Remo hadn't been aware the samurai was coming at him until he emerged from the door.
He popped from the blank door like a black soap bubble, landed in a crouch and came clumsily to his feet.
His katana was sheathed. Over his shoulder was slung a black leather bag, which hung heavy under the weight of its contents.
It was broad daylight, so everyone got a good look. The sun gleamed on his black plates, made the ornate helmet smoulder and most unnervingly of all, showed very clearly that the samurai had no face.
"Mercy!" said K.C., who started backing away. A dozen steps later, she turned and ran.
Remo moved in on the samurai. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Chiun flitting in from another angle.
They intercepted the apparition at the same time.
The ronin had no chance to draw his blade. Remo and Chiun were on him.
They each threw a blow, Remo directing the heel of his hand at the flat, blank face, intending to turn it to jelly. The Master of Sinanju came around spinning, one sandaled toe seeking a fragile kneecap.
Both connected. Remo struck the featureless face dead center. Chiun's foot bisected the knee joints. And passed through.
Encountering no resistance, Remo found himself plunging through the black, solid-looking form.
The Master of Sinanju spun past him, his flashing toe nearly catching Remo on the fly.
Recovering, Remo reversed. He brought an elbow back. It sank into the back of the samurai's flanged helmet.
The ronin strode on unconcerned.
Hissing like an angry cat, the Master of Sinanju recovered from his wild spin and stamped his feet hard. "Ronin! Hear me!"
The ronin may have heard, but he walked on, arrogant, purposeful, sword flashing from its sheath. He waved it from side to side to warn any other challenger he meant business. He looked like a batter warming up.
Major Grimm thought he was seeing things. But it had happened so fast he couldn't be sure. Appropriating an M-16 from a stupefied airman, he lined up the muzzle on the samurai's advancing chest. "Halt or I will shoot."
The samurai declined to halt. Or so his body language indicated.
So Major Grimm opened up.
The bullet track was noisy but abbreviated. There was no way he could have missed.
In fact, the boxcar directly behind the menacing figure began collecting more bullet indentations.
The samurai kept coming, unfazed by the noise and the hammering lead.
"Hand me another," Grimm called.
Another rifle was clapped into his hands. He raised the weapon, planted his feet wide apart and laid the sight on the precise center of the shielded face.
Grimm waited until they stood nearly toe-to-toe, then opened fire. The clip was only half-full. Still, sufficient rounds snarled out to obliterate the head, helmet and all.
The samurai walked into the still-chattering muzzle. Major Claiborne Grimm saw the last muzzleflashes disappear into the black face. The muzzle sank all the way in as the samurai came on. It looked as if he was deliberately and contemptuously swallowing the weapon.
Major Grimm was brave. Not to mention stubborn. He held his ground. Right to the point when the samurai walked into his body.
Then he fainted on the spot.
Grimm missed the rest of it.
Remo and Chiun got in front of the ronin, once more blocking its way.
They rained blows, punches, snap-kicks and, in the case of the Master of Sinanju, assorted invective on his unperturbable head.
The ronin didn't so much as flinch from any of it. He just walked on, swinging his blade with slow menace.
Chiun followed him, kicking at the back of his knees with strenuous fierceness, while Remo settled for taking the occasional swipe.
"You know what this reminds me of?" Remo complained.
"I do not care," said Chiun, kicking out again and again.
"Wonder what's in that sack?" said Remo.
"It is a kubi-bukuro. It is for carrying captured heads."
"Looks full to me."
"Just take care that your head does not join his collection," spit Chiun, shaking his fists in the ronin's glassy face.
The ronin trudged on, head lowered like a striding bull.
Eventually they had to give up trying to arrest him.
WALKING BEHIND the ronin, Remo and Chiun lowered their voices.
"You see, Remo?"
"Okay. It's just like you said."
"The House is haunted."
"If the House is haunted, why is he walking away from us?"
