The Daimler limousine crawled through the congested street in Mongkok, an urban mass that had the unenviable distinction of being the most densely populated city district in the history of mankind. Populated, it must be recorded, almost exclusively by Chinese. A Western face was so much a rarity that it drew curious glances, at once hostile and amused. No white man or woman was ever encouraged to go to Mongkok after dark; no Oriental Cotton Club existed here. It was not a matter of racism but the recognition of reality. There was too little space for their own—and they guarded their own as all Chinese had done from the earliest dynasties. The family was all, it was everything, and too many families lived not so much in squalor but within the confines of a single room with a single bed and mats on coarse, clean floors. Everywhere the multitude of small balconies attested to the demands of cleanliness, as no one ever appeared on them except to hang continuous lines of laundry. The tiers of these open balconies filled the sides of adjacent apartment houses and seemed to be in constant agitation as the breezes blew against the immense walls of fabric, causing garments of all descriptions to dance in place by the tens of thousands, further proof of the extraordinary numbers that inhabited the area.
Nor was the Mongkok poor. Lavishly manufactured color was everywhere, with bright red the predominant magnet. Enormous and elaborate signs could be seen wherever the eye roamed above the crowds; advertisements that successively rose three stories high lined the streets and the alleyways, the Chinese characters emphatic in their attempts to seduce consumers. There was money in Mongkok, quiet money, as well as hysterical money, but not always legitimate money. What there was not was excess space, and what there was of it belonged to their own, not outsiders, unless an outsider—brought in by one of their own—also brought in money to feed the insatiable machine that produced a vast array of worldly goods, and some not so much worldly as otherworldly. It was a question of knowing where to look and having the price. Pak-fei, the driver, knew where to look, and Jason Bourne had the price.
“I will stop and make a phone call,” said Pak-fei, pulling behind a double-parked truck. “I will lock you in and be quick.”
“Is that necessary?” asked Webb.
“It is your briefcase, sir, not mine.”
Good Lord, thought David, he was a fool! He had not considered the attaché case. He was carrying over $300,000 into the heart of Mongkok as if it were his lunch. He gripped the handle, pulling the case to his lap, and checked the hasps; they were secure, but if both buttons were jolted even slightly, the lid would snap up. He yelled at the driver, who had climbed out of the car. “Get me some tape! Adhesive tape!”
It was too late. The sounds of the street were deafening, the crowds nothing less than a weaving human blanket, and they were everywhere. And suddenly a hundred pairs of eyes peered in from all sides as contorted faces pressed against the glass—on all sides—and Webb was the core of a newly erupted street volcano. He could hear the questioning shrieks of Bin go ah? and Chong man tui, roughly the English equivalent of “Who is it?” and “A mouth that’s full,” or as combined, “Who’s the big shot?” He felt like a caged animal being studied by a horde of beasts of another species, perhaps vicious. He held on to the case, staring straight ahead, and as two hands started clawing at the slight space in the upper window on his right, he reached slowly down into his pocket for the hunting knife. The fingers broke through.
“Jau!” screamed Pak-fei, thrashing his way through the crowd. “This is a most important taipan and the police up the street will pour boiling oil on your genitals if you disturb him! Get away, away!” He unlocked the door, jumped in behind the wheel, and yanked the door shut amid furious curses. He started the engine, gunned it, then pressed his hand on the powerful horn and held it there, raising the cacophony to unbearable proportions, as the sea of bodies, slowly, reluctantly parted. The Daimler lurched in fits and starts down the narrow street.
“Where are we going?” shouted Webb. “I thought we were there!”
“The merchant you will deal with has moved his place of business, sir, which is good, for this is not a savory district of the Mongkok.”
“You should have called first. That wasn’t very pleasant back there.”
“If I may correct the impression of imperfect service, sir,” said Pak-fei, glancing at David in the rearview mirror. “We now know that you are not being followed. As a consequence I am not being followed to where I drive you.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You go with your hands free into a large bank on Chater Square and you come out with your hands not free. You carry a briefcase.”
“So?” Webb watched the driver’s eyes as they kept darting up at him.
“No guard accompanied you, and there are bad people who watch for such men as yourself—often signals are sent from other bad people inside. These are uncertain times, so it was better to be certain in this instance.”
