Текст книги "The Bourne Sanction (Санкция Борна)"

Автор книги: Eric Van Lustbader

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something, perhaps something even you don’t know.”

The professor nodded, clearly impressed.

Bourne sat on the leather sofa with his leg up on the coffee table. Specter eased himself

into a facing chair. Clouds chased each other across the windblown sky, setting patterns

shifting across the Persian carpet. Bourne saw a different kind of shadow pass across

Specter’s face.

“Professor, what is it?”

Specter shook his head. “I owe you a most sincere and abject apology, Jason. I’m

afraid I had an ulterior motive in asking you to return to university life.” His eyes were

filled with regret. “I thought it would be good for you, yes, that’s true enough, absolutely.

But also I wanted you near me because…” He waved a hand as if to clear the air of

deceit. “Because I was fearful that what happened this morning would happen. Now,

because of my selfishness, I’m very much afraid that I’ve put your life in jeopardy.”

Turkish tea, strong and intensely aromatic, was served along with eggs, smoked fish,

coarse bread, butter, deep yellow and fragrant.

Bourne and Specter sat at a long table covered with a white hand-finished linen cloth.

The china and silverware were of the highest quality. Again, an oddity in an academic’s

household. They remained mute while a young man, slim and sleek, served their perfectly

cooked, elegantly presented breakfast.

When Bourne began to ask a question, Specter cut him off. “First we must fill our

stomachs, regain our strength, ensure our minds are working at full capacity.”

The two men did not speak again until they were finished, the plates and cutlery were

cleared, and a fresh pot of tea had been poured. A small bowl of gigantic Medjool dates

and halved fresh pomegranates lay between them.

When they were again alone in the dining room, Specter said without preamble, “The

night before last I received word that a former student of mine whose father was a close

friend was dead. Murdered in a most despicable fashion. This young man, Pyotr Zilber,

was special. Besides being a former student he ran an information network that spanned

several countries. After a number of difficult and perilous months of subterfuge and

negotiation he had managed to obtain for me a vital document. He was found out, with

the inevitable consequences. This is the incident I’ve been dreading. It may sound

melodramatic, but I assure you it’s the truth: The war I’ve been engaged in for close to

twenty years has reached its final stage.”

“What sort of a war, Professor?” Bourne said. “Against whom?”

“I’ll get to that in a moment.” Specter leaned forward. “I imagine you’re curious,

shocked even, that a university professor should be involved in matters that are more the

province of Jason Bourne.” He lifted both arms briefly to encompass the house. “But as

you’ve no doubt noted there is more to me than meets the eye.” He smiled rather sadly.

“This makes two of us, yes?

“As someone who also leads a double life I understand you better than most others. I

need one personality when I step onto campus, but here I’m someone else entirely.” He

tapped a stubby forefinger against the side of his nose. “I pay attention. I saw something

familiar in you the moment I met you-how your eyes took in every detail of the people

and things around you.”

Bourne’s cell buzzed. He flipped it open, listened to what Deron had to say, then put

the phone away.

“The Cadillac was reported stolen a hour before it appeared in front of the restaurant.”

“That is entirely unsurprising.”

“Who tried to kidnap you, Professor?”

“I know you’re impatient for the facts, Jason. I would be, too, in your place. But I

promise they won’t have meaning without some background first. When I said there’s

more to me than meets the eye, this is what I meant: I’m a terrorist hunter. For many

years, from the camouflage and sanctuary my position at the university affords me, I have

built up a network of people who gather intelligence just like your own CI. However, the

intelligence that interests me is highly specific. There are people who took my wife from

me. In the dead of night, while I was away, they snatched her from our house, tortured

her, killed her, then dumped her on my doorstep. As a warning, you see.”

Bourne felt a prickling at the back of his neck. He knew what it felt like to be driven by

revenge. When Martin died all Bourne could think about was destroying the men who’d

tortured him. He felt a new, more intimate connection with Specter, even as the Bourne

identity rose inside him, riding a cresting wave of pure adrenaline. All at once the idea of him working at the university struck him as absurd. Moira was right: He was already

chafing at the confinement. How would he feel after months of the academic life, bereft

of adventure, stripped of the adrenaline rush for which Bourne lived?

“My father was taken because he was plotting to overthrow the head of an

organization. They call themselves the Eastern Brotherhood.”

“Doesn’t the EB espouse a peaceful integration of Muslims into Western society?”

“That’s their public stance, certainly, and their literature would have you believe it’s

so.” Specter put down his cup. “In fact, nothing could be farther from the truth. I know

them as the Black Legion.”

