Coin of the Realm td-77 Read online

  "Yeah, pulling on the oars like a galley slave," Remo complained. "You know, she thinks I'm your servant," he added. He spoke English so the princess wouldn't understand their argument.

  "If you would like, I will add a codicil to my records, assuring future Masters that to the best of my knowledge you were never at any time a slave."

  "It's not future Masters I'm worried about. It's her."

  "Then," Chiun retorted, turning from the bow, "you will bend your back to this task with vigor so that the Low Moo may admire your efforts on her behalf."

  "Up yours," said Remo, who didn't like being thought of as a slave. But he pulled at the oars while Chiun returned to his proud stance at the bow. He stood with one arm on his hip and the other holding the Sinanju banner rigid. The princess sat behind him. Remo thought Chiun looked impossibly affected, like an idealized portrait of George Washington crossing the Delaware.

  The Master of Sinanju was pleased. The High Moo stood surrounded by his retinue. Women busily swept the sand clear with straw whisks. An honor guard of warriors formed two ranks to meet them.

  A bronze man clad only in a loincloth splashed into the water. He took the bow in hand and helped guide it ashore. The keel scraped sand. And the boat was quickly pulled up onto dry beach so that the sandals of the Master of Sinanju would not suffer being wet.

  It was as Chiun always dreamed of being greeted. By a proper emperor in a proper kingdom. Let Remo see true respect, such as Masters of Sinanju had enjoyed in times when the world was ruled correctly and Sinanju was respected from pole to pole.

  Chiun set the banner into the sand. It stuck, the fabric waving proudly.

  "I am Chiun, Master of Sinanju," he proclaimed. And abruptly the retinue surrounding the High Moo parted and the High Moo strode forward. His face was broad and fine, a king's visage. But his garb was not as kingly as Chiun had imagined. He had expected more clothing than a feathered breechclout. But it was summer, so Chiun decided it was not an affront if the king greeted him bare-chested. Chiun was pleased to see the golden feather that signified the crown of the High Moo. True, the crown was not, strictly speaking, a crown, but more a band of metal. Probably the original crown had been lost when Moo had sunk.

  Chiun placed his long-nailed hands into his joined sleeves and bowed once to the High Moo.

  And the High Moo replied in a booming voice. "I am Tu-Min-Ka, High Moo of Moo. I am pleased that my daughter has brought you."

  "Not so," said Chiun. "It is I who have brought your daughter. I found her in the thrall of an evil wizard, and recognizing her as of true royal blood, rescued her from this man."

  "Then I am doubly grateful," murmured the High Moo, taking his daughter into his arms. He turned away from the Master of Sinanju abruptly.

  Chiun's face wrinkled. An emperor did not turn his back on the Master of Sinanju during a formal greeting ceremony. Still, this was the man's daughter, whom he had believed lost. On the other hand, a daughter is only a female who happens to be a blood relation. This was the first meeting between the Master of Sinanju and a High Moo in nearly five thousand years. One would think that the man had more respect for history than to take his daughter aside to gossip. Chiun wondered what it was they discussed, but decided that eavesdropping would not be seemly. Besides, they were too far way.

  Remo drifted up beside Chiun.

  "What are they saying?" he wanted to know.

  "I do not know. But he is probably thanking her profusely for finding me." Chiun noticed Remo's posture. "Straighten up! Do you want the High Moo to think I have trained a laggard?"

  "Yes, Master," Remo muttered unhappily.

  "Are you certain, my daughter?" the High Moo whispered.

  "He alone of all I met spoke our language. He remembers Old Moo."

  "But the Master of Sinanju is tall and powerful. This man is elderly. And he carries no weapons."

  "I do not understand it either, but I am certain it is he."

  "And where are the night tigers? Did he not think enough of my plea to bring his retinue? He travels with a slave, and a sickly pale one at that."

  "He is a nice slave," said the princess. "I like him."

  "If you are certain; my daughter . . ." the High Moo said vaguely. "But I fear he will not be able to help us. For he is very old and his limbs look as if a fever has withered them."

