“Who are you?” screamed Bourne in a frenzy, gripping the old man by the throat and pressing him into the wall.
“Delta, stop it!” commanded d’Anjou. “Your voice! People will hear you. They’ll think you’re killing him. They’ll call the desk.”
“I may kill him and the phones don’t work!” Jason released the impostor’s impostor, released his throat but gripped the front of his shirt, ripping it as he swung the man down into a chair.
“The door,” continued d’Anjou steadily, angrily. “Put it in place as best you can, for God’s sake. I want to get out of Beijing alive, and every second with you diminishes my prospects. The door!”
Half crazed, Bourne whipped around, picked up the shattered door and shoved it into the frame, adjusting the sides and kicking them into place. The old man massaged his throat and suddenly tried to spring out of the chair.
“Non, mon ami!” said the Frenchman, blocking him. “Stay where you are. Do not concern yourself with me, only with him. You see, he really might kill you. In his rage he has no respect for the golden years, but since I’m nearly there, I do.”
“ ‘Rage’? This is an outrage!” sputtered the old man, coughing his words. “I fought at El Alamein and, by Christ, I’ll fight now!” Again the old man struggled out of the chair, and again d’Anjou pushed him back as Jason returned.
“Oh, the stoically heroic British,” observed the Frenchman. “At least you had the grace not to say Agincourt.”
“Cut the crap!” shouted Bourne, pushing d’Anjou aside and leaning over the chair, his hands on both arms, crowding the old man back into the seat. “You tell me where he is and you tell me quickly, or you may wish you never got out of El Alamein!”
“Where who is, you maniac?”
“You’re not the man downstairs! You’re not Joseph Wadsworth going up to Room three-twenty-five!”
“This is Room three-twenty-five and I am Joseph Wadsworth! Brigadier, retired, Royal Engineers!”
“When did you check in?”
“Actually, I was spared that drudgery,” replied Wadsworth haughtily. “As a professional guest of the government, certain courtesies are extended. I was escorted through customs and brought directly here. I must say the room service is hardly up to snuff—God knows, it’s not the Connaught—and the damned telephone’s mostly on the fritz.”
“I asked you when!”
“Last night, but since the plane was six hours late, I suppose I should say this morning.”
“What were your instructions?”
“I’m not sure it’s any of your business.”
Bourne whipped out the brass letter-opener from his belt and held the sharp point against the old man’s throat. “It is, if you want to get out of that chair alive.”
“Good God, you are a maniac.”
“You’re right, I haven’t much time for sanity. In fact, none at all. The instructions!”
“They’re harmless enough. I was to be picked up sometime around twelve noon, and as it’s now after three, one can assume that the People’s government is not run by the clock any more than its airline.”
D’Anjou touched Bourne’s arm. “The eleven-thirty plane,” said the Frenchman quietly. “He’s the decoy and knows nothing.”
“Then your Judas is here in another room,” replied Jason over his shoulder. “He has to be!”
“Don’t say any more, he’ll be questioned.” With sudden and unexpected authority, d’Anjou edged Bourne away from the chair and spoke in the impatient tones of a superior officer. “See here, Brigadier, we apologize for the inconvenience, it’s a damned nuisance, I know. This is the third room we’ve broken into—we learned the name of each occupant for the purposes of shock interrogation.”
“Shock what? I don’t understand.”
“One of four people on this floor has smuggled in over five million dollars’ worth of narcotics. Since it wasn’t the three of you, we have our man. I suggest you do as the others are doing. Say your room was broken into by a raging drunk, furious over the accommodations—that’s what they’re saying. There’s a lot of that going around, and it’s best not to be put under suspicion, even by mistaken association. The government here often overreacts.”
“Wouldn’t want that,” sputtered Wadsworth, formerly of the Royal Engineers. “Damned pension’s little enough to get by on. This is a bloody feather from the goose’s ass.”
“The door, Major,” ordered d’Anjou, addressing Jason. “Easy, now. Try to keep it upright.” The Frenchman turned to the Englishman. “Stand by and hold it, Brigadier. Just lean it back and give us twenty minutes to get our man, then do whatever you like. Remember, a raging drunk. For your own sake.”
“Yes, yes, of course. A drunk. Raging.”
“Come, Major!”
Out in the hallway they picked up their bags and started rapidly toward the staircase. “Hurry up!” said Bourne. “There’s still time. He has to make his change—I’d have to make it! We’ll check the street entrances, the taxi stands, try to pick two logical ones, or, goddamn it, illogical ones. We’ll each take one and work out signals.”
