They came to the door of Tiffany’s cabin, but she pulled him away and on down the long, softly creaking corridor.
“I want it to be in your house, James,” she said.
Bond said nothing until he had kicked the door of his cabin shut behind them and they had twisted round and stood locked together in the middle of the wonderfully private, wonderfully anonymous little room. And then he just said, softly, “My darling,” and put one hand in her hair so that he could hold her mouth where he wanted it.
And after a while his other hand went to the zip fastener at the back of her dress and without moving away from him she stepped out of her dress and panted between their kisses. “I want it all, James. Everything you’ve ever done to a girl. Now. Quickly.”
And Bond bent down and put an arm round her thighs and picked her up and laid her gently on the floor.
24
DEATH IS SO PERMANENT
THE last thing Bond remembered before the telephone rang was Tiffany bending over him in bed and kissing him and saying, “You shouldn’t sleep on the heart-side, my treasure. It’s bad for the heart. It might stop beating. Turn over.” And obediently he had turned and as the door clicked he was at once asleep again with her voice and the sigh of the Atlantic and the soft roll of the ship holding him in their arms.
And then the angry bell rang in the dark cabin and went on ringing and Bond cursed and reached for it and a voice said, “Sorry to disturb you, Sir. This is the wireless operator. There’s a cipher signal just come in for you and it’s got an en clair prefix of ‘Most Immediate’. Shall I call it out to you or send it down?”
“Send it down, would you?” said Bond. “And thanks.”
Now what the hell? All the beauty and heat and excitement of passionate love were pushed roughly away as he turned on the lights, slipped out of bed and, shaking his head to clear it, took the two steps into the shower.
For a full minute he let the water hit him, and then he rubbed himself down and picked up his trousers and shirt from the floor and climbed into them.
There was a knock on the door and he took the cable and sat down at the desk and lit a cigarette and set grimly to work. And, as the groups gradually dissolved into words, his eyes grew narrower and the skin slowly crawled on his body.
The cable was from the Chief of Staff. It said :
FIRSTLY CLANDESTINE SEARCH OF SAVES OFFICE REVEALED SIGNAL FROM QE ADDRESSED ABC SIGNED WINTER ADVISING OF YOUR AND CASES PRESENCE ABOARD REQUESTING INSTRUCTIONS STOP REPLY ADDRESSED WINTER SIGNED ABC ORDERS ELIMINATION OF CASE COMMA PRICE TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS STOP SECONDLY WE CONSIDER HUFUS B SAYE IS ABC WHICH IS PARTLY EQUIVALENT OF HIS INITIALS IN FRENCH THUS AH DASH BAY DASH SAVE STOP THIRDLY POSSIBLY ALERTED EY SIGNS OF SEARCH SAYE FLEW PARIS YESTERDAY AND NOW REPORTED BY INTERPOL BE IN DAKAR STOP THIS TENDS CONFIRM OUR SUSPICION THAT DIAMONDS ORIGINATE SIERRA LEONE MINES THENCE SMUGGLED OVER FRONTIER INTO FRENCH GUINEA STOP WE STRONGLY SUSPECT MEMBER OF SIERRA INTERNATIONALS DENTAL SURGERY STAFF WHO BEING WATCHED STOP FOURTHLY RAF CANBERRA AWAITS YOU BOSCOMBE DOWN FOR IMMEDIATE ONWARD FLIGHT TOMORROW NIGHT TO SIERRA LEONE SIGNED COS.
Bond sat for a moment frozen to his chair. Suddenly, there flashed unwanted into his mind that most sinister line in all poetry: ‘They reckon ill who leave me out. When me they fly, I am the wings.’
So somebody from the Spangled Mob was on board and travelling with them. Who? Where?
His hand snatched at the telephone.
“Miss Case, please.”
He could hear the telephone beside her bed click and then give its first ring. The second. The third. Just one more. He crashed the receiver back on to its cradle and ran out of his room and up the corridor to her cabin. Nothing. Empty. The bed unslept in. The lights burning. But her evening bag lay on the carpet by the door and its contents were scattered around it. She had come in. The man had been behind the door. Perhaps a cosh had fallen. And then what?