Thunder thudded somewhere in the distance. A snaking stream of lightning cut through the cheerless gray sky.
Dreary fat raindrops splattered loudly against the windshield. The wipers were attached at the top of the frame--unlike those in America. They squeaked angrily and doggedly across the sheet of bowed glass.
Remo had always thought that the British Isles were famous for their lousy weather. But he was willing to wager Germany could give England a real run for its money. He could not remember one decent day since they had arrived in Germany.
The dismal cast of the sky translated to Remo's attitude. He wanted nothing more than to get the last of the thousand-year-old junk in the back of the truck moved off German soil.
The treasure Remo was transporting across Germany was part of the legendary Nibelungen Hoard. A few weeks earlier, he and the Master of Sinanju had been involved in a race with a secret neo-Nazi organization to retrieve the incredibly valuable fortune. The neo-Nazi organization-called IV-had wanted the money to further its nefarious schemes. Chiun had simply wanted the money. In the end, Chiun had won out.
An eleventh-hour deal made with an interested and greedy third party had reduced Chiun's treasure to half the actual Hoard. However, even after halving the loot, there was a tremendous amount left over.
When he learned that their portion of the Hoard was in a storage facility in Bonn, Remo's employer had insisted that it be moved immediately.
"It's too risky, Remo," Harold W. Smith of the supersecret American agency CURE had said.
"Risk shmisk," Remo had said dismissively. "It's sitting in a half-dozen sheds collecting dust. No one's going near it."
"What if someone gets curious? What if they investigate to see what is in the storage facility? Good Lord, what if someone has already done so?"
"Smitty, don't burst a blood vessel," Remo said. "Chiun and I will deal with it first chance we get."
"Do it now."
"Isn't there anything else more pressing?" Remo begged.
"No," Smith insisted.
In their encounter with the neo-Nazi organization, Smith had been attacked and injured. At the moment he was hospitalized after undergoing emergency surgery to remove fluid from around his brain. With nothing urgent on the table for his two field agents to handle, the recuperating Smith had given Remo and Chiun time to move the Hoard from Germany to Chiun's ancestral village of Sinanju in North Korea. Smith, however, did not offer to help in any way. He did not want to create an international incident that could in any way be traced back to the United States. CURE's participation in the smuggling operation was to be strictly hands-off.
Remo had no idea how much their share of the Hoard came to. Millions, certainly. Billions, probably. That much raw wealth in the wrong hands could spell disaster if dumped into a single nation's economy. An economic domino effect could even go on to topple the world economy. This was Smith's real concern, Remo knew.
Fortunately, both Smith and Remo knew that Chiun had as much of a chance of spending the vast stores of Nibelungen wealth as he had of parting with the rest of his ancestors' five thousand years' worth of accumulated spoils that were even now languishing in the Master of Sinanju's Korean home. That was to say, there was no chance whatsoever.
Chiun's personal riches did not dissuade him from studying every nook and cranny in the storage sheds to make certain not a single ingot of the Hoard had been left. Since they had climbed into the truck cab, Chiun had been eager to return the last meager portion of gold to his tiny village.
Driving without a break for several hours now, they had just come upon a dreary, sprawling industrial city.
"Is this Berlin?" Chiun asked, perking up.
"You know it isn't," Remo said tiredly.
"All Hun cities look alike to me," Chiun replied.
"It's Magdeburg," Remo told him. "We've got another eighty miles to go."
Chiun's face pinched in displeasure as he stared across the visible portions of the gloomy German city.
The Gothic spires of the Cathedral of Saints Maurice and Catherine rose high above the other flat roofs. Industrial grit and grime seemed to be attracted to the steeples as if they were magnetized.
"I see they allowed that monstrosity to be completed," he commented with displeasure. He nodded to the cathedral.
"Gothic architecture doesn't do much for me," Remo admitted, glancing up at the steeples. "Still, you've got to admit it's pretty impressive."
Chiun turned to him, hazel eyes flat. "Do I," he said. His voice was devoid of energy.