“Then the Black Legion has finally decided to come after you.”

“If only it were as simple as that.” He halted at a discreet knock on the door. “Enter.”

The young man he’d sent on the errand strode in carrying a shoe box, which he set

down in front of Bourne.

Specter gestured. “Please.”

Taking his foot off the table, Bourne opened the box. Inside were a pair of very fine

Italian loafers, along with a pair of socks.

“The left one is half a size larger to accommodate the pad that will protect your heel,”

the young man said in German.

Bourne pulled on the socks, slipped on the loafers. They fit perfectly. Seeing this,

Specter nodded to the young man, who turned and, without another word, left the room.

“Does he speak English?” Bourne asked.

“Oh, yes. Whenever the need arises.” Specter’s face was wreathed in a mischievous

smile. “And now, my dear Jason, you’re asking yourself why he’s speaking German if

he’s a Turk?”

“I assume it’s because your network spans many countries including Germany, which

is, like England, a hotbed of Muslim terrorist activity.”

Specter’s smile deepened. “You’re like a rock. I can always count on you.” He raised a

forefinger. “But there is yet another reason. It has to do with the Black Legion. Come.

I’ve something to show you.”

Filya Petrovich, Pyotr’s Sevastopol courier, lived in an anonymous block of crumbling

housing left over from the days the Soviets had reshaped the city into a vast barracks

housing its largest naval contingent. The apartment, frozen in time since the 1970s, had

all the charm of a meat locker.

Arkadin opened the door with the key he’d found on Filya. He pushed Devra over the

threshold, stepped in. Turning on the lights, he closed the door behind him. She hadn’t

wanted to come, but she had no say in the matter, just as she’d had no say in helping him

drag Filya’s corpse out the nightclub’s back door. They set him down at the end of the

filthy alley, propped up against a wall damp with unknown fluids. Arkadin poured the

contents of a half-empty bottle of cheap vodka over him, then pressed the man’s fingers

around the bottle’s neck. Filya became one drunk among many other drunks in the city.

His death would be swept away on an inefficient and overworked bureaucratic tide.

“What’re you looking for?” Devra stood in the middle of the living room, watching

Arkadin’s methodical search. “What d’you think you’ll find? The document?” Her laugh

was a kind of shrill catcall. “It’s gone.”

Arkadin glanced up from the mess his switchblade had made of the sofa cushions.

“Where?”

“Far out of your reach, that’s for sure.”

Closing his knife, Arkadin crossed the space between the two of them in one long

stride. “Do you think this is a joke, or a game we’re playing here?”

Devra’s upper lip curled. “Are you going to hurt me now? Believe me, nothing you

could do would be worse than what’s already been done to me.”

Arkadin, the blood pounding in his veins, held himself in check to consider her words.

What she said was probably the truth. Under the Soviet boot, God had forsaken many

Ukrainians, especially the young attractive females. He needed to take another tack

entirely.

“I’m not going to hurt you, even though you’re with the wrong people.” He turned on

his heel, sat down on a wood-framed chair. Leaning back, he ran his fingers through his

hair. “I’ve seen a lot of shit-I’ve done two stints in prison. I can imagine the systematic brutalization you’ve been through.”

“Me and my mother, God rest her soul.”

The headlights of passing cars shone briefly through the windows, then dwindled

away. A dog barked in an alleyway, its melancholy voice echoing. A couple passing by

outside argued vehemently. Inside the shabby apartment the patchy light cast by the

lamps, their shades either torn or askew, caused Devra to look terribly vulnerable, like a

wisp of a child. Arkadin rose, stretched mightily, strolled over to the window, looked out

onto the street. His eyes picked out every bit of shadow, every flare of light no matter

how brief or tiny. Sooner or later Pyotr’s people were going to come after him; it was an

inevitability that he and Icoupov had discussed before he left the villa. Icoupov had

offered to send a couple of hard men to lie low in Sevastopol in the event they were

needed, but Arkadin refused, saying he preferred to work alone.

Having assured himself that the street was for the moment clear, he turned away from

the window, back to the room. “My mother died badly,” he said. “She was murdered,

brutally beaten, left in a closet for the rats to gnaw on. At least that’s what the coroner told me.”

“Where was your father?”

Arkadin shrugged. “Who knows? By that time, the sonovabitch could’ve been in

Shanghai, or he could’ve been dead. My mother told me he was a merchant marine, but I

seriously doubt it. She was ashamed of having been knocked up by a perfect stranger.”

