Union Bust

"But it's just a building. You had me practice on atomic installations."

"Those installations were designed to prohibit the entrance of people who used guns and cars and tanks and various implements of Western technology. This building was designed to repel us."

"But who the hell in this country knows the methods of Sinanju?"

"Some know Ninji," said Chiun, referring to the Japanese art that teaches people to move at night and penetrate castles.

"But the teaching of Ninji is only part of Sinanju." Chiun was silent. "I myself must look."

"That's all we need from the building for now. I'll work it from the other end, from Jethro," said Remo. "And, little father…"

"Yes?" said the Master of Sinanju preparing to darken his face and don the robes of the dark so that he could become part of the night.

"Bring home victory in your teeth," said Remo.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The hardware stores were closed. Remo had to open one. He went through the front door of a little shop around the corner from his hotel, because it had a special kind of burglar alarm that held a special kind of guarantee for Remo. If the door were snapped open very quickly and then closed again just as quickly, the alarm turned itself off and one could walk right in.

Remo selected a Stanley crowbar about three feet long, $4.98. He forgot whether there was a sales tax in Chicago or how much that tax would be, so he left $5, assuming that he had saved the owner a salesman's fee. He wrapped the crowbar in brown paper, careful not to touch it with his bare hands. Then he slipped from the shop, resetting the alarm, and went to Abe Bludner's room.

Bludner had a suite in the same hotel as Remo and Chiun.

Remo knocked on Bludner's door.

"Who is it?" came Stanziani's voice.

"Remo."

"What do you want?"

"I want to see Bludner."

"He's not in."

"Open the door.'"

"I said he's not in."

"Either you'll open the door, or I'll open the door, but the door is going to open."

"You want a table in your face?"

"If you have to open the door to throw it, yes."

The door opened and a heavy, lacquered coffee table came flying through it. Remo caught the table's center with his free left hand. A little chop down its center. Split.

Stanziani stood in the doorway in gray slacks and sports shirt. He looked at the left side of the table against the far wall, and the right side near the door. Then he looked at Remo and smiled weakly. A dark stain began to spread in the crotch of his grey slacks.

"Hi," he said.

"Hi," said Remo.

"Wanna come in?" asked Tony.

"Yeah," said Remo. "I thought you'd never ask."

A voice bellowed from another room.

"Did you let in the kid? I told you I didn't want to let in the kid." It was Bludner.

Remo followed the voice to the bedroom. Bludner was part of a three-handed card game. The door to another living room was open. Three middle-aged, matronly women, obviously the wives, were playing cards.

"You must be Remo," called out one of them. "I'm Mrs. Bludner. Did you eat? Why didn't Abe tell me you were so cute. Hey, Abe, he's cute. He's the first cute official you've ever had. The rest look like gangsters. Answer me, Abe."

Bludner shot Remo a baleful look.

"What is it, Dawn?"

"Why didn't you tell me he was so cute? I don't think he's faggy at all. Some weight you could use, however. Did you eat?"

"I ate. Thank you, ma'am. Abe, why didn't you tell me your wife was so attractive."

Giggles from the living room.

"What do you want, kid?"

"I want to talk to you."

"I don't want to talk to you." said Bludner.

"What's wrong?"

"What's this, you come in the driver's union because I say so and then you're national recording secretary without I even know? What's this?"

"Abe, you know I'm loyal to the local," said Remo, the politician.

"Loyal to the local, you don't even know the local."

"Abe, you should be happy. Now the local's got a national officer."

"I should have been asked. Jethro should have cleared it with me. How does that make me look to my own men, Jethro appointing someone from my local without it being cleared by me."

"Jethro is a sonuvabitch and I don't trust him," said Remo, the politician. "But you can trust me. I'm your man in there," said Remo the politician.

"Trust you, kid? I don't even know you."

"Are your feelings hurt?" asked Remo.

"Hurt? How the hell could two young punks like you and Jethro hurt me? I've spit better men than you two out of my mouth. Hey, Tony. Am I hurt?"

"No, boss," answered Stanziani. He was in the other room, changing.

"Hey, Paul. Am I hurt?"

"No boss," came a voice from a far off bathroom.

"He's hurt," came a woman's voice from the living room. Abe Bludner left the cards and shut the door to the living room.

"You really know how to hurt, kid," said Abe 'Crowbar' Bludner.

"I'm sorry," said Remo.

"That for me?" asked Bludner.

"This. No. It's for me. It's a crowbar. I'm going to hang it in my office to remind me forever that I owe my career to Abe "Crowbar" Bludner."

"I don't know whether that's such a good idea," said Bludner. He reached for the crowbar, and Remo slipped off the paper. Bludner grabbed it and took a few practice swings, like a batter warming up. Then he brought the crowbar a hair from Remo's head with a great swishing of air.

"Scare you, kid?" asked Bludner.

"No," said Remo. "I knew you wouldn't hit me, Abe. We're from the same local."

"Don't you ever forget it, kid. You hear?"

Bludner returned the crowbar and Remo carefully wrapped it without getting his own fingerprints on it. They shook hands and Remo departed. No, Remo did not care to make a pinochle foursome.

He hid the crowbar under the mattress of his hotel bed, careful not to smudge the prints any more than he had to. The crowbar would be for the extreme plan, if all else didn't work.

Jethro now had a whole floor in the posh Delstoyne Hotel across town. The elevators did not stop there unless permission was granted by telephone from the top floor where Jethro was staying. The stairwells were locked. When the recording secretary, Remo Jones, asked permission to see Jethro, this was surprisingly denied because Jethro wasn't in.

"Where is he?" asked Remo.

"He's out."

"That tells me where he isn't, not where he is. Where is he?"

"I can't say any more. Do you want to leave a message? Where you can be reached?"

"No. I'm coming up."

"You can't do that, sir. The elevator won't stop and the stairwells are locked."

"See you in a minute."

Actually it was closer to five minutes. Remo took his time walking up the steps. The stairwell lock to the eighteenth floor was reinforced by a freshly installed, super-strength padlock.

Remo took the bolts out of the hinges and opened the door from the other side. He handed the startled guard the bolts.

"I'll only be a few minutes," he said.

"You can't do that. That's breaking and entering."

"They wouldn't have a name for it if it couldn't be done," said Remo. The guard tried to grab Remo's shoulder, but the shoulder wasn't there. He tried to grab the shirt collar but that was suddenly just out of reach. He tried to crack the head with a rosewood billy club. Suddenly he felt a sharp pain in his chest, a heavy sinking to the floor, and then he felt nothing.

Remo surveyed the hallway. Jethro was probably in the end room. The reasoning behind this deduction impressed Remo himself. Jethro was the most important man in the driver's union. He would, therefore, have the biggest suite. The biggest suites would have windows looking out on two streets instead of one. Therefore, the Jethro suite would be at the end of the corridor. Remo cracked open the locked door at the end of the corridor.

"Oh, I'm sorry," he said, staring at a middle-aged man with tousled jet-black hair on his head and graying hair on his crotch. The middle-aged man was on his back and mounted by a svelte young redhead.

"Hi. What can we do for you?" she asked.

"Nothing. I'm looking for Gene Jethro."

"Where's Jethro?" the redheaded girl asked of her mount.

"You get out of here or I'll call the guard," yelled the middle-aged man.

"You're position's wrong," said Remo.

"Bye, sweetie," said the girl.

Remo shut the door. If Jethro were not at the end, then it stood to reason he would be in the middle.

There were five doors in the hallway. Remo opened the third from the end.

"Oh, sorry," he said to the tangle of arms and legs that he judged to be four people, three women and a man. He stepped into the room to examine the man's face. Moving aside a rather pendulous breast, he saw the hard-lined face of a man who was not Gene Jethro. The man had the happy grin of a cocaine high. Remo returned the breast and left the room.

He tried another door. Another orgy. Three rooms, three orgies. One room would have been whoopie. Two rooms, an epidemic of whoopie. But for three rooms, there was a plan behind this. It was simple numbers. And if Remo knew who the men were, he would know why the activity. They were obviously supplied women. Three random men just don't happen to orgy score at the same time. The women were probably assigned to keep them in their rooms.

.Remo looked down the hallway. The crumpled figure of the guard began to stir. They were probably the other union chiefs, kept nice and safe and occupied here in Jethro's suite until tomorrow's announcement of the superunion. And if Remo did not succeed, they would all become gristle and cracked bone between a fallen beam and platform.

The guard staggered to his feet.

"What hit me?"

Remo trotted to him, grabbing him by the collar. He pressured nerves in the neck until the guard emitted a little helpless groan.

"Where's Jethro's apartment?" Remo asked.

"Second from the end."

"Why that one?"

"It's the biggest suite," said the guard.

"Oh," said Remo and put the guard to sleep again.

Jethro's suite was indeed the largest. The plushly carpeted living room, draperies at the windows and paintings on the wall, contained the kind of furniture that could wreck a bank account.

"Is that you, honey?" It was a woman's voice, muffled by a door.

"Yes," said Remo, since he felt very much like a honey at the time.

"I've got soap in my eyes. Will you hand me a towel?"

Of course, Remo would hand her a towel. He wasn't a sadist.

He opened the door whence the voice came and immediately was hit by steam. The mirrors were fogged. The tile walls dripped, and a shower ran full and hot. A delicate hand poked from behind the shower curtain. Remo put a towel in it.

"How did it go today, dear?"

"Okay."

"It looks as if it's all going to work out, doesn't it? I mean you won't have any more trouble from that rotten, awful man."

"No," said Remo.

"What does he want from you anyway? You've done everything you're supposed to."

Remo cocked an ear.

"What?" he said.

"What does he want from you anyway?"

"Who?"

"Who do you think I'm talking about? Mick Jagger? You know, Nuihc."

So there was someone else. So maybe it wasn't this driver leader who designed the building? So why would Remo ever think that a Western man born into Western technology would ever be able to construct a building defended against a force he knew nothing about?

"Did he phone?" Remo would get his whereabouts if he could.

The hand crumpled the shower curtain. A wet, blond head peeked out. It was a beautiful head, with smooth cheeks and blue eyes and voluptuous lips now turned into a smile. The left breast was well formed, too. Firm and rising with symmetrical, light-pink nipple.

"You're not Gene," said the woman. The smile went.

"I see you got the soap out of your eyes."

"Get out of here. Get out of here now."

"I don't want to," said Remo.

"Get out of here or I'll call the guard."

"Go ahead."

"Guard. Guard. Guard," shrieked the woman.

"My name's Remo, what's yours?"

"You won't be around here long enough to find out. Guard. Guard."

"Until he comes, tell me your name."

The beautiful young face was anger and frustration. No guard was coming.

"Will you get out of here? Will you please get out of here?" Now she put on her stern face. It was also beautiful.

"Look. I don't know what sort of kicks you get from watching women bathe, but would you please get out of here?"

Now the supplicating, pained face. Still beautiful.

"All right. What do you want?"

Now the businesswoman.

"Who's Nuihc?"

"I can't tell you. Would you go please?"

Remo shook his head.

"Aw c'mon, mister. If Gene conies back and finds you here, hell kill you."

"Maybe he'll tell me who Nuihc is."

"You wanna find out who Nuihc is, there's a building just outside the city. He's there."

"I've been there."

"Bullshit, you've been there. I know you haven't been there, wise guy. Now get out of here before Gene comes back."

"What's your name?"

"Chris. Now get out of here. At least, let me get dressed."

"Okay, you can get dressed. I'll be outside."

"Gee, you're generous," said Chris.

Remo stole a kiss on her wet cheek, ducking a roundhouse left. He waited in the living room, and waited in the living room, and waited in the living room.

"Are you coming out?"

"Just a second. Just a second," said Chris.

The door opened and Chris, her blond hair flowing like gracious silk, her body sheathed in white transparent filament, floated into the room. Exquisite.

"I can see more of you dressed than in the shower."

"Drives you up a wall, doesn't it?" said Chris triumphantly.

Remo cocked his head. He thought a moment.

