Chinese Puzzle

If the Pelnor Investigative Service could so easily spot the trio, who else?

There it was, the two Orientals obviously yelling at each other, and the man who had been publicly executed years before. A neat picture obviously shot with a not-very-long telephoto lens.

The face of Remo Williams had been changed by plastic surgery, the cheekbones, nose and hairline altered. But to see their ultimate weapon, The Destroyer, in a common photograph made by simple private detectives made Smith's already queasy stomach turn sour in anticipation of coming doom.

CURE would be disbanded before being exposed. Only the two men would know, as they had known before, and they would not know for long. Smith had prepared the destruct mechanism the day he returned from his meeting with the President.

He had his pill. He would phone his wife and tell her he was off on business. In a month, a man from the C.I.A. would tell Mrs. Smith her husband had been lost on an assignment in Europe. She would believe it because she still believed that he worked for the C.I.A.

Smith dropped the photograph into the shredder basket behind him. The basket whirred and Remo Williams' picture disappeared.

He spun his chair around and peered out at the sound and the lapping waves breaking over the rocks in small rhythmic currents, dictated by moon and wind and tide.

The water was there before CURE. It would be there after CURE. It had been there when Athens was a democracy, when Rome was a republic, and when China stood at the center of world civilization, known for its justice and wisdom and serenity.

They had fallen and the water continued. And when CURE was gone, there would still be the water.

Smith would do several small things when he put CURE into destruct. He would make the phone call to payroll which would reassign approximately half the people back to the agencies they thought they worked for anyway, turn Folcroft back into a real sanitarium, and dismiss with recommendations the remainder.

When this large scale dismissal was processed through the computer, it would set off in one day a raging fire within the computer complex destroying the tapes and the equipment.

Smith would not witness the fire. He would have, 24 hours earlier, left a memo ordering shipment of a box in the basement to the Maher Funeral Home in Parsippany, New Jersey. He would not see the memo executed either.

He would have gone downstairs, to the corner of the paint room, where the box stood in the corner, slightly taller and wider than the average man. He would remove the light aluminum lid, lie down in the tight white foam rubber, approximately hollowed for Ms figure, and pull the lid back down over himself. From the inside, he would snap shut four locks that fastened the lid and made it airtight.

He would need no air. Because when the last lock was closed, he would swallow the pill and go to sleep forever along with the organization he had helped design to save a nation incapable of saving itself.

What of Remo Williams? He would die soon after if the plan worked. And it was the only plan that could work. For when Smith had put the destruct plan on "prepare", Remo's executioner was already at Remo's side. He had been assigned to accompany him.

Smith would receive the daily phone contact from Remo through a Detroit dial-a-prayer, and would 'tell Remo to send Chiun back to Folcroft immediately.

And when Remo told this to Chiun, Chiun would fulfill his contract of death, as Koreans had been fulfilling contracts for centuries.

And Remo and Smith would carry with them to their graves the awesome secret of CURE. And when the only other person who even knew of its existence called from the White House, he would get that busy signal on the special line signifying that CURE was no more.

Chiun, who never knew for whom he worked except that it was the government, would probably return to Korea to live his few remaining years in peace.

The waves beat steadily on the shore.

The world was close to peace. What a fantastic dream. How many years of peace had the world known? Was there ever a time when man was not killing man, or when -war upon relentless war was not being waged to adjust this border or to right that wrong, or even in its ultimate silliness, to protect a nation's honor?

The President had a dream. And Smith and Remo might have to die for it. So be it. It was worth dying for.

It would be nice to be able to tell Remo why he was going to die but Smith could not dare reveal how Remo would die. If one had an advantage against this most perfect killing machine, one kept it. To use when needed.

And then the special line from Remo rang.

Smith picked up the receiver. He suddenly felt a deep and disturbing affection for this wisecracking killer, the sort of attachment one makes in a foxhole one has shared with someone for… what was it now, eight years?

"Seven-four-four," said Smith.

"You're some piece of work," came Remo's voice. "You really gave me the business. You know the two of them are fighting?"

"I know."

"It's incredibly stupid to keep Chiun on this thing. He's popped his cork."

"You need someone who can translate."

"She speaks English."

"And what does she speak to a Chinese who might try to contact her?" Smith said.

"Okay. I'll try to live through it. We'll be leaving Boston later today."

"We're checking out that Puerto Rican group. We still don't know who sent them."

"Okay. We're going to start looking around."

"Be careful. That cab company has delivered a very fat little bundle of cash to the mainland. I think it's for you, $70,000."

"Is that all I'm worth? Even with the deflated dollar?"

"If that doesn't work, you'll probably be worth $100,-000 soon."

"Hell, I'm worth that to a medicine show. Or a sports contract. How would that be if everything comes apart? A 35-year old cornerback who retires at sixty? Chiun could play tackle. I bet he could. That would blow their minds. An eighty-year-old, ninety-pound tackle."

"Stop the foolishness."

"That's what I like about you, sweetheart. You're all joy."

"Goodbye," said Smith.

"Chiun. The ninety-pound Alex Karras."

Smith hung up and returned to the reports. They were all bad and getting worse. Perhaps his own fear of dying was now clouding his judgment. Perhaps CURE already had passed the point of compromise. Maybe he should have ordered Chiun back to Folcroft then and there.

From the safe on the left side of his desk, he withdrew a small air-sealed plastic bag. It held one pill. He put it in his vest and went back to the reports. Remo would contact again tomorrow.

The new reports were coming in again, this time with his razor. Remo's call line had been tapped and traced to Rye, New York. That information came from an assistant traffic manager of a telephone company in Boston.

Smith flicked the intercom to see if his secretary was in yet.

"Yes, Dr. Smith," came the voice over the intercom.

"Oh. Good morning. Please send a memo to the shipping department. We're almost certainly going to send an aluminum box of laboratory equipment to Parsippany, New Jersey, tomorrow. I'd like it routed through Pittsburgh and then flown in."