As the assassin scrambled under the bent wire, Bourne crouched and surged through the opening inches behind him. Expecting otherwise, the commando whipped around, rising to his knees. He was met by the beam of the penlight, the glow illuminating the weapon levelled at his head. I'd have done the same,' said Jason, getting to his feet . 'I'd have thought the same. Now go back to the fence, reach under, and yank that section back into place. Quickly!'
The killer did as he was told, straining as he pulled the thick wire mesh down. At the three-quarter mark Bourne spoke. 'That's enough. Get up and walk past me with your hands behind your back. Go straight ahead, shouldering your way through the branches. My light's on your hands. If you unclasp them I'll kill you. Am I clear?'
'You think I'd snap a limb back in your face?'
I would. '
'You're clear. '
They reached the road in front of the eerily dark gate. The distant shouts were clearer now, the advance party nearer. 'Down the road,' said Jason. 'Run!' Three minutes later, he snapped on the penlight . 'Stop!' he shouted. That pile of green over there, can you see it?'
'Where?' asked the breathless assassin.
'My beams on it. '
'They're branches, parts of the pine trees. '
'Pull them away. Hurry up!'
The commando began throwing the branches aside, in moments revealing the black Shanghai sedan. It was time for the knapsack. Bourne spoke. 'Follow my light, to the left of the bonnet. '
To what?
The tree with the white notch on the trunk. See it?'
'Yes. '
'Under it, about eighteen inches in front, there's loose dirt. Beneath there's a knapsack. Dig it out for me. '
'Fucking technician, aren't you?'
'Aren't you?'
Without replying, the sullen killer dug through the dirt and pulled the knapsack out of the ground. With the straps in his right hand, he stepped forward as if to hand the bag to his captor. Then suddenly he swung the knapsack, sweeping it diagonally up towards Jason's weapon and the penlight as he lunged forward, the fingers of-his hands spread like the extended claws of a huge, furious cat.
Bourne was prepared. It was the precise moment he would have used to gain the advantage, however transient, for it would have given him the seconds he needed to race away into the darkness. He stepped back, smashing the automatic into the assassin's head as the lunging figure passed him.
He crashed his knee down into the back of the splayed-out commando, grabbing the man's right arm while clenching the penlight between his teeth.
'I warned you,' said Jason, yanking the killer up by his right arm. 'But I also need you. So instead of your life, we'll do a little bullet-surgery. ' He put the barrel of his automatic laterally against the flesh of the assassin's arm muscle and pulled the trigger.
'Jesus!' screamed the killer as the spit echoed and blood erupted.
'No bone was broken,' said Delta . 'Only muscle tissue, and now you can forget about using your arm. You're fortunate that I'm a merciful man. In that knapsack is gauze and tape and disinfectant. You can repair yourself, Major. Then you're going to drive. You'll be my chauffeur in the People's Republic. You see, I'll be in the back seat with my gun at your head, and I have a map. If I were you, I wouldn't make a wrong turn. '
Twelve of Sheng Chou Yang's men raced to the gate, only four flashlights among them. 'Wei shemme? Cuo wu!'
'Mafan! Feng kuang.r
'You mao bing!'
'Weifan!'
A dozen screaming voices were raised against the unlit floodlights, blaming everything and everyone from inefficiency to treachery. The gatehouse was checked; the electric switches and the telephone were found to be inoperative, the guard nowhere in evidence. Several studied the coiled chain around the gate's lock and issued orders to the others. Since none could get out, they reasoned, the offenders had to be inside the sanctuary.
'Biao? shouted the infiltrator who had been the false prisoner. 'Quart bu zai zheli? he shrieked, telling the others to share the lights and search the parking lot, the surrounding woods and the swamps beyond. The hunters spread out, guns extended, racing across the parking area in different directions. Seven additional men arrived, only one carrying a flashlight. The false prisoner demanded it and proceeded to explain the situation so to form another search party. He was countered by objections that one light among them was insufficient for the darkness. In frustration the organizer roared a series of profanities, ascribing incredible stupidity to everyone but himself.
