Of these forty-seven possibles, including two of... 389
Of these forty-seven possibles,
including two of the eleven couples, an even dozen had made recent trips to the Soviet Union?
scratch all of themThe Komitet Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, otherwise known as the KGB, had
less use for the Jackal than the PopeIlich Ramirez Sanchez, later Carlos the assassin, had been
trained in the American compound of Novgorod, where the streets were lined with American gas
stations and grocery stores, boutiques and Burger Kings, and everyone spoke American English
with diverse dialects?no Russian was allowed?and only those who passed the course were
permitted to proceed to the next level of infiltratorsThe Jackal had, indeed, passed, but when the
Komitet discovered that the young Venezuelan revolutionary?s solution for all things disagreeable
was to eliminate them violently, it was too much for even the inheritors of the brutal OGPU
Sanchez was expelled and Carlos the Jackal was bornForget about the twelve people who had
traveled to the Soviet UnionThe assassin would not touch them, for there was a standing order in
all branches of Russian intelligence chanel jewelry that if Carlos was tracked he was to be shotNovgorod was to
be protected at all cost
The possibles were thus narrowed to thirty-five, the hotel?s register listing them as nine couples,
four single women and thirteen single menThe raw-file printouts from the data banks de scribed in
detail the facts and speculations that resulted in the negative evaluation of each individualIn truth,
the speculations far outnumbered the facts and were too often based on hostile appraisals given by
Robert Ludlum ?? THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
53
enemies or competitors, but each had to be studied, many with distaste, for among the information
might be a word or phrase, a location or an act, that was the link to Carlos
The telephone rang, breaking Jason?s concentrationHe blinked at the harsh, intrusive sound as
if trying to locate the source, then he sprang from the couch and rushed to the desk, reaching the
phone on the third ringI?m calling from down the street
?Are you coming up??
?Not through that lobby, I?m notI?ve made arrangements for the service entrance, with a
temporary guard hired this chanel ceramic watches afternoon
?You?re covering all the bases, aren?t you??
?Nowhere near as many as I?d like to,? replied Conklin?This isn?t your normal ball gameSee
you in a few minutes
Bourne hung up the phone and returned to the couch and the printouts, separating three that had
caught his attention, not that any of them contained anything that evoked the JackalIn stead, it was
seemingly offhand data that might conceivably link the three to each other when no apparent
connection existed between themAccording to their passports, these three Americans had flown in
to Philadelphia?s International Airport within six days of one another eight months agoTwo
women and a man, the women from Marrakesh and Lisbon, the man from West BerlinThe first
woman was an interior decorator on a collecting trip to the old Moroccan city, the second an
executive for the Chase Bank, Foreign Department; the man was an aerospace engineer on loan to
the Air Force from McDonnell-DouglasWhy would three such obviously different people, with
such dissimilar professions, converge on the same city within a week of one another? balenciaga dix motorcycle Coincidence?
Entirely possible, but considering the number of international airports in the country, including the
most frequented?New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami?the coincidence of Philadelphia
seemed unlikelyStranger still, and even more unlikely, was the fact that these same three people
were staying at the same hotel at the same time in Washington eight months laterJason wondered
what Alex Conklin would say when he told him
?I?m getting the book on each of them,? said Alex, sinking into an armchair across from the
couch and the printouts
?You knew??
?It wasn?t hard to put togetherOf course, it was a hell of a lot easier with a computer doing the
scanning
?You might have included a note! I?ve been poring over these things since eight o?clock
?I didn?t find it?them?until after nine and I didn?t want to call you from Virginia
?That?s another story, isn?t it?? said Bourne, sitting down on the couch, once again leaning
forward anxiously
?Yes, it is, and it?s God-awful
?Medusa??
?It?s worse than I thought, and worse than that, I didn?t think it could be
?It?s a bowelful,? countered the retired gucci new bag intelligence officerPentagon
procurements? The Federal Trade Commission? Our ambassador in London, or would you like the
supreme commander of NATO??
?My God !?
Robert Ludlum ?? THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
54
?Oh, I can go one betterFor size, try on the chairman of the Joint Chiefs
?Christ, what is it? Some kind of cabal??
?That?s so academic, DrNow try collusion, down deep and elusive and after all these
years still breathing, still aliveThey?re in contact with each other in high placesWhy??
?What?s the purpose? The objective??
?I just said that, asked that, really
?There has to be a reason!?
?Try motiveI just said that, too, and it may be as simple as hiding past sinsIsn?t that what we
were looking for? A collection of former Medusans who?d run to the hills at the thought of the past
coming to light??
?Then that?s it
?No, it?s not, and this is Saint Alex?s instincts searching for wordsTheir reactions were too
immediate, too visceral, too loaded with today, not twenty years agoSomething?s different from what we expected, and I?m goddamned sick of
making mistakesBut this isn?t a white chanel j12 watch mista
