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.There was someone inside.A man.Breathing oddly.But he was alone.Remo was about to spring up the next flight of stairs when he heard it.It was more shallow than usual, but the intake of air was unmistakable."Chiun! "Remo cleaved the ancient door in two with a single downward stroke and burst into the apartment beyond.A living room piled high with clutter greeted his anxious eyes.Remo wasted no time there.The breathing had come from farther back in the apartment.Another door.This one he wrested apart on its hinges, as if it were moist paper.Door fragments spun through the air like shrapnel, embedding themselves in the walls on either side of the inner room.Remo saw the body on the floor.Its back was to him, and it was curled in the fetal position, but Remo recognized the emerald dragon design woven on the back of the silver kimono.Page 56ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html"Chiun!" he breathed.The thin figure from the street knelt above Chiun.The one who had warned them of the female gyonshi.He looked up at Remo, his eyes those of the most vile demon from hell."The one you look to for guidance will help you no more, gweilo," he laughed."The hour of the Final Death is come."Bile rising in his throat, Remo fell upon the Taoist.Hands flew in a furious blur.Arms pounded with pneumatic precision.In seconds, the Chinese had been reduced to a quivering cone of jelly encased in its own black shroud.When the body fell still, Remo drew the Taoist's own gyonshi fingernail across what had been his neck.In the shimmer of the candlelight, a puff of orange smoke rose and vanished.He dropped to his knees beside the Master of Sinanju, holding the fragile head delicately in his lap, and said, "Not again, Little Father! I swear I won't lose you again!"Tears squeezed from the corners of his pained eyes, as he gathered up his frail burden and bore him out of the bric-a-brac-littered apartment and down to the street below.No one attempted to stop him.They all saw the expression on his face.Chapter 16It was a unforgivable breach of security, but Remo had threatened to take Folcroft apart, brick by brick, if Harold Smith did not comply with his demand for an immediate medevac.The Coast Guard emergency rescue helicopter touched down on the widest, flattest roof in Chinatown, where Remo stood, holding the Master of Sinanju in his arms.Less than thirty minutes later it alighted on the sloping lawn of Folcroft Sanitarium, near the decrepit docks on the edge of Long Island Sound.Smith realized that medevacing a patient from lower Manhattan, at a time when the police were trying to clean up a gangland massacre, would be difficult to explain.He hoped he would not find himself in that position as, stooping, he met Remo under the sweeping helicopter blades."I have been trying to reach you all day," Smith said, by way of greeting.Remo glared at him."Congratulations," he said flatly, pushing past the CUREdirector.The medical technicians had already been instructed how to carry the old man on the stretcher.They were not to drop, jostle, bounce, shake, or drag the old man.They were to do nothing that might cause the old Oriental any further injury.The young man named Remo had explained all this to them on the way from the city.When one of them told the young man not to tell them how to do their jobs, he informed them that they hadn't been listening properly and explained the entire procedure over again, this time dangling one of them out the open door of the rescue helicopter by his ankles to focus their attention.When they climbed off the helicopter in Rye, the technicians carried the old Oriental as if he were a gossamer chrysalis, not a mere human being.Smith followed a grim Remo Williams across the broad lawn.He was having difficulty keeping up with the young man.His belt hung loose, for his stomach still pained him."What happened?" Smith demanded."Poison," Remo shot back.Smith paled visibly."He did not eat chicken?""He did not," Remo snapped."Good.""This is a thousand times worse.""Remarkable," Dr.Lance Drew said, shaking his head in amazement."What is it, doctor?" Smith asked.Dr.Drew started, as if surprised by the reminder that there was someone else in the room with him [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]