Prophet Of Doom td-111

by Warren Murphy

  Kaspar laughed. "Just that the race isn't as hot as everyone thinks," he said. "Jackson Cole isn't polling very high, and I have it on good authority that his opponent, T. Rex Calhoun, is about to drop out of the race because of some troubling personal problems." For the first time in his on-camera career, Barry

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  Duke seemed at a loss for words. His office had endured call after call from T. Rex Calhoun on Kaspar's behalf. Calhoun had even managed to get the chairman of his party to put in a call in favor of Kaspar. Duke had been hesitant to put a national nonentity like Kaspar on the air—no matter how influential his friends—until Calhoun's father-in-law had agreed to foot the legal bills for Duke's latest divorce. Now Kaspar was using this forum to turn on the man who had been responsible for helping him step into the national arena.

  "What kind of problems is Calhoun facing?" Duke asked after swallowing his bewilderment.

  "Let me just say that I hope the charges aren't true and leave it at that, okay, Barry?" It was a nod and a wink to the host.

  "Wow!" said Barry Duke, reiterating the interjection he fell back on whenever he couldn't think of anything else to say. "Let's open the phone lines up to callers now. Orvis from Bourbon, Kentucky, you have a question for Mark Kaspar?"

  "Yeah, hi, Barry," the caller began nervously. "I just want to know how soon Mark is going to run for office and where I can sign up to help!"

  "Wowee!" Barry Duke exclaimed, in the hyper-excited manner that looked out of place on his sagging features. "I guess there's one vote for you out there already!"

  Kaspar shook his head. "I only want what the people of America want," he said.

  Apparently the people of America wanted Mark Kaspar.

  Several more callers phoned in their support for a

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  Kaspar candidacy during the show's first segment. While the number of calls coming in to the "Barry Duke Live" switchboard could never be deemed a flood, they were still a good fifty percent higher than most Wednesday nights.

  Barry Duke got the good news through the radio earpiece concealed under a side bulge of his jet black hair. An awkward smile rose up beneath his hawk-like

  nose.

  "One more call before the break. Gus from Houston, Texas, you're next on the line with Mark Kaspar."

  Although he was trying to disguise it, the voice on the line was distinctly Southern, with clipped, nasal tones. The man launched into an attack even before Barry Duke finished speaking.

  "That Kaspar feller is the cheatenist low-down dog that ever crawled on his belly in a flea-filled wagon rut. He is stealin' another man's life right out from under the noses of everyone in the country out there, and you, Barry Duke, are helpin' and aidin' right along in his goldurn act of thievery. Me and my world-class family are shocked, I say, shocked at the shameless-ness of this cheap display."

  Barry Duke's eyes squinted in suspicion under his enormous glasses. "Is this by any chance Moss Monroe?" he asked.

  The caller immediately hung up. "Wow!" said Barry Duke. "I think it's time we took a little break. We'll be back to political prognos-ticator Mark Kaspar right after this."

  Remo snapped off the television in Smith's office. The image of Barry Duke collapsed into a single

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  white dot in the center of the tiny black-and-white screen.

  "I guess we know their game plan," he told Smith.

  Leaving Chiun, Remo had made a beeline for Smith's office. He and the CURE director had watched the "BarnrDuke Live" program with growing concern. ^

  "I am not certain we do," Smith said somberly.

  "The guy is setting himself up to run for President," Remo said, jerking a thumb toward the TV. "I think he made it pretty clear."

  Smith didn't wholly agree. The older man knew that on the Barry Duke talk show, as on most shows of its type, there were very few real surprises. The questions, as well as a sketchy version of the responses, were thrashed out well before airtime. What made Smith sit up and take notice were Kaspar's comments about the Wyoming Senate race. Obviously Kaspar felt he had something pretty damning on senatorial candidate T. Rex Calhoun if he was willing to take the risk of mentioning it on national television. Wordlessly Smith began typing rapidly at his computer keyboard.

  "What was that stuff about the state department?" Remo asked.

