The Bourne Objective

Bourne came around and took a look at the painting. It was almost finished-enough, anyway, to take his breath away. A woman in white, carrying a parasol against a burning sun, walked in high grass, while a young boy, possibly her son, looked on longingly. The depiction of the light was simply extraordinary. Bourne stepped in, peering closely at the brushstrokes, which matched perfectly those of Claude Monet, who had painted the original La Promenade in 1875.

“What do you think?”

Bourne turned. Deron had returned with a hard-sided attaché case. “Magnificent. Even better than the original.”

Deron laughed. “Good God, man, I hope not!” He handed Bourne the case. “Here you are, safe and sound.”

“Thanks, Deron.”

“Hey, it was a challenge. I forge paintings and, for you, passports, visas, and the like. But a computer? To tell you the truth the composite housing was a bitch. I wasn’t sure I’d gotten it quite right.”

“You did a great job.”

“Another satisfied customer,” he said with a laugh.

They began to drift back through the house.

“How’s Kiki?”

“As ever. She’s back in Africa for six weeks working to improve the locals’ lot. It’s lonely here without her.”

“You two should get married.”

“You’ll be the first to know, old man.” They were at the front door. He shook Bourne’s hand. “Ever get up to Oxford?”

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

“Give the Grand Old Dame my regards.”

“I will.” Bourne opened the door. “Thanks for everything.”

Deron waved away his words. “Godspeed, Jason.”

Bourne, on the night flight to London, dreamed that he was back in Bali, at the top of Pura Lempuyang, peering through the gates that framed Mount Agung. In his dream he saw Holly Marie moving slowly from right to left. As she passed in front of the sacred mountain, Bourne began to run toward her and, as she was pushed, he caught her before she could fall down the steep, stone steps to her death. Holding her in his arms, he looked down on her face. It was Tracy’s face.

Tracy shuddered and he saw the jagged shard of glass impaling her. Blood inundated her and ran over his hands and arms.

“What’s happening, Jason? It’s not my time to die.”

It wasn’t Tracy’s voice that echoed in his dream; it was Scarlett’s.

London greeted him with an uncharacteristically brilliant, crisp, blue morning. Chrissie had insisted on picking him up at Heathrow. She was waiting for him just outside of security. She smiled as he kissed her on the cheek.

“Baggage?”

“Only what I’m carrying,” Bourne said.

Linking arms with him, she said, “How very nice to see you again so soon. Scarlett was so excited when I told her. We’ll have lunch up at Oxford and then pick her up from school.”

They walked to the car park and got into her battered Range Rover.

“Old times,” she said, laughing.

“How did Scarlett take the news about her aunt?”

Chrissie sighed as she pulled out. “About as well as could be expected. She was a complete wreck for twenty-four hours. I couldn’t go near her.”

“Children are resilient.”

“That, at least, is a godsend.” After winding her way out of the airport, she got on the motorway.

“Where is Tracy?”

“We buried her in a very old cemetery just outside Oxford.”

“I’d like to go straight there, if you don’t mind.”

She gave him a quick look. “No, not at all.”

The drive to Oxford was quick and silent, both Bourne and Chrissie lost in thought. In Oxford they stopped at a florist. At the cemetery, she turned in and parked the SUV. They got out and she led him through the ranks of headstones, some very old indeed, toward a spreading oak tree. A brisk wind was blowing from the east, ruffling her hair. She stood slightly back while Bourne approached Tracy’s grave.

He stood for a moment, then lay the bouquet of white roses at the foot of the stone. He wanted to remember her as she had been the night before her death. He wanted to remember only their intimate moments. But for better or for worse, her death had been the most intimate of moments between them. He didn’t think he’d ever forget the sensation of her blood on his hands and arms, a crimson silk scarf being drawn across them. Her eyes looking up at him. He had so wanted to hold on to the life that was draining out of her. He heard her voice whispering in his ear and his vision clouded. His eyes burned with tears that welled but would not spill over. How he wished he could feel her breathing beside him.

Then he felt Chrissie’s arm around him.

Scarlett, breaking away from a gaggle of her schoolmates, ran into his arms. He picked her up and whirled her around.

“I went to Aunt Tracy’s funeral,” Scarlett said with a child’s terrible gravity. “I wish I had known her better.”

Bourne hugged her tight. Then they all got into the Range Rover and, at his request, drove over to Chrissie’s office at All Souls College, a large, square room with windows that overlooked the ancient college grounds. It smelled of old books and incense.

While Bourne and Scarlett settled themselves on the sofa Chrissie used to grade papers, she made tea.

“What do you have in the briefcase?” Scarlett asked.

“You’ll see,” Bourne told her.

Chrissie came over with the tea service on an antique black japa

“Now,” Chrissie said as she pulled up a chair, “what’s all this about?”

Bourne placed the attaché case on his lap. “I have a birthday present for you.”

Chrissie frowned. “My birthday is almost five months away.”

“Consider this an early gift.” He unlocked the case, opened the snaps, and removed a laptop computer, which he placed on the table beside the tea service. “Come sit beside me,” he said.

Chrissie rose and moved onto the sofa while Bourne opened the laptop and started it up. He had made sure to fully charge the battery on the flight over. Scarlett sat on the edge of the cushion to be closer to the screen.

The screen swelled with images as the computer finished booting up.

“Scarlett,” Bourne said, “do you have the ring I gave you?”

“I keep it with me.” Scarlett dug it out. “Do I have to give it back?”

Bourne laughed. “I gave it to you and I meant it.” He held out his hand. “Just for a moment.”

He took the ring and inserted it in the slot that had been built for it. This was the laptop he had stolen from Jalal Essai, Holly’s uncle, at Alex Conklin’s behest. He hadn’t delivered it because he had discovered what it contained and determined that it was too important a find to be given over to Treadstone, or anyone in the clandestine services. Instead he had asked Deron to make a fake laptop. Accompanying Holly on one of her trips to Sonora to stock a narcorrancho, he had been introduced to Gustavo Moreno. Bourne had allowed the fake laptop to fall into the drug lord’s hands because having it eventually come to light in Moreno’s possession would keep any suspicion on Conklin’s part from falling on him.

Similarly, he had switched the Solomon ring with the one Marks had taken off his London assailant. The fact that Scarlett had found Marks’s ring when Marks had been shot gave him a perfect cover for the switch. He had been correct to assume the Solomon ring would be far safer in her hands than in his own.

The two pieces fit together perfectly. The mysterious inscription engraved on the inside of the ring unlocked the ghost file on the laptop’s hard drive, a PDF file, a perfect replica of an ancient Hebrew text.

Chrissie hunched forward. “What is this? It looks like… directions?”

“You recall the discussion we had with Professor Giles.”