Coin of the Realm td-77

by Warren Murphy

  Remo was on his third bowl when a thought occurred to him.

  "This is really excellent, Little Father, but if you were able to eat this stuff all these years, why didn't you?"

  "Egg-lemon soup is reserved for full Masters, which I have been for all the years that you have known me, but which you have achieved only recently."

  "So, why'd you abstain?"

  "Could the father eat so well and let his only child go without?"

  "All these years," Remo said, looking up from the nearly empty bowl. "All these years you sacrificed. For me."

  "A father's duty," said Chiun, who was not really Remo's father, but in many ways was more, much more than that.

  "I am honored by your sacrifice," Remo said quietly. "And only yesterday you were telling me that it was time for me to grow a beard like your own. And I told you to go stuff it."

  "A harsh memory, but on this night we transcend such petty arguments," Chiun said loftily. "More?"

  "Yes," said Remo, holding out his bowl.

  After consuming every last drop, Remo spoke up. "I feel ashamed, Little Father," he said quietly.

  "On such a night?" Chiun squeaked. He brushed Remo's admission aside as if it were inconsequential. "It is of no moment."

  "But I should explain."

  "It is nothing."

  "But I'd really like to," Remo repeated. "I cut you off, about the beard and the fingernails, because we've had these discussions many times before. But I don't want you to think I don't honor you. I do. It's just that this is America. Customs are different. I could grow a beard, but it's just not me. As for my fingernails, as I've explained to you before, in America only women go about with their fingernails long."

  "And Masters of Sinanju," added Chiun.

  "Yes, and Masters of Sinanju. But you're Korean. You can get away with it. But the work we do for Smith and America requires that I sometimes go undercover. I can't have long fingernails. I'd stick out. It would defeat the whole purpose. You can understand that?"

  And the Master of Sinanju surprised Remo by saying a simple, "Yes, I understand perfectly."

  Remo's concerned expression relaxed. He nodded when Chiun held up a steaming ladle. Remo's bowl came up again. This was the fifth bowl, but the soup was so light that Remo felt as if he could drink it all night.

  As he dug in again under Chiun's approving gaze, Remo thought of another question.

  "One other thing puzzles me, Little Father."

  "Yes?"

  "I thought we couldn't eat eggs."

  "We cannot. But egg-lemon soup is different."

  "Oh. I seem to remember you telling me that even the white of the egg was poison to us. The yolk would turn our dead bones to powder."

  "And so it would. But this is egg-lemon soup."

  "Its lemony, all right. But I don't seem to taste much egg."

  "It is there. The lemon simply masks its taste."

  "And these crunchy things," said Remo, looking at the dark specks floating in his spoon. "What are they? Almond slices?"

  "No," said Chiun quickly.

  "Seeds, then? They're very hard."

  "No."

  "Then what?"

  "They are the precious egg bits." Remo blinked. He looked at his spoon.

  "I don't get it. Eggs aren't hard and crunchy." He looked closer. He noticed that the specks were shaped like tiny shards of glass. Some were white. Others a dark brown. He jiggled his spoon and noticed that some of the brown ones were white on the opposite side. What did that remind him of? Remo wondered.

  "How do you get an egg to be this hard?" he asked.

  "It is simple," Chiun replied. "You take the raw egg, and you break it over a bowl. Then you place the shell in another bowl."

  "Yeah," said Remo. He was hanging on every word.

  "And there you are," said Chiun, beaming.

  "Did I miss a step here?" Remo asked.

  "You wish to know the recipe?"

  "If that will explain the egg part, yeah."

  Chiun shrugged. "It is simple. In a pot you have the lemon broth simmering."

  "Right. Lemon broth."

  "Then you take the bowl with the eggshells and the bowl with the inedible eggs' hearts."

  "That means the whites and yolks. Yeah. Go on."

  "Then," said Chiun rapidly, "you pour the first bowl down the sink and the second bowl into the broth, first taking care to crush the eggs into small edible pieces."

  "The shells!" Remo roared. "I'm eating eggshell soup!"

  "Egg-lemon soup," Chiun corrected, his face stung. "And a moment ago you were raving about it."

