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."Then we will remain here until these matters are resolved," said Chiun, hiseyes questing about the basement suspiciously."You're only saying that because you think if you keep sniffing around, you'llstumble across your gold.""It is somewhere.""It is safe.That's all you need to know," said Remo, trying to suppress agrin.It was rare that he put one over on the old Korean.Chapter 22Big Dick Brull sent his onyx black Cadillac Eldorado tearing through theFolcroft gates like a hearse trying to catch up to a funeral procession.Itswept up the road and stopped at the main entrance.The door opened.A black brogan came out and struck the asphalt like ajackhammer punch.Dick Brull stepped out and strode into the lobby.There was no guard, no oneto stop him.Not that anyone would dare.The look of intensity in Dick Brull'shard eyes usually stopped an ordinary man in his tracks.Brull clomped throughthe lobby, his feet making distinct reports that bounced off the walls.WhereDick Brull walked, people took notice.Wherever Dick Brull entered, it becamehis domain.The lobby was spacious and empty, but the striding feet of Big Dick Brullfilled it as if he stood forty feet tall.His pumping legs took him to the elevator.He gave the button a punch.Theelevator, as if intimidated, responded without hesitation.The steel doorsparted.Brull stepped aboard.He stabbed the second-floor button.The doorclosed.The elevator whisked him up, and he stepped out, pausing.The corridor wasempty.His icy black eyes swept left and right.They came to rest on the plaindoor marked Dr.Harold W Smith, Director.Shooting his cuffs, Dick Brull stormed toward that door.The hard tapping ofhis shoe heels warned anyone who knew that dreaded sound that Big Dick Brullhad arrived, Big Dick Brull was on-site.Big Dick Brull was taking charge.And the devil take the man who saw it otherwise.AGENT PHILIP PHELPS was literally shivering before the sound of footstepsoutside the office door."Now you're in for it," he muttered to Harold W.Smith, who stood pale facedand grim."What do you mean?""Don't you hear that sound? That's Dick Brull."Page 75ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html"Who?""Big Dick Brull.The guy you just asked about.He's the most feared assistantcommissioner in the service.Better straighten that tie of yours before hesees it.""I do not work for the IRS," Smith said."You do now""Is Brull responsible for this outrage?""He's the man.""Then I'll have words with him.""It's your ass," said Agent Phelps as the door flew open.Harold Smith's eyes went to the door, which was reverberating against the wallwhere it slammed.A man stood in the doorway.The first thing a person noticed about him was theshock of virile black hair over a face like a thundercloud.It was not a facemade for smiling.The lines of the man's face went all the wrong ways.Possibly he had never smiled in his entire adult life.His brow was a scowl,his mouth a frown, his eyes hard and black and uncaring.Big Dick Brull stood in the open door, and his head turned in one directionthen another like a deliberate radar dish, his black eyes tracking everyface."Report!" he thundered, his voice as big as all outdoors.Heels clicked."Agent Phelps, sir.""Where's Koldstad?""In rehab.Third floor, sir.""What was that commotion I heard on my way in.""DEA agents, sir.""What happened to them?""They stormed ashore without warning.""You deal with them?""No, sir.We did not.""Too bad.DEA owes IRS a few scalps.Who did?"Agent Phelps hesitated.He swallowed."It was-""Out with it.""It was the butterfly, Mr.Brull.""We all saw it, Mr.Brull," another agent blurted out."It was real.Honest," added a third."It killed those three DEA agents, and the rest took off," Phelps finished.Dick Brull's head swept from side to side, his icy black eyes boring intothose of each man.One shuddered and turned away.Another sobbed.Then his eyes fell on the colorless orbs of Harold W.Smith."Who the fuck are you?"Smith strode over and stopped toe-to-toe with Dick Brull.Their eyes met andlocked, Brull's looking up, Smith's glaring down.Harold Smith stood exactly six feet tall, but looked taller because of hiselongated Ichabod Crane frame.Dick Brull's brush-cut black hair came up to Harold Smith's lower ribs.Brullhad to step back two paces in order to hold Smith's cold gaze."You responsible for what happened here?" Brull demanded."No," Smith said coldly."You are."Hearing this, the IRS agents gasped."You can't talk back to him like that.He's Dick Brull.""I don't care if he is the President of the United States," Smith said, notlooking away."This outrage is his responsibility.""Kiss my ass," Dick Brull yelled."I won't dignify that with an answer.""Then answer this.Where is the gold?"An agent piped up."In the basement, sir.""Shut the fuck up! I wasn't talking to you.I was talking to this lying sackof shit."Harold Smith's patrician face turned a smoldering crimson.His prim mouthPage 76ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlthinned to a bloodless line until he looked like a reverse color negative ofan unhappy clown."Why don't you see for yourself?" he said bitingly."Let's all do that." Brull looked at Smith's trembling-with-rage hands."Whyisn't this man in irons?""We thought he was paralyzed.""Bring him with us.I want to see the look on his sad-sack face when we shovehis lying nose into the gold."Strong hands took Harold Smith by the arms.Smith shook them off, saying, "Ican walk under my own power.""That's what we're afraid of.That you'll try walking out of IRS jurisdiction.Let's go, Smith."Harold Smith allowed himself to be escorted to the waiting elevator.He andthe other agents crowded aboard.The door closed.The elevator began todescend.Smith looked around, frowning."Where is Brull?""Here, beside you," a voice growled from somewhere in the pack of brown andgray suits.Smith looked down.Dick Brull's bristly hair floated in the vicinity of hiselbow like a hairy jellyfish."I see," he said.The elevator ride was a one of the longest in Harold Smith's memory.Hewondered how he would explain what was in the basement.Then, remembering thatthe Master of Sinanju was lurking somewhere on the premises, he wondered if hewould have to."HARK," the Master of Sinanju cried."Smith comes!"Remo listened to the elephant stampede of feet over the hum of openingelevator doors one floor above and said, "Smith? How can you tell?""The creaking of his knee."Remo focused his own hearing.Harold Smith had an arthritic knee that creakedwhen he walked.It was a sound Remo had come to associate with the CUREdirector.The familiar creaking was audible over the stamping of many feet, but onlybecause Remo's sensitive Sinanju-trained hearing enabled him to pick it out ofthe din."It's Smith, all right," he muttered."He walks under duress.Let us free him.""Let's fade into the woodwork.We'll take our cue from Smith."They retreated into the deep shadows far to the rear of the basement andwaited, immobile and attentive.HAROLD SMITH was holding his breath as he was marched into the dimly litbasement
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