Текст книги "The James Bond Anthology"

Автор книги: Ian Fleming

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Текущая страница: 179 (всего у книги 190 страниц)

‘And then Philip Masters came home.’

The Governor paused and looked reflectively over at Bond. He said: ‘You’re not married, but I think it’s the same with all relationships between a man and a woman. They can survive anything so long as some kind of basic humanity exists between the two people. When all kindness has gone, when one person obviously and sincerely doesn’t care if the other is alive or dead, then it’s just no good. That particular insult to the ego – worse, to the instinct of self-preservation – can never be forgiven. I’ve noticed this in hundreds of marriages. I’ve seen flagrant infidelities patched up, I’ve seen crimes and even murder forgiven by the other party, let alone bankruptcy and every other form of social crime. Incurable disease, blindness, disaster – all these can be overcome. But never the death of common humanity in one of the partners. I’ve thought about this and I’ve invented a rather high-sounding title for this basic factor in human relations. I have called it the Law of the Quantum of Solace.’

Bond said: ‘That’s a splendid name for it. It’s certainly impressive enough. And of course I see what you mean, I should say you’re absolutely right. Quantum of Solace – the amount of comfort. Yes, I suppose you could say that all love and friendship is based in the end on that. Human beings are very insecure. When the other person not only makes you feel insecure but actually seems to want to destroy you, it’s obviously the end. The Quantum of Solace stands at zero. You’ve got to get away to save yourself. Did Masters see that?’

The Governor didn’t answer the question. He said: ‘Rhoda Masters should have been warned when her husband walked through the bungalow door. It wasn’t so much what she saw on the surface – though the moustache had gone and Masters’s hair was once again the untidy mop of their first meeting – it was the eyes and the mouth and the set of the chin. Rhoda Masters had put on her quietest frock. She had taken off most of her make-up and had arranged herself in a chair where the light from the window left her face in half-shadow and illuminated the pages of a book on her lap. She had decided that, when he came through the door, she would look up from her book, docilely, submissively, and wait for him to speak. Then she would get up and come quietly to him and stand in front of him with her head bowed. She would tell him all and let the tears come and he would take her in his arms and she would promise and promise. She had practised the scene many times until she was satisfied.

‘She duly glanced up from her book. Masters quietly put down his suitcase and walked slowly over to the mantelpiece and stood looking vaguely down at her. His eyes were cold and impersonal and without interest. He put his hand in his inside pocket and took out a piece of paper. He said in the matter-of-fact voice of a house agent: “Here is a plan of the house. I have divided the house in two. Your rooms are the kitchen and your bedroom. Mine are this room and the spare bedroom. You may use the bathroom when I am not in it.” He leant over and dropped the paper on the open pages of her book. “You are never to enter my rooms except when we have friends in.” Rhoda Masters opened her mouth to speak. He held up his hand. “This is the last time I shall speak to you in private. If you speak to me, I shall not answer. If you wish to communicate, you may leave a note in the bathroom. I shall expect my meals to be prepared punctually and placed in the dining-room, which you may use when I have finished. I shall give you twenty pounds a month to cover the housekeeping, and this amount will be sent to you by my lawyers on the first of each month. My lawyers are preparing the divorce papers. I am divorcing you, and you will not fight the action because you cannot. A private detective has provided full evidence against you. The action will take place in one year from now when my time in Bermuda is up. In the meantime, in public, we shall behave as a normal married couple.” Masters put his hands in his pockets and looked politely down at her. By this time tears were pouring down her face. She looked terrified – as if someone had hit her.

‘Masters said indifferently: “Is there anything else you’d like to know? If not, you had better collect your belongings from here and move into the kitchen.” He looked at his watch. “I would like dinner every evening at eight. It is now seven-thirty.” ’

The Governor paused and sipped his whisky. He said: ‘I’ve put all this together from the little that Masters told me and from fuller details Rhoda Masters gave to Lady Burford. Apparently Rhoda Masters tried every way to shake him – arguments, pleadings, hysterics. He was unmoved. She simply couldn’t reach him. It was as if he had gone away and had sent someone else to the house to represent him at this extraordinary interview. And in the end she had to agree. She had no money. She couldn’t possibly afford the passage to England. To have a bed and food she had to do what he told her. And so it was. For a year they lived like that, polite to each other in public, but utterly silent and separate when they were alone. Of course, we were all astonished by the change. Neither of them told anyone of the arrangement. She would have been ashamed to do so and there was no reason why Masters should. He seemed to us a bit more withdrawn than before, but his work was first-class and everyone heaved a sigh of relief and agreed that by some miracle the marriage had been saved. Both of them gained great credit from the fact, and they became a popular couple with everything forgiven and forgotten.

