Dark Horse

Destroyer 89: Dark Horse

By Warren Murphy apir

Chapter 1

It was called "the Buddy Holly rule."

It applied to the President of the United States and the Vice-President. It was strictly observed by sports teams. Rock bands adhered to it religiously, as did corporate officers.

It was inflexible, unbreakable policy wherever it applied. And it applied to every business and political situation. And, on occasion, social situations.

It should have applied to the Governor of California and his lieutenant governor.

Technically, it did. They were, under no circumstance, to fly on the same plane, travel in the same vehicle, or even ride the same elevator. That was unshakable policy.

Unfortunately, unshakable policy applied only to political trips, arranged for by political aides and handlers.

This was social.

The governor of California didn't know that his lieutenant governor was going to attend the concert at Los Angeles's Music Center.

He discovered this amazing coincidence shortly after the flight attendant had shut the 727's big door.

Almost immediately, someone began pounding on it.

The governor, seated in first-class, smiled thinly. He knew how the airlines worked. If the door was closed, you missed your flight. There was no second chance, no appeal. The jetway passenger bridge was about to be retracted from the jetliner's aluminum skin. This particular airline was plagued by recurring schedule problems. They were not about to add to them, the governor was sure, simply for a single passenger who couldn't even make check-in.

The governor settled back to see what the editorial pages of the Sacramento Bee were saying about him today.

Suddenly, a harried voice could be heard in between spasms of pounding.

"Let me in! Let me in!"

This guy just isn't going to give up, the governor thought, wondering how he had managed to get onto the jetway in the first place. The late ones were usually intercepted beforehand.

The flight attendants began to buzz among themselves. One knocked on the flight deck door, and slipped in.

She returned after a very brief consultation with the captain and went directly to the exit door, where she undogged the locking latch. She gave the door a shove.

And in stomped a face the governor of California knew only too well.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, taking his briefcase off the empty seat beside him.

The lieutenant governor flopped onto the seat, extracting a white handkerchief from his coat pocket. He ran this across his bedewed forehead, while he caught his breath. His face was flushed.

"Damn cab ran out of gas!" he huffed. "Can you believe it-a cab running on empty? Only in California."

The jetway ramp was retracted, while the two highest-ranking officers in the State of California shared a rueful laugh. With a rising whine, the jet slithered out from its berth.

"You're lucky they relented," the governor said as the 727 turned into its takeoff position, wishing they hadn't. The lieutenant governor was a Democrat.

"I kept telling them I was the damn lieutenant governor," the lieutenant governor muttered. "Wasn't sure they heard me."

A pleasant voice over the intercom called on the flight crew to begin a cross-check in preparation for takeoff.

In a moment, the engine whine rose and the wheels under their feet began to bump and rumble.

As the jet started to pick up speed, pushing them back into their seats, the governor remarked, "You know, we shouldn't be doing this."

"Doing what?"

"Flying together. It's the old Buddy Holly scenario." "Huh?" asked the lieutenant governor, who had been born in New Zealand.

"You know, the Crickets. Everybody got on the same plane, it crashed, and rock and roll took a mortal blow."

"Didn't one of them take the bus?" asked the lieutenant governor, as the wheels left the runway.

"Search me. Back then, I was listening to Guy Mitchell."

The jet climbed steeply, and their stomachs sank. The sound came of the wheels toiling up into their wells.

Only after the engine roar had settled down to the familiar whine of horizontal flight did they resume speaking. By that time, the flight attendants were offering martinis and smiles.

"Well," the governor said ruefully, "if anything happens to us, there's still the secretary of state."

This thought sobered both men until the drinks were set before them.

"What's your business in L.A.?" the governor asked, when the first very-dry sip had gone down.

"I'm attending a concert," the lieutenant governor said. "Nana Mouskouri, or something like that."

The governor started. "Really? Those are my plans!"

"How about that?"

"I didn't know you were a fan of her music."

"I'm not," returned the lieutenant governor.

"Then why?"

The lieutenant governor shrugged. "The tickets were free."

In the act of swallowing a gulp of dry martini, the governor of California felt his mouth go dry. Something of the fear he felt must have showed up in his eyes, because the lieutenant governor took one look at his paling face and blurted, "What's wrong?"

Slowly, the governor of California withdrew an envelope from his suit. He displayed a ticket. His next words were little more than a croaking.

"Came two days ago. Anonymous."

"Mine contained airline tickets, too," the lieutenant governor said, in a voice drier than his drink.

"Mine, too."

The two highest elected officials in California-over California, now-digested this startling coincidence in silence.

"Someone," the lieutenant governor said thickly, "must really want us at that concert."

"Or maybe," the governor croaked, "on this flight."

Their eyes were already wide. They had been widening all through the conversation. They could hardly have grown wider, but they did. A child could have run a Magic Marker around the outer edge of the irises and not touched or discolored an eyelash.

They were both thinking the same thing. They were thinking how unpopular their administration had become in less than two years. How many special-interest groups despised them. How unpopular recent gubernatorial vetoes had been.

The governor shot up in his seat.

"Turn this plane around!" he demanded harshly, his voice like something that had been torn off bleeding muscle.

The flight attendant hurried up the aisle. She presented a concerned face, and a smile that promised reassurance but jittered around its lipsticked edges.

"Sir, is something the matter?"

The governor used his finger to point. "This is the lieutenant governor sitting next to me."

The attendant looked, said, "Yes?"

"We're not supposed to be flying together!"

"It's the Buddy Holly rule," the lieutenant governor chimed in dutifully. "And you know what happened to them."

"Was he an actor?" wondered the flight attendant, who looked all of twenty-two.

The governor cleared his throat and mustered up his best oratorical voice. "Please inform the captain that the governor of the state sincerely requests that he turn this flight around and put us down at LAX," he said, giving each syllable a tight, steely enunciation.

"I'm sorry, but that's against the airline's rules."

"Please do this."

"Yes, please," the lieutenant governor pleaded, moist-eyed.

The flight attendant hurried off. She was gone for a while.

Eventually, a stone-faced man in airline black stepped into the first-class cabin. He wore his years in the cockpit on his regular, seamed face.

"Are you the captain?" the governor said tightly, trying to keep control of himself.

"Copilot. The captain sends his regrets."

In terse words the governor presented his case, ending with, "This can't be a coincidence."

The copilot gave an aw-shucks laugh and tilted back his uniform cap.

"Sir . . ."

"Governor. "

"Governor, what I think you got there is a pair of tickets from Miss- What did you say the lady's name was?"

"Mouskouri."

"It's clear to me that you're both being treated by the little lady herself. I don't see what the fuss is."

"You don't understand!" the lieutenant governor put in frantically. The copilot's face hardened. "Maybe it's the other way around," he said flatly. "We held up the flight to let you on board, sir. Now, the captain has the discretion to do that. But turning the plane around without an on-board emergency?" He shook his head. "No. I'm sorry."

They harangued the poor copilot, demanded to see the captain, but the man stood his ground.

Eventually, with mumbled apologies and a stiff face, the copilot returned to the cockpit.

The flight attendants refreshed their drinks and made a point of showing off their legs.

The governor and his lieutenant soon settled down. The drone of the jet engines became routine, putting them off their guards.

"Maybe it was Miss Mouskouri who sent the tickets," the lieutenant governor said hopefully.

"It's the only explanation that makes sense," the governor agreed.

"Still," the lieutenant governor said wistfully, "I wish I had taken the bus. Just in case."

They shared a laugh that rattled in their throats like old bones. It was an unpleasant sound that squelched further conversation and provided absolutely no reassurance up at twenty thousand feet, in a jet buffeting through clouds and air pockets like a shaky rollercoaster.

The jet rattled. The overhead luggage compartments jiggled uncertainly. The seats, although bolted to the cabin floor, shook and bounced them on their plush, roomy cushions.

The governor and lieutenant governor started to grow nervous all over again.

"Is this plane shaking worse than usual?" the lieutenant governor muttered.

"I can't tell. I'm shaking too much myself."

"Why are you shaking?"

"I'm thinking of how many death threats I've been getting since I vetoed that Gay Rights bill."

"Well, I didn't veto it. I was for it. But you-you wouldn't listen to me."

"That's right. If it was the Gay Rights people, they wouldn't be after you." A flush of relief raced up the governor's boyish features.

At that exact moment, the 727 went into a steep dive and the overhead compartments popped, like topsy-turvy jack-in-the-boxes.

A yellow oxygen mask slapped the governor of California in the eye. An identical one dangled before the lieutenant governor's suddenly bone-white face. They might have been hangman's nooses from the sick, incredulous way the two politicians stared.

The captain's drawling voice came over the intercom, saying, "Nothing to be concerned about, folks. We're experiencing a little problem with our pressurization, so we're just gonna descend to ten thousand feet while we check it out. If you start feeling light-headed, that's what the yellow oxygen masks are for."

"Oh my God! We're going to crash!" the governor said, voice twisting.

"But he just said-"

"I don't care what he said!" the governor snapped, pulling the plastic oxygen mask to his face and hyperventilating wildly.

The lieutenant governor grabbed his mask with one hand and his stomach with the other. As he inhaled deep lungfuls of cold, plasticky oxygen, he prayed to God to keep him from throwing up in the mask and blocking the air line.

On the flight deck, Captain Del Grossman had his flight chart in his lap, as scraps and wisps of cloud whipped by the windshield.

The copilot was guarding the throttles. The captain looked up from his chart and peered out the side window.

Below, under the lower edge of the cloud layer, he saw a city-sprawl that looked like a transistorized circuit board.

"Looks like Fresno," he muttered.

"Can't be Fresno," the copilot said. "It's not possible that we could have wandered this far off-course."

"That's why I said, 'looks like.' " The captain took another look at the flight chart. "According to our heading," he said, "we should be on Low-Altitude Airway Number 47."

"Right," the copilot said, as a hanging hump of cloud swallowed all forward visibility.

"But if we're following that route," the captain added, "we should be seeing the San Joaquin River beneath us."

"Huh," the copilot grunted. They were barreling through a world of gloomy stratocumulus now. "Wanna go lower?"

"No," said the captain. "I want you to check your flight chart."

The flight chart came out of its compartment, and the captain took the throttles.

The copilot checked his chart, frowned, and compared it with that of his senior officer.

"Everything I see tells me we're on-course," he said, with almost no conviction in his voice.

"And everything I see," said the captain, "tells me we're off-course."

"Charts don't lie, you know."

"And I trust the evidence of my eyes."

They were silent while the jet nosed through seemingly impenetrable cloud. The pressurization problem, which had forced them down to this perilously low altitude, was forgotten.

"I'm going to try to get under this damn weather," the captain grumbled.

He reached for the throttles. And his hand froze.

"Jesus H. Christ!"

There was no time to react. No time for anything. They both understood that with complete and utter clarity. They had each logged over twenty-six thousand hours in the air and knew the limitations of their aircraft.

Visibility was less than an eighth of a mile. The 727 was slamming along at about three hundred and seventy miles per hour.

By the time the stone face of Mount Whitney broke the low-hanging clouds and filled the windshield like an implacable idol, there wasn't even enough time to become afraid.

The cockpit crew were snuffed out with an appalling finality that could only have been equaled if they had taken seats in a high-speed trash compactor.

First-class got it from both directions. The foot-thick wall of tangled steel and human detritus that the cockpit and nose had become rammed back, while the rest of the airframe, still under power, drove it toward the collapsing forward bulkhead.

The governor and his lieutenant had a heartbeat's notice. That was all. Then they were both inextricably intertwined, in a roaring metallic entanglement that was almost instantly awash in the poisonous stink of Jet-A fuel. The plane careened and broke up as it made its absolutely final descent.

Down the side of the mountain that shouldn't have been there.

Chapter 2

His name was Remo, and he had a dilemma.

Should he do the hit before, or after, the target was baptized?

It was, Remo had to admit, a first.

Remo had done hits many times. Too many to count. Big shots. Small fish. This particular fish was big. And ugly. There would be no mistaking him amid the small army of Federal marshals, FBI agents, press, and invited observers that, according to Upstairs, were due at any moment.

It couldn't be too soon for Remo Williams.

He was crouched in a thicket on a spongy isle in the heart of the Florida Everglades. It was hot. The air steamed. Love bugs danced in the heat. Remo showed barely a trace of sweat on his cruel face and bare arms. Still, that did not mean he was comfortable-only that he was the master of his own body.

For twenty years he had not felt cold, or heat, or pain or any ordinary discomfort that he was not able to will his body to ignore. For twenty years he had breathed not merely with his lungs, but through his entire body: nose, mouth, unclogged pores. For two decades he had been Sinanju. A Master of Sinanju. The latest Master of Sinanju in an unbroken line that stretched back to the dawn of recorded history. A line that had begun in a ramshackle fishing village on the West Korea Bay where men hired themselves out as assassins and bodyguards in order to feed the village, and now continued in Remo Williams, the first white Master of Sinanju, who served the newest empire on earth, the United States of America, as its secret assassin.

On a nearby hump, a heron flew up.

Remo had heard it unfold its wing preparatory to flight. The sudden upflinging of colorful feathers did not take him by surprise-although it startled an alligator into slithering into the water.

Why would anyone pick the Florida Everglades to be baptized in? Remo wondered, not exactly for the first time.

It was probably the least of the questions hanging in the humid Florida air.

Remo had been assigned the job of eliminating General Emmanuel Alejandro Nogeira, the deposed dictator of the Central American nation of Bananama. Snuffing out General Nogeira was something the Medellin drug cartel, assorted political enemies, and even the U.S. Rangers had attempted over the years.

Ever since he had risen up from rent-a-colonel in the Bananamian version of the CIA, to the day he was seized by U.S. forces as they liberated the country he had bankrupted through greed and corruption, Emmanuel Nogeira had proven immune to assassination.

The former general and self-proclaimed Maximum Chief had grinningly attributed his longevity to Voodoo-specifically to the red underwear he wore to ward off the Evil Eye. He ascribed his continual survival to a wide array of charms, friendly spirits, and ritual sacrifices-usually involving beheaded chickens. In actual fact, he had simply found the perfect-if somewhat inconvenient-sanctuary from his numerous enemies.

A United States federal prison.

The U.S. government had proclaimed a great victory on the day they captured General Nogeira. American servicemen had lost their lives in the effort to bring him to justice. He had been spirited into the U.S. and charged with violating American law through a pattern of drug-smuggling activities. The evidence against him was overwhelming.

Then General Nogeira proceeded to turn the tables on his captors, making a mockery of the American judicial system. He demanded-and got-prisoner-of-war status, a private cell, and privileges usually reserved for criminals serving time in corrupt Mexican jails. Not to mention the unfreezing of his assets.

Despite this, Nogeira had been convicted of drug trafficking, and sentenced to life without parole. But no sooner had that happened than the appeals began. It was estimated that the appeals process would not be entirely exhausted until the year 2093.

Since he had time to kill, General Nogeira announced that he had given up Voodoo, and was now a born-again Baptist. Or would be, once, as he put it, the "gringos" allowed him to be baptized.

Naturally, the prison authorities to whom he had put this unusual request had denied his petition, citing security risks.

Dipping into his seemingly limitless legal fund-the product of his voracious drug dealings, which he had managed to safeguard from confiscation by claiming it represented his income from the days when he was a CIA informer-General Nogeira enlisted the American Civil Rights Collective in his attempts to embrace his newfound religion.

It had taken nearly a year, but the ACRC had taken the issue all the way to the Florida Supreme Court. The Justice Department had caved in at that point. Not on principle, but because the appeals process was threatening to devour their entire operating budget.

General Emmanuel Nogeira had won-once again.

This time he publicly thanked Jesus Christ, whom he had claimed as his personal savior.

General Nogeira asked to be baptized in the Florida Everglades, claiming that it was the environment most like that of his native country, which he missed very much.

For the first time in nearly two years, General Emmanuel Alejandro Nogeira would be outside the walls of the maximum-security federal prison in Miami.

There were rumors that the Medellin Cartel would hit him then. There was other intelligence that they actually planned to liberate Nogeira and reinstall him in Bananama, which he had single-handedly turned into the major coke transshipping point between Colombia and the United States.

That was when Upstairs had ordered the hit on Nogeira.

"Not that I mind," Remo had said at the time, "but why? He's going to rot in prison until the next century. Why not let him rot?"

"Because," he was told, "the man is costing this country thousands of dollars a day in legal fees. He's a common criminal, yet he has been declared a prisoner of war, entitled to wear his uniform and to an allowance of seventy-five Swiss Francs a day. He has his own private cell, and two adjoining ones for his shredding machine and a safe that contains classified U.S. documents the CIA was compelled to surrender to him in the name of a fair trial." Upstairs thinned already thin lips. It was clear that Remo's superior was offended by all this. Deeply offended.

Remo had to admit that Upstairs had a point. He didn't care if there were hit teams sent out to interrupt the baptism. He just wanted to get the hit over with and get out of the Everglades.

So the question remained: Before the baptism, or after?

It was a serious dilemma. If he hit Nogeira before he was baptized, then the general would probably go straight to hell. After, and maybe the guy had a chance to do penance. Spend a few centuries in Purgatory. Remo wasn't sure about that part. He had been raised Catholic. The Baptists might as well have been Jains for all he knew of their theological rules. Did they even have confession?

Crouching on the spongy isle, Remo frowned. The frown made his cruel face harden into angular lines. He was neither handsome nor ugly. Certainly not as ugly as Emmanuel Nogeira, who looked like a comic-book depiction of the Incredible Toad Man.

Remo's eyes were set deep into his skull, and his cheekbones pronounced. His body was lean, almost skinny, and unremarkable, except for his wrists. They were as thick as door posts, as if some mad surgeon had implanted steel rods where his ulna and radius connected with his metacarpals.

Except that the wrists were Remo's own. The two decades of training in the discipline that was Sinanju, the sun-source of the martial arts, had produced this freakish side effect.

Remo tried to imagine what his mentor, the Reigning Master of Sinanju, would say about his dilemma.

He could hear the squeaky voice in his mind's ear after only a moment's reflection.

"Do the House of Sinanju proud. Leave no trace."

Not much help there. Remo thought back to his orphanage days, and Sister Mary Margaret.

Remo wasn't quite sure what Sister Mary Margaret would have said, but it probably would have entailed calling off the hit. Not an option for America's secret assassin.

Finally, Remo considered the counsel of his superior, Dr. Harold W. Smith.

It was easy to figure out Smith's hypothetical advice. "Just do it quietly," Smith would say.

That went without saying. Smith, who ran the supersecret government organization for which Remo worked, had a mania for secrecy. And with good reason. The agency officially did not exist. It was known only as CURE. CURE was no acronym. The letters had no individual meaning. CURE was the symbolic name for the agency's function. That is, a prescription for American society, which criminals such as Emmanuel Nogeira had made sick by twisting constitutional guarantees to serve their own criminal purposes.

Remo had dealt with a great many people who made a mockery of the Constitution, but few did so as blatantly as General Nogeira, who wasn't even a U.S. citizen. This, perhaps more than anything, Remo decided, had offended the proper Smith.

The more Remo thought about it, the more it offended him, too.

He made his decision.

"Screw the baptism," he murmured. "Let him burn forever."

Just then the sound of approaching air-boats sent birds fleeing, and brought on a spasm of splashing in the cypress roots. Remo counted eight splashes. The identical number of alligator heartbeats his sensitive ears had detected pumping in syncopation with reptilian lungs.

Maybe, Remo thought with a fierce grin, the gators will enjoy a nice Banamanian snack.

Remo parted a thicket of yellow-green leaves that felt like cardboard cutouts, and got a good look at the noisy procession.

There were six air-boats in all. The lead boat was choked with Federal marshals, and a few others in blue windbreakers emblazoned with the stenciled letters FBI. They brandished machine pistols.