“And you’re certain … now.”
“Oh, yes, sir!” Pak-fei smiled. “An automobile following us on a back street in the Mongkok is easily seen.”
“So there was no phone call.”
“Oh, indeed there was, sir. One must always call first. But it was very quick, and I then walked back on the pavement, without my cap, of course, for many meters. There were no angry men in automobiles, and none climbed out to run in the street. I will now take you to the merchant much relieved.”
“I’m relieved, too,” said David, wondering why Jason Bourne had temporarily deserted him. “And I didn’t even know I should have been worried. Not about being followed.”
The dense crowds of the Mongkok thinned out as the buildings became lower and Webb could see the waters of Victoria Harbor behind high, chain link fences. Beyond the forbidding barricades were clusters of warehouses fronting piers where merchant ships were docked and heavy machinery crawled and groaned, lifting huge boxcars into holds. Pak-fei turned into the entrance of an isolated one-story warehouse; it appeared deserted, asphalt everywhere and only two cars in sight. The gate was closed; a guard walked out of a small, glass-enclosed office toward the Daimler, a clipboard in his hand.
“You won’t find my name on a list,” said Pak-fei in Chinese and with singular authority as the guard approached. “Inform Mr. Wu Song that Regent Number Five is here and brings him a taipan as worthy as himself. He expects us.” The guard nodded, squinting in the afternoon sunlight to catch a glimpse of the important passenger. “Aiya!” screamed Pak-fei at the man’s impertinence. Then he turned and looked at Webb. “You must not misunderstand, sir,” he said as the guard ran back to his telephone. “My use of the name of my fine hotel has nothing to do with my fine hotel. In truth, if Mr. Liang, or anyone else, knew I mentioned its name in such business as this, I would be relieved of my job. It is merely that I was born on the fifth day of the fifth month in the year of our Christian Lord, 1935.”
“I’ll never tell,” said David, smiling to himself, thinking that Jason Bourne had not deserted him after all. The myth that he once had been knew the avenues that led to the right contacts—knew them blindly—and that man was there inside David Webb.
The curtained whitewashed room of the warehouse, lined with locked, horizontal display cases, was not unlike a museum displaying such artifacts from past civilizations as primitive tools, fossilized insects, mystic carvings of religions past. The difference here was in the objects. These were exploding weapons that ran the gamut, from the lowest-caliber handguns and rifles to the most sophisticated weapons of modern warfare—thousand-round automatic machine guns with spiraling clips on near-weightless frames to laser-guided rockets to be fired from the shoulder, an arsenal for terrorists. Two men in business suits stood guard, one outside the entrance to the room, the other inside. As was to be expected, the former bowed his apology and moved an electronic scanner up and down the clothes of Webb and his driver. Then the man reached for the attaché case. David pulled it away, shaking his head and gesturing at the wandlike scanner. The guard had waved it over the surface of the case, checking his dials as he did so.
“Private papers,” Webb said in Chinese to the startled guard as he walked into the room.
It took David nearly a full minute to absorb what he saw, to shake off his disbelief. He looked at the bold—emblazoned—No Smoking signs in English, French, and Chinese that were all over the walls and wondered why they were there. Nothing was exposed. He walked over the small-arms display and examined the wares. He clutched the attaché case in his hand as though it were a lifeline to sanity in a world gone mad with instruments of violence.
“Huanying!” cried a voice, followed by the appearance of a youngish-looking man. He came out of a paneled door in one of those tight-fitting European suits that exaggerate the shoulders and hug the waist, the rear panels of the jacket flowing like a peacock’s tail—the product of designers determined to be chic at the price of neutering the male image.
“This is Mr. Wu Song, sir,” said Pak-fei, bowing first to the merchant and then to Webb. “It is not necessary for you to give your name, sir.”
“Bu!” spat out the young merchant, pointing at David’s attaché case. “Bu jing ya!”
“Your client, Mr. Song, speaks fluent Chinese.” The driver turned to David. “As you heard, sir, Mr. Song objects to the presence of your briefcase.”
“It doesn’t leave my hand,” said Webb.
“Then there can be no serious discussion of business,” rejoined Wu Song in flawless English.
“Why not? Your man checked it. There are no weapons inside, and even if there were and I tried to open it, I have an idea I’d be on the floor before the lid was up.”
