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down in his leather chair.
Near the blue contact phone sat a silver spoon and a small bowl of prune-whip
yogurt. Both were untouched. Smith had asked Miss Purvish to bring him the
food from downstairs but found when it arrived that he had no appetite.
Under ordinary circumstances he would have let appropriate police and security
agencies deal with the threat to the President. But these were not ordinary
times for America. The bedrock on which she had been founded had turned to
quicksand. It was far worse than it had been when Smith was selected to head
up CURE nearly a decade before. The once-great nation seemed to be faltering.
Even something as straightforward as television news was rife with subtext.
Smith generally avoided Walter Cronkite. The man was not a reporter in the old
sense. His broadcast tended to editorialize on the news rather than recite the
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facts.
Smith switched the channel to ABC, where the voice of coanchor Harry Reasoner
was commenting on the day's events.
The ABC anchor had just announced the arrival of the President at the Capitol
when the picture abruptly cut out. A flash of hissing static was followed by a
test pattern. This lasted only a few seconds before ABC's two anchormen
appeared on-screen, assuring viewers that the technical difficulties from
Washington would be fixed quickly.
Smith allowed himself a flicker of hope.
He had turned on the TV to watch for Remo or Master Chiun. Damage control for
CURE would depend on what played out at the Capitol today. This was the first
real stroke of good fortune in a dismal affair.
Leaning forward, Smith switched to CBS, then to NBC. As he had suspected, the
networks were using a single camera feed from the Capitol Building. There was
a total blackout from within the building itself.
On NBC they were playing tape of the arrival of the President's motorcade,
already a few minutes old. The footage focused on the chief executive himself,
not on his entourage. Smith didn't see Remo or Chiun anywhere.
Perhaps things weren't as bleak as they had seemed. America was overdue for a
change in luck. With a flutter of cautious optimism, Harold W. Smith reached
for his bowl of yogurt.
"WHERE DID YOU disappear to?" Remo asked as the Master of Sinanju padded up
beside him.
They were inside the Capitol. Chiun had vanished as soon as the motorcade
stopped at the steps outside. "My emperor has made clear his desire to remain
anonymous until the time of his ascendance to the throne," the Oriental said.
"I have seen to our anonymity."
Remo wasn't sure what the old man meant. He wondered if it had anything to do
with the group of agitated newspeople who seemed to be arguing at the
periphery of the crowd and pointing up at the lone camera in the gallery.
As men worked around the camera, Remo returned his attention to the floor of
the rotunda.
The President had not invoked privilege, insisting that he join the line like
the rest of the mourners. He moved along with a small group of congressmen.
Two Secret Service agents pretending to be civilians remained near the chief
executive. The rest had fanned out throughout the rotunda.
Remo's entire body was coiled with nervous energy. He and Chiun stood away
from the line. The younger man's eyes were skipping carefully from mourner to
mourner.
If a killer was there, Remo couldn't see him. Neither his police instincts nor
his crash-course CURE training in how to spot a criminal seemed to be working
very well. As far as he could tell, the only one who looked like he had
something to hide was the President of the United States.
"You really think they'll strike here?" Remo whispered.
"Yes," Chiun replied.
"You seem pretty damned sure."
Chiun didn't turn. "I am the Master of Sinanju."
"Right. Any last-minute pointers?"
Chiun nodded, tufts of white hair bobbing above his ears. "Actually, there is
something that might be useful to you," he said, face etched in stone, "since,
after all, it is you who is going to stop the actual attack."
Remo blinked. "Me? I thought we were partners here."
Chiun gave him a withering look.
"Knock that off," Remo said. "You were supposed to help. That's why Upstairs
sent you down here."
"Stop whining," Chiun said. "I intend to help by keeping you alive long enough
to die another day." He took a deep breath, as if reaching some great internal
decision. "You are not of Sinanju. I do not fault you for this, for you could
no more alter the circumstances of your own birth than you could control the
pasty paleness of your skin. As an outsider, you ordinarily would not be privy
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to the tales of my ancestors. For what I am about to tell you, know that I am
breaking a long-standing tradition."
Despite the insults, Remo felt a sense of momentousness emanating from the
tiny figure beside him. As if some great line had been crossed, some hidden
chamber door opened. There was an importance to the moment that Remo couldn't
seem to quite understand. Yet he felt it to his marrow.
"I'm honored," Remo said after a pause. He almost said the words "Little
Father." He didn't know why. As an orphan, he had never had a true father.
Chiun glanced around, as if checking to make certain the ghosts of his
disapproving ancestors weren't hovering nearby.
"Once upon a time-" the old Korean began. The mood broke.
"You've got to be kidding me," Remo interrupted.
"Listen, idiot," Chiun snapped. "It is important. Once upon a time there was a
Master of Sinanju named Bang..."
THEY WERE IN the village of Sinanju. Gulls played in the misty updrafts above
the rocky shore.
"Now Bang was a Master of the early order," the Master of Sinanju intoned,
"before the New Age of the Sun Source."
As he began the tale of his ancestor, he kept a sad eye on one seagull as it
floated and fell in the cold air.
It was plain that youth had begun to flee for the Reigning Master of the House
of Sinanju. His once black hair was now the gray of old pewter. Streaks of
white cascaded from the leading edge of his widening bald spot.
In the village they whispered that it was the death of his son, Song, that had
aged this Master before his time. The strength and speed were still there, but
the vitality had been sapped from him that day he carried his first pupil back
from Mount Paektusan. The villagers hoped that this new pupil, the son of the
Master's brother, would return life to the hollowed-out shell of the Master,
for the people relied on the rapidly aging fool for their very sustenance.
The pupil who would one day cause his teacher great shame sat cross-legged at
the Master's feet. The eyes of the little boy were similar to his uncle's, yet
there was a quiet cunning deep within them. Even at the tender age of eight,
there was a hint ever so slight-of the twisted path the student would one day
take. On some level the Master saw it. Always knew it to be there. But grief
and urgency and history suppressed his better judgment.
"Now in the time of Bang there was not one Master and one pupil, as is the
case now. While Bang was head of the village and could alone claim the title
Master of Sinanju, he had many students, called night tigers. So feared were
these night tigers of Sinanju throughout the world that Bang rarely found it
necessary to venture from the village. When men came from far-off shores to
hire the skills of Sinanju, Bang simply dispatched an underling to handle the
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