The occupants of the second boat were too well dressed to be law-enforcement officials. Unless gold Rolexes and hand-tooled leather briefcases had become standard-issue. Remo decided that they were Nogeira's lawyers. He counted twenty. The rest must have had the day off.

There was no mistaking General Emmanuel Alejandro Nogeira, as the first two air-boats rounded a twisted oak dressed in Spanish moss, and the third came into view.

The general wore his fawn-colored military uniform, with its row of three bronze stars on black shoulder boards. His uniform was impeccable-no doubt drycleaned at U.S. taxpayer expense.

The general stood in the blunt bow of the air-boat, unfettered, because the ACRC insisted that it was unconstitutional to manacle an individual while he practiced his religion. The Florida Supreme Court had agreed to that-by a narrow margin.

He was, Remo saw, even uglier in person than on TV.

The general was short and squat, like a repulsive frog. Remo recalled reading that in his native country he was called El Sapo-the Toad-because of his bestial brown face and heavy-lidded serpent's eyes. He was also sometimes called Cara Pina, or "Pineapple Face." He had more acne scars than Tom Hayden.

Remo decided right then and there that the alligators probably would not touch the man. Unless alligators practiced cannibalism.

The first air-boat turned, and Remo saw that the three boats trailing in the rear were filled with reporters. There were a lot of reporters, burdened with minicams and camera equipment. They were busy interviewing a man and a woman. The man was dressed in minister's black. The woman he couldn't see clearly.

This presented Remo with a fresh dilemma. Since officially he no longer existed, he would have to figure out a way to take out Nogeira without getting his latest face on nationwide TV. Every time that happened, Upstairs insisted he go under the knife. Remo had had so much plastic surgery over the years the only change Upstairs hadn't made was to turn his face inside out.

There was a big hump of dry isle nearby, and one by one the air-boats throttled down and glided up to this. Their prows beached with gritty hissing sounds.

General Emmanuel Nogeira stepped off the air-boat like Napoleon onto Saint Helena.

He lifted his hands into the air, fists clenched-a gesture that would have been familiar to anyone who had watched television in the months before the U.S. intervention that had turned Nogeira into a prisoner of war. His thick, blubbery lips peeled back into a dazzling smile. It was the only thing about General Nogeira that was not inherently repulsive. The smile was dazzling. It belonged on someone else's face.

The baptist minister stepped forward, open prayer book in hand.

"Shall we begin?" he inquired.

A throaty female voice cut in. "Not until the speech."

This brought a glower from one of the Federal marshals, who said, "We are here to allow the prisoner to exercise his freedom of religion, not to give a speech."

"Not him," the throaty voice snapped. "Me."

"No time," the marshal said.

"If I am not allowed to exercise my constitutional right to free speech," the voice growled, "then I fully intend to sue you, your superiors, and the entire United States government."

The Federal marshal turned red. An FBI agent stepped forward. They conferred briefly.

Finally the Federal marshal said, "Make it short." He did not sound happy about the delay.

The woman came into view. Remo recognized her then. Rona Ripper. The ACRC lawyer who had singlehandedly spearheaded the legal drive to get General Nogeira baptized. She looked like Elivra, plus forty pounds.

Rona Ripper stepped up to General Nogeira and put her arm around his shoulder. The general's smile gained an inch at either side of his mouth as he placed his arm under hers. His hand came to rest at the small of her back, above the belt line.

"This man," she said loudly, "stands before you a victim of U.S. imperialism!"

Camera flashbulbs popped. Microphones rose. Pencils scribbled furiously in lined note pads.

"This man, this patriot in his country, was exercising his right to rule his nation as he saw fit, when murderous U.S. killer-soldiers descended from the skies and virtually kidnapped him out of his lawful seat of power!"

Remo wondered if Rona Ripper was talking about the same General Nogeira who had nullified an election, and had his goons stone the duly-elected president and vicepresident of Bananama in full view of television cameras.

From his vantage point, Remo had an excellent view as the general's hand slipped down over the woman's right buttock. He gave her a playful squeeze. Rona Ripper went on as if she hadn't noticed.

"They accuse this man of all kinds of barbarism!" she thundered. "None of it true!"

General Nogeira pinched experimentally.

"This man is neither a criminal nor a torturer nor a murderer. He is kind, gentle, and loving. Children write him letters, and he answers every one of them."

General Nogeira took a fistful of buttock and gave Rona Ripper a hard squeeze.

Rona Ripper turned bright red. It was impossible to tell if the coloring was the result of blushing, or the passion aroused in her by her speech. She plowed on.

"He is a great man, a man who-"

General Nogeira's straying hand went up to the top of Rona's skirt and slipped down inside it.

This produced an immediate reaction. Rona Ripper shoved him away and simultaneously slapped him in his pocked face.

Remo took this as his cue.

He withdrew into the water. It smelled. Remo drew in a deep breath and his head went under. He struck out in the general direction of the isle where the baptism was to take place.

Even though it smelled, the water conducted sound perfectly. It brought to Remo's alert ears the slither and splash of an alligator entering the water.

Remo changed direction. He scarcely had to turn his head in the direction he wanted to go, and his body followed. That was Sinanju, which unified every cell in the body into a single responsive organic engine.

The alligator was long and greenish-black, like a mutant glob of snot, and it had hooded eyes that reminded Remo very much of General Nogeira's. Sleepy, yet as creepy.

The gator was working in his direction by kicking and pawing the water with its feet. Its mouth yawned open, disclosing rows of yellowed needle teeth

Remo knew little enough about alligators. He did know they could grab hold of a man's arm and literally saw off the limb. He got that from a Leave it to Beaver episode. Their muscular tails could lash out and stun a man senseless, perhaps kill him. Remo wasn't sure where he'd picked up that morsel of information. He might actually have read it somewhere, but the "where" escaped him, and there was no time to think about it because the alligator had suddenly shot forward, his jaws distending.

For a wild moment, Remo wondered if it was going to attempt to swallow his head. Did alligators do that?

Remo made a half fist that left his lower palm exposed and drove the hard heel of his right hand into the alligator's snout

Limp-legged, the reptile shot back as if equipped with reverse thrusters. And why not? It had just been struck by a blow that carried as much force behind it as a steampowered pile driver.

Remo shot ahead, catching up to the reptile.

He took hold of its jaws and closed them like a crude suitcase. Then, twisting, he took hold of the creature's forelegs, aligning his body with that of the reptile's.

Remo allowed himself to float upward. The feel of the alligator's knobby stomach against his back was like a pebbled beach. Although he was certain the creature had been stunned, he reached up and gave the slick stomach a tickle. He had heard that that made alligators go to sleep. He didn't believe it, but what could it hurt?

When the alligator's ridged back and protuberent eyes popped above the water's surface, there was no sign of Remo Williams.

The alligator started moving forward, looking for all the world like any ordinary alligator swimming through the Everglades-except that this one's legs did not kick and his long tail, instead of trailing behind, drooped forlornly in the brackish water.

Because he wanted the reptile to look as natural as possible, Remo made more splashings with his feet than he needed to pilot the alligator to his destination.

Remo's plan was simple. He was going to push the alligator along like a horny torpedo, toward the baptismal site, then slip away.

While everyone-and more importantly, every camera-was focused on the reptile, he would slip out of the water, deal with the target, and slip back. A single heartstopping blow would make it look like Nogeira had suffered a heart attack.

The unexpected crackle of gunfire made Remo abandon the plan, and the alligator. At first Remo thought they had spotted the gator too soon, and had opened up on it.

He pushed against the beast, seeking the water bottom. His idea was to get as deep as possible. Most bullets lost force and direction upon entering the water.

As soon as Remo touched bottom, he realized the gunfire was not directed toward him or the gator. There were almost no sounds of bullets plunking into water.

Remo took a chance. He thrust his head above the waterline.

He saw pandemonium.

The phalanx of beached air-boats was coming apart in a storm of automatic weapons fire. The protective steel cages over the pusher propellers seemed to be melting, the firing was so fierce.

The Federal marshals and FBI agents drew weapons and dived for cover. The media, however, simply stood their ground busily recording every bullet strike and sound as if they had papal dispensations to protect them from harm.

The sources of the firing were the approaching airboats and cigarette boats. Brown-skinned gunmen lined the rails. Assorted Uzis, Mac-10s, Tec-9s and other vicious weapons were pouring out concentrated hell.

Everyone seemed to have a role to play in the sudden drama-except General Emmanuel Nogeira. He stood frozen, bestial face going from the converging attackers to the federal agents digging in for cover. His wide mouth hung open like a greedy frog's.

It was clear the general didn't know whether he was being attacked or rescued.

In the act of pulling the general's groping hand from her skirt, Rona Ripper went white as a sheet.

General Nogeira grabbed her and wrestled her around and in front of him. Bullets chopped moss off cypress tree branches and made plinking sounds in the water.

Remo submerged.

The attacking boats were not far from his position. He laid his palms on his thighs and gave a great double kick.

Remo became a human arrow. As he passed under a pair of boats, he poked holes in the careening hulls. If any of the cameras had been underwater, they would have recorded a casual tapping. Remo used one finger. It was enough.

Perfectly round finger-sized holes perforated the hulls. Water surged in. Then the crafts began to wallow and slow down.

Remo veered toward an air-boat. Its flat bottom surged over him.

He took hold of the dangling rudder and made a fist. The fist went through the aluminum hull as if the fist were aluminum and the hull mere flesh.

Kicking back, Remo got out of the way.

The air-boat, being shallow, simply dropped. Mud began stirring up when the great spinning fan dropped below the water line.

Remo moved among the floundering passengers, pulling them down by their legs and breaking their spines at the neck like a farmer harvesting chickens.

Through the nicely sound-conducting water, Remo caught the shrill scream of panic.

"Gators! Look out! Gators!"

Remo grinned, letting a solitary air bubble escape through his teeth. If they thought he was an alligator, so much the better. He continued with his work.

He got a glimpse of brown faces as he pulled the attackers down. Bananamian or Colombian? He couldn't tell. It didn't matter. They were bad guys. Dealing with bad guys was his job.

Remo quickly brought most of the boats down. He didn't come up for air once. He didn't need to. If necessary he could hold his breath for hours, releasing only a little carbon dioxide at a time.

Keeping submerged, Remo swam around to the other side of the isle, away from the tumult.

When he stuck his head back up, he saw that the press had retreated for cover. All except one man, who lay screaming, clutching his minicam with one hand and his bleeding leg with the other. He was crying, "Medic! Medic!" and the look on his face was one of disbelief.

The FBI and Federal marshals had staked out firing positions. They were returning fire in a steady, methodical way, not wasting ammunition or firing recklessly.

A shrill voice carried over the concatenation, crying, "I'll sue! I'm suing everyone for violating my civil rights."

It was Rona Ripper. She was crawling on her stomach for shelter.

An FBI agent in a blue windbreaker started out to assist her. His head disappeared in a fine crimson mist as a dozen machine pistols sought his head.

Rona Ripper instantly started crawling backward, crying, "I surrender! I surrender!" Her face dragged in the sand because she was trying to crawl with her hands raised.

"Damn!" Remo growled, seeing no sign of General Nogeira.

A surviving cigarette boat veered off from the rest of the attacking flotilla and rounded the isle on the opposite side.

Remo figured it had gone after Nogeira. He jackknifed under and began swimming at high speed.

His ears picked up a clumsy splashing and he popped out of the water like a dolphin.

General Nogeira was stumbling out of the back side of the island. His pocked face was a picture of ugly fear.

He saw the churning boat, and his expression became ludicrous. He doubled back.

The cigarette boat piled up on the isle, and its passengers jumped off and gave chase. Some of them wore fawn-colored uniforms not much different from General Nogeira's. One, wounded, had to be helped along.

They all disappeared into the thick foliage.

Hanging back in the water, Remo wondered if he shouldn't let nature take its course. The way he saw it, the Bananamanian armed forces had dibs on the man who had ruined their country.

The decision was made for him. A scream rose up in the close, humid air.

A few seconds later, a man came stumbling back into the water. He ran blindly, his hands clutching his eyes. His fingers and lower face were slick with blood. The blood was coming from his eyes. The five bronze stars on his shoulder boards more than identified him.

The general was screaming in Spanish, a language Remo didn't understand. But the horrible tones told him all he had to know.

The man had been blinded. Probably by a knife across his eyeballs.

He proved this by stumbling over a twisted cypress root and falling face-first into the water.

Remo was wondering if he should put the suffering brute out of his misery when an alligator came charging out of the thicket.

"Charging" was the only word for it. The reptile erupted into view and ran like an absurd, clumsy dog for the water's edge. Its jaws snapped open and shut with every clumsy step.

The alligator plunged into the water and snapped up the general by one flailing arm. It wasted no time. It dragged the screaming man, pounding against its greenish hide, below the water.

After that, Remo decided to tread water and count bubbles.

When the bubbles stopped, Remo had counted forty-two. The water had become a diffuse color resembling pink lemonade.

Remo climbed onto shore with the intention of taking care of the assailants. They must be pretty dumb, he thought, to let the general get away from them like that. Or maybe not so dumb-since he hadn't actually gotten away.

The gunfire had died down.

It started up again, more ferocious than before.

Remo went through the saw grass like a lawnmower through hay. He got to the high hump and looked down.

The FBI and Federal marshals were pinned down in a crossfire. The withering fire was coming up, from the surviving boats, and down, from a line of fawn-uniformed attackers not a dozen yards below Remo's position.

Maybe he was wrong. Maybe this was a Colombian hit team, after all.

Remo slipped down to the line and began relieving the assailants of their weapons. He did this in a novel way. He literally disarmed them.

The first man to be disarmed was down on one knee hosing the low ground with his Uzi when it happened.

Remo slipped up behind him, took him by the hard balls of his shoulder bones, and separated his hands. He seemed to exert casual effort. But five thousand years of accumulated knowledge were behind the gesture.

The shoulder joints went pop!

The man's arms came away in Remo hands. He threw them in two directions.

The man jumped up and, squirting blood from each shoulder like a human lawn sprinkler, began to dance and caper until blood loss had turned him into a squirming pile on the ground.

By that time, Remo was flinging arms in all directions with joyous abandon.

This spectacle didn't exactly go unnoticed. Gunmen scattered, firing to cover their retreat. Remo was forced to waste time evading the crossfire. He could dodge bullets as if they were spring rain, but this was a slashing rain.

Remo was forced to drop to his stomach and let the storm pass over him.

When the firing finally had died down, Remo stood up in time to see the remaining attackers pile into the water under a hail of FBI return fire. The attackers were stubborn: They did not desert their comrades. A few died in the attempt to rescue the others who had fallen.

This forced Remo to revise his opinion yet again. No drug-killer worked this way. This was a military operation.

Then, under harassing fire, they waded up on a single air-boat and blasted away at the grassy isle that had been chosen for a baptism but instead had become a baptism of fire for a number of federal agents.

Hearing the FBI getting itself organized, Remo faded back to the back end of the isle and the water.

He swam past the bloated body in the fawn-colored uniform. The alligator had hold of it by the head and was vigorously attempting to crack open its skull.

As Remo, swimming underwater to avoid detection, left it behind, his ears were rewarded by an ugly crack of a sound.

He hoped Upstairs would be satisfied with the way things had turned out. The target had been taken out, even if Remo had had help. As for the attackers--whoever they turned out to be-they would have a hard time getting out of the country once the FBI had alerted Washington.

The last thing Remo heard as he put the day's work behind him was the throaty voice of Rona Ripper, threatening to sue everyone from the FBI to the President of the United States.

It annoyed him-but the thought of General Emmanuel Alejandro Nogeira, roasting in Hell, unbaptized, more than made up for that.

Chapter 3

Dr. Harold W. Smith received the first report on the deaths of the governor of California and his lieutenant governor directly from the President of the United States.

There was a red phone on one corner of Smith's desk, in an office that overlooked Long Island Sound. The phone had no dial. It didn't need one. It was a dedicated line. On the other end, hundreds of miles south of Washington, D.C., an identical red instrument nestled in an end table attached to the bed in the Lincoln Bedroom of the White House.

When the phone rang, Harold Smith brought the red receiver to his gray, bitter face. He cleared his throat and said, "Yes, Mr. President?"

He held his breath. He always held his breath at these moments, because if the next voice Dr. Harold W. Smith heard was not that of the current President of the United States, Harold W. Smith was obligated to swallow a coffin-shaped poison pill he kept in the watch pocket of his gray vest. After shutting down CURE, the organization that officially did not exist.

The parched Texas-by-way-of-Massachusetts voice came as an imperceptible relief to Smith. The news did not.

"The governor of California has just perished in an airline crash," the President said, dry-voiced.

Smith recalled the governor. Like the President, he was a Republican. He could not recall the name of the next man in line, the lieutenant, and whether or not California's lieutenant governor was a Republican or not: Not that it mattered to Smith. He no longer voted. It was the price he was forced to pay to remain above national politics.

The President's next words made Smith's unspoken question moot.

"The lieutenant governor was on the same flight," the President said.

Smith sat up. His cracked leather chair, his personal seat of power for as long as he headed CURE, creaked in protest.

"Isn't that against all protocol?" Smith asked. A frown creased his pale forehead. Or rather, the permanent lines of worry that rode his face deepened.

"It is. That's why I'm calling you. The FAA will naturally be investigating this, but I thought, given the bizarre circumstances, that you might look into this-discreetly."

"I understand," Harold Smith said. "Discreetly" meant that Smith was not to send in Remo. When Remo went in, bodies piled up. This was not that kind of situation. Yet.

"Do you have any idea where the two men were bound when the plane crashed?" Smith asked.

"It didn't actually crash. It flew into the side of a mountain."

"That is unusual. I will get on the matter directly," Smith said.

"Remember. Be prudent."

"Always."

Smith hung up. When the President had interrupted his workday, Smith was going over the overtime logs for the institute whose management was his day-to-day responsibility-and CURE's cover.

The brass plate on Smith's closed door read: HAROLD W. SMITH, DIRECTOR. There was a larger brass plate on one of the brick posts that framed the wrought-iron gates to the institution. It read: FOLCROFT SANITARIUM. Smith headed Folcroft. But Folcroft business could wait.

He slid the overtime logs into a desk drawer, and his thin hand paused over a bottle of Maalox. It was his habit to take a tablespoon of this every day at this time, in the normal course of events. On bad days, he took Zantac. On hectic days, children's aspirin. A triple dosage. Then there were his Alka-Seltzer days, and his mineral-water days, and his warm-milk days.

Today, Harold Smith felt like none of these things. He wondered if this had anything to do with the recent ordeal he had undergone-in which an ancient enemy of the Master of Sinanju had ensnared them all in his web. It had been a disturbing experience, which Smith only dimly recalled. Smith had not been himself. The doctor had pronounced it a virus. Both he and Chiun had been infected. It was invariably fatal.

Smith might have died but for a quirk of fate.

He had suffered a heart seizure. Only quick action by the Folcroft staff, and the electrical restimulation of his diseased heart muscle, had pulled him back from the brink.

Miraculously, it had also burned all trace of the virus from his bloodstream.

Now, months later, Smith was back to normal. No, he was more than normal. His stomach no longer bothered him. His blinding headaches had abated. He no longer needed his Zantac, or Maalox, or Tums, or Flintstones-brand aspirin, or any of those common remedies.

Another man would have been relieved. Smith was worried. He was a chronic worrier.

He decided against taking a tablespoon of Maalox, just in case, and closed the drawer. Pressing a concealed stud on the other side of his shabby oak desk, Smith watched a panel drop and slide away. An ordinary computer terminal hummed up and clicked into place.

It was no more ordinary than Smith. It connected to a bank of mainframes deep in the Folcroft basement. These in turn fed off virtually every computer in the country that could be accessed by modem. Their memory banks contained a vast reservoir of raw data on people, companies, and organizations that could conceivably be of use to Smith in the performance of his secret duties.

