At a nod from Remo, the Master of Sinanju faded back into the jungle, his emerald-and-ocher kimono blending in with the vegetation.
After that, Remo folded his arms and waited.
The Extinguisher moved in a semicircle, keeping them in sight at all times. When he reached a tree, he unhooked a small folding grapnel from his web belt and affixed it to a black nylon line. Swinging it up, he snared an overhanging branch. Then like a nimble black spider, he went up, hand over hand.
His grip was not what it should have been. He slid down twice.
Floating across the space came a soft curse or two.
Finally he reached the branch and started to grab for it.
Perched directly above, the Master of Sinanju calmly reached down and sawed the nylon line with one swift fingernail swipe.
The man in black landed in the dirt like a sack of sausage.
Remo was on top of him seconds later. Reaching down, he pulled off his gear and threw it every which way.
"You can't do this to the Extinguisher!"
"Watch me," said Remo, flinging away the web belt and reaching for the black leather shoulder sling supporting a machine pistol.
It broke under the strength of his hard yank, and Remo prepared to toss it away, too, when he noticed amid all the projecting clips a Lucite ammo drum.
"What the hell is this?"
"My Hellfire pistol. It's the only one of its kind."
Remo's eyes looked strange. Dropping the weapon, holster and all, he took hold of the ski mask and yanked it straight up.
The last of the starlight disappeared then. But Remo didn't need it.
The exposed face was young and angular, the short hair dirty blond. And to Remo's eyes it looked very familiar.
"Chiun, I think we have a problem."
"It is not my problem," Chiun said from the branch above. "For he is not my son, but yours."
Chapter 38
Remo dragged the man who called himself the Extinguisher to his feet.
The Master of Sinanju dropped from his branch, as light as a green parachute descending, to land beside them.
"This idiot isn't my son," Remo said in a disgusted voice.
"Hey, I resent that!"
"No son of mine would parade around tricked out like a walking Swiss army knife. Or pretend to be some phoney dime-novel superhero."
"The Extinguisher is a legend. How do you know he isn't real?"
"Because I have a working brain. Your name is Winston Smith. Until last year you were with the Navy. Now you're AWOL."
"No. Wait. Think about it. Everybody knows the Extinguisher's name. It might be a cover to con the bad guys thinking that they have nothing to be afraid of."
"They do not," Chiun retorted. "For we spied your clumsy clanking and clunking and ambushed you before you could unleash your ridiculous toy gun upon us."
"Hey, I have an excuse. I have the trots."
"What is this witless one talking about?" Chiun asked Remo.
Winston Smith lowered his voice. "The screaming shits to you."
Chiun sniffed the air delicately. "Is it you who has befouled the jungle?" he asked.
"Not my fault. I drank some bad water."
"This is Mexico," Remo said. "All the water is bad."
"Yeah, well, now I know. That doesn't change who I am."
"Kid, I was reading Blaize Fury when I was in Nam and your highest ambition was to crawl up a fallopian tube."
"You were in 'Nam? Cool! What was it like?"
"It was hell."
"You're lucky. I missed out on 'Nam."
"You missed out on common sense too. What are you doing down here?"
"He is a Juarezista," the girl inserted.
"That true?"
The Extinguisher looked away. "Let me talk to you in private, okay?"
Remo took him by the arm and into the jungle. In a thick part of the woods, he spun him around.
"Let's have it."
"I'm only pretending to be a Juarezista. "
"Like you're pretending to be the Extinguisher?"
"No, I'm really him. I mean I took on the nom de guerre to further my work."