Father to Son td-129

by Warren Murphy

  His greatest fear was that he would falter. That he would somehow tip his hand.

  "In no circumstance have I ever been nervous. Not in my entire career," Sevigne had said one lazy summer evening in the gazebo of Dilkes's Zimbabwe ranch.

  The two men sat with their brandies and watched the African sky burn away to smoldering ash.

  "But these men from Sinanju," Sevigne continued, shaking his head in awe. He took a deep, thoughtful breath. "There was a young American performer a few years back. He wanted nothing more than to sing in front of his idol, Frank Sinatra. It was his lifelong dream. If and when the moment came, he thought it would be magical. He became successful and, as fate would have it, ended up performing on a stage in front of Sinatra. It was not a magical night, Benson. He forgot the words. He stumbled, he stammered. He made a nervous fool of himself. That is my greatest fear. I am not afraid of meeting the men from Sinanju. I am afraid I will make a fool out of myself when I do."

  Dilkes had dragged on his pipe, blowing a lazy smoke ring to the warm gazebo ceiling.

  "Your fear is misplaced," he warned. "Fear them, and not what you'll do to embarrass yourself in your dying moments. Because if this legend comes to pass and we're all forced to meet them, there's no doubt that they will be your dying moments."

  In the end Dilkes was right.

  Jean-Pierre had tried being clever. But all clever got him was a belly full of acid and a thumbtack stuck in a shopworn corkboard map.

  The futility of cleverness had already been proved to Dilkes months ago. Olivier Hahn had been particularly clever. The high-tech Swiss assassin was a Dilkes protege. For a time he was like a son to Benson Dilkes. The younger man loved to build elaborate traps for his prey.

  Hahn's thumbtack was stuck in the Swiss Alps where his frozen body had been discovered in a remote cabin.

  Clumsy, low-tech didn't seem to have an effect, either.

  Dilkes had gotten a report out of London a few hours after England's two Source agents were killed. A third body. Killed by an explosion over the Thames.

  Although most of the thorax had been blown open, the head and one hand had stayed intact. They had landed on the deck of a pleasure boat. The police had identified the dead man as Amwala Mohtat, an Afghan national.

  Dilkes went to his computer. He found Mohtat in his detailed files of the shadow world. At the moment, there was no confirmation from his sources that this had to do with the contest. None was needed for Benson Dilkes. He just knew.

  Another thumbtack. This one in the Thames River. Four dead in a matter of hours.

  Still standing at the Europe map, Benson Dilkes suddenly wondered if he had enough thumbtacks. He might have to run out to an office-supply store to pick up some more.

  He glanced absently over at the nightstand where the open case of tacks sat. It was only then that he noticed the man standing in the bedroom with him.

  A sliver of shock. Quickly overtaken by instinct honed from years of experience.

  Dilkes didn't panic, didn't run. His gun was on his bureau.

  Duck, slide, grab. Out of a crouch, his fingers closed around the butt of the automatic. Spin. The gun was up. Smoothly, efficiently. Aimed squarely at the narrow chest of the small man who stood in his bedroom doorway.

  "How did you get in here?" Dilkes demanded. The man in the black business suit didn't react to the gun. His eyes remained locked on those of Benson Dilkes. A spider eyeing a twitching fly.

  "Your defenses are elaborate," the intruder admitted. "However, doors are made to be opened. If there is a right way and a wrong way, one merely has to use the right way."

  If Dilkes was the sort of man who made mistakes, he would have been racking his brain to think of what he did wrong.

  Maybe he left the door ajar, maybe he hadn't flipped the switch when he came home, maybe he hadn't wired the damn thing up right. But the door had been wired perfectly, he had closed it tight and he had made certain to reset the charges when he entered the apartment.

  This man couldn't be here. Yet here he was. And that face. It couldn't be.

  Benson Dilkes began to get a terrible sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. His bowels turned to water.

  The stranger seemed to sense his apprehension. "Yes," the intruder said, nodding. "You are wise, Benson Dilkes. You understand that all doors yield to me."

  It was true. It had to be.

