Child's Play td-23 Page 3

  And once again Chiun repeated the tale of Sinanju, how the village was so poor that for lack of food the newborn were not allowed to live and mothers had put their babies into the cold waters of the bay, until Sinanju sent out its masters to save the lives of the children.

  "Think of that when you want peace," said Chiun righteously.

  "That hasn't happened for more than two thousand years, Little Father," said Remo.

  "Because we did not think like you," said Chiun, equating Remo's desire for peace with murdering the babies of Sinanju. Chiun would no longer discuss this with someone who had been given the secrets of Sinanju, a white no less, and then had turned his back on the cries of little children.

  At 3 a.m. precisely, Dr. Harold W. Smith arrived, gaunt, grim-faced, with a lemony purse to his lips. In a collage of gaudy tourist fashion, his gray suit and vest and striped Dartmouth tie stood out like a tombstone at a birthday party.

  "Glad to see you're looking well, Smitty," said Remo, assuming that this was well, since he had never really seen Smith any other way. Once, seven years before, Remo thought he had seen Smitty smile. The thin lips had risen slightly on both sides, a barely perceptible altering of the facial muscles. Remo had smiled back until he had found out it was caused by a toothache. Smitty had put off seeing a dentist.

  "Remo," said Smith by way of greeting. "And Chiun, Master of Sinanju."

  Chiun did not answer.

  "Is something wrong?" Smith asked.

  "No," said Remo. "Business as usual."

  Chiun turned. "Hail, Emperor Smith," he said. "Oh, glorious defender of the great document, the holy Constitution, wise and benificent ruler of the organization. The Master of Sinanju regrets not observing you properly at the outset, but my heart is troubled and my soul is deeply rent for the problems that beset your poor servant."

  "We already increased the gold allotment to Sinanju," Smith said.

  "Quite so," said Chiun, bowing. Remo was not surprised to see him accept this rebuff so cordially and easily. He knew Chiun had merely shifted his approach, not his purpose.

  "We'll have to talk here," said Smith. "We can't use the roof, which is usually safest. Police are all around. Somebody jumped to his death or was pushed."

  "Yeah," said Remo, looking at Chiun.

  "How horrible," Chiun said. "Life becomes more dangerous every day."

  Smith nodded curtly and continued. The problem was so grave that if they did not solve it, all the work of the organization since its inception might as well not have happened at all. Smith spoke for ten minutes, avoiding specifics in case there was a bug in the room.

  From what Smith had said, Remo surmised there was now a system under which witnesses could be protected. With this system, prosecutors around the nation had begun to make significant inroads into the organized crime structure. It was the most successful program so far of the organization, and within five years could cause the syndicates to crumble because they could not hold the loyalty of their members without assuring them reasonable safety from jail. With this system, the top men in these crime structures were no longer safe. An aide could be promised immunity and a new life for testifying. The code of silence, omerta, was being broken daily.

  That was, until recently. Somehow someone had found a way to get to the witnesses. Three in one day.

  "Hmmmm," said Remo, seeing more than a decade of work trickle away. The purpose of the organization was, quite simply, to make the constitution work. The very safeguards that protected the citizen also made it possible for well-financed destructive elements to become virtually unprosecutable. Had this continued, the nation would have had to abandon the Constitution and become a police state. So, many years before, a now-dead President set up a small group headed by Dr. Harold W. Smith. Its budgets were siphoned from other agencies, its employees did not know for whom they worked, and only Smith and each succeeding president would know it existed. For to admit that the government was breaking the law in order to enforce it, was to admit that the Constitution did not work.

  Therefore, the organization, CURE, did not exist-and when it needed an enforcement arm, they selected someone without living relatives, framed him for a murder he did not commit, secretly presided over his public "electrocution" (one of the last men to die in the chair in New Jersey), and made sure this electrocution didn't work quite properly, so that when Remo Williams awoke, he was publicly a dead man. A man who didn't exist for the organization which didn't exist

  They had done enough psyche tests to know this man would serve. On that first day after his visit to the electric chair, he had met Chiun and started the long journey along the road no white man had ever walked before, that only those from the village of Sinanju had ever trod.