"That is not the question. The question is where is the Nihonjinwa walking to?"
The answer developed before very long. The ronin, ignoring them with a pointedness bordering on insult, swinging his blade from side to side, looked east, then west. He was looking for something.
But all that lay ahead was the still-smoldering MX missile and the unending cornfields of Nebraska.
"This is starting to look like Field of Dreams in reverse," said Remo.
"What do you mean?" demanded Chiun.
"Once he gets into the corn, he's going to be tough to stay with."
Chiun hitched up his kimono skirts resolutely. "We cannot let him get into the corn."
"Any idea how to stop him?"
"We must draw him into battle."
"Feel free."
Suddenly the Master of Sinanju hurried up. He got in front of the ronin. Blocking the way, he set his hands against the waist of his kimono and made his face fierce.
"Jokebare!" he thundered.
The ronin slowed.
"Jokebare!" Chiun repeated, then launched into a bitter stream of invective Remo had trouble following. Some of the words sounded vaguely Korean, but most did not. Probably Japanese, he decided. The two languages shared a lot of words in common.
To Remo's surprise, the ronin stopped dead in his tracks.
He stamped one foot into the ground. The ground didn't respond. Not with sound or a trembling of dirt.
Lifting his katana high, he laid it across one shoulder, then the other.
"What's he doing?" called Remo.
"I do not know," Chiun said, low-voiced. "I am not familiar with this stance."
"Well, he's gotta be doing something."
The ronin was. On his third draw back, he suddenly swung his blade all the way around. His squat upper body turned with it. When he let go, the katana unexpectedly flew toward Remo.
Remo's eyes saw it coming. His other senses detected nothing. It flew fast, going into a methodical spin like a helicopter blade winding up.
"Remo! Take care!" Chiun called.
Normally Remo could dodge bullets blindfolded by sensing the advancing shock waves. There was no wave here. According to his senses, the sword didn't exist. But his eyes read it coming. His Sinanju training, receiving conflicting signals, told him to dodge and not dodge at the same time.
Since to his heightened senses, it was all happening in slow motion anyway, Remo studied the phenomenon.
The blade was coming on a horizontal spin, exactly at the level of his neck. It meant to behead. But a blade that could not slice air had no hope of cleaving flesh.
Remo folded his arms.
The blade spun closer.
Chiun voice was a high, batlike squeak. "Remo! Remember the finger!"
So Remo flipped the ronin the bird.
The spinning blade was only inches away now.
At the last possible moment, something changed. The air roiled not an inch from his face. A swishing sound reached his ears. Strangely it started in midswish.
And as the first warning signals reached his brain, Remo started to duck. It was pure instinct. He was going down before his brain started processing the incoming information.
A meaty smack sounded just above his head.
That was Remo's first indication that the blade had struck something.
But what?
Fading back and to the side
, Remo straightened.
There stood the Master of Sinanju. He was holding the katana by its ebony hilt. His other hand joined the first, and he lowered the blade resolutely.
Remo blinked. "What happened?"
"I saved your worthless life."
"No way. I had already ducked."
"I arrested the blade before it could separate your dull melon of a head from the magnificent body I have trained."
"Not a chance," Remo said, returning Chiun's side.
The Master of Sinanju held the blade firmly in both hands, the blade tip touching the ground, making a dent. It was real. It had weight.
Then they remembered the ronin. Remo and Chiun turned their heads in unison.
A vile greenish black smoke was boiling out of the downed missile. The flames were dying down, but the smoke was thickening. It rose into the sky like a black dragon in the throes of its death torment.
The surrounding flatlands were hazy with chemical smoke. The wind was blowing away from them, but the haze in the air started to sting their eyes anyway.
There was no sign of the ronin anywhere in the haze.
"He's in the corn," said Remo.
"No, he walked into the fire," insisted Chiun.
"Why would he do that?"
"Because he can with impunity," said Chiun.
They ran to the burning MX missile.
