Balance Of Power td-44 Read online

  "Be sure to lock the door," Chiun said. "One never knows what a pervert might try."

  "Got a drink?"

  "No," Remo said, glowering.

  "Just asked, that's all No reason to get touchy." Barney headed off toward the bathroom and turned on the shower.

  Remo called Smith. "We've got Daniels here," he said.

  "Whatever for?"

  He told Smith about Gloria X and the Peaches of Mecca and Barney's assignment to kill Calder Raisin.

  "It doesn't make any sense," Smith said.

  70

  "Glad you agree."

  "What does any of this have to do with His-pania?" Smith wondered aloud.

  "Probably nothing. He's probably just trying to pick up a few bucks. The question is, what do we do with this rum pot?"

  "Hang on to him until I can put everything into the computer. Don't let him kill Raisin. What's Gloria X's address?"

  Remo gave it to him as Smith punched the information into the computer console.

  "And what's her real last name?"

  "Raisin."

  "What?"

  "She's Raisin's wife. That's what she said."

  Smith was silent for a long moment before he said, "She can't be."

  "Why not? Interracial marriages and murder between spouses has never been big news."

  "Because Calder Raisin's wife lives in, Westches-ter with their two kids under another name, and they're all as black as Raisin is. He keeps their profile low for security reasons, but he spends the weekends there. That information is in every personal biographical printout on every computer in the country."

  "Maybe he's got two wives," Remo offered.

  ''I'll check it out. How old is Gloria?"

  "Mid-twenties. Southern accent. Fanatic about the upcoming black revolution."

  "Good," Smith said, keying in the material. "I'll go through the SDS and black organizations lists. Anything else?"

  Remo thought for a moment. "She talks a lot while screwing."

  71

  Smith's keyboard fell silent. "Is that everything?" he asked drily.

  "I guess so." Remo heard the phone click off.

  It just didn't make sense.

  Smith read the printout on the video screen for the third time:

  RAISIN, CALDER B.

  B. 1925, BIRMINGHAM, ALA.

  ATTENDANCE, MERIWETHER COLLEGE, 1 YR.

  PRESENT OCC: DIRECTOR, UNION RACIAL JUSTICE (URGE)

  FORMER OCC: ASST. DIR., RAY THE JUNKMAN, INC., NEW YORK CITY.

  FORMER OCC (2): SANITATION PERSONNEL, CITY OF NEW YORK

  MARRIED 1968, LORRAINE RAISIN, FORM. DALWELL

  CHILDREN (2) LAMONTE, B. 1969, MARTIN LUTHER, B. 1974.

  NO PREV. MARRIAGE OR OFFSPRING

  INCOME: $126,000

  HEALTH: POOR

  SUB (1) HEALTH

  CANCER, COLON. TERMINAL HOSP: ROOSEVELT, 8/79

  ROOSEVELT, 5/79

  ROOSEVELT, 3/79

  LENOX HILL, 12/78

  A.B. LOGAN, 9/78

  N.Y. UNIV. HOSP, 2/78

  72

  "Cancer," Smith said out loud. What reason would anyone have for assassinating a terminal cancer patient?

  The obvious answer, that Gloria X and her Peaches of Mecca didn't know about Raisin's illness, was too remote for Smith to consider. Any organization, particularly a black organization, willing to hire an assassin would know enough about Raisin to know he wasn't going to live long. But then the Afro-Muslim Brotherhood wasn't an official organization. In fact, the first traces of the Afro-Muslim Brotherhood that the computer was able to pick up had appeared less than a year before. During the same month that Barney Daniels had been returned from Hispania to the United States.

  Blaming the assassination of a civil rights leader on an ex-CIA agent might make some sense as part of some larger scheme. It could make the agency look even worse to the public than it already did.

  But as part of what larger scheme? What could Hispania, a banana republic no larger than Rhode Island, with a gross national product so small that most of its inhabitants lived hi jungle huts-what could Hispania do to America?

  America could wipe it out with a sneeze.

