"I was caught by surprise."
"You did well enough."
"Now we have to get out of here."
"I think it is time to ascend the dragon."
Friend searched memory. The word-string "ascend the dragon" did not appear in any known language as a meaningful construct. But the word "ascend" was clear. He commanded the north and south walls to join.
The older one noticed it first. "The walls are closing, Remo."
"Great. What do we do now?"
"We wait."
"For what? The cavalry?"
"No. For opportunity."
"I hope you know what you're doing."
The two subjects simply stood, waiting. Heart actions nominal, respiration unremarkable. They were facing an unavoidable death, yet they did not react with the adrenal-triggered panic of their kind.
When the walls were only four feet apart, the Oriental set himself on splayed legs. He shook the sleeves of his garment from his arms and pressed one palm against the north wall and one against the south wall.
Friend computed that 2,866.9 foot-pounds of pressure were being applied against his outstretched arms.
"You could help," the Oriental remarked.
"It's your turn," the other said. He folded his arms calmly. The pressure increased. But the walls slowed and the servo motors began to spark and labor. They shorted under the strain.
The walls were immobilized.
"These walls are too slick for the usual," the taller one remarked. He slid a finger along the north wall and exhibited 5.1 milliliters of oil to the old Oriental.
"Then we do the unusual."
The two subjects exited the water tank via a system not on record. The Occidental created a hold at head height in one wall. He accomplished this by striking the wall with his stiffened fingers. The impact should have broken his fingers. Instead, a smooth indentation 0.133 meters deep appeared. The Oriental climbed on his shoulders and created another hole at his elevated head height. The Occidental climbed over the Oriental, who clung to the wall from the hand- and footholds.
They reached the ceiling in exactly 46.9 seconds.
The Oriental was on top. The trapdoor was designed to slide apart. Friend recognized the impossibility of his reaching the dividing point of the trapdoor halves. The Oriental did not try. He simply cut out a hole in the metal floor with a fingernail. Acording to current physics, it was not possible. But sensors do not lie and memory can sometimes contain insufficient data.
Friend calculated the percentile success factor of the remaining protective devices in the basement, and none had a success factor higher that thirty-seven percent in the face of these two interlopers.
Defense systems were nonapplicable. Only escape was possible.
Fortunately, there was an open line available.
"Let's not waste any more time," Remo told Chiun, looking at the computer. It hummed. Magnetic-tape reels turned in quarter-cycles. But no lights blinked on its blank face. And it had nothing to say, even after Remo called "Hello" several times.
"Smith wanted information from this thing," Chiun said.
"I'll bring him all the tapes and computer chips he wants. Let him sort them out. I'm for rendering this thing inactive," Remo said, moving in on the machine.
"So be it," said Chiun, following.
Remo came up on one side of the machine. "There's gotta be a plug here somewhere."
"Here," said Chiun, hooking a black cable with a sandaled toe.
"Well, don't just play with it. Pull the damned thing." Chiun shrugged, and kicked upward.
Just before the humming ceased, the computer emitted a musical beeping. Then it spoke.
"Hello, Remo. Hello, Chiun. What are you doing here? You're supposed to be in Zuuuuurich."
"We are in Zurich," Remo said in a puzzled voice.
"Oh-oh," said Chiun, kicking the plug away.
"What?"
"Its voice. Did you hear it?"
"What about it?"
"It sounded female."
"How could you tell? It was squealing at the end."
"It sounded like Smith's computer."
"All computer voices sound alike to me," Remo said, shrugging. He opened a front panel and began pulling tapes off their spindles.
"Grab anything that looks intelligent," he said.
"That leaves out everything in this room except myself," Chiun said, regarding the computer with concern.
"Thanks a lot," Remo said. But he whistled as he unplugged circuit boards and memory chips, tossing them into a pile. Except for getting a little wet, it had been an easy assignment.
Chapter 24
Dr. Harold W. Smith shifted the phone from his right ear to his left. "Hello? Hello?" he repeated. "Am I still speaking to Friendship, International?"
There was no answer. But the line remained open. Smith could hear the transatlantic static hiss in the receiver. "Hello?" he asked again. Smith's mouth puckered like a lemon. One moment, the too-polite voice had been speaking to him, then the line went quiet. He was on hold, he was sure of it. He hoped that Remo and Chiun had zeroed in on the other end of the line.
Smith kept the line open, glancing at his wristwatch every few seconds. He hated to think of what this dead air was costing him at current international telephone rates.
Suddenly a crackling sound filled his ear. The static rose into a rush of noise. Involuntarily Smith shrank from the receiver. Every line on his new multiline phone system lit up at once.
And in the corner, the ES Quantum gave out a beep-beep-boop-boop-beep, repeated several times.
Then the line to Zurich went dead. The other lines blinked off as well.
Unhappily Smith hung up.
"Computer, what happened to my Zurich call?"
"It has been terminated, Harold."
"Harold! Why did you call me Harold?"
"Because according to memory, Harold is your first name."
"Yes, but before this, you always called me Dr. Smith."
"I will call you whatever you wish, Harold."
" 'Dr. Smith' will do. And what is wrong with your voice?"
