The man didn't even look at her. That was unusual. With her smooth skin, perfect teeth and piercing brown eyes, Cindee had the sort of features that usually had no problem turning men's heads.
The man spoke without lifting his head. "Where'd you buy that accent, Paul Hogan's going-out-of-career sale?" he asked, his nose still in the gutter.
What he was looking at, Cindee had no idea. "I wanna ask you about TV," Cindee pressed.
"Go squat on one."
"Did you hear the president got away?" Cindee demanded.
The man let loose a protracted exhale of air. Turning his attention from the junk on the ground, he straightened, settling his gaze on Cindee.
"What part of me being rude to you so you'll go away don't you understand?" asked Remo Williams.
"I just want to ask you a question. Why won't you let me ask you a question? You Americans are so vulgar."
"This one speaks with a wisdom beyond her years," announced the Master of Sinanju, who had been studying the trash in the road alongside his pupil.
Remo shook his head, irritated. "Thanks a heap, Waltzing Matilda," he growled at Cindee. "He wasn't on the rag enough already without a jump start from you. What do you want to ask me? And make it quick."
"Drama," Cindee said. "I want the opinion of the man in the street about what he thinks makes good drama. You couldn't get more in the street than you, since you're actually standing in the street." She frowned. "What are you doing in the street, anyway?"
"Going back to ignoring you," Remo said.
"Wait," Cindee insisted. "Even you must understand what makes good drama. The ex-president here, a mob on the street hurling flaming bottles and rocks at the building where he's hiding. That's drama. You'd watch that, wouldn't you?"
"No," said Remo impatiently. "Are we done now?" Not waiting for a reply, he returned to examining the street.
A man with a camera near the battered building caught the eye of Cindee's assistant. The young woman hurried over to him, leaving her boss in the company of Remo and Chiun.
"Of course you would," Cindee persisted. "Don't try to pretend you're not like everybody else in this country. You people love that kind of violent drama. Why do you think you're glued to the set every time some kid opens fire in his high-school cafeteria? You got helicopters overhead, police cordons, kids climbing out windows. Drama."
When Remo looked back up, his face was cold. "Don't tell me what I love," he said, voice chilly. She was momentarily taken aback by the icy menace in his tone. It was in that moment of hesitation that the Master of Sinanju inserted himself. The old Korean took Cindee's gloved hands in his frail fingers, patting gently. His face was the personification of ancient wisdom.
"Of course you are correct, my dear," Chiun said.
"I have maintained for years that the American culture revels in violence. I hear others out there saying the same thing now, but I was first."
"Good for you," Cindee said. She tried to extricate her hands, but they wouldn't budge. It was as if the old man's hands were fast-drying concrete that had firmed up around her own.
"This is a new kind of violence," Chiun continued. "There are some who might think it began with your foolish Revolution or the things you would call world wars, even though everyone knows the only important part of the world wasn't involved in them. There was violence there, yes, but it was men killing men, which has gone on forever. Do you want to know when your culture truly turned to violence?"
"Technically, I'm Australian, not American," Cindee said. "Not my culture." She tugged at her hands.
"June 11, 1975," Chiun said. "A day that will live in infamy." He hung his head.
Cindee's eyes narrowed. "What happened then?"
"Some dippy soap opera actress hit some dippy soap-opera actor," Remo supplied.
The Master of Sinanju's face tightened. "It was Rad Rex, it was 'As the Planet Revolves' and it was the end of your American culture," he said over his shoulder to Remo. "Since then there has been nothing but car crashes and shooting guns. Poor Mr. Rex, whose autograph remains my most prized possession, had to retire. A gentle soul, he left before his dignity could be sullied by the death of art in this land."
"Yeah, he was really worried about preserving his dignity that time I saw him hawking some pocket wiener pump on a 1980s infomercial," Remo said.
"Pay him no heed," Chiun confided. "He only says such things to appeal to prurient minds. How typical he is of the current state of this nation's culture."
This time when Cindee yanked her hands, Chiun allowed her to have them. She pulled so hard, she smacked herself in her Australian forehead. She quickly stuffed her hands in her pockets, lest the old geyser with the viselike grip latch on to them again.
"Thanks for the input, Fops," Cindee said. "But you're not my ideal demographic."
"What does that mean?" Chiun asked suspiciously.
"It means you're too old for your opinion to matter," she explained. "Advertisers skew younger and-I hate to break it to you-you're way beyond that prized eighteen-to-forty-nine range. Like two hundred years beyond it."
"I will let that insult pass because you are obviously possessed of a deranged mind," Chiun said thinly.
"What she obviously is is some kind of TV exec," Remo said. "They're deranged on a good day. On the rest, they're just stupid as a sack of doorknobs." He was annoyed at his teacher for wasting time with the Australian ditz.
"I'm a producer," Cindee corrected.
"Same pot, different crack," Remo said.
"You do not listen to anyone older than forty-nine?" Chiun interjected, steering her back to what was now, for him, the main point.
"Not if I can help it," Cindee said. "No offense, but that's just the way the business works."
"What of the wisdom derived from age and experience?" Chiun said, astonished. "They mean nothing to you?"
"Sorry," Cindee said. "Now him," she added, pointing at Remo. "He's in the right demo group. His opinion holds weight."
"Go cuddle a kangaroo," opined Remo.
Chiun thrust his hands deep in the sleeves of his kimono. "You and my son have much in common," he said unhappily. "He, too, believes that people of a certain age have nothing more to contribute to the world. He has often said that he would send all of us over sixty-five on buses to the cemetery today, just to save the young the time and expense of having to bother with funerals later on."
"Not true. Not listening," Remo said. He was leaning over, hands on his knees.
Chiun nodded to Cindee. "It is true, no matter what he tells you," he confided.
"Hey, lady," Rema said, ignoring the old man, "you're a TV expert. Does this look like a little TV to you?"
Cindee went over to him. She peered down at the object that had so fascinated the two men.
"Yeah," she said. "It's one of those little handheld numbers you get at the mall."
The plastic case was cracked, the electronic guts spilled out onto the road. The mini-television set looked as if it had been crushed flat by hundreds of stomping feet.
"So that's one, too?" Remo said.