  Smith pursed his lips as he continued to type. "I honestly have no idea," he admitted. "Sadly, Kaspar is correct. The assistant-secretary-of-state position is not something most politicians are willing to weigh in on. According to my information, the President has ample votes to place his nominee."

  "Then the guy is just plain schizo," Remo said with a shrug.

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  Smith's sudden intake of air brought Remo to his feet. The old man was peering at his computer, a look of dread on his lemony features.

  "Calhoun was arrested on child-molestation charges three times in the past five years," Smith announced.

  Remo bounded around the desk and quickly scanned the information on the computer screen buried beneath the gleaming black surface. It was a police file from Cheyenne, listing Calhoun's infractions alongside the dates the various charges had been filed. A picture of the candidate himself stared glumly up from the screen.

  "This is a pretty big thing for the press to miss, isn't it?" Remo asked angrily.

  Smith's hands became a blur as his slender fingers dug deeper into the Cheyenne police records.

  "The charges in all three instances were dropped," he announced momentarily. "Calhoun was never brought to trial."

  "I smell a payoff," said Remo.

  Smith nodded as he considered Remo's words. "Calhoun's father-in-law is quite wealthy," he admitted. "It is a plausible scenario."

  "You bet your ass it's plausible," Remo griped. "First the skunk buys his way out of the state penitentiary, and then Daddy runs out and buys him a Senate seat. If Kaspar's got the goods on him, I say we let the chips fall where they land."

  "Remo," Smith interjected, "we mustn't become sidetracked. Our primary concern remains the Truth Church itself. From what I've been able to determine, Kaspar has been directly benefiting from the subsidiary Truth Church account."

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  "It can't possibly help the guy's political aspirations to be hooked up with some nutty doomsday cult," Remo said.

  "There is nothing that directly links Kaspar to the Truth Church," Smith explained. "If it came to it, he could always claim ignorance, saying that his organization accepted payment from individual church members only. But there is no doubt that he is in partnership with Esther Clear-Seer. Perhaps she is engineering this entire political movement of Kaspar's to create an ally in the federal government."

  "Then let me take her out, Smitty," Remo begged. "I'm going out of my mind cooped up here."

  Smith nodded in agreement as he tapped out a few brief commands on his computer. "If it is as I suspect..." he muttered as he awaited the results. "Yes," he said, momentarily. "I've checked with Washington National, and Kaspar is not scheduled to return to Wyoming until the day after tomorrow. We have a window of opportunity with negative press attention in Thermopolis. If you fly into Worland tonight, you can be gone before he returns."

  "What if he's one of the bad guys?" Remo said. "Shouldn't I wait and zap him, too?"

  "We will deal with that when it becomes necessary." Smith paused. He seemed filled with dread by what he was about to ask. "Where is Master Chiun?" he asked finally.

  "He's downstairs sitting on his steamer trunks waiting to catch the next sub to Korea."

  "Er, yes. The submarine."

  Remo raised his hands, palm up. "Don't tell me,

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  Smitty," he warned. "I don't want to know. It's between you and him."

  "Fine," Smith said, relaxing somewhat. "You will fly to Wyoming alone."

  Remo was quietly relieved. Chiun had been acting strangely ever since he had conjured up a thousand-year-old Sinanju legen
d from the malodorous cloud that surrounded Esther Clear-Seer. The old Korean would never have allowed Remo to return to the Truth Church ranch.

  Another part of his mind hoped that the inevitable blowup over the no-show submarine would happen while he was out of town.

  In any event Remo was no longer stuck on the sidelines. And that made him very glad indeed.

  "I'll be back tomorrow with the false Prophetess's noggin on a platter," Remo announced as he left the office.

  Smith started to push himself to his feet, ready to go after Remo, but he stopped in midmovement. If he objected now, it might prompt Remo to follow through on his threat. Reluctantly Smith settled back in his seat, hoping to himself that Remo was only joking about the final resting place of Esther Clear-Seer's head.

  If not, an old coal furnace in the Folcroft basement would become the crematorium for the Prophetess's cranial remains.

