Feast or Famine td-107

by Warren Murphy

  "Do not kill that bee!" he sputtered.

  "Why not?" asked Remo, switching to his fists. He let fly as if to sucker punch the bee from behind.

  "That is no ordinary bee."

  "No fooling," said Remo.

  "It appears to be intelligent."

  "Well, it is fast."

  The bee swooped. Spinning, it dive-bombed Remo. Remo feinted. The bee barrel-rolled out of the way. Recovering, Remo backhanded it smartly.

  The bee was nimble. It came close to escaping, but it flew out of harm's way into harm's way. A slashing fingernail like a thin ivory dagger caught it.

  Helwig Wurmlinger heard the tiny clip as one of the bee's wings came off in midair.

  Buzzing, the bee dropped, fought to regain airspeed and struck the floor.

  Landing on its feet, it spun in a frantic circle as if seeking escape. The skirted figure of the old Korean got between it and the door. Remo stepped up behind it.

  "We got you now, you little bastard," Remo growled.

  "Don't hurt it," Wurmlinger urged.

  "It tried to kill us," Chiun hissed. "It must die."

  As if the bee understood every word, it suddenly took off. Remo dropped one Italian loafer in its path. It scooted around it. Remo repositioned his foot, blocking it again.

  Each time, the bee moved around it.

  Helwig Wurmlinger watched in slack-jawed fascination. Bees, he knew, moved in random patterns. They didn't move toward goals, except toward their hives or food sources.

  This bee appeared to be moving toward the dropped minicam, whose light was still blazing through its broken protective lens.

  "Peculiar," he said.

  Chiun indicated the bee's fuzzy black-and-yellow thorax with a long fingernail.

  "Behold, the face of death," he intoned.

  Wurmlinger bent at the waist and blinked at the yellow markings on the black thorax. They formed a pattern he had seen before. On moths. It was a tiny but very symmetrical skull, or death's-head.

  "I have never seen a death's-head marking on a bee before," he breathed.

  "Take a good look," Remo growled. "You won't see it again."

  Helwig Wurmlinger started to protest. Before the first word could take shape, the bee gave a last convulsive effort and leaped over Remo's blocking shoe.

  And jumped into the hot bulb.

  With a sputtery sizzle, it died.

  The smell that arose with the tiny grayish black mushroom cloudlette stank amazingly for such a small thing.

  Wurlinger pinched his long nose shut with his spidery fingers and said, "It committed suicide."

  "Bull," said Remo.

  But the cold voice of the Master of Sinanju cut the room with a brief intonation. "It is true. The bee killed itself."

  Remo made his voice scoffing. "Why the hell would a bee up and kill itself?"

  "Because it is not a bee," returned the Master of Sinanju cryptically.

  Chapter 13

  "Bees," Remo Williams was insisting, "do not commit suicide."

  "That one did," Chiun retorted.

  Tammy Terrill decided to put in her two cents. She hadn't resumed her standing-on-her-head position after she failed to gain Dr. Wurmlinger's assistance.

  "Hey, they commit suicide every time they sting someone, don't they?"

  "It's not the same," Remo said. "And you stay out of this."

  "I will not," she said. Then, apparently remembering that she had been stung, suddenly turned the color of yesterday's oatmeal.

  "Oh, my God. Am I still dying?"

  "Die in seemly quiet if you are," Chiun hissed.

  "Let me examine you," Dr. Wurmlinger said.

  "Will you suck the poison out?" Tammy asked anxiously.

  "No," Dr. Wurmlinger answered.

  Tammy sat down, and Wurmlinger began massaging her blond head with his spindly fingers.

  "What are you doing?" she challenged.

  "Feeling for the bump."

  She winced. Her scalp winced, too. "It hurts."

  "The sting of a bee is painful, but of short duration," Wurmlinger told her.

  As he quested about among Tammy's roots, Remo and Chiun continued their argument.

  "No bee in its right mind would commit suicide," Remo was saying. "They're not intelligent. They don't think like we do. That's why they sting. They don't know they're killing themselves by stinging people."

  "That not-bee deliberately ended its life," Chiun insisted.

  "Why would he do a thing like that?"

