SHAKEN, NOT STIRRED
This short story takes place between Ian Fleming's novels
ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE and YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE
Bill Tanner could not help but be concerned as he watched James Bond leave the club and head off towards his 1933 4½-litre Bentley, which would be, parked some discreet distance away. James Bond and Bill Tanner had joined the service around the same time, and it had seemed inevitable that, over the years, they would become friends, in the strict sense of the word, were never made in their world.
Bond was a little heavy from the drinks. Tanner had insisted on buying and Bond had not refused. He fumbled now at the buttons of his coat, feeling a slight and unseasonal chill in the London air, and thought of the evening ahead. He had one more visit to pay, a few telephone calls to make, but apart from that he would return alone to his flat in the plain- tree'd square off the King's Road.
He did not relish the prospect. It had been four months since his wife, Tracy had been murdered by Blofeld and every day since it seemed to James Bond that all life, as someone put it, was nothing but a heap of six to four against.
And just to confirm that, he had collected a parking ticket. He ripped it from the windscreen, walked around the car once as though he were a potential and only half-informed buyer, and bent down as if checking for a bald tyre or broken silencer. Then, satisfied, he unlocked the passenger door. The Bentley's interior looked fine. He slid across into the driving seat and slipped the key into the ignition, turning it quickly. The engine coughed once then roared into life. He sat back, letting it idle, staring into space.
That was that then. He was not about to be blown up today. He sat for a few minutes, reflecting upon the years spent inspecting his car, checking rooms and telephones and even the undersides of restaurant tables. People thought he had become clumsy since Tracy's death because he would always drop a knife or a fork before the meal began, bowing his head beneath the tablecloth to pick it up. All he was doing was obeying another of the unwritten rules: checking for bugs.
The department had started whispering the words 'paranoia' and 'nerves', going about their own business casually and without fear, as though there were invisible barriers between them and some preordained death. But then now Bond had become a cautious man. He had let his guard down twice in his long secret service career, and both times they had resulted in the deaths of two women he had really loved. Vesper Lynd and Tracy, his wife.
He slipped the Bentley into gear and pulled away from the kerb.
Bond stopped outside the Cordelia, a popular nouveu riche hotel off Hyde Park. The receptionist was an MI6 plant, Loelia Ponsonby his secretary a few years ago, who was replaced by Mary Goodnight when she wanted to do some fieldwork.
"Morning Lil," he said.
The careful warmth of her smile of welcome dropped about ten degrees.
"There in room 514," she said, "and don't call me Lil. You know I hate it."
Bond nodded and headed for the lifts. The lift was mirrored, and, riding it alone to the fifth floor, he tried no to catch a glimpse of himself.
It was he was ashamed of how he had let himself go in the last few months. The drinks with Bill he had hoped would cure his bad hangover, but all it had done was to increase his aching head and stiff joints. He coughed loudly. He was smoking too much as well and combined with drinking too much this double the hangover. A cloud of small luminous black spots swam across his vision like amoebae on pond water.
He knocked twice on the door of room 514, and 008, looking tired opened the door, his tie hanging undone around his neck.
"Hello, 007," he said, surprised. "What's up?"
Inside the room, 0011 was busy listening to something on a headset. The head was attached to tape recorder and a small receiver. He nodded in greeting towards Bond, seeming interested in the conversation on which he was eavesdropping.
"Nothing," said Bond. "I just wanted to check, that's all."
008 nodded while he poured some coffee from a thermos, gesturing with the cup towards 007, but Bond waved away the offer.
He flicked through the tiny notebook, which was filled with telephone numbers and initials, nothing more. He realised now that his reason for coming here was simply to defer his going home. There did not seem to be any good nights at home now, since Tracy had died.
"Do you have any aspirin, 008?"
"Afraid not. Been on the bottle, have we?"
"I've had couple, yes."
"Thought I could smell it." 008 sipped his tepid coffee.
"It's been quiet here," said 0011. "A few phone calls to his embassy, made in Russian, just asking about the situation back home and if they had any of this week's newspapers, and a call to Harrods, made in English, to ask what time they close. He went out for an hour and half. Bought the Telegraph, would you believe, and a dirty magazine. 008 know the name of it. I don't go in for them myself. He also purchased two packets of Senior Service and one bottle of three-star brandy. That's about it. Came back to his room."
"Who's he speaking to just now?"
008 went across to check the notepad, which lay on 0011's knees.
"To Jermyn Street. Arranging a fitting. These people." 008 shook his head in ironic disbelief.
Bond knew what he meant. The 00's seemed to spend half of their lives trailing men and women who did little more than buy expensive clothes and gifts for their families' back home.
"He's making another call," said 0011, the section's most recent recruit. 007 was watching him for any signs of weakness, of hesitation or misjudgment. 0011 was still on probation.
"Speaking Russian again," he said now, switching on the tape recorder. As he began to scribble furiously with his pen, 008 went to his shoulder to watch.
"He's arranging a meeting," 008 murmured. "This looks a little more promising."
James Bond, attuned to such things, doubted it, but it gave him a good excuse not to go home just yet.
"Mind if I come along on this one?" he asked. 008 shrugged his shoulders.
"Not at all," he said. "Your Russian is as good as mine. I'm sure. But isn't this supposed to be your night off?"
"I'd like to stick with this one," lied Bond.
"Fine," said 008. "I'll go downstairs and fetch the car."
Having put his car into the hotel's basement garage, Bond began to unwind in the firms gleaming D.B.III.
They drove slowly. 008 really was an excellent driver, unshowy, but never losing his prey.
"Turning into the Strand."
The Russian's real name was Bogdan Stashinsky and his codename was Bones. Bond wondered just who was responsible for these absurdities. Someone had to sit at a desk all day doing nothing else but invent codenames. Bones. Suspected of being an assassin for Smersh. Conceivably, however, he might be merely what his public image and his passport showed, a well-placed civil engineer, in London to advise his embassy on possible contacts for British companies in oil fields of the Urals. Some very high-tech refineries were about to be built in order to extract every last drop of commercial goodness from the crude natural product. And that was why no toes were to be stepped on, no possible evidence of interference left lying around. Discretion was paramount if the contracts were not to be endangered, and the burden belonged to Bond.
