He saw her on the steps, her arms folded against the icy wind that swept off the boulevard. At first she did not see him, her eyes searching the tree-lined street. She was restless, anxious, an impatient woman afraid she would not see what she wanted to see, frightened that it would not be there.
Ten minutes ago he would not have been.
She saw him. Her face became radiant, the smile emerged and it was filled with life. She rushed to him as he raced up the steps toward her. They came together and for a moment neither said anything, warm and alone on the Saint-Michel.
“I waited and waited,” she breathed finally. “I was so afraid, so worried. Did anything happen? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Better than I’ve been in a long time.”
“What?”
He held her by the shoulders. “‘Six months ago a man was killed…’ Remember?”
The joy left her eyes. “Yes, I remember.”
“I didn’t kill him,” said Bourne. “I couldn’t have.”
They found a small hotel off the crowded boulevard Montparnasse. The lobby and the rooms were threadbare, but there was a pretense to forgotten elegance that gave it an air of timelessness. It was a quiet resting place set down in the middle of a carnival, hanging on to its identity by accepting the times without joining them.
Jason closed the door, nodding to the white-haired bell captain whose indifference had turned to indulgence upon the receipt of a twenty-franc note.
“He thinks you’re a provincial deacon flushed with a night’s anticipation,” said Marie. “I hope you noticed I went right to the bed.”
“His name is Hervé, and hell be very solicitous of our needs. He has no intention of sharing the wealth.” He crossed to her and took her in his arms. “Thanks for my life,” he said.
“Any time, my friend.” She reached up and held his face in her hands. “But don’t keep me waiting like that again. I nearly went crazy; all I could think of was that someone had recognized you … that something terrible had happened.”
“You forget, no one knows what I look like.”
“Don’t count on that; it’s not true. There were four men in the Steppdeckstrasse, including that bastard in the Guisan Quai. They’re alive, Jason. They saw you.”
“Not really. They saw a dark-haired man with bandages on his neck and head, who walked with a limp. Only two were near me: the man on the second floor and that pig in the Guisan. The first won’t be leaving Zurich for a while; he can’t walk and he hasn’t much of a hand left. The second had the beam of the flashlight in his eyes; it wasn’t in mine.” She released him, frowning, her alert mind questioning. “You can’t be sure. They were there; they did see you.”
Change your hair… you change your face. Geoffrey Washburn, Ile de Port Noir.
“I repeat, they saw a dark-haired man in shadows. How good are you with a weak solution of peroxide?”
“I’ve never used it.”
“Then I’ll find a shop in the morning. The Montparnasse is the place for it. Blonds have more fun, isn’t that what they say?”
She studied his face. “I’m trying to imagine what you’ll look like.”
“Different. Not much, but enough.”
“You may be right. I hope to God you are.” She kissed his cheek, her prelude to discussion.
“Now, tell me what happened. Where did you go? What did you learn about that … incident six months ago?”
“It wasn’t six months ago, and because it wasn’t, I couldn’t have killed him.” He told her everything, save for the few brief moments when he thought he would never see her again. He did not have to; she said it for him.
“If that date hadn’t been so clear in your mind, you wouldn’t have come to me, would you?”
He shook his head. “Probably not.”
“I knew it I felt it. For a minute, while I was walking from the café to the museum steps, I could hardly breathe. It was as though I were suffocating. Can you believe that?”
“I don’t want to.”
“Neither do I, but it happened.”
They were sitting, she on the bed, he in the single armchair close by. He reached for her hand.
“I’m still not sure I should be here… I knew that man, I saw his face, I was in Marseilles forty-eight hours before he was killed!”
“But you didn’t kill him.”
“Then why was I there? Why do people think I did? Christ, it’s insane!” He sprang up from the chair, pain back in his eyes. “But then I forgot I’m not sane, am I? Because I’ve forgotten… Years, a lifetime.”
