Part 1 (1/2)

FROM A VIEW TO A KILL

The eyes behind the wide black rubber goggles were cold as flint In the howling speed-tur seventy, they were the only quiet things in the hurtling flesh and les, they stared fixedly ahead from just above the centre of the handlebars, and their dark unwavering focus was that of gun ot into the face through the rin that showed big tourin the cheeks had been blown out by the wind into pouches that fluttered slightly To right and left of the hurtling face under the crash helauntlets, broken-wristed at the controls, looked like the attacking paws of a big animal

The man was dressed in the unifornals, and his reen, ith certain modifications to the valves and the carburettor and the reive more speed, identical with a standard British Ar in the est that he was not what he appeared to be, except a fully loaded Luger held by a clip to the top of the petrol tank

It was seven o'clock on a May littered with the tiny lu On both sides of the road the reat oak trees held the theatrical enchantment of the royal forests of Versailles and St Ger local traffic in the St Germain area, and the motor-cyclist had just passed beneath the Paris-Mantes autoroute already thundering with co north towards St Gerht in either direction, except, perhaps half a ure - another Royal Corps dispatch-rider He was a younger, sli thehis speed to around forty He ell on time and it was a beautiful day He wondered whether to have his eggs fried or scraht

Five hundred yards, four hundred, three, two, one The auntlet up to his teeth and pulled it off He stuffed the gauntlet between the buttons of his tunic and reached down and unclipped the gun

By now heman jerked his head round, surprised to find another dispatch-rider on his run at that ti He expected that it would be an Aht be anyone froht NATO nations that nized the uniforhted Who the hell could it be? He raised a cheerful right thu for the other side With one eye on the road ahead and the other on the approaching silhouette in the h the names of the British riders in the Special Service Transportation Unit at Headquarters Coht be Wally, sa about that little frog bit in the canteen - Louise, Elise, Lise - what the hell was her naun had slowed Noas fifty yards away His face, undistorted by the wind, had set into blunt, hard, perhaps Slav lines A red spark burned behind the black, aipie flew out of the forest ahead of the young dispatch-rider It fled clun that said that St Gerrinned and raised an ironical finger in salute and self-protection - 'One pie is sorrow'

Twenty yards behind hiun took both hands off the handlebars, lifted the Luger, rested it carefully on his left forear man's hands whipped off his controls andspine His machine veered across the road, jurass and lilies of the valley There it rose up on its screa back wheel and slowly crashed backwards on top of its dead rider The BSA coughed and kicked and tore at the young man's clothes and at the flowers, and then lay quiet

The killer executed a narrow turn and stopped with hisback the way he had come He stamped down the wheel-rest, pulled histhe wild flowers under the trees He knelt down beside the dead hly he tore the black leather dispatch-case off the corpse and ripped open the buttons of the tunic and removed a battered leather wallet He wrenched a cheap wrist-watch so sharply off the left wrist that the chro the dispatch-case over his shoulder While he stowed the wallet and the watch away in his tunic pocket he listened There were only forest sounds and the slow tick of hot metal from the crashed BSA The killer retraced his steps to the road He walked slowly, scuffing leaves over the tyre marks in the soft earth and moss He took extra trouble over the deep scars in the ditch and the grass verge, and then stood beside his motor-cycle and looked back towards the lily of the valley patch Not bad! Probably only the police dogs would get it, and, with ten miles of road to cover, they would be hours, perhaps days - plenty long enough The in He could have shot the et to twenty And taking the watch and the wallet had been nice touches - pro touches

Pleased with himself, the man heaved his machine off its rest, vaulted smartly into the saddle and kicked down on the starter Slowly, so as not to show skid marks, he accelerated away back down the road and in a ain and the wind had redrawn the erin across his face

Around the scene of the killing, the forest, which had held its breath while it was done, slowly began to breathe again

Ja at Fouquet's It was not a solid drink One cannot drink seriously in French cafes Out of doors on a pavein A fine a I'eau is fairly serious, but it intoxicates without tasting very good A quart de chaht before luncheon, but in the evening one quart leads to another quart and a bottle of indifferent chaht Pernod is possible, but it should be drunk in company, and anyway Bond had never liked the stuff because its liquorice taste reminded him of his childhood No, in cafes you have to drink the least offensive of the o with the - an Ae slice of lemon peel and soda For the soda he always stipulated Perrier, for in his opinion expensive soda water was the cheapest way to improve a poor drink

