Chapter 32
He maintained his control until he came to a little fishing village. He did not know the name of the village, only that it lay below the thirty-eighth parallel and therefore was in South Korea.
The village reminded him of Sinanju, and because he had kept it penned in too long, the beast burst free.
The village caught fire, every hut at once. The people screamed as they fled their homes. Then they too caught fire. The flames were blue. Pretty flames. The flesh that burned under the flames was pretty. Then it shriveled and blackened and slid off the bone as the helpless screaming peasants rolled in the dirt in a futile attempt to put out their roasting bodies.
The beast satiated again, the Dutchman continued his slow march to Seoul.
In the South Korean capital he bought a pair of wraparound sunglasses and a Sony Walkman headset. He also purchased a brush and jar of flat black enamel paint. And a cassette of the loudest rock music he could find.
He paid for the airplane ticket with a credit card that was an illusion and went through customs with a passport that was a product of his imagination. Everyone saw him as a portly American businessman in a cable-knit gray suit.
In the airport men's room he painted the inside of the sunglasses with the black paint.
The Dutchman put on the glasses immediately after takeoff. And although it was against airline rules, he donned the Walkman. He hoped the sounds of the overproduced music and the fact that he could not see past the painted-over sunglasses would keep the beast in check. Just long enough. Just until he was safe in America.
Where he could kill again.
Because there was nothing left for him.
Chapter 33
The President of the United States had never felt more helpless.
The ornate walls of the Oval Office seemed to press in on him. As commander-in-chief of America's armed forces and vast intelligence apparatus, he should have been able to find the answers he so desperately needed.
The CIA had assured him that they had no special operative detailed to guard the Vice-President. So did the DIA, and the FBI, and even though it hurt him to have to ask, he inquired of his National Security Council. And the Secret Service.
He was assured that only normal Secret Service agents guard the Vice-President. Not fancy martial-arts practitioners.
Not even the Secret Service could say that they were guarding Governor Michael Princippi. He still refused protection. In fact, for a man who had escaped one assault on his life, he seemed serene.
In desperation the President had put in a call to Dr. Harold W. Smith. And for the first time in his memory, Smith did not pick up the red phone. The President tried calling at all hours.
It was obvious something had happened to Smith. It was impossible for the President to learn what. An average citizen could have made a normal phone call to Smith's Folcroft office. But the President could never get away with it. The phone company would make a record of any ordinary long-distance call. Nor could the President ask his staff to investigate the disappearance of a certain Dr. Harold W. Smith. Someone might ask why. And the President could never answer that question.
So he sat alone in the loneliest office in human history, trying to put the pieces together himself.
He did have one new fact, courtesy of the Secret Service. It had taken them two days to uncover it. Two critical days in which the news media and editorial writers of the nation had whipped themselves into a frenzy attempting to link all the loose ends into some sinister skein.
The Secret Service had interrogated surviving members of the Eastie Goombahs. They learned that the gang leader had boasted of having been paid to assassinate Governor Princippi. Okay, thought the President, so maybe it's a conspiracy. Who runs it? Who could know about CURE and use it to topple the American electoral system or even the entire government?
Over and over the President chased the possibility around in his mind. The name that he kept coming back to was that of Dr. Harold W. Smith.
Perhaps that was why Smith had disappeared. He was the mastermind. Having failed, he had gone into hiding. Now, if only there was some way to prove it. . . .
Dr. Harold W. Smith breathed.
That was all. He took his food through a tube that ran into his discolored right forearm. His gray eyes were closed and for the fourth day there was no rapid eye movement to indicate a dream state or even minimal brain activity.
Dr. Martin Kimble checked the progress chart that was clipped to the foot of the hospital bed on which Smith lay. It was a flat horizontal line. There was no rise or fall. They had brought Smith in in this state. It was not a coma, because there were no obvious signs of brain activity. But Smith was not dead. His heart continued to beat-if the slow-motion gulp his vascular organ gave every twenty minutes could be called a beat. Perhaps the lungs worked too. It was impossible to tell. Dr. Kimble had ordered life-support systems hooked up to the man who had been found at his desk, inert, without any sign of trauma or violence or poison.
As Dr. Kimble had explained to Smith's frightened wife, "I don't have a firm prognosis. This could be a long vigil. You'd be better off at home. "
What he didn't say was that for all his vital signs, Dr. Harold W. Smith might have been a block of cheese carved to resemble a human being. He even had the same waxy, yellowish color to his skin.
A rush of ammonia-scented air came from the direction of the doorway, causing Dr. Kimble to turn. An elderly Oriental man in a teal-blue embroidered gown stepped in and, ignoring Dr. Kimble, floated over to Smith's bedside.
"Excuse me, but visiting hours are over," said Dr. Kimble stuffily.
"I am not visiting," said the old Oriental in a squeaky, querulous voice. "I am Smith's personal physician."
"Oh? Mrs. Smith never mentioned you, Dr.... "
"Dr. Chiun. I have just returned to this country from my native Korea, where I attended a serious burn patient."
"I assume you have some identification," prompted Dr. Kimble, who knew that there were a lot of foreign medical schools turning out third-rate doctors these days.
"I can vouch for him," said a cool voice from the door. Dr. Kimble saw a lean man in a white T-shirt and black slacks. "And who are you supposed to be?" he asked. "I'm Dr. Chiun's personal assistant. Call me Remo."
"I'm going to have to ask you both to come with me. We have procedures at this hospital regarding visiting doctors."
"No time," said Remo, taking Dr. Kimble by the arm. The man merely touched his funny bone, but the pins-and-needles feeling started immediately. It ran up his arm, over his chest, and up his neck. Dr. Kimble knew that it was impossible to feel pins and needles in the brain, but he felt them nonetheless. His vision started to cloud over.
When the man called Remo let go, Dr. Kimble found himself on his knees. He could see again.
"Tell us about Smith," said Remo.
Dr. Kimble started to speak but the little Oriental, who was fussing over the patient, cut him off.
"Forget that quack," said Dr. Chiun. "Look at what he has done to Smith. Jabbed him with needles and hooked him up to machines. Where are the leeches? I am surprised that he has not attached leeches to Smith's arm to suck out the rest of the vitality."
"Leeching hasn't been used in centuries, Little Father."
"Actually, it's coming back," said Dr. Kimble, groping to his feet. He felt woozy and began looking around for an oxygen tank. When he found one, he pushed the clear oxygen mask to his face and breathed deeply. As he inhaled, he watched and listened.
Dr. Chiun strode around the bed, examining Smith critically.
"He's been like that for four days," Dr. Kimble told him. Dr. Chiun nodded silently.
"There's no sign of injury," Dr. Kimble said.
"Wrong," said Chiun, pointing with an impossibly long fingernail at Smith's forehead. "What is this?"
Still clutching the oxygen mask, Dr. Kimble learned over. In the middle of Smith's forehead was a tiny purplish spot. "That's a liver spot," said Dr. Kimble. "Probably a birthmark. "