“First there are two doors,” broke in d’Anjou breathlessly. “In this hallway. Pick any two you wish, but do it quickly. Kick them in and yell abusive language, slurring your words, of course.”
“You were serious?”
“Never more so, Delta. As we saw for ourselves, the explanation is entirely plausible, and embarrassment will restrict any formal investigation. The management will no doubt persuade our brigadier to keep his mouth shut. They could lose their comfortable jobs. Quickly now! Take your choice and do the job!”
Jason stopped at the next door on the right. He braced himself, then rushed toward it, crashing his shoulder into the middle of the flimsy upper panel. The door flew open.
“Madad demaa!” screamed a woman in Hindi, half out of her sari, which was draped around her feet.
“Kyaa baat hai?” shrieked a naked man racing out of the bathroom, hastily covering his genitals.
Both stood gaping at the mad intruder, who lurched about with unfocused eyes as he swept articles off the nearest bureau, yelling in a coarse, drunken voice. “Rotten hotel! Toilets don’t work, phones don’t work! Nothing—Jesus, this isn’t my room! Shhorry …”
Bourne weaved out, ‘slamming the door shut behind him.
“That was fine!” said d’Anjou. “They had trouble with the lock. Hurry. One more. That one!” The Frenchman pointed to a door on the left. “I heard laughter inside. Two voices.”
Again Jason crashed into a door, smashing it open, roaring his drunken complaints. However, instead of being met by two startled guests, he faced a young couple, both bare to the waist, each drawing on a pinched cigarette, inhaling deeply, their eyes glazed.
“Welcome, neighbor,” said the young American male, his voice floating, his diction precise, if at quarter speed. “Don’t let things trouble you so. The phones don’t work, but our can does. Use it, share it. Don’t get so uptight.”
“What the hell are you doing in my room?” yelled Jason even more drunkenly, his slur now obscuring his words.
“If this is your room, macho boy,” interrupted the girl, swaying in her chair, “you were privy to private things and we’re not like that.” She giggled.
“Christ, you’re stoned!”
“And without taking the Lord’s name in vain,” countered the young man, “you’re very drunk.”
“We don’t believe in alcohol,” added the spaced-out girl. “It produces hostility. It rises to the surface like Lucifer’s demons.”
“Get yourself detoxified, neighbor,” continued the young American liltingly. “Then get healthy with grass. I will lead you into the fields where you will find your soul again—”
Bourne raced out of the room, slamming the door, and grabbed d’Anjou’s arm. “Let’s go,” he said, adding as they approached the staircase, “If that story you gave the brigadier gets around, those two will spend twenty years deballing sheep in Outer Mongolia.”
The Chinese proclivity for close observation and intense security dictated that the airport hotel have a single large entrance in the front for guests, and a second for employees at the side of the building. The latter was replete with uniformed guards who scrutinized everyone’s working papers and searched all purses and bags and bulging pockets when the employees left for the day. The lack of familiarity between guards and workers suggested that the former were changed frequently, putting space between potential bribes and bribers.
“He won’t chance the guards,” said Jason as they passed the employees’ exit after hastily checking their two suitcases, pleading lateness for a meeting due to the delayed plane. “They look as if they get Brownie points for picking up anyone who steals a chicken wing or a bar of soap.”
“They also intensely dislike those who work here,” agreed d’Anjou. “But why are you so certain he’s still in the hotel? He knows Beijing. He could have taken a taxi to another hotel, another room.”
“Not looking the way he did on the plane, I told you that. He wouldn’t allow it. I wouldn’t. He wants the freedom to move around without being spotted or followed. He’s got to have it for his own protection.”
“If that’s the case, they could be watching his room right now. Same results. They’ll know what he looks like.”
“If it were me—and that’s all I’ve got to go on—he’s not there. He’s made arrangements for another room.”
“You contradict yourself!” objected the Frenchman as they approached the crowded entrance of the airport hotel. “You said he’d be receiving his instructions by phone. Whoever calls will ask for the room they assigned him, certainly not the decoy’s, not Wadsworth’s.”
“If the phones are working—a condition that’s a plus for your Judas, incidentally—it’s a simple matter to have calls transferred from one room to another. A plug is inserted in the switchboard if it’s primitive, or programmed if it’s computerized. It’s not a big deal. A business conference, old friends on the plane—read that any way you like—or no explanation at all, which is probably best.”
“Fallacy!” proclaimed d’Anjou. “His client here in Beijing will alert the hotel operators. He’ll be wired into the switchboard.”
