The Bourne Identity Chapter 9 Summary

How It All Goes Down

  • Bourne finds Marie being raped. He drives off her assailant but is badly wounded. A watchman also pops up for the sole purpose of being killed.
  • Marie crawls over to the wounded Bourne, who tries to convince her to escape and leave him.
  • Marie is extremely grateful that Bourne came to save her…though he was the one who kidnapped her and put her in danger in the first place. But hey, anyway, she doesn't want to leave him to die.
  • Bourne tells Marie he came back to kill the man who had seen his face, but she doesn't believe him. She helps him into the car and drives away with him.
  • Bourne wakes up in a hotel room.Marie has brought him there and paid a doctor to look at him.
  • Marie explains that she works with statistics and that she methodically came to the decision that he's a good person. She also methodically came to the conclusion that she should help him. Far be it from us to question a renowned statistician, but we're not so sure that any of this has a whole lot to do with statistics.
  • Marie is kind of tricky herself: she got a friend at the hotel to bring her clothes and make-up by pretending she was trying to avoid a guy. Bourne's not the only good liar.
  • Bourne tries to convince Marie to leave him and go back to Canada. She won't, though, so he figures he'd better tell her about his amnesia.
  • After the story, Marie says she always thought he wasn't a killer, even when he was hitting her. She saw "reluctance" in his eyes (9.151).
  • This doesn't seem altogether convincing... and Bourne isn't convinced. He tells Marie that it sure looks like he was a contract killer back in the day when his brain worked, and he tells her she should go.
  • Bourne gives Marie the money—but she refuses and says she's going to stay and help him. Shmoop sort of agrees that she should get out of there, so we're not sure it's exactly an "awww" moment... but there it is.