  Now he was two men: the man who would serve CURE and the younger Master of Sinanju. And the man who would serve heard how more than a decade of work was disappearing, while the younger Master of Sinanju cared only about approaching that ultimate use of the human body and mind called Sinanju.

  And both of them saw Chiun nod wisely and tell Dr. Harold W. Smith that Chiun commiserated with the emperor's problems-to a Master of Sinanju, a president, chairman, czar, king, dictator, director… were all emperors-but it would be impossible to continue service to Emperor Smith. The House of Sinanju was withdrawing from the organization. This time for good.

  "But why?" said Dr. Smith.

  "Because this time we do not dispose of your enemies but suffer our own demise. It is written." Chiun was somber. His eyes lowered. "We are through."

  Smith asked if it were more gold the House of Sinanju wanted, but Chiun responded there were some things that could not be purchased for gold.

  "I'll double the tribute to the village," said Smith. And then, hesitantly, "if that will do any good."

  "You cannot purchase our services for mere gold," said Chiun, "because you have already purchased our undying loyalty with your awesome grace, oh, Emperor Smith."

  And, added the Master of Sinanju, the doubling of the tribute to Sinanju exhibited the very essence of that grace.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Martin Kaufmann was screaming at the post commander when Chiun and Remo arrived at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. As Kaufmann shrieked it, he was not a member of the Airborne, had not been in the service for twenty-three years, was not under arrest and therefore, as an American citizen, he had a complete and legal right to leave. Just walk out, if you please.

  As Major General William Tassidy Haupt responded, without even the movement of a finger on his clear and immaculate desk top:

  "Personnel assigned under jurisdiction of the Department of Justice shall not exercise freedom of movement beyond post confines and within these said confines shall, at the discretion of the post commander, be restricted to areas deemed safe, beneficial and in accordance with the proper function of the unit's mission, heretofore determined by Regulations 847-9 and 111-B, paragraph 2-L of the latter."

  And as Remo who had presented his credentials just moments before to Major General William Tassidy Haupt said:

  "What're you dingies talking about?"

  "I'm a prisoner," yelled Kaufmann, small blue veins popping around his light blue eyes. He was in his late fifties and had an accountant's gentle paunch under his blue and gold Bermuda shirt. He wore white sandals and white tennis shorts.

  "He is a special guest who has signed Form 8129-V, granting and deeming certain prerogatives to the post commander as to area of abode and movement therein," said General Haupt. He too was in his late fifties but his body was trim, his eyes clear, his jaw set, his hair combed immaculately, as if each strand was organized and filed above his head. He looked as if he were waiting for a magazine photographer who wanted a model of a modern major general for a bad article on "Meet Your Post Commander."

  "Therein is the key word," said General Haupt. "Therein."

  "I want to leave," yelled Kaufmann.

  "Did you or did you not sign Form 8129-V of your own free w
ill?" said General Haupt.

  "I signed a load of papers. I guess I signed that one."

  "Then there is nothing to argue about," said General' Haupt. "These men from the Justice Department will tell you that."

  "I ordinarily do not interfere in white affairs," said Chiun.

  "Executive order 1029-V, there shall be no function assigned to race or religion. Go ahead, sir," said General Haupt to Chiun.

  "This man who is afraid lacks confidence in your defenses and therefore seeks others."

  "You're damned right. I'm scared shitless," said Kaufmann. "They're gonna get me."

  General Haupt thought about this a moment. His face puzzled into little furrows above his eyes.

  "Defenses?" he asked.

  "Protection," said Chiun. "Those who fear attack have defenses."

  "Like in wars and things," said General Haupt. "That's old stuff. Haven't dealt with that since the Point. An attack is like an assault, right?"

  Chiun nodded.

  "Yeah, I know what it is now," said General Haupt. "They happen during wars and things."

