"I didn't order room service," Remo said.
"I did," announced an authoritative voice from the hall.
Petrovina Bulganin breezed into the room.
The phone in his hand still ringing, Remo spun around Petrovina and the waiter, who had pushed the cart in after the Russian agent.
"I thought you were eating in your room," Remo said.
"I decide is perhaps too dangerous," Petrovina replied. "Hello," she said to Chiun.
The old man eyed the young woman with bland contempt.
"This is your company?" he said to Remo in Korean. "A Russian female? I thought you were past that phase."
"Can we not pick that particular wound right now?" Remo answered darkly in the same language. Petrovina didn't understand what they were saying. Nor did she care. She was looking at the ringing telephone, her beautiful face twisting in a frown of irritation.
"Are you going to answer that?"
Remo looked at the still-squawking phone. "Can you get this for me?" he asked the waiter, who was in the process of setting up Petrovina's meal on the cart.
The waiter took the phone and pressed a button. Remo swore it was the same button he had pressed. But this time instead of dead air, he heard the familiar lemony voice of Harold W. Smith.
"Remo? What took so long? Is everything all right?"
"Just a sec, Smitty," Remo said. "We're reenacting the stateroom scene from A Night at the Opera here."
He told the waiter to bill the meal to Petrovina's room, threw him a tip and hustled him from the suite. When he came back into the living room, Petrovina was lifting the sheet on the floor with the toe of her shoe. She was frowning at the bare floorboards. "I've got to take this in private," Remo said, pushing her cart toward an adjacent room. "You mind?"
She looked through the doorway. "You want me to eat in lavatory?" she asked in bland disbelief.
"Hey, I've been to Moscow," Remo said. "This is five-star ambience."
He rolled her cart in, pushed a protesting Petrovina in after it and stuck a chair up under the knob. "Okay, Smitty, we can talk now," Remo said.
"What was that commotion?" the CURE director asked.
"Just a Russian agent I picked up. She was sent here to figure out what's going on, too."
Smith's voice grew concerned. "Who is this Russian?" he asked.
Remo frowned. Stepping over, he knocked on the bathroom door. "Hey, dumpling, what's your name again?" he called.
"Let me out!" Petrovina shouted. "That your first name or last?"
There was a furious hiss and a stream of muttered Russian on the other side of the door. It was followed by the angry sound of silverware clanking on dinner plates.
"She's not talking, Smitty," Remo said. "I think she said Bulganov, Balganan or something like that before."
"I do not like the idea of you bringing an outsider into this," the CURE director admonished.
"Hold that thought, because you're going to like what we found out even less," Remo said gravely. "The captain of that scow was right. The boats were torpedoed."
The Russian agent was instantly forgotten. "Are you certain?" Smith asked tightly.
"Those weren't love taps on the sides of those scows."
"Have you any idea who is responsible?"
"Not yet. But a couple of guys tried to kill Chiun while I was out checking the boats. Could be related."
"Is Master Chiun all right?" Smith asked.
Near the balcony windows, the old Korean clucked indignantly. "Four months," he muttered to the newborn night sky. "I have not been Reigning Master for a mere four months. Does the mad ghost-face think my skills were scattered to the winds with the relinquishing of my title?"
"Chiun's fine, Smitty," Remo said. "Which is more than I can say for the guys who came after him. They had no ID, no nothing. But dollars to doughnuts they're tied in with whatever's going on down here. They probably saw us when we were taking our tour of that doohickey or something."
"You saw the device in action?"
"Yeah. And you can surrender your skepticism, Smitty," Remo said. "It definitely works. By the looks of what Chiun and I saw today, this machine of theirs is really incredible. I can see why everybody's lining up to haul their junk down here. The world gets cleaner and Mayana gets richer. Seems to me like everyone benefits. Actually I don't see why anyone would want to stop it."
"Since the device was unveiled there have been complaints issued from a number of quarters," Smith said. "Some poorer nations are saying that lack of funds will limit their access to the device. A few in the scientific community have suggested that the technology is too important not to share it freely with the entire world. There are also some groups with environmental concerns. Any one of them has a motive to throw a monkey wrench into the works."
"I suppose there's no lack of screwballs out there," Remo conceded. "So I guess this means the President won't be coming down here after all."
"Unfortunately I doubt this will be enough to change his mind," Smith said. "The Mayanans have successfully kept outside investigators from checking out the scows-I'm assuming so as not to derail the Globe Summit. They have too much invested in it, especially now. The President has already made clear his intention to go. Unless the sinkings become public knowledge-or expand into something that affects more than a few garbage scows-I doubt he will change his mind. However, I will bring the matter up once more. It would help if you found something concrete on whoever is behind this. Perhaps that will help sway him to err on the side of caution."
"If you wish to know who is responsible, Emperor Smith, look no further than the Russian pretender who once occupied beloved Czar Ivan's throne," Chiun called. "Not only is his name garbage, but he once ruled the trough of garbage that poor, late, lamented Ivan's Russia has become."
"Oh, yeah, Smitty. Garbegtrov's down here, too," Remo said. "And it doesn't work that way," he told Chiun. "His name doesn't have anything to do with anything, other than the fact that he got shafted by his parents."
"Believe what wrong things you wish," Chiun sniffed.
"I heard the former premier was there," Smith said thinly. There was a note of disapproval in his tart voice.
"I know what you're thinking, Smitty, and I don't want another lecture."
Smith would not be deterred. "It was reckless of you to do what you did," the CURE director said. "Breaking in to the former premier's house and tattooing that slogan on his head was not something that I would ever have authorized."
"Wasn't up to you," Remo replied. "Russia stole some techniques from Sinanju. Three Russian leaders knew all about it, starting with Garbegtrov. That made it a Sinanju matter for punishment, not a CURE one. Ol' Garby was just lucky this wasn't the day of Master Nun. Back then a Chinese baker tried to steal just one ingot of gold from an Egyptian tribute caravan as it passed through his village. Nun flayed him alive and made him cook his own skin in his own ovens. Big mess. At least Garbegtrov got to keep all his skin. He got off easy. Besides, that tattoo was some of my finest work. It's still holding up even after a couple of years."
"You actually saw him?" Smith said.
Remo's tone grew sheepish. "We kind of shared an elevator," he admitted.
He could almost see the look of intense irritation on the CURE director's face.
"Did he see your face?" Smith pressed.
"Yes, but that's not a problem," Remo sighed. "He was asleep during the tattooing. And even though he saw me and Chiun years ago when Russia tried to steal our contract and get us to work for them, we gave him the Sinanju amnesia thing. He wouldn't remember me."
"Perhaps," Smith said. "But you do not exist in a vacuum. You have operated in Russia several times since then. It is possible you are known to some within their security services. Remember Anna Chutesov."