  Benson Dilkes was shaking. He lowered his gun. If he was right, it was pointless to even try to aim it. "Are you-?" Dilkes began weakly. "That is, who are-? I thought you were ...older. "

  The intruder smiled a smile devoid of warmth. His hazel eyes remained as flat and lifeless as his Asian face.

  "I am what you think I am, yet not who," he said. "Names are but air formed by lips that inevitably turn to dust. They are fleeting, forgotten things. However, if you must call me something-" the Asian smiled, this time with wicked pleasure "-you may call me Nuihc."

  Chapter 15

  Mark Howard was waiting anxiously by the window when he finally spied Dr. Smith's station wagon turning through Folcroft's main gates. Mark rushed down to the fire doors. When the CURE director came hustling upstairs a few moments later, his office keys were already in hand.

  Smith didn't stop. "Did you trace the call?" he demanded as he hurried down the hall.

  "Yes," Howard said, falling in beside his employer. "You were right."

  Nodding crisply, Smith ducked into his office suite. Mrs. Mikulka's desk was empty.

  "You are certain it was Chiun's number in Sinanju?" Smith asked as he unlocked the inner door, ushering his young assistant into his Spartan office.

  "Double-checked," Mark said. "It was his. A clean line. No one tapped it. How did you know?"

  "This is not without precedent," Smith explained. He shut the door tightly and hurried across the room, settling in his cracked leather chair. He booted up his computer.

  "Should I have called back?"

  "No, I'll handle this," Smith insisted.

  Mark sighed relief. "Just as well," he said, taking up a post beside Smith's desk from where he could better see the canted monitor. "It sounded like she didn't speak English. I couldn't understand a word she was saying."

  "That in itself is odd," Smith said. "Not the fact that you couldn't understand the language, but that it was a woman. I was led to understand that Chiun's caretaker is the only individual with access to the village phone line."

  "She sounded like she was in hysterics," Howard said.

  Frowning, the CURE director attacked his keyboard with certain hands. Amber letters burst soft in the trailing wake of his drumming fingers.

  "After we spoke I tried tracking down Remo and Chiun," Howard offered as Smith typed, "but they're missing in action right now. Remo used his Visa card at a restaurant about two hours ago." He snapped his fingers. "Oh, I forgot. The French assassin is gone."

  "That isn't unexpected," Smith said as he worked. "Master Chiun told me that this trial Remo is undergoing is merely a formality. Historically there is no real risk to the Apprentice Master of Sinanju. Remo shouldn't have any problems with any of the assassins he is scheduled to meet. It is more a demonstration of technique to potential employers, as well as a reminder that Sinanju is in the world. It is also a nuisance I could do without at this point in my life. But I learned many years ago the futility of arguing with the Master of Sinanju. As long as their activities remain below the world's radar, that is the best I can hope for." He finished typing. "There, we're tied in."

  He picked up the blue contact phone. It was the line Remo used to call in. There was no dial on the phone. That didn't matter. The moment he picked up the receiver, the CURE computer was already dialing Chiun's special 800 number.

  The phone rang a dozen times before someone finally picked up. Even away from the phone Mark recognized the desperately wailing woman.

  "Hello," Smith said. "Master Chiun is not available at the moment. Is there something wrong?" There wa
s more crying, more babbling. As the woman spoke, Smith eyed his computer.

  "I'm sorry, I don't understand," the CURE director said. He spoke slowly and loudly, knowing full well the futility of doing so for the benefit of a person who obviously spoke no English. "May I speak with Master Chiun's caretaker? Please put Pullyang on the phone. Pullyang."

  This drew a reaction from the woman. The crying turned into shrieks of agony. The woman wailed as if in pain for a few minutes, shouting her anguish into the phone, before hanging up amid a series of pitiful sobs.

  Smith quickly cradled the phone. Spinning back to his computer, he tapped a few keys and then leaned back.

  "I tapped the line and dumped her voice directly into the mainframes," he explained. "The translation will not be perfect, but we should at least see-"

  The computer beeped and a window opened. Through narrowing eyes, Smith scanned the text. As he read, his lips thinned to razor slits of tight concern.

  When he was finished, he leaned back in his chair. Mark Howard was still scanning the monitor, absorbing the data.