  "If this man can be made to feel your defenses are safe, then there won't be any problem," said Remo.

  "Good," said General Haupt. "That's not my mission. Outside my office you'll find a warrant officer. He will assign you to an official familiar with your specified function."

  "Specified function?" said Remo.

  "War and things. This is a modern army. We have people who are specialists for almost every function, no matter how exotic," said General Haupt.

  "I don't care," said Kaufmann leaving the office with Remo and Chiun. "They're going to get me. I only said I'd testify because I was told, I was assured, I would be safe." And Kaufmann blurted out his story. He was a CPA who organized the books for a crime family in Detroit. His job was surfacing money, that is, taking the huge excess amounts of illegal cash from gambling, narcotics, prostitution, and making it public in housing developments, banks, and shopping centers.

  Remo nodded. All the money in the world was worthless if you couldn't spend it. And to spend money in America you had to show where you got it. You couldn't say you were unemployed and buy a $125,000 house and two $20,000 automobiles. So the mobs consistently surfaced money through a web of banks and businesses and phony investors.

  If Kaufmann were the man in charge of this, he was a hell of a find for a witness. His testimony alone could take apart the whole structure of an entire city. No wonder Smitty had called him a "high probable" target. It was Remo's job not so much to stop a hit, which he would do, but to find out from the hit man who had sent him, and then to find out from who sent him who had paid the sender, and keep moving back until he was at the nub of this thing, where he would eliminate it.

  In the process, he was to find out how these people worked.

  They had killed three already, two current and one past witness in Detroit operations. According to Smitty, not only the identities of these witnesses were supposed to be secret but their whereabouts were supposed to be unknown outside the Justice Department. One by a bomb and two by gunshots. No one was seen around the schoolyard or the other two death scenes, who had not been, in Justice Department parlance, totally "clean."

  The two gun deaths had been done with .22 caliber bullets, so long-distance sniping was out. Someone had gotten close without being seen. The Justice Department, and ultimately CURE, did not know who or how. Remo estimated Kaufmann's chances of survival as fifty-fifty-at best.

  Feeling very governmental, Remo looked Kaufmann in the eye. "You've got nothing to worry about," he said, putting a reassuring arm around Kaufmann's shoulder.

  "Then what about that bombing in the Oklahoma schoolyard? The papers said that guy was named Calder. But I knew him as a bookkeeper. I knew he was talking. He was safe too."

  "That was an entirely different situation," lied Remo. He and Chiun walked along pin-neat paths of Fort Bragg, where white-painted stones like piping marked where people should and should not walk. Large, fresh-painted signs pointed arrows toward jumbles of numbers and letters such as "Comsecpac 918-V."

  It was as if 20,000 persons had descended on the piny woods of North Carolina for the sole purpose of keeping this area neat-from time to time running around shooting off guns whose shell casings were collected, stacked, bound according to regulations, then shipped out to the Atlantic to be dumped by other men who kept ships just as neat.

  A squad of men, rifles at port, jogged by in formation, chanting: "Airborne. Airborne." As Chiun had said of armies: "They are trained to smother their senses in order to perform duties, while Sinanju enhances the senses to perform more fully."

  "How Is it different for me and that poor bastard who got blown up?" asked Kaufmann.

  "Look around you," said Remo. "Men with guns. Guards at gates. You're in the center of an organized fist, and it's protecting only you."

  And Chiun nodded, saying something in Korean.

  "What'd he say?" Kaufmann asked.

  "He said you are probably the safest man in the world," said Remo, knowing that Chiun had noted that almost any attack could be foiled, except the one you were ignorant of.

  "Who is he anyway?"

  "A friend."

  "How do I know you're not the killer? The mob had to get into the Justice Department somehow to even find that poor bastard in Oklahoma."

  "Look, no weapons," Remo said, raising his arms.

  "I still don't like it. You know what Polastro must be thinking since I left his payroll?"

  "Polastro?" said Remo.

