The Destroyer - 29 - The Destroyer 029 - The Final Death by Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir

Author:Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir [Murphy, Warren & Sapir, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Pulp Action
Publisher: PINNACLE BOOKS
Published: 2010-03-19T14:53:20+00:00

Chapter Seven

The lead­er calm­ly ex­plained what they had to do.

The lead­er calm­ly ex­plained that the at­tack had not failed, it had suc­ceed­ed.

The lead­er coughed three times, hacked once, and spit a hunk of phlegm in­to the garbage can of the eigh­teenth-​floor suite of the Hous­ton, Texas, Sher­aton.

“But we lost three of our best men,” said a voice in Chi­nese.

“We have gained knowl­edge,” was the lead­er’s re­ply. “We have gained un­der­stand­ing.” The lead­er weighed the two in his mind. “It is re­gret­table,” he said at last. “But it was nec­es­sary. Tell me, what have we learned?”

The young Chi­nese voice told the old man about the at­tack at Meata­ma­tion and how the white man lev­eled three of the Creed’s best fight­ers. Then the voice spoke of the yel­low man who had been wait­ing out­side Meata­ma-​tion.

“The yel­low man,” whis­pered the lead­er, rais­ing his right hand to­ward his eye. His right fore­fin­ger stopped at his left breast but his eight-​inch fin­ger­nail rest­ed just be­low his left eye. “Were his eyes the col­or of steel?”

“Yes,” was the an­swer.

“It is as I feared,” said the lead­er. “He has come. He has fi­nal­ly come.” The lead­er dropped his hand to his lap and bent his head in silent prayer. He re­mained that way for a minute and a half, then his an­cient head rose.

“Have you paid the oth­ers?”

“The marchers? Yes.”

“Do they know of our creed?”

“No.”

“Have you re­plen­ished our ranks?”

“Hired some new men? Yes.”

“Call the oth­ers,” said the lead­er. “The time ap­proach­es. We must do it. Now.”

Af­ter the young per­son had left the room, the lead­er raised him­self from his chair. His rise was slow as were his move­ments and speech. He fi­nal­ly got to his stand­ing height of four feet eleven, then shuf­fled across the ny­lon-​pile ho­tel car­pet to the drawn cur­tains.

A shak­ing left hand gripped the heavy green ma­te­ri­al and wrenched it open. Hard, hot sun­light poured over the lead­er in­to the room. Hous­ton hung in space, shiny gray, as if some hand had smeared Vase­line over it.

Big cars, each look­ing new­ly paint­ed, jockeyed with the dirty, tan hulks of the trac­tor trail­er trucks for 10 clear yards of road space. Work crews were pulling off the red-​and-​green dec­ora­tions from the streets, herald­ing the pass­ing of the new year. Stores were end­ing their post-​Christ­mas sales.

And it was hot in Texas. It was al­ways hot. That’s why the lead­er liked it here bet­ter than Con­necti­cut. It was hot. That was all the lead­er cared about. That was all he felt. That was all he saw.

Be­cause the lead­er’s eyes were bright blue, but the pupils were dark, smoky white. The lead­er was com­plete­ly blind.

He heard the door open. The oth­ers had re­turned.

“Sit down, please,” said the lead­er in Chi­nese.

“Sit down,” said an­oth­er, trans­lat­ing in En­glish.

The lead­er wait­ed un­til he heard two bod­ies set­tle in­to the suite’s chairs, then he closed the cur­tain, and shuf­fled back to his chair, se­cure in the knowl­edge that no out­stretched leg or up­right body would ob­struct his path.

The lead­er low­ered him­self in­to his blood-​red seat with the green fanged drag­ons carved from wood rest­ing be­neath his arms.

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