night, a heart that was close to death, or in whose chambers death had inveigled itself like a thief.
Marks felt his life was about to be stolen from him prematurely, as it had been from his sister. How close he felt to her at this moment, as if at the last instant he had snatched her from the doomed plane, holding her close while they soared through the clouds. This abrupt awareness of the tenuousness of his own life did not frighten him so much as change his perspective. He lay, helpless and bleeding, and watched an ant struggle with a freshly fallen leaf, a new leaf, a luminous green, until moments ago bursting with life. The leaf was clearly too big for the ant, but the insect was undeterred, tugging and pulling, dragging the recalcitrant leaf over pebbles and roots, the huge impediments of its world. Marks loved that ant. It refused to give up no matter how difficult its life had become. It persevered. It abided. This, too, Marks resolved to do. He resolved to look out for himself and for the people he cared about - Soraya, for instance - in a way that he could not have imagined, let alone foreseen, before he had been shot.
And so he lay for some time, hearing nothing but the occasional soughing of the wind through the woods. Which was why, when he heard Chrissie's voice calling, he said, "This is Peter Marks. I've been hit in the leg. Moreno's dead, and Adam went after the sniper."
"I'm coming out to get you."
"Stay where you are," he shouted back. Dragging himself forward, he struggled to sit with his back against the Opel. "The area isn't secure."
But a moment later she appeared at his side, crouched down behind the safety of the car's bullet-ridden flank.
"Stupid move," he said.
"You're welcome."
It was the second time someone had said that to him today and he didn't like it. In fact, he didn't like much of anything in his life at the moment, and he became momentarily disoriented, wondering how in the world he had allowed himself to get into this sorry state. He loved no one and so far as he knew no one loved him, not currently, anyway. He supposed his parents had loved him in their gruff overriding way, and surely his sister had. But who else? His latest girlfriend had lasted six months, just about par for the course, before she got fed up with his long hours and inattention, and walked out. Friends? A few. But like Soraya, he used them or they used him. He felt suddenly sick to his stomach and shuddered.
"You're going into shock," Chrissie said, understanding him better than he could imagine. "We'd better get you into the house and warmed up."
She helped him to stand, balanced on his good leg. He put his arm around her, and she helped him toward the house. He moved shakily and, stumbling over a rock or a root, almost sent them both tumbling over.
Christ on a crutch, he thought wildly, I'm full of self-pity today, and was even more thoroughly disgusted with himself than he had been a moment ago.
Her father, who had emerged from the house, rushed to Marks's other side and helped her with her burden. The old man kicked the door shut when they were inside.
Bourne came upon the woman almost without warning. She was half buried in crisp, dead leaves. Her face was turned away from him, eyes closed. Her long hair was streaked with blood, but from the way she lay, it was impossible to tell whether she was dead or alive. A neighbor out walking, it had been her bad luck to stumble upon Kazmi. Beneath the fall of leaves, he could make out bits and pieces of her red-and-black-checked flannel shirt, jeans, and hiking boots. Leaves appeared to have been kicked over her with considerable haste.
He needed to return to Peter Marks and to the people in the house, but he couldn't bypass the woman until he found out whether she was alive and, if so, how badly she was injured. Creeping closer, he put a hand out to find the pulse in her carotid artery.
Her eyes snapped open, her hand rose up, clutching a hunting knife by its handle. The point stabbed out toward his chest and, as he moved, sliced through his shirt and across the skin covering his breastbone. She sat up, coming after him. Leaves fell away from her