Carte Blanche Part 2

The Irishman would have taken the rucksack and everything else from the boot, of course. Inside the car, though, on the inverted ceiling, towards the back seat, there were a few sc.r.a.ps of paper. Bond jammed them into his pockets before the flames forced him away. He ran back to the Jetta and sped off towards Highway 21, away from the approaching flas.h.i.+ng lights.

He fished out his mobile. It resembled an iPhone, but was a bit larger and featured special optics, audio systems and other hardware. The unit contained multiple phones one that could be registered to an agent's official or nonofficial cover ident.i.ty, then a hidden unit, with hundreds of operational apps and encryption packages. (Because the device had been developed by Q Branch it had taken all of a day for some wit in the office to dub them 'iQPhones'.) He opened an app that gave him a priority link to a GCHQ tracking centre. He recited into the voice-recognition system a description of the yellow Zastava Eurozeta lorry the Irishman was driving. The computer in Cheltenham would automatically recognise Bond's location and determine projected routes for the truck, then train the satellite to look for any nearby vehicle of this sort and track it.

Five minutes later he heard his phone buzz. Excellent. He glanced at the screen.

But the message was not from the snoops; it was from Bill Tanner, chief of staff at Bond's outfit. The subject heading said: CRASH DIVE shorthand for Emergency.

Eyes flipping from the road to the phone, Bond read on.

GCHQ intercept: Serbian security agent a.s.signed to you in Incident 20 operation died on way to hospital. Reported you abandoned him. Serbs have priority order for your arrest. Evacuate immediately.

Monday THE RAG-AND-BONE MAN.

6.

After three and a half hours' sleep James Bond was woken at seven a.m. in his Chelsea flat by the electronic tone of his mobile phone's alarm clock. His eyes focused on the white ceiling of the small bedroom. He blinked twice and, ignoring the pain in his shoulder, head and knees, rolled out of the double bed, prodded by the urge to get on the trail of the Irishman and Noah.

His clothes from the mission to Novi Sad lay on the hardwood floor. He tossed the tactical outfit into a training kitbag, gathered up the rest of his clothes and dropped them into the laundry bin, a courtesy to May, his treasure of a Scottish housekeeper who came three times a week to sort out his domestic life. He would not think of having her pick up his clutter.

Naked, Bond walked into the bathroom, turned on the shower as hot as he could stand it and scrubbed himself hard with unscented soap. Then he turned the temperature down, stood under freezing water until he could tolerate that no longer, stepped out and dried himself. He examined his wounds from last night: two large aubergine-coloured bruises on his leg, some sc.r.a.pes and the slice on his shoulder from the grenade shrapnel. Nothing serious.

He shaved with a heavy, double-bladed safety razor, its handle of light buffalo horn. He used this fine accessory not because it was greener to the environment than the plastic disposables that most men employed but simply because it gave a better shave and required some skill to wield; James Bond found comfort even in small challenges.

By seven fifteen he was dressed: a navy-blue Ca.n.a.li suit, a white sea island s.h.i.+rt and a burgundy Grenadine tie, the latter items from Turnbull & a.s.ser. He donned black shoes, slip-ons; he never wore laces, except for combat footwear or when tradecraft required him to send silent messages to a fellow agent via prearranged loopings.

Onto his wrist he slipped his steel Rolex Oyster Perpetual, the 34mm model, the date window its only complication; Bond did not need to know the phases of the moon or the exact moment of high tide at Southampton. And he suspected very few people did.

Most days he had breakfast his favourite meal of the day at a small hotel nearby in Pont Street. Occasionally he cooked for himself one of the few things he was capable of whipping up in the kitchen: three eggs softly scrambled with Irish b.u.t.ter. The steaming curds were accompanied by bacon and crisp wholemeal toast, with more Irish b.u.t.ter and marmalade.

Today, though, the urgency of Incident Twenty was in full bloom so there was no time for food. Instead he brewed a cup of fiercely strong Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee, which he drank from a china mug as he listened to Radio 4 to learn whether or not the train incident and subsequent deaths had made the international news. They had not.

His wallet and cash were in his pocket, his car key, too. He grabbed the plastic carrier bag of the items he had collected in Serbia and the locked steel box that contained his weapon and ammunition, which he could not carry legally within the UK.

He hurried down the stairs of his flat formerly two s.p.a.cious stables. He unlocked the door and stepped into the garage. The cramped s.p.a.ce was large enough, just, for the two cars that were inside, plus a few extra tyres and tools. He climbed into the newer of the vehicles, the latest model Bentley Continental GT, its exterior the company's distinctive granite grey, with supple black hide inside.

The turbo W12 engine murmured to life. Tapping the downs.h.i.+ft paddle into first gear, he eased into the road, leaving behind his other vehicle, less powerful and more temperamental but just as elegant: a 1960s E-type Jaguar, which had been his father's.