"Yes," he said. "Be nice and I'll make love to you."

"Don't you wish you could?"

"I can."

"Don't you wish I'd help you?"

"You will."

"You're pretty sure of yourself."

"It's part of the biz, sweetheart."

"Want a drink?"

"I'm on a diet."

"I'd offer you something to eat but nobody can go in or out without Gene's okay."

"We can."

"No. The whole place is sealed. Until tomorrow at noon, when everyone's going over to that building that you say you've been to."

Remo nodded. "What's your favourite food."

"Are you kidding? Italian."

"I know a great Italian restaurant in Cicero."

"We can't get out of here."

"Lasagna, dripping with cheese and red sauce."

"I don't like lasagna. I like spaghetti in clam sauce and lobster fra diavola and veal marsala."

"I know a place where the clams swim in garlic butter and the veal melts wine-tasty in your mouth," said Remo.

"Let's kill the guard," said Chris laughing.

"Put some clothes on over your clothes."

"I was only joking," said Chris.

"And the lobster swims in a bath of red sauce."

"I'll wear a coat," said Chris.

When they passed the guard in the hallway, Chris put a delicate hand to her soft lips.

"I didn't mean that about the guard."

"I know," said Remo. "He just went to sleep for a little while."

They tiptoed laughing down the steps like youngsters playing hookie. Remo 'borrowed' a car in the hotel garage by jumping the wires.

"You're awful," laughed Chris. 'When Gene finds out, are you gonna get it. Am I gonna get it."

"The bread crackles when you break it to soak up the sauce," said Remo.

"I know a shortcut to Cicero," said Chris. "I was born there."

They talked as they drove, Remo checking his watch. Chris loved Gene, loved him more than any man in her life. She had known many. But there was something just, you know, nice about Gene. Like Remo was nice in a way but too much of a wise guy. Could Remo understand that? Remo could. She had fallen in love with Jethro before he started to change, and when he did start to change about two months ago, she loved him anyway. She couldn't stop loving him. She wanted to stop loving him after the…

"Yes."

"Never mind. It's something I don't want to say."

"Okay," said Remo. They drove in silence until Chris continued.

"You know I never used to wear clothes like this. Gene started liking them about two months ago when he started doing those funny things like breathing exercises and all sorts of nonsense."

"Does he scream when he lets out the air?" asked Remo.

"Yeah. How do you know?"

"I know," said Remo. "I know too well. All too well."

"Well, I don't like wearing these clothes," said Chris, unaware of Remo's remark. She was too much in herself. "I like to keep myself for Gene. But he likes to show off too much. Like I'm another piece of jewellery. I don't like that."

"Then dress the way you want."

"He said I'd dress the way he wants or he'd walk."

"Then you don't need him."

"Oh, I need him. I need him more than any man in my life. Especially now. You don't know the way he makes love. No man makes love like him. It's more than beautiful; it's so great, it's horrible."

They found the restaurant, and Remo had water while Chris went through second helpings of linguini. On the way back, Remo parked beside the road. Before she could say no, he slid a smooth hand across her stomach, then covered her lips with his. Working his hand to her thighs and his mouth to her breast, he brought her to slow, inexorable passion, brought her, undressed, to demanding him, begging for him, screaming for him, groaning for him, until he was inside her, her passionate body throbbing with exquisite, unbearable desire for fulfilment.

"Ohhh. Ohhh." She groaned and her head pressed into the car door, her writhing body making wet marks on the vinyl seat. "Ahh. Ahhh." Her fingernails bit into his back and neck, her eyes closing and opening, her mouth open for groaning and air, and biting. She kicked the steering wheel and banged her fists against his head, and cried and yelled, and slammed her hips upward begging for more and more. And when she reached her heights, Remo with two quick, masterful strokes brought her to sobbing, shrieking conclusion.

"Oh. Oh. Oh. More. Give me more. I'm here."

She softened to limpness and was kissing his ear when Remo ran his tongue down her neck, across her shoulder and down to the hardened nipple. His right hand car- essed her hip and then imperceptibly he began to build tension in her again, and fire it, and build it, until she was banging her own head against the door guard, begging for more and faster. Then Remo moved faster, with speed and friction rare for the untrained, but creating a wild heat within her so that she suddenly became stiff and rigid and could not move, just stayed stretched like a bolted board, until her face suddenly contorted, her mouth opened, and there was no scream. Just a sinking down into the car seat where she cried with delirious happiness. It was a good few moments before she spoke and when she did, she was hoarse.

"Remo. Oh, Remo. Oh, Remo. No one was ever like that. You're beautiful."

He caressed her gently and helped her on with her clothes, and covered her with her coat, and she snuggled into him as they drove back to Chicago. In the inner city, they passed a small, pocket park.

"Want to walk?" said Remo.

"Yes, dear. But we can't here. It's a coloured neighbourhood."

"I think we'll be all right," he said.

"I don't know," said Chris, worry on her face.

"Do you trust me, honey?" said Remo.

"You called me "honey,"" said Chris, beaming.

"Do you trust me?"

"Oh, yes, Remo. Yes."

They walked into the park. It was littered with broken bottles; its trees were scarred; its bushes uprooted, and its jungle gym was bent arid cracked. A dark, drunken hulk was sleeping one off under a scarred bench.

Chris smiled and kissed Remo's shoulder. "This is the most beautiful park I've ever been through. Just smell the air."

Remo smelled only the drifting odour of garbage dumped from a window because someone didn't bother to walk to a garbage can down the hall.

They sat down on a bench, and Remo wrapped her with an arm, bringing her warm, close, and secure.

"Darling," he said sweetly. "Tell me about yourself and Jethro and the union and the men in those rooms and Nuihc."

And she talked. She told of how she first met Gene Jethro, and Remo asked when he started having money. She talked about Gene's change in temperament, and Remo asked if Nuihc had supplied the money. She talked about the building outside of the city that took so much of Gene's time, leaving her alone, and Remo asked if she had a key to the building. He noted that it must be hard on someone as sensitive as herself to share a floor with those horrible men. Oh, those men weren't horrible. They were Gene's friends. They were the presidents of the three other unions which would join with Gene's, but Remo knew that already, didn't he?

Yes, Remo did. He even knew they were going to make the joining tomorrow. Those men, however, were unfaithful to their wives. Chris knew that and she knew the wives also. Remo wouldn't be the unfaithful kind, would he? Of course not. Could Remo have made love like that if he didn't love her deeply? By the way, did she know where to reach the wives? Yes, she did. She was also Gene's personal secretary. She was chosen for this because she could file things mentally instead of on paper.

No really? She couldn't do that, could she? Remo would like to see her reel off some things.

And so it went until Remo had the full web, the interlocking arrangements of one union with another, the monetary cement that bound closer than blood and tighter than concrete. Did Remo really love her? Of course he did. What sort of a person did she think he was?

Suddenly, footsteps in the night, scuffling footsteps kicking the broken glass before them. Remo turned around. There were eight, ranging from a youngster with afro and comb still in it, to one in his mid-thirties. Eight men with nothing to do at 1 a.m. on a hot spring night in the inner city.

"Oh, my God," said Chris.

"Don't worry," said Remo.

Two of the taller men in undershirts and bell bottoms, with multi-coloured high-heeled shoes and floppy pimp hats angled over their afros, came close. The others surrounded the white couple. Remo could see the black muscles glint in the street light.

"We out of our lily-white neighbourhood tonight, ain't we?" said the man on the left.

"The zoo was closed," said Remo, "so we thought we'd drop in here." He could feel Chris pinch his arm in terror.

"Oh you funny, man. Thank you for the white meat. White meat just love black meat."

Remo's voice was cold and remorseless. He did not wish to do anything without giving full warning of the consequences.

"You bring it out," said Remo. "It's coming off."

"Wrong, honky, yours is coming off," said the one on the left. He flashed a shiny razor. The one on the right had a bowie knife. The older man unveiled a chain. The youngster who couldn't have been more than nine or ten, unveiled an ice-pick. Remo felt Chris's body grow limp. She had fainted.

"Look. Last chance, fellas. I got nothing against you."

"You can run, honky. Leave the white pussy for the black brothers who know what to do with it. She just gonna love it." He smiled a white-toothed, glinting smile. The smile lasted only a second, and then it was a mass of blood as Remo moved through it with a left hand. The knife on the right went into the air. The chain went around a neck, and suddenly bodies were scurrying, running, fleeing out of the park. The youngster, swinging his pick wildly, suddenly realized he was alone.

"Shit," he said and waited courageously for the onslaught.

"What are you going to do with that?" asked Remo, pointing to the ice-pick.

"Gonna cut yo' head off if you don' move back."

Remo moved back.

The young man was delightfully surprised, yet still suspicious. One of his elders managed enough courage to yell from across the street.

"Get outen there, Skeeter."

"You' ass get outen heah. I got the honky. You move, Charlie, you dead."

"I'm not moving," said Remo.

"Less yo' has bread."

"You won't kill me if I give you my money?"

"Gimme," said the youngster, his hand outstretched.

Remo unfolded a ten-dollar bill.

"All."

"No," said Remo.

"You gonna get this in you belly," Skeeter waved the ice-pick.

"Ten dollars. Take it or leave it."

"I take it," said Skeeter. He folded the bill into his chest pocket and sauntered from the park.

"Thet honky ain't so tough," he yelled to his hiding friends. The older man promptly smacked Skeeter in the head, knocking him into a trash can. Another held him down while the third grabbed the ten-dollar bill. They left the youngster bloodied, hanging on to the edge of the trash can.

Chris slept in unconsciousness. Remo went over to the youngster, and stuffed two twenties in his shirt.

"That was pretty stupid going back to those guys with ten bucks," he said.

The youngster blinked and staggered to his feet.

"Those my bruthas and one's my old man, I think."

"I'm sorry," said Remo.

"You white honky shit, I hate you. Ah'll kill you," arid the youngster went tearing at Remo who sidestepped and walked back to Chris, leaving the kid swinging wildly in the street.

Remo kissed her awake.

"Oh," she said. "They took me while I was unconscious."

"Nobody touched you, honey. It's all right."

"They didn't take me?"

"No."

"Oh."

"C'mon, dear. We've got some phone calls to make and the numbers are in your beautiful file cabinet," he said and he kissed her forehead.

CHAPTER TWELVE

The wives of the presidents of the three other transportation unions were scattered around Chicago in motels. They had been told their husbands were to be working straight through Friday, April 17. They could reach their husbands by phone, but so secret were the negotiations they were conducting, they could not see them.

The wives had ample spending money and constant surveillance. This according to Chris.

"Gene figured that the chance to whoop it up free of interference from their wives was another strong inducement for them to join with the drivers. He said you'd be surprised how many major decisions were made for minor self-indulgences."

Remo and Chris sat in the car parked in front of the 'The Happy Day Inn," which boasted, as did all Happy Day Inns, a big marquee. This one said; 'Welcome Drivers. Truck Stop."

"I can't see the union chiefs making risky decisions like that for, well, some female companionship."

"Oh, no," said Chris. "Gene knew they wouldn't do it for that reason. They got money personally, plus he gave them good deals, higher guaranteed base salaries for their union members. You know with a national union like that, they don't have to bargain for a wage, they submit it. They've got to get what they want or the country starves."

"Did he think Congress wouldn't pass a law?"

"Oh, Congress could pass a law. But Congress can't drive a truck or fly a plane or unload a ship."

"Why didn't he bring the seafarers' union in on this?"

"He didn't need them. They'd only be more of a burden. They got to bring the stuff in. As Gene explained it, the seafarers are pretty much at the mercy of the dock-workers. The dockworkers go on strike and the seafarers can just go play with themselves. It's the delivery to the heartland of America that counts."

"And this Nuihc figured it all out."

"Right. He's a creepy little twirp. But he knows what he's doing."

"What does he look like?':

"A skinny gook."

"Oh, great. Now we have it down to a third of the world's population. Stay here. I'm going in."

