‘And what was it?’ Bond asked, though he had a feeling he knew.
‘Noah.’
16
The time was now half past five. Since it would be several hours before Philly received the intelligence she was waiting for, Bond suggested they meet for dinner.
She agreed and returned to her work station, while Bond composed an encrypted email to M, copying in Bill Tanner, saying that Noah was Severan Hydt and including a synopsis of his background and what had happened in March. He added that Hydt referred to the attack involved in Incident Twenty as the ‘Gehenna plan’. More would be forthcoming.
He received a terse reply:
007 -
Authorised to proceed. Appropriate liaison with domestic organisations expected.
M
My
Bond left his office, took the lift to the second floor and entered a large room filled with more computers than an electronics shop. A few men and women laboured at monitors, or at the type of work stations to be found in a university chemistry laboratory. Bond walked to a small, glass-walled office at the far end and tapped on the window.
Sanu Hirani, head of the ODG’s Q Branch, was a slim man of forty or so. His complexion was sallow and his luxuriant black hair framed a face handsome enough to get him roles in Bollywood. A brilliant cricketer, known for his fast bowling, he had degrees in chemistry, electrical engineering and computer science from top universities in the UK and America (where he had been successful in everything except introducing his sport to the Yanks, who could neither grasp the game’s subtleties, nor tolerate the length of a Test match).
Q Branch was the technical support enclave within the ODG and Hirani oversaw all aspects of the gadgetry that has always been used in tradecraft. Wizards for departments like Q Branch and the CIA’s Science and Technology Division spent their time coming up with hardware and software innovations, like miniature cameras, improbable weapons, concealments, communications devices and surveillance equipment – such as Hirani’s latest: a hypersensitive omnidirectional microphone mounted within a dead fly. (‘A bug in a bug,’ Bond had commented wryly to its creator, who had replied that he was the eighteenth person to make the joke and, by the way, a fly was not, biologically speaking, a bug.)
Since the ODG’s
But Hirani’s particular genius was his ability to invent and improvise, coming up with devices like the iQPhone. The ODG was, of all things, the patent holder on dozens of his inventions. When Bond or other O Branch agents were in the field and found themselves in a tight spot, one call to Hirani, at any time of day or night, and he would find a solution. He or his people might put something together in the office and pop it into the FCO diplomatic pouch for overnight delivery. More often, though, time was critical and Hirani would enlist one of his many wily innovators and scroungers around the world to build, find or modify a device in the field.
‘James.’ The men shook hands. ‘You’ve bought Incident Twenty, I hear.’
‘Seems so.’
Bond sat down, noticing a book on Hirani’s desk:
‘How serious is it?’
‘Rather,’ Bond said laconically, not sharing that he’d nearly been killed twice already in pursuing the assignment, which he’d had for less than forty-eight hours.
Sitting beneath pictures of early IBM computers and of Indian cricketers, Hirani asked, ‘What do you need?’
Bond lowered his voice so that the closest Q Branch worker, a young woman raptly staring at her screen, could not hear. ‘What kind of surveillance kits do you have that one man could put in place? I can’t get to the subject’s computer or phone but I may be able to plant something in his office, vehicle or home. Disposable. I probably can’t retrieve it later.’
‘Ah, yes…’ Hirani’s luminescent eyes dimmed.
‘Some problem, Sanu?’
‘Well, I must tell you, James. Not ten minutes ago I had a call from upstairs.’
‘Bill Tanner?’
‘No – farther upstairs.’
M. Dammit, Bond thought. He could see where this was going.
Hirani went on: ‘And he said that if anyone from O Branch wished to check out a surveillance kit I was to let him know immediately. A touch coincidental.’
‘A touch,’ Bond said sourly.
‘So,’ Hirani said, with a qualified smile, ‘shall I tell him that someone from O Branch wishes to check out a surveillance kit?’
‘Perhaps you could hold off for a bit.’
‘Well, get it sorted,’ he said, the gleam in his face restored. ‘I have some
Bond sighed. The off-limits devices sounded so damn perfect. He thanked the man and told him he’d be in touch. He returned to his office, where he found Mary Goodnight at her desk. He saw no reason for her to stay. ‘Scoot on home now. Good evening, Goodnight.’
She glanced at his latest injuries and forewent the opportunity for mothering him, which from past experience she knew would be deflected. She settled for ‘See to those, James,’ then gathered up her handbag and coat.
Sitting back, Bond was suddenly aware of the stench of his sweat and the crescents of brick dust under his nails. He wanted to get home and shower. Have his first drink of the day. Yet there was something he had to sort out first.
He turned to his screen and entered the Golden Wire’s general information database, from which he learnt where Severan Hydt’s business and home were located, the latter, curiously, in a low-income area of East London known as Canning Town. Green Way’s main premises were on the Thames near Rainham, abutting the Wildspace Conservation Park.
Bond peered at satellite maps of Hydt’s home and Green Way’s operation. It was vitally important to set up surveillance on the man. But there was no legitimate way to conduct it without enlisting Osborne-Smith and the A Branch snoop teams from MI5 – and the instant the Division Three man learnt Hydt’s identity he’d move in to ‘detain’ him and the Irishman. Bond considered the risk again. How realistic was his concern that if the two were pulled in, other co-conspirators would accelerate the carnage, or vanish until they struck again next month or next year?
Evil, James Bond had learnt, can be tirelessly patient.