  "Am I reading this right?" Howard asked. "This looks like she was saying her father was murdered."

  "Apparently she is Pullyang's daughter," Smith said, his voice perfectly even. He adjusted his wireless glasses. "The mainframes are unable to translate all of the dialect peculiar to Sinanju, but that would seem to be the reason for both her calling here and for her emotional state."

  "Wow," Mark said, shaking his head slowly. "This isn't going to sit well with Chiun. He must have told me a hundred times how the village is safe because of him. And this was the guy he trusted to watch his stuff? I'd hate to be in the shoes of whoever did it."

  Smith could not disagree with his assistant's assessment. On a few occasions over the years Sinanju had been vexed by outside forces, invariably involving meddling by representatives of the Communist North Korean government. Since Pullyang was in charge of keeping watch over Chiun's treasure, Smith wondered if yet another North Korean agent had allowed greed to overcome wisdom.

  The other option was a murderer among the citizens of Sinanju itself. To Smith's knowledge in the thirty years he'd known the Master of Sinanju there had not been a murder in the tiny fishing village on the West Korean Bay.

  There was no doubt about one thing. This crossed a line none before had ever dared venture past.

  "So what do we do?" Mark asked. "Chiun doesn't know. Do we let them finish what they're doing before we tell him?"

  Smith released a sigh that was a mixture of bile and burned meat loaf.

  "It would be easier," he admitted. "Certainly this is a complication none of us needs. With Remo and Chiun already skipping around the world for the Time of Succession, their activities are already too close to public. A rage-fueled vendetta on the part of the Master of Sinanju possibly directed against the North Korean government is not something I would like to see added to the mix right now."

  "So we don't tell him," Howard said.

  Smith shook his head. He offered something that might have started as a weary laugh but came out a tired moan.

  "The only option worse than telling him would be to keep the knowledge from him." Smith sighed. Rolling his chair firmly into the desk foot well, the CURE director stretched his hands to his keyboard.

  REMO CAUGHT UP to the Master of Sinanju on the steps of Czar Alexis's dingy French apartment building.

  "What's wrong?" he asked, bounding down the stairs.

  "I must think," Chiun replied tersely. He swept across the sidewalk to their waiting taxi.

  "This can't be because of that Russian stink machine in the black bathrobe," Remo insisted. "Chiun, don't let him rattle you. I saw better hustlers than him rigging three-card-monte games on Coney Island when I was a kid."

  But the Master of Sinanju didn't respond. He flung the rear door open and slipped into the cab. Remo hopped in beside him as the old man was barking orders at the cabbie.

  "A little bad breath and mood lighting and you're running like French cheese?" Remo asked as the cab drew away from the curb. "That's not like you." The Master of Sinanju shot him a dark glance.

  "Did you not hear the words of the wicked monk?" he snapped.

  "See? There's my problem. If you'd said good monk, or happy monk or goddamn Dopey, Doc or Grumpy monk, I might put some stock in what he had to say. As it is, I listen to wicked monks about as much as I listen to crack-smoking mullahs."

  "You would be wise to heed the words of this one," Chiun insisted. "He has been bestowed a gift, imparted to him by the dark forces with which he is aligned. My father knew well of him. The monk sees the future."

  The words were said with such gravity that Remo dared not disagree.

  "Okay, so he's a fortune-teller. So what? If he wanted to impress me, he'd predict himself a bar of soap."

  "Do you not have eyes?" Chiun demanded. "Explain to me what just happened in that apartment." Shrugging exhausted surrender, Remo dropped his hands to his knees.

  "I don't know, Little Father. I really don't. Maybe it was trick lighting. Maybe it was something more. Maybe you rigged it all somehow just to pull my leg. If you want to know the God's honest truth, whenever this sort of stuff happens I do my damnedest not to think about it."

  "Is that what I have trained? A gangly legged ostrich with his big, dumb head stuffed in the ground? Have you seen nothing in your years as my apprentice? By now you should know well that there are forces at work in the universe that are beyond the comprehension of mere mortals. Apparently for ostrich you, that is doubly true."