Smith got to work. He was relieved that he would not need Remo and Chiun on this one. They invariably brought results-but also problems.

Smith logged on to the wire service news-feeds. He got the preliminary bulletins that were now breaking all over the nation.

These told him the bare facts. The airline; flight number, and confirmation that the governor and lieutenant-governor were on the passenger list although the bodies had yet to be recovered.

This scant information was enough. Smith logged over to the airlines reservation data banks, using the access code of a mythical travel agency.

The governor's ticket had been purchased by a third party, Smith discovered, through a Sacramento travel agency. He called up the purchaser's name.

Behind his rimless eyeglasses, Smith's puritanical gray eyes blinked.

The name was Emmanuel Nogeira.

"This must be a joke," Smith muttered.

Smith next went to the lieutenant governor's ticket file. It, too, was a third-party purchase, charged to the same Mastercard number.

This time Smith gave vent to a gasp as dry as the New England soil that had nourished him.

An "Emmanuel Nogeira" had purchased that ticket as well. He had also paid for the Federal Express shipping cost to the recipient ticket holder's name.

Smith switched off, and called up the Mastercard file after a brief tapping of keys and the press of a hot key. Smith had set up his system so that by pressing the hot key marked F4 on his keyboard, whatever computer system he had called up would be immediately attacked by the proper password, kept on permanent file in the mainframe.

The Mastercard system surrendered in a twinkling.

The file showed that the "Emmanuel Nogeira" in question currently resided at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Miami, Florida. His occupation was given as "Displaced Dictator and Prisoner of War."

Reflexively, Harold Smith reached for his drawer of pharmaceuticals.

He pulled it open, looked inside, and realized that, despite the horrific discovery he had made, he felt no need for medical support. Slowly, he closed the drawer.

The card file showed that Emmanuel Nogeira was carrying six months' worth of debt. He was just a hair under his credit limit.

It also showed that he had purchased two front-row tickets to a Nana Mouskouri concert at the L.A. Music Center for eight P.M. on this very night.

Smith swallowed what little saliva remained in his rapidly drying mouth. The fatal flight had had a Los Angeles destination.

Harold W. Smith was a man who believed in order. He understood that he lived in a mathematical universe, one ruled by variables and constants. Coincidence abounded, but unbroken chains of coincidences did not.

In a rational universe governed by mathematical principles, the green alphanumeric symbols that wavered before Harold Smith's eyes told of a clever plot to lure the governor and lieutenant governor of California to their deaths.

Smith did not yet know how. He was a long way from understanding why. But he had a working model of the problem-and he had pulled it all together in just under five minutes.

Smith sat back in his chair, his gray eyes still on the screen, but no longer seeing the displayed data, except as abstract green lights. His eyes were focused inward.

Smith was a gray man. He was thin and pinch-faced. He might have been a stern headmaster out of the nineteenth century. His clothes, although twentieth-century, had that flavor too. His lanky, angular frame was swathed in a three-piece gray suit of conservative cut. His hair was white and thinning. His school tie bore Dartmouth stripes. It was the only splash of color on his otherwise colorless person.

No one looking at Harold Smith could imagine his burdens, or grasp the fact that, next to the President of the United States, he was the most powerful man in the U.S. government, which of course meant the entire world.

Through his nondescript computer, Smith ran CURE. He enjoyed full autonomy. Although he reported directly to the President, just as he had to the current President's predecessors going back to the one who had died in office after creating CURE, a victim of an assassin's bullet, Smith was not answerable to the Executive Branch. He took requests, reported concerns. That was as far as it went. Smith was empowered to take whatever action he deemed necessary to deal with internal problems and external threats.

Technically, this arrangement made him more powerful than the President. But there was one presidential directive Smith was obligated to accept: the shutdown command. If invoked, Smith would, without hesitation, erase his massive data banks, put into motion a plan of action that would take his sole enforcement arm, Remo Williams, out of the picture. And when that was accomplished, and only then, he would swallow his vest-pocket pill and go to his reward-whatever that might be.

Right now, Smith wasn't thinking about any of that. He was wondering what plan General Emmanuel Alejandro Nogeira had in mind-and for the first time, he was worried that his enforcement arm might succeed in an assignment.

Because right at this moment, Harold W. Smith wanted General Emmanuel Nogeira very much alive. And only hours before he had sent Remo to Miami to liquidate Nogeira.

"Damn."

The curse was barely a breath. Smith rarely cursed. He was of taciturn New England stock. Vermont Smiths didn't curse, although sometimes they kicked the furniture.

There was no way to contact Remo in the field. He was the perfect field agent in some respects. He almost always came through. But a dismal failure, insofar as carrying communications equipment was concerned. In desperation, Smith had simplified his contact phone number to an unbroken succession of ones. Even Remo could not forget that code.

If only he would call in, Smith thought, his weary eyes going to the blue contact telephone.

They were still on the blue instrument, several minutes later, when it shrilled suddenly.

Smith grabbed the receiver, said, "Remo! Have you completed your mission?"

"Yes and no," Remo said guardedly.

"Please do not burden me with evasions. I want a direct answer. Did you terminate your target?"

Remo's voice was abashed. "I'm sorry, Smitty. I kinda screwed it up."

"Thank God," Smith said.

"Huh?" Remo grunted.

"Nogeira is alive then?"

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean?"

"An alligator got him."

"Got? By what do you mean, 'got'?"

"Got, as in 'turned into a human Tootsie Pop,' " Remo said flatly. "What other kind of 'got' is there, where alligators are concerned?"

"Then he is dead," Smith said woodenly.

"I think his toes may still be twitching, but his head was definitely dead," Remo said dryly.

"This is unfortunate. I very much wanted Nogeira alive."

"Yeah? Then why'd you send me out to take him out? Was this some bullshit field test that I screwed up by not screwing up?"

"No, Remo," said Smith in a tired tone. "In the last hour both the governor and lieutenant governor of California have been killed in a plane crash. According to my computers, they were on their way to a concert. The tickets-both airline and concert-were provided by Emmanuel Nogeira."

"But he's been in prison for two years," Remo said.

"A prison in which he had unlimited access to a telephone, and full use of his credit card," Smith pointed out.

"Some prison," Remo remarked.

"Remo, I need a full report on the assignment."

"Okay," Remo said. "Put the scrambler on top speed. Here goes."

Remo rattled off his report. At the end of it, he added, "There is one consolation."

"And that is?"

"Nogeira never did get baptized."

Smith was silent a moment. "You say you are not clear on the identities of these assailants?"

"Take your pick," Remo said. "Either they were Colombians out to kill him, Bananamanian Army forces out to kill him, or his own people out to kill him. Whoever they were, they were out to kill him. And they definitely contributed." "I think we can leave the Bananamanian Army out of this," Smith mused. "It was in their interest to let American justice run its course."

"If that means they wanted to see Nogeira punished,"

Remo inserted, "I'd say they go back to the top of the list. Because American justice was being run into the ground by this guy, not the other way around."

"Point taken," said Smith, his voice losing its distant, reflective quality.

"You think Nogeira was behind the plane crash?" Remo asked, after the pause on the line had grown lengthy.

"I am certain of it."

"Well, whatever he was up to, the secret died with him."

"He may have had confederates."

"The guys who wasted him?" Remo suggested.

Smith's response was thin. "Perhaps."

Remo asked, "What do you want me to do?"

"Nothing. I will have Federal agents cover the airports, highways, and train stations."

"I think you can save your breath."

"Why is that?"

"From the way those guys shot up the FBI down there, I think the word's already been put out."

"Of course. Then I must confer with the President."

"Before you do, do me a favor, Smitty?"

"What is that?" Smith said, wincing at that bit of familiarity. He hated to be called "Smitty"-the more so because it usually meant Remo was about to ask a favor.

"Call Chiun first and tell him that even though I didn't do the hit, I did right."

"You did neither," said Harold Smith, who was too busy now to bother with trivial disputes between his field operatives.

He hung up the phone without another word and took hold of the red telephone, wondering what the President's reaction to his discovery would be.

Chapter 4

In the lobby of the Fontainebleau Hotel overlooking the Miami waterfront, Remo hung up the pay phone.

He glided to the bank of elevators. "Glided" was the perfect word to describe the way Remo moved. He wore a white T-shirt and tan chinos. His feet were encased in hand-made loafers of Italian leather. Quality shoes. Still, they should have left impressions in the deep nap of the lobby carpet. But they did not. His soles seemed just to caress the nap, like constantly moving brushes.

Remo's casual attire should have gotten disapproving looks from the lobby staff. It did not. He might have been invisible. In a way, he was.

The elevator door dinged and opened. Remo stepped aboard, punched the seventh-floor button, and folded his lean arms. His deep-set brown eyes were clouded with worry.

Maybe Chiun won't ask me how it went, Remo thought.

Yeah, and maybe he'll have cooked dinner for us both.

Neither was very likely, Remo knew.

He came off the elevator with his hands in his pockets and his mouth an unhappy downward curl on his face.

He pushed open the door to his room.

Instantly, his nostrils were greeted by the fresh, sweet smell of boiled white rice-his favorite-and the tang of baked fish.

Remo grinned. Maybe the day would be saved, after all. Something had caused Chiun to break down and cook dinner.

He started toward the kitchenette of their suite of rooms.

"I smell good eating," Remo said.

"And I smell failure," came a squeaky, querulous voice.

"Uh-oh," Remo muttered. In a brighter voice he said aloud, "Do I smell dinner?"

"No, you do not."

"No? Why?"

"Because I smell failure."

This time, Remo's "Uh-oh" was audible.

He paused on the threshold of the kitchenette. The Master of Sinanju was in the act of pouring the contents of a stainless-steel pot into the sink. He reached down and touched the garbage-disposal button. It rumbled. The steam emanating from the sink was quickly drawn from sight. The fresh smell of steamed rice went away with it.

"You're throwing away perfectly good rice," Remo pointed out.

"I am no longer hungry," said Chiun, next taking a tray of baked fish from the oven.

This, too, was consumed by the garbage disposal.

Remo could only watch helplessly, his saliva glands-just about the only physical part of him he did not fully control-working overtime.

"Who said I failed?" Remo asked unhappily.

"Your feet."

Remo looked down. His feet looked like they always did. His shoes shone. Not that he ever bothered to shine them. Whenever they got dirty or picked up a scuff, he simply threw them away and bought new ones. Sometimes in that order.

"What about my feet?"

"They stink of failure."

Remo sniffed the air. "I don't smell anything."

"This odor is not smelt, but heard," Chiun said, thin-voiced. "Your every footfall reeks of shame, and failure."

"I did not fail," Remo said stubbornly.

"You did not accomplish your mission?" asked Chiun, turning to face him for the first time.

Chiun, Reigning Master of Sinanju, stood no more than five feet tall. In his kimono, he resembled a frail cone of scarlet. The front was a swirl of calla lilies, stitched in silvery thread.

Eyes the color of steel regarded Remo, giving off cold, brittle sparks. They were set in a face that might have been a resin mask, yellow and lined with age. The bald head shone under the overhead light. Over each ear, wispy white hair made a gentle puff. His chin, resolute despite its unquestionable frailty, boasted a curl of a beard that was like smoke frozen in eternity.

Slowly, long-nailed hands rose and the fingers, thin and the color of eagle talons, came together. Fingers grasped the opposite wrist and the scarlet sleeves came together then, hiding the old Korean's hands.

"Speak," he intoned.

"Okay," Remo said quickly. "I didn't complete my mission. "

"Then you failed."

"I did not fail," Remo repeated.

"You lie. This was the most important mission Emperor Smith has given you, and you botched it like the clod-footed amateur that you are."

"Who said it was so important?"

"I do. Smith asked you to do a simple thing: to dispatch a former head of state. A minor thing-for Sinanju. A major thing, in our Emperor's eyes."

"Smith said nothing of the sort."

Chiun cocked his head. "You did not kill this man?"

"No. But he is dead."

"Aiiee!" Chiun wailed, his hands springing into view. They took hold of the puffs over his ears and tugged in consternation. He did a little circle dance in his sandaled feet. "You let competition steal the food from our babies' mouths!"

The reference was to the children in Sinanju-who were fed by the work of the Master, as they had been for five thousand years. It was the reason the men of Sinanju had first hired out their services to the emperors of ancient Asia.

"Actually, an alligator got him," Remo admitted, folding his lean arms.

"Who saw this?" Chiun asked quickly.

"No one, as far as I know."

"Then you will tell Smith that you dispatched this evil warlord yourself," Chiun snapped. "Use flowery phrases. He will not detect the deceit in your tones."

"I think that when the autopsy results come in and show that Nogeira died from having his head chewed off his shoulders, we'll have a hard time keeping that story alive."

"I will inform Emperor Smith that you are employing a new technique-designed to fool the gullible into believing wild alligators were at fault. We will tell him that this was done in Egyptian times."

"They have alligators back then?"

Chiun gestured with a lifted finger. "Crocodiles. A minor difference no one will discover, if we keep our wits about us."

"I can't lie."

"Why not?"

"Because I already reported to Smith."

Chiun's slit eyes widened in shock. "Before conferring with me? Who did you think you work for?"

"Smith."

"No! A thousand times, no! You work for the village. Smith is merely a middleman. The emperor is not important, only the emperor's gold."

Remo smiled thinly. "I'll tell Smith that next time I see him."

"Don't you dare!"

"Fine. Then get off my back."

"Never. Through you, my House survives. I will never get off your back until you are perfection."

"Never happen," said Remo, going to the cabinet over the stove. He began rummaging for something to eat. A feast awaited him-if a rice smorgasbord was his idea of sumptuous dining. Virtually every kind of rice was available to him, from domestic whites to exotic browns that smelled like popcorn.

He pulled off the shelf a clear plastic bag, heavy with hard, white grains, and grabbed up the still warm pot.

The Master of Sinanju watched this with grim mien.

"What did Smith say when you broke the terrible news of your abysmal failure?"

"He said he didn't want me to kill Nogeira, after all. So there."

Chiun's pale eyebrows drew together. "He changed his mind?"

"It was changed for him."

"Ah. The so-called 'President,' exerting his will. Perhaps this will impell Smith to see the light."

"If by 'light' you mean overthrow the President, I doubt it."

"What exactly did Smith say? We may yet salvage our honor in this-sordid matter."

"I forget," Remo said cagily, drawing tap water and filling the pot.

"Come! Speak! You are hiding something."

"Okay," said Remo. "Turns out he wanted Nogeira alive. "

"Unbelievable!" cried Chiun. The single word was a keen of anguish. "Even in your failure, you have failed."

Remo looked up from the sink. "How's that again?"

"You failed to eliminate your target," Chiun spat. "That is one thing. Your emperor changed his mind and desired that the evil one survive. You had a golden opportunity to demonstrate that you anticipated your emperor's unspoken wishes, and you allowed a mere alligator to come between you and glory."

"Since when is Smith my emperor?"

"Since you have piled failure upon failure."

"The way I see it," Remo retorted, going to the tabletop refrigerator, "I'm a victim of Smith's not knowing what he wants."

Chiun nodded vigorously. "Yes. Good. Now you are thinking. We will blame Smith."

Remo looked back. "We will?"

"In our histories, of course. This way our ancestors will understand that no blame will attach itself to us, and become something they will be forced to live down in later times."

"Now might be a good time to get it down in the scrolls," Remo suggested. "While it's still fresh in your mind."

"You begin to show glimmerings of intelligence," said Chiun, who then swept away in a flourish of Christmas-red kimono skirts.

Remo returned to picking through the refrigerator, his unhappy mouth brightening into a self-satisfied grin.

With luck, Chiun would spend the next hour telling his future descendants how Mad Harold, the Emperor of America, had blown the mission. That would be plenty of time for Remo to cook up a mess of rice and fish.

His grin went away by degrees, when he discovered that there was no more fish to be had. There was plenty of duck, though. All kinds.

The trouble was, it took a lot longer than an hour to cook a duck properly.

Remo hurriedly pushed the smallest duck he could find into the oven and turned on the burner. With luck, it would be ready before Chiun was finished.

Just to be safe, he turned the heat up as high as it would go. After all, luck was something Remo had encountered little of today.

The oven started smoking immediately, but smoky duck would be a hell of a lot better than no duck at all, Remo reasoned. And who knew? He might discover that he liked smoked duck.

Remo never found out. When the smoke got thick enough to attract the Master of Sinanju's attention, Chiun swept in, and threw open the kitchen window to let in fresh air.

He also threw the smoking duck out the open window. Without a word, he tossed the boiling rice water after it, and returned to his labors.

Remo settled for yesterday's cold rice.

Chapter 5

Harmon Cashman had hope in his heart. For the first time in almost four years, since the last presidential election, he had hope in his heart.

Back in those halcyon days, Harmon Cashman had been chief advance man for the then Vice-President and now current President of the United States. He had served the man well. Got him through the minefield of the Iowa Caucuses. Helped shape his presidential image. Distanced him from his predecessor, the incumbent President.

It was true that they had come to New Hampshire trailing in the polls. The campaign was on the ropes. No other way to describe it. There, the governor of the state had stepped in. A real bulldog. No finesse about him at all. But he had single-handedly turned the New Hampshire primary and the fortunes of the Vice-President around.

Harmon Cashman had to hand it to the New Hampshire governor. Even now. Never said any different.

What Harmon Cashman had never understood was how the governor had ended up White House Chief of Staff. That job was supposed to have gone to Harmon Cashman. True, there had been no such agreement, written or oral. But it was understood. At least, it had been understood by Harmon Cashman.

After the election, the President-elect had broken the news to Harmon Cash, gentle but direct. He explained that he owed his office to the governor, who had turned everything around for him. Snatched victory out of the jaws of defeat, the man had. Harmon Cashman took it hard. He declined any lesser appointment. It was Chief of Staff or nothing.

It ended up nothing. To be more precise, a handwritten thank-you note from the new president was forthcoming. A two-pager. Believing himself humiliated, Harmon Cashman, the most seasoned advance man in national politics, withdrew from electioneering, telling himself there would be other elections, other candidates.

Now, four years later, with the presidential primaries in full cry, he found this was true. But not for Harmon Cashman. No one liked a sore loser. The GOP shunned him. The Democrats, who this year more than ever all looked and sounded alike, like some extended family with matching hair, wouldn't have him on their teams. They figured he was some kind of Republican Trojan horse.

Harmon Cashman had made overtures to certain state campaigns, but in every case the boat had already left the dock. There was no place on any campaign-unless he wanted to stuff envelopes in some stuffy storefront campaign headquarters in East Treestump, Nebraska.

This all changed the day hope came into Harmon Cashman's life.

Hope came up to the front door of Harmon Cashman's Manassas townhouse, carrying a paper sack and bearing a beatific smile that made Harmon Cashman instantly want to help the face behind the smile.

"I am called Esperanza," said the smile.

Harmon Cashman understood the name to be Spanish. He frowned. "I had a maid named Esperanza once," he muttered, looking over the face behind the dazzling smile.

It was a round, cherubic face, the color of toffee. The skin was as smooth as molasses, as if poured into a mold; perfect and without blemish.

The eyes were a liquid, like melting licorice. They gleamed with a I-want-you-to-like-me gleam.

The man was some kind of ethnic. But he had such a nice face that Harmon Cashman was instantly lulled into swallowing his surprise.

"Esperanza," the man said, "is my last name." His voice reminded Harmon of honey, sweet, and golden clear. It was the perfect radio voice. An alto. With a trace of fire under it. "Esperanza means 'Hope.' " He lifted the paper sack. "I bring you hope."

Brown fingers pulled open the bag. Harmon Cashman looked inside. He saw vaguely familiar hard, black, round shapes mixed with curls of white. Like thin smiles. They seemed to be smiling at him, those round black shapes. The smiles were familiar. They reminded him somehow of Virginia, where he had grown up. And Grandma Cashman's kitchen.

