Arnold Jordan had so many broken links between himself and the final sale, that it was very unlikely that he would personally face these handicaps. That was for the little men.

A maid answered the door.

"Good evening," said Remo. 'I'm from the Grosse Pointe Homeowners' League and I would like to talk with Mr. Jordan."

"Is Mr. Jordan expecting you?"

"No," said Remo.

"If you would wait here, I'll see if Mr. Jordan is at home."

"Thank you," said Remo. He began to whistle somewhat nervously while he waited for a reply. He had an unusually busy schedule for the evening. Upstairs—where his orders came from—had become highly unreasonable recently, almost bordering on the worst of all possible sins, incompetence. It was this IDC thing. It had to be the IDC thing, although Remo had not even been formally notified that there was such a thing as an IDC thing. He had just been given the names and general whereabouts of three computer programmers. Disposing of the last one on a Long Island beach had taken fifteen seconds. Remo spent the first fourteen of them laughing as the man had assumed some sort of silly Kung Fu stance, which was fine for a martial arts school, but which left the chest as open as the ocean.

Remo did not know the name of the stance, because as the Master of Sinanju—Remo's trainer—had explained, one should not waste precious time cataloguing someone else's foolishness. Sinanju, unlike the known variations of the martial arts, was not an art but a working tool. Less and less could Remo fathom how people would want to make games out of daily work, even devoting leisure hours to it. But then there were even lawyers who mowed lawns for relaxation.

The maid, in starched white apron, returned with apologies that Mr. Jordan was unavailable.

"It will just take a minute. I'm really in a rush," said Remo, gliding around the maid who could have sworn she had a hand out there to stop him. She watched the visitor seem to slip through it as she stood there, hand upraised in empty air.