CHAPTER SEVEN

Bond Takes some Meetings (Part 2)

St. Cyr was located in Coëtquidan, in the department of Morbihan, was a brutal five-hour drive or a relaxing three-hour train ride. Bond opted for the train.

Properly named École spéciale militaire de Saint-Cyr, St. Cyr was the foremost French military academy. Founded in 1802, its original buildings were once a boarding school for girls founded by king Louis XIV at the request of his second wife, Madame de Maintenon. Its campus now sprawled across a huge swath of the rural countryside, hemmed in on all sides by the thick wood of the Paimpont forests. It offered rigorous military training for both French citizens and their counterparts from the ragged remnants of the French Empire.

Dr. Glauser's office overlooked the Cour Napoléon, a tiny space with a narrow slit of a window. "Wonderful view," he said to Bond as he gestured him into the office's one hardwood chair ⸺ it was too small already for his military-surplus metal desk, his own rolling chair, the two bookcases, and the small aspidistra struggling to survive on the window sill.

"I'm sure," said Bond. The hardwood chair lacked a little thing he liked to call 'comfort.'

"I sometimes watch the cadets on drill," he said. "So very handsome, moving in unison. You feel such pride. Quite lovely."

"Dr. Glauser ⸺"

Dr. Glausner turned to him suddenly. He wore a lighly checked jacket with an asoct tucked into his white shirt, with a diamond stick-pin in it. Pomade, liberally applied, kept his hair from escaping. "You should come here on a festival day," he interrupted. "It's a most impressive sight."

"I'm sure it is," said Bond. "Now, about ⸺"

"Tea?" he said. "Or coffee?" Before Bond could answer, Dr. Glauser depressed a button on his office intercom. "Madame Couvier, we'd like a nice cup of creamy coffee, please. Will you please tell Marie-Thérèse? I have a visitor."

"That's not necessary," Bond insisted.

He dismissed Bond's objection with a wave of his hand. "Nothing to it, dear boy."

Bond reigned in his annoyance as Dr. Glauser sorted through files on his desk. One was a manila dossier with 'Kronsteen' written across the top of it in thick black pen.

Bond checked his watch, more to express his annoyance than because of a need to be someplace. "Section 42's people tell me that Kronsteen should come into Berlin in two weeks' time."

"Oh, we know all about that," he said airily.

"Oh?"

"Yes. Your people told me. MI-6 is all secrecy and bad manners, but at the end of the day they just talk, don't they."

"Do they?" Bond asked, trying to keep his voice from sounding poisonous.

"Now you're being naughty," said Dr. Glauser. "It will be to the advantage of both of us in the long run if we get along." He offered what he thought was a winning smile.

"You asked me for a meeting," said Bond. "Well, here I am."

There was a tap at the door, which opened a moment later unbidden. An aged crone in a faded-floral print apron limped painfully into the room struggling with a large tray bearing cups, saucers, and a full coffee service.

"Put it down there, Madame Couvier," he said, indicating his desk. There was no place else to put it. "Lovely," he cooed. "And chocolate digestives, too. My goodness." Dr. Glauser moved a mound of files to make room for the coffee tray.

As she tried to heave the tray onto the landing pad he'd cleared for her, Dr. Glauser said, "I say, Mr. Bond, do you have a cigarette?" He produced a silver cigarette holder.

Bond fished out his black gunmetal cigarette case and opened it for him.

Dr. Glauser selected one, unmindful of Madame Couvier. "These look nice."

"Morland & Co.," Bond answered. The English gentleman in him wanted to come to Madame Couvier's rescue, but the secret agent in him wanted to see where Dr. Glauser was going with his annoyance act.

The aged crone turned to him with a big smile and both hands locked together over-and-under.

"How's your back today, Madame Couvier?" Dr. Glauser asked.

"I think it will rain," she prognosticated.

"More accurate than the weather people on the television," the doctor told Bond.

"Really," Bond said.

Madame Couvier picked up the carafe of coffee and said to Dr. Glauser, "You owe me for two weeks' service, sir."

Dr. Glauser looked at her in surprise. "That much? Are you sure?"

"Yes." The single syllable was chopped and short.

Dr. Glauser glanced at Bond with discomfort, then produced a small leather purse. "Two weeks?"

"Yes, sir."

He shook coins into his hand, sorted through them like he didn't want the light to get at them, then gave Madame Couvier a small dripping of silver. "Keep the change."

"You still owe me twenty centimes."

"Really?"

