"And would it be just like a man not to change even if new facts came in?" asked Anna. She gave him one of her smiles again. He was the sort of man who would be tolerant of amusement, she felt.
"A proper man would know all the facts beforehand," said Chiun. "Where did you fall into this thing, Remo?"
"We met on a plane. She's all right."
"I am going to speak to Rabinowitz. I am going to assure him he is safe, and he can believe it now. If I come back in any strange way, try to get me out of it. If you can't, please kill me quickly," she said.
"Just like that?" asked Chiun. "You want an assassination, for nothing? Free? Remo, don't you see what she's doing now? She's getting away with being murdered."
"If he gets you, what am I going to do?" asked Remo.
"Try to figure out what hasn't been tried yet and try it. But one thing you can't do is go directly in. Stay back and think. I don't know what the hell they're going to do back in Moscow. This is too much of a defeat. I only wanted a little one to make Rabinowitz comfortable."
"Good luck," said Remo, and gave her a light kiss on the lips.
"You're doing that because it bothers me," said Chiun.
"I'm doing that because she's beautiful and courageous."
"I'm supposed to believe that?" said Chiun.
"I don't know what you believe. I never know what you believe. "
"For two decades I have given the best of my life to you, and you remember nothing. I have given you my thinking, and this thinking you now throw away to indulge in public obscenities."
Anna laughed.
"You two sound so much alike," she said.
Off on a hill, Rabinowitz was meeting with his commanders. Anna headed toward the hill as Remo and Chiun stayed back watching her. Chiun wanted to know what the experience was like with the Great Wang, Remo's first experience.
"The second is not nearly as good, I can tell you, Remo."
"He said you and I have the cleanest strokes in the history of Sinanju."
"He said that?"
"Yeah. I think I told you before. He said we have the best strokes. Identical, he said. Said he could be looking at you when he saw me deliver a blow."
"I teach well," said Chiun.
"Not everyone can learn," said Remo. He did not mention Wang had told him that Chiun had a son who had died.
"The teacher is first."
"To pour water into a glass, one needs the glass, even though the water is first. Otherwise it splashes in uselessness," said Remo.
"Where did you learn to talk like that?"
"Who do you think I've been palling around with for the last twenty years?"
"I don't like it."
"Neither did I."
"You sound like a fortune cookie," said Chiun. He folded his hands within his black kimono, and Remo stuffed his hands in his pockets.
"Wang said something so silly I don't know if I should repeat it," said Remo.
"Wang never says anything silly," said Chiun.
"He said we were really just alike under it all. That our differences were illusions."
"The Great Wang never said anything silly. Until now."
"Absurd," said Remo.
"I am ashamed that you were the first one he showed his great flaw to."
"What great flaw?"
"He cannot judge people as well as we thought," said Chiun.
"He certainly does know when someone is ready to be a great Master," said Remo. "I mean, he appears."
"He can judge quality, true. I may be the only Master to be at the great level whose student was also at that level. Two for me. That is a record."
"But not enough to be called the Great Chiun. That must be done by succeeding generations in the histories."
"You still have to learn about negotiations. I hope in your passage you have learned to appreciate that."
"He called us dullards. Said we're too serious. Me about America. You about the House of Sinanju."
"Wang was fat," said Chiun.
"I thought so too," said Remo.
"Lacked control of his eating," said Chiun.
"I thought we had no fat on our bodies," said Remo.
"We don't," said Chiun.
"He does," said Remo.
"We're not alike at all," said Chiun.
"Not at all," said Remo, and both of them could not remember a time when they had agreed on something so thoroughly, which was another proof they were not alike. And for a second time they agreed thoroughly.
Anna Chutesov saw him on the high hill. She wished Remo were with her, because he had a way of moving through defenses that was astounding. She thought she might be stopped, but ironically at a headquarters position itself there was more confusion than at some outpost where people might fire.
Rabinowitz had staff aides, of course, and when she said what she wanted, she made a crucial mistake, one that anyone who ever tried to deal with an institution or corporation would have known was an error.
One she should have known. But she had no choice. She had to speak to the aide.
And as in all organizations, the aide was more difficult to deal with than the leader.
"I have come to surrender to Mr. Rabinowitz and offer him anything he wants," said Anna.
"Who are you?"
"I represent Russia in this situation."
"Then how come you're not with the prisoners?" said the aide.
"Because I never surrendered. I am here to speak with Mr. Rabinowitz," she said, hoping he saw Rabinowitz as Rabinowitz and not some love-authority figure from his past.
"You haven't surrendered to anyone yet, right?" said the aide, a young captain.
"That's right."
"Then you're my prisoner," he said.
As Anna passed Remo in a truck crowded with Russian missile technicians, she waved. Remo was on board with hardly a leap, separating her from the men and helping her off the truck.
"I'll have to take you up there myself," he said.
"No. I don't want you near him. You're the world's last chance, Remo. I'll go with Chiun."
"He doesn't like you."
