The Bourne Supremacy

There he was! Jean Louis Ardisson was being escorted through the doors by no fewer than four Chinese bureaucrats, all of whom were doing their best to mollify him. One rushed ahead to the lobby liquor store as the others detained him by the elevator, chattering continuously through the interpreter. The buyer returned carrying a plastic bag, the bottom stretched and sagging under the weight of several bottles. There were smiles and bows as the elevator doors opened. Jean Louis Ardisson accepted his booty and walked inside, nodding once as the doors closed.

Bourne remained seated watching the lights as the elevator ascended. Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen. It had reached the top floor, Ardisson's floor. Jason got up and walked back to the bank of telephones. He looked at the sweep hand of his watch; he could only guess at the timing, but a man in an agitated state would not stroll slowly to his room once he left the elevator. The room signified a measure of peace, even the relief of solitude after several hours of tension and panic. To be held for questioning by the police in a foreign country was frightening for anyone, but it became terrifying when an incomprehensible language and radically different faces were added to the knowledge that the prisoner was in a country where people frequently disappeared without explanation. After such an ordeal a man would enter his room and, in no particular order, would collapse, trembling in fear and exhaustion; light one cigarette after another, forgetting where he left the last one; take several strong drinks, swallowing rapidly for a faster effect; and grab the telephone to share his dreadful experience, unconsciously hoping to minimize the after-effects of his terror by sharing them. Bourne could allow Ardisson's collapsing, and as much wine or liquor as the man could handle, but he could not permit the telephone. There could be no sharing, no lessening of the terror. Rather, Ardisson's terror had to be extended, amplified to the point where he would be paralysed, fearing for his life if he left his room. Forty-seven seconds had elapsed; it was time to call.

'Hello? The voice was strained, breathless.

'I'll speak quickly,' said Jason quietly in French. 'Stay where you are and do not use the telephone. In precisely eight minutes I'll knock on your door, twice rapidly, then once. Admit me, but no one else before me. Especially a maid or a housekeeper.'

'Who are you?

'A countryman who must speak to you. For your own safety. Eight minutes. ' Bourne hung up and returned to the chair, counting off the minutes and calculating the time it took an elevator with the usual number of passengers to go from one floor to the next. Once on a specific floor, thirty seconds were enough to reach any room. Six minutes went by and Jason rose, nodding to a bewildered stranger next to him, and walked to an elevator where the lighted numbers indicated it would be the next to reach the lobby. Eight minutes were ideal for priming a subject; five were too few, not long enough for the right degree of tension. Six were better but passed too quickly. Eight, however, while still within an urgent timespan, provided those additional moments of anxiety that wore down a subject's resistance. The plan was not yet clear in Bourne's mind. The objective, however, was crystallized, absolute. It was all he had left, and every instinct in his Medusan body told him to go after it. Delta One knew the Oriental mind. In one respect it had not varied for centuries. Secrecy was worth ten thousand tigers, if not a kingdom.

He stood outside the door of 1743, looking at his watch. Eight minutes precisely. He knocked twice, paused, then knocked once again. The door opened and a shocked Ardisson stared at him.

'C'est vous!' cried the businessman, bringing his hand to his lips.

'Keep calm,' said Jason in French, stepping inside and closing the door. 'We have to talk,' he continued. 'I must know what happened. '

' You! You were next to me in that horrid place. We spoke. You took my identification. You were the cause of everything?

'Did you mention me?

'I didn't dare. It would have looked as if I had done something illegal – giving my pass to someone else. Who are you? Why are you here? You've caused me enough trouble for one day! I think you should leave, monsieur. '

'Not until you tell me exactly what happened. ' Bourne walked across the room and sat down in a chair next to a red lacquered table. 'It's urgent that I know. '

'Well, it's not urgent that I tell you. You have no right to walk in here, make yourself comfortable and give me orders. '

'I'm afraid I do have that right. Ours was a private tour and you intruded. '

'I was assigned to that damn tour!'

'On whose orders?

The concierge, or whatever you call that idiot downstairs. '

'Not him. Above him. Who was it?

'How would I know? I haven't the vaguest idea what you're talking about. '

'You left. '

'My God, it was you who told me to leave!'

'I was testing you. '

Testing...? This is unbelievable!'

'Believe,' said Jason. 'If you're telling the truth no harm will come to you. '

'Harm?'

'We do not kill the innocent, only the enemy. '

'Kill... the enemy?

Bourne reached under his jacket, took the gun from his belt and placed it on the table. 'Now convince me you're not the enemy. What happened after you left us?

Stunned, Ardisson staggered back into the wall, his wide, frightened eyes riveted on the weapon. 'I swear by all the saints you are talking to the wrong man,' he whispered.

'Convince me. '

'Of what?'

'Your innocence. What happened?

'I... down in the square,' began the terrified businessman. 'I thought about the things you said, that something terrible had happened inside Mao's tomb, and that the Chinese guards were shouting about foreign gangsters, and how people were going to be cordoned off and detained -especially someone like me who was not really part of the tour group... So I started to run – my God, I couldn't possibly be placed in such a situation! Millions of francs are involved, profits on a scale unheard of in the high fashion industry! I'm no mere bargainer, I represent a consortium?

'So you began running and they stopped you,' interrupted Jason, anxious to get the non-essentials out of the way, 'yes! They spoke so rapidly I didn't understand a word anyone was saying, and it was an hour before they found an official who spoke French!'

'Why didn't you simply tell them the truth? That you were with our tour. '

'Because I was running away from that damned tour and I had given you my damned identification card! How would that look to these barbarians who see a fascist criminal in every white face?'

'The Chinese people are not barbarians, monsieur,' said Bourne, gently. Then suddenly he shouted. 'It is only their government's political philosophy that's barbaric! Without the grace of Almighty God, with only Satan's benediction!'

'I beg your pardon?'

'Later, perhaps,' replied Jason, his voice abruptly calm again. 'So an official who spoke French arrived. What happened then?'

'I told him I was out for a stroll – your suggestion, monsieur. And that I suddenly remembered I was expecting a call from Paris and was hurrying back to the hotel, which accounted for my running. '