One fang hit his wind-pipe and collapsed it.

  Makato’s fist missed. His body fell across mine, but he was breathing yet. His neck was strong, so the trachea had sprung back, but he had suffered a hell of a shock. I hit the side of his neck with the edge of my hand, trying to score on the nerve center that controlled the flow of blood to the brain, thereby knocking him unconscious. But his neck was too tough, and my arm too weak. He rolled off and started to climb to his feet.

  I had to get him now, while I had the chance. He was partially dazed too; his whole effort was to disengage and stand. He was open for a terminal strike—if only I could make it.

  I tried. I reached up to grasp the right side of his head with my good left hand, and with my cupped right I smote his left ear. The sudden explosive pressure was calculated to rupture his eardrum.

  It did. Makato leaped up, and I knew that soon blood would dribble from that ear; he had no calluses inside his head. But still he did not yield. He would go on fighting as long as he was conscious, no matter what injury I did him.

  I sat up, my head spinning, and looked about the room. I was braced to catapult into action the instant the karateka attacked, and I wanted him to come to me. But for the moment he stood back, shaking his hurting head and kneading his bitten hand. Now he knew that judo was no easy match; his own life was at stake too. And he knew that Jason Striker could fight.

  Everyone in the audience was sitting silently. There was no encouragement for either judoka or karateka, and no condemnation for the tactics employed. Only a tense waiting for the outcome. Amalita sat beside her uncle as if hypnotized; perhaps her fate also hung on this match. There was no expression on Pedro’s face, and Hiroshi’s eyes were almost closed.

  But I could not afford to dwell on the spectators. Makato was stalking me again, more carefully now, for I had hurt him and might do so again. Another man would have yielded, with the injuries he had suffered so far, but not the Korean. I found myself on my feet, stepping back. Did he know how much he had hurt me with that iron hand? I could not last much longer. My hand, my leg, my chest, my face . . .

  As I circled, my eyes crossed the room again, involuntarily seeking some escape though I knew there was none. I had to kill— or die. My eyes took in fast details as they swept the faces there. I saw the two wrestlers, Kipchak and Whale, uncomfortable in their formal costumes; Whale’s eyes were heavily bandaged, so that he could not see at all. Next to him was Mustapha the boxer, one brown fist clenching spasmodically. Then Wang the kung-fu sifu, for once not smiling. All the men were deadly sober. The girls were uniformly pale, whatever their physical colors, some frozen-faced, some not looking. What had they expected, a Ping-Pong game? Then my roving eye caught Hiroshi’s eye—and I felt something remarkable.

  It was as though a star shone in his face, though there was no special light. It was the power of his ki, imbuing him despite his illness, making him more than a man. The power I had not believed, until I discovered it in him.

  Be positive! I thought, reminded of Hiroshi’s advice. But what was positive about death? Only the removal of Pedro’s grudge against me could stop this killfest, and how was that possible, when I had given him cause? No power on Earth could expurgate my act with his niece. Makato was getting set again, and all the good will in the universe would not stop the fist of karate at this moment.

  I saw the fist, as if it were in slow motion, rising from his springing body. Makato was hurt, yes, but the whole of his intolerable might was in that final blow. It was driving toward my face like a wrecking ball toward a condemned building.

  Yet I did not move. My feet seemed rooted, my arms hung down. Some strange rigidity was spreading through me, pulsing outward from my eye, as though I had seen the gorgon Medusa and was being transformed to stone. My face hardened, my neck became stiff, my torso crystallized. All feeling left my body, and only my brain functioned, deep within thick layers of leather, gristle and bone.

  The blow struck my jaw just below the left ear. The impact was tremendous. I felt bone giving way, nerves being crushed, flesh being pulped, blood vessels bursting hydraulically.

  I watched Makato’s hand fall away. I heard a groan of utter agony, not mere pain, but the loss of the certainty of a lifetime.

  Then I understood. It was the ki.

  My flesh and bone and brain had not been crushed; Makato’s had. His hand hung loosely, like his spirit, shattered.

