He went over to the desk and removed the tiny cassette from the tape machine, nipping off the little plastic safety lug to prevent the tape from being accidentally recorded over. He addressed a stout envelope in M’s cover name as Chairman of Transworld, at one of the safe Post Office box numbers, folded the cassette into a sheet of hotel writing paper, on which he had written a few words, and sealed the envelope. Guessing the weight of the package, he added stamps.
He had just finished this important chore when a knock at the door heralded Sukie’s return. She carried a brown paper sack containing her purchases, and appeared inclined to stay in the room until Bond firmly suggested that she join Nannie and wait in the snug bar for him.
The job of cleaning up the bathroom, wearing the rubber gloves and using almost the entire bottle of antiseptic which Sukie had brought him took fifteen minutes. Before completing the job he added the gloves to the neat, sinister parcel containing the remains of the vampire bat. He was as sure as he could be that no germs had entered his system.
While he worked, Bond thought of the possibilities regarding the perpetrator of this last attempt on his life. He was almost certain that it was his old enemy, SMERSH – now Directorate S’s Department Eight of the KGB – who were holding Kirchtum, and using him as their personal messenger. But was it really their style to use such a thing as a hybrid vampire bat against him?
Who, he wondered, would have the resources to work on the breeding and development of a weapon so horrible? It struck him that the creature must have taken a number of years to be brought to its present state, and that indicated a large organisation, with funds and the specialist expertise required. The work would have been carried out in a simulated warm forest-like environment, for, if his memory was correct, the species’ natural habitats were the jungles and forests of Mexico, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay.
Money, special facilities, time and zoologists without scruples: SPECTRE was the obvious bet, though any well-funded outfit with an interest in terrorism and killings would be on the list, for the creature would not have been developed simply as a one-off to inject some terrible terminal disease into Bond’s bloodstream. The Bulgarians and Czechs favoured that kind of thing, and he would not even put it past Cuba to send some agent of their well-trained internal G-2 out into the wider field of international intrigue. The Honoured Society, that polite term for the Mafia, was also a possibility – for they were not beyond selling the goods to terrorist organisations, as long as they were not used within the borders of the United States, Sicily or Italy.
But, when the chips were down, Bond plumped for SPECTRE itself – only, once more during this strange dance with death, someone had saved him, at the last moment, from another attempted execution, and this time it was Sukie, a young woman met seemingly by accident. Could she be the truly dangerous one?
He sought out the kitchens and with a great deal of charm explained that some food had been left accidentally in his car. He asked if there was an incinerator and a porter man was summoned to lead him to it. The man even offered to dispose of the bundle himself, but Bond tipped him heavily and said he would like to see it burned.
It was already six-twenty. Before going to the bar he made a last visit to his room and doused himself in cologne to disguise any remaining traces of the antiseptic.
Sukie and Nannie were anxious to hear what he had been doing, but Bond merely said they would be told all in good time. For the moment they should enjoy the pleasanter things of life. After a drink in the snug bar, they moved to the table which Nannie had been sensible enough to reserve and dined on the famous Viennese boiled beef dish called Tafelspitz. It was like no other boiled beef on earth, a gastronomic delight, with a piquant vegetable sauce, and served with melting sautéed potatoes. They had resisted a first course for it is sacrilege to decline dessert in an Austrian restaurant. They chose the light, fragile Salzburger soufflé, said to have been created nearly three hundred years ago by a chef in the Hohensalzburg. It arrived topped by a mountain of Schlag, rich whipped cream.
Afterwards they went outside among the strolling window-shoppers in the warm air of the Getreidegasse. Bond wanted to be safe from bugging equipment.
‘I’m too full,’ said Nannie, hobbling with one hand on her stomach.
‘You’re going to need the food with what the night has in store for us,’ Bond said quietly.
‘Promises, promises,’ Sukie muttered, breathing heavily. ‘I feel like a dirigible. So what’s in store, James?’
He told them they would be driving to Paris.
‘You’ve made it plain that you’re coming with me, whatever. The people who are giving me the run-around have also insisted that you’re to accompany me, and I have to be sure that you do. The lives of a very dear friend, and an equally dear colleague are genuinely at risk. I can say no more.’
‘Of course we’re coming,’ Sukie snapped.
‘Try and stop us,’ added Nannie.
‘I’m going to do one thing out of line,’ he explained. ‘The orders are that we start tomorrow – which means they expect us to do it in daylight. I’m starting shortly after midnight. That way I can plead that we did start the drive tomorrow, but we might get a jump ahead of them. It’s not much, but it may just throw them off balance.’
It was agreed that they would meet by the car on the stroke of midnight. As they started to retrace their steps towards the Goldener Hirsch, Bond paused briefly by a letter box set into the wall and slid his package from his breast pocket to the box. It was neatly done, in seconds, and he was fairly certain that even Sukie and Nannie did not notice.
It was just after ten when he got back to his room. By ten-thirty the briefcases and his bag were packed, and he had changed into casual jeans and jacket. He was carrying the ASP and the baton as usual. With an hour and a half to go, Bond sat down and concentrated on how he might gain the initiative in this wild and dangerous death hunt.
So far, the attempts on his life had been cunning. Only in their early encounters had someone else stepped in to save his life, presumably in order to set him up for the final act in the drama. He knew that he could trust nobody – especially Sukie since she had revealed herself as his saviour, however unwitting, in the vampire bat incident. But how could he now take some command over the situation? Suddenly he thought of Kirchtum, held prisoner in his own clinic. The last thing they would expect would be an assault on this power base. It was a fifteen minute drive out of Salzburg to the Klinik Mozart and time was short. If he could find the right car, perhaps it was just possible.
Bond left the room and hurried downstairs to the reception desk to ask what self-drive hire cars were immediately available. For once, he seemed to be making his own luck. There was a Saab 900 Turbo, a car he knew well, which had only just been returned. A couple of short telephone calls secured it for him. It was waiting only four minutes’ walk from the hotel.
As he waited for the cashier to take his credit card details, he walked over to the internal telephones and rang Nannie’s number. She answered immediately.
‘Say nothing,’ he said quietly. ‘Wait in your room. I may have to delay departure for an hour. Tell Sukie.’
She agreed, but sounded surprised. By the time he returned to the desk, the formalities had been completed.
Five minutes later, having collected the car from a smiling representative, Bond was driving skilfully out of Salzburg on the mountain road to the south, passing in the suburbs the strange Anif water-tower which rises like an English manor house from the middle of a pond. He continued almost as far as the town of Hallein, which had begun as an island bastion in the middle of the Salzach and which has been made famous as the birthplace of Franz-Xavier Gruber, the composer of Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht.