Remo The Adventure Begins Page 12

  Remo missed a girder by a hair, crawling up to the side of the cage where Chiun sat with his hands crossed in his lap.

  “Jeeesus, Chiun,” yelled Remo.

  “No prayers. Concentrate,” said Chiun, who recognized the name of a western god of the last two thousand years. It helped, when you trained whites, to be familiar with their deities.

  Remo crawled up the Ferris wheel cage in which Chiun sat comfortably, to the top, and kept on crawling as the cage made the gigantic circumference.

  It was early winter and the amusement park was virtually empty but for the garbage that seemed to infest its lanes and booths. Remo mentioned it might be nice to have a warm coat. Chiun said thank you, but he didn’t need one. Remo said it wasn’t for Chiun who was inside the cage on the rim of the wheel. Chiun said Remo didn’t need one.

  Remo said he did. Chiun said he wasn’t concentrating. Remo said he didn’t care. Chiun said Remo might fall. Remo answered he didn’t care about that anymore either.

  Good, thought Chiun. He is learning the first thing about heights.

  When they were done, Remo in the manner of whites expected a compliment for not getting killed.

  “I was pretty good, huh?”

  “Because a caterpillar is faster than a flower does not make it a bolt of lightning.”

  “Am I ever going to do something you think is all right?”

  “To be proud of what you do is to look behind you. You must look ahead. You must see what you have to do. An ant can carry one hundred times its own weight. Why?”

  “Because you taught him?” said Remo.

  “Because he uses his powers fully. You must use your mind. You must believe in your powers. The mind is your power. You must believe.”

  Remo noticed a stand that openly sold hot dogs, openly sold hamburgers, hamburgers cooked in grease then served with fried onions and tomato catsup alongside, fizzy sugary drinks to wash them down. He was steps away, just upwind from whole hamburgers cooking on a grill.

  “I do believe,” said Remo. “I believe I am hungry.”

  “Pale piece of a pig’s ear. I cast pearls of wisdom. I attempt transforming, and I get this. But I get what I deserve. You once asked if a Sinanju Master ever had a weakness. I do. My weakness is that I am too nice.”

  “You already told me that,” said Remo, turning away from the hamburgers.

  “I will not tolerate these insults anymore.”

  “You already told me that too.”

  The two walked to the deserted beach. Remo had to work on his running. The first run sent him dashing across the beach with sand spitting up behind him. He waited at the other end, looking at the watch he had bought despite Chiun’s admonition that time was internal not external, that the more one relied on things instead of oneself the more one lost oneself. Look at the appendix. Unused for thirty thousand years, and now useless.

  Still there was Remo grinning. Chiun moved to him without haste.

  “I swear, I must have done two hundred yards in twelve seconds. That would be a record,” said Remo. Chiun looked sadly back at the heavy tracks in the sand.

  With great patience he took Remo to where the water covered the smooth sand and then washed back, leaving a flat glistening surface.

  “You were not running. You were making holes in the sand. Big banging clumps. Look, there are your footprints. If you wish to kill sand you did well. If you wish to run, run.”

  “Hey, if you guys are better, then why didn’t you enter the Olympics. You could make fortunes running.”

  “Yes, perhaps this century. Perhaps in the year you called 500 B.C., but those fads change. The world always needs an assassin. Run.”

  Remo ran down the beach even faster this time. He could see Chiun shake his head.

  “No. No. No.” Chiun ran to him.

  “You were slower than me,” said Remo.

  “I wanted you to see.”

  “See what?”

  “And you didn’t see,” said Chiun, pointing to the flat glistening part of the beach where one set of footprints was just being washed by the western sea the whites called the Atlantic.

  “You didn’t leave footprints,” said Remo.

  “Ah,” said Chiun.

  “I am supposed to run without leaving footprints.”

  “Ah,” said Chiun.

  “Okay, how do I do it?”

  “Now, he asks,” said Chiun. “Next time, perhaps, you will help us all by asking beforehand? Yes?”