"No tracks that I can see," said Remo as they approached.
"Of course not. Ghosts do not make tracks. Except when they wish for devious purposes."
"If he's a ghost, shouldn't his blade be a ghost, too?"
"Do not split hairs with me, Remo. We must find him."
They didn't.
The poisonous smoke from the destroyed MX missile prevented them from getting too close. Moving upwind, they examined it from every angle with searching eyes.
If the ronin had walked into the smoking missile, there was no way to tell.
"I say we try the corn," said Remo.
"One of us must stay to see that he does not emerge from the smoke."
"I'll go."
"No, you will only gorge yourself on corn."
"Okay, you go."
"Yes, I will go. See that he does not not escape under your very nose."
And Chiun flashed into the corn.
Remo watched the smoking missile, one eye on the corn.
The tall ears waved in a soft breeze but otherwise didn't move or rustle. Chiun was slipping through the rows with such stealth the ronin would never see or hear him coming.
THE MASTER of SINANJU plunged into the lurid forest of corn. Its scent called to him. Its golden allure whispered of forbidden pleasures. He ignored them all. He had one goal, one purpose.
Unfortunately he also faced many paths. North or south? Perhaps west. His hazel eyes raking the ground discovered no tracks. His ears heard nothing of his foe. And the only scent on the wind was the maddening reek of uncooked corn, which swayed like brazen harlots with long yellow hair.
In the end it was the overwhelming numbers, not his illusive foe, that defeated him. Holding his nose, he raced through the cornrows back in the direction he had come.
AFTER FIFTEEN MINUTES, the Master of Sinanju emerged, looking unhappy.
"No luck?" Remo asked.
"Luck has nothing to do with what has happened in this riceless land," Chiun spit. "He is not in the corn."
"In other words, you lost him."
"Pah! My senses were dazzled by the malevolent miasma of raw corn."
By this time Melvis Cupper trotted up. "I seen it all and I deny it ever happened," were his first words.
Remo looked at him. "You're a big help."
"It ain't my idea. That major woke up and said that was the way it was going to play. I see no reason not to oblige him."
"You know as well as we do that a samurai caused both train wrecks."
"I don't know what you're talkin' about. I got only one wreck. This here's a haz-mat situation. No derailment. No striking train. No cars in a ditch."
"What about the missile?"
"I don't do missiles. I'm strictly a high-iron-and-steel-wheel man." Melvis lowered his voice. "Somebody should drop a dime in the general direction of the EPA, though."
"So what are you going to report caused the Amtrak collision?"
"That? That was suicide. Yessir, naked suicide."
"Homicide is more like it," said Remo.
Melvis puckered up his weather-beaten face. "Tell you what. We'll split the difference. Let's say for the sake of sayin' there was these two sexually confused persons. One gave the other AIDS. The infected party takes the head off the party of the second part and then goes out in a blaze of diesel and glory. End result-homo-suicide."
"That's bull and you know it," said Remo.
Melvis put on a crooked grin. "You knew I was weak from the first time you laid eyes on me."
Chapter 20
They waited until the MX Peacekeeper missile burned itself out.
A cursory examination of the white-hot slag heap that remained led to one inescapable conclusion.
"Looks like he went into the corn after all," said Remo.
"Pah," said Chiun.
The Master of Sinanju paced back and forth before the slag, face tight, eyes squeezed to slits that reminded Remo of the seams of uncracked walnuts. He shook his fists at the ascending smoke.
"We're going to have to report this to Smitty," he reminded.
"I do not care."
"We're going to have to get our stories straight."
Chiun frowned like a thundercloud getting ready to rain. "I no longer care. I have been twice bested by a mere ronin. My ancestors are surely weeping tears of blood over my shame."
K. C. CROCKETT WAS waiting for them at the helicopter. She gave them a nervous corn-fed smile as they approached.
"Thought I'd guard your box for you," she said sheepishly.
Chiun bowed in her direction without saying anything.
