"That's the guy. A loser. I still wonder where he got the money from."
Remo took the slip of paper and said, "If I find out, I'll let you know."
"Yeah, you do that," Palmer said. "You do that."
Chiun was quiet during the ride to the lawyer's office, which made his pupil suspicious. "This is the place," Remo said, pulling up in front of the address Palmer had given him. "Weems. Harvey Weems. Sounds like someone who should be related to old Elmo Wimpler, remember, Chiun?"
Chiun maintained a stony-faced silence, indicating to Remo that something was definitely going on inside his head.
"Well, let's go and pay him a visit," he said, getting out of the car. Studying the building, he added, "Can't be the world's most successful lawyer, not if he's got his office in this dump."
"You assume," Chiun said, and they'd been all through that before too.
"I'm sorry, Little Father," Remo said. "I should not assume that a pig is a pig simply because it lives in a pigsty."
Chiun declined to comment, which was just fine with Remo. He was hoping they'd find this "child killer" quickly just so Chiun would get off his soapbox.
They went inside the four-story building and learned from the directory that Weems's office was on the fourth floor. In fact, it was the only occupied office on that floor, and one of only four occupied offices in the entire building.
In the absence of an elevator, they began to climb the stairs, which seemed to be more a popular location for excretory functions than anything else. In fact, on the second landing they came across a man who was relieving his bladder in a corner, and Remo asked apprehensively, "You wouldn't be Harvey Weems, the attorney, would you?"
"Shit, no," the man said, shaking off the last few drops and tucking himself away, "I'm Blackie Danelo, the brain surgeon." Giving Remo a disgusted look and Chiun a look of disbelief, the brain surgeon walked past them, descended to the first level, and exited to the street.
Chiun gave Remo a glare that could charbroil a hamburger and preceded him up the remainder of the steps to the fourth level.
"I just asked," Remo said, following.
They scanned the doors on the fourth floor and finally found the one that read HARVEY WEEMS, AT OR EY-AT-AW.
"This is it," Remo said. "At-or-ey at-aw."
When Chiun did not even reply with a glare, Remo knocked on the door. When there was no immediate reply, he knocked a second time.
"Try the doorknob," Chiun suggested as if talking to a child.
"I was about to."
Remo reached for the doorknob and found that it turned freely. He pushed the door open and peered inside the dark office.
"Light," Chiun said.
"Don't you just hate it when someone keeps telling you to do something a split second before you're about to do it anyway?" Remo asked nobody in particular. He flicked on the light and stepped into the room, which turned out to be an outer office with no windows. Across from them was another door, which presumably led to the at-or-ey's office.
"Let's see if he's in there," Remo said.
"Someone is," Chiun said.
"Oh?"
"You do not smell it?"
Remo stopped and sniffed the air, and damned if he didn't smell it. Blood, sharp and acrid, accompanied by the odor of death. Somebody was in there, all right, and whoever it was wasn't about to open the door for them— or anybody.
He walked across the room and opened the door. The room was dimly lit by a shaft of light coming through the lone window. He switched on the light, knowing what he would find.
There was blood everywhere, on the walls, the floor, the desk, the window. The body was not immediately noticeable, which meant it had to be behind the desk.
Three long strides across the room confirmed his guess.
"Whew" he said, "looks like the blade men got here ahead of us."
Chiun came over to examine the body, which had been hacked almost to pieces.
"Weems," he said.
"Maybe," Remo said. "Are you assuming?"
"I do not assume," Chiun said stiffly, "I employ logic. This is Weems's office, Weems's desk—"
"And that makes it Weems? That's logic."
Chiun closed his eyes and continued. "This man has his jacket and shoes off. The jacket is on the back of the desk chair, and the shoes are underneath the desk. Who else would make himself that comfortable?"
Remo shrugged and said, "Maybe you're right."
"Get his wallet."
Remo checked the jacket on the back of the chair, and when that did not yield a wallet, he checked the dead man's pants, coming up with a faded brown leather billfold.
"Driver's license," he said, extracting same from the wallet. Reading the name on the license aloud, he said, "Harvey Weems." He put the license away, replaced the wallet, and said, "And I'm Dr. Watson."
"This man cannot help us."
"Good observation."
"We must, however, determine why he was killed."
"I'll bite. Why was he killed?"
"He knew something."
"Ah."
Chiun looked at the top of the desk and noticed a pad with some writing on it. A large dollar figure inside a heart, and a smaller figure next to it. Also the words "phone" and "man's voice" scribbled on the pad.
"There," Chiun said, pointing.