Robert Ludlum's (TM) The Bourne Initiative (Jason Bourne series)(106)

“It looks like there was a coup in your absence, Timur,” Bourne said as he and Mala armed themselves with the fallen men’s weapons.

“My brother,” Savasin said with active distaste.

“Going after the first minister,” Mala said. “That takes brass stones.”

Bourne waved them to silence as he got down on his stomach. They followed suit, and the three of them made their wriggling way between the rails, where there was enough clearance for their prone bodies but not much more. Bourne went as fast as he could, knowing that the gunshot would bring the others converging on the spot the explosion came from.

In fact, he was counting on this. There were five remaining FSB agents. Having all of them in a group was much more to his liking than having them spread out over the station. Having worked their way halfway down the Sapsan, he tapped Savasin on the shoulder, mouthed for him to stay where he was. Then he signed to Mala, who snaked her way to their left, toward the platform on the far side of the train.

Bourne himself rolled to his right, moving toward the gap between the train and the platform. On the verge of being able to get to his feet, he paused, watching for moving shadows, listening for hushed conversations, or even single voices.

When, after five minutes of the only form of surveillance available to him, he discerned that at least the spot he had chosen was clear, he picked his way forward into the gap. Again, he paused to listen; again he heard nothing but the normal noises attributable to engines, steel wheels, sighing hydraulics, and, every once in a while, the conversation of the repairmen coming through the broken window in the conference cabin.

Working his way backward, he headed for the front of the train.





39



Ivan was nearing the end of the line. He’d been working on trains more or less his whole adult life—actually even before that. His father had worked on the trains in Moscow, though of course he’d never even dreamed of anything like the Sapsan. But the Sapsan had been Ivan’s baby from the moment it had rolled into the yard at Leningradsky Station. He’d had to spend a week in a stuffy glass box of a classroom where he was taught every aspect of the Sapsan’s workings, then another week working hands-on in the yard. That was how he came to love the Sapsan, and he thought of his father every time his gnarled hands touched the sleek outer shell or the even sleeker innards.

Unfortunately, Ivan thought as he surveyed the destruction of his most luxurious conference cabin, he was saddled with a trio of near-idiots. They were young, it was true, but they were also lazy, unteachable, and almost always high on some illegal substance that Ivan refused to acknowledge, let alone identify.

It was not always thus, he thought with an inward sigh. When he came up through the ranks the youngsters were enthusiastic, eager to learn an honorable trade. No more. Nowadays, the young ones were infected by modern-day culture. Clubbing, whoring, and hanging out drinking, smoking, and making mischief were their off-hours avocations. Useless carbuncles on the ass of decent society, that’s what they were, Ivan thought sourly as he directed Fool Number One to scrub out the carpet with a solution he had concocted to take out vomit and bloodstains from the special carpet in first class without affecting the color.

He ordered Fool Number Two to vacuum up the shards of glass from the blown-out window. Luckily, there weren’t many of them, as the blow had come from the inside, but those that were there were bloody, and they all donned thick rubber gloves to protect themselves. Fool Number Three was in charge of making sure the pane of glass didn’t strike any hard surface or topple over. Nevertheless, as Ivan picked his way over to the blown-out window he kept an eagle eye on Fool Number Three, the youngest, rawest, and highest of the trio.

Possibly that was why he didn’t sense the Angelmaker until she was in his face. She grabbed the front of his uniform, pulled him hard against the chrome frame of the window, and put a forefinger across her lips in the universal sign for silence. Then she grinned at him, though all his terrified mind registered was her bared teeth. He had the irrational thought—though considering what was going on in the world today it was hardly impossible—that she was going to tear into his throat with those sharp, white teeth.

Instead, she drew him to one side while a man with the watchful, steely eyes of someone who saw and understood everything at first glance climbed in through the open space where the window had been. It was a long window; there was plenty of space. When the man looked at Ivan, Ivan’s guts turned to water, and he felt an urgent need to piss. Then the man smiled at him, not in the feral way the woman had, but rather it was the smile of a comrade, an old hand with whom you could share a cold vodka and a cigarette at the end of a long day. He asked the woman to let go in perfect, fluid, Moscow-inflected Russian. He looked Russian, too. Ivan relaxed somewhat.

As for the three Fools, only the youngest one, mouth gaping open, noted the man’s appearance. The other two were too occupied in trying to attend to their duties to notice, let alone care.

“What’s your name?” the man said.

“Ivan Ivanovich,” Ivan said, blinking like an owl in sunlight.

“Well, Ivan Ivanovich, my name is Fyodor Ilianovich,” Bourne said, using a legend he’d employed before in Moscow. “I’m very pleased to meet you.”

Ivan stared at him as if mesmerized. He did not know what to say. He suddenly longed for a glass of strong tea, or better yet, a vodka. Even a cigarette would do, he thought, but none of these amenities were on offer.