"Harold, it was horrible. They threw me out into the street!"
"I know, dear. But it is over. Maude, I would like to go over our discussion of last night."
"Discussion?"
"Yes, you remember. You came to Folcroft last night."
"Harold, I was here all last night, frantic with worry. I tried calling the hospital, but no one would give me any satisfaction."
"Excuse me?" said Smith, gray eyes blinking rapidly.
"Harold, what are you talking about? Are you well?"
Flustered, Harold Smith said, "It is nothing. It must have been a dream. I will be home as soon as I can."
Smith abruptly hung up. "Er," he began, "it appears there has been a slight misunderstanding."
"Hah!" said Remo. "I knew it!"
"But Maude came to me last night," he said dully.
"Yeah," Remo said. "And we all saw pink bunny rabbits and purple pterodactyls. None of them were real, either."
Smith made long faces as he sat thinking.
"We did have a conversation about the search for your parentage within hearing of the Dutchman's room," Smith went on. "It is possible that he could have created the illusion of a visit from my wife, to sow confusion and dissension among us."
"Who's the Dutchman?" asked Winston Smith.
No one bothered to reply.
Smith continued. "Then it was all concoction." His face was almost comical with realization.
"Right," said Remo. "I'm not related to you and you are not related to me. End of freaking story."
"There is still this one," said Chiun, indicating Winston Smith.
"Forget him. "
"He wears your face, Remo," Chiun pointed out.
"I don't believe it."
"Neither do I," said Winston Smith. "I'm bailing."
Smith spoke up. "I am afraid we cannot allow this. You know too much, Winston."
Winston Smith started backing out of the room. "I don't know jack shit. Except that you're a fraud."
"If you will not return to your unit, some provision must be made for you. Chiun, render him unconscious, please."
Chiun shook his aged head. "He is not my son. He is Remo's responsibility."
"I offer him to you for training," Smith said quickly. "Since Remo has made his intentions of leaving the organization clear, we have need of a new Destroyer. I put him in your hands."
"Don't I get any say in this?" Remo and Winston said in unison. Their heads snapped around, and their gazes locked.
After a beat Remo suddenly advanced on Winston Smith. Smith drew a combat knife from a boot sheath. Remo stopped. Suddenly he tossed Winston a set of car keys. He caught them.
"What's this?"
"There's a blue Buick parked down the road. Take it. Change your name. And don't look back."
Winston Smith's camouflage tiger stripes gathered up in confusion. "You're giving me your car?"
"Once Smith gets his hooks into you, he'll never let go. You have a chance for your own life." Remo gave Harold Smith a hard look. "Which is more than I ever got. Take it and go."
Winston Smith smiled cockily. "Thanks, jarhead."
"Don't mention it, swabbie."
And he was gone.
Smith rose from his desk. "Remo! We cannot-"
Remo kicked the door shut. "Forget it, Smitty. Your story may be true or not. Either way, the kid deserves a decent break after the raw deal you handed him."
"Here! Here!" said Chiun.
Smith settled back into his chair, features haggard.
"And what kind of a name is Winston?" Remo demanded.
"I told you before. A family name. It happens to be my middle name."
"You ought to be shot just for naming an innocent kid after a cigarette," said Remo.
Smith made a lemony mouth and said nothing.
The Master of Sinanju floated up to the glasstopped desk and plucked something out of one voluminous sleeve. He laid it on the black glass.
Smith squinted.
"If it is still your wish to end your life," Chiun intoned, "there is the means."
Smith took up the white coffin-shaped pill, regarded it with an impassive expression and without a word slipped it into the watch pocket of his vest.
"The crisis has passed."
No one said anything for a long awkward moment.
Then Smith said, "I have many loose ends to clean up. Staff to rehire. Patients to calm down. Strings to pull with the IRS and DEA."
"What about the Dutchman?" asked Remo.
"His medications will have to be changed. His mind is clearing and the danger is growing. At the moment I am more concerned with Uncle Sam Beasley."
Smith pulled closer the worn attache case that Big Dick Brull left on the desk. He worked the combination that disarmed the explosive latch charges, exposing a portable computer and telephone handset. He booted it up.
"The basement computers are inoperative but may be salvageable, even if the data stored on them is not. In the meantime, I will undertake a search for Beasley."
"Don't forget my mother," Remo reminded. "I'll make you a copy of the drawing."
"I will do my best as promised," said Smith absently.
"Do better," warned Remo. "You have a lot of sins to make up for."
Harold Smith said nothing to that. He was already lost in cyberspace.
"Come on, Little Father. Let's go panning for gold."
Hazel eyes widening, the Master of Sinanju followed Remo out of the office.
Chapter 35
Remo Williams led the Master of Sinanju down to the Folcroft basement. They walked in silence, lost in their own thoughts.
There Remo raised the corrugated loading door.
"Remember when the DEA stormed ashore that second time and you tore into them?" he asked Chiun.
"They were fools and died fools."
"You made a lot of noise."
"Striking terror into one's enemies is never wasted," sniffed Chiun.
They were standing on the rust-stained concrete loading dock.
"It covered the whizzing very nicely," said Remo.
"What whizzing?"
Remo had picked up a crowbar along the way. He drew back, letting fly.
It seemed a casual gesture. But the crowbar whizzed once it left his fingers. It kept on whizzing as it arced high out over the sound. The noise it made splashing was too far away to make much impression on their eardrums. But their sharp eyes easily detected the eruption a mile out on the sound where it struck.
"You threw my gold out to sea!" Chiun cried in horror.
"No," said Remo. "I threw everyone's gold out to sea. I threw high and far so no one noticed. Not even you. Of course, I had to work really fast and one ingot spun out of control and sank a DEA boat. But I figured they had it coming."
"What if my gold rusts?" demanded Chiun.
"You know that gold doesn't rust. Like I kept telling you, it's safe as soap."
Chiun puffed out his cheeks while his wrinkled face smoldered. "You will recover every dram of gold or you will never hear the end of it," Chiun said in a flinty voice.
"Done," said Remo unconcernedly.
"Any gold missing from my share will come out of your share."
"Fair enough."
"And any missing from Smith's share comes out of your share, as well. Unless, of course, Smith does not notice it-in which case, it goes into my share."
Remo blinked. "How is that possible?"
Chiun levered a quivering finger at the choppy waters of the sound. "Do not think. Swim. I will not endure the thought of the gold of the House of Sinanju lying wet and untended at the bottom of this barbarian bay."
"Next time let's use a bank."
"Pah! Banks are untrustworthy."
"How is that?"
"They accept your gold and money with smiles and promises of safekeeping. But when you demand it back, they are full of lies and excuses."
Remo looked puzzled.
"They never give you back your own money. It is always someone else's," sniffed Chiun.