“Lucky my ass.” Pelz settled himself on a bench. “My nephew pays a town official
under the table to keep the lights on.” He offered them whiskey or wine, which they
refused. He poured himself a shot of liquor, downed it perhaps to fortify himself or to
keep himself from sinking back into the shadows. It was obvious he liked having
company, that the stimulation of other humans was bringing him out of himself.
“Most of what I’ve already told you about the Black Legion is basic history, if you
know where to look, but the key to understanding their success in negotiating the
dangerous postwar landscape lies in two men: Farid Icoupov and Ibrahim Sever.”
“I assume this Icoupov you speak of is Semion Icoupov’s father,” Bourne said.
Pelz nodded. “Just so.”
“And did Ibrahim Sever have a son?”
“He had two,” Pelz replied, “but I’m getting ahead of myself.” He smacked his lips,
glanced at the bottle of whiskey, then decided against another shot.
“Farid and Ibrahim were the best of friends. They grew up together, each the only sons
in large families. Possibly, this is what bonded them as children. The bond was strong; it
lasted for most of their lives, but Ibrahim Sever was a warrior at heart, Farid Icoupov an
intellectual, and the seeds of discontent and mistrust must have been sown early. During
the war their shared leadership worked out just fine. Ibrahim was in charge of the Black
Legion soldiers on the Eastern Front; Farid put in place and directed the intelligence-
gathering network in the Soviet Union.
“It was after the war when the problems began. Stripped of his duties as commandant
of the military end, Ibrahim began to fret that his power was eroding.” Pelz clucked his
tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Listen, American, if you’re a student of history
you know how the two longtime allies and friends Gaius Julius Caesar and Pompey
Magnus became enemies infected by the ambitions, fears, deceptions, and power
struggles of those under their respective commands. So it was with these two. In time,
Ibrahim convinced himself-no doubt abetted by some of his more militant advisers-that
his longtime friend was planning a power grab. Unlike Caesar, who was off in Gaul when
Pompey declared war on him, Farid lived in the next house. Ibrahim Sever and his men
came in the night and assassinated Farid Icoupov. Three days later Farid’s son, Semion,
shot Ibrahim to death as he was driving to work. In retaliation, Ibrahim’s son, Asher,
went after Semion in a Munich nightclub. Asher managed to escape, but in the ensuing
hail of gunfire Asher’s younger brother was killed.”
Pelz scrubbed his face with his hand. “You see how it goes, American? Like an ancient
Roman vendetta, an orgy of blood of biblical proportions.”
“I know about Semion Icoupov, but not about Sever,” Bourne said. “Where’s Asher
Sever now?”
The old man shrugged his thin shoulders. “Who knows? If Icoupov did, Sever would
surely be dead by now.”
For a time, Bourne sat silent, thinking about the Black Legion’s attack on the
professor, thinking about all the little anomalies that had been piling up in his mind: the oddity of Pyotr’s network of decadents and incompetents, the professor saying it was his
idea to have the stolen plans delivered to him via the network, and the question of
whether Mischa Tarkanian-and Arkadin himself-was Black Legion. At last, he said,
“Virgil, I need to ask you several questions.”
“Yes, American.” Pelz’s eyes looked as bright and eager as a robin’s.
Still, Bourne hesitated. Revealing anything of his mission or its background to a
stranger violated every instinct, every lesson he’d been taught, and yet he could see no
other alternative. “I came to Munich because a friend of mine-a mentor, really-asked me
to go after the Black Legion, first because they’re planning an attack against my country,
and second because their leader, Semion Icoupov, ordered his son, Pyotr, killed.”
Pelz looked up, a curious expression on his face. “Asher Sever gathered his power
base, which he’d inherited from his father-a powerful intelligence-gathering network
strewn across Asia and Europe-and ousted Semion. Icoupov hasn’t been running the
Black Legion for decades. If he had, I doubt whether I’d still be down here. Unlike Asher
Sever, Icoupov was a man you could reason with.”
“Are you saying that you’ve met both Semion Icoupov and Asher Sever?” Bourne said.
“That’s right,” Pelz said, nodding. “Why?”
Bourne had gone cold as he contemplated the unthinkable. Could the professor have
been lying to him all the time? But if so-if he was in fact a member of the Black Legion-
why in the world would he entrust the delivery of the attack plans to Pyotr’s shaky
network? Surely he would have known how unreliable its members were. Nothing
seemed to make sense.
Knowing he had to solve this problem one step at a time, he took out his cell phone,
scrolled through the photos, brought up the one the professor had sent of Egon Kirsch. He
looked at the two men in the photo, then handed the phone to Pelz.
“Virgil, do you recognize either of these men?”
Pelz squinted, then stood and walked nearer to one of the bare lightbulbs. “No.” He
shook his head, then, after a moment’s further scrutiny, his forefinger jabbed at the photo.
“I don’t know, because he looks so different…” He returned to where Bourne sat, turned
the phone so they could both see the photo, and tapped the figure of Professor Specter.
“… but, damn, I’d swear this one is Asher Sever.”
Thirty-Six
PETER MARKS, chief of operations, was with Veronica Hart in her office, poring
over reams of personnel data sheets, when they came for her. Luther LaValle,
accompanied by a pair of federal marshals, had swept through CI security, armed with
their warrant. Hart had only the briefest of warnings-a phone call from the first set of
security guards downstairs-that her professional world was imploding. No time to get out
of the way of the falling debris.
She barely had time to tell Marks, then stand up to face her accusers before the three
men entered her office and presented her with the federal warrant.
“Veronica Rose Hart,” the senior of the stone-faced federal marshals intoned, “you are
hereby placed under arrest for conspiring with one Jason Bourne, a rogue agent, for
purposes that violate the regulations of Central Intelligence.”
“On what evidence?” Hart said.
“NSA surveillance photos of you in the courtyard of the Freer handing a packet to
Jason Bourne,” the marshal said in the same zombie voice.
Marks, who was also on his feet, said, “This is insane. You can’t really believe-”
“Shut it, Mr. Marks,” Luther LaValle said with no fear of contradiction. “One more
word out of you and I’ll have you put under formal investigation.”
Marks was about to reply when a sharp look from the DCI forced him to bite back his
words. His jaws clamped shut, but the fury in his eyes was unmistakable.
Hart came around the desk, and the junior marshal cuffed her hands behind her back.
“Is that really necessary?” Marks said.
LaValle pointed at him wordlessly. As they marched Hart from her office, she said,
“Take over, Peter. You’re acting DCI now.”
LaValle grinned. “Not for long, if I have anything to say about it.”
After they’d gone, Marks collapsed into his chair. Finding that his hands were
trembling, he clasped them together, as if in prayer. His heart was pounding so hard he