into widespread violence throughout the underworlds of Hong Kong and Macao. Organized crime becomes suddenly very disorganized, not unlike the tong wars of the twenties and thirties. The killings pile up. Rival gangs instigate riots; waterfronts become battlegrounds; warehouses, even cargo ships are blown up for revenge, or to wipe out competitors. Sometimes all it takes is several powerful warring factions - and a Jason Bourne in the background. '
'But since there is no Jason Bourne, it's police work! Not MI6. '
'Mr McAllister just said the man was called in by the Hong Kong police,' broke in Marie looking hard at the undersecretary of state. 'MI6 obviously agreed with the decision. Why was that?
'It's the wrong ballpark!' David was adamant, his breath short.
'Jason Bourne wasn't the creation of the police authorities,' said Marie, going to her husband's side. 'He was created by US Intelligence by way of the State Department. But I suspect MI6 inserted itself for a far more pressing reason than to find a killer posing as Jason Bourne. Am I right, Mr McAllister?
'You're right, Mrs Webb. Far more. In our discussions these last two days, several members of our section thought you'd understand more clearly than we did. Let's call it an economic problem that could lead to serious political
turmoil, not only in Hong Kong but throughout the world. You were a highly regarded economist for the Canadian Government. You advised Canadian ambassadors and delegations all over the world. '
'Would you both mind explaining to the man who balances the chequebook around here?
'These aren't the times to permit disruptions in Hong Kong's marketplace, Mr Webb, even - perhaps especially its illegal marketplace. Disruptions accompanied by violence give the impression of government instability, if not far deeper instability. This isn't the time to give the expansionists in Red China any more ammunition than they have already. '
'Come again, please?"
'The treaty of 1997,' answered Marie quietly. 'The lease runs out in barely a decade, which is why the new accords were negotiated with Peking. Still, everybody's nervous, everything's shaky and no one had better rock the boat. Calm stability is the name of the game. '
David looked at her, then back at McAllister. He nodded his head. 'I see. I've read the papers and the magazines... but it's just not a subject that I know a hell of a lot about. '
'My husband's interests lie elsewhere,' explained Marie to McAllister. 'In the study of people, their civilizations. '
'All right,' Webb agreed. 'So?'
' Mine are with money and the constant exchange of money - the expansion of it, the markets and their fluctuations - the stability, or lack of it. And if Hong Kong is nothing else, it's money. That's more or less its only commodity; it has little other reason for being. Its industries would die without it; without priming, the pump runs dry. '
'And if you take away the stability you have chaos,' added McAllister. 'It's the excuse for the old warlords in China. The People's Republic marches in to contain the chaos, suppress the agitators, and suddenly there's nothing left but an awkward giant fumbling with the entire colony as well as the New Territories. The cooler heads in Beijing are ignored in favour of more aggressive elements who want to save face through military control. Banks collapse, Far East trade is stymied. Chaos. '
'The PRC would do that?'
'Hong Kong, Kowloon, Macao and all the territories are part of their so-called "great nation under heaven", even the China Accords make that clear. It's one entity, and the Oriental won't tolerate a disobedient child, you know that. '
'Are you telling me that one man pretending to be Jason Bourne can do this - can bring about this kind of crisis? I don't believe you!'
'It's an extreme scenario, but yes, it could happen. You see, the myth rides with him, that's the hypnotic factor. Multiple killings are ascribed to him, if Only to distance the real killers from the scenes - conspirators from the politically fanatic right and left using Bourne's lethal image as their own. When you think about it, it's precisely the way the myth itself was created. Whenever anyone of importance anywhere in the South China area was assassinated, you, as Jason Bourne, made sure the kill was credited to you. At the end of two years you were notorious, yet in fact you killed only one man, a drunken informer in Macao who tried to garrotte you. '