“Plastic?” asked Wu Song. “Plastic microphones leading to recording devices where the metal content is so low as to be dismissed even by sophisticated machinery?”
“As they say in your country, it goes with the territory.”
“Your idiom’s as good as your English.”
“Columbia University, ’73.”
“Did you major in armaments?”
“No, marketing.”
“Aiya!” shrieked Pak-fei, but he was too late. The rapid colloquy had covered the movement of the guards; they had walked across the room, at the last instant lunging at Webb and the driver.
Jason Bourne spun around, dislodging his attacker’s arm from his shoulder, clamping it under his own and, twisting it, forced the man down and smashed the attaché case into the Oriental’s face. The moves were coming back to him. The violence was returning as it had to a bewildered amnesiac on a fishing boat beyond the shoals of a Mediterranean island. So much forgotten, so much unexplained, but remembered. The man fell to the floor, stunned, as his partner turned in fury to Webb after pummeling Pak-fei, the driver, to the ground. He rushed forward, his hands held up in a diagonal thrust, his wide chest and shoulders the base of his dual battering rams. David dropped the attaché case, lurched to his right, then spun again, again to his right, his left foot lashing up from the floor, catching the Chinese in the groin with such force that the man doubled over, screaming. Webb instantly kicked out with his right foot, his toe digging into the attacker’s throat directly under his jaw; the man rolled on the floor, gasping for air, one hand on his groin, the other gripping his neck. The first guard started to rise; Bourne stepped forward and smashed his knee into the man’s chest, sending him halfway across the room where he fell unconscious beneath a display case.
The young arms merchant was stunned. He was witnessing the unthinkable, expecting any moment that what he saw would be reversed, his guards the victors. Then suddenly, emphatically, he knew it was not going to happen; he ran in panic to the paneled door, reaching it as Webb reached him. David gripped the padded shoulders, spinning the merchant back across the floor. Wu Song tripped over his twisting feet and fell; he held up his hands, pleading. “No, please! Stop! I cannot stand physical confrontation! Take what you will!”
“You can’t stand what?”
“You heard me, I get ill!”
“What the hell do you think all this is about?” yelled David, sweeping his arm around the room.
“I service a demand, that is all. Take whatever you want, but don’t touch me. Please!”
Disgusted, Webb crossed to the fallen driver, who was getting to his knees, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. “What I take I pay for,” he said to the arms merchant as he grabbed the driver’s arm and helped him to his feet. “Are you all right?”
“You ask for great trouble, sir,” replied Pak-fei, his hands trembling, fear in his eyes.
“It had nothing to do with you. Wu Song knows that, don’t you, Wu?”
“I brought you here!” insisted the driver.
“To make a purchase,” added David quickly. “So let’s get it over with. But first tie up those two goons. Use the curtains. Rip them down.”
Pak-fei looked imploringly at the young merchant.
“Great Christian Jesus, do as he says!” yelled Wu Song. “He will strike me! Take the curtains! Tie them, you imbecile!”
Three minutes later Webb held in his hand an odd-looking gun, bulky but not large. It was an advanced weapon; the perforated cylinder that was the silencer was pneumatically snapped on, reducing the decibel count of a gunshot to a loud spit—but no more than a spit—the accuracy unaffected at close range. It held nine rounds, clips released and inserted at the base of the handle in a matter of seconds; there were three in reserve—thirty-six shells with the firepower of a .357 Magnum available instantly in a gun half the size and weight of a Colt .45.
“Remarkable,” said Webb, glancing at the bound guards and a quaking Pak-fei. “Who designed it?” So much expertise was coming back to him. So much recognition. From where?
“As an American, it may offend you,” answered Wu Song, “but he is a man in Bristol, Connecticut, who realized that the company he works for—designs for—would never recompense him adequately for his invention. Through intermediaries he went on the closed international market and sold to the highest bidder.”
“You?”
“I do not invest. I market.”
“That’s right, I forgot. You service a demand.”
“Precisely.”
“Whom do you pay?”
“A numbered account in Singapore, I know nothing else. I’m protected, of course. Everything’s on consignment.”
“I see. How much for this?”
“Take it. My gift to you.”
