"Sounded like a scream to me."
"You are such a chauvinist jerk, you know that?" Robin shouted, clutching herself. She shivered uncontrollably.
"Remo, do you smell it?" Chiun asked suddenly.
Remo sniffed the air.
"Yeah. Electricity. It's very strong."
Robin Green sniffed the air too. It smelled cold to her. Like old ice cubes.
"I don't smell anything," she said.
"There are four steaks missing," Remo said, examining the steak shelf. "The four biggest, thickest, juiciest, most succulent-"
"Remo!" Chiun admonished.
"Sorry," Remo said. "I haven't had a steak in years and years. You miss little things like that."
"Well, don't just stand there," Robin snapped. "He went through that wall. Maybe we can still catch him."
"Yes, for once this loud female is correct, Remo," Chiun said. "We will search."
They searched the entire launch-control facility. The post went to full alert. No trace of a white-skinned manlike creature with external golden veins was found.
"He must have left the facility," Robin suggested at last.
"We can split up," Remo suggested. "There's a lot of ground to cover. But we can make good time if everyone pitches in."
"Not necessary," she barked suddenly. "Come on."
66
Remo followed her out to the LCF perimeter. A green Air Force Bell Ranger helicopter was settling to the ground. A major stepped out, clutching his cap against the prop wash.
Robin ran up to him and said, "Major, I'm commandeering your chopper."
The major began to bluster, but Robin flashed her OSI card and he subsided.
Robin waved Remo and Chiun into the helicopter.
"Step out, airman," Robin told the pilot. "I'm rated for one of these birds."
The pilot hastily got out of the way while Robin seized the controls. She tested the cyclic control and worked the directional-control pedals while Remo and Chiun climbed aboard. The helicopter lifted off like an angry buzz saw.
"You handled that major like you outranked him," Remo said over the turbine noise. "Do you?"
"No," Robin said tartly, "but he doesn't know that."
"Oh, It's getting dark. Think we can find our phantom?"
"He was all white and he glowed. He should be easy to spot," Robin explained over the rotor churn.
"I hate to break this to you," Remo said. "But Chiun and I didn't see or hear a thing."
"He spoke. You didn't hear that?"
Remo frowned. "What did he say?"
"It sounded like 'graseeva' or something."
"I thought that was you," Remo said.
"Me? Why would I say something like that?"
"That's what I wondered. I figured maybe you were muttering under your breath again."
"You know, if you'd acted when you heard that, you'd have been in time to catch him."
"And if it was only you, you'd have bitten my head off."
Robin Green was silent for a long while as she canted the Bell Ranger in spiraling circles.
67
"You're right," she said finally in a quiet voice. "I'm sorry. There was something else. Something I'm almost afraid to mention."
"What's that?"
"Remember the car battery I saw go through the wall the day the jeans were stolen? Well, I just saw it again. It was strapped to the thing's back."
"Really?"
"That's not the strange part. It had a brand name on it. It was a Sears car battery."
Remo looked at Robin Green's tense profile.
"Don't look at me like that," she said tightly.
"I wonder," Chiun mused from the back of the helicopter.
"What's that, Little Father?"
"Why would an American ghost be speaking Russian?"
Remo and Robin exchanged glances.