"Taxi signalling and stopping," said 008. "I'll drop you and park the car."
Bond slipped out of the car and followed Bones into the Doric, one of the capital's grandest hotels. As he pushed through the revolving door, he wished he had gone home to change. The Russian was gliding into the cocktail bar, smoothing down his tie as went.
"Would you have a light?"
The girl who barred his way was blonde, petite, and very pretty, with a trained voice and a trained smile. Everything about her looked trained, so that her movements told the prospective customer that she was a professional girl. Bond had no time to waste.
"I'm afraid not, Miss?"
"Storm. Mason Storm." she smiled.
"Sorry," he moved past her.
She was not about to waste time herself, time being money in her world. She smiled again, drifting off towards another tired-looking traveller.
The bar was busy with early evening drinkers, not those who leave their offices tired and thirsty, but those who feel it a duty to consume a few expensive drinks before an expensive meal. Bond pushed an earpiece into hi ear as he walked, the slender flex curving down his neck and into his top pocket. He found a chair with his back to Bones, who was seated alone at a table for two. Having ordered a vodka martini, shaken, not stirred, miming to the waiter that he was partially deaf, Bond took a notebook from his pocket and produced a silver pen from the same place. He looked like the perfect accountant, ready to jot down a few calculations of profit margins.
In poising the pen, an expensive-looking fountain model, Bond angled its top towards Bones, and through his earpiece came the chaotic sounds of the bar. He cursed silently the fact that there were so many people around. Bones, having coughed twice, ordered a fresh orange juice from the waiter - "as in freshly squeezed, you understand" - while Bond, appearing to mull over figures, listened.
008 would be calling for assistance, though it still seemed unlikely that anything important was about to take place. The really important meetings always occur either in obscure, well-guarded rooms, or else in parks and on heaths, preferably with a storm raging in the background. Nothing that the constantly ingenious Q could rig up in his dark chambers was of much help on a windswept hill.
The pen, however, was superb, a tiny transmitter inside the cap sending information to the receiver inside his pocket, and from there to the earpiece. It was not perfect. Bond was hard-pressed to hear what Bones was saying to the waiter who had brought him his drink. A couple nearby, thinking themselves involved in the most intimate dialogue, kept interrupting, the woman's voice of just sufficient flutedness to block out the Russian's soft inflections. Bond, listening to their conversation, hoped that they would turn words into deeds and slip upstairs to their room. But then Bones wasn't saying anything yet, so where was the harm in trying out the equipment on other couples in the vicinity? None, however, as a quick sweep revealed, were saying the sorts of things that the fluted woman was saying to her partner.
Bond's great fear was that Bones and his contact would speak together in Russian, for he knew that his Russian, despite 008's protestations, was a little rusty. The meeting had been arranged in Russian, but with English pleasantries at the end of the dialogue. 0011 had worked quickly and accurately on the transcription, and Bond would remember that. He tried to ignore the niggling feeling that he had been stupid to come here tonight, stupid to have insisted on playing a role in what was not his drama. He should have gritted his teeth and gone home.
The woman shrieked suddenly, laughing at her partner's lubricious joke, and looking up, Bond saw that 008 was standing in the doorway, looking around as though for a friend. Their eyes met for less than a second, and Bond knew that the back up had arrived. At that moment, a swarthy man brushed past 008 and walked across to Bones' table. Bond, nodding as the sweating waiter laid a drink before him, concentrated hard on the table behind him.
"It's good to see you again. How is the refinery project progressing?"
"There have been some difficulties."
As their conversation continued - in English, thank God - it became obvious to Bond that he was wasting his time. The two men discussed what introductions were to be made to what companies. They even spoke about bribes, which might be offered, to them by certain work-hungry corporations in return for a slice of this or that contract. It was all very businesslike and above board. The contact was Bones' man in the City, nothing more. They drank little and spoke slowly and clearly.
It was just after ten o'clock when they rose to shake hands. Both seemed pleased with the monies, which would be slipped into their hands sub rosa in the days to follow. Bones told his friend to wait for him outside, and then went into the toilet, looking back and smiling as he did so.
"Drinking alone?"
It was Mason Storm again, not having much luck tonight, but determined to keep on trying. Bond tucked the earpiece back into his pocket while she pulled a chair across from where the Russian's contact had been sitting.
"Just finishing," he said, watching her cross her legs as she sat down.
"What a pity," she said, her bottom lip full. "What else are you doing tonight then?"
"Going home, that's all."
"You don't sound very happy about it. Why not stay here and keep me company? I'd make you happy."
Bond shook his head.
"Not tonight."
"Which night then?"
"A year next Saturday."
She laughed at this.
"It'll be my pleasure."
He was beginning to enjoy this little game, signalling as it did the end of his evening's work. At the same time, however, Bones was taking a long time, considering that he had a friend waiting for him outside, and when the door of the gentlemen's toilet opened and Bones' dark suit, white shirt, and pale tie emerged, the man wearing them was not Bones.
Aghast, Bond recalled that a bearded businessman, a little the worse for drink, had entered the toilet before Bones, and that the same bearded businessman had emerged during his conversation with the girl. Something was very, very wrong, for it was that bearded businessman who now wore Bones' clothes.
Bond rose to his feet shakily, the girl forgotten, and walked quickly to the bar. 008 was seated in the foyer, flicking uninterestedly through a newspaper. When he saw the look on Bond's face, he jumped to his feet.
"What's wrong?"
"Everything. We've been sold a dummy. There was a bearded man, a bit drunk, glasses. Did you see him leave?" Bond felt queasy. It had been an old trick, fairly clumsy in execution. Nevertheless, it had caught him dead.
"Yes, he left a couple of minutes ago, but he looked as sober as the proverbial judge to me."
"I'll be he did. It was Bones. And there's a ringer in the bar just now wearing Bones' clothes."
"Hook, line and bloody sinker. Where would he be going?"
