Murder's Shield Read online

“Are you referring to the executions in the East?”

  “Yes. This sort of thing cannot be tolerated. Operating with discretion, your organization is intolerable enough. Running amok, it must be stopped.”

  “That’s not us, Mr. President. That’s someone else and we are on it.”

  “It wasn’t you, then?”

  “Of course not. We don’t have an army, sir. And that sort of sloppiness would never be tolerated by our person. We are moving against whoever is responsible.”

  “You are going to use that person, then?”

  “If we can.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I cannot elaborate.”

  The President paused, looking at the red phone. Finally, he said, “For now, you may continue. But I think you should know I do not rest easier knowing you exist.”

  “Neither do I, sir. Good night.”

  · · ·

  In a motel outside Fort Worth, the customer in Room 12 had a message from his aunt. The room clerk trudged wearily to the door and knocked. The door opened and a voice said, “Yes?”

  “It’s a telegram for you.”

  “Who’s it from?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Read it.”

  “Well, okay. It’s from your Aunt Harriet in Minneapolis.”

  “Thanks,” came the voice and the door shut in the clerk’s face. He blinked, startled, then knocked again.

  “Hey, do you want this telegram or don’t you?”

  “No,” came the voice.

  “What?”

  “I don’t want it. You ever get a telegram you didn’t want?”

  “Ah’ll be a toad’s tail,” said the clerk, scratching his head.

  “Fine,” came the voice from inside.

  When the clerk left, Remo packed his last sock. He pushed it roughly into the corner of the suitcase. Chiun watched him.

  “I am worried,” said Chiun.

  “About what?” said Remo brusquely.

  “There are enough people who will try to kill you. Why must you make their job easier by carrying the shackles of anger?”

  “Because I’m mad is why. That telegram was the signal. And I’m going in and I don’t want to go in.”

  “I give you this advice. Of all the people you will see, none is worth the giving of your life.”

  “My life, my life. It’s my life, dammit, and I have a right to piss it away if I feel like it. It’s not your life. It’s not Smith’s life. It’s mine. Even though the bastards took it away from me ten years ago. Mine.”

  Chiun shook his head sadly.

  “You carry the wisdom of the pain of my ancestors of Sinanju. Do not destroy it for boyish thoughts.”

  “Let’s put it where it’s at, Little Father. You got paid to teach me. Cold, hard, American taxpayer cash. You would have taught a giraffe to kill for a price.”

  “Do you really think I would have taught you all that I have taught you for money?”

  “I don’t know. Are you packed?”

  “You know. You do not wish to admit it.”

  “And you aren’t all that concerned solely with the idea of wasting a few years of your life. Admit that, too.”

  “The Master of Sinanju does not admit. He illuminates.”

  Remo snapped the luggage shut. When Chiun did not wish to talk, Chiun did not talk.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IN PHILADELPHIA, STEFANO COLOSIMO was greeting his children and grandchildren and his brothers and sisters and cousins, kissing both male and female alike on the cheek in the gusty love of a patriarch for his family.

  In small happy groups they came to greet Grandpa Stefano, moving through the foyer past the bodyguards, to feel the heavy hands and the wet lips, and then to get the little brightly-wrapped packages. For the children, it would be cakes and toys. For the grownups, there was jewelry and sometimes an envelope if family finances were not going well. Grandpa Stefano would give these envelopes with heartfelt respect, mentioning that it was only undeserved good fortune that enabled him to do this small thing for a relative and, who knows, perhaps the relative would be able to do him a favor some day too.

  The bodyguards, their faces like stone, marked a severe contrast to the joyful family reunion. But then, no one paid attention to bodyguards any more than one paid attention to plumbing.

  Some of the younger Colosimos, when they went to school, were surprised to discover that their classmates did not have bodyguards. Some had maids, some even had chauffeurs, but none had bodyguards. And it was then that the children got the first inkling of what it meant to be a Colosimo. You didn’t tell everything in classroom show-and-tell. You were in the class but not part of it. The people they talked about on the television news, you had heard on the telephone asking to speak to your grandpa. And you kept this very quiet in class because you were a Colosimo.

  Grandpa Colosimo greeted his family and received respect from the outside world also. There were messages and calls from the mayor, a senator, the governor, every city councilman, the chief of police, and the state chairmen of the Democratic and Republican parties. All wishing Philadelphia’s largest builder, olive oil importer, and real estate developer a very happy fortieth wedding anniversary.

  So it was laughable when the lowly patrolman became insistent that a car outside was blocking the street and he wished to speak to the owner of the house.

  “Carlo, take care of it,” Grandpa Stefano said to one of his bodyguards.

  “He says he wants to speak only to the owner,” said Carlo Digibiassi whose income tax returns listed him as a business consultant.

  “Take care of him, Carlo,” said Grandpa Stefano, rubbing a thumb across the tips of his fingers to indicate small bills.

  The bodyguard disappeared into the happy throng, then returned, shrugging his shoulders.

  “What kind of a cop is this?” he asked.

  “Did you tell him we know people?”

  Carlo nodded, exaggeratedly, indicating he had not only told but had been rebuffed.

