23.

The moon silvered the edges of the Pyramids of Giza, which otherwise glowed a pale melon in the powerful uplights buried in the sand. Ivan Borz, sitting with his legs up, ankles crossed on the top of the wrought-iron balcony railing of his residence in Giza, peered across the desert at the immense Pharaonic necropolis that had cost so many their lives. "And for what?" he wondered aloud. "The ancient Egyptians had it all wrong."

He looked from the Pyramids to the five-sided box sitting on the chair next to him. The top was off, the face of the head turned toward him. The American head. So beautifully preserved.

He drew his computer onto his lap, opened it, and displayed one TV show after another to the head. "You see this shit?" He pointed to the screen on which grotesquely built men and women were vying for control of something-different things on the different shows that flickered across the screen-but always control. "These must be familiar to you, yes? European and American reality shows. This is the soul-rotting drivel we must protect our people from. There are no Muslim values here-no values whatsoever, except greed, avarice, and betrayal."

With an angry gesture, he closed the laptop, put it away. He stared down at the head for a moment. Then he smiled. "You know," he said, "you are my only friend in this godforsaken wilderness, the only one I can talk to. The only one I trust." He sighed deeply. "Being Muslim, being a student of history, I know how to talk to the downtrodden, the disenfranchised, the poor shits who have nothing, no prospects ever to be anything. But you already know this, don't you? You know everything that's in my head, every thought, every memory. No crevice too deep." He laughed. "But I digress. Where was I? Ah, yes! I give them martyrdom. After I'm through with them, that's all they long for." His smile, though widening, had turned rueful. "But, let's face it, who wants to be stuck here in Cairo or in Syria or Iraq recruiting? Not you. Not I. But for the amount of money I'm being paid, for the assurance of being left alone by the FSB to do whatever the fuck I want, it's worth it." He tousled the black hair. "Don't you think?" He laughed. "Of course you do."

He pulled out a Cuban cigar from a secret inner pocket, bit off the end, lit it slowly with a solid silver lighter, took his first few puffs. "Have patience, my friend. The one who murdered you will pay, this I have sworn. You will be revenged."

Footfalls came to him, soft and delicate as a woman leaving her bath. "Keep your own counsel now," Borz whispered to the head. "We do not want this one to know our business. I recruited him in a dazzling display of Muslim activism, the twisting of the Qur'an that suits our aims. He is a believer, my friend. I am not. But soft now. He comes."

But it was no woman who came up behind him now, breathing softly as a lover.

"El-Amir," he said without turning around. "Punctual as usual."

"I smelled the smoke from a distance," the young man said, stepping around to face his boss.

"In this godforsaken shithole one must take one's pleasures, tiny though they may be."

El-Amir was clothed in an outfit straight from the best tailors in London. He had the dirty-blond hair and light eyes that set the British upper classes and the polo masters off from everyone else. On close inspection, however, it was possible to discern that his hair was dyed, that he wore blue contact lenses. His upper-class British accent might have been fake, as well, but none save a linguist could tell. He carried a slim, crocodile-skin laptop case that, like the powerful computer inside, had been handmade expressly for him.

Ivan Borz produced another cigar, held it up. "Here." He flicked open the lighter as El-Amir took the cigar from him, rolled it between his fingers, inhaled its rich aroma. "I'll light it for you with the present you gave me."

When the second Cuban was lit, El-Amir took a seat on the other side of the boxed head. He was tall and lanky. His face seemed to belong to a long-dead age. Three hundred years ago, he might have been mistaken for a crafty Jesuit, save for his lens-clad eyes, which were like stones weirdly glimmering underwater.

"How long are you going to keep that thing?"

"For as long as I can converse with it."

El-Amir shook his head. "You're bonkers."

Borz leapt up, was at El Amir's throat all within the space of a single heartbeat. "Shut your fucking mouth." Eye to eye, breath mingled, the two men stared at each other, each thinking their own thoughts. All at once, Borz stood back, stared down at El-Amir. "Speak not about things of which you are ignorant."

El-Amir swallowed hard, held his hands up, palms outward in a gesture of calm and peace. "Apologies. I didn't-"

"I saw the video, by the way." Borz retook his seat. His demeanor serene, as if nothing untoward had happened. "Magnificent production values."