“You smell. I don’t take gifts from people who smell. How much?”
Wu Song swallowed. “The list price is eight hundred American dollars.”
Webb reached into his left pocket and pulled out the denominations he had placed there. He counted out eight $100 bills and gave them to the arms merchant. “Paid in full,” he said.
“Paid,” agreed the Chinese.
“Tie him up,” said David, turning to the apprehensive Pak-fei. “No, don’t worry about it. Tie him up!”
“Do as he says, you idiot!”
“Then take the three of them outside. Along the side of the building by the car. And stay out of sight of the gate.”
“Quickly!” yelled Song. “He is angry!”
“You can count on it,” agreed Webb.
Four minutes later the two guards and Wu Song walked awkwardly through the outside door into the blazing afternoon sunlight, made harsher by the dancing reflections off the waters of Victoria Harbor. Their knees and arms were tied in the ripped cloth of the curtains, so their movements were hesitant and uncertain. Silence was guaranteed by wads of fabric in the mouths of the guards. No such precautions were needed for the young merchant; he was petrified.
Alone, David put his retrieved attaché case on the floor and walked rapidly around the room studying the displays in the cases until he found what he wanted. He smashed the glass with the handle of his gun, and picked around the shards for the weapons he would use—weapons coveted by terrorists everywhere—timer grenades, each with the impact of a 20-pound bomb. How did he know? Where did the knowledge come from?
He removed six grenades and checked each battery charge. How could he do that? How did he know where to look, what to press? No matter. He knew. He looked at his watch.
He set the timers of each and ran along the display cases, crashing the handle of his weapon into the glass tops and dropping into each a grenade. He had one left and two cases to go; he looked up at the trilingual No Smoking signs and made another decision. He ran to the paneled door, opened it, and saw what he thought he might see. He threw in the final grenade.
Webb checked his watch, picked up the attaché case and went outside, making a point of being very much in control. He approached the Daimler at the side of the warehouse where Pak-fei seemed to be apologizing to his prisoners, perspiring as he did so. The driver was being alternately berated and consoled by Wu Song, who wanted nothing more than to be spared any further violence.
“Take them over to the breakwater,” ordered David, pointing to the stone wall that rose above the waters of the harbor.
Wu Song stared at Webb. “Who are you?” he asked.
The moment had come. It was now.
Webb again looked at his watch as he walked over to the arms merchant. He gripped Wu Song’s elbow and shoved the frightened Chinese farther along the side of the building where soft-spoken words would not be overheard by the others. “My name is Jason Bourne,” said David simply.
“Jason Bou—!” The Oriental gasped, reacting as though a stiletto had punctured his throat, his own eyes witnessing the final, violent act of his own death.
“And if you have any ideas about restoring a bruised ego by punishing someone—say, my driver—get rid of them. I’ll know where to find you.” Webb paused for a single beat, then continued. “You’re a privileged man, Wu, but with that privilege goes a responsibility. For certain reasons you may be questioned, and I don’t expect you to lie—I doubt that you’re very good at lying anyway—so we met, I’ll accept that. I even stole from you, if you like. But if you give an accurate description of me, you’d better be on the other side of the world—and dead. It would be less painful for you.”
The Columbia graduate froze, his lower lip trembling as he stared at Webb. David returned the look in silence, nodding his head once. He released Wu Song’s arm and walked back to Pak-fei and the two bound guards, leaving the panicked merchant to his racing thoughts.
“Do as I told you, Pak-fei,” he said, once more looking at his watch. “Get them over to the wall and tell them to lie down. Explain that I’m covering them with my gun, and will be covering them until we drive through the gate. I think their employer will attest to the fact that I’m a reasonably proficient marksman.”
The driver reluctantly barked the orders in Chinese, bowing to the arms merchant, as Wu Song started ahead of the others, awkwardly maneuvering himself toward the breakwater some seventy-odd yards away. Webb looked inside the Daimler.
“Throw me the keys!” he shouted to Pak-fei. “And hurry up!”
David snatched the keys from the air and climbed into the driver’s seat. He started the engine, slipped the Daimler into gear, and followed the odd-looking parade across the asphalt directly behind the warehouse.
