They watched as Remo, seemingly playing the part of a good samaritan, knocked out the window glass on the driver's side.
"Are you all right, pal?" Remo asked.
The driver was all but standing on his head and had a gusher of a nosebleed that rampaged down into his eyes.
"Get me out of here! Get me out!"
"Scared?" Remo asked solicitously.
"Yeah, yeah— get me out!"
"Want not to be scared?"
"Yeah— yeah, I do."
So Remo shot a hard finger into the man's forehead, which cancelled out his emotions. Not to mention his life.
"Your wish is granted," Remo said.
"Is he going to be all right?" someone asked as Remo walked off.
"Sure is. I gave him first aid."
The FOES office was still empty when Remo got there, but he was in a better mood. Chiun had always said that exercise was good for the spirit as well as the body. Thinking of Chiun again, Remo felt a twinge.
It was time for a long talk with Chiun.
* * *
Not fearing attack, the Master of Sinanju hadn't bothered to lock the door. Remo just walked in.
Chiun, attired in the white kimono that he seldom wore, sat writing on a piece of parchment. He did not acknowledge Remo, although Remo knew Chiun was aware of his presence.
"I have come to talk, Little Father," Remo said quietly in Korean.
"I have offended you, I know," Remo said, finding the words more difficult than expected. He cleared his throat.
"If this is the end of our travels together," Remo said, "then I will accept that fact if I must. It is not my wish to put our friendship aside, but if it is your wish, then my respect for you forces me to accept this."
Chiun gave no sign he heard, but his pen scratched less furiously.
"But just as I have my respect for you, you must respect me. I am prepared to say my last good-bye and wish to atone for my offense before we part. But because I do not know how I have offended you, I cannot do this. You must tell me. This is my parting request to you, who have been both parent and teacher to me."
When Chiun finally spoke, it was after a long silence, and he did not look up from his writing.
"That was a good speech, excellently spoken," he said tonelessly.
"Thank you," Remo said, a lump growing in his throat. Dammit! Why do I feel like this? he asked himself.
"But your voice broke toward the last," Chiun added, and resumed his writing. A long silence stretched into minutes in which neither of them spoke.
"Sit at my feet, Remo," Chiun said at last.
Remo sat, his face a mask.
"Emperor Smith has been trying to reach you."
"I don't care about Smith," Remo said.
"And your assignment? Do you no longer care about that?"
"I don't know," Remo said truthfully.
"Then what do you care about?" Chiun dropped his quill for the first time and faced Remo. His expression was unreadable.
"I care about you. I care about us."
Chiun nodded and turned his parchment over.
"Do you remember the legend of the Great Master Wang?" Chiun asked.
"There are many legends about Wang," Remo replied.
"True. But one stands above all other." Chiun placed his hands flat on his lap and spoke with his eyes closed, as if from memory.
"There is a saying in my village, 'Blue comes from indigo but is bluer.' This means that a pupil can sometimes exceed his Master. So it was with Wang in the long-ago days of Sinanju. Now, Wang was not the first of the Masters of Sinanju. No, many came before him, and many came after, and some who followed also took the name of Wang.
"Before Wang, the Master was named Hung. A good Master was Hung, and the last of the old Masters of Sinanju, who knew not the sun source. In those days the Master was followed by lesser Masters, who were known as night tigers.
"When the time came for Hung to train his replacement, he chose a young night tiger named Wang, who was my ancestor. Wang was not a difficult choice, for in the years those times were hard, and the babies of Wang's generation had mostly been sent home to the sea. Those who survived were not always healthy, although some made adequate night tigers. But only Wang, Hung saw, was worthy to train as the next Master, and Wang began that training, quickly proving himself an apt student and possessive of the promise of true leadership.
"But, woe, before Wang had been training more than one year, the Master Hung died in his sleep. There was no shame attached to this, Remo, for this Master was still young, being only seventy-five. Yet he died before his time, leaving no heir worthy of being called the Master of Sinanju. This tragedy had never before happened to the House of Sinanju."
Remo had heard this story before, but listened patiently.
"And the people of the village gathered around the body of Hung," Chiun continued. "And with much wailing and weeping, they consigned his body to the earth, setting a marker upon it which said: HERE LIES HUNG, THE LAST MASTER OF SINANJU.
"And so it seemed. The glory of the finest house of assassins the world had ever nurtured was no more.
"The people of Sinanju huddled by their fires, for winter was fast approaching, and they asked themselves, 'What are we to do now that there is no Master to protect us and feed our bellies and our children's bellies?'
"And some said, 'We will have to send the babies home to the sea again.'
" 'But there are so few babies even now,' said others.
" 'Perhaps we should leave this wretched village for the south.'