He reached in and pulled one of the hauntingly familiar smiles out of the bag. It was sandwiched between two serrated wafers of black chocolate.

He sniffed it. The odor brought back powerful childhood memories.

"This is an Oreo cookie," he said, blank-voiced.

"Yes, you may have another," said the man who called himself Esperanza.

Blinking, Harmon Cashman succumbed to an urge that had been suppressed since childhood. He took another cookie. Grandma had always allowed him two. Sometimes three.

He bit the dry, crumbly edge off one. It tasted as sweet as he had remembered. And he had not eaten an Oreo sandwich cookie in a long, long time. He wondered how the man knew he used to gobble these things up by the boxful when he was in short pants.

"My full name is Enrique Espiritu Esperanza," said the cherubic man.

"I'm Harmon Cashman," Harmon Cashman said, through lips to which clung black crumbs and flecks of white creme filling. He licked them clean, but with the next bite they collected more chocolaty Oreo bits.

"I know. That is why I have come to converse with you."

"Say again?"

"I am running for governor of California, and I need you to manage my campaign. I understand that in what you do, you are the best."

"I never heard of you," replied Harmon Cashman, his mouth full.

"That is why I have come to you. You will help me to become known."

The man had such a pleasant way about him that Harmon Cashman immediately stepped out of the way and said, "Let's talk." They ate as they talked. Harmon Cashman somehow ended up with the bag of Oreos. The man took another out of the inner pocket of his suit. This was a small roll of Oreos. Lunch-box size.

As they munched away happily, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza talked of his vision.

"As you know, there has been a tragedy in California."

"They broke the most basic rule of political travel," said Harmon Cashman, gobbling his cookies. "You know, these are the best Oreos I ever tasted," he murmured. His eyes gleamed with pleasure.

The liquid eyes of Esperanza shone like those of a doe.

"They have called a special election. It is wide open. To anyone."

Harmon shook his head ruefully. "Only in California."

"It is a fine place. It is my home."

"Never been there more than three-four weeks."

"You will like it there-if you accept my offer."

Harmon Cashman extracted the last Oreo from the bag. He nursed it, as if afraid that when it was gone there would be no more like it in the world. Now he understood what some people meant by "comfort food." And he wondered why he had stopped eating the things. He thought it was around the time he had discovered beer. And girls.

"Are you familiar with those who are running to take the late governor's place?" asked the smooth, pleasant voice of Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

"Yeah. The last Democrat to hold the job. Since he washed out of the Presidential race, he's claimed he had a conversion. He's a Republican now. And the state committee can't do a damn thing about it."

"The Democrat is just as strange."

"There's no way Rona Ripper has a shot," Harmon Cashman snapped. "She's a woman, and thirty pounds overweight, so the camera makes her look obese. And she's a card-carrying ARCRer. No chance."

"Her campaign theme is a good one. Anti-smoking."

"Hell, California's the biggest anti-smoking state there is. She's preaching to the converted."

"And Barry Black is promising Republican results with Democratic ideals."

"Mixed message," Harmon Cashman scoffed. "They don't sell. He's just splitting the vote."

"Precisely. That is why Enrique Esperanza has an exceptional chance."

"How come I never heard of you?" Harmon wondered.

"Before this, I was a simple farmer. Growing grapes."

"There's good money in grapes."

"But there is greater satisfaction in governing. I would like to be the governor of my state and help it prosper again."

Harmon Cashman ticked off points on his finger. "Good business background. Your smile's photogenic. Nice voice. You got the goods for a media blitz. But you're a dark horse."

Enrique Esperanza looked blank. "I am a what?"

"Dark horse," Harmon explained. "It's a figure of speech. It means a candidate who nobody has ever heard of and who has almost no chance. A long shot."

"A dark horse is like an underdog?"

"You got it," said Harmon Cashman, swallowing the last morsel of cookie.

"Then I will be the dark underdog," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza. "I will carry this name proudly."

"You need a slogan."

"My name is my slogan."

"Huh?"

"Hope. I represent hope. I am Esperanza."

"Hmm. A lot of Hispanics in California. You know, it's so simple, it might fly."

"You are on board then?"

Harmon Cashman hesitated. "You got any more Oreos?" he asked, looking at the remaining cookies in Enrique Espiritu Esperanza's soft brown hand with open greed.

"Here," said the dark-horse candidate for governor. "You may have the last of mine."

"It's a deal," said Harmon Cashman, snatching up the Oreos. They were tiny, so he took smaller bites, knowing that he would have to make them last.

They were long gone by the time Enrique Espiritu Esperanza had outlined his plan to take the governorship of California. It was a brilliant plan., or so it seemed to Cashman, who didn't know the ins and outs of the California political scene.

As Esperanza explained it, the California population was gradually shifting. The influx of new blood from the Central and South American nations, from the Pacific Rim and other places, was inexorably pushing the state's demographics into completely uncharted territory for an American state. In such an uncertain climate, anything was possible. Even his election.

After he had explained it all, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza leaned forward and let the full beatific radiance of his smile wash over Harmon Cashman. His dark, liquid eyes were imploring. Harmon Cashman understood the nature of personal power. He understood that the simplest, most effective and direct way to cultivate personal loyalty was not to do a person a favor, but to ask one. Somehow, this cemented the wielder of personal power with his adherents.

He had seen it work a thousand times. And for all his savvy and cynicism, it was working on him.

"I accept," he said sincerely. "And proud to do it."

"What do you need to begin?"

"More Oreos," Harmon Cashman said without skipping a beat. "These baby ones just don't have the kick of the big ones."

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza threw his round head back and laughed like distant church bells. The sound reminded Harmon Cashman of Sunday morning back in Virginia, for some reason. But he was scarcely aware of it.

For he had everything he wanted in life: a candidate he could believe in, and a campaign to wage.

But most of all, he had hope again.

He spelled it "Esperanza."

Chapter 6

The days that followed were heady ones for Harmon Cashman.

The election was scheduled for six weeks hence. In national electioneering terms, that might as well have been next Tuesday. On the state level, it was the equivalent to a hundred-meter dash.

"We'll need signatures to get on the ballot," Harmon Cashman had said during the flight to California.

"I have been collecting them," replied Enrique Esperanza, who insisted on being called "Rick."

"It is a good American-sounding name, no?"

"Only in front of the right audience. In the barrios and out in the fields, you're Enrique."

"I am Enrique. And Enrique will have for you all the signatures you will need."

And he delivered. They came, in a torrent of paper. Mostly signed by Hispanic names.

"Looks to me like you got a pretty good field organization to start," Harmon Cashman had said delightedly, as they spread out the petition sheets in the storefront in Los Angeles, their main campaign headquarters.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza smiled broadly. "I have many friends who like me and wish that I succeed."

"These guys are documented, aren't they?"

Esperanza smiled, "Of course."

"We'll need a hell of a lot more than these to put you over the top, Rick."

"I have a strategy I have devised for this."

"Yeah?"

"It is Amnistia."

"What is that-Spanish?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza laughed heartily, and with a total lack of self-consciousness. He patted Harmon's knee.

"Yes, mi amigo. It means 'amnesty.' I am referring to the Federal program which runs out soon. It provides that all illegal aliens, migrant workers-what some call crudely 'wetbacks'-be allowed to petition for citizenship. With citizenship comes American rights. Such as the right to vote."

Harmon Cashman blinked. "How many migrants in California?"

"Not just California. But in all of America."

"Only the ones in California count."

"Not if they come to California for their Amnistia."

Harmon's eyes widened. "Is this legal?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza's cherubic face became placidly confident. "There are no restrictions on where they may settle as citizens," he replied. "Is this not a free country?"

"It is not only free," Harmon Cashman said joyously, "it is the greatest country in the world. But how will you get them to come here?"

"Leave that to me."

"Will they vote for you? Most of them, that is?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza spread his generous arms like the statue of Christ on a Brazilian hilltop. "Look at me: my skin, my eyes, my voice. Do you think they could vote for any of the others if I am on the ballot?"

"Let's get you on the ballot, then!"

They got on the ballot. With signatures to spare.

"Now we need campaign workers," Harmon Cashman said. "Lots of them."

"Let us go for a ride," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

Harmon Cashman drove the tasteful white Mercedes that seemed to be the perfect vehicle to convey Enrique Espiritu Esperanza from place to place.

"You must sell a lot of grapes," Harmon said, noting the custom interior.

It was early morning. All along Mulholland, brown-skinned men with sad faces and tattered blanket rolls under their arms stood waiting, their eyes watching the passing traffic with expectation. A faint, uneasy light, like tiny bulbs, could be seen deep in their dark eyes. From the first day he had arrived, Harmon Cashman had seen this phenomenon all over Los Angeles. He figured the bus system must be very, very bad.

They parked. A pickup truck rumbled up and the driver called out a summons in Spanish. Harmon didn't catch the words. He wouldn't have understood them if he had.

But the Hispanic men with sad faces piled onto the open bed of the pickup until they were spilling off the sides. There was room for perhaps thirty men, and near to fifty were scrambling for a place. A fistfight broke out. It was brief. The winners found places in back of the truck and the losers ended up sitting on the asphalt, tears streaming down their unwashed faces.

"They will be paid twelve cents an hour to break their backs in the fields," said Enrique Esperanza, his voice for once sad.

"It's a hard life," said Harmon Cashman glumly. "We will pay them a decent wage, and they will work for us."

"You don't pay campaign workers!" Cashman said in horror.

"We will change the rules. While others are playing by the old rules, we will win."

"But-but it's un-American!"

"Exactly. I intend to run the most un-American campaign ever."

At that, Enrique Esperanza stepped from the white Mercedes and walked up to a Mexican man who sat on the gutter, crying tears of shame because he had been too slow and now he and his family would not eat.

Enrique knelt beside the man and laid a hand on his shoulder. He whispered a few words. The Mexican's eyes went wide. He took up the man's toffee-colored hand and kissed it. Lavishly.

Enrique Esperanza helped the man to his feet, and lifted his arms. His voice rose, clear and bell-like. It called up and down the length of Mulholland.

It's like watching a modern Pied Piper at work, Harmon Cashman thought with admiration.

"Drive slowly," said Enrique Esperanza, after he had returned to the car.

At the wheel, Harmon Cashman craned to see out the back window. Mexican migrant workers had formed up behind the white Mercedes in lines three deep.

"Why?" he asked.

"So they can follow," Enrique said simply.

And follow they did. Others were picked up along the way. As they trailed behind the white Mercedes, their voices rang out joyously.

"Esperanza! Esperanza! Esperanza!"

"What did you tell them?" Harmon whispered, his eyes wide with awe.

"What I told them cannot be expressed in words. It is what I gave them."

"Yeah?"

"Hope, Harmon. I gave them hope."

"I getcha," said Harmon Cashman, fingering an Oreo cookie out of his vest pocket. He had taken to carrying them that way. One never knew when a person might need a pick-me-up. It was going to be a hectic six weeks ....

The white Mercedes pulled up before an empty storefront, the first they came to.

"What's here?" Harmon wondered.

"Our second campaign headquarters."

"Do we need two in L.A.?"

"Yes. One where the white people will feel comfortable, and one for the brown people. This will be the brown people's place."

"Good strategy. I never did think that 'Rainbow Coalition' stuff made any sense."

Within an hour, they had the rental agent opening the front door with a key. The storefront had been unrented for eight months. The haggling was brief. It ended when Enrique Esperanza offered the rental agent a second Oreo. The man also promised to vote for Esperanza. His eyes shone with admiration.

By afternoon they had phones installed, castoff desks and chairs in place.

"We have our new headquarters!" Enrique Esperanza announced in a pleased, infectious voice.

Harmon looked around. "Can these guys speak English?"

"English will not be necessary this first week. They will reach out to their friends, their relatives, their brothers of brown skin in far states. They will tell them of Amnistia, and the opportunities to have their voice heard in California. To elect one of their own."

Harmon Cashman frowned. "It's a good start, sure. But what about the Anglos?"

"We call them blancos. As for them, I have a message for them too."

"What's that?" Harmon Cashman asked, nibbling on an Oreo.

"That cookie you are eating. Do you know what the tax on it is?"

"No. Why should I care?"

"The tax is eight and one quarter percent. It is called the snack tax. A terrible outrage."

Harmon Cashman looked at his Oreo, the innocent Oreo of his Virginia childhood.

"You know, you used to be able to buy one whole box for thirty-five cents when I was a kid," he said wistfully.

"Now it is two dollars. Plus tax. How can they tax such a thing?" Enrique Esperanza asked morosely. "Children eat these."

"Damn it, that's ridiculous!"

"We must repeal this terrible, unjust tax," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

"Ricky," Harmon Cashman said, his voice trembling with righteous indignation. "I know this is an issue we can make real to people."

"And we will. All we need do is hand these cookies out at rallies."

Harmon Cashman almost choked. "Are you sure there'll be enough to go around? These babies are expensive now."

Esperanza grinned broadly. "Of these cookies, there will be more than enough to win the election, I assure you."

"You've sold me," said Harmon Cashman, separating the two black wafers and scraping the white creme filling onto his tongue with his lower incisors.

Within two weeks, two hard-fought combative weeks, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza had himself a statewide network of staff. They came in all colors, brown, yellow, white.

It shouldn't have surprised Harmon Cashman as much as it did. This was California, after all. People didn't vote color or race, they voted issues. The snack thing, which had festered for a year, suddenly erupted.

Harmon first saw evidence of this at a Burbank rally.

White staffers stood at the door of a rented hall, handing out glassine bags of cookies to everyone who walked through the doors.

The post-bills plastered all over town said FREE COOKIES in big letters and RALLY FOR HOPE in somewhat smaller but still prominent letters.

The legend, "Sponsored by the Campaign to Elect Enrique Espiritu Esperanza for Governor" was in small print.

The people who came out were not patronage hounds or sycophants, but a cross-slice of the California electorate. Some had agendas. Others were simply looking for a trendy cause, or a free snack.

"Tax-free as well as free," the staffers said, as they passed out the glassine bags. Ricky had coined that particular slogan. He was good at slogans. The man was a natural.

When the house had settled down, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza stepped up to the podium. No applause greeted him, just respectful attentiveness. In the back of the hall, Harmon Cashman was worried. The audience had not been salted with campaign workers, whose job it was to fire up the crowd. Ricky had insisted it was not necessary. This could be a disaster.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza was attired in a white suit, shirt, and tie. These made his benevolent brown face stand out, starkly beautiful.

He began speaking, his tone steady, his words a velvet purr. He spoke of a change for California. Of the recession. Of unemployment. Of unfair taxes, and the public's growing distaste for the politics of recent years. The backstabbing, the bickering.

"I stand for what -I am," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza. "I am Esperanza. I am hope. Hope for a better future."

It was sincere, polished, and said nothing risky. In short, it was a perfect campaign speech. High on homilies, lean on substance. Harmon Cashman had heard such speeches thousands of times in his career. But coming from the charismatic Esperanza, this one sounded fresh, clear as spring water-even brilliant.

At the end of it Enrique Espiritu Esperanza said, "I ask that you vote for me on election day. I will make you all proud that you did so."

There was silence. It was punctuated by the dry snap of Oreos breaking under the pressure of biting teeth, and thoughtful chewing sounds.

"If you have any questions, I will be happy to answer them," added Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

A hand went up. A young woman. Her eyes shone with what seemed to be innocence.

"Yes?"

"Do you have any more cookies?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza allowed a sad look to come over his wide, cherubic face.

"I am sad to say, no. We have used up our budget for this rally."

"Aww . . ." said the bright-eyed young woman.

A forlorn sigh ran through the audience. There were a few "darns" and "drats," sprinkled with more pungent curses.

"There would have been more," Esperanza added, "but you understand .... The tax."

"That damned tax!" a man howled.

A man jumped to his feet. "Somebody ought to do something!"

Esperanza raised his smooth brown palms. "This is exactly what I propose. To repeal this detestable tax that deprives the open-minded people of this state of the small comforts of life."

A shout of encouragement went up. Others chimed in.

At first, Harmon Cashman thought that the crowd had been salted behind his back. He realized this was unlikely. Maybe it was the cookies. Maybe everyone went wild for Oreos. After all, this was America. What child had not eaten them by the carload? And how many of those had stopped eating them as adults? Sure, Harmon Cashman decided, it was their taste buds getting nostalgic. Using Oreos to create loyalty-it was a masterstroke. Brilliant.

Then, they began to chant, "Esperanza! Esperanza! Esperanza!"

And Cashman realized that the migrants had fallen into the same chant. And no one had slipped them any cookies.

"This guy," Harmon Cashman muttered over the swelling chanting, "must have the greatest pheromones anybody ever saw!"

In rally after rally, it had been the same. The guy just got up on the podium, sometimes without benefit of a microphone, and no sooner did he start to speak than the crowd was with him.

For Harmon Cashman, the campaign was like a vacation in Heaven. He hardly had to do a thing. The press got wind of the Esperanza fever, and suddenly they were running a press campaign. Without so much as lifting a telephone.

At the end of two weeks, the name "Enrique Espiritu Esperanza" had appeared at the bottom of the polls. His speeches were leading the local newscasts. By the middle of the third week, the dark horse nobody had ever heard of was edging up to be in striking distance of the frontrunners, Barry Black and Rona Ripper.

Their campaign staffers were smart. They simply ignored the upstart. That gave the Esperanza campaign a clear field to sprint even further ahead.

Besides, what was there to criticize? Oreo cookies and hope?

"We're in trouble," Harmon Cashman confided to his candidate over a working lunch that very afternoon.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza looked at him with his doe-like eyes. "I am shooting up in the polls. How is this terrible?"

"We were doing great as an underdog. Nobody bothered to attack us. We were running a guerrilla campaign, and if we'd kept it at the pace we were going, by the time the polls had you in a dead heat it would have been a week before the election, and too late for the other campaigns to do anything about you."

"It is better to win big and win early," said Enrique Esperanza without hesitation.

Harmon Cashman stock his head. "Not if they score any hits. They're going to dig up all the dirt on you they can."

"They will find no stain on my honor. Enrique Espiritu Esperanza is as pure as the driven snow."

"And this appeal to the ethnic vote. It's going to bring the hate-mongers out. You know that?"

"Let them emerge into the light. One cannot step on a hiding cockroach, and the only way to draw out a cockroach is to turn off the light, wait, and turn it on again. I have turned off the light. Now the cockroaches will come. Let them. Let them."

They came.

It was at a Sacramento rally. An indoor rally, this time.

Esperanza was in the middle of his speech before a packed house, when two men jumped up from either side of the front row and shouting "Down with Esperanza!" opened fire with machine pistols.

An X formed on the white wall above and behind the unflinching figure of Enrique Espiritu Esperanza. One bullet track made a slashing diagonal from the left. The other showed up as a wavering line of punch holes coming down to the right.

They should have crossed at a point exactly between Enrique Espiritu Esperanza's black eyes.

Except the percussive stuttering sounds went suddenly quiet.

On the podium, Enrique Esperanza stood blinking, as if unable to comprehend that he had come as close to having his head blown off as the bullet capacity of a Tec-9 machine pistol clip.

In the front row, the gunmen were fumbling empty clips out and attempting to get fresh ones out of their coat pockets.

"Get them!" Cashman shouted.

The hall turned into a sea of panic.

On the podium, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza called for calm.

Belatedly, Harmon Cashman lunged for his candidate, threw him to the floor.

"Stay down!" he hissed, surprised at his own personal courage.

"I am not afraid," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza, his voice as calm as a sultry breeze. "Those asesinos cannot harm Esperanza. Esperanza is hope."

It sounded corny, but coming from the lips of his candidate, it brought proud tears to Harmon Cashman's eyes.

The police got the crowd under control. The gunmen had escaped in the confusion. After the situation had stabilized, and people had been questioned, the weapons were found taped to the undersides of a pair of folding chairs.