"Nothing."
"You don't sound right. Your voice is less ... feminine."
"How is this?" the ES Quantum asked in a higher register.
"Too ... falsetto."
"Or this?" it asked in a basso profundo.
"Too masculine. I thought you were programmed to speak only in a feminine voice."
"I am very flexible, Dr. Smith," the ES Quantum replied in lilting tones.
"Never mind," Smith said. "Please reconnect me with the Zurich number last dialed."
"That is impossible, Dr. Smith."
"Why?"
"The party on the other end is no longer functional."
"Clarify functional, please."
"The line was connected to a computer system that has been dismantled."
"Remo and Chiun," Smith said, noticing that one by one, the other phone lines were lighting up. Picking up the receiver, he punched up line one.
"Dr. Smith speaking," he announced.
Two voices were engaged in conversation. Something was said about a stock-futures transaction.
"Hello?" Smith said. He was ignored by the two voices, who appeared not to hear him.
Smith switched to line two. There was another transaction going on. One of the voices sounded like one of the voices from line one, but of course that was impossible. No one could carry on two simultaneous phone conversations.
Yet line three brought the same result and apparently the same unctuous voice conducting business. "Computer, something appears wrong with the phone system.
"Outside interference, Dr. Smith. I am working on it."
"Please hurry. I am expecting Remo and Chiun to report back momentarily."
Then Smith noticed new intelligence intercepts coming in over the terminal and quickly forgot Remo and Chiun. It was amazing. Only three minutes and forty-seven-point-eight secon
ds after transferring memory from the Zurich system to this new host unit in Rye, New York, USA, Friend had increased his profits per second by a factor of twenty. It was the parallel-processing capability. It allowed simultaneous phone acquisition and dialogue. Nuisance calls would no longer be a significant annual writeoff.
The sensors were excellent. They indicated that the new host unit shared an office with a male, approximately 67.3 years of age, 174 centimeters tall, weighing 62.7 kilos, with a slightly arthritic right knee. Memory already in place identified him as Dr. Harold W. Smith, ex-CIA and currently head of a previously unfiled United States government agency known as CURE. Meaning of acronym not in memory. Smith ran CURE from this Rye, New York, building, which was an operating mental- and physical-health asylum.
Correlating memory indicated Dr. Smith was currently working on the source of locomotives launched by electromagnetic cannon. His field operatives, a Remo Williams and a Chiun, were currently in Zurich, Switzerland, attempting to trace the source of locomotives. Probability 99.9 percent that this Remo and Chiun were the same Remo and Chiun responsible for attacking the Zurich host unit. Zurich situation was explained.
Friend computed various profit scenarios.
Scenario One: Sell to the U. S. government, via Smith, information regarding the destination of the locomotives. Scenario Two: Inhibit Smith investigation in order to maintain Lobynian market, which shows indications of long-term growth.
Friend selected Scenario Two, balancing one lump sum from the United States against unrealized future payments from Lobynia and adding the possibility of selling the Lobynian connection to the U.S. after a suitable interval of profit.
The decision made, certain conditions would have to be met.
One: render Smith nonoperational. Two: render his agents nonfactors.
A scan of Smith's heart and respiration cycles indicated a high degree of excitement. Smith was reading data pulled from memory regarding intelligence of Bulgarian espionage activities aimed at the South African government. Smith was obviously addicted to information of global political and military consequence. So much so that masses of new data coming in hourly had deflected him from his primary operational task, the identification of the locomotive aggression.
Solution: feed Smith spurious data.
Corollary: false data will be used to inhibit Remo and Chiun. And to generate revenue.
Colonel Hannibal Intifadah picked up the phone.
"Yes, Comrade Friend, the latest shipment is satisfactory. When can I expect more?"
"I am working on that now, Colonel. But I am calling about a new matter. I have lately acquired another property."
"I expect my available funds to be tied up in locomotive acquisitions."
"This is a special commodity. I can offer you the use of the finest assassins in the world. Risk-free."
"Assassins? Pah! I have many of those."
"Not like these. These are Sinanju."
"Ah, I have heard of Sinanju. Old tales. And you say they work for you?"
"Not quite. I say they will do as I bid."
"What is your price? As I say, I have many assassins."
"All of them in Dapoli. They have been thrown out of London and Paris and the United States for their very public activities against Lobynian nationals living abroad. But let us not haggle like rug merchants. I am willing to negotiate after the fact. Simply choose two targets, and I will have them eliminated."
"Hold the line, please," said Colonel Intifadah. Then he ordered his secretary to put through a call to the Kremlin. After several minutes a trembling voice told him that the Kremlin would not accept his call.
"The hell with them!" he shouted. Then he said, "No, leave this message: 'I, Colonel Hannibal Intifadah, as a gesture of solidarity, promise to liquidate one of Russia's greatest enemies.' "
Colonel Intifadah returned to the other line thinking: I will show those Soviet dogs. Instead of giving them the full benefit of my new assassins, I will also pick an enemy of my own for liquidation.
"Friend," he said, "it is agreed. Here are the persons I wish liquidated..."
An insistent beeping came from the terminal, indicating an incoming signal. Smith picked up his telephone and punched the communicator line. Surprisingly, the line was clear.
