"Shit," Artemis said. "I missed out on the action, as usual."
44
Four
"Oklahoma," the fatigued, lemony voice on the telephone said. "The chaplain from Wheeler was reported missing this morning. It must have happened last night."
Remo and Chiun were stopped at the gate by two sentries who looked as if they were experiencing the final stage of narcotics poisoning. "Where you going, man?" one of them asked, scratching his crotch.
"How about straight ahead?" Remo took out his wallet and rummaged inside for appropriate identification. The Department of Agriculture card would have sufficed, but the guard held out a shaky hand. "Wait, mister. You from the devil-worshipping socio-industrial-corporate oppressors?"
"What?"
"You from the—"
"Never mind," Remo said. "Whatever you said, we're not from there. My friend here's a student nurse. We've come to pick up a few pointers on ptomaine poisoning from the mess halL"
"Enter," the guard said.
45
Remo looked over his shoulder at the guards as he trotted inside. One was nodding off, his forehead resting against the barrel of his rifle. The other was staring fixedly at the sun. "Say, can either of you tell us the way to the administration building?"
The nodder snapped to with a lazy jerk of his head. "Uh," he said, trying vainly to retract his tongue into his face, "I think it's a white building. Mostess administration buildings be white. Always a white building when I go to get my food stamps or the welfare. Once, when they was gonna make me an administrator in the CETA program, they sent me to an administration building, and that one was white too. And when the judge tell me I gots join the army or gets twenty years, that be in a white building too. Yup, you just find yourself a white building. That be the administration building."
Remo glanced around.
"All the buildings are white," he said.
The guard roused himself enough to look around. A small furrow appeared between his eyes. "Lookie, lookie," he said, astonished. "Every last one of them. Hey, Wardell." He prodded his associate, who continued to gaze, unblinking, at the white Oklahoma sun. "Wardell, lookie here. All these buildings be white. Hey, Wardell." Wardell stared on.
"Thanks a lot," Remo said, as he and Chiun walked away toward the mass of white buildings clustered ahead.
"These are the fighting men Emperor Smith employs to defend your country?" Chiun asked.
"Yeah," Remo said.
"No wonder you lost against even the Vietnamese. The first recorded war victory in the long, lamentable history of those duck-romancers."
46
"Uh huh," Remo said. "Our army didn't lose Vietnam. The rest of the country gave up. Not the army. But that was the old army. This is the new army. These are all volunteers."
"This, then, is their chosen work?" Chiun asked.
" 'Fraid so, Chiun."
"Now I understand."
"Understand what?"
"How Emperor Smith finds you to be even moderately useful. Look at what he has to compare you with."
"That's interesting," Remo said. "I always thought he compared me with you and found me witty, charming, sensible, intelligent, and a perfect delight to have around."
"Heh, heh," Chiun said. "I've always told you that Smith is a lunatic, but I never told you he was a fool. He would not be likely to compare a chip of glass with a diamond and choose the chip of glass. Heh, heh."
Chiun looked around. The expression on his face would have been appropriate for watching babies being boiled. "How long has your army been like this?"
"A few years," Remo said. "We used to have an army like everybody else; when we needed soldiers, we drafted them. To protect their country, people came. Then some genius decided it was too much to expect anybody to sacrifice anything for his country, and they changed the army to all volunteers."
"So these people fight not for love of country, but for a paycheck?" Chiun asked.
"That and to stay out of jail or because they've used up every other kind of government check they could get without working."
47
"It'll never work," Chiun said. "It doesn't," Remo said. "Now the Persian Army," Chiun said. "Good?"
"So-so. The Master at that time helped them, and so they made short work of their enemies. But volunteers were not allowed. The emperor of the Peacock Throne knew that soldiers should be unwilling recruits. Only then will they be angry enough to fight well. The Carthaginians too. They were better. They had a Master of Sinanju too, and he did most of the fighting while they played their lutes and drums. Thus developed the Carthaginian victory at Bothay." Chiun raised an index finger in the air. "But no Carthaginian ever deserted."
Just then, a young recruit came walking toward them. He stared straight ahead, and his arms hung limply at his sides as he strode in even paces toward the gate.
"Excuse me, soldier," Remo said. But the recruit walked past him without missing a step.
"Rude," Chiun said. "He must be a Cypriot." "He's an American soldier," Remo said irritably. "And he's stoned, to prove it. Well, anyway, there's someone else up ahead we can ask."
About 20 yards away, two soldiers stood talking. "Hey, fellas," Remo said, but they must not have heard him, because as he approached, one of them drew a Bowie knife from his uniform and plunged it into the heart of the other.
"Wait a second," Remo said, racing ahead to collar the attacker. "What the—" But even as he spoke, the soldier with the knife stabbed himself in the chest, hara-kiri style. He slumped to the ground, a thin smile playing on his lips.
48
"Hey. You." Remo shook the still-warnl corpse, whose eyes were already glazing over.
"Your American army behaves abominably," Chiun said. "The angle of his elbow was completely incorrect. It was merely luck that he managed to accomplish his task, even at such close range and with such an unnecessary weapon." He shook his head. "Tsk. Disgraceful."
Just then a lean, athletic-looking major with a team of six soldiers in full combat dress surrounded the two bodies. The major looked briefly at Remo and Chiun, then directed his men toward the entrance gates. Remo noticed that the soldiers all looked straight ahead as they marched in perfect rhythm.
"Everybody looks mindless around here," Remo observed.
"Of course," Chiun said with a small smile of triumph.
"Why 'of course'?"
"They are white. Mindlessness is natural to those of your race."
"Two of those soldiers were black."
"Black skin, tan skin, pink skin," Chiun said with a dismissive wave. "All non-yellow persons behave as one in America."
Remo ignored him. "I guess that's the administration building over there. I see typewriters in the windows."
A guard stood in front of the big white building. His eyes, too, were vacant. Remo waved a hand in front of the guard's face, but his stare was unblinking. They walked past him and climbed automatically to the top floor of the building, where the bellowing bass voice of someone behind a door labeled
49
"General Arlington Montgomery" drowned out all the other noise on the floor.
"I'm damned if I know what's going on, Major. It's your job to tell me everything I know. Now you find out where that pansy chaplain went to, or you stay on latrine duty till the day you retire." A telephone jingled as it slammed into its cradle.
Inside, a middle-aged WAC sat typing. She looked up coldly.
"Hi. We're here to see the general," Remo said.
"Do you have an appointment?" Without waiting for an answer, she began to type again.
"I don't think we need one," Remo said as he slid two fingers to the base of her ear. The WAC nuzzled and purred like a kitten. "More," she said. "Are you an officer?"
"No. I was in the army once, but I was a private."