  And even if Hispania were connected to the Afro-Muslim Brotherhood in some way, how could Smith explain the Hispania envelope filled with plastic explosive-the envelope that was delivered to Barney? And the name on the envelope, Denise Daniels. Who was she? There had been 122 Denise Danielses on Smith's printout, and none of them were related ha any way to Bernard C. Daniels with the exception of a third cousin of Barney's uncle who lived in Toronto. Smith would have to create a new code to tap into international personal biographical

  73

  data banks. He would begin with Hispania. But it could take years to sift through the names of every person, living or dead, in the entire world.

  None of it made sense. But the weirdest piece of the puzzle was right in New York City.

  Gloria X.

  Who was Gloria X?

  "A political genius with the body of a goddess, that's who you are," rumbled General Robar Estomago as Gloria rose from between his legs. "Also you give the best head in Puerta del Rey," he added with a chuckle.

  "The best in the world, Robar honey," she said, rubbing her jaw. "Taking me out of that whorehouse and setting me loose back in America were the smartest things you ever did. Now I'm all yours." She rearranged herself on the bed in Estomago's office at the end of the Hispanian Embassy building.

  "No, my hot puff pastry, not all mine. You are Hispania's. When you complete this mission, El Presidente De Culo will erect a statue of you."

  "Hope it's more erect than El Presidente," she giggled.

  "Your plan is going well, I take it?"

  "Perfectly. I told you the bomb in the envelope wouldn't work. Daniels is too smart to be bumped off so easily. This way, we get rid of him nice and legal, and crack this two-bit country apart while we're at it. This place'll be so torn up with riots and demonstrations that nobody will even see us com-ing."

  "Boom," Estomago said, gesturing wildly. "El Presidente will love that. And so will our Russian sponsors."

  74

  "That's right, sweetie. And you're going to love this."

  At that, Gloria X nestled her head against the belly of the Hispanian ambassador and began to prove herself again.

  General Robar Salvatore Estomago, chief emeritus of the National Security Council of the Republic of Hispania, current ambassador to the United States, and recipient of the considerable personal favors of Gloria X, had come a long way from flipping Big Macs at the local McDonald's franchise in Puerta del Rey.

  The short-order stint was a post he had held immediately prior to his appointment as head honcho of Hispania's secret police under El Presidente Cara De Culo.

  He shifted his rotund lower belly to grant Gloria better access to his legendary tool which, were it not for its exemplary size, would be all but hidden from view by the porcine proportions of his torso.

  Her head bobbed enthusiastically, her blonde hair spilling out over his swarthy skin like a golden cloud. All his life he had fancied gringo women, white as diamonds. And Gloria was white to the core. She embodied everything he had ever dreamed or feared about white women. Gloria was beautiful, cruel, deceitful, duplicitous, selfish, spoiled, and unaccustomed to any sort of work. She was also utterly contemptuous of her homeland, and sought to destroy America with more zeal than El Presidente and the Russian premier combined.

  Estomago knew he'd found a treasure in Gloria the minute she walked down the ramp of the American ship onto the docks at Puerta del Rey, whistling as she stripped to the skin and started soliciting the dock workers.

  75

  She had come with a shipload of women, volunteers anxious to get out of American prisons, even if it meant a long rehabilitation work program in Hispania. But the work was top-secret and all the workers were fated for disposal and since Gloria was blonde and Estoma
go lusted for her, he saved her from the normal work details, and put her in an occupation more suited to her talents. He set her up in the biggest whorehouse in town, with instructions to report on every important American who visited the place.

  It was a good move. Because of one American, a CIA agent who knew more than agents in Hispania were supposed to know, Estomago was now ambassador to the United States. Also because of that one American-Bernard C. Daniels-a grand scheme was now coming into play, a scheme devised by Gloria to disrupt the United States, upset the balance of power in the world, and to thrust Hispania to world power, just as surely as Estomago was thrusting now under the expert guidance of Gloria's tongue and lips.

  "Ah yes," Estomago sighed, fanning himself with a framed photograph of El Presidente, which he kept by the bed. "You sure know your business."

  "Destroying America is my business," she said curtly, wiping her mouth. "In spite of these black fools you have saddled me with."

  "The Afro-Muslim Brotherhood is a good cover for us," Estomago said. "Besides, you were the one who thought of creating it in the first place."

