The taxi pulled around Alameda de Mazarredo, where the Museo Guggenheim de Arte Contemporaneo is now the showpiece of the waterfront. Designed by American architect Frank Ghery, one critic has described the spectacular titanium-skinned building as ‘a cauliflower on LSD’. Still, Bond couldn’t help but be impressed with the shimmering, iconoclastic structure, which certainly seemed out of place in a city not known for its love of art. Too bad he hadn’t the time to take a look at the collection, but he wasn’t in Spain for that.
Bond stopped the taxi in the Plaza del Museo, then walked away from the Guggenheim toward a nearby rather nondescript office building. The engraved brass plaque in front announced ‘La Banque Suisse de l’lndustrie (Privee)’. Underneath were translations in Spanish, German and English. Before entering, Bond slipped on the lightly-tinted glasses that he had picked up from Q Branch, then made a quick check of his belongings, namely the Walther PPK under his navy sport jacket and a Sykes-Fairbairn throwing knife concealed in a sheath on his lower back.
He entered the building and gave his name to the mousy, horn-rimmed receptionist. She punched some buttons on her desk and spoke French into her headset. She nodded, then said to Bond, smoothly switching to English, ‘Mister Lachaise will be with you momentarily.’ Bond smiled and sat down in the comfortable lounge. The Guggenheim could be seen in all its splendour across the Plaza through a large wall-sized window.
Three Armani-clad thugs eventually appeared from behind a column. The suits were incongruous, for they looked more like professional wrestlers than bankers.
‘Mister Bond?’ one of them grunted. ‘Come this way’
Bond stood and followed them into the lift. The three men stood silently around him, one man in front, blocking the doors.
‘Nice day,’ Bond said. The men didn’t acknowledge him.
The lift stopped at the top floor. The big men escorted Bond down a hallway, past an attentive secretary, and into a luxurious office, the focal point of which was a large oak desk. Behind the desk were three floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out onto a balcony and the street beyond.
Lachaise, an extremely well-groomed gentleman, was sitting at the desk studying figures on a printout.
‘Mister Bond,’ the head thug announced.
As if on cue, the other two men began to frisk Bond. They quickly found the Walther and set it on the desk. A few seconds later, they found the knife and laid it beside the other things.
The head man nodded to Lachaise that Bond was clean.
When this formality had been completed, Lachaise looked up with patronising amusement and said, ‘Good. Now that we’re all comfortable, why don’t you sit down?’ He gestured to a leather armchair, then sat back behind the desk. ‘So good of you to come to see me, Mister Bond. Particularly at such short notice’
Bond said, ‘If you can’t trust a Swiss banker, what's the world coming to?’
Lachaise laughed gently and punched a button. Bond dropped into the chair as a very attractive brunette entered the room, pushing a cart carrying a large silver metal case and a cigar box. She picked up the box and offered it to Bond. It was full of Havanas. He shook his head, keeping his attention on the banker. She then offered the box to
Lachaise, who took a cigar and set it on the ashtray on the desk.
‘Thank you, Giulietta,’ Lachaise said. He turned his attention to Bond. ‘It wasn’t easy, but I retrieved the money. No doubt Sir Robert will be pleased to see it again.’
The girl picked up the case and set it in Bond’s lap. She opened it with a flourish, a seductive smile on her face during the entire process. The case was full of fifty pound sterling notes.
It s all there at the current exchange rate. Here is the statement.’
Giulietta offered Bond a piece of paper, which he took and gave a cursory glance. It was an odd number, calculated down to the penny: £3,030,003.03.
‘Would you like to check my figures?’ the girl asked. ‘I’m sure they’re perfectly rounded,’ Bond replied. She was certainly not Swiss, Bond observed: she looked Mediterranean, with long, curly hair and large brown eyes. Spanish? Southern Italian, perhaps?
She closed the case and stepped back as Lachaise said, ‘It’s all there; I assure you,’
Bond slipped the statement into his pocket, then slowly and deliberately removed his glasses. He eyed Lachaise and, after a brief pause said, ‘I didn’t come only for the money. The report Sir Robert bought was stolen from an MI6 agent. Who was killed for it.’
Bond reached into another pocket and pulled out a photo of 0012. He laid it on the desk in front of Lachaise.
‘I want to know who killed him.’
Lachaise raised his eyebrows, attempting to register confusion and surprise, as if he had no idea what Bond was talking about. He glanced at the photo. After an obviously rehearsed moment of reflection, Lachaise went, ‘Tsk, tsk,’ nodded his head, and said, ‘Oh, right, quite so. Yes, terrible tragedy.’ Bond looked at him hard, waiting for him to go on.
‘But,’ Lachaise said, raising a finger, ‘not to put too fine a point on it, your MI6 agent had stolen the document himself, two weeks earlier, from a Russian operative.’
As if that excused the killer.
‘I want a name,’ Bond said.
Lachaise smiled much too warmly. ‘Discretion, Mister Bond. I’m a Swiss banker. Surely you can understand my position. . ’ ‘Which is what?' Bond snapped. ‘Neutral? Or just pretending to be?’
‘I am merely a middle man. I’m just doing the honourable thing and returning the money to its rightful owner’
‘And we know how difficult that can be for the Swiss,’ Bond said.
Lachaisc dropped his smile. The two men stared at each other. The cigar gid and the three thugs felt the growing tension in the room.
Finally, the banker said, I'm offering you the opportunity to walk out with the money, Mister Bond’
‘And I'm offering you the opportunity to walk out with your life,’ Bond replied.
‘In your present situation,’ Lachaise said, indicating the three men behind Bond, ‘speaking strictly as a banker, of course, I’d have to say that the numbers are not on your side.’ He nodded to the first thug, who pulled a Browning Hi- Power 9mm handgun from beneath his jacket.
Carefully putting his glasses back on and fingering the frame, Bond said, ‘Perhaps you failed to take into account my hidden assets’
A flicker of doubt passed over Lachaise’s face as Bond’s finger found a tiny protrusion on the arm of his glasses.
A charge inside the grip of the gun on the table flashed loudly and brightly, blinding everyone except Bond. It was a brief effect, just enough to disorient the thugs and give him the opening he needed Bond jumped out of his seat, spear-handed the gunman in the throat and simultaneously grabbed the pistol with his other hand. The Browning discharged a shot, blowing out one of the windows behind the desk, but the gunman flew backwards, unconscious. Without wasting a second, Bond turned and flung his leg up and out, kicking the second henchman in the face. The third man lunged at Bond, but he was too late. Bond spun around, took hold of the man’s shoulders, and used the thug’s own momentum to hurl him up, over the armchair and against a low cupboard. He then leaped over the desk and thrust the borrowed Browning into the hollow of Lachaise’s cheek.
It all happened in six seconds. Lachaise hadn't had time to think.
‘It seems you’ve had a small reversal of fortune,’ Bond said. ‘Give me a name’
Now truly frightened, Lachaise stammered, ‘I ... I can’t tell you . . .’
‘Let’s count to three,’ Bond said. ‘You can do that, can’t you?’ He cocked the gun, the click sending a shiver down the Swiss banker’s spine. ‘One. Two . . ’