constant is my proficiency with languages. Learning languages is like learning history
from the inside out. It encompasses the battles of ethnicity, religion, compromise,
politics. So much can be learned from language because it’s been shaped by history.”
By this time they had left campus and were walking down 36th Street, NW, toward
1789, a favorite restaurant of Moira’s, which was housed in a Federal town house. When
they arrived, they were shown to a window table on the second floor in a dim, paneled,
old-fashioned room with candles burning brightly on tables set with fine china and
sparkling stemware. They sat down facing each other and ordered drinks.
Bourne leaned across the table, said in a low voice,”Listen to me, Moira, because I’m
going to tell you something very few people know. The Bourne identity continues to
haunt me. Marie used to worry that the decisions I was forced to make, the actions I had
to take as Jason Bourne would eventually drain me of all feeling, that one day I’d come
back to her and David Webb would be gone for good. I can’t let that happen.”
“Jason, you and I have spent quite a bit of time with each other since we met to scatter
Martin’s ashes. I’ve never seen a hint that you’ve lost any part of your humanity.”
Both sat back, silent as the waiter set the drinks in front of them, handed them menus.
As soon as he left, Bourne said, “That’s reassuring, believe me. In the short time I’ve
known you I’ve come to value your opinions. You’re not like anyone else I’ve ever met.”
Moira took a sip of her drink, set it down, all without taking her eyes from his. “Thank
you. Coming from you that’s quite a compliment, particularly because I know how
special Marie was to you.”
Bourne stared down at his drink.
Moira reached across the starched white linen for his hand. “I’m sorry, now you’re
drifting away.”
He glanced at her hand over his but didn’t pull away. When he looked up, he said, “I
relied on her for many things. But I find now that those things are slipping away from
me.”
“Is that a bad thing, or a good thing?”
“That’s just it,” he said. “I don’t know.”
Moira saw the anguish in his face, and her heart went out to him. It was only months
ago that she’d seen him standing by the parapet in the Cloisters. He was clutching the
bronze urn holding Martin’s ashes as if he never wanted to let it go. She’d known then,
even if Martin hadn’t told her, what they’d meant to each other.
“Martin was your friend,” she said now. “You put yourself in terrible jeopardy to save
him. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel anything for him. Besides, by your own admission,
you’re not Jason Bourne now. You’re David Webb.”
He smiled. “You have me there.”
Her face clouded over. “I want to ask you a question, but I don’t know whether I have
the right.”
At once, he responded to the seriousness of her expression. “Of course you can ask,
Moira. Go on.”
She took a deep breath, let it go. “Jason, I know you’ve said that you’re content at the
university, and if that’s so, fine. But I also know you blame yourself for not being able to save Martin. You must understand, though, if you couldn’t save him, no one could. You
did your best; he knew that, I’m sure. And now I find myself wondering if you believe
you failed him-that you’re not up to being Jason Bourne anymore. I wonder if you’ve
ever considered the idea that you accepted Professor Specter’s offer at the university in
order to turn away from Jason Bourne’s life.”
“Of course I’ve considered it.” After Martin’s death he’d once again decided to turn
his back on Jason Bourne’s life, on the running, the deaths, a river that seemed to have as many bodies as the Ganges. Always, for him, memories lurked. The sad ones he
remembered. The others, the shadowed ones that filled the halls of his mind, seemed to
have shape until he neared them, when they flowed away like a tide at ebb. And what was
left behind were the bleached bones of all those he’d killed or had been killed because of
who he was. But he knew just as surely that as long as he drew breath, the Bourne
identity wouldn’t die.
There was a tormented look in his eyes. “You have to understand how difficult it is
having two personalities, always at war with each other. I wish with every fiber of my
being that I could cut one of them out of me.”
Moira said, “Which one would it be?”
“That’s the damnable part,” Bourne said. “Every time I think I know, I realize that I
don’t.”
Two
LUTHER LAVALLE WAS as telegenic as the president and two-thirds his age. He
had straw-colored hair slicked back like a movie idol of the 1930s or 1940s and restless
hands. By contrast, General Kendall was square-jawed and beady-eyed, the very essence
of a ramrod officer. He was big and beefy; perhaps he’d been a fullback at Wisconsin or
Ohio State. He looked to LaValle the way a running back looks to his quarterback for
instructions.
“Luther,” the president said, “seeing as how you requested this meeting I think it
appropriate that you begin.”
LaValle nodded, as if the president deferring to him was a fait accompli. “After the
recent debacle of CI being infiltrated at its highest level, culminating with the murder of the former DCI, firmer security and controls need to be set in place. Only the Pentagon
can do that.”
Veronica felt compelled to jump in before LaValle got too much of a head start. “I beg
to differ, sir,” she said, aiming her remarks at the president. “Human intelligence
gathering has always been the province of CI. Our on-the-ground networks are
unparalleled, as are our armies of contacts, who have been cultivated for decades. The
Pentagon’s expertise has always been in electronic surveillance. The two are separate,
requiring altogether different methodologies and mind-sets.”
LaValle smiled as winningly as he did when appearing on Fox TV or Larry King Live.
“I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that the landscape of intelligence has changed radically since 2001. We’re at war. In my opinion this state of affairs is likely to last indefinitely, which is why the Pentagon has recently expanded its field of expertise, creating teams of
clandestine DIA personnel and special-ops forces who are conducting successful
counterintelligence ops in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
“With all due respect, Mr. LaValle and his military machine are eager to fill any
perceived vacuum or create one, if necessary. Mr. LaValle and General Kendall need us
to believe that we’re in a perpetual state of war whether or not it’s the truth.” From her
briefcase Veronica produced a file, which she opened and read from. “As this evidence
makes clear, they have systematically directed the expansion of their human intelligence-
gathering squads, outside of Afghanistan and Iraq, into other territories-CI’s territories-
often with disastrous results. They’ve corrupted informers and, in at least one instance,
they’ve jeopardized an ongoing CI deep-cover operation.”
After the president glanced at the pages Veronica handed him, he said, “While this is
compelling, Veronica, Congress seems to be on Luther’s side. It has provided him with
twenty-five million dollars a year to pay informants on the ground and to recruit
mercenaries.”
“That’s part of the problem, not the solution,” Veronica said emphatically. “Theirs is a
failed methodology, the same one they’ve used all the way back to the OSS in Berlin