Chinese Puzzle Read online

  Chinese Puzzle

  The Destroyer #3

  Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir

  For Deirdre, Megan, Brian, Ardath, and Devin

  You're loved and loved…

  Foreword

  This book, the third in the original Destroyer series, is about the visit of a mythical American President to China. It first appeared in the bookstores in February 1972, the same week that Richard Nixon made his trip to China (and then spoiled it all by coming back).

  That relevance was one of the charms of writing books back in the early days of The Destroyer series, when Pinnacle was a tiny publishing house, and deadlines were a lot more flexible. Nowadays, publishers like manuscripts in hand a year or more before a book gets published, so trying to write a novel that stays on top of the news is almost impossible.

  But it wasn’t just timeliness that made this book special for us. Chinese Puzzle was the first Destroyer in which the relationship between Remo and his teacher, Chiun, was defined, and the first book in which they actually worked together on a mission. For the first time, the legends of the House of Sinanju, the age-old house of Korean assassins, began to work their way into the stories.

  Why should it take until the third book of a series to nail down such basic points as the characters, their history, and their relationships?

  Well, the first Destroyer, Created the Destroyer, was written in 1963, but not published until 1971. In that book, Chiun was a karate instructor and nothing more. In the eight years the book was waiting for publication, karate, which had been an esoteric art in 1963, became more and more common. After publication of Created in 1971, we realized we needed something more, something which totally eluded us in The Destroyer #2, Death Check.

  In Chinese Puzzle, we felt we had it right for the first time. This was also the book that we decided we were not going to write “splatter books,” filled with bodies oozing blood, and which read like casualty reports. Instead, we decided to make humor and satire ongoing components of the series — if it lasted, which, in those days, was never certain.

  CHAPTER ONE

  HE DID NOT WANT COFFEE, tea or milk. He did not even want a pillow for his head, although the BOAC stewardess could see he was obviously dozing.

  When she attempted to slip the white pillow behind his barrel neck, two younger men slapped it away and motioned her to the rear of the jet, then to the front. Any direction, so long as it was away from the man with closed eyes, and hands folded on top of a brown leather briefcase handcuffed to his right wrist.

  She did not feel comfortable around this particular group of Orientals. Not with their dour faces, their cement lips obviously set in childhood never to smile.

  She judged them to be Chinese. Usually Chinese were most pleasant, often charming, always intelligent. These men were stone.

  She went forward to the captain’s cabin, past the forward galley, where she snitched an end of a cinnamon bun and gobbled it down. She had bypassed lunch on her slimming diet and then did what she always did when she missed lunch. She ate something fattening to quell the rising hunger. Still, dieting and breaking the diet in small ways, while not really trimming pounds, kept her lissome enough to hold her job.

  The bun was good, somehow extra sweet. No wonder the Chinese gentleman had asked for more. Perhaps they were his favorite. Today was the first time they had served cinnamon buns. They were not even on the regular lading for the menu.

  But he had liked them. She could see his eyes light when they were served. And the two men who had slapped the pillow away had been ordered to give him their buns.

  She opened the front cabin door with her key and leaned into the cabin.

  “Lunch, gentlemen,” she said to the pilot and co-pilot.

  “No,” they both answered. The captain said: “We’ll be over Orly soon. What kept you?”

  “I don’t know. It must be that time of year. Most everyone is dozing back there. I had a pickle of a bother fetching pillows. It’s awfully hot here, isn’t it?”

  “No, it’s cool,” said the co-pilot. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes. Yes. Just feels a bit warm. You know.” She turned away, but the co-pilot did not hear her close the door. There was a good reason she did not close the door. She was suddenly sleeping, face down on the cabin floor, her skirt angling up to the pinnacle of her rump. And in those strange patterns that greet the unexpected, the co-pilot’s first thought was silly. He wondered if she was exposing herself to the passengers.

  He need not have worried. Of the 58 passengers, 30 had passed all cares of the world, and most of the rest were in panic.

  The co-pilot heard a woman’s scream. “Oh, no. Oh, no, Lord. No. No. No.”

  Men were yelling now also, and the co-pilot unstrapped himself and hopped over the body of the stewardess, dashing into the seat-lined body of the plane where a young woman slapped a young boy’s face and kept slapping it, demanding he wake up; where a young man walked the aisle dazed; where a girl desperately pressed her ear to a middle-aged man’s chest; and where two young Chinese men stood over the body of an elderly Chinese gentleman. They had drawn guns.

  Where the hell were the other stews? Dammit. There was one in the back. Asleep.

  He could feel the plane pitch and dive. They were going in for an emergency.

  Unable to think of anything else, he yelled to the passengers that they were making an emergency landing and that they should fasten their seat belts. But his voice scarcely made an impression. He dashed back to the front, pushing the dazed, wandering man down into a seat. An elderly couple nearby did not even look up. They were apparently dozing through it also.

  He snatched the stewardess’ microphone from its cradle hook in the small compartment near the front seat, and announced they were making an emergency landing at Orly airport and that everyone should fasten his seat belts.

