‘Myra. But I was told . . .’
He turned and glared at her. ‘You here alone, Myra?’
‘Yes, but . . .’
‘No buts. Show me the other rooms.’
She shrugged, then took him back into her main room and through to a master bedroom, her bedroom, he thought, for the ledge in front of a built-in vanity mirror was bottle-scaped with everything from Chanel to Elizabeth Taylor’s Passion, plus various unguents unknown even to Bond.
There was one other room which looked as though it was ready for guests, sporting like Myra’s room, a king-sized bed. It flicked through his mind that this might be a shade tricky.
‘Okay, Myra. I understand you’ve a message for me.’
‘I must wait for . . .’ she began.
‘For nobody,’ he said firmly. ‘You have orders, I have orders. You have a message, for God’s sake, she’ll be here in a minute.’
‘It’s only a telephone number.’
‘Well?’
It was long distance with the 415 San Francisco area code.
‘I use that telephone?’ He inclined his head towards the only phone he could see.
‘Yes, but please . . .’
The buzzer sounded. Bond smiled at her. ‘That’ll be Héloïse now. It’s okay, Myra.’
But she was already over by the security panel asking her flat, ‘Yes?’
‘Héloïse.’ Chi-Chi’s voice was slightly distorted through the speaker.
‘Oh, come right up. Come straight up.’ Myra’s whole mood changed. She held the button for what seemed to be a long time, then turned back to Bond.
‘I’m sorry if I was difficult, but it’s been so long since I’ve seen Jenny. I’ve been on pins and needles all week, just waiting for your call. Oh, it’s going to be great to see her again. We were such friends when she lived here.’
9
BEDTIME STORIES
Myra hovered by the door, ready to snatch at the handle as soon as her old friend hit the buzzer. On the other side of the room, Bond tapped out a number on the telephone. But it was not the number Myra had given him. It rang twice, then a voice at the distant end said, ‘Curve’s Deli, Howard speaking. How can I help you?’
‘Oh, sorry, I think I’ve misdialled.’
‘Okay, sir.’ The line closed and Bond put down the instrument and began to move towards Myra and the door. There were ten combinations of the misdialled, or misrouted, code that he could have used. The ‘Oh, sorry,’ prefix meant that Grant’s people had to get a message urgently to Rushia and stand by for another call from Bond – Custodian.
The door buzzer gave two quick brrrrps and Myra wrenched at the handle. ‘Jenn . . .’ she began, then stepped back into the room, her mouth open. ‘You’re not!!’
‘Not Jenny Mo,’ Bond said, standing directly behind her as Chi-Chi came in, dumping her case and the canvas bag on the floor.
‘I don’t . . .’ Myra looked around her, eyes wide with terror. ‘Who are you? I thought Jenny . . .’
‘Get her into the bedroom, over there,’ he said sharply, and Chi-Chi moved in, caught Myra’s right wrist, spun her around and hissed, ‘Move.’
Myra tried to protest, but Chi-Chi merely applied a little pressure and she had no option but to do what was commanded.
‘Just keep her quiet in there. We’ll sort her out later.’
Chi-Chi said nothing, but indicated with her eyes that she could handle it. When the bedroom door closed he went to the phone again and tapped out the number Myra had given to him. It rang for quite a long time before a gruff, accented voice answered with a grunt.
‘I had a message to call you,’ Bond said.
‘Your name?’
He took a deep breath and prayed that Franks and Orr had got it right. ‘Peter Abelard.’
‘So you’ve arrived. Is Héloïse with you?’
‘Yes, but she’s pretty tired. It’s been a long trip.’
‘We have your wellbeing at heart.’ The voice became strong and not unpleasant. ‘That’s why we arranged an overnight stop before you come on to San Francisco. You leave tomorrow night, or tonight in your case, for it must be after midnight. American Airlines Flight 15, leaving JFK at nine fifteen. The tickets are being held in your names at the desk. Just be there before eight fifteen to pick them up. You get in here about half past midnight, and you will call this number as soon as you’re through the gate. You understand?’
‘We’ll be there.’
‘Good.’
Bond stood, silent and looking at the handset for a few seconds after they had disconnected, then he called to Chi-Chi, ‘Bring her out here, we’ve a whole lot of talking to do.’
Chi-Chi did not have Myra under restraint when the women came back into the room, and it was obvious that the tall girl was confused and upset; her eyes were red and filled with tears.
Chi-Chi sat her down in one of the leather chairs. ‘Tell my friend what you’ve told me.’ Her voice had almost a parade ground snap in it.
Myra looked up at Bond, and then away again quickly, as though very frightened. ‘Just tell him,’ Chi-Chi commanded again.
‘I was expecting my old friend, Jenny,’ she began.
‘Yes, we all know that. Tell him why you were expecting her.’
She bit her lip. ‘They told me that she was one of the people who would come during the period from twenty-seventh of September until seventh of this month.’ She was still very tearful.
‘And you were to identify her for them? Whoever “they” happen to be.’
‘No . . . No . . . No,’ in rapid succession, with a wild shaking of the head. ‘No, they had no idea that I’d ever known anyone by the name of Jenny Mo.’
Bond thought this was an unlikely story, but he kept up the fiction. ‘Myra, who are they?’
‘I . . .’ she began, then faltered and started again, ‘I don’t really know. People I am indebted to.’
‘That’s as far as I got with her,’ Chi-Chi muttered.
‘See if you can rustle up some coffee or something.’ Bond moved to sit near Myra, but the girl half rose. ‘How stupid of me, I have food waiting for you. I’m sorry to be so damned wet, but – well, I’ve so looked forward to seeing Jenny, and this is a blow. I thought she was dead.’
‘Sit down,’ Bond spoke softly, gently, glancing up at Chi-Chi. His eyes tried to indicate that they should play the good cop, bad cop routine. ‘Just coffee.’
Chi-Chi nodded and went towards the kitchen.
‘These people you say you’re beholden to – who are they, exactly?’
‘Are you police?’ A very small voice.
‘No. If you tell us the truth, Myra, nothing bad will happen to you.’
‘Then . . .’
‘I should warn you, Myra,’ Chi-Chi stood in the passageway to the kitchen, ‘if you do not tell us the truth, we shall know. Then you will wish you had never been born.’
Bond nodded to Myra, as though bearing out the Chinese girl’s words, while at the same time showing his own compassion.
There was a long, drifting hesitation, then Myra started again. ‘I’d better begin at the beginning, for I was born in China, just outside Peking, as they called it then, in 1948.’
So, Bond thought, she was older than he had suspected. Over forty in fact.
‘My parents had spent most of their lives in China. They were American citizens, Baptist missionaries, and you will know that things were chaotic in that strange country during the late 1940s . . .’