  The High Moo turned to the Master of Sinanju. He forced himself to smile. In his heart he felt sick. The Master of Sinanju had been his last hope.

  "I bid you welcome to Moo," he said. "And in honor of your landfall, we have prepared a feast. We have all the foods that in ancient times Masters of Sinanju enjoyed. There is roast pig, turtle, fresh eggs, and we have butchered a Korean delicacy-dog."

  "No way, Chiun," Remo whispered in English. "I don't care what taboo it violates. I draw the line at dog."

  "Hush, Remo." To the High Moo the Master of Sinanju said, "We are grateful for your thoughtfulness, O High Moo, but times have changed. Masters of Sinanju no longer eat meat."

  "No meat?"

  "Have you fish?"

  "Yes, of course."

  "We still eat fish. And rice."

  "We have rice. But fish is peasant food." Chiun winced at the implication.

  "Here, perhaps," he said, "but in Sinanju it is considered a delicacy."

  "Fish and rice are a delicacy nowhere on earth, Little Father," Remo whispered in English.

  "What did your slave say?" the High Moo asked.

  "He asked if you have lemons," Chiun replied.

  "Yes."

  "Good, he will have egg-lemon soup. But it must be prepared under my supervision."

  "Very well," said the High Moo slowly.

  "Thanks a lot, Chiun," Remo said sourly.

  "I knew you would appreciate my suggesting it," Chiun replied.

  "I don't mean the soup. I meant the fact that you didn't disabuse him of the notion that I'm your slave."

  "This bothers you?"

  "Slightly," Remo growled, looking at the Low Moo, who stared at him with a wild eager light in the depths of her black eyes.

  Chiun suddenly shook his spindly arms free of his sleeves. He raised them to the heavens, and in a loud voice proclaimed, "In honor of this historic occasion, and knowing that the wicked practice of slavery has been long abolished by the enlightened rulers of Moo, I hereby set free my unworthy slave, Remo."

  "Oh, you're a thrill," Remo hissed.

  "He does not look happy," said the High Moo, taking note of Remo's expression.

  "It is the shock," Chiun assured him. "He has been in my family for years. But he will get used to being free."

  "And in honor of this meeting, joining the House of Sinanchu with the House of Moo," proclaimed the High Moo, "my royal priest, Teihotu, will bless you both so that no harm will come to you during your sojourn with us." The priest padded out of the crowd. His dark robes rustled like serpents slipping through dry leaves.

  "Please kneel," he intoned. Chiun dropped to his knees. Remo did likewise. But only after Chiun pulled him down.

  The royal priest laid his bony, long-fingered hands on their heads. Remo noticed that his hands smelled fishy. He held his breath until the man was through muttering incantations to the sky. Then he withdrew and they found their feet.

  "Now, quickly, darkness comes," said the High Moo. "We must hurry to light the fires. For when darkness comes, they walk."

  Chiun marched in the High Moo's wake. Remo stepped up alongside him.

  "Moo looks pretty small, Little Father," he remarked casually.

  "You have not seen the whole of it yet," Chiun sniffed.

  "You spoke about an empire."

  "I told you. Moo sank. This is all that is left."

  "Where are the jeweled clothes, the golden shields? And that crown on the High Moo's head looks like an oversize wedding ring with feathers."

  "It is his summer crown. I am certain that his winter crown is more impressive."

  "I don
't think they have winters in the South Pacific."

  "And how would you know, O well-traveled one?"

  "I remember my geography lessons."

  "And did these geography lessons include a history of Moo?"

  "No," Remo admitted.

  "Then you have been taught by the ignorant and should not be surprised at your own lack of knowledge," Chiun said haughtily.

  "Where are the women, by the way?"

  "You did not see them because your back was turned as you rowed. They were here smoothing the sand for us. Then they left."

  "Yeah? Were they bare-breasted?"

  "I did not notice," Chiun said distantly.

  "How could you not notice an important thing like that?"

  "Because unlike you, I am not a lover of cows."

  "Moo," said Remo.

  "Is that another of your lame jests?"

