advanced towards the glass feeling as if someone had applied a coating of talcum powder to the roof of his mouth. Stromberg was watching him intently. What the devil could he say? That he had left his spectacles at the hotel and was blind without them? How ridiculously lame it sounded. He peered into the tank - my God! Could it be true? He looked again. What a fantastic coincidence. The chap he had shared a study with at school had kept two of those. He remembered the outlandish Latin name.
‘Well?’
‘You mean the Pachypanchax Playfairi?’ Bond's voice was casual to the point of ennui. ‘The Thick Panchax.’ He tapped the glass as if it was the window of a petshop with a particularly beguiling puppy behind it. ‘Happy little chap, isn’t he?’ Bond turned away and walked as swiftly as he dared towards a glass case lit from inside. ‘What’s this?’
‘Something that I think you’ll find very interesting, Mr Sterling.’ There was no warmth in the voice but the edge of distrustful menace had been blunted. ‘A plan that I am developing. It’s a project very close to my heart.’
Stromberg’s small, sphincter mouth had devoured its lips and his face glowed with a strange luminous sheen. Bond was glad to look down into the case. It clearly represented the bed of the ocean and showed inter-connected glass-domed buildings. Like living in a goldfish bowl, he thought to himself. Most imposing of all, the laboratory standing in the middle of the whole structure. The axle from which the spokes radiated. It must all be feasible. Bond wondered what kind of comment would be appropriate.
‘How long do you envisage people staying down there?'
A chilling intensity froze the liquid eyes. ‘Indefinitely, Mr Sterling.’
There was a challenge in the voice but before Bond could consider means of answering it, he was saved by the soft, muted warbling of a concealed telephone.
‘Excuse me, Mr Sterling.’ Stromberg crossed to the wall by the lift and opened a concealed cupboard. The incongruous warbling stopped. Bond turned towards the far aquarium as a huge grey shadow passed across the glass and then swung abruptly away. A shark. And a big one. It must have been fourteen foot at least. Bond moved forward and his jaw tightened as the sinister flat head planed in towards him. The half-moon mouth seemed to be set in a contemptuous sneer, as if daring him to cross the glass barrier that divided them, and the flick of the turning tail was dismissive. Bond watched the shark disappear into the cobalt gloom and wondered how far back the aquarium went. There seemed to be some gap in the rocks like the entrance to a tunnel. He was about to turn away when something emerged from the tunnel. A large spider-crab clutching an object in one of its pincers. Bond peered forward. The crab was dragging a human hand, severed at the wrist. The flesh was hideous, glaucous green but the long female nails, with one exception, were intact. Bond controlled a desire to retch.
‘I am sorry, Mr Sterling- Stromberg had materialized behind him like a ghost. Had he too seen the hand? Bond turned away and tried to appear composed before the searching eyes that fed on secrets. ‘Something has arisen that requires my urgent attention. I hope you will forgive me if I bring our meeting to a close. At least you will have enjoyed a small maritime excursion/
‘Oh, much more.’ Bond could feel his legs carrying him towards the lift as if operating under their own volition. ‘Just to catch a glimpse of your operation was a privilege.’
Stromberg pressed a button and the lift door slid open. ‘Goodbye, Mr Sterling. We never had an opportunity to discuss your activities but I wish you success with them.’
Bond inclined his head deferentially. ‘What I’ve seen today encourages me to redouble my efforts. Goodbye, Mr Stromberg.’
The lift door closed, and for several seconds Stromberg continued to stare at it reflectively. He then crossed to the aquarium where Bond had last been standing and looked downwards. His was not a face on which it was easy to read expressions, but a faint cloud of preoccupation wrinkled the serene brow. Obediently, the swivelling lenses of the closed- circuit television followed his every move and awaited the inevitable summons. Stromberg was still looking at the floor of the tank when he eventually spoke.
‘Send Jaws in. There is more work to be done.’
Motorcycles are Dangerous
‘Comfortable?’ asked Bond.
‘Physically, yes. Mentally, less so.’ Anya looked at him challengingly. ‘It does not seem to be the moment to go riding in fast sports-cars.’
Bond coaxed the Esprit’s stubby gear-stick into first. ‘Fasten your seat belt. You’ll enjoy it more.’
‘But where are we going?’
‘I want to take a closer look at Stromberg’s laboratory.’
‘We could take a boat from the hotel.’
‘Too risky. I think Stromberg has a number of friends at the hotel They’d soon be on the wireless to him. Has your baggage been searched?’
Anya looked at him sharply. ‘I thought it was you.’
Bond smiled. ‘Not guilty. I’ve had everything searched - and by experts. They even checked the heels of my shoes. I found the marks where they'd been prising out the nails.’ Bond paused whilst a small, nut-brown child retrieved her beach ball from beneath the wheels, and slowly took the car down the drive.
Anya settled hack against the head-rest and stretched out her legs. ‘So we’re going to approach the place from a different direction?' Bond raised approving eyes from legs to road. ‘Exactly.’ He paused at the entrance to the drive and swung the wheel to the left. The Lotus came round like a whippet with its nose down on a rabbit and the race-proved two-litre 907 engine began to bubble happily as the revs built up. Anya watched the expression of tight-lipped anticipation on Bond s face and smiled to herself. He was like a child with a new toy.
‘Do you think they could operate the tracking system from the laboratory?’
Bond frowned. ‘It’s feasible, I suppose. What I don’t understand is how they could have sunk the submarines - if that’s what happened.’ He did a racing change and blessed the telescopic shock-absorbers as the Esprit ironed out a pot-hole and swung round a corner as if hooked to a rail.
Anya shrank back into the bucket seat. ‘Do you always drive like this?’
Bond darted a glance at her. ‘No. Sometimes I speed a little.’ A piece of straight road loomed up and the needle flickered against the hundred mark. ‘How did your conducted tour go?’
‘Very slowly. Nobody understood my questions, or at least, pretended not to. But some of those men were Bulgars, I would swear it. They understood Russian.’
‘So you saw nothing? No laboratories? No unusual equipment?’
‘They showed me a kind of sitting-room. That was most untechnical. Very old-fashioned in fact - except for the model of a tanker. The latest addition to the Stromberg line. It is called the
Anya’s chin lifted proudly. ‘After the Karl Marx.''
Bond sighed and slipped past a lorry while the driver wondered why he had never seen him coming up in the rear-view mirror. ‘I might have guessed. Maybe it would be a good idea to check out this
Anya leant across and tapped Bond lightly on the knee. ‘That will not be necessary, James’ - she pronounced it ‘Shems’ which Bond found rather charming - ‘I have already contacted our information service.*
Bond nodded and pursed his lips. It would be foolish to underestimate Major Amasova. She was the ultimate proof that beauty and brains could go together. He glanced in the rear-view mirror and frowned. That was funny. The motorcycle and side-car that had suddenly appeared behind them. The sea was on one side, a hundred feet below a low stone wall, and there was sheer cliff on the other. The motorcycle must have been in a lay-by. It was almost as if it had been waiting for them. Bond put his foot down and the Lotus surged forward. Anya caught up with her stomach and followed Bond’s checking eyes.
‘Do you think we’re being followed?’
‘Possibly. But they won’t be able to live with us in that thing. I’d be more worried if there was anyone in the sidecar.’ Bond put his foot down and flicked into fourth as the needle hovered round the ninety mark. The mounting excitement of the Grand Prix engine settled into a contented bay. Ahead was a long stretch of straight road with the