"Well, you can bet he's not off for a late-night fitting in Jermyn Street. Had someone taken the contact?"
"He's being tailed."
"Right, stay here and keep a tab on the one still in the bar. I'd better phone in with the happy news."
"OK. Anything else?"
"Yes. Pray that nothing happens in London tonight, because if it does, we're all in trouble." He looked back towards the bar. "Double bloody trouble."
As the whirligig of his thoughts slowed and began spinning in the right direction. Bond saw how perfectly the Russian had underplayed everything. His own error had been in underestimating every single move. He could not deny that his mind had been on other things throughout. He had been only half interested. And there was something else at the edge of his vision. What was it? It had something to do with Mason Storm. Yes, she had approached just as Bones was disappearing into the toilet, and Bones had turned and, seeming to sum up the situation, had smiled towards him. No, not towards him, directly at him. There could have been many reasons for that smile. The most obvious now was that Bones had known who Bond was.
He had known.
And he hadn't even bothered to hide the fact.
The telephone call from Miss Moneypenny served only to bring into the waking world all of James Bond's nightmares.
"James? There's a meeting in M's office in one hour. He wants you there."
"OK, Penny. Has anything happened?"
"I'm afraid so. A Ukranian nationalist dropped down dead in Oxford Street. Witnesses said that a man holding a newspaper approached him just before he died. Fits the technique of the assassin Bones, doesn't it? See you in an hour."
Lying in his hot bath, stiff from an uncomfortable sleep, Bond closed his eyes for a few precious moments. Of course there had been an assassination. And of course this man Bones wasn't holding just any newspaper. This one would have concealed a device, which fired nerve gas into the face of its victims. A trademark killing. What else could he have expected? There was knocking at the door. Bond never locked the bathroom door, but May, his elderly Scottish housekeeper, would never dram of walking in on him.
"Your breakfast is ready-s" (To Bond, one of May's endearing qualities was that she would call no man 'sir' - Bond had teased her about it years before - English Kings and Winston Churchill. As a mark of exceptional regard, she accorded Bond an occasional hint of an 's' at the end of the word.)
"OK. I'll be down in a minute," he answered.
There was silence as she moved away.
Looking around the bathroom, Bond appeared to see everything anew. The shapes of sink, toilet-bowl, bath seemed to strange to him, and even the bathwater felt curiously new as he ran his hands through it. In this reverie, he let his mind go blank, until an internal alarm system reminded him of his appointment, and the world fell back upon him like the last wall of some condemned building.
A light winked on the intercom. M pressed down the switch. "Yes?"
"007's here, sir."
"Send him in."
M sat back. He put his pipe in his mouth and set a match to it. Through the smoke he looked over the heads of 008 and 0011 who were already sitting silently in front of him, and watched the door to his secretary's office. His eyes were very bright and watchful.
James Bond came through the door and shut it behind him. Pausing at the sight of his two colleagues already sat like schoolboy truants. 0011 had his hands in his lap as though he might be needing to urinate, while 008, sat arms folded, legs crossed, looked relaxed and a little too confident. The spare chair was in the middle.
"Morning, 007."
"Good morning, sir."
Bond walked over to the chair and sat down.
There was silence in the room except for the rasping of M's pipe. It seemed to be taking a lot of matches to get it going. In the background the fingernails of sleet slashed against the two broad windows.
"You were the responsible agent at the time Stashinsky went missing, weren't you, 008?"
M saw his question have the immediate and hoped-for impact. 008 unfolded his arms and gripped his thighs with his thighs with his hands, perhaps to stop them from shaking.
"Well . . .no, sir, not really. You see, I . . . ahm . . ."
"You were, at the time, acting under orders given by 007?"
"Yes, yes, actually, I was."
"Hmm." M looked at the papers again, rearranging them, shifting through as though in search of something specific.
James Bond coughed.
"What do we know, sir," he said, "about the dead man?"
"We know, 007, that he died about then o'clock last night at a bus stop in Oxford Street. And the cause of death was brought on by exposure to a highly concentrated form of nerve gas."
"I see, sir."
M threw the box of matches down on the red leather desk. He leant back and clasped the hands behind his head.
"We know, too," M said, "that the dead man, though attached to the Ukranians, was no ordinary aide, though that may be his official title. He seems to have been working on the periphery. Something of an arms dealer in an earlier incarnation. All very discreet, of course, but he was on our files."
"Any links with Smersh, sir?" asked 008.
"Again, no," M looked across to 0011. "Smersh, is a contraction of Smiert Spionam - Death to Spies-remains today the most secret department of the Soviet Government, you know."
"Yes, sir," said 0011 in hushed tones. "I know."
"The strength of Smersh at home and abroad is about 40,000. Speak to 007 about them if you want to know more, he's had a lot of dealings with them and has the scars to prove it."
Bond glanced up sharply. "It was a long time ago," he said slowly. In the back of his mind, he remembered quite clearly, all the circumstances which had led to the plastic surgery, that showed now only as a white blemish, after the Cyrillic letter Ù– standing for SH – had been carved into the back of his hand in an attempt by Smersh to brand him as a spy. It was long ago, and very far away now; but clear as yesterday. So long ago, he thought: the business with Le Chiffre at Royale-les-Eaux, and Vesper, lying dead from an overdose, her body under the sheets like a stone effigy in a tomb.
M was about to go back to his reading when the door opened and the Minister of War came hurrying into the room.
"Good morning, gentlemen," he said, crisply, drawing a chair over to the desk and seating himself beside a now flushed M. "Briefing your men, M? Very wise, I should think. There will be an investigation, of course."
"Yes, sir. Of course, sir."
"And the Prime Minister himself wants to see us in fifteen minutes. But I thought I'd say my piece first."
"Of course, sir. Thank you, sir."
Bond hated to see a grown man cry, and that was just what M was doing. Not outwardly, of course. His tears were directed inwards, but all the more pitiful for that. He was crying from the soul.
Employees of the firm, at every level knew John Profumo and Bond had met him many times before. But what concerned Bond was the way he had managed to turn M into a weak, glandular schoolboy. It was quite a feat.