Wu Song and his two guards lay prostrate on the ground. Webb leaped out of the car, the motor running, and raced around the trunk to the other side, his newly purchased weapon in his hand, the silencer affixed. “Get in and drive!” he shouted to Pak-fei. “Quickly!”
The driver jumped in, bewildered. David fired three shots—spits that blew up the asphalt several feet in front of each captive’s face. It was enough; all three rolled in panic into the wall. Webb got into the front seat of the car. “Let’s go!” he said, for a final time looking at his watch, his gun out the window aimed in the vicinity of the three prostrate figures. “Now!”
The gate swung back for the august taipan in the august limousine. The Daimler raced through and turned right into the speeding traffic on the dual-lane highway to Mongkok.
“Slow down!” ordered David. “Pull over to the side, on the dirt.”
“These drivers are madmen, sir. They speed because they know that in minutes they will barely move. It will be difficult to get back on the road.”
“Somehow I don’t think so.”
It happened. The explosions came one after another—three, four, five … six. The isolated one-story warehouse blew to the skies, flames and deep black smoke filling the air above the land and the harbor, causing automobiles and trucks and buses to come to screeching stops on the highway.
“You?” shrieked Pak-fei, his mouth gaping, his bulging eyes on Webb.
“I was there.”
“We were there, sir! I am dead! Aiya!”
“No, Pak-fei, you’re not,” said David. “You’re protected, take my word for that. You’ll never hear from Mr. Wu Song again. I suspect he’ll be on the other side of the world, probably in Iran, teaching marketing to the mullahs. I don’t know who else would accept him.”
“But why? How, sir?”
“He’s finished. He dealt in what’s called ‘consignments,’ which means he pays as his merchandise is sold. Are you following me?”
“I think so, sir.”
“He has no more merchandise, but it wasn’t sold. It just went away.”
“Sir?”
“He kept wired rolls of dynamite and cases of explosive plastic in the back room. They were too primitive to put in the display cases. Also too bulky.”
“Sir?”
“I couldn’t have a cigarette.… Weave around the traffic, Pak-fei. I have to get back to Kowloon.”
As they entered the Tsim Sha Tsui, the movements of Pak-fei’s constantly turning head intruded on Webb’s thoughts. The driver kept looking at him. “What is it?” he asked.
“I am not certain, sir. I am frightened, of course.”
“You didn’t believe what I told you? That you’ve got nothing to be afraid of?”
“That is not it, sir. I think I must believe you, for I saw what you did, and I saw Wu Song’s face when you spoke with him. I think it is you I am frightened of, but I also think this may be wrong, for you did protect me. It was in Wu Song’s eyes. I cannot explain.”
“Don’t bother,” said David, reaching into his pocket for money. “Are you married, Pak-fei? Or have a girlfriend, or a boyfriend? It doesn’t matter.”
“Married, sir. I have two grown children who have not-bad jobs. They contribute; my joss is good.”
“Now it’ll be better. Go home and pick up your wife—and children, if you like—and drive, Pak-fei. Drive up into the New Territories for many miles. Stop and have a fine meal in Tuen Mun or Yuen Long and then drive some more. Let them enjoy this fine automobile.”
“Sir?”
“A xiao xin,” went on Webb, the money in his hand. “What we call in English a little white lie that doesn’t hurt anybody. You see, I want the mileage on this car to approximate where you’ve driven me today—and tonight.”
“Where is that?”
“You drove Mr. Cruett first up to Lo Wu and then across the base of the mountain range to Lok Ma Chau.”
“Those are checkpoints into the People’s Republic.”
“Yes, they are,” agreed David, removing two $100 bills, and then a third. “Do you think you can remember that and make the mileage right?”
“Most certainly, sir.”
“And do you think,” added Webb, his finger on a fourth $100 bill, “that you could say I left the car at Lok Ma Chau and wandered up in the hills for an hour or so.”
“Ten hours, if you like, sir. I need no sleep.”
“One hour is fine.” David held out the $400 in front of the driver’s startled eyes. “And I’ll know if you don’t live up to our agreement.”
“You have no concerns, sir!” cried Pak-fei, one hand on the wheel, the other grasping the bills. “I shall pick up my wife, my children, her parents, and my own as well. This animal I drive is big enough for twelve. I thank you, sir! I thank you!”
