"You mean Bernstein?"
"Whatever, I'm him. The next him. Some day you could be playing golf with me. "
"No sale, Pepsie. The network president told me I could keep my job as long as you lost yours."
"I'm telling you a man named Smith is important to this story."
"Do you realize how many Smiths there are in the world?"
At that point a news writer poked his head in the door and said, "We just noticed something funny about the President when he went jogging."
"Can't it wait? I'm trying to fire somebody here."
The news writer noticed Pepsie for the first time. "Oh! Hi, Pepsie. Good luck in your next job."
"Hi," Pepsie said disconsolately.
"What is it?"
"The President was wearing a cap that said Eat Granny Smith Apples," the news writer said.
The news director pointed to Pepsie and roared, "Have you been drinking from the same water cooler as this one?"
"And his T-shirt said Smith College."
The news director looked strange for a moment.
"That's a woman's college, isn't it?"
"I went there," Pepsie volunteered helpfully. "I never saw any guys. Unless you count dykes."
"Why would the President wear a Smith College shirt?"
Pepsie started jumping an place. "Smith! Smith! Don't you get it? It has something to do with the Smith I told you about."
"Who's Smith?" the news writer asked curiously.
"Play down that story and get out of my office," the news director roared.
The door slammed.
The news director said slowly, "Pepsie, I know I'm going to regret this, but here's the deal. You're fired. Officially."
"Dam."
"Unofficially if you want to follow this cockeyed story of yours, go to it. But I didn't authorize it. I don't know anything about it. And I don't want to hear about it unless you come up with something solid. If you do, and this is as big as it sounds, even the network president will welcome you back with open arms."
"Guarantee me no other reporter gets to run with the Oswald angle, and it's a deal."
"Believe me, that's between you and me. And I'm forgetting it the minute you've left the building."
"I'll need a Minicam," said Pepsie.
"I'll have one messengered to your apartment. But no cameraman."
"No problem. I'll have my assassinologist carry it. All you have to do is know where to point it. It'll be just like driving a cab."
The news director opened the door invitingly. "Goodbye, Pepsie. Unless you pull off a miracle."
"Don't think I won't."
Chapter 17
Remo and Chiun were seated on the rug of their Watergate hotel room, eating take-out rice from cardboard containers and talking. Chiun's steamer trunks were stacked on the big bed.
Remo was saying, "I don't want to be an assassin anymore, Little Father."
Chiun's voice grew thin. "Why is this?"
" 'Assassin' is a bad word in this country."
"This is a country where vast sums of money are showered upon a starved blond singer who cannot sing simply because she makes a public spectacle of herself. It is no wonder."
"I would have paid Medusa not to publish that book of naked pictures of herself," Remo admitted.
"You are an assassin," said Chiun. "It is not only what you do, if clumsily, but what you are. You can no more not be an assassin than you can cease to breathe correctly."
"And it's the week before Christmas. It's always a sad time of year for me."
"We do not celebrate Christmas," Chiun sniffed.
"I know."
"Christmas is a pagan festival started by the Romans, which was debased even further by the followers of the Nazarene, who brought ruin to the old Rome just as they will bring ruin to this new Rome called America."
"I've heard this story a thousand times before," Remo said wearily. "Sinanju celebrates the Feast of the Pig instead."
Chiun made a face. "It is not called that! That is your cruel name for the beauty of the day in which certain obligated persons bestow a small offering to those who have shared wisdom with them."
"I like Christmas better," Remo said dryly. "The presents flow in both directions."
"Pah! What good are presents flung about willy-nilly? A present should be given in gratitude, not in expectation of a gift in return. Otherwise, even the unworthy receive presents, debasing the giver, the recipient and the offering in a shameful spectacle of mutual greed, avarice and ingratitude."
"A good way to describe Christmas these days," Remo grunted. "But when I was a kid, I always looked forward to Christmas. Sometimes-" his voice caught "--sometimes I used to dream that my parents would come for me at Christmas, and everything would change."
"Everything has changed, my son," Chiun said in a suddenly gentle tone of voice. "You have a father. Me."
"I have another father out there," Remo said sadly. "I need to find him"
"If you wish to make me an offering in return for all that I have bestowed upon you, Remo Williams, do not seek out your father."
The grave tone in Chiun's voice made Remo eye the Master of Sinanju suspiciously.
"Why are you so against my finding my father?" he asked.
"It will only bring you unhappiness."
Remo dug a folded artist's sketch from the pocket of the gray Brooks Brothers suit he was wearing on Smith's instructions. He unfolded it. It showed a young woman with sad eyes and long dark hair. The face in the sketch had been drawn by a police artist from Remo's instructions. It was a perfect likeness of the phantom woman who had appeared to him at his grave site.
"I don't even know her name," he said quietly. "She's my mother, and I don't even know her name."
"She is not your mother!" Chiun spat.
Remo looked up. "That wasn't what you said before."
"I did not wish to break your heart," Chiun said evasively. "Now, I cannot bear to see you pine so over a fragment of your imagination. I cannot conceal the truth from you."
"I think the truth is the last thing you want me to discover," Remo said. "And I'd like to know why."
The phone rang.
"Must be Smith," said Remo, getting up to answer it.
Remo had no sooner said "Hello" into the mouthpiece than a breathless, lemony voice said, "No names. You know who this is. Meet me at the logical place in twenty minutes."
Before Remo could say "What?" the line went dead in his ear.
Remo slammed down the telephone, saying, "Damn it!"
"What is wrong?" asked Chiun.
"That was Smitty. And he's so paranoid he said to meet him in the logical place. Then he hung up before I could ask him what the logical place is."
"The logical place is the logical place," Chiun said blandly.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Remo fumed.
"It is logical because it is obvious."
"Well, it isn't obvious to me."
"That is because you do not have a logical mind."
"And I suppose you do?"
"Bring me a guide to the attractions of this latterday Athens."
Remo grabbed a thick guidebook off the writing desk and laid it at Chiun's sandaled feet, simultaneously scissoring down into a lotus position, facing him.
"I defy you to find the logical meeting place in that," he said.
The Master of Sinanju frowned and brought his long nailed fingers together prayerfully. He closed his eyes. The nails touched, but his palms did not. He might have been communing with his ancestors.
Abruptly Chiun's eyes opened, and his hands, as if moving of their own volition, pried open the book at random. He looked down. His wide hazel eyes darted along the open pages.
"Well?" said Remo.
Without warning, the Master of Sinanju clapped the guidebook shut.
"Finish your rice," he said. "For we have less than twenty minutes to meet our emperor at the logical and obvious place."