The Bourne Identity jb-1

by Robert Ludlum

  Inside, he took the envelope out of his pocket and placed it against the base of the lamp on the bedside table. He stared down at it, the ache unendurable.

  “Goodbye, my love,” he whispered.

  Bourne waited in the drizzle outside the Hotel Meurice on the rue de Rivoli, watching Marie through the glass doors of the entrance. She was at the front desk, having signed for the attaché case, which had been handed to her over the counter. She was now obviously asking a mildly astonished clerk for her bill, about to pay for a room that had been occupied less than six hours.

  Two minutes passed before the bill was presented. Reluctantly; it was no way for a guest at the Meurice to behave. Indeed, all Paris shunned such inhibited visitors.

  Marie walked out on the pavement, joining him in the shadows and the mistlike drizzle to the left of the canopy. She gave him the attaché case, a forced smile on her lips, a slight breathless quality in her voice.

  “That man didn’t approve of me. I’m sure he’s convinced I used the room for a series of quick tricks.”

  “What did you tell him?” asked Bourne.

  “That my plans had changed, that’s all.”

  “Good, the less said the better. Your name’s on the registration card. Think up a reason why you were there.”

  “Think up? … I should think up a reason?” She studied his eyes, the smile gone.

  “I mean we’ll think up a reason. Naturally.”

  “Naturally.”

  “Let’s go.” They started walking toward the corner, the traffic noisy in the street, the drizzle in the air fuller, the mist denser, the promise of heavy rain imminent. He took her arm—not to guide her, not even out of courtesy—only to touch her, to hold a part of her. There was so little time.

  I am Cain. I am death.

  “Can we slow down?” asked Marie sharply.

  “What?” Jason realized he had been practically running; for a few seconds he had been back in the labyrinth, racing through it, careening, feeling, and not feeling. He looked up ahead and found an answer. At the corner an empty cab had stopped by a garish newsstand, the driver shouting through an open window to the dealer. “I want to catch that taxi,” said Bourne, without breaking stride. “It’s going to rain like hell.”

  They reached the corner, both breathless as the empty cab pulled away, swinging left into rue de Rivoli. Jason looked up into the night sky, feeling the wet pounding on his face, unnerved. The rain had arrived. He looked at Marie in the gaudy lights of the newsstand; she was wincing in the sudden downpour. No. She was not wincing; she was staring at something … staring in disbelief, in shock. In horror. Without warning she screamed, her face contorted, the fingers of her right hand pressed against her mouth. Bourne grabbed her, pulling her head into the damp cloth of his topcoat; she would not stop screaming.

  He turned, trying to find the cause of her hysterics. Then he saw it, and in that unbelievable split half-second he knew the countdown was aborted. He had committed the final crime; he could not leave her. Not now, not yet.

  On the first ledge of the newsstand was an early-morning tabloid, black headlines electrifying under the circles of light:

  SLAYER IN PARIS

  WOMAN SOUGHT IN ZURICH KILLINGS

  SUSPECT IN RUMORED THEFT OF MILLIONS

  Under the screaming words was a photograph of Marie St. Jacques.

  “Stop it!” whispered Jason, using his body to cover her face from the curious newsdealer, reaching into his pocket for coins. He threw the money on the counter, grabbed two papers, and propelled her down the dark, rainsoaked street. They were both in the labyrinth now.

  Bourne opened the door and led Marie inside. She stood motionless, looking at him, her face pale and frightened, her breathing erratic, an audible mixture of fear and anger.

  “I’ll get you a drink,” said Jason, going to the bureau. As he poured, his eyes strayed to the mirror and he had an overpowering urge to smash the glass, so despicable was his own image to him. What the hell had he done? Oh God!

  I am Cain. I am death.

  He heard her gasp and spun around, too late to stop her, too far away to lunge and tear the awful thing from her hand. Oh, Christ, he had forgotten) She had found the envelope on the bedside table, and was reading his note. Her single scream was a searing, terrible cry of pain.

