The attending doctor showed up and began explaining. “He wet the bed repeatedly, so we had orderlies carry him into the bathroom to sponge him down. He took one look at the tub filled with water and threw himself in. We haven’t been able to pry him out after that.”

  Smith found the patient still in his jungle fatigues soaking in the tub. He wasn’t soaking on his back, but on his stomach.

  When Smith peered over the edge of the oversize tub, he felt his skin crawl involuntarily. The patient’s limbs were splayed out. His head was almost entirely submerged except for the white hair on top. His green eyes shifted to fix Smith with a cold lizardlike regard. Bubbles dribbled up from the thin, submerged lips.

  Experimentally Smith reached toward a tiny bald spot in the white hair that resembled the burr hole found on the skull of the Socks replica.

  Abruptly the patient reared up. He tried to snap the hand off. Smith withdrew his fingers just ahead of the jaws. The man eased back into the water and returned to dribbling slow bubbles, as if nothing had happened.

  “See what we mean?” one agent said.

  “Distract him, please,” Smith told the agents as he removed his coat and rolled up one shirt sleeve.

  The agents moved to the end of the tub, and the cold green eyes shifted to follow.

  Ducking low, Smith slipped up on one side and snaked his bare arm into the tub. He reached under and carefully began tickling the man on his stomach.

  The frozen face betrayed no notice at first. Then a slow, satisfied smile crept over the thin mouth. The eyes grew sleepy and pleased.

  “Quickly,” hissed Smith. “Turn him over on his back.”

  The agents hesitated.

  “Now!” said Smith.

  Eyes afraid, the agents moved in and, reaching around Smith’s tickling hand, upended the man.

  Smith continued tickling the stomach. The man lifted his arms like a contented kitten. They hung in the air, bent and boneless.

  “Print him now,” Smith ordered.

  “With what?”

  “Anything!”

  The agents cracked open a pen and smeared raw ink on the fingers of one limp hand. The man in the tub appeared oblivious to the entire procedure.

  They pressed each fingertip to a sheet of hospital stationery and when they had all five prints of one hand, Smith said, “Step back quickly.”

  They did. Smith ceased his methodical tickling and pulled away.

  Slowly the man in the jungle fatigues rolled over onto his stomach again. His head slipped under the ink stained water, and he returned to blowing slow bubbles.

  “Run those prints and contact me at the White House,” Smith told the two agents, returning his sleeve to normal.

  “How did you know he was ticklish?” the attending doctor asked Smith on the way out.

  “All alligators are ticklish,” said Smith.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Orville Rollo Fletcher was getting tired of waiting in his corner room in the Washington Holiday Inn on Wisconsin. It was nerves. Sheer nerves. He was a bundle of nerves. A big bundle. A very big bundle. Three hundred and twenty pounds, to be exact.

  It had been very exciting at first. Orville had never been to Washington before. Not Washington, D.C. He came from Washington State. Spokane, to be exact.

  It had been a very uneventful life in Spokane for Orville Rollo Fletcher until the advent of Thrush Limburger.

  At first there had been no problem. Thrush Limburger had been a radio voice. His voice bore no resemblance to the voice of Orville Rollo Fletcher, unless you considered the deep resonance that typically emanated from the guts of very large men.

  Then Limburger had launched his TV show. After that, Orville’s life became a living hell. It had begun at work. Orville owned a hardware store in downtown Spokane. Fletcher’s. Nothing fancy, nothing big. He stocked the basics of home maintenance–nails, shovels, paint and tools. The home warehouse superstores with their deep-discount seed spreaders and submersible sump pumps had not yet come to Spokane, so the competition consisted of upstart hardware stores who could not compete with Fletcher’s Hardware, a local institution established in 1937 by Orville’s grandfather, August Orville Fletcher.

  Customers began to come into his store, saying, “Roger, Thrush.”

  The first time it happened, Orville had simply ignored it. A case of mistaken identity. It happened, even to 320-pound men like Orville Rollo Fletcher.