"You didn't catch your spook, did you?" she asked.
"No," said Melvis. "It was the durnest, dangest, most spiflicated thing you ever did see. And I take my hat off to the Almighty that I don't have to write it into any report."
"Just as well. It ain't good to catch spooks."
"We're going to need a lift back to Lincoln," Remo told Melvis.
"Suits me fine." Melvis showed K.C. his Sunday smile. "Don't suppose I could interest you in a ride goin' my way?"
"Thank you kindly, but I'm bound in the opposite direction. The Denver Rail Expo awaits."
"I might be persuaded to fly thataway. Eventually."
"Mighty neighborly of you. If I don't get a passel of pictures for my magazine, it's back to the farm for me."
"Gonna shoot a lot of steam, are you?"
"That, too. But my assignment's to get all I can on the new flock of maglev trains."
Without warning, Melvis staggered back as if hit on the head by a falling steer. "Maglev!" he barked. "Why you have to go fool with that heathen crap?"
"Maglev's not crap!" K.C. flared. "It's the future."
"In a pig's ass!" Melvis roared. "How can you be for steam and maglev both? It's like prayin' to Satan and St. Peter."
"You are a close-minded old reprobate, you know that?"
The two glared at one another. There was blood in Melvis's eyes and disappointment in K.C.'s.
"Guess I can forget about that lift, huh?" K.C. finally said in a soft, dejected voice.
Melvis looked as though he wanted to bawl. He squared his shoulders manfully. He yanked down the brim of his Stetson to shadow the pain in his eyes.
"I'm a steel-wheel man. I don't hold with maglev. It's against the laws of God, man and nature. I'm sorry, but you and I have got to go our separate and distinct ways."
"Guess it wasn't meant to be. I'll just hafta hitch a ride on that there Desert Storm train."
"Adios, then," muttered Melvis, turning away.
"See y'all," K.
C. said to Remo and Chiun. Pulling the bill of her engineer's cap low, she loped off, shoulders slumping.
Walking back to the helicopter, Remo asked Melvis, "What was that all about?"
"That," spit Melvis, "is the chief reason Hank Williams sung so lonesome and died so young. And if you don't mind, I can't talk about it no more. I'm plumb heartbroke."
Glancing back at the Master of Sinanju for understanding, Remo saw Chiun brush a vagrant tear from the corner of one eye before averting his unhappy face.
HAROLD SMITH was feeling better. He no longer smelled mulch when he exhaled. His coughing had almost abated. He had traded the hospital wheelchair for his comfortable executive chair. And his secretary had brought him two containers of his favorite lunch-prune-whip yogurt.
He was deep into the second cup when his computer beeped, and up popped a report of a head-on collision between the California Zephyr and an unidentified engine in the Nebraska flatlands.
Smith read the report, instantly categorizing it. It looked like a serious accident. He captured the report and added it to his lengthening Amtrak file.
The file was quite extensive now. He had been analyzing it all morning. The train crashes and derailments over the past three years were almost evenly divided between the Amtrak passenger system and the various long-haul and short-line freight railroads. A few tourist and excursion lines had been affected, as well. Even a Philadelphia streetcar line reported an accident.
There was no pattern. No line had been targeted over any other. No one kind of engine bubbled up over any other. It was not equipment failure of the roiling stock. Crew fatigue or negligence was cited with the most regularity, but Smith knew train crews were a convenient NTSB scapegoat. His computers had already crunched the numbers and discounted some twenty percent of those attributions as NTSB laziness and scapegoating. The Oklahoma City cattlecar wreck of last summer and the more recent Southern Pacific disaster at Texarkana proved that.
The yogurt was a fond memory when the blue contact telephone rang, and Smith scooped it up.
"Smitty. Remo."
"What have you learned in Connecticut?"
"Not much. We're in Nebraska. We hitched a ride with our good buddy Melvis, who by the way is full of beans, beer and bull."
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