  Chapter Fourteen

  "I just talked to Barry Duke's producer, and he says your positive-phone-reaction ratio was eighty-five percent. They're telling me that Moss Monroe's the only one who ever came close to touching those numbers." Michael Princippi was more excited than he had been the first time he and Kiki had gone "all the way" in the tiny back seat of his Volkswagen Beetle, circa 1963. "They want to have you on again next week," he added happily.

  Kaspar was seated in the green room of the "Barry Duke Live" cable program, reading a copy of the Washington Post. He gazed blandly over the masthead at Princippi. "Tell them no," he said thinly.

  Princippi was crestfallen. "You've got to do it, Mark," he said. "It's the only way to keep yourself in the public eye. The 2000 presidential race is a good ways off."

  "A child must walk before he can run," Kaspar said by way of explanation.

  "Huh?"

  "Advice given me by the Pythia," Kaspar said.

  Princippi glanced around nervously. "Ixnay on the ithiapay," he whispered once certain there was no one within earshot. "Believe me, any whiff of psychic

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  sulphur can torpedo your nomination before you're even out of drydock." He folded his hands in supplication. "Please do the show. It'll cement your image in the public's mind. Trust me, the American people have the attention spans of white mice."

  Kaspar folded the paper into neat quarters and placed it on the ugly plaid sofa cushion beside him. "We will do Barry Duke's program again," he said. "But we will do it on my terms. There are certain housekeeping chores that I must first attend to. Think of this as a relay race, not a hundred-yard dash."

  With a disappointed sigh, Princippi nodded. "Okay, I'll tell them," he said reluctantly. "But they're not going to be happy about it." He paused at the door. "By the way." His thick eyebrows gathered together worriedly. "I was just on the phone with the chairman of my party—"

  "Your former party," Kaspar interjected.

  "Right," Princippi said, with a nod that dismissed his lifelong political affiliation as irrelevant. "Anyway, he called up screaming to find out what kind of dirt you have on Calhoun. He almost plotzed when they handed me the phone. Guess he figured I was gone for good." Princippi sounded pleased at the prospect of rattling cages in the organization that had shut him out for over a decade.

  A slight smile crossed Kaspar's lips, and Princippi half expected to see the tip of a forked tongue dart out from between his near absent lips.

  "I am not surprised that he would be displeased," Kaspar allowed.

  "Displeased?" Princippi scoffed. "He's screaming for your blood, along with Calhoun's for putting him

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  in the middle of this Barry Duke thing. And then— get this—he asks me to see if you'll come over and join the party."

  Princippi nodded. "A pragmatic man," he said.

  At that moment a stagehand stuck his head around the door. "Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Kaspar," he said. "But there's a call for you on line three." He indicated the simple black phone on the end table near Kaspar's elbow, then slipped away.

  "I've got to make a few calls myself," Princippi said, excusing himself. "I've set up an informal breakfast meeting with some friendly press for tomorrow."

  He left Kaspar alone in the green room.

  Kaspar hefted the bulky receiver and depressed the flashing button.

  "Yes?"

  Esther Clear-Seer's shrill voice practically leapt through the phone like an escaped wildcat. "Kaspar, what the hell is going on?" she demanded.

  "It would be helpful if you could be more specific," he said, examining his fingernails. He noticed a chip on his right index finger and wondered if there was someplace nearby where he could get a good manicure this late at night.

  "How specific do you want me to be over an open line?" she asked through tightly clenched teeth.

  Kaspar looked toward the open green-room door and hoped no one was eavesdropping around the corner. "Is there a problem?" he asked calmly.

  "Only that I was stupid enough to get hooked up with you," she said sarcastically.

  He let the remark pass. "Did you procure the latest vessel, as instructed?"

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  "I followed your directions, Kaspar," Esther said tartly. "Your new 'vessel,'" she said, her tone dripping malice, "is going completely psycho."

  His voice remained calm, but he felt his stomach clench like a hollow fist.

  "What do you mean?" he asked.

  "Psycho. Bonkers. Stark raving bananas, Kaspar," Esther hissed. "I put the vessel up on the stool and she immediately started jerking around like she was on angel dust or something."

