D'Anjou! Jason ran to his right, rounding the stone corner, and ran down the side of the pillared structure until he reached the front. Guards were doing their best to calm the agitated crowds while trying to find out what had happened. A riot was in the making.
Bourne studied the place where he had last seen d'Anjou, then moved his eyes over a gridlock area within which the Frenchman might logically be seen. Nothing, no one even vaguely resembling him.
Suddenly, there was the screeching of tyres far off on a thoroughfare to Jason's left. He whipped around and looked. A van with tinted windows had circled the stanchioned pavement and was speeding towards the south gate of Tian an men Square. They had taken d'Anjou. Echo was gone.
24
'Qu'est-il arrive?'
'Des coups defer! Les gardes sont paniques!"
Bourne heard the shouts and, running, joined the group of French tourists led by a guide whose concentration was riveted on the chaos taking place on the steps of the mausoleum. He buttoned his jacket, covering the gun in his belt, and slipped the perforated silencer into his pocket. Glancing around, he moved quickly back through the crowd next to a man taller than himself, a well-dressed man with a disdainful expression. Jason was grateful that there were several others of nearly equal height in front of them; with luck and in the excitement he might remain inconspicuous. Above, at the top of the mausoleum's stairs, the doors had been partially opened. Uniformed men were racing back and forth along the stairs. Obviously the leadership was a shambles, and Bourne knew why. It had fled, had simply disappeared, wanting no part of the terrible events. All that concerned Jason now was the assassin. Would he come out? Or had he found d'Anjou, capturing his creator himself and leaving with Echo in the van, convinced that the original Jason Bourne was trapped, a second unlikely corpse in the desecrated mausoleum.
'Qu'est-ce que c'est?' asked Jason, addressing the tall, well-dressed Frenchman beside him.
'Another ungodly delay, no doubt,' replied the man in a somewhat effeminate Parisian accent. This place is a madhouse, and my tolerance is at an end! I'm going back to the hotel. '
'Can you do that?' Bourne up-graded his French from middle-class to a decent university. It meant so much to a Parisian. 'I mean, are we permitted to leave our tour? We hear constantly that we must stay together. '
'I'm a businessman, not a tourist. This "tour", as you call it, was not on my agenda. Frankly, I had the afternoon off -these people linger endlessly over decisions – and thought I'd see a few sights but there wasn't a French-speaking driver available. The concierge assigned me – mind you assigned me – to this group. The guide, you know, is a student of French literature and speaks as though she was born in the seventeenth century. I haven't a clue what this so-called tour is all about. '
'It's the five-hour excursion,' explained Jason accurately, reading the Chinese characters printed on the identification tag affixed to the man's lapel. 'After Tian an men Square we visit the Ming tombs, then drive out to watch the sunset from the Great Wall. '
'Now, really, I've seen the Great Wall! My God, it was the first place all twelve of those bureaucrats from the Trade Commission took me, prattling incessantly through the interpreter that it was a sign of their permanence. Shirt If the labour weren't so unbelievably cheap and the profits so extraordinary-'
'I, too, am in business, but for a few days also a tourist. My line is wicker imports. What's yours, if I may ask?'
'Fabrics, what else? Unless you consider electronics, or oil, or coal, or perfume – even canework. ' The businessman allowed himself a superior but knowing smile. 'I tell you these people are sitting on the wealth of the world and they haven't the vaguest idea what to do with it. '
Bourne looked closely at the tall Frenchman. He thought of Medusa's Echo and a Gallic aphorism that proclaimed that the more things changed the more they remained the same. Opportunities will present themselves. Recognize them, act on them. 'As I said,' continued Jason while staring up at the chaos on the staircase, 'I, too, am a businessman who is taking a short sabbatical – courtesy of our government's tax incentives for those of us who plough the foreign fields – but I've travelled a great deal here in China and have learned a good deal of the language. '
'Cane has come up in the world,' said the Parisian sardonically.
'Our best quality work is a staple line on the Cete d'Azur, as well as points north and south. The Grimaldi family has been a client for years. ' Bourne kept his eyes on the staircase.
'I stand corrected, my business friend... in the foreign fields. ' For the first time the Frenchman actually looked at Jason.
'And I can tell you now,' said Bourne, 'that no more visitors will be permitted into Mao's tomb, and that everyone on every tour in the vicinity will be cordoned off and possibly detained. '
'My God, why?
'Apparently something terrible happened inside and the guards are shouting about foreign gangsters... Did you say you were assigned to this tour but not really a part of it?'
'Essentially, yes. '
'Grounds for at least speculation, no? Detention, almost certainly. '
'Inconceivable?
This is China-'
'It cannot be! Millions upon millions of francs are in the balance! I'm only here on this horrid tour because-'
'I suggest you leave, my business friend. Say you were out for a stroll. Give me your identification tag and I'll get rid of it for you-'
'Is that what it is?'
'Your country of origin and passport number are on it. It's how they control your movements while you're on a guided tour. '
'I'm for ever in your debt!' cried the businessman ripping the plastic tag off his lapel. 'If you're ever in Paris-'
'I spend most of the time with the prince and his family in-'
'But of course. ' Again, my thanks!' The Frenchman, so different and yet so much like Echo, left in a hurry, his well-dressed figure conspicuous in the hazy, greyish yellow sunlight as he headed towards the Heavenly Gate – as obvious as the false quarry who had led a hunter into a trap.
Bourne pinned the plastic tag to his own lapel and now became part of an official tour; it was his way out through the gates of Tian an men Square. After the group had been hastily diverted from the mausoleum to the Great Hall, the bus passed through the northern gate and Jason saw through the window the apoplectic French businessman pleading with the Beijing police to let him pass. Fragments of reports of the outrage had been fitted together. The word was spreading. A white Occidental had horribly defiled the coffin and the hallowed body of Chairman Mao. A white terrorist from a tour without the proper identification on his outer clothing. A guard on the steps had reported such a man.
'I do recall,' the tour guide said in obsolete French. She was standing by the statue of an angry lion on that extraordinary Avenue of Animals where huge stone replicas of large cats, horses, elephants and ferocious mythical beasts lined the road, guarding the final way to the tombs of the Ming Dynasty. 'But my memory faileth concerning your knowledge of our language. And I do believe that I heard you employ our tongue but a moment ago. '
A student of French literature and speaks as though she were in the seventeenth century... an indignant businessman, now undoubtedly far more indignant.
'I didn't before,' replied Bourne in Mandarin, 'because you were with others and I didn't wish to stand out. But let's speak your language now. '
'You do so very well. '
'I thank you. Then you do recall that I was added to your tour at the last minute?'
The manager of the Beijing Hotel actually spoke to my superior, but, yes, I do recall. ' The woman smiled and shrugged. 'In truth, as it is such a large group, I recall only giving a tall man his tour-group emblem, and it is in front of my face now. You will have to pay additional yuan on your hotel bill. I am sorry but then you are not part of the tourist programme. '