El-Amir nodded, not knowing whether or not to smile. "That's what you get when you hire professionals." Leaning over, he slipped the laptop out of its case, fired it up. He inserted a flash drive into one of the USB slots, navigated to the files therein.

Up popped one video after another-beautifully lit, exquisitely framed, even though they were obviously shot with a handheld camera. The camera's movement added to the urgency of the images of black-clad Islamics taking over one Syrian town after another. Jump-cut to a map of the area, showing how far the movement had spread, how close they now were to the Turkish border.

"Here's our latest, and it's killer." He laughed. "Literally." He focused the screen on a video of terror chieftains sitting around a campfire in what might have been a desert, except for the fact that bombed-out buildings like the cracked, rotten teeth of a wino formed the dramatic backdrop.

There was no talk, no subtitles. Instead, the men passed around a series of weapons: submachine guns, mortars, bazookas, flamethrowers, antitank missiles. The metallic sounds of the war materiel seemed somehow heightened, to come at the viewer like shots. They were passed from left to right as one reads the Qur'an. As each weapon was handed to the last man on the left, he gave it to a female, fully clothed in black from head to foot. Only her eyes were visible, gleaming, lambent from the firelight. The camera zoomed in slowly, lovingly on her eyes.

El-Amir hit the Pause button. "Look at those eyes," he said admiringly. "I spent five days finding this young woman. Those eyes are huge, dark, exotic, and, most of all, expressive. These are eyes the viewer falls in love with. The way this section is framed you can't help it. Now the viewer, in thinking 'How beautiful!' has become complicit in the video. He's drawn in despite himself. In such beauty the camera finds power."

El-Amir hit the Play button and the image unfroze. The camera moved back to show the upper half of the young woman. She brought each weapon toward the camera like a religious relic, offering it up to the viewer. In extreme close-up one could see that the weapons were American made. The camera raked over their serial numbers in pitiless slow motion, so there could be no doubt that the Islamic terrorists were using American weapons that had been "liberated" from the Syrian military.

Now the fire-lit group broke up, the camera followed them closely as they approached a towering cache of weapons and ammunition, still in their original shipping crates. Jump-cut to the terrorists using the weapons to kill everyone who stood in their way as they moved through the last Syrian town before the border to Turkey.

The screen went black, but the sounds of weapons fire, the shouts and screams of the dead and dying, persisted, heightened not by increased volume but by the lack of visual. At last, one line in Arabic appeared, and, below it, the English translation: THANK YOU, AMERICA! WE WILL NOT FORGET YOU!

"Beautiful, El-Amir." Borz stomped his booted feet as if he were at a sporting event. "I commend you, my friend!"

"It's as I told you," El-Amir said as he removed the thumb drive and packed away his laptop. "The production, framing, and editing of violence into a memorable entertainment package takes old-school Hollywood theory and modern electronic know-how."

Borz nodded. "This will go out?"

"It's already up on YouTube and our own six channels with links on Twitter, Facebook, pins on Pinterest, and Tumblr. I got it out as soon as I finished the editing." He sat back, puffed on his cigar. "And how was Moscow?"

"Shitty," Borz said. "Why anyone would choose to live there is beyond me."

"Most of them don't."

"Killing Karpov," Borz said, hopscotching topics to see how well El-Amir would keep pace. He was well aware of how he had terrified the man. All well and good. Periodically, everyone needed to be reminded of their place in the scheme of things.

"Killing General Karpov was a positive pleasure," Borz said with admirable alacrity. "Plus, I got to spike an old friend of mine-a Kidon assassin named Rebeka."

"I'm happy for you."

"What are friends for?" Borz's lips formed a curdled smile. "Even the ones who can no longer talk. Especially those."

El-Amir tilted his head back, blew smoke into the sere wind off the desert. "Where does the bad blood between you and Rebeka come from?"

"A poisoned well." Hell would freeze over before he told anyone, let alone El-Amir, the origin of his animus toward Rebeka. Mossad had been trying to shadow him for some time, with only limited success. Frustrated, they had gotten Kidon involved. They had given Rebeka the scent and set her loose in Cairo, where they suspected he was hiding out. They were only half right. He was in Cairo, all right, but he was there to broker the biggest arms deal of his career. Unusually, the deal was complicated. Borz had had to handle two separate clients, two murderous personalities, two outsize egos, two hateful human beings-which for Borz was saying a lot-in order to close the deal. For all these reasons and one other-he alone was the arms dealer with a large and diverse enough inventory to satisfy these people-they had come to him. As such, he had tripled his usual fees. Neither of the clients seemed to mind. For Borz himself it was the payday of a lifetime and, as an added incentive, a good portion of the war materiel he would be supplying was going to be used against Israel.