  "More like a prayer. If there aren't any bare-breasted native women on this sandhill, I've come a long way for nothing. "

  "You are very haughty for a newly freed slave," sniffed Chiun. He hastened his step so that he would not have to listen to any more of Remo's nonsense.

  Chapter 14

  The world had done it to Shane Billiken again.

  It was always this way. Just when success was within his grasp, some retro-case would snatch the brass ring away. The Beatles hijacked his singing career. Roy Orbison's lawyers squelched his comeback. And now, two strange men had stolen the perfect channeler out of his own house.

  Oh, sure, Glinda had been good. He'd never have gotten into channeling without her. Shane had met her in a Muscle Shoals bar, where she was waitressing. One drink led to another, which led to her apartment. They were reminiscing about the sixties-or Shane was. Glinda hadn't been born until 1967, so was lamenting that she'd missed out on "the good years."

  "What was it, like, like?" she had asked.

  "You want to experience the sixties?" Shane had replied, firing up a joint. "Try this organic time machine." It was in the smoky moments that followed that he made his discovery. When high, Glinda babbled. Not in English, but in some crazy nonsense baby-talk. That was what had given Shane the channeling idea.

  And so was launched the career of Glinda Thrip, who, under certain conditions-usually a joint before a performance-became possessed by the spirit of Shastra, high priestess of Atlantis. Shane Billiken translated her babble into prophecies, for, as he repeated to anyone gullible enough to listen, the high priestess knew all and saw all.

  Of course nothing was one hundred percent perfect. Sometimes Glinda muttered a few English words, which Shane covered over with a standard line about disruptions in the cosmic flow. And sometimes when she was high, Glinda giggled. That was worse. Atlantean high priestesses weren't supposed to giggle.

  Which was why, when the Princess Sinanchu washed up on his beach, Shane Billiken realized he had struck true gold at last. Princess Sinanchu looked like a princess. Glinda looked like a silicone-augmented California waitress in Greek clothing. And Glinda did not have silver wires in her clothes or a pouch stuffed with strange coins.

  It was the coins that particularly fascinated Shane Billiken. Coins were coins, but these looked authentic, historical. As artifacts, they might be worth a fortune to a museum. Millions, depending on who the girl was and where she came from.

  Especially, Shane Billiken thought suddenly, if there were more of those coins where she came from.

  The thought caused him to push aside the aluminum sun reflector on his chest and sit up.

  It was the morning after Princess Sinanchu had left. He had slept fitfully all night, even after soaking in his hot tub, eating cheese and playing with the bath crystals he had brought into he tub. They were supposed to soak up negativity, but when he stepped out, wrinkled like a prune, he felt as frustrated as ever.

  Even a joint didn't help.

  Now Shane Billiken felt positively enraged. How could the world keep doing this to him? Why? Why him? He was evolved. He chanted every night. True, his heart wasn't always in it, but who knew how much of this New Age stuff really worked? It was not for nothing that his favorite off-camera saying was "You don't fuck with magic."

  Shane paced his house fuming. He wandered into his personal library, which he had started with three battered paperbacks but which was now one of the most extensive collections of occult books in private hands. Maybe the I Ching had the answer to his problems.

  Then he recalled the exchange between the old Eastern mystic and the skinny white man while they argued on his beach. Shane had listened through his cracked glass patio door.

  They had talked about building a boat, then about buying one. The Asian kept babbling about going to Moo, like it was a place, not a sound effect. Why did that name sound familiar?

  Shane went to the Atlantis section of his library. He ran his thick fingers along the rows of spines until he came to the book he wanted. It was called The Lost Continent of Mu.

  Eagerly he opened the book. Shane read three chapters straight through before he realized his feet were killing him. He was so mesmerized that he had forgotten to sit down.

  According to the book, Mu was an island nation of great size which had dominated the Pacific Ocean before the dawn of recorded history. It had sunk during a fierce natural cataclysm that the book's author supposed was the Great Flood of biblical legend. Mu would have been forgotten, except when the Muvian race perished, they transmitted their thoughts to receptive survivors in other lands, who wrote of their visions and thus kept the existence of Mu alive despite skeptical nay-sayers.

