No wonder Chiun thought the Dutchman was such a prize. He was perfect, the prick. Remo began to feel the loose stirrings of self-doubt.
"He sent me to school in Switzerland," the Dutchman was saying. "I was good in languages. At times I thought I might graduate like any other student and work as a translator. I think I might have liked that." For a moment, the icy eyes thawed, remembering a time long gone when hope was still something that belonged to everyone, even the Dutchman.
"And?" Chiun asked.
The eyes retreated behind their glacial façade again. "It was not my destiny," he said. "The school found out about my unusual abilities."
"The exploding lamp?" Chiun asked.
He nodded.
"What about Pierre?" Remo asked from the windows. "He froze to death. In this weather."
"Sometimes it's hard for me to control this...this thing." Purcell looked apologetically at the old man. "I won't use it with you, though. We'll fight fairly."
"Let Pierre tell you how fair he is," Remo said.
The Dutchman pretended not to hear. "When the school found out, they put me in a special room with no exits, and they brought in a team of doctors and scientists to poke and probe at me. They never let me rest, always sticking me with needles and trying drugs on me."
"Poor little stinkums," Remo said. "They just wouldn't let you kill people in peace, like all the other homicidal maniacs."
The Dutchman colored deeply, but continued. "After six months, I managed to escape during one of my supervised outings. I ran for the communications office and signaled Nuihc in Lisbon. Two days later he arrived and demolished the place. There's no trace of the school now. Then he brought me here, to train. And wait for you. He hated and feared you, you know. I never saw him again."
Chiun put down his teacup with a silvery tinkle. "I never knew Nuihc had adopted an heir. And why? He held no ties to anyone, as far as I knew."
The Dutchman stooped slightly. "I don't think I was his heir. You see, he never expected to die. But he wanted a partner with my mental abilities. That was why he trained me. In the end, he wasn't able to use me."
"I suppose you know what Nuihc would have done to you once your usefulness got in his way," Remo said.
"You swine!" The Dutchman moved his arm in a sweeping arc. Remo felt a hundred knives come crashing in on his bad leg where the python had crushed it. He buckled, gasping, to the floor.
"You gave your word," Chiun spat, rushing over to Remo.
"To you. To you alone. Not to untrained vermin like him."
"Our talk is finished," the old man said. He cradled Remo's head in his hands.
"I'm all right," Remo said between clenched teeth. "Don't fight him without me."
Chiun whispered softly into Remo's ear. "I must. That was why I left you at the shipyard. He is too much for you. I have trained your body, but his weapon is his mind. He promises not to use his power, but he cannot keep that promise, because Nuihc, in all his teaching, did not teach him right from wrong. We must not allow him to kill us both at once, Remo. If he kills me, then you must fight him. Not before."
"I can't let that happen," Remo groaned.
"I hope I have taught you right from wrong," Chiun said. "Obey me, for the good of us both." He stood.
The Dutchman nodded to Sanchez. The mute helped Remo off the floor and led him, limping, down a long corridor. Remo looked back. Chiun was watching him silently. When Remo was out of sight, Chiun spoke.
"You call Nuihc your father. Did he ever refer to you as his son?"
The Dutchman looked at him sharply. "What gives you the right to ask such a question?"
"As I thought. And so, when I say that Remo is my son and that I love him, does that make you wish to harm him?"
"He is nothing. Nothing compared with me."
"And still no one will call you 'son.' " The hazel eyes shone with pity. "You could have been fine, Jeremiah Purcell. But now you will be dead. Fatherless and dead."
The Dutchman stood stock still, his breathing heavy. Working to keep his face expressionless, he pointed to the four corners of the room. As if commanded, a thick fog inexplicably rolled in from the corners. It covered the floor and curled its way up the walls. "Poison gas," he hissed.
"Nuihc taught you well in his skills of lying and treachery. You cannot keep your word, can you? So important is it that I see your power and your worth." He shook his head sadly.
"I keep my word to kill you," the Dutchman answered. "Come outside and fight, or die here like a coward. Our moment has come, old man." He threw open the French windows and leaped to the balcony, then to the lawn below.
It is illusion, Chiun told himself as the room careened around, the air choking him. The old man crawled out the window to the balcony and balanced on the rail. Below, the terraced gardens tilted crazily, the effects of the Dutchman's conjured poison still thick in Chiun's body. Good, the Oriental said to himself. He has shown me his capabilities. I understand the enemy. Now I can fight him.
Rest, Remo, my son. Your time with him may soon come.
On the railing of the balcony, Chiun drained his lungs of the poison gas and filled them with clean air. He slowed his heartbeat.
The Dutchman waited below, his pale eyes glowing with anticipation and fear. He was going to do combat with the ancient Master of Sinanju. The end was coming, one way or the other. Blessed end to a life no one should have to live.
"I am your destiny, Chiun," the Dutchman said quietly. "Come do battle with the spirit of the dread Master Nuihc."
Chiun stepped off the railing.
?Thirteen
Alberto Vittorelli lay unconscious on a cot in the ship's infirmary, covered by an oxygen tent brought by two Dutch island doctors. Dr. Caswell instructed the nurses to watch the makeshift monitors closely as the ship's crew prepared the island's ambulance speedboat for departure.
It was five P.M. Caswell was numb with fatigue. Not since his days as a medic in the Pacific during World War Two had he been called on to treat a patient for shock, third-degree burns, an amputated limb, and massive infection all at the same time. As the two Dutch G.P.'s slapped him wearily on the back in congratulations, he felt a surge of gratitude for the training of those wartime years.
He had been planning to retire in a few months. The cushy cruise ship job was Caswell's last stab at a youth long departed. It hadn't turned the trick for him: age and defeat, he discovered, crept up on him in the middle of the Caribbean as easily as they did anywhere else. But just when he had begun to give in to time, when the ambition and fervor of a young surgeon seemed a thousand years past, Alberto Vittorelli came, burned and mutilated, into his hands. And with those hands Caswell had healed again. Vittorelli was alive.
It had all been worth it, after all.
He stripped off his sweat-soaked surgical gown and stepped outside the infirmary. On deck, the captain paced, his youthful face twisted into a scowl.
"We're finished, Captain," Caswell said. "We'll have him on the speedboat in twenty minutes."
"Nine hours," the captain roared. "Do you realize what this means to my schedule? The passengers can forget Jamaica. We'll have so many reports to fill out, we won't see daylight for six weeks. Your commission is shot, by the way. This kind of delay is inexcusable."
"This kind of delay saved a man's life," the doctor said quietly.
"He'll probably die in the hospital anyway," the captain muttered. He strode away.
Before he knew what he was doing, Caswell heard his own voice shouting, "Just a minute, you pompous ass."
The captain stopped abruptly and whirled around. "What did you call me, mister?"
"It's 'Doctor.' I am a doctor, a fine doctor at that, and you are an idiot with sardines for brains. How dare you presume that your precious schedules are more important than one breath from Alberto Vittorelli's mangled body? How dare you speak to me of losing a day in Jamaica when in that infirmary a man is alive who would surely be dead if it weren't for nine hours of my work?"