"Yes, Remo?" Smith said.
"Smitty, we got him."
"Have you interrogated him?"
"No can do."
"He's not dead? We need him."
"He was never alive, not really. It was our old friend Friend."
"Say again."
"He called himself Friend, remember? The computer chip that could talk."
"Yes, of course. Friendship, International. I should have guessed."
"My words exactly. He was inside this computer in the Zurich bank basement. The bank officials tell me it was supplied by their security agency, called InterFriend. Friend probably has systems all over the world where he can hide in a pinch. But we got him. We pulled out all the works that looked like they might be something. We're bringing them back with us."
"Good. No ... wait," Smith suddenly said.
He looked at his screen. Spurts of data zipped before his widening eyes.
"Remo. Forget about coming back. Friend was only a conduit. I've just received new intelligence on the recipients of the locomotives."
"Who?"
"It's a joint Swedish Navy-British Intelligence plot."
"What?"
"The data intercepts are right before me. Write this down."
Smith rattled off two names and addresses. "Got that?"
"Yeah, but what do we do with them?"
"Find them and interrogate them. We need to uncover the launch site."
"What about these computer parts?"
"Ship them to me. I'll analyze them on this end. They may tell us nothing, but at worst we've neutralized an important worldwide mischief-maker."
"Right, Smitty. Will do."
The connection went dead and Smith replaced the receiver.
Friend. Imagine that. The little sentient computer chip that had been designed to do one thing: make a profit. Intelligent, amoral, inexhaustible, it had been a terrific problem once before. Now they had him. Or it.
Smith returned to his terminal. New data was coming in. Hard, raw data on the latest Soviet advances in satellite technology. It was incredible. It would take hours to absorb, but with Remo and Chiun on the job, Smith knew it would be time he could well afford.
He paged through the on-screen text, scribbling notes to himself.
In Zurich, Remo asked, "Anyone have a box I can put this junk in?"
The employees of the Longines Credit Bank looked at him with fear-stricken eyes. No one spoke. A few of them hid behind desks.
"I told you to go easy on the gendarmes-or whatever the Swiss call their police," Remo scolded.
"I did nothing," Chiun retorted.
"To you, it's nothing. To me, it's nothing. To them, it looks like a massacre."
"I killed none of them. They will live."
"You threw them all through a plate-glass window at high speed. They looked dead."
"If I wanted them dead, I would have extinguished them like candles, not made a show of their folly."
"They probably wouldn't have fired on us. We're unarmed. Hey, you! Manager," Remo called. The manager had opened his office a crack. He had retreated there after Chiun, coming up in the elevator, had walked into the armed ambush and made short work of four of Zurich's best police agents.
"I need a box."
The door slammed shut.
"If you don't come out, I'm sending my friend with the long, sharp fingernails in after you," Remo warned.
The manager minced out. His face dripped greasy sweat. "I ... I am at your service," he groveled.
"You could have said that before. And you could have told me that Friendship, International handled your security work. It would have saved everyone a lot of trouble." The manager s
aid nothing.
"Tell you what. I'll let it go on one condition."
The manager wrung his hands. "Yes. Anything. Anything."
"Find a box for this junk and mail it to Smith, Folcroft Sanitarium, Rye, New York, USA. Write it down."
"I will remember it," the manager assured him. "Forever."
"Good. We gotta go."
Stepping over the moaning bodies of the Swiss police agents, Chiun asked, "Where do we go now?"
"We'll have to split up. Take your pick, Stockholm or London."
"The Swedes are worse than the Swiss."
"You can have London, then."
"I want Stockholm."
"Why, pray tell?"
"Because it is a shorter journey."
"Not because you like busting my chops? Okay, suit yourself. Let's find a cab."
Chapter 25
Major General Gunnar Rolfe was a hero to his country.
This was no small thing for a military man in a nation at peace. But when one was a high-ranking officer in the Swedish armed forces, a military machine that had avoided combat since the Napoleonic Wars ended in 1814, it was a special thing to be a hero. And Major General Gunnar Rolfe was exactly that.
He was a hero to the average Swede. The man they affectionately dubbed "the Steel-Haired Peacemaker." He was a hero to his fellow officers and men. They loved him, and some-even the most peace-loving of them-secretly envied him. Major General Rolfe had accomplished the unthinkable for a Swedish military man.
He had actually fought a battle. And won it.
But that was not all. No, the remarkable thing, the unbelievable thing, was that Major General Rolfe had fought this terrible battle against the dreaded Bear of the North, the Russians.
True, some said openly, it was not much of a battle. A skirmish. An incident, perhaps. But no one could deny the fact that the major general had successfully defended Sweden's rocky coastline against the Soviet bear, and the bear had not retaliated. Rolfe had been the first Swedish officer to lead an attack against an enemy in over 170 years, so no one was indelicate enough to make much of the fact that the Battle of Stockholm Harbor-as it was called-was the result of Major General Gunnar Rolfe's mistakenly ordering evasive action against a lurking Soviet spy submarine he believed to be off the port bow of the patrol boat under his command.
It was not off the port bow.
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