"Destroyer 036 - Power Play.pdb" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Remo)

"Come on in."
He went back to the bed while Theodosia sat on the couch.
"How did you get into that hospital room?" asked Theodosia.
"Don't answer that, Remo," Chiun said as he appeared in the doorway connecting Room 15 and his own Room 17.
"Why not?" Remo asked.
"Because she has not paid you anything and even if she had, we do not give our secrets away. We sell our performance but not knowledge of our techniques."
"Very wise," Theodosia said.
"Actually, it just sounds wise," Remo said. "Even if I told, you wouldn't understand the techniques."
"Try me," said Theodosia. There was a small smile on her face, the smile of a woman who had been underestimated many times before by men who thought that because she had enough chest for everybody, it automatically followed that she didn't have a brain in her head.
"All right," Remo said, holding back a smile of his own, "We saw the guard on the fire escape, the one in the stairwell, the one outside the door. Plus the slug guarding the front door. We only wanted to go into the room, not hurt anybody. So we didn't go any of those ways."
"So mystically we appeared, masked in the cloak of invisibility," said Chiun, with a warning glance at Remo.
Theodosia smiled at him. Chiun smiled back.
Remo shook his head. "No. We figured you had all the openings to the room covered but you didn't cover the non-openings, so we turned a non-opening into an opening."
He nodded to her.
"The windows," she said. "You got in through a window."
"You'll never know that," Remo said. "Now that's a secret."
"But how did you get to a window? The roof is sealed off and there's only one fire escape up the side, and that one's guarded."
"Secret," Remo said.
"Yes," said Chiun. "Remo is right. It is very secret. We would like to tell you, young lady, but if we tell you, you will tell someone else and he will tell someone else and before you know it, everyone will know how to climb the sides of smooth walls and remove steel plates from over windows and then replace the plates on the way back down. So we cannot tell you."
"Thank you, Little Father," Remo said, "for not telling."
Chiun nodded his appreciation.
"How much?" Theodosia said.
"What are you paying those three blocks you've got now? I guess the cop on the front door is free."
Theodosia nodded. Chiun cleared his throat.
"A thousand a week each," Theodosia said.
"That means two thousand a week," Remo said.
Chiun cleared his throat again. Remo ignored him. "That's a total of six thousand a week," Remo said. "Since we're incalculably better than they are, we can't apply a percentage to it. But let's say, ten thousand a week."
"Too much," Theodosia said.
Chiun cleared his throat again and Remo looked at him in annoyance, before glancing back at the woman.
"Suit yourself," Remo said. "We can always go to work for the people who want to get rid of him."
"You know who they are?" the woman said warily. She had a pencil in her hand but she jabbed it angrily against her small note pad as she asked the question.
"No, but it shouldn't be hard to find them if we'd a mind to," Remo said. Chiun cleared his throat again.
"You think so?" said Theodosia.
"I know so," said Chiun, before Remo could answer. The old Oriental looked confidently at the young dark-haired woman.
"All right. Ten thousand a week. Guard Wesley and find out who's responsible for that attack on him."
Chiun raised a finger. "Not quite," he said, "Who pays for these hotel rooms?"
Theodosia looked around at the worn bedspread, the walked-thin carpet, the water-stained wallpaper near the door.
"All right," she said. "I'll throw in the rooms too."
"Fine," said Chiun. He looked triumphantly at Remo, then leaned closer to him. "See," he said in Korean, "how easily it all goes if you leave the negotiating to me."
In his halting Korean, Remo said, "Chiun, I would have gotten the same money. All you did was get us another job, finding out who hit Pruiss."
"I got us the hotel rooms paid for," Chiun said. His voice raised as he became excited.
"The rooms only cost us six dollars, for Chrissakes," Remo said. "You gave away an extra job for six dollars. No wonder Sinanju's a poor village."
"You speak terrible Korean," Chiun said. "I can't understand a word you say."
"I said I would have gotten the same money."
"You wouldn't have," Chiun insisted. "Negotiating is one of the special skills of Masters of Sinanju."
"Would," said Remo in English.
"Wouldn't," said Chiun.
Theodosia stood up.
"Why not come with me now?" she said.
Remo started off the bed.