Bond pulled his head up and once more focused on the calendar. Come on, Sweetheart. We can do better than this. I thought we had something beautiful going between us. I thought we were on the brink of something -
This time, Bond was prepared for the wave of pain. It swept in like a rising tide, probing familiar ground, infiltrating pre-explored crevasses. And then it edged forward, overlapping itself to invade new territory. Saturating unexplored sand, drawing forth new screams of seared, screeching agony. The hinges of Bond’s mouth snapped back and his throat divided into the columns of an organ as he hurled himself forward against the cruel ropes. The roman candle of pain between his legs was burning out his soul.
‘Niet!’
The waves fell back and the sea of suffering slowly withdrew. Bond, head on sweat-soaked chest, strained his throbbing cars for another sound of that female voice.
‘Fools! Imbeciles! Are you trying to kill him?’ She was speaking Russian but Bond could keep pace with her. His time for a diploma at the defector Vozdvishensky’s language symposium for employees of the ‘Ministry of Defence' had broken all records. ‘What information can he yield us dead?’ There was an immediate murmur of disgruntled disapproval. Bond opened one eye, straining to catch sight of this newcomer. He saw two slim trouser-legs. One petulant heel tapping against the floor. ‘Must I remind you again who is in control of this operation? Untie him and revive him. We have drugs that can do this work.* Not entirely an altruist, thought Bond.
‘But Major. With respect.’ The voice belonged to the senior torturer and had precious little respect in it. ‘We have experience of these methods. We have enjoyed much success with them. The man will not die until we want him to.*
‘Nevertheless. Do as I say! ’
Bond gambled that all eyes would be upon the speaker, and turned his head slightly. Through half-closed eyes he could make out an erect female presence that was familiar. The girl he had seen at the son-et-lumiére. So, she was one of them. Not one of them but in control of them. He could understand the reaction of the others. Having to receive orders from a woman after years of torturing people their way. Why couldn't she find a job in a factory or on a collective farm? God knew, they needed all the help they could get.
Bond continued to push back the heavy curtains of throbbing aching pain and stifled the scream that rose to his lips as the claws were plucked from his flayed organ. He heard a knife click open and the blade began to saw through the ropes about his ankles. This was it. His only chance was approaching. If he didn’t make a move soon he was finished. They would open him up by one means or the other and when they found there was nothing inside they would kill him. The girl wasn’t being squeamish, she was practical.
Bond risked another glance. The operator of the machine was sulkily wrapping the connection wires round his fingers. Suddenly the mist of pain rose as it was penetrated by the bright sunlight of an idea. It might just work. Bond lolled forward and felt the knife sawing through the ropes at his tortured wrists. Half way through, three-quarters, seven-eighths. He braced himself and, as the rope parted, hurled himself towards the hideous instrument of torture that had set out to emasculate him. It was still humming and a red light glowed. Too late, the operator saw what was in his mind and desperately sought to free his fingers from the enveloping wire. Bond drove the lever down so that it buckled against the bottom of the slot. The needle on the gauge leapt forward and with a bright flash the man’s body jack-knifed in the air. There was a two-tier scream and a disgusting smell of burning, frizzled flesh. The man’s features flattened against the wall with a sickening, blood-smearing crunch but he was dead one-twentieth of a second before the impact.
Instinctively, Bond ducked to one side and the knife arm flashed past his throat. With automatic deference to the classic defence riposte, his right arm cut across and his body swivelled with it. The two forearms met halfway between the two bodies and the withdrawing knife arm was jarred to one side. Bond saw the opening and drove hard and upwards. His stiff, locked wrist travelled two feet and the heel of his left hand, with the fingers spread wide for extra rigidity, came up under the spokesman’s throat with terrifying force. He staggered back and in the same instant, Bond lashed out with the edge of his finger-locked hand turned into an axe-blade. The blow hacked into the Adam’s apple in the middle of the taut throat and the man fell like a tree.
Bond looked down at the two untidy heaps of human being and wondered how long it would be before streams of homeless vermin started to leave their bodies. The girl was staring at him as if mesmerized by the events of the last few seconds. Bond fastened his trousers and looked at her just long enough to sec that she was beautiful and not pointing a gun at him
‘Thanks for saving my life.’ He smiled grimly, and added as an afterthought, ‘And possibly one or two other people’s.’
And then he was through the door and down the worn stairs, two at a time. Throwing his weight against a second door and feeling the blessed cool of the night air. He ran hard down an alley and then out into a street where people were walking and he could slow down and walk amongst them, listening to his pumping heart reassuring him that he was still alive.
Adventures in Clubland
The Mujaba Club was an incongruous building to find in a bustling tourist metropolis on the eastern bank of the Nile three hundred and seventy-five miles south of Cairo - for that was where Bond eventually found it. On the outskirts of Luxor. It was surrounded by clumps of palm trees, to be sure, but that, apart from its awnings and shutters, was its only obvious concession to the mystic East. In all other respects it was redolent of the era when Britannia ruled the waves aud most of the land that divided them. It looked like a cross between an open prison, a Methodist church hall, a youth hostel and the officers’ mess of an inferior county regiment, and, because it was none of these things, yet clearly built by English hands, it had to be a club.
Bond was feeling less depressed. He was not a masochist but the pain and relentless action of two nights before had left him with a keen edge of purpose. He had a lead, something to go on, something to get his teeth into. Most important of all, there was a tough, ruthless game being played for enormous stakes and he had been dealt in. No matter the insignificance of his cards. What was vital was that he should have the chance to play them.
Outside the club was an impressive range of cars. Bond noted the larger Merccdcs and the latest Cadillac which must have been flown over from the States almost before it was available to the American public. There was clearly a lot of money about. Most of it, from the look of the number plates, Arabic. Bond squared his shoulders beneath the sculptured lightness of his black barathea dinner jacket and met the eye of the garishly dressed doorman. The man wore a curved dagger in a scabbard of semi-precious stones tucked into the
waistband of his embroidered burnous. He had a nose like a falcon and his sharp, dark eyes ran over Bond like the editor of Burke’s Peerage considering an applicant for a vacant baronetcy. Bond passed muster and returned the slight inclination of the head that passed him through to the interior of the club.
Inside, the atmosphere was considerably more gracious than Bond had anticipated from his first observation of the building. The entrance hall was high and vaulted, with cloakrooms and a telephone-room going off to the right. On the left was a reception desk, now untenanted, a notice-board and another board covered in green baize and criss-crossed with brass- studded pink tape which held letters to members. Bond inspected the notice-board. There were details of camel races and of a book being made on competitors in the club's bridge tournament. Bond quickly scanned the list of names, but there was no sign of a Kalba, Max or otherwise. Better to ask, and best to ask with a drink in one’s hand.