‘So?’ Webb watched the driver’s eyes as they kept darting up at him.
‘No guard accompanied you, and there are bad people who watch for such men as yourself- often signals are sent from other bad people inside. These are uncertain times, so it was better to be certain in this instance. ‘
‘And you’re certain… now. ‘
‘Oh, yes, sir!’ Pak-fei smiled. ‘An automobile following us on a back street in the Mongkok is easily seen. ‘
‘So there was no phone call. ‘
‘Oh, indeed there was, sir. One must always call first. But it was very quick, and I then walked back on the pavement,
without my cap, of course, for many metres. There were no angry men in automobiles, and none climbed out to run in the street. I will now take you to the merchant much relieved. ‘
‘I’m relieved, too,’ said David, wondering why Jason Bourne had temporarily deserted him. ‘And I didn’t even know I should have been worried. Not about being followed. ‘
The dense crowds of the Mongkok thinned out as the buildings became lower and Webb could see the waters of Victoria Harbour behind high chain-link fences. Beyond the forbidding barricades were clusters of warehouses fronting piers where merchant ship’s were docked and heavy machinery crawled and groaned, lifting huge boxcars into holds. Pak-fei turned into the entrance of an isolated one-storey warehouse; it appeared deserted, asphalt everywhere and only two cars in sight. The gate was closed; a guard walked out of a small glass-enclosed office towards the Daimler, a clipboard in his hand.
‘You won’t find my name on a list,’ said Pak-fei in Chinese and with singular authority as the guard approached. ‘Inform Mr Wu Song that Regent Number Five is here and brings him a taipan as worthy as himself. He expects us.’ The guard nodded, squinting in the afternoon sunlight to catch a glimpse of the important passenger. ‘Aiya!’ screamed Pak-fei at the man’s impertinence. Then he turned and looked at Webb. ‘You must not misunderstand, sir,’ he said as the guard ran back to his telephone. ‘My use of the name of my fine hotel has nothing to do with my fine hotel. In truth, if Mr Liang, or anyone else, knew I mentioned its name in such business as this, I would be relieved of my job. It is merely that I was born on the fifth day of the fifth month in the year of our Christian Lord, 1935. ‘
‘I’ll never tell,’ said David, smiling to himself, thinking that Jason Bourne had not deserted him after all. The myth that he once had been knew the avenues that led to the right contacts – knew them blindly – and that man was there inside David Webb.
The curtained whitewashed room of the warehouse, lined with locked, horizontal display cases, was not unlike a museum displaying such artifacts from past civilizations as
primitive tools, fossilized insects, mystic carvings of religions past. The difference here was in the objects. These were exploding weapons that ran the gamut, from the lowest-calibre handguns and rifles to the most sophisticated weapons of modern warfare – thousand-round automatic machine guns with spiralling clips on near-weightless frames to laser-guided rockets to be fired from the shoulder, an arsenal for terrorists. Two men in business suits stood guard, one outside the entrance to the room, the other inside. As was to be expected, the former bowed his apology and moved an electronic scanner up and down the clothes of Webb and his driver. Then the man reached for the attach6 case. David pulled it away, shaking his head and gesturing at the wandlike scanner. The guard had waved it over the surface of the case, checking his dials as he did so.
‘Private papers,’ Webb said in Chinese to the startled guard as he walked into the room.
It took David nearly a full minute to absorb what he saw, to shake off his disbelief. He looked at the bold, emblazoned No Smoking signs in English, French and Chinese that were all over the walls and wondered why they were there. Nothing was exposed. He walked over to the small arms display and examined the wares. He clutched the attache case in his hand as though it were a lifeline to sanity in a world gone mad with instruments of violence.
‘Huanying!’ cried a voice, followed by the appearance of a youngish looking man. He came out of a panelled door in one of those tightfitting European suits that exaggerate the shoulders and hug the waist, the rear panels of the jacket flowing like a peacock’s tail – the product of designers determined to be chic at the price of neutering the male image.
‘This is Mr Wu Song, sir,’ said Pak-fei, bowing first to the merchant and then to Webb. ‘It is not necessary for you to give your name, sir, ‘
‘Bu!’ spat out the young merchant, pointing at David’s attache case. ‘Bu jing ya!’
‘Your client, Mr Song, speaks fluent Chinese.’ The driver turned to David. ‘As you heard, sir, Mr Song objects to the
presence of your briefcase. ‘
‘It doesn’t leave my hand,’ said Webb.
‘Then there can be no serious discussion of business,’ rejoined Wu Song in flawless English.
‘Why not? Your man checked it. There are no weapons inside, and even if there were and I tried to open it, I have an idea I’d be on the floor before the lid was up. ‘
‘Plastic?’ said Wu Song, asking a question. ‘Plastic microphones leading to recording devices where the metal content is so low as to be dismissed even by sophisticated machinery?’
‘You’re paranoid. ‘
‘As they say in your country, it goes with the territory. ‘
‘Your idiom’s as good as your English. ‘
‘Columbia University, seventy-three. ‘
‘Did you major in armaments?’
‘No, marketing. ‘
‘Aiya!’ shrieked Pak-fei, but he was too late. The rapid colloquy had covered the movement of the guards; they had walked across the room, at the last instant lunging at Webb and the driver.
Jason Bourne spun, dislodging his attacker’s arm from around his shoulder, clamping it under his own and twisting it further in place, forcing the man down and smashing the attache case up into the Oriental’s face. The moves were coming back to him. The violence was returning as it had returned to a bewildered amnesiac on a fishing boat beyond the shoals of a Mediterranean island. So much forgotten, so much unexplained, but remembered. The man fell to the floor, stunned, as his partner turned in fury to Webb after pummelling Pak-fei to the ground. He rushed forward, his hands held up in a diagonal thrust, his wide chest and shoulders the base of his dual battering rams. David dropped the attache case, lurched to his right, then spun again, again to his right, his left foot lashing up from the floor, catching the Chinese in the groin with such force that the man doubled over, screaming. Webb instantly kicked out with his right foot, his toe digging into the attacker’s throat directly beneath his jaw; the man rolled on the floor, gasping for air,
one hand on his groin, the other gripping his neck. The first guard started to rise; Bourne stepped forward and smashed his knee into the man’s chest, sending him halfway across the room where he fell unconscious beneath a display case.
The young arms merchant from Columbia University was stunned. His eyes explained: he was witnessing the unthinkable, expecting any moment that what he saw would be reversed, his guards the victors. Then suddenly, emphatically, he knew it was not going to happen; he ran in panic to the panelled door, reaching it as Webb reached him. David gripped the padded shoulders, spinning the merchant back across the floor. Wu Song tripped over his twisting feet and fell; he held up his hands, pleading.
‘No, please! Stop! I cannot stand physical confrontation! Take what you will!’
‘You can’t stand what?’
‘You heard me, I get ill?
‘What the hell do you think all this is about?’ yelled David, sweeping his arm around the room.
‘I service a demand, that is all. Take whatever you want, but don’t touch me. Please?
Disgusted, Webb crossed to the fallen driver, who was getting to his knees, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. ‘What I take, I pay for,’ he said to the arms merchant as he grabbed the driver’s arm and helped him to his feet. ‘Are you all right?’
‘You ask for great trouble, sir,’ replied Pak-fei, his hands trembling, fear in his eyes.
‘It had nothing to do with you. Wu Song knows that, don’t you, Wu?
‘I brought you here!’ insisted the driver.
To make a purchase,’ added David quickly. ‘So let’s get it over with. But first tie up those two goons. Use the curtains. Rip them down. ‘
Pak-fei looked imploringly at the young merchant.