"The hussy lived in blissful ignorance until one day she was kicked in the head by an ass. Memory returned to her and she did report the false heart of the prince to his father. Enraged, the sultan slew his son at once. Afterward, Master Suo-Lok was discharged from the Mameluke's service with only partial payment-this for subcontracting to the prince."
"So I was right," Remo challenged. "It was a smack on the head that brought back her memory."
"Essentially," Chiun admitted.
"So why'd you tell me it wasn't?"
"You might not have listened otherwise," Chiun sniffed, "and thus missed a riveting tale. We have arrived."
The Master of Sinanju tapped the slender fingertips of one hand to the dashboard. Annoyed, Remo glanced ahead.
The road from Tyre had taken them to Nahal Litani, a river northeast of the port city.
Settlements like border towns in an old Western grew among the trees alongside the road. They had just reached a sprawling collection of simple tenements and flat houses.
Using the directions given to them by the restaurant owner, they located the headquarters of the PIO. When they arrived at the dilapidated building, there were already several vehicles, mostly trucks and jeeps, parked in front. Angry men with coarse beards, automatic rifles and sloppy military garb stomped around the vehicles.
"Front door or back?" Remo asked, eyeing the men as he slowed the car. The men, in turn, looked on them with shock.
"This is Lebanon." Chiun shrugged. "Neither is safe."
"Front door it is."
Remo parked the Buick next to a jeep. The Arabs were like jackals on a carcass. The Buick was surrounded before he even shut off the engine.
Rifle barrels jammed through open windows. Wild eyes glared hatred at the two obvious foreigners. As he stabbed his gun muzzle against Remo's chest, the closest man let out a furious torrent of unintelligible Arabic.
Remo looked blandly from gun to Chiun. "What's he saying?" he asked.
"He wishes us to get out of the car," the Master of Sinanju replied. He was looking disdainfully at the multiple gun barrels jutting through his own window.
"You still in an accommodating mood, Little Father?"
The old man's nod was so subtle only Remo saw it. It was all Remo needed.
Remo's hand flew to the door handle. At the same time, Chiun's bony fingers flashed forward. They popped their respective handles simultaneously.
Doors flew open at speeds nearing Mach 2. Metal slammed flesh with meaty slaps. PIO soldiers were launched from the sides of the Buick like scattered seeds. Before the bodies struck dust, Remo and Chiun were already springing through the open doors.
The doors had taken out a total of seven men. They hadn't even crumpled to the ground before another thirty were flooding in to fill the void.
Automatics exploded to life, riddling the Buick with bullets. Tires erupted in coughs of dust and rubber.
Even as the old car was settling like a deflated balloon to the ground, Remo and Chiun were swirling into the midst of the furious PIO soldiers.
Remo snagged two kaffiyehs, one in each hand, yanking them together in a simple forearm snap. Skulls cracked open, popping squishy clumps of fat gray brain into the crystal-clear Mideast sky.
On the other side of the car, the Master of Sinanju's hand flashed up to the barrel of an extended rifle. A push popped the gun free of its owner. Unfortunately for the PIO soldier, his arm popped loose, too.
The rifle soared back, arm in tow. The gun became a missile unto itself as it pierced the chest of another PIO man. Shedding the excess baggage of its human appendage, the rifle continued straight through the soldier. It screamed in and out another advancing man before coming to a quivering stop in a third.
As the three men fell to the dust, Chiun was finishing off the original one-armed soldier with a sharp toe to the forehead. It had happened so quickly, the PIO man hadn't had time to mourn the loss of his arm before the blackness of oblivion overcame him.
Spinning from the body, Chiun whirled into the thickest cluster of men, catching up to Remo at the front of the car.
A mound of bodies decorated the ground at Remo's feet. Though their weapons were raised, the PIO soldiers seemed hesitant to use their guns in such close quarters.
"How many you get?" Remo asked Chiun as he worked.
The Master of Sinanju sprang off the ground, twisting in midair. Pipe-stem legs swirled into the throng of armed men. Two heads snapped around with brittle spine cracks.
"Six," he announced, kimono skirts settling around his ankles.
"You're slowing down," Remo chided. "I'm up to nine."
As he spoke, he launched an elbow back, catching a PIO soldier in the Adam's apple. When the man fell, clutching his throat, a heel kick collapsed his face into an angry smear of crimson.
"That is because I allowed you to work without distraction," Chiun retorted.
Sharpened fingernails slashed forward, ripping the throats from a pair of soldiers. Even as the first men were dropping, the old Korean threw his hands out to either side, catching two charging men in the chest. They stopped dead, quivering on the ends of extended index fingernails. When he pulled the nails away, the men collapsed.
The rest had gotten the message by now. The tattered remnants of the small PIO platoon decided to disperse. Abandoning their cars, they opted to leave on foot. Obviously, they thought screaming would somehow accelerate their pace. A theory not entirely unjustified given the speed at which they were flying down the street. They waved hands over heads as they shrieked.
"We're even," Remo announced, coming up beside Chiun. "Ten for you and ten for me."
A tie was apparently not good enough for the Master of Sinanju. Bending quickly, he wrapped one bony hand around the bumper of their Buick. With a painful wrench, he tore it free and hefted the heavy, rusted strip of metal high above his head. With a whoosh, it vanished from his fingertips.
Remo tracked the bumper as it flew end-over-end down the sun-cracked street. It soared only twenty yards before it lopped off the head of one of the fleeing PIO men. The body continued to run a few more steps as the head and bumper thudded to the road.
After brushing a cloud of imaginary dust from his palms, Chiun replaced his hands inside his kimono sleeves. He smiled triumphantly at Remo. "I win," he proclaimed.
"We'll settle up later," Remo said. "Let's go." On the way inside the building, they found a crumpled body lying facedown in the dirt. Remo toed it over.
Ree Hop Doe's glasses were askew, but his Asian features were unmistakable.
Remo's thoughts at once turned to the former President. "I smell a Los Alamos rat," he commented thinly as they viewed the body.
Leaving Doe to the desert sun, he pushed open the door.
There were PIO men inside, as well. These ones seemed to be more high-ranking than the corpses outside. Instead of rifles, they wore side arms. Once Chiun had liberated a few arms from a few sides, the initial anger they had displayed at the sudden appearance of the two men was replaced with intense agreeability. All around were nervous smiles.
"Where's Aruch?" Remo demanded of the man with the biggest epaulets.
Like the rest of the PIO membership, he wore a scruffy beard and fatigues.
"Gone." The man grinned, sweating. "Did he take the bomb with him?"