Robert Ludlum - The Bourne Ultimatum

"You're out of bullets," said Carlos to the stunned Jason Bourne below. "Thirteen years, Delta, thirteen loathsome years. But now they'll know who won."

The Jackal raised his gun and fired.

The searing ice-cold heat ripped through his neck as Bourne lunged over the pews, crashing down between the second and third rows, smashing his head and his hips on the glistening brown wood as he clawed at the floor. His vision spun out of control as a cloud of darkness enveloped him. In the distance, far, far away, he heard the sound of voices shouting hysterically. Then the darkness was complete.

"David." There was no shouting now; the single voice was low and urgent and used a name he did not care to acknowledge. "David, can you hear me?"

Bourne opened his eyes, instantly aware of two facts. There was a wide bandage around his throat and he was lying fully clothed on a bed. To his right, the anxious face of John St. Jacques came into focus; on his left was a man he did not know, a middle-aged man with a level, steady gaze. "Carlos," Jason managed to say, finding his voice. "It was the Jackal!"

"Then he's still on the island-this island." St. Jacques was emphatic. "It's been barely an hour and Henry's got Tranquility ringed. Patrols are hovering offshore, roving back and forth, all in visual and radio contact. He's calling it a 'drug exercise,' very quiet and very official. A few boats come in, but none go out and none will go out."

"Who's he?" asked Bourne, looking at the man on his left. "A doctor," answered Marie's brother. "He's staying at the inn and he's a friend of mine. I was a patient of his in-"

"I think we should be circumspect here," interrupted the Canadian doctor firmly. "You asked for my help and my confidence, John, and I give both gladly, but considering the nature of the events and the fact that your brother-in-law won't be under my professional care, let's dispense with my name."

"I couldn't agree with you more, Doctor," added Jason, wincing, then suddenly snapping his head up, his eyes wide in an admixture of pleading and panic. "Ishmael! He's dead-I killed him!"

"He isn't and you didn't," said St. Jacques calmly. "He's a goddamned mess but he's not dead. He's one tough kid, like his father, and he'll make it. We're flying him to the hospital in Martinique."

"Christ, he was a corpse!"

"He was savagely beaten," explained the doctor. "Both arms were broken, along with multiple lacerations, contusions, I suspect internal injuries and a severe concussion. However, as John accurately described the young man, he's one tough kid."

"I want the best for him."

"Those were my orders."

"Good." Bourne moved his eyes to the doctor. "How damaged am I?"

"Without X rays or seeing how you move-symptomatically, as it were-I can only give you a cursory judgment."

"Do that."

"Outside of the wound, I'd say primarily traumatic shock."

"Forget it. That's not allowed."

"Who says?" said the doctor, smiling kindly.

"I do and I'm not trying to be funny. The body, not the head. I'll be the judge of the head."

"Is he a native?" asked the doctor, looking at the owner of Tranquility Inn. "A white but older Ishmael? I'll tell you he's not a physician."

"Answer him, please."

"All right. The bullet passed through the left side of your neck, missing by millimeters several vital spots that would certainly have rendered you voiceless and probably dead. I've bathed the wound and sutured it. You'll have difficulty moving your head for a while, but that's only a superficial opinion of the damage."

"In short words, I've got a very stiff neck, but if I can walk ... well, I can walk."

"In shorter words, that's about it."

"It was the flare that did it, after all," said Jason softly, carefully moving his neck back over the pillow. "It blinded him just enough."

"What?" St. Jacques leaned over the bed.

"Never mind. ... Let's see how well I walk-symptomatically, that is." Bourne slid off the bed, swinging his legs cautiously to the floor, shaking his head at his brother-in-law, who started to help him. "No thanks, Bro. This has got to be me on me." He stood up, the inhibiting bandage around his throat progressively becoming more uncomfortable. He stepped forward, pained by the bruises on his thighs, but they were bruises-they were minor. A hot bath would reduce the pain, and medication, extra-strength aspirin and liniment, would permit more normal mobility. It was the goddamned dressing around his neck; it not only choked him but forced him to move his shoulders in order to look in any direction. ... Still, he considered, he was far less incapacitated than he might have been-for a man of his age. Damn. "Can we loosen this necklace, Doctor? It's strangling me."

"A bit, not much. You don't want to risk rupturing those sutures."

"What about an Ace bandage? It gives."

"Too much for a neck wound. You'd forget about it."

"I promise not to."

"You're very amusing."

"I don't feel remotely amusing."

"It's your neck."

"It certainly is. Can you get one, Johnny?"

"Doctor?" St. Jacques looked at the physician.

"I don't think we can stop him."

"I'll send someone to the pro shop."

"Excuse me, Doctor," said Bourne as Marie's brother went to the telephone. "I want to ask Johnny a few questions and I'm not sure you want to hear them."

"I've heard more than I care to already. I'll wait in the other room." The doctor crossed to the door and let himself out.

While St. Jacques talked on the phone, Jason moved about the room raising and lowering his arms and shaking his hands to check the functioning of his motor controls. He crouched, then rose to his feet four times in succession, each movement faster than the previous one. He had to be ready-he had to be!

"It'll only be a few minutes," said the brother-in-law, hanging up the phone. "Pritchard will have to go down and open the shop. He'll bring different sizes of tape."

"Thanks." Bourne stopped moving and stood in place. "Who was the man I shot, Johnny? He fell through the curtains in that archway, but I couldn't see his face."

"No one I know, and I thought I knew every white man in these islands who could afford an expensive suit. He must have been a tourist-a tourist on assignment ... for the Jackal. Naturally, there wasn't any identification. Henry's shipped him off to 'Serrat."

"How many here know what's going on?"

"Outside of the staff, there are only fourteen guests, and no one's got a clue. I've sealed off the chapel-the word is storm damage. And even those who have to know something-like the doctor and the two guys from Toronto-they don't know the whole story, just pieces, and they're friends. I trust them. The others are heavy into island rum."

"What about the gunshots at the chapel?"

"What about the loudest and lousiest steel band in the islands? Also, you were a thousand feet away in the woods. ... Look, David, most everyone's left but some diehards who wouldn't stay here if they weren't old Canadian buddies showing me loyalty, and a few casuals who'd probably take a vacation in Teheran. What can I tell you except that the bar is doing a hell of a business."

"It's like a mystifying charade," murmured Bourne, again carefully arching his neck and staring at the ceiling. "Figures in silhouette playing out disconnected, violent events behind white screens, nothing really making sense, everything's whatever you want it to be."

"That's a little much for me, Professor. What's your point?"

"Terrorists aren't born, Johnny, they're made, schooled in a curriculum you won't find in any academic catalog. Leaving aside the reasons why they are what they are-which can range from a justifiable cause to the psychopathic megalomania of a Jackal-you keep the charades going because they're playing out their own."