  Kaspar relaxed. "That is not unusual for a new Py-thia," he said.

  "Yeah, well is it unusual for a new Pythia to be screaming about Sinanju being on the way?"

  Kaspar felt his already cold blood turn to ice. "Sinanju? Now?"

  "She's keeps yelling about the first hour."

  Kaspar knew that that meant sometime between midnight and 1:00 a.m., mountain time. With the time difference, if he got a flight out of Washington National within the next hour, he could make it back. But it would be close.

  "Brief the acolytes," Kaspar instructed briskly. "Make it clear to them that this is not a drill situation. I will return as quickly as possible, but if I do not arrive in time, you must be ready."

  "Oh, I'll be ready," said Esther. "I owe that old chink a shot in the nose."

  "Just be prepared."

  "What about your new vessel?" Esther asked. "She's going to kill herself the way she's thrashing around up there."

  "That would be problematic," Kaspar said.

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  "Yeah," Esther said indifferently. "Why?"

  "Just take special care of this one," Kaspar advised.

  "All right already," Esther said. "Just hurry back here. I don't know why this new one is so special," she added, severing the connection.

  Kaspar listened to the humming dial tone momentarily. In spite of the grave prospect of another Sinanju visit, he allowed himself a tight smile. "You will find out soon enough," he said, quietly hanging up the phone.

  Kaspar had been very specific about when and where Esther Clear-Seer would find his latest vessel: 9:30 p.m., Wednesday. The precise time he would be on the "Barry Duke Live" talk show.

  Esther thought it was strange that this late in the game Kaspar would help out with the procurement of a new Pythia, and she found it odder still that he would send her back into Thermopolis after having scolded her for collecting the first several virgins from the nearby town. But at this point she was grateful for anything that made this aspect of the job a little easier. Some of these little bitches put up one heck of a struggle.

  The residence Kaspar had indicated was on Sagebrush Street in the expensive side of town. Esther first drove slowly past the girl's house, checking for cars or movement on the grounds or in any of the windows. As Kaspar had promised, the house was as lifeless as a crypt.

  There was only one small light on inside the house itself—in a side rear window. A
kitchen night-light left on by the girl's parents, Esther guessed. The only other

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  illumination wasn't even inside the house itself, but rather was arranged carefully around the large Colonial structure. Spotlights were trained on the exterior of the house, brightening the whitewashed clapboard walls like new paint.

  There were several halogen bulbs, set into the front lawn, which shone on the front of the house as dazzlingly white as a thousand angels of the Second Coming. One of these was trained on the raised black numbers above the front door, which announced the street address to all passersby. A line of conical lights, low to the ground and spaced at perfectly measured intervals, illuminated the paths up to the front and side doors. Twin spotlights were aimed carefully at the empty driveway.

  The house was expensive looking—especially by Thermopolis's middle-class standards—but seemed worth so much attention. Esther wondered why anyone would feel compelled to light up their home brighter than the Washington Monument at midnight.

  She shut her own headlights off and coasted quietly down to Sagebrush Street's dead end.

  True to Kaspar's word, there was a dirt access road that connected Sagebrush Street to Cheyenne Drive and was blocked by a heavy concrete barrier at this time of year. Esther backed her car up to the barrier and crept on foot back along the woodsy path to the street.

  Although Kaspar had repeatedly assured her that the Pythia was not wrong about the ease with which this vessel would be procured, Esther remained nervous as she snuck through the strip of woods that ran along the side of the house.

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  She held her breath as she listened for approaching cars. When she heard none, she screwed up her courage and darted across the brightly lit driveway, ducking into the shadows behind the main house.

  She threw herself roughly against the rear wall beside the broad back deck and listened. Somewhere far away a dog howled into the moonless night.

  Esther's heart trip-hammered. Safely hidden from the road, she took a few deep, cleansing breaths. She felt the odd, late-night coolness of the clapboards through her black cotton blouse. Esther shuddered.

  This was it. She had come far enough in this business without having to tear around on someone else's ghoulish errands in the dead of night.