The Bourne Ultimatum jb-3

by Robert Ludlum

  "Hey, back up, gumball!" shouted DeFazio. "This slime Bourne's a fake, a contraffazione. He never was an executioner!"

  "You're quite wrong, signore," said the countess. "He may not have entered the arena with a gun, but it became his favorite instrument. Ask the Jackal."

  "Fuck the Jackal!" cried DeFazio, getting up from the chair.

  "Lou!"

  "Shut up, Mario! This Bourne is mine, ours! We deliver the corpse, we take the pictures with me-us-standing over all three with a dozen ice picks in their bodies, their heads pulled up by the hair, so nobody can say it ain't our kills!"

  "Now you're the one who's pazzo," said the Mafia count quietly, in counterpoint to the capo supremo's raucous yelling. "And please keep your voice down."

  "Then don't get me excited-"

  "He's trying to explain things, Lou," said DeFazio's relative, the killer. "I want to hear what the gentleman has to say because it could be vital to my approach. Sit down, Cousin." Louis sat down. "Please continue, Count."

  "Thank you, Mario. You don't object to my calling you Mario."

  "Not at all, sir."

  "Perhaps you should visit Rome-"

  "Perhaps we should get back to Paris," again choked the capo supremo.

  "Very well," agreed the Roman, now dividing his attention between DeFazio and his cousin, but favoring the latter. "You might take out all three targets with a long-range rifle, but you won't get near the bodies. The Soviet guards will be indistinguishable from any other people in the area, and if they see the two of you coming in to the killing ground, they'll open fire, assuming you're from the Jackal."

  "Then we must create a diversion where we can isolate the targets," said Mario, his elbows on the table, his intelligent eyes on the count. "Perhaps an emergency in the early hours of the morning. A fire in their lodgings, perhaps, that necessitates their coming outside. I've done it before; in the confusion of fire trucks and police sirens and the general panic, one can pull targets away and complete the assignments."

  "It's a fine strategy, Mario, but there are still the Soviet guards."

  "We take them out!" cried DeFazio.

  "You are only two men," said the diplomat, "and there are at least three in Barbizon, to say nothing of the hotel in Paris where the cripple and the doctor are staying."

  "So we outmatch the numbers." The capo supremo pulled the back of his hand over the sweat that had gathered on his forehead. "We hit this Barbizon first, right?"

  "With only two men?" asked the countess, her cosmeticized eyes wide in surprise.

  "You got men!" exclaimed DeFazio. "We'll use a few. ... I'll pay additional."

  The count shook his head slowly and spoke softly. "We will not go to war with the Jackal," he said. "Those are my instructions."

  "Fairy bastards!"

  "An interesting comment coming from you," observed the countess, a thin insulting smile on her lips.

  "Perhaps our dons are not as generous as yours," continued the diplomat. "We are willing to cooperate up to a point but no further."

  "You'll never make another shipment to New York, or Philly, or Chicago!"

  "We'll let our superiors debate those issues, won't we?"

  There was a sudden knocking at the door, four raps in a row, harsh and intrusive. "Avanti," called out the count, instantly reaching under his jacket and ripping an automatic out of his belt; he lowered it beneath the overhang. of the red tablecloth and smiled as the manager of Tetrazzim's entered.

  "Emergenza," said the grossly overweight man, walking rapidly to the well-tailored mafioso and handing him a note.

  "Grazie."

  "Prego," replied the manager, crossing back to the door and exiting as quickly as he had arrived.

  "The anxious gods of Sicily may be smiling down on you after all," said the count, reading. "This communication is from the man following your targets. They are outside Paris and they are alone, and for reasons I cannot possibly explain, there are no guards. They have no protection."

  "Where?" cried DeFazio, leaping to his feet.

  Without answering, the diplomat calmly reached for his gold lighter, ignited it, and fired the small piece of paper, lowering it into an ashtray. Mario sprang up from his chair; the man from Rome dropped the lighter on the table and swiftly retrieved the gun from his lap. "First, let us discuss the fee," he said as the note coiled into flaming black ash. "Our dons in Palermo are definitely not as generous as yours. Please talk quickly, as every minute counts."

