They didn't know I existed. '
That status will change,' said Havilland, abruptly serious. He paused, staring at the undersecretary, then lowered his voice. 'Have you ever heard the name Jason Bourne?'
'How could anyone posted in Asia not have heard it? answered McAllister, perplexed. Thirty-five to forty murders' the assassin-for-hire who eluded every trap ever set for him. A pathological killer whose only morality was the price of the kill. They say he was an American – is an American; I don't know; he faded from sight – and that he was a defrocked priest and an importer who'd stolen millions and a deserter from the French Foreign Legion and God knows how many other stories. The only thing I do know is that he was never caught, and our failure to catch him was a burden on our diplomacy throughout the Far East . '
'Was there any pattern to his victims?'
'None. They were random, across the board. Two bankers here, three attaches there – meaning CI A; a minister of state from Delhi, an industrialist from Singapore, and numerous -far too numerous – politicians, generally decent men. Their cars were bombed in the streets, their flats blown up. Then there were unfaithful husbands and wives and lovers of various persuasions in various scandals; he offered final solutions for bruised egos. There was no one he wouldn't kill, no method too brutal or demeaning for him... No, there wasn't a pattern, just money. The highest bidder. He was a monster – is a monster, if he's still alive. '
Once more Havilland leaned forward, his eyes steady on the undersecretary of state. 'You say he faded from sight. Just like that? You never picked up anything, any rumors or backstairs gossip from our Asian embassies or consulates?
'There was talk, yes, but none of it was ever confirmed. The story I heard most often came from the Macao police, where Bourne was last known to be. They said he wasn't dead or retired, but instead had gone to Europe looking for wealthier clients. If it's true, it might be only half the story. The police also claimed informants told them that several contracts had gone sour for Bourne, that in one instance he killed the wrong man, a leading figure in the Malaysian underworld, and in another it was said he raped a client's wife. Perhaps the circle was closing in on him – and perhaps not . '
'What do you mean?
'Most of us bought the first half of the story, not the second. Bourne wouldn't kill the wrong man, especially someone like that; he didn't make those kinds of mistakes. And if he raped a client's wife – which is doubtful – he would have done so out of hatred or revenge. He would have forced a bound husband to watch and then killed them both. No, most of us subscribed to the first story. He went to Europe where there were bigger fish to fry – and murder. '
'You were meant to accept that version,' said Havilland, leaning back in his chair.
'I beg your pardon?
'The only man Jason Bourne ever killed in post-Vietnam Asia was an enraged conduit who tried to kill him. '
Stunned, McAllister stared at the diplomat . 'I don't understand. '
'The Jason Bourne you've just described never existed. He was a myth. '
'You can't be serious. '
'Never more so. Those were turbulent times in the Far East. The drug networks operating out of the Golden Triangle were fighting a disorganized, unpublicized war. Consuls, vice– consuls, police, politicians, criminal gangs, border patrols -the highest and the lowest social orders – all were affected. Money in unimaginable amounts was the mother's milk of corruption. Whenever and wherever a well-publicized killing took place – regardless of the circumstances or those accused – Bourne was on the scene and took credit for the kill. '
'He was the killer,' insisted a confused McAllister. There were the signs, his signs. Everyone knew it!'
'Everyone assumed it, Mr. Undersecretary. A mocking telephone call to the police, a small article of clothing sent in the mail, a black bandanna found in the bushes a day later. They were all part of the strategy. '
The strategy? What are you talking about?
'Jason Bourne – the original Jason Bourne – was a convicted murderer, a fugitive whose life ended with a bullet in his head in a place called Tarn Quan during the last months of the Vietnam war. It was a jungle execution. The man was a traitor. His corpse was left to rot – he simply disappeared. Several years later, the man who executed him took on his identity for one of our projects, a project that nearly succeeded, should have succeeded, but went off the wire. '
'Off the what?