  “Fasten your seat belts now,” he said firmly. And he saw a woman first buckle in a sleeping boy whose face she had been slapping, then resume her slapping in an effort to rouse him.

  The plane moved down through the foggy night, locked in on the right path by a homing beacon that the pilot followed unerringly. Upon landing, the airplane was not allowed to taxi to the main terminal but was ordered to a hangar where ambulances and nurses and doctors were waiting. As soon as he opened the door for the platform steps, the co-pilot was pushed aside by two men in gray suits, with revolvers drawn. They went storming into the plane, pushing aside two passengers. When they reached the Chinese gentleman, they returned their revolvers to their holsters, and one of them nodded to one of the young Chinese, and the two of them ran back up the aisle again, slamming into a nurse and a doctor, knocking them over, and continuing down the ground platform.

  Only the people taken to the morgue or the hospital that night left the airport. It was not until midnight on the following day that the survivors were allowed to depart. They had not been allowed to see a newspaper or listen to a radio. They answered questions upon questions until all the questions and answers seemed to blend in a continuous flow of words. They talked to white men, to yellow men, to black men. And very few of the questions made sense.

  Nor did the newspaper headline they were finally allowed to see:

  TWENTY NINE ON FLIGHT DIE OF BOTULISM

  Nowhere, noticed the co-pilot, did the paper mention the Chinese gentleman or his two aides, not even in the roster of passengers.

  “You know, honey,” he said to his wife, after reading the newspaper reports three times, “these people couldn’t have died of botulism. There were no convulsions. I told you what they looked like. And besides, all our food is fresh.” He said this in his small London flat.

  “Well then,
you should go to Scotland Yard and tell them.”

  “That’s a good idea. Something’s not on the up and up here.”

  Scotland Yard was very interested in his story. So were two American blokes. Everyone was so interested that they wanted to hear the story again and again. And just so the co-pilot would not forget, they gave him a room to himself that stayed locked all the time. And did not let him leave. Or call his wife.

  The President of the United States sat in the large soft chair in the corner of his main office, his shoeless feet resting on a green hassock before him, his eyes riveted on predawn Washington—for him, the floodlights on the White House lawn. His pencil tapped on the sheaf of papers resting between his knees and his stomach.

  His closest advisor was summing up in his professorial manner. The room smelled of the lingering cigar smoke of the CIA director who had left one hour before. The advisor spoke in the gutturals of German childhood, droning on about possibilities and probabilities of international repercussions and just why this was not as bad as it looked.

  “It would not do to minimize what has happened. The dead man was, after all, a personal emissary from the Premier. But the important thing is that the Premier’s visit to this country is still on. For one thing, the emissary was not poisoned over American territory. He boarded the plane in Europe and was to transfer at Montreal, for this country. Because of this, it is apparent that the Premier does not believe that any of our people were involved. That is evident, because he has indicated a willingness to send another man to finalize the arrangements for his visit to this country.”

  The advisor smiled.

  “Moreover, Mr. President, the Premier is sending a close friend. A colleague. A man who was with him on the long march when they were retreating from Chiang Kai Shek, and a friend who was with them in their dark days in the caves of Yenan. No, I absolutely and firmly believe, that they know we were not responsible. If they felt otherwise, they would not now send General Liu. His presence on this mission is their assertion that they believe we are of good will. So the Premier’s trip will go ahead as planned.”

  The President sat up straight and rested his hands on his desk. It was autumn in Washington, and the offices he entered and worked in were always toasty warm. But the desk now felt cold to the touch.

  “Just how is Liu arriving?” asked the President.

  “They will not let us know.”

  “That doesn’t sound as if they are brimming over with confidence in us.”

  “We have not exactly been their trusted allies, Mr. President.”

  “But if they would let us know the route, then we could offer protection also.”

  “Frankly, sir, I am very happy we are unaware of General Liu’s route. If we are unaware, then we are not responsible for him until he arrives in Montreal. We will hear from the Polish embassy here as to his arrival time. But he is coming. May I further stress again that they informed us he would be coming, within one day of the tragedy.”

  “That’s good. It shows they did not change policy.” The table still felt cold to the touch and the President’s hands felt wet. “All right. Good,” he said. But there was little joy in his voice. He added, looking up: “The people who poisoned the Chinese emissary? Who could they have been? We have absolutely no clues from our intelligence. The Russians? Taiwan? Who?”

  “I am surprised, Mr. President, that Intelligence did not send an entire library on who would wish the Chinese Premier not to visit the United States.” He brought from his briefcase a folder the thickness of a Russian novel.

  The President raised his left hand, palm forward, signalling the advisor to belay the report.

  “I don’t want history, Professor. I want information. Hard today information on how the Chinese security system could be breached.”

  “That is unavailable as yet.”

  “All right, dammit, then I’ve decided.” The President rose from his chair, still clasping the sheaf of notes that had been on his lap. He put the papers down on the fine polished wood of his desk.

  “On one level, we will continue with normal procedures of the intelligence and local security people. Just continue.”