Driving north, Bond manoeuvred through the traffic, with tens of thousands of others who were similarly making their way to offices throughout London at the start of yet another week although, of course, in Bond's case this mundane image belied the truth.

Exactly the same could be said for his employer itself.

Three years ago, James Bond had been sitting at a grey desk in the monolithic grey Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall, the sky outside not grey at all but the blue of a Highland loch on a bright summer's day. After leaving the Royal Naval Reserve, he had had no desire for a job managing accounts at Saatchi & Saatchi or reviewing balance sheets for NatWest and had telephoned a former Fettes fencing teammate, who had suggested he try Defence Intelligence.

After a stint at DI, writing a.n.a.lyses that were described as both blunt and valuable, he had wondered to his supervisor if there might be a chance to see a little more action.

Not long after that conversation, he had received a mysterious missive, handwritten, not an email, requesting his presence for lunch in Pall Mall, at the Travellers Club.

On the day in question, Bond had been led into the dining room and seated in a corner opposite a solid man in his mid-sixties, identified only as the 'Admiral'. He wore a grey suit that perfectly matched his eyes. His face was jowled and his head crowned with a spa.r.s.e constellation of birthmarks, evident through the thinning, swept-back brown and grey hair. The Admiral had looked steadily at Bond without challenge or disdain or excessive a.n.a.lysis. Bond had no trouble in returning the gaze a man who has killed in battle and nearly died himself is not cowed by anyone's stare. He realised, however, that he had absolutely no idea what was going on in the man's mind.

They did not shake hands.

Menus descended. Bond ordered halibut on the bone, steamed, with Hollandaise, boiled potatoes and grilled asparagus. The Admiral selected the grilled kidney and bacon, then asked Bond, 'Wine?'

'Yes, please.'

'You choose.'

'Burgundy, I should think,' Bond said. 'Cte de Beaune? Or a Chablis?'

'The Alex Gambal Puligny, perhaps?' the waiter suggested.

'Perfect.'

The bottle arrived a moment later. The waiter smoothly displayed the label and poured a little into Bond's gla.s.s. The wine was the colour of pale b.u.t.ter, earthy and excellent, and exactly the right temperature, not too chilled. Bond sipped, nodded his approval and the gla.s.ses were half filled.

When the waiter had departed, the older man said gruffly, 'You're a veteran and so am I. Neither of us has any interest in small-talk. I've asked you here to discuss a career opportunity.'

'I thought as much, sir.' Bond hadn't intended to add the final word, but it had been impossible not to do so.

'You may be familiar with the rule at the Travellers about not exposing business doc.u.ments. Afraid we'll have to break it.' The older man withdrew from his breast pocket an envelope. He handed it over. 'This is similar to the Official Secrets Act declaration.'

'I've signed one-'

'Of course you have for Defence Intelligence,' the man said briskly, revealing his impatience at stating the obvious. 'This has a few more teeth. Read it.'

Bond did so. More teeth indeed, to put it mildly.

The Admiral said, 'If you're not interested in signing we'll finish our lunch and discuss the recent election or trout fis.h.i.+ng in the north or how those d.a.m.n Kiwis beat us again last week and get back to our offices.' He lifted a bushy eyebrow.

Bond hesitated only a moment, then scrawled his name across the line and handed it back. The doc.u.ment vanished.

A sip of wine. The Admiral asked, 'Have you heard of the Special Operations Executive?'

'I have, yes.' Bond had few idols, but high on the list was Winston Churchill. In his young days as a reporter and soldier in Cuba and Sudan Churchill had formed a great respect for guerrilla operations and later, after the outbreak of the Second World War, he and the minister for economic warfare, Hugh Dalton, had created the SOE to arm partisans behind German lines and to parachute in British spies and saboteurs. Also called Churchill's Secret Army, it had caused immeasurable harm to the n.a.z.is.

'Good outfit,' the Admiral said, then grumbled, 'They closed it down after the war. Inter-agency nonsense, organisational difficulties, in-fighting at MI6 and Whitehall.' He took a sip of the fragrant wine and conversation slowed while they ate. The meal was superb. Bond said so. The Admiral rasped, 'Chef knows what he's about. No aspirations to cook his way on to American television. Are you familiar with how Five and Six got going?'

'Yes, sir I've read quite a lot about it.'

In 1909, in response to concerns about a German invasion and spies within England (concerns that had been prompted, curiously, by popular thriller novels), the Admiralty and the War Office had formed the Secret Service Bureau. Not long after that, the SSB split into the Directorate of Military Intelligence Section 5, or MI5, to handle domestic security, and Section 6, or MI6, to handle foreign espionage. Six was the oldest continuously operating spy organisation in the world, despite China's claim to the contrary.

The Admiral said, 'What's the one element that stands out about them both?'