  "Raving. I'm hysterical!" Remo snapped. "Why didn't you tell me these were shells? I wouldn't have eaten them!"

  "But they are good for you. Did you not enjoy your first five bowls?"

  Remo's face calmed down. "Well, yeah, actually I did. But now that these are eggshells, it's a different story."

  "That is the recipe. Had I used the hearts of the eggs, you would have been dead after your first bowl."

  "Yeah, but-"

  "I do not understand, Remo. If it was delicious when you did not know its ingredients, why is it not still delicious after you know these things?"

  "It is delicious," Remo said defensively, and Chiun's face softened.

  "Then eat," Chiun implored. "There is plenty."

  "You're still on your first bowl," Remo observed.

  "At my age, it is better to eat in moderation. But you are young yet. Come, fill your stomach. This is a happy day. "

  "Okay with you if I skip the shells?"

  "But they are the best part. And you would not spoil this auspicious day by not eating what I have slaved over all day?"

  "I won't chew them, then."

  "If that is your wish," Chiun said sadly.

  "Okay, I'll chew," said Remo. "See?" His teeth went crunch-crunch against the bits of eggshell.

  Chiun beamed. He looked like a wrinkled little angel. When the meal was over and Remo had cleared the table, he asked:

  "So what do we do now?"

  "It is time for Copra Inisfree. We will watch her show."

  "Okay," said Remo, but only to be polite. He had no interest in the talk-show hostess whom Chiun found so fascinating.

  But when the Master of Sinanju settled on his reed mat before the living-room television, the picture that greeted his eyes sent his happy face into shocked dismay.

  "What is this?" he demanded querulously. "Where is Copra the Clown?"

  Remo looked. "Guess she's been replaced. This guy is the new hot thing."

  On the screen was the name "Horton Droney III" inside a graphic designed to resemble a shouting mouth. The image dissolved into a shot of a cheering studio audience. Then a casually dressed man jogged down the studio aisle, giving high fives to enthusiastic greeters. In the background, Remo noticed that security guards were dragging other audience members away. One took a switchblade away from a black man. Others shouted epithets to the man who, once on the stage, appeared not to notice that not all the commotion was in his favor. He shot the audience a huge smile. His teeth were so big and white the smile made his face seem suddenly dirty.

  "Tonight's guests-and I use the term loosely-are a quack and a fraud," said Horton Droney III in a too-loud voice. "The quack's here to plug his book, The Hidden Healing Powers of Cheese." A hardcover book flew into Horton Droney's hands. He pretended to flip through the pages. "And a piece of Swiss it is too." He threw the book over his shoulder. It knocked over a standing spotlight. The crowd cheered wildly.

  Chiun turned to Remo. "Explain this creature to me."

  "Where do I start?"

  "With the answer to a simple question. Why does he have a Roman numeral for a last name?"

  "Actually, he doesn't. The number III means 'the third.' He's Horton Droney the Third."

  Chiun's wrinkles smoothed in surprise. "You mean there are two more like him?"

  "Not exactly. It means his father is Horton
Droney II. Probably his grandfather was the First."

  "How long will this go on?"

  "As long as there are women willing to bear little Horton Droneys, I guess."

  "Shhhh," Chiun said suddenly. "He speaks."

  "Shouts," Remo corrected. Chiun's hand shot up.

  "Now I know you're going to give these New Age hucksters exactly the welcome they so richly deserve," Horton Droney III proclaimed. A blood howl rose from the audience. "Here they come, Shane Billiken and-get this-Princess Sinanchu."

  "Hey, did you catch that name? It sounded almost like-"

  Remo's words were literally pinched off by Chiun's fingers. He tried removing Chiun's fingers from his lips. They were locked like pliers. Remo decided to sit quietly. Chiun would not let go until he was ready.

  A square-faced man in black leather clothes and wraparound sunglasses stepped out. He led a small golden-skinned woman by the hand. She wore a short white costume and seemed frightened by the roar of the audience. Even after they were seated, the man, whom an on-screen tag identified as "Shane Billiken, New Age Guru," continued holding the girl's hand, as if afraid she would bolt at any second.

  "This, I take it, is Princess Sinanchu?" Horton Droney III sneered.

