"What's the latest?"
"Castro is still speaking."
"This could go on for days," Remo remarked.
"Let us hope not."
"You and me both. If Chiun doesn't get his daily Cheeta fix, I wouldn't give odds on Castro's survivability"
Remo hung up and turned to the Master of Sinanju, who was patiently waiting some distance away, saying, "Smith says to chase down Zorilla."
"Then let us begin."
They returned to their rented car and drove off.
Remo hadn't been to Miami in a number of years. It had changed. The palmettos still shook in the offshore breezes, the heat still soaked cloth to the skin, but the people were different. There were more Latin faces than Remo remembered.
Off in the night, he heard a sporadic pop-pop-pop-pop of a sound. Machine pistols. His mouth went grim.
Remo had been raised in a time when street gangs were considered unsalvageable if they carried zip guns. Now it seemed that the cheapest hood was better armed than the average Korean War-era soldier.
"This town looks and sounds like it washed ashore from the Third World," he said bitterly.
"I do not remember it this way," Chiun remarked, his narrow eyes reading the faces in the night.
"Another present from Fidel. About ten years ago, he launched a little thing called the Mariel boat-lift. Dumped the contents of his prisons and mental institutions on Miami. As well as honest refugees. I guess both flavors stuck around. I hardly see any white faces."
"This is acceptable," sniffed Chiun, arranging his kimono skirts absently.
"Listen to you, Mr. Multicultural."
"Pah! Do not speak that word."
Remo smiled. He had scored a direct hit. A few months ago, the Master of Sinanju had joined the campaign of a darkhorse candidate for governor of California. The man-an Hispanic-had offered Chiun the post of treasurer. Chiun had tentatively accepted. Only after Chiun had nearly burned his bridges with Harold Smith did he learn that the candidate was actually a fugitive banana-republic dictator, with a face made media-friendly by plastic surgery.
They had been forced to terminate the guy, and Chiun found himself in a ditch with Harold Smith. He was still digging out.
The bewildering maze of Miami byways took Remo to what was supposed to be Little Havana. He slowed down and unrolled his window.
"Hey, pal. This Little Havana?"
The man turned, shrugged, and continued walking.
"I just need a yes or no. Is it?"
The man kept walking.
"People are real friendly down here," he grumbled, driving on.
Remo took the next right and cruised by a row of bars whose neon names were flowery and Spanish.
This time he pulled over and asked a knot of people, "I'm looking for Little Havana."
Swarthy faces turned. Eyes grew tight. No one spoke.
"Anybody speak English here?"
Apparently no one did.
"Little Havana," Remo repeated in a loud voice, pointing around him. "This?"
"No," a voice returned. "Little Haiti."
"Where Little Havana?" Remo asked, thinking he was making progress.
He got a chorus of "Quien sabes. " He didn't know what it meant, but he had seen enough Cisco Kid reruns to get the message.
"This is ridiculous," he grumbled, sending the car screeching along.
He found a well-lit gas station called Jose's and pulled in.
"Fill her up," he said, by way of breaking the ice.
"Que?" asked the attendant, a brown-faced teenager with a mustache like a used paint brush.
"I said fill her up. Comprende?"
"No, senor."
"No, you don't speak English, or no, you won't fill her up?" Remo wanted to know.
"No, senor."
There were others working on an exposed engine and Remo called over to them. "Anybody here speak English?"
The men looked blank.
"Habla ingles?" Remo asked.
"No ingles!" one called back, returning to his engine.
"What is this?" Remo demanded of no one in particular. "How can you run a gas station if no one speaks English?"
The teenager shrugged. He didn't offer to fill Remo's tank, so Remo pulled out, tires caterwauling.
"I'm here in Miami less than a day, and already I'm tired of it," Remo said bitterly.
"It would be easier if you had learned the language," Chiun sniffed.
"Language! This is America! The language of America is English!"
"The language of North America is English," Chiun corrected. "The language of South America is Spanish."
"So? We're in North America."
"No, we are in South Florida."
"Which, the last time I was in this town, was still part of the U.S.A."
"None of this would be happening if you had learned Spanish."
"Why should I learn Spanish?" Remo said hotly.
"In case we ever have to work for Spain," Chiun said reasonably.
"When was the last time that happened? Really."
"The sun will not shine on this mongrel land forever. I will not be at your side forever. You must learn other tongues, so that the tradition can continue and you will not have to stoop to working for inferior nations, as have I in my declining years."
"My ass," said Remo. He tapped the brake. The car stopped short.
Remo and Chiun went forward and back, as if they were anchored to their seats by spring cables. It was a tribute to the total control they exercised over their bodies.
"Wait a minute!" Remo said. "You speak Spanish."
"Therefore, so should you."
"That's not what I mean. Why am I wasting my time trying to communicate when you can interpret for me?"
Chiun raised a wise finger. "Because you will never learn if I keep doing this for you."
"Bulldookey," said Remo, sending the car shooting ahead. "There's gotta be at least one white guy in Miami. Somewhere."
They found one after another ten minutes of circling what seemed to be a very large Spanish area.
The white man was definitely white. He was also definitely scared. He was outrunning the pack pursuing him, even though he was carrying a middle-aged paunch and his pursuers all wore Reebok Pumps and the tight flesh of teenagers.
Remo cut in front of the pursuers and got out.
"Habla espanol?" he demanded.
"Tu madre!" someone snarled, drawing a switchblade. It snicked into the extended position and the wielder brought it down to the level of his belt, driving in for Remo's stomach.
Remo smiled. He grabbed the attacker's wrist and made a sudden complicated motion with his other hand. His wrist drove the knife into the stomach of the one attacking him.
The attacker felt the dull pain that he knew was associated with being stabbed. It was not the first time. His bare brown arms were scarred and scatched from previous encounters with assorted blades and straight razors.
But this time was different. This time, he was holding the hilt of the blade that had been pushed into his vitals. Pushed deep, he saw with widening eyes.
"Dios mio!" he moaned. "Compadres! Come to my aid!"
His compadres backed off and withdrew assorted ordnance. Safeties clicked off. It was about to get serious.
Seeing this, Remo released the man's wrist.
The erstwhile attacker did not release the knife stuck in his own stomach. He was streetwise, and knew that to extract the blade would be to bleed profusely. So he held on to the knife for dear life-even when he found himself suddenly airborne in the direction of his amigos.
A few upward-pointing gun muzzles went pop-pop-pop! before they fell from surprised hands and Remo stepped into their midst.
He didn't waste time. He used the heel of his shoe to crush the weapons flat, driving his handmade sole home so fast and so hard the metal barrels went flat. His shoe leather didn't pick up so much as a nick.
Technique.