Particular if the rumours about him were true. Bond never listened to rumours but the Minister of War was walking a tightrope if he was having an affair with Christine Keeler.
"I suppose you have spoken of the murder, M?"
"Yes, sir."
"And have filled in what we know of the victim's back ground?"
"Yes, sir."
Turning to the three guilty-looking 00's on the other side of the table, Profumo placed his hands delicately in front of him as though he were counsel for the defence in a difficult case, anxious to reassure his doomed clients.
"This is a serious matter, gentlemen, of that there's no question. But it's not quite as serious as it might have been. The murdered man's employers want everything kept quiet, or as quiet as possible under the circumstances. They were, it seems, certain visa irregularities which neither they nor we would wish to have to pursue. Moreover, they do not know that we were keeping an eye on Bones, which gives us a decided advantage in the matter. I can now tell you that Bones did not return to his room last night. He left behind all of his things, including a fairly good bottle of brandy and several new suits. Even his passport was left behind, though I think we can assume it is a forgery and that he will by now have left the country."
Bond saw now that the switch had been very cleverly planned. The phone call to Harrods and Jermyn Street, the purchase of a bottle of spirits and some reading matter, and even the meeting with the contact - all had been designed to make anyone think that a long surveillance was in progress, lulling the 00's into a false sense of being in medias res. Clever, clever, clever.
"Yes," the Minister of War was saying, "I'm afraid that, in football terminology, we've been caught a bit square. Their man has scooted past us to score." He allowed a smile to form on his face, and then to melt away again as it had never existed. Nobody in the room had dared smile back. Their futures were being decided, and it was no joke. "We've got Special Branch onto the man whom, as one of us was not quite quick enough to spot, Bones changed clothes. We don't think they'll get much from him. This was probably a strictly one-off job for him, and he'll have nothing to fear. Likewise Stashinsky's contact, who went back last night to his fairly substantial apartment in NW1. He's been on our files for some time actually, though we won't be acting against him at this time. So, gentlemen," Profumo gave each of them a two second glance, "we've been bloody lucky in one respect, in that this is not going to damage our reputation or our standing with the Ukranians. In another respect, however, we've thoroughly botched a resolutely straightforward surveillance operation, and a man is dead as a result. There will be a full internal inquiry."
Bond wondered how long it had taken Profumo to prepare his speech, which now ended with a reshuffling of papers. 008, 0011, and M, who had been sitting bolt upright, shifted in their seats, lecture over.
"Well," said Profumo, rising, "I've had my say. Let's see what the Prime Minister has to add, shall we?"
The Prime Minister was, so the gossip went, close to retirement. Certainly, as they entered his curiously small office, Bond scented world- weariness, an old man's smell, as though oxygen were being pumped out, leaving a vacuum.
"Sit down, please."
It was not that the old boy was old, not particularly, though to the likes of 008 and 0011 he might appear so. Responsibility always made people look older than their years, and that respect the Prime Minister looked about a hundred and twenty. He had plenty of hair, albeit of a distinguished silver and yellow colouring, and his face was relatively unwrinkled. But Bond could sense the ageing process upon the man: his clothes were old and his movements were old.
He was standing, staring from his uncleaned window onto Downing Street below. Rather than sitting down himself, Bond felt that he should be offering a chair to the elder statesman. But he remembered the old boy's reputation as a tenacious and quick-witted Prime Minister, and Bond sat down with as much respect as he could muster.
"When you leave this office, gentlemen I would like you to go and draft full reports on this matter, and I do mean full. Security will be along to see you in due course, and will cross-check everything." He turned from the window and examined them, seeming to photograph them with his clear blue eyes. "This," he said, "has been a bloody farce from start to finish. I had thought of telling M to suspend every one of you, of asking for resignations even." He paused, letting his words sink in. It was as if Profumo had set them up for this kill.
"M," he continued, "you have led your 00's efficiently for several years. It's a pity this had to happen. There has to be tightening up of procedure. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir." M was making a good showing. He had his pride that was sure. His eyes met those of the Prime Minister without blinking.
"Good."
Bond noticed that 008 had gone very pale, as if he had just realised that he, too, would have to suffer the caning, and was afraid that he would not accept it with the same strength as his friends. The Prime Minister's eyes met those of 008 and 0011, then came to rest on Bond.
"If there's anyone to blame, Bond, it's you." With the slow drama of a Shakespearean actor, the old boy took his seat, placing his hands on the leather-topped desk. "You are to blame. You were careless, sloppy even. We don't expect that of you, and we cannot accept it of you. Perhaps you should take a long hard look at yourself and your future within the 00 section. It may be that you need a change of scenery, who knows?"
"With respect, sir, I like the scenery here."
"Do you?" whispered the Prime Minister. He leaned forward confidentially, his eyes filling with a malign humour. "Bond you're a bloody fool. I know what you've been through but the Intelligence Services have no room for sentimentality. You should never have been in that hotel in the first place. I'd rather you had been somewhere else drowning your sorrows."
Profumo turned to look at Bond now, as though to indicate that he was in agreement with his superior's words. His eyes were like tunnels burrowing deep underground.
"If it hadn't been me, sir, it would have been someone else."
"And which would you have preferred?"
There was another silence while Bond, looking as though he were considering this, thought about nothing in particular.
"That will be all," said the Prime Minister. "War Minister, I'd like a word, please."
When Profumo rose, they all did. Bond his legs unsteady for the first few seconds noticed the relief on M's face. Perhaps the Prime Minister was right. Perhaps Bond did need a change, something to challenge him. He had made an error of judgement, and that very error had already shaken him part of the way back into place.
Shaken him, but not stirred him.
Four months later, Bond's life took another turn when he was sent out to Japan to meet Tiger Tanaka the head of the Japanese Secret Service, in what at first seemed to be a reasonably straightforward assignment. However, it turned out he would come face to face with his nemesis, Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
As for John Profumo, he was forced to resign his post as Minister of War after finally admitting that he had shared his young mistress, Christine Keeler with a Russian diplomat and spy. This diplomat also happened be the London controller for Boris Stashinsky.