Marie spoke matter-of-factly, no compassion in her voice. “The answers will come to you. From one source or another, finally from yourself.”
“That may not be possible. Washburn said it was like blocks rearranged, different tunnels … different windows.” Jason walked to the window, bracing himself on the sill, looking down on the lights of Montparnasse. “The views aren’t the same; they never will be. Somewhere out there are people I know, who know me. A couple of thousand miles away are other people I care about and don’t care about … Or, oh God, maybe a wife and children—I don’t know. I keep spinning around in the wind, turning over and over and I can’t get down to the ground. Every time I try I get thrown back up again.”
“Into the sky?” asked Marie.
“Yes.”
“You’ve jumped from a plane,” she said, making a statement.
Bourne turned. “I never told you that.”
“You talked about it in your sleep the other night. You were sweating; your face was flushed and hot and I had to wipe it with a towel.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I did, in a way. I asked you if you were a pilot, or if flying bothered you. Especially at night”
“I didn’t know what you were talking about. Why didn’t you press me?”
“I was afraid to. You were very close to hysterics, and I’m not trained in things like that. I can help you try to remember, but I can’t deal with your unconscious. I don’t think anyone should but a doctor.”
“A doctor? I was with a doctor for damn near six months.”
“From what you’ve said about him, I think another opinion is called for.”
“I don’t!” he replied, confused by his own anger.
“Why not?” Marie got up from the bed. “You need help, my darling. A psychiatrist might—”
“No!” He shouted in spite of himself, furious with himself. “I won’t do that. I can’t.”
“Please, tell me why?” she asked calmly, standing in front of him.
“I … I … can’t do it.”
“Just tell me why, that’s all.”
Bourne stared at her, then turned and looked out the window again, his hands on the sill again.
“Because I’m afraid. Someone lied, and I was grateful for that more than I can tell you. But suppose there aren’t any more lies, suppose the rest is true. What do I do then?”
“Are you saying you don’t want to find out?”
“Not that way.” He stood up and leaned against the window frame, his eyes still on the lights below. “Try to understand me,” he said. “I have to know certain things … enough to make a decision … but maybe not everything. A part of me has to be able to walk away, disappear. I have to be able to say to myself, what was isn’t any longer, and there’s a possibility that it never was because I have no memory of it. What a person can’t remember didn’t exist … for him.” He turned back to her.
“What I’m trying to tell you is that maybe it’s better this way.”
“You want evidence, but not proof, is that what you’re saying?”
“I want arrows pointing in one direction or the other, telling me whether to run or not to run.”
“Telling you. What about us?”
“That’ll come with the arrows, won’t it? You know that.”
“Then let’s find them,” she replied.
“Be
careful. You may not be able to live with what’s out there. I mean that.”
“I can live with you. And I mean that.” She reached up and touched his face. “Come on. It’s barely five o’clock in Ontario, and I can still reach Peter at the office. He can start the Treadstone search … and give us the name of someone here at the embassy who can help us if we need him.”
“You’re going to tell Peter you’re in Paris?”
“He’ll know it anyway from the operator, but the call won’t be traceable to this hotel. And don’t worry, I’ll keep everything ‘in-house,’ even casual. I came to Paris for a few days because my relatives in Lyon are simply too dull. He’ll accept that.”
“Would he know someone at the embassy here?”
“Peter makes it a point to know someone everywhere. It’s one of his more useful but less attractive traits.”
“Sounds like he will.” Bourne got their coats. “After your call we’ll have dinner. I think we could both use a drink.”
“Let’s go past the bank on rue Madeleine. I want to see something.”
“What can you see at night?”
“A telephone booth. I hope there’s one nearby.”
There was. Diagonally across the street from the entrance.
The tall blond man wearing tortoise-shell glasses checked his watch under the afternoon sun on the rue Madeleine. The pavements were crowded, the traffic in the street unreasonable, as most traffic was in Paris. He entered the telephone booth and untangled the telephone, which had been hanging free of its cradle, the line knotted. It was a courteous sign to the next would-be user that the phone was out of commission; it reduced the chance that the booth would be occupied. It had worked.