"Room 60," said Chris.

"I remembered."

"It's just a precaution. Most people can't remember real good."

"Thanks," said Remo.

It was 3 a.m., the night was still and quiet. A floodlight lit the Happy Inn sign, and small orange lights outside each door in the courtyard burned a pungent chemical, obviously to keep away bugs.

Remo found 31 and knocked. A man cradling a long pole—Remo peered closer—no, it was a shotgun, turned the corner and approached him.

"Why are you at that…" the man said and then suddenly was saying no more. The gun clanked to the cement walkway. The door opened. A head awash in a collection of curlers and a sea of cold cream poked out of the open door.

"Mrs. Loffer?"

"Yes."

"My name is Remo Jones, moral squad, Chicago police."

"There's no one in here," said the sleepy woman. 'I'm alone."

It's not you, ma'am. It's some bad news about your husband;

"Can I see your badge?"

Remo reached into his pocket and with his right hand grabbed a half-dollar. With his left, he removed his wallet from his jacket. Then with hands covering the movement, he presented to the woman what appeared to be a wallet open with a shiny badge of some sort. In the dark, it worked.

"Okay. Come in."

Detective Sergeant Remo Jones told Mrs. Loffer the sad and true story of her husband and underage girls.

"The bastard," said Mrs. Loffer.

He told her the girls were sick and probably even seduced her husband.

"The bastard," said Mrs. Loffer.

He told her how the girls were probably being used in some national union manipulation and that her husband should probably not be blamed at all.

"The bastard," said Mrs. Loffer.

Bluntly, he told her he thought her husband was the victim.

"Bullshit. He's a bastard and he always will be," said Mrs. Loffer.

If Mr. Loffer would leave town this very morning, Chicago police would drop charges.

"You may, but I won't. The bastard," said Mrs. Loffer.

By 4.30 a.m. Remo had three angry wives in the back seat of the car. The first wife helped convince the second, and the third was dressed and ready to go before Remo had a chance to explain that it wasn't her husband's fault.

At 4.30 a.m. just outside the city limits in a new building with some of the plaster still drying and the plumbing just beginning to work, Gene Jethro sat beside a pool in an indoor garden listening, nodding, working his hands nervously, and perspiring profusely.

"Can't we just ignore the guy?"

"No," said the other person in a high, squeaky voice.

"Look. I don't have anything against him. So he walked with Chris. She was just another broad, anyhow."

"It is not that he has taken your woman. It is not that he is most dangerous. It is that proper precautions indicate he be dead."

"We used the truck. It didn't work. The guy gives me the creeps, Nuihc."

"This will work."

"How do you know?"

"I know what will work on this man. And once he is gone, then the other person will go."

"Oh, we can take the little gook, I mean Oriental gentleman."

"Did your three men, as you say it, take the gook?"

"I'm sorry for that expression, sir."

"Let me tell you something. Neither you nor your men nor your children, given weapons of the utmost ferocity, given coordination beyond your pitiful imagination, could, as you so crudely say it, take that little gook."

"But he's an old man. He's ready to die."

"So you say. And so you have lost three men. You think your eyes can tell you truths, when you cannot see. You think your ears can tell you truths, when you cannot hear. You think your hands can tell you truths, when you do not know what it is you feel. You are a fool. And a fool must be told in detail what to do."

Gene Jethro listened and watched the long fingernails as they made arrows in the air.

"In your Western ambush, you are very blunt. You arrange that weapons begin their assault at the same time. This you think is most effective. It is not, especially against one man who knows the bare rudiments of his craft. Rather a more subtle ambush is in order, two layers of surprises beyond the initial trap. Now, let us take a normal ambush, four sides or three it does not matter. Guns firing here. Guns firing there. And guns firing there. Impossible to escape, right?"

"I guess so, sir," said Jethro.

"No. Not in the least. With speed one can eliminate one point before the others really become effective. What I'm talking about are fractions of your seconds. But we are assuming our target is not as clumsy as you. So, he destroys a single point and then begins to work on the others or runs or whatever he wills. This sort of ambush works only against amateurs. So, but let us say that each point is an ambush. Let us create firing patterns around each individual firing pattern, and these patterns stay quiet until that point is attacked."

"It's like doubling the chances," said Jethro.

"No. It is increasing the effectiveness nine times. Now we're assuming he will attack the points if he has been trained correctly. Remember now, the secondary level does not fire at him originally—only when he attacks the primary level. Secondary must hold its fire. Now you set up a third level for the second level. And you increase your effectiveness, not by nine times, but nine to the ninth power. You use only twenty-seven men. Twenty-seven men for an infinitely large effectiveness than three times three times three."

"Yeah, but where are we gonna set this thing up? The Mojave desert?"

"Don't be absurd. A hotel is perfect. Perfect. With their rooms and hallways, perfect. The lobby of his hotel. Even you could figure out how that would work."

"I'm scared."

"There's this or, if you prefer, a puddle."

"You need me. You can't do what you do without me."

"And who were you when I found you? A shop steward. If I can make a shop steward into the Gene Jethro of today, I can do it with anyone. I have taught you to love as no Westerner can love. I have given you a gadget weapon designed for your incompetence that dissolves your worst opponents. I have made you Gene Jethro, and I can do the same for someone else. I do not need you. I use you. I am surprised you have not figured this out by now."

"But you said you just wanted to help me. You said you saw so much potential in me that it was a shame I was wasting it."

"A pretty little song for a foolish little head."

Gene Jethro sighed and stared at a hanging palm, then down at his hands.

"What if this older Oriental gentleman should decide to come here after us, if he's as good as you say."

"He has been here and left. We need have no worry about that gentleman. He is not a fool."

"Twenty-seven you say? In his hotel lobby?"

"Correct. Three protected by three, each protected by three."

"I better get going then."

"Call your people to you. I'm afraid you're not leaving here."

"But the convention. The 17th. This is our biggest day."

"It shall come to pass," said the man with the flat Oriental voice. "It shall come to pass. Who would have thought that I could build this structure in two months? Who would have thought I could raise you to a presidency in two months? It shall come to pass, for you see, my friend, it is written both in the stars and in my mind. Our little white adversary whom you fear will be dead before another sun sets. You will be the most powerful labour leader by another sunset. And I shall have what I want."

"What do you want?"

The flat Oriental face smiled. "One thing at a time. First the whiteling. Of course, he might escape."

Nuihc took joy in the sudden shock on the face of his whiteling.

"He could escape this ambush," said Nuihc.

"But…"

"If he knows the scarlet ribbon. But do not add unnecessary worries to your heart. No white man could ever comprehend the scarlet ribbon, any more than you."

Remo reached Jethro's headquarters hotel. Surprisingly, the entrance was easy. No reinforcements—the door hadn't even been repaired. Chris waited downstairs out of sight in the car parked a few blocks away.

The women climbed the flights of steps, driven by anger and rage, panting, stumbling, pressing forward, mumbling, "Wait'll1 get him."

They paused on the eighteenth floor. The door was still open at the hinges. Remo opened it wider for the women. They pushed through, panting. When the guard saw Remo, he hurriedly pressed the elevator button. Jumping up and down in fear, he looked nervously at the indicator dial and then back at Remo and the women. The door opened and Remo could see him lunge for the close button. He let him go. The quartet stormed to the far door.

"It's open," said Remo. "There was some trouble with the lock breaking. They just don't make things the way they used to." Snores could be heard from inside.

"That's him," said Mrs. Loffer. 'I know that snore," Remo eased the door open. The other women watched. One whispered:

"Cut out his heart."

Remo followed. Mrs. Loffer stared at the bed, illuminated by a small night light, a middle-aged man with a redhead snuggled in his arms.

"She's a perfect size ten," sobbed Mrs, Loffer, her voice cracking. "A perfect size ten."

She tiptoed to the bed. Remo could smell the nausea of stale champagne. Mrs. Loffer leaned down, close to her husband's ear.

"Joey. Honey. I heard a noise downstairs."

Still snoring. The redhead turned over, her mouth wide open in a grinding rasp of a nasal symphony.

Mrs. Loffer nudged her husband's hairy shoulder.

"Joey. Honey. It's time for coffee. Go downstairs and get the coffee, honey. Gotta make the coffee."

Snores. The redhead size ten opened her eyes, saw Remo, saw the woman, and started to scream. Remo had his hand over her mouth before the sound could begin.

Joseph Loffer, leader of the best-paid workers in the world, pilots whose average salary topped $30,000 a year, awoke, presumably to go downstairs to start the coffee.

He opened his eyes, kissed his wife, and suddenly became totally awake when he saw that his wife was dressed, and that a man was holding the mouth of his nude paramour. He was about to launch a desperate explanation when Mrs. Loffer clobbered him. The blow took off from the floor and ended in his testicles. As he doubled over, Mrs. Loffer caught him with a knee in the face, then an open hand slap to the cheek, then fingernails to the eyes. He tumbled back on the bed, Mrs. Loffer on top.

It was not a bad attack at all and Remo wondered at the capacity of some people, whether by instinct or through rage, to execute an almost perfect interior line attack. Of course, there were no fatal blows, but still Mrs. Loffer kept up the unrelenting pressure along the center of her body and Joey's, She sustained well, she executed rather well, and all in all, Remo had to admit she was doing a fine job.

"See if you can get the elbows into it. Very nice, Mrs. Loffer. Very nice. Let me say, for someone without training, superb. That's it, keep up the pressure, very nice. No, no roundhouse blows. You've got a nice interior-line attack going there, and I wouldn't spoil it now," said Remo.

Mrs. Loffer, tired, rolled off her husband, who lay stunned and bleeding slightly. She sat on the edge of the bed, lowered her head into her hands, and sobbed hysterically. Her husband managed to raise himself on his elbows and then, with a mighty effort, pushed himself to sitting position.

"I'm sorry." he said. "I'm sorry."

"You bastard," said Mrs. Loffer. "You bastard. Get packed. We're going."

"I can't go."

"You tell that to the policeman. You were doing such awful things, even the morals squad got involved."

"There's no law, dear…"

"You'll see from my lawyer whether there's a law or not."

"I can't go."

Remo released the redhead.

"Better get dressed and out of here," he said.

She shot him a dirty look.

"You're a private detective, aren't you?"

"Get dressed," he said. 'And you, Mr. Loffer, I want you dressed and out of this city in half an hour."

Remo took the next wife to the center room. She emptied two ashtrays on the pile of bodies and hit every limb, buttock, and face her nails could reach. Her husband cowered in the corner. Remo threw him his clothes.

"Be out of Chicago in a half hour or you're in jail."

The third room was less of a battle. The wife burst into tears when she saw her husband entangled in a melange of female parts. She put her head into Remo's chest and began to cry. A tingle of guilt crossed Remo's emotions. Yet, it was either get them out of town or between a beam. The nation could not survive what they were about to do to it.

This husband was furious. How dare his wife break in on him? How dare his wife have him followed? How dare his wife not trust him?

Remo explained that the husband was violating a morals ordinance, which Remo conveniently made up. Granted, the ordinance was written in 1887, but it still holds true today, as it did when the Chicago forefathers passed it unanimously.

"Yeah. Well, it ain't constitutional," said the president of the dockworkers. "I can get it thrown out of court."

"You're going to fight it in the courts?"

"You're damned right I am."

The president of the International Stevedores Association had a very interesting lower right rib. Remo readjusted it. The gentleman, amid a loud wail, reconsidered his legal course and agreed to get out of Chicago.

There was a mass exodus from the hotel that morning as the first faint red lines appeared in the gray Chicago sky. First the ladies of the evening. Then, the husbands and wives. But Remo, leaning against a lamppost, waiting to make sure, was not really sure at all as he saw the last husband engage the attention of the other couples. At the end of the block they flagged down a squad car. The two other husbands and all the women suddenly pretended they did not know this man, as he spoke to the two policemen in the squad car.

