Murder Ward td-15

by Warren Murphy

  Kathy Hahl, however, had other ideas. Williams had come too close, and now his death would bring in other government people, very nosey, very efficient. It was time for Kathy Hahl to take her new discovery and leave.

  "Remo."

  What was that sound? It was a voice. But he didn't want to talk to anybody now. He just wanted to sleep, to forget that awful headache.

  "Remo."

  He would not answer. No matter who called him, he would not speak. He would just ignore that voice. If he didn't answer, whoever it was would go away. Remo just wanted to sleep.

  "You can't sleep, Remo. I will not let you."

  But you've got to let me sleep. I hurt. Please let me sleep, whoever you are.

  "You are hurting, Remo, but that is the proof that your body lives. You must let your body fight. You must use your will to give your body a reason to fight. Tell your body to fight, Remo."

  It was Chiun. Why don't you go away, Chiun? I don't want to fight. I just want to sleep. I feel so tired. So old.

  "No one grows old who will not grow old, Remo. Only you can stop that. You must will yourself young again. I will help you, Remo. Squeeze your right hand into a fist."

  Maybe if he squeezed his right hand into a fist, Chiun would go away. Just go away, Chiun. Later we'll talk.

  Remo squeezed his right hand into a fist.

  "Good," came the voice. "Now your left hand. Keep your right hand tight."

  Right hand. Left hand. It was awful being confused by Chiun. Why did he always do that to Remo? Poor Remo. Poor Remo.

  Remo squeezed his left hand into a fist.

  "Now you must open and close your hands rapidly. It will hurt but I will do it with you. I will accept your hurt. Remo. Open and close your hands."

  Anything, Little Father, if you will be quiet. No yelling allowed on the Feast of the Pig. All I want is peace and quiet. And rest.

  Remo opened and closed his hands several times rapidly.

  "Good. See, Remo, you can live. You must live because your body wants to live. You have given it will to live. You want to live, Remo, don't you?"

  I just want to sleep, Little Father.

  "Now your stomach, Remo. Think of your stomach. Concentrate all the essence of your force on your stomach. The way I taught you many years ago. We must make the blood run to the stomach. You can feel it coursing in your veins, Remo. It will make the pain go away, Remo, if we get your blood to your stomach."

  Anything to make the pain go away. Chiun would not let him sleep. Maybe if Remo did what he wanted, Chiun would let him sleep.

  He concentrated his will on his stomach.

  "Good, Remo. Force it. More and more. The blood of your body must run to your stomach, must carry the poison to your stomach."

  Yes, Chiun, yes. Must carry the blood to the stomach. Away from the head. No more headache if I get the blood to the stomach. Smart, smart Chiun.

  Remo felt the blood moving to the center of his body; he felt warmed there; his hands still clenched and unclenched rhythmically.

  "Do you feel it, Remo? Do you feel the blood in your stomach?"

  "Feel it," Remo said faintly. "Feel it now."

  "Good," said Chiun, and then Remo felt a steel-hard rock-compact fist slam into his stomach. What a dirty trick. Chiun had punched him in the stomach. His stomach, knotted, uncurled, knotted again, then spastically, it convulsed and Remo felt the vomit run up his tubes and it was in his mouth and he was rolling to his side, throwing up onto the rug of the hospital room. Wave after wave of convulsions racked his stomach as he retched its contents onto the floor.

  Dirty bastard, Chiun. Dirty Chinese bastard. Hit me when I'm sick.

  His body trembled with the convulsions as he heaved. Then… it seemed like hours… he stopped. His spat to clean his mouth.

  The headache was gone. The sore tiredness had vanished. There was only pain in the stomach area where Chiun had punched him.

  Remo opened his eyes, winced at the late afternoon sunlight glinting into the room and turned to Chiun.

  "Damn it, Chiun, that hurt."

  "Yes," said Chiun, "it hurt. I hurt you because I hate you. I want to cause you pain. It is of no consequence to me how much pain I cause you. That is why I punched you in the stomach, instead of letting you just lie there and die quietly. I never realized before how much I hated you, Remo. I will punch you in the stomach again and again. Because I hate you."