  The advisor looked up querulously. “Yes?”

  “That’s it. I can’t tell you any more. I’m glad I have your services, you’re doing as well as anyone could. You’re doing a good job, professor. Good night.”

  “Mr. President, we have worked well together because you do not withhold pertinent information. At a time like this, to leave me wondering would be counterproductive.”

  “I agree with you 100 per cent,” the President said. “However, the very nature of this area precludes my sharing it with anyone. And I’m sorry. I cannot explain further. I really cannot.”

  The advisor nodded.

  The President watched him leave the room. The door shut with a click. Outside, the harsh floodlights would be dimmed in two hours, when replaced by the sun still steaming hot over Washington in the early fall.

  He was alone, as every leader of every nation had always been when the difficult decisions had to be made. He lifted the receiver of a phone he had used only once since he had been inaugurated.

  There was no need to dial although the telephone had a dial, as if it were any other telephone. He waited. He knew there would be no ringing sound on his end. There was not supposed to be. Finally he heard a sleepy voice answer.

  The President said: “Hello. Sorry to wake you. I need the services of that person… it is a grave crisis… If you come down to see me then I will explain more fully… Yes, I must see you in person… and bring him, please. I want to talk to him… Well, then tell him to stand by for immediate service… All right. Fine. Yes. That would be fine for now. Yes, I understand, it’s just an alert. Not a commitment. You will put him on alert. Thank you. You don’t know how desperately the world needs him now.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  HIS NAME WAS REMO.

  He had just laced the skin-tight black cotton uniform around his legs, when the telephone rang in his room in the Hotel Nacional in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

  He picked up the receiver with his left hand while finishing the cork-blackening of his face with his right. The telephone operator told him there had just been a long distance call from the Firmifex Company in Sausalito, California. The woman at Firmifex said that the shipment of durable goods would be arriving in two days.

  “Yeah, okay.” He hung up and said one word: “Idiots.”

  He turned off the lights and the room was dark. Through the open window, the sea breezes blew off the Caribbean, not cooling Puerto Rico but swirling away and redistributing some of the autumn heat. He walked out onto the open balcony with its round aluminum tube railing supported by curved metal spokes.

  He was about six feet tall and the only hint of muscle was a slight thickness around the neck, wrists and ankles, but he hopped the railing to the ledge as though it were a horizontal matchstick.

  He leaned into the sea-slick brick wall of the Hotel Nacional, smelling its salty wetness, and feeling the cool of the ledge at his feet. The bricks were white but they appeared gray close up in the early morning darkness.

  He tried to concentrate, to remember to press into the building, not away from it, but the telephone call rankled him. A 3:30 a.m. telephone call to inform him of manufacturing deliveries. What a stupid cover for an alert. They might as well have advertised on prime time. They might as well have put a spotlight on him.

  Remo looked down the nine stories and attempted to spot the old man. He could not. Just the darkness of the tropical shrubbery, cut by the white paths, and the rectangular splotch where the pool was, midway between hotel and beach.

  “Well?” came the high-pitched Oriental voice from below.

  Remo dropped from the ledge, catching it with his hands. He hung there for a moment, dangling his feet down into space. Then he began rocking his body back and forth, picking up the where of the wall, speeding his rocking, and the
n he opened his fingers and let go.

  The swinging of his body threw him against the hotel wall, where his bare toes slid against the smooth white brick. His fingers, tensed like talons, bought a hold on the surface of the stones.

  The lower half of his body rebounded out again from the wall of the hotel, and as it began to swing back in, he released his hands, and his body dropped. Again his feet braked his descent against the wall of the hotel, and again his powerful, charcoal-coated fingers pressured like talons against the wall of the Hotel Nacional.

  His fingers felt the slimy Caribbean moistness on the wall. If he had tried to hang on, even momentarily, he would have plunged to his death. But he remembered the injunction: the secret is in, not down.

  Remo’s mind concentrated furiously on the position of his body. It must keep moving, constantly, but its force must always be inward, overcoming the downward pull of nature.

  He smelled rather than felt the breezes, as he again rocked off from the wall with his legs, and dropped another five feet, before his toes and hands slowed his descent against the wall.

  Fleetingly, he wondered if he really was ready. Were his hands strong enough, his timing keen enough, to overcome gravity, by the disjointed rocking technique perfected in Japan by the Ninja — the warrior wizards — more than ten centuries ago?

  Remo thought of the story about the man who fell from the 30th floor of a skyscraper. As he passed the 15th floor, someone inside yelled, “How are you?” “So far, so good,” he answered.

  So far, so good, Remo thought.

  He was moving rhythmically now, an irresistible pattern of swing out, drop, swing in, and slow against the wall. Then repeat. Swing out, drop, swing in, and slow against the wall, defying gravity, defying the laws of nature, his smoothly muscled athlete’s body using its strength and timing to bring its force inward against the wall, instead of down where death waited.

  He was halfway down now, literally bouncing off the wall, but the downward pull was growing stronger, and as he rocked off the wall, he applied upward pressure with his leg muscles to counteract the pull.