When Remo saw the driver laugh, he knew his little ploy had been shot. The third man had not been panicked by the situation. He had kept his head. Checked out an ordinance. Found out it was nonexistent, and through his coolness of action was going to get himself and his companions killed today - a beam would go hurtling down on a row of union delegates who knew no such morals law had been passed in 1887. Unanimously. The way they would have to die.

It was a bad report for Smith. Extreme actions are to be used when you have lost everything else. Only fools, madmen, and losers resort to them. As Remo ducked out of sight, he knew he was in the latter category.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The plan was simple. And it was safe.

Rocco Pigarello explained it again to the twenty-six other men. He wasn't asking anyone to get killed. He wasn't asking anyone to commit murder. He was asking the men merely to make some money. He wasn't even going to mention that these men were the least important in the entire union because they were muscle and muscle could be bought cheap anytime. No. He wasn't going to mention unpleasant things because he had a very pleasant proposition and he did not wish to mar its sweetness.

"What I want from you guys is a little common sense and that you should defend yourselves if attacked or if anyone attacks one of your driver brothers. Right?"

A few suspicious mumbles of 'right,' 'yeah,' and 'okay' emanated from the twenty-six men sitting sullenly sleepily in the large auditorium that smelled of fresh paint. They had been awakened in the motel rooms and hotel rooms in the wee hours and hustled to this new building just outside Chicago. In some cases it was the president of the local who woke them. In others it was another delegate or a business agent. It was always someone in direct command over them. And they were not asked to get up early, they were told to do so. Or else.

As soon as the auditorium started filling, the men recognized each other. Muscle. From Dallas, San Francisco, Columbus, Savannah. Twenty-six men with special reps. They saw each other and they knew there would be blood, and they didn't like it because this convention was to be one of their rewards for loyal service, not some more work.

The Pig continued. "I know many of you guys think it unfair to bring you here at this hour. I know many of you guys think you ought to be back asleep. But let me tell you, you're here because… because…" Pigarello thought a moment. 'Because you're here."

Angry mumbling from the men.

"Now I am asking you to protect a brother driver. I am asking you to protect a fellow union member from vicious goons. I'm gonna tell you all your places. If you see anyone attacking a fellow driver, shoot him in defence of that fellow driver. We have the lawyers ready and we foresee no trouble. No trouble, okay."

Angry mumbles.

"Now, it is my suspicion that this company goon, this strong-arm man, will attack me with a pistol. I am sure all of you will see this. You will see the attack with the pistol. Once you hear a shot, it will mean he has begun to attack a brother driver. You will defend that brother driver. This is the picture of the man I expect to attack me." The Pig raised a glossy, magazine-sized photograph above his head.

A few mumbles of shock. The recording secretary. They were going to do a job on the recording secretary.

"Now. Any questions?"

A delegate from a Wyoming local rose. He was as tall and lean and raw-boned as his cowboy ancestors.

"How many men is that gentleman going to bring? I mean we have twenty-seven men, Pig, and I don't hanker to go up against no fifty or a hundred of Abe Bludner's boys."

"Bludner is on our side," said the Pig.

Mumbles of approval.

"You mean to say, this Remo Jones is going up against you without his president's approval?" asked the Wyoming delegate.

"You heard me."

"Where's he getting his support?"

"He ain't got none."

"You mean to tell me he's all alone and he's going up against you, Pig?"

"Yeah."

"I don't rightly believe that."

"Yeah, well you better rightly believe it, shit-kicker, because this guy is gonna do just that. Now sit down. Any more questions?"

Three hands raised.

"Take 'em down," said the Pig. "Questions are over."

Remo hailed a cab.

"How much time do you have left on your shift?" he asked.

The cabby looked puzzled.

"How much time are you willing to work today?"

The driver shrugged. "Usually people ask are you willing to go this far or that far, not how much time."

"Well I'm not usual people and I've got some unusual money."

"Look, I've had a good day. I'm not interested in anything shady."

"Nothing shady. You want to earn twelve hours?"

"I'm beat."

"A hundred dollars."

"I feel refreshed."

"Good. Just drive this lady around Chicago for twelve hours and don't stop for more than ten minutes anywhere."

Remo eased Chris into the back of the cab.

"Honey. You get your rest right here in the back of the cab," he said. He ostentatiously handed Chris a wad of bills, letting the driver know there was money to be paid.

"But why can't I go to your hotel with you, darling?" said Chris.

Remo whispered in her ear. "Because we're marked people. You're a target. I'd bet on it. I'll meet you at O'Hare International Airport at six or seven tonight. The bar is the best restaurant. Whatever it is. If I'm not there, wait until midnight. If I don't come, run for your life. Change your name and keep going. In two days stop."

"Why two days?"

"Because it's been worked out that two days is an ideal time in a run pattern like this, and I don't have time to explain.

"Why can't I just book a six-hour flight out and a six-hour flight back if you want me to keep travelling for twelve hours?"

"Because a scheduled flight is like an elevator. In something like this it functions like a stationary room that keeps you locked in. Take my word. This is best."

"I'm not afraid of Gene, darling."

"I am. Move." Remo kissed Chris on the cheek and nodded to the cab driver. He made obvious a check of the cabbie's identification, not that he would remember it. He just wanted the man to believe that he would be remembered and vulnerable if anything should happen to the girl.

April 17 was a hot day in Chicago, the muggy, skin-soaking kind of morning that makes you feel you've worked a full day when you get up. Remo hadn't slept. He could make do with twenty minutes rather easily, and with this intention he headed back to his hotel.

He did not get rest. As he entered the marble-floored lobby, he saw a man ease a rifle barrel in his direction. Automatically he did not respond to this man who had taken the rifle out of a golf bag leaning against a lobby sofa. As he had been trained to do, he first checked—in an instant—the entire pattern he was in. Other guns came out. From suitcases, from a carton, from behind the registration clerk's desk. Ambush.

Remo would work it left to right. Not bothering to feint, he was into a rugged man who was squeezing the trigger on a Mauser. The Mauser did not fire. It was jammed up into the solar plexus, taking part of a lung with it. The man vomited his lungs, and Remo continued to work right so that his being in the right firing pattern prevented the center and left from getting him without shooting into their own men.

A woman screamed. A porter jumped for cover, catching a wayward bullet in the throat. Two young children huddled against a sofa. Remo would have to work the line of fire away from the children. But if he could not, whoever might have fired the shots that injured the youngsters would not die quickly.

The right side was too bunched. Amateurs. Remo thumbed a side of a head, and interior-attacked a thin man with a .357 Magnum. It was held too close to the body, as though the man were working a snub-nose at close quarters. The trigger finger was squeezing off a shot so the gun went first. With a wrist. Then the head caved in and Remo was moving towards the center, going under a rifle line to come up under it when a shot cracked passed his head. He felt it in his hair.

Double layer. Remo finished the driver through the rifleman, taking off his testicles. The man would be stunned until dead. He spun back to where the second level of fire came from, another bullet narrowly missing him from the center. He was now in cross fire. Very stupid move on his part.

He quickly put a post between him and center left, taking that line into the dining room, whence the second-level fire came.

They were using tables here as cover. One man got a table top, tablecloth and all, in his mouth. Down through a vertebra. A nervous, wildly chattering machine gun ended its chirp with the barrel in its user's mouth, still firing from a trigger finger that could no longer receive messages to stop. The bullets took skull fragments and brain into the ceiling.

Remo's body wove and jerk-ran into a free space that suddenly had a bullet in it, taking flesh from Remo's right side. Minor wound.

Without thinking, Remo reacted. His body reacted as it had been taught to react in the painful, pressing hours of training, reacted as Chiun had taught it despite Remo's protests, despite Remo's conscious begging for surcease, despite the long hours and high temperatures.

As it had been taught and no other way. Scarlet Ribbon for the three times three times three. It was not only the only defence, but against this combination it was invincible. Back toward the center he moved, keeping lines of fire within the ambush itself. He did not attack men anymore because that would remove them, and the Ribbon depended upon the men to destroy themselves, like using the greater mass of a body against itself.

He brushed the center and spun back, careful not to let any close shots, which were the easiest to avoid, get him. The distant, more dangerous, shots were now no worry because there would be other men in their line.

With incredible, balanced speed, Remo, like a darting flash of light brought down from the heavens, spun his ribbon in the three-layered defence. Guns silenced when the speeding body disappeared among other men of the ambush, then resumed in the fleeting second he was visible. Wild shots. Hesitant shots. The target was no longer the center of the ambush. The target was part of it.

Through the registration desk, back up through the triple layer left, over the staircase, keeping close and unhittable to the confused and now panicked men, Remo worked to third layer center, second layer center, picked off a first layer center only for the rebound back to third layer right.

Bullets cracked into light fixtures spraying the lobby with a shower of glass. Mindless screaming and yelling whipped the panic still further. An elevator door opened and a maid was cut in two by a shotgun blast. On the final spin of the ribbon, Remo took care of the man who fired the shotgun. He creased the man's eyes with his fingernails, leaving two blood-gushing sockets in the skull.

Then fast up the middle, picking up the two children from the couch, then a reverse into the dining room, out again and behind the third layer that did not know he had penetrated up the steps, and wait. Standing on the steps, waiting. The gunfire continued. The two children stared at him, confused.

What had happened was natural. Instead of acting like professionals, the men in the parts of the ambush catching fire, returned it. The men were fighting for their lives against each other. The Scarlet Ribbon had woven the blood curse of fear and confusion into the ambush. It would never recover. If Remo wished, he could wait to the last spurts of firing, and move in for the final kill. But that was not his purpose. The only thing he wanted from the ambush was to get through it alive.

The little girl looked stunned. The boy was smiling.

"Bang, bang," said the boy. "Bang, bang."

"Your mommy and daddy around here?" asked Remo.

"They're on the third floor. They told us to play in the lobby."

"Well you go back up to your parents' room."

"They said we shouldn't come back until 9.30," said the girl.

"Bang, bang," said the boy.

"You can't go downstairs again."

Rifle fire cracked sporadically in the hallway. Sounds of far-off sirens could be heard filtering into the stairway where Remo stood with the two children.

"All right. But would you come with us?" said the girl.

"I'll come with you."

"And tell my mommy and daddy that we can't play in the lobby."

"I'll do that.'"

"And tell them we didn't do the trouble downstairs."

"I'll do that."

"And give us a dollar."

"Why give you a dollar?"

"Well, a dollar would be nice, too."

"I'll give you a quarter," said Remo. "A nice shiny quarter."

"I'd rather have a dirty old dollar."

Remo brought the two youngsters to their parents' room. His shirt was bloody and his pants were beginning to darken. It was uncomfortable, but not serious.

The father opened the door. He was bleary-eyed, a face of anguish, a face of alcohol-damaged brain cells, the damaging process of which was pleasant, and the results painful.

"What trouble did you kids cause now?"

"They didn't cause any trouble, sir. Some madmen went amok with guns downstairs, and your children might have been killed."

"I didn't know," said the man. He tied the terrycloth belt around his terrycloth robe. "Are they all right? Are you all right?"

"Yes. I got nicked. You know us innocent passersby. Always getting hurt."

"Terrible what's happening to America these days. Is it safe to go downstairs?"

Remo listened. The gunfire had stopped. The police were probably flooding the lobby now. The sirens were about that much time away when he first heard them.

"Yes. But I'd advise you to go back to sleep. It's not a pretty sight."

"Yeah, thanks. C'mon in, kids."

"Bang, bang," said the little boy.

"Shut up," said the father.

"What is it dear?" came a woman's voice.

"Some trouble in the lobby'.

"Those kids are gonna get it," yelled the woman.

"Not their fault," said the father shutting the door.

Remo walked up the flights to his floor. The blood flow was stemming now, coagulating as it should. The shirt became sticky. When he entered the suite, Chiun was asleep by the window, lying on his floor mat, curled like a fetus in peaceful repose, his face to the window.