  I moved. Every muscle in my body glowed with smooth power, and there was no pain anywhere. I was invulnerable.

  I stepped toward Makato, raising my right hand, now stronger than his. He merely stood, watching me dully, knowing what was coming but taking no evasive action. He had lost, and knew it; he had not thrown it away by error, but had been conquered at his height. The penalty for his failure might be a crushed skull or a burst heart, or merely an arm snapped like kindling wood, but he refused to flee from it.

  “Kill him! Kill him!” It was Pedro’s voice. He did not realize that Makato’s strength was gone.

  I turned on our host a glance of contempt, and saw him straining at the arms of his chair. How badly he must want me dead. Amalita put out a hand to restrain him, and Hiroshi also put his hand on Pedro’s. It was pathetic: the cripple so eager for the kill that he had to be stopped from falling out of his wheelchair.

  I returned to Makato. He remained as he had been, pleading no mercy. Killer he might be, but no coward.

  I turned away. The ki was the most remarkable thing I had ever experienced. I could not use it as a murder weapon. Better to forfeit the match. That much, now, I understood of Hiroshi’s philosophy. But Makato did not follow. He also was through. We bowed formally to each other, terminating the match.

  The experience of the ki—Hiroshi’s gift to me—was more important than all the glory and all the prize money. But now the ki drained away, and I felt my wounds and fatigue. I would be out of action for weeks, healing. It was all I could do to continue standing. But I had to remain for the decision.

  The three judges did not confer. “Karate!” the karate man cried. “On points.”

  The kung-fu, or theoretically neutral judge, considered longer. He had been alert to the kung-fu tactics I had used, and he had recognized the ki. “Draw,” he said.

  Pedro, the third judge, struggled again in his chair, throwing off Amalita’s hand but not Hiroshi’s. “There is no draw!” he said. “It’s a plain win!”

  Still Hiroshi’s hand was on him, and I wondered whether any of the ki was touching the incorrigible despot.

  “A win for whom?” the announcer asked, perplexed.

  “For Judo!” Pedro cried, standing up. “That is the best match I’ve ever seen! Three times the fist was launched—and three times countered! By knife, by snake, and by—” He stopped, realizing that everyone in the hall was staring at him.

  Only the announcer failed to comprehend. “One vote for Karate, one for Judo, one Draw,” he said. “The result is a draw. Folks, you have just seen—”

  But the rest of us were watching Pedro, and Pedro was facing Hiroshi, feeling the ki, realizing what had happened. Amalita was studying Pedro with new appraisal. It had not been him she disliked, but his crippled state, and that had changed.

  “Come on,” I said to Makato. “Let’s go clean up.”

  Then the applause began, swelling tremendously. Was it for the combatants, or for Pedro, or for the true victor in the true contest, Hiroshi? Did it matter?

  CHAPTER 10

  DEATHBLOW

  Jim was up and about when I returned, and he was full of praise for my televised performance. “But you should have put a better strangle on that karateka,” he said. “I know you can strangle when you really try.”

  “Get out of here!” I yelled, making a motion as of a kung-fu strike at his groin.

  He got serious. “Speaking of kung-fu—did you realize that our local practitioner died?”

  “Died!” I exclaimed, shocked. “Kolychkine the sifu? What happened?” I remembered how Kolychkine had beaten off Dato’s raid last month. Had there been foul play?

  “Heart attack. In front of his own students. Just like Charles Smith.”

  So abruptly, the muffled dread of the local situation returned. I had supposed everything would be peaceful once I got free of the Martial Open and back to familiar haunts.

  Smith had had contact with Dato, and so had Kolychkine. Now both were dead, similarly. Could there be a connection? I had the growing and awful certainty that there could be, and was. “What has Dato been doing?” I asked warily.

  “Nothing special. He entered a tournament while you were gone—jealous of you, I’m sure—just a small local affair, and he was matched up against Cohen Worthen. But Dato stopped after a few motions, claiming he was ill. So he lost by forfeit. Nobody can figure why he entered in the first place; at his age he’s in no shape to compete.”