Devra, who had sat down on the ripped-apart arm of the sofa during this recitation,

said, “It sucks not knowing where you came from, doesn’t it? Like always being adrift at

sea. You’ll never recognize home even if you come upon it.”

“Home,” Arkadin said heavily. “I never think of it.”

Devra caught something in his tone. “But you’d like to, wouldn’t you?”

His expression went sour. He checked the street again with his usual thoroughness.

“What would be the point?”

“Because knowing where we come from allows us know who we are.” She beat softly

at her chest with a fist. “Our past is part of us.”

Arkadin felt as if she’d pricked him with a needle. Venom squirted through his veins.

“My past is an island I’ve sailed away from long ago.”

“Nevertheless, it’s still with you, even if you’re not aware of it,” she said with the

force of having mulled the question over and over in her own mind. “We can’t outrun our

past, no matter how hard we try.”

Unlike him, she seemed eager to talk about her past. He found this curious. Did she

think this subject was common ground? If so, he needed to stay with it, to keep the

connection with her going.

“What about your father?”

“I was born here, grew up here.” She stared down at her hands. “My father was a naval

engineer. He was thrown out of the shipyards when the Russians took it over. Then one

night they came for him, said he was spying on them, delivering technical information on

their ships to the Americans. I never saw him again. But the Russian security officer in

charge took a liking to my mother. When he’d used her up, he started on me.”

Arkadin could just imagine. “How did it end?”

“An American killed him.” She looked up at him. “Fucking ironic, because this

American was a spy sent to photograph the Russian fleet. When the American had

completed his assignment he should’ve gone back home. Instead he stayed. He took care

of me, nursed me back to health.”

“Naturally you fell in love with him.”

She laughed. “If I was a character in a novel, sure. But he was so kind to me; I was like

a daughter to him. I cried when he left.”

Arkadin found that he was embarrassed by her confession. To distract himself, he

looked around the ruined apartment one more time.

Devra watched him warily. “Hey. I’m dying for something to eat.”

Arkadin laughed. “Aren’t we all?”

His hawk-like gaze took in the street once more. This time the hairs on the back of his

neck stirred as he stepped to the side of the window. A car he’d heard approaching had

pulled up in front of the building. Devra, alerted by the sudden tension in his body,

moved to the window behind him. What caught his attention was that though its engine

was still running, all its lights had been extinguished. Three men exited the car, headed

for the building entrance. It was past time to leave.

He turned away from the window. “We’re going. Now.”

“Pyotr’s people. It was inevitable they’d find us.”

Much to Arkadin’s surprise she made no protest when he hustled her out of the

apartment. The hallway was already reverberating with the tribal beat of heavy shoes on

the concrete floor.

Bourne found walking unpleasant but hardly intolerable. He’d put up with a lot worse

than a flayed heel in his time. As he followed the professor down a metal staircase into

the basement, he reflected that this was proof again that there were no absolutes when it

came to people. He had assumed that Specter’s life was neat, tidy, dull, and quiet,

restricted by the dimensions of the university campus. Nothing could be farther from the

truth.

Halfway down, the staircase changed to stone treads, worn by decades of use. Their

way was guided by plenty of light from below. They entered a finished basement made

up of movable walls that separated what looked like office cubicles outfitted with laptop

computers attached to high-speed modems. All of them were staffed.

Specter stopped at the last cubicle, where a young man appeared to be decoding text

that scrolled across his computer screen. The young man, becoming aware of Specter,

pulled a sheet of paper out of the printer hopper, handed it to him. As soon as the

professor read it a change came over his demeanor. Though he kept his expression

neutral, a certain tension stiffened his frame.

“Good work.” He gave the young man a nod before he led Bourne into a room that

appeared to be a small library. Specter crossed to one section of the shelves, touched the

spine of a compilation of haiku by the master poet Matsuo BashoЇ. A square section of

the books opened to reveal a set of drawers. From one of these Specter pulled out what

looked like a photo album. All the pages were old, each one wrapped in archival plastic

to preserve them. He showed one of them to Bourne.

At the top was the familiar war eagle, gripping a swastika in its beak, the symbol of

Germany’s Third Reich. The text was in German. Just below was the word

OSTLEGIONEN, accompanied by a color photo of a woven oval, obviously a uniform

insignia, of a swastika encircled by laurel leaves. Around the central symbol were the

words TREU, TAPIR, GEHORSAM, which Bourne translated as “loyal, brave,

steadfast.” Below that was another color photo of a woven rampant wolf’s head, under

which was the designation: OSTMANISCHE SS-DIVISION.

