'You're a font of unwarranted information, you know that . '
'I'm also right. It's said you were one of the best. How do you read it?
Alex shook his head in the booth; the air was close, the
noise outside his 'sterile' phone growing louder in the seedy bar on 9th Street . 'What I said before. Someone found out what you people were planning – mounting for Webb – and decided to take over. '
'For God's sake, why?
'Because whoever it is wants Jason Bourne more than you do,' Alex said and hung up.
It was 6:28 when Conklin walked into the lounge at Dulles Airport. He had waited in a taxi down the street from Webb's hotel and had followed David, giving the driver precise instructions. He had been right, but there was no point in burdening Webb with the knowledge. Two grey Plymouths had picked up David's cab and alternately exchanged positions during the surveillance. So be it. One Alexander Conklin might be hanged, and then again, he might not. People at State were behaving stupidly, he had thought as he wrote down the licence numbers. He spotted Webb in a darkened back booth.
'It is you, isn't it? said Alex, dragging his dead foot into the banquette. 'Do blonds really have more fun?
'It worked in Paris. What did you find?'
'I found slugs under rocks who can't find their way up out of the ground. But then they wouldn't know what to do with the sunlight, would they?
'Sunlight's illuminating; you're not. Cut the crap, Alex. I have to get to the gate in a few minutes. ' '
'In short words, they worked out a strategy to get you over to Kowloon. It was based on a previous experience.'
'You can skip that,' said David. 'Why?'
'The man said they needed you. Not you, Webb; they needed Bourne. '
'Because they say Bourne's already there. I told you what McAllister said. Did he go into it?'
'No, he wasn't going to give me that much, but maybe I can use it to press them. However, he told me something else, David, and you have to know it. They can't find their conduits, so they don't know who the blinds are or what's happening. They think it's temporary, but they've lost Marie.
Somebody else wants you out there and he's taken over. '
Webb brought his hand to his forehead, his eyes closed, and suddenly, in silence, the tears fell down his cheeks. 'I'm back, Alex. Back into so much I can't remember. I love her so, I need her so!'
'Cut it out!' ordered Conklin. 'You made it clear to me last night that I still had a mind, if not much of a body. You have both. Make them sweat?
'How?'
'Be what they want you to be – be the chameleon! Be Jason Bourne. '
'It's been so long.. . '
'You can still do it. Play the scenario they've given you. '
'I don't have any choice, do IT.
Over the loudspeakers came the last call for Flight 26 to Hong Kong.
The grey-haired Havilland replaced the phone in its cradle, leaned back in his chair and looked across the room at McAllister. The undersecretary of state was standing next to a huge revolving globe of the world that was perched on an ornamental tripod in front of a bookcase. His index finger was on the southernmost part of China, but his eyes were on the Ambassador.
'It's done,' said the diplomat . 'He's on the plane to Kowloon. '
'It's God-awful,' replied McAllister. 'I'm sure it appears that way to you, but before you render judgement, weigh the advantages. We're free now. We are no longer responsible for the events that take place. They are being manipulated by an unknown party,' 'Which is us! I repeat, it's God-awful!' 'Has your God considered the consequences if we fail?' 'We're given free will. Only our ethics restrict us. ' 'A banality, Mr. Undersecretary. There's the greater good. ' There's also a human being, a man we're manipulating, driving him back into his nightmares. Do we have that right? 'We have no choice. He can do what no one else can do – if we give him a reason. '
McAllister spun the globe; it whirled around as he walked towards the desk. 'Perhaps I shouldn't say it, but I will,' he said, standing in front of Raymond Havilland. 'I think you're the most immoral man I've ever met . '
'Appearances, Mr. Undersecretary. I have one saving grace which supersedes all the sins I have committed. I will go to any lengths, indulge in all venalities, to stop this planet from blowing itself up. And that includes the life of one David Webb – known where I want him as Jason Bourne. '
8
The mists rose like layers of diaphanous scarves above Victoria Harbour as the huge jet circled for the final approach into Kai Tak Airport. The early morning haze was dense, the promise of a humid day in the colony. Below on the water the junks and sampans bobbed beside the outlying freighters, the squat barges, the chugging multi-tiered ferries and the occasional marine patrols that swept through the harbour. As the plane descended into the Kowloon airport, the serried ranks of skyscrapers on the island of Hong Kong took on the appearance of alabaster giants, reaching up through the mists and reflecting the first penetrating light of the morning sun.
