Smith grudgingly bought a one-cent stamp-the lowest denomination he could purchase-and then went to the bank of boxes. Inserting a brass key shiny from long use, he opened the box.
Inside was a sheaf of mail. He took it, shut the box and left the foyer, clutching the envelopes protectively. Behind the wheel of his station wagon, Smith examined each one to be sure it was addressed to him. Although he had maintained the box for some thirty years now, sometimes Smith still received other people's mail. The fourth letter in the stack brought a chill to Harold Smith's age-curved spine. Written in flowing blue ink, it was addressed to Mr. Conrad MacCleary.
There was no return address. Only an Oklahoma postmark. Smith tore open the envelope and read the folded note inside with startled eyes.
Our Lady of Perpetual Care Home for the Infirm
My Dear Mr. MacCleary,
I trust you are well.
As promised so very long ago, I am writing to inform you of the imminent passing of Sister Mary Margaret Morrow. She has been in declining health for several years now, yet has clung to this earth most wonderfully. But the nurses do not believe that she will survive the month of July.
If it still is your wish to attend the funeral, I cannot say with certainty when this will be, but you should know that Sister Mary Margaret's time is very short. In this case, you would do well to contact me by telephone so I might better advise you. Yours in Christ, Sister Novella.
Harold Smith read with eyes that skated over the ink script uncomprehendingly. He read the short note again. And for the third time.
"She's alive," he breathed.
Smith thought back. Conrad MacCleary had been his right hand in the creation of CURE. Grizzled, hard drinking and indomitably patriotic, he had executed the frame that had brought Remo Williams to CURE in the first place.
Harold Smith had engineered it all. Masterminded the plan. But Smith couldn't go into the field. As head of CURE, he wasn't expendable. MacCleary was.
From stealing Remo's police badge, to rigging the electric chair to deliver a nonlethal charge, to visiting Remo on death row disguised as a Capuchin monk in order to slip him the pill that suppressed his life signs so he could be pronounced dead after the mock execution, MacCleary had done it all, leaving no fingerprints and no witnesses.
Except apparently Sister Mary Margaret, the one person who had shaped Remo Williams's young life. Smith remembered the conversation that had taken place so long ago.
"What about the nun?" MacCleary had asked. "Is she a problem?"
"She was like a mother to Williams. Even after the plastic surgery, she would be able to recognize his eyes or his voice."
"Where is she now?"
"Still holding down the fort at St. Theresa's."
"It's to be burned," Smith ordered. "To the ground. There must be no record of any Remo Williams."
"Got it," McCleary said. "But what about the sister?"
"No one must be allowed to place the program at risk. The nation depends on it."
"Understood," MacCleary replied.
That was all. That was the way they worked. Smith did not have to say that Sister Mary Margaret, despite her good works in life, had to die. Just as Remo Williams had had to die. Just as so many who threatened CURE over the years had had to die. It was understood. MacCleary was a seasoned agent. He had been one of the finest cold warriors Harold Smith had ever known.
It was true he was a hard-drinking SOB with a tendency to get sloppy drunk and sentimental. But it had never interfered with his duty. In fact, MacCleary had a saying for those occasions when the work got nasty: America Is Worth A Life.
But as Harold W. Smith folded the letter after committing Sister Novella's address and phone number to memory and burning it in the immaculate ashtray of his dashboard, he remembered another fact.
Conrad MacCleary had been a Catholic. Although a lapsed Catholic, obviously he'd not been without sympathy for a nun who had done nothing wrong and perhaps everything right.
Smith crushed the warm gray ashes to powder as he drove back toward Rye and Folcroft, his patrician face was thoughtful.
From beyond the grave, Conrad MacCleary may have provided CURE with the one thing it most needed now. A way to hold on to its enforcement agent.
Smith said a silent thank you to the memory of his old comrade in arms.
As a precaution, he emptied the ashes into three different trash receptacles along the route so no one could ever resurrect the note.
Chapter 16
"I'm going to hit the sack," Remo said when the keel of the rowboat finally grated on the sands of Waikiki Beach.
Dawn was peeping over the Pacific. The night wind off the water had abated, leaving only an eerie calm. "If you slept on the boat, as you claim, why do you need more sleep?" Chiun asked, waiting in the boat for his pupil to drag the craft out of the water by its painter so he could step off onto dry ground, as befitted his station as Reigning Master.
To Chiun's surprise, Remo did no such thing. He started inland, saying with utmost disrespect, "I'm going to find a nice quiet hotel and sleep on a Western bed for a change."
Chiun's facial hair trembled in anger. "You will not sleep on a Western bed. I forbid it!"
"Try and stop me," Remo hurled back.
Suddenly the Master of Sinanju was standing in the darkness before Remo.
Remo took a wary step backward. "Do I have to fight you, too?" he asked wearily.
"It is not yet time."
"What do you mean?"
"If you desire sleep so much, I will allow this. But on the morn we journey to Hesperia."
"Tomorrow we'll see about Hesperia."
"We are going to Hesperia," Chiun insisted.
"I said we'll see!" Remo flared, and stalked off into the night.
The Master of Sinanju watched him go, saying nothing, his face a stiff mask of papyrus. In the moonlight it had the grim aspect of a death mask.
REMO CHECKED into the Waikiki Sheraton and threw himself facedown on a queen-size bed the moment he stepped into his suite. It was against all of Chiun's teachings to sleep on a bed and not a reed mat, but Remo no longer cared. After all that Chiun had put him through, the old Korean could take a flying leap into the Void.
Sleep took Remo within seconds of his face hitting the down pillow.
HE FOUND HIMSELF in a room of gold walls, heaped with treasure. In the center a thick-bodied man sat on a throne of teak chased with silver and gold. He wore a flowing silk robe of the brilliant red hue believed in the Orient to ward off evil demons.
Remo recognized the man on the throne instantly. "Wang?"
"The Great Wang, if you please." And the Great Wang grinned like a cherub. "I see you've made it all the way to the Rite of Attainment. Good for you, Remo Williams. Good for you. I was beginning to wonder about you."
"Maybe you can tell me why I'm having all these dreams about past Masters."
"Chiun didn't tell you?"
"Chiun flat-out denied my dreams mean anything."
"That is so like him. Cloaking a simple ritual in mystery just to milk the moment."
"Simple ritual? Do you know what he's got me doing?"
Wang beamed. His perfect smile made his high forehead fall into doughy rolls of flesh. "Sure. Been through it myself. You chase around till you're ready to drop. When you do, past Masters visit you, look you over and, if they like what they see, dispense wisdom."
"The dreams are part of the Rite?" Remo demanded.
"It was so from the first Master who emerged from the Caves of Mist to those who came just before you."
"So that's who that was."
"Hey. Did you meet Sa Mangsang yet?"
"Yeah. And I hope I never do again. Was it a dream?"