  "You motherfucking bastard!"

  "My Oedipal problems are not your concern. How much, Signor DeFazio?"

  "I'll go the limit," replied the capo supremo, lowering himself into the chair, staring at the charred remnants of the information. "Three hundred thousand, American. That's it."

  "That's excremento," said the countess. "Try again. Seconds become minutes and you cannot afford them."

  "All right, all right! Double it!"

  "Plus expenses," added the woman.

  "What the fuck can they be?"

  "Your cousin Mario is right," said the diplomat. "Please watch your language in front of my wife."

  "Holy shit-"

  "I warned you, signore. The expenses are an additional quarter of a million, American."

  "What are you, nuts?"

  "No, you're vulgar. The total is one million one hundred fifty thousand dollars, to be paid as our couriers in New York so instruct you. ... If not, you will be missed in-what is it?-Brooklyn Heights, Signor DeFazio?"

  "Where are the targets?" said the beaten capo supremo, his defeat painful to him.

  "At a small private airfield in Pontcarré, about forty-five minutes from Paris. They're waiting for a plane that was grounded in Poitiers because of bad weather. It can't possibly arrive for at least an hour and a quarter."

  "Did you bring the equipment we requested?" asked Mario rapidly.

  "It's all there," answered the countess, gesturing at the large black suitcase on a chair against the wall.

  "A car, a fast car!" cried DeFazio as his executioner retrieved the suitcase.

  "Outside," replied the count. "The driver will know where to take you. He's been to that field."

  "Come on, cugino. Tonight we collect and you can settle a score!"

  Except for a single clerk behind the counter in the small one-room terminal and an air controller hired to stay the extra hours in the radio tower, the private airport in Pontcarré was deserted. Alex Conklin and Mo Panov stayed discreetly behind as Bourne led Marie outside to the gate area fronting the field beyond a waist-high metal fence. Two strips of receding amber ground lights defined the long runway for the plane from Poitiers; they had been turned on only a short time ago.

  "It won't be long now," said Jason.

  "This whole damn thing's stupid," retorted Webb's wife. "Everything."

  "There's no reason for you to stay and every reason for you to leave. For you to be alone here in Paris would be stupid. Alex is right. If Carlos's people found you, you'd be taken hostage, so why risk it?"

  "Because I'm capable of staying out of sight and I don't want to be ten thousand miles away from you. You'll forgive me if I worry about you, Mr. Bourne. And care for you."

  Jason looked at her in the shadows, grateful for the darkness; she could not clearly see his eyes. "Then be reasonable and use your head," he said coldly, suddenly feeling so old, too old for such a transparently false lack of feeling. "We know Carlos is in Moscow and Krupkin isn't far behind him. Dimitri's flying us there in the morning, and we'll be under the protection of the KGB in the tightest city in the world. What more could we want?"

  "You were under the protection of the United States government on a short East Side block in New York thirteen years ago and it didn't do you much good."

  "There's a great deal of difference. Back then the Jackal knew exactly where I was going and when I'd be there. Right now he has no idea we even know he's in Moscow. He's got other problems, big ones for him, and he thi
nks we're here in Paris-he's ordered his people to keep searching for us."

  "What will you do in Moscow?"

  "We won't know until we get there, but whatever it is, it's better than here in Paris. Krupkin's been busy. Every ranking officer in Dzerzhinsky Square who speaks French is being watched and is under surveillance. He said the French narrowed down the possibilities and that something should break. ... Something will break; the odds are on our side. And when it does, I can't be worried about you back here."

  "That's the nicest thing you've said in the past thirty-six hours."

  "So be it. You should be with the children and you know that. You'll be out of reach and safe ... and the kids need you. Mrs. Cooper's a terrific lady, but she's not their mother. Besides, your brother probably has Jamie smoking his Cuban cigars and playing Monopoly with real money by now."

  Marie looked up at her husband, a gentle smile apparent in the darkness as well as in her voice. "Thanks for the laugh. I need it."