  “Tell him we’ll take his ticket.”

  “He says it’s an ordinance. He can take you in.”

  “For parking?”

  Carlo shrugged.

  “See who he is, this policeman,” said Grandpa Stefano. The order launched phone calls to headquarters, to precincts, to policemen who were employees of Colosimo although they were never carried on company books.

  Carlo returned. “Headquarters knows him, but some of our people say they never heard of him.”

  With the resignation of a man who realizes he must handle everything himself, Grandpa Stefano went outside to speak to the policeman.

  On his porch, flanked by bodyguards, he introduced himself. “Can I be of any help?” he said.

  “Yeah. That car out there. It’s a vehicular hazard.”

  “On my wedding anniversary?”

  “Sorry. A vehicular hazard is a vehicular hazard.”

  “A vehicular hazard,” said Grandpa Stefano with just a hint of contempt in his voice. “No one else can move this vehicular hazard. All right. I will go.”

  On the curb, Carlo noticed something unusual. It was not the four other policemen coming toward them. It was the way they came. Like a basketball team with the two tall front men setting picks for the two shorter men behind, as if they would jump up to take a shot. They did not jump up, however; they shot from the hip. The flash was the last thing Carlo saw.

  The five policemen drew their guns simultaneously. All went for the bodyguards. For a flash of a moment, only one man stood unscathed, and that was Grandpa Stefano Colosimo and then he was cut down by all five guns.

  The bulletin made the 2:00 p.m. news. Philadelphia police were blaming the killing on a rival gang faction.

  In New York City, Inspector William McGurk flipped off his radio and scribbled some numbers on a yellow pad. Very neat. It took five men and that was a lot, but it was worth it. Very neat, indeed.

  McGurk leaned back
in his chair and locked his eyes on the map on the wall of his office in police headquarters, across the hall from the commissioner’s. He could visualize the web of policemen moving farther and farther across the country. He had done a great deal already. And now his papers were in; any day now his retirement as the police department’s manpower deployment officer would become effective, and he could spend full time on his other, more important, mission. And then that web would expand. With a blooded army, it would travel west, and north and south. Texas. California. Chicago. Ultimately, of course there was Washington. There would always be Washington. And Duffy, with his Fordham cleverness, had known it.

  McGurk’s army would have to go all the way, all the way to the White House. Once you began an avalanche, you didn’t stop it halfway down the mountain.

  McGurk stood up, and began straightening his office before leaving for his other office where important work was done. Soon, he would have to call the United States Attorney General and tell him that the secret police army did not exist.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  DR. HAROLD SMITH’S LEMONY face looked unusually acidic.

  “Hello, Remo,” he said. He sat in the harshly-lit, securely locked depositor’s room of the Manhattan Bank with two attaché cases before him. They were open and stacked rim level with packets of new hundred-dollar bills.

  Remo looked at the money. Funny how money lost its value when you could have it by picking up a telephone and mumbling a few words, or when there was nothing you really wanted to buy because your life didn’t make any difference to anyone but your employer anyway. The hundred dollar bills were what they were. Paper.

  “First, let me explain the money. You will establish yourself in New York as a figure in the rackets. We have established that in the eyes of our police targets, a man is identified as a rackets figure, not because he functions in the rackets, but because he has the police on his payroll. In other words, you exist as a racketeer because you pay off police.

  “Now, the beauty of this is that you do not have to build—which would take time—an organization of your own. Moreover, it eliminates the risk of your bungling around in loan-sharking, numbers, hijacking, prostitution, drugs and the like which are highly sophisticated.”

  “You mean the cops will think I’m a gangster if I pay them off and I won’t have to mess with the business of being one?”

  “Exactly,” said Smith.

  “And then?”

  “Find out the leadership, clean it out, and then we’ll dislocate the rest of the organization.”

  “Why not just let your drones gather evidence and have it appear on some U.S. attorney’s desk? I mean, why do the leaders have to be terminated?”

  “Because we don’t want their organization public. It’s our belief that if the organization were made known, in this country today they would not only escape conviction, but could run for public office and win.”

  “That’s bad?” asked Remo angrily. “If they won, we could retire. If they won, we wouldn’t be needed. They’re doing our job, Smitty.”

  “No, they’re not, Remo,” said Dr. Smith softly.

  “Don’t tell me that some of those people they’ve been knocking off weren’t on your little computer print-outs with some long, complicated plan to get them in trouble with the IRS? Come on, Smitty, who the hell do you think you’re talking to? Those guys are doing our job and doing it faster and better, and I think in your aristocratic gut, you’re afraid we won’t be needed any more.”

  “Remo,” said Smith, his voice tense and low, “your function parallels what these people are doing, so you see them as doing right. But there are differences. One, we use you only in dire emergencies when we have no alternative. Two, we exist precisely to prevent the sort of thing that is going on now. CURE exists so America won’t become a police state. We were commissioned so this wouldn’t happen.”

  “That’s too subtle for me, Smitty.”

  “Remo, I’m going to ask you what every commander has asked his troops since he led them from the caves. Trust me. Trust my judgment.”

  “As opposed to my own.”

  “Yes.”