“That’s the one thing he won’t do,” said Bourne, pushing the Frenchman through a revolving door out onto the pavement, which was crawling with confused tourists and businessmen trying to arrange transportation. “It’s a gamble he can’t afford to take,” continued Jason as they walked past a line of small, shabby buses and well-aged taxis at the curb. “Your commando’s client has to keep maximum distance between the two of them. There can’t be the slightest possibility that a connection could be traced, so that means everything’s restricted to a very tight, very elite circle, with no runs on a switchboard, no calling attention to anyone, especially your commando. They won’t risk wandering around the hotel either. They’ll stay away from him, let him make the moves. There are too many secret police here; someone in that elite circle could be recognized.”
“The phones, Delta. From all we’ve heard, they’re not working. What does he do then?”
Jason frowned while walking, as if trying to recall the unremembered. “Time’s on his side, that’s the plus. He’ll have backup instructions to follow in case he’s not reached within a given period of time after his arrival—for whatever reasons—and there could be any number considering the precautions they have to take.”
“In that event they’d still be watching for him, wouldn’t they? They’d wait somewhere outside and try to pick him up, no?”
“Of course, and he knows that. He has to get by them and reach his position without being seen. It’s the only way he retains control. It’s his first job.”
D’Anjou gripped Bourne’s elbow. “Then I think I’ve just spotted one of the spotters.”
“What?” Jason turned, looking down at the Frenchman and slowing his pace.
“Keep walking,” ordered d’Anjou. “Head over to that truck, the one half out on the street with the man on the extension ladder.”
“It follows,” said Bourne. “It’s the telephone repair service.” Remaining anonymous in the crowds, they reached the truck.
“Look up. Look interested. Then look to your left. The van quite far ahead of the first bus. Do you see it?”
Jason did, and instantly he knew the Frenchman was right. The van was white and fairly new and had tinted glass windows. Except for the color it could be the van that had picked up the assassin in Shenzen, at the Lo Wu border. Bourne started to read the Chinese characters on the door panel. “Niao Jing Shan.… My God, it’s the same! The name doesn’t matter—it belongs to a bird sanctuary, the Jing Shan Bird Sanctuary! In Shenzen it was Chutang, here something else. How did you notice it?”
“The man in the open window, the last window on this side. You can’t see him too clearly from here, but he’s looking back at the entrance. He’s also somewhat of a contradiction—for an employee of a bird sanctuary, that is.”
“Why?”
“He’s an army officer, and by the cut of his tunic and the obviously superior fabric, one of high rank. Is the glorious People’s Army now conscripting egrets for its assault troops? Or is he an anxious man waiting for someone he’s been ordered to pick up and follow, using a rather acceptable cover flawed by an angle of sight that demands an open window?”
“Can’t go anywhere without Echo,” said Jason Bourne, once Delta, the scourge of Medusa. “Bird sanctuaries—Christ, it’s beautiful. What a smoke screen. So removed, so peaceful. It’s one hell of a cover.”
“It’s so Chinese, Delta. The righteous mask conceals the unrighteous face. The Confucian parables warn of it.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. Back in Shenzen, at Lo Wu, where I missed your boy the first time, he was picked up by a van then—a van with tinted windows—and it also belonged to a government bird sanctuary.”
“As you say, an excellent cover.”
“It’s more than that, Echo. It’s some kind of mark or identification.”
“Birds have been revered in China for centuries,” said d’Anjou, looking at Jason, his expression puzzled. “They’ve always been depicted in their great art, the great silks. They’re considered delicacies for both the eye and the palate.”
“In this case they could be a means to something much simpler, much more practical.”
“Such as?”
“Bird sanctuaries are large preserves. They’re open to the public but subject to government regulations, as they are everywhere.”
“Your point, Delta?”
“In a country where any ten people opposed to the official line are afraid to be seen together, what better place than a nature preserve that usually stretches for miles? No offices or houses or apartments being watched, no telephone taps or electronic surveillance. Just innocent bird-watchers in a nation of bird lovers, each holding an official pass that permits him entry when the sanctuary is officially closed—day or night.”
“From Shenzen to Peking? You’re implying a situation larger than we had considered.”
“Whatever it is,” said Jason, glancing around. “It doesn’t concern us. Only he does.… We’ve got to separate but stay in sight. I’ll head over—”
“No need!” broke in the Frenchman. “There he is!”
“Where?”
“Move back! Closer to the truck. In its shadow.”
“Which one is he?”
“The priest patting the child, the little girl,” answered d’Anjou, his back to the truck, staring into the crowd in front of the hotel’s entrance. “A man of the cloth,” continued the Frenchman bitterly. “One of the guises I taught him to use. He had a priestly black suit made for him in Hong Kong complete with an Anglican benediction sewn into the collar under the name of a Savile Row tailor. It was the suit I recognized first. I paid for it.”
