" formation.

"Yes, we can," whispered Chiun. "These men have no intention of taking care of my trunks."

"Ssh," whispered Remo back, "this is a break. We can find out who is behind all these killings from them. Besides, I don't want them shooting up the crowd."

"These men are nothing," Chiun said. "Talk to them and you will get three dead men. Lose my trunks and you will get never-ending guilt."

"As opposed to?" asked Remo. Chiun folded his arms and set his lips in stubborn silence.

Around them, the three men in "V" formation chattered, and Remo called out, "What are you guys? That doesn't sound like Hebrew. You Arabic?"

"Oh, no," said the first.

"No, no, no," said the second and third quickly.

"Ho, ho, ho," they all said.

"We are from Peru," said the first.

"Yes. We are Perubic," said the second.

Remo looked at Chiun and rolled his eyes in disgust. "They're Perubic, Chiun."

"And you are normal," Chiun said. "What language they speak in Peru, Chiun?" Remo asked softly.

"The interlopers speak Spanish. The real people speak the Quechua dialects."

"And what are these three babbling in?"

"Arabic," said Chiun. "They are talking about how they are going to kill us." He paused, listening to the conversation around them for a moment, then shouted: "Hold. Hold."

The three men stopped short. Chiun let go a short machine-gun burst of Arabic.

"What'd you tell them, Chiun?" Remo asked.

"Insults. Insults. Must I always bear insults?"

"What now?"

"They said they were going to kill us."

"So?"

"They referred to us as the two Americans. I just let them know that you are American as can easily be determined by your ugliness, laziness, stupidity, and inability to learn proper discipline. On the other hand, I am Korean. A human being. This I told them."

"Terrific, Chiun."

"Yes." Chiun agreed.

"They'll never guess now that we're on to them, will they?"

"That is not my concern. Protecting the good name of my people from random insults by people who talk in the voices of crows is."

The three "Perubians" were backing away from Remo and Chiun, slowly removing guns from shoulder holsters. Remo sent out a left leg, and the biggest one went skidding down the alleyway, the gun clattering loose from his hand.

The two others stared open-mouthed at the thin American, taking their eyes off Chiun for a fraction of a second. A fraction too long. The next moment, they found themselves hunched in the dirt, deep in the alley, their chins on the ground.

"It is terrible," Chiun said, "when an old man cannot travel anywhere without being threatened with bodily harm. I have no time to play with you, Remo. I am going to sit with my trunks. These awful men with no sense of property have upset me greatly."

Chiun glided away and Remo stepped into the alley. One of the men was stumbling up. His pistol was in his hand. He glared in triumph and pointed it at a gently smiling Remo, then he stared in surprise as there was a tan blur, the gun fired, and the front of his own shirt blew off.

He fell forward muttering in gutter Arabic about fate and fickle gods.

The two men Chiun had pushed into the alley were reaching for their guns too. Remo slapped the guns away and turned one of the men over. He assumed the man was the leader because his suit almost fit.

Remo picked up one of the guns and pointed the barrel at the man's mouth.

"How did you do that to Rahmoud? You were five feet away from him and then his stomach blew all over?"

"I'll ask, you answer," Remo said. He stuck the gun barrel between the man's lips. "Name, please."

The man felt the warm steel between his teeth and saw the look in Remo's eyes. He spoke around the gun barrel. "Achmudslamoonce-muhoomoodrazoolech."

"Very good, Ach," said Remo. "Nationality?"

Ahmed Schaman Muhumed Razolie saw his partner rising behind Remo. In his hand was a broken bottle from the alley's dirt floor.

"It is as I said before," he said slowly, stalling , for time. "I am from Peru."

"Wrong," said Remo. Without changing his stance, without looking back, he sent a kick behind him. The broken bottle flew into the air and hit the alley's deep dust with a soft thud, followed immediately by Ahmed's partner, who hit with a louder, terminal thud.

Ahmed Razolie looked around the alley at his two dead partners, and then again at Remo, who had just kicked a man's stomach out without looking at him.