  "That's right," said Shane Billiken. "And you can scoff all you want. But this woman is what I call a perpetual channeler. Unlike other channelers, she does not need to go into a trance in order to access her spirit guide. She is permanently locked into the consciousness of Princess Sinanchu, a warrior queen from prehistoric times, when technology was more advanced than ours."

  Horton Droney III gave the studio audience, and the camera, an arched eyebrow look. The audience howled with laughter. A tomato splashed at the feet of Princess Sinanchu, who recoiled.

  "No, not yet," Horton Droney told his audience reprovingly. "I'll tell you when to start throwing things."

  "I can prove my claim," Shane Billiken insisted.

  "I know, I know," Horton Droney said. "You've had language experts from all over the world listen to her, and they all agree that she's speaking in an unknown tongue."

  "Exactly right."

  "And we all know how infallible those ivory-tower geniuses are. I mean, if I wanted to run a scam like this, all I'd have to do is say, 'Yabbba-dabbo doo' a few times and I'd have them scratching their pointy little heads too."

  "Why don't we let the audience judge for themselves?"

  "Shoot."

  Shane Billiken turned to the woman he called Princess Sinanchu and squeezed her hand hard. She began speaking in rapid bursts.

  "Mola re Sinanchu. A gosa du Sinanchu. Ponver dreu du Sinanchu."

  "She says that she is Princess Sinanchu," Shane Billiken said carefully, "and she wants to warn us that we're letting our technology destroy us. We should eat more organic foods like cheese, clean up our water and our air, or the calamity that befell her civilization will fall upon ours."

  "She said all that, eh?"

  "That's correct."

  "Then how come she said her name three times and you repeated it only once?" Horton Droney said savagely.

  "I gave you the loose translation."

  "And if this language is unknown to modern world, how come you speak it? Huh? Answer me that."

  "Because in a previous life I was her husband."

  "Oh, this is such crap." Horton Droney turned to the audience. "I say it's crap. What do you say?"

  "It's crap!" yelled the studio audience. Security guards moved in when some in the front row started to rush the stage.

  "They say it's crap," accused Horton Droney, turning to Princess Sinanchu. "And I'm going to prove it." He was shouting now, shouting abuse and invective in the frightened face of Princess Sinanchu.

  "Come on, admit it. You're a fraud. This is an act. Who are you really? Some cheap stripper he picked up in a saloon? I'll bet right now there's someone in our television audience looking at you and saying, 'I know her. I went to high school with the little trollop.' Come on, 'fess up, before someone else blows the whistle."

  "Dakka, qi Drue Sinanchu," said Princess Sinanchu.

  "We know your freaking stage name, you smarmy fake. What we want is the truth. Who are you? How much is he paying you to work this little scam? Huh? Come on, admit it."

  Horton Droney was spitting words in her face with relentless violence. His face was turning red. The studio audience was a mob.

  "Shake it out of her, Hort," they yelled. "Make the bitch talk."

  Horton Droney grabbed Princess Sinanchu by the hair and yanked her out of her seat.

  "I know how to prove she's a fraud," he shouted, wrestling her to the front of the stage. "An old-fashioned spanking!"

  Princess Sinanchu made a sound like a spitting cat and reached under her skirt. Her hand flashed up and Horton Droney suddenly backed away from her. He twisted on his feet until his knees started buckling. His mouth opened in a grimace. An ornate bone handle jutted from his chest.

  He gripped it in both hands, and then, his face darkening even as his grimace widened, he fell on his face.

  A "Technical Difficulties" sign was beamed into millions of homes across the nation.

  "Enough," Chiun said abruptly, releasing Remo's numb lips. He arose and shut off the TV. "We are going to Moo."

  "I realize television may have sunk to new depths here, Little Father," Remo protested. "But I think we can find some better way to entertain ourselves than by resorting to animal impressions."

  "There is no time to explain," Chiun said, flouncing from the room like a fussy hen. "Pack."

  "Pack? Why?"

  "Because we are going to Moo."

