and attractive girls.’ He held up four fingers, grasping one for each name, as though ticking them off. ‘There was Franzi Trauben, Elli Zuckermann, Irma Wagen and Emilie Nikolas.’ He laughed pleasantly again. ‘Emilie is a good name when you consider that we always spoke of our honeytrap targets as Emilies. But you know all that.’ He ran a hand through his dark hair. ‘Each of these girls had a well placed target, and they might have got away with it but for the fact that I was included.’ Suddenly his whole demeanour altered. ‘They used
So, this was the real Smolin – proud, arrogant, and unforgiving.
‘Surel y the
‘Casual labour?’ A fine spray of spittle clouded the air in front of Smolin’s lips as he spat the words out. ‘Of course we would train casual labour but never would we use it against a target of my importance.’
There he had it. My importance. Colonel Maxim Smolin regarded himself as inviolable, essential to the smooth running of one of the topmost secret organisations within the Soviet Union. The other was Bond’s older enemy, the onetime smersh, now totally reorganised as Department 8 of Directorate S, following their loss of credibility as Department V as in Victor. Smolin was breathing heavily, and Bond felt that old and ice-cold hand trace an invisible finger down his spine, an indication of fear. He recognised the stone-hard face of a killer, the muscular body, that brightness in the dark eyes.
From far away came the sound of a car’s horn. It gave three short blasts followed by a longer one.
‘They’re here,’ said Smolin, speaking again in German.
The ambulance doors were opened, revealing the full view of green slopes strewn with outcrops of grey rock and a half circle of trees. They were parked well off the road. Two cars, a BMW and a Mercedes, were making slow progress towards them. Bond looked at Smolin and cocked his head towards Heather.
‘I honestly have no knowledge of this Cream Cake business.’ He spoke quietly, hoping that in his blind rage Smolin might believe him. ‘It sounds more like a BND job than our people . . .’ Smolin turned. ‘It was your Service, James Bond. I have proof, believe me; just as you must believe we’ll sweat you until your very bones turn to water. There are still a couple of mysteries that need solving, and I’m here to solve them.’
‘Mysteries?’
The cars were near now and two of the men had descended from the ambulance, preparing for the transfer of their prisoners.
‘We have dealt with two of that nest of spiders – Trauben and Zuckermann. You might recognise them better as Bridget Hammond and Millicent Zampek. They were small fry, but they had to be squashed. This girl – my girl – may hold some of the answers in her tiny brain; and there’s another yet to come. Nikolas – Ebbie Heritage. Those two, and you, should fill in the gaps before we send you to hell and damnation.’
If he wanted Heather and Ebbie alive, why had he sent the thug with the mallet and the two who chased them down the fire escape? Smolin had spoken of the incident earlier as ‘some ill-advised idiots trying to kill her’. The most devious of ideas filtered into Bond’s mind as he watched Heather being carried to the Mercedes. He was surprised to see the driver loading the packages they had bought in Dublin into the boot. They had moved with great speed, Bond thought, to get everything out of his rented car in so short a time. But then the GRU were organised on military principles and the kidnap would be run with military precision. This was the first time he had been up against the GRU, and he was impressed by their strict standards.
In Moscow, they worked out of that decorative mansion at 19 Knamensky Street – once the property of a Tsarist millionaire – and were constantly at loggerheads with the KGB, who always claimed to have the upper hand, even though the GRU, by virtue of its military roots, was effectively set apart from the larger and better known intelligence and security service.
He felt Smolin’s arm on his shoulders.
‘Your turn, Mr Bond.’
They frogmarched him to the BMW, where they drew a thick sack over his head, handcuffed his wrists securely behind his back and forced him on to the floor. The sack smelled of grain, making his throat dry in a matter of minutes. He heard the sound of the ambulance starting up, and felt Smolin’s feet pressing down on his back as he took his seat. A moment later, the car started and they began to move away.
Smolin had said, ‘The honeytrap . . . was baited with four very young and attractive girls.’ Only the four girls had been mentioned. He had not spoken of Jungle Baisley and Fraulein Captain Dietrich, whom Heather had described as one of the two prime targets. Why? As he concentrated on trying to deduce their speed and direction, a more sinister scheme began to take shape. Was Jungle not yet blown as a member of the network? Had M performed a neat piece of misdirection when briefing him, or was there something more dangerous at work? Was there a connection with Norman Murray’s rumour of an officer more senior to Smolin in the field? Was Smolin under pressure?
He remembered Murray’s smiling face as he said, ‘Maxim Smolin . . . a stupid code name – Basilisk.’ Bond delved into what little he knew of mythology. The basilisk was a particularly revolting monster hatched from a cockerel’s egg by a serpent. Even the purest and most innocent humans perished by looking at the basilisk’s eyes. The creature would lay the whole world to waste but for its two enemies, the cockerel and the weasel. The weasel was immune and the basilisk died at the sound of a cock’s crow.
Bond wondered whether he was a cock, a weasel, or neither.
9
SCHLOSS GRUESOME
By Bond’s reckoning, they drove for roughly three hours. After half that time he lost all sense of direction, although his instincts told him they were crossing their own path again and again. In the dark, stuffy sack, cramped and uncomfortable on the floor of the car, he tried to work out exactly where they might be heading. When he was forced to abandon this, he began to examine the various theories that had first come to mind in the ambulance.
He did not doubt that Smolin’s threat to get a full rundown on Cream Cake from them would be carried out. The man’s reputation was enough to convince him of that. If Norman Murray’s vague information bore any truth, Smolin might not be entirely his own man. If the huge arrogance he had shown in the ambulance had been dented, it could be that the GRU officer would act irrationally and that could be Bond’s lever. He knew that it was now up to him somehow to influence events.
They stopped once. Smolin did not leave the car but said to Bond, ‘Your lady friend appears to have woken up, so they’re taking her for a short walk. She is quite safe. She will anyway remain docile for a while yet.’
Bond moved, trying to shift his position, but Smolin’s heel came down hard on one shoulder, almost causing him to shout with pain. He realised that his interrogation, when it came, would not be conducted along sophisticated lines but rather in an atmosphere of brutality.
Eventually they seemed to leave the well made road and follow an upward course on a rougher track. They were moving at around thirty miles an hour and bouncing a good deal. Then they met a good surface, turned slightly and came to a halt. He heard the engines dying and doors opening. He felt fresh air on his body. Smolin moved and hands pulled away the sack and freed his wrists.
‘You can get out of the car now, Mr Bond.’
Bond blinked, adjusting to the bright light as he tried to massage life back into his arms. Stiffly, he pulled himself on to the seat and then through the door. His legs felt as though they did not belong to him, while his back and arms ached so that he could hardly move. He had to clutch at the car to steady himself.
It took several minutes for him even to stand properly, and he made good use of the time to examine the