“You come from a wealthy diocese,” said Bourne, studying the man he wanted more than his life to race over and take, to subdue and force up into a hotel room and start on the road back to Marie. The assassin’s cover was good—more than good—and Jason tried to analyze that judgment. Gray sideburns protruded below the killer’s dark hat; thin steel-rimmed glasses were perched low on the nose of his pale, colorless face. His eyes wide and his brows arched, he showed joy and wonder at what he saw in this unfamiliar place. All were God’s works and God’s children, signified by the act of being drawn to a little Chinese girl and patting her head lovingly, smiling and nodding graciously to the mother. That was it, thought Jason, in grudging respect. The son of a bitch exuded love. It was in his every gesture, every hesitant movement, every glance of his gentle eyes. He was a compassionate man of the cloth, a shepherd of his flock. And as such, in a crowd he might be glanced at but instantly dismissed by eyes seeking out a killer.
Bourne remembered. Carlos! The Jackal had been dressed in the clothes of a priest, his dark Latin features above the starched white collar, walking out of the church in Neuilly-sur-Seine in Paris. Jason had seen him! They had seen each other, their eyes locking, each knowing who the other was without words being spoken. Get Carlos. Trap Carlos. Cain is for Charlie and Carlos is for Cain! The codes had exploded in his head as he raced after the Jackal in the streets of Paris … only to lose him in the traffic, as an old beggar, squatting on the pavement, smiled obscenely.
This was not Paris, thought Bourne. There was no army of dying old men protecting this assassin. He would take this jackal in Peking.
“Be ready to move!” said d’Anjou, breaking into Jason’s memories. “He’s nearing the bus.”
“That’s the point. He’ll be the last one on. Who refuses a pleading priest in a hurry? One of my lessons, of course.”
Again the Frenchman was right. The door of the small, packed shabby bus began to close, stopped by the inserted arm of the priest, who wedged his shoulder inside and obviously begged to be released, as he had been caught. The door snapped open; the killer pressed himself inside and the door closed.
“It’s the express to Tian An Men Square,” said d’Anjou. “I have the number.”
“We have to find a taxi. Come on!”
“It will not be easy, Delta.”
“I’ve perfected a technique,” replied Bourne, walking out of the shadow of the telephone truck as the bus passed by, the Frenchman at his heels. They weaved through the crowd in front of the airport hotel and proceeded down the line of taxis until they reached the end. A last cab rounded the circle, about to join the line, when Jason rushed into the street, holding up the palms of his hands unobtrusively. The taxi came to a stop as the driver pushed his head out the window.
“Shemma?”
“Wei!” cried Bourne, running to the driver and holding up fifty American dollars’ worth of unmetered yuan. “Bi yao bang zhu,” he said, telling the man he needed help badly and would pay for it.
“Hao!” exclaimed the driver as he grabbed the money. “Bingle ba!” he added, justifying his action on behalf of a tourist who was suddenly ill.
Jason and d’Anjou climbed in, the driver vocally annoyed that there was a second fare entering the curbside door. Bourne dropped another twenty yuan over the seat, and the man was mollified. He swung his cab around, away from the line of taxis, and retraced his path out of the airport complex.
“Up ahead there is a bus,” said d’Anjou, leaning forward in the seat, addressing the driver in an awkward attempt at Mandarin. “Can you understand me?”
“Your tongue is Guangzhou, but I understand.”
“It is on the way to Tian An Men Square.”
“Which gate?” asked the driver. “Which bridge?”
“I don’t know. I know only the number on the front of the bus. It is seven-four-two-one.”
“Number one ending,” said the driver. “Tian Gate, second bridge. Imperial city entrance.”
“Is there a parking section for the buses?”
“There will be a line of many bus-vehicles. All are filled. They are very crowded. Tian An Men is very crowded this angle of the sun.”
“We should pass the bus I speak of on the road, which is favorable to us for we wish to be at Tian An Men before it arrives. Can you do this?”
“Without difficulty,” answered the driver, grinning. “Bus-vehicles are old and often break down. We may get there several days before it reaches the heavenly north gate.”
“I hope you’re not serious,” interrupted Bourne.
“Oh, no, generous tourist. All the drivers are superior mechanics—when they have the good fortune to locate their engines.” The driver laughed contemptuously and pressed his foot on the accelerator.
Three minutes later they passed the “bus-vehicle” carrying the killer. Forty-six minutes after that they reached the sculptured white marble bridge over the flowing waters of a man-made moat that fronted the massive Gate of Heavenly Peace, where the leaders of China displayed themselves on the wide platform above, approving the paraded instruments of war and death. Inside the misnomered gate is one of the most extraordinary human achievements on earth. Tian An Men Square. The electrifying vortex of Beijing.
