Brokenclaw

‘No, Peter.’ He sounded quite shocked. ‘You only dispose of people who cannot be recycled. Remember? I have these officers here, in this place, just in case we have further need of them. Mind you, there might well come a point when we have to think seriously about their futures. But we have everything, even though our final ploy – an attempt to bring their leading scientist here – did not quite work out. He was required for corroboration only. We have the goods, Peter. Incidentally, have you brought the money?’

‘I have the means to collect it.’

The smile faded on Brokenclaw’s face. ‘The means? I understood from Beijing Hsia that you would bring it with you.’

Bond slowly shook his head. ‘That is not quite how we work. My instructions are to let Jenny check over the information and, providing she is satisfied, turn it into microdots which I shall personally return to Beijing Hsia. While she does the complicated photography, I go and collect the money. Or, at least I hope I can collect the money. You see, sir, I understood we were to operate with you in the San Francisco area. Looking from the windows this morning, I’m not certain that I know where we are.’

Brokenclaw Lee threw back his head and gave a huge laugh, his burly shoulders shaking with mirth. ‘Ah, it works,’ he still chuckled. ‘It always works on strangers, and it is all part of my methods for avoiding detection. They say that Brokenclaw Lee can come and go as he pleases, he can make himself invisible and fly away like an eagle. Yes, Peter Abelard, or Argentbright, come with me and let me show you. Come to these windows here.’ He rose and led the way across to the leaded mullion windows at the end of the room.

Bond joined him and looked out on the sweeping expanse of the Virginian Blue Ridge. Occasionally he detected movement, a car’s windshield reflecting sunlight. Also the sun had begun to shift, moving higher.

‘You see Virginia, yes?’ He could feel Brokenclaw’s smile.

‘Of course.’

‘Let me show you something else.’

Bond was aware of the big man’s hand moving to a point in the panelling between the two windows. There was a click and he glanced down to see that a small console with knobs, buttons and switches had slid from the wall. ‘Keep looking,’ said Brokenclaw.

Outside, there was a sudden darkening of the day, as though the sun had gone behind thick cloud, then he saw the clouds themselves, drawing in, covering the landscape until it was as black as night. Lights twinkled in the far distance, then there was complete darkness. It was an eerie experience.

Then, just as the night had come quickly across the view so there were streaks of pink on the horizon, washing the sky with light. A new dawn was coming up, but with unusual speed, and, as the daylight returned, Bond realised that they were not looking at the Blue Ridge Mountains any more.

He gasped audibly, for they now stood at these leaded windows looking out across London – his London, only it was not his London, but a London of an earlier time, the London reflected in the engraving over the fireplace. A London of the seventeenth century, complete in all its perspective, real enough to touch; there was even movement on the Thames which seemed to be flowing almost past the house.

‘You like that little trick? My time and place machine?’ Brokenclaw was fiddling with the buttons again, and in seconds the view of the Blue Ridge Mountains reappeared. The sense of time, place and dimension was startling.

‘How?’ Bond asked.

Brokenclaw laughed. ‘How? Oh, with a great deal of technology.’

He began to explain to Bond that they were in fact within a house that did not exist at all.

‘But I saw it. I saw its bulk last night when we arrived.’

‘You saw a house. But not this house. Did you notice the name of the company on whose executive jet you travelled?’

‘Silver something . . .’

‘Silver Service.’ Chi-Chi, dressed in a robe, had entered, Frozen Stalk Pu at her elbow.

‘Lady walk about. I bring her straight to you,’ Pu said.

‘Good,’ Brokenclaw gave another of his beaming smiles. ‘Go and bring coffee and more toast for the lady, Pu. You will take breakfast, Jenny? Yes, I may call you Jenny?’

‘Of course, and of course. I guess I must be disorientated. I could have sworn I saw the Blue Ridge Mountains from the windows of the guest suite.’

‘Come on in, darling.’ Bond crossed to her, kissing her cheek. ‘I left you to sleep.’

‘And I awoke and found you gone. So I came looking.’

‘Just in time. Mr Lee has been explaining why you can see the Blue Ridge, but I still don’t understand him. He says we are in a house that does not exist.’

‘Silver Service, Inc. That was on the side of the Gulfstream,’ she said, as though contributing something of immense value. ‘Am I right?’

‘Completely.’ Brokenclaw was still smiling the sly, want-to-know-a-secret smirk. ‘Silver Service, Inc. is a company which can never, never in a hundred years be tied to me. I own it, naturally, but nobody can ever prove that, if only because my name does not appear in any of its records. Like a number of companies I own, much is done on trust. Trust, and, well, I suppose you could say, fear.’

They moved back to the table as Frozen Stalk reappeared, carrying fresh coffee and toast. Lee gave orders to have the chafing dishes checked and asked what Ms Mo would like to eat. She said that toast would be just fine. ‘Toast and some preserves.’

They all took more coffee and, when Pu had left, Brokenclaw carried on his explanation.

‘The house you caught a glimpse of in the early hours of this morning, certainly exists. Silver Service, Inc. makes compact disks – for the young market, for those who have to have loud, discordant music with unbelievable lyrics. The company manages to get through about forty new bands in a year. The run-of-the-mill bands do not last long. However, it also owns, lock, stock, barrel, electronic keyboards and drum machines, four bands who manage to keep turning out albums which please their public so much that they make millions of dollars a year – millions for themselves and millions for Silver Service. The house you saw last night belongs to that company, who rents or sells it to members of one or another of the bands in vogue. If it has been sold, then the company simply buys it back when the band ceases to be financially viable. At the moment, it belongs to a young man called Halman, an odd name and I think not his own, Marty Halman, drummer for a band called Ice Age. He lives in that house, often with several concubines, and a very expensive and serious nasal habit. I believe he’s in residence at the moment, and I fear that Ice Age, who have been chart-toppers for nearly eighteen months, will soon be no more. But, while they last, they make a great deal of money. When they are gone, the house will be bought – I use the word loosely – by another member of one of Silver Service’s top groups, or bands.

‘The house has appeared during TV interviews; it’s even been raided by the police – that was before Mr Halman moved in. It is secluded, though within easy reach of San Francisco. Why, we even moved out the unrepentant Wanda to Sausalito in the early hours of this morning.’

‘But we came in through a great iron-bound door into that magnificent hall,’ Bond protested. Already he had some inkling of what Brokenclaw was telling them, but he would play the naive, amazed member of the audience if only to humour the magician.

‘And if you went to find that door, you would merely see part of Mr Halman’s end wall, with no windows, just the gable end. Of course, the door is there, and I can make it appear at the press of a button, but it is covered by steel and brick. A great slab of steel with a brick facade. A press of the button and the slab moves outwards and upwards. Rarely do we open that entrance during the daytime. We have other exits at the end of each of the long corridors underground.’

‘But the hallway, and . . .’ Bond continued to play being baffled.

‘The hallway exists, but the stairs lead to nowhere. The hallway and my study both exist, but they are as Chinese boxes within the strongly built house where Mr Halman resides. In other words, they are surrounded by quite a large portion of the building you saw last night. The main house is a great deal larger than our false hallway and my study. In fact, by the use of great construction skills, it is almost impossible to detect that our hallway and my study are within the house at all. They are bounded by corridors of their own, even moderately sized servants quarters, and, with some cleverly placed false windows, it would take even a very experienced architect a great deal of time to discover there is “missing space”, as we call it, within the main house.