Chiun nodded in return. "Pyon ha-da will change all," Chiun said, his happiness returning. "No longer will my son with a Korean soul be painted the shade of sickness and death. My joy for him is without measure." The parchment skin at his eyes squeezed to vellum knots of delight. "Tell me, O Seer Sun, when is the blessed moment to take place?"
"Soon," Sun said absently. "Quite soon. Tell me, does your son intend to return?"
"Remo?" Chiun asked. "I do not know. He leaves, he comes back. Who can keep track of children these days? Can you not see, O Seer?"
Sun smiled. "I see much, but not all," he admitted. He stood from his chair. "I have a commercial to tape in New Jersey today. I would be pleased if you would accompany me."
"It would be my privilege."
Smiling, the Master of Sinanju rose from the balcony floor once more.
As Chiun walked beside Sun to the door, he was careful to stay as far as was politely possible from the range of the cult leader's wretched perfume. Unbeknownst to him, the powerful sulfur stench of the ancient Greek urn clung just beneath the thick fragrance.
Had Chiun recognized the sulfur smell, he would have slain Sun on the spot and flown to Remo's side. But he did not. Instead, he stepped placidly and guilelessly from the room in the company of the man who had been chosen by the ancient spirit of the urn to slay both Masters of Sinanju.
The big door shut with echoing finality.
HE KNEW WHEN THEY BROUGHT him through the police cordon at the Berlin embassy that his life was over.
After the high-speed chase with police and the subsequent crash at the North Korean mission, the Communist government needed a scapegoat. Rim Kun Soe had been chosen to fulfill that role.
He had sullenly accepted the blame for the chase that had resulted in several injuries-some severe. Face a tight mask, he had voiced regret over the death of the Burg police officer whose bloody, battered body had been returned to German authorities.
There had been two people in the cab, the police had argued. Where was the other man?
A dummy, was the explanation. They were a new thing from America for single travelers intending to lend the impression of more than one person. In his love of all things Western, Rim Kun Soe had purchased one of these. They had even produced one of the dummies for authorities.
It was another insult heaped atop the pile.
Rim Kun Soe hated the West and everything that remotely resembled the bourgeois American culture. He would have just as soon been dragged from his car and beaten to death on one of the lawless streets of America itself as buy one of their artificial people for protection.
But he had accepted the added indignity like the good Public Security Ministry officer he was.
Fortunately for him, he was not turned over to German authorities. This was not due to any loyalty on the part of the North Korean government.
It was merely feared by those in the ministry that his recollection of events would not match the reality of the American who had really been driving the truck.
He was in Germany as a diplomat and therefore enjoyed the protection of extraterritoriality. He was exempt from the laws of his host state, so the police could do nothing to Rim Kun Soe as he was hustled through the line of officers and reporters onto the first plane home.
Back in North Korea, he had been reprimanded by the ministry he served. Somehow they had decided that he was responsible for the debacle concerning the American and the aged Master of Sinanju. Even though he had been following the orders of his superior, even though Kim Jong Il himself had turned over use of his jet to the two smugglers, Rim Kun Soe had borne the brunt of the punishment.
He had not yet been relieved of duty, but that was certainly coming. There might even be a show trial. Prison, perhaps. Maybe worse.
Until that time, he had been given minor security work at the airport in Pyongyang. According to whispers of those in the know, there had been several mysterious packages delivered on a mail flight from the South two days before, and as a result security had been tightened greatly.
Shipments that had been flown into the country were not leaving as they should. Slow under ordinary circumstances, the movement from the airport was practically nonexistent. Earlier that morning, the security officer had realized just how slowly things were moving from the airport when he spied some familiar crates in a back room. They were no longer his problem, he decided. Let someone else take the blame.
In the vast storeroom off the main concourse, there was a bottleneck of government luggage and mail-government officials being the only ones with access to travel and some, albeit censored, communication with the outside world.
After several hours at work in the back rooms of the airport, Rim Kun Soe had been turned over to a detail that was inspecting the suitcases. It was the greatest indignity he had endured in his entire career. Searching through the dirty undergarments of stupid diplomats.
The security officer was not exercising much care as he fumbled through the cheap suitcase of a support staffer from the North Korean mission to Hanoi.
While he worked, Soe was forced to endure the endless prattling of a pair of very junior officers with the People's Bureau of Revolutionary Struggle. They appeared to be obsessed with food.
"Were you able to eat today?" one asked as he swept an electronic device over a pair of trousers.
"Some," admitted his partner.
"I, as well. It has not been easy."
The other nodded. He wore a sickly expression. As a member of the Public Security Ministry while at home and particularly during his brief stay in Germany, Rim Kun Soe had always been able to eat his fill. However, returning as he had in disgrace, he did not enjoy the privileges he once had. Back home in Pyongyang, he had been dropped into the middle of another one of the interminable food shortages the North Korean government specialized in.
Somehow, the men he now worked with seemed to have been affected by more than the famine.
"I think about it at night," the first said. "How he pulled it from the box and threw it to you. Last night, my meal came up in my sleep. I was awakened by the sound of my wife eating it off the blanket."
The other nodded. "I have told my wife I will turn her and the children out if I find them eating my vomit," he said knowingly. "Strength is the only way to deal with them."
"Mmm," said the other in bland agreement.
The conversation went on like this for much of Rim Kun Soe's day. It was humiliating for one who had had so much in his political career to deal with wretches like these two.
His only relief to the embarrassing tedium came when the hip radio of one of the two men he was with squawked to life.
"Security Officer Hyok," the first man announced into the mouthpiece, his breath reeking of stomach acid.
There followed a steady stream of Korean so frantic as to be unrecognizable from Soe's position across the big room.
The security man blanched when he heard the report over the radio. When the voice was through issuing orders, the man stuffed the radio away, quickly drawing his side arm.
"What is it?" his partner asked.
"We are needed on the tarmac," said the first. "Right away. You," he commanded to Soe. "There is an emergency. Come with us."
Soe was grateful for the break in the tedium. He pulled his automatic free and, with the others, made his way out of the building and into the pale sunlight of Pyongyang Airport.
They reached the tarmac at a run, finding many security personnel already there. As Soe looked around, he realized that this was probably the entire airport detachment.
There were hundreds of men standing around. All were looking skyward. Many jeeps lined the periphery field beside the long runway.
"What is it?" Security Officer Hyok asked when he and the others ran into the crowd.
"A plane," said a ranking officer of the PBRS. "From the South."
"Why has it not been shot down?" Soe demanded.