“Oh, God, please, no!” the man cried. “I didn’t do it, I swear! It was Walter. My partner. He’s the real Union man. He’s one of the commandants. I just work for him. I swear. It was all his doing. I just followed orders.”
“And did you kill her?”
“No, I swear,” Clayton pleaded. “It was Walter. He did it. He does all the dirty work like that. He … he likes it! Please, don’t hurt me!”
“And what about Dr. Feare?”
“Dr. Feare?”
Then Bond remembered. Clayton and van Breeschooten had already left London by the time Kimberley had been killed.
“Do you know who killed her?” Bond applied a little more pressure with the knife. The blade made a small nick in Clayton’s neck.
“I don’t know anything about Dr. Feare! I swear!”
The man seemed to be telling the truth. He was too frightened not to.
“Why was she killed? Was she Union?”
“I don’t know! Maybe my cousin does! Please have mercy!”
“Who’s your cousin?”
Bond heard voices approaching. At least two men were on their way inside. He had run out of time.
Clayton heard them and started to scream for help. Bond savagely sliced the man’s neck, then stabbed him in the heart.
“There’s your mercy. I made it quick,” Bond spat.
Clayton gasped, his eyes bulging, then fell to the floor. Bond wiped the knife clean on the man’s clothes, then walked out of the latrine just as the two men were stepping inside. One of them said something in Arabic and Bond grunted.
As soon as he was outside, Bond began to run. He heard shouts behind him, and the two men ran out of the latrine in pursuit. Bond zigzagged through the groups of tents and headed toward the hill. Shots were fired, and then a siren wailed.
A big man appeared in front of him and shouted, “Hey!” It was Rodney. Bond kicked, swinging his foot in the shape of a crescent moon. There was a discernable crack as he connected with Rodney’s jaw. The man screamed and fell to the ground. Bond leaped over him and kept running.
Two floodlights snapped on and began to sweep the area. Men were running about in a state of confusion. What’s the trouble? What happened? An intruder? Where?
Bond made it to the cliff just as a floodlight beam passed over him. There was more shouting, and two bullets whizzed uncomfortably close and ricocheted off nearby rocks. He didn’t stop, praying that he could stay ahead of the light. It found him anyway, and it stayed with him as he ascended.
Bond turned with the Walther in hand to aim at the floodlight, but realized that he was out of range. More bullets chopped up the earth around him. He tried to roll out of the spotlight and keep climbing, but the light followed him to the top. Fortunately, he was up and over before any of the men could stop him.
He ran for the bridge, crossed it, and was never so happy to see a Land Rover waiting for him.
“Are you all right?” Reggab asked.
“Yes, let’s get out of here!”
They jumped into the vehicle and fired it up. Reggab spun the wheels and took off. They heard more gunfire behind them. Bond looked back and saw three pairs of headlamps.
“They’re right behind us. Step on it!”
“I’m going as fast as I can!” Reggab shouted.
The Land Rover made it to the main highway. Reggab swerved out of the dirt road and skidded on the gravel, straightened, and sped west toward Ketama. As they passed the landmark berraka, two men with automatic rifles stepped out into the middle of the road and began firing in their direction. Bullets broke the back window and took out a taillight. The three pursuing vehicles were gaining fast. They appeared to be jeeps, but it was really too dark to tell for certain.
Bond leaned out of the window and fired the Walther at them, but the road had too many bends. He couldn’t get a good bead on them.
He sat back in the cab and said, “We’re just going to have to outrun them.”
“No problem,” Reggab said, clutching the steering wheel. “Better fasten your seat belt.”
But one of the jeeps had gained ground and was not far behind. More bullets slammed into the back of the Land Rover. There was a loud boom, the recognizable sound of a blowout. The Land Rover swerved and screeched as Reggab struggled to gain control. To avoid sailing off the cliff into a dark abyss, he pulled the wheel toward the mountain. The Land Rover sideswiped a rough patch of rocks, causing it to topple onto its side. The vehicle slid for twenty feet and crashed into the mountainside.