Remo shrugged. "Sure," he said. "It's like the pyramids. I don't know how they managed to do anything so huge back then. I mean, we consider ourselves lucky when we get the government to deliver the mail on time."
Chiun extended a bony finger to the steeple. It was still far in the distance. They were not even going to drive within miles of the massive cathedral.
"That eyesore is representative of everything that went wrong with Europe in the last millennium," he said. "It is the direct product of the vile pretender Carolus the Dreadful. And you would defend such a thing?"
"Hey, I only said it was impressive," Remo said.
"It is ugly," Chiun insisted.
"Whatever." Remo shrugged.
They drove on in silence. The cathedral receded behind them along with the city of Magdeburg. They had just crossed the Elbe River and were proceeding along to Berlin when Chiun spoke once more.
"Do you not wish to know who Carolus the Dreadful was?" the Master of Sinanju asked.
"Not particularly."
"You in the West know him as Carolus Magnus-Charles the Great. He was not great, however," Chiun added quickly. "He was quite awful."
Remo scrunched up his face. "Charles the Great," he said. "Wasn't that Charlemagne?"
"See how easily the vile name spills off your white tongue," Chiun accused.
"I thought Charlemagne was a great ruler," Remo said.
"White lies. Perpetuated by whites." Chiun pitched his voice low, as if imparting some heinous secret. "The truth is, Carolus was in league with the Church of Rome."
"That's no secret, Chiun," Remo said. "Everybody knows that. Didn't he even get crowned emperor by the pope, or something?"
"Another reason to dislike him," Chiun sniffed.
"Which, the pope part or the emperor part?"
"Take your pick," Chiun said with a shrug.
"Any individual with vile papist inclinations cannot help but be socially maladjusted. Look at you, for instance. The carpenter's sect had you for but a few years early in your life and you still cannot slough off your peculiar notions of right and wrong. Honesty. Pah!"
"Thou shalt not steal, Little Father," Remo reminded him. "That's what Sister Mary Margaret taught me."
"A nun," Chiun scoffed. "If she was so smart, why could she not land a man?"
"They have to take a vow of celibacy, Chiun," Remo said, knowing full well that the old Korean was already aware of this. "And don't dump on Sister Margaret. She practically raised me."
Chiun harrumphed again. "At least her vow prevented her from breeding more squalling papists."
"What about the emperor part?" Remo said, steering Chiun away from Sister Mary Margaret.
The Master of Sinanju glanced over at Remo. "You know at one time Sinanju had much work from Rome."
Remo nodded. The House of Sinanju had been home to the greatest assassins the world had ever known for more than five millennia. Remo and Chiun were the latest in a long line of Sinanju Masters that dated back to prehistory.
"When Charlemagne had himself crowned emperor, it was thought that he would give rise to an empire as great as that of ancient Rome," Chiun said. "This in spite of his dubious flirtation with Catholicism."
"Didn't he?"
"Certainly not. The fool set up educational systems in monasteries and encouraged literacy among his advisers. He aided the Roman church in winding its wretched tentacles throughout his vast conqu
ered territories. His lunacy led to what is called the Carolingian Renaissance."
"I take it from your tone there wasn't much work for the House back then," Remo said.
"Work?" Chiun balked. "The fool created a civilization. Assassins cannot function where men are civilized. Even when he embarked on his idiotic crusades, he conscripted local help. The House never got a single day's work from the impostor Carolus."
Chiun was silently thoughtful for a pregnant moment. "Well, perhaps one," he admitted.
Remo tore his eyes away from the gray roadway. "Are you telling me we bumped off Charlemagne?"
Chiun turned a level eye on Remo. "The man believed in education and religion. His interference in history led directly to the Christian West, the Magna Carta and-worst of all-American democracy. You tell me."
Remo looked back to the road "We did in Charlemagne," he said, shrugging to himself.
"A blot on the European continent that has never been erased. He gave an insufferable air of smugness to you whites that lives to this day."
"Listen, can we get through this last trip without the race-baiting?" Remo begged.
"You brought it up," Chiun challenged.
"All I said was I thought that cathedral was impressive," Remo said.
