"Well, you know the etiquette of ignoring," said Remo in an unconvinced tone of voice.
Smith's patrician nose was almost touching the desktop now. He made assorted faces he was entirely unaware of.
"What do you say, Smitty?" Remo prompted.
Smith looked up, squint eyed. "It appears to be a bee's wing. Unremarkable."
"Well," said Remo. "Is it a bumblebee or a drone?"
Smith sat back and began working his keyboard.
Remo came around the desk to watch.
Smith had brought up a color replica of a drone honey bee and was manipulating it. One wing broke off and enlarged itself. It matched in outline and vein patterns the detached wing resting on the desk.
"It is a drone's wing. An ordinary drone," he said.
"No, it was a not-bee," Chiun corrected.
"I am unfamiliar with that terminology," Smith admitted.
"Examine that wing more closely," Chiun suggested.
Smith did.
"What do you see?" asked Chiun.
"A common drone honey bee wing, according to my data base."
Chiun shook his head slowly. "The creature that possessed that wing owned intelligence and malevolence. It was not a bee, common or otherwise."
Smith brought up an image of a killer bee.
It was completely different and the wing structure was different, as well. The killer bee was no different than a typical honeybee-long of body but not as long or distinctively colored as a yellow jacket. The drone, on the other hand, was plump and fuzzy.
"This is not a killer bee's wing," Smith said flatly.
"True. It belongs to a killer not-bee."
Smith looked to Remo for help. Remo rolled his eyes and pretended to find the overhead fluorescent lights of interest.
"I fail to understand," Smith said helplessly.
"You are excused," Chiun said, and floated over to the picture window to contemplate Long Island Sound.
"I guess we came a long way for nothing," Remo told Smith.
"There is word out of the L.A. Coroner's Office."
"Yeah?"
"The new coroner has pronounced the deaths of Dr. Nozoki, Dr. Krombold and the others as the result of killer-bee stings."
"That can't be!" Remo exploded. "We saw how those people bought it. A garden-variety bumblebee got them."
"Drone honey bees," Smith said carefully, "cannot sting. And more importantly, the venom of the Africanized killer bee is a neurotoxin, which is to say it affects the nervous system, not merely the breathing passages, as does ordinary bee venom."
"That makes no sense."
"It does if someone has crossbred a new kind of bee.
"That's possible ...."
"Since the advent of killer bees in this hemisphere, Remo, there have been many attempts to interdict the killer bee in its northern migration. All have failed. The defense of last resort has been to cross these feral bees with more-gentle domestic bees in order to obtain a less virulent and aggressive strain."
"How's it coming?"
"It has been an utter failure. But that is not to say that someone could not attempt to create a more virulent strain of bee, if they chose to reverse the breeding program."
"What's the point of that?"
"It is obvious," said Chiun, turning from the window.
Remo and Harold Smith looked at him, unspoken questions in their eyes.
"To kill," said Chiun.
Remo and Smith looked at one another, their faces undergoing various changes of expression-Remo's dubious, Smith's lemony.
Clearing his throat, Smith swept the bee's wing into the FedEx container and attacked his keyboard. He brought up a list of the dead to date, including the two pilots.
"Doyal T. Rand was the first," he said.
"We don't know that," said Remo. "He wasn't stung. His brains were eaten out."
"Let us assume he was the first because the man who autopsied him subsequently died of anaphylactic shock."
"Okay," allowed Remo.
"That was Dr. Lemuel Quirk. The New York coroner-"
"M.E.," Remo corrected.
"-also was killed by the sting of a bee, although no bee was found."
"Why?"
"Simple. To cover up the first killing."
"In Los Angeles, three people died at a new restaurant of bee venom, although none appeared stung and no bee parts were found in their stomachs, according to Dr. Wurmlinger."
"How did you know that?" asked Remo.
"I talked to the assistant deputy coroner in Los Angeles."
"Oh."
"A Dr. Nozoki who autopsied them died of a bee sting. As did a Fox cameraman. As did Dr. Gideon Krombold. Again, let us assume a cover-up."
"By bees."
"Using bees," said Smith.
"Idiots," said Chiun.
"What was that?" Smith asked the Master of Sinanju.
"Nothing," said Chiun, resuming his enjoyment of Long Island Sound.
Smith returned to his glowing amber list. "The bee attempted to kill you and Chiun. It died. Yet another bee followed you from the coroner's office and apparently attempted to finish the job by bringing down your flight."
"It's a chain of BS, but it's solid," Remo admitted.
"That leaves but one question."
"Actually, it leaves a zillion. But what's the one on your mind?" Remo asked.
"If the intelligence behind this-and there can be no mistaking that one does exist-is intent on killing everyone involved with those two deaths, why are Tammy Terrill and Dr. Wurmlinger still alive?"
"Search me."
"Because they are useful," said Chiun.
"Useful to whom?" asked Smith. "Who could so perfectly control this new strain of feral bees that they function as assassins?"
Chiun made a face at the misuse of the honorable term assassin.
"And how are they controlled?" added Smith.
"Sounds like Bee-Master to me," muttered Remo.
"Who?"
"Bee-Master. It was a comic-book character I used to read about back at the orphanage."
Smith made the lemony face of a man who had bitten into a persimmon unsuspectingly.
"We are dealing with reality here," he said.
"Not if bees can think and attack people they don't like," Remo returned.
Smith made an uncomfortable noise in his throat.
"If this chain of deaths began with Rand and the owners of that restaurant, what do they have in common?" Remo queried.
Smith posed the question to his computer, and it came up with side-by-side profiles of Doyal T. Rand and the Notos.
"Rand is a genetic genius. It was he who perfected the current method of roach-population control by shutting off their pheromones."
"What about the others?" asked Remo.
"They had just opened a restaurant that served bugs."
"I sure hope the thunderbug isn't back," said Remo to Chiun. Chiun made a disgusted face.
"Ordinarily," Smith mused, "I would not connect two such dissimilar deaths were it not for the fact that in both cases the medical examiner who autopsied the victims succumbed to bee stings. That is the only link. The cover-up of the attacks. It is wrong."
"It's criminal," Remo admitted.
"No, it is wrong in this sense-if a serial killer is at work, his signature should be static. The cause of death-the modus operandi-may vary."
"You think we're dealing with a serial killer?"
"I am nearly certain of it. And the only connection between the two victims involves insects."
"The killer is a bug on bugs, you mean?"
"An insane person who must be identified and apprehended."
"Well, what can we do?"
"At this stage, little. I believe it is time to bring in the FBI. They have psychological profilers who can glean remarkably accurate information on the subject from details surrounding the killings and crime scene."
"What about us?" wondered Remo.
"Go home. Stand by. I will call upon you when I need you."
"What about Wurmlinger?"
"He is in police custody, according to my sources. He is going nowhere for now."