Bond was dazed. The first thing he was aware of was the sound of the Land Rover’s blaring horn. Then he smelled the petrol leaking out the back. Bond looked over at Reggab. His friend was slumped forward, his head bent grotesquely. There was a bullet hole at the base of his skull.
Without another thought, Bond kicked at the passenger door above his head. He got it open and struggled to pull himself out. The three jeeps had stopped thirty yards away. Men with guns piled out and stood watching him.
Bond fell to the ground and crawled away from the Land Rover. He fought to get to his feet, but the sudden pain in his head and chest prevented him from doing so. He reached up and felt the sticky, wet blood in his hair. He collapsed on the road just as the Land Rover’s petrol tank exploded behind him and the sudden waves of heat rolled over his body.
One of the men in uniform ran to him and dragged him across to the side of the road. Bond was woozy, unable to fight back. He felt his shirt sleeve being unbuttoned and rolled over. There was the prick of a needle, and in a moment he felt nothing.
THIRTEEN
ALL-POINTS ALERT
JAMES BOND OPENED HIS EYES.
Three alley cats were eyeing him suspiciously. When they saw that the human was awake, they scurried away.
The smell of urine and rotten eggs was overwhelming.
It was dawn. Bond could hear roosters crowing in the distance. His surrounding were bathed in the dim light of the new day.
He was lying on something scratchy.
Bond rose carefully. His head was spinning wildly, and he had a massive headache. Where the hell was he?
It was a street. A medina. He was lying on a pile of hay used to feed mules. Bond recognized Latif’s shop across the little street and down a few doors.
He was back in Tangier! How did he get here?
Bond got to his feet and found that he was steadier than he expected. He took stock of his body. To his surprise, the Walther PPK was in the shoulder holster and the knife was in its sheath. His passport was in his pocket.
Hold on … the P99. It was gone. The holster on his belt was empty.
There were some cuts and bruises and a crusty wound on his head from the Land Rover wreck, but otherwise he seemed to be in one piece.
Again.
What the hell?
How did he get here? Could the Union have brought him here? If so, why? Wouldn’t they have left him to die, or better yet, made sure of it?
Then he remembered the needle. He had been drugged.
Bond was convinced more than ever that something extraordinary was going on. Someone wanted him alive. In London, he had distinctly heard Clayton and von Breeschooten order their thugs not to shoot at him. After the Land Rover crash outside the terrorist training camp, he remembered seeing several vehicles and armed men surrounding him before he had succumbed to his injuries. They had put him to sleep and then carted him back to Tangier. It was the only possible explanation.
Bond wearily stumbled to Latif’s shop and went inside. Reggab’s son Hussein was shocked at Bond’s appearance.
“I’m sorry,” Bond said. “I have something I need to tell your mother.”
The boy knew what the problem was just by looking at Bond’s face. He immediately embraced Bond and sobbed. Bond held the boy and stroked his head before going inside to break the news to the rest of the family.
An hour later, Bond was back on the street, dressed respectably, and feeling as re
freshed as he possibly could. He walked out of the medina so that he could catch a taxi to the railway station. Once again he examined the piece of paper he had taken from Michael Clayton. The slip said: “14 Ville de Casablanca.” The Union headquarters.
As he entered the Grand Socco, he noticed that there was a high concentration of police cars circling the square. There seemed to be excitement in the air. People were rushing about and shouting. Something had happened.
He caught a Westerner and asked in French, “What’s going on?”
“Terrorists on a ferry,” the man said. “Some men shot a bunch of British tourists last night.”
“What?”
“That’s all I know. They’re looking for the gunman.”
Bond went to the nearest newsstand and bought an English newspaper.
He couldn’t believe what he saw on the front page. It was madness! Utter madness!
The headline read: “TERRORISTS KILL BRITISH TOURISTS!” What was more disconcerting was a police drawing of a suspect who had fled the scene of the crime.
The man in the drawing looked just like Bond.