  "To avoid capture and interrogation at our hands."

  "Not a chance in hell, Chiun."

  "I am afraid I must agree with you," Wurmlinger commented, fingering Tammy's roots aside to expose a reddish swelling.

  "Which one of us?" asked Remo.

  "Both."

  "See?" Remo said to Chiun. "He's an expert. He knows about bees."

  Chiun stiffened his spine. "He knows about bees, not about not-bees. Therefore, he does not know what he is talking about."

  "He's an etymologist," Remo argued.

  "Entomologist," corrected Wurmlinger.

  "What's the difference?"

  "Entomology is the study of insects. An etymologist studies the roots of words."

  "I stand corrected. Now correct him," said Remo, pointing to Chiun.

  But Wurmlinger had already focused the entirety of his attention on the site on Tammy's skull where a reddish bump was rising, angry and dull. It was at the exact top, along the depressed sagital crest.

  "Ah."

  "Is the stinger still in there?" Tammy moaned.

  "No, there is no stinger."

  "Is that good or bad?"

  "You are in no danger," Wurmlinger said.

  "How can you be sure?"

  "Because you are breathing normally, and the wound did not penetrate your skull."

  "Why not?"

  "Because it is exceedingly thick."

  Tammy, her eyes rolled up as if she could somehow peer over the top of her own head, made a notch between her pale brows and asked, "Is that good or bad?"

  "It's not usually considered a compliment to be thick of head, but in your case, it has saved your life."

  "What about the poison?"

  "I see no sign of venom or infection."

  "Suck it anyway."

  "No," said Wurmlinger, stepping back in disgust. Tammy's eyes flew to Remo. "Suck me."

  "Bite me," said Remo.

  Tammy's blue eyes flared. "Hey, that wasn't nice!"

  "It's called tit for tat," returned Remo, who then resumed his argument. "That bee was just a bee, only more stubborn than most bees. You know about being stubborn, Chiun. Not to mention mule-headed."

  Chiun's almond eyes squeezed down to knife slits. "You are the stubborn one."

  Remo addressed Dr. Wurmlinger. "You're the bee expert. Are they naturally suicidal or not?"

  Rudely, Wurmlinger walked between them as if they weren't there and got down on one knee next to the minicam. A faint curl of fading smoke was still wafting upward from the broken bulb. Wurmlinger found the Off switch and doused the light.

  "This is most peculiar," he said after a moment.

  "What is?" asked Remo.

  "I see no remains."

  "Of what-the bee?"

  "Yes. There are no bee remains."

  "He got zapped," Remo contended.

  "There should be some matter remaining."

  They all gathered around the minicam, which was still emitting a wisp of what looked like cigarette smoke.

  Tammy grabbed her nose. "Smells like burning garbage."

  "Smells like fried bug to me," grunted Remo.

  "A bee is not a bug," Wurmlinger said, grimacing as if suffering a personal insult.

  "It is a not-bee," said Chiun. "Why will no one accept my words?"

  "I am not familiar with that species," Wurmlinger muttered. He was on his knees now and sniffed around the lamp with his eyelashes held before his sha
rp nose.

  Wurmlinger poked and prodded and attempted to scrape some smoky residue from the flash reflector, but all he got was thin black soot.

  Frowning like a twitchy bug himself, he climbed to his long, spindly feet.

  "There is nothing left," he said in a small, disappointed voice.

  "It was a very thorough suicide," said Chiun.

  "The bee did not immolate itself," Wurmlinger explained, snapping out of his mental fog. "It merely sought a light source it mistook for the sun. You see, bees navigate through sighting the sun. Any bright light in an indoor setting will confuse them. He sought escape. The light drew him. And, sadly, he perished."

  "Better luck next bee," said Remo, who then drew the Master of Sinanju aside and said, "Cover me. I'm going to call Smitty."

  "Do not tell him about the not-bee."

  "Why not?"

  "Because that is my discovery. I do not want you hogging all credit."

  Remo looked at the Master of Sinanju dubiously. "Chiun, the not-bee theory is all yours."

  "See that it is," said Chiun, who then turned his attention to the shambles that was the office.

