‘Serious?’
‘Not sure, sir. It’s a report from Dragontooth. It looks as though the Cat, or one of her lieutenants, is there and very much on the prowl. The query is should we pull her, or wait for her to move?’
‘No idea how big her team is?’
‘Impossible to tell, sir. Maybe three. Possibly more. Certainly one was wounded in the not over-zealous attempt we know about.’
M sat, silent, for a full minute. ‘We need hard intelligence, Chief of Staff. Hard as nails. But, if it serves the purpose, tell Dragontooth to be utterly ruthless. Our contacts with the Italians are still holding up?’
‘No problem there, sir.’
‘Right. Ruthless if necessary. And there’s another order . . .’ He spoke to Tanner for ten minutes, giving him detailed instructions. Then, with a sharp, ‘Keep me informed,’ M closed the line, wondering why, of all the agents under his command, he worried most about 007. Was he the son the old man had always wanted? Difficult. Something not to be dwelt upon.
Behind the rise and fall of Wassail! Wassail! he heard his daughter’s car crunch on the gravel outside. Banishing all thoughts of what was probably going on far away in Ischia, M fashioned a smile of greeting and went to the door.
They trimmed the little tree with the cheap and gaudy things bought in the Forio market, prepared everything for tomorrow’s dinner and settled down for a light snack of a soup that Beatrice had put together quickly, and allowed to simmer while they were dealing with the tree. There was also bread and a choice of a dozen cheeses, washed down with a bottle of good local wine. Afterwards, Bond stretched out in an easy chair, with Beatrice resting her back against his legs, while his arm caressed her shoulder, occasionally dropping to finger one of her breasts.
He had purposely not asked her anything about her contact with London. Now he thought the time was right. ‘What was their reaction?’
‘Whose?’
‘London’s reaction to the Pennington girl being around.’
She twisted her body so that she could look up at him. ‘Better you shouldn’t know. It’ll all be taken care of, James. It’s under control.’
He nodded, trying to explain that all this was new to him. ‘Normally it’s me doing the protection and giving the orders.’
‘Well,’ her voice took on the husky tone he had come to know and appreciate from the previous night, and what had passed between them during the morning. ‘Well, James, there are some orders you can give me.’
‘I hadn’t noticed it. You’re a pretty dominant young woman. Even . . .’
‘Even in bed? I know, but I can change all that. You want to try?’
‘Soon.’ He sounded very relaxed. ‘You know, Beatrice, I think – barring anything going wrong – this is going to be one of the happiest Christmases ever.’
She took his hand from her shoulder and drew it down to her mouth, kissing it, nibbling at the vortex between thumb and forefinger, then gently sucking each finger in turn. At last she asked, ‘Until now, what’s the best Christmas you can remember?’
Bond grunted and stretched. ‘I think the last Christmas I spent with my parents.’ His voice also changed, the sentences delivered haltingly, as though he found it difficult to discuss. ‘I’m a mongrel as well, Bea. Scottish father and Swiss mother. Christmas in a little chalet on Lago Lugano.’ He gave a laugh, ‘Odd that it was the best, because I was ill – just recovering anyway. Chickenpox, measles, that sort of thing.’
‘Why was it the best?’
He gave an almost schoolboyish smile. ‘I got everything I asked for. They indulged me. There was an air-pistol, as I recall it.’
‘What else?’
‘I had to stay in bed, but my father opened the window and put some tin cans on the ledge. Let me pot away at them for half an hour or so. In the evening they both stayed in my room and ate Christmas dinner from trays. It was different. A final taste of love. I’ll never forget it.’
‘Final? Why final?’
‘My parents were killed, climbing, a few weeks later.’
‘Oh, James.’ She seemed shocked, as though regretting she had asked.
‘A long time ago Beatrice. Your turn. Your best Christmas ever?’
She twisted around and pulled him down from the chair, close to her, on the floor. ‘This Christmas. I never had great Christmases, James, and I’ve never had things happen to me so quickly before. It’s . . . it’s all strange. I don’t entirely believe it.’ She took his hand and placed it intimately against her.
Bond fumbled in his pocket and brought out the gift-wrapped package. ‘Merry Christmas, Beatrice.’