  But when longtime customers started doing it, Orville became annoyed. He was hypersensitive about his weight, his oversize ears and the size 18-EE orthopedic shoes his forefathers’ generous genes had burdened him with. He was also sensitive about his lifelong bachelorhood, and so when the women customers began to poke fun at him, he was beyond being offended. He was mortified.

  “Why don’t you watch Thrush Limburger?” one asked.

  “I have never heard of the gentleman,” Orville said, mustering up his best Raymond Burr tone of dismissal. Raymond Burr had been a favorite actor of his. The man carried his weight with great dignity.

  “He’s a scream. When they call in to his talk show, people say ‘Roger, Thrush.’ That means, ‘I read you, politically speaking–’”

  “I abhor politics.”

  “You look so much like him you could be his brother.”

  “I have no siblings,” said Orville. “I am an only child.” It was another sore point with the forty-four-year-old hardware-store owner.

  The ribbing and kidding and tiresome jokes and comparisons very quickly became unendurable. It was enough for Orville to consider closing down the store he had inherited from his father.

  Then the Home Depot hit Spokane, and within six months, Orville Rollo Fletcher was sitting in the modest clapboard home he had also inherited, wondering what sort of future would be the lot of an asthmatic ex-hardware-store owner who had known no other trade.

  Everything had changed with the ringing of his home telephone.

  “Orville Fletcher?” a soft, confident voice had asked.

  “Orville Rollo Fletcher,” he had corrected. His father had been Orville August Fletcher. He still received bills in that name. Another quiet indignity.

  “I represent the Ixchel Talent Agency.”

  “I buy nothing from telephone solicitors,” he said, starting to replace the receiver.

  “No. I’m not selling. I’m buying.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I understand you look a great deal like Thrush Limburger, the political commentator.”

  “I would not dignify what that man does with such a description,” Orville had said.

  “My agency specializes in celebrity doubles.”

  The soft voice had no need to go any further. Orville sat home a lot and had fallen into the evil habit of watching TV talk shows from Nancy Jessica Rapunzel to Copra Innisfree.

  “If it is my wish to join a circus,” Orville had said with measured dignity, “I shall contact the Ringling Brothers myself. Good day.”

  “The pay is phenomenal,” the soft voice said quickly.

  Orville hesitated. “How do you define phenomenal?”

  The soft voice had quoted a figure as substantial in its own way as Orville was in his.

  “That is a different matter,” said Orville, who had inherited a mortgage to go with the family homestead. “What exactly would I have to do?”

  “Practice Thrush Limburger’s voice to start.”

  “I confess I have no such aptitude.”

  “We’ll take care of that for you.”

  And so the man had. A voice trainer had arrived within two days, bearing a cashier’s check that constituted a year’s retainer.

  It was the work of six weeks before Orville Rollo Fletcher had mastered Thrush Limburger’s walk, talk and rich vocabulary.

  The soft voice called often. “We should have your first gig soon.”

  “I prefer a more dignified term, sir. I am a professional.”

  “But before we send you out, you’ll have to submit to a complete medical examination.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “To satisfy our insurers.”

  “Very well,” said Orville, who dreaded the very thought of exposing his excess poundage to a doctor’s scrutiny. They were forever trying to get him to cut down on his comfort foods.

  A local doctor had performed the examination. It was astonishingly thorough, and included a PET scan.

  The results came by Federal Express from the offices of the Ixchel Talent Agency in Hollywood, California.

  Despite the fact that he was not anywhere near a chair, Orville Rollo Fletcher sat down very hard when he read the evaluation and saw the dreaded words “Brain tumor.”

  He was sobbing when the soft voice called him.

  “I am going to die,” he said in a strangled voice.

  “Not if we can help it.”

  “Wh–what do you mean?”

  “We have access to the finest medical facilities. Put yourself in our hands and kiss that tumor goodbye.”

  “Why would you do that for me?”