“Drop me off around ten streets from Salisbury Road and get out of the area. I don’t want this car seen in Kowloon.”
“No, sir, it is not possible. We will be in Lo Wu, in Lok Ma Chau!”
“As far as tomorrow morning goes, say whatever you like. I won’t be here, I’m leaving tonight. You won’t see me again.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Our contract’s concluded, Pak-fei,” said Jason Bourne, his thoughts returning to a strategy that became clearer with each move he made. And each move brought him closer to Marie. All was colder now. There was a certain freedom in being what he was not.
Play the scenario as it was given to you.… Be everywhere at once. Make them sweat.
At 5:02 an obviously disturbed Liang walked rapidly out the glass doors of the Regent. He looked anxiously around at the arriving and departing guests, then turned to his left and hurried down the pavement toward the ramp leading to the street. David watched him through the spraying fountains on the opposite side of the courtyard. Using the fountains as his cover, Webb ran across the busy area, dodging cars and taxis; he reached the ramp and followed Liang down toward Salisbury Road.
He stopped midway to the street and turned, angling his body and his face to the left. The assistant manager had come to an abrupt halt, his body lurching forward, as an anxious person in a hurry will do when he has suddenly remembered something or changes his mind. It had to be the latter, thought David, as he cautiously shifted his head and saw Liang rushing across the entrance drive toward the crowded pavement of the New World Shopping Centre. Webb knew he would lose him in the crowds if he did not hurry, so he held up both hands, stopping the traffic, and raced diagonally down the ramp as horns bellowed and angry shrieks came from drivers. He reached the pavement, sweating, anxious. He could not see Liang! Where was he? The sea of Oriental faces became a blur, so much the same, yet not the same. Where was he? David rushed ahead, muttering excuses as he collided with bodies and startled faces; he saw him! He was sure it was Liang—but not sure, not really. He had seen a dark-suited figure turn into the entrance of the harbor walkway, a long stretch of concrete above the water where people fished and strolled and performed their tai chi exercises in the early mornings. Yet he had seen only the back of a man; if it was not Liang he would leave the street and lose him completely. Instinct. Not yours but Bourne’s—the eyes of Jason Bourne.
Webb broke into a run, heading for the arched entrance of the walkway. The skyline of Hong Kong sparkled in the sunlit distance, the traffic in the harbor bobbing furiously, winding up the day’s labors on the water. He slowed down as he passed under the arch; there was no way back to Salisbury Road but through the entrance. The walkway was a dead-end intrusion on the waterfront, and that raised a question, as well as supplying an answer to another. Why had Liang—if it was Liang—boxed himself into a dead end? What drew him to it? A contact, a drop, a relay? Whatever it was, it meant that the Chinese had not considered the possibility that he was being followed; that was the immediate answer David needed. It told him what he had to know. His prey was in panic; the unexpected could only propel him into further panic.
Jason Bourne’s eyes had not lied. It was Liang, but the first question remained unanswered, even compounded by what Webb saw. Of the thousands upon thousands of public telephones in Kowloon—tucked away in crowded arcades and in recessed corners of darkened lobbies—Liang had chosen to use a pay phone on the inner wall of the walkway. It was exposed, in the open, in the center of a wide thoroughfare that was in itself a dead end. It made no sense; even the rankest amateur had basic protective instincts. When in panic he sought cover.
Liang reached into his pocket for change, and suddenly, as if commanded by an inner voice, David knew that he could not permit that call to be made. When it was made, he had to make it. It was part of his strategy, a part that would bring him closer to Marie! The control had to be in his hands, not others’!
He began running, heading straight toward the white plastic shell of the pay phone, wanting to shout but knowing he had to get closer to be heard over the sounds of the windblown waterfront. The assistant manager had just finished dialing. Somewhere a telephone was ringing.
“Liang!” roared Webb. “Get off that phone! If you want to live, hang up and get out of there!”
The Chinese spun around, his face a rigid mask of terror. “You!” he shouted hysterically, pressing his body back into the shell of white plastic. “No … no! Not now! Not here!”
Gunfire suddenly filled the winds off the water, staccato bursts that joined the myriad sounds of the harbor. Pandemonium swept over the walkway, as people screamed and shrieked, dropping to the ground or racing in all directions away from the terror of instant death.