The Bourne Deception - By Robert Ludlum & Eric van Lustbader Page 0,71
equally fake papers at a safe house or perhaps a locker at the airport or rail stationbut if that was the case, where was the key?
Then Bourne turned the body slightly, looking for it when the bull came out of its temporary stupor and made a run at him. His arm was directly in the path of the horns. At the last instant he snatched it away, but the bull twisted its head violently and the length of the horn rode up his arm, flaying off the skin in a thin ribbon.
Grabbing on to the horn, Bourne used it as a fulcrum to swing himself onto the bulls back. For an instant the beast did not know what happened. Then, as the weight on its back shifted, it stomped forward, charging the barrier again. But this time the bull slammed into it sideways, and if Bourne hadnt lifted his right leg it would have been smashed between the muscle of the beast and the stucco. As it was, he was jarred halfway off the bull. Had he fallen, it would have been the end of him, the creature mindlessly stomping him to death within seconds.
Now he had to hang on as the bull made another run at the barrier in an attempt to shake him off. Bourne still had Scarfaces knife; there was a chance the blade was long enough to deliver the coup de grâce and bring the bull to its knees if he chose precisely the right spot and the correct angle. But he knew he wouldnt do it. To kill this beast from behind when it was terrified of him seemed cowardly, craven. He thought of the wooden pig overlooking the pool in Bali, its painted face carved with the eternal smile of the mystical sage. This bull had its own life to live; Bourne had no right to take it.
At that moment he was almost thrown off as the beast slammed into the barrier at an angle, twisting its head down and to the left in a more desperate attempt to dislodge the shifting weight on its back. Bourne, bounced painfully around, was clinging to the bulls horns. His arm ached where Scarface had tried to break it, his back was still bleeding from the knife wound, and worst of all his head felt as if it were splitting into a thousand pieces. He knew he couldnt last much longer, but rolling off the bull meant almost certain death.
And then, as the massed shouts from the corrida came to an ear-shattering crescendo, the bull folded its front legs, its back canted steeply down, and Bourne was shaken loose at last, tumbling head over heels, fetching up against the barrier, which now was spiderwebbed with cracks from the force of the bulls charges.
He lay in a heap, half dazed. He could feel the beasts hot breath on him; the horns were no more than a handbreadth from his face. He tried to move, but couldnt. His breath labored in and out of his lungs and he was gripped by a terrible dizziness.
The red eyes fixed him in their glare, the muscles beneath the glistening hide were bunching for the final lunge at him, and he knew that in the next moment he would be nothing more than a rag doll skewered like Scarface on the points of those bloody horns.
15
THE BULL LURCHED FORWARD, covering Bournes face with a spray of hot mist. The beasts eyes rolled up and its massive head hit the floor at Bournes feet with a heavy thud. Bourne, struggling with clearing his fuzzy brain, wiped his eyes with his forearm, put his head back against the barrier, and saw the guard he had taken out and dragged into the anteroom.
He stood in the classic marksmans pose, legs spread, feet planted firmly, one hand cupping the butt of the pistol with which hed shot the bull twice and which, now that it was dead, was aimed squarely at Bourne.
ĄLevántese! he ordered. Stand up and show me your hands.
All right, Bourne said. One moment. Using one hand on top of the barrier to brace himself, he struggled to his feet. Placing Scar-faces knife carefully on top of the barrier, he raised his hands, palms outward.
What are you doing here? The guard was livid with rage. Son of a bitch, look what you made me do. Have you any idea what that bull cost?
Bourne pointed to the ripped-apart body of Scarface. Im nothing. It was this