Remo could almost hear his superior wince over two thousand miles away.
"Remo, please."
"Okay, they're landfill. Happy now?"
"That is satisfactory."
"All except Roy Shortsleeve."
"He did not get away?"
"No. I left him where he sat."
"Why, Remo?"
"Because he's innocent. I could tell, having been an innocent on death row once myself. I think someone should reopen his case."
"That is not our mission," Smith said flatly.
"And I say it is."
The line hummed in the silence that followed.
Remo shifted his feet. He had reverted to his habitual wardrobe, a T-shirt and chinos. Today the T-shirt was white and the chinos tan. Loafers of Italian leather covered his feet. They looked brand new. They were. When they lost their original shine or got scuffed, he just ash-canned them and bought a fresh pair. This was his third pair this week.
"Very well, Remo," Smith said in his eternally bitter voice. "I will make inquiries. But I do not expect miracles. It is very difficult to overturn such convictions."
"Tell that to the ACLU-who are going to have a lot of explaining to do after Roy Shortsleeve tells his story."
Smith groaned audibly. In the phone booth, Remo smiled to himself. The hand holding the receiver was of average size, but the attached wrist was freakishly thick.
"Anything else I can do?" Remo asked. "How about Dr. Gregorian? I sent you a bunch of clippings on that dried-up old ghoul. I can be in Milwaukee by sundown."
"Do not go to Milwaukee."
"No?"
"Fly to Boston."
"What's there?"
"I will be there," said Smith. "With Master Chiun."
"Yeah? What's up?"
"I have concluded purchase negotiations on the new residence Chiun has requested-"
"You mean extorted."
"-as a part of the latest contract negotiations," Smith finished.
"Boston, huh? I guess you talked Chiun out of living in a castle."
"No, I did not," said Smith.
Remo gripped the receiver so tightly he left fingerprints. Fingerprints that could never be traced because Remo had been declared dead, his identity files pulled. "You got him a castle! In Boston?"
"Outside Boston, actually. Try to catch the nine o'clock plane, and we will rendezvous at the airport."
"On my way," Remo said, not sounding at all happy about it.
Remo wore a long face as he cabbed to the airport. It was not a face that was at its best when it was long. Remo's face-resculpted over the twenty years he had worked for CURE-had been turned pretty much back to its original contours. Twenty years of faces. Twenty years of changing identities. Twenty years of assignments. And twenty years-minus a four-year period in which he had actually lived in a home in the New York suburbs-of living out of suitcases in hotels and motels all over the world.
And now, thanks to the Master of Sinanju's insistence, CURE was going to provide them with a permanent place to live.
It should have been something Remo would look forward to. But there were problems. For one thing, Chiun had insisted on a castle. Remo had no desire to live in a castle.
For another, Chiun was about to become a father. And it was his stated intention to prepare his new domicile for the baby and its mother.
For weeks now, in anticipation of this joyous occasion-dreaded by Remo-Chiun had been preparing.
And ignoring Remo. Remo had started to feel left out and between that and boredom, he had taken to calling up Smith and asking for missions. At first, Smith had little for Remo to do. A crooked judge in Buffalo. A gang leader in Detroit. Piecework. Nothing big. Definitely nothing challenging. Mostly it was fly to the hit's city, locate the hit, say hello to the hit and hit the hit. Wham, bang, thank you, hit. Have a nice death.
After a while, Remo had taken to cutting out newspaper articles about people worthy of being hastened to the boneyard and sending them to Folcroft Sanitarium by Federal Express. Always making sure to check off the "bill recipient" box on the airbill to give the penurious Smith added incentive.
An article on the ACLU's attempt to win reprieves for four death row inmates had been one of the latest. Remo was hoping Smith would send him after Dr. Mordaunt Gregorian next. Maybe tomorrow, Remo reflected. After they had gotten settled in.
The flight across the U.S. seemed longer than it should be because the stewardess kept trying to sit in Remo's lap.
Remo was not in the mood for stewardesses who wanted to sit in his lap, and he told the woman so.
This did not dissuade her. "How about I just kneel at your feet and massage them lovingly?" she countered.
"Won't they fire you?" Remo wondered.
"If they do, will you make it worth my while?"
"Not on this leg."
The stewardess looked ready to burst into tears. Remo, to avoid a scene, tried to head off the cloudburst.
"You know, you don't really love me," he pointed out.
"I do! I do! Since forever."
"Since exactly twenty minutes ago when I got on this plane," Remo said. "Before that you never saw my face."