Webb studied the scene below, as a man under a horrible strain and as one consumed by an eerily detached curiosity. Down there somewhere in the seething, vastly overpopulated territory was Marie – that was uppermost in his thoughts and the most agonizing to think about. Yet another part of him was like a scientist filled with a cold anxiety as he peered into the clouded lens of a microscope trying to discern what his eye and his mind could understand. The familiar and the unfamiliar were joined, and the result was bewilderment and fear. During Panov's sessions in Virginia, David had read and re-read hundreds of travel folders and illustrated brochures describing all the places the mythical Jason Bourne was known to have been; it was a continuous, often painful exercise in self-probing. Fragments would come to him in flashes of recognition; many were all too brief and confusing, others prolonged, his sudden memories astonishingly accurate, the descriptions his own, not those of travel agents' manuals. As he looked down now, he saw much that he knew he knew but could not specifically remember. So he looked away and concentrated on the day ahead.
He had wired the Regent Hotel in Kowloon from Dulles Airport requesting a room for a week in the name of one James Howard Cruett, the identity on Cactus's refined blue-eyed passport. He had added: 'I believe arrangements were made for our firm with respect to Suite Six-nine-zero, if it is available. Arrival day is firm, flight is not.'
The suite would be available. What he had to find out was who had made it available. It was the first step towards Marie. And either before or after or during the process there were items to purchase – some would be simple to buy, others not; but even finding the more inaccessible would not be impossible. This was Hong Kong, the colony of survival and it had the tools of survival. It was also the one civilized place on earth where religions flourished but the only commonly acknowledged god, of believers and non-believers alike, was money. As Marie had put it: 'It has no other reason for being. '
The tepid morning reeked with the odors of a crowded, rushing humanity, the smells strangely not unpleasant. Kerbsides were being hosed ferociously, steam rising from pavements drying in the sun, and the fragrance of herbs boiling in oil wafted through the narrow streets from carts and concessions screeching for attention. The noises accumulated; they became a series of constant crescendos demanding acceptance and a sale or at least a negotiation. Hong Kong was the essence of survival; one worked furiously or one did not survive. Adam Smith was outdone and outdated; he could never have conceived of such a world. It mocked the disciplines he projected for a free economy; it was madness. It was Hong Kong.
David held up his hand for a taxi, knowing that he had done so before, knowing the exit doors he had headed for after the prolonged drudgery of customs, knowing he knew the streets through which the driver took him – not really remembering, but somehow knowing. It was both a comfort and profoundly terrifying. He knew and he did not know. He was a marionette being manipulated on the stage of his own sideshow, and he did not
know who was the puppet or who the puppeteer.
'It was an error,' said David to the clerk behind the oval marble counter in the centre of the Regent's lobby. 'I don't want a suite. I'd prefer something smaller, a single or a double room will do. '
'But the arrangements have been made, Mr. Cruett,' replied the bewildered clerk, using the name on Webb's false passport.
'Who made them?'
The youthful Oriental peered down at a signature on the computer print-out reservation. 'It was authorized by the assistant manager, Mr. Liang. '
'Then in courtesy I should speak with Mr. Liang, shouldn't I?'
'I'm afraid it will be necessary. I'm not sure there's anything else available. '
'I understand. I'll find another hotel. '
'You are considered a most important guest, sir. I will go back and speak with Mr Liang. '
Webb nodded as the clerk, reservation in hand, ducked under the counter on the far left and walked rapidly across the crowded floor to a door behind the concierge's desk. David looked around at the opulent lobby, which in a sense started outside in the immense circular courtyard with its sprays of tall, gushing fountains and extended through the bank of elegant glass doors and across the marble floor to a semicircle of enormously high tinted windows that looked out over Victoria Harbour. The ever-moving tableau beyond was a hypnotic mise-en-scene for the open curving lounge in front of the wall of soft-coloured glass. There were dozens of small tables and leather settees, mostly occupied, with uniformed waiters and waitresses scurrying about. It was an arena from which tourists and negotiators alike could view the panorama of the harbour's commerce, played out in front of the rising skyline of the island of Hong Kong in the distance. The watery view outside was familiar to Webb, but nothing else. He had never been inside the extravagant hotel before; at least nothing of what he saw aroused any flashes of recognition.