Bourne noted the date on the page: 14 December 1941.

“I never heard of the Eastern Legions,” Bourne said. “Who were they?”

Specter turned the page and there, pinned to it, was a square of olive fabric. On it had

been sewn a blue shield with a black border. Across the top was the word

BERGKAUKASIEN-Caucasus Mountains. Directly beneath it in bright yellow was the

emblem of three horses’ heads joined to what Bourne now knew was a death’s head, the

symbol of the Nazi Schutzstaffel, the Protective Squadron, known colloquially as the SS.

It was exactly the same as the tattoo on the gunman’s arm.

“Not were, are.” Specter’s eyes glittered. “They’re the people who tried to kidnap me,

Jason. They want to interrogate me and kill me. Now that they’ve become aware of you,

they’ll want to do the same to you.”

Eight

THE ROOF or the basement?” Arkadin said.

“The roof,” she said at once. “There’s only one way in and out of the basement itself.”

They ran as fast as they could to the stairway, then took the steps two at a time.

Arkadin’s heart pounded, his blood raced, the adrenaline pumped into him with every

leap upward. He could hear his pursuers laboring up below him. The noose was

tightening around him. Racing to the far end of the narrow hallway, he reached up with

his right hand, pulled down the metal ladder that led to the roof. Soviet structures of this era were notorious for their flimsy doors. He knew he’d have no trouble breaking out

onto the roof. From there, it was a short jump to the next building and the next, then

down to the streets, where it would be easy to elude the enemy.

Boosting Devra’s body through the square hole in the ceiling, he clambered up. Behind

him, the shouted calls of the three men: Filya’s apartment had been searched. All of them

were coming after him. Gaining the tiny landing, he now faced the door to the roof, but

when he tried to push against the horizontal metal bar nothing happened. He pushed

harder, with the same result. Fishing a ring of slender metal picks out of his pocket, he

inserted one after another into the lock, fiddling it up and down, getting nowhere.

Looking more closely, he could see why: The interior of the cheap lock was rusted shut.

It wouldn’t open.

He turned back, staring down the ladder. Here came his pursuers. He had nowhere to

go.

On June 22, 1941, Germany invaded Soviet Russia,” Professor Specter said. “As they

did so they came upon thousands upon thousands of enemy soldiers who either

surrendered without a fight or were flat-out deserting. By August of that year the

invading army had interned half a million Soviet prisoners of war. Many of them were

Muslims-Tatars from the Caucasus, Turks, Azerbaijani, Uzbek, Kazakhs, others from the

tribes in the Ural Mountains, Turkestan, Crimea. The one thing all these Muslims had in

common was their hatred of the Soviets, Stalin in particular. To make a very long story

short, these Muslims, taken as prisoners of war, offered their services to the Nazis to fight alongside them on the Eastern Front, where they could do the most damage both by

infiltration and by decoding Soviet intelligence transmissions. The Fьhrer was elated; the

Ostlegionen became the particular interest of Reichsfьhrer SS Heinrich Himmler, who

saw Islam as a masculine, war-like religion that featured certain key qualities in common

with his SS philosophy, mainly blind obedience, the willingness for self-sacrifice, a total lack of compassion for the enemy.”

Bourne was absorbing every word, every detail of the photos. “Didn’t his embrace of

Islam fly in the face of the Nazi racial order?”

“You know humans better than most, Jason. They have an infinite capacity for

rationalizing reality to fit their personal ideas. So it was with Himmler, who had

convinced himself that the Slavs and the Jews were subhuman. The Asian element in the

Russian nation made those people who were descended from the great warriors Attila,

Genghis Khan, Tamerlane fit his criteria of superiority. Himmler embraced the Muslims

from that area, descendants of the Mongols.

“These men became the core of the Nazi Ostlegionen, but the cream of the crop

Himmler reserved for himself, training them in secret with his best SS leaders, honing

their skills not simply as soldiers, but as the elite warriors, spies, and assassins it was widely known he’d yearned to command. He called this unit the Black Legion. You see,

I’ve made an exhaustive study of the Nazis and their Ostlegionen.” Specter pointed to the

shield of three horses’ heads joined by the death’s head. “This is their emblem. From

1943 on it became more feared than even the SS’s own twin lightning bolts, or the

symbol of its adjunct, the Gestapo.”