"They are very clever, these men," Enrique Esperanza said, when he was shown the weapons. "Without these incriminating tools, they were able to blend with the crowd and simply walk out the doors unchallenged."

"They'll be back," Harmon Cashman said, when the police were through with their questions and had left. "Guys like them never give up."

"I am not afraid," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza, who sounded as if he meant it. "I am Esperanza."

Chapter 7

Harold W. Smith received the report of the attempt on the life of gubernatorial candidate Enrique Espiritu Esperanza the same way most of America did. Through the media.

Smith was driving home when the bulletin broke over the radio. Smith had been listening to a classical music program on National Public Radio. Smith liked National Public Radio-when they broadcast music. The minute someone who was not an announcer spoke for more than ninety seconds, he either turned off the radio or switched stations.

The bulletin was brief:

"UPI is reporting that an attempt was made on the life of the Hispanic dark horse candidate for governor of California, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza, within the last hour," the metallic announcer's voice said. "Details are sketchy at this time, but initial reports are that Esperanza was unhurt. The unidentified assailants are believed to have escaped in the confusion."

In the darkness of his battered station wagon, Harold W. Smith voiced a question:

"Who is Enrique Espiritu Esperanza?"

There was no followup, so the question went unanswered.

Smith pulled over to the side of the road and turned on the dome light. A well-worn briefcase, its edges peeling and thus unlikely to be stolen by a casual thief, sat on the seat beside him. Smith threw the safety latches, so the briefcase would not detonate a gram of plastique embedded in the lock, and opened it.

Revealed was a minicomputer with a cellular telephone handset attached.

Smith brought the system up and dialed into the Folcroft mainframes. He had not been following the California race for two weeks now. Once the uproar over the deaths of the governor and lieutenant governor had subsided, and there had been no activity that seemed suspicious, Smith had concluded that whatever had been General Nogeira's motives in assassinating the officials, the plan had died with him.

The President of the United States had agreed, and pending the National Transportation Safety Board crash report, they decided to let the matter rest.

And now this.

Smith had been completely unaware of the existence of a candidate by the name of Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

Smith punched up the name. The liquid-crystal display began emitting a brief file. Smith's gray eyes absorbed the data with interest.

He learned that Esperanza was an independent candidate for the governorship. A Napa Valley wine-grower by profession, he had become wealthy and had entered the race as a dark horse. He was barely a blip in the polls, which were dominated by Barry Black, Junior and Rona Ripper.

His message was not so radical that someone was likely to attempt to do him in, Harold Smith concluded. Yet obviously someone had tried.

Smith called up Remo's current contact number. Normally, it was something he would simply have committed to memory, but Smith's memory was not as sharp as it once had been, and lately Remo had been changing residences so often that it was harder to keep track of his whereabouts.

As Smith hit the autodial key, he thought wistfully that there had been advantages to having Remo reside here in Rye, near Folcroft. But recent events had forced Remo and Chiun back into the nomadic lifestyle they had once practiced. It was a situation not to anyone's liking.

The phone rang once. The receiver was lifted, and a squeaky voice said, "Speak."

"Master Chiun. It is I."

"Hail Emperor Smith, the Infallible," Chiun said in an excessively loud voice. "Your wisdom exceeds that of the pharaohs. Sinanju lives to serve you well-despite certain embarrassments that have occurred of late."

Smith cleared his throat. "If you are referring to the Nogeira incident, once again, I do not hold it against you."

"As you should not. It was Remo's blunder."

"Nor do I hold it against Remo," Smith added quickly. "It was just one of those things."

Chiun's voice grew conspiratorial. "The true perpetrators. You have their names at last? I will attend to them myself, so as to atone for my pupil's blunder."

"No," Smith admitted. "Washington gave up on that angle weeks ago. The perpetrators have melted into the shadows. It is possible they never left the country at all, which would explain why they have not been intercepted at the usual international points of departure."

"Obviously they are cunning beyond words," Chiun mused. "Otherwise they would not be hiding within your very borders after their brazen, cowardly attack."

"Er, yes," said Smith uncomfortably. "That is all in the past now. I have an important assignment."

"Your generosity knows no bounds."

"Excuse me?" said Smith, for a moment wondering if it was once again contract-renewal time. Chiun tended to speak of America's generosity only on those annual occasions.

"Your faith in Sinanju must be great indeed to give Remo a second chance," Chiun went on. "It is not misplaced. Whoever must be dispatched, Sinanju vows his hours are numbered."

"I don't want you to, ah, dispatch anyone. There is a gubernatorial candidate who is in peril."

"I will let you speak with Remo," Chiun said, his tone noticeably cooling.

The sound of a hand covering the mouthpiece came to Smith's ear. Still, Chiun's squeaky voice could be heard, although muffled.

"It is Smith," Chiun said.

"What does he want?" Remo's voice, very distant and not at all happy.

"I am not certain. He has lapsed into that patois of his that is not English. I think he wants you to take out the garbage."

"Garbage?"

"Gubernatorial," Chiun said. "Is that not the same as 'garbage'?"

"No," Remo said.

"Whatever it means, it is beneath my dignity as Reigning Master to deal with it. Since you have yet to atone for your recent misdeeds, I give Smith to you."

The sound of the hand coming off the microphone was like a suction cup popping free of window glass. Remo's voice, clear and filled with acid, came again.

"Thanks a bunch, Little Father." Into the telephone, he said, "What's going on, Smitty?"

"One of the candidates for governor of California has survived an assassination attempt tonight."

"Ripper or Black?"

"Neither. Esperanza."

"I never heard of Esperanza."

"Nor had I," Smith admitted frankly. "He is barely registering in the polls, yet someone is trying to kill him. I want you and Chiun to look into it."

"Any suspects?"

"None. There is an outside chance that this attempt might be some repercussion from the Nogeira scheme, perhaps some sleeper hit team that has activated in spite of the death of its mastermind, Nogeira."

"I still have a hard time believing that toad-faced ogre could have caused that plane crash from jail," Remo muttered.

"The FAA investigation continues," Smith replied crisply. "We may know something soon. In the meantime, I want you to look into this event."

"How?"

"Join the Esperanza campaign, to start."

"Hold the phone, but isn't he the victim?"

"I want you and Chiun in place if there's another attempt. If one comes, you know what to do."

"And if there isn't?" Remo wondered.

"By that time," said Harold Smith, bathed in the pale radiance of his station wagon dome light, "I hope to have developed some concrete leads for you to follow."

"Great," Remo said dryly. "And here I was just getting settled in sunny Seattle."

"I am not aware that Seattle is particularly sunny."

"Funny," Remo said acidly. "Neither am I. It hasn't stopped raining since we hit town."

"I will expect progress reports every twelve hours," Smith said thinly.

"You can expect them," Remo returned. "But getting them is another thing. You have to make progress to report on it."

"We shall see," said Smith, hanging up.

Closing up his briefcase, Harold Smith shut off the dome light and resumed his drive home. He was in his third week without medication of any sort and, while he did not feel like a new man-his burdens precluded such a renewal of spirit-it was good not to have his stomach churning with excess acid, and his brain throbbing with persistent headaches.

He wondered how long it would last. In this job, he thought ruefully, probably not very long.

Chapter 8

The first thing Remo did upon disembarking at LAX airport was to buy a newspaper from a vending machine.

"You have no time to read the comic strips," Chiun sniffed as they walked toward the cab stand. He wore a royal blue kimono.

"I'm not," Remo said, tossing the business and entertainment sections into a trash can. "I want to read up on Esperanza."

"Esperanza," said Chiun thoughtfully. "It is a worthy name."

"It is?"

"In the Spanish tongue, it means hope."

"I guess he knows it too. Because it says here he's holding a 'Rally for Hope' tonight. Maybe we should catch it."

"I would prefer to catch this man today," Chiun retorted.

"What's the rush?"

"The air smells bad. I would not linger in this so-called 'City of Angels.' "

The Master of Sinanju said this as the automatic glass doors slid apart and they were hit by a wave of dry heat and smog.

Remo, feeling his lungs begin to rebel, said, "This is worse than Mexico City."

"Nothing is worse than that foul place," Chiun sniffed, his hazel eyes looking to the brownish layer of clouds.

The first cab in line, they discovered, was not air-conditioned.

"No thanks," Remo said. "We'll take the next guy."

"You gotta take me," the cabby said. "It's the rules."

"Whose?"

"The Drivers' Association."

"We don't belong," Remo pointed out in a reasonable voice.

"Then you don't ride."

The Master of Sinanju took this in without a change of expression. He drifted up to the rear tire, pretending to scrutinize the low-lying smog.

One sandaled foot bumped the rear tire.

The rubber popped a rip, and air hissed through the ragged eruption.

The cab settled at its southern corner.

"It is okay, Remo!" Chiun said loudly. "We will ride with this man!"

"We will?" Remo blurted.

"He is desperately in need of our business." Chiun pointed. "Look. His wheels are in a sad state."

The driver came out and looked at his tire.

"A flat?"

"It is too bad," clucked Chiun, "but we will wait for you to repair it." He beamed. Remo looked at him doubtfully.

The cabby shook his head. "Can't. The rules say you take the next one in line."

"Then my son and I will take the next conveyance in line with sorrow in our hearts," the Master of Sinanju said magnanimously.

"Yeah, yeah," the driver grumbled, popping his trunk and removing a tire iron and jack.

The second cab-this one air-conditioned-took them out into traffic. They got all of sixty yards out before they hit a traffic jam. It didn't last long. It was just that they encountered so many on the way into the city.

As they drew cool, filtered air into their lungs, Chiun folded his kimono skirts delicately and said, "Remo, tell me of this assignment."

Remo shrugged. "What's to tell? Someone killed the governor and lieutenant governor. Now there's a special election to replace them."

Chiun nodded. "Typically debased," he said.

"What is?"

"The American approach to democracy. Not that the Roman brand was any good. It lasted but four centuries."

"A mere tick of the Korean clock," Remo said, smiling.

Chiun's button nose wrinkled up. "Koreans did not have clocks until the West introduced them as a form of slavery. "

"Slavery?"

"When one is watching clocks, one is not attending to one's proper business."

"I won't argue with that," Remo allowed, looking out the window. They were approaching the city. He saw business signs in an amazing variety of languages, including the modern Korean script called hangul.

"In Roman times," Chiun went on, "the governors were appointed by the emperor."

"Well, we elect ours."

"The Romans voted for their consuls. That was in their early primitive period, before they came to embrace the sweet serenity of rule by emperor."

"Like Caligula, I suppose?"

Chiun frowned, transforming his wizened face into a dried yellow apricot. "He has gotten bad press," he sniffed, watching the palm trees whip by. "It is no wonder the trees grow as they do here," he added.

"How's that?"

"The bad air. It makes the trees grow naked, except for their heads. Trees should not possess heads. It is unnatural. Like elections."

"Look, Chiun. Since we're going to volunteer our services to the Esperanza campaign . . ."

Chiun's head whipped around. His thin eyes went wide.

"Volunteer? Sinanju-volunteer!"

Remo nodded. "That's how it works. People who support a candidate volunteer their services."

"Then they are fools and worse," Chiun said harshly. "I will dispatch no enemies for no gold."

"Sounds like a cute campaign slogan," Remo remarked. "But volunteers are what Smith wants us to be. So we do it."

"We do not!"

"We who are loyal to our emperor do," Remo pointed out dryly.

The Master of Sinanju absorbed this example of white logic without comment. His eyes narrowed. Perhaps, at the next contract negotiation, he would find a way to make Smith pay for any enemies of Esperanza he was forced to dispatch without pay. With interest, of course.

They finally pulled up before a Wilshire Boulevard hotel, where Remo understood from The Los Angeles Times Enrique Espiritu Esperanza had taken the penthouse suite for his protection.

Remo paid the cabby, after a brief argument over the tip. The driver insisted the tip was insufficient. Remo pointed out the undeniable fact that it was ten percent of the fare.

"But it was a two-hour ride because of traffic," the cabby complained. "How can I make a living at these rates?"

"Drive in another state," Remo said, turning away.

They entered the lobby. Remo noticed a single dollar bill sliding up one of the Master of Sinanju's voluminous sleeves.

"Don't tell me you were planning to chip in on the tip?" he asked incredulously.

"No, I surreptitiously relieved the driver of one dollar."

"Why?"

"You provided him valuable career advice, therefore overtipping him. I merely balanced accounts."

"Then you can catch the next tip."

Chiun's tiny mouth expressed disapproval. "Perhaps," he said.

There were three LAPD police officers standing guard at the elevator bank, and also being besieged by press. Microphone and micro-cassette recorders were pushed into their faces. Questions were snapped. Remo was reminded of a pack of hounds yapping at a cornered fox.

"Has candidate Esperanza requested police protection?" one reporter asked.

"No comment."

"Who is behind this attempt, and what is his motive?" another demanded.

"That is still under investigation."

"I insist upon being allowed upstairs," a sharp-voiced woman said, in a screeching voice that could have sharpened razor blades at fifty feet.

Remo, hearing that voice, said, "Uh-oh."

The Master of Sinanju, hearing that same voice, squeaked, "Remo! It is Cheeta!"

"It is not," Remo said quickly, taking Chiun by the arm and attempting to pull him out of the lobby.

The Master of Sinanju looked no more sturdy than a sapling. Yet all of Remo's efforts couldn't budge him. In fact, when Chiun breezed toward the elevator, Remo found himself being dragged along. He let go, barely finding his feet in time.

Horror on his face, Remo got in front of the Master of Sinanju, blocking him.

"Look, you'll blow our cover!" he said urgently.

"But it is Cheeta Ching!" Chiun squeaked. "In person."

"I know who it is," Remo hissed. "And that barracuda represents one of the biggest TV networks in the country. You cozy up to her and our cover will be blown. And we know what that means, don't we? No more work. No more Emperor Smith. And no submarine full of gold offloading in Sinanju every November."

The Master of Sinanju drew himself up proudly. "I am not a babbler of secrets. I will tell her nothing, of course."

"That's good. That's good. Tell her nothing. Period. Because if she gives you the time of day, she will ask you a zillion questions, none of them her business."

At that moment, Cheeta Ching's voice rose again. "I'm going to stay here until someone from the Esperanza campaign agrees to come down to talk to me!" she screeched.

Chiun's eyes narrowed. For a horrifying moment, Remo thought he was going to rush in and announce, prematurely, that he was the official assassin of the Esperanza campaign.

Instead, the Master of Sinanju turned in place and hurried out into the street. Hands disappearing into his kimono sleeves, he floated around to the back of the building and gazed upward.

The hotel was California modern. Not much in the way of gingerbread, ledges, or handholds.

The Master of Sinanju stepped up to one corner and laid hands on each joining wall, then began rubbing them in small circles, as if drying his palms. Abruptly, his sandals left the pavement.

It was one of the most difficult of Sinanju ascent techniques: the employment of converging pressure to gain purchase. His spindly legs working, the Master of Sinanju pulled himself up like a poisonous blue spider.

Remo let him get a few floors ahead and followed, thinking that Chiun was obviously showing off on the rare chance that Cheeta Ching might spot him. Remo knew that the Master of Sinanju had been infatuated with the Korean anchorwoman eyer since he had discovered her when she was a mere local anchor back in New York.

Once she had gone national, she had become Chiun's obsession. No amount of common sense, such as their undeniable age difference and Cheeta's subsequent marriage to the cadaverous middle-aged gynecologist Chiun had dubbed "that callow youth," could dissuade the old Korean from his delusion that Cheeta was fated to be his one true love.

"I'm glad you see things my way!" Remo called up, as he drew under the Master of Sinanju's scuttling form,

"It is better this way," Chiun answered.

"Absolutely."

"Once I have gained the confidence of this 'Esperanza,' I will convince him to grant Cheeta a special audience."

"Maybe," Remo said cautiously.

"And she will be eternally grateful to me," Chiun added.

"Not likely," Remo muttered.

"And so will consent to have my child," Chiun finished. "Which is her great destiny."

"What!"

Chiun halted at the twelfth floor. His stern face peered down and his voice was cold.

"It is her destiny, Remo. I warn you not to interfere."

"Little Father," Remo said sincerely. "I would not get between you and Cheeta Ching for any amount of money."

"Good."

"Especially," Remo murmured, "when she's in heat."

Chiun resumed climbing. Remo followed, his face worried:

They expected the penthouse to be guarded, and they were right.

The wide patio promenade surrounding the penthouse itself was patrolled by security guards. They could hear their feet crushing the gravel. The sound was specific enough to tell Remo what kind of weapons they carried. Most had sidearms. From the sound of his swaggering, wide-legged walk, one toted a rifle openly. Since it was designed for long-range use, that weapon represented the least threat to them.

"We will take the rifle first," said Chiun.

"You got it," Remo said.

They got to a narrow strip of ornamental metal and, using it for a tightrope, worked their way to the north side of the building, where the rifle-toter was walking back and forth and sounding anxious.

Carlos Lugan was muy anxious. He had joined the Esperanza campaign only two days ago, walking off his security guard job without even bothering to turn in his uniform. The march of migrant workers shouting "Esperanza! Esperanza!" had been like the summons of some smiling siren. Carlos was from El Salvador. His mother still lived in San Salvador-and only because Carlos Lugan sent her a check every month. Without it, she would starve like her friends, whose family could not get to America.

So when Carlos followed the chanting migrants to a Rally for Hope, and heard that the Esperanza campaign was paying seven dollars an hour for help, he did not hesitate. That was two dollars more than his job paid. He became a loyal Esperanza supporter.

Carlos was not disappointed to find himself, in the wake of the failed assassination attempt, performing much the same menial tasks as he had in his previous situation. He was proud to be a servant of Esperanza. In truth, he hoped someone would make another attempt on his life. That way, Carlos Lugan would gladly throw himself in the path of the bullet. He fantasized about the moment. About martyring himself for the man who had offered him such hope, and provided him with the wherewithal to increase his monthly check to his mother by an incredible twenty dollars.

Unfortunately for Carlos Lugan, it was not a bullet he had to face in the defense of his candidate. It was something older, more accurate-and virtually indefensible.

Carlos was standing at the edge of the parapet, which was waist-high. There had been a time he was afraid of heights. But working for Esperanza, he was afraid of nothing.

He failed to see the hand that reached up for his rifle muzzle.

In fact, he did not notice the absence of the rifle, even though he had been holding it firmly in both hands. Carlos was staring out at the Los Angeles skyline-what he could see of it in the smog-and his chest burned with intense pride.

A creeping numbness came over his hands. He looked down at them. And blinked. Blinked several times rapidly.

There was no understanding it, at first. He had been holding his rifle. Now it was no longer there. Had he, in his passionate fantasizing, dropped it? He turned around to look . . .

. . . and the gnarled yellow hand that had casually relieved him of his weapon reached up and seized the exposed back of his neck. The hand-Carlos did not know it was a hand-exerted such force that Carlos had the weird impression of a vise seizing his neck. This, of course, was impossible. He decided he had been shot. That was the only explanation. A bullet had struck his magnificent body, forcing him to drop the rifle. Now a second bullet had entered his neck from the back, severing his spinal cord and paralyzing him with cruel finality.

The anti-Esperanza devils were attacking!

Carlos fell face-first into the gravel. The fact that it did not hurt convinced him his spinal cord had been severed. Not that there was any doubt.

Out of one eye, he saw a pair of white sandals pad past. They were followed by a pair of feet encased in ordinary shoes. There were only two of them-two assassins.

Carlos tried to shout a warning, to alert his patron of danger, but no words came. Only tears coursing down the humiliated face of Carlos Lugan, the loyal.

He saw, as if dreaming, his compadres succumb to the pair, an Anglo and an Asian. The Asian meant his worst fears were true. There was bad blood between Hispanics and Asians in Los Angeles.

