Chiun eyed the stack. "That is all?"
"That's all I could carry this trip. There's more downstairs."
"Make haste. I wish to know who courts our favor."
"Coming right up," said Remo, ducking back down the stairs.
Remo had just filled his arms when a second FedEx truck pulled into their parking lot.
He zipped up the stairs, laid the packets down and called to Chiun as he zipped back down, "Second batch coming in."
At the front door Remo asked the driver, "How many?"
"I don't count them when they get this high," the FedEx driver said happily. "But when we empty my truck, I can go home for the day."
"Figures," said Remo. "Tell you what, open the door and back up. Save up some steps."
The driver obliged and hunkered down at the tailgate as he passed stack after stack of cardboard mailers to Remo, who made four neat piles in the foyer.
"I don't suppose I can sign my name really big in one spot instead of individually?" he said after laying down the last stack.
"That's a great idea. I'll put it in the suggestion box and let you know next time."
"Don't mention it," Remo said sourly as he accepted the stack of airbills for signing.
Twenty minutes later he dropped another stack in front of Chiun. "This would go quicker if you helped," Remo said.
"Masters of Sinanju are not help. Now, make haste. There is much mail to be read."
Remo noticed not a mailer had been disturbed. "Wait a sec. You haven't opened a single letter."
"And I will not. That is your duty."
Remo considered Tahiti, Hawaii and Guam as viable options while going back downstairs. But he knew no matter where he hid, Chiun would find him and haul him back.
Two stacks remained when a drab UPS truck pulled up, parking nose to nose with a DHL worldwide courier van.
Remo called upstairs.
"Better throw on an old soap opera on the VCR. We're a long way from opening any mail."
By noon the incoming mail had died down, and Remo dropped onto his tatami mat facing Chiun. Mail stood stacked around him like cardboard sandbags.
"Where do we start?" Remo asked.
"With favorite clients."
Remo reached into a stack. "This one's got the lion of England on it."
"Place it in the favorable stack," directed Chiun, his face beaming.
"Here's one with a funny flag."
"What flag?"
"Looks kinda like the American flag, except instead of stars there's a white cross. The stripes are blue and white."
Chiun nodded. "Greece. Place it in the favored stack."
"What nation has a two-headed phoenix for its official bird?" asked Remo, looking at the label of the next mailer.
Chiun wrinkled his tiny nose. "None."
Remo held up the label. "Then what's this?"
"An eagle."
"With two heads?"
"It is not a living eagle, and the language says the nation is Bulgaria."
"Unfavorable?"
"Of course. Not."
Remo added it to the favored stack. "How do you feel about Peru?" he then asked.
"Who rules?"
Remo thought a moment. "Last I heard, a Japanese guy."
"A Japanese emperor sits upon the throne of Peru?"
"No, he's president or something."
Chiun made a face like a golden prune. "We do not work for presidents anymore. They are too unstable. Presidents are not true rulers, for their sons do not succeed them. This fad will pass, mark my words, Remo."
Remo scaled the letter into the unfavorable pile.
Three hours later Remo had seven letters in the unfavorable stack. The favorable stacks threatened to swallow him.
"This isn't much of a sorting process," he said ruefully.
"We have weeded out the weak, the unfit, the transgressors—"
"What did the Turks do to the House?"