"Please, mister, don't shoot me," Remo pleaded. The man inched closer. His breath, like sour milk, wafted into Remo's face.
"The wallet," he repeated. The man was close enough now. Remo's foot lashed out and made contact with a kneecap. The gunman screamed as a kaleidoscope of pain-induced lights exploded behind his eyes. His kneecap felt like a fragmenting grenade. His arm flew up and struck the wall behind him. When he tried to yank it down, it wouldn't pull free.
"I said I didn't want trouble," Remo told him in a grating voice. "I didn't say I don't like trouble, because I do. I didn't mean I can't handle trouble, because as you'll plainly notice, your knee is broken and your gun is embedded six inches into a brick wall with your hand still wrapped around it. What I meant was, I wasn't in the mood for trouble. But now that I don't have a choice, I plan to make the best of it."
The gunman looked at the brick wall above his head. He saw that his leather jacket cuff was touching brick. He pulled it back and there was his wrist, and then there was the brick. There was no sign of his hand. The wall wasn't shattered or cracked. Not even the mortar was disturbed. It looked as if the wall had grown around his hand. He felt the trigger under his finger and decided against pulling it. No telling what might happen.
Instead, he looked into the dead, flat eyes of the skinny guy who had done this to him. He decided an apology was in order.
"I apologize," he said sincerely.
"Too late. My night is ruined. You're going to have to make it up to me."
"How? Just tell me. I'll do it."
"I need some fast cash."
"Left-front pants pocket. Help yourself. Just leave me bus fare, okay?"
"Thank you," said Remo. He extracted the man's wallet. It was fat and black. Remo riffled through it. He counted out nearly thirteen hundred dollars in wrinkled bills.
"What were you sticking me up for?" Remo demanded of the would-be holdup man. "You got a small fortune here."
"How do you think I come to be carrying that large a wad? Working as a hairdresser?"
"Well, you're donating it to a new fund. The Free the U.S. POW's Fund. It so happens I'm president and treasurer."
"I'm a charitable man. Easy come, easy go."
"I can use this credit card too," Remo said, stuffing the wallet back into the man's dungaree pocket.
The gunman scowled. "Hey, have a heart, man. That ain't fair. That's my own credit card. I didn't steal it. You can have the money, okay? I can always steal more. But getting square with the credit-card people, that's real work."
"Think of yourself as Robin Hood. You're stealing from the rich and giving it to the poor. Me."
"This ain't fair."
"No, it ain't," Remo admitted, starting off. "Toodle-oo."
"Hey! What am I gonna do about my hand? It's still caught in this wall."
Remo turned. "You still have your own teeth?" he asked.
"Yeah. So?"
"Start gnawing brick."
The woman at the travel agency was a crisp, no-nonsense blond in a black-and-white business suit set off with a string tie. Remo decided he liked the way a lock of her hair fell over her smooth brow. She had the shiniest ears he'd ever seen. Remo wondered why it was that blonds always had ears that looked as if they were waxed daily.
"And where would your travel plans be taking you?" she asked.
Remo hesitated. He decided to trust her. He leaned closer and let her get the full impact of his magnetic charm.
"Between you and me, how close can you get me to Vietnam?"
She leaned into Remo's face conspiratorially. "Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City?" she asked breathily.
"You can do that?" Remo asked, taken aback.
"Uh-huh," she said. "We have a package plan. It's called the Trans-Vietnam tour. Vietnam is hungry for tourist dollars. Of course, there are no direct flights from this country."
"Of course," Remo said, blinking. This seemed almost too easy.
"But we can book you to Bangkok, Thailand, where you can pick up a connecting flight. It's a two-week tour and includes all meals and hotels."
"I'll be brown-bagging," Remo said. "I've eaten Vietnamese before."
"Oh, were you there? During the war, I mean?"
"Does it show that much?" Remo asked.
"Not on you. You look kinda young, actually-now that I think of it. But this tour is very popular with servicemen. Nostalgia, you know."
"Nostalgia is a terrible thing," Remo said, thinking of his year in Nam.
"So-Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City?"
"Ho Chi Minh City-that used to be Saigon, right?"
"Um-huh." The blond was wetting her lips with her tongue.
"I'll take it."
"When would you like to depart?" she asked, calling up a schedule on her desk terminal.
"When's the next flight?"
"Well, there's one tonight, but obviously-"
"I'll take it," Remo said quickly.
"You'll need a connecting flight to Kennedy International. "
"First class," Remo said. "All the way. A friend is paying for it."
The blond lifted penciled eyebrows quizzically and got to work.