Bond quickly scanned the article to glean the details. Apparently, the ferry was on its way from Spain to Tangier. Sometime in the late evening hours, three armed men had taken control of the ship. Witnesses described them as “two Spaniards and an Englishman.” The men entered the dining room and called for everyone with a British passport to come with them. There were ten in all—six men and four women. The men marched them to the front of the dining room. The British terrorist announced to the crowd, in English, that what they were doing was in the name of Domingo Espada of Spain. The man then called for an immediate surrender of Gibraltar, or war would break out between Spain and Britain. He then said, “This is the first strike.” With that, he shot each and every British tourist, one by one. The two Spaniards held the rest of the crowd back with their weapons.
After the murders, the three men ran out of the room and hid somewhere on another deck. When the ferry got to Tangier, the police stormed the boat. Panic ensued as gunfire erupted all over the ship. The two Spaniards were killed, but the Brit slipped away unseen. He might have escaped with the crowd of frightened passengers who rushed the gangway after the incident.
Eyewitnesses described the unidentified Briton and the police were looking for the man shown in the drawing.
Bond dropped the paper in a dustbin and kept walking.
Christ! he thought. This was all becoming too bizarre.
As he couldn’t possibly have done that horrible deed, someone was obviously impersonating him. The Union was behind it. That had to be the answer. It was some kind of diabolical plot, and he was a part of it. The only way to uncover this mystery was to go to Casablanca and find the Union headquarters. He would kill everyone in the place if he had to. Walter van Breeschooten would be number one on the hit list.
“SmeH leeya! Inta!”
Bond looked up and saw a policeman ten feet away, walking toward him. Without a second’s hesitation, Bond turned and ran. The policeman called on him to halt in Arabic and French and the chase began. Bond crossed the square and ran up stone steps that connected to a major avenue, Rue de la Liberté. The traffic was heavy, and Bond used this to his advantage by darting in and out between cars. Horns blared and drivers shouted at him as they slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting him. Bond glanced back and saw that the policeman was still in pursuit. He forged ahead, running down the avenue to the Place de France roundabout, then turned southeast onto Boulevard Pasteur and ran across a bridge overlooking the Grand Socco below. Another set of stone stairs led back down, so he took them three at a time. Bond ran past men selling piles of silver, smelly fish, then slipped into a crowd of veiled women. They screamed as he pushed through and turned a corner, finding himself in a narrow alley. He stopped and pressed himself against a wall, attempting to catch his breath. He waited, hoping he had lost the policeman.
“Put your hands up!” The voice came from the other end of the alley. It was the policeman. He must have known another way around. He held a handgun and was calmly walking toward Bond.
Perhaps the smartest thing he could do at this point was surrender, Bond thought. He should let London handle it. Surely Bill Tanner would believe that Bond had not committed those crimes.
Bond slowly raised his hands. The policeman had a glint in his eye. He had caught the terrorist!
A gunshot rang out, reverberating in the narrow alley. Bond was confused—at first he thought that the policeman had fired his gun. Instead, the officer stumbled and dropped his firearm. A red splotch spread across the man’s chest, and he fell to the ground. Bond looked around frantically, trying to pinpoint where the shot had come from. There were some windows in the building overlooking the alley, but they were dark.
He scanned both ends of the alley. They were clear. Rather than ask questions, he decided to keep running. He backed out of the alley and ran back to the square, and then climbed up the stairs to Boulevard Pasteur. He hailed a taxi and told the driver to take him straight to the railway station.
The station was crowded with commuters coming into the city from the outskirts. Bond bought a one-way first-class ticket to Casablanca. His timing was perfect. He could catch a rapid-service train in one hour. Now he only had to stay unnoticed in the waiting area.
At least three policemen were patrolling the station, probably looking for him. Bond went into the gift shop and purchased a pair of cheap sunglasses and an American-style baseball cap with “Morocco!” stitched on the front. It wasn’t much of a disguise, but it would have to do for now.
