"I swear it is the truth! I serve Uncle Sam!"
"Satisfied?" the one called Remo asked.
"Pah!" said the one called Chiun. "We have been sent on a wild weasel quest."
"Wild goose chase, and right about now I think discretion would be the better part of valor."
"Meaning?"
"We'd better check with Smith."
"Who is Smith?" asked Comandante Leopoldo Zorilla, at the exact moment before the lights went out and he knew no more.
Chapter 9
Harold Smith was very close to falling asleep.
National security depended upon Harold Smith's remaining awake, alert, and in contact with the developing situation. Yet he found himself nodding off.
It was night over Long Island Sound. The moon was high and full, and its silver effulgence washed the dark pimpled water like a luminous bleach.
The light poured through the one-way picture window behind his Folcroft desk. It was made of one-way glass so that no one could look in on the office, over Smith's shoulder, and read the computer screen that often displayed the deepest secrets of America.
The overhead lights were fluorescent, and shook the air.
Except for the medical staff and security guards, Folcroft slept. Only Smith, in the administrative wing, was working.
He was at his desk. The CURE terminal was up and running. On a corner of the pathologically neat desk sat a tiny black-and-white television set. It was turned to a network channel.
The bearded face of El Lider animated the screen. Smith had the sound turned up. Still, even with the sound of that raging voice, he could barely keep his eyes open.
"Does that man ever stop?" he complained, catching himself nod off for the fifteenth time.
The situation in Washington remained tense. After the MIG interception over the Gulf of Mexico, there had been nothing from the President. Smith continued to watch the seemingly endless Castro speech. The networks, having been overwhelmed in South Florida by the more powerful signal from Havana, had made matters worse by repeating the signal to affiliates all over the nation, with a running translation at the bottom. It was certain to heighten tensions, but nothing could be done about it.
No doubt, Harold Smith reflected as he put eye drops into his bleary gray eyes in an attempt to keep them open, the President was working the phones in an effort to convince the networks to downplay the interruption of regular programming.
In the meantime, it was all Smith could do to stay awake. For all his bluster, Castro and his tirade were having a soporific effect on him. But he dared not shut off the set while there was a possibility the networks would break in with an important bulletin.
So, while the Maximum Leader of Cuba ranted on about the Cuban people being willing to eat their shoes and pick their teeth with the nails rather than turn away from Socialism, Harold Smith continued to monitor his computer, waiting for word from Remo and Chiun.
It came when the blue contact telephone began ringing.
"Yes, Remo," Smith said, replacing his rimless glasses.
"We got a problem, Smitty."
A surge of adrenaline perked Harold Smith up in his cracked leather executive's chair.
"What is it?" Smith asked, his voice lemon-bitter.
"We found Zorilla. All tricked out in his soldier suit, ramrodding a paramilitary outfit in the Big Cypress Swamp."
"Good. You have interrogated him?"
"Yep. "
"And?"
"That's the problem, Smitty. You'd better check back with the President."
"Why?"
"According to Zorilla, Uncle Sam's behind the whole thing."
"He said that?"
"He did. With Chiun squeezing every syllable from him. So he has to be telling the truth."
"I understand," said Smith, his gray-hued face going ashen.
Remo asked, "So what do we do? Back off until you clear this up?"
"One moment, Remo," said Smith. Cradling the blue receiver between jaw and shoulder, he attacked his keyboard. As he worked, he continued speaking.
"If there is a covert U.S. Cuban invasion in the works, it has to be a CIA operation," he muttered.
"Sounds about right to me."
"I am entering their central computer net right now."
"Don't startle any sleeping spooks," Remo said dryly.
"They have no idea I am in their system. I have super-user status."
"Goody for you," Remo said in an impatient voice.
Smith entered the deepest recesses of the CIA system. He executed a global search of keywords. "CUBA" brought up only intelligence intercepts and contingency plans.
"ULTIMA HORA" produced nothing more than raw intelligence.
"CASTRO" summoned up such an endless file of assassination senarios that Smith was forced to log off out of sheer impatience.
He broke contact and turned in his squeaking chair.
"Remo," he said, thin-lipped. "This is not a CIA operation. There is no active scenario fitting the description on file."