"You're wounded," he said without turning around, without the twitch of body to indicate awakeness. He was sleeping and his mind registered sounds, and he was quietly awake in an instant, trained since childhood to awake immediately upon the entrance of a strange sound and trained to awake in such a manner as to avoid giving any indications that he was awake. It was many of the little advantages that made up the Master of Sinanju, supreme teacher of the martial arts, respected leader of the small Korean village that depended on his rented services for its financial survival.

"Not serious," said Remo.

"Every wound is serious. A sneeze is serious. Wash it clean and rest."

"Yes, little father."

"How did it go?"

"Not too well."

"It went well enough. I felt vibrations of rifle fire through the floor."

"Oh that. Yeah it was a three, three, three that took a Scarlet Ribbon."

"Why are you wounded?"

"I started the Ribbon late."

"Never before," said Chiun, "has so much been given to so few who used it so little. I might as well give my instructions to walls as to a white man."

"All right. All right. I'm wounded. Lay off."

"Wounded. A minor flesh wound, and we make it into the great tragedy. We have more important problems. You must rest. We will flee soon."

"Run?"

"That is the usual word in the English language tor run, is it not?"

"I can't go, Chiun. I have work. We can't run."

"You are talking silliness and I am trying to rest."

"What happened at the building, Chiun?" Remo asked.

"What happened at the building is why we must run."

Dr. Harold Smith got the report late in the morning, at 10.12. The phone line was activated ever hour at twelve minutes past the hour. From 6 a.m. Eastern Standard Time until 6 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, this was done with direct link to Smith. If he were not in his office, a tape recording would be accepted. Into this tape recording Remo would read the message as best he could in medical terms. Thus, if the message were discovered by others, it would only be a doctor reading in an odd hour report.

At 10.12 when the buzzer on his phone rang, Smith knew from the very first words that the plan would be the extreme one.

"My alternate plan didn't work," came Remo's voice.

"All right," said Dr. Smith. "You know what to do."

"Yeah."

And that was it. The phone was dead, and four of the nation's leading labour leaders were going to die.

"Damn," said Dr. Smith. "Damn."

If the system could not tolerate collective bargaining, then maybe the American system was just false. Maybe the patch-up work CURE did only delayed the final outcome. Maybe business and labour were supposed to function as warring, hostile giants, with the public whipsawed in between. After all, Dr. Smith knew, business had a history of doing just what the unions were trying to do now. It was called cornering the market, and that was considered the height of business acumen. Why should the unions not be allowed to do the same?

Dr. Smith spun to view Long Island Sound, deep and green and going far out into the Atlantic. Perhaps there should be a sign, "You are leaving the Sound. Now entering the Atlantic." But there were no signs, either on the Sound or in life. It was wrong for the unions to blackmail the nation like this, just as it was wrong for businessmen to corner the market in a certain commodity and drive up its prices. He must begin to work the agency towards stopping that sort of crime. And so, staring at Long Island Sound, Dr. Harold Smith planned to enact a piece of American legislation. Without votes. Without writing. Without immediate public knowledge. But he would enact it somehow, someday: it would be illegal for corporations to corner the market and drive up the price of food. And he would not stop at using 'The Destroyer," just as he had not hesitated to use him today.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Remo slipped the wrapped crowbar with Bludner's fingerprints on it into the back of his pants. Then he put his shirt over it, and a jacket over that. He surrounded the crowbar with muscle, cushioning it between his shoulder blades, keeping the metal rod positioned on top and hidden behind the jacket. The forked end of the crowbar nestled right behind his reproductive organs, following the curve of his body. An X-ray would have shown a man sitting on a curved bar.

A good tap on his back would, Remo knew, cause him great pain. He walked somewhat stiffly to the door of his hotel suite.

"I'll be back."

"You are going to that building?" Chiun said in caution.

"No," said Remo.

"Good. When you return I will tell you why we must run. If I did not have to stay here and watch over an impetuous youth," said Chiun. 'I would leave now. It is no matter, however. We will leave later, after you expend your wasted energy."

"It will not be wasted, little father."

"It will be wasted, but feel free to indulge yourself. Amuse yourself."

"This is not amusement, little father."

"It is not work, Remo. It is not productive, mature work."

"I am going to set things right which must be set right."

"You are going to indulge yourself in wasted effort. Goodnight."

Remo exhaled his frustration. One did not reason with Chiun. For all his wisdom he could not know the threat of four unions joining into one. For all his wisdom he was wrong this morning.

The lobby was aswarm with police, newspapermen, photographers, TV cameras. The ambulance drivers had left, most of them headed for morgues.

Rocco 'the Pig' Pigarello was perspiring under the television lights. His arm was bandaged, undoubtedly the result of a bullet from one of his own men.

"Yeah. These crazy men were shooting at us for no reason. It was an assault against organized labour by gangsters."

"Mr. Pigarello, police say all the injured and dead were union men." The newscaster held a microphone to Pigarello's face.

"Dat's right. We had no way to defend ourselves. There must have been twenty, maybe thirty wid guns."

"Thank you, Mr. Pigarello," said the television newscaster. He turned to his cameraman.

"That was Rocco Pigarello, a delegate to the International Brotherhood of Drivers' convention here in Chicago, a union that has been severely hurt today in an outburst of senseless violence."

Remo watched Pigarello's eyes. They spotted him. The Pig went to a police captain. He shot Remo a furtive glance. Remo smiled at the Pig. The Pig suddenly forgot what he was going to say to the captain, and Remo walked from the hotel out into the busy morning street through a corridor of police barricades. People gawked over the barricades, they leaned from windows across the street, they stood on tiptoes on the opposite sidewalk.

A bright blue Illinois sky covered it all—with, of course, a layer of air pollution sandwiched in between. Remo hailed a cab to the convention hall.

The driver talked about the horrible killings in the hotel, how Chicago wasn't safe anymore, and how everything would be fine if only the Blacks left Chicago.

"Blacks weren't involved," said Remo.

"So in this one incident," said the driver, "they weren't involved. Don't tell me that if we didn't have coloureds the crime rate wouldn't drop."

"It would drop even faster if we didn't have people," said Remo.

The convention hall was, strangely, all but deserted. No uniformed guards to take delegates' tickets, no vendors preparing for special bars with the early tubs of ice, no last-minute scurrying of workers giving the microphone system a last-minute check. No one was even placing the day's agenda on the seats as they had done every day since Monday.

Even the gates were locked. At the third gate, Remo decided to stop looking for someone to let him in. He walked in, right through the crowd-proof, locked gate. His footsteps echoed down the dark, deserted corridors that smelled freshly cleaned. The stands exuded a faint yesterday's-beer odour. The air was cool yet without freshness. A lone worker stood on a ladder installing a light bulb. Remo stayed in the shadows enough not to be recognized but not enough to appear suspicious.

"Hi," Remo said, walking on as though he belonged in the deserted corridor.

"Hi," said the workman.

Remo scampered up to the top tier and paused. He was two aisles away. The banner was still and flat.

"Welcome, International Brotherhood of Drivers." Not a ripple. The crowds would change that. The body heat would change that. Yet even with no one inside the huge structure, it should get some air currents. Perhaps too many doors and windows were closed on the outside. Remo ducked back into the corridor and came out perfect. Fifty feet above him was the joint of the beam that stretched across the huge dome of the hall. He eased the crowbar from the back of his pants with the protective paper still on it. An edge of the paper was smeared with his blood. The wound had coagulated, but apparently not fast enough to keep the paper dry. He checked the crowbar, looking for the glistening hint of his own blood. He did not want blood on the crowbar to complicate things. It should be a very simple crime. Abe 'Crowbar' Bludner had somehow un-riveted the beam and was stupid enough to leave the crowbar. The police, desperately in need of a suspect for the murder of four union officials, would gratefully and rapidly pick Bludner. Blood would be a minor complication that might set their minds to working on other angles. Not that he would be implicated, but as Chiun had said, fools and children take chances.

"It is the height of arrogance to fling your chances of survival into the lap of the goddess of fate, demanding that she perform what you will not. This arrogance is always punished."

Remo eased out of his shoes. He rewrapped the crowbar. There was no blood. He leaped to a small overhang and held with one hand. Working with feet forward and one hand behind it, he slithered up the curved wall. His free hand was used as a foot now because two feet were better for grabbing than one free hand. In the other hand was the evidence against Bludner.

Suddenly walking sounds, hollow, leather, clicking walking sounds came towards him. Two men. Remo pressed against the wall. His blood rushing headward, but unlike ordinary men he could sustain this pressure and function for three hours.

"Hey, Johnny. One of those idiot driver delegates left his shoes."

"They should have been picked up by cleaning. That contractor we use is getting sloppy. I mean it. Sloppy. You never should have hired him."

"What's this "you" jazz? We both hired him."

"You recommended him."

"And you said "Okay.""

"I said "Okay" because you recommended him. I'm not going to listen to your recommendations anymore."

They stood directly beneath Remo, a bald head and a grease conglomerate swirled in such a way as to hide impending departure of hair. This was very evident to anyone who wanted to cling upside down directly above a grease-coated head.

"I recommended the drivers. You want to give back their money?"

"So one of your recommendations finally turns out all right. What do you want, a medal?"

"I want a little appreciation. You know any other outfit that would pay for a place like this on a day they're not using it?"

"Yeah, anyone else who signed a contract and at three in the morning said they weren't going to use the place that day."

"They could hold up the final payment. They could talk deal. They could talk settlement. The people I rent to pay in full, anyway."

"When you rented at the last minute, I was the one who told you to go ahead. I was the one who, with two pathetic months, broke the contract for that horse show."

"Because I got you the drivers, dumbell. For the drivers I'd break a contract with God."

"For five cents you'd break a contract with God. He could fall down right now and you'd break a contract for five cents."

It was as good a time as any to collect his shoes. The drivers would not be meeting in the giant hall that day, and there was no point getting Abe Bludner indicted for murdering a circus or a basketball team or whoever was there when the vibrations, unaided by Remo, would determine that the beam would fall.

Remo dropped gently, missing the greasy head.

"My shoes, please," said Remo indignantly. He grabbed the shoes from the startled men and handed the greasy-headed one the paper-wrapped crowbar. The paper was still flecked with blood.

"And here's your crowbar. You shouldn't leave it lying around. People could trip over it and get hurt."

"On the ceiling?" asked the bewildered men.

Remo slipped into his shoes. "Anywhere," said Remo. "Carelessness cannot be excused."

And with that he was back into his shoes and walking briskly down a corridor towards anything that resembled an exit. He had wasted his effort, as Chiun had said he would. The crowbar would not be needed now. It was as useless as the Maginot Line. Besides, one didn't need a crowbar when one was going to die.

Gene Jethro listened as the Pig, his arm getting a fresh bandage from Sigmund Negronski, explained how it had all happened. The Pig was awash in sweat despite the even chill of the air-conditioned basement of the new building.

"I had it set good. In the lobby like you told me. Twenty-seven guys including me. I was in your third layer central. The first layer was in the lobby or facing it like we planned. You know, rooms surrounding the lobby and the stairs we used for first layer and beginning of second. And the third, I placed it myself because I was in it. I mean I was really careful. The registration desk, I had a guy behind. I had 'em waiting just right, and the guns concealed and every man knew what he was supposed to do. The first layer was the dining room right, the registration clerk center and the…"

"Go on. Go on," said Jethro.

Negronski gently taped the bandage and eyed Jethro. The smiling confidence was no longer there. The joyous manipulation of men was no longer in the face grown suddenly old. Deep lines clouded his face. He worked a white handkerchief in his hands. He was wearing yesterday's clothes. He had not changed them. Negronski took both joy and pity in Jethro's condition. He fervently wished that they could return to the Nashville local and wrestle with pensions, threatened layoffs, and jurisdictional disputes. A jurisdictional dispute would be good now. Of jurisdictional disputes, he knew. This was all strange.

"Okay," said the Pig. "So I got Connor up close to the door as the first layer right. He would fire the first shot. And he's good. He hunts a lot and you know his rep. Like he's made of bones. He's the best man for that first…"

"Get to it. Get to it, dammit," said Jethro.