This short story takes place between Ian Fleming's novels
ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE and YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE
Bill Tanner could not help but be concerned as he watched James Bond leave the club and head off towards his 1933 4½-litre Bentley, which would be, parked some discreet distance away. James Bond and Bill Tanner had joined the service around the same time, and it had seemed inevitable that, over the years, they would become friends, in the strict sense of the word, were never made in their world.
Bond was a little heavy from the drinks. Tanner had insisted on buying and Bond had not refused. He fumbled now at the buttons of his coat, feeling a slight and unseasonal chill in the London air, and thought of the evening ahead. He had one more visit to pay, a few telephone calls to make, but apart from that he would return alone to his flat in the plain- tree'd square off the King's Road.
He did not relish the prospect. It had been four months since his wife, Tracy had been murdered by Blofeld and every day since it seemed to James Bond that all life, as someone put it, was nothing but a heap of six to four against.
And just to confirm that, he had collected a parking ticket. He ripped it from the windscreen, walked around the car once as though he were a potential and only half-informed buyer, and bent down as if checking for a bald tyre or broken silencer. Then, satisfied, he unlocked the passenger door. The Bentley's interior looked fine. He slid across into the driving seat and slipped the key into the ignition, turning it quickly. The engine coughed once then roared into life. He sat back, letting it idle, staring into space.
That was that then. He was not about to be blown up today. He sat for a few minutes, reflecting upon the years spent inspecting his car, checking rooms and telephones and even the undersides of restaurant tables. People thought he had become clumsy since Tracy's death because he would always drop a knife or a fork before the meal began, bowing his head beneath the tablecloth to pick it up. All he was doing was obeying another of the unwritten rules: checking for bugs.
The department had started whispering the words 'paranoia' and 'nerves', going about their own business casually and without fear, as though there were invisible barriers between them and some preordained death. But then now Bond had become a cautious man. He had let his guard down twice in his long secret service career, and both times they had resulted in the deaths of two women he had really loved. Vesper Lynd and Tracy, his wife.
He slipped the Bentley into gear and pulled away from the kerb.
Bond stopped outside the Cordelia, a popular nouveu riche hotel off Hyde Park. The receptionist was an MI6 plant, Loelia Ponsonby his secretary a few years ago, who was replaced by Mary Goodnight when she wanted to do some fieldwork.
"Morning Lil," he said.
The careful warmth of her smile of welcome dropped about ten degrees.
"There in room 514," she said, "and don't call me Lil. You know I hate it."
Bond nodded and headed for the lifts. The lift was mirrored, and, riding it alone to the fifth floor, he tried no to catch a glimpse of himself.
It was he was ashamed of how he had let himself go in the last few months. The drinks with Bill he had hoped would cure his bad hangover, but all it had done was to increase his aching head and stiff joints. He coughed loudly. He was smoking too much as well and combined with drinking too much this double the hangover. A cloud of small luminous black spots swam across his vision like amoebae on pond water.
He knocked twice on the door of room 514, and 008, looking tired opened the door, his tie hanging undone around his neck.
"Hello, 007," he said, surprised. "What's up?"
Inside the room, 0011 was busy listening to something on a headset. The head was attached to tape recorder and a small receiver. He nodded in greeting towards Bond, seeming interested in the conversation on which he was eavesdropping.
"Nothing," said Bond. "I just wanted to check, that's all."
008 nodded while he poured some coffee from a thermos, gesturing with the cup towards 007, but Bond waved away the offer.
He flicked through the tiny notebook, which was filled with telephone numbers and initials, nothing more. He realised now that his reason for coming here was simply to defer his going home. There did not seem to be any good nights at home now, since Tracy had died.
"Do you have any aspirin, 008?"
"Afraid not. Been on the bottle, have we?"
"I've had couple, yes."
"Thought I could smell it." 008 sipped his tepid coffee.
"It's been quiet here," said 0011. "A few phone calls to his embassy, made in Russian, just asking about the situation back home and if they had any of this week's newspapers, and a call to Harrods, made in English, to ask what time they close. He went out for an hour and half. Bought the Telegraph, would you believe, and a dirty magazine. 008 know the name of it. I don't go in for them myself. He also purchased two packets of Senior Service and one bottle of three-star brandy. That's about it. Came back to his room."
"Who's he speaking to just now?"
008 went across to check the notepad, which lay on 0011's knees.
"To Jermyn Street. Arranging a fitting. These people." 008 shook his head in ironic disbelief.
Bond knew what he meant. The 00's seemed to spend half of their lives trailing men and women who did little more than buy expensive clothes and gifts for their families' back home.
"He's making another call," said 0011, the section's most recent recruit. 007 was watching him for any signs of weakness, of hesitation or misjudgment. 0011 was still on probation.
"Speaking Russian again," he said now, switching on the tape recorder. As he began to scribble furiously with his pen, 008 went to his shoulder to watch.
"He's arranging a meeting," 008 murmured. "This looks a little more promising."
James Bond, attuned to such things, doubted it, but it gave him a good excuse not to go home just yet.
"Mind if I come along on this one?" he asked. 008 shrugged his shoulders.
"Not at all," he said. "Your Russian is as good as mine. I'm sure. But isn't this supposed to be your night off?"
"I'd like to stick with this one," lied Bond.
"Fine," said 008. "I'll go downstairs and fetch the car."
Having put his car into the hotel's basement garage, Bond began to unwind in the firms gleaming D.B.III.
They drove slowly. 008 really was an excellent driver, unshowy, but never losing his prey.
"Turning into the Strand."
The Russian's real name was Bogdan Stashinsky and his codename was Bones. Bond wondered just who was responsible for these absurdities. Someone had to sit at a desk all day doing nothing else but invent codenames. Bones. Suspected of being an assassin for Smersh. Conceivably, however, he might be merely what his public image and his passport showed, a well-placed civil engineer, in London to advise his embassy on possible contacts for British companies in oil fields of the Urals. Some very high-tech refineries were about to be built in order to extract every last drop of commercial goodness from the crude natural product. And that was why no toes were to be stepped on, no possible evidence of interference left lying around. Discretion was paramount if the contracts were not to be endangered, and the burden belonged to Bond.