  They practiced running most of the day, until Remo got it almost right. On the way out they passed a ring toss for stuffed dolls, and Chiun won twelve pandas and a Miss Piggy. Remo wanted the Miss Piggy. It reminded him of a long time ago in another life when he had kept it under the dashboard of his squad car. A gang of motorcyclists thought it was funny that two grown men would be carrying dolls. They made comments about the same. Then two of them tried to take away a panda from the elderly oriental.

  They were admitted to Brooklyn Mercy Hospital almost as soon as ambulance workers could pry them from the boardwalk of Coney Island. One of them even managed to reach stable condition by midnight.

  10

  Moscow was burning. The woman shrieked. She wasn’t heard. The buzz from below drowned it out. Glasses clinked, people talked. And then Moscow burned itself out and the ash blew away over the crowd gathered beneath the thirty-foot model of the world, where the woman had moments before flicked her cigarette ash so casually. It landed on Moscow because that was near the top of the globe. On the other side, where the partygoers could see from below, was the United States of America, protected by what appeared to be a metallic spider.

  The legs, thin glistening wires, were supposed to represent rays. The body was a polished metallic box atop those rays.

  “Those rays,” explained Mr. Grove’s secretary, whose name was Wilson, “will make America and the west invulnerable into the next century.”

  “We don’t want to be invulnerable,” said the guest in an accent that sounded vaguely British. He was an official from New Zealand.

  “I beg your pardon,” said Wilson. Grove Industries had learned long ago that one did not confront pacifists directly, rather one drew them out. At this party in the main ballroom of Grove Industries’ Washington office with the elaborate models of the guns, gunships, and now HARP atop the western world, Wilson was performing his duty even if that duty meant making mindless conversation.

  George Grove was at this party, and if Wilson could occupy one fool, then that meant one fool less that George Grove had to deal with instead of dealing with congressmen and senators. It was more critical that Grove himself spend time with the people who would be deciding the future of America, which of course meant the future of Grove.

  Hearings were under way concerning HARP. Whereas an undiscovered leak would be a problem under any circumstances, Wilson knew so well that a leak now, with HARP coming up, might be disastrous. Exactly why HARP should be more vulnerable than other projects, Wilson honestly did not know.

  He was not part of manufacturing. He only did special things for George Grove, like keep this New Zealander occupied.

  “Would you explain to me,” Wilson asked the man in the good pinstripe suit, somewhat old-fashioned but solidly tailored, “how you could be in danger if we make you invulnerable along with the rest of the west?”

  “If the Russians don’t think we’re invulnerable they won’t attack.”

  “Invulnerable means you can’t be harmed.”

  “That’s right, mate. We won’t be harmed if we’re vulnerable.”

  “That makes no sense,” said Wilson, guiding the man to the farthest corner of the room where there was a model of one of the first machine guns produced by Grove Industries.

  “It don’t have to make sense, mate. Do you really think anyone cares what happens to New Zealand; I mean what other civilized country could look up to Australia, mate?”

  Wilson had to laugh. The man was right.
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br />   “Honest now, right, mate,” said the man, refusing a champagne and taking a beer. “No one is going to bother dropping an atomic anything on us. What would they destroy? A bunch of footsoldiers in funny hats? Sheep? Dogs? Horses? A garden party?”

  Wilson glanced back at Grove. A general with a beautiful major was approaching Grove, who had a senator cornered. Wilson knew the senator would be crucial to HARP. He knew Grove did not want to be bothered by the military when he was working Congress. The general was approaching at flank speed. But Wilson could not get away from the friendly New Zealander who, as was the manner of his countrymen, talked with an armlock on his listener.

  “Look, mate, we know we are not really targets. Could you name me one atomic scientist from Australia? Could you name me one great electronics engineer from New Zealand? Name me something we export that could affect the modern world in any way. Ever see a New Zealand camera or an Australian television set? Getting the picture, mate?”

