No Contest

Crisp was clearly not the favorite, but the race was still considered a huge success from an entertainment perspective. The two women who crashed were young and tough, and after disentangling from each other they began a dusty catfight that nobody was in a hurry to break up. As they were identical twins, it was impossible to tell them apart after they lost the helmets.

“Our business is with the winner,” Chiun stated firmly over the appreciative roar of the crowd.

“Your business, not mine,” Remo reminded him. “Besides, we already know that poor schmuck is clueless. They must have some way of remote controlling which luge boards break down during the race so he wins.”

They moved in for the award ceremony, which was quick and informal. Crisp posed with the race officials and gave a brief interview to the Extreme Sports Network. He thanked his mother and Extreme Nuggets breakfast cereal, which provided him the extreme nutrition he needed for excellent performance.

“Can we go now?” Remo asked. “The racing is over.”

“Then why are the people not departing?” Chiun asked.

A twenty-two-foot screen was alight with the opening credits of Mogul Mania, featuring the greatest moments in nude luge in extreme slow motion. Chiun blanched as a well-endowed woman flopped outrageously on the screen, one frame per endless second.

“On second thought, let’s stay,” Remo said. “Hey, look, you buy popcorn at that stand and they let you put on your own butter-like topping. Much as you want.”

Chiun ignored the comment and led the way out. “Remo, I hope you never follow through with your outlandish threats.”

“Hope is good for the spirit.”

“Promise me you never will do something as foolish as luge without clothing.”

“I guess so.”

Chiun’s eyebrows were heavy. “That was not convincing.”

The door of a nearby ticket booth flew open. The woman standing there had frizzy, dishwater hair that looked as if it hadn’t been cut in years or washed in weeks. Her tunic was a flannel sheet with poorly sewn sleeves and seams, and its bright tie-dye colors had faded to dirty splotches.

Her lower lip quivered. “Oh, thank goodness, it’s you! I thought I would never see you again!”

She strode barefoot to Chiun with her arms out, only to come up empty-handed. The wise, ancient Asian man had vanished like a spirit—which, surely, he had to have been.

Chapter 8

The prime minister of Jamaica held a press conference in time for the morning news. The verdant gardens were in Kingston, where the sky was blue and cloudless, the Caribbean Sea was turquoise, and the prime minister’s face went from dark brown to scarlet.

“The Americans always win de games. Jamaicans, dey just die trying,” the prime minister proclaimed. “Yesterday, our special girl Beetrice Goldings, she was cheated out of another hundred t’ousand dollars by the crooks and the thieves of the Extreme Sports Network. Dis is poor sportsmanship.”

Mark Howard was getting ready for work in the suite he now shared with Sarah Slate at Folcroft Sanitarium. He should have moved out weeks ago, but moving out posed its own problems. Where would Sarah go? Home, to the Slate mansion in Providence?

He didn’t want her to go home.

Right now, something was bothering him, and it wasn’t Sarah Slate. It was the prime minister of Jamaica. Howard knotted his tie too long and undid it, tying it again, and he tried to figure out where the PM’s head was at.

“Today I am calling on all athletes from Jamaica to no longer compete in competition organized by the Extreme Sports Network of the United States,” the PM stated. “We won’t compete until the Americans make dere games fair to all de world!”

The prime minister of Jamaica was a dignified, impeccably neat black man who was known to be restrained and friendly. Today he was angry and passionate.

Sarah came out of the shower in a bulky bathrobe, brushing her hair. “What’s the matter?”

“He’s sure mad.”

“He has a right to be, doesn’t he?”

“I don’t know,” Mark Howard replied, but he didn’t know if that was even the point.

“I’m extending a request, too, to my counterparts in Grea’ Britain, to also pull ut of all events sponsored by this network of cheaters and a nation of bullies!”

The PM stalked away from the cameras.

“Pretty strong,” Mark said.

“He’s just jumping on the bandwagon,” Sarah said.

“I suppose he is,” Mark admitted.

“Americans do not always win in our events!” exhorted the president of Extreme Sports Network to the cue-ball, old-school talk-show host. They were sitting around a circular table, and the highly credible interviewer had his shirtsleeves rolled up his arms and his glasses coming down the bridge of his nose.

“That’s not what the rest of the world thinks,” he said.

“Look, I have a pie chart to prove it,” the president of ESN said.