"Spoken like a man. What on earth makes you think that with a possible world disaster, I would care whether he likes me or not? All I want him to do is go with me. You can get him to do that, can't you? And just maybe I'll be able to see something neither of us have. Right now we have to get Vassily defused from his anxiety."
Chiun agreed to take Anna Chutesov to see the Great Wang's friend Vassily Rabinowitz, provided she kept her hands to herself, made no lascivious moves, and gave up any designs on Remo.
"Done. Absolutely. The easiest promise I ever made," said Anna.
"Don't trust her. She's Russian," said Chiun.
"I'll be all right. You two go ahead," said Remo. He remembered his days long ago from Vietnam when he was a marine and he thought fighting was done with a rifle against people you didn't know. How different it was, he thought, watching the columns of American soldiers slogging along the roads.
Now he understood that to kill another properly you really had to know him, know his moves, his essence, what he was. It was the knowing that made Sinanju different.
Would that mean that Vassily Rabinowitz might be the one man he and Chiun could never kill because he was the one man they could not know?
It was a good question. He would have to ask Anna that when she returned.
Anna thought walking up the hill toward the headquarters with the old Oriental was like walking with Remo, except the older man expressed his hostility, which in a way wasn't all that hostile. It was more like intense peeve. Both he and Remo had extraordinary powers and demanded that the world conform to their realities. For the most part they could effect bits of that, but the world was too big even for those like Chiun.
She had crucial questions about Rabinowitz. And the answers were interesting.
Chiun had been planning to kill Vassily until a legend of Sinanju stepped in to tell him Va
ssily was a good man. "What were you thinking at the time just before your legend stepped into your path?"
"I wasn't thinking anything. I was working."
"Killing?" asked Anna.
"If you must be so crude. But then why should I expect anything but crudity from another Remo pickup? He's had hundreds of women, you know. You won't be any different. So don't even try."
"You have my promise," said Anna.
"Do you know what the historical worth of a Russian promise is?" asked Chiun. "Your revolution didn't change anything. Czar Ivan, of course, was the wonderful exception. But otherwise, I would never work in Russia without payment in advance. None of us did. And you have only yourselves to blame. We could have saved you from the Mongols, but you wanted credit. Never again."
"I take it past czars did not pay their bills."
"Ivan the Good did. There was always work and he paid promptly."
"Some people call him Ivan the Terrible."
"Russians are always good at propaganda."
"This Great Wang could not appear to both you and Remo at the same time, could he?"
"I don't discuss work with women."
"Think of me as a Russian."
"Worse yet."
"Think of me as the woman who will not touch your precious Remo again."
"Wang does many things, but not appearing in two different places simultaneously. He doesn't do that."
"And you know Remo saw Wang because he has made this transition you spoke of."
"Yes," said Chiun.
"Then do you ever wonder that this might not be the Great Wang you talk to?"
"My wonderings are my own."
"If you threw a blow at Wang, of course you would kill him."
"No. He has been dead for centuries."
"So then it would not matter."
"Correct. One can throw a blow at the Great Wang. Our strokes, mine and the one that I taught Remo, are the cleanest, if you didn't know. In all history."
"That's wonderful," said Anna. "Could I see you throw one of them at the Great Wang?"
"No. You wouldn't see it."
"Could I see the results?"
"Can you see this?" said Chiun, and Anna only saw a rustle of the dark kimono.
"I didn't see your hand move."
"Too fast. You'd never see it."
"I have a sister more beautiful than me. And she lipkisses in public. I wouldn't tell her about how cute Remo is if you'd show me you did that."
"I don't make deals with harlots, especially concerning the family heritage."
"But you are worried about the Wang you see, aren't you?" said Anna. And Chiun fell silent.
And so by the time she reached Vassily Rabinowitz she understood that his powers were even more than convincing someone they saw someone else. Rabinowitz had been able to reach a core of thinking that would transcend a person's normal logic. She also knew that the moment Rabinowitz even suspected danger, her mind would not be her own. Even worse, she would not know something was wrong; she would not be able to understand that anything but something wonderful was happening.
The happy faces of the American officers coming out of the meeting with Rabinowitz did not make Anna feel any better. Rabinowitz might be broadcasting his powers now toward anyone who came to him.
This had not been the case at the parapsychology village. She had checked this out carefully. Cleaning people, and those around Vassily who were not in authority and not a threat, were never affected by him.
According to his dossier, occasionally he would perform tricks for them.
If they didn't like the weather he would change it, and they would return to their homes soaked to the skin, claiming the day was sunny.
He made things disappear easily, because all a person had to believe was that they were gone to stop seeing them. But other than these random tricks he did not practice his powers on those who were not a danger.
"Old Blood 'n' Guts will see you now," said a sergeant.
"Sometimes they call the Great Wang that. It is an American term of endearment," said Chiun.
Anna's mouth felt dry. She smoothed out her skirt. She told herself that she was going to feel good things for Vassily. She was not going to let off any vibrations of hostility. She would show servility from the beginning.
"All right," she said. "I'm ready."
Several colonels left, laughing. They gave Anna lascivious looks. She lowered her eyes.