Suddenly his eyes were drawn to the sight of the clerk rushing across the lobby several steps ahead of a middle-aged Oriental, obviously the Regent's assistant manager, Mr. Liang. Again the younger man ducked under the counter and quickly resumed his position in front of David, his accommodating eyes as wide as they could be in anticipation. Seconds later the hotel executive approached, bowing slightly from the waist, as befitted his professional station.
This is Mr. Liang, sir,' announced the clerk.
'May I be of service?' said the assistant manager. 'And may I say it is a pleasure to welcome you as our guest?5
Webb smiled and shook his head politely. 'It may have to be another time, I'm afraid. '
'You are displeased with the accommodations, Mr. Cruett?'
'Not at all. I'd probably like them very much. But, as I told your young man, I prefer smaller quarters, a single or even a double room, but not a suite. However, I understand there may not be anything available. '
'Your wire specifically mentioned Suite Six-ninety, sir. '
'I realize that and I apologize. It was the work of an overzealous sales representative. ' Webb frowned in a friendly, quizzical manner and asked courteously. 'Incidentally, who did make those arrangements? I certainly didn't . '
'Your representative, perhaps,' offered Liang, his eyes noncommittal.
'In sales? He wouldn't have the authority. No, he said it was one of the companies over here. We can't accept, of course, but I'd like to know who made such a generous offer. Surely, Mr. Liang, since you personally authorized the reservation, you can tell me. '
The noncommittal eyes became more distant, then blinked; it was enough for David but the charade had to be played out . 'I believe one of our staff – our very large staff -
came to me with the request, sir. There are so many reservations, we are so busy, I really can't recall. '
'Certainly there are billing instructions. '
'We have many honoured clients whose word on a telephone is sufficient . '
'Hong Kong has changed. '
'And always changing, Mr Cruett. It is possible your host wishes to tell you himself. It would not be proper to intrude on such wishes. '
'Your sense of trust is admirable. '
'Backed by a billing code" in the cashier's computer, naturally. 'Liang attempted a smile; it was false.
'Well, since you have nothing else, I'll strike out on my own. I have friends at the Pen across the street,' said Webb, referring to the revered Peninsula Hotel.
That will not be necessary. Further arrangements can be made. '
'But your clerk said.'
'He is not the assistant manager of the Regent, sir. ' Liang briefly glared at the young man behind the counter.
'My screen shows nothing to be available,' protested the clerk in defence.
'Be quiet!' Liang instantly smiled, as falsely as before, aware that he had undoubtedly lost the charade with his command. 'He is so young – they are all so young and inexperienced – but very intelligent, very willing... We keep several rooms in reserve for misunderstood occasions. ' Again he looked at the clerk and spoke harshly while smiling. 'Ting, ruan-ji!' He continued rapidly in Chinese, every word understood by an expressionless Webb . 'Listen to me, you boneless chicken! Do not offer information in my presence unless I ask you! You will be spit from the garbage shoot if you do it again. Now assign this fool Room Two-zero-two. It is listed as Hold; remove the listing and proceed. ' The assistant manager, his waxen smile even more pronounced, turned back to David. 'It is a very pleasant room with a splendid view of the harbour, Mr. Cruett.'
The charade was over, and the winner minimized his victory with persuasive appreciation. 'I'm most grateful,' said
David, his eyes boring into those of the suddenly insecure Liang. 'It will save me the trouble of phoning all over the city telling people where I'm staying. ' He stopped, his right hand partially raised, a man about to continue. David Webb was acting on one of several instincts, instincts developed by Jason Bourne. He knew it was the moment to instil fear. 'When you say a room with a splendid view, I assume you mean you hao jingse de fangian. Am I right? Or is my Chinese too foolish?'