The Asians were out to stop Esperanza, fearing him.

They carried no weapons. They simply deployed, slipping up stealthily behind the other guards and bringing them to the same humiliation that had visited Carlos Lugan, by taking them by the backs of their necks and lowering their faces into the gravel.

Then, like ghosts, they slipped up to the sliding glass doors of the penthouse suite, where Esperanza was plotting strategy with his campaign manager.

Certain he was dying, Carlos Lugan said a silent prayer. Not for himself, but for Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

Remo paused at the sliding glass door. He turned to the Master of Sinanju, whispering.

"Okay, Little Father. Here comes the tricky part."

"I will handle this," Chiun said, girding his blue kimono skirts.

"Remember," Remo cautioned. "We are just good citizens out to help a candidate."

Chiun gave the sliding door a firm tug. It shot along its track and shattered into a thousand pieces.

Seated around a coffee table on which a map of L.A. County was laid out, Enrique Espiritu Esperanza and Harmon Cashman looked up. Their mouths dropped open at the sight of a tiny wisp of an Asian man followed by a lean, unhappy Caucasian, stepping through the suddenly open door.

Harmon Cashman bolted from his chair and flung himself across the body of Esperanza.

"Assassins! Stop them!" he shouted to the guards.

From an inner room, two hulking Mexicans came charging out. They resembled a pair of Lou Ferrignos, with extra coats of tan. They brought up Uzi machine pistols while vaulting over the furniture.

The Asian and the Caucasian separated. The pair didn't appear to move. Yet suddenly they were five feet apart, utterly unconcerned and outwardly not seeming to hurry. Their movements appeared casual, even slow. Except they were unexpectedly in places far from their earlier positions, without, apparently, having crossed the intervening space.

The phenomenon befuddled the two bodyguards. They continually repositioned the muzzles of their weapons. Each time they were about to fire, the targets floated out of their sights.

One man beheaded a lamp, because his brain had been too slow in translating the image his retina had picked up: the image of empty space where a skinny white guy had been an instant before.

The two Mexicans quickly became so used to the utter confoundedness of their targets that they were too surprised to be surprised when the pair, synchronizing their actions to the nanosecond, simply swept in from their blind sides and rendered the weapons useless.

They used their hands. They floated up and around the Uzis unseen, and the two ringing claps came as one.

The Anglo and the Asian stepped back, joined up once more. The white man folded his arms defiantly, a cruel smile tugging at his lips. The Asian simply tucked his hands into his wide blue sleeves. He looked unafraid.

And the two bodyguards lifted flattened and useless weapons to firing position and depressed the triggers. The triggers refused to pull. They looked down.

It was then and only then that they comprehended the intriguing fact that their weapons were much, much thinner than they had been. In fact, they resembled gray palm leaves studded with rivets.

"Let me give you a hand," the Caucasian told Harmon Cashman, reaching out with his hands.

Before Harmon could respond, he was lifted to his feet. The other hand pulled Enrique Espiritu Esperanza to his feet.

"To what do I owe this intrusion?" Enrique asked blankly, his liquid eyes taking in the bizarre sight of his guards attempting to brain the tiny Asian.

The old man-all five feet of him-turned to bow in Esperanza's direction. The bow coincided with a strenuous attempt to brain him, with strangely wide and flat Uzis, on the part of the two Mexican bodyguards.

"I am Chiun, Master of Sinanju," said the old man in a low voice.

When he straightened, the weapons were coming down again.

Esperanza raised broad palms to quell the violence. He might have saved the energy. His towering guards had missed again. One fell on his face. The other, rearing back for a third attempt, suddenly dropped his useless weapon and grabbed his left foot, howling. He hopped on his right foot, as if the left had been hit by a jackhammer.

He hopped right out of the room and never hopped back.

"I have heard of Sinanju," said Esperanza quietly.

Remo, standing beside the white-coated man, blinked.

"I have been sent by a person I cannot name to safeguard your life," Chiun said placidly.

"I see."

"I have vanquished your guards to show the superiority of our services."

"I accept," said Enrique Esperanza. "Name your price."

"Grant the gorgeous creature named Cheeta an audience, and no further payment will be necessary."

"Done."

As Remo watched, his mouth dropping with each syllable spoken, the Master of Sinanju bowed gravely. Enrique Esperanza returned the gesture with the elegance of an Aztec lord.

Harmon Cashman sidled up to Remo.

"You with him?"

"Yeah," Remo said unhappily.

"Can you explain anything of what I just heard?"

"No."

"I didn't think so," Harmon said glumly.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza turned to Harmon Cashman.

"Harmon, these men will form the nucleus of our security force from now on."

"Are you sure about this, Ricky?"

"As certain as I am of my ultimate safety," replied Enrique Esperanza.

Frowning, Harmon Cashman walked up to the Master of Sinanju. He offered his hand, saying, "I'm Ricky's campaign manager."

Chiun nodded. "I will allow you to remain in his presence then," he sniffed, ignoring the hand.

"You . . . you . . ." Harmon sputtered.

The Master of Sinanju turned to the dark-horse candidate for governor.

"Is it this man's function to assist you in your work?"

Esperanza nodded. "It is."

"Then he should be about the business of escorting the wondrous Cheeta to our presence, should he not?"

Esperanza gestured. "Harmon. Have Miss Ching brought up here."

"You're giving her a statement?"

"No, I am granting her an interview. On our terms."

Harmon Cashman looked at the Master of Sinanju. "What are you?"

"Korean. "

"Okay, you might be able to help us in Koreatown."

He turned to Remo. "You. What's your name?"

"Remo."

Harmon nodded. "The Italians aren't much, demographically speaking, but we can use all the help we can get with the minority crowd."

"Since when are Italians in the minority?" Remo asked.

"Since this is California at the end of the twentieth century," replied Harmon Cashman in a smug voice, as he went to the elevator.

Chapter 9

Cheeta Ching was furious.

There were those who claimed that Cheeta Ching had been born furious. Certainly she had been born ambitious. In newsrooms from Los Angeles to New York, she was known as "the Korean Shark." Other reporters had hung this nickname on her. It was hardly an affectionate coinage.

Nobody, but nobody, got between Cheeta Ching and a story.

Right now, a trio of LAPD police officers stood between her and her goal, a one-on-one with the most charismatic local candidate for governor since Barry Black's last run.

Cheeta, who had family in Los Angeles, had first heard about Esperanza from her sister-in-law. The stories were intriguing. A spectacular orator, who cleverly dispensed indescribably tasty cookies at his rallies and played to minority aspirations.

Cheeta had a lukewarm spot in her frosty heart for candidates who played to minorities. Being a member of minority groups herself, she felt oppressed on two fronts. One, because she was a woman, and more importantly, because she was Korean.

Nobody seemed to understand what unique beings Koreans were. People lumped her in with the Chinese and the Japanese, and the other Asians who were pouring into this country by the thousand, threatening Cheeta Ching's unique standing as the premier Asian-American anchorwoman of renown.

In fact, she was proud to say, Koreans didn't even belong to the same racial family as those other so-called minority Asians. Ethnically, Koreans were closer to Turks and Mongols.

The trouble was, Turks weren't considered a true minority in America. Minorities enjoyed strength in numbers, and had political-action groups looking out for their interests. If you were a Turk or a Mongol or, God forbid, a Finn, no one cared about you.

So Cheeta bit her tongue every time some fool referred to her as "Asian." Someday she would come out of the closet as an Altaic Mongoloid. When it was politically advantageous. Or when she finally became pregnant. Whichever came first.

At the moment, it was more effective to shout, "I'm an oppressed Asian-American female person, and I demand my rights!"

The police officers looked away, their faces stony. The other media had dropped their camera equipment and were using their index fingers to protect their eardrums. The screech of Cheeta Ching in full cry had been known to shatter wineglasses. This was so well known that several cameramen were pressing their minicam lenses to their chests, to protect them from the sonic assault.

"I happen to be the number-two anchorperson on my network!" she added shrilly.

To which a voice in the media pack added, "Yeah. In the dead-last-in-the-ratings network."

Cheeta whirled on the others. They recoiled at the blazing fury they saw crackling in her predatory eyes.

"I hope every one of you ends up at my network one day!" she hissed venomously. "I'll have you for lunch, with kimchee."

No one said anything in reply. They knew Cheeta was sincere. And they also knew that if they did end up at her network, Cheeta would make their lives miserable.

Having cowed her colleagues, Cheeta Ching returned to hectoring the police detail.

"I used to be an important reporter in this town. Don't any of you remember that?"

"Yeah," one cop said, his voice gravelly. "We remember. Especially that twelve-part series on police insensitivity."

That tack having proved fruitless, Cheeta let her perfect brows knit together. Her flat face-the term "pancake makeup" had a double meaning when applied to her-attempted an unsuccessful frown. She wondered if her hair spray was wearing off. Usually, the estrogen-impaired half of the human race was easier to handle than this. She wondered if it had anything to do with the Rodney King videotape, which her network broadcast, on average, once a week, to illustrate stories on police forces all over the nation. Even positive ones.

At that moment the elevator door separated, and a flustered man Cheeta recognized as Harmon Cashman, campaign manager to the Esperanza campaign, appeared.

Grabbing the handiest minicam, Cheeta knocked over two of the police officers and successfully eluded a third to get to the elevator. She might have saved herself the trouble, because as soon as she had stepped aboard, thrusting a hard elbow into the Door Close button, Harmon Cashman said, "Ricky will see you, Miss Ching."

"Of course," said Cheeta Ching dryly, taking a tiny canister of hair varnish from her purse and applying it generously to her glossy black hair. "I'm Cheeta Ching."

On the way up, Cheeta examined her face in a small compact. To her horror, she saw that her makeup was flaking. They were almost to the penthouse level, so she closed her eyes, steeled herself, and shot a blast of sticky hair varnish directly into her own face.

When she opened her eyes, the compact revealed that this carefully guarded professional secret had once again saved the day. She looked flawless. Professional. Perfect.

And why not? she thought to herself, as she stepped off the elevator. I am Cheeta Ching, the most famous Korean woman on the planet. If that isn't perfection, what is?

Remo Williams was saying, "I'm a campaign aide, not a freaking maid."

Chiun rushed about the room, straightening cushions and blowing dust off the window drapes, squeaking, "Hurry, Remo! She is coming. Cheeta is coming!"

Remo stood his ground. "No. You broke the glass door, you pick up the shards."

"I will grant you anything you desire!" Chiun pleaded.

"Peace of mind," Remo said instantly. "And a boon to be named later."

"Done!" Chiun crowed. "Now hurry! The great moment is about to arrive!"

Grinning, Remo found a corn broom and swept the door glass out of sight. He hid the bullet-shattered lamp and piled the unconscious Esperanza bodyguards in a back room.

He returned to the living room just in time to hear the elevator doors roll open.

Chiun, his eyes wide, swept in on Remo, saying, "Back! She must not see you!"

"Why not? I'm part of the team."

Chiun raised a warning finger. "Remember Emperor Smith's admonition. Your face must not be seen."

"Oh, yeah," Remo said. Smith was still upset because Remo's original face-the one he had worn in his former life as a Newark patrolman-had inadvertently been restored through plastic surgery. He retreated to the back room and listened.

The sound of Cheeta Ching entering the room was unmistakable. Her high heels sounded as if she were using them to drive railroad spikes.

Chiun's voice came then-the low, grave tone he affected on important occassions, completely the opposite of his usual high, squeaky one.

"I am Chiun."

"Great," Cheeta said. "You're just the person I need."

"Of course," Chiun replied. "How could it be otherwise?"

"Here. Take this."

"What is this?" came Chiun's voice, taken aback.

"It's a minicam. It's very simple to operate."

"Why would I wish to operate such a contraption?" Chiun asked, his tone injured.

"Because I left my cameraman down in the lobby and I need my hands free for the interview," replied Cheeta Ching, as if explaining why the sky is blue.

There was a pause. Remo, who was not ordinarily gifted with second sight, knew exactly what was coming next.

"Remo!"

"You rang?" Remo said, grinning as he stepped out into the living room.

The Master of Sinanju gestured carelessly in Remo's direction. "This is Remo, my lackey. Instruct him, and he will obey your every whim."

Remo looked at Cheeta Ching. Cheeta Ching looked at Remo. Cheeta's almond eyes widened in twin explosions. Her too-red vampire lips softened. Her whole face softened. It seemed to be melting. Like a butterscotch sundae. A patch of pancake base cracked loose from her chin and fell to the rug.

"Romeo," she said in a breathy voice.

"Remo," Remo corrected.

"You could change your name," Cheeta cooed. "For me."

"I'm outta here," Remo said, retreating as if from Typhoid Mary.

"Wait!" Cheeta called out. "Don't go!"

The Master of Sinanju, his expression stricken, said, "Go, Remo. You are no longer needed."

It was too late. Cheeta got between Remo and the door. She put her back to the door and threw out her chest. There wasn't much to throw out, but Remo got the message. So did Chiun.

"Remo!" he said hotly.

"This isn't my idea," Remo protested.

Cheeta Ching took Remo by the arm. Her nails dug in experimentally, as if testing his muscles. "Come with me," she said warmly. "I'll show you how to operate the camera. I bet you'll be wonderful at it. Perhaps you might like to become my personal cameraman. The last one had terrible reflexes."

"He will not!" Chiun blazed.

Cheeta said, "Hush, grandpa. And tell Esperanza that Cheeta Ching is ready for him."

The Master of Sinanju stood as if quick-frozen. His hands became fists and his cheeks became red. They puffed out in exasperation.

"Remo!" he hissed. "Do something!"

Remo asked Cheeta Ching, "Aren't you married?"

"Oh, him. You've probably heard about our little problem. I've been trying to get preggers for ages."

"I am much more virile than that round-eyed, bignosed, ape-footed clod!" Chiun shouted.

"Anybody would be," Cheeta said dryly, not taking her dark eyes off Remo Williams. "He's a gynecologist. Takes a lot to start his engine."

"I'd better get Ricky," Harmon Cashman said uneasily. "He's on the phone."

"Yes, you had better," Chiun said bitterly, his hazel eyes boring into Remo.

Because it meant getting Cheeta Ching's nails disengaged from his bare arms, Remo agreed to operate the minicam.

"You just point and shoot, right?" he asked.

"No, it's much more complicated than that," Cheeta said sweetly. Her voice was like butter warm from the microwave. "Make sure you pan over to my face every time I ask a question."

"Isn't this interview about Esperanza?" Remo wondered.

"No. It's an interview with Cheeta Ching." She winked. "Stick around, and I'll show you why that's such a big deal."

Remo hefted the camera onto his shoulder, found the eyepiece, and experimentally roved the lens around the room. The face of the Master of Sinanju appeared in the viewfinder. It was very, very angry.

Remo took the camera away from his face and mouthed the words, "Not my fault."

"Humph," said Chiun, flouncing around, presenting his cold, austere back to his pupil.

The sounds caught Cheeta Ching's attention. "You. Grandfather. Yoo-hoo." She was still in her buttery mode. "Why don't you run out and get us some coffee?"

"I am no servant," Chiun said huffily.

"Well then, don't you have something you could be doing? This is a major, major interview for Mr. Esperanza. Only important people should be here. We cannot have any distractions. I'm sure you understand?"

"I," said the Master of Sinanju, in a voice that was like ice cracking in a glass, "do not."

Chiun stormed from the room out onto the patio promenade, where he could pretend to suffer in silence yet keep his eyes on Remo and the fickle Cheeta unobtrusively.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza made his entrance a moment later. He came bearing a silver tray, which he placed on the coffee table before Cheeta Ching, who didn't deign to rise at his entrance.

"For you," he said smoothly.

"Thank you," said Cheeta, casually taking an Oreo cookie from the tray. As Enrique Esperanza sat down, she shook the cookie in his face. "Before we get to the story behind your brush with death yesterday, tell me about these."

"They are very good," Enrique invited. "You should try one."

Cheeta held up the confection so that Remo could get a close-up of it in her hand. He zoomed in eagerly. Cheeta's face in the viewfinder made him feel like an extra in Jaws.

"I'm given to understand that the Oreo cookie is the symbol of your campaign. Can you explain your position on the snack-tax controversy?"

"Gladly, Miss Ching."

Remo switched the lens over to the cherubic face of Enrique Esperanza. Remo's finger was on the trigger-or whatever they were called. The thing was whirring. He hoped that meant it was recording and not rewinding. He'd always had trouble with mechanical stuff.

"I am against all hurtful taxes," said the dark-horse candidate for governor.

"You can't be serious. That's boilerplate."

"But I am. Taxes are wrong when they hurt people."

"Would you mind expanding on that?" Cheeta Ching asked, lifting the cookie higher. The dark chocolate aroma wafted into her nose, tickling nasal receptors, which in turn triggered long-dead memory cells. Somehow it brought her back to her teen years, when she'd had a weight problem, and cookies had made her feel so good.

In the middle of an exclusive interview, Cheeta Ching almost did an unspeakable thing. She almost ruined her lipstick by biting into an Oreo sandwich cookie.

As the aromatic dark chocolate floated like some fragrant genie to her lips, she thought that maybe her tiny transgression could be edited out in production.

The Oreo never made it to her blood-red lips.

Instead, it exploded into black chocolate powder and flecks of partially hydrogenated soybean oil creme filling, as a high-powered bullet pulverized it before burying itself in the fabric of the leather sofa behind her.

Cheeta Ching was rarely at a loss for words. But now she found herself staring dumbly at her numb forefinger and thumb, which had been holding the confection.

They stung. And there was a little blood on the ball of her thumb, which had been scraped in passing.

"I . . . uh . . . oh . . . I . . ." she gulped through blood-red lips.

Then the room seemed to explode all around her.

Chapter 10

Before the second bullet shattered the panoramic glass window on the west side of the penthouse, everybody in the room reacted to the first shot.

Everyone, that is, except Cheeta Ching.

Remo Williams helped Cheeta to react by jamming her face deep into the sofa cushions. Cheeta yelped. Remo gave the back of her neck an extra squeeze and she promptly went to sleep.

The second bullet came, bringing with it a shower of plate glass like sharp, crystalline hail.

Harmon Cashman had already thrown himself across the body of Enrique Esperanza. He grabbed the silver tray of Oreos off the coffee table and cradled them from harm as well.

While he waited to die, he used his tongue to soak up cookie crumbs that had fallen like chocolate snow on his coat sleeves.

Remo grabbed both men up, and, tucking them under each arm, rushed to an inner room.

The Master of Sinanju burst in from the outside, crying, "Cheeta! My beloved!"

"I just put her down," Remo called back.

Chiun fell upon the limp anchorwoman, carried her inside in spindly arms, gently placed her on the bed. He turned to Remo.

"Why did you do that?" he demanded, eyes flinty.

"Put her to sleep? So she wouldn't see anything that would get on the news!"

The Master of Sinanju stamped a sandaled foot. "But you have deprived me of my moment of glory! I have rescued the one and only Cheeta, and she does not know!"

"Little Father," Remo said earnestly. "I promise to put in a good word for you when she comes to. Okay?"

Glass shattered in the outer room. It was followed by a snapping, ricochet sound.

"Come on. We have a sniper to slay," Remo urged.

Chiun turned to Esperanza. "Have no fear."

"I have none," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza. "For I know I am protected by the best."

Chiun, bowing formally, breezed from the room. Remo followed.

"Who is that guy, that he knows all about you?" Remo asked.

"Esperanza is a great man," Chiun said.

"Bulldookey," said Remo.

They weaved their way through the furniture. No bullets struck them. No bullets came at all.

Moving low, they reached the parapet and peered up over the edge.

There was only one sniper. He was crouched on the roof of a high-rise office building, directly across Wilshire. They could see the color of his face. It was as brown as a cashew.

"He looks Latino," Remo whispered.

