Anxiously Remo looked for the off ramp. Maybe there was still time to catch up.
He put all thought of the slippery Dodge out of his mind when a frantic voice cried, "Help me, someone! My wife is trapped!"
Remo jumped over a sedan hood and pushed a man out of the way so he could get to the passenger side of a compact whose engine had been vomited from its shorn hood and was spilling licking gasoline-fed flames.
On the passenger side, a woman was hung up in the straps of her shoulder harness, her head down, a tributary of blood visible in the snarling orange glow washing her forehead.
Remo saw that the driver had escaped through his shattered window. The driver's door had been compacted in place. He was trying to wrench it open, sobbing and crying his wife's name.
Gently impelling him to one side, Remo stepped up to the gaping window and took hold of the jagged frame. He stepped back.
The door surrendered with a lurching groan. He set it aside and crawled in. The straps came free like cobwebs under his swift hard fingers. The woman slumped. There was no time to worry about broken bones. The flames were starting to roar.
Crawling back, Remo pulled the woman out like a dead cat. Only she was not dead. Her heart still beat.
He brought her to the side of the road and laid her there as her husband fell to his knees behind her, sobbing without words.
There were more injured, and Remo went to help them. He had no choice. He had screwed up. Not lying flat on the bus roof had spooked the mafioso. This had been the result.
An hour later, a tired Remo Williams limped back to the Bartilucci Construction Company yard.
"You failed," Chiun said after only a glance at his pupil's bedraggled clothes. His necktie was smeared with soot. Here and there, seams had burst.
"Don't rub it in, okay?" Remo said dispiritedly.
"You should have done your duty, not dallied like an amateur. "
"Hey! I was worried about you. Is that a crime?"
"Worry I will accept. Pity is unacceptable. You think I am too old to serve my emperor?"
"No, I do not," Remo said. Chiun glared. "Okay. Maybe a little."
"I will remind you that you were incautious enough to make an alarm sound when Smith sent you on a small errand."
"It was one of those ultrasonic alarms," Remo said sourly. "A fly can't get past them. And I'd like to see you handle one."
"Perhaps you will," said Chiun tightly.
"Great. Then you can teach me. Come on, let's give the bad news to Smith."
"I will leave it to you to inform Smith that the ransom was not properly paid," Chiun said tonelessly.
"Except that I saw you take the envelope. What're you trying to pull?"
"Nothing. Behold. There is no more than forty dollars in this envelope. The remainder is waste paper."
"Only forty?"
Chiun beamed. "Less my finder's fee, of course."
"That's too bad, Little Father," said Remo. "You get only thirty-six bucks."
"Smith will make up the rest, of course. For my fee was based on the ransom to be paid, not the ransom that was delivered."
Remo said, "Chiun, I can hardly wait to be the fly on the wall when you try to work that out with Smitty."
"Smith will not deny me."
"No," said Remo, jerking a thumb at the deceased form of Vinnie (The Maggot) Maggiotto. "If you hadn't eliminated that guy, we would have had a line on LCN headquarters."
"We will not speak of this one to Smith," Chiun said quickly.
"Only if you stop carping."
"I never carp. I enlighten."
"Try enlighting without carping, then," said Remo.
"Only if you will attempt to receive enlightenment," returned the Master of Sinanju.
They left the body to decompose in the dark as they walked to their waiting car parked behind the long shed.
Chapter 26
Don Carmine Imbruglia was soaking the postmarks off a stack of postage stamps he had steamed off the day's mail when Nicky Kix burst in with the bad news.
"I didn't whack the Jap."
"Scroom, then," said Don Carmine, adding a dollop more Lestoil.
"And I lost the Maggot."
"Screw the Maggot," snarled Don Carmine. "He eats garbage. Tell me somethin' important. What about the fuggin' hard-on disk?"
"Right here, boss," said Nicky Kix, producing the sealed disk unit.
"Beautiful," said Don Carmine, his mood instantly brightening. He kissed the disk. "Beautiful. Now I'm gonna make some money."
"You're already making money."
"Yeah, but I gotta pay tribute on it to Don Fiavorante. This stuff in here is all free and clear."
"Oh, I get it. Guess you gotta let Tollini off the hook, huh?"
"No chance. He don't know about this. And who's gonna tell him? You? Do that and you'll never eat pasta in this town again."