  "Fine," Remo said. "You want to know what I saw? I saw exactly what you did. Which is to say I don't know what the hell I saw. A hundred-year-old crown prince who looks like he's late for gym class and a Svengali monk who can Casper his way in and out of rooms. So I accept it. There. And he can tell the future. So what did he say? Watch out for the night and watch out for the day. What's that supposed to mean other than typical ambiguous fortune-telling gibberish?"

  "He told us to beware the false night and day," the Master of Sinanju insisted.

  "Okay, so what does that mean?"

  "I don't know. But we must further beware of the hand that reaches from the grave. Darkness comes from the cold sea. For both of us, for he said Masters of Sinanju."

  "Are you telling me you bought into that bullshit about someone being alive who was dead?"

  "It seems unlikely," Chiun replied. "While the secret to true necromancy was supposed to be known to the priests of ancient Egypt, it was lost many years ago."

  "I know necro is dead. Who the hell's Nancy?"

  The old Korean gave a withering look. "It is the raising of the dead, numskull."

  "I hate to break it to you, Little Father, but if the world starts vomiting up the living dead at us, it won't exactly limit either one of us. We've been tossing bad guys overboard to the sharks for more years than I like to think about. And there's a whole slew of dead chambermaids and bellboys who got in the way of your TV over the years. Not to mention ex-girlfriends, pissed-off gods and the occasional poor slob who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. If we've got some oogidy-boogidy from the great beyond stalking us, he's going to have to take a number. "

  "It does not necessarily mean direct involvement by someone either of us has dispatched," Chiun said, stroking his thread of a beard with slender fingers. "Maybe it means a trap an enemy set before we delivered them to the Void."

  "Like what?" Remo asked.

  Chiun's wrinkled forehead creased. "I do not know," he admitted. "But he said that we are already stalked by death. Whatever it is may already be out there."

  "Could be he's just talking about the Time of Succession," Remo suggested, hating the fact that he was being drawn into the demented monk's predictions. "We've got hit men already hiding behind every mailbox."

  "Perhaps," Chiun said. He did not sound convinced.

  Remo could see that his teacher was deeply disturbed. He t
ouched the old man's shoulder.

  "Hey, don't worry, Little Father," he said, his tone reassuring. "I don't put as much faith in Raspoopin as you do, but we've gone up against worse prophecies before and we're both still here to tell the tale. Let the world throw whatever it's got at us. We'll come out fine. I promise."

  Chiun looked deep in his pupil's open, confident face.

  Still so much a child. The boy had come to the edge, yet still had so much to learn.

  Chiun knew. His father had told him. The monk was gifted. The monk was never wrong. And according to his words, two Masters of Sinanju were destined to die. Master and student, father and son.

  Remo and Chiun.

  Sitting in the back of the Parisian taxi, the old Korean studied the innocent, smiling face of the man he had trained. The man who was going to die. His son.

  Grief overtook him. As Remo smiled, Chiun gave a brief nod, quickly turning away.

  As Remo settled in for the cab ride, the old Korean stared out the window at the passing Paris lights.

  Chapter 16

  Benson Dilkes was certain he was a dead man.

  He had been driven from comfortable retirement in Africa, hired to kill the next Sinanju Master by a man he had met only once and came back to the world he had fled for a contest that was as unwinnable as it was unavoidable. As far as he was concerned, his fate was already sealed.

  But when the small Korean standing in the bedroom of his Boca Raton apartment did not make a move toward him, Dilkes began to get a new sense. It was the name that finally did it. When the man mentioned his name, Benson Dilkes dropped his handgun to the carpet.

  "Did you say Nuihc?" Dilkes breathed.

  "There is nothing wrong with your hearing, Benson Dilkes," replied the Korean in the black business suit.

  Dilkes's palms were sweating. He could feel the prickly sensation. Dilkes rarely perspired. Most days it took him an hour of kneeling out under the blazing hot sun in his rose garden back in Zimbabwe to even break a sweat.

  Dilkes swallowed. "Forgive me, but the Master of Sinanju once had a pupil named Nuihc. I heard of him because, unworthy as I am, I traveled in some of the same circles as he did. Not that I was ever deserving to do so." He paused, heart racing. "Are you him?"