Bond spent the rest of the hour in the small snack bar, where he had a mediocre breakfast of eggs and yogurt. Nevertheless, the food made him feel better, and he thought that perhaps he could get some sleep on the train. If only the damned headache would go away … as well as the nagging feeling that he was being watched.
He took his time with the breakfast, then made his way out to the platform, where the ONCF express to Casablanca sat waiting. The trains in Morocco are modern and reliable. They are painted red and yellow with black tops, and the compartment classes are clearly marked on the outside. Bond got into the only first-class carriage and found his compartment. For the moment he was alone, but there were five other seats. He had purposefully asked for a nonsmoking compartment, thinking that it might be less crowded. If he wanted a smoke, he could go out into the corridor or stand on the platform and look out the back of the train.
Before long, the train began to move. The conductor came by and punched his ticket without saying a word. Bond settled into his seat and silently watched the scenery.
He felt more alone than he had ever felt in his life.
“It can’t be him,” M said, looking at the police sketch of the terrorist suspect.
Tanner shook his head. “I don’t believe it, either.”
“We need to determine if Double-O Seven really went to Morocco. Still no answer from Station NA?”
“No, ma’am. I’ve left three messages. If Mr. Reggab is anywhere around, he should have got back to me.”
The intercom buzzed. M pushed the button. “What is it?” she snapped.
“An urgent communication came in from Cipher. I’m sending it through on your PC,” Money penny said.
“All right, thank you,” M said.
Tanner looked over M’s shoulder as she punched the keyboard and Bond’s coded message came up.
LATIF REGGAB, STATION NA, KILLED BY THE UNION. PLEASE MAKE ARRANGEMENTS FOR HIS WIDOW ASAP. WILL REPORT WHEN I KNOW MORE.
007
M punched the intercom again.
“Moneypenny, where did this message come from?”
“Somewhere strange,” her secretary said. “Wait a second … here it is. Thailand.”
“Thailand?!”
“Cipher thought that it had been routed through several countries so that we wouldn’t know where it originated from.”
�
�Thank you.”
Tanner sighed. “Well, I doubt it came from Thailand.”
“He’s obviously in bloody North Africa!” M said. “You were right. That fax from Felix Leiter indicated as much. Double-O Seven’s going against my orders and is off on a mission of personal vendetta.”
Tanner sat down in front of the desk. He had found Leiter’s fax in Bond’s office, as well as the other documents concerning the Union.
“I think you need to look at it from his perspective, ma’am,” he said gently.
“I understand his perspective!” she spat. “It doesn’t mean that he can compromise SIS and my orders. Have you spoken to Inspector Howard today?”
“No, ma’am. As far as I know, Double-O Seven’s still the number one suspect in Dr. Feare’s murder.”
The red phone rang. M picked it up and said, “Yes?” She listened intently for a moment, then said, “Thank you,” and hung up.
Tanner waited for her to speak. She looked at him with concern and said, “A group of Spanish tourists were attacked in London a couple of hours ago. An angry mob surrounded them in Piccadilly. One man was killed.”
“My God.”
“The PM has asked that the summit meeting in Gibraltar be moved up. We’re waiting on the exact date and time, but it will probably be in a day or two. In the meantime, NATO and the U.N. are urging restraint.”
The intercom buzzed again. “Now what?” M asked.
“Captain Hodge is here. He says it’s urgent,” Moneypenny said. Hodge was the head of the antiterrorism section at SIS.
“Well, send him in. I can only imagine …”
Captain Hodge, a tall man in his fifties, walked into the room.
“Good morning, ma’am, Chief-of-Staff,” he said.
“What do you have for us, captain?” she asked.
“It’s not good, I’m afraid.” He held up a videocassette. “Something you ought to look at.”
M gestured to the VCR and monitor on the cabinet to her left. “Be my guest.”
Hodge popped in the cassette and turned on the monitor. The picture was grainy and black-and-white, shot from a security camera. Numerals indicated the date and time of the recording.
Doubleshot Page 13