  "It's probably the truth-your brother, I mean. If there are good-looking women on the staff, it's quite possible our son's lost his virginity."

  "David!" Bourne was silent. Marie chuckled briefly, then went on. "I suppose I really can't argue with you."

  "And you would if my argument was flawed, Dr. St. Jacques. That's something I've learned over the past thirteen years."

  "I still object to this crazy trip back to Washington! From here to Marseilles, then to London, then on a flight to Dulles. It'd be so much simpler just to get on a plane from Orly to the States."

  "It's Peter Holland's idea. He'll meet you himself, so ask him; he doesn't say an awful lot on the phone. I suspect he doesn't want to deal with the French authorities for fear of a leak to Carlos's people. A single woman with a common name on crowded flights is probably best."

  "I'll spend more time sitting in airports than in the air."

  "Probably, so cover those great legs of yours and carry a Bible."

  "That's sweet," said Marie, touching his face. "I suddenly hear you, David."

  "What?" Again Bourne did not respond to the warmth.

  "Nothing. ... Do me a favor, will you?"

  "What is it?" asked Jason, in a distant monotone.

  "Bring that David back to me."

  "Let's get an update on the plane," said Bourne, his voice flat and abrupt as he touched her elbow and led her back inside. I'm getting older-old-and I cannot much longer be what I am not. The Chameleon is slipping away, the imagination isn't there the way it used to be. But I cannot stop! Not now! Get away from me, David Webb!

  No sooner had they reentered the small terminal than the telephone on the counter began to ring. The lone clerk picked it up. "Oui?" He listened for no more than five seconds. "Merci," he said, hanging up and addressing the four interested parties in French. "That was the tower. The plane from Poitiers will be on the ground in approximately four minutes. The pilot requests that you be ready, madame, as he would like to fly ahead of the weather front moving east."

  "So would I," agreed Marie, rushing to Alex Conklin and Mo Panov. The farewells were brief, the embraces strong, the words heartfelt. Bourne led his wife back outside. "I just remembered-where are Krupkin's guards?" she asked as Jason unlatched the gate and they walked toward the lighted runway.

  "We don't need them or want them," he answered. "The Soviet connection was made in the Montaigne, so we have to assume the embassy's being watched. No guards rushing out into cars, therefore no movement on our part for Carlos's people to report."

  "I see." The sound of a small decelerating jet could be heard as the plane circled the airfield once and made its descent onto the four-thousand-foot runway. "I love you so much, David," said Marie, raising her voice to be heard over the roar of the aircraft, rolling toward them.

  "He loves you so much," said Bourne, images colliding in his mind. "I love you so much."

  The jet loomed clearly into view between the rows of amber lights, a white bullet-like machine with short delta wings sweeping back from the fuselage, giving it the appearance of an angry flying insect. The pilot swung the plane around in a circle, coming to a jarring stop as the automatic passenger door sprang out and up while metal steps slapped down to the ground. Jason and Marie ran toward the jet's entrance.

  It happened with the sudden impact of a murderous wind shear, at once unstoppable, enveloping, the swirling winds of death! Gunfire. Automatic weapons-two of them; one nearby, one farther away-shattering windows, ripping into wood, a piercing screech of pain erupting from the terminal, announcing a mortal hit.

  With both hands Bourne gripped Marie by the waist, heaving her up and propelling her into the plane as he shouted to the pilot. "Shut the door and get out of here!"

  "Mon Dieu!" cried the man from the open flight deck. "Allez-vous-en!" he roared, ordering Jason away from the spring-hinged door and the metal steps, gunning the jet's engine as the plane lurched forward. Jason plunged to the ground and raised his eyes. Marie's face was pressed against the window; she was screaming hysterically. The plane thundered down the runway; it was free.

  Bourne was not. He was caught in the wash of the amber lights, the glowing rows a cyclorama of yellowish orange. No matter where he stood or knelt or crouched he was in silhouette. So he pulled out the automatic from his belt-the weapon, he reflected, given to him by Bernardine-and began slithering, snaking his way across the asphalt toward the bordering grass outside the fenced-gate area.

