As he spoke, Smedley pulled on a pair of gloves that he had fished out of his pocket. As he awaited the American's inevitable death, he smiled behind his plastic shield.
The smile began to fade when the American didn't grab his throat and drop dead on the garage floor. In another second, as the American persisted in his stubborn refusal to die, Thomas Smedley's smile of success melted completely away.
For the first time in his professional career, he felt a fluttering hint of deep concern.
Across the room Remo stood in the smoke. Even though it kissed his bare arms and face, it seemed to have no ill effect. He shook his head in disgust.
"What is it with you people and gadgets?" he complained. "All the time gadgets, gadgets, gadgets."
Stooping, he picked up the smoke-spewing pellet. There was no risk of the poison seeping into skin. As soon as the danger was detected, his pores had shut down, closing out the harmful effects of the gas cloud.
Remo flicked the pellet off his thumb. It launched up into the ceiling vent, there to hiss and die harmlessly.
Near the rear wall, Smedley's jaw hung slack. He quickly recovered.
With the tip of his umbrella, Smedley poked a button on the wall near the elevator. Fans above their heads kicked on, sucking the gas from the parking garage.
"Hmm. I am loath to admit it, but I believe I might require a spot of assistance here, Mrs. Knight," the Source agent called over his shoulder.
The reply came from the open elevator doors. "I thought you'd never ask, Mr. Smedley." Remo had sensed another person lounging inside. From his angle he couldn't see inside. He was surprised when it was a woman's voice that spoke. Even more so when he saw who it was that stepped casually out to join Smedley.
Her long legs and thin arms were wrapped in tight black leather. Her neck was a porcelain pedestal for a perfect face. She was the same cat-suited pedestrian who had fallen to the ground in agony on the sidewalk near the Royal Mews.
As Smedley tucked up his bowler gas mask and pulled off his gloves, the woman stopped in a karate crouch beside him.
"You recognize our Mrs. Knight, I see," Smedley said. "Her performance on the sidewalk was just a cunning plan to lure you to your doom. The other pedestrians were frightened but unharmed by our little game. Well done, Mrs. Knight."
"Did you expect anything less, Mr. Smedley?" she asked.
Remo was nearly on the two Source agents. When he was close enough, Mrs. Knight made her move. Her attack was surprisingly quick. A graceful back flip and she was before Remo, her hands flashing like mallets in killing blows.
"You sure you're English?" Remo asked, tipping his head to examine her face even as he deflected her blows. "You're pretty okay looking. What passes for sexy in England is usually 'yikes' in the brush-and-floss parts of the world."
She tried launching a crushing knee into his sternum. Remo took the occasion to feel her up. "Nice," said Remo.
"Arrggghhh!" screamed Mrs. Knight.
Behind her, Thomas Smedley still had one trick left up his sleeve. As his partner fruitlessly fought Remo, the Source agent slipped the fabric off his umbrella, revealing a long stainless-steel sword. Its deadly sharp blade gleamed in the fluorescent light. He tested the weight of the blade over his head once before extending the sword before him.
"En garde!" Smedley challenged.
Mrs. Knight was still kicking and punching. By now she was sweating in her cat suit.
Remo looked at the sharpened tip of the umbrella sword. It was directed at his chest. He turned to Mrs. Knight.
"You work for him or is it the other way around?" he asked.
"I work for Britain." She tried to gouge his eyes out.
"Hey, here's a tip," Remo said. And, taking Smedley's wrist, he plunged the sword through Mrs. Knight's heart.
"Oh, dear," Smedley said as his dead partner slipped off the end of the sword. "Bad show."
"Worse movie," Remo said.
He flicked the sword from Smedley's hand. The Source agent seemed surprised to see it flying away. It buried two feet deep in the concrete wall. The sword wobbled in place.
"Now it's question-and-answer time," Remo said.
Smedley wanted to bolt, but before he could even take a single step, Remo had grabbed him by the hand. Remo pinched the fleshy web between Smedley's thumb and forefinger.
The pain was awful. Blinding. Worse than anything Thomas Smedley had ever experienced in his entire life.
"Eeeeeeaaaahhhh!" Thomas Smedley shrieked.
"That's level one," Remo explained as he squeezed. "It goes to one hundred. If you make it to fifty, you get a bonus of an umbrella suppository. Who do you work for?"
Remo increased the pressure. He made it as far as level one and a half before Thomas Smedley fell blubbering to his well-tailored knees.
"Source!" Smedley shrieked. "I work directly on order from Sir Guy Philliston."
"Philliston sent you to kill me?" Remo asked.
Smedley nodded. "I believe he was following orders from higher up." He gasped at the pain in his hand. "Please, go down from level one hundred. I can't bear it."
Remo scowled. "One hundred? I backed off before I reached two. What kind of girlie spy are you anyway?" He released the Source agent's hand.
With a disgusted look on his face, he collected the two sections of Smedley's umbrella. He wondered briefly after pulling the sword from the wall if it meant he now had to rule this damp sponge of a country. He hoped not. The climate was hell on leather loafers and he doubted he could get used to the stench of haggis blowing in from Scotland.
He slipped the gleaming silver sword back in the standard umbrella with a click.
Panting, Smedley pulled himself up on the Bentley's grille. "I've got a slight problem with pain," he admitted as Remo toyed with the umbrella. "It showed up on some of my early Source tests. Never had cause to worry about it before. Nasty bit of luck."
"No kidding?" Remo said. "How'd you score for getting umbrellas stuck through the head?"
He stuck Smedley's umbrella through Smedley's head.
If dying with a dumb look frozen on his face could have been judged high on the Source entrance exam, Thomas Smedley would have gotten perfect marks.
Remo opened the umbrella and gave it a little spin. It was still spinning above the head of Britain's former top assassin when he left the secret garage.
Chapter 8
Remo found the Master of Sinanju waiting for him in the back seat of a taxi out in front of the Steen Hotel. The driver was of Middle Eastern descent. He wore grimy white pajamas, a swatch of cloth on his head that looked like he'd mugged a dog for its sleeping blanket, and a surly, suspicious expression. When Remo slid in beside Chiun he noticed that the cabbie seemed to take particularly keen interest in him in the rearview mirror.
"Okay, what's the deal here?" Remo demanded of the Master of Sinanju as the car pulled into traffic. "If you are referring to the cost of this carriage ride, you may work out the details with our driver," Chiun said. "I forgot my purse at home."