"I did not say 'trounce,' Emperor Smith," a squeaky voice called from the background.
"You said 'trounce,' Little Father," Remo said.
"I said that the other program has, in the past, been known to beat the emperor's program. But surely with the addition of Emperor Smith to the cast, the half hour of decadence will transcend its usual level of drollery and fecklessness and mount an effective attack against the sprite Urkel."
"You said 'trounce,' " Remo insisted.
"Did not."
"Did, too," Remo challenged.
"I will not argue with you."
"You should hear what he said about your acting," Remo confided to Smith.
Chiun raised his voice to a new pitch of squeak.
"Do not listen to him, Emperor. Your skills as a thespian are matched only by your wisdom as a ruler."
"I rest my case."
This brought forth from Chiun a burst of Korean that Smith could not follow even if he were fluent in the language, which he was not.
"Is there a point to this phone call, Remo?" Smith asked wearily, once the tirade tapered off.
"I thought we covered that. I just wanted to tell you we caught you on the news last night."
"A masterful performance, O Emperor," Chiun called.
"Er, yes," Smith said, uncomfortably. "A neighbor informed my wife that I was in some of the background footage of the news story."
"You mean to tell me some of your neighbors actually know what you look like? I figured with those Dracula hours you keep they'd either have to be up after midnight or before five just to get a glimpse of you skulking through the bushes."
"I am as active in my community as our work allows."
"Yeah, right. From the house to the car to the office and back. You used to golf," Remo said.
"When was the last time you were out on the links?
Ten years ago? That neighbor lady probably dropped her colon when she saw you on the news. She must've thought you were dead."
"Remo, is there something I can do for you?"
"Not me, Smitty. It's Chiun."
Smith raised an eyebrow. "Is there something wrong with the Master of Sinanju?" he asked.
"Nothing wrong. He just wanted me to ask you for something."
"A trifling item, O illustrious Emperor," Chiun called.
"If it is within my power to do so."
"Oh, it is," Remo said. Smith could almost see the grin being beamed via satellite from the kitchen of Remo's Massachusetts home. "Chiun wants to know if he can have your autograph."
"I'm not sure I understand...."
"He thinks since you've been on the news that you're going to break into the big time. He wants to get your signature first. Especially since he heard that a lot of autographs fetch big bucks."
"How like you to apply your base motivations to another," squeaked Chiun. 4'I would treasure the emperor's signature always, and hold it up for all to see. It would be witness to his munificent and generous nature."
"And you'll sell it as soon as you think you smell a buck."
"Visigoth," Chiun hissed.
"So, you willing to do it or what?" Remo spoke to Smith.
"I will see what I can do." Smith stood up from the bed, eager to end the phone call.
"And Smitty?" Remo said.
"Yes?"
"Don't forget us little people when you're a star."
The kitchen reeked of barbecued pot holders. The tiny hood fan above the stove was making a feeble attempt to clear the smoke-filled air as Smith took his seat at the kitchen table.
"I'm sorry the pancakes are a little dark," Maude Smith apologized as she placed a plate before him.
It looked like a tarred stack of miniature manhole covers.
"They are fine, dear," he said. He picked up his knife and fork and began the laborious job of hacking his way through the pile of charred disks. His wife went over to the sink. With great care, she started to chisel the black grit off the still-smoking frying pan.
Smith considered the phone call from Remo as he chewed languidly on a triangular sliver of carbonized pancake.
All things considered, he was holding up very well. Smith was a man to whom the security of CURE was paramount. For that secure shield to remain firmly in place, Smith could never move out into the limelight. The security of CURE and of Folcroft, and the possible compromise of both, had driven Smith into fits of terror for years.
It was, therefore, uncharacteristic for him to be so casual at getting his face plastered across the evening news.
But though it was normal for him to be upset as a general rule about such things, it was also just as normal for him to be pragmatic about any given situation. And the truth was, the news report meant very little.
Nothing of CURE'S secret mission had been revealed. Smith's name had not been given out. The simple fact was, he had been just another face in the crowd, recognized only by a nosy neighbor.
But Maude Smith had been delighted.
She was waiting up for him when he got home the previous night and had treated him as if he were a real media celebrity. She had burbled on for an hour about how thrilled she was that Gert Higgins had called her after the six-o'clock news and how she wished Harold had allowed her to purchase a VCR
machine so that she could have taped the later broad-cast.
She reminded him that she was going to visit their daughter, Vicki, at the end of the week and that Vicki would have gotten a real thrill out of the whole thing.
Maude was happier than he had seen her in years.
In fact, he didn't generally eat breakfast at home—
preferring instead to get a cup of coffee and a container of prune-whipped yogurt at Folcroft—but Maude had been so pleased at his brush with celebrity and so eager to do something special for him that he had agreed to eat a rare breakfast at home with his wife.
So here he was, home more than an hour later than normal, chewing in silence, lost in his own thoughts, while Maude Smith scrubbed diligently away at the blackened pans in the sink.
Smith was surprised at his own calm appraisal of the situation.
There was always risk of exposure. CURE had had several crises in the past. But this was nothing. Nothing at all.
Smith sliced away at a fresh sliver of blackened pancake, and raised it to his thin lips, first swallow-ing the wad of gritty, wet dough already in his mouth.
There was a timid knock at the kitchen door.
Maude went to answer it.
Probably the paperboy. Late, as usual.
Smith made a mental note to chastise the boy for his tardiness. But all at once, a thought occurred to him. The paperboy collected his money on Friday.
This was Tuesday.
"Mrs. Smith?" a man's voice asked from the door.
"Yes."
With worried eyes, Smith glanced up at the door...and nearly vomited his pancakes back up onto his plate.
He recognized the man from the bank. Lothar Holz.
Maude Smith recognized him, too. Before Smith could protest, she had ushered the man into the small kitchen and shut the door. With a quavering voice she announced him as "the man from the bank" to her seated husband.
"Am I disturbing you?" Holz asked politely, looking from Smith to his wife and back again.
"No, not at all." Mrs. Smith was clearly delighted to have the cause of her husband's celebrity in her own home. "Would you care for some breakfast?"
she asked hopefully. When Holz accepted the offer, Maude restarted the burners and retrieved the damp, black pan from the sink. She moved around the stove excitedly, clucking like a proud mother hen.
"May I?" Holz asked. With a nod, he indicated the vacant chair across from Smith.
Through a colossal effort of will, Smith subdued the urge to panic. He nodded stiffly, and Lothar Holz sat down at the tiny table.