Chapter Fifteen

  The headquarters for CURE, the supersecret U.S. government agency that existed in no budget, employed no official staff and yet possessed a multimillion-dollar operating budget, was a second-floor office in a sleepy private hospital in Rye, New York.

  The name on the plain door was Harold W. Smith, who was officially director of the hospital, incorporated as Folcroft Sanitarium.

  For nearly three decades Smith, formerly with the CIA, had helmed CURE from its early days of crisis management through times of grave political uncertainty. He had not been young when the even younger President had offered him the monumental task of preserving American democracy from those who would twist the Constitution to achieve their vicious ends. And he was not young now.

  Smith sat in the same chair he had first occupied in the first day on the job, staring into a modest computer terminal on his desk. He looked like a man who had spent his youth locked in a dank basement eating only lemons and the occasional hard crust of bread. His skin was grayish and dry, his mouth puckered in thought. Behind the prim transparencies of his rimless eyeglasses, his eyes were gray where they should be gray and red where they should have been white.

  Smith watched the message-traffic intercepts scrolling before his eyes. The White House was clamped down like a fortress. Cryptic, carefully guarded messages were going back and forth in the State Department and from there to the CIA station in Mexico City.

  The lid was still on. It would not stay on long, Smith knew.

  He leaned into the screen, his long patrician nose almost bumping the glare-free glass. His fingers lifted like a pianist’s. The dry clicking of the keys was as close to music as lemony Harold Smith ever made.

  Smith brought up the whereabouts of the Vice-President. All was calm there. He was definitely where he should be.

  So whom had Remo and Chiun seen–or supposedly seen–on the Mexican videotape?

  “An impostor,” he muttered. “Must be.” Or was it as Remo had suggested, the other way around?

  There was no way Smith could verify either theory. His eyes darted to the black dialless red telephone that sat within easy reach. Normally it was his hot line to the White House. But now there was no one there to pick up the phone. Other than the President, no one in the executive branch knew of Smith or CURE or any of it. That was one of the safeguards built into CURE, which, if it was discovered, would have to be disbanded, because to admit it existed was to admit that one gray man hunched over a computer screen, unknown and unelected, as well as two of the finest assassins ever known, was all that kept America from slipping over the brink into anarchy–or worse.

  Smith considered the possibility that the Vice-President had somehow been responsible for the downing of Air Force One. He immediately resolved not to communicate with the man until he knew for an absolute certainty that the President had been lost and the Vice-President was not complicit. He had that option. CURE was autonomous of the executive branch.

  Smith switched over to the wire services and TV news digests, automatically processed by the massive computers hidden in Folcroft’s basement, two floors below.

  A press plane had just arrived in Bogotá. It had gone on ahead to record Air Force One’s arrival. They would be stalled with a story about weather over the Yucatán Peninsula.

  The White House was throwing a lot of attention to the Vice-President’s itinerary, obviously hoping by misdirection to keep the domestic press occupied. A major speech by the Vice-President had been announced, one having serious political repercussions.

  More misdirection. Unless it too was part of the plot. Smith dismissed that thought. The President’s own staff would not throw in with any coup. It made no sense. This was America, not some banana republic. But even as the thought struck Smith, he sat up, realizing that had it not been for CURE, America might be no better than many Latin-American republics struggling against internal disorder.

  The ordinary desk phone rang, and Smith reached for it without averting his eyes from the screen.

  “Yes?” he said dryly.

  “Remo here.”

  “Progress?”

  “We found the Bimbo Bread truck, but it got away.”

  Smith’s hand tightened on the receiver. “The President?”

  “He might have been in back, but the V.P. was definitely at the wheel. He drives pretty good too. He got away from us.”

  “Where are you now?” Smith’s voice was bitter.

  “In a hotel. The Krystal. That’s with a K.”

  “Return to the field. Every minute counts.”

  “Wish we could,” Remo said worriedly, “but Chiun’s incapacitated. I’m not feeling so hot myself.”

  “What is this?”

  “It’s the air. The pollution. You know how we function, Smith. Correct breathing, centering. We’re weak as kittens.”

  “I understand nothing of that.”

  “If you can’t breathe, you can’t run. Right? If we can’t breathe, we can’t do the impossible. But we’ll manage.”

  “Remo, I’m getting the CIA warnings out of Mexico of suspected Colombian narco-terrorists converging on Mexico City. What do you know about that?”

  “Oh, right. That flashy DFS comandante you hooked us up with? We think he’s been bought off. It’s possible he overheard our last talk.”

  “Then he knows the President may be alive in Mexico,” Smith said in a hoarse tone.

  “Afraid so,” Remo admitted.

  “Therefore these terrorists may be en route to locate or possibly to take possession of the President from whoever’s holding him.” The long-distance trunkline buzzed over the silence as both men considered the possibility. Finally Smith cleared his throat. His voice was metallic when he spoke again.

  “Remo, the President must not fall into the hands of the Colombians.”

  “Gotcha.”

  “Remo, it would be better if the President died before he fell into their hands–better for him, and better for America.”

  “You don’t mean–”

  “Do you want me to repeat that?” Smith said harshly.