'Out of control. That man – that very brave man – who went underground for us, using the name "Jason Bourne" for three years, was injured, and the result of those injuries was amnesia. He lost his memory; he neither knew who he was nor who he was meant to be. '
'Good Lord
'He was between a rock and a hard place. With the help of an alcoholic doctor on a Mediterranean island he tried to trace his life, his identity, and here, I'm afraid, he failed. He failed but the woman who befriended him did not fail; she's now his wife. Her instincts were accurate; she knew he wasn't a killer. She purposely forced him to examine his words, his abilities, ultimately to make the contacts that would lead him back to us. But we, with the most sophisticated intelligence apparatus in the world, did not listen to the human quotient. We set a trap to kill him-'
'I must interrupt, Mr. Ambassador,' said Reilly.
'Why? asked Havilland. 'It's what we did and we're not on tape. '
'An individual made the determination, not the United States Government. That should be clear, sir. '
'All right,' agreed the diplomat, nodding. 'His name was Conklin, but it's irrelevant, Jack. Government personnel went along. It happened. '
'Government personnel were also instrumental in saving his life. '
'Somewhat after the fact,' muttered Havilland.
'But why?' asked McAllister. He now leaned forward, mesmerized by the bizarre story. 'He was one of us. Why would anyone want to kill him?'
'His loss of memory was taken for something else. It was erroneously believed that he had turned, that he had killed three of his controls and disappeared with a great deal of money – government funds totalling over five million dollars. '
'Five million... ?' Astonished, the undersecretary slowly sank back into the chair. 'Funds of that magnitude were available to him personally?
'Yes,' said the ambassador. 'They, too, were part of the strategy, part of the project . '
'I assume this is where silence is necessary. The project, I mean. '
'It's imperative,' answered Reilly. 'Not because of the project – in spite of what happened we make no apology for that operation – but because of the man we recruited to become Jason Bourne and where he came from. '
That's cryptic . '
'It'll become clear. '
'The project, please. '
Reilly looked at Raymond Havilland; the diplomat nodded and spoke. 'We created a killer to draw out and trap the most deadly assassin in Europe. '
1Carlos?'
'You're quick, Mr. Undersecretary. '
'Who else was there? In Asia, Bourne and the Jackal were constantly being compared. '
Those comparisons were encouraged,' said Havilland. 'Often magnified and spread by the strategists of the project, a group known as Treadstone Seventy-one. The name was derived from a sterile house on New York's Seventy-first Street where the resurrected Jason Bourne was trained. It was the command post and a name you should be aware of. '
'I see,' said McAllister pensively. Then those comparisons, growing as they did with Bourne's reputation, served as a challenge to Carlos. That's when Bourne moved to Europe -to bring the challenge directly to the Jackal. To force him to come out and confront his challenger. '
' Very quick, Mr. Undersecretary. In a nutshell, that was the strategy. '
'It's extraordinary. Brilliant actually, and one doesn't have to be an expert to see that. God knows I'm not . '
'You may become one-'
'And you say this man who became Bourne, the mythical as
sassin, spent three years playing the role and then was injured-'
'Shot,' interrupted Havilland. 'Membranes in his skull were blown away. '
'And he lost his memory?'
Totally. '
'My God!'
'Yet despite everything that happened to him, and with the woman's help – she was an economist for the Canadian Government, incidentally – he came within moments of pulling the whole damn thing off. A remarkable story, isn't it?'
'It's incredible. But what kind of man would do this, could do it?'
The redheaded John Reilly coughed softly; the ambassador deferred with a glance. 'We're now reaching ground zero,' the big man said, again shifting his bulk to look at McAllister. 'If you've any doubts I can still let you go. '
'I try not to repeat myself. You have your tape. '
'It's your appetite. '
'I suppose that's another way you people have of saying there might not even be a trial. '
'I'd never say that . '
McAllister swallowed, his eyes meeting the calm gaze of the man from the NSC. He turned to Havilland. 'Please go on, Mr. Ambassador. Who is this man? Where did he come from?'