  "All right, Yenta. Knock it off, will you?"

  Remo rolled up into a sitting position and then felt the tattered straitjacket on his shoulders and chest. He looked down at it.

  "Christ. I forgot," he said.

  "It was a game for Truth or Consequences, right? You let someone come in and strap you in this madman's coat. It is a very appropriate garment for you, Remo. Very becoming. You should wear one all the time."

  Remo stood up, ripping off the shreds of the jacket. "It was the aging drug, Chiun. It nearly had me. I could feel myself getting old and tired."

  "And now you know the killer?"

  "That Kathy Hahl woman who runs the hospital. She set me up. I'm going to see her now," he said.

  He took a few steps toward the door, gingerly, then stopped. The door hung broken, ripped off its hinges as if by a bartering ram. Remo turned to Chiun. "You were in a hurry to get in, I see."

  "I thought I had left the soup cooking," said Chiun. "Go."

  Remo found he could walk perfectly well. He slipped on his shoes and went out into the hall.

  Kathy Hahl's office was down the corridor from the research labs. Remo saw the laboratory doors open and ducked into a stairwell just a fraction of a second soon enough. The dark-haired man and the blond passed by him, heading down the corridor for Remo's room. Inside that room, the Master of Sinanju turned on his television set and prepared to review the day's diet of soap operas, an act which always brought peace to his soul, despite the violence and ugliness rampant in the world.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Remo decided to stop in the research lab first, in case Kathy Hahl was there.

  As he walked toward the double iron doors, he saw that the lock had been replaced with a new one.

  "Beg your pardon, sir. You can't go in there."

  Remo turned to the speaker, a nurse working on the desk there.

  "Thank you," he said. "I'll be sure to mention it in my report."

  He moved toward the door and did not bother this time to fake using a key. He curled his fingertips into a tight fist, then shot his hand out against the door. It shuddered and opened.

  Inside, he closed the door behind him.

  "Kathy," he called.

  "She's not here," came a woman's voice from inside one of the offices to the left.

  Remo stepped forward. In the third office, there was an elderly woman sitting at a desk, her pencil poised over a long yellow pad on which were written strings of figures. She was looking at the doorway.

  "Oh, my goodness," she said when she saw Remo. "Visitors aren't allowed in here."

  "I'm not a visitor," Remo said. "I'm from the AMA. Doctor Shiva. Ms. Hahl said you'd tell me about the aging drug."

  "Oh, you know. Well, I'm very happy to meet you." The woman stood up and came toward Remo. "I'm Dr. Hildie. I developed the drug, you know."

  "How does it work?"

  The woman walked by Remo out into the laboratory. She picked up a stoppered test tube half-filled with a clear heavy oily liquid.

  "This is it," she said. "And these are some of the results of our work," she added, waving toward the animal cages. For the first time since he'd entered, Remo heard the animal chatter.

  "Yes, I know," he said. "Freddy and Al showed me the other day. But how does the drug work?"

  "If you remember, Doctor Shiva, about a year ago, some scientists discovered an unidentified protein in the bodies of the elderly. That protein was not to be found in the bodies of the young. It occurred to me that if aging produced this protein, perhaps the protein c
ould produce aging. We were able here, with Ms. Hahl's help and funding, to make the protein synthetically and greatly intensify its strength."

  "And it's worked?"

  "It certainly has, as these animals show."

  "What about human experiments?"

  "Oh, no," she said. "We've never had any of those. And what would be the purpose anyway? There's value in learning how to bring animals to maturity more rapidly, but not humans. Oh, no."

  "How is the protein given?" Remo asked. "By injection?"

  She nodded. "First we tried it in food, but that was too slow. The best way is to inject it into the bloodstream. The absorption rate of the fluid," she said, holding up the test tube, "is very great. It can be absorbed by any soft body tissues. Injection is fastest."

  "But if I rubbed it, say, on my arm, it would work?"

  "Yes," she said, "though the tough skin covering off the arm would slow down its effects. But, for instance, your tongue would absorb it much more rapidly. Any soft, open tissue."