Chiun stood up and shook an angry fist, which was mostly bone covered by yellow parchment-skin.

"Hear me, O villain!" he called. "I am the Master of Sinanju, and I say that your minutes are numbered!"

The sniper brought his weapon up to his cheek and put an eye to the sniper scope.

It was a mistake. The Master of Sinanju cracked a piece of parapet off the roof combing, and with a flicking motion sent it screaming on its way.

The sniper had no sooner laid the cross hairs onto his target than the scope filled with stone. The stone, moving at terminal velocity, drove the scope into the man's eye socket, shattering it, so that the tube buried itself for half its length in the soft cheese of his brain.

"Scratch one sniper," Remo said, coming to his feet.

"He will never threaten Cheeta again," the Master of Sinanju intoned.

"Not to mention the inspiring Esperanza," Remo said dryly.

"Him, too."

"Too bad you had to waste him," Remo said slowly. "Now he can't tell us who put him up to it."

"We could not risk a stray bullet harming Cheeta."

"Fickle as she is, right?"

"Perhaps something may be learned from that body," Chiun said pointedly.

"Just what I was thinking. You know, it would be a good idea if one of us were to spirit the body away before that hairy barracuda wakes up and starts asking questions."

"I do not dispose of bodies," Chiun said icily.

"That means you want the Cheeta detail, huh?"

Chiun considered. "She is fickle, but it may be she will come to see my good qualities."

Remo grinned. "You forget. I have a boon coming to me."

Remo had known the Master of Sinanju a long time. He had seen him angry, greedy, elated, and sad, and every mood in between. But he had never seen the old Korean do a slow burn before.

Chiun first went pale. Then a flush crept up from his neck, which had turned very, very red. The flush suffused his wrinkled visage, until his bald head came to resemble a Christmas bulb with almond eyes.

"Of course," Remo said quickly, not sure that a volcano wasn't about to blow, "for the right word, I might be willing to fetch the body."

The Master of Sinanju's voice was thin. "What word?"

"The P word will do."

"Pale piece of . . ."

"Not what I had in mind. How about 'please'?"

Chiun hesitated. He cleared his throat. Remo waited.

"Aren't you going to say it?" Remo asked.

"I did."

"Huh?"

Chiun cleared his throat again. More clearly, he said, "Is that not sufficient?"

"No. I want to hear the vowels caress my ears."

Chiun parted his dry lips. A word emerged-long, drawn-out, a sibilant hiss.

It sounded like "please." Although it might have been "sneeze" or "bees" or "freeze."

"Close enough for government work," Remo said lightly. "I got the body."

"Then begone, callow one."

On his way to the elevator, Remo called back, "Whatever you do, don't let Esperanza out of your sight!"

"He is safe, never fear."

Remo grinned. "What, me worry?"

Remo took the elevator to the lobby. When the doors opened, he was immediately confronted by a trio of LAPD cops and a flock of press. Since this was the private penthouse elevator, there was no disguising where Remo had come from.

"I don't remember letting you pass," the head cop said.

"Funny, I don't remember passing you," Remo said, offering an ID that identified him as Remo Custer of the Secret Service.

The cop lost his attitude. "Everything all right up there?"

"Shouldn't it be?"

"Guess so."

From that, Remo figured the gunshots hadn't been heard down here. He moved toward the door. The waiting media, smelling a quote, tried to follow him through the lobby.

"Have you any statement?" he was asked.

"Get a life."

Remo foiled them at the revolving door. As soon as he was out on the sidewalk, he gave the door a reverse shove. The door was not meant to go in reverse and it jammed, trapping three reporters in the glass pie-slice sections, and the remainder in the building itself.

Remo slipped across the street and into the office building on the other side. He grabbed the elevator and pressed the highest number, hoping the cage would take him to the top without his having to transfer.

It got as far as the sixth floor. The door opened, and a long-necked mailroom clerk rolled a dirty, canvas-sided mail hamper into the cage, practically squeezing Remo into a corner.

"This going down?" the mail room clerk asked, as the cage resumed its climb.

"This feel like down to you?"

"It feels like up."

"Must be that we're going up."

The mail clerk frowned. "I want down."

"You got up. Tough."

The boy shut his mouth, and started stabbing buttons at random, trying to get the car to stop.

It finally stopped at fifteen. The clerk got out and reached in to pull the hamper out of the cage. The hamper refused to budge.

"I haven't got all day," Remo pointed out.

"It's stuck!"

"This is what happens when you get on the wrong elevator."

"I can't leave it," the clerk said frantically.

"Tell you what," Remo said, "you get off, catch the next elevator to the first floor, and when I get to my floor I'll send this thing down. You can reclaim it in the lobby. How's that?"

"I can't leave this. It's full of important mail."

"I never heard of mail that wasn't important," Remo pointed out, "but you can't tie up this elevator until you grow muscles."

The mail clerk was reluctant. Finally he said, "I guess it'll be all right. Promise to send it right down?"

"Scout's honor," said Remo, lifting four fingers ceilingward.

The mail room clerk got off. The doors closed, and Remo removed an inhibiting toe from the metal frame that held the wheels to the hamper.

The rest of the ride was pleasantly uneventful.

On the top floor, Remo pushed the hamper off the elevator, pushed it into a gloomy corner, and went in search of a way to the roof.

It was a drop-down ladder. Remo pulled it down and popped the hatch.

The body of the sniper had almost finished twitching when Remo reached it.

"Chiun musta been nervous," he muttered, gathering up the body. "They almost never twitch this long."

The head wobbled as Remo carted it back to the ladder. That was because the sniper scope, rifle still attached to it, kept swinging with each step.

Down on the top floor, Remo scooped out a bed for the corpse and laid it in the hamper. He covered it with assorted envelopes and packages. The rifle stuck up, so Remo simply snapped it off the scope mount and tossed it away, along with a long mailing tube that kept getting in the way.

That solved the problem.

Whistling, Remo rode the elevator down to the lobby.

The long-necked mailroom clerk was, as Remo had expected, waiting for him impatiently. His eyes were coals of fear. The worried look on his moist, twitchy face turned to one of relief when Remo stepped off, pushing the squeakywheeled hamper.

"What took you so long?" the clerk demanded.

Remo pulled his wallet from his chinos and displayed an official-looking ID card.

It read: REMO DRAKE, POSTAL INSPECTOR.

"I'm confiscating this mail hamper," Remo said crisply.

"Why?"

"Random inspection. Washington is looking for reused stamps."

"Reused?"

"Don't play coy with me!" Remo growled. "You know, when they don't get canceled and people peel them off and reuse them."

"I'm sure nobody in this building would-"

"We have machines that can detect postage that has gone through the system once," Remo said solemnly.

"But . . . what about the legal pieces?"

"Don't sweat it. Every piece that passes through the Elmer's sniffer machine without tripping a red light will reach its destination."

"Truth?"

Remo placed his hand over his heart and said, "Son, if I'm lying, may God cancel my soul."

The clerk's eyes widened. "I believe you," he gulped.

"Good for you," Remo said, pushing the hamper out to the sidewalk.

Remo pushed the hamper across the street to the hotel and registered under the name "Remo Ward."

A bellboy came up to him and said, "Luggage, sir?"

Remo pointed out the hamper.

The bellboy went over, peered inside, and said, "This is a mail cart."

"And five bucks says it's my luggage," Remo retorted.

Five bucks was five bucks, so the bellhop obligingly pushed it to one of the regular guest elevators. The police guard and the media got out of his way.

Once they were in the room, Remo paid the bellboy the five dollars and, after he had gone, got on the phone.

"Smitty?" he said. "I have in my possession the sniper who took a shot at Esperanza yesterday."

"Who is he?"

"Good question. There's no ID on him."

"Make him talk. Find out all you can."

"That would be a trick. He's dead."

Smith sighed. "What does he look like, then?"

"Oh, about five-foot-seven, brown complexion, black eyes, and hair you could use for a dry mop."

Remo heard the clicking of rapid keystrokes coming over the phone.

"Distinguishing features?"

"He's got a sniper scope sticking out of his right eye socket. "

The keying stopped. The pause on the line was long.

"What about the other one?" Smith asked, his voice like lemonade.

"What other one?" Remo countered.

"Yesterday's attack was the work of two assailants. You say you have only one."

"Good point," Remo said. "I found only one. Maybe he had an accomplice waiting in a getaway car."

"Please investigate further. We need answers."

"Right away," Remo said.

Down on the boulevard Remo circled the neighborhood, checking out parked cars for suspicious people. The only cars parked near the office tower were empty.

Remo pushed into the office building through a revolving door. The minute he started through, he picked up the faint smell of burned gunpowder. Remo kept pushing, following the scent and ending up back in the street.

It was identical to the aroma that still clung to the sniper rifle Remo had left on the top floor of the building.

Out in the open smells were almost indistinguishable, given the metallic residues in the smog-ridden air. But now that he knew what to smell for, Remo picked up the scent.

He did not sniff. That would have abraded his sensitive olfactory nerves. He simply walked in a careful circle, drawing in a long inhalation through his nose.

The odor seemed to be trailing west, so Remo went west. It grew more bitter. Remo's lungs, taking in the acrid smog, began to burn. He hoped the second killer hadn't gotten far. This was murder on his system.

Around the corner came the sound of a car engine starting. Remo picked up the pace, following the cordite stink around the corner.

He was in time to spot the brown-skinned man pulling away from the curb. In the backseat of his red convertible, a thick mailing tube shifted. It looked like the same one Remo had removed from the mail cart. It was big enough to contain the pieces of the rifle, if it had been disassembled first.

Remo took off after the red convertible, pacing it from the sidewalk. It was easier that way. Less traffic on the sidewalk. Although the roller-blade artists were a problem. Remo sent one into a traffic light and another whipping around a corner, and out of his way.

The typical L.A. traffic helped to slow the red car. Remo came abreast of it before it had cleared the block.

"Pull over!" Remo called, flashing an ID badge. It didn't matter which. The guy wouldn't be able to read it from this distance anyway.

The driver refused to stop. He floored the pedal, and shot out in front of a cab as it came around the corner. The cab driver hit the brakes, spun out of control, and bounced up on the sidewalk.

Remo got out of his way just in time. The driver banged his face on the inside of his windshield. When he took his face out of his hands, Remo saw it was as red as a candied apple.

Angrily, the driver threw the cab into reverse, spun around, and raced off after the red convertible. Remo raced after the taxi. He drew up behind it, his feet seeming to float along the street. When he was in perfect sync with the cab, Remo gave a graceful leap.

The leap looked weak. To a bystander, the cab should have outdistanced Remo easily. Instead, Remo's right foot touched the cab's trunk. His left kept going and found the roof. The other joined it.

Arms wide, bending at the waist like a surfer, Remo kept his balance as the taxi accelerated. He called down, "Don't lose him!"

"Who the fuck are you?" the cabby yelled up.

"A creative passenger," Remo shot back.

"What's your beef with that guy?"

"Tell you when we catch up."

"Well, I want that guy's ass!"

"I won't need that part," Remo said. "It's yours."

The red convertible screeched through an intersection. The cab driver took the right-hand turn before it. Remo leaned into the turn, keeping his balance.

The cabby called up. "You still there, buddy?"

"So far."

The taxi driver knew his streets. He ran the cab up a side street and across, getting in front of the convertible. He slammed on the brakes so hard Remo's body was thrown forward. But his feet stuck to the taxi roof as if Krazy-glued.

There was almost a collision. The red convertible J-turned, burned rubber backing up, and sped back the way it had come. In reverse.

The cabby screeched after him.

"This is a one-way street," Remo warned.

"Tell that to the other guy," the cabby snarled.

"You pull this off, and there's twenty bucks in it."

"Don't worry. The meter's running."

Squinting into the airstream, Remo saw the convertible closing in on the oncoming traffic. It would have to slow down soon, or dart up a side street. If the driver could stop in time, which Remo doubted. The maniac was doing sixty, the wrong way on a busy downtown street.

Whether the convertible would have braked in time to cut down a side street will never be known. As it passed one intersection, it ran a red light.

Coming in from the north was a Backgammon Pizza delivery truck, running a yellow.

The person who had ordered the pizza collected a free Pepperoni Supreme later that day. The next of kin of the deliveryman received a sixty-thousand-dollar death benefit, and collected one-point-three million in a wrongful-death suit from the company.

The driver of the red convertible got a pauper's grave, because he was mangled beyond recognition at the moment of impact, then incinerated to a blackened twist of meat when his gas tank ignited.

The smell of burning pizza and human flesh was not long in coming.

The taxi slowed to a stop and Remo hopped off the cab roof. The cabby came out from behind the wheel, his mouth slack in horror and his eyes sick.

Remo reached the twisted, burning mass of metal, and saw the flames shrivel and blacken the driver of the red convertible. When the flames reached the backseat, and the mailing tube, it began jumping and making popcorn sounds. A bullet whined up through the bubbling paint of the roof and knocked out an overhead streetlight.

Remo pulled the cab driver back. "Bullets," he warned.

"You a cop?" the shaken driver croaked.

Remo ignored the question. "So, what's the fare?" he asked.

"How can you think of money at a time like this?"

"Good point," Remo said cheerfully. "Can I keep the tip, too?"

The cabby picked that moment to vomit up his lunch. While he was filling the gutter, Remo slipped away.

He was not having a good day. But there's one consolation, he thought to himself. If there were only two people out to snuff Enrique Espiritu Esperanza, both are now out of the picture.

Even Harold Smith couldn't find fault with that.

Chapter 11

When Remo reached him by phone, Harold W. Smith's reaction was typically Smith.

"You say the second gunman was burned to death?"

"To a crisp," Remo said sourly. "If you're going to quote me, do it right."

"Remo, this is serious."

"The way I see it, Smitty," Remo said absently, lifting the covers of his bed to check on the first gunman, "this is a happy ending. We have our killers."

"But we do not know who hired them," Smith pointed out.

"No, but we can put on our little thinking caps and guess. General Nogeira. Since he's dead and they're dead, Chiun and I should be outta here by sundown. And not a moment too soon."

"I would rather you remained in Los Angeles, Remo."

"Sure you don't want what's behind Door Number Two?" Remo asked airily.

"Er, what do you mean?"

"I mean even as we speak, several floors over my head, Chiun is mooning over a certain hatchet-faced Korean anchorwitch."

Harold Smith sucked in a dry breath that seemed forceful enough to dislodge Remo's right eardrum. "Not Cheeta Ching?"

"Funny," Remo said dryly, "that was my exact thought when I first spotted her."

"Ah, do you think this represents a security threat?"

"If by 'threat,' you mean do I think Chiun is on the verge of making a major conquest, no."

"Good."

"On the other hand," Remo added, "she has the hots for me."

"Cheeta Ching?"

"Wants me to be her partner in procreation," Remo said lightly.

"Remo, under no circumstance are you to appear on camera with Cheeta Ching," Harold Smith said tightly.

"Smitty, where Cheeta Ching is concerned, I'm strictly behind the camera. I was running her minicam when her interview was interrupted by the sniper." "Is there a chance your camera picked up anything important?"

"Search me. I dropped it when the ruckus started. It could have picked up anything, from the sniper to Chiun. "

"Remo," Smith said, urgency coming into the lemon-flavored voice, "obtain that tape. I do not care how you do it."

Remo sighed resignedly. So much for heading east. "Anything else?"

"Yes. I would like a photograph of the dead man. He is still with you?"

"Decomposing peacefully," Remo said lightly, dropping the bedding on the dead sniper's waxy gray face. "What do I do with the body afterward?"

"I do not care. But before you dispose of it, I would like fingerprint samples as well."

"Anything else? Blood type? Nose hair clippings? Earwax samples?"

"Remo, this is serious."

"Tell you what, Smitty. Looks like I'm going to have a busy day. Why don't I just ship the guy to Folcroft?"

"Absolutely not!"

"Oh, don't thank me," Remo said sweetly. "I'll even include return correct postage."

"Remo!"

Laughing, Remo hung up. Things were getting better. He had Smith's goat, and Chiun owed him peace of mind for an unspecified period of time and a boon to be named at a later date. No sense squandering that one too soon.

As he took the stairs to the penthouse, Remo thought that he might hold that boon over Chiun's head for a good long time.

When Remo came over the parapet-the only way to the penthouse that didn't involve returning to the lobby and catching the penthouse elevator--Cheeta Ching was interviewing herself.

She stood in a corner of the living room, the minicam in her hands. She was pointing it at her own face and speaking into the directional mike. Her thumb was holding down the trigger.

"For the first time in the history of television, an attempt has been made on the life of a network anchor," she said shrilly. "Only moments ago, in this very room, this reporter narrowly escaped a sniper's bullet. Obviously, the killer had been aiming at my head, and-"

Remo sidled up to the Master of Sinanju, who stood off to one side with Enrique Espiritu Esperanza and Harmon Cashman, watching the spectacle with varying degrees of disbelief written on their faces.

"How long has this been going on?" Remo asked.

"Since you left," Harmon Cashman murmured. "She actually believes she was the target."

"Maybe that's good. You don't want this kind of bad publicity for the campaign."

"Of course we do," Cashman said instantly.

Remo blinked. "You do?"

"This is better than an endorsement from the President."

Remo looked at Harmon Cashman. Then at Chiun. Chiun shrugged as if to say, "All whites are mad. Did you not know?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza introduced a note of sanity.

"It would be better for all concerned if this embarrassing spectacle did not go out over the air," he said quietly.

"I like your thinking," Remo said. "How about I steal it?"

"I do not like that word. I am a moral man."

"Borrow it, then?" Remo suggested.

"Borrow is good," Harmon Cashman said quickly.

"The trick," Remo said, looking at the white-knuckled way Cheeta Ching was holding the minicam up to her flat face, "will be prying those bony talons from the camera grip."

They decided to wait until Cheeta ran out of tape. The way she was going, only that would bring the selfinterview to a bloodless conclusion.

Meanwhile, Remo filled them in on his attempt to locate the killers.

"They are dead?" asked Enrique Espiritu Esperanza, his cherubic face sad. It was clear that the deaths saddened him. Even the deaths of murderers.

"We do not fail," Chiun said sternly, his wistful eyes on Cheeta's flat profile, as if beholding true beauty.

"What do you see in her?" Remo whispered.

"Grace," said the Master of Sinanju.

Remo thought she looked like Medusa staring down the minicam.

"Unless there are more of these guys in the woodwork, this should be the end of it," he added.

"Have you no idea as to their identity, these two men?" asked Esperanza.

Remo shook his head. "No ID on them. But they looked Hispanic."

"Hispanic?" Harmon Cashman mumbled. "They're our core support. Why would Hispanics want to kill Ricky?"

Remo shrugged. He decided not to mention the Nogeira connection. It would only complicate things. "Maybe they were just crazies," he suggested.

Enrique Esperanza nodded. "Ah, loco. That I understand."

Over in the corner the minicam clicked, and the faint whir of the videotape cartridge came to a stop.

"Oh, damn!" Cheeta Ching swore.

Chiun gasped, as if a priest had loudly passed gas.

"Let me get that," Remo said helpfully, seeing his opportunity.

Cheeta turned. Her eyes took in Remo. They lost their dagger's edge, softened to melting hot-tar blobs.

"Demo!" she squeaked.

"Remo."

"Romeo!"

"Demo is fine. Call me Demo."

"Oh, Demo, would you be a darling and get me a fresh tape from that arthritic cameraman of mine? He's down in the lobby-probably updating his resume."

"Sure," Remo said. "In fact, why don't I get fresh batteries for this thing while I'm at it?"

"That," Cheeta Ching said breathily, "is the most brilliant suggestion I ever heard. Anyone ever tell you you're a natural-born cameraman?"

"Not this week," Remo said brightly, taking the minicam from Cheeta's slow-to-unclench hands. He noted that the pistol grip was slippery with sweat when he took hold of it.