He glanced at his watch again; the time span had begun. Marie inside the bank. She would call within the next few minutes. He took several coins from his pocket, put them on the ledge and leaned against the glass panel, his eyes on the bank across the street. A cloud diminished the sunlight and he could see his reflection in the glass. He approved of what he saw, recalling the startled reaction of a hairdresser in Montparnasse who had sequestered him in a curtained booth while performing the blond transformation. The cloud passed, the sunlight returned, and the telephone rang.
“It’s you?” asked Marie St. Jacques.
“It’s me,” said Bourne.
“Make sure you get the name and the location of the office. And rough up your French. Mispronounce a few words so he knows you’re American. Tell him you’re not used to the telephones in Paris. Then do everything in sequence. I’ll call you back in exactly five minutes.”
“Clock’s on.”
“What?”
“Nothing. I mean, let’s go.”
“All right… The clock is on. Good luck.”
“Thanks.” Jason depressed the lever, released it, and dialed the number he had memorized.
“La Banque de Valois. Bonjour.”
“I need assistance,” said Bourne, continuing with the approximate words Marie had told him to use. “I recently transferred sizable funds from Switzerland on a pouch-courier basis. I’d like to know if they’ve cleared.”
“That would be our Foreign Services Department, sir. I’ll connect you.”
A click, then another female voice. “Foreign Services.”
Jason repeated his request.
“May I have your name, please?”
“I’d prefer speaking with an officer of the bank before giving it.” There was a pause on the line. “Very well, sir. I’ll switch you to the office of Vice-President d’Amacourt.”
Monsieur d’Amacourt’s secretary was less accommodating, the bank officer’s screening process activated, as Marie had predicted. So Bourne once more used Marie’s words. “I’m referring to a transfer from Zurich, from the Gemeinschaft Bank on the Bahnhofstrasse, and I’m talking in the area of seven figures. Monsieur d’Amacourt, if you please. I have very little time.” It was not a secretary’s place to be the cause of further delay. A perplexed first vice-president got on the line.
“May I help you?”
“Are you d’Amacourt?” asked Jason.
“I am Antoine d’Amacourt, yes. And who, may I ask, is calling?”
“Good! I should have been given your name in Zurich. I’ll make certain next time certainly,” said Bourne, the redundancy intended, his accent American.
“I beg your pardon? Would you be more comfortable speaking English, monsieur?”
“Yes,” replied Jason, doing so. “I’m having enough trouble with this damn phone.” He looked at his watch; he had less than two minutes. “My name’s Bourne, Jason Bourne, and eight days ago I transferred four and a half million francs from the Gemeinschaft Bank in Zurich. They assured me the transaction would be confidential.”
“All transactions are confidential, sir.”
“Fine. Good. What I want to know is, has everything cleared?”
“I should explain,” continued the bank officer, “that confidentiality excludes blanket confirmations of such transactions to unknown parties over the telephone.” Marie had been right, the logic of her trap clearer to Jason.
“I would hope so, but as I told your secretary I’m in a hurry. I’m leaving Paris in a couple of hours and I have to put everything in order.”
“Then I suggest you come to the bank.”
“I know that,” said Bourne, satisfied that the conversation was going precisely the way Marie foresaw it. “I just wanted everything ready when I got there. Where’s your office?”
“On the main floor, monsieur. At the rear, beyond the gate, center door. A receptionist is there.”
“And I’ll be dealing only with you, right?”
“If you wish, although any officer—”
“Look, mister,” exclaimed the ugly American, “we’re talking about over four million francs!”
“Only with me, Monsieur Bourne.”
“Fine. Good.” Jason put his fingers on the cradle bar. He had fifteen seconds to go. “Look, it’s 2:35 now—” He pressed down twice on the lever, interrupting the line but not disconnecting it.