  “Because,” said the soft voice, “Thrush Limburger is the hottest thing going, and you’re the next best thing. This is an investment in the future.”

  “I will be only too happy to take you up on your kind offer,” Orville had choked out tearfully, taking a hit of Vanceril from his asthma inhaler.

  It had involved a plane flight to Jalisco, Mexico, where a waiting car whisked Orville through dusty streets to what looked like an old abortion mill. Inside there was a doctor with a thick accent and an operating room with some of the finest surgical equipment Orville could imagine.

  The PET scan results were already in the doctor’s hand.

  “We can shrink this tumor with radiation, señor,” the doctor assured him. “It will be no problem whatsoever.”

  “I cannot believe my good fortune,” Orville said, weeping openly with relief.

  They prepped him by shaving his head bald and wheeled him perfectly conscious into the operating room that very afternoon. As he lay there, he saw the jars of specimens on racks, and a dusky nurse reached for one labeled in Latin, Loxodonta Africana.

  The doctor stopped her with a sharp order in Spanish, and she took up the one labeled Elephas Maximus instead. She walked it carefully over to the shelf where the surgeon’s tools had been laid out.

  Orville had taken Latin in high school. A long time ago, but his dimming memory dredged up something.

  He wondered what elephants had to do with his brain tumor when the anesthetic mask was clapped over his mouth and all questions were smothered by the rolling fog overtaking his mind.

  When he awoke, Orville felt fine. But there was a bandage atop his shaven head.

  “What’s this?”

  “Your brain did not take well to the operation,” the Mexican doctor had informed him. “It swelled up, and so it was necessary to open a hole in the skull to release the pressure.”

  Horror clouded Orville’s eyes. “I have a hole in my skull.”

  “A small one. It is called a burr hole. It will heal. As for your tumor, it is dying. By the time the bandages come off, it will be no more than a bad memory.”

  Every ounce of him shook with the relief of his weeping.

  “I hear you pulled through with flying colors,” the soft voice said over the long-distance line the next day.

  “I owe it all to you and I don’t even know your name.”

  “J. D. Tippit.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Tippit, from the bottom of my exceedingly grateful heart.”

  · · ·

  When he had healed, Orville Rollo Fletcher returned to Spokane feeling renewed. His hair grew back, he had actually lost some weight, despite being bedridden for nearly a month.

  He quickly gained it all back. For some reason, he had developed an unquenchable craving for peanuts.

  One day first-class plane tickets to Washington, D.C., came by Federal Express, along with hotel-reservation information.

  That had been four days ago. Upon arrival, Orville Fletcher had found a note had been slipped under the hotel-room door.

  It said simply, “Wait for my call. Tippit.”

  So he waited. Four days. He grew more nervous every day. He passed the time listening to Thrush Limburger’s radio program and the TV show, parroting the words that sometimes escaped his own mouth before they came from the TV speaker. His florid gestures expertly emulated Limburger’s own.

  Standing before the dresser mirror, with the TV screen behind him, Orville Rollo Fletcher watched the double reflection–his own and the true Limburger’s–and let a satisfied smile expand his otherwise glum face.

  “A perfect replication, if I do say so myself,” he murmured. He just hoped his public debut was not some cheesy mall opening, or worse, a sleazy bachelor party. A man had to have his dignity. Without it, he was nothing.

  At four in the afternoon, a bellman showed up with a boxy package secured with stout twine.

  “Thank you, my good man,” said Orville, tipping as generously as his girth.

  When he undid the paper and twine and opened the box, Orville Rollo Fletcher’s heart sank.

  He had been sent a red-and-white Santa Claus outfit. A perfect size 50, but perfect in no other way. There was even a snowy wealth of whiskers and size 18-EE orthopedic boots.

  “Why on earth should I wear this? I will be unrecognizable.”

  But he tried the costume on anyway. Perhaps he would be in luck, and it would not fit properly.