The hotel man stared at the American. 'I could not have phrased it better,' he said softly. 'The clerk will see to everything. Enjoy your stay with us, Mr. Cruett . '
'Enjoyment must be measured by accomplishment, Mr. Liang. That's either a very old or very new Chinese proverb, I don't know which. '
'I suspect it's new, Mr. Cruett. It's too active for passive reflection, which is the soul of Confucius, as I'm sure you know. '
'Isn't that accomplishment?'
'You are too swift for me, sir. 'Liang bowed. 'If there's anything you need, don't hesitate to reach me. '
'I hardly think that will be necessary, but thank you. Frankly, it was a long and dreadful flight, so I'll ask the switchboard to hold all calls until dinner time. '
'Oh? Liang's insecurity became something far more pronounced; he was a man afraid. 'But surely if an emergency arises-'
'There's nothing that can't wait. And since I'm not in Suite Six-ninety, the hotel can simply say I'm expected later. That's plausible, isn't it? I'm terribly tired. Thank you, Mr. Liang. '
Thank you, Mr. Cruett. ' The assistant manager bowed again, searching Webb's eyes for a last sign. He found none and turned quickly, nervously, and headed back to his office.
Do the unexpected. Confuse the enemy, throw him off balance... Jason Bourne. Or was it Alexander Conklin?
'It is a most desirable room, sir!' exclaimed the relieved clerk. 'You will be most pleased. '
'Mr. Liang is very accommodating,' said David. 'I should show my appreciation, as, indeed, I will, for your help. ' Webb
took out his leather money clip and unobtrusively removed an American $20 bill. He extended a handshake, the bill concealed. 'When does Mr. Liang leave for the day?'
The bewildered but overjoyed young man glanced to his right and left, speaking as he did so in disjointed phrases. 'Yes! You are most kind, sir. It is not necessary, sir, but thank you, sir. Mr. Liang le
aves his office every afternoon at five o'clock. I, too, leave at that hour. I would stay, of course, if our management requested, for I try very hard to do the best I can for the honour of the hotel. '
'I'm sure you do,' said Webb. ' 'And most capably. My key, please. My luggage will arrive later due to a switch in flights. '
'Of course, sir!'
David sat in the chair by the tinted window looking across the harbour at the island of Hong Kong. Names came to him, accompanied by images – Causeway Bay, Wanchai, Repulse Bay, Aberdeen, The Mandarin, and finally, so clear in the distance, Victoria Peak with its awesome view of the entire colony. Then he saw in his mind's eye the masses of humanity meshing through the jammed, colourful, frequently filthy streets, and the crowded hotel lobbies and lounges with their softly lit chandeliers of gold filigree where the well-dressed remnants of the empire reluctantly mingled with the emerging Chinese entrepreneurs – the old crown and the new money had to find accommodation... Alleyways? For some reason thronged and run-down alleyways came into focus. Figures raced through the narrow thoroughfares, crashing into cages of small screeching birds and writhing snakes of various sizes – wares of peddlers on the lowest rungs of the territory's ladder of commerce. Men and women of all ages, from children to ancients, were dressed in rags, and pungent, heavy smoke curled slowly upward, filling the space between the decaying buildings, diffusing the light, heightening the gloom of the dark stone walls blackened by use and misuse. He saw it all and it all had meaning for him, but he did not understand. Specifics eluded him; he had no points of reference and it was maddening.
Marie was out there. He had to find her! He sprang up from the chair in frustration, wanting to pound his head to
clear the confusion, but he knew it would not help – nothing helped, only time and he could not stand the strain of time. He had to find her, hold her, protect her – as she had once protected him by believing in him when he had not believed in himself. He passed the mirror above the bureau and looked at his haggard, pale face. One thing was clear. He had to plan and act quickly, but not as the man he saw in the glass. He had to bring into play everything he had learned and forgotten as Jason Bourne. From somewhere within him he had to summon the elusive past and trust unremembered instincts.
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