‘Have you got a light, mister?’
McAllister looked at the matches, quickly picked them up, tore one out and struck it, holding the flame up for the cigarette. When Jason returned to his seat, the sealed envelope was in his hand. He opened it, removed the paper inside and read the typewritten English script: Telephone Macao – 32-61-443.
He looked around for a pay phone and then realized that he had never used one in Macao, and even if there were instructions, he was not familiar with the Portuguese colony’s coins. It was always the little things that loused up the bigger things. He signalled the bartender, who reached him before his hand was back on the bar.
‘Yes, sir? Another whisky, sir?
‘Not for a week,’ said Bourne, placing Hong Kong money in front of him. ‘I have to make a phone call to someone here in Macao. Tell me where a pay phone is and let me have the proper coins, will you, please?’
‘I could not permit so fine a gentleman as yourself to use a common telephone, sir. Between us, I believe many of the customers here may be diseased.’ The bartender smiled. ‘Allow me, sir. I have a telephone on my counter – for very special people.’
Before Jason could protest or give thanks, a telephone was put in front of him. He dialled as McAllister stared at him.
‘Wei?’ said a female voice.
‘I was instructed to call this number,’ replied Bourne in English. The dead impostor had not known Chinese.
‘We will meet.’
‘We won’t meet.’
‘We insist.’
‘Then Resist. You know me better than that, or you should. I want to talk to the man, and only the man.’
‘You are presumptuous.’
‘You’re less than an idiot. So’s the skinny preacher with the big sword unless he talks to me.’
‘You dare-‘
‘I’ve heard that once before tonight,’ interrupted Jason sharply. ‘The answer is yes, I do dare. He’s got a hell of a lot more to lose than I do. He’s only one client, and my list is growing. I don’t need him, but right now I think he needs me.’
‘Give me a reason that can be confirmed.’
‘I don’t give reasons to corporals. I was once a major, or didn’t you know that?’
There’s no need for insults.’
There’s no need for this conversation. I’ll call you back in thirty minutes. Offer me something better, offer me the man. And I’ll know if it’s himself because I’ll ask a question or two that only he can answer. Ciao, lady.’ Bourne hung up.
‘What are you doing?’ whispered an agitated McAllister four chairs away.
‘Arranging your day in the sun, and I hope you’ve got some lotion. We’re getting out of here. Give me five minutes, then follow me. Turn right out of the door and keep walking. We’ll pick you up.’
‘We?
There’s someone I want you to meet. An old friend -young friend – whom I think you’ll approve of. He dresses like you do.’
‘Someone else! Are you insane!’
‘Don’t blow your cool, analyst, we’re not supposed to know each other. No, I’m not insane. I just hired a back-up in case I’m out-thought. Remember, you wanted my input in such matters.’
The introductions were short and no names were used, but it was evident that McAllister was impressed by the stocky, broad shouldered, well-dressed Chinese.
‘Are you an executive with one of the firms over here?’ asked the analyst as they walked towards the side street where the conduit’s car was parked.
‘In a manner of speaking, yes, sir. My own firm, however. I run a courier service for very important people.’
‘But how did he find you?’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I’m sure you can understand. Such information is confidential.’
‘Good Lord’ muttered McAllister, glancing at the man from Medusa.
‘Get me to a phone in twenty minutes,’ said Jason in the front seat. The bewildered undersecretary sat in the back.
‘They are using a relay then?” asked the conduit. They did so many times with the Frenchman.’
‘How did he handle them?’ asked Bourne.
‘With delays. He would say, “Let them sweat.” May I suggest an hour?’
‘You’re on. Is there a restaurant open around here?’
‘Over in the Rua Mercadores.’
‘We need food, and the Frenchman was right – he was always right. Let them sweat.’
‘He was a decent man to me,’ said the conduit.
‘At the end he was some kind of eloquent if perverted saint.’
‘I do not understand, sir.’
‘It’s not necessary that you do. But I’m alive and he’s not because he made a decision.’
‘What kind of decision, sir?
That he should die so that I could live.’
‘Like the Christian scriptures. The nuns taught them to us.’
‘Hardly,’ said Jason, amused at the thought. ‘If there’d been another way out we would have taken it. There wasn’t. He simply accepted the fact that his death was my way out.’
‘I liked him,’ said the conduit.
Take us to the restaurant.’
It was all Edward McAllister could do to contain himself. What he did not know and what Bourne would not discuss at the table was choking him with frustration. Twice he tried to broach the subject of relays and the current situation and twice Jason cut him off, admonishing the undersecretary with a stare, as the conduit, in gratitude, looked away. There were certain facts the Chinese knew about and there were other facts he did not care to know about for his own safety.
‘Rest and food,’ mused Bourne, finishing the last of his tian-suan ran. The Frenchman said they were weapons. He was right, of course.’
‘I suggest he needed the first more than you did, sir,’ said the conduit.
‘Perhaps, but he was a student of military history. He claimed more battles were lost from fatigue than from inferior fire power.’
This is all very interesting,’ McAllister interrupted sharply, ‘but we’ve been here for some time and I’m sure there are things we should be doing.’
‘We will, Edward. If you’re uptight, think what they’re going through. The Frenchman also used to say that the enemy’s exposed nerves were our best allies.’
‘I’m becoming rather tired of your Frenchman,’ said McAllister testily.
Jason looked at the analyst and spoke quietly. ‘Don’t ever say that to me again. You weren’t there.’ Bourne checked his watch. ‘It’s over an hour. Let’s find a phone.’ He turned to the conduit. ‘I’ll need your help,’ he added. ‘You just put in the money. I’ll dial.’
‘You said you’d call back in thirty minutes? spat out the woman at the other end of the line.
‘I had business to take care of. I have other clients and I’m not too keen on your attitude. If this is going to be a waste of time, I’ve got other things to do and you can answer to the man when the typhoon comes.’
‘How could that happen?’
‘Come on, lady! Give me a trunk filled with more money than you’ve ever thought about and I might tell you. On the other hand I probably wouldn’t. I like to be owed favours by men in high places. You’ve got ten seconds until I hang up.’
Please. You will meet a man who will take you to a house on the Guia Hill where there is highly sophisticated communications equipment-‘
‘And where half a dozen of your goons crack my skull and throw me into a room where a doctor fills me with juice and you get it all for nothing? Bourne’s anger was only partly feigned; Sheng’s troops were the ones behaving like amateurs. ‘I’ll tell you about another piece of sophisticated equipment. It’s called a telephone and I didn’t think there’d be communications from Macao to the Guangdong garrison if you didn’t have scramblers. Of course, you bought them in Tokyo because if you made them yourselves they probably wouldn’t work! Use one. I’m calling you just once more, lady. Have a number for me. The man’s number.’ Jason hung up.
‘That’s interesting,’ said McAllister several feet away from the pay phone, glancing briefly at the Chinese conduit who had returned to the table. ‘You used the stick when I would have used the carrot.’
‘Used the what?’
‘I would have emphasized what extraordinary information I had to reveal. Instead you threatened, as if you were dismissing whoever it was.’
‘Spare me,’ answered Bourne, lighting a cigarette, grateful that his hand was not shaking. ‘For your edification I did both. The threat emphasizes the revelation and the dismissal reinforces both.’
‘Your input is showing,’ said the undersecretary of state, a hint of a smile on his face. Thank you.’
The man from Medusa looked hard at the man from Washington. ‘If this damn thing works, can you do it, analyst? Can you whip out the gun and pull the trigger? Because if you can’t, we’re both dead.’
‘I can do it,’ said McAllister calmly. ‘For the Far East. For the world.’