His face tight with somber reflection, he pondered Chiun's words for the rest of the flight to Maine.
Chapter 21
When they landed in Bangor, Remo called Smith for directions before renting a car at the airport. They drove east to Bay Cove. With a twice-delayed flight and a long drive, the late-afternoon shadows were already growing long.
It was the end of the autumn-foliage season in New England. Nature had painted the trees along the winding roads in vivid shades of red and yellow. By the time they arrived in the small seaside community Stewart McQueen called home, Chiun had his window rolled down. The old Korean sniffed the chilly October air with satisfaction.
"This place reminds me of my village," the Master of Sinanju said as they took the winding main road past quaint cottages decorated with lobster traps and sea-stained buoys.
"I don't smell shit," Remo said as he studied the road signs.
Chiun ignored him. "My quest for a new home still continues. I have seen many pictures. The Prince Regent has been most helpful."
"I think Smitty wants us out of Folcroft," Remo said. "The artist formerly known as Prince is just following orders."
He turned off the main drag onto a shaded side street.
"Yet you persist in your recalcitrance."
"I don't want to live in Maine, Chiun. It's colder than all hell. Besides, we've done the East Coast thing already. I'm putting winter behind me."
"We will see," Chiun said, settling back into his seat.
Remo followed Smith's directions, turning off the small lane and onto a tree-lined cul-de-sac. They looped around to the end. When he stopped before the gates of Stewart McQueen's mansion, his eyes grew flat.
"You gotta be kidding me," he said as he looked up at the unsightly Gothic mess that was Stewart McQueen's home.
The four-story structure slouched like an architectural bully at the end of the sparsely populated street. The round windows of the gabled attic rooms were like malevolent eyes of doom, staring out across the neighborhood. A widow's walk with rusted rail clung precariously to the slate roof. Gray shingled walls in desperate need of paint were adorned here and there with half-nailed shutters.
Around the property, autumn seemed to have come earlier than in the surrounding region, for any trace of leaves had been stripped from the handful of trees whose clawlike roots were fixed to soil. Bare black branches scraped the sky.
In the front seat beside Remo, the Master of Sinanju's button nose crinkled in distaste as he viewed the house.
"What is this place?" Chiun asked unhappily.
"I think the nuns would call it a living testament to the decline of American literature," Remo suggested. "Either that or it's the Munsters' summer house."
The two men got out of the car.
A pair of black metallic bats decorated the stone posts to which was fixed the rusting front gate. "Cameras in the bats' eyes," Remo pointed out as they strolled up to the gate. He had detected the soft clicks and whirs of delicate machinery.
"What manner of man lives in such a dwelling?" the Master of Sinanju asked. Standing on tiptoe, he was peering intently up at the bats.
The bats didn't look back. Remo and Chiun were now below their range. The dark, smoky eyes stared out across the deserted street.
"The guy's a superrich horror writer," Remo explained. "I saw on some tabloid show how he had his place done up to look like a haunted house." Hands on his hips, he peered through the bars of the gate at the house beyond. "Can't say it looks better in person than it did on TV."
With a soft harrumph of disapproval, Chiun dropped back to his soles. "The gate is electrified," he announced, tucking hands inside his kimono sleeves.
"Whole place is, judging by the hum I'm getting off it," Remo replied. "He must have a major security system. So what do you say, Little Father," he asked, turning to the Master of Sinanju, "through it or over it?"
Neither course proved necessary. As Remo and Chiun stood on the sidewalk before the gate, a gentle click sounded at the heavy bolt. The electrical charge that hummed through the fence powered down to silence. With a forlorn groan of rusted metal, the heavy steel gate rolled slowly open.
Remo glanced at Chiun. "This might be a good time to remember not to take any balloons from killer clowns who want to lure us into the woods," he said dryly.
Chiun's face was serious. "Stay alert," he warned. With that the old Korean slipped through the gates. Remo followed him inside.
As they walked away, high up on the gateposts behind them, the heads of the two bat sentries swung around.
The eyes of the metal creatures were directed at the backs of the two men as they made their way up the walk.
When Remo felt the telltale waves from the cameras on his back, he arched a curious eyebrow.
"I thought those things looked solid," he commented. "Didn't look to me like the necks could swivel."
He glanced over his shoulder. But when he did, the bats were once more facing the street, away from Remo and Chiun.
"What the hell?"
As a frown took shape on Remo's face, the front gate abruptly swung closed without so much as a creak. The hum from the electrified fence rose in the chilly air.
"Isn't this the part where Shemp sees the ghost, but Moe and Larry are too busy moving furniture to notice?" Remo asked the vacant air.
As if in response, a low moan rose from the house, painful and protracted.
As they headed up the flagstone walk, Chiun and Remo both saw the small speakers hidden under the lip of a narrow ledge just above the eaves. The protracted moan echoed to silence, replaced by the distant, desolate howl of a wolf.
A blanket of rotten leaves was spread across the dead brown grass. Thorn bushes and creeping ivy decorated the front of the house around the porch.
The front steps were bowed and rickety. Up close Remo could see that they were deliberately made to look old and battered. They seemed sturdy enough underfoot as the two men climbed up onto the broad front porch.
"Abracadabra," Remo said mysteriously, waving his hand as they approached the front door.
The instant he uttered the word, the door creaked open.
"I don't know what you think," Remo said, careful to keep his voice low enough that only Chiun could hear, "but I think we're about to get pounced on by an eight-hundred-pound spider."
"Caution," the Master of Sinanju warned in reply. Senses straining alertness, the old man breezed through the door. Remo followed.
If the spider was inside, it was not in the foyer. Nor, Remo judged, was it in any of the ground-floor rooms.
From what he could tell there were no detectable life signs. Just the constant thrum of electricity that powered Stewart McQueen's elaborate security system. The whole house seemed to vibrate with coursing energy.
The two men had taken only a few steps inside the house when they felt the rush of air at their backs. Spinning, they were just in time to see the front door slam shut.
To Remo's trained eyes, it moved faster than any mechanical device should have allowed. The entire house rumbled from attic to basement, such was the force with which the door cracked shut.