  “No, I read you, you cold-blooded son of a bitch,” Remo said bitterly.

  “Do you remember the story of Enrique Camarena?”

  “Should I?”

  “He was a DEA agent stationed in Mexico. Corrupt Mexican authorities betrayed him to drug traffickers. They tortured him until they extracted every DEA secret they could. Then they killed him. The President holds many secrets too. Our national security–never mind our nation’s prestige–rides on his not falling into the hands of these bloodsuckers.”

  “I said, I read you,” Remo snapped. “Look, we’re on it. Is there anyone we can trust down here?”

  “No.”

  “That makes it harder for us. We’re handicapped as it is.”

  “Your best lead will be the local Mexican news,” Smith said. “That was the source of the bread-truck tip. Follow any rumor, no matter how bizarre.”

  “Oh, come on, Smith!” Remo exploded. “We can’t hang around watching TV, hoping for a lead.”

  “You’ll do whatever it takes, Remo,” Smith said flintily. “But you’ll do your job. And stay in constant touch.”

  “There’s another thing,” Remo said quickly. “Chiun thinks the V.P. recognized him. That’s why he took off.”

  “Remo, that’s impossible. The President knows what you both look like, but the Vice-President could not.”

  “You don’t suppose the President could have told him about us?” Remo suggested.

  Smith’s voice was flat. “I cannot believe this President would do any such thing.”

  “Then can you explain it?”

  “No,” Smith admitted.

  “Well, there it is. Look, we’ll stay in touch. You do the same.”

  “I want results, Remo.” Smith hung up on Remo’s response. He had work to do.

  · · ·

  Down in Mexico City, Remo snapped, “And you’ll get them,” into the dead phone. He hung up, adding, “You just might not like them. But then, you never do, do you?”

  Outside, a violent electrical storm had broken out. Rain came down in sheets of metallic needles. It washed the windows like an invisible car wash. Forked lightning stirred the storm.

  Remo turned to Chiun, lying on the bed. “We got to move fast,” he said. “Can you hold up your end?”

  The Master of Sinanju opened his tired eyes.

  “Yes. The rain will cleanse the air of impurities.”

  “It won’t add any oxygen. We’re way above sea level.”

  Chiun slipped his legs over the side of the bed.

  “We must do what we can. Where do we begin?”

  “Believe it or not,” Remo said, picking up the remote-control unit and pointing it at the television set, “we start with the local news. I’ll watch. You translate.”

  He fell back onto the bed, felt something hard dig into his back, and pulled out the videotape of the President’s rescue. He tossed it on the nightstand and waited for the TV screen to come to life.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The White House staff called it “grips and grins.”

  After four straight hours of it, the Vice-President of the United States called it agony.

  He collapsed in his suite at a local hotel.

  “Boy, am I glad that’s over!” he told his chief of staff. “I could use a round of golf,” he added, squeezing his right hand, “but I think if I get a club in my hand, I won’t be able to let go.”

  “I got bad news for you, Dan.”

  The Vice-President looked up.

  The look on his chief of staff’s face was grave. He was pale. His voice had quavered toward the end.

  For an instant the universe reeled under the Vice-President of the United States. For an instant he thought the thing he half-hoped and half-dreaded had come to pass. The thing that the nation talked about, joked about, and even feared, each according to his views and political opinions.

  “You mean...?” The Vice-President croaked.

  “Yes,” the chief of staff said. “The White House wants us to go to Detroit and do another one of these damn things.”

  The Vice-President let out his breath. His heart started beating again. He was not the new President.

  “What?” he said dazedly.

  “More grips and grins,” the chief of staff said grimly. “The White House wants it coordinated with the Bogotá thing.”

  “Oh,” said the Vice-President. He was relieved. He hadn’t wanted to become President under these circumstances. But the possibility had been on everyone’s lips ever since the President had agreed to go to Colombia.

  “I don’t know if I can deal with this,” the Vice-President admitted, trying to unclench his right hand.

  “It’s a two-hour flight. Take a nap and soak your hand-shaking hand on the plane. But let’s go. They’re really anxious about this.”

  The Vice-President got up and straightened his tie with stiff fingers.

  “Oh, by the way,” his chief of staff said, pulling out an envelope, “this is for you.”

  The Vice-President reached for the proffered envelope, but his fingers refused to close around it. It dropped to the carpet.

  “I’ll get it,” said his chief of staff.

  “No, I will,” the Vice-President said genially.

  They bumped heads attempting to retrieve the fallen envelope.

  “Sorry.”

  “No, I’m sorry,” the Vice-President said, holding his head.

  His chief of staff helped the Vice-President to his feet and again handed him the envelope. This time the Vice-President accepted it with his left hand. The transfer was completed without further incident, much to his chief of staffs surprise. He had known the Vice-President to forget his own wife’s name.

  The Vice-President looked at the blank white front and asked, “What is it?”

  “From the White House. It’s your speech.”

  “My speech?”

  “Yeah. They had the President’s top speechwriter draft it. I think it’s tied to the one the President is giving in Bogotá.”

  “Really?” the Vice-President said, pleased that he rated a presidential speech writer. He reached for the flap.

  “No, don’t open it now!”

