Warren Murphy: In Enemy Hands

"I'm going to hang them up by their balls."

When the Secretary of State met his eyes, the President of the United States winked.

The other important meeting was held later that day, backstage at the Crystal Hotel in Las Vegas where Miss Jacquanne Juiceshe was always billed as "Miss Jacquanne Juice," although there had not been, since she was eleven years old, any danger of anyone's mistaking her for Mr. Jacquanne Juice was trying to explain to a costume designer what was wrong with the bra she was wearing.

"Look, I'm going to flash my galonkers at them for the finale. But it would help if I could get them out of the bra. The goddamn thing doesn't open up."

The designer was a small man with long whiteblond hair. His wrists were thinner than the woman's. His fingers were inoffensive as he touched the front clip on the bra the young woman wore and showed her how a simple squeeze on both sides of the strap would pop it open.

"See?" he said, as the bra exploded open and Miss Jacquanne Juice was left standing barebreasted in the middle of the rehearsal stage. Around them, throats cleared and movement ceased. Men who a second before had been busy doing things, professional things on which their livelihoods depended, stopped, no longer caring about anything except Miss Jacquanne Juice's mammary glands.

"It's easy," the costume designer said.

"It's frigging impossible," the woman answered. "It's easy for you, you're fooling around with somebody else's tits all day. For me, it's hard. I keep clawing at this thing and clawing at it. If I ever get the thing open, I'll be standing there, my jugs covered with blood. Is that what you want for a finale? Is it? A frigging horror show? You going to bring bats down out of the balcony? Hah? Oh, crap. Doesn't anyone around here care about me? Am I always going to be just a piece of meat?"

She looked around the stage and found that every pair of male eyes within sighting distance was fixed upon her breasts. Some of them were nodding answers to her question.

Except one.

A small, aged Oriental wearing a white robe looked at her with hazel eyes that were wise beyond wisdom, and he smiled at her slightly and nodded, a nod of sympathy and understanding. The small movement of his head seemed to send waves across the room to where Miss Jacquanne Juice stood, waves that enveloped her with knowledge of her own womanhood and personhood. She suddenly felt barebreasted, and she pulled the bra's cups closed around her front and fumbled with the clip.

"We'll work on it later," she told the clothing designer, then brushed past him to speak with the old Oriental.

She stood in front of the old man, staring down at the white brocade robe, and then, because she could think of nothing to say but had to say something, she said: "Did you know I have an IQ of 138?"

"I can see that," Chiun said. He had never heard anyone describe her bust size with the letters IQ before, but if she claimed to be a 138, he believed it, because she was cow-like like most American women were or aspired to be.

"And yet," he added, "they treat you badly. They all want something from you, but in turn they give nothing."

He patted a spot next to him on the top of the wardrobe trunk, indicating that she should sit down.

"How did you know that?" she said.

"They all want and take but never give. There is none you can trust, none who cares about you as much as he cares about himself."

Miss Jacquanne Juice nodded.

"But how did you know? You're some kind of a guru, aren't you? How did you know?"

"It is ever thus with leaders. With stars as well as with emperors. The most difficult thing is to find one you can trust, someone without motives of his own, someone who cares for you as you and does not wish something from you."

"Oh. All my life. Looking and looking," Miss Jacquanne Juice said. She put her head on Chiun's shoulder. He patted her bare back gently, to console her for a world so cruel that it paid her only a quarter-million dollars for two weeks of breast-baring in the middle of the Nevada desert.

"You can stop searching," Chiun said. "There is one who cares about you." He turned his face to look into her eyes.

"I believe. I believe," she said. She pushed her face closer to his shoulder. "Oh, what a feeling to know there is someone who cares."

Chiun patted her back again, this time searching out a precise spot for tapping with his long fingernails.

"And you must let me…" She sighed as she felt the currents from Chiun's fingers pass through her body. "You must let me do something for you."

She looked up at Chiun hopefully. He shook his head. "There is nothing I need, my child."

"There must be something, something I can do for you."

"Nothing," Chiun said.

"Something. Anything. A gesture."

Chiun paused, long enough to appear thoughtful. Then he said:

"Well, there is just one little thing."

That afternoon, after a platoon of hotel personnel had made her comfortable in her room, Ludmilla pressed Remo for the exact location of the secret spring that gave him his powers.

Remo sighed. "Look, we're in America. You promised to give this a try, and maybe to stay. Now can't you stop being a government honcho for a while?"

"This has nothing to do with government. This has to do with honor. And trust. And love. You promised me and you should live up to your promise."

"It's not far from here," Remo said. "Ten, twenty miles."

"When will we go there?"

"Now if you want."

"Tomorrow. Tomorrow will be better. And we will have a picnic. And we will make love out in the sand."

Remo, who knew more about sand and desert heat than Ludmilla, nodded, but the more he nodded, the more appealing the idea sounded.

"And now you must leave," Ludmilla said.

"Why?"

"Because I need my rest. Go. Go. I will see you later and be beautiful for you."

Remo nodded again and left, and walked whistling down the hallway toward the steps to his own room. He did not hear the silent movements behind him as Chiun came from behind a potted palm and walked to Ludmilla's door.

Inside the telephone rang. Ludmilla said "hello" and waited while the operator opened the line on her call to Moscow. Chiun could only hear her half of the conversation with Marshal Denia.

"Yes. Probably tomorrow we will go there. Oh, good. You are coming? When will you get here? Wonderful. I long to see you again. I will not go there until you arrive."

Chiun rapped on the door, and heard the telephone quickly hung up. When Ludmilla opened the door, her face was first surprised, then annoyed.

"Oh. You."

"Yes. I hope I did not disturb anything important." He smiled at her and Ludmilla knew that Chiun had heard the call. What she did not know was that Chiun, at that moment, was only a hair away from killing her to protect Remo. But he did not strike, because Remo would never have believed in the necessity of the act.

"Nothing important," she said. "What do you want?"

"I am inviting you and Remo to dinner tonight. As my guests."

"Oh, well…"

"You must," Chiun said. "You and I must be friends."

She paused, then acceded. "If you insist."

"I do. I insist. Remo will call for you. I will see to it."

Ludmilla laughed. "I have already seen to it, old man. He will call for me whenever I wish."

"As you would have it," Chiun said and walked away, angered because the woman was right. Remo was her slave.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"I don't know why you keep that old man hanging around anyway," Ludmilla said.

"I've grown accustomed to his face," Remo said, and sipped his mineral water to turn off the conversation.

They sat at a front table in the Crystal Hotel supper club. Chiun had insisted that all the arrangements be left to him, and when Remo and Ludmilla arrived, the headwaiter smiled at them, showed them to a front row table, was polite, and set the indoor record for Las Vegas, a mark that would live forever, Remo decided by refusing a tip.