“Hello? Hello?”
“I am here, monsieur.”
“Damn phones! Listen, I’ll—” He pressed down again, now three times in rapid succession.
“Hello? Hello?”
“Monsieur, please—if you’ll give me your telephone number.”
“Operator? Operator?”
“Monsieur Bourne, please—”
“I can’t hear you!” Four seconds, three seconds, two seconds. “Wait a minute. I’ll call you back.” He held the lever down, breaking the connection. Three more seconds elapsed and the phone rang; he picked it up. “His name’s d’Amacourt, office on the main floor, rear, center door.”
“I’ve got it,” said Marie, hanging up.
Bourne dialed the bank again, inserted coins again. “Je parlais avec Monsieur d’Amacourt quand on m’a coupe …”
“Je regrette, monsieur.”
“Monsieur Bourne?”
“D’Amacourt?”
“Yes—I’m so terribly sorry you’re having such trouble. You were saying? About the time?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s a little after 2:30. I’ll get there by 3:00.”
“I look forward to meeting you, monsieur.”
Jason reknotted the phone, letting it hang free, then left the booth and walked quickly through crowds to the shade of a storefront canopy. He turned and waited, his eyes on the bank across the way, remembering another bank in Zurich and the sound of sirens on the Bahnhofstrasse. The next twenty minutes would tell if Marie was right or not. If she was, there would be no sirens on the rue Madeleine.
The slender woman in the wide-brimmed hat that partially covered the side of her face hung up the public phone on the wall to the right of the bank’s entrance. She opened her purse, removed a compact and ostensibly checked her makeup, angling the small mirror first to the left, then to the right. Satisfied, she replaced the compact,
closed her purse, and walked past the tellers’ cages toward the rear of the main floor. She stopped at a counter in the center, picked up a chained ballpoint pen, and began writing aimless numbers on a form that had been left on the marble surface. Less than ten feet away was a small, brass-framed gate, flanked by a low wooden railing that extended the width of the lobby. Beyond the gate and the railing were the desks of the lesser executives and behind them the desks of the major secretaries—five in all-in front of five doors in the rear wall.
Marie read the name printed in gold script on the center door.
M. A. R. D’Amacourt
Vice-President
Comptes a L’Étranger et Devises
It would happen any moment now—if it was going to happen, if she was right. And if she was, she had to know what Monsieur A.R. d’Amacourt looked like; he would be the man Jason could reach. Reach him and talk to him, but not in the bank.
It happened. There was a flurry of controlled activity. The secretary at the desk in front of d’Amacourt’s office rushed inside with her notepad, emerged thirty seconds later, and picked up the phone. She dialed three digits—an inside call—and spoke, reading from her pad.
Two minutes passed; the door of d’Amacourt’s office opened and the vice-president stood in the frame, an anxious executive concerned over an unwarranted delay. He was a middle-aged man with a face older than his age, but striving to look younger. His thinning dark hair was singed and brushed to obscure the bald spots; his eyes were encased in small rolls of flesh, attesting to long hours with good wine. Those same eyes were cold, darting eyes, evidence of a demanding man wary of his surroundings. He barked a question to his secretary; she twisted in her chair, doing her best to maintain her composure.
D’Amacourt went back inside his office without closing the door, the cage of an angry cat left open. Another minute passed; the secretary kept glancing to her right, looking at something—for something. When she saw it, she exhaled, closing her eyes in relief.
From the far left wall, a green light suddenly appeared above two panels of dark wood; an elevator was in use. Seconds later the door opened and an elderly elegant man walked out carrying a small black case not much larger than his hand. Marie stared at it, experiencing both satisfaction and fear; she had guessed right. The black case had been removed from a confidential file inside a guarded room and signed out by a man beyond reproach or temptation—the elderly figure making his way past the ranks of desks toward d’Amacourt’s office.
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