  The Vice-President’s smile turned to a frown. “Why not?”

  “It’s not to be opened until you give it.”

  “How am I gonna practice it?”

  “You can’t. The White House gave strict orders that you not read it beforehand. There’s a covering letter inside explaining that.”

  “Okay,” the Vice-President said, digging at the flap.

  “No! You’re not supposed to read that until five minutes before the speech.”

  “This is crazy!”

  “The White House chief of staff says it’s very, very important. It’s a major speech. He says it may be one of the most important of your career.”

  “This is weird.”

  “This is politics. And you know how the President is about leaks. Now, come on. We’ve got a plane to catch.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Emilio Mordida wore the stony copper face of a mestizo. His expression seldom wavered. It might have belonged on a Mayan rain god. Emilio was of Mayan descent. Also Zapotec, Chichimec, and of course Spanish.

  Like most mestizos, he had no concept of time. Not even years of working as a desk clerk in the Japanese-owned Nikko Hotel in Mexico City’s Zona Hotelera had inculcated him with a shred of punctuality. A wake-up call for seven sharp might be made at seven-fifteen or even seven-fifty-nine. It did not matter. This was Mexico, where the only god was mañana.

  It was another desultory afternoon in the massive neo-Aztec lobby of the Nikko. Emilio shifted between the computer terminal and the guests checking in and out, looking very modern in his powder-blue jacket, but wearing the immutable mask of his Mexican forebears, one that betrayed no hint of ego or inferiority. It was the mask many Mexicans wore in a land that did not belong to them anymore.

  Nothing, not the drumming of impatient fingers on the marble countertop, nor the half-muttered insults by foreign turistas who thought they too were the lords of Mexico, brought a flicker of reaction as Emilio went about his methodical unhurried day.

  The drone of the fountains was his clock. Unlike the Japanese or the Americans, who saw time as a straight line, Emilio saw time as a bubble–a warm amniotic bubble in which a man might float through life. And so patrons waited while Emilio went on his silent, officious way, his face impassive.

  Until a man who bore a strong resemblance to the Vice-President of the United States of America entered the spacious lobby.

  Emilio Mordida noticed him because he entered carrying a dusty golf bag. Golf was not unknown in Mexico City, but it hardly rivaled soccer or bullfighting.

  Emilio studiously ignored a West German couple who were attempting to check out in time to meet their plane and followed the man with the golf bag with his dark eyes.

  Yes, those were definitely golf clubs in the bag. And it was certainly the Vice-President. He walked mechanically, looking neither left nor right, his face a mask as stiff as Emilio’s own. Only instead of a sullen set to his mouth, the Vice-President wore a smile that might have been carved of ivory and rose marble.

  The Vice-President spurned the reception desk and went directly to the elevators.

  It was enough to cause one of Emilio Mordida’s inflexible eyelids to lift in surprise.

  All morning the city had been buzzing with rumors that the American Vice-President had been seen driving around the city. At first it was said he had been driving a bread truck. Then he was seen at a discotheque dancing with Charro. Or that he had lost two fingers fighting over a bullfighter’s woman in the affluent Colonia del Valle district, but had emerged victorious.

  Emilio had absorbed these rumors with interest, dismissing them as hysteria in the wake of the imminent arrival of the President in Bogotá. Many had thought that Mexico City was a better–and safer–location for the drug summit. The President of Mexico himself had prevailed on the U.S. President to consider reconvening in Mexico City, but was politely rebuffed.

  But here was the Vice-President, clearly the Vice-President. Although it could have been Robert Redford. They looked very much alike.

  Emilio, showing uncharacteristic swiftness, fairly leapt to the reservations terminal and punched up the Vice-President’s name. He was not registered, which did not surprise Emilio one bit. Robert Redford was also not listed.

  Moving swiftly, Emilio Mordida left the reservations desk and made for the elevator bank.

  He was not surprised to see that the Vice-President was still awaiting an elevator. Even the elevators were slow in Mexico.

  When one arrived, Emilio followed the Vice-President into the car. The Vice-President pressed sixteen. Emilio then pressed seventeen.

  They rode in silence, Emilio watching the Vice-President’s boyish, almost ghoulishly smiling profile. He was even younger-looking than he had appeared on television.

  The car stopped at the sixteenth floor. The Vice-President stepped off. The doors rolled shut.

  Emilio rode to the next floor and slipped back down the stairs.

  The Vice-President was still in the corridor, Emilio discovered when he peered around the elevator alcove. He was behaving very strangely. He was going from door to door, putting his ear to each panel. He would listen for a brief instant, then move on.

  Until he reached Room 1644. There he paused a bit longer. The Vice-President dropped to his knees with a quick folding of his knee joints and put his eyes to the electronic lock, much as a submarine captain looks through a periscope.

  The Nikko’s locks required no key, but a magnetized passcard. The lock combinations were changed daily. They could not be breached without the correct card.

  Yet, as Emilio watched, the Vice-President proceeded to breach the lock. He accomplished this in a novel, perhaps unique manner. Withdrawing his eyes from the card slot, he lifted his right hand and, retracting his thumb, jammed the remaining four into the slot.