  "It'll serve its purpose," she said. "I'm sending Daniels out to bump off Calder Raisin. That ought to work the niggies into a rampage."

  "And Daniels? Did he object?"

  76

  "That poor drunken thing? I told him I was Raisin's wife and that I was after the insurance money."

  "An American will always believe in greed," Estomago said loftily.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "Gone? What do you mean he's gone?" Remo ran into the bathroom where Chiun stood on the toilet lid, peering out the open window. "A true assassin," Chiun said, glowing. "Nothing can deter him from his goal."

  "I've got to get to Raisin," Remo said.

  The leader of URGE stood on the front steps of Longworth Hospital. He was wearing a short white hospital gown tied by two bows in the back, revealing a pair of red and green striped shorts. Before him, a dozen demonstrators similarly attired sprawled across the expanse of marble steps reading comic books and passing marijuana joints. Ahead of them, television cameras recorded the proceedings.

  "My fellow freedom fighters," Raisin intoned into the microphones in front of him. A breeze shimmied through the thin gown he was wearing, causing it to ripple at his knees.

  "I stand before you today in the cause of justice."

  77

  He turned aside and hissed, "Sheeit, brother, it cold out here. Go get rne my robe."

  A white man whose hospital gown was adorned with buttons advocating peace, the abolition of nuclear power, the execution of the Shah of Iran, the expulsion of whites from South Africa, the elimination of noise from urban centers, and a very old one demanding the death of anyone over thirty years of age, shuffled into the hospital to get Raisin the robe.

  "I urge you to join us here at Longworth Hospital to help us meet our demands for equality in the medical profession. I urge you to participate in our call to action. I urge you to answer that call with us. Because, fellow supporters of this nation's oppressed Block Mon, the URGE must be met."

  He. pointed his finger in the air and scowled ferociously at the cameras. "And I tell you now as I stand before you, that I have more than a dream. I tell you, with four hundred years of black servitude echoing these words through the ages: I'VE GOT THE URGE!"

  The people on the steps stirred. A young couple groped each other. Several of the pot smokers lay snoring. A tall black man wearing mirrored sunglasses shook a tambourine in time to disco music playing on his trunk-sized portable radio. "And you know, all of you who seek to break the chains of inequality, that when you've got the urge, you've got to do your duty!"

  Remo walked up to Raisin. He wore a hospital gown untied over black chino pants and a tee shirt. He offered Raisin his robe. "Someone's going to try to kill you soon," Remo whispered, his back to the cameras.

  78

  "Who you?"

  "Never mind. Get back inside the hospital."

  "Fellow freedom fighters," Raisin shouted into the microphones. "I have just been informed that an attempt is being made on my life."

  The groping couple squeezed closer together, their lips parted in ecstasy. The tambourine player rolled off to sleep.

  "Would you shut up?" Remo said.

  "And I say to you. I do not fear death from the hands of an assassin."

  "Be quiet, will you? Just get inside."

  "For what does a life signify without the full achievement of freedom for the Block Mon? I stand ready to die. And every Block Mon, woman and child stands ready to die in the cause of freedom."

  Raisin's chest puffed out. His chin jutted forward. One shoulder rose higher than the other and he planted one foot out in front of him as though he were a mold for a bronze statue. "Freedom now," he shouted.

  The young couple began to copulate and rolled into the range of the cameras. "Cut!" somebody yelled from behind the TV equipment. "Get those two screwers out of here, will you?"

  As the couple was being rolled out of sight, Remo once again requested that the director of URGE return to his hospital bed where he could be protected while Remo searched out his assassin.

  "Thank you, boy, but nobody going to kill me 'fore the Lord do hisself. Besides, they all these TV cameras around. Ain't nobody going to do nothing serious on TV." He patted Remo on the shoulder. "You just go about your business. I'll get inside quick as I can. And thanks for the tip. It make a

  79

  good speech. Freedom now!" he repeated into the cameras, which had been turned on again, the screwers having been removed.

  Remo walked through the sparse crowd. No sign of Daniels. If Barney hadn't come directly to Calder Raisin, Remo reasoned, he must have gone back to see Gloria X for instructions. He would be back in Harlem.