"Taxi signalling and stopping," said 008. "I'll drop you and park the car."
Bond slipped out of the car and followed Bones into the Doric, one of the capital's grandest hotels. As he pushed through the revolving door, he wished he had gone home to change. The Russian was gliding into the cocktail bar, smoothing down his tie as went.
"Would you have a light?"
The girl who barred his way was blonde, petite, and very pretty, with a trained voice and a trained smile. Everything about her looked trained, so that her movements told the prospective customer that she was a professional girl. Bond had no time to waste.
"I'm afraid not, Miss?"
"Storm. Mason Storm." she smiled.
"Sorry," he moved past her.
She was not about to waste time herself, time being money in her world. She smiled again, drifting off towards another tired-looking traveller.
The bar was busy with early evening drinkers, not those who leave their offices tired and thirsty, but those who feel it a duty to consume a few expensive drinks before an expensive meal. Bond pushed an earpiece into hi ear as he walked, the slender flex curving down his neck and into his top pocket. He found a chair with his back to Bones, who was seated alone at a table for two. Having ordered a vodka martini, shaken, not stirred, miming to the waiter that he was partially deaf, Bond took a notebook from his pocket and produced a silver pen from the same place. He looked like the perfect accountant, ready to jot down a few calculations of profit margins.
In poising the pen, an expensive-looking fountain model, Bond angled its top towards Bones, and through his earpiece came the chaotic sounds of the bar. He cursed silently the fact that there were so many people around. Bones, having coughed twice, ordered a fresh orange juice from the waiter - "as in freshly squeezed, you understand" - while Bond, appearing to mull over figures, listened.
008 would be calling for assistance, though it still seemed unlikely that anything important was about to take place. The really important meetings always occur either in obscure, well-guarded rooms, or else in parks and on heaths, preferably with a storm raging in the background. Nothing that the constantly ingenious Q could rig up in his dark chambers was of much help on a windswept hill.
The pen, however, was superb, a tiny transmitter inside the cap sending information to the receiver inside his pocket, and from there to the earpiece. It was not perfect. Bond was hard-pressed to hear what Bones was saying to the waiter who had brought him his drink. A couple nearby, thinking themselves involved in the most intimate dialogue, kept interrupting, the woman's voice of just sufficient flutedness to block out the Russian's soft inflections. Bond, listening to their conversation, hoped that they would turn words into deeds and slip upstairs to their room. But then Bones wasn't saying anything yet, so where was the harm in trying out the equipment on other couples in the vicinity? None, however, as a quick sweep revealed, were saying the sorts of things that the fluted woman was saying to her partner.
Bond's great fear was that Bones and his contact would speak together in Russian, for he knew that his Russian, despite 008's protestations, was a little rusty. The meeting had been arranged in Russian, but with English pleasantries at the end of the dialogue. 0011 had worked quickly and accurately on the transcription, and Bond would remember that. He tried to ignore the niggling feeling that he had been stupid to come here tonight, stupid to have insisted on playing a role in what was not his drama. He should have gritted his teeth and gone home.
The woman shrieked suddenly, laughing at her partner's lubricious joke, and looking up, Bond saw that 008 was standing in the doorway, looking around as though for a friend. Their eyes met for less than a second, and Bond knew that the back up had arrived. At that moment, a swarthy man brushed past 008 and walked across to Bones' table. Bond, nodding as the sweating waiter laid a drink before him, concentrated hard on the table behind him.
"It's good to see you again. How is the refinery project progressing?"
"There have been some difficulties."
As their conversation continued - in English, thank God - it became obvious to Bond that he was wasting his time. The two men discussed what introductions were to be made to what companies. They even spoke about bribes, which might be offered, to them by certain work-hungry corporations in return for a slice of this or that contract. It was all very businesslike and above board. The contact was Bones' man in the City, nothing more. They drank little and spoke slowly and clearly.
It was just after ten o'clock when they rose to shake hands. Both seemed pleased with the monies, which would be slipped into their hands sub rosa in the days to follow. Bones told his friend to wait for him outside, and then went into the toilet, looking back and smiling as he did so.
"Drinking alone?"
It was Mason Storm again, not having much luck tonight, but determined to keep on trying. Bond tucked the earpiece back into his pocket while she pulled a chair across from where the Russian's contact had been sitting.
"Just finishing," he said, watching her cross her legs as she sat down.
"What a pity," she said, her bottom lip full. "What else are you doing tonight then?"
"Going home, that's all."
"You don't sound very happy about it. Why not stay here and keep me company? I'd make you happy."
Bond shook his head.
"Not tonight."
"Which night then?"
"A year next Saturday."
She laughed at this.
"It'll be my pleasure."
He was beginning to enjoy this little game, signalling as it did the end of his evening's work. At the same time, however, Bones was taking a long time, considering that he had a friend waiting for him outside, and when the door of the gentlemen's toilet opened and Bones' dark suit, white shirt, and pale tie emerged, the man wearing them was not Bones.
Aghast, Bond recalled that a bearded businessman, a little the worse for drink, had entered the toilet before Bones, and that the same bearded businessman had emerged during his conversation with the girl. Something was very, very wrong, for it was that bearded businessman who now wore Bones' clothes.
Bond rose to his feet shakily, the girl forgotten, and walked quickly to the bar. 008 was seated in the foyer, flicking uninterestedly through a newspaper. When he saw the look on Bond's face, he jumped to his feet.
"What's wrong?"
"Everything. We've been sold a dummy. There was a bearded man, a bit drunk, glasses. Did you see him leave?" Bond felt queasy. It had been an old trick, fairly clumsy in execution. Nevertheless, it had caught him dead.
"Yes, he left a couple of minutes ago, but he looked as sober as the proverbial judge to me."
"I'll be he did. It was Bones. And there's a ringer in the bar just now wearing Bones' clothes."
"Hook, line and bloody sinker. Where would he be going?"
