"Chiun, fix it so he can't yell, will you?" Remo said and Stantington felt a light pressure of a single fingertip on the underside of his jaw. Not yell, hah? He'd show them yelling. The admiral opened his mouth to shout for help. He breathed deep and let the air come rushing out. There was no sound, except for a thin hiss. He tried again, breathing harder this time, but still producing only silence.
He felt himself being hoisted up in the air. He heard Remo say, "Is that his topcoat, Chiun?"
"It is not mine," Chiun said.
"Get it, will you? It might be chilly in Rye," Remo said.
It was all very strange. That was what the President had said to him when he asked about the topcoat. There was something going on in government that Stantington didn't know about.
The topcoat was dumped unceremoniously on
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top of his head. He heard the garbage bag being fastened with a yellow plastic zipper closure.
The bag was hoisted in the air. He must be on Remo's shoulder, he decided, because he could hear the man whistling and the sound was very close to his ear. He was whistling the theme from The Volga Boatman.
He heard the door to his office open and they walked outside.
Remo's voice said, "Hi, honey. The admiral in?"
"Yes, but he's busy," a woman's voice answered. It was Stantington's secretary. The CIA director wanted to call out that he was not in his office; he was in the garbage bag. He tried, but still no sound came out.
"Well, that's all right," he heard Remo tell the secretary. "We'll come back later."
"You can wait if you want," the young woman said. Even through plastic, Stantington could recognize unmistakable lust in her voice. "I'll make you coffee," she told Remo.
"No thanks, he said.
"I can get you Danish. Two Danish and coffee. Or I could make you sandwiches. It wouldn't be any trouble at all to make you sandwiches. All I've got to do is drive to the store in town and get some cold cuts and some bread. I could be back here in no time and I'd have good sandwiches for you. Liverwurst. With Vandalia onions and mayonnaise."
"Aaaaagh," Chiun said in disgust.
"Honey, when I come back for you, it won't be with sandwiches in mind," Remo said.
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Stantington heard his secretary exhale a puff of air. She must have leaned back in her chair because it squeaked slightly under her weight.
Ask him what's in the bag, he wanted to shout. But he was mute.
"Give us a pass out of here, will you?" Remo said. "You know what pains in the butt all these guards and things are."
No, no, Stantington tried to shout. Nobody gets in or out, without all kinds of clearances. Somebody doesn't just come up to your desk and ask for a pass out. Follow the book, girl. But no sound came from his mouth and he heard his secretary say, "Sure. Here. Take this. It's the admiral's special clearance pass. Just flash that in anybody's face and nobody'll bother you."
"Thanks, toots," Remo said.
"And if you want to come back and see me, well, just hang onto that pass. It'll get you right in."
It must be mind control, Stantington thought. This Remo, whoever he was, must have some kind of power to hypnotize. Otherwise his secretary would never be so lax with security procedures.
"You can count on it," Remo said. "This will be my prized possession." Stantington shifted slightly. Apparently Remo was taking the pass from the woman. He felt himself leaning forward inside the bag, then heard Remo drop a kiss on his secretary's cheek.
Then he was lifted high up again and felt himself moving. A strange thought passed through his mind. He would have expected riding in a bag on someone's shoulder to be bumpy as the per-
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son's body dipped with each step he took. But he felt like he was floating. There was no jarring, no real sense of movement.
He heard his secretary's voice behind him. "Hey, what's in the bag?" she asked.
"Government secrets," Remo said.
"Come on, kidder. Really. What's in the bag?"
"The admiral," Remo said.
The secretary giggled and then her voice faded as the door to the outside office closed behind them.
"You're doing good, Admiral," Remo said. "Just behave and you'll be out of there before you know it."
No one challenged them in the halls or the elevators and then they were outside, because Stantington heard the plastic of the bag rip slightly and he breathed the sweet fresh air of the Virginia countryside. He gulped deeply, then wondered to himself if this Remo didn't ever get tired. Stantington was a big man, over 200 pounds, and Remo just kept walking along carrying him on his shoulder with no more effort than if he had been an epaulette on a military uniform.
Then there was an automobile and then an airplane, and then a helicopter. Through the three rides, the white man and the Oriental kept bickering. Something about starring in a movie. The Oriental quoted Variety to prove that the white man could not expect more than three points of the gross and 1 percent of 100 percent of the wholesale price on commercial products. He talked a lot about bringing it all home for under five mill and Remo would get his money pari
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passu and that was the best he could do. Remo said he could have lived with Burt Reynolds or Clint Eastwood, but Ernest Borgnine was an insult.
Stantington was beginning to believe he was in the hands of lunatics.
Then he was dumped onto a hard floor and the top of the bag was ripped open.
He heard a voice that dripped acid ask, "What is this? What are you two doing here?"
"Don't go blaming me," came Remo's voice. "Ruby told me to do it. It was all Ruby's idea."
"That is right, Emperor," Chiun said. Emperor? What Emperor, Stantington wondered. "I heard her tell him," Chiun said. "I was away across the room and I could still hear her over the telephone, telling him to do it. Her voice was so loud, it ruined my writing for the day."
"That's right," a woman's voice said. "I told him to do it."
"Do what?" asked the acid voice. Stantington stood up. His legs were wobbly and weak from the hours of being cramped into the bag.
The acid voice came from a thin balding man sitting behind a large desk, in an office surrounded by windows tinted smoky brown. Stantington recognized them as one-way glass. From the inside, they were windows. From the outside, they were mirrors. Stantington looked through them and saw the waters of the Long Island Sound, down a long embankment from the upper-story office he was in.
The balding man's eyes widened when he saw the CIA director.
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"Stantington," he said. Stantington opened his mouth to speak. "Ga, ga, ga, ga, ga," he said. "Chiun," said Remo.
The tiny Oriental, not even coming up to Stantington's shoulder, stepped forward and gently pressed a spot under the admiral's jawbone. There was no sense of pain, no feeling of anything internal having been tampered with. But one moment he could not talk and the next moment he knew his voice had returned.
"Doctor Smith, I presume," Stantington said. He looked around the office. Remo and Chiun were standing behind him, along with a tall, light-skinned black woman. Her hair was wrapped in a red bandana. She was wearing a black pants suit and her face was more actively intelligent than beautiful.
Smith nodded. He looked to Ruby. "Suppose you tell me what this is all about," he said.
"He wanted to talk to you. I told him you was too busy," Ruby said, "so I sent these two to go get him."
"In a Hefty bag?" Smith said. "Why not?" said Ruby. "Nobody notice just one more bag of garbage coming out of that CIA. That CIA be all garbage." She looked challengingly at the admiral.
Remo said to her, "Why are you wearing that hanky on your head ?"