The majesty of its sheer vastness first catches the visitor’s eye, then the architectural immensity of the Great Hall of the People on the right, where reception areas accommodate as many as three thousand people. The single banquet hall seats over five thousand, the major “conference room” ten thousand with space to spare. On the opposite side of the Gate, reaching toward the clouds, is a four-sided shaft of stone, an obelisk mounted on a two-story terrace of balustraded marble, all glistening in the sunlight, while in the shadows below on the huge base of the structure are carved the struggles and triumphs of Mao’s revolution. It is the Monument to the People’s Heroes, Mao first in the pantheon. There are other buildings, other structures—memorials, museums, gates and libraries—as far as the eye can see. But, above all, the eye is struck by the compelling vastness of open space. Space and people … and for the ear something else, totally unexpected. A dozen of the world’s great stadiums, all dwarfing Rome’s Colosseum, could be placed within Tian An Men Square and not exhaust the acreage; people in the hundreds of thousands can wander about the open areas and still leave room for hundreds of thousands more. But there is an absence of an element whose lack would never have been found in Rome’s bloody arena, much less tolerated in the contemporary great stadiums of the world. Sound; it is barely there, only decibels above silence, interrupted by the soft rippling notes of bicycle bells. The quiet is at first peaceful, and then frightening. It is as though an enormous, transparent geodesic dome had been lowered over a hundred acres, as an unspoken, but understood, command from a nether kingdom repeatedly informs those below that they are in a cathedral. It is unnatural, unreal, and yet there is no hostility toward the unheard voice, only acceptance—and that is more frightening. Especially when the children are quiet.
Jason observed these things quickly and dispassionately. He paid the driver the sum based on the odometer reading and shifted his concentration to the purpose and the problems facing him and d’Anjou. For whatever reason, whether a phone call had reached him or whether he had opted for back-up instructions, the commando was on his way to Tian An Men Square. The pavane would begin with his arrival, the slow steps of the cautious dance bringing the killer closer and closer to his client’s representative, the assumption being that the client would remain out of sight. But no contact would be made until the impostor was convinced the rendezvous was clean. Therefore the “priest” would mount his own surveillance, circling the appointed coordinates of the meeting ground, searching out whatever armed minions were in place. He would take one, perhaps two, pressing them at the point of a knife or jamming a silenced gun into their ribs to elicit the information he needed; a false look in the eyes would tell him that the conference was a prelude to execution. Finally, if the landscape seemed clear, he would propel a minion under a gun to approach the client’s representative and give his ultimatum: the client himself must show up and walk into the net of the assassin’s making. Anything else was unacceptable; the central figure, the client, had to be the deadly balance. A second meeting ground would be established. The client would arrive first, and at the first sign of deception he would be blown away. That was the way of Jason Bourne. It would be the commando’s if he had half a brain in his head.
Bus number 7421 rolled lethargically into place at the end of the line of vehicles disgorging tourists. The assassin in priestly garb emerged, helping an elderly woman down to the pavement, patting her hand as he nodded his gentle good-byes. He turned away, walked rapidly to the rear of the bus, and disappeared around it.
“Stay a good thirty feet behind and watch me,” said Jason. “Do as I do. When I stop, you stop; when I turn, you turn. Be in a crowd; go from one group to another, but make sure there are always people around you.”
“Be careful, Delta. He is not an amateur.”
“Neither am I.” Bourne ran to the end of the bus, stopped, and edged his way around the hot, foul-smelling louvers of the rear engine. His priest was about fifty yards ahead, his black suit a dark beacon in the hazy sunlight. Crowds or no crowds, he was easy to follow. The commando’s cover was acceptable, his playing of it even more so, but like most covers there was always the glaring but unrecognized liability. It was in limiting those liabilities that the best distinguished themselves from the merely better. Professionally, Jason approved the clerical status, not the clerical color. A Roman priest might be wedded to black, but not an Anglican vicar; a solid gray was perfectly acceptable under the collar. Gray faded in the sunlight, black did not.
