Warren Murphy: Summit Chase

Remo looked at him carefully, and noticed two things. First, they planned to kill him. No doubt about it. Second, the burly one had hazel eyes. And that was interesting.

Remo was happy that they wanted to go to his room. He had wanted to get them out of the lobby, where things could get crowded and messy, causing the hotel management to complain. Smith might even hear about it.

He turned and led the way toward the elevator and calmly jabbed the up button.

When the doors opened, he stepped in first. The two men took posts on either side of him; the oriental type on his left, slightly behind him. Remo knew the pistol was pointing through his pocket at Remo's left kidney. He was really interested in those hazel eyes.

So far as he knew, only one type of oriental had hazel eyes: Koreans.

On the eleventh floor, he led them carefully down the hallway to his room. He took the key from his pocket, then stopped.

"Listen, I don't want any trouble. I don't want you to think I'm pulling a fast one. My partner is inside."

"Is he armed?" the Italian one asked.

"Armed?" Remo laughed and watched the burly one's face. "He's an eighty-year-old Korean. He was a friend of my grandfather's."

At the word Korean, the yellow-skinned man's eyes had narrowed. So he was Korean. Hey, Chiun, guess who's coming to dinner?

The Italian one nodded toward the door. The Korean took the key, opened the door quietly, then pushed it back. It swung open and the handle hit the door with a thud. Chiun was still seated in his white robes on the floor, watching television. He did not turn. He made no sound; he did not acknowledge the intrusion.

"That him?"

"Yeah," Remo said. "He's harmless."

"I hate Koreans," the yellow-skinned man said, his lip twisting in an involuntary rictus.

He preceded Remo into the suite. Remo was surprised at how sloppy the two of them were. Neither checked the bedrooms, the bathrooms or the closets. If he had wanted to, Remo could have hidden an Army platoon in the suite, but these two incompetents would not have known.

The one with hazel eyes stood in the middle of the living-room floor, Remo behind him, the Italian behind him.

"Hey, old man," the Korean called.

Chiun did not move, but Remo saw his eyes lift in the mirror, scan the scene behind him, then lower to the television screen. Poor Chiun. A tired old man.

"Hey. I'm talking to you," the burly man roared. Chiun studiously ignored him and the big man went around in front of him and pulled the tape cartridge from the television set.

Chiun rose in the one smooth motion that always impressed Remo. Every time he tried to copy it, he wound up facing in a different direction. Chiun did it automatically. Some things never deteriorated with age.

Chiun looked at the big man. Remo realized he had seen the hazel eyes and recognized a countryman.

"Please return my television program," Chiun said, extending a hand.

The big man giggled. His face contorted in a mask of hatred and he spoke to Chiun in a babble of Korean that Remo could not understand.

Chiun let him speak, let him wear himself out, and then said, quietly, in English: "And you, you piece of dog meat, are unworthy of the blood that flows in your veins. And now, return my television program. I, the Master of Sinanju, command it."

The big man's face blanched. He said, slowly, "There ain't any Master of Sinanju."

"Fool," Chiun's voice roared. "Half-caste ape. Do not tempt me to feed my anger."

He extended his hand again for the tape cartridge.

The Korean looked at Chiun's hand, then at the tape, and then with a snarl, grabbed the plastic cartridge in both hands and snapped it in half, as if it were an ice-cream stick, and dropped the two pieces to the floor.

He hit the floor before the pieces did.

With a roar of rage, Chiun was in the air, his foot planted deep into the Korean's throat, and the big man crumpled down in a heap, his hands slowly relaxing in death.

Chiun had recoiled in the air, curving his body, so now he landed on both feet, facing Remo and the Italian, his fists curved into hand maces at his hips, his weight balanced on the balls of both feet, a pictorial study of the perfect weapon.

Remo heard the Italian gasp, then he felt the rustle of clothing as the hood went for his gun.

"Do not exert yourself, little father," Remo said. "This one is mine."

The gun came out quickly, but Remo's elbow moved even more quickly, blasting backward into the man's sternum. The bone splintered under the force and the Italian should have let out a "whoomph" of air from the impact, but he didn't because he was dying. He staggered backwards, seemingly drunk, the gun waving irrelevantly around the room, and then his eyes opened wide in a look of horror. His feet stopped moving, the hand that held the gun slowly opened, dropping it onto the floor, and then he fell, heavily, his head cracking against an open closet door, but by then it was too late for him to feel it.

Remo bowed to Chiun. China bowed back.

Remo nodded his head to the dead Korean on the floor. "I guess he wasn't impressed by your credentials."

"He was a fool," Chiun said. "Trying through hatred to punish his mother's sin with a white man. When her only sin was her execrable taste. Aah, such fools."

Then he looked at Remo and his eyes dropped sadly in a parody of helplessness. "I really feel poorly today," he said. "I am very old and very weak."

"You are very devious and very lazy, as befits the true Oriental," Remo said. "We each get rid of one."

"But look at the size of him," Chiun protested, motioning to the fallen Korean. "How could I?"

"Necessity is the mother of invention. Call MotherTruckers. They move anything."

"Insolent," Chiun said. "That my years of training have produced not a thoughtful, kindly human being but a spoiled, self-indulgent white man." It was Chiun's supreme insult.

Remo smiled. Chiun smiled. They stood there, smiling at each other, like two life-sized porcelain figures.

Then, Remo remembered something.

"Wait here," he said.

"I have an appointment with the beautician?" Chiun asked.

"Please. Just wait here."

"I will leave only if Father Time comes to claim my frail shell."

Out in the hall, Remo saw what he was looking for. An empty laundry basket stood near the freight elevator. He looked around, made sure no one was in the corridor, and pulled the empty basket back to his room.

He closed the door behind him. Chiun smiled when he saw the wheeled cart.

"Very good. Now you can handle both of them."

"Chiun, you take advantage of my basic good nature. I'm tired of picking up after you."

"It is a nothing." Then Chiun was bent down, picking up the pieces of the tape cartridge, looking at them sadly. Then he spit contemptuously at the Korean.

"So much hatred," he said.

"We contribute our share," Remo said.

"I," Chiun said, his voice plumbing the depths of hurt. "Whom do I hate?"

"Every one but Koreans," Remo said. Glancing at the burly man, he said, "And some of them too."

"That is not true. I tolerate most people. But hatred? Never."

"And me, little father? Do you tolerate me too?"

"Not you, my son. You, I love. Because you are really a Korean at heart. The kind of sturdy, brave, noble, thoughtful Korean who would clean up the mess of these two baboons."

Remo cleaned up the mess.

He put the two bodies into the laundry cart and then stripped the sheets from the sofa bed. He tossed them on top of the bodies and pushed the cart into the hall.

At the end of the hallway was the laundry chute. When he tipped up the cart, the sheets and bodies tumbled into the chute and down the slide. He waited until he heard the dull thud, far below. If the Palazzo laundry was as efficient as its room service, the bodies wouldn't be discovered for a week. He pushed the cart into a broom closet and went back to his room, whistling. He felt good. The events of the last few minutes had seemed to perk Chiun up. And that was well worth the effort.