  "Makes sense to me," Shane muttered, reading on. When he put the book down, hours later, he thought he had it all figured out. Princess Sinanchu was from Mu. Somehow, Mu must have come to the surface again. As Shane Billiken saw it, this was perfectly plausible. After all, they were getting near the Millennium. Weird stuff like this was supposed to happen.

  Why Princess Sinanchu had come to America remained a mystery, but Shane understood one thing: if that girl could make the trip one way, Shane Billiken, who was in tune with the universe, could retrace the voyage.

  There was only one boat dealership in this area. Shane hopped into his Ferrari and drove for it at high speed. The owner recognized his description of the unlikely pair.

  "Sure, they bought that ratty junk, the Jonah Ark. Imagine that. Took off right away, too."

  "Was there a girl with them?"

  "Yep. Looked Tahitian or something like that. Didn't say a word."

  "How long ago?"

  "Ten, twelve hours."

  "Is a junk slow?"

  "Is Superman blue? It's one step up from a garbage scow."

  "I'll take the fastest boat you have," Shane said suddenly.

  "If you're thinking of following them, and I think you are, you'll want a deep-water craft, not some zippy little cigarette boat. They had long voyage written all over them. "

  "I'll take whatever you recommend."

  "For sure," said the salesman. "But clue me in first: is there something I should know? I recognize you from The Horton Droney Show and that little Oriental lama looked pretty freaky. Is the world gonna end, or what?"

  "Friend, we're talking a definite spiritual migration here."

  "Oh wow, I knew it. Like I've been getting these really, really intense vibrations all week."

  "Eat more cheese. It'll help you image better."

  Once he had made the purchase arrangements on a two-masted schooner with twin inboard-outboard diesels-receiving a ten-percent discount in return for giving the salesman a biorhythmic polarity analysis-Shane Billiken returned home to pack. He didn't know what to expect, so he packed his entire wardrobe, ultimately filling seven medium-size suitcases, three large steamer trunks, an assortment of over-the-shoulder bags, and his electric guitar.

  "Food!" he said suddenly. "I'll probably need food." He hurried into the wine cellar, where vats of natural cheese were hardening.

  "Anything else would spoil,
but cheese is good forever," he muttered, thanking his lucky stars that he had stumbled across the bioregenerative powers of cheese. He wondered if he should bring mineral water, but shrugged. What the hell, he thought, I'll just bring along a bucket and rough it on ocean water. It's probably chock-full of minerals and other healthful stuff.

  When he had everything together, Shane realized that he would need help loading all these provisions on his new boat. Then he realized that he might just need help crewing the ship. Then he further realized he didn't know what to expect on the other end of the voyage.

  I gotta think this through a little more, he decided, collapsing on a beanbag chair. He switched on his lava lamp. Watching the blue-green goop floating in the amber fluid always helped him to image.

  Hours later, a thought struck him. He spoke it aloud.

  "I'm thinking expedition when I should be thinking conquest. "

  He jumped out of the chair and ran for his bedroom. He rummaged through his dresser looking for that magazine clipping. He knew it was there somewhere. He never threw anything out. Not anything that important.

  He found it wrapped around a copper antiarthritis bracelet with rubber bands. He pounced on the phone. After three rings, a hard voice answered.

  "Yeah?"

  "Mr. Eradicator?"

  "Maybe." The voice was guarded.

  "You probably won't remember me, but we had a meet three or four years back."

  "You're right, pal. I don't remember you."

  "Let me finish. I wanted a certain party taken care of. A certain famous party. A singer. Is it coming back?"

  "Yeah. Sunglasses. Square face. Bangs."

  "That's me."

  "I meant the victim."

  "That fits him too."

  "If you've changed your mind, my rates have gone up."

  "Yes and no. I don't want that particular party hit. Maybe later, if things work out. But your Soldier of Fortune ad said you handle military ops too."

  "What have you got?"

  "There's an island in the South Pacific. I want to take it over. You know, do a Marlon Brando."

  "This island got a name?"

  "Er, not yet," Shane said evasively. Better not mention Mu. Military types were notoriously unenlightened.

  "I don't get you."