  As Remo slipped out the door, the Master of Sinanju was poking about the room with all the focused concentration of an Asian Sherlock Holmes, searching for clues while Tammy piped up with a question.

  "How can bees have sex? Don't their stingers get in the way?"

  Wurmlinger's voice brightened with interest.

  "The male bee," he said, "invariably dies in the act of procreation."

  "Cool beans," said Tammy.

  Chapter 14

  Dr. Harold W. Smith was a logical man. He lived in a world that, despite testing his sense of order, ultimately made sense. Or, sense could be made out of it.

  Smith had grown up during the Great Depression, although to a family of means. It had been a dark time, and Smith hadn't escaped the meanness and frugality. Nor had the following decade, with its global war, been any better. Nor had the 1950s and the Cold War been a golden age, as some nostalgic writers liked to purport.

  But in retrospect, all of those times made sense to Smith. He first began to notice the world going out of kilter in the early 1960s. Over the course of that decade, things began to shift. At first, it was subtle. Much of it eluded him for a long time.

  Then one day, during the Vietnam conflict, Smith was watching the television, and nothing he saw made sense. Not the long-haired, bearded protesters trying to levitate the Pentagon with the dubious power of their minds. Not the smug politicians determined to prosecute an undeclared war with doubtful aims. Not the veterans of a prior Asian war, still scarred by conflict, yet willing to encourage a new generation to follow a doomed path.

  Eventually, he adjusted. Not easily. After a while, Harold Smith came to a realization that helped his peace of mind. And it was this: any man blessed with sufficient years will ultimately outlive his time.

  Smith's time had been the era of big bands and patriotism. He had had the misfortune-or the luck-to outlive the comfortable social context of his formative years.

  Still, he liked for things to be logical.

  Smith was having trouble following Remo's telephone report. Maybe it was because he had just received a wire-service report that the publisher of the Sacramento Bee in California had succumbed to a bee sting. There were no other details, only that the man had been found in his office dead. It was a very bizarre coincidence. But Smith had dismissed it as just that-coincidence.

  And now Remo was telling him things that cast doubt on that very logical conclusion.

  "We lost another coroner," Remo was saying.

  "I know."

  "No, I think you're a coroner behind."

  "I understand that the medical examiner who performed the autopsy on the medical examiner who autopsied Doyal T. Rand has died," Smith said.

  "That was a medical examiner. I'm talking coroners now."

  "Remo, where are you?"

  "L.A."

  "Where Dr. Nozoki succumbed to a bee sting," said Smith.

  "That was yesterday's news. Today's news is that the guy who took over his job bought it, too. A killer bee got him."

  "Are you saying that another coroner has died mysteriously?"

  "Nothing mysterious about it, Smitty," Remo said patiently. "We came in just after it happened. A bee got him. Then it attacked a cameraman and then it attacked a dip of a TV reporter named Tammy Terrill. But she survived. Then it got Dr. Krombold. He's dead. It tried to get us, too."

  "A killer bee, you say?"

  "No, that's what Tammy says. Chiun says it's a not-bee."

  "A what?"

  "Uh-oh. I wasn't supposed to say that. It's Chiun's big secret. He called it a not-bee. In other words, it ain't a bee. And you didn't hear that from me."

  "If it is not a bee, what is it?"

  "Wurmlinger says it was a garden-variety drone honey bee. But we saw it sting one guy to death, so that can't be."

  "Why can't it be a drone, Remo?" asked Smith, struggling to follow Remo's illogic.

  "To bee or not to bee," said Remo.

  "Excuse me?"

  "Nothing. According to Wurmlinger, who was with us the entire time, drone bees can't sting. They don't have the equipment. Therefore, it's not a killer bee. But it had these weird markings on its back, kinda like a death's-head."

  "There is a moth called the death's-head moth, but it is not poisonous in any way," Smith said slowly.

  "Well, I saw the world's only death's-head bee, and it's vicious as a pit bull with wings."

  "I am very confused, Remo," Smith confessed.

  "Join the club."

  "Who is Dr. Wurmlinger? Another coroner?"

  "No. He's an etymologist."

  "You mean an entomologist."