The dancing flames of torches grew brighter as the last of the conspirators arrived from the glen, led by the striding figure of Sheng Chou Yang, the ceremonial sword swinging at his side in its belted scabbard. The infiltrator showed him the coiled chain and repeated his argument.
'You're not thinking correctly,' said Sheng, exasperated. 'Your approach is wrong! That chain was not placed there by one of our people to keep the criminal or criminals inside. Instead, it was put there by the offender or the offenders to delay us, to keep us inside!'
'But there are too many obstacles-'
'Studied and considered!' shouted Sheng Chou Yang. 'Must I repeat myself? These people are survivors. They stayed alive in that criminal battalion called Medusa because they considered everything! They climbed out!'
'Impossible,' protested the younger man. The top rail and the extended panel of barbed wire are electrified, sir. Any weight in excess of thirty pounds activates them. That way the birds and animals are not electrocuted. '
Then they found the source of the current and shut it off!'
The switches are inside, and at least seventy-five metres from the gate, concealed in the ground. Even I am not sure where they are. '
'Send someone up,' ordered Sheng.
The subordinate looked around. Twenty feet away two men were talking quietly, rapidly, to each other; it was unlikely either had heard the heated conversation. 'You!' said the young leader, pointing to the man on the left.
'Sir?
'Scale the fence!'
'Yes, sir!' The lesser subordinate ran to the fence and leaped up, his hands gripping the open, crisscrossing squares of wire mesh as his feet worked furiously below. He reached the top and started over the angled panel of coiled barbed wire. 'Aiyaaa!'
A shattering cascade of static was accompanied by blinding, blue-white bolts of fired electricity. His body rigid, his hair and eyebrows singed to their roots, the climber fell backward, hitting the earth with the impact of a heavy flat rock. Flashlight beams converged. The man was dead.
The truck? screamed Sheng. This is idiocy! Bring out the truck and break through! Do as I say! Instantly?
Two men raced into the parking lot and within seconds the roar of the truck's powerful engine filled the night. The gears whined as reverse was found. The heavy truck lurched backward, its whole chassis shaking violently until it came to a sudden, leaden stop. The deflated tyres spun, smoke curling up from the burning rubber. Sheng Chou Yang stared in growing apprehension and fury.
The others? he shrieked. 'Start the others! All of them!'
One by one the vehicles were started, and one after another each lurched in reverse only to rattle and groan, sinking into the soft gravel unable to move. In a frenzy, Sheng ran up to the gate, pulled out a gun and fired twice into the coiled chain. A man on his right screamed, holding his bleeding forehead as he fell to the ground. Sheng raised his face to the dark sky and screamed a primeval roar of protest. He yanked out his ceremonial sword and began crashing it repeatedly down on the chained lock of the gate. It was an exercise in futility. The blade broke.
28
There's the house, the one with the high stone wall,' said CIA Case Officer Matthew Richards as he drove the car up the hill in Victoria Peak. 'According to our information, there are marines all over the place, and it won't do me any goddamned good being seen with you. '
'I gather you want to owe me a few more dollars,' said Alex Conklin, leaning forwar
d and peering through the windshield. 'It's negotiable. '
'I just don't want to be involved, for Christ's sake! And dollars I haven't got. '
'Poor Matt, sad Matt. You take things too literally. '
'I don't know what you're talking about. '
'I'm not sure I do, either, but drive by the house as if you were going to somebody else's place. I'll tell you when to stop and let me out. '
'You will?'
'Under conditions. Those are the dollars. '
'Oh, shit. '
'They're not hard to take and I may not even call them in. The way I see it now, I'll want to stay on ice and out of sight. In other words, I want a man inside. I'll call you several times a day asking you if our lunch or dinner dates are still on, or whether I'll see you at the Happy Valley Race-'
'Not there,' interrupted Richards.