"Connor misses. He's three feet from the guy and he misses. The first time in his life and he misses. Bang. And nothing. This Remo creep moves like he ain't even been touched. Good-bye, Connor. Like three feet and…"

"Dammit, Pig. Get on with it."

"Then he goes through the first layer right, and he's into and partially through the second layer, and fast. I mean you think you know fast. You think you've seen fast. You think Gale Sayers is fast. Gale Sayers is a cripple. Bob Hayes is a slug. And shifty? Willie Pep is a plodder. Muhammad Ali walks on his heels."

"Get on with it, Pig!"

"'Okay, okay. I'm telling ya what went wrong."

"You're telling me why you're not responsible for what went wrong, not what went wrong."

"I did what ya told me."

"Go on. Go on, damn you."

"Yeah, well, okay. Then he starts to really move. I mean move. Sometimes you don't see him, he's so fast. I swear on my mother's grave, you don't see him he's moving so fast. And I try to get off a shot. Other guys try to get off shots, and pretty soon we're shooting back at the people who are shooting at us. And then we're in a fire-fight with ourselves and we don't even see this guy Remo get away."

"That's what I thought, Pig."

"It wasn't our fault, Mr. Jethro. Honest."

Jethro sulked. He turned away from Negronski and Pigarello. He twisted the handkerchief, looked at it a moment, then threw it into a wastebasket.

"You're going to have to wait here, Pig."

"You ain't gonna do a job on me, are you?"

"No. No. I don't think so."

"Whadya mean ya don't think so? I mean what is that? You don't think you're gonna kill me. I mean, what is that?"

"That, my dear fat New England friend, is where it is at."

"You ain't gonna kill me, you shit-kicker," said the Pig. He grabbed a chair. "You've had it, pretty boy. We ain't in your little room now, shit-kicker. You get yours now. I seen what McCulloch did to you before he went into that room, and you ain't in that room now." The Pig advanced on Jethro and Negronski went for the chair. With massive, hairy arms the Pig nipped Negronski aside.

"Stay out of this, Siggy. This is me and Jethro."

Like a lumbering truckload of gravel, Pigarello moved on Jethro, the heavy oak chair raised above his head as if it were light as matchsticks. Negronski raised himself and saw the chair move towards Jethro's head.

But Jethro was standing in a strange position, not like when they'd have to face an occasional challenge in a Nashville bar, but like a peculiar old man with a spine injury. The toes were pointed in. The hands outstretched and curved loosely. The wrists stiff. The face impassive and free of hate, as though listening to a column of tax figures.

The Pig put his bulk into the downward swing of the chair, but Jethro was no longer there. His left hand, with the light-quickness of a laser, was into the Pig's stomach. The chair tumbled harmlessly behind Jethro. The Pig stood as if watching a surprise party for a ghost. The mouth was open. The eyes were popping wide, and his hands dropped to his sides.

Jethro brought what looked to be a dainty slap to the Pig's head. It was like touching a blood faucet. The Pig spit a stream of red. Like a bowling pin, he began to wobble straight-legged, then down, face forward. Crack. Negronski heard the head hit, and shuddered.

"I had to do it, Siggy," said Jethro.

"You want me to get a doctor down here?" Negronski's voice was flat.

"No. He's dead, Siggy."

"I guess we're going to have to move him to that special room."

"Yeah," said Jethro.

"We ought to have rollers to that room and a regular conveyer belt."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You know what I mean. You know the Pig isn't the last. You know that room is gonna be filled every week. You know it's never going to end, Gene."

"No. It will. It will. As soon as we get the transportation lock on the country, we'll be home free. Everything will quiet down then. It'll be beautiful, Siggy. Beautiful."

"It'll be more of this," said Negronski, absently reaching over to the fallen Pigarello and straightening the bandage, for reasons beyond his comprehension. "It was supposed to be beautiful when we got the convention switched to Chicago. It was supposed to be beautiful when we got the building built. It was supposed to be beautiful when you become president of the drivers. Yeah. And the only thing we got was more killing and more bodies, and more of that room over there. It's never gonna end, Gene. Let's give up and go home. I wouldn't even mind doing time now. Going to the cops, levelling the whole thing. There's no death penalty anymore. And I don't think we'd get the chair anyhow even if there was. Give a full confession. Maybe we'd spend most of the rest of our lives in jail, but it would be our lives. Not running to kill this guy because of this, or that guy because of that. It never ends, Gene. What do you say. For old times' sake. Let's chuck this thing."

"We can't," said Jethro. "Help me with the body."

"It used to be Pigarello. He's not just a body."

"It's a body, Siggy. And it's either our bodies or his body. Now which do you want it to be?"

"Nobody, Gene. I'm through." Sigmund Negronski rose to his full height. His legs planted firm, he stared the new president of the International Brotherhood of Drivers directly in the eye.

"I'm through, Gene. No more. Maybe you can't stop. Maybe you can't get out, but I can. I quit. Right now I wouldn't even touch a sparrow if it were pecking at my head. I'd run. And right now, I'm running. I'm through. I helped you. I stepped aside for you. I helped you, but I'm not helping you anymore. I'm not gonna talk to the police because I know you'd kill me, Gene. That's the way it is nowadays, and I want to live. I want to see tomorrow so bad I can breathe the morning already. Back home. Not here in Chicago. I want to wake up with my wife next to me with her cold cream and curlers and bitching for me to make the coffee, and I want to worry about getting up the mortgage money, not the body counts. I want to walk down the street and be happy to see people, not happy to not see them, if you know what I mean. I want to live and you can take this union and shove it up your velvet bell bottoms. Good-bye. I'm going back to driving a truck. I'm good at that."

"Siggy, before you go, help me with this," said Jethro. His voice was cold and smooth like an ice pond.

"No," said Negronski.

"Just to the room and then you're through," Jethro smiled the old smile again, the smile that washed away worries and used to make the business fun.

"Okay. Just to the room."

When Gene Jethro left the special room an hour later, there were two giant green Garby Bags sitting by the door with a note to the janitor to dump them in the building's furnace. Jethro left the room alone.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

"I have failed, little father."

Remo said this mournfully, daring to interrupt Chiun who sat before the hotel television set, entranced by the problems of a housewife telling all to her psychiatrist. Remo knew Chiun had heard him enter. He was on his way to change his clothes when Chiun did something Remo had never seen him do before. He turned off the picture on the television. Voluntarily—by himself.

He beckoned Remo to him, turning in his seated position to an empty space on the floor. It was a gesture used by countless Korean teachers of previous generations to students who were to listen to something of great import. It was a gesture of a priest to a neophyte.

Remo sat down on the carpeting facing Chiun, his legs crossed beneath him in the position taught him many years before when just a few minutes of sitting like this would bring excruciating back pains. Now Remo could sleep with his legs tucked under him, his back straight, and awake refreshed.

He looked into the wise, un-telling eyes of the man he had first hated, then feared, then respected and finally loved, a father for a man who had known no father, a father for the creation of a new man.

"You know the story of Sinanju, the village of my birth, the village of my father and my father's father and his father before him; of our poverty, of our babies for whom there was naught to eat and who during times of famine would be sent home in the cold waters to return to the larger womb of the sea.

"This then, Remo, you know. You know how the sons must support the village through their knowledge of the martial arts. You know that my monies are shipped to my village. You know how poor the land is there, and that our only resource is the strength of our sons."

Remo nodded respectfully.

"This you know. But you do not know all. You know I am the Master of Sinanju, but if I am the master, then who is the student?"

"I, little father, am the student," said Remo.

"I was the Master of Sinanju before you were born."

"Then there is someone else."

"Yes, Remo. When I approached that building, the building you could not penetrate, I suspected that you could not penetrate it because if was designed to stop approaches with which you are familiar. When I saw the name of the road leading to the building, I knew who had ordered the construction of that building. I knew there was great danger in there."

"For me, little father?"

"Especially for you. Why do I of such age have such ease in taking you when we practice, despite your death lunges?"

"Because you are the greatest, little father."

"Besides that obvious fact."

"I'm not sure. I guess you know me."

"Correct. I have taught you all the moves you know. I know what you will do. It is like fighting myself as a young man. I know what you will do before you know what you will do. There is someone else who knows what you will do, and he knows this because I taught him. He has trained since birth, and I have not seen his name until I read a sign leading to that building. Then I needed to know no more. The man you face betrayed his calling and his village. The man who can destroy you is named Nuihc, as the road is named."

"I've heard that name from one of the sources I used."

"True. If you reverse the letters you will see that his name and mine are the same."

"He reversed his name?"

"No. I did. This man, the son of my brother, left his village and plied the craft we taught him, and did not return the sustenance to the people who needed him. In shame before my villagers, I, a teacher, reversed my family name, and left my teaching for service abroad. After me, there is no master of Sinanju. After me, there is no one to support the village. After me, starvation."

"I am sorry to hear that, little father."

"Do not be. I have found a student. I have found the new Master of Sinanju to take my place on the day I return home to the womb waters separating China from Korea upon which Sinanju sits like a blessed pearl."

"That is a great honour, little father."

"You will be worthy if you do not allow your arrogance and laziness and impure habits to destroy the magnificence of the progress I have initiated and nurtured."

"Your success but my failure, little father," said Remo smiling. "Don't I get a chance to do anything right?"

"When you will have a pupil you will do everything right," said Chiun with ever so slight a smile, giving himself full approval for a witticism he was sure deserved it.

"This Nuihc. How do I rate next to him?"

Chiun lifted his fingers and closed them to a hair's breadth.

"You are that far away," he said.

"Good," said Remo. "Then I'm in the ball game."

Chiun shook his head. "A close second is not a desirable place to finish in a battle to the death."

"It doesn't have to be a second. I could work something."

"My son, in five years, you will be this much," said Chiun, holding his hands a half-foot apart, "better than he. You must be an aberration of your white race. But this is truth. In five years Nuihc, the ingrate and deserter, will be second place. In five years, I unleash you against the son of my brother and we will bring his kimono back to Sinanju in triumph. In five years there will be no parallel to you. In five years you will surpass even my greatest ancestors. Thus it is written. Thus it is becoming."

Chiun's voice echoed with pride. Lest his pupil indulge in the vanities to which he was so addicted, Chiun added another thought.

"Thus have I made greatness from nothing."

"Little father," said Remo. 'I don't have five years. My country does not have five years. It has until this afternoon."

"It is a big country. So today one group robs it instead of another. It will be here tomorrow, rich and fat. What is your country to you? Your country executed you. Your country forced you into a life you did not seek. Your country unjustly accused you of a crime."

"America is my Sinanju, little father."

Chiun bowed gravely. "This I understand. But if my village had wronged me as you have been wronged, I would not be its master."

"A mother cannot wrong a son…"

"That is untrue, Remo."

"I did not finish. A mother cannot wrong a son to such a degree that he will not save her in time of danger. If you are the father I never had, then this nation is the mother I never had."

"Then in five years give your mother a present of Nuihc's kimono."

"She must have it now. Come with me. The two of us can surely overcome this Nuihc."

"Ah, unfortunately at this stage we would only endanger ourselves. We would have to cross lines of attack only for a fraction of a moment, and we would both be dead. I have trained you as no other man has been trained. Greatness lies on the morrow. You are not some tin soldier to go marching off to his death because bugles call. You are what you are, and what you are does not march foolishly to his death. No training, no skill, no energy or force can overcome the mind of a fool. Do not be a fool. This I command."

"I cannot obey that command, little father." Chiun spun to face his television set, and turning it on, he remained silent.

Remo changed to a loose-fitting suit. The wound had caked and was becoming itchy. He ignored it. At the door to the suite, Remo said good-bye to the Master of Sinanhu.

"Thank you, little father, for what you have given me."

Without turning to set his eyes upon Remo, Chiun spoke.

"You have a chance. He may not conceive that a white man can do what you do."

"Then I do have a chance. Why are you so glum?"

"Chances are for cards and dice. Not for us. My teaching is like the rose fragrance in a north wind."

