The President of Cuba cautiously approached. He pointed to the box. "That is what is keeping him alive. We must destroy it." And he lifted a combat boot.
The Master of Sinanju swept a hand out and found the sensitive back of the Cuban leader's knee. He used his fingernails to inflict maximum pain on the Maximum Leader.
And the Maximum Leader of Cuba hopped away, holding his leg and howling Spanish invective through his beard.
Remo looked down. "We can't let him die, can we?"
"No," said Chiun.
Remo knelt and examined the box. The digital readout was counting only up to 7 before resetting itself. Remo touched the dial he had hit before. He turned it one way. The number reset to 0, and Sam Beasley began to quiver and gasp for air.
"Oops!" Remo turned it the other way. The man began to breathe, jerkily but more regularly. The number cycle climbed to 15.
Remo experimented with the heart cycle until he had found a setting-19-that kept Beasley on his back and breathing, but still helpless.
He stood up. "I think that does it."
The President of Cuba limped up. His face was pale and incredulous.
"Jou have saved my Revolution," he whispered hoarsely. "This lunatic was going to try me for imaginary crimes."
Chiun eyed him coldly. "Speak to me not of your crimes, preempter of beauty."
"Que?"
"He means," Remo said dryly, "you knocked his favorite TV show off the air."
The Maximum Leader of Cuba blinked. "Are jou all mad? First this one complains that I am stealing his cartoons. Now jou are angry because I have interrupted a mere television program."
"Wrong thing to say, bushy," Remo warned.
The Master of Sinanju drew himself up haughtily. "Cheeta Ching is no mere television personality. She is all that is good and beautiful and pure in the universe."
"You are loco. I responded to aggression. No more."
The Master of Sinanju puffed out his cheeks.
"You admit your guilt, then!"
"I am proud of it." The President of Cuba lifted an authoritarian finger. "I will rub the Yanquis' noses in their folly at every opportunity."
"Then you must die a thousand deaths!" proclaimed Chiun, starting after the man.
"Hold it, Chiun." Remo warned. "You know what Smith said."
Chiun stopped. His eyes narrowed. "Since I am forbidden to send you to the fate you so richly deserve," he fumed, "I must visit a less suitable punishment than I would like."
And with grim purpose the Master of Sinanju backed the fear-struck President of Cuba up against a wall.
Remo Williams, clutching his wounded hand, was powerless to prevent what happened next.
The screams of the Maximum Leader came in bursts, like those of a misfiring machine gun.
It was such a horrific sight, Remo was forced to turn away.
Off in one corner Dingbat Duck, Gumpy Dog, and the others covered their faces and cowered in fear.
No one noticed that Mongo Mouse had slipped away.
Below deck, Captain Ernest Maus went to an emergency locker and armed himself with a Glock pistol and a big box of Ricky Rabbit fruit drops. He broke open the inner plastic wrapping, and the unleashed scent of almonds floated upward.
He found the main Ultima Hora force trapped in the hold, milling about, their arms hanging numb at their sides. That made it easy to feed them the drops, although some did fight. He shot those ones.
When he had left, all were dead.
In other areas of the ship, such as the staterooms and the gym, many were already unconscious or dead. The Beasley employees willingly accepted their allotment although with sobs and hot tears in their eyes-and succumbed, after first whispering the praises of Uncle Sam.
It was all accomplished in a surprisingly short period of time. When Maus finally doffed his mouse head in exchange for a scuba mask and air tanks, only he remained alive.
He leaned against the gleaming brass rail of the stern and let the heavy tanks carry him over into the polluted water of Havana Harbor.
No one heard the splash. No one saw him make for a puttering ramshackle fishing boat and climb aboard. There was only an old man at the wheel, piloting his craft out into open water.
Maus stopped his heart by thrusting into his back a marlin spike left lying on the deck. He took the wheel and returned the aging craft to its course.
In his brain there lingered a deep distaste for what he had done. But he had executed his orders. He had shielded the mouse. The future would take care of itself.
He was the Beasley Corporation now.
Chapter 30
Two days later, Harold W. Smith was escorting the Master of Sinanju and Remo Williams to the security wing of Folcroft Sanitarium. Smith's footsteps echoed off the well-scrubbed walls. As usual, Remo and Chiun made no sounds as they walked.
"I could see no other viable option," Smith was saying.
"This is a correct attitude," Chiun said with approval.
"It would have been better had the man expired in action. Still, the world need never know he returned from the dead."
"No way was I going to waste him," said Remo.
"Nor I," said Chiun.
"And turning him over to the Cuban authorities wasn't exactly on the menu," Remo added.
They turned a corner.