  I shook my head, remembering how people had thought the same about little Hiroshi. “Dato is eccentric.”

  “He’s a clown!”

  And I had called Takao a clown. How terribly we wrong good men by our superficiality! But long after Jim had gone, I lay on my bed, thinking of Dato and of the rumors I had heard about him. I didn’t like the situation at all, but still I hesitated to believe the ugly notion that pushed at my mind. Next day I still couldn’t let it rest. I was recuperating from the beating Makato had given me, but I just couldn’t lie about my house while this thing obsessed me. It seemed ridiculous to vocalize, so I didn’t try to phone. But I had to get over to see Cohen Worthen, the other local judo sensei.

  I stepped out of my door, and into the arms of a chic young lady. “Thera!” I exclaimed, gladder to see her than I should be.

  “What—?”

  “Just checking on you between trimesters,” she said brightly. “Never did get raped, so I thought you and I could—” she paused. “Jason—you look awful! What have you been doing, headstands on a bed of nails?”

  “I—”

  “That’s bad for the complexion. I know.”

  “Don’t you watch TV?” I asked, bemused. “Or check the sports pages?”

  “Never. I have no time for current events. I’m studying hard at college, remember? So I can get smart and impress a certain dumb— Jason, did you get raped?”

  So she didn’t even know about Nicaragua. That was deflating. “Yes, I got raped,” I said, only half joking. “Come on over to the dojo.”

  “Are you sure it’s a safe place for a nice girl?”

  “The dojo? Of course! Thera, I’ve got something on my mind—”

  “Well, then, I have no business at your dojo!” she said, taking hold of my arm and nudging her firm young bosom against it. “Let’s just get that something off your mind, at my place, after a drink, and—”

  “Thera, we’ve been through all that,” I said, though privately flattered and tempted. I had experienced a lot in the past few weeks, and she was a lovely girl.

  “And I’ve kept up my judo practice, too,” she said. “Want to see de assi bare?” She wiggled her rear.

  “De ashi barai,” I said, correcting her atrocious pun. “There really is something I have to attend to. Possibly a matter of life and death.”

  “I love life and death! I’ll drive you there!”

  “Uh-uh! The way you drive, you’d better love one or the other! Last time you took me to a bar, remember?”

  “I was young then.” But she joined me in my car.

  It was nice being with her again. I wished I could take time to socialize, but this thing about Dato simply would not let go. The Martial Open had taught me that exceedingly strange things are possible.

  Jim met us at the entrance to the dojo. “What’s this, Chief?” he joked. “Picking up broads in broad daylight?”

  Thera bristled. “Who let that loudmouth in?”

  “Wait a minute, kids!” I said quickly. How like that age, to enjoy making but not receiving sexual puns. “Thera, this is Jim Blake, my assistant. Jim, this is Thera Drummond, visiting from college.”

  “College?” he asked. “What does a piece like that want with college? She’ll never use what little mind she has!”

  Thera stopped short on the edge of the tatami. “What would an oaf like you know about a mind?”

  “Come off it, tart! I’m in college myself. You girls think you can wiggle your bottoms and get high grades.”

  “Better both than neither!”

  “Look, folks—” I began, surprised by the vehemence of their antagonism. They were scoring on each other better than either knew, for Thera did tend to solve problems by displaying her anatomy, and Jim’s grade point average had suffered somewhat because of the time he put into judo.

  But there was no stopping it. “Listen, sister,” Jim said angrily, putting a hand on her arm.

  Thera executed a neat de ashi barai, sweeping Jim’s foot with the side of her own while pulling on his sleeve. Caught by surprise, he fell.

  She turned to me. “See? De assi bare. He’s certainly an ass!” Jim sat up, amazed. “She knows judo!”

  “Brown belt, oaf,” she said. “Have you heard of it?”

  “I thought you knew,” I said belatedly to Jim. “She was my tutoring student. Six weeks, and then she kept it up in college.”

  “I’ll be damned!” Jim said, getting up.

  “Will you clean up your language?” Thera snapped. “What’s so strange about a girl learning self-defense?”

