"You can't leave. You don't know where you're leaving from or going to. You're in your time of transition, the last transition you will ever make. Speak to the man. It is your current contact, Harold Smith."
"Tell him I no longer work for him. I've done the last meaningless hit of my life."
"Ah, you think every assassination has a purpose, Remo? There you go again. Savior of the world. Chiun saves the House of Sinanju and you save the world. What a pair of dullards you two are."
Remo took the phone that seemed to leap from Wang's pudgy hand into the sweep of Remo's arm, so that while Remo was trying to snatch something, he couldn't help but look as though he was really in a sort of cooperative dance with Wang, who was still smiling.
"I told you I'm through, Smitty," said Remo.
"And you quit for good reason, Remo," said Smith. Remo could hear artillery fire in the background. Smith sounded happy. That was strange. He never sounded happy.
"Look, Remo. For all these years we have been fighting what seems to be a case of creeping national rot. We've gotten bigger and better, and the country gets weaker and worse. But I have found something down here, something very special. The sort of spirit that made America great."
"Then enjoy it," said Remo, and hung up.
"That's the way you treat a client'?" asked Wang, shaking his head in amusement.
"I'm not going to lie to him like Chiun. Chiun tells him all sorts of nonsense, and then does what he wants. That's how we differ. I tell him flat out. Good-bye. When I say good-bye it doesn't sound like three hundred verses of praise for the pope."
Remo nodded on that one. He was right.
"So serious," said Wang. "How you both treat clients amazes me. So serious. Chiun odorizes the atmosphere, and you, Remo, grimly announce the absolute truth. The two of you are so alike."
"If truth and lying are alike, then you can call anything the same. I got you there, Wang. Unless you're like Chiun and can't admit when you've been defeated. Maybe that's part of the Sinanju heritage. I don't know. Your ball game. Case closed. "
"Then if it's closed, I can't tell you that someone who thinks a client is so important as to tell the absolute truth to him all the time is the same as someone who thinks a client is so important as to be lied to all the time. I guess they both don't think the client is important, eh?"
"Twist the truth any way you want, fat man," said Remo. "I'm gone."
"No you're not. You're right here," said Wang. "What you want to run from is the truth. And you'll run forever and never get away."
"Do we live forever?" asked Remo. "How long does a Master of Sinanju live? I mean, I'm twenty years older than when I began, and I look a year or two younger. I don't know how old Chiun is, but he moves perfectly."
"Ah, Remo, do you really want to say that last part? Do you really think Chiun moves perfectly? Have you not been listening to what I said about the Masters?"
"You said Chiun and I had the cleanest strokes in the history of Sinanju. And what the hell do you mean, we treat clients with too much importance?"
"I can mention only one country that exists today that existed in my day, and that's Egypt. And believe me, it's not the same country. I can mention no dynasty that existed in my day that exists now. No border that men died and killed for is today what it was then. They all go, Remo. Your America will go. Everything goes."
"Except Sinanju. That's what Chiun said."
"No, I think he said the techniques. And why has that remained the same? Because people are the same. The Sinanju techniques have not only stayed the same, they have gotten better."
The phone rang again.
"Remo, just hear me out," said Smith. "Please, I'm asking for whatever the last two decades has meant to you. "
"Shoot," said Remo.
Wang laughed. "How grim," he said. "Chiun would be effusing his head off. But you tell the truth. So important. So different, you two."
Rema covered the receiver with his hand.
"Let me get this over with before you start the needles again," said Remo.
"So personal. You and Chiun. Everything is personal."
"Yeah, Smitty," said Remo into the receiver.
"You probably have heard of the war going on in Sornica here in Central America," said Smith.
"No," said Remo. He signaled for Wang to throw him one of the wonderful fresh Florida oranges. Wang's fat hand dropped on a pile set in a pink bowl. He nicked the top one with his thumb and then sent it spinning to Remo. The force of the spin tore the white underbelly of the orange skin away from the meat in a single strand as though a careful cook had removed it. The peel landed on the rugged floor, and the orange dropped into Remo's hand.
"How did you do that?" asked Remo.
"Chiun didn't teach you?"
"No. He doesn't know."
"We must have lost it in the Middle Ages. Works better with the old hard oranges. Less skin. Tighter meat. With the old oranges of Paku you could land both the peel and the orange just where you wanted. No picking up off the rug," said Wang.
"Never heard of Paku."
"See'?" said Wang. "Biggest trading center of its age. Only good thing it ever did was produce the tight small orange that could be spun out of its skin better. Go back to your client with that in mind."
Remo uncovered the receiver again. "Yeah, Smitty."
"Is someone there?"
"Yeah."
"We still have to maintain secrecy, if nothing else. Remo, today there is a battle going on that will decide the future of mankind. We are struggling here in Sornica against an evil that must be eradicated. And for the first time in years, I see a light at the end of the tunnel. I see a real chance to save America once and for all."
"Paku," said Remo.
"What's Paku?" asked Smith.
"Another center of the universe," said Remo.
"I don't understand. But look. Chiun is here, and he'll tell you for himself how important this is."
Remo waited, whistling.
"You're hurt and angry, aren't you?" asked Wang.
"Get off my back," said Remo.