‘All right!’ Lachaise cried. ‘All right! But you must protect me!’
Bond said, ‘Fine. Now talk’
But the banker suddenly stiffened, his eyes wide. A knife had been thrown, and it was now protruding grotesquely from the man’s neck.
Giulictta the cigar girl had acted quickly and professionally. Now she leaped past the desk, through the broken window and out onto the balcony. Bond pushed Lachaise to the floor and ran to the window. He saw that the brunette was swinging on a wire that she must have previously attached to the balcony railing. She sailed smoothly over the side street to another building. She quickly disappeared into the shadows before Bond could fire a shot. Already there were sirens in the distance; the police had no doubt been alerted by the secretary outside the office. He had to move fast.
Bond turned, only to find that the first thug had recovered and was blocking the way, gun in hand. He was about to squeeze the trigger when Bond saw a red dot appear on the man’s chest. Behind him, another window shattered as a bullet zinged through and pierced the henchman’s heart. Bond instinctively ducked behind the desk and peered outside in an attempt to find the source of the shot, but there were too many windows in the building across the street.
He rolled over and up to run for the door, but he could hear voices and the sound of running feet in the hallway. Bond threw the bolt and quickly glanced at the windows again. Why wasn’t the sniper shooting? He looked around the room and noted that the second thug was beginning to stir.
Bond realised that whoever had shot through the window had not been aiming at him. Perhaps the balcony was the safest escape route after all . . .
A breeze blew, fluttering the curtains that had been pulled back and tied with a long piece of decorative rope. Thinking quickly, Bond grabbed the rope, yanked it down and threaded one end under a radiator pipe beneath the shattered window. He then moved to the prone body of the groggy henchman and tied the rope to his legs in a slip knot.
Shouting in Spanish followed a ferocious hammering at the door. The police had arrived.
Bond deftly picked up his Walther PPK and throwing knife and pocketed them, then clutched the handle on the case full of money. He then wrapped the other end of the rope around his arm and eyed the window, ready to make his move.
He paused just long enough to take one of the Havanas from the box on the cart and slip it into his pocket.
Bond ran through the open window and leaped. He held on tightly to the case with one hand and gripped the rope with the other. In the office, the groggy henchman came to his senses in time to see the rope tied to his ankles running out of the window. He clung to the leg of the desk and held on for dear life as the rope went taut.
Bonds fall suddenly jerked to a stop.
Then the leg of the desk broke off in the thug’s hand and Bond’s weight dragged him across the Oriental rugs toward the window. He crashed into the wall just as the police burst through the door with their guns drawn.
Outside, Bond slowly descended to the street on the rope, unwrapped it and dropped the remaining ten feet to the pavement. He rounded the corner to blend in with the lunchtime business crowds - just another man with a case, in a suit and tie.
As he walked, though, Bond glanced at the building where the cigar girl had fled. Why would someone up there want him to get out of that room alive?
While pondering this strange turn of events, he decided that perhaps he should take in some contemporary art after all. As more police poured into the bank building, Bond slipped into the front of the Guggenheim museum and disappeared. He was back in London before midnight.
Giulietta entered the huge, high-ceilinged room in the building across from the Swiss bank. She swallowed hard, for she was terribly afraid of the man who was standing on the balcony overlooking the city.
He was not a large man. He was slight, thin and wiry, but there was no doubt that he could be quick on his feet. His cold eyes were as dark as anthracite. He might have been handsome at one time, but the raised, red scar on the right temple distorted the shape of his shiny, bald head. It was an ugly, slick wound that throbbed and shifted with the slightest facial expression, like an insect living just beneath the skin. His right eye drooped slightly, deadened. His mouth turned down on the same side and he was unable to smile. As a result, he was quite literally a man with two half-faces. It was a condition an unfortunate Syrian doctor had called Bell’s Palsy.
The girl approached him, but he didn’t move. A gas- operated Belgian FN FAL sniper rifle with an attached laser sight was propped against the doorframe. Binoculars on a tripod were trained on the rooftop below, where Bilbao policemen were now inspecting the shattered office windows.
‘Renard . . ’ Giulietta whispered.
The man seemed lost in thought. He rubbed and pinched his trigger finger, attempting to find a single nerve ending that might respond. He even brought the hand up to his mouth and bit the fleshy area between his thumb and forefinger. As always, he felt nothing.
Then he turned and inspected her. Finally, he said, ‘What’s his name?’
The girl had lost the ability to speak. Renard the Fox might very well kill her then and there.
‘Our friend from MI6,’ he said, quietly. ‘What’s his name?’
Giulietta swallowed and finally found her voice. ‘James Bond.’
Renard nodded as if he knew all about the Briton. ‘Ah. One of M’s more resourceful tin soldiers’
‘He ... he could identify me,’ she said.
Renard reached out and touched her cheek. She tensed at the cold tips of his fingers.
The man looked at the girl in front of him. She was attractive, certainly, but he felt no desire for her. She was merely an expendable soldier.
‘Then I suppose a death is in order,’ he said. He paused long enough for her eyes to widen, then dropped his hand. ‘His. When the time is right, I trust you won’t fail’
She sighed with relief. He was giving her another chance. Renard left the balcony and took a bottle of wine that was sitting on the bar of the suite. He filled two glasses and handed one to her.
‘Until then, let us toast this James Bond.’ He raised the glass. ‘We're in his hands now’
02 - Fireworks on the Thames
The Westland Lynx helicopter picked up Bond and made the short hop to central London, swooping over the spectacular Millennium Dome as it followed the river. Called the ‘dustbin lid’ by some critics, the dome was the largest in the world, having been constructed on the North Greenwich peninsula, bounded on three sides by the River Thames. As Bond looked at the Teflon-coated glass-covered structure from the window, he was reminded of a giant robotic beetle with antennae that might have come from an episode of Doctor Who. Part of a 300-acre former gasworks, the site had been derelict for more than two decades until it was sold to English Partnerships in 1997. Two Wembley stadiums could fit inside the dome which is tall enough to house Nelson’s Column, and big enough to accommodate forty thousand people. More significantly, the site was chosen because the Prime Meridian cuts across the west side, which is about two and a half kilometres from historic Greenwich.
As far as Bond was concerned, it added yet another eyesore to the scenery around the Thames. Another, of course, was the gaudy, layered-cake-like building that was the headquarters of SIS in London.
The Lynx banked along the snaking river and landed near the river entrance of the SIS building. Carrying the money
case, Bond disembarked, nodded at the police officer standing guard at the private entrance, then entered the secret, high- tech world that was MI6. Although all the security personnel knew Bond by sight, it was standard operating procedure that every precaution be taken. He passed through the metal detector, which clearly indicated that he was carrying his usual weaponry. An attentive staff member took the case from Bond and set it on a table. Bond opened it and began to scoop out the packs of cash. He wistfully flicked his finger through the last wad, then threw it down with the rest as a blue light scanned the money in three dimensions. Bond watched as the money was bundled into a clear plastic bag, sealed and placed on a tray that was wheeled through a series of barred enclosures into a secure room. Bond handed the empty case to an attendant.