can I help you?"
"You're Leonard Fine? I saw your name on the window outside."
"That's me," Fine said.
"Alex sent me"
The tailor blinked. "Who?"
"Alex Conklin," Bourne repeated. "My name is Jason Bourne." He looked around. No one was paying them the slightest attention. The sound of the sewing machines made the air sparkle and hum.
Very deliberately, Fine pulled his glasses down onto the narrow bridge of his nose. He peered at Bourne with a decided intensity.
"I'm a friend of his," Bourne said, feeling the need to prompt the fellow. "There are no articles of clothing here for a Mr. Conklin."
"I don't think he left any," Bourne said.
Fine pinched his nose, as if he were in pain. "A friend, you say?" "For many years."
Without another word, Fine reached over, opened a door in the counter for Bourne to step through. "Perhaps we should discuss this in my office." He led Bourne through a door, down a dusty corridor reeking of sizing and spray starch.
The office wasn't much, a small cubicle with scuffed and pitted linoleum on the floor, bare pipes running from floor to ceiling, a battered green metal desk with a swivel chair, two stacks of cheap metal filing cabinets, piles of cardboard boxes. The smell of mold and mildew rose like steam from the contents of the office. Behind the chair was a small square window, so grimed it was impossible to see the alley beyond.
Fine went behind the desk, pulled out a drawer. "Drink?"
"It's a little early," Bourne said, "don't you think?"
"Yeah," Fine muttered. "Now that you mention it." He removed a gun from a drawer and aimed it at Bourne's stomach. "The bullet won't kill you right away, but while you're bleeding to death, you'll wish it had."
"There's no reason to get excited," Bourne said easily.
"But there's every reason." the tailor said. His eyes were set close together, making him appear somewhat cross-eyed. "Conklin's dead and I heard you did it."
"I didn't," Bourne said.
"That's what you all say. Deny, deny, deny. It's the government's way, isn't it?" A crafty smile crossed the other's face. "Sit down, Mr. Webb - or Bourne - whatever you're calling yourself today."
Bourne looked up. "You're Agency."
"Not at all. I'm an independent operator. Unless Alex told them, I doubt if anyone inside the Agency knows I even exist:' The tailor's smile grew wider. "That's why Alex came to me in the first place."
Bourne nodded. "I'd like to know about that."
"Oh, I have no doubt." Fine reached for the phone on his desk. "On the other hand, when your own people get hold of you, you'll be too busy answering their questions to care about anything else."
"Don't do that," Bourne said sharply.
Fine halted with the receiver in midair. "Give me a reason."
"I didn't kill Alex. I'm trying to find out who did"
"But you did kill him. According to the bulletin I read, you were at his house at the time he was shot to death. Did you see anyone else there?" "No, but Alex and Mo Panov were dead when I arrived."
"Bullshit. Why did you kill him, I wonder." Fine's eyes narrowed. "I imagine it was because of Dr. Schiffer."
"I never heard of Dr. Schiffer:'
The tailor emitted a harsh laugh. "More bullshit. And I suppose you never heard of DARPA:'
"Of course I have," Bourne said. "It stands for Defense Advanced Re-search Projects Agency.
Is that where Dr. Schiffer works?"
With a sound of disgust, Fine said, "I've had enough of this." When he momentarily took his eyes off Bourne to dial a number, Bourne lunged at him.
The DCI was in his capacious corner office, on the phone with Jamie Hull. Brilliant sunlight spilled in the window, firing the jewel tones of the carpet. Not that the magnificent play of colors had any effect on the DCI. He was still in one of his black moods. Bleakly, he looked at the photos of himself with presidents in the Oval Office, foreign leaders in Paris, Bonn and Dakar, entertainers in L.A. and Vegas, evangelical preachers in Atlanta and Salt Lake City, even, absurdly, the Dalai Lama in his perpetual smile and saffron robes, on a visit to New York City. These pictures not only failed to rouse him from his gloom but made him feel the years of his life, as if they were layers of chain-mail weighing him down.
"It's a fucking nightmare, sir," Hull was saying from far-off Reykjavik. "First off, setting up security in conjunction with the Russians and Arabs is like chasing your tail. I mean, half