  "I see," Remo said. "Well, thank you, Doctor Hildie. You don't mind if I look around for myself, do you?"

  "Of course not. I'll be inside if you need me."

  "Wonderful. I'll call you."

  Doctor Hildie returned the test tube to its holder and walked back toward her office. Poor thing knew nothing, Remo thought, and had no idea how her great discovery was being used. He waited until she was out of sight, in her office, before he picked up the test tube carefully and stuck it into the chest pocket of his shirt.

  Then he headed back toward the door. Kathy Hahl's office was down the corridor to the left.

  They were so surprised to see the back of an old man, sitting on the floor watching television, that Freddy and Al failed to notice the torn straitjacket on the couch when they entered Remo's suite.

  "Williams?" said Freddy.

  Chiun turned slowly, his leathered face lit in blue from the flickering light of the TV tube.

  Freddy, the dark-haired one, looked at him and giggled. "I knew there was something wrong with Williams. The eyes were a giveway. He's part Chink."

  Chiun looked at them, still saying nothing.

  Al shook his blond hair from his eyes. "It's eerie," he said. "Look at him. Only about a half hour, it took."

  "How do you feel, Williams?" asked Freddy. "Headache go yet? Do you know what you look like? Like Confucius. You're ancient. But don't worry, man. Not much longer. Pretty soon, different parts of you aren't going to work any more and pretty soon after that, you'll be dead." He giggled again. "Sound like fun?"

  "You two imbeciles were the deliverers of the poison?" Chiun asked. But it wasn't really a question, more a statement of fact.

  "See? Your memory's already starting to go. You don't remember us, do you?" Freddy said.

  "No," Chiun said. "But you will remember me in the few moments you have yet to live."

  Freddy and Al moved into the room.

  "Oh, you frighten me to pieces… old man," Freddy snapped sarcastically. "Doesn't he frighten you terribly, Al?"

  "Oh, heavens to Betsy, yes. I'm pissing my pants."

  "It is the way with untrained babies. And beasts," Chiun said.

  "Hey, hey, hey. Pretty chipper," Al said.

  Chiun ignored him. "Because you are going to die, I am going to tell you the reason."

  "Oh, yes," Freddy mocked. "Tell us the reason, before you tear us apart with your bare hands." He winked at Al.

  "You are going to die because you laid a hand upon the child of the Master of Sinanju."

  Al rotated his finger near his temple. "He's gone, Freddy. Maybe the big dose wipes out the brain. Nutty as a fruitcake."

  Freddy said, "We'd better put him back in the jacket, so he doesn't create any row. How'd you get out of that anyway, Williams?"

  Chiun rose slowly to his feet, twisting as he rose so he faced the two men across five feet of carpeting.

  He was silent

  "Well, it doesn't matter," Freddy said. "Let's get you back into it." He walked forward, extending his arms to put them on Chain's shoulders.

  His fingertips were only inches from Chiun's shoulders when there was a yellow blur as Chiun's hand moved. Freddy felt the side of his neck turn wet. He clapped his hand to his head and felt, under his palm, that his right ear had been severed.

  "Bastard," he shouted and turned at Chiun, swinging a roundhouse right hand. But it hit nothing and again Freddy felt the pain, but this time on the left side of his head. His other ear was gone and the blood ran wildly down the side of his jaw and neck. Chiun stood motionless as if rooted in the one spot. Freddy screamed, his hands over the gaping wounds where his ears had been. Al stepped forward to help him, but before he could intercede, he saw two longnailed hands flash out and he heard the crack as they hit into Freddy's head. It was a sickening, breaking sound; Freddy dropped to the floor and Al knew he was dead.

  Al stopped halfway in his charge, then turned and fled toward the door. But alongside him—by God, the old man was moving along the wall—there was a green figure, and then the grim aged Oriental specter stood in front of the door, a hand upraised to stop him. Al swallowed, then charged, and Chiun imposed upon him a slow lingering death, before he experienced which, Al wet his pants.

