"Find out the pattern of that kimono because we might all be dead if you don't know it," said Uncle Pimsy.
"You're serious, aren't you? You know, this isn't the Britannia-rules-the-waves sort of heroics."
"If that pattern is what I think it is, heroics or anything else won't do any of us any good."
"Would you mind telling me what you suspect?" Neville asked.
"Do you remember that your late father and I had one stipulation before you took over?"
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"Yes. That we not take any contracts in the Orient. No clients in the East," said Wissex.
"Do you know why?"
"Frankly," Lord Wissex said, "I thought it rather peculiar but I had to make that promise so you wouldn't stop me."
"We had you make that promise because our fathers had us make that promise because their fathers had them make that promise because their fathers had them make that very same promise."
"What are you talking about?"
"I am talking, lad, about why you must find out the pattern of that kimono."
"You won't tell me beforehand?"
"Find it," ordered the old man, and he turned and limped his way down the battlements, with the poodle following behind wagging her scented tail.
"What a lovely kimono," said the British gentleman to the trio on the beach in front of the St. Maarten village of Grand Case. Grand Case was a walk up the road to the new headquarters front, the offices of Analogue Networking Inc. Smith had devised a plan whereby a request for the lost information would be beamed over the satellite during a weather disturbance similar to the one in which it had originally been lost. The hope was that it would reach the same terminus it had reached before. If it reached anyone. If all the records even existed anymore.
The request for return of the records had been carefully written by Smith, so as not to sound desperate. Instead, it hinted at a sizable reward. Noth-
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ing so big as to alarm, but enough to get interest from someone out there who might just be wondering what was all this nonsense about two decades of undercover work and its detailed portraits of how crime worked, with its names and numbers and tools and secrets to see a nation through its desperate years of trial.
So Remo and Chiun had returned to St. Maarten with Terri from the Yucatan, along with a battered golden plaque that they had found in an underground cave near the wiped-out village. Terri had to translate the plaque and its battered condition made that a detective's riddle, and so Remo, while waiting, would keep an eye on the transmission from Analogue Networking Inc. If something happened with CURE's records, Chiun would continue with Terri, and Remo would be off to retrieve the program.
Terri wore a scanty bathing suit while she pored over the rubbing of the Hamidian plaque they had found. Each time she thought she had the key to it, she had another question and it all still puzzled her.
She looked up from the rubbing as the cultured voice intruded on her thoughts.
"I say, that is an interesting pattern on the kimono you are wearing, sir."
Remo looked at the man. He was carrying a small concealed weapon under his left armpit.
Chiun stared at the horizon, that clean line separating the Caribbean blue from the pastel sky.
"I say, that is a most interesting design. May I photograph it?"
"Why do you ask?" said Remo. "You could just
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stand up the beach over there and photograph us. Why do you ask?"
"I just thought you might mind."
"We do. Thank you. Don't photograph," said Remo.
"Oh," said the gentleman. He wore a dark suit with vest and regimental tie. He carried an umbrella.
"I say, what is that?" he said, looking at the rubbing Terri was analyzing.
"It is an ancient Hamidian inscription," she said.
"Yes, yes. I seem to have seen that somewhere. Some time," he said.
"Where?"
"The Yucatan Peninsula, I believe it was. I don't imagine you've been there."
"Why, yes, I have," said Terri. He was so polite.
"Why, yes, I have," said Remo, imitating in sing-song Terri's voice. "Surprise."
Terri shot him a dirty look.
"What does it say?" the British gentleman asked Terri.
"Nothing much," said Terri.
"I see. The villagers there also worshiped a jade standard with a similar design to the one your gentleman friend is wearing."
"His name is Chiun."
"Hello, Chiun. How do you do."
Rerno smiled. He knew why Chiun was staring implacably at the horizon. He did not wish even to honor this man by a look.
A delicate finger with the nail curving gracefully upward emerged from the kimono. Slowly, it signaled the gentleman to come closer.
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Down went the forehead, up went the finger, with such speed that only Remo saw it.
So fast and clean was the stroke that at first no blood emerged, just a thin line where the forehead had been cut. Not deep but deep enough.
By the time the British gentleman knew what had happened, the blood had formed in tiny specks on his forehead, reproducing the symbol on Chiun's robe. It was the symbol that meant "house," and that meant the House of Sinanju.
It was not necessary to say more.
"Better wash your forehead with the salt water," Remo said.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You've been cut on the forehead."
"It just tickled."
"Not supposed to hurt," Remo said.
A gloved hand went up to the forehead and came back down with blood on it.
"What? Blood. Gracious. My blood."
"Wash it off. It's not deep," Remo said.
"Why did he do that?"
"You wanted the symbol to take back to your master, so now you've got it. It means greetings from the House of Sinanju."
"I can't believe Chiun would do that," said Terri, who had not seen the blow because the hand had moved too quickly.
"He did it," said Remo.
"You did it. And you are blaming it on him. Right? Right, Chiun? You wouldn't do something like that, would you?"
Chiun did not answer.
"I'm sorry," Terri said. "I interrupted your med-
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itation, but your partner has been slandering you again."
The Briton stumbled to the water's edge and splashed salt water on his forehead, groaning.
"It's only the salt that stings," Remo said.
"Poor man," said Terri.
Remo got up and went slowly toward the gentleman and reached into where he was favoring his body, just under an armpit. He brought out a very nasty little Cobra pistol.
He showed it to Terri.
"See? He is not just an innocent beach stroller."
"You palmed the gun to justify your vicious attack," she said.
Remo tossed the gun back to the man who put it in his neat little nylon shoulder holster. "I also planted the shoulder holster. Under his jacket," Remo said.
"Well, he wasn't firing it," said Terri.
"I've got to leave, Little Father," said Remo. "I'll be back soon."
"Don't hurry," Terri said.
Remo kicked sand in her face.
"Go lift weights," he said.
"Did you see what he did?" Terri said to Chiun, but the old Korean was not answering. He was looking at the skyline for a reason Terri or the British gentleman could never fathom.
Remo knew why.
Chiun was looking at the skyline because he liked the way it looked.
At Analogue Networking Inc., the technician explained to Remo the foolproof method of check-
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ing whether a transmission was received or sent and how the computer stored such information.
Remo did not understand the language the man used. There was a satisfied sort of chuckle in the man's voice as he went on about all the wonders of computers.
He explained that it was the weather's fault that the program was lost in transmission. Not the computer's. The computer did not make mistakes. It couldn't. No one had yet taught it how.