The miles flashed by. Once the limo drifted into Remo's lane and he simply slithered out of the way into the right lane.
In response, the limo straddled both lanes, and suddenly greenish gas began streaming from its skin.
It looked like the engine had caught fire, except the vapor was green. Remo hastily shut every vent on the car. He took a deep breath and held it.
He hoped it was the same kind of gas as before. A nerve agent-especially the kind that worked through the pores-would kill him within seconds, he knew.
Remo held the road and his breath as the greenish streamers tore past his windshield.
A thin haze of green vapor seeped into the car. Remo ignored it. He felt no telltale skin tingling.
Eventually the gas gave out. When it was gone, Remo ran down every window and waited until the cold air had scoured the Buick's interior clean of gas before finally inhaling fresh air.
The limo picked up speed.
"Looks like you're out of tricks, pal," Remo said tightly.
Remo settled down for the ride. The overhead signs started to say "New Rochelle." Remo wasn't surprised.
The limo pulled onto an exit marked "Glenwood Lakes."
There the chase turned frenetic again. Once, Remo caught a glimpse of stern almond eyes in the narrow rear window. They regarded him without mercy or care.
On an angular turn, Remo lost control of his car, piling into a drift. He raced the rear wheels, and the car refused to budge.
Angrily Remo got out and simply lifted the car's rear tires onto better traction. His efforts transformed his face into a mask of pain-induced sweat.
He had lost sight of the limo. He decided that might be a good thing. It probably meant the driver thought he had lost Remo.
Remo took a side street. He recognized the neighborhood from the day before. With luck, he might beat the limo to the garage.
He hoped it was heading toward that same garage.
It was, Remo saw as he came up a parallel street. Through the breaks between the houses, he saw the limo slide around a corner on Storer Avenue. It had made better time than he had anticipated.
Remo pulled around the corner just as the limo nosed up to the garage. The door began opening automatically, obviously activated by a radio command.
The limo lurched inside. The garage door began to accordion down like a Japanese bamboo curtain.
Remo parked, got out, and ran for the door.
Three steps told him that he wasn't in running shape. He slowed to a trot, his lungs burning with transmitted pain.
The garage door clicked shut. Remo grasped the handle, feeling the last vibrations of an electric motor.
The door wouldn't budge. Remo went around to the side.
That door was unlocked. He pushed it in.
Inside, he was confronted by the taunting sight of a white convertible sitting dusty and inert.
There was no sign of the black limousine.
Remo didn't waste time. He plunged out and hit the side door of the adjoining house like a cannonball on legs.
He found the house sparsely decorated, but in an unmistakable Asian decor. He ran through the house, ready for anything.
There was nothing. Every room was empty.
Remo made three circuits of the house before he finally gave up.
The garage was as he had left it. He checked for tracks. As before, faint wet smears of fresh rattlesnake tread stopped short of the convertible's rear bumper.
Remo stood looking at those tracks for a long time.
Then all life, all energy, seemed to drain from his hard face. Woodenly he stumbled back toward his own car.
He squeezed in behind the wheel and reached for the ignition key.
He lost it then.
His eyes rolled up in his head and his bruised face hit the steering column.
The horn gave out a long blast that startled the entire neighborhood, but Remo Williams didn't hear it.
He was dead to the world.
Chapter 8
Remo Williams knew where he was before he even opened his eyes.
The smell gave it away. It was a combination of hospital disinfectant and Pinesol.
Folcroft Sanitarium, the cover for CURE.
A familiar lemon-lime after-shave was sour in Remo's nostrils.
"Hi, Smitty," he croaked.
"Remo, it's Smith," Harold Smith hissed.
"Would I say, 'Hi, Smitty,' if your name was Jones?" Remo retorted without humor.
Slowly he opened his eyes. The light hurt like needles.
"How long?" he asked the hovering face of Harold Smith.
"You were brought here four hours ago."
"Chiun?"
"I tried to notify him. He is not at your home. In fact, it has been vandalized."
"I know," Remo said. "I was one of the vandals."
"Remo, before the doctor returns, I must have your report."
Remo shut his eyes again. A kaleidoscope of images tumbled in his mind's eye-the vanishing limousine, the inexplicable footprints, and the tall man in the fur hat.
"I don't know where to start," he admitted.
"Where is Zhang Zingzong?" Smith demanded.
"With Chiun."
"And where is Chiun?"
"For all I know, he drove a big black limo straight into the Twilight Zone."
"I do not appreciate your humor at normal times," Smith lectured, "and especially not now.
"I'm not joking, Smith. I don't know where Chiun is. The last I remember, I was getting into my car outside that weird garage."
"You were found on a residential street in New Rochelle.'
"Yeah, there. I followed the limo. It went into the garage. But it wasn't there when I went in. That was the second time that little kung-fu acrobat pulled that trick on me."
"Who?"
"The chauffeur with the mask," Remo said.
"Are you delirious?"
"Check the garage if you don't believe me. The limo isn't there."
"You are not making any sense," Smith clucked. "I will come back when you are again yourself."
Remo opened his eyes. He reached out and took Smith by the wrist. He squeezed. Smith's face twisted with the pain.
"No time," Remo said tightly. "You gotta take me back there. I gotta find Chiun. I think he's left."
"Left CURE?" Smith said huskily.
"CURE. America, everything. I don't know yet. We had a fight, but I can't believe he'd throw everything we had away over a lousy fight. It must have something to do with that dingdong Chinese student."
"Zingzong," Smith said. "His name is Zhang Zingzong."
"Whatever. He and Chiun were fighting all last night. They made such a racket I checked into a motel. When I went back this morning, the limo was there, but most of Chiun's steamer trunks were gone. You know he never takes that many unless he's planning to go back to Sinanju. Then I got the stuffing kicked out of me by that kung-fu bozo."
"You, Remo?"
"Hate to admit it, but he was good."
"I will undertake a search for Chiun. Please let go of my wrist."
"I said," Remo added, squeezing so hard Smith's forehead broke out in a sweat, "there's no time. Screw your computers. Take me back to that garage. The limo went in there. It's gotta still be there, or it's not anywhere."
"Very well," Smith said stiffly. "The doctor thinks there is no internal organ damage. But are you up to walking?"
"Help me up."
Unhappily Smith allowed his shoulder to be used as support. Slowly he eased Remo up to a sitting position.
"Where are my clothes?" Remo asked, grimacing.
Smith handed him a pile of clothes and primly turned his back while Remo painfully slid into them.
"Lead the way," Remo said, getting to his feet with arthritic difficulty.
"Are you certain this is wise?" Smith asked doubtfully.
"Screw wise. We can't waste time."
Remo let Smith drive. He regretted it as soon as they pulled into traffic. Smith drove like a maiden aunt. He slowed down at every yellow light, stopping dead and looking both ways before proceeding through stop signs, and observed the speed limit as if his car would self-destruct if the indicator touched the fifty-six-mile-an-hour mark.