  The gunfire erupted again, but now they were three scattered single shots from within the terminal, where the lights had been extinguished. They had to have come from Conklin's gun, or possibly the clerk's if he had a weapon; Panov did not. Then who had been hit? ... No time! A shattering fusillade burst out of the nearest automatic rifle; it was steady, prolonged and deadly, spraying the side of the small building and the gate area.

  Then the second automatic weapon commenced firing; from the sound it was on the opposite side of the terminal's waiting room. Moments later there were two single shots, the last one accompanied by a scream ... again on the other side of the building.

  "I've been hit!" The voice was the cry of a man in pain ... on the other side of the building. The automatic rifle! Jason slowly rose to a low crouch in the grass and peered into the darkness. A fragment of blacker darkness moved. He raised his automatic and fired into the moving mass, getting to his feet and racing across the gate area, turning and squeezing the trigger until he was both out of bullets and out of sight on the east side of the building, where the runway ended and the amber lights stopped. He crawled cautiously to the section of the waist-high fence that paralleled the corner of the small terminal. The grayish-white gravel of the parking area was a gratifying sight; he was able to make out the figure of a man writhing on the stones. The figure gripped a weapon in his hands, then pushing it into the gravel, raised himself to a half-sitting position.

  "Cugino!" he screamed. "Help me!" His answer was another burst of gunfire from the west side of the building, diagonally to the right of the wounded man. "Holy Christ!" he shrieked. "I'm hit bad!" Again the reply was yet another fusillade from the automatic rifle, these rounds simultaneous with crashing glass. The killer on the west side of the building had smashed the windows and was blowing apart everything inside.

  Bourne dropped the useless automatic and grabbed the top of the fence, vaulting over it, his left leg landing in agony on the ground. What's happened to me? Why do I hurt? Goddamn it! He limped to the wood-framed corner of the building and edged his face to the open space beyond. The figure on the gravel fell back, unable to support himself on the automatic rifle. Jason felt the ground, found a large rock, and threw it with all his strength beyond the wounded man. It crashed, bouncing into the gravel, for an instant like the sound of approaching footsteps. The killer spastically rose and spun his body to the rear, gripping his weapon, which twice fell out of his grasp.

  Now! Bourne raced across the stones of the parking lot and lunged off his feet
down into the man with the gun. He tore the weapon from the killer's grip and crashed the metal stock into his skull. The short, slender man went limp. And, again, suddenly, there was another crescendo of gunfire from the west exterior of the terminal building, again accompanied by the shattering of glass. The first and nearer killer was narrowing down his targets. He had to be stopped! thought Jason, his breath gone, every muscle in his body in pain. Where was the man from yesterday? Where was Delta from Medusa? The Chameleon from Treadstone Seventy-one? Where was that man?

  Bourne grabbed the MAC-10 submachine gun from the unconscious figure on the gravel and raced toward the side door of the terminal.

  "Alex!" he roared. "Let me in! I've got the weapon!"

  The door crashed open. "My God, you're alive!" shouted Conklin in the darkness of the shadows as Jason ran inside. "Mo's in bad shape-he was shot in the chest. The clerk's dead and we can't raise the tower out on the field. They must have reached it first." Alex slammed the door shut. "Get down on the floor!" A fusillade raked the walls. Bourne got to his knees and fired back, then threw himself down beside Conklin.

  "What happened?" cried Jason, breathless, his voice strained, the sweat dripping down his face and stinging his eyes.

  "The Jackal happened."

  "How did he do it?"

  "He fooled us all. You, me, Krupkin and Lavier-worst of all, me. He sent the word out that he'd be away, no explanation even with you here in Paris, just that he'd be gone for a while. We thought the trap had worked; everything pointed to Moscow. ... He sucked us into his own trap. Oh, Christ, did he suck us in! I should have known better, I should have seen through it! It was too clean. ... I'm sorry, David. Oh, God, I'm sorry!"