“It’s a little late in the day for Nazis to be a serious threat,” Bourne said, “don’t you

think?”

“The Black Legion’s Nazi affiliation has long since vanished. It’s now the most

powerful and influential Islamic terrorist network no one has heard of. Its anonymity is

deliberate. It is funded through the legitimate front, the Eastern Brotherhood.”

Specter took out another album. This one was filled with newspaper clippings of

terrorist attacks all over the world: London, Madrid, Karachi, Fallujah, Afghanistan,

Russia. As Bourne paged through the album, the list grew.

“As you can see, other, known terrorist networks claimed responsibility for some of

these attacks. For others, no claim was made, no terrorists were ever linked to them. But I know through my sources that all were perpetrated by the Black Legion,” Specter said.

“And now they’re planning their biggest, most spectacular attack. Jason, we think that

they’re targeting New York. I told you Pyotr Zilber, the young man the Black Legion

murdered, was special. He was a magician. He’d somehow managed to steal the plans for

the target of the Legion’s attack. Normally, of course, the planning would all be oral. But apparently the target of this attack is so complex, the Black Legion had to obtain the

actual plans of the structure. That’s why I believe it to be a large building in a major

metropolitan area. It’s absolutely imperative that we find that document. It’s the only way we’ll know where the Black Legion intends to strike.”

Arkadin sat on the floor of the small landing, his legs on either side of the opening

down to the top residential floor.

“Shout to them,” he whispered. Now that he was situated on the high ground, so to

speak, he wanted to draw them to him. “Go on. Let them know where you are.”

Devra screamed.

Now Arkadin heard the hollow ring of someone climbing the metal ladder. When a

head popped up, along with a hand holding a gun, Arkadin slammed his ankles into the

man’s ears. As his eyes began to roll up, Arkadin snatched the gun from his hand, braced

himself, and broke the man’s neck.

The moment he let go the man vanished, clattering back down the ladder. Predictably,

a hail of gunfire shot through the square opening, the bullets embedding themselves in

the ceiling. The moment that abated, Arkadin shoved Devra through the opening,

followed her, sliding down with the insides of his shoes against the outside of the ladder.

As Arkadin had hoped, the remaining two men were stunned by the fall of their

compatriot and held their fire. Arkadin shot one through the right eye. The other retreated around a corner as Arkadin fired at him. Arkadin gathered the girl, bruised but otherwise

fine, ran to the first door, and pounded on it. Hearing a querulous man’s voice raised in

protest, he pounded on the opposite door. No answer. Firing his gun at the lock, he

crashed open the door.

The apartment was unoccupied, and from the looks of the piles of dust and filth no one

had been in residence in quite some time. Arkadin ran to the window. As he did so, he

heard familiar squeals. He stepped on a pile of rubbish and out leapt a rat, then another

and another. They were all over the place. Arkadin shot the first one, then got hold of

himself and slid the window up as far as it would go. Icy rain struck him, sluiced down

the side of the building.

Holding Devra in front of him, he straddled the sash. At that moment he heard the third

man calling for reinforcements, and fired three shots through the ruined door. He

manhandled her out onto the narrow fire escape and edged them to his left, toward the

vertical ladder bolted to the concrete that led to the roof.

Save for one or two security lights, the Sevastopol night was darker than Hades itself.

The rain slanted in needled sheets, beating against his face and arms. He was close

enough to reach out for the ladder when the wrought-iron slats on which he was walking

gave way.

Devra shrieked as the two of them plummeted, landing against the railing of the fire

escape below. Almost immediately this rickety affair gave way beneath their weight and

they toppled over the end. Arkadin reached out, grabbed a rung of the ladder with his left

hand. He held on to Devra with his right. They dangled in the air, the ground too far for

him to risk letting go. Plus there was no convenient fully loaded Dumpster to break their

fall.

He began to lose his grip on her hand.

“Draw yourself up,” he said. “Put your legs around me.”

“What?”

He bellowed the command at her and, flinching, she did as he ordered.

“Now lock your ankles tight around my waist.”

This time she didn’t hesitate.

“All right,” Arkadin said, “now reach up, you can just make the lowest rung-no, hold

on to it with both hands.”

The rain made the metal slippery, and on the first attempt Devra lost her grip.

“Again,” Arkadin shouted. “And this time don’t let go.”

Clearly terrified, Devra closed her fingers around the rung, held on so tightly her

knuckles turned white. As for Arkadin, his left arm was being slowly dislocated from its

socket. If he didn’t change his position soon, he’d be done for.