Bond couldn't begin to guess.

'Plausible deniability,' the older man muttered. 'Both Five and Six were created as cut-outs so that the Crown, the prime minister, the Cabinet and the War Office didn't have to get their hands dirty with that nasty business of spying. Just as bad now. Lot of scrutiny of what Five and Six do. s.e.xed-up dossiers, invasion of privacy, political snooping, rumours of illegal targeted killings . . . Everybody's clamouring for transparency. Of course, no one seems to care that the face of war is changing, that the other side doesn't play by the rules much any more.' Another sip of wine. 'There's thinking, in some circles, that we need to play by a different set of rules too. Especially after Nine-eleven and Seven-seven.'

Bond said, 'So, if I understand correctly, you're talking about starting a new version of the SOE, but one that isn't technically part of Six, Five or the MoD.'

The Admiral held Bond's eye. 'I read those reports of your performance in Afghanistan Royal Naval Reserve, yet still you managed to get yourself attached to forward combat units on the ground. Took some doing.' The cool eyes regarded him closely. 'I understand you also managed some missions behind the lines that weren't quite so official. Thanks to you, some fellows who could have caused quite a lot of mischief never got the chance.'

Bond was about to sip from his gla.s.s of Puligny-Montrachet, the highest incarnation of the chardonnay grape. He set the gla.s.s down without doing so. How the devil had the old man learnt about those?

In a low, even voice the man said, 'There's no shortage of Special Air or Boat Service chaps about who know their way around a knife and sniper rifle. But they don't necessarily fit into other, shall we say subtler, situations. And then there are plenty of talented Five and Six fellows who know the difference between . . .' he glanced at Bond's gla.s.s '. . . a Cte de Beaune and a Cte de Nuits and can speak French as fluently as they can Arabic but who'd faint at the sight of blood, theirs or anyone else's.' The steel eyes zeroed in. 'You seem to be a rather rare combination of the best of both.'

The Admiral put down his knife and fork on the bone china. 'Your question.'

'My . . . ?'

'About a new version of the Special Operations Executive. The answer is yes. In fact, it already exists. Would you be interested in joining?'

'I would,' Bond said without hesitation. 'Though I should like to ask: what exactly does it do?'

The Admiral thought for a moment, as if polis.h.i.+ng burrs off his reply. 'Our mission,' he said, 'is simple. We protect the Realm . . . by any means necessary.'

7.

In the sleek, purring Bentley, Bond now approached the headquarters of this very organisation, near Regent's Park, after half an hour of the zigzagging that driving in central London necessitates.

The name of his employer was nearly as vague as that of the Special Operations Executive: the Overseas Development Group. The director-general was the Admiral, known only as M.

Officially the ODG a.s.sisted British-based companies in opening or expanding foreign operations and investing abroad. Bond's OC, or official cover, within it was as a security and integrity a.n.a.lyst. His job was to travel the world and a.s.sess business risks.

No matter that the moment he landed he a.s.sumed an NOC a nonofficial cover with a fict.i.tious ident.i.ty, tucked away the Excel spreadsheets, put on his 5.11 tactical outfit and armed himself with a .308 rifle with Nikon Buckmasters scope. Or perhaps he'd slip into a well-cut Savile Row suit to play poker with a Chechnyan arms dealer in a private Kiev club, for the chance to a.s.sess his security detail in a run-up to the evening's main event: the man's rendition to a black site in Poland.

Tucked away inconspicuously in the hierarchy of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the ODG was housed in a narrow, six-storey Edwardian building on a quiet road, just off Devons.h.i.+re Street. It was separated from bustling Marylebone Road by lackl.u.s.tre but camouflaging solicitors' quarters, NGO offices and doctors' surgeries.

Bond now motored to the entrance of the tunnel leading to the car park beneath the building. He glanced into the iris scanner, then was vetted again, this time by a human being. The barrier lowered and he eased the car forward in search of a parking bay.

The lift, too, checked Bond's blue eyes, then took him up to the ground floor. He stepped into the armourer's office, beside the pistol range, and handed the locked steel box to redheaded Freddy Menzies, a former corporal in the SAS and one of the finest firearms men in the business. He would make sure the Walther was cleaned, oiled and checked for damage, the magazines filled with Bond's preferred loads.

'She'll be ready in half an hour,' Menzies said. 'She behave herself, 007?'

Bond had professional affection for certain tools of his trade but he didn't personify them and, if anything, a .40 calibre Walther, even the compact Police Pistol Short, would definitely be a 'he'. 'Acquitted itself well,' he replied.

He took the lift to the third floor where he stepped out and turned left, walking down a bland, white-painted corridor, the walls a bit scuffed, their monotony broken by prints of London from the era of Cromwell to Victoria's reign and of battlefields aplenty. Someone had brightened up the windowsills with vases of greenery fake, of course; the real thing would have meant employing external maintenance staff to water and prune.