She opened it like a child, tearing the paper from it as though she could not wait to see what lay beyond. When she lifted the lid of the box she gave a little cry. ‘Oh. Oh. Oh, my God, James.’
‘Like it?’
She looked up at him and he could see the tears staining her cheeks.
Later, in the darkness of the bedroom, and at a crucial moment, she whispered, ‘Merry Christmas, James darling.’
Without thinking, Bond whispered, ‘God bless us, every one.’
Franco, Umberto and the dogs must have done their work well. Nothing came suddenly to interrupt a blissful night, and when the lovers dropped into sleep they did so with quiet untroubled dreams.
Waking at ten-thirty, Beatrice proved to be highly domesticated and moved around the kitchen with speed, preparing their meal. Even the Browning 9mm, tucked into her waistband, did not seem out of place.
They ate chicken, not the traditional turkey. But it was a huge bird, cooked in some mystic manner which she said had been a secret of her mother’s. The trimmings were in keeping, however, and after the chicken there was a real Christmas pudding, round like those you see in Victorian drawings and very rich, with an outrageously alcoholic brandy sauce. Then came mince pies and nuts.
‘What about the crackers?’ Bond asked with a laugh.
‘Sorry, my darling. Couldn’t lay my hands on a single Christmas cracker, nor any kind of favour.’
‘I think I’ll sleep for a week.’ Bond stretched his arms and yawned.
‘Well, that’s not what you’re going to do.’ She rose. ‘I’m going to let you drive me to the other side of the island, and we’re going to walk off the food and let the sea air clear our heads. Come on.’ She moved quickly to the front windows, grabbing the keys and sliding them open. ‘Race you to the car.’
Bond picked up his Browning, cocked it and settled it in the shoulder-holster, then checked that he had the car keys, and followed her. She had just unlocked the inner gate as he got to the top of the stone steps leading down to it. ‘Stop. Wait for me!’ he called, laughing.
She giggled as he ran after her, heading for the car. Then Bond stopped, eyes widening with horror. The main front gates were drawn apart and he shouted ‘No!’ and again, ‘No. Beatrice!’ as he saw her tug at the car door, hardly believing what his eyes and brain told him. ‘Beatrice, no! No! Don’t open . . .’
But the car door moved and opened. As it did so, she looked up at him, laughing, happy. Then the ball of flame erupted from inside the Fiat. The wind from the explosion hit him a second later, knocking him backwards, making his ears sing, scorching his eyes as the flame leaped from the shattered car.
He reached for the pistol and had it up as someone seized him from behind.
Then life changed. There were cars and people. Men in uniform, others in plain clothes. Some dashed around to the rear of the villa, and through his singing ears, Bond thought he heard barking, then shots, from the garden.
Somehow he was back in the villa, sitting with the remnants of their Christmas meal still on the table, and a familiar figure was striding through the sliding doors.
‘Dragontooth, Captain Bond,’ Clover Pennington said. ‘I’m sorry, but it was the only way, and it almost didn’t work. Can you hear me, sir? Dragontooth.’
Bond looked up at her with loathing and spat out, ‘Dragontoo
th, and all the other Demons of the Pit to you!’ He even seemed to be cringing back against the chair, as though to get away from her.
9
NORTHANGER
Even though he had seen the ambulance people, firemen, and the police around the twisted and blackened shell that had once been the Fiat, James Bond could not take all of it in. Vaguely, in the far corner of his mind, he realised that he must be in shock, but every time he turned to Clover Pennington he expected to see the trim and bubbly Beatrice Maria da Ricci. He could not believe she was dead, even though Clover was spelling it out to him: slowly, as one explains to a child, and loudly as his ears still rang from the explosion.
‘She was either “Cat” or one of “Cat’s” close accomplices,’ Clover told him, time and time again. It was like being beaten over the head. Occasionally a plain-clothes man came to her, muttered in her ear and received a reply. ‘M had the staff here checked out. One of our people spotted there had been some kind of a switch when they saw the man called Franco in the gardens. We went on full alert then. Nobody was sure of the situation. That is until I spotted you with her yesterday.’
