He quickly went through the cupboard and found nothing of interest, then went into the bedroom. Harding’s suitcase was in the wardrobe, along with a few items of clothing he had hung up. Bond reached for the suitcase but stopped cold when he heard a rattling of keys outside the door.
He bolted forward and slipped into the small bathroom. He quickly closed the door, leaving it slightly ajar, then stepped behind the frosted glass panel over the bathtub. Bond heard the suite door open, and the approaching voices of three men.
“You have to take it easy, Mr. Lee,” one of them said. Bond recognized Harding’s voice. “Basil here will make sure you get on the flight. How do you feel now?”
The door closed and the men went into the sitting room.
“It’s not too sore,” another man said with an Asian accent. “Except when I laugh.” Mr. Lee . . . Chinese, perhaps?
“Basil,” Harding said, “I’m leaving Brussels now. My job is done. You follow Mr. Lee and make damn sure he gets on that flight without any problems. Understand?”
“Yeah,” came a deep voice.
“Sit down, Mr. Lee, while I pack,” Harding said. “You want something out of the minibar?”
“No, thank you. I’ll just watch TV.” Bond heard the television in the sitting room switch on. A newscaster spoke in French.
“I want a beer after I go piss,” Basil said. He had a pronounced French accent, but Bond thought he might be Senegalese.
“Go ahead, it’s right in there,” Harding said.
Christ! There was nowhere to hide. Bond’s shape could easily be seen through the frosted glass. He squatted in the tub and drew the gun.
The door swung open. Through the foggy glass Bond could see a huge bulk of a man. He was black, and was dressed in a dark T-shirt and trousers. Although the image was distorted through the glass, his shoulders looked as wide as a dam’s.
Basil stood in front of the toilet and started to urinate. Bond couldn’t help but think that he was looking at the evil counterpart to Manneken-Pis.
“Basil?” Harding called from the other room.
“One minute, monsieur!” he yelled.
Bond didn’t wait for him to finish. He stood up slowly and stepped out from behind the glass. Basil was so busy watching his stream that he didn’t notice. When he felt the nuzzle of the gun in his back, he didn’t stop urinating.
“Don’t say a word,” said Bond. “Just finish up.”
The man nodded. After a few seconds, his bladder was empty.
Go on, give it a good shake and zip up.”
The man did as he was told.
“Better flush. Someone else may want to use it.”
Basil reached out and pulled the steel bulb on top of the commode. The toilet flush was loud. Bond took the opportunity to cold-cock the man on the back of the head.
Unfortunately it was like hitting an anvil. This took Bond by surprise, and Basil took advantage of the hesitation. He swung around, using his huge girth to slam Bond against the frosted glass panel, shattering it. The Walther PPK fell to the floor of the bathroom, discharging a round.
Basil grabbed Bond by his jacket collar and lifted him as if he were paper. Now that he was face-to-face with the thug, Bond could see that he was well over six feet tall and probably weighed in the neighborhood of three hundred pounds. His upper arms had a circumference of at least twenty inches.
Like a cat with a mouse, the big man slammed Bond back and forth against the walls around the bathtub. The tiles broke off in chunks.
“What the hell?” Harding looked in the bathroom. He stood in horror for a second, then turned to Lee, who was behind him. “Come on, let’s get out of here!”
Bond caught a glimpse of Harding and the Chinese man before Basil grabbed hold of his hair with one hand, then punched him in the face with the other. It might as well have been a wrecking ball. Once again Bond crashed back into the tub on top of shards of broken glass. Basil then raised his left leg and stomped on Bond’s chest with his heavy boot, over and over.
Harding ran into the sitting room, gathered his attaché case and a couple of items from the bedroom, and pulled Lee out of the room. “Leave them, come on!” he shouted.
Bond was stunned, nearly unconscious. He could feel the boot slamming down on his rib cage and felt a terrible sharp pain. If he didn’t get out of that tub fast, the man would kick him so hard that his chest cavity would collapse.
Blinded and in agony, Bond groped beside him and felt pieces of broken glass. His fingers wrapped around a long one with a sharp point. When the boot came down again, Bond thrust the weapon as hard as he could into Basil’s calf.
The thug yelled so loudly that it snapped Bond out of the fog. He clutched the boot with both hands and shoved upward, throwing the big man off balance so that he toppled to the bathroom floor.
Bond jackknifed to his feet and leaped over the edge of the tub. He saw the Walther lying in the opposite corner, near the door. He tried to jump over Basil’s body, but the brute managed to trip him and shove him against the toilet. Bond landed hard against the porcelain, striking his lower back. He felt the edge of the toilet dig into his kidneys, sending jolts of anguish up his spine.
Basil rose and put his hands around Bond’s throat. He began to tighten his viselike grip. The man was so strong that he wouldn’t merely choke Bond to death. The man was about to crush his windpipe, and possibly his neck.
Bond’s eyes rolled into the back of head as the pressure on his neck increased. Instinctively, he reached up to the counter by the sink to his left to feel for a weapon—anything that might give him an advantage. He found it in a can of spray deodorant. With the thumb and fingers of one hand, Bond flicked the top off and positioned his index finger on the button. He aimed it in front of him and sprayed.
Basil screamed again and let go of Bond’s neck.
Bond immediately brought his legs up to his chest and kicked forward, knocking Basil off him and back against the bathroom wall.
There was barely enough room for one person in the bathroom, let alone two grown men, one of whom was a giant. Bond struggled to get to his feet, gasping for air as the black man bounced off the wall. The glass shard was still in his leg. Bond scooped the rest of Harding’s toiletries off the counter into Basil’s face. It gave Bond just enough time to get up and leap for the gun. The black man was just as fast, though. He tackled Bond and the two of them burst out of the bathroom into the entry hall. The gun was still in the bathroom.
They had a little more room here. Bond rolled backward so that he could get to his feet in the bedroom. Basil thundered after him. Bond picked up one of the chairs and threw it at the black man, who brushed it away as if he were swatting a mosquito. The chair smashed against the full-length mirror, breaking it into a hundred pieces.
“Now look what you went and did,” Bond said, completely out of breath. “Your seven years of bad luck is just beginning.”
Basil made a grotesque sound that resembled the roar of a lion, then charged Bond. They both fell back onto the king-sized bed, then rolled off the other side onto the floor. Bond got in two good punches, but the man was so strong, they didn’t seem to bother him at all. Bond twisted out from under him and got to his feet. He performed a neat back kick and struck Basil in the face. Basil, in retaliation, simply lifted the huge mattress off the bed as if it were a pillow. He threw it at Bond with the strength of a rhinoceros. The mattress knocked Bond into the dresser. Bond grabbed a lamp and clubbed the black man with it, smashing the lamp shade and bulb.
The fight moved into the sitting room, where they had even more space in which to move. There was an open bottle of wine on top of the wet bar. Bond took it by the neck and broke it against the wall, splashing bloodred liquid all over the place. Now he had a jagged weapon. The two men faced and circled each other slowly. Bond kept Basil at a distance with the sharp edge of the bottle.