‘The year passed and it was time for Masters to go. He announced that Rhoda would stay behind to close the house, and they went through the usual round of farewell parties. We were a bit surprised that she didn’t come to see him off in the ship, but he said she wasn’t feeling well. So that was that until, in a couple of weeks, news of the divorce case began leaking back from England. Then Rhoda Masters turned up at Government House and had a long interview with Lady Burford, and gradually the whole story, including its really terrible next chapter, leaked out.’

The Governor swallowed the last of his whisky. The ice made a hollow rattle as he put the glass softly down. He said: ‘Apparently on the day before Masters left he found a note from his wife in the bathroom. It said that she simply must see him for one last talk before he left her for ever. There had been notes like this before and Masters had always torn them up and left the bits on the shelf above the basin. This time he scribbled a note giving her an appointment in the sitting-room at six o’clock that evening. When the time arrived, Rhoda Masters came meekly in from the kitchen. She had long since given up making emotional scenes or trying to throw herself on his mercy. Now she just quietly stood and said that she had only ten pounds left from that month’s housekeeping money and nothing else in the world. When he left she would be destitute.

‘ “You have the jewels I gave you, and the fur cape.”

‘ “I’d be lucky if I got fifty pounds for them.”

‘ “You’ll have to get some work.”

‘ “It’ll take time to find something. I’ve got to live somewhere. I have to be out of the house in a fortnight. Won’t you give me anything at all? I shall starve.”

‘Masters looked at her dispassionately. “You’re pretty. You’ll never starve.”

‘ “You must help me, Philip. You must. It won’t help your career having me begging at Government House.”

‘Nothing in the house belonged to them except a few odds and ends. They had taken it furnished. The owner had come the week before and agreed the inventory. There only remained their car, a Morris that Masters had bought second hand, and a radio-gramophone he had bought as a last resort to try and keep his wife amused before she took up golf.

‘Philip Masters looked at her for the last time. He was never to see her again. He said: “All right. You can have the car and the radiogram. Now that’s all. I’ve got to pack. Goodbye.” And he walked out of the door and up to his room.’

The Governor looked across at Bond. ‘At least one last little gesture. Yes?’ The Governor smiled grimly. ‘When he had gone and Rhoda Masters was left alone, she took the car and her engagement ring and her few trinkets and the fox fur tippet and went into Hamilton and drove round the pawnbrokers. In the end she collected forty pounds for the jewellery and seven pounds for the bit of fur. Then she went to the car dealers whose name-plate was on the dashboard of the car and asked to see the manager. When she asked how much he would give her for the Morris he thought she was pulling his leg. “But, madam, Mr Masters bought the car by hire-purchase and he’s very badly behind on his payments. Surely he told you that we had to send him a solicitor’s letter about it only a week ago. We heard he was leaving. He wrote back that you would be coming in to make the necessary arrangements. Let me see” – he reached for a file and leafed through it. “Yes, there’s exactly two hundred pounds owing on the car.”

‘Well, of course, Rhoda Masters burst into tears and in the end the manager agreed to take back the car, although it wasn’t worth two hundred pounds by then, but he insisted that she should leave it with him then and there, petrol in the tank and all. Rhoda Masters could only accept and be grateful not to be sued, and she walked out of the garage and along the hot street and already she knew what she was going to find when she got to the radio shop. And she was right. It was the same story, only this time she had to pay ten pounds to persuade the man to take back the radiogram. She got a lift back to within walking distance of the bungalow and went and threw herself down on the bed and cried for the rest of the day. She had already been a beaten woman. Now Philip Masters had kicked her when she was down.’