Another couple of men came in through the french windows and spoke to her. Clover’s eyes flicked towards Bond, then away. When the men left she said that, unhappily, the two men Beatrice had at the house had been killed in the firefight. ‘My orders were to be absolutely ruthless, though we had to try and get at least one of the team alive. Unhappily we didn’t manage it, and I’m uncertain whether the Ricci girl was the “Cat” or not . . . And . . .’ she paused, embarrassed. ‘And I don’t know if we’ll ever get confirmation. She must have taken the full blast. There’s nothing, or very little, left. Sorry,’ she added, as though apologising.
Bond sat, staring into space as though he was taking nothing in. ‘She gave me the right daily codes,’ he said, his voice like that of a robot.
‘They had the telephone in here wired. Picked it all up at the big villa.’ Clover, in her pleated grey skirt, sweater and sensible shoes, felt she was still not really getting to him. ‘Captain Bond? James? Sir?’ she tried. But he still sat, staring into space.
Someone switched on the radio in the kitchen. ‘Have yourself a merry little Christmas,’ the late Bing Crosby sang in English, and she saw Bond’s head lift, cocked to one side.
‘Put that off, you clown!’ Clover shouted, then turned back to Bond. ‘They’ve found the regular staff, and the watchers our people put in. At least they’re alive: gagged and bound in the wine cellars. We’ll know more when our fellows provide their reports and descriptions. Now, I have to get you out of here, sir. Do you understand? We really do have to debrief you as well.’
Finally, Bond nodded, slowly, as though common sense had started to prevail. In his head, whenever someone made a noise, dropped something, or talked too loudly, he heard the deafening double-crump again, and clearly saw Beatrice smiling at him, pulling open the car door, then being engulfed by the explosion. The ringing in his ears had turned into a permanent whine. He looked up at Clover Pennington. ‘I want to speak, personally, to M,’ he said, coldly.
‘Not yet, James – er sir. Not yet. We do have to move you on. And we have to be very careful. M’s instructions are that you remain in deep cover. That’s essential. We have to drop you out of sight again so that you can re-emerge when you join Invincible, in just over a week.’
Bond made a gesture that signified he understood. Though this was not borne out by his next question – ‘If she was BAST, what happened? Did they kill her by mistake?’
‘Later, sir. Please. I really think it would be dangerous for you to stay on here. We have a helicopter coming in to pick you up. They’ll take you to a secure base on the mainland. There’s a debriefing team standing by, and they have good doctors, in case you need medical . . .’
‘I’m not in need of doctors, First Officer Pennington.’
‘With respect, sir, you need them to give you the once-over.’ There was the clattering sound of a helicopter, getting louder as it swept in from the sea to circle above the villa.
‘I take the pistol, sir?’ from one of the thick-set men in civilian clothes.
‘Not on your life.’ Bond was now becoming really angry. ‘I’m not a child, nor am I about to do anything stupid.’ He glared around him. ‘What’re we waiting for, then? Let’s go.’
Outside, hovering directly over the villa, an old Agusta chopper, carrying Italian naval markings, began to descend.
One of Clover Pennington’s men gave hand-signals and they lowered a crewman with a harness, and winched Bond into the chopper. The last thing he looked at, as the helicopter turned away, heading for the coast, was the black, charred and twisted remains of the Fiat, and local police blockades at each end of the road.
An hour later he was inside a small military base, near Caserta. Bond’s local geographic knowledge was enough to follow the route. From the air, the base looked anything but military, with half a dozen oblong buildings, and a triple security perimeter: a sandwich of heavy-duty razor wire between two high chain-link fences. The guards at the main gates were armed but did not seem to be uniformed.
He was given a large, airy room, functional, with minimal comfort, a small bathroom and no TV or distracting pictures on the wall. Somehow they had managed to pack his case at the villa and it now stood neatly just inside the door. Bond stretched out on the bed, placing the Browning within reach. At least they had not disarmed him. There were a dozen or so paperbacks in a pile on the night table, a couple of thrillers, one Deighton, a Greene, two thick Forsyths and a little assorted bunch which included Joyce’s Ulysses and a copy of War & Peace. He knew from his own strung-out state that he needed something to keep his mind working, but this was a bizarre little collection, and he felt very tired, too fatigued to read, but not enough flaked out to sleep. Anyway, he had read the lot, apart from an odd little thriller masterpiece by some unknown author boasting the title Moonlight and Bruises.