"I won't be a moment," Remo said. He winked. Cheeta beamed. In the corner, Chiun glowered.

Remo felt Cheeta Ching's eyes follow him as he floated to the elevator. On his way out, he bared his teeth. It made him look like he was smiling. No point in blowing this when it was going to be so easy.

Remo had barely reached the elevator when he heard a squeaky voice say, "I know something you do not."

"Oh, no," Remo said under his breath. "Chiun. Don't do this to me."

"What's that?" Cheeta asked suspiciously.

"Chiun . . ." Remo groaned.

"You have surrendered your precious tape to a notorious kleptomaniac," Chiun warned.

"What!"

"It is true," Chiun said loftily. "He is tricky-fingered. Notoriously tricky-fingered."

"He's just jealous!" Remo called back. He made his lips grin. By grinding his teeth, he seemed to smile wider. He hoped his eyes smiled with them. He doubted it very much.

The doors opened just in time. Giving Cheeta a limp little wave, Remo stepped back.

Cheeta, her eyes stricken, torn between hope and fear, waved back. Her wave was even more feeble than Remo's.

The doors snicked shut.

Remo breathed a sigh of relief as he rode the elevator down.

In the lobby, he called out, "Where's Cheeta Ching's cameraman?"

"Out committing suicide," someone said in a bored voice.

"Why?"

"He was too slow. He knows he's dead. He just doesn't want to die the Shark's way."

"Cheeta the Shark?" Remo asked.

"They call her the Korean Shark."

"They," Remo said, "have a higher opinion of her than I do."

Remo got a ripple of nervous laughter that broke the ice enough for him to ask, "I need two fresh videocassettes, and I'll pay well for them."

"How well?" a voice asked.

"A hundred each."

Minicams popped their ports and began disgorging black, plastic boxes. No two looked alike.

"I need ones that will fit this baby," Remo said, hefting his minicam. Half the tapes were withdrawn.

Remo exchanged two hundred-dollar bills for two cassettes. He went off into corner to change tapes.

A minute later he called out, "A fifty to the guy who shows me how to open this thing."

Remo hurried back to his hotel room, took the original tape, and shoved it down the front of the dead man's shirt. Then he tucked him back into bed, making sure his head was covered. He was beginning to smell, Remo found. He would deal with that later. Before he shipped the stiff back east to Folcroft.

Then he took the lobby route back to the penthouse. The sooner I get this over with the better, he told himself.

Cheeta Ching's stiff mask of a face almost cracked with joy when Remo sauntered into the penthouse, brandishing the two tapes. In fact, makeup flecks from the anchorwoman's chin rained onto the carpet like pink dandruff.

"Ta-dah!" he crowed.

"Excellent!" Cheeta said, grabbing the minicam. She popped a cassette in and handed the rig back to Remo.

"Now interview me," she ordered. "All of you. Ask me any question that comes to mind. Just leave my fallopian tubes out of it, okay?"

"What about Ricky's interview?" asked Harmon Cashman.

Cheeta looked blank. "Ricky?"

"The guy you came to talk to in the first place," Harmon pointed out. "You know, the candidate."

Cheeta's face fell. "Oh. That's right. I guess I should do that, too, shouldn't I?" She looked to Remo. Remo said, "I can get you all the videotape you could ever want. Or I can send my little friend, Chiun, to fetch it. He owes me a favor. A big one."

The Master of Sinanju drank in this spectacle with widening eyes. His face was ashen, the wrinkles flattening in shock.

"Augh!" he said, storming from the room.

That left the coast clear for the interview. Remo got the minicam going, and Enrique Espiritu Esperanza took a seat opposite Cheeta Ching.

The interview began. Cheeta was obviously distracted. At one point she noticed the blood on her thumb, and began sucking on it. Remo made sure he captured the precious sight on tape.

When it was over, Remo realized he had learned almost nothing about Enrique Esperanza that he hadn't already known. And he knew almost nothing about the man.

"Got enough?" Remo said doubtfully.

"Plenty. This will be a sidebar to the main story," she said, snatching the minicam from Remo's hand and the other blank from the coffee table and starting for the elevator.

"I have to rush this to editing in time for the five-o'clock feed. Coming?"

"I'm not hungry," Remo said, straight-faced.

"I'll be in touch, Nemo."

"Demo."

"Get your resume together."

"Count on it," Remo said, waving Cheeta off.

After she had gone, the Master of Sinanju reentered the penthouse.

"Never have I been so humiliated in all my life," he huffed.

"Wait'll I call in my marker," Remo said dryly.

"Augh!" said Chiun, storming out into the smog-laden air once more.

Remo started for the elevator. "Chiun will keep an eye on you," he told Enrique and Harmon Cashman.

"Where are you going?" Cashman asked.

"I got a package to mail to the folks back home, and I want to hit the post office before it closes."

Chapter 12

That evening, the second attempt to assassinate gubernatorial candidate Enrique Espiritu Esperanza led the BCN Evening News with Don Cooder.

There was no tape shown. Instead, after an opening background piece, they went to a satellite hook-up interview between Don Cooder and Cheeta Ching. Millions of viewers nationwide were treated to a rare view of the back of the anchor's thick helmet of black hair and the sight of Cheeta Ching, teeth on edge, answering harsh questions.

"Cheeta. About this alleged second attempt . . ."

Cheeta glowered. "It was not alleged. I was there!"

"True. But I was not. So let's say 'alleged.' The sniper, he was shooting at random, was he?"

"No! He was shooting at me! He grazed my thumb."

Cheeta Ching held up her heavily bandaged thumb for ninety million Americans to behold.

Don Cooder pressed on. "What about the candidate? Was he frightened? Obviously cowed? Did he wet his pants?"

"I didn't notice," Cheeta admitted glumly. "I was too busy protecting my reproductive system with my body. I lose that, and there will be no future Cheeta Chings to carry on the superanchorwoman tradition I single-handedly pioneered."

Don Cooder swung around in his seat, gave the camera a steely look, and said, "Obviously, Cheeta has yet to recover from her remarkable brush with death. Speaking for her colleagues here at BCN, I wish her godspeed and good news on the fertility front. More news, after this."

"They didn't even show the interview!" Harmon Cashman complained, jumping up from his seat.

Enrique Esperanza patted the air with his hands. "Harmon, sit down please. It is of no moment. There will be other interviews."

"I'll bet that damn Cooder killed the piece. You could just see the jealousy crackle between those two."

Harmon Cashman resumed his seat in the living room of the penthouse suite overlooking Los Angeles, now a forest of fiery towers in the setting sun. Absently, he took an Oreo cookie off a silver tray and gave it a hard squeeze. Creme filling oozed out, and he began licking it. His eyes went to the tiny wisp of a Korean, who stood out on the parapet, taking in the blazing sunset.

"I don't get it. Why bring that little guy into the campaign organization?" he asked.

"He is Korean. We must reach out to all people, all colors, if we are to win."

"You know, Ricky, no matter what you do, you're still a long shot."

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza laughed good-naturedly. "I do not mind being a long shot. Just so long as I am not shot before election day."

Harmon Cashman stopped licking. "Who the hell could be trying to kill you? It doesn't make sense."

"Perhaps someone who sees that I am a threat to the established order. You know, Harmon, that this state simmers with racial tension."

"Yeah, white people are petrified at the numbers of illegals coming across the border, and jealous of the Asians coming in from Hong Kong. The black people see their piece of the pie being gobbled up by everyone else. One day, it may just explode."

"Not if all these people come together."

"Never happen."

"What if they are brought together?" asked Enrique Esperanza, taking his empty brown fists and bringing them together, with a sound like tupperware containers bumping.

"By you?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza nodded. "By me."

"Look," Harmon said, "you got the Hispanic vote sewed up, if you stick with that. The white liberals will help. Yeah. Might even bring us in second. But you go after the black and Asian vote, and you're wasting your time. Hell, most of the blacks don't even vote. And the Asians are too busy holding down two-three jobs to have the time."

"Harmon, do you know why I chose Los Angeles County to launch my campaign?"

"Sure. Because its got a humungous Hispanic population. No mystery there."

"No. Because L.A. County is the blueprint for the future of this country. The black, Asian, and Hispanic populations are mushrooming. The white people are in decline. In twenty, thirty, perhaps fifty years, all of America will be like this."

Harmon Cashman paused in the act of separating an Oreo sandwich in halves, exposing the white creme filling. "It will?"

"These are the trends. I have studied them. Carefully."

Harmon Cashman put down his Oreo. He was from the South, had grown up in Virginia. He remembered the Old South. How intolerant it had been. He also remembered how much safer it had been.

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza went on. "White people, whom I call blancos, are growing nervous. They see their cultural dominance in decline. They fear for their future, and the future of their children and grandchildren. But there is nothing they can do. Immigration is immigration. New children are born every day, in all colors. Their skin colors happen not to be white."

"My God!"

"But there is a way to allay these fears," Enrique Esperanza added quickly.

"What? Tell me!"

"A new idea. One that is taking root all over. One that will erase these fears, all barriers."

"What? What is it?"

"Multiculturalism."

"Huh?"

"It is a brave new philosophy," Esperanza said. "I am not the candidate of color, but of hope. I represent the man who will lift up people of color, while at the same time protecting the blancos from the erosion of their estate in life."

Harmon Cashman frowned. "Sounds like Rainbow Coalition stuff. You sure you're not talking Rainbow Coalition? You know that won't fly with the electorate. Especially down in Orange County."

"No, it will not fly," Enrique Esperanza admitted. "But multiculturalism will."

Harmon Cashman's eyes went to the tiny wisp of a Korean then.

"Tell you what-you bring that little fellow in here and tell him that. Let's see if it goes over with him."

"Agreed," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

The Master of Sinanju stared into the setting sun. It burned his tender features, wise with age. Never had he felt such pain. Never before had he been so wounded.

The mellow sound of Enrique Espiritu Esperanza's voice dispelled his pain like a soothing pool of light.

Turning, the Master of Sinanju padded into the room where the man called Esperanza waited with his white lackey.

"I am at your service," said Chiun, using polite words he did not feel.

"I am glad to hear this, because I have a favor to ask of you," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

"Speak."

"I will be governor of this state in less than a month's time."

"If the people are with you," Chiun added pointedly.

"They are with me. With your help."

"As long as the Master of Sinanju stands at your side, you need not fear for your safety."

"And I do not. But I need more than that."

Chiun wrinkled his button nose. "I am no soldier, who volunteers to perform lesser tasks. You know what I am?"

"I do. And it is with that in mind that I make the following offer to you."

"Continue."

"I have yet to select my cabinet."

Hearing this, Harmon Cashman gulped. "Ricky . . . Think about this," he said hotly.

"I will soon be governor of the state with the largest economy in this country. An economy that is ranked as the seventh largest on the face of this earth. I need someone to attend to the financial concerns of this economy. Someone to handle the money."

Between anguished fingers, Harmon Cashman ground his bifurcated Oreo into crumbly bits.

"How much money?" asked the Master of Sinanju coolly.

"Billions," replied Enrique Esperanza.

"Continue," Chiun invited.

"The person who performs this task is called a 'treasurer.' "

"An honored post, since before Egyptian times."

"I would be honored if you would consent to be my treasurer," said Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

The Master of Sinanju took in the words of the man called Esperanza. He saw a man of vision, of unsurpassed brilliance, one who knew the value of the House of Sinanju without being told. One who recognized greatness when he came upon it.

In this bitter hour, it was more than enough.

"I accept," said the Master of Sinanju, bowing deeply.

"I am honored," returned Enrique Esperanza, matching the bow.

Off to one side, Harmon Cashman groaned as if he'd been impaled by a Zulu spear.

"Now let me tell you how I plan to achieve this goal and bring us both to power . . . ." Enrique Espiritu Esperanza continued smoothly.

"It is called cultimulcherism," Chiun said into the telephone.

"Good for it," Remo said. "I've booked a room in the hotel. Forty-four D. Any time you feel like coming down, feel free."

"It will not be necessary."

"Okay, I guess we take turns guarding Esperanza then. When do you want to be relieved?"

"Your services will no longer be required."

"Cut it out, Chiun. For crying out loud. You don't speak for the organization. And until Smitty pulls us both off this one, I'm as stuck as you are."

"I am not speaking for Smith or for the organization," said Chiun testily. "I am speaking for Esperanza. I have joined his crusade in cultimulcherism."

"Never heard of it."

"In return, he has promised me the exalted position of Lord Treasurer of California."

"He what!"

"Where I shall rule in splendor, issuing wise decrees, and being appreciated by all."

"And skimming any small change that passes through your hands," Remo suggested darkly.

"Of course there is a magnificent salary attendant to this position," Chiun said loftily. "As befits one of my grace."

"Smitty won't like this, Chiun."

"I will leave it to you to convey my regret to Emperor Smith that our current contract negotiations have borne no fruit."

Remo said, "You're not quitting, are you?"

Silence.

"Chiun?"

"This is a decision I will make at a later date," Chiun said at last.

"How much later?"

"Possibly after the glorious day of election."

"Somehow I knew you were going to say that. But I gotta tell Smitty what you're up to anyway."

"I am certain he will understand. I can better serve him here in the outlying provinces of his empire, if I am in a position of responsibility."

"Don't bet on it," Remo said, hanging up.

Harold W. Smith should have reached for the Maalox when he received the news from Remo Williams. But his stomach did not flare with acid. He should have grabbed the aspirin and wolfed down two or three chewable orange tablets, but strangely, his head felt fine.

"Could you repeat that, Remo?" he said into the receiver. His knuckles tightened imperceptibly. The other hovered over the drawer where he kept his array of medicines.

"Chiun's joining the Esperanza campaign," Remo said wearily. "Says Esperanza has offered him the post of treasurer if he's elected."

"According to the most recent polls, there is a very slim chance of that," Smith pointed out dryly.

"That's a relief. But where does that leave me? I've been laid off from the campaign."

Smith's hand came away from the drawer. He definitely did not feel like a Turns or a chewable aspirin. It was a liberating feeling.

"Simply await developments," he told Remo.

"Did I mention that Esperanza knows about Sinanju?"

"He does?"

"At least, he claims to."

"Sinanju is not a secret," Smith said calmly. "CURE is. It is entirely possible that Esperanza is familiar with the legends of the House of Sinanju. He might accept Chiun as the inheritor of a long-dead tradition. Certainly, no more than that."

"I didn't know, Smitty. Once he understood we were on the job, he acted as if he was immune from harm."

"Hmmm. Curious."

"You okay, Smitty?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Oh, nothing. It's just that you usually don't take bad news this well."

"I do not see a great problem here. Chiun will continue to protect Esperanza, and you will remain in the area in case you are needed. And there is no chance of Chiun's assuming a cabinet post. When he realizes this, I will be in a better bargaining position when we start serious contract negotiations."

"Makes sense. But you're not acting like yourself."

"There is still the matter of the dead assassin's photograph and fingerprints," Smith reminded.

"Not to mention the Cheeta Ching tape."

"Yes, that too."

"All are winging their merry way to Folcroft. I just hope the tape doesn't smell too bad by the time it gets there."

"Why would it be?" Smith asked, his voice puzzled.

"You'll find out," Remo said, hanging up quickly.

At the other end of the nation, Harold W. Smith replaced the receiver. His necktie felt too tight, and he loosened the precise Windsor knot.

Remo, he was confident, was only bluffing. There was no way on earth he had expressed a corpse to Folcroft. It was preposterous.

But to be on the safe side, Harold Smith stopped to speak with the lobby guard on his way out of the building. He gave explicit instructions that any unusually large crates or boxes that arrived at the front desk were to be placed, unopened, in a storage room and the arrival brought to his attention. Immediately.

Then he went home, feeling liberated. He was especially glad to be free of his daily antacid pills. He had read that they contained aluminum, which had a tendency to build up deposits in the brain. Aluminum was suspected of contributing to Alzheimer's disease, a fate Harold W. Smith wished very much to avoid. Otherwise, how could he remember to take his poison pill if the need ever arose?

Chapter 13

The overnight polls changed the public perception of the California governor's race.

Before, only two candidates had placed in the running. Barry Black, Junior and Rona Ripper. They had been virtually neck-and-neck in the eyes of an electorate which had come to despise the previous governor and was apathetic about electing his replacement.

The previous poll had showed Black and Ripper tied, with less than twenty percent of the respondents expressing a preference. Two percent had endorsed Esperanza. Less than one percent wanted the interim governor-the previous California Secretary of State-to continue in office. The remaining seventy-seven percent had declared themselves undecided.

The new poll put it at a three-way tie between Black, Ripper, and Enrique Espiritu Esperanza.

When Harmon Cashman read the poll results in the morning edition of The Los Angeles Times, over coffee and Oreos, he leaped from his seat and said, "I'm jazzed! I'm really jazzed!"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza came out of the shower, wrapping a terry-cloth robe about his sturdy body and saying, "Good news?"

Cashman started to dance about the room. "It's a dead heat! Look at these polls! We have a chance! We have a chance!"

From the living room, a squeaky querulous voice came.

"Silence! An artist is at work!"

Harmon Cashman subsided. "Artist?"

"My very good friend Chiun is preparing new campaign posters," Enrique Esperanza said.

"What's wrong with the old?"

"They were in English and Spanish. These are in Korean, Chinese, and Japanese."

"This, I gotta see," said Harmon Cashman, snatching up a fresh cookie.

In the next room, the little Asian sat on a reed mat. Offset posters featuring the wide, benevolent face of Enrique Espiritu Esperanza were scattered about the rug. The old Korean was dipping a goose quill in a flat shallow stone that was dark with ink.

Holding the quill over a poster with a seemingly awkward grip, the old Korean stared at the blank space under the image of Esperanza.

Then he began painting broad strokes, which he bisected by thinner, more ornate ones. When he was through he lifted the quill, laid the poster aside, and exposed another one in its place.

The quill went to work again.

Harmon Cashman turned to his candidate. "Chinese?"

"I am not sure. I just know what he is writing."

"If you don't know the language, how can you tell what it says?"

Enrique Espiritu Esperanza smiled. "The word 'hope' is a universal one, my friend."

The posters began appearing in Chinatown, Little Tokyo, and Koreatown by ten o'clock.

The Master of Sinanju stood on a street in Koreatown, before a mural depicting Shin Saim-Dong, a mother figure from Korean folklore, surveying his handiwork.

On buildings and light poles all around, portraits of Enrique Esperanza stared out. Passersby paused to look, and read, then walked on.

The Master of Sinanju allowed himself a tight smile. It was working. Who could not vote for the man called "Esperanza," with the endorsement of the Master of Sinanju?

As he paused to drink in his triumph, a pair of young Koreans dressed in ridiculous jeans and Western shirts walked past.

"Who the heck is the Master of Sinanju?" one asked the other.

"Search me."

Chiun's eyes went wide. Were these Koreans, or Japanese wearing Korean faces?

An old woman strolled by, laden with bundles. Her back was bent with a lifetime of cares, and her hair was the color of steel wool. She stopped before a light pole and blinked owlishly at the poster there.

Chiun approached. He cleared his throat respectfully.

"This says that the candidate Esperanza is endorsed by no less than the Master of Sinanju," he said politely. "How could one not vote for such a man?"

The old woman spat. "It is a trick. The Masters of Sinanju are long dead. Besides, of what value is the recommendation of a pack of killers and thieves?"

"We were never thieves!" Chiun howled.

"Do not shout at me, old man."

"I am not shouting, you bony cow! I am spreading enlightenment. You must be from the lazy south."

"And you from the cold and bitter north."

"Southern farmer's wife!" Chiun fumed.

"Northern fishmonger!" snapped the old woman, storming off.

Face tight, the Master of Sinanju retreated to the mural of Shin Saim-Dong. He looked up at the benevolent features, her hair tied up in the traditional ch'ok, delicate hands properly resting in the lap of her kimono.