  Remo drummed his fingers on the clean wood table top. He had to be careful about hitting things. He wanted to hit. He wanted to smash the table.

  “All right. And I’ll tell you what every foot soldier has felt since you led us out of the caves: I don’t have much choice.”

  Smith nodded. He gave Remo a verbal rundown on the latest reports, analyzing the growing police network, the probability that it would be located in the East.

  “Our best guess from the number and location of the hits is that they have at least a hundred and fifty men. It would take that kind of manpower pool to be able to move people around into different cities, and take no chances on their faces becoming familiar.”

  Smith added that a teller had been overly interested in the large amount of cash withdrawn from the bank under one of CURE’s cover names and Remo should be careful that he was not the target of a robbery.

  “There’s almost a million dollars in these two cases. Cash. You’ll return what’s left at the usual account.”

  “No,” Remo said, eyeing the thin bitter face before him. “I’m going to burn what’s left over.”

  “You destroy American energy when you burn money.” There was shock on Smith’s face.

  “I know, Smitty. You’re a real descendant of the Mayflower.”

  “I fail to see… ”

  “And I’m just a dumb honkey cop,” Remo interrupted, “who, if he knew his folks, would probably see them in blue collars.”

  “Chiun says you’re something more.”

  “I don’t want to be anything more,” Remo said. “I’m proud to be a honkey. You know what that is? That’s the redneck dirt farmer, not the plantation owner. That’s the cowhand, not the rancher. That’s the guinea, not the Italian-American. That’s the Jewish philanthropist. Me.”

  “And don’t think I don’t know how much those people mean to America,” said Dr. Smith.

  “Those people. Those people.”

  Remo snatched a packet of bills, fresh and new and packed together as hard as wood. In front of Smith’s face, he worked the fibers in his hands, wresting them from each other. The green confetti sprinkled on Smith’s lap.

  “That was ten thousand dollars, Remo. Our ten thousand dollars.”

  “Our ten thousand and those people. Our. Those.”

  “Good day, Remo,” said Smith, rising. Remo could feel frustration mounting in the little pillar of integrity. A nice warmth overcame him, especially when Smith tried to say something at the door and could not find words.

  “Have a good day, Smitty,” laughed Remo. He closed the attaché cases, gave Smith time to get out of the bank, then strolled out into the street to be robbed.

  He saw no one who seemed to have any interest in him. So he walked around the block. Still no one. He walked around again, and then saw the same car again, and realized why he had overlooked the targeters. It was a man and woman in the front seat of a parked car. They appeared to be staring lovingly into each other’s eyes. Good cover. Of course, lovingly, on Remo’s third time around the block, was obviously a fraud. The essence of love, as Chiun had said, was its transitory nature. It was like life itself. Short. A brief interlude surrounded by nothing.

  Having identified his attackers, Remo walked briskly along Fourteenth Street swinging the two attaché cases. He paused in traffic-snarled Union Square, lest the lovers lose him. He glanced back. No, they were there, in the car following him. There was another car behind theirs. Two tall black men with floppy-brimmed hats jumped out of the second car. The lover and another white man came out of the front car, all moving in his direction. An integrated job. Who said New Yorkers didn’t work together in harmony, regardless of race, creed, or color?

  Remo decided to circle Union Square to see if they would actually attempt a daylight robbery in a crowd. Far back now, the two c
ars still stood in the traffic that choked the Square. The four men loped after Remo as he strolled the park. They were packing, but it was not the bulges that gave them away. Armed people walked differently, as if they were surrounding their weapons, not carrying them.

  On Remo’s second time around the park, the four men split into twos, and took stations on the east and west sides of the small park. Remo headed for the middle. The four men headed for him. The blacks went for his head and each white went for an attaché case.

  The cases were not there, however. They were simultaneously cutting up under two black chins with sickening cracks. The whites got the cases in their backs on the way past Remo.

  To passers-by, it looked as if one poor man was being overwhelmed by four, and Remo noticed he was the subject of curiosity and nothing more. No screams. No help. Just mild interest. One of the whites fumbled for a revolver and Remo placekicked his teeth to the back of his throat. He imbedded the big floppy hat of a black in the central portion of his brain, and caught the second white with a neat, but not very powerful, elbow thrust. Too strong, and you had to get the suit cleaned. The temple shattered, without releasing blood or brains.

  Remo separated the spinal column of the last living member of the foursome with a simple heel chop.

  Then came the shock. The curious bystanders were no longer curious. They just continued on their way, stepping over the bodies. The only interruption to the smooth flow was a comment from a woman shopper about the inadequacy of the city’s sanitation department.

  Remo looked back to where the two cars still sat in traffic. The drivers bolted. The woman dashed toward the East River and the man ran toward the Hudson. Remo didn’t feel like running after them, and he walked on with the stream of New Yorkers scurrying toward their destinations, hoping to get there alive.

  Remo noticed his shoes were scuffed. At Third Avenue he stopped for a corner shoeshine boy. The boy looked at the tip of Remo’s right shoe and took out a greenish, well-used bottle.

  “What’s that?” Remo asked.

  “You can’t get blood off leather right with just water,” the boy said. “You got to use special solution.”