When Bond was in Paris he invariably stuck to the same addresses He stayed at the Terminus Nord, because he liked station hotels and because this was the least pretentious and most anonymous of them He had luncheon at the Cafe de la Paix, the Rotonde or the Doh and it amused him to watch the people If he wanted a solid drink he had it at Harry's Bar, both because of the solidity of the drinks and because, on his first ignorant visit to Paris at the age of sixteen, he had done what Harry's advertisement in the Continental Daily Mail had told him to do and had said to his taxi-driver 'Sank Roo Doe Noo' That had started one of thein the loss, alinity and his notecase For dinner, Bond went to one of the great restaurants - Vefour, the Caneton, Lucas-Carton or the Cochon d'Or These he considered, whatever Michelin ent, Maxims and the like, to have somehow avoided the tarnish of the expense account and the dollar Anyway, he preferred their cooking After dinner he generally went to the Place Pigalle to see ould happen to hi did, he would walk hoht Bond decided to tear up this dusty address-book and have hih Paris after a disarian border It had been a question of getting a certain Hungarian out Bond had been sent from London specially to direct the operation over the head of Station V This had been unpopular with the Vienna Station There had been s - wilful ones The man had been killed in the frontier minefield There would have to be a court of inquiry Bond was due back at his London headquarters on the following day to ht of it all depressed him Today had been so beautiful - one of those days when you alay - and Bond had decided to give the town just one irl as a real girl, and he would take her to dinner at some make-believe place in the Bois like the Armenonville To clean the money-look out of her eyes - for it would certainly be there - he would as soon as possible give her fifty thousand francs He would say to her: 'I propose to call you Donatienne, or possibly Solange, because these are na We knew each other before and you lent me this money because I was in a jam Here it is, and noill tell each other e have been doing since we last o In the meantime, here is the menu and the wine list and you must choose ill make you happy and fat' And she would look relieved at not having to try any h and say: 'But, James, I do not want to be fat' And there they would be, started on the ', and Bond would stay sober and be interested in her and everything she said And, by God, by the end of the evening it would not be his fault if it transpired that there was in fact no shred of stuffing left in the hoary old fairytale of 'A good ti for his Americano, Bond s at this fantasy for the satisfaction of launching a last kick at a town he had cordially disliked since the War Since 1945, he had not had a happy day in Paris It was not that the town had sold its body Many towns have done that It was its heart that was gone - pawned to the tourists, pawned to the Russians and Rouars, pawned to the scuradually taken the town over And, of course, pawned to the Germans You could see it in the people's eyes - sullen, envious, ashalanced across the pavement at the shi+ny black ribbons of cars off which the sun glinted painfully Everywhere it was the same as in the Champs-Elysees There were only two hours in which you could even see the town - between five and seven in thestreas, no spacious, tree-lined boulevards, could compete

The waiter's tray clattered down on the marble-topped table With a slick one-handed jerk that Bond had never been able to copy, the waiter's bottle-opener prised the cap off the Perrier The man slipped the tab under the ice-bucket, said a mechanical ”Voila, M'sieur” and darted away Bond put ice into his drink, filled it to the top with soda and took a long pull at it He sat back and lit a Laurens jaune Of course the evening would be a disaster Even supposing he found the girl in the next hour or so, the contents would certainly not stand up to the wrapping On closer examination she would turn out to have the heavy, dank, wide-pored skin of the bourgeois French The blonde hair under the rakish velvet beret would be brown at the roots and as coarse as piano wire The pepperarlic The alluring figure would be intricately scaffolded ire and rubber She would be from Lille and she would ask him if he was American And, Bond smiled to himself, she or her maquereau would probably steal his notecase La ronde! He would be back where he came in More or less, that was Well, to hell with it!

A battered black Peugeot 403 broke out of the centre stream of traffic, cut across the inside line of cars and pulled in to double park at the kerb There was the usual screaot out of the car and, leaving the traffic to sort itself out, walked purposefully across the sidewalk Bond sat up She had everything, but absolutely everything that belonged in his fantasy She was tall and, although her figure was hidden by a light raincoat, the way she moved and the way she held herself proaiety and bravado that ith her driving, but now there was impatience in the coonally through thecrowd on the pavee of the tables and ca to meet sos to somebody else She was late for him That's why she was in such a hurry What da blonde hair under the rakish beret! And she was looking straight at hiether, the girl had come up to his table and had drawn out a chair and sat down

She smiled rather tautly into his startled eyes ”I' at once You're wanted at the office” She added under her breath: ”Crash dive”

Bond jerked himself back to reality Whoever she was, she was certainly fro expression the Secret Service had borrowed from the Sub into his pocket and slid soot up and followed her down through the tables and across to her car It was still obstructing the inner lane of traffic Any lared at the She banged the gears into second and slid out into the traffic

Bond looked sideways at her The pale skin was velvet The blonde hair was silk - to the roots He said: ”Where are you fro on the traffic: ”From the Station Grade two assistant Number 765 on duty, Mary Ann Russell off I've no idea what it's all about I just saw the signal from HQ - personal from M to Head of Station Most Immediate and all that He was to find you at once and if necessary use the Deuxieme to help Head of F said you alent to the sairl were given a list” She smiled ”I'd only tried Harry's Bar, and after Fouquet's I was going to start on the restaurants It was lance ”I hope I wasn't very clu to handle it if I'd had a girl withto do much the same except call you 'sir' I was only worried about how you'd dispose of the girl If she started a scene I was going to offer to take her home in my car and for you to take a taxi”

”You sound pretty resourceful How long have you been in the Service?”

