Chinese Puzzle

"There are only two targets. Two bullets are enough for this job. The other three are for practice. My weapon and I have been inactive for so long. Get the binoculars. Behind you. On the shelf."

Guerner moved to the window, looking out over his valley, rolling lawns in front, the last blooming garden off to his right. The autumn sun was dying red over the Hudson beyond, bathing the valley in blood.

Maria picked up the 7x35 Zeiss Ikon binoculars from the shelf and noticed there was dust on the lenses. Strange. He worshipped that rifle as if a woman, and let a fine pair of binoculars gather dust. Well, he had once been very good.

She walked to the open window by him and felt the late afternoon chill. A bird sang harshly off in the distance. She wiped the binocular lenses clean on her sleeve and did not notice that this drew a glance of contempt from Guerner.

He looked forward out the window. "Two hundred yards from here," he said,-pointing, "there is a small furry animal. I ca

She raised the binoculars to her eyes. "Where?"

"About ten yards to the left of the corner of the stone wall."

She focused on the wall and was surprised that through the lenses, the wall appeared better lit than to her naked eyes. She remembered this was characteristic of good binoculars.

"I can't see it," she said.

"It's moving. Now it's still."

Maria sca

"I know what you're doing," she said, still looking. "You know little animals are always on that wall and when you shoot it will hide and you will say you shot it."

Maria felt the crack of the rifle at her left ear, just before she saw the chipmunk spin over as though slapped in the head with a paddle, a ball of orange fur bouncing backwards, rolling out of sight behind the wall, then rolling into sight again, the legs just as they had been, but without a head. The legs quivered. The white patch on the stomach still pulsated.

"That bird," said Guerner quietly and Maria again heard the painful crack of the rifle, and suddenly in a flock of dark birds far in the distance, perhaps 300 yards, one dropped. And she did not lift her binoculars because she knew its head was gone too.

"Another chipmunk," Guerner said, and the rifle cracked, and Maria saw nothing, partly because she had, stopped looking.

"It is only possible if the target is alive," Guerner said. "That is the secret. One must sense the life of the target. One must feel it move into the orbit of your life. And then, there can be no miss."

He clutched his rifle to his chest, as though thanking the instrument.

"When do we perform against this fool this Remo who uses only his hands?" he asked.

"Tomorrow morning," Maria said.

"Good. My weapon can hardly wait." He squeezed it tenderly in his two large hands. "The target, the living target, gives itself to you. We want the living target to do it with. The secret is that you do it with the victim." His voice was smooth and deep and vibrant. As it had been 30 years before, Maria remembered, when they had made love.

CHAPTER TEN

Seventy thousand dollars. How did they arrive at that price? Remo hung up the phone in the booth and walked out to Adams Street.

The sun made Boston alive, a very dead city from the time the first settler designed the dirty, gloomy metropolis, to this September noon when the air was warm with just a hint of growing coolness.

He had done his morning exercises behind the wheel of the rented automobile, driving all night from Montreal to the din of Chiun and the young Mrs. Liu. At one point, while he was reinforcing his breathing, Mrs. Liu surrendered to angry tears. Chiun leaned forward and whispered in Remo's ear: "They don't like that. Heh, heh."

"Chiun, will you cut that out now?" Remo said.

Chiun laughed and repeated the phrase in Chinese that had caused the anger.

"My government has sent me here to officially identify my husband," Mei Soong said in English. "They did not send me here to suffer abuse from this reactionary, meddlesome old man."

"I show you how old I am in bed, little girl. Heh, heh."

"You are gross, even for a Korean. Do you still remember your last erection?"

Chiun emitted a warlike shriek and then poured forth verbal Oriental abuse.

Remo pulled to the side of the road. "All right, Chiun. Up front with me."

Stilled instantly, Chiun moved into the front seat and adjusted himself angrily. "You are a white man," he said. "Like moldy dead grain. White."

"I thought you were mad at her, not me," Remo said, pulling back to the Thruway where cars were zipping by, most of them no longer under the control of their drivers. At 65 miles an hour in a soft-sprung comfort car, the operator was aiming, not driving.

"You embarrassed me in front of her."

"How?"

"By ordering me up front like a dog. You have no feeling for real people because you are not people. And in front of her."

"All white men are like that," said Mrs. Liu. That's why they need ru

"Shit," said Remo, summing up the situation.

He had lost two of the three cars following him by pulling off the roadway. But the last car still was on his tail. With one hand, Remo unwrapped the red cellophane covering from a pack of cough drops on the dashboard. He smoothed it out as best he could, then held it in front of his eyes, peering through it as he drove through the pre-dawn darkness.

He continued looking through the red filter for a full two minutes, as he began to push the car to its limits. Sixty-five. Seventy. Eighty. Ninety. As he came to the top of a rise with the pursuit car some 400 yards behind him, he saw what he was looking for. As soon as he cleared the rise, he turned off his lights and dropped the piece of red cellophane. His eyes, now functional in the dark, saw clearly the Boston exit, and without lights at 90 miles an hour, Remo whipped around the turn, then began slowing down without hitting the brake.

In his mirror, he could see the pursuit car-its driver blinded by darkness-plow ahead on the Thruway toward New York. Goodbye car number three.

"Barney Oldfield," Chiun said. "A regular Barney Oldfield. Did it ever occur to you that your life would be safer if you stopped and did combat, Mr. Barney Oldfield?"

"You can fasten your seat belt."

"I am my own seat belt. But that is because I can control my body the way civilized people are supposed to. Perhaps you should fasten your seat belt. Heh, heh."

"Reckless, inconsiderate driving," said Mrs. Liu. "Do you know that driving at these speeds consumes gasoline more rapidly than driving at lower speeds? Besides, I want to find my husband, wherever he is, not precede him to heaven."

"Shit," said Remo, and it was the last thing he said until they reached Boston. He wondered if he had been wise to shake the tail. But his mission called for finding General Liu, not endangering the general's wife. His followers would pick him up again, if they hadn't already, and he wanted the meeting on his terms, when his decisions would not be warped because of the danger to the girl.

Now, he was in Boston, it was just after noon, and it felt somewhat exhilarating to know that someone thought you were worth $70,000 to kill. But as he walked back to his hotel, a vague anger began to grow. Only $70,000?

A basketball player recently was sued for jumping a team, the team claiming he was worth $4 million. Four million for him and his life, and only $70,000 for Remo's death. Inside the hotel lobby, Remo felt concentration on him. It was not strong and his anger had almost dulled his senses. Collecting the extra room key, he noticed a scruffy woman in a black dress and hat reading a newspaper. But her eyes didn't move across the columns.