  Remo, seeing from the Master of Sinanju's body language that he meant business, shrugged and said, "I'd better inform Smith, then." He picked up the telephone and dialed the nonemergency number that connected him with CURE, the supersecret government organization for which he worked. A recorded message told him he had reached the Miami Beach Betterment League and that, at the sound of the beep, the caller had exactly thirty seconds to leave a message.

  Remo waited for the beep and then, letting out his breath, let out with it a rapid-fire stream of words. "Smitty. Remo. Chiun and I are going to moo. I don't know what exactly that means, but it involves travel, and from Chiun's look, it's serious. I'd explain, but I don't know any more than that, and besides, I have a hunch the explanation would take longer than thirty seconds. Next time spring for a longer tape. 'Bye."

  Remo hung up with three seconds to spare and called into the other room:

  "Srnitty's taken care of."

  "Good," called Chiun. "Are you packed?"

  "One thing at a time," Remo grumbled, starting for his room. He stopped abruptly and ducked back into Chiun's room.

  "Give me one good reason why I should," Remo demanded.

  "I will tell you on the way."

  "No, I think I deserve a straight answer right now." Remo folded his arms. "And if I don't get one, I'm not going to quack, bark, grunt, or whinny. Never mind moo."

  Chiun stopped his packing. He straightened up from laying a traveling kimono in a bright red lacquer trunk with brass handles. His clear hazel eyes narrowed craftily.

  "Because," the Master of Sinanju said carefully, "the women go bare-breasted."

  Remo blinked as the significance of the Master of Sinanju's words sank in. He did not understand this moo business. He did not understand how it connected with this sudden urge to pack. Breasts, he understood. When Harold Smith had first subjectgd him to a battery of psychological tests before turning him over to Chiun, Remo had passed most of the tests handily. Except one. The Rorschach test. Smith laid down one inkblot and Remo looked at it briefly and pronounced it a pair of female breasts. That was the answer he gave for nine out of nine inkblots. Sometimes he saw only one breast. Once he saw three. When the worried look on Smith's parsimonious face made Remo fear he was about to be dumped into the grave bearing his name but which actually contained a nameless derelict
, Remo announced that the tenth and final inkblot was an accurate depiction of the Indian subcontinent-even though it looked like the most colossal set of boobs he had ever seen.

  Remo shook his head suddenly and straightened out of his leaning slouch against the doorjamb.

  "Well, don't just stand there," he said. "Keep packing. I'll call a cab."

  Chapter 4

  The doctor at New York Hospital wanted to say that Horton Droney III would not, could not, under any imaginable circumstances, see visitors.

  Instead, a blood-curdling scream erupted in the room. It wasn't coming from the tiny Oriental gentleman in the colorful native costume. His companion, the one with the deadest eyes Dr. Alan Dooley had seen since medical school, stood tight-lipped. He was not the author of the blood-curdling scream either.

  It might have been Nurse Bottomsly. Her mouth was open. But her throat wasn't pulsating the way people do when they scream. She looked more shocked than horrified. And she was looking directly at him.

  It was then that Dr. Dooley noticed that it was he himself who had authored the mysterious scream. Imagine that. He was screaming and he hadn't even noticed. Before his fear-frozen brain synapses could begin the process of wondering why he was screaming, the answer shot up his arm, spread to the other arm, down both legs, up his screaming skull, and, most painfully, to his testicles.

  He fell on the floor and clutched himself. He screamed louder. He coughed through the scream and the resulting sound was quite disgusting. As he curled up on the floor like a maggot that has been doused with lighter fluid and set afire, he noticed that his right arm hadn't joined his left in the necessary action of clutching himself at the point of maximum pain. It was hung up on something.

  With tearing eyes, Dr. Dooley looked up. His wrist was pinched between the thumb and forefinger of the little Asian gentleman. The man's face was a thundercloud of wrath.

  "I will ask again," the Asian said evenly. "Direct us to the room of Horton the Turd."

  "Do us both a favor," the white man interposed casually. "He's in a rush and I'm in a hurry. Don't piss either of us off."

  The thought, clear as a surgical needle going through Dr. Dooley's brain, penetrated with amazing clarity. If the Asian was inflicting this much agony before he was pissed, how much pain would he inflict when he crossed that terrible threshold?