  "Salvatore Polastro," said Kaufmann, slapping his forehead. "Oh, this is great. You're supposed to be special protection to me and you don't know who I'm testifying against."

  "Good point," said Chiun.

  "Thanks," said Remo and once more reassured Kaufmann. The lieutenant in charge pointed out that only families, trusted families, were allowed into what was now called Compound Seven.

  Compound Seven had a gate, electronically wired. Compound Seven had constant security with ten-minute two-man patrols round the clock. Compound Seven had total control over entrance and egress. Everyone had to have a pass or to be recognized. Compound Seven had metal security detection, thereby identifying every piece of metal anyone tried to carry into the compound.

  "Most secure area outside of a SAC base, sir," the lieutenant told Remo.

  "A death trap," Chiun said in Korean.

  "What'd he say, what'd he say?" Kaufmann asked.

  "He said the most secure area outside of a SAC base," Remo said.

  "No, him," said Kaufmann, pointing to Chiun.

  "He just commented on the compound. Relax, you have nothing to fear but fear itself."

  Chiun cackled and said to Remo in Korean: "What silliness. Would you say that the only trouble with seeing danger is your eyesight? Would you say that the only trouble with hearing a great animal approach you was your ears? Why do you indulge in this silliness? Fear, like any other sense, helps prepare you for danger."

  "You don't understand governments, Little Father."

  "No, it is that I do understand governments."

  "What're you two talking about?" said Kaufmann. "I'm surrounded by beanbags, and I'm going to die."

  "General Haupt is the safest post commander in the Armed Forces," said the lieutenant.

  "That's like hearing an unbiased endorsement of the Pope from an archbishop," Kaufmann said. "I'm leaving."

  Remo followed him to his neat frame house surrounded by the same white-painted rocks that seemed to mark everything at the base. Two MPs, one with .45 caliber pistol at the ready, demanded Remo's identification before they let him follow Kaufmann inside. Another MP sat in the living room. He too demanded the same identification. Upstairs, Kaufmann was throwing clothes into a valise.

  "Don't come near me. One yell and those MPs will be all over the place."

  "And you want to leave this kind of security?"

  "Yep."

 
"Why?"

  "Because if they got that guy in Oklahoma, they're gonna get me."

  "Where are you going to run to?"

  "Not telling anyone."

  "Is there no way I can convince you to stay?"

  "No way," said Kaufmann, shoving a shirt and a handful of socks into the valise and compressing the jumble with the valise lid. Snap. "No way."

  "The government needs you as a witness. Why don't you listen to my point of view?"

  "You've got three seconds," said Kaufmann.

  In that three seconds, Remo rose to his pinnacle of excellence. He explained how society depended upon citizens caring about justice. He said that when destructive elements such as Polastro were put to rout, the more constructive elements could flourish. He explained the responsibility of a citizen in a free society.

  He also pressed an upper vertebra full into the cranial socket so that Kaufmann at first feared he would die as lights danced before his darkening eyes and then wished he would as every socket in his body felt as-though it had been brushed with Number Two sandpaper.

  Remo rested Kaufmann softly on the bed by the valise.

  "Ohhh," said Kaufmann, waiting for the pain to subside so he could cry in agony.

  "So you see how you fit into the plans of better government," said Remo.

  Kaufmann saw that indeed. He assented by nodding his head. The nod was very sincere. So much did Kaufmann wish to show civic consciousness that he touched his head to his knees and rolled to the floor. A deep nod.

  "On behalf of the government of the United States and the American people, I thank you," Remo said.

  Downstairs, Remo smiled to the living room MP. He heard a shriek from upstairs. It was Kaufmann getting back his lungs. The pain was, of course, momentary. Chiun called the pressure move "the fallen petal" and said it worked because of a disruption of life forces and death forces which coexisted in the human body. Remo had tried to discover what it meant in Western terms, and the closest he could figure out was that it was a forced disfunction of the nervous system. Except that according to the medical books the recipient of that sort of pressure should die. They never did.