Her hair was powdered white with a cloud of talcum and pulled back into a Grandma Moses bun. One lab coat was arranged around her to look like a house dress, and another was tied around her waist to resemble an apron. Brown eyebrow pencil scored her face with laugh lines. "Happy?" she said disgustedly.
"You did this for me," Mr. Gordons said, his mechanical eyes shining.
"Will you stay, Gordons?"
"Will you program creativity into me?"
Her face was pained as she tried to explain. "Creativity isn't as wonderful as you think, baby," she said softly. "Sometimes it's easier just to have someone tell you what to do, to follow your programming."
"But you promised," Mr. Gordons said.
"It'll make a mess of your life. Look at you, honey. You're perfect. You never make mistakes. You never embarrass yourself. You never do idi-
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otic things that you regret later. Why do you want to be creative? All that will bring you is trouble and unpredictability and heartbreak."
"Because I want to be free," the robot said.
With a long look the professor took in Mr. Gor-dons's sad eyes. "I understand," she said. "Sit over there. I'll give it a go."
"Oh, Mom, I'll never leave you." He swept her into his arms.
. "Put me down," she growled. He did. "Look, kid, as long as you're going to hang around, why don't you take that body out of the bathroom. It's starting to rot."
"I'll do anything for you, Mom." He kissed her lightly on the cheek and left the lab.
Alone, the professor blew some talcum out of her eyes and sucked up the rest of the gin.
Ill
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Remo fumbled with the doorknob to his motel room before finally getting the door open.
"Chiun," he said. "I'm not right."
"Heh, heh, heh, heh," Chiun said, without turning. He was in the same spot on his mat where Remo had last seen him, his eyes still riveted to the television screen. "It is one of the joys of teaching, knowing that someday a student, no matter how backward and inept, will eventually learn. You have learned the biggest lesson of your life, one I had almost despaired of teaching you. Channel Three News Update is beginning." He what I have been telling you. Now, silence. The Channel Three News Update is beginning. He stared entranced at the television as the predatory face of Cheeta Ching appeared, relishing the latest bulletins on the demise of American democracy.
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"Chiun. I can't walk. I can't move right. I can't even think right."
"Shhhhh. Do not expect too much of yourself. I certainly don't. Heh, heh. I certainly don't."
He continued to stare at the screen until Cheeta Ching signed off with full venom, her evil face replaced by a vignette of a wife mortified by her husband's dirty neck as evidenced by the ring around his shirt collar. Chiun snapped off the set.
"All I want is peace and quiet in my twilight years," Chiun said. "All I get from you is noise:" He turned on his mat to look angrily at Remo. He started to speak again, but then his eyes narrowed and seemed to examine his pupil. "What is wrong?" he asked. "My balance. It doesn't seem right. I'm kind of out of control."
"It happened to me once," Chiun said. "Oh?" Remo sat on the sofa. "I was your age. Twelve, perhaps." "I'm older than twelve," Remo said. "In the ways of Sinanju, you are a baby. Actually, I was flattering you by saying you were twelve. Somebody else, with your training, might be twelve. You? You're more like six." "Get on with the story, Chiun." "I was older than you. I was twelve while you're only six. And one day I lost my balance. I could do nothing. My arms and legs seemed to have a will of their own. I asked my teacher. He told me that those of Sinanju have a delicate sense of balance. Anything, no matter how small, could distort it. I asked him what it was, and the
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Master told me that since it was my body, I would have to learn its weaknesses and find my own cures."
"Chiun, this isn't one of those stories that goes on for four weeks and ends with you insulting me, is it?
"Why not? You insult me every time I look at you. To think of all the years I have wasted, the precious time...."
"Chiun, the rest of the story, please."
"I see I have exceeded your usual attention span. I was just a child. I examined my body and found that I had been stung by a bee. The bee's barb was still in my flesh. Its weight had confused my senses."
"That's ridiculous," Remo said. "A bee stinger?"
"All things are foolish to a fool," Chiun sniffed. He turned to the television set and switched it back on. A game show invaded the room. Two different branches of the Jukes family tried to outguess each other, presided over by a master of ceremonies who seemed determined to explore new heights in somnambulism.
"Why is not Cheeta Ching on the picture box all the time?" Chiun asked.
"She's orí at six and eleven," Remo said. "That ought to be enough for anybody, looking at that piranha face."
"She appears other times also," Chiun said. "Often without warning. Why is that?"
"Those are news bulletins. They break into the program to announce important bulletins."
"This can happen anytime?" Chiun said.
"Whenever some important news happens."
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"What do they consider important, these people who are in charge of this?"
"You know, news. A big fire. A big accident. A plane crash. World War III."
Chiun shook his head. "I don't like fires," he said, "because the innocent are hurt as much as the guilty. But automobile accidents. Now, that is a possibility. Anyone who drives one of those big, ugly vehicles deserves what he gets. Yes. Perhaps an auto accident."
"Chiun, you're not going out and cause automobile accidents just so you can get to see that pancake face on television more often."
"I have not decided yet," Chiun said. "It may not be an automobile accident. Perhaps an airplane crash. What else did you say?"
"World War III," Remo said.
"I'd better watch. That might be on any minute," he said and turned back to the television screen.
The telephone rang.
"If that is the mad Emperor Smith, I want to talk to him," Chiun said.
"You? You want to talk to him?"
"I thought that was clear," Chiun said.
"Then answer the telephone," Remo said.
"It is not my job."
"Please?" Remo said. "It's Smitty."
Chiun looked at the game show, nodded, and went to the telephone.
"I speak from the most inadequate domicile of the exalted Master of Sinanju," he announced. "You who seek audience may now speak."
"This is Doctor Smith."
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"Oh, worthy emperor. You honor us with your visit by this instrument. I have been quite well, despite the shabbiness of this residence. If only I had a photograph of the lovely Cheeta Ching to grace these bare walls."
"Cheeta Ching?"
"She is the herald of tidings in the land, spreading her message of joy from the inviolate truth of the television."
"She's the anchor woman on Channel Three," Remo yelled out.
"Oh," said Smith. "I see. I'll see what I can do." 1Chiun tossed the telephone across the room. It landed in Remo's lap.
"It's for you," he said. "Smith." He sank back in front of the television.
"Yeah," Remo said.
"The tape you sent me has to do with laser coordinates on the moon. It must be part of the programming of the LC-111. What did you find out from Dr. Payton-Holmes?"
"That she needs a girdle."
"I warned you about her," Smith said.
"I know. That's why I'm even bothering to talk to you." Remo went on to tell him about Payton-Holmes's strange encounter with the garbageman and the garbageman's resemblance to the skinned murder victim Verbanic. He told him about Marco Gonzalez's abduction from the holding cell. He told him how Ralph Dickey had lost his laboratory entrance card after drinks with a man who wore gold balls around his neck.