"Well, you can bet he's not off for a late-night fitting in Jermyn Street. Had someone taken the contact?"
"He's being tailed."
"Right, stay here and keep a tab on the one still in the bar. I'd better phone in with the happy news."
"OK. Anything else?"
"Yes. Pray that nothing happens in London tonight, because if it does, we're all in trouble." He looked back towards the bar. "Double bloody trouble."
As the whirligig of his thoughts slowed and began spinning in the right direction. Bond saw how perfectly the Russian had underplayed everything. His own error had been in underestimating every single move. He could not deny that his mind had been on other things throughout. He had been only half interested. And there was something else at the edge of his vision. What was it? It had something to do with Mason Storm. Yes, she had approached just as Bones was disappearing into the toilet, and Bones had turned and, seeming to sum up the situation, had smiled towards him. No, not towards him, directly at him. There could have been many reasons for that smile. The most obvious now was that Bones had known who Bond was.
He had known.
And he hadn't even bothered to hide the fact.
The telephone call from Miss Moneypenny served only to bring into the waking world all of James Bond's nightmares.
"James? There's a meeting in M's office in one hour. He wants you there."
"OK, Penny. Has anything happened?"
"I'm afraid so. A Ukranian nationalist dropped down dead in Oxford Street. Witnesses said that a man holding a newspaper approached him just before he died. Fits the technique of the assassin Bones, doesn't it? See you in an hour."
Lying in his hot bath, stiff from an uncomfortable sleep, Bond closed his eyes for a few precious moments. Of course there had been an assassination. And of course this man Bones wasn't holding just any newspaper. This one would have concealed a device, which fired nerve gas into the face of its victims. A trademark killing. What else could he have expected? There was knocking at the door. Bond never locked the bathroom door, but May, his elderly Scottish housekeeper, would never dram of walking in on him.
"Your breakfast is ready-s" (To Bond, one of May's endearing qualities was that she would call no man 'sir' - Bond had teased her about it years before - English Kings and Winston Churchill. As a mark of exceptional regard, she accorded Bond an occasional hint of an 's' at the end of the word.)
"OK. I'll be down in a minute," he answered.
There was silence as she moved away.
Looking around the bathroom, Bond appeared to see everything anew. The shapes of sink, toilet-bowl, bath seemed to strange to him, and even the bathwater felt curiously new as he ran his hands through it. In this reverie, he let his mind go blank, until an internal alarm system reminded him of his appointment, and the world fell back upon him like the last wall of some condemned building.
A light winked on the intercom. M pressed down the switch. "Yes?"
"007's here, sir."
"Send him in."
M sat back. He put his pipe in his mouth and set a match to it. Through the smoke he looked over the heads of 008 and 0011 who were already sitting silently in front of him, and watched the door to his secretary's office. His eyes were very bright and watchful.
James Bond came through the door and shut it behind him. Pausing at the sight of his two colleagues already sat like schoolboy truants. 0011 had his hands in his lap as though he might be needing to urinate, while 008, sat arms folded, legs crossed, looked relaxed and a little too confident. The spare chair was in the middle.
"Morning, 007."
"Good morning, sir."
Bond walked over to the chair and sat down.
There was silence in the room except for the rasping of M's pipe. It seemed to be taking a lot of matches to get it going. In the background the fingernails of sleet slashed against the two broad windows.
"You were the responsible agent at the time Stashinsky went missing, weren't you, 008?"
M saw his question have the immediate and hoped-for impact. 008 unfolded his arms and gripped his thighs with his thighs with his hands, perhaps to stop them from shaking.
"Well . . .no, sir, not really. You see, I . . . ahm . . ."
"You were, at the time, acting under orders given by 007?"
"Yes, yes, actually, I was."
"Hmm." M looked at the papers again, rearranging them, shifting through as though in search of something specific.
James Bond coughed.
"What do we know, sir," he said, "about the dead man?"
"We know, 007, that he died about then o'clock last night at a bus stop in Oxford Street. And the cause of death was brought on by exposure to a highly concentrated form of nerve gas."
"I see, sir."
M threw the box of matches down on the red leather desk. He leant back and clasped the hands behind his head.
"We know, too," M said, "that the dead man, though attached to the Ukranians, was no ordinary aide, though that may be his official title. He seems to have been working on the periphery. Something of an arms dealer in an earlier incarnation. All very discreet, of course, but he was on our files."
"Any links with Smersh, sir?" asked 008.
"Again, no," M looked across to 0011. "Smersh, is a contraction of Smiert Spionam - Death to Spies-remains today the most secret department of the Soviet Government, you know."
"Yes, sir," said 0011 in hushed tones. "I know."
"The strength of Smersh at home and abroad is about 40,000. Speak to 007 about them if you want to know more, he's had a lot of dealings with them and has the scars to prove it."
Bond glanced up sharply. "It was a long time ago," he said slowly. In the back of his mind, he remembered quite clearly, all the circumstances which had led to the plastic surgery, that showed now only as a white blemish, after the Cyrillic letter Ù– standing for SH – had been carved into the back of his hand in an attempt by Smersh to brand him as a spy. It was long ago, and very far away now; but clear as yesterday. So long ago, he thought: the business with Le Chiffre at Royale-les-Eaux, and Vesper, lying dead from an overdose, her body under the sheets like a stone effigy in a tomb.
M was about to go back to his reading when the door opened and the Minister of War came hurrying into the room.
"Good morning, gentlemen," he said, crisply, drawing a chair over to the desk and seating himself beside a now flushed M. "Briefing your men, M? Very wise, I should think. There will be an investigation, of course."
"Yes, sir. Of course, sir."
"And the Prime Minister himself wants to see us in fifteen minutes. But I thought I'd say my piece first."
"Of course, sir. Thank you, sir."
Bond hated to see a grown man cry, and that was just what M was doing. Not outwardly, of course. His tears were directed inwards, but all the more pitiful for that. He was crying from the soul.
Employees of the firm, at every level knew John Profumo and Bond had met him many times before. But what concerned Bond was the way he had managed to turn M into a weak, glandular schoolboy. It was quite a feat.