"It is ugly," Chiun stated firmly.
"Yes, that's right." Remo exhaled, surrendering at last. "Of course. I don't know why I didn't see it before. It's ugly. Ugly, ugly, ugly. It is the ugliest thing I've ever seen, and Charlemagne deserved to have his head lopped off for doing whatever it is he did that caused it to eventually get built. There, happy?" Remo demanded. He gripped the steering wheel in frustration.
Chiun tipped his head thoughtfully to one side. "It was not that ugly," he said lightly.
The scream that threatened to explode from Remo's throat was drowned out by the sound of a high-pitched siren directly behind them. When he looked into the big side-view mirror, Remo saw the small shape of a German police car trailing the rented truck.
"What the hell's wrong now?" he asked aloud.
"Do not stop," Chiun commanded. "It could be a bandit in disguise who has learned of the Hoard and wishes to claim it as his own."
"It's a cop, Little Father," Remo said, frowning. "We've probably got a taillight out or some thing." He pulled the big truck over to the side of the road.
Remo climbed down to the wet pavement, grateful to get out from behind the wheel if only for a moment. He heard Chiun's door close, as well. They met up at the closed rear of the truck.
The markings on the door of the police car identified it as belonging to the small town of Burg, which was roughly halfway between Magdeburg and Brandenburg. The policeman himself was dressed in a dark blue uniform with gold piping. As he stepped out of his own vehicle, the officer pulled an odd-shaped blue cap onto his graying hair. It reminded Remo of a French Foreign Legion hat.
"You vill open the rear of the truck, bitte," the German police officer announced as he stepped up to Remo and Chiun.
Remo raised an eyebrow. "Is there something wrong, Officer?" he asked.
Standing behind him, Chiun tugged at the back of Remo's black T-shirt. "I told you not to stop," he hissed.
Remo shrugged Chiun's hand away.
"Open it," the officer said, nodding to the door. His hand was resting on his gun holster. Remo noted that the silver snap had been popped before the cop had even gotten from the car. He had been expecting trouble from the start.
"I'm sorry-" Remo began.
He didn't have a chance to finish. The gun was quickly and expertly drawn from the holster. The policeman leveled it at Remo's chest. "I vill not ask again."
"Why do they all sound like Major Hochstetter the minute they get a gun in their hands?" Remo mumbled to Chiun.
"Do not let him see the Hoard, Remo," Chiun insisted.
There had been cars zipping past the busy roadway the entire time they had been stopped. Remo noted the speeding vehicles with tight concern. "I don't have a choice," he said to the Master of Sinanju. He lifted an eyebrow as he looked at Chiun. Reluctantly, Chiun nodded.
"Das is correct," the cop said firmly.
As Chiun stepped back, Remo turned away from the police officer. He found the key to the rear door in his pocket and unlocked the padlock. Turning the latch, he lifted the rolling door several feet from the rear platform.
"Inside," the cop insisted. "Bose of you."
Remo and Chiun glanced at one another. They climbed up from the wet roadway and into the damp, murky interior of the truck. The police officer came in behind them, gun still aimed at the two men. The muted Doppler sound of cars racing by hummed through the shadowy metal walls of the truck. Water splashed from the highway onto the sides of the road.
When the officer caught sight of the open crates of gold and gems packed inside the cold truck, his mouth dropped open. Even though it was only a fraction of the larger amount of the Nibelungen Hoard, it was still a huge amount of treasure. He stared, shocked, at the stacks of ancient wealth.
"I am confiscating all of dis," he announced, voice numb. He had to concentrate to keep the gun aimed at his two prisoners. He wanted more than anything to ram his black-gloved hands into the nearest crate of gold coins.
"Of course you are," Remo said indifferently. "What I'd like to know is where did you hear about this?"
"Hmm?" the cop asked, glancing up. "Oh. My brusser."
Remo looked at the man's chest. "What the hell are you talking about?" he asked.
"My brusser told me," the cop repeated. He had turned away from Remo once more and was staring, awestruck, at the glittering gold.
Remo was dumbfounded. "You wear ladies' underwear, and it talks to you?" he asked, incredulous.