Be subservient she told herself again. Think subservient. "You can come in now. But make it fast," said another guard. He nodded to Chiun.
Chiun led the way.
Inside, Rabinowitz sat on a lounge chair. A gaunt lemon-faced man worked a computer keyboard. He did it with such skill and speed, Anna was surprised he was not younger. More important, he seemed to be able to access things with a smooth precision most computer operators lacked. They always seemed to be trying things that had to be tried again. This man just did things. Anna glanced at the computer terminal and saw the coordinates for the entire southwest railway system. Apparently this man, whoever he was, had jumped the communications for four independent railroads and was now operating them in the service of moving supplies south toward debarkation points, appearing on the screen now as Sornica.
"O great one, here is a woman whose virtue I cannot vouch for," said Chiun.
"I've come to surrender," said Anna.
"Don't have time for that," said Vassily. She still saw him as Vassily. Good. He didn't need her for anything.
"Russia wishes to surrender. You have won. We have an apology for sending General Matesev and the sniper. Russia guarantees the safety of your family. Of your loved ones. Of your return if you wish. Russia is no enemy of yours." This Anna said in Russian so Vassily would understand he was speaking to another Russian.
"Because I beat you, right?"
"Doesn't it make sense?" said Anna, praying he couldn't read minds too. Because she knew while it made sense, those who ran the Russian military did not make sense.
"I don't care. You can't hurt me now. No one can hurt me now," said Rabinowitz. "And you'd get my parents out of Dulsk if I asked and if they wanted, you know why?"
"No," said Anna.
"It doesn't matter now. That's why."
"I don't understand."
"I don't need an army. I've got better than an army, and I beat you."
"Yes, Vassily. You beat us," said Anna. Were all men like this? Did they have to crow about these things? Apparently that was what parades were for.
"You can't touch me now. Tell that to the Politburo."
"I'll be happy to, Vassily."
"You can tell them I don't care about them either. I don't have to beat them anymore."
"That's very good, Vassily."
"I don't have to beat them anymore because I am getting myself a whole country for myself. That's why."
"Good, Vassily."
"And he's getting it for me, Harold. Show me all the males making over two million dollars a year who are under twenty-five years old. I want their names and private lives."
The computer operator punched a few keys, and faces, mostly black ones in basketball uniforms, appeared.
"All right, give me State Department officials who have made embarrassing mistakes in the past that we know about. "
Another list came up, but this time with white faces. "Okay, now give me stockbrokerage houses which haven't lived up to SEC regulations."
The screen turned into a blur of names and faces and did not stop.
"Miss Ashford, this will take all day," said the lemon-faced man.
"All right, that's enough. Now, you go back and you tell your friends I am in the process of getting a country and if they want to cut a deal I have nothing against them. But also tell them I'm Russian too. So I know their word isn't worth anything."
"I understand that."
"All I want is to be left alone. Now send me Remo."
"I've been with him. I'll ge
t him."
"He is the only friend I found in this country. Hell of a guy."
"Yes, Great Wang," said Chiun.
"He has his good points, Miss Ashford," said the man Anna was sure was Smith.
"He's a fine fellow, and I'll get him now," said Anna, turning her eyes toward the door.
"You have a nice ass," said Rabinowitz.
"Thank you," said Anna, very careful to control any hostility in her voice. No man who ever said that understood what he was saying. Nice ass for what? Sitting? Fornicating? It hardly played much role in the act. No, what they meant was that the round softness appealed to them. As though a woman's body was an art object.
Well, her object was to get out of the headquarters right away without looking back.
"I will escort her, Great Wang."
"That's all right, I'll do it myself. Fine. We'll be back in a shake of a lamb's tail," she said.
"Perhaps you'd better go, Chiun. Someone may shoot her because she's Russian."
"I've heard them say the same thing about you, Great Wang, which is not true."
"Yes, I've heard that said of you, too, Miss Ashford," said the man who had to be Smith.
"No problem. I'm gone," said Anna, holding her breath. She was out of the headquarters and in the hot Sornica sun, hoping with all her body and soul that Chiun would not come along. She had to reach Remo first. She had to reach Remo now. Remo had to know. He was the only one who could save civilization, and if Chiun got to him first, he might be no better than the slaves in that headquarters. She forced herself not to run. She also knew that she had to look as though she was in charge of something, otherwise some MP would arrest her and it would be back into the trucks.
She almost twisted an ankle on a loose rock going down the hill. Somewhere off to the left she heard small-arms fire. The Americans were mopping up. Someone said that the Sornican forces were trying to escape with their Gucci eyeglasses, Louis Vuitton luggage, and Bally shoes.
She didn't want to look around, but she knew both Remo and Chiun moved so quickly and silently she would never know they were there until they were there.
A soldier offered to give her a hand. She slapped it away. Where was Remo? She didn't see him. Had he attempted to sneak up on Rabinowitz and try an execution? If he had, he was a fool. This was not the place to kill Rabinowitz. She knew that now from what she saw. And she was not the one to do it. It had to be Remo. But he couldn't do it here.
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