"Will you wish me luck?"

"You have learned naught," said Chiun, and was silent again.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The traffic jam into Nuihc Street stretched for miles, Remo got out of the taxi and trotted past the cars with angry frustrated drivers, men who had been told in the wee hours of the morning that the final day of the convention was to be in a new building, the new headquarters of the International Brotherhood of Drivers.

When a few had complained that they already had a headquarters in Washington, they were told that Washington would be only the drivers' headquarters. Confusing. There were lots of confusing things about their new president. This was one more.

Remo pushed his way through a long line of men at the entrance, weaving and dodging complaints of 'Hey, don't you know how to get in line?"

A few recognized him as the new recording secretary. The guard at the gate was wearing a bandage. Oh, that was the man who had held his fish last night, at the beginning of the long night in which every effort to avoid the extreme plan had failed—and ultimately the extreme plan itself had failed.

The guard did not recognize him in daylight. He looked at Remo's delegate card.

"Oh yeah," said the guard. "Jethro wants to see you. He's right inside."

Remo saw Jethro in the large entrance hallway. Drapes hid what was obviously a sign. Perhaps those drapes would unveil the driver's emblem, or worse, the emblem of the new superunion.

Jethro greeted people as they arrived with the usual 'howarya," and 'goodtoseeya." Remo walked up to within a spit. He saw Jethro notice him, saw the faint flicker of fear in the blue eyes, then the phony smile.

"Howarya fella, good to see ya," said the president of the International Brotherhood of Drivers.

"Glad to be here, Gene. A great day. A great day," said the recording secretary. They embraced warmly, the drivers lined up watching union solidarity at work.

"Let's go downstairs. I want to talk to you. Union business."

"Good idea," said Remo.

Friendly, the two union leaders made their way to the elevator. Friendly, they got into the elevator. Friendly, they spoke until the doors closed and Jethro had pressed the combination button.

"You lying sonuvabitch," said Jethro. "You said you had pined us."

"You're hurt that I lied," laughed Remo. "When were you born?"

"Who do you work for?" said Jethro.

"I don't work for Nuihc," said Remo. "Where is he?"

"None of your business," said Jethro.

"Am I going to meet him?"

"Sure," said Jethro, a cold smile crossing his face.

Remo hummed. He hummed as they entered the large basement. He hummed as he saw the auto-length sign for the union that would destroy a nation and the union movement with it. He hummed as Jethro worked the combination lock on a door to a room that seemed the center of a whole waterpipe network.

He hummed when the door shut behind him.

Jethro went behind a barren iron desk. Remo spotted the nozzles on the ceiling, shower nozzles.

Jethro reached under the desk.

"I have a switch here that will unleash something that will kill you painfully. Now I can make it hard on you, or I can kill you with my hands."

Remo shouldn't have done it. It was highly unprofessional. But the laugh was out before he thought of controlling it.

"Sorry," said Remo. "I just thought of a joke."

"All right. Have it your way," said Jethro. "I can stop this process when it becomes very painful and then you'll beg me to let you talk."

"Right," said Remo fighting back an instant guffaw. "Beg. Right. Beg you." But it was no use. He laughed, and then let the laughter roar out full and pleasing.

He stopped laughing when a fine spray began forming from the nozzles. Jethro donned a mask. Obviously the substance was to be breathed in. Let your blood stream carry the poison, and perhaps, if it followed an old, simple mechanism of Sinanju discarded in the twelfth century, perhaps Remo would begin to dissolve.

The masters of Sinanju discarded this mechanism because someone accidentally discovered a simple defence to it. Don't breathe. Practically any swimmer could overcome it, and everyone who had body discipline thought it a joke. Besides, the whole machinery was cumbersome and the children liked to play with it, so, as Chiun had said, it went the way of the bow and arrow.

Remo watched Jethro stare at him sardonically through the eyes of the oxygen mask. Remo suddenly noticed one danger. Laughter. He turned his eyes away from Jethro and tried to think of something sad. He couldn't. So he thought of Dr. Smith and all the discomforting things of his life. In a few moments, the fog began to disappear into an exhaust system. Jethro ripped off his oxygen mask. A look of triumphant hate was on his face.

"Die," he said. "Die painfully because you now cannot move your hands or your mouth or your eyes. You can barely hear me now. So let me tell you before the hearing goes, you are going to dissolve into a puddle. A puddle like people step into. A puddle that will flush along with the rest of the scum into the sewer system."

Too much. Dr. Smith and every sad thing in his life could not overcome this.

"Yahhhh," said Remo curling over and grabbing his sides in hysterical laughter. The roaring, guffawing laughter made him stagger to a wall for balance. He looked back at Jethro. There was shock. The shocked face of Jethro. It was hysterical. Why didn't Jethro stop doing those hysterical things? Perhaps Jethro thought it was the mist that was affecting him. Remo regained control.

"Sorry," said Remo. "Sorry to laugh at you. Where's Nuihc."

"Uh," said Jethro.

"Nuihc," said Remo.

"First door to your right. Knock three times."

Jethro's mouth hung open. Beads of sweat formed on his head. He rubbed his hands on his bell bottom suit. Then anger. He assumed his stance. Remo peered around the desk at the toes. They were pressed too far in. A beginner's mistake.

"The toes," said Remo. "Too far in."

"Come and get it," said Jethro.

Remo reached a hand around the desk and felt for the socket, Jethro tried to crack the hand with a downstroke. Remo merely removed Jethro's hand. At the wrist.

When he saw the mist coming from the nozzle, Remo ripped the mask and the tubing from its desk connection.

Jethro's one hand gripped the bloody stump of his other hand. Remo took a large green Garby Bag from a shelf. Obviously the mist did not affect plastic. He slipped the bag under Jethro and sat him down on the desk. Like putting pants on a baby, Remo slipped the bag up to Jehhro's armpits. Jethro's eyes widened in terror. His face reddened from trying not to breathe. Remo got a little metal twister that came with the Garby's and poked it into Jethro's solar plexus to help him breathe. He did. Exhale, then, full inhale.

"Don't lose the twist," said Remo. "Some of these bags can open by themselves if you don't have the twist."

Then, he walked out, shutting the door behind him and breathing clean full basement air. Which was not the best of air in the world, but it would not kill him.

The first door on the right. Remo saw it immediately. He had one edge, which he had never mentioned to Chiun. Having been trained in Sinanju, Nuihc would be vulnerable to this edge. Chiun had grown to expect certain levels of performance from Remo. But Nuihc would not expect white hands to move that fast. Not expect a white body to respond that well. Not expect Remo to be what he was. Nuihc would be vulnerable to the constant danger to which every student arid master of Sinanju was vulnerable. The constant danger they were taught to avoid from birth. Overconfidence. They were taught this constantly precisely because they were vulnerable.

Remo knocked three times.

"Come in, Remo," sounded a thin voice.

Remo opened the door into a room that was a garden. There, sitting beside a pool, was Nuihc, his face that of a young Chiun, smooth and alive, and just a mite deadlier than Chiun.

Remo pretended not to see the body in its surroundings, pretended he did not have the eyes that could see things meant to be hidden.

"Over here. By the pool," said Nuihc.

"I don't see you. Oh, yeah. There you are," said Remo.

"Yes. Over here. Where you saw me the first time, Remo. Anyone who can work the Scarlet Ribbon, can see a man sitting peacefully."

Remo closed the door behind him.

"Come. Sit by me."

Remo stood still. He would have more room to analyze the attack with some distance between them.

Nuihc smiled. "Very bright. Good. I like that. Did you kill Jethro? Of course you did. You wouldn't be here if you hadn't. You probably think me foolish in giving you the knowledge that I knew you saw me. As our mutual teacher has often taught, we should give nothing. But I give you something because I want something in return. Chiun has obviously done a remarkable job." Remo picked up a note of condescension in the voice. Nuihc had just given too much.

"Yeah," said Remo. "I'm pretty good." Maybe Nuihc would take just a mite more. Accept the boast as a sign of weakness and stupidity.

"Come, come, Remo. Let us not indulge in such silliness. Let us indulge in what you are and what you want. What do you want?"

"I want to kill you."

"Ah, do not try to throw me off with such foolishness. We do not have time. I saw you on television the other day. Magnificent. You spoke well. You loved it. You made very pretty songs. Chiun has told you what we mean by songs, I presume."

"Yes," said Remo.

"Good. We need a new president of the International Brotherhood of Drivers who will become president of a new transportation union. I presume that is why you are here. To stop it. Of course you are. Remo, your presidency is only your first step to power. Come with me and all men will be at your feet. All crowds will listen to your voice. All men will proclaim you great. Your name. Your being. You will be known far and wide. Come, join."

"I'd have to leave the persons I work for. I have a strong commitment to them."

"Really. I don't know whom you work for, but I wonder what they have done for you. Tell me. Honestly. What have they done for you?"

"I get whatever I need."

"Really. What? Maybe I can stop it. Seriously, what do you get?"

"Well, I have just about all the money I need."

"And that buys you?"

"Uh, clothes, food, although I imagine you know the diet I'm on, it's necessary."

"That you would have to undergo, with me or them. Yes, what else?"

"Uh, I don't have to worry about rent."

"Hmmm. You have several palaces, I take it."

"Well, no. You see I live mostly in hotels here and there."

"Oh, I see. Yes, I know now how they have you. You're a tool."

"No. No. It's I can do pretty much what I want."

"What do you want to do? You know that games of physical skill are of no interest to us. The challenge is too little. What do you do?"

"Train mostly."

"A good tool needs that. What do you really want, Remo? Come on. We're being honest. I'll tell you whatever you want to know about me. Tell you how I cheated my village. Tell you even what makes me unhappy or happy. Come on. We're graduates of that same school."

"All right, Nuihc. I want a home. I mean a home. And I want a family, not those one-night stands where it's more work in the line of business than it is love. I'd like to screw a woman once just to get off my rocks, not to get into her mind. I'd like to yell at a kid. My kid. And hold my kid. And teach my kid not to be afraid."

"The president of the new transportation union will be required to have a wife and family."

"Yeah, and I'll be dead in a year."

"With both of us working together?"

"I don't want to have to kill Chiun."

"He wouldn't come against both of us, Remo."

Remo waited a minute, staring vacantly at the floor.

"Done," he said. "I've got to do something for myself for once." He opened his hand and offered it to Nuihc. He walked openly to him, with the sign that he bore no weapon. Nuihc smiled broadly and extended his hand, too.

"The greater union is us. You and me," said Nuihc.

The hands met, but Remo's kept going, slicing into the padded shoulder of the suit, taking bone in the first exhilarating feeling of a score in attack. He had scored against this Nuihc, and so well and so thoroughly that he moved into an interior line attack for the kill. No waiting to work up the shoulder and safely take it apart for the more cautious attack. With the incredible speed and force of the perfect blow, Remo brought the elbow into the chest. But the chest was not there. Mistake. Remo had scored because of over-confidence and trust on the other side, and now he would die for the same reason. His elbow was forward in air, and he was off balance because the blow needed a body to meet it.

A searing pain ripped his ribs and tore from his ribs to his shoulder. He was going dully forward, down onto a pathway of rocks. He could not move. He was not dead, but he could not move. He felt his mouth fill with warm wetness. Blood. He saw it spill onto the rock path, form a little stream, and then tip over into the clear, blue pool, making it foggy where it landed.

"Fool," said Nuihc. "Fool. Why are you such a fool? Magnificent you were. That was magnificent. In ten years you could have killed me. In ten years your interior attack would have worked also. But you are a fool. Fool. Fool. Together we could rule the world. Together all would be yours. But you attacked me, fool. And you attacked like a fool."

Remo tried to see Nuihc for the final blow he knew would come shortly. But he could not move his head. He could only stare at the growing foggy area where the water, now filling with his life, had once been clear.

Then a voice, a voice Remo knew well.