  “On reflection,” Orville said, regarding himself in the dresser mirror, “this might be for the best.”

  The phone rang, and the soft voice he had come to know said, “It’s tonight.”

  Orville swallowed his disappointment. After all, he owed the Ixchel Talent Agency his life. “Excellent. Where and when do I appear?”

  “Eight-fifteen sharp. The White House.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Tonight is the annual Christmas-tree lighting ceremony on the White House lawn. And you’re the official Santa Claus.”

  “I am going to the White House?”

  “Present yourself at the East Gate at eight-fifteen. Don’t be early and don’t be late. They have security concerns over there.”

  “I fail to understand.”

  “It’s the First Lady’s little joke. You and the President will together throw the switch that lights the tree, then you pull off your hat and beard and do your Thrush Limburger bit.”

  “What shall I say?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Ad-lib. Just see if you can get a rise out of the President. Make him laugh.”

  “I don’t know if I am up to this,” Orville said.

  “You are. It’ll all be over in fifteen minutes. Just go get a good dinner and a stiff drink or two if you need it and be at the East Gate at eight-fifteen on the dot.”

  “I will do my best,” Orville promised solemnly.

  “Don’t forget your asthma inhaler.”

  “I always carry it in case of an attack.”

  “When you go through the gate, take a good shot. The steroids will give you that boost that’ll get you through the ceremony.”

  “A very good idea. I will be sure to remember it,” said Orville Rollo Fletcher.

  He took his meal in the hotel restaurant, happy to be out of the room, and ordered the prime rib, baked potato and kernel corn. And two helpings of peanutbutter pie.

  On the way back from the restaurant he was accosted by a panhandler in a shabby coat and taped-together Ray-Ban Aviator sunglasses. “Spare a dollar?” the beggar asked in a low whine of a voice.

  “I am very sorry, my good man.”

  The beggar was obviously drunk because he lurched into Orville, then went stumbling away.

  Orville patted his bulk and was relieved to find his wallet where it should be. But his patting fingers failed to find his asthma inhaler.

  Heart pounding, he searched the pavement at his feet, backtracked to the restaurant and experienced no luck.

  He was greatly relieved to discover it on the bed stand of his hotel room, although he had been virtually certain he had taken it with him before leaving.

  “Mustn’t forget my Vanceril,” he said, pocketing the inhaler. In the lobby he purchased a large packet of salted peanuts. They had become his latest comfort food.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Remo Williams found the Master of Sinanju in the White House kitchen hectoring the Presidential chef.

  “What are these sauces you inflict upon your liege?” he demanded.

  “These are French sauces. I am a French chef.”

  “Liar. You are not French.”

  “I did not say I was French. I am a French chef. I cook according to the French way. I am Italian.”

  “Then you cook the Italian way!” said Chiun. “And the Italian way is the Borgia way. Are you a Borgia?”

  “I resent the implication that my cooking is poisonous.”

  Chiun noticed Remo at the entrance to the White House kitchen and said, “Look at these concoctions. It is no wonder the President is grossly fat.”

  “He has lost ten pounds since I have began cooking for him,” the chef said, his tall white hat shaking with indignation.

  Chiun held two bottles, one in each hand. He carried them over to a stainless-steel sink and gave then a squeeze. The bottles broke. Chiun’s hands withdrew so quickly his fingers were neither spattered with hollandaise sauce nor touched by flying glass.

  He stabbed the garbage disposal button, and it was impossible to say which howled more loudly, the glass in the disposal or the chef at the sight of it.

  Chiun fixed the chef with glittering hazel eyes.

  “From now on you will serve steamed rice. No cow tallow or spices will despoil your rice. Duck will be your only fowl. You may serve any fish that you do not ruin with your gross ways. No chicken. No beef.”

  “The First Lady enjoys shellfish.”

  “No shellfish. Proper fish do not have shells. Insects and turtles do.”

  The White House chef sputtered. “I will resign first.”

  “You will be doing your country a great boon,” said Chiun.