He entered his bedroom and found the furniture equally oppressive. There was a huge bed with the head intricately carved in solid oak, a heavy free-standing wardrobe and an oldfashioned marble topped washstand doubling as a dressing table. The bathroom was modern, in unlikely avocado green, with pine surrounds to the tiny cupboard, a bath built for a midget and even a bidet squeezed between the bath and lavatory. Bond went back into the bedroom to find one of the men standing in the doorway holding his getaway case.
‘The lock is, I fear, broken,’ he said in English. ‘The Herr Colonel ordered the contents inspected.’
The Herr Colonel can take a running jump, thought Bond. Aloud, he thanked the man. It was highly unlikely that they had found anything to interest them. His two overt weapons, the ASP and the baton, had been removed, but they had left his cigarette lighter, wallet and pen – all three from Q Branch with Q’ute’s blessing. It struck Bond as odd that so far Smolin had not subjected him to a body search, which could easily have revealed items secreted in his clothing. Such an oversight was out of tune with his reputation.
As Bond was about to open the getaway case, he heard the two girls talking loudly in the sitting room. Quickly he went out, motioning them to stop – pointing at the telephone and lighting to remind them that the rooms were almost certainly bugged.
He needed to find some way of talking unheard to the girls, to discover the three key questions Heather had been instructed to ask Smolin, and more details about Swift. Once they could have crowded into one of the bathrooms, turned on all the taps and talked. But that old dodge had long gone out of the window with modern filtering systems that cut out extraneous sound. Even talking in whispers with a radio on at full volume was no longer safe.
He strode to the bureau and tried the flap. It was not locked and sure enough, writing paper and envelopes had been left in the pigeon holes. Taking some of the paper, he gestured at the girls to sit down near one of the heavy side tables and carry on talking while he went to the door and looked out. They must have been very sure of themselves, for the door was unlocked and there appeared to be no guards in the corridor.
Back at the table, seated between the girls, he bent over the paper and took out his pen. Writing quickly, trying to make some logic of his own confused suspicions, he set questions in order of importance. The girls were flagging, their conversation becoming stilted, so he asked Ebbie how she had been picked up.
‘It was done by telephone. After the girl’s murder.’
Ebbie moved a fraction closer to him, her hand brushing his arm. Bond started to write his questions, two to each sheet of paper, and double sets, one for Ebbie, another for Heather.
‘They telephoned you?’
‘Ja. They said I was to leave as soon as the police had no use for me. I was to drive to Galway, to the Corrib Great Southern Hotel and they would contact me there.’
She allowed her shoulder to press hard against his arm, leaving in its wake a tingling sensation that he found decidedly pleasant.
Bond passed two sheets of questions to Heather, and a couple to Ebbie, miming for them to write replies. Heather had a pen, but Ebbie looked lost, so Bond gave her his. Meanwhile he continued the conversation, as though desperate to know the answers.
‘And they said they were from Britain?’
There was a slight hesitation, for Ebbie was trying to write. Then she said, ‘Yes, they said they came from the people we used to work for.’
She smiled at him, revealing small, perfect teeth and the tantalising pink tip of her tongue.
‘You had no doubts?’
‘None. They seemed to be perfect English gentlemen. They promised me one night at a safe place, then an aeroplane would come and I would go to some other place.’
She frowned and continued to write, still allowing her arm to press against Bond’s shoulder.
‘Did they say anything about Heather?’
There was an agonising silence while she wrote some more.
‘Safe. They say she is safe and will be coming soon. I never . . .’
He turned to Heather, who had apparently been writing without trouble. ‘You were unconscious in the ambulance,’ he said, giving her a broad wink so that she would not be disturbed by what he was going to say. ‘Smolin talked to me about something called Cream Cake. Do you know about that?’
Her jaw dropped, her mouth starting to form the word ‘but’, then she remembered their audience and said she was not to speak of it. The whole business had been a despicable trick; neither she nor Ebbie were responsible for it.
‘It was a mistake,’ she repeated, ‘A most horrible mistake.’
Bond leaned over and began to read what they had already written, his eyes moving quickly first down one page, and then the other. As he read, the suspicion that had started earlier returned. At that moment the door burst open to reveal Smolin flanked by two of his men. There was no point in trying to hide the papers, but Bond pulled them off the table, hoping to misdirect Smolin’s gaze by rising to his feet.
‘James, I’m surprised at you.’ Smolin’s voice was soft, almost soothing and therefore more threatening. ‘You think we only listen to what we call our guest suite? We have son et lumière, my friend – sound and pictures.’ He gave one of his regular laughs. ‘You would never guess how many times we’ve compromised people in these rooms. Now, be a good fellow and hand over the papers.’
One of the men stepped towards them, but Heather snatched the sheets from Bond and headed for her bedroom door, light and very fast on her feet. The man sprang at her in a rugger tackle, missed and fell against the wall as her door slammed and the key turned in the lock.
Smolin and the other man had automatics in their hands, while the other man who had fallen was back on his feet, pounding on the door and shouting in German for Heather to come out. But there was no sound until eventually the door opened and Heather stalked haughtily into the room. From behind her, smoke curled out of a metal waste bin.
‘They’re gone,’ she said in a matter-of-fact tone, ‘burned. Not that they would have meant much to you, Maxim.’
Smolin took one pace forward and hit her hard in the face, first with the back of his hand, then the palm smashing into her cheeks. She staggered with the blows and then straightened up, her face scarlet.
‘That’s it. Enough!’ Smolin drew in a breath through his clenched teeth. ‘We won’t wait for food. I think the time has come to talk – and talk you will. All of you.’
He turned back to the door and shouted for more of his men, who came noisily up the stairs, weapons drawn.
‘You first, I think, James.’ Smolin’s finger was aimed like a dagger.
There was little point in struggling as two of the men seized Bond’s arms and hustled him out along the corridor and down the main staircase.
Ingrid stood overseeing the whole incident like a thin black insect, surrounded by the growling dogs. The men pushed Bond through one of the other doors, down another pine staircase and along a passage. They sat him down in a small room, bare but for a metal chair bolted to the floor. Handcuffs were snapped on his wrists and ankles, shackling him to the arms and legs of the chair. He was conscious of the two men standing behind him, while Smolin, his face set in cold anger, was directly in front of him.
Bond braced himself for physical pain or, even worse, the ordeal the Soviets always spoke of as a chemical interrogation. He did everything they had taught him, emptied his mind, putting in layers of rubbish and forcing the truth deep into his subconscious. When it came, Bond was shocked into mind-bending fear. Smolin, the main target of Cream Cake, spoke very quietly.