Again, as if in answer to the words he could not hear, the stranger dropped his captured weapon, turned and passed beneath the watching camera empty-handed, headed for the orphanage.
“He’s coming,” Radcliff said.
“No shit.” The look on Morgan Lasser’s face was six parts anger, four parts fear.
“What can we do?” asked Warren Oxley, looking pale as three grim pairs of eyes were focused on his face. “I mean, how can he do that?”
“Let’s go out and ask him,” Lasser said. The chairman of Security Unlimited produced an automatic pistol from beneath his jacket as he spoke.
Beside him, Garrick Tilton also palmed a weapon.
“We’re not armed,” said Oxley, glancing desperately at Radcliff for support.
“You will be,” Lasser said, and turned to Tilton.
“Stop off at the gun room,” he instructed. “Fix them up.”
“But we’re not gunmen,” Oxley protested.
“No shit,” Lasser repeated. “Anyway, it’s time you learned.”
“Shut up, for Christ’s sake, Warren!” Radcliff snapped. “This is a critical emergency.”
“You got that right,” said Lasser, moving toward the exit. “All hands to their battle stations.”
Radcliff fell into step behind the men who were, in fact, subordinates. It was no time to challenge Lasser, when they needed all his expertise and he held all the weapons. Later, after they had cleared this problem up, there would be time enough to deal with Lasser’s insubordination, shop around for someone else to fill in as the leader of Security Unlimited. Perhaps the company itself should be dissolved, a new one organized to take its place.
But first they had to stop the man who was intent on ruining a lifetime’s work. Find out what he was doing here and who had sent him. Failing that, destroy him utterly and relocate the whole damn operation to a safer place.
Radcliff was thinking now in terms of the Caribbean or South America. The land that sheltered Dr. Josef Mengele for over forty years should be amenable to visitors with plenty in the bank. The world could be his oyster, after all, but he would have to take it one step at a time.
Step one was getting through the next half hour alive.
The sound of gunfire in the woods was audible before she reached the driveway leading to the boys’ home. Chelsea Radcliff hesitated, rolling down her window with a hand that she found trembling unexpectedly.
It sounded like a war in there, beyond her line of sight, and Chelsea played with the idea of turning back. Stop at the first pay phone she found and call the sheriff’s office.
She shook her head vehemently in response to that impulse. One lesson that her father had repeatedly drilled into Chelsea’s skulclass="underline" avoid outsiders as much as possible, and shield the family’s business from their prying eyes.
Still, this was serious trouble, obviously. People died when guns went off. Her father’s very life might be in danger while she sat there on the roadside, pondering his orders. There was still a chance that she could save his life with one quick phone call.
Again she shrugged it off.
The first thing she would do is have a look inside. She might find out the gunfire was no more than target practice, though the very notion seemed ridiculous to Chelsea at the moment. Why would they have guns around the home at all, much less the kind that sounded like machine guns tearing up the woods?
She rolled her window up again to minimize the racket as she turned in from the two-lane highway. Intertwining branches met above her car to block a portion of the sunlight out and place her in a realm of dappled shadow. She accelerated, taking chances with the narrow driveway, knowing that the longer she remained a moving target, the more likely that some gunman in the woods might draw a bead upon her vehicle. The shooters wouldn’t recognize her, wouldn’t know her car, and it might well be worse for Chelsea if they did.
Suppose that she had blundered into an attempt against her father’s life. What could she do about it? How would she respond?
She would defend him, certainly!…but how?
A moment later, she could see the building coming at her through the trees. No one was in sight, but it wouldn’t surprise her if the boys were hiding in their rooms, with all the shooting going on. She drove around the south side of the building, still braced for the impact of a bullet that would smash through glass or ring against the metal of her car, but no shots came.
She killed the engine, hesitated, wishing that she had some kind of weapon with which to defend herself. Not that it would have helped her much. No. one would readily mistake her for a warrior, even in a pinch.
But if she had to fight, no way around it, to protect her father and his work.
Perhaps, thought Chelsea, she might find a weapon in the house. It would be worth a look, at least, since she was bent on looking for her father, come what may.
Reluctantly, still trembling, Chelsea bailed out of her car and started running toward the nearest door.
The Master of Sinanju left his cab on Webster Road and barely heard the driver asking him if he was sure he had the address right. The cabbie blinked and shook his head in wonder as his wizened passenger appeared to vanish in thin air. One moment he was standing there beside the taxi, and the next he was a flitting shadow, lost among the trees.
The driver took his hundred-dollar tip and split, no longer interested in what the old man wanted on this stretch of rural highway. Cruising past the entrance to the Fairfield Home for Boys, he barely gave the sign a second glance, before he turned around and started back toward Louisville.
By that time, Chiun was deep into the forest, homing on the compound proper with unerring intuition. The reports of distant gunfire made him hesitate, but only for a heartbeat. He corrected his direction slightly, homing on the sharp, staccato sounds.
It would not be that simple for the enemy to murder his adopted son. Chiun had confidence in Remo’s skill. However, faced with a confusing situation, even Remo might falter. And that could give an enemy the moment he needed.
Chiun felt a burning rage directed against those who would attempt to slay the future Master of Sinanju. They were idiots, but even the most simple-minded fools got lucky now and then. It seemed unlikely that they could destroy Remo, but if he was wrong, there would be nothing to protect them from the Master’s vengeful wrath.
He would destroy them all in such a fashion that they would regret the miserable days when they were born.
Chiun had another hundred yards to go before he reached the source of gunfire, silent now, when he was interrupted by a shout from somewhere on his left.
“Hey, you! That’s far enough! Stop where you are and raise your hands!”
Chiun paused, turned toward the voice and saw three men approaching through the trees. All three held automatic weapons, and their faces were the same. Same close-cropped hair. Same cold, unfeeling eyes. Same mouths and noses. The one on the right looked slightly younger than the others, but. Chiun could have been mistaken.
These must be the creatures Remo called the clones.
They were the walking dead.
“Let’s get those hands up!” barked the gunman on the left.
“Are you addressing me?” the Master of Sinanju asked.
“Who else, you stupid dink?”
The others laughed at that, enjoying his presumed embarrassment. Chiun frowned and asked, “What is this ‘dink’?”
“It’s like a gook,” the young one answered, smiling. “Chink, Jap, slope—you know?”
More laughter from the walking dead.
“You are mistaken,” said Chiun.
“Oh, yeah?” the gunman in the middle said. “You sure look like a dink to me.”
“Your eyes deceive you,” Chiun replied. “It is a common failing of the mentally deficient.”