"You talk of fools, Nuihc. You are the fool of fools. Did you think my student would desert his village as you have deserted yours. Did you think the Master of Sinanju would desert a student as you have deserted your blessed village of Sinanju." Chiun's voice was filled with anger.

"Master. This is a white man. You would not harm me for a white man, me a son of the village of Sinanju."

"For this white man, as you call him, I would rent the core of the earth and fill its molten center with the blood of a thousand such as you. Beware. If this white man, as you call him, is dying, I shall take your ears and make you chew them, you dog-dropping."

"But you cannot turn your skills on a member of your village, even a member who has deserted," said Nuihc.

"Duck-hearted one, dare you speak the rules of the Master of Sinanju, your infamy still trailing behind you like excrement in the wind. Speak you now to me of the rules?"

"He is not dead and will not die." Nuihc's voice trembled with fear.

Strange, thought Remo, he should not fear. He should have been trained to deal with fear because next to arrogance, fear was the major enemy. Stranger still was Chiun's boast to Nuihc, and the insults. Chiun had always said to threaten damage was to give a man a shield. To spew insults was to give him energy, except in a case where the enemy could be provoked to foolish anger. From his voice, Nuihc was obviously not angry. It must be, thought Remo, that Chiun knew Nuihc could not be fooled by talk of peace or appearances of weakness.

"Leave," said Chiun.

"I leave, but I have ten years in which to deprive you of your special student."

"Why do you let me know this?"

"Because I hate you and your father and your direct lineage from the original Master of Sinanju."

Remo heard faint footsteps scurry out to the hall. He tried to call out to Chiun to stop him, but even if he could, he wondered whether Chiun would try. He felt Chiun's hands on his back working quickly and deftly, and suddenly the incredible, immobilizing pain filtered away and Remo could move his head, then his shoulders, and with great pain begin to sit up slowly.

"Now you can move," said Chiun.

With a sudden wrenching of his back, Remo sat up, grimacing. He tried to control it. He did not wish the little father see him succumb to pain.

"Rush. Rush," said Chiun angrily. "You are so American. You could not wait a measly five years."

"I had to do my job."

"Do not make that mistake again, but I respected you for it. Next time you will be ready for Nuihc. I cannot kill another member of the village."

"But I heard you say you would."

"You hear many foolish things. Quiet your insolent tongue. He has made a grave mistake. It is not ten years. And that sort of mistake at our level is deadly."

"What if he returns in less than five years?"

"We run. Time is on our side. Why give away advantages?"

"Yes, little father."

Something still troubled Remo.

"Did you really mean I would be better than the Masters of Sinanju eventually, even though I am not Korean."

"No," said Chiun. "That was a song for your benefit."

"I do not believe you," said Remo.

"Silence! You have almost destroyed in one foolish moment my work of years."

Remo was silent. Then he lifted himself to his feet, wincing.

"Good," said Chiun. "Pain is an excellent teacher. What your mind cannot grasp, your body will never forget. Remember this in your pain. Never rush. Time is your ally or your enemy."

"There are some things I must do now, little father."

"Well, be quick about it. A shirt is not the best bandage in the world, even a shirt tied by me."

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Remo mounted the podium in the large hall of the new building. Wild, hysterical cheering met his ascent. He waved his good arm to quiet the crowd. But the roar continued and he met it with a smile for the television cameras, the still photographers and, last but not least, his audience.

A new shirt covered his torso, and the jacket was so arranged as to hide the knots Chiun had installed. The pain continued sharp and throbbing, but Remo smiled. He smiled at the three union presidents sitting on the speaker's platform. He smiled at the secretary of labour and he smiled at the delegates he knew. Especially at Abe 'Crowbar' Bludner, who appeared to be cheering the loudest.

The hall in this new building was smaller than Convention Hall, but is was roomy enough for the driver delegates. There were even some empty seats in the second balcony.

Remo leaned down into the mike. The noise subsided.

"Brother drivers," he said. 'Brother drivers. I have sad news that will come as a shock to you." Remo paused to allow the hall to become still, to glean the last bit of attention from the audience. He looked at the few key men he had called to him just an hour ago. They knew what the shock would be. Gene Jethro, always a kook, had run out on the union. Remo had explained this to the few delegates an hour before. His explanation had been believed instantly, because there was no reason for not believing it. Remo had spoken to those key men in a small receptionist's room while most of the membership was still filing into the hall.

They had less than an hour to decide among themselves what the union would do. There were less than a dozen men in the small office.

"You can let this go to the vice-president of the international, or you can make yourself a good deal now. You know the vice-president was only chosen to balance the ticket."

The key delegates nodded. Some sat on chairs, two leaned against a desk, one of them sat on the large pot holding a palm tree. There were sounds of approval. This kid knew what he was doing.

Remo continued. "If we choose the new president now, we can stampede the convention. If we have somebody, nobody can beat us. All we have to do is come to an agreement now. It's gonna be our union or it's gonna be chaos. It's up to you guys to decide. Jethro is gone. You want to make a president now among us?"

In the confusion of the sudden announcement, one delegate offered the job to Remo.

Remo shook his head. "I know someone better. I know someone perfect," Remo had said.

That was an hour ago, and now as he faced the full membership, he knew he could stampede the entire convention momentarily. Remo looked out over the faces of the silent delegates, tobacco smoke rising blue to the ceiling.

"The sad news is that our president, Gene Jethro, has left. He has resigned and left the country. He left giving me this note." Remo waved a paper out in front of the podium. It was blank. But only he could see that.

"I'm not going to read you the words, because the words don't convey Gene Jethro's love of the Brotherhood of Drivers, of unionism, and the American way of life. The words aren't good enough. It was his heart that counted. And what was in his heart was love for you. He told me he thought he wasn't old enough to be president. Yes. That's what he told me. I told him age was measured in more than years. It is measured in honesty and courage and in love for our union. I told him he had an abundance of that, but he would not listen. He said he had won the election but was afraid to lead. He said he was going off to a place he knew where he could think. This resignation says all that. But I don't need it to tell you what was in his heart."

Remo tore the blank paper into tiny strips, and the tiny strips into confetti.

The convention was mumbling now. Many of the delegates were shocked. But certain key delegates were not shocked. They were ready and had been for an hour. They waited for Remo to complete the deal they had made.

"We cannot be leaderless in the troubled sea of trade unionism. We cannot run without rudder or keel," Remo intoned. "We have a man who has worked his way up union ranks. A man who stands with the drivers, behind the drivers and in the forefront of the drivers, lo these many years. A man who knows strength yet is strong with charity. A man who knows unionism as well as peopleism. A man who has led and has followed. A man who has been a driver stalwart in the dark hours of defeat and in the sunny hours of victory. There is only one man this union can elect as president to replace our beloved Gene Jethro. That man is my own local president from New York City, Abraham Bludner."

At the sound of the name, the key delegates led their followers into the aisles for a spontaneous demonstration. Their numbers swelled as each delegate saw the center of new power and did not want to be reminded at some crucial time during the next four years that he had sat on his ass when Abe Bludner needed him most.

Remo waved at Bludner who was now being carried to the podium on the shoulders of his men. Bludner had been ready for this even before the key delegates had been asked to the special caucus meeting. Remo, the politician, had stampeded the fewer than dozen men the way he would stampede the entire convention. He had met with Bludner in Nuihc's private rooms, fountain and all. Bludner had given it a suspicious look, so Remo had shrugged, indicating that he, too, thought it odd.

"Abe," said Remo, sitting by the pool where he had almost lost his life. "How would you like to be president of the International Brotherhood of Drivers?"

"In four years I'll be too old, kid."

"I'm talking about this afternoon."

"What about Jethro?"

"Jethro has had a little family trouble. He's out of the picture for good."

"Oh," said Bludner." One of those things."

"One of those things," said Remo.

"What do you want?" asked Bludner.

"A few favours."

"Of course, what?"

"You don't know whom I represent. But let's not go into that. It is of little import. There are some other allied unions, other transportation unions that want to merge with us. They plan to announce it today. That was Jethro's plan. People who have plans like that tend to have unfortunate family problems also, if you know what I mean?"

Bludner knew what Remo meant.

"I don't think the drivers should ever merge with another union. Do you?"

"And lose our independence? said Bludner indignantly.

"From time to time the organization I work for needs information on who is doing what. They won't hurt your union. Of course, you will be paid for the favour of supplying information."

Bludner thought about that. He nodded.

"You will be contacted by someone. Do not mention me. You never knew me. Right?"

"You leaving?"

"You want to be president, Abe?"

"Kid, I used to think about it, but when I became, I think around 45, I stopped. You know. It was a dream then and it went with all the other dreams. I wouldn't run the international the way I run the local. I think we could do with a bit more class in the international." Bludner smiled. "Of course, not so much class that I'll be a one-term president."

"Now who are the key delegates?" Remo had asked, and Bludner had told him. He also told him they couldn't meet them privately in the room with the flowers and everything, "cause they'll think we're a little bit, you know, kid."

Remo knew. The delegates went for Bludner in private the way they were going for him now in the open convention. The vice-president would be no trouble, Remo had assured them. He was, after all, a lightweight, as everyone agreed, and he would forgo the legal succession. There would be a court case, of course, from some dissidents, but it could be dragged out in the courts until Bludner solidified his power nationally, as he had learned to do locally years before.

Remo had picked a good man. He watched a handful of delegates struggle up the platform steps with Bludner on their shoulders. Bludner tapped a few heads, indicating that he wished to walk up by himself. When he got to the podium, there was a roar. Remo hugged Abe. Abe hugged Remo.

Smiling at the crowd, Remo said out of the corner of his mouth, so that only Bludner could hear:

"You live as long as you keep the deal, Abe."

"I understand, kid," said Bludner.

Remo glanced over his shoulder at the presidents of the three other transportation unions. They, too, were reasonable men, although one of them sat very carefully on a very painful spinal column.

When the enthusiasm was surmountable, Remo yelled into the microphone.

"Voice vote. All in favor of Abe Bludner as president, say "Aye.""

The hall exploded in a roar of ayes.

"All against, say 'Nay.'" There was a single 'nay' that was met by laughter.

"Carried. The new president is Abe Bludner."

There was more cheering and more hysteria.

Remo quieted the audience. "Before I introduce my good and long-time friend, Abe Bludner, to the union he now leads, I would like to say a few words."

Remo looked out into the balcony. A few driver wives dotted those seats. He thought of Chris at the airport. She would wait and he would never come. She would be met instead by agents of the FBI who had a tip. Her testimony would end the careers of the presidents of the three other unions. That exposure, including their using of union funds to pay for the construction of a building for another union, would end their careers for all time. It would also kill the merger idea. The superunion was dead. In a few days at most, Remo Jones would cease to exist. There would be a new face and maybe even a new regional accent. He would never have that family or home, any more than he could now eat a hamburger laced with monosodium glutamate. So be it. He was what he was, and all the longing in the world could not change that.

"I want to tell you something I mean very much," said Remo. His voice was steady, free of the orator's rising pitches. "You have heard many things about America and its wealth. You have heard about its coming demise. You have heard many people say we are rich and fat and weak. But I ask you, where did that wealth come from?

"Did someone give it to you? Did you find it on the streets? Did your parents or grandparents find it on the street? No, I say to you, you are the wealth of this nation. You are what makes it strong. Other continents have more raw material and they are impoverished. Look at South America. Look at Africa. Look at most of Asia and look at many sections of Europe. No, the wealth of any nation is its people, the willingness of its people to work and to get for themselves and their families the best things they can.

"This country is not strong because of some mineral deposit somewhere. Other countries have more and are weak and backward. This country is strong because it offers hope. And strong people have taken that hope. You represent drivers. They are part of that hope. That hope lives. And I say to you, very honestly, it is an honor to die for it."

The last sentence seemed overdramatic to many delegates, even though dramatics was the way with many of these convention speeches. What they could not realize was that they had not heard a song.

A few delegates believed they saw tears in the eyes of their new recording secretary that day. A few said that when he left the building just outside Chicago, he was crying openly. None of them saw him again.