  Barney eased himself out of the taxi, his head pounding. Eight o'clock in the morning, and not one drink since before dawn.

  Some protectors, Barney thought, remembering Remo and Chiun. They might be able to fight, but nobody who would refuse a drop of tequila to a thirsty man was any friend of his.

  He pounded on the door to Gloria X's house. The Grand Vizier Malcolm opened it at once. Obeying orders, Malcolm stepped aside to allow Barney to race to the bar in the living room.

  Perched on top of the bar was a silver hip flask of tequila with a note attached. It read: "Im yours whenever you want me."

  He unscrewed the cap and sniffed. The welcome aroma of fine tequila filled his nostrils and coursed down his throat, beckoning for more. "Oh, baby, do I want you," he said to the flask.

  He let the glory gallop down his throat. Then he filled it up again after locating the tequila bottle.

  "Dat's all, whitey," the Grand Vizier said, striding across the white room. "You coming with me now."

  "Hold it, Baby Huey," Barney said. "I am to be admitted to the bar anytime I feel like it. Your massa told me."

  The Grand Vizier lifted Barney over his head and

  80

  carried him aloft out the door and into a black automobile, where two Peaches of Mecca snorted awake. Barney would have slugged it out with all of them were it not for the fact that he still held the cap to the hip flask in one hand and had to screw it back on so that the tequila in the flask would not be spilled.

  As soon as he was tossed into the car, Barney was enveloped in a rough wool burnoose and handcuffed.

  "I realize I ought to be getting used to this, but do you mind telling me where we're going?" he asked.

  "We going to the Mosque," one of the Peaches said reverently. "You keep that hood over your face when we go in, else you get killed."

  The Afro-Muslim Brotherhood mosque, about twenty minutes from Gloria X's, was identifiable by a hand painted sign on unvarnished plankboard nailed over another sign reading: Condemned Building. Do not enter.

  "Open, doors of the faithful," the two Peaches cried in unison. The doors swung open heavily. Awfully heavily, Barney noted, for a condemne
d building that looked as though it would crumble to dust at a touch. And the doors were new. Fragments of steel shavings still clung to the hinges.

  Barney was led through a maze of hallways, stairwells, past closed doors and giant empty rooms. The building had evidently been some kind of public building at one time, abandoned after Harlem ceased to be a quiet suburban retreat for middle-class white professionals and became the black Harlem it was today.

  Barney could tell by the sound of his feet against the flooring that he was walking on a steel base. He

  81

  bumped a wall with his elbow. Again steel. There were no windows.

  The mosque was as well fortified as Gloria X's house.

  Flanked by his two bodyguards, Barney ground to a halt in front of an enormous hall where a speaker, wrapped in purple swaths of silk, entreated , his audience.

  "Who keep you down?"

  The answer was a soft grumble from five hundred black throats: "Whitey."

  "Who kill our kids in these dirty slums?"

  "Whitey."

  "Who rob you, rape you, steal your bread?"

  "Whitey."

  "Who plan to wipe out the black man?"

  "Whitey."

  The speaker roared on, his voice rising above women in purple scarves on the left side of the old amphitheater, and above the dark, clean-shaven heads of the black-suited men on the right.

  The speaker yelled. He pleaded. He cried put in the tradition of the black preacher. The temperature inside the old theater rose with the speaker's volume, manufacturing waves of perspiration. It flowed from black foreheads, black backs, black cheeks. It swamped brown armpits. It trickled down tan legs and tan spines. Yet no one moved. They sat rigid as soldiers, a theater full of zombies. Their only sign of life was the movement of their mouths as they murmured "Whitey."

  "Whitey own this world," the speaker continued, "and he hate you. He hate your pure blackness which remind him of his own ugly white skin.

  "He hate your strength and your courage and your wisdom. That why he want to kill you."

  82

  He paused a moment and smiled, a gold-toothed smile, a smile that cost him $4,275, from a white dentist in the Bronx, a smile he had bought while preaching for the Pentacostalist Gospelry Church. And that had paid well. But this paid unbelievably. That white woman with the blonde hair sure knew how to get his oratory moving.