  Wilson tried to break free, but the New Zealander was on a roll. “Name me anything that ever came out of New Zealand but our national beer. And there ain’t no place, mate, what don’t have its national beer. And what’s neighbor Australia known for? What is the one thing that continent down under has done? Name it. You know it.”

  Wilson watched the general and the major close in. Mr. Grove had wanted congressional time at this party. In fact, that was the party’s purpose. He could see that General Scott Watson anytime. And certainly there was no major in the world that would do anything but take up Mr. Grove’s valuable congressional time. But the New Zealander held Wilson fast.

  “Name it, mate. All right, I’ll tell you. We won a bloody boat race, that’s what. A sailboat race. Australia’s great technological breakthrough was a bloody keel. They’ve been coming up with new keels since the Stone Age. Do you know how you tell an aborigine from the prime ministers of New Zealand and Australia?”

  Wilson tried a smile and a duck and a good-bye but the New Zealander was too swift for him.

  “The difference between the Stone Age aborigine and our elected leaders, mate, can be most readily discerned by turning on the lights. Aborigines are black.”

  The New Zealander gave himself a hearty laugh. Wilson was now faced with the horrible dilemma of risking a seam tear in his jacket or watching George Grove lose vital lobbying time. Wilson ripped. The New Zealander let go. Wilson’s unrestrained arm went sailing into someone’s back, knocking a drink into someone else’s face.

  “Ever taste our New Zealand lamb?”

  “No, dammit,” yelled Wilson, who saw now he had failed. The general and the major had arrived at George Grove. He knew this because George Grove was faking a friendly smile.

  “Mr. Grove, this is our Major Rayner Fleming of whom we are most proud,” said General Watson. “Major Fleming, George Grove.”

  General Watson waited for George Grove’s charm to work. The message was clear. George Grove for some reason was to turn this young lady’s head.

  “My, my,” said George Grove. “If all the majors look like you, I’m joining the Army again.”

  General Watson thought that was tremendously funny. He laughed. Grove laughed. Major Fleming maintained a polite silence.

  “Major Fleming is our best in-house watchdog,” said General Watson. “She keeps the world honest. And we’re grateful for it.”

  “Really, Major Fleming,” said Grove, impressed. “What do you watch?”

  “Oh, you know. The usual defense-contract stuff. Fraud. Waste. Shoddy workmanship. The AR-60,” said Major Fleming.

  “AR what?”

  “The field rifle Grove manufactures,” said General Watson.

  “Oh, that. Yes, well, forgive me. My mind is on HARP,” said Grove, nodding to the world whose western half was protected by the metallic simulations of electronic rays. “We can make every city, every home in America safe with that.”

  “If you can’t make a rifle correctly how can you make an electronics space defense?” said Major Fleming.

  General Watson started to answer, but Grove was going to handle this one himself.

  “We are really so vast that different factories, different staffs produce different equipment. One has nothing to do with the other.”

  “I would say that they do. Quality control is quality control. We lost a man with one of your lousy rifles. Now I hear that thing is being billed as America’s roof,” said Major Fleming, nodding to the metallic box with the metallic spider-leg rays suspended over the room. “Well, how do we know it is not going to leak?”

  George Grove was going to answer that one when unfortunately an assistant of his named Wilson insisted he immediately had to go over to speak to an Undersecretary of Defense.

  “I’m sorry, I have to go,” said Grove. He nodded his good intentions with a warm smile, as though if given time, none of them really would see a problem at all, especially the major who was upset.

  “His name was Anthony D’Amico, Mr. Grove,” said Major Fleming.

  “Excuse me?” said George Grove, following his elbow which was being tugged away by his aide, Wilson.

  “The soldier who died testing your junk rifle. Private Anthony D’Amico,” yelled Major Fleming.

  “I’m sorry,” said Grove, and when he was out of hearing distance, whispered, “What took you so long?”

  “I was trapped by a New Zealander telling me everything that was wrong with New Zealand and Australia.”