Suddenly, the assassin broke away from the crowd and walked up behind a Chinese soldier taking pictures, the camera at eye level, the soldier’s head moving constantly. Bourne understood. This was no insignificant enlisted man on leave in Beijing; he was too mature, his uniform too well tailored—as d’Anjou had remarked about the army officer in the truck. The camera was a transparent device to scan the crowds; the initial meeting ground was not far away. The commando, now playing his role to the fullest, clasped a fatherly right hand on the military man’s left shoulder. His left was unseen, but his black coat filled the space between them—a gun had been jammed into the officer’s ribs. The soldier froze, his expression stoic even in his panic. He moved with the assassin, the commando now gripping his arm and issuing orders. The soldier abruptly, out of character, bent over, holding his left side, recovering quickly and shaking his head; the weapon had been rammed again into his rib cage. He would follow orders, or he would die in Tian An Men Square. There was no compromise.
Bourne spun around, lowering his body and tying a perfectly firm shoelace, apologizing to those behind him. The assassin had checked his rear flank; the evasive action was demanded. Jason stood up. Where was he? Where was the impostor? There! Bourne was bewildered; the commando had let the soldier go! Why? The army officer was suddenly running through the crowds, screaming, his gestures wildly spastic, then in a frenzy he collapsed, and chattering, excited people gathered around his unconscious body.
Diversion! Watch him. Jason raced ahead, feeling the time was right. It had been not a gun but a needle—not jammed but puncturing the soldier’s rib cage. The assassin had taken out one protector; he would look for another, and perhaps another after that. The scenario Bourne had predicted was being played out. And as the killer’s concentration was solely on his search for his next victim, the time was right! Now! Jason knew he could take out anyone on earth with a paralyzing blow to the kidneys, especially a man whose least concern was an attack on himself—for the quarry was attacking and his concentration was absolute. Bourne closed the gap between himself and the impostor. Fifty feet, forty, thirty-five, thirty … he broke away from one crowd into another … the black-suited “priest” was within reach. He could take him! Marie!
A soldier. Another soldier! But now, instead of an assault there was communication. The army man nodded and gestured to his left. Jason looked over, bewildered. A short Chinese in civilian clothing and carrying a government briefcase was standing at the foot of a wide stone staircase that led up to the entrance of an immense building with granite pillars everywhere supporting twin sloping pagoda roofs. It was directly behind the Heroes’ Monument, the carved calligraphy over the huge doors proclaiming it to be the Chairman Mao Memorial Hall. Two lines were moving up the steps, guards separating the individual groups. The civilian was between the two lines, the briefcase a symbol of authority; he was left alone. Suddenly, without any indication that he would make such a move, the tall assassin gripped the soldier’s arm, propelling the smaller army man in front of him. The officer’s back arched, his shoulders snapping upright; a weapon had been shoved into his spine, the commands specific.
As the excitement mounted and the crowds and the police kept running to the collapsed first soldier, the assassin and his captive walked steadily toward the civilian at the steps of the Mao Memorial. The man was afraid to move, and again Bourne understood. These men were known to the killer; they were at the core of the tight, elite circle that led to the assassin’s client, and that client was nearby. They were no mere minions; once they appeared the lesser figures took on lesser importance, for these men rarely exposed themselves. The diversion, which was now reduced to a mild disturbance as the police swiftly controlled the crowds and carried the body away, had given the impostor the seconds he needed to control the chain that led to the client. The soldier in his grip was dead if he disobeyed, and with a single shot any reasonably competent marksman could kill the man by the steps. The meeting was in two stages, and as long as the assassin controlled the second stage he was perfectly willing to proceed. The client was obviously somewhere inside the vast mausoleum and could not know what was happening outside, nor would a mere minion dare follow his superiors up into the conference area.
There was no more time for analyzing, Jason knew. He had to act. Quickly. He had to get inside Mao Zedong’s monument and watch, wait for the meeting to conclude one way or another—and the repugnant possibility that he might have to protect the assassin crossed his mind. Yet it was within the realm of reality and the only plus for him was the fact that the impostor had followed a scenario he himself might have created. And if the conference was peaceful, it was simply a matter of following the assassin, by then inevitably buoyed by the success of his tactics as well as by whatever the client delivered—and taking an unsuspecting supreme egotist in Tian An Men Square.
Bourne turned, looking for d’Anjou. The Frenchman was on the edge of a controlled tourist group; he nodded, as if he had read Delta’s thoughts. He pointed to the ground beneath him, then made a circle with his index finger. It was a silent signal from their days in Medusa. It meant he would remain where he was, but if he had to move he would stay in sight of that specific location. It was enough. Jason crossed behind the assassin and his prisoner, and walked diagonally through the crowd, rapidly negotiating the open space to the line on the right half of the staircase and up to the guard. He spoke pleadingly in polite Mandarin: “High Officer, I’m most embarrassed! I was so taken by the calligraphy on the People’s Monument that I lost my group, which passed through here only minutes ago.”