The Governor paused. ‘Pretty extraordinary, really. A man like Masters, kindly, sensitive, who wouldn’t normally hurt a fly. And here he was performing one of the cruellest actions I can recall in all my experience. It was my law operating.’ The Governor smiled thinly. ‘Whatever her sins, if she had given him that Quantum of Solace he could never have behaved to her as he did. As it was, she had awakened in him a bestial cruelty – a cruelty that perhaps lies deeply hidden in all of us and that only a threat to our existence can bring to the surface. Masters wanted to make the girl suffer, not as much as he had suffered because that was impossible, but as much as he could possibly contrive. And that false gesture with the motor-car and the radio-gramophone was a fiendishly brilliant bit of delayed action to remind her, even when he was gone, how much he hated her, how much he wanted still to hurt her.’

Bond said: ‘It must have been a shattering experience. It’s extraordinary how much people can hurt each other. I’m beginning to feel rather sorry for the girl. What happened to her in the end – and to him, for the matter of that?’

The Governor got to his feet and looked at his watch. ‘Good heavens, it’s nearly midnight. And I’ve been keeping the staff up all this time,’ he smiled, ‘as well as you.’ He walked across to the fireplace and rang a bell. A Negro butler appeared. The Governor apologized for keeping him up and told him to lock up and turn the light out. Bond was on his feet. The Governor turned to him. ‘Come along and I’ll tell you the rest. I’ll walk through the garden with you and see that the sentry lets you out.’

They walked slowly through the long rooms and down the broad steps to the garden. It was a beautiful night under a full moon that raced over their heads through the thin high clouds.

The Governor said: ‘Masters went on in the Service, but somehow he never lived up to his good start. After the Bermuda business something seemed to go out of him. Part of him had been killed by the experience. He was a maimed man. Mostly her fault, of course, but I guess that what he did to her lived on with him and perhaps haunted him. He was good at his work, but he had somehow lost the human touch and he gradually dried up. Of course he never married again and in the end he got shunted off into the ground nuts scheme, and when that was a failure he retired and went to live in Nigeria – back to the only people in the world who had shown him any kindness – back to where it had all started from. Bit tragic, really, when I remember what he was like when we were young.’

‘And the girl?’

‘Oh, she went through a pretty bad time. We handed round the hat for her and she pottered in and out of various jobs that were more or less charity. She tried to go back to being an air hostess, but the way she had broken her contract with Imperial Airways put her out of the running for that. There weren’t so many airlines in those days and there was no shortage of applicants for the few hostess jobs that were going. The Burfords got transferred to Jamaica later in that same year and that removed her main prop. As I said, Lady Burford had always had a soft spot for her. Rhoda Masters was pretty nearly destitute. She still had her looks and various men had kept her for a while; but you can’t make the rounds for very long in a small place like Bermuda, and she was very near to becoming a harlot and getting into trouble with the police when Providence again stepped in and decided she had been punished enough. A letter came from Lady Burford enclosing her fare to Jamaica and saying she had got her a job as receptionist at the Blue Hills Hotel, one of the best of the Kingston hotels. So she left, and I expect – I’d been transferred to Rhodesia by then – that Bermuda was heartily relieved to see the last of her.’

The Governor and Bond had come to the wide entrance gates to the grounds of Government House. Beyond them shone, white and black and pink under the moon, the huddle of narrow streets and pretty clapboard houses with gingerbread gables and balconies that is Nassau. With a terrific clatter the sentry came to attention and presented arms. The Governor raised a hand: ‘All right. Stand at ease.’ Again the clockwork sentry rattled briefly into life and there was silence.

The Governor said: ‘And that’s the end of the story except for one final quirk of fate. One day a Canadian millionaire turned up at the Blue Hills Hotel and stayed for the winter. At the end of the time he took Rhoda Masters back to Canada and married her. She’s lived in clover ever since.’

‘Good heavens. That was a stroke of luck. Hardly deserved it.’

‘I suppose not. One can’t tell. Life’s a devious business. Perhaps, for all the harm she’d done to Masters, Fate decided that she had paid back enough. Perhaps Masters’s father and mother were the true guilty people. They turned Masters into an accident-prone man. Inevitably he was involved in the emotional crash that was due to him and that they had conditioned him for. Fate had chosen Rhoda for its instrument. Now Fate reimbursed her for her services. Difficult to judge these things. Anyway, she made her Canadian very happy. I thought they both seemed happy tonight.’