"Not brassiere, imbecile," Chiun interjected, in a hissing whisper. The Master of Sinanju turned to the policeman. "Can I assume that your brother is the owner of the storehouse where my treasure was secreted?"
"Ja," the cop said. "He vas upset dat you put your own locks on the place. I helped him to set up a surveillance system outside the sheds you had rented. In dis vay ve vere able to see vat you had stored there vile it vas being loaded onto the truck. However, it did not look like so much." He shook his head in awe.
"Where is your brother now?" Remo asked.
"Vaiting for us," the cop said. "Somevere safe."
"Does anyone else know about this?" Remo asked.
The cop looked up, abruptly annoyed. "Dat is irrelevant. Ve vill go now," he said.
The Master of Sinanju was growing impatient. "Dispatch this one, Remo," he said.
"We've got to find out if anyone else knows," Remo insisted.
"No one knows but this imbecile Hun and his untrustworthy sibling. Make haste."
"You. Qviet," the officer said to Chiun. He pointed his gun at the Master of Sinanju.
"Buddy, wait-" Remo began. Too late.
The gun had been the last straw. In the instant the barrel had been aimed at his frail chest, Chiun's fingers flew from the confines of his kimono sleeves. Fingernails like deadly talons and as sharp and strong as titanium knife blades swept around to the officer's neck. The first rush of nails took out half the man's throat. Blood erupted in a gushing font onto the nearest crate of gold.
As he felt the shock of raking pain in his neck, the officer tried to shoot. Only then did he realize that his gun was no longer there. Nor, it seemed, was the hand that held it.
Chiun's other hand had dropped down onto the man's wrist, severing the policeman's fist just below the cuff of his blue uniform. The impulse to squeeze the gun that was no longer there caused spurts of blood to pump from the raw wrist stump. In another moment, the officer joined his hand and gun on the floor of the truck, a tiny bubble of crimson at the center of his forehead indicating where Chiun's final blow had been struck.
The Master of Sinanju stepped away from the body as it fell to the damp floor.
"Couldn't you have waited another second?" Remo griped. "We
don't know how many more like him are out there."
"They are irrelevant. My gold is all that matters." He turned to go. "See to it that that thing does not bleed on my treasure," Chiun added. Kimono skirts billowed as he hopped down from the truck.
Muttering, Remo rolled the body away from the crates.
Moments later, with the truck's rear door sealed once more, Remo joined Chiun in the cab.
"What did you do with the brigand's vehicle?" the Master of Sinanju asked.
"What did you expect me to do, eat it?" Remo asked. "I shut off the lights and locked it up."
"It will be noticed," Chiun said, concerned.
"Well, duh," Remo said.
Chiun rapped his knuckles urgently on the dashboard. "Hurry, Remo!" he insisted. "Make haste to Berlin lest some other highwayman attempts to take that which is rightfully mine!"
"Sure. Lock the barn door after the horse is at the glue factory," Remo grumbled.
Leaving the persistent light mist to accumulate on the parked police car, Remo pulled the truck back into traffic.
Berlin was still some sixty miles away.
Chapter 3
He had awakened more than two hours before.
The shock of his being kidnapped by Loonies had worn off the second time around, so when Mike Princippi opened his eye only to see a fat pale toe peeking from the end of a cheap sandal two inches from his face, he had merely blinked at the digit. The toe wiggled back.
Princippi pushed his cheek from the floor of the van. The imprint of a metal truck seam lined his grayish skin.
Kneeling, the former governor eyed his captors.
They looked back at him with benign-almost deranged-smiles. The men were jostled on their plain seats as the van continued to speed down the unseen road to a destination known only to the Loonies.
Princippi cleared his throat. "What-?" The words caught for a moment. He coughed again, trying to work up his courage. "What do you want from me?" he asked.
One of the men smiled. Princippi recognized him as the man who had spoken to him in his driveway, though with the matching clothes, haircuts and insipid smiles it was hard to tell for sure.
"Want?" the young man asked. "We want nothing of you, friend Michael. What we want is to give you something."
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