”Five years This is my first time with a Station”

”How do you like it?”

”I like the work all right The evenings and days off drag a bit It's not easy to make friends in Paris without” - her mouth turned doith irony - ”without all the rest I mean,” she hastened to add, ”I'm not a prude and all that, but somehow the French ive up taking the Metro or buses Whatever time of day it is, you end up with your behind black and blue” She laughed ”Apart fro what to say to the et around I bought this car cheap, and other cars see as you don't catch the other driver's eye, you can take on even the meanest of them They're afraid you haven't seen them And they're worried by the bashed-about look of the car They give you a wide berth”

They had come to the Rond Point As if to deht at the line of traffic co up from the Place de la Concorde Miraculously it divided and let her through into the Avenue Matignon

Bond said: ”Pretty good But don't make it a habit There hed She turned into the Avenue Gabrielle and pulled up outside the Paris headquarters of the Secret Service: ”I only try that sort of ot out and came round to her side of the car He said: ”Well, thanks for picking e? I don't get the pinches, but I'm just as bored in Paris as you are”

Her eyes were blue and wide apart They searched his She said seriously: ”I'd like that The switchboard here can always find h theand pressed the hand on the wheel He said ”Good,” and turned and walked quickly in through the archway

Wing Commander Rattray, Head of Station F, was a fattish ht back He dressed in a mannered fashi+on with turned-back cuffs and double slits to his coat, bow-ties and fancy waistcoats He , wine-and-food-society i blue eyes struck a false note He chain-sreeted Bond with relief ”Who found you?”

”Russell At Fouquet's Is she new?”

”Six ood one But take a pew There's the hell of a flap on and I've got to brief you and get you going” He bent to his interconal to M, please Personal froo the switch

Bond pulled a chair over by the opento keep away fro of Gauloises The traffic on the Charound Half an hour before he had been fed up with Paris, glad to be going Now he hoped he would be staying

Head of F said: ”Soot our dawn dispatch-rider fro The weekly run froence Division with the Suence papers, Iron Curtain Order of Battle - all the top gen One shot in the back Took his dispatch-case and his wallet and watch”

Bond said: ”That's bad No chance that it was an ordinary hold-up? Or do they think the wallet and watch were cover?”

”SHAPE Security can't uess it was cover Seven o'clock in the ue it out with the you as his personal representative He's worried as hell Apart froence dope, their I people have never liked having one of our Stations outside the Reservation so to speak For years they've been trying to get the St Gerence set-up But you knohat M is, independent old devil He's never been happy about NATO Security Why, right in the SHAPE Intelligence Division there are not only a couple of Frenchence and Security section is a German!”

Bond whistled

”The trouble is that this da M to heel Anyway, he says you're to get down there right away I've fixed up clearance for you Got the passes You're to report to Colonel Schreiber, Headquarters Command Security Branch A froather, he's already done just about all there was to be done”

”What's he done? What actually happened?”

Head of F picked up a -scale Michelin Environs de Paris He pointed with a pencil ”Here's Versailles, and here, just north of the park, is the big junction of the Paris-Mantes and the Versailles autoroutes A couple of hundred yards north of that, on N184, is SHAPE Every Wednesday, at seven in the , a Special Services dispatch-rider leaves SHAPE with the weekly Intelligence stuff I told you about He has to get to this little village called Fourqueux, just outside St Germain, deliver his stuff to the duty officer at our HQ, and report back to SHAPE by seven-thirty Rather than go through all this built-up area, for security reasons his orders are to take this N307 to St Noo under the autoroute and through the forest of St Ger it easy he'll do the trip in under a quarter of an hour Well, yesterday it was a corporal froood solid man called Bates, and when he hadn't reported back to SHAPE by seven-forty-five they sent another rider to look for hiht-fifteen the Security Branch was on the job, and by nine the roadblocks were up The police and the Deuxies found hi around six, and by that time if there had been any clues on the road they'd have been wiped out by the traffic” Head of F handed the map to Bond and walked back to his desk ”And that's about the lot, except that all the usual steps have been taken - frontiers, ports, aerodro won't help If it was a professional job, whoever did it could have had the stuff out of the country by midday or into an embassy in Paris inside an hour”

Bond said impatiently: ”Exactly! And so what the hell does M expect ain, but better? This sort of thing isn't my line at all bloody waste of time”

Head of F smiled sympathetically ”Matter of fact I put much the same point of view to M over the scrambler Tactfully The old man was quite reasonable Said he wanted to show SHAPE he was taking the business just as seriously as they were You happened to be available and more or less on the spot, and he said you had the sort of ht pick up the invisible factor I asked hiuarded headquarters there's bound to be an invisible ranted that he just isn't noticed - gardener,cleaner, postht of that, and that all those sort of jobs were done by enlistedup”

Bond laughed He could see M's frown and hear the crusty voice He said: ”All right, then I'll see what I can do Who do I report back to?”