Bond laughed. Suddenly the violent dramatics of his own life seemed very hollow. The affair of the Castro rebels and the burned out yachts was the stuff of an adventure-strip in a cheap newspaper. He had sat next to a dull woman at a dull dinner party and a chance remark had opened for him the book of real violence – of the Comédie Humaine where human passions are raw and real, where Fate plays a more authentic game than any Secret Service conspiracy devised by Governments.

Bond faced the Governor and held out his hand. He said: ‘Thank you for the story. And I owe you an apology. I found Mrs Harvey Miller a bore. Thanks to you I shall never forget her. I must pay more attention to people. You’ve taught me a lesson.’

They shook hands. The Governor smiled. ‘I’m glad the story interested you. I was afraid you might be bored. You lead a very exciting life. To tell you the truth, I was at my wit’s end to know what we could talk about after dinner. Life in the Colonial Service is very humdrum.’

They said goodnight. Bond walked off down the quiet street towards the harbour and the British Colonial Hotel. He reflected on the conference he would be having in the morning with the Coastguards and the F.B.I. in Miami. The prospect, which had previously interested, even excited him, was now edged with boredom and futility.

4 | RISICO

‘In this pizniss is much risico.’

The words came softly through the thick brown moustache. The hard black eyes moved slowly over Bond’s face and down to Bond’s hands which were carefully shredding a paper match on which was printed Albergo Colomba d’Oro.

James Bond felt the inspection. The same surreptitious examination had been going on since he had met the man two hours before at the rendezvous in the Excelsior bar. Bond had been told to look for a man with a heavy moustache who would be sitting by himself drinking an Alexandra. Bond had been amused by this secret recognition signal. The creamy, feminine drink was so much cleverer than the folded newspaper, the flower in the buttonhole, the yellow gloves that were the hoary, slipshod call-signs between agents. It had also the great merit of being able to operate alone, without its owner. And Kristatos had started off with a little test. When Bond had come into the bar and looked round there had been perhaps twenty people in the room. None of them had a moustache. But on a corner table at the far side of the tall, discreet room, flanked by a saucer of olives and another of cashew nuts, stood the tall-stemmed glass of cream and vodka. Bond went straight over to the table, pulled out a chair and sat down.

The waiter came. ‘Good evening, sir. Signor Kristatos is at the telephone.’

Bond nodded. ‘A Negroni. With Gordon’s, please.’

The waiter walked back to the bar. ‘Negroni. Uno. Gordon’s.’

‘I am so sorry.’ The big hairy hand picked up the small chair as if it had been as light as a match-box and swept it under the heavy hips. ‘I had to have a word with Alfredo.’

There had been no handshake. These were old acquaintances. In the same line of business, probably. Something like import and export. The younger one looked American. No. Not with those clothes. English.

Bond returned the fast serve. ‘How’s his little boy?’

The black eyes of Signor Kristatos narrowed. Yes, they had said this man was a professional. He spread his hands. ‘Much the same. What can you expect?’

‘Polio is a terrible thing.’

The Negroni came. The two men sat back comfortably, each one satisfied that he had to do with a man in the same league. This was rare in ‘The Game’. So many times, before one had even started on a tandem assignment like this, one had lost confidence in the outcome. There was so often, at least in Bond’s imagination, a faint smell of burning in the air at such a rendezvous. He knew it for the sign that the fringe of his cover had already started to smoulder. In due course the smouldering fabric would burst into flames and he would be brûlé. Then the game would be up and he would have to decide whether to pull out or wait and get shot at by someone. But at this meeting there had been no fumbling.

Later that evening, at the little restaurant off the Piazza di Spagna called the Colomba d’Oro, Bond was amused to find that he was still on probation. Kristatos was still watching and weighing him, wondering if he could be trusted. This remark about the risky business was as near as Kristatos had so far got to admitting that there existed any business between the two of them. Bond was encouraged. He had not really believed in Kristatos. But surely all these precautions could only mean that M.’s intuition had paid off – that Kristatos knew something big.

Bond dropped the last shred of match into the ashtray. He said mildly: ‘I was once taught that any business that pays more than ten per cent or is conducted after nine o’clock at night is a dangerous business. The business which brings us together pays up to one thousand per cent and is conducted almost exclusively at night. On both counts it is obviously a risky business.’ Bond lowered his voice. ‘Funds are available. Dollars, Swiss francs, Venezuelan bolivars – anything convenient.’