“Now what?” Devra said.

“Once your grip on the rung is secure, uncross your ankles and pull yourself up the

ladder until you can stand on a rung.”

“I don’t know if I have the strength.”

He lifted himself up until he’d wedged the rung in his right armpit. His left arm was

numb. He worked his fingers, and bolts of pain shot up into his throbbing shoulder. “Go

ahead,” he said, pushing her up. He couldn’t let her see how much pain he was in. His left

arm was in agony, but he kept pushing her.

Finally, she stood on the ladder above him. She looked down. “Now you.”

His entire left side was numb; the rest of him was on fire.

Devra reached down toward him. “Come on.”

“I’ve got nothing much to live for, I died a long time ago.”

“Screw you.” She crouched down so when she reached down again she grabbed onto

his arm. As she did so, her foot slipped off the rung, slid downward and against him with

such force she almost dislodged them both.

“Christ, I’m going to fall!” she screamed.

“Wrap your legs back around my waist,” he shouted. “That’s right. Now let go of the

ladder one hand at a time. Hold on to me instead.”

When she’d done as he said, he commenced to climb up the ladder. Once he was high

enough to get his shoes onto the rungs the going was easier. He ignored the fire burning

up his left shoulder; he needed both hands to ascend.

They made the roof at last, rolling over the stone parapet, lying breathless on tar

streaming with water. That was when Arkadin realized the rain was no longer hitting his

face. He looked up, saw a man-the third of the trio-standing over him, a gun aimed at his

face.

The man grinned. “Time to die, bastard.”

Professor Specter put the albums away. Before he closed the drawer, however, he took

out a pair of photos. Bourne studied the faces of two men. The one in the first photo was

approximately the same age as the professor. Glasses almost comically magnified large,

watery eyes, above which lay remarkably thick eyebrows. Otherwise, his head was bald.

“Semion Icoupov,” Specter said, “leader of the Black Legion.”

He took Bourne out of the basement library, up the steps, out the back of the house into

the fresh air. A formal English garden lay before them, defined by low boxwood hedges.

The sky was an airy blue, high and rich, full of the promise of an early spring. A bird

fluttered between the bare branches of the willow, unsure where to alight.

“Jason, we need to stop the Black Legion. The only way to do that is to kill Semion

Icoupov. I’ve already lost three good men to that end. I need someone better. I need you.”

“I’m not a contract killer.”

“Jason, please don’t take offense. I need your help to stop this attack. Icoupov knows

where the plans are.”

“All right. I’ll find him and the plans.” Bourne shook his head. “But he doesn’t have to

be killed.”

The professor shook his head sadly. “A noble sentiment, but you don’t know Semion

Icoupov like I do. If you don’t kill him, he’ll surely kill you. Believe me when I tell you I’ve tried to take him alive. None of my men has returned from that assignment.”

He stared out across the pond. “There’s no one else I can turn to, no one else who has

the expertise to find Icoupov and end this madness once and for all. Pyotr’s murder

signals the beginning of the endgame between me and the Black Legion. Either we stop

them here or they will be successful in their attack on this target.”

“If what you say is true-”

“It is, Jason. I swear to you.”

“Where is Icoupov?”

“We don’t know. For the last forty-eight hours we’ve been trying to track him, but

everything’s turned up a blank. He was in his villa in Campione d’Italia, Switzerland.

That’s where we believe Pyotr was killed. But he’s not there now.”

Bourne stared down at the two photos he held in his hand. “Who’s the younger man?”

“Leonid Danilovich Arkadin. Up until a few days ago we believed he was an

independent assassin for hire among the families of the Russian grupperovka.” Specter

tapped a forefinger between Arkadin’s eyes. “He’s the man who brought Pyotr to

Icoupov. Somehow-we’re still trying to establish how-Icoupov discovered that it was

Pyotr who had stolen his plans. In any event, it was Arkadin who, along with Icoupov,

interrogated Pyotr and killed him.”

“Sounds as if you’ve got a traitor in your organization, Professor.”

Specter nodded. “I’ve reluctantly come to the same conclusion.”

Something that had been bothering Bourne now rose to the surface of his mind.

“Professor, who called you when we were having breakfast?”

“One of my people. He needed verification of information. I had it in my car. Why?”

“Because it was that call that drew you out into the street just as the black Cadillac

came by. That wasn’t a coincidence.”

A frown creased Specter’s brow. “No, I don’t suppose it could have been.”

“Give me his name and address,” Bourne said, “and we’ll find out for certain.”