“You speak our language very well,” said the astonished guard, apparently used to the strange accents of tongues he neither knew nor cared to know. “You are most courteous.”
“I’m simply an underpaid teacher from the West who has an enduring love of your great nation, High Officer.”
The guard laughed. “I’m not so high, but our nation is great. My daughter wears blue jeans in the street.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“It’s nothing. Where is your tour-group identification?”
“My what?”
“The name tag to be worn on all outer clothing.”
“It kept falling off,” said Bourne, shaking his head helplessly. “It wouldn’t stay pinned. I must have lost it.”
“When you catch up, see your guide and get another. Go ahead. Get in back of the line on the steps. Something is going on. The next group may have to wait. You’ll miss your tour.”
“Oh? Is there a problem?”
“I don’t know. The official with the government briefcase gives us our orders. I believe he counts the yuan that could be made here, thinking this holy place should be like Beijing’s underground train.”
“You’ve been most kind.”
“Hurry, sir.”
Bourne rushed up the steps, bending down behind the crowd, once again tightening a secure shoelace, his head angled to watch the assassin’s progress. The imposter talked quietly to the civilian with the soldier still in his grip—but something was odd. The short Chinese in the dark suit nodded, but his eyes were not on the impostor; they were focused beyond the commando. Or were they? Jason’s angle of vision was not the best. No matter, the scenario was being followed, the client reached on the assassin’s terms.
He walked through the doors into the semidarkness, as awed as everyone in front of him by the sudden appearance of the enormous white marble sculpture of a seated Mao, rising so high and so majestically that one nearly gasped in its presence. Too, theatricality was not omitted. The shafts of light that played on the exquisite, seemingly translucent marble created an ethereal effect that isolated the gigantic sitting figure from the velvet tapestry behind it and the outer darkness around it. The massive statue with its searching eyes seemed alive and aware.
Jason pulled his own eyes away and looked for doorways and corridors. There were none. It was a mausoleum, a hall dedicated to a nation’s saint. But there were pillars, wide high shafts of marble that provided areas of seclusion. In the shadows behind any one of them could be the meeting ground. He would wait. He would stay in other shadows and watch.
His group entered the second great hall, and it was, if anything, more electrifying than the first. Facing them was a crystal glass coffin encasing the body of Chairman Mao Zedong, draped in the Red flag, the waxen corpse in peaceful repose—the closed eyes, however, any second likely to open wide and glare in fiery disapproval. There were flowers surrounding the raised sarcophagus, and two rows of dark green pine trees in huge ceramic pots lined the opposing walls. Again shafts of light played a dramatic symphony of color, pockets of darkness pierced by intersecting beams that washed over the brilliant yellows and reds and blues of the banks of flowers.
A commotion somewhere in the first hall briefly intruded on the awed silence of the crowd, but was arrested as rapidly as it had begun. As the last tourist in line, Bourne broke away without being noticed by the others. He slipped behind a pillar, concealed in the shadows, and peered around the glistening white marble.
What he saw paralyzed him as a dozen thoughts clashed in his head—above all, the single word trap! There was no group following his own! It was the last admitted—he was the last person admitted—before the heavy doors were closed. That was the sound he had heard—the shutting of the doors and the disappointed groans from those outside waiting to be admitted.
Something is going on.… The next group may have to wait.… A kindly guard on the steps.
My God, from the beginning it was a trap! Every move, every appearance had been calculated! From the beginning! The information paid for on a rain-soaked island, the nearly unobtainable airline tickets, the first sight of the assassin at the airport—a professional killer capable of a far better disguise, his hair too obvious, his clothes inadequate to cover his frame. Then the complication with an old man, a retired brigadier from the Royal Engineers—so illogically logical! So right, the scent of deception so accurate, so irresistible! A soldier in a truck’s window, not looking for him but for them! The priestly black suit—a dark beacon in the sunlight, paid for by the impostor’s creator—so easily spotted, so easily followed. Christ, from the beginning! Finally, the scenario played out in the immense square, a scenario that could have been written by Bourne himself—again irresistible to the pursuer. A reverse trap: Catch the hunter as he stalks his quarry!
Frantically Jason looked around. Ahead in the distance was a steady shaft of sunlight. The exit doors were at the other end of the mausoleum; they would be watched, each tourist studied as he left.
Footsteps. Over his right shoulder. Bourne spun to his left, pulling the brass letter-opener from his belt. A figure in a gray Mao suit, the cut military, cautiously passed by the wide pillar in the dim outer light of the pine trees. He was no more than five feet away. In his hand was a gun, the bulging cylinder on the barrel a guarantee that a detonation would be reduced to the sound of a spit. Jason made his lethal calculations in a way David Webb would never understand. The blade had to be inserted in such a way as to cause instant death. No noise could come from his enemy’s mouth as the body was pulled back into darkness.