‘That makes me glad. I have already too much lire.’ Signor Kristatos picked up the folio menu. ‘But let us feed on something. One should not decide important pizniss on a hollow stomach.’A week earlier M. had sent for Bond. M. was in a bad temper. ‘Got anything on, 007?’

‘Only paper-work, sir.’

‘What do you mean, only paper-work?’ M. jerked his pipe towards his loaded in-tray. ‘Who hasn’t got paper-work?’

‘I meant nothing active, sir.’

‘Well, say so.’ M. picked up a bundle of dark red files tied together with tape and slid them so sharply across the desk that Bond had to catch them. ‘And here’s some more paper-work. Scotland Yard stuff mostly – their narcotics people. Wads from the Home Office and the Ministry of Health, and some nice thick reports from the International Opium Control people in Geneva. Take it away and read it. You’ll need today and most of tonight. Tomorrow you fly to Rome and get after the big men. Is that clear?’

Bond said that it was. The state of M.’s temper was also explained. There was nothing that made him more angry than having to divert his staff from their primary duty. This duty was espionage, and when necessary sabotage and subversion. Anything else was a misuse of the Service and of Secret Funds which, God knows, were meagre enough.

‘Any questions?’ M.’s jaw stuck out like the prow of a ship. The jaw seemed to tell Bond to pick up the files and get the hell out of the office and let M. move on to something important.

Bond knew that a part of all this – if only a small part – was an act. M. had certain bees in his bonnet. They were famous in the Service, and M. knew they were. But that did not mean that he would allow them to stop buzzing. There were queen bees, like the misuse of the Service, and the search for true as distinct from wishful intelligence, and there were worker bees. These included such idiosyncrasies as not employing men with beards, or those who were completely bilingual, instantly dismissing men who tried to bring pressure to bear on him through family relationships with members of the Cabinet, mistrusting men or women who were too ‘dressy’, and those who called him ‘sir’ off-duty; and having an exaggerated faith in Scotsmen. But M. was ironically conscious of his obsessions, as, thought Bond, a Churchill or a Montgomery were about theirs. He never minded his bluff, as it partly was, being called on any of them. Moreover, he would never have dreamed of sending Bond out on an assignment without proper briefing.

Bond knew all this. He said mildly: ‘Two things, sir. Why are we taking this thing on, and what lead, if any, have Station I got towards the people involved in it?’

M. gave Bond a hard, sour look. He swivelled his chair sideways so that he could watch the high, scudding October clouds through the broad window. He reached out for his pipe, blew through it sharply, and then, as if this action had let off the small head of steam, replaced it gently on the desk. When he spoke, his voice was patient, reasonable. ‘As you can imagine, 007, I do not wish the Service to become involved in this drug business. Earlier this year I had to take you off other duties for a fortnight so that you could go to Mexico and chase off that Mexican grower. You nearly got yourself killed. I sent you as a favour to the Special Branch. When they asked for you again to tackle this Italian gang I refused. Ronnie Vallance went behind my back to the Home Office and the Ministry of Health. The Ministers pressed me. I said that you were needed here and that I had no one else to spare. Then the two Ministers went to the P.M.’ M. paused. ‘And that was that. I must say the P.M. was very persuasive. Took the line that heroin, in the quantities that have been coming in, is an instrument of psychological warfare – that it saps a country’s strength. He said he wouldn’t be surprised to find that this wasn’t just a gang of Italians out to make big money – that subversion and not money was at the back of it.’ M. smiled sourly. ‘I expect Ronnie Vallance thought up that line of argument. Apparently his narcotics people have been having the devil of a time with the traffic – trying to stop it getting a hold on the teenagers as it has in America. Seems the dance halls and the amusement arcades are full of pedlars. Vallance’s Ghost Squad have managed to penetrate back up the line to one of the middle-men, and there’s no doubt it’s all coming from Italy, hidden in Italian tourists’ cars. Vallance has done what he can through the Italian police and Interpol, and got nowhere. They get so far back up the pipeline, arrest a few little people, and then, when they seem to be getting near the centre, there’s a blank wall. The inner ring of distributors are too frightened or too well paid.’

Bond interrupted. ‘Perhaps there’s protection somewhere, sir. That Montesi business didn’t look so good.’