  “Doll like you needs it, for sure,” Jim said.

  “Only against free-handed oafs!”

  I had to cut in. “Jim, I have some private business this morning. Can you handle the dojo?”

  “You mean you leave him in charge?” Thera demanded incredulously.

  Jim’s face darkened. “Sister, you are pushing your luck. You think you’re the only female who ever made brown belt?”

  “I didn’t notice you making anything of it!” she said, pointedly eyeing the spot where he had landed on the tatami.

  “Why don’t you put on a judogi and try it again?”

  “You think I won’t?”

  I started to protest, for Thera could be no match for Jim’s second degree black belt and great strength. But I stopped myself. Thera had more than judo going for her, and Jim knew enough to avoid serious trouble. Two young, bright, short-tempered college kids, both my students—let them work it out by themselves. There would be fireworks before they came to terms, but that was all part of growing up.

  I ducked out. They didn’t even notice.

  I drove across town to Cohen Worthen’s dojo. I was in luck; I caught him in his office. He was a short, rotund and very hairy man whose huge mane of hair was shot with gray. He was about forty five, fat but strong, an outgoing type. I rather liked him, though he had a number of annoying mannerisms and a thick hide.

  “Jason the Strike!” he bawled as he always did, never tiring of the supposed humor.

  “Cohen, this is important,” I said. “You had a run-in with Dato, didn’t you?”

  “Nothing like yours with that karateka! I don’t mind telling you, Striker, I didn’t think you had the stuff to pull it off. But you did judo proud, winning that tournament.”

  “I didn’t win,” I said. “But about Dato—”

  “I couldn’t have done better myself!” he continued with blithe conceit. “You must be hurting, though! Broke a rib, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, and then some. But I got even. I bit his finger.” He laughed at that. Then I continued: “Look, Cohen—this is serious. Are you feeling well?”

  “Am I feeling well!” He shook his head, his hair flying. “All right, Striker. I’ll give you a rundown. I took a couple fouls off Dato, but when I really came to grips with him he was weak, and quit right off. So I won, by forfeit, technically. But I’d’ve taken him easily anyway. Dato’s old, and kinda kooked, and his technique is like nothing known!”

  “That’s what I’m worried about!” I said. “When he hit you—”

  “Oh, sure, it was sore for a few days where he hit me on the upper thigh, and it had a funny kind of bruise, but nothing crippling. You expect to get bruised, in this business. Hardly a day when I’m not hurting somewhere, but I never miss a day, and right now I’m better’n ever. So if that’s all’s bothering you—”

  “Cohen, Dato hit a student of mine, and maybe six weeks later that boy died, with no illness in between. He hit Kolychkine the sifu, and several weeks later he died, right in front of his own students. Now he has hit you.”

  “Striker, I get your drift,” Worthen said. “I know all about those cases; hell, Koly was a friend of mine, after hours. But it has to be coincidence. Dato just isn’t that good! When he tried to match me—”

  “He doesn’t have to be good!” I said. “At least, he doesn’t have to seem good. Maybe he’s faking incompetence, so that nobody will believe he has actually mastered—”

  “The delayed-action deathblow?” Worthen shook his head, slowly, so that the hair stayed in place. “The blow itself is folklore, Striker! Just like the ninja mythology. Might as well start believing in old Fu Antos while you’re at it, and the Tooth Fairy! How could Dato master a technique that doesn’t exist? He might fool himself into believing it, but who else?”

  “I’m not so sure,” I said. “I thought at first I was making a wild conjecture. But the pattern fits. There are strange things in the old Oriental texts.”

  “Work it out for yourself, Striker. How would such a blow work? I mean physically? What would go on in the body of the victim, over the course of hours, days, weeks? Does such a thing make any conceivable sense, in terms of the physics and biology we know today? Maybe it was possible in the old days, just as witchcraft was possible, and voodoo. I’m not fooling; I really believe those hexes worked—when people believed in them! We’d call it hypnotism today, or faith-healing, or neurasthenia, or maybe even ki. All how you view what you can’t understand.”