He lunged, the rigid fingers of his left hand clamped vise-like over the man’s face as he plunged the letter-opener into the soldier’s neck, the blade rushing through sinew and fragile cartilage, severing the windpipe. In one motion, Bourne dropped his left hand, clutching the large weapon still in his enemy’s grip, and swung the corpse around, dropping with it under the branches of the row of pine trees lined up along the right wall. He slid the body out of sight into the dark shadows between two large ceramic pots holding the roots of two trees. He crawled over the corpse, the weapon in front of his face, and made his way back against the wall toward the first hall, to where he could see without being seen.
A second uniformed man crossed through the shaft of light that lit up the darkness of the entrance to the second hall. He stood in front of Mao’s crystal coffin, awash in the eerie beams, and looked around. He raised a hand-held radio to his face and spoke, listening; five seconds later his expression changed to one of concern. He began walking rapidly to his right, tracing the assigned path of the first man. Jason scrambled back toward the corpse, hands and knees silently pounding the marble floor, and moved out toward the edge of the low-slung branches.
The soldier approached, walking more slowly, studying the last people in the line up ahead. Now! Bourne sprang up as the man passed, hammerlocking his neck, choking off all sound as he pulled him back down under the branches, the gun pressed far up in the flesh of the soldier’s stomach. He pulled the trigger; the muffled report was like a burst of air, no more. The man expunged a last violent breath and went limp.
He had to get out! If he was trapped and killed in the awesome silence of the mausoleum, the assassin would roam free and Marie’s death would be assured. His enemies were closing the reverse trap. He had to reverse the reversal and somehow survive! The cleanest escape is made in stages, using whatever confusion there is or can be created.
Stages One and Two were accomplished. A certain confusion already existed if other men were whispering into radios. What had to be brought about was a focal point of disruption so violent and unexpected that those hunting him in the shadows would themselves become the subjects of a sudden, hysterical search.
There was only one way and Jason felt no obscure heroic feelings of I-may-die-trying. He had to do it! He had to make it work. Survival was everything, for reasons beyond himself. The professional was at his apex, calm and deliberate.
Bourne stood up and walked through branches, crossing the open space to the pillar in front of him. He then ran to the one behind, and then the one behind that, the first pillar in the second hall, thirty feet from the dramatically lit coffin. He edged his body around the marble and waited, his eyes on the entrance door.
It happened. They happened. The officer who was the assassin’s “captive” emerged with the short civilian carrying his government briefcase. The soldier held a radio at his side; he brought it up to speak and listen, then shook his head, placing the radio in his right-hand pocket and removing the gun from his holster. The civilian nodded once, reached under his jacket and pulled out a short-barreled revolver. Each walked forward toward the glass coffin containing the remains of Mao Zedong, then looked at each other and began to separate, one to the left, one to the right.
Now! Jason raised his weapon, took rapid aim and fired. Once! A hair to the right. Twice! The spits were like coughs in shadows as both men fell into the sarcophagus. Grabbing the edges of his coat, Bourne gripped the hot cylinder on the barrel of his pistol and spun it off. There were five shells left. He squeezed the trigger in rapid succession. The explosions filled the mausoleum, echoing off the marble walls, shattering the crystal glass of the coffin, the bullets embedding themselves in the spastically jerked corpse of Mao Zedong, one penetrating a bloodless forehead, another blowing out an eye.
Sirens erupted; clamoring bells split the air and deafened the ear, as soldiers, appearing at once from everywhere, raced in panic toward the scene of the horrible outrage. The two lines of tourists, feeling trapped in the eerie light of the house of death, exploded into hysteria. En masse, the crowds rushed toward the doors and the sunlight, trampling those in their paths. Jason Bourne joined them, crashing his way into the center of an inside column. Reaching the blinding light of Tian An Men Square, he raced down the steps.
D’Anjou! Jason ran to his right, rounding the stone corner, and ran down the side of the pillared structure until he reached the front. Guards were doing their best to calm the agitated crowds while trying to find out what had happened. A riot was in the making.
Bourne studied the place where he had last seen d’Anjou, then moved his eyes over a grid area within which the Frenchman might logically be seen. Nothing, no one even vaguely resembling him.
Suddenly, there was the screeching of tires far off on a thoroughfare to Jason’s left. He whipped around and looked. A van with tinted windows had circled the stanchioned pavement and was speeding toward the south gate of Tian An Men Square.
They had taken d’Anjou. Echo was gone.