  “Jasonnnn! …”

  “Please! No!” He raced from the bureau and grabbed her. “It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t count anymore!” He shouted helplessly, seeing the tears swelling in her eyes, streaking down her face.

  “Listen to me! That was before, not now.”

  “You were leaving! My God, you were leaving me!” Her eyes went blank, two blind circles of panic. “I knew it! I felt it!”

  “I made you feel it!” he said, forcing her to look at him. “But it’s over now. I won’t leave you. Listen to me. I won’t leave you!”

  She screamed again. “I couldn’t breathe! … It was so cold!” He pulled her to him, enveloping her. “We have to begin again. Try to understand. Its different now—and I can’t change what was—but I won’t leave you. Not like this.” She pushed her hands against his chest, her tear-stained face angled back, begging, “Why, Jason? Why?”

  “Later. Not now. Don’t say anything for a while. Just hold me; let me hold you.”

  The minutes passed, hysteria ran its course and the outlines of reality came back into focus.

  Bourne led her to the chair; she caught the sleeve of her dress on the frayed lace. They both smiled, as he knelt beside her, holding her hand in silence.

  “How about that drink?” he said finally.

  “I think so,” she replied, briefly tightening her grip on his hand as he got up from the floor. “You poured it quite a while ago.”

  “It won’t go flat.” He went to the bureau and returned with two glasses half filled with whiskey.

  She took hers. “Feeling better?” he asked.

  “Calmer. Still confused … frightened, of course. Maybe angry, too, I’m not sure. I’m too afraid to think about that.” She drank, closing her eyes, her head pressed back against the chair. “Why did you do it, Jason?”

  “Because I thought I had to. That’s the simple answer.”

  “And no answer at all. I deserve more than that.”

  “Yes, you do, and I’ll give it to you. I have to now because you have to hear it; you have to understand. You have to protect yourself.”

  “Protect—”

  He held up his hand, interrupting her. “It’ll come later. All of it, if you like. But the first thing we have to do is know what happened—not to me, but to you. That’s where we have to begin. Can you do it?”

  “The newspaper?”

  “Yes.”

  “God knows, I’m interested,” she said, smiling weakly.

  “Here.” Jason went to the bed where he had dropped the two papers. “We’ll both read it.”

  “No games?”

  “No games.”

  They read the long article in silence, an article that told of death and intrigue in Zurich. Every now and then Marie gasped, shocked at what she was reading; at other times she shook her head in disbelief. Bourne said nothing. He saw the hand of Ilich Ramirez Sanchez. Carlos will follow Cain to the ends of the earth. Carlos will kill him. Marie St. Jacques was expendable, a baited decoy that would die in the trap that caught Cain.

  I am Cain. I am death.

  The article was, in fact, two articles—an odd mixture of fact and conjecture, speculations taking over where evidence came to an end. The first part indicated a Canadian government employee, a female economist, Marie St. Jacques. She was placed at the scene of three murders, her fingerprints confirmed by the Canadian government. In addition, police found a hotel key from the Carillon du Lac, apparently lost during the violence on the Guisan Quai. It was the key to Marie St. Jacques’ room, given to her by the hotel clerk, who remembered her well—remembered what appeared to him to be a guest in a highly di
sturbed state of anxiety. The final piece of evidence was a handgun discovered not far from the Steppdeckstrasse, in an alley close by the scene of two other killings.

  Ballistics held it to be the murder weapon, and again there were fingerprints, again confirmed by the Canadian government. They belonged to the woman, Marie St. Jacques.

  It was at this point that the article veered from fact. It spoke of rumors along the Bahnhofstrasse that a multimillion-dollar theft had taken place by means of a computer manipulation dealing with a numbered, confidential account belonging to an American corporation called Treadstone Seventy-One. The bank was also named; it was of course the Gemeinschaft. But everything else was clouded, obscure, more speculation than fact.