'All right, the Wax Museum – anything that comes to mind, except the track. If you say "No, I'm busy", I'll know I'm not being closed in on. If you say "Yes", I'll get out. '
'I don't even know where the hell you're staying! You told me to pick you up on the corner of Granville and Carnarvon. '
'My guess is that your unit will be called in to keep the lines straight, and the responsibility where it belongs. The British will insist on it. They're not going to take a solo fall if DC blows it. These are touchy times for the Brits over here so they'll cover their colonial asses. '
They passed the gate. Conklin shifted his gaze and studied the large Victorian entrance.
'I swear, Alex, I don't know what you're talking about. '
'That's better yet. Do you agree? Are you my guru inside?'
'Hell, yes. I can do without the marines. '
'Fine. Stop here. I'll get out and walk back. As far as anyone's concerned I took the tram to the Peak, got a cab to the wrong house and made my way to the right address only a couple of hundred feet down the road. Are you happy, Matt?'
'Ecstatic,' said the case officer, scowling as he braked the car.
'Get a good night's sleep. It's been a long time since Saigon, and we all need more rest as we get older. '
'I heard you were a lush. It's not true, is it?'
'You heard what we wanted you to hear,' replied Conklin, flatly. This time, however, he was able to cross the fingers of both hands before he climbed awkwardly out of the car.
A brief knock and the door was flung open. Startled, Havilland looked up as Edward McAllister, his face ashen, walked rapidly into the room. 'Conklin's at the gate,' said the undersecretary. 'He's demanding to see you and says he'll stay there all night if he has to. He also says if it gets chilly, he'll build a fire in the road to keep warm. '
'Crippled or not, he hasn't lost his panache,' said the ambassador.
This is totally unexpected,' continued McAllister, massaging his right temple. 'We're not prepared for a confrontation. '
'It seems we haven't a choice. That's a public road out there, and it's the province of the colony's Fire Department in the event our neighbours become alarmed. '
'Surely, he wouldn't-'
'Surely, he would,' broke in Havilland. 'Let him in. This isn't only unexpected, it's extraordinary. He hasn't had time to assemble his facts or organize an attack that would give him leverage. He's openly exposing his involvement, and given his background in covert to black operations, he wouldn't do that lightly. It's far too dangerous. He himself once gave the order for beyond-salvage. '
'We can presume he's in touch with the woman,' protested the undersecretary, heading for the telephone on the ambassador's desk. That gives him all the facts he needs!'
'No, it doesn't. She hasn't got them. '
'And you,' said McAllister, his hand on the phone. 'How does he know to come to you!
Havilland smiled grimly. 'All he'd have to hear is that I'm in Hong Kong. Besides, we spoke, and I'm sure he's put it all together. '
'But this house?
'He'll never tell us. Conklin's an old Far East hand, Mr Undersecretary, and he has contacts we can't presume to know about. And we won't know what brings him here unless he's admitted, will we?'
'No, we won't. ' McAllister picked up the phone; he dialled three digits. 'Officer of the Guard?... Let Mr. Conklin through the gate, search him for a weapon, and escort him yourself to the East Wing office... He what! ... Admit him quickly and put the damn thing out!'
'What happened?' asked Havilland, as the undersecretary hung up the phone.
'He started a fire on the other side of the road. '
Alexander Conklin limped into the ornate Victorian room as the marine officer closed the door. Havilland rose from the chair and came around the desk, his hand extended.
'Mr Conklin?'
'Keep your hand, Mr Ambassador. I don't want to get infected. '
'I see. Anger precludes civility?'
'No, I really don't want to catch anything. As they say over here, you're rotten joss. You're carrying something. A disease, I think. '
'And what might that be?'
'Death. '
'So melodramatic? Come, Mr Conklin, you can do better than that. '
'No, I mean it. Less than twenty minutes ago I saw someone killed, cut down in the street with forty or fifty bullets in her. She was blown into the glass doors of her apartment house, her driver shot up in the car. I tell you the place is a mess, blood and glass all over the pavement... '
Havilland's eyes were wide with shock, but it was the hysterical voice of McAllister that stopped the CIA man. 'Her? She! Was it the woman?
