"You've got three seconds," said Kaufmann.
In that three seconds, Remo rose to his pinnacle of excellence. He explained how society depended upon citizens caring about justice. He said that when destructive elements such as Polastro were put to rout, the more constructive elements could flourish. He explained the responsibility of a citizen in a free society.
He also pressed an upper vertebra full into the cranial socket so that Kaufmann at first feared he would die as lights danced before his darkening eyes and then wished he would as every socket in his body felt as-though it had been brushed with Number Two sandpaper.
Remo rested Kaufmann softly on the bed by the valise.
"Ohhh," said Kaufmann, waiting for the pain to subside so he could cry in agony.
"So you see how you fit into the plans of better government," said Remo.
Kaufmann saw that indeed. He assented by nodding his head. The nod was very sincere. So much did Kaufmann wish to show civic consciousness that he touched his head to his knees and rolled to the floor. A deep nod.
"On behalf of the government of the United States and the American people, I thank you," Remo said.
Downstairs, Remo smiled to the living room MP. He heard a shriek from upstairs. It was Kaufmann getting back his lungs. The pain was, of course, momentary. Chiun called the pressure move "the fallen petal" and said it worked because of a disruption of life forces and death forces which coexisted in the human body. Remo had tried to discover what it meant in Western terms, and the closest he could figure out was that it was a forced disfunction of the nervous system. Except that according to the medical books the recipient of that sort of pressure should die. They never did.
The MP ran upstairs. Outside the door two guards stopped Remo until it was fully determined that said disturbance was not related in any manner, physical or otherwise, to current temporary personnel.
"Which means what?"
"Which means you don't move till we find out what happened upstairs," said the MP with the unholstered .45.
The living room guard stuck his head out of an upstairs window.
"He says it's all right," the MP called. "He just keeps repeating how he supports constructive elements."
Chiun watched this and commented:
"The fallen petal."
Three young boys, one with a plastic baseball bat, ran into the yard and pushed their way past Remo. Did Mr. Kaufmann want to play pitch? one of them yelled. "No," came Kaufmann's voice from upstairs-but they could have some cookies if they wished.
"Sorry we had to detain you," said the MP to Remo, with an official smile that showed neither regret nor remorse. One of the boys threw a white plastic ball at his head and it bounced off.
On the neat grass-ordered street of the compound, with the smells of dinner coming from the homes and with the sun hot over the Carolinas, Remo asked Chiun why he called the compound a death trap.
"I figured fifty-fifty myself," Remo said.
"Those are odds of probability, correct?"
"Yeah," said Remo.
"Then ninety-fifty against," said Chiun.
"It's got to come out a hundred."
"Then a hundred against."
"A certainty?" Remo asked.
"Almost a certainty."
"Well, that's ninety-nine to one."
"Granted," said Chiun. "Ninety-nine to your one that this Mr. Kaufmann is a dead man. His instinct to run was correct."
"How can you say that?"
"Do you know how the other safe ones were killed?"
"No, which is why I figure these safety measures make it fifty-fifty."
"If you have a bowl of rice, and if this bowl of rice is on the ground, and if someone steals the rice?"
"Yeah?" said Remo.
"What would you do?"
"I'd protect the rice."
"Ah, good. How?"
"Put a watchdog on it."
"And if the next day, the watchdog were killed?"
"Build a fence around it."
"And if the next day the rice was gone and the fence still there?"
"Camouflage the rice. I now have a fucking camouflaged bowl of rice with a leaky fence and a dead dog."
"And on the morrow that rice is gone also, what would you do?"
"Think of something else, obviously."
"And just as obviously that something else would fail."
"Not necessarily," said Remo.
"Yes, necessarily," said Chiun.
"How can you say that?"
"It is simple," said Chiun. "You cannot defend against what you do not know."