  Chiun stepped over the bodies and went back to the television set which was now booming organ music and showing the introductions to his personal rerun of that day's showing of "As the Planet Revolves." Chiun looked around at the corpses, the blood, the vomit, the various body parts, and shook his head sadly. Remo would have to clean up this mess. The room was getting disgusting.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Kathy Hahl was bent over a file cabinet, sticking papers into a briefcase, when Remo went into her office. He moved silently toward her, reached around her and grasped her breasts.

  He squeezed them gently, his fingers kneading the tips through her thin sweater. He could feel her instant arousal, and he pressed his lower body against hers.

  "Don't stop," she said. "Keep going."

  "Is that any way to talk to a man who's going to be old enough to be your grandfather?"

  He released her, stepped back, and she turned around. Her face showed her shock at seeing him, then she relaxed into a smile.

  "I'm surprised to see you still up and about," she said, "Mr. Williams. Is it really Mr. Williams?"

  "Yes, it is. Remo Williams."

  "Are you really a billionaire hermit?"

  "Afraid not. Just your everyday garden-variety assassin."

  "I see," she said. "How do you feel? Has the headache gone yet?"

  "I just got over it."

  "That's normal. The aging process starts any moment now. You may already be able to feel it. Does the skin at the side of your eyes start to feel a little tight? That's the loss of elasticity that comes with age. And the back of your hands. Your veins should become more pronounced and the skin should start to wrinkle. Has that happened yet? No worry. Any moment now."

  "Good. It'll give me something to look forward to," Remo said.

  "How did you get here? Freddy and Al went down for you."

  "They missed me. I'm sure they found enough to keep them busy."

  "Remo Williams, eh? Who are you with? The IRS? The FBI?"

  "None of those. I'm kind of a freelance for the government. Tell me, Kathy, since it doesn't matter any more, what was this all about? Was it just the money?"

  She smiled, showing even, crystal white teeth. "Since it doesn't matter, I'll tell you. Sure it was the money. But not the small change I got for doing in people on the table."

  "And the big money?"

  "This hospital is used by two dozen of the top officials in the federal government for annual checkups, routine medical treatment, that kind of thing. Can you imagine what other governments would pay to have me produce instant old age in, say, the secretary of state? Maybe on the eve of a big summit conference?"

  "Kathy, that's downright unpatriotic," said Remo. />
  "Sure, but highly productive. And I was just about to begin. I figured Mrs. Wilberforce for our last guinea pig. And then you came here, and got a little too close for comfort. Why did you come up here, by the way? I hate to see people die."

  "I came up because I thought since I was going to leave the world anyway, I'd do it with a bang, not a whimper."

  She smiled. "You can try. But I do this thing to men. Ten seconds is all they can take."

  "I should have that much time left," said Remo.

  He scooped her up in his arms and bore her back toward the filing cabinet where he placed her down gently.

  "I think the position we started in would be satisfactory," he said.

  "Far be it from me to stifle an old man's fantasy," she said. She turned away, over the open file drawer, and smiled to herself. The drug was working of course. And the longer she kept him here, the surer would be the result. Maybe she'd let him prolong it. She'd give him, perhaps, a full thirty seconds of ecstasy. She felt her skirt being lifted up around her hips, and then she felt Remo. He felt strangely oily, but the lubrication was somehow exciting. Maybe forty seconds, she thought.

  Then it was underway, but he was like no one else had ever been. His body was strong and with his hands he controlled her movements. She counted to fifteen and then began an internal movement which men had always told her they had never experienced before, but he matched it with a movement and a swelling of his own, and she kept counting but when she reached thirty, she stopped, because she was too busy moaning her pleasure. There was pleasure again, and again, and again, and through it all, she wished that she did not really have to kill this Remo, because after all these years, she had found a man whose performance matched her appetites. And there was pleasure again and again.

  How long it went on, she did not know, but then, without reaching his own peak, he was gone, moving away from her.

  She hung there, over the file cabinet, trying to catch her breath. She heaved a big sigh and turned. He was zipped up and in his fingers he was holding a test tube from the laboratory. She recognized it. He dropped it into her wastepaper basket.