"The biscuits."

Dr. Glauser grudgingly gave her the additional money, and she left, but Dr. Glauser was gazing at the door for a while, looking stunned.

"Dr. Glauser," Bond said, "is there any chance we can get on with it?"

"Hmm? Yes."

As he poured out the coffee from the carafe into a pair of fine china cups, he said, "It's a political matter I wished to discuss with you. Biscuit?"

"No," Bond said shortly, then, "No, thank you."

"Go on," he said. "They're chocolate, and I've already paid for them." He laughed at his pallid joke. His eyes shone as he rearranged papers on his desk. "Major Pushkin."

"Uh-huh."

"That's what I want to talk to you about."

"Uh-huh."

"We have a question for him." He gestured to the cup. "Is that coffee too strong?"

"It's fine," Bond said, "what's your question?"

Dr. Glauser sipped a little coffee, then settled the cup into the saucer with a refined delicacy. "We are interested in Pushkin's side of this deal. He's an interesting case, you know. A real Old Guard Bolshie. Did you know he was with Antonov-Ovseyenko in the storming of the Winter Palace in '17?"

"I didn't know that."

"You understand what that means in Russia."

"He's tantamount to Superman."

"A minor sort of god, really. The most rigid of the rigid," Dr. Glauser agreed. "His interest in assisting with the Kronsteen defection is..." His voice trailed off, and his face screwed up as he pondered the correct word. "Unique," was what he came up with.

"I don't understand your intent," said Bond.

Dr. Glauser said, as he screwed Bond's cigarette into his silver cigarette holder, "We know that old-school Chekists like Pushkin are happy with the idea of the Party having complete control of the land. In five years' time, the Red Army expects to regain an elite position because of it."

He accepted Bond's offer of fire, and puffed the cigarette to life. "I say, that is nice."

Bond nodded acknowledgement. "A Balkan and Turkish blend."

"I could get used to this."

"Don't," said Bond, "they're pricey enough without me supporting your bad habit."

Dr. Glauser laughed. "Anyway, there is this constant shifting in their influence. When the Army people are feeling confident, we can expect the cold war to warm up. When the Party is in the saddle, we get a lessening of tension."

Bond said, "War is a continuation of politics."

Dr. Glauser's eyes twinkled "Von Clausewitz. Yes."

"So you don't believe that Pushkin intends to defect, do you?"

"Of course not."

"Good," said Bond, "now that's out of the way. Pushkin claims he's trying to make some money on the side with this defection."

"We don't believe that the Russians would give up Kronsteen," said Dr. Glauser. "He was a psychologist, you know."

"I didn't know."

"Yes, and a rather good one. Lucrative practise in Budapest, as I understand it." He took a drag off the cigarette holder as he gathered his thoughts. "Some of this is top secret and I shouldn't share it."

Bond said nothing.

"Hitler was quite the fan of psychological warfare. He openly and enthusiastically engaged psychologists in his war effort, whereas the British were less inclined to admit that they, too, were using such techniques. They preferred calling it 'political warfare.' We have it on good authority that Kronsteen was one of the architects of 'Case Green,' a plan to aggressively attack Czechoslovakia that relied heavily on psychological warfare, both within Czechoslovakia and against Czechoslovakia's allies. Internally, the Czechoslovak government and citizenship were inundated with media messaging, particularly radio, designed to break up whatever cohesiveness existed among the Czech and ethnic German minorities."

"The German minorities were largely pro-Nazi."

"Didn't matter. It was designed to internally weaken and disrupt the country. As a nation, they were supposed to be intimidated and their will broken. Internationally, psychological warfare co-ordinated with propaganda aimed at isolating the country so that it would stand alone against any aggression, with its defences having no hope." He puffed and removed the silver cigarette holder. "Kronsteen was one of the architects behind this."

"I see," said Bond.

"Do you?" asked Dr. Glauser. "Because the Russians are doing this right now. The Americans were collecting Nazis through their Paperclip operation, but so were the Russians. Chemical warfare people, camp operators ⸺ Stalin and his penchance for gulags, mind you ⸺ weapons designers, tanks, aircraft, uniforms. But also the battlefield up here." He touched his forehead. "Hearts and minds, my dear boy, the only battlefield that matters."

"Meaning there is no chance that the Russians would give up Kronsteen."

"Not one," said Glauser with triumph. "Which begs the bigger question."

"Yes," mused Bond, "what does Pushkin get out of helping Kronsteen defect?"