Particular if the rumours about him were true. Bond never listened to rumours but the Minister of War was walking a tightrope if he was having an affair with Christine Keeler.
"I suppose you have spoken of the murder, M?"
"Yes, sir."
"And have filled in what we know of the victim's back ground?"
"Yes, sir."
Turning to the three guilty-looking 00's on the other side of the table, Profumo placed his hands delicately in front of him as though he were counsel for the defence in a difficult case, anxious to reassure his doomed clients.
"This is a serious matter, gentlemen, of that there's no question. But it's not quite as serious as it might have been. The murdered man's employers want everything kept quiet, or as quiet as possible under the circumstances. They were, it seems, certain visa irregularities which neither they nor we would wish to have to pursue. Moreover, they do not know that we were keeping an eye on Bones, which gives us a decided advantage in the matter. I can now tell you that Bones did not return to his room last night. He left behind all of his things, including a fairly good bottle of brandy and several new suits. Even his passport was left behind, though I think we can assume it is a forgery and that he will by now have left the country."
Bond saw now that the switch had been very cleverly planned. The phone call to Harrods and Jermyn Street, the purchase of a bottle of spirits and some reading matter, and even the meeting with the contact - all had been designed to make anyone think that a long surveillance was in progress, lulling the 00's into a false sense of being in medias res. Clever, clever, clever.
"Yes," the Minister of War was saying, "I'm afraid that, in football terminology, we've been caught a bit square. Their man has scooted past us to score." He allowed a smile to form on his face, and then to melt away again as it had never existed. Nobody in the room had dared smile back. Their futures were being decided, and it was no joke. "We've got Special Branch onto the man whom, as one of us was not quite quick enough to spot, Bones changed clothes. We don't think they'll get much from him. This was probably a strictly one-off job for him, and he'll have nothing to fear. Likewise Stashinsky's contact, who went back last night to his fairly substantial apartment in NW1. He's been on our files for some time actually, though we won't be acting against him at this time. So, gentlemen," Profumo gave each of them a two second glance, "we've been bloody lucky in one respect, in that this is not going to damage our reputation or our standing with the Ukranians. In another respect, however, we've thoroughly botched a resolutely straightforward surveillance operation, and a man is dead as a result. There will be a full internal inquiry."
Bond wondered how long it had taken Profumo to prepare his speech, which now ended with a reshuffling of papers. 008, 0011, and M, who had been sitting bolt upright, shifted in their seats, lecture over.
"Well," said Profumo, rising, "I've had my say. Let's see what the Prime Minister has to add, shall we?"
The Prime Minister was, so the gossip went, close to retirement. Certainly, as they entered his curiously small office, Bond scented world- weariness, an old man's smell, as though oxygen were being pumped out, leaving a vacuum.
"Sit down, please."
It was not that the old boy was old, not particularly, though to the likes of 008 and 0011 he might appear so. Responsibility always made people look older than their years, and that respect the Prime Minister looked about a hundred and twenty. He had plenty of hair, albeit of a distinguished silver and yellow colouring, and his face was relatively unwrinkled. But Bond could sense the ageing process upon the man: his clothes were old and his movements were old.
He was standing, staring from his uncleaned window onto Downing Street below. Rather than sitting down himself, Bond felt that he should be offering a chair to the elder statesman. But he remembered the old boy's reputation as a tenacious and quick-witted Prime Minister, and Bond sat down with as much respect as he could muster.
"When you leave this office, gentlemen I would like you to go and draft full reports on this matter, and I do mean full. Security will be along to see you in due course, and will cross-check everything." He turned from the window and examined them, seeming to photograph them with his clear blue eyes. "This," he said, "has been a bloody farce from start to finish. I had thought of telling M to suspend every one of you, of asking for resignations even." He paused, letting his words sink in. It was as if Profumo had set them up for this kill.
"M," he continued, "you have led your 00's efficiently for several years. It's a pity this had to happen. There has to be tightening up of procedure. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir." M was making a good showing. He had his pride that was sure. His eyes met those of the Prime Minister without blinking.
"Good."
Bond noticed that 008 had gone very pale, as if he had just realised that he, too, would have to suffer the caning, and was afraid that he would not accept it with the same strength as his friends. The Prime Minister's eyes met those of 008 and 0011, then came to rest on Bond.
"If there's anyone to blame, Bond, it's you." With the slow drama of a Shakespearean actor, the old boy took his seat, placing his hands on the leather-topped desk. "You are to blame. You were careless, sloppy even. We don't expect that of you, and we cannot accept it of you. Perhaps you should take a long hard look at yourself and your future within the 00 section. It may be that you need a change of scenery, who knows?"
"With respect, sir, I like the scenery here."
"Do you?" whispered the Prime Minister. He leaned forward confidentially, his eyes filling with a malign humour. "Bond you're a bloody fool. I know what you've been through but the Intelligence Services have no room for sentimentality. You should never have been in that hotel in the first place. I'd rather you had been somewhere else drowning your sorrows."
Profumo turned to look at Bond now, as though to indicate that he was in agreement with his superior's words. His eyes were like tunnels burrowing deep underground.
"If it hadn't been me, sir, it would have been someone else."
"And which would you have preferred?"
There was another silence while Bond, looking as though he were considering this, thought about nothing in particular.
"That will be all," said the Prime Minister. "War Minister, I'd like a word, please."
When Profumo rose, they all did. Bond his legs unsteady for the first few seconds noticed the relief on M's face. Perhaps the Prime Minister was right. Perhaps Bond did need a change, something to challenge him. He had made an error of judgement, and that very error had already shaken him part of the way back into place.
Shaken him, but not stirred him.
Four months later, Bond's life took another turn when he was sent out to Japan to meet Tiger Tanaka the head of the Japanese Secret Service, in what at first seemed to be a reasonably straightforward assignment. However, it turned out he would come face to face with his nemesis, Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
As for John Profumo, he was forced to resign his post as Minister of War after finally admitting that he had shared his young mistress, Christine Keeler with a Russian diplomat and spy. This diplomat also happened be the London controller for Boris Stashinsky.