M. shrugged impatiently. ‘Maybe, maybe. And you’ll have to watch out for that too, but my impression is that the Montesi case resulted in a pretty extensive clean-up. Anyway, when the P.M. gave me the order to get on with it, it occurred to me to have a talk with Washington. C.I.A. were very helpful. You know the Narcotics Bureau have a team in Italy. Have had ever since the War. They’re nothing to do with C.I.A. – run by the American Treasury Department, of all people. The American Treasury control a so-called Secret Service that looks after drug smuggling and counterfeiting. Pretty crazy arrangement. Often wonder what the F.B.I. must think of it. However,’ M. slowly swivelled his chair away from the window. He linked his hands behind his head and leaned back, looking across the desk at Bond. ‘The point is that the C.I.A. Rome Station works pretty closely with this little narcotics team. Has to, to prevent crossed lines and so on. And C.I.A. – Alan Dulles himself, as a matter of fact – gave me the name of the top narcotics agent used by the Bureau. Apparently he’s a double. Does a little smuggling as cover. Chap called Kristatos. Dulles said that of course he couldn’t involve his people in any way and he was pretty certain the Treasury Department wouldn’t welcome their Rome Bureau playing too closely with us. But he said that, if I wished, he would get word to this Kristatos that one of our, er, best men would like to make contact with a view to doing business. I said I would much appreciate that, and yesterday I got word that the rendezvous is fixed for the day after tomorrow.’ M. gestured towards the files in front of Bond. ‘You’ll find all the details in there.’

There was a brief silence in the room. Bond was thinking that the whole affair sounded unpleasant, probably dangerous and certainly dirty. With the last quality in mind, Bond got to his feet and picked up the files. ‘All right, sir. It looks like money. How much will we pay for the traffic to stop?’

M. let his chair tip forward. He put his hands flat down on the desk, side by side. He said roughly: ‘A hundred thousand pounds. In any currency. That’s the P.M.’s figure. But I don’t want you to get hurt. Certainly not picking other people’s coals out of the fire. So you can go up to another hundred thousand if there’s bad trouble. Drugs are the biggest and tightest ring in crime.’ M. reached for his in-basket and took out a file of signals. Without looking up he said: ‘Look after yourself.’Signor Kristatos picked up the menu. He said: ‘I do not beat about bushes, Mr Bond. How much?’

‘Fifty thousand pounds for one hundred per cent results.’

Kristatos said indifferently: ‘Yes. Those are important funds. I shall have melon with prosciutto ham and a chocolate ice-cream. I do not eat greatly at night. These people have their own Chianti. I commend it.’

The waiter came and there was a brisk rattle of Italian. Bond ordered Tagliatelli Verdi with a Genoese sauce which Kristatos said was improbably concocted of basil, garlic and fir-cones.

When the waiter had gone, Kristatos sat and chewed silently on a wooden toothpick. His face gradually became dark and glum as if bad weather had come to his mind. The black, hard eyes that glanced restlessly at everything in the restaurant except Bond, glittered. Bond guessed that Kristatos was wondering whether or not to betray somebody. Bond said encouragingly: ‘In certain circumstances, there might be more.’

Kristatos seemed to make up his mind. He said: ‘So?’ He pushed back his chair and got up. ‘Forgive me. I must visit the toiletta.’ He turned and walked swiftly towards the back of the restaurant.

Bond was suddenly hungry and thirsty. He poured out a large glass of Chianti and swallowed half of it. He broke a roll and began eating, smothering each mouthful with deep yellow butter. He wondered why rolls and butter are delicious only in France and Italy. There was nothing else on his mind. It was just a question of waiting. He had confidence in Kristatos. He was a big, solid man who was trusted by the Americans. He was probably making some telephone call that would be decisive. Bond felt in good spirits. He watched the passers-by through the plate-glass window. A man selling one of the Party papers went by on a bicycle. Flying from the basket in front of the handle-bars was a pennant. In red on white it said: PROGRESSO? – SI! – AVVENTURI? – no! Bond smiled. That was how it was. Let it so remain for the rest of the assignment.On the far side of the square, rather plain room, at the corner table by the caisse, the plump fair-haired girl with the dramatic mouth said to the jovial good-living man with the thick rope of spaghetti joining his face to the plate: ‘He has a rather cruel smile. But he is very handsome. Spies aren’t usually so good-looking. Are you sure you are right, mein Täubchen?’