'His name is David Webb. He's currently an associate professor of Oriental Studies at a small university in Maine and married to the Canadian woman who literally guided him out of his labyrinth. Without her he would have been killed – but then without him she would have ended up a corpse in Zurich. '
'Remarkable,' said McAllister, barely audible.
'The point is, she's his second wife. His first marriage ended in a tragic act of wanton slaughter – that's when his story began for us. A number of years ago Webb was a young foreign service officer stationed in Phnom Penh, a brilliant Far East scholar, fluent in several Oriental languages and married to a girl from Thailand he'd met in graduate school. They lived in a house on a riverbank and had two children. It was an ideal life for such a man. It combined the expertise Washington needed in the area with the opportunity to live in his own museum. Then the Vietnam action escalated and one morning a lone jet fighter – no one really knows from which side, but no one ever told Webb that – swooped down at low altitude and strafed his wife and children while they were playing in the water. Their bodies were riddled. They floated into the riverbank as Webb was trying to reach them; he gathered them in his arms, screaming helplessly at the disappearing plane above. '
'How horrible, '' whispered McAllister.
'At that moment, Webb turned. He became someone he never was, never dreamed he could be. He became a guerrilla fighter known as Delta . '
'Delta?' said Mr. McAllister. 'A guerrilla... ? I'm afraid I don't understand. '
There's no way you could. ' Havilland looked over at Reilly, then back at the man from State. 'As Jack made clear a moment ago, we're now at ground zero. Webb fled to Saigon, consumed with rage, and, ironically, through the efforts of the CIA officer named Conklin, who years later tried to kill him, joined a clandestine operations outfit called Medusa. No names were ever used by the people in Medusa, just the Greek letters of the alphabet – Webb became Delta One. '
'Medusa? I've never heard of it . '
'Ground zero,' said Reilly. 'The Medusa file is still classified, but we've permitted limited declassification in this instance. The Medusa units were a collection of internationals who knew the Vietnam territories, north and south. Frankly most of them were criminals – smugglers of narcotics, gold, guns, jewels, all kinds of contraband. Also convicted murderers, fugitives who'd been sentenced to death in absentia... and a smattering of colonials whose businesses were confiscated – again by both sides. They banked on us -Big Uncle – to take care of all their problems if they infiltrated hostile areas, killing suspected Viet Cong collaborators and village chiefs thought to be leaning towards Charlie, as well as expediting prisoner-of-war escapes where they could. They were assassination teams – death squads, if you will – and that says it as well as it can be said, but of course we'll never say it. Mistakes were made, millions stolen, and the majority of those personnel wouldn't be allowed in any civilized army, Webb among them. '
'With his background, his academic credentials, he willingly became part of such a group?
'He had an overpowering motive,' said Havilland. 'As far as he was concerned, that plane in Phnom Penh was North Vietnamese. '
'Some said he was a madman,' continued Reilly. 'Others claimed he was an extraordinary tactician, the supreme guerrilla who understood the Oriental mind and led the most aggressive teams in Medusa, feared as much by Command Saigon as by the enemy. He was uncontrollable; the only rules he followed were his own. It was as if he had mounted his own personal hunt, tracking down the man who had flown that plane and destroyed his life. It became his war, his rage; the more violent it became the more satisfying it was for him – or perhaps closer to his own death wish. '
'Death... ?' The undersecretary of state left the word hanging.
'It was the prevalent theory at the time,' interrupted the ambassador.
'The war ended,' said Reilly, 'as disastrously for Webb – or Delta – as it did for the rest of us. Perhaps worse; there was nothing left for him. No more purpose, nothing to strike out at, to kill. Until we approached him and gave him a reason to go on living. Or perhaps a reason to go on trying to die. '
'By becoming Bourne and going after Carlos the Jackal,' completed McAllister.
'Yes,' agreed the intelligence officer. A brief silence ensued.
'We need him back,' said Havilland. The soft-spoken words fell like an axe on hard wood.
'Carlos has surfaced?