  According to “unnamed sources,” an American male holding the proper codes transferred millions to a bank in Paris, assigning the new account to specific individuals who were to assume rights of possession. The assignees were waiting in Paris, and upon clearance, withdrew the millions and disappeared. The success of the operation was traced to the American’s obtaining the accurate codes to the Gemeinschaft account, a feat made possible by penetrating the bank’s numerical sequence related to year, month and day of entry, standard procedure for confidential holdings. Such an analysis could only be made through the use of sophisticated computer techniques and a thorough knowledge of Swiss banking practices. When questioned, an officer of the bank, Herr Walther Apfel, acknowledged that there was an ongoing investigation into matters pertaining to the American company, but pursuant to Swiss law, “the bank would have no further comment—to anyone.”

  Here the connection to Marie St. Jacques was clarified. She was described as a government economist extensively schooled in international banking procedures, as well as a skilled computer programmer. She was suspected of being an accomplice, her expertise necessary to the massive theft. And there was a male suspect; she was reported to have been seen in his company at the Carillon du Lac.

  Marie finished the article first and let the paper drop to the floor. At the sound, Bourne looked over from the edge of the bed. She was staring at the wall, a strange pensive serenity having come over her. It was the last reaction he expected. He finished reading quickly, feeling depressed and hopeless—for a moment, speechless. Then he found his voice and spoke.

  “Lies,” he said, “and they were made because of me, because of who and what I am. Smoke you out, they find me. I’m sorry, sorrier than I can ever tell you.” Marie shifted her eyes from the wall and looked at him. “It goes deeper than lies, Jason,” she said.

  “There’s too much truth for lies alone.”

  “Truth? The only truth is that you were in Zurich. You never touched a gun, you were never in an alley near the Steppdeckstrasse, you didn’t lose a hotel key and you never went near the Gemeinschaft.”

  “Agreed, but that’s not the truth I’m talking about.”

  “Then what is?”

  “The Gemeinschaft, Treadstone Seventy-One, Apfel. Those are true and the fact that any were mentioned—especially Apfel’s acknowledgment—is incredible. Swiss bankers are cautious men. They don’t ridicule the laws, not this way; the jail sentences are too severe. The statutes pertaining to banking confidentiality are among the most sacrosanct in Switzerland. Apfel could go to prison for years for saying what he did, for even alluding to such an account, much less confirming it by name. Unless he was ordered to say what he did by an authority powerful enough to contravene the laws.”

  She stopped, her eyes straying to the wall again. “Why? Why was the Gemeinschaft or Treadstone or Apfel ever made part of the story?”

  “I told you. They want me and they know we’re together. Carlos knows we’re together. Find you, he finds me.”

  “No, Jason, it goes beyond Carlos. You really don’t understand the laws in Switzerland Not even a Carlos could cause them to be flaunted this way.” She looked at him, but her eyes did not see him; she was peering through her own mists. “This isn’t one story, it’s two. Both are constructed out of lies, the first connected to the second by tenuous speculation—public speculation—on a banking crisis that would never be made public, unless and until a thorough and private investigation proved the facts. And that second story—the patently false statement that millions were stolen from the Gemeinschaft—was tacked onto the equally false story that I’m wanted for killing three men in Zurich. It was added. Deliberately.”

  “Explain that, please.”

  “It’s there, Jason. Believe me when I tell you that; it’s right in front of us.”

  “What is?”

  “Someone’s trying to send us a message.”

  19

  The army sedan sped south on Manhattan’s East River Drive, headlights illuminating the swirling remnants of a late-winter snowfall. The major in the back seat dozed, his long body angled into the corner, his legs stretched out diagonally across the floor. In his lap was a briefcase, a thin nylon cord attached to the handle by a metal clamp, the cord itself strung through his right sleeve and down his inner tunic to his belt. The security device had been removed only twice in the past nine hours.

  Once during the major’s departure from Zurich, and again with his arrival at Kennedy Airport. In both places, however, U. S. government personnel had been watching the customs clerks—more precisely, watching the briefcase. They were not told why, they were simply ordered to observe the inspections, and at the slightest deviation from normal procedures—which meant any undue interest in the briefcase—they were to intercede. With weapons, if necessary.

