And then I saw the men! They were coming up toward me on the grass, and each was carrying a big box in his hands. They were television sets. They must have salvaged them to sell and make themselves a little extra cash. They walked side by side, the thin man and the squat, and the light from the flaming cabins shone on their sweating faces. When they came to the charred arches of the covered way to the lobby block, they trotted quickly through, after glancing up at the still-burning roof to make sure it wouldn’t fall on them. Where was James Bond? This was the perfect time to get them, with their hands full!
Now they were only twenty yards away from me, veering right toward their car. I cringed back into the dark cave of the carport. But where was James? Should I run out after them and take them on alone? Don’t be idiotic! If I missed, and I certainly would, that would be the end of me. Now, if they turned round, would they see me? Would my white overalls show up in the darkness? I got farther back. Now they were framed in the square opening of my carport as they walked across the grass a few yards from the still-standing north wall of the lobby building from which the wind had so far kept most of the flames. They would soon vanish round the corner, and a wonderful chance would have gone!
And then they stopped, stock still, and there was James facing them, his gun arming dead steady between the two bodies! His voice cracked like a whip across the lawn. “All right! This is it! Turn round! The first man drops his television gets shot.”
They turned slowly round so that they faced toward my hideout. And now James called to me, “Come over, Viv! I need extra hands.”
I took the heavy revolver out of the waistband of my overalls and ran quickly across the grass. When I was about ten yards away from the men, James said, “Just stop there, Viv, and I’ll tell you what to do.” I stopped. The two evil faces stared at me. The thin man’s teeth were bared in a sort of fixed grin of surprise and tension. Sluggsy let off a string of curses. I pointed my gun at the television set that covered his stomach, “Shut your mouth or I’ll shoot you dead.”
Sluggsy sneered. “You and who else? You’d be too frightened of the bang.”
James said, “Shut up, you, or you get a crack on that ugly head of yours. Now listen, Viv, we’ve got to get the guns off these men. Come round behind the one called Horror. Put your gun up against his spine and with your free hand feel under his armpits. Not a nice job, but it can’t be helped. Tell me if you feel a gun there and I’ll tell you what to do next. We’ll go at this slowly. I’ll cover the other, and if this Horror moves let him have it.”
I did as I was told. I went round behind the thin man and pressed the gun into his back. Then I reached up with my left hand and felt under his right arm. A nasty, dead kind of smell came from him, and I was suddenly disgusted at being so close to him and touching him so intimately.
I know that my hand trembled, and it must have been that that made him take the chance, for, suddenly, in one quick flow of motion, he had dropped the television, whirled like a snake, slapping the gun out of my hand with his open palm, and clutched me to him.
James Bond’s gun roared, and I felt the wind of a bullet, and then I began to fight like a demon, kicking and scratching and clawing. But I might have been fighting with a stone statue. He just squeezed me more agonizingly to him, and I heard his dry voice say, “Okay, limey. Now what? Want the dame to get herself killed?”
I could feel one of his hands loosening itself from me to get to his gun, and I began struggling again.