He played back the memory which blazed in his head. The Fiat, the steps, the wrought iron gates, Beatrice smiling and opening the car door, then being blotted out by the ball of fire. No, was it his memory playing tricks? It was not really like that. She waved and smiled. What next? The violence of the explosion throwing him back? No, something else. She was smiling and pulling the car door open. Smoke. There was a lot of smoke with the fireball, wind and crack-thump of the explosion. What kind of explosive could they have used that made so much smoke? It did not happen with Semtex or RDX. This was something he would have to report. It could be that some terrorist organisations were using a new type of explosive: or was it an old mixture which, with age, produced more smoke than usual? Anyway, it had wiped out an unusually cold-blooded terrorist princess.
How many terrorist princesses does it take to wire up a time-bomb? Three: one to get the wire, one to get the gold Rolex and one to call the expert. There was a tap on the door and he called ‘Come,’ with one hand slipping off the Browning’s safety and turning the pistol towards the door.
The man was tall, dressed casually in slacks and a sweater. He had the dark leathery looks of the Middle East, but his voice was pure Oxford English.
‘Captain Bond?’ he queried, though Bond got the distinct impression that he was merely adhering to some kind of ritual.
He nodded.
‘Name’s Farsee.’ He was in his forties, carried himself in an alert military manner, adjusting everything to make it seem as though he was pure civilian to the marrow. His laugh, when it came, lacked real humour. ‘Julian Farsee, though my friends call me Tomato. Play on words, kind of thing, y’see. Tomato Farsee. Tomates Farcies – the old French stuffed tomatoes. See?’
‘What’s bloody going on?’ Bond asked, his voice brittle and with undertones of violence.
‘The quacks want to give you a bit of a going over. I just dropped in to see if you were feeling okay, and ready for that kind of thing, right?’
‘And who exactly are y
ou, Julian? Where are we; what are you; and what’s going on?’
‘Well, I’m the Two I/C actually. Right?’ (Two I/C was military for Second-in-Command, Just like Jimmie The One, in the Royal Navy, stood for First Lieutenant, who could hold the rank of Commander or even Captain, depending on the Captain’s rank, which could even be Rear-Admiral. Some people found it confusing.)
‘You’re Second-in-Command of what, exactly?’
‘This.’ Farsee waved a hand in the direction of the window.
It was like prising a grape-pip from a peach. ‘And what is this?’
‘Nobody told you?’
‘If they had, I wouldn’t be asking you, Julian.’
‘Oh, ya; right. We’re slightly irregular actually.’
‘How irregular?’
‘Comes under NATO installations, right? Highly classified, you might say. Very highly classified. We’re not even in the book, as they say, right?’
‘More!’ Bond almost shouted. He could stand Yuppies up to a point, but not Yuppie military.
‘CO’s American, right?’
‘CO of what?’
‘We sort of handle things. Hide folk away when we don’t want the world to see them – or I should say when some of the intelligence people don’t want the world to see them.’
‘Such as myself?’
‘Ya. Oh, ya. Right, Captain Bond. Look, you ready for the medical wallahs, eh?’
Bond gave a long sigh, then nodded. ‘Lead me to them.’
The doctors spent over three hours going over him. There was a general examination, and a few tests. The ENT specialist said he was lucky. ‘Eardrums’re intact. Miracle from what I hear.’ This particular specialist was very much in the military mould.
Bond only became angry when they took him to a room in the hospital block that smelled strongly of psychiatrist. You could tell, first, by the pictures on the wall: light-grey skies and calm landscapes. Then there was the abundance of plant life. You could have been in Kew Gardens, and the young, very laid-back young man leaning in his adjustable Draberl chair, had about him an air of calm, laced heavily with deep anxiety. But it was the Rorschach test that clinched it. In his day, Bond had seen experts play with psychiatrists when they brought out the ink blots. He also knew the crazy and clever answers that gave an analyst the Rorschach protocol.