Remo paused in the doorway. "You won't forget what I said about Smith and the operation, will you?"
"Never," promised the Vice-President.
"Great," said Remo, giving the Vice-President an A-okay sign with his fingers.
When the door shut, the Vice-President looked for a telephone. He'd get help down here so fast those two would never know what happened. But he saw no telephone in the bedroom. Frantically he looked everywhere. In the side tables, by the window, even under the bed. Finally he realized there wasn't one.
Doffing his bathrobe, the Vice-President crawled into the bed and tried to sleep. Come morning, the Secret Service shift would be changed. Then those two would see what they were in for. And Smith would too. National security be damned. Dr. Harold W. Smith had overstepped himself this time and the Vice-President was going to see that man clapped in a federal cell if it was his last official act as Vice-President.
Chapter 11
Secret Service agent Orrin Snell knew how to read the street. He was trained to zero in on the subtle details that never registered on the ordinary person. The little things that were out of place or not quite right. A man walking with his hand hovering instead of hanging limp meant that that person carried a sidearm and was prepared to use it. A furtive walk meant a man who feared notice or pursuit. A car moving too slowly could mean anything, but one moving too fast could only mean trouble.
Agent Snell could hear trouble coming four blocks away. He knew it even before his walkie-talkie crackled the message.
"Late-model Ford coming at you at a high rate of speed. Two males in the front, no further description."
"Backup!" Snell barked, dropping into a crouch behind the concrete barriers on the curb. He set his walkie-talkie down at his feet and pulled his revolver, holding it double-handed.
The car squealed to a stop, fishtailing. Its doors banged open and two men in dungaree jackets and colorful kaffiyehs masking their faces exploded out of either side. They carried Uzis.
Agent Snell called for them to drop their weapons. That was his mistake.
A hand grenade arched up from one of the attackers' hands and landed behind him, bouncing twice before it detonated.
Snell felt nothing at first. Then there was a crushing noise and his top of his head seemed to squeeze in on itself. When he opened his eyes, he was on his back, his head somehow resting against a concrete barrier so that he was looking down at himself.
His legs resembled twin meatball sandwiches in the torn wrappers of his trousers. The right one was doubled under his thigh. he could not move either leg. He groped for his revolver, but it was nowhere to be found.
At that moment his backups arrived from around the corner. They stopped, took in the sight of agent Snell bleeding on the sidewalk, and their faces registered the shock of what they saw.
Snell tried to shout at them. Don't look at me, you idiots. Get the ones who did this. What's the matter with you? No words came.
Then two figures jumped from behind the barriers and cut both agents down.
The two attackers went for Blair House's massive double doors. They applied a plastic charge to the lock, jumped back, and waited for the explosion.
A mushy whoom came and the doors fell in.
The two terrorists followed the doors inside, their kaffiyehs protecting them against the smoke and swirling plaster dust.
On the ground, Orrin Snell tried to find his gun. His hand brushed something. Through pain-racked eyes he saw that it was his walkie-talkie. He fumbled it onto his chest.
"Two men . . . Uzis . . . inside front door. Stop them," he muttered painfully.
Static answered him. And there was no sound of returning fire from inside Blair House.
What was the matter with them? Snell thought dazedly. Why weren't the inner guards responding? Were they all asleep?
"Still asleep," said Remo, peeking into the room.
He rejoined Chiun in the hall. The Master of Sinanju sat on an antique chair. A long scroll lay in his lap.
"What's that you're working on?" Remo asked.
"Nothing," said Chiun absently, shifting in his chair so that Remo could not see what he was writing.
"Looks like one of your histories, but I know you left them all back in Sinanju."
"Correct," said Chiun.
"Then what?"
"It is none of your business."
"If it's not a history scroll, then it's gotta be a contract scroll."
"What makes you say that?"
"The ribbon you untied from it. It's blue. Aren't Sinanju contracts tied with blue ribbons?"
"So are the birth announcements of the offspring of Sinanju Masters."
"Then it's a contract," Remo said.
"Do not be so quick to assume," said the Master of Sinanju.
"You'd deny it if it weren't. Look, Chiun, I hope you're not cooking up some new scheme to keep us in America. I'm telling you right now that it won't work,"
"Why not? It worked last time."
"Aha! So you admit last time was a trick?"
"You are just catching on now, Remo my son? You are duller of mind than I thought. Perhaps you need more stimulating work to sharpen your skills. Weeding has made you soft-witted. "
"I only did that once. So what are you doing-looking over the last contract for loopholes?"
"I am trying, but the traffic noise is very bad."
"Yeah, I heard the tires screeching too. Teenagers, probably."
From the end of the corridor there came the dull whump of a muffled explosion.
"What was that?" asked Remo, stiffening.
The Master of Sinanju was on his feet, rolling the scroll and tying its ribbon with a complicated two-handed motion. He tossed it onto the chair.
"Intruders," he snapped. "Let us welcome them."
It had worked perfectly so far, thought Rafik. He and Ismat had penetrated Blair House with almost no resistance. As he bounded up the stairs, he could not believe how lax the security was. He and Ismat worked through the ground floor, room to room, reckless and ready to shoot. They found no guards on the ground floor and climbed the stairs to the second floor.
They found someone here.
There were two of them. A casually dressed white man and an older, almost tiny Oriental. Neither seemed to be armed.
"Look, Little Father," the taller one said conversationally. "Visitors."
"Shall I make tea?" asked the Oriental, just as casually.
"Let's see how many lumps of sugar they want, first."
"I will let you ask them, for I am an old man, frail in health, and I do not wish to tax myself walking down this long corridor to converse with them. Besides, you need the exercise and not I. "
Rafik decided to take them alive. They would tell where the American leader could be found and save him valuable search time.
"Stand where you are," Rafik ordered, pointing his weapon. In spite of the warning, the American walked toward him, while the Oriental disappeared through a side door.
"I said stop," Rafik repeated.
"Do we shoot him?" asked Ismat.
"No," hissed Rafik. "He is unarmed. We will take him easily. "
"How do you folks like your tea?" asked the American. His smile was cruel, almost arrogant in his wide-cheekboned face.
Rafik decided to shoot him once in the leg. That would cool his bravado. And get him talking. He snapped off a low shot.
A long rip appeared in the hall runner between the man's shoes.
"You missed," Ismat hissed. "I will not miss again."
And he did not, because even though the white American had been at the other end of the hall, suddenly he was in Rafik's face. It was as if Rafik had been looking at him through a camera and accidentally tripped the zoom lens.
Rafik knew he could not miss at this range. He pulled the trigger. And felt himself being turned in place. When he felt the recoil of the Uzi, he was no longer looking at the dead eyes of the white American but into Ismat's shocked face.