'A woman,' said Conklin, turning to the undersecretary whose presence he had not yet acknowledged. 'You McAllister?'
'Yes. '
'I don't want to shake your hand, either. She was involved with both of you. ' 'Webb's wife is dead? yelled the undersecretary, his whole body paralysed.
'No, but thanks for the confirmation. '
'Good God!' cried the longstanding ambassador of the State Department's clandestine activities. 'It was Staples.
Catherine Staples?
'Give the man an exploding cigar. And thanks again for the second confirmation. Are you planning to have dinner with the Canadian consulate's high commissioner soon? I'd love to be there – just to watch the renowned Ambassador Havilland at work. Gosh and golly, I betcha us low-level types could learn an awful lot. '
'Shut up, you goddamned fool? shouted Havilland, crossing behind the desk and plummeting into his chair; he leaned back, his eyes closed.
That's the one thing I'm not going to do,' said Conklin, stepping forward, his club foot pounding the floor. 'You are accountable... sir!' The CIA man leaned over, gripping the edge of the desk. 'Just as you're accountable for what's happened to David and Marie Webb! Who the fuck do you think you are? And if my language offends you, sir, look up the derivation of the offending word. It comes from a term in the Middle Ages meaning to plant a seed in the ground, and in a way that's your specialty! Only in your case they're rotten seeds – you dig in clean dirt and turn it into filth. Your seeds are lies and deception. They grow inside people, turning them into angry and frightened puppets, dancing on your strings to your goddamned scenarios! I repeat, you aristocratic son of a bitch, who the fuck do you think you are?'
Havilland half opened his heavy-lidded eyes and leaned forward. His expression was that of an old man willing to die, if only to remove the pain. But those same eyes were alive with a cold fury that saw things others could not see. 'Would it serve your argument if I said to you that Catherine Staples said essentially the same thing to me?'
'Serves it and completes it!'
'Yet she was killed because she joined forces with us. She didn't like doing that, but in her judgement there was no alternative. '
'Another puppet?'
'No. A human being with a first-rate mind and a wealth of experience who understood what faced us. I mourn her loss -and the manner of her death – more than you can imagine. '
'Is it her loss, sir, or is it the f
act that your holy operation was penetrated!'
'How dare you?' Havilland, his voice low and cold, rose from the chair and stared at the CIA man. 'It's a little late for you to be moralizing, Mr Conklin. Your lapses have been all too apparent in the areas of deception and ethics. If you'd had your way, there'd be no David Webb, no Jason Bourne. You put him beyond-salvage, no one else did. You planned his execution and nearly succeeded. '
'I've paid for that lapse. Christ, how I've paid for it!'
'And I suspect you're still paying for it, or you wouldn't be in Hong Kong now,' said the ambassador, nodding his head slowly, the coldness leaving his voice. 'Lower your cannons,
Mr. Conklin, and I'll do the same. Catherine Staples really did understand, and if there's any meaning in her death, let's try and find it. '
'I haven't the vaguest idea where to start looking. '
'You'll be given chapter and verse... just as Staples was. '
'Maybe I shouldn't hear it. '
'I have no choice but to insist that you do. '
'I guess you weren't listening. You've been penetrated! The Staples woman was killed because it was assumed she had information that called for her to be taken out. In short, the mole who's bored his way in here saw her in a meeting or meetings with both of you. The Canadian connection was made, the order given, and you let her walk around without protection!'
'Are you afraid for your life?' asked the ambassador.
'Constantly,' replied the CIA man. 'And right now I'm also concerned with someone else's. '
'Webb's?'
Conklin paused, studying the old diplomat's face. 'If what I believe is true,' he said quietly. There's nothing I can do for Delta that he can't do better for himself. But if he doesn't make it, I know what he'd ask me to do. Protect Marie. And I can do that best by fighting you, not listening to you. '
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