  There was a sudden, quiet ringing; the major snapped his eyes open and brought his left hand up in front of his face. The sound was a wrist alarm; he pressed the button on his watch and squinted at the second radium dial of his two-zoned instrument. The first was on Zurich time, the second, New York; the alarm had been set twenty-four hours ago, when the officer had received his cabled orders.

  The transmission would come within the next three minutes. That is, thought the major, it would come if Iron Ass was as precise as he expected his subordinates to be. The officer stretched, awkwardly balancing the briefcase, and leaned forward, speaking to the driver.

  “Sergeant, turn on your scrambler to 1430 megahertz, will you please?”

  “Yes, sir.” The sergeant flipped two switches on the radio panel beneath the dashboard, then twisted the dial to the 1430 frequency. “There it is, Major.”

  “Thanks. Will the microphone reach back here?”

  “I don’t know. Never tried it, sir.” The driver pulled the small plastic microphone from its cradle and stretched the spiral cord over the seat. “Guess it does,” he concluded.

  Static erupted from the speaker, the scrambling transmitter electronically scanning and jamming the frequency. The message would follow in seconds. It did.

  “Treadstone? Treadstone, confirm, please.”

  “Treadstone receiving,” said Major Gordon Webb. “You’re clear. Go ahead.”

  “What’s your position?”

  “About a mile south of the Triborough, East River Drive,” said the major.

  “Your timing is acceptable,” came the voice from the speaker.

  “Glad to hear it. It makes my day … sir.”

  There was a brief pause, the major’s comment not appreciated. “Proceed to 139 East Seventy-first. Confirm by repeat.”

  “One-three-niner East Seventy-first.”

  “Keep your vehicle out of the area. Approach on foot.”

  “Understood.”

  “Out.”

  “Out.” Webb snapped the transmission button in place and handed the microphone back to the driver. “Forget that address, Sergeant. Your name’s on a very short file now.”

  “Gotcha’, Major. Nothing but static on that thing anyway. But since I don’t know where it is and these wheels aren’t supposed to go there, where do you want to be dropped off?”

  Webb smiled. “No more than two blocks away. I’d go to sleep in the gutter if
I had to walk any further than that.”

  “How about Lex and Seventy-second?”

  “Is that two blocks?”

  “No more than three.”

  “If it’s three blocks you’re a private.”

  “Then I couldn’t pick you up later, Major. Privates aren’t cleared for this duty.”

  “Whatever you say, Captain.” Webb closed his eyes. After two years, he was about to see Treadstone Seventy-One for himself. He knew he should feel a sense of anticipation; he did not. He felt only a sense of weariness, of futility. What had happened?

  The incessant hum of the tires on the pavement below was hypnotic, but the rhythm was broken by sharp intrusions where concrete and wheels were not compatible. The sounds evoked memories of long ago, of screeching jungle noises woven into a single tone. And then the night—that night—when blinding lights and staccato explosions were all around him, and below him, telling him he was about to die. But he did not die; a miracle wrought by a man had given his life back to him … and the years went on, that night, those days never to be forgotten. What the hell had happened?

  “Here we are, Major.”

  Webb opened his eyes, his hand wiping the sweat that had formed on his forehead. He looked at his watch, gripped his briefcase and reached for the handle of the door.

  “I’ll be here between 2300 and 2330 hours, Sergeant. If you can’t park, just cruise around and I’ll find you.”

  “Yes, sir.” The driver turned in his seat. “Could the major tell me if we’re going to be driving any distance later?”

  “Why? Have you got another fare?”

  “Come on, sir. I’m assigned to you until you say otherwise, you know that. But these heavy-plated trucks use gas like the old-time Shermans. If we’re going far I’d better fill it.”

  “Sorry.” The major paused. “Okay. You’ll have to find out where it is, anyway, because I don’t know. We’re going to a private airfield in Madison, New Jersey. I have to be there no later than one hundred hours.”