  “You’re lucky you got out this century. Who is that Major Rayner Fleming?”

  “I don’t know. I am sure she must be someone on General Watson’s staff.”

  “She mentioned the AR-60.”

  “The leak?”

  “If it’s not us, it must be them.”

  “General Watson is careful about that. He may not know a bullet from a brassiere, but the man is an American flag officer. He does understand the danger of the press, even if he doesn’t always move quickly enough for you.”

  “I know people, Wilson. That woman is upset. And she would leak. Warn Scott Watson about her. I don’t know what’s the matter with him for not spotting her himself. I would bet she was the officer who pushed through that bad AR-60 report also.”

  Wilson nodded. Normally Grove himself would be the conduit to General Watson. But George Grove did not want to spare the time now. The future phases of HARP were coming up before Congress now, and the head of Grove Industries could not be bothered with a simple little rifle, or some major who was obsessed with it. Besides, if worse came to worst, Grove Industries could always manufacture the AR-60 properly no matter how much that would cut into profits.

  At the other end of the room, General Watson was furious.

  “Major, I am afraid that display at a Washington party will do little to advance your career,” said General Watson.

  “My father fought all across Europe. He served in Korea. He fought in Vietnam. Three wars, and every time he went into battle he knew he had the best equipment his government could give him. We didn’t do the same for Private D’Amico. I went to his funeral. I made a promise to his grandfather, who fought for another country a long time ago. They did not go into battle with the best weapons.”

  “I see,” said General Watson. When Grove’s man Wilson saw Watson the next day, the general told him:

  “None of us will have to worry about Major Fleming anymore. I will not even have to mention that she spoke without permission to the press.”

  “I would like to know what you are going to do. We want discretion about all things. We are not that concerned with the AR-60 in itself. That is not the major weapons system.”

  “Don’t worry. I know a psychological case when I see one,” said General Watson. “She has difficulty working with people and unfortunately, she became too emotionally involved after seeing a soldier’s death. Now we all care about our brave men, but this officer went to the man’s funeral, even though he was not in her outfit. And I was there at a W
ashington party when she wildly called out his name to a manufacturer who wasn’t even all that familiar with that small product. She needs a rest, Wilson.”

  “Very good,” said Wilson. He noticed the array of campaign ribbons on General Watson’s uniform. The uniform, Wilson had to admit to himself, didn’t do much for the man. The last really good uniform was that of the British Hussars, 1702 to 1755, but he doubted whether the American military would be interested in tassels nowadays.

  Major Rayner Fleming knew her career might be over, and not because of calling a name out at a party. She knew it might be over because, faced with removal from monitoring the quality of the AR-60 and being ordered to a military clinic for “stress examination,” she defied orders.

  She did not report to the hospital.

  She took a very big risk, one she calculated had one chance in twenty. Alone, she went to an Undersecretary of Defense and took on one of the largest defense contractors.

  “I believe, sir,” she said, “that Grove Industries is unqualified to manufacture arms for the United States military. I believe that in a barrel of generally good apples, providing the best military equipment in the world, this manufacturer provides rot. And I suspect that it is rotten throughout, and that it lives on rotting whatever it touches.”

  The meeting was held in a small office with a view of the Potomac. A picture of an aircraft carrier hung behind the Undersecretary. Private D’Amico’s rifle looked like a very small thing in this office, where models of missiles sat on the desk, where problems affecting hundreds of thousands of men were solved.

  But that rifle and that private were Major Fleming’s business. Even if this man might not remember the name of anyone with less than two stars, this lowly major had to do what she had to do.

  The problem was apparent immediately. General Watson had outsmarted her.

  “You say that you have been sent to a clinic for rest. I am sure your file will verify that. You say your problem is stress?”

  “Yes,” said Major Fleming. She noticed the Undersecretary’s eyes glance lightly at her breasts and then move on up to her face. “My problem is listed as stress, but the real problem is that I give a damn.”