How it happened to this day Borz was unclear, but somehow Rebeka had discovered the site for the meet, where the deal would be consummated. A crack sniper, among her other infernal talents, she had shot dead both of his clients and just missed killing him by a hairsbreadth. Since then, he had been trying to run her down to exact the revenge she so richly deserved. She had not only cost him his enormous payday but had also humiliated him in a manner he could not abide.

El-Amir, unaware of the inner workings of his master's mind, took the cigar out of his mouth, studied the tip. "You know what I love most about a good cigar?"

Ivan Borz watched a thin streamer of cloud occlude the moon for a moment. Then the silvery light returned to the Pyramids. "I can't imagine."

"The ash," El-Amir said. "It never crumbles. It stays together no matter how extended it gets."

Ivan Borz wanted nothing more than to strangle the life out of this ego-inflated balloon, but for the moment El-Amir was crucial to his current work. Borz laughed silently. Pity, really. "Is that part of Existentialism One at Cambridge?" He blew out a stream of smoke, watched it hide the moon as the cloud had moments before. Then it was gone.

El-Amir laughed. "Don't tell me you're jealous of my education?"

"Hardly," Ivan Borz said. "Do the professors at Cambridge teach you how to kill? Or how to die?"

24.

The moment Bourne left Amira's houseboat he put in a call to Eli Yadin. Ever since he had worked with the director of Mossad he had Yadin's private mobile number. He heard the electronic ring, then a click, the sudden hollowness on the line that indicated the switch to a secure line, then more buzzing as the various security sweeps processed the origin of the call. Only then did Yadin answer.

"Where are you?" The Director was never one for small talk.

"Cairo, looking for Ivan Borz."

Yadin grunted. "Good luck finding that fucking chameleon."

"Eli, was Sara in Moscow two nights ago?"

"Why don't you ask her yourself?"

"Because I'm asking you."

Yadin's voice grew grave and dark. "What's happened?"

"I was hoping you could tell me."

"Unfortunately, I have nothing to tell you."

"Eli, listen to me. I'm standing here on a bank overlooking the Nile and I have in my hand Sara's Star of David."

Silence.

"I know what you're thinking, Eli. I know it's hers."

"It can't be. She was here this morning and she was wearing it."

He told Yadin about the dented point. "She must have bought a replacement."

"She hardly had time; she came here directly from the airport."

"Where did she fly in from, Eli? Where was Sara?"

Silence.

"I wouldn't ask if-"

"I know."

Another silence.

"Sara had a target in Moscow," Yadin said.

"Did her assignment include killing Boris Karpov?"

"It was not."

"The truth, Eli."

"I'm pleased Karpov is dead. He was no friend of Israel's."

"He was a friend of mine."

"So Sara tells me. Curious friends you have, Jason."

"That would include you, Director."

Again, silence. And all the while Bourne was watching every movement, every shadow, the passing of every vehicle and boat, scrutinizing them for a hostile motion, or surveillance. He was in the enemy's camp; from now on there would be no rest, no letting down his guard.

"How does your friend's death involve Sara?" the Director said at length.

"His throat was slashed by a garrote. I found Sara's star embedded in the wound."

"That's not possible-"

"Deep inside the wound, Eli." Bourne took a breath. He hated the drift of this conversation, but he had to go there. "We both know Sara has used her star as a weapon."

"On more than one occasion," Eli said with some deliberation, "it has saved her life."

Time to get it over with. "Did she have orders to terminate Boris Karpov?"

"She did not."

"Eli-"

"This I swear to you, Jason. But your information explains why the FSB is after her. They were checking all exits from Moscow. They pulled her face off a CCTV at Sheremetyevo, and now the entire organization's out for her blood."

"Imagine what Mossad's response would be if you were terminated, Eli."

"I can't say I'm sorry he's dead, but she didn't come anywhere near your friend."

Now came the question Bourne did not want to ask. "Eli, do you think she might have deviated from her assignment? Boris was a whale of a target."

"We don't work that way. Sara doesn't work that way. End of story."

Bourne felt relief spread through him. "Okay. Then I think I know who did kill Boris."