  "Whatever a bug expert is, that's him. He's looking into the bee deaths. He says the bee that was trying to kill us isn't a killer bee. But we saw it kill. In fact, it tried to murder us all before it committed suicide."

  "Bees do not commit suicide," Smith said flatly.

  "I agree with you there. But Chiun swears it did. We had it trapped on the floor, and it ran into a hot electrical bulb and went blooie!"

  "It was probably attracted to the bulb. Sometimes bees mistake ordinary ceiling lights for the sun and fly into them repeatedly."

  "This one only got one shot. And that's what Wurmlinger was saying. It mistook the bulb for the sun. Only it bothers him that it went straight for it. Bees are supposed to bumble. Or meander or something. They don't do straight lines."

  "The bee made a beeline for the bulb," said Smith.

  Remo's puzzled voice brightened. "That's right. They do call it a beeline, don't they?"

  "They do." Smith was tapping the rubber end of a yellow No. 2 pencil on his desk absently. "Remo, how did Wurmlinger escape the bee's attack?"

  "Good question. While we were here, the bee never bothered him."

  "That seems strange."

  "Well, he's a bug expert. Maybe he wears Deet instead of Mennen Skin Bracer."

  "Let me look Wurmlinger up."

  "Feel free. He and Chiun were busy arguing about bees."

  Smith input the name "Wurmlinger," and up came a series of newspaper and magazine articles on Wurmlinger and his works.

  "Helwig X. Wurmlinger is chief apiculturalist at the USDA's Bee Research Laboratory at Beltsville, Maryland. He specializes in pests, particularly the African killer bee. He has done significant work in the field of insect genetics. The man has a reputation for eccentricity," Smith reported.

  "You ask me, he looks like he crawled out from under a rotten log."

  "Excuse me?"

  "Buggy. He's definitely buggy."

  "He maintains a private laboratory in Maryland. You say he is still there in Los Angeles?"

  "Yeah, they called him in over those restaurant poisonings."

  "While he is preoccupied, go look at his lab."

  "Why?"

  "Beca
use," said Harold W. Smith, "he is telling you that a stingless bee is responsible for a new string of stinging deaths. Wurmlinger is one of the nation's leading apiculturists. He cannot easily be wrong. Perhaps he is deliberately misleading you."

  "You mean he's involved in this?"

  "It is possible."

  "What's possible?"

  "That Dr. Wurmlinger is some new kind of serial killer."

  "A serial killer who kills with bees?"

  "We know that bee stings are implicated in every death in the present chain of deaths, although in the case of Doyal T. Rand, it's far less straightforward."

  "And we don't know that a bee didn't do him," Remo said.

  "No bee could devour a man's brains and eyes."

  Smith gave Remo the address of Dr. Wurmlinger's laboratory near Washington, D.C.

  "Be careful," Smith admonished. "You and Chiun are not immune to bee stings."

  "I'll bee seeing you," said Remo.

  When the line went dead, Smith took another look at the report out of Sacramento. The publisher of the Sacramento Bee, Lyndon D'Arcy, had been found dead at his desk. There was no obvious cause of death, but a bee had been discovered flying around his office. Once the door had been opened, the bee had flown out.

  There was no description of the suspect bee.

  Smith wondered if it might have been a bumblebee and set about looking into it.

  As he worked, he wondered if perhaps he shouldn't have sent Remo and Chiun to Sacramento, especially since they were already in California. Too late now.

  WHEN REMO FOUND the Master of Sinanju, Chiun was arguing with Wurmlinger over something clutched tightly in his old-ivory-and-bone fist.

  "I demand you surrender that to me," Wurmlinger was saying in an agitated voice.

  Chiun presented his back to the tall entomologist. "I found it. It is mine."

  "You have no right, no authority to keep it. I am here in an official capacity, at the behest of the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office."

  "Finders keepers," intoned Chiun.

  "What is it now?" asked Remo.

  Hearing this, Chiun moved to Remo's side. "Tell this elongated cretin that he has no right to what is not his."

  "Okay. What's going on here?" Remo demanded.

  Wurmlinger pointed a shaking-with-rage forefinger in the old Korean's direction. "He has confiscated evidence in a crime," he spluttered.