Bond spotted a young woman in front of a desk at the end of a large open area filled with work stations. Sublime, he had thought, upon meeting her a month ago. Her face was heart-shaped, with high cheekbones, and surrounded by Rossetti red hair that cascaded from her marvellous temples to past her shoulders. A tiny off-centre dimple, which he found completely charming, distressed her chin. Her hazel eyes, golden green, held yours intently, and to Bond, her figure was as a woman's should be: slim and elegant. Her unpainted nails were trimmed short. Today she was in a knee-length black skirt and an apricot s.h.i.+rt, high-necked, yet thin enough to hint at lace beneath, managing to be both tasteful and provocative. Her legs were embraced by nylon the colour of cafe au lait.

Stockings or tights? Bond couldn't help but wonder.

Ophelia Maidenstone was an intelligence a.n.a.lyst with MI6. She was stationed with the ODG as a liaison officer because the Group was not an intelligence-gathering organisation; it was operational, tactical, largely. Accordingly, like the Cabinet and the prime minister, it was a consumer of 'product', as intelligence was called. And the ODG's main supplier was Six.

Admittedly, Philly's appearance and forthright manner were what had initially caught Bond's attention, just as her tireless efforts and resourcefulness had held it. Equally alluring, though, was her love of driving. Her favourite vehicle was a BSA 1966 Spitfire, the A65, one of the most beautiful motorcycles ever made. It wasn't the most powerful bike in the Birmingham Small Arms' line but it was a true cla.s.sic and, when properly tuned (which, G.o.d bless her, she did herself), it left a broad streak of rubber at the take-off line. She'd told Bond she liked to drive in all weather and had bought an insulated leather jumpsuit that let her take to the roads whenever she fancied. He'd imagined it as an extremely tight-fitting garment and arched an eyebrow. He'd received in return a sardonic smile, which told him that his gesture had ricocheted like a badly placed bullet.

She was, it emerged, engaged to be married. The ring, which he'd noted immediately, was a deceptive ruby.

So, that settled that.

Philly now looked up with an infectious smile. 'James, h.e.l.lo! . . . Why are you looking at me like that?'

'I need you.'

She tucked back a loose strand of hair. 'Delighted to help if I could but I've got something on for John. He's in Sudan. They're about to start shooting.'

The Sudanese had been fighting the British, the Egyptians, other nearby African nations and themselves for more than a hundred years. The Eastern Alliance, several Sudanese states near the Red Sea, wanted to secede and form a moderate secular country. The regime in Khartoum, still buffeted by the recent independence movement in the south, was not pleased by this initiative.

Bond said, 'I know. I was the one going originally. I drew Belgrade instead.'

'The food's better,' she said, with studied gravity. 'If you like plums.'

'It's just that I collected some things in Serbia that should be looked into.'

'It's never "just" with you, James.'

Her mobile buzzed. She frowned, peering at the screen. As she took the call, her piercing hazel eyes swung his way and regarded him with some humour. She said, into the phone, 'I see.' When she had disconnected, she said, 'You pulled in some favours. Or bullied someone.'

'Me? Never.'

'It seems that war in Africa will have to soldier on without me. So to speak.' She went to another work station and handed the Khartoum baton to a fellow spook.

Bond sat down. There seemed to be something different about her s.p.a.ce but he couldn't work out what it was. Perhaps she'd tidied it, or rearranged the furniture as far as anyone could in the tiny area.

When she came back she focused her eyes on him. 'Right, then. I'm all yours. What do we have?'

'Incident Twenty.'

'Ah, that. I wasn't on the hot list so you'd better brief me.'

Like Bond, Ophelia Maidenstone was Developed Vetting Cleared by the Defence Vetting Agency, the FCO and Scotland Yard, which permitted virtually unlimited access to top-secret material, short of the most cla.s.sified nuclear-arms data. He briefed her on Noah, the Irishman, the threat on Friday and the incident in Serbia. She took careful notes.

'I need you to play detective inspector. This is all we have to go on.' He handed her the carrier bag containing the slips of paper he'd s.n.a.t.c.hed from the burning car outside Novi Sad and his own sungla.s.ses. 'I'll need identification fast very fast and anything else you dig up.'

She lifted her phone and requested collection of the materials for a.n.a.lysis at the MI6 laboratory or, if that proved insufficient, Scotland Yard's extensive forensic operation in Specialist Crimes. She rang off. 'Runner's on his way.' She found a pair of tweezers in her handbag and extracted the two slips of paper. One was a bill from a pub near Cambridge, the date recent. It had been settled in cash unfortunately.

The other slip of paper read: Boots March. 17. No later than that. Was it code or merely a reminder from two months ago to pick up something at the chemist?