The diplomat shook his head. 'Not Europe. We need him back in Asia, and we can't waste a minute. '
'Someone else? Another... target?' McAllister swallowed involuntarily. 'Have you spoken to him?
'We can't approach him. Not directly. '
'Why not?
'He wouldn't let us through the door. He doesn't trust anything or anyone out of Washington and it's difficult to fault him for that. For days, for weeks, he cried out for help and we didn't listen. Instead, we tried to kill him. '
'Again I must object,' broke in Reilly. 'It wasn't us. It was an individual operating on erroneous information. And the Government currently spends in excess of four hundred thousand dollars a year in a protection programme for Webb . '
'Which he scoffs at. He believes it's no more than a back-up trap for Carlos in the event the Jackal unearths him. He's convinced you don't give a damn about him, and I'm not sure he's far off the mark. He saw Carlos and the fact that the face has not yet come back into focus for him isn't something Carlos knows. The Jackal has every reason to go after Webb. And if he does, you'll have your second chance. '
'The chances of Carlos finding him are so remote as to be practically nil. The Treadstone records are buried and in any case they don't contain current information as to where Webb is or what he does. '
'Come, Mr. Reilly,' said Havilland testily. 'Look at his background and qualifications. How difficult would it be? He's got academia written all over him. '
'I'm not opposing you, Mr. Ambassador,' replied a somewhat subdued Reilly. 'I just want everything clear. Let's be frank, Webb has to be handled very delicately. He's recovered a large portion of his memory but certainly not all of it. However, he's recalled enough about Medusa to be a considerable threat to the country's interests. '
'In what way? asked McAllister. 'Perhaps it wasn't the best and it probably wasn't the worst, but basically it was a military strategy in time of war. '
'A strategy that was unsanctioned, unlogged and unacknowledged. There's no official slate. '
'How is that possible? It was funded, and when funds are expended-'
'Don't read me the book,' interrupted the obese intelligence officer. 'We're not on tape, but I've got yours. '
'Is that your answer?
'No, this is: there's no statute of limitation on war crimes and murder, Mr. Undersecretary, and murder and ot
her violent crimes were committed against our own forces as well as allied personnel. In the main they were committed by killers and thieves in the process of stealing, looting, raping, and killing. Most of them were pathological criminals. Effective as Medusa was in many ways, it was a tragic mistake, born of anger and frustration in a no-win situation. What possible good would it do to open all the old wounds? Quite apart from the claims against us, we would become a pariah in the eyes of much of the civilized world. '
'As I mentioned,' said McAllister softly, reluctantly, 'at State we don't believe in opening wounds. ' He turned to the Ambassador. 'I'm beginning to understand. You want me to reach this David Webb and persuade him to return to Asia. For another. project, another target – although I've never used the word in that context in my life before this evening. And I assume it's because there are distinct parallels in our early careers – we're Asia men. We presumably have insights where the Far East is concerned and you think he'll listen to me. '
'Essentially, yes. '
'Yet you say he won't touch us. That's where my understanding fades. How can I do it?
'We'll do it together. As he once made the rules for himself, we'll make them now. It's imperative. '
'Because of a man you want killed?'
'Neutralized will suffice. It has to be done. '
'And Webb can do it?
'No. Jason Bourne can. We sent him out alone for three years under extraordinary stress – suddenly his memory was taken from him and he was hunted like an animal. Still he retained the ability to infiltrate and kill. I'm being blunt . '
'I understand that. Since we're not on tape – and on the chance that we still are-' The undersecretary glanced disapprovingly at Reilly, who shook his head and shrugged. 'May I be permitted to know who the target is?
'You may, and I want you to commit this name to memory, Mr. Undersecretary. He's a Chinese minister of state, Sheng Chou Yang. '
McAllister flushed, angrily. 'I don't have to commit it, and I think you know that. He was a fixture in the People's Republic's economics group and we were both assigned to the trade conferences in Peking in the late seventies. I read up on him, analyzed him. Sheng was my counterpart and I could do no less – a fact I suspect you also know. '
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