Remo started to object but Chiun raised a quelling palm.
"I hope that my impression is not true. Perhaps I am wrong. But it has been weeks since you sat at my feet thirsting for the wisdom that only one who has memorized the histories of Sinanju may impart. In the old days, it was different. In the old days, you hung on my every pronouncement."
Remo, who could remember no such thing, remained silent.
"I am not merely an old man," Chiun went on. "I am the Master of Sinanju. I am the last of my line. The last of the pure bloodline of Sinanju. When I am gone, there will be no pure link to the Masters who came before me. You should not squander the resource that is Chiun, last reigning Master of Sinanju, Remo. You should be imbibing my wisdom while there is time."
Remo spun on the floor to face the Master of Sinanju. He looked up into Chiun's pleasantly wrinkled features. "Okay."
"Good. Now ask me a question. Any question. Any trifling question that comes to mind. I have all the accumulated wisdom of the House of Sinanju at my command."
Remo thought. His brow furrowed. His mouth puckered. He struggled for a question, hoping to ease Chiun's fears of being unwanted-the true reason, as Remo saw it, that Chiun clung to America, where he and Remo had lived for so long together.
Finally Remo asked his question.
"Why is it before you step into the shower, your body feels dirty but your mouth feels clean, but when you step out, it's the opposite?"
Chiun's face shook with surprise. His mouth opened. His beard trembled excitedly. His hands, resting palm-up in his lap, closed into tiny long-nailed fists.
"Is this a trick question?" he demanded angrily.
"It was the only question I could think of," Remo said.
"Well, I will not answer it. There are no showers in the histories of Sinanju. I will not answer such a question. And you offend me with this frivolous and cheap waste of my magnificent mind."
"You said any question," Remo protested.
"I did not say any frivolous question."
"You said 'trifling.' I distinctly heard the word 'trifling' used."
"Trifling I would have accepted. But not frivolous."
"I'm sorry, Little Father. I . . ." Remo stopped in mid-sentence. The shrill voice of Cheeta Ching cut into his thoughts with one word. The word was "homeless."
"Please, Little Father. I want to hear this," Remo said.
"I was just leaving," said Chiun. "I am returning to Folcroft. "
"Be with you in a minute," Remo said. Then he listened to the harsh voice of Cheeta Ching lament the fate of a single man, an American who had no home because unthinking, unsympathetic people refused to let him live in their communities. Here was a man who was truly homeless, she said.
After the report was over, Remo punched the Off switch and stepped into the next room, where the Master of Sinanju was packing.
"I have to go to Washington," Remo said stonily.
"We are in Washington," said Chiun, not looking up. "We are in Washington, D.C. I have to go to Washington State," Remo said.
"Only you would split hairs like that," said Chiun. "Why do you have to go to this other place?"
"There is a homeless man there. A real one. He has nowhere to go. Every place he goes, people send him away. I have to do something about his situation."
The Master of Sinanju looked up. He saw the anger in his pupil's eyes.
"This is very important to you?"
"Yes," said Remo coldly.
The Master of Sinanju, seeing the whitened knuckles of Remo's clenched fists, nodded sagely.
"I will return to Folcroft and await you there," he said.
"Thank you, Little Father," said Remo, bowing slightly.
"I do not need thanks."
"I know you do not," Remo said, the tension going out of his face.
"But I would accept a personal introduction to Cheeta Ching," Chiun added mischievously.
Chapter 3
The President of the United States looked at his Secretary of Defense. The Secretary of Defense looked back, his mouth hanging open.
"What did he say?" the Secretary of Defense said slowly.
"It sounded like 'Hello' to me," the President said, doubt shading his words.
"Actually he said, 'Hello is all right,' " inserted the NSA stenographer.
"Let me see that," said the Secretary of Defense, tearing loose the long roll of paper on which the transmissions from the Soviet shuttle were recorded. " 'Hello is all right,' " the Secretary read aloud. "What does that mean?"
"Probably broken English," suggested the NSA man. "They are sending us greetings and assuring us that they are well."
"Why us?" demanded the President, his face gathering in concentration. "Why are they communicating with us and ignoring their own control people?"
"Perhaps they are unable to receive the Russian ground transmissions," the NSA man suggested.
"Is that possible?" asked the President of the Secretary of Defense.
"Hardly."
In the background, the Soviet ground control requests had grown more shrill. They, too, had overheard the brief burst of English from the shuttle craft and were demanding equal time. But there was no response to their urgent demands.
"I think we should attempt to contact the shuttle," the Secretary of Defense said after scanning the stenographer's running transcript of the Soviet pleas.
"Won't that annoy the Soviets?" asked the President. The Secretary shrugged. "It will serve them right for trying to get the jump on us. Besides, they're not getting through to their people. We can call this a humanitarian gesture on our part."