James Bond and Moonraker (9 page)

Bond found that his eye had unaccountably strayed to a glass model of a four-poster bed, and was quick to remove it. ‘I’m tempted to say yes immediately, but maybe I’d better take a look round.’

The girl smiled and made a graceful sweep with her arm. ‘Please, go anywhere you wish. You may visit the workshop if you like.’ She pointed towards the back of the shop and left Bond in order to pursue another customer.

Bond made his way down the aisles and decided that on the whole he preferred antique glass to modern. There were a few showcases displaying antique pieces that appeared to a layman’s eye to be worth a fortune. He passed them and paused in the doorway that led to the workshop. The light beyond was dim and the focus of attention inevitably became the furnaces and the glowing globules on the ends of the glass workers’ rods. The sweat glistened on the chests of two men stripped to their under vests who were expertly fashioning a complicated multi-handled squat vase with the aid of pincers that manipulated the molten strands of glass as if they were spaghetti. What they were doing captured the interest of a small group of tourists, one of whom was fiddling with his camera at a speed scarcely inferior to that with which the glass makers were working.

Bond crossed to the tourists and then found his attention straying to another man who was working away from the others in a remote corner of the workshop. He was blowing what at first glance seemed like glass phials. Bond watched, admiring the skill with which the man picked up a blob of molten glass and inflated his cheeks until they seemed to be stuffed with a couple of tennis balls. The globule quivered and suddenly expanded like a balloon. A deft twist and a tap, and the glowing glass cylinder joined nine identical shapes in a tray. Bond looked at them and experienced an immediate sensation of
déjà vu
. An identical, four-inch glass phial with a swollen neck had been illustrated on the engineering drawing. There was no mistaking the convex protuberances. As Bond watched, the craftsman put down his rod and carried the full tray to an open service lift. He laid it carefully on a shelf and pushed a button. The globes disappeared from view. Bond saw the man glance at him suspiciously as he turned, and so he quickly swung round and followed a sign above another of the doors that led into the workshop which read ‘Museum of Antique Glassware’.

Without looking back, Bond went through the door and along a dark brick and stone corridor that brought him into another showroom. Here there was none of the crush of the shop proper, and many of the exhibits were in glass cases. A girl in a beautiful but simple white cashmere suit was showing round a party of tourists. ‘... and this perfect bowl is the work of Bruno Venini, the founder of this establishment. Born in Padua in 1451, he came to Venice at the age of eighteen and, five years later, opened a small workshop on the island of Murano...’

Bond forgot about Bruno Venini as the party moved on to a second showcase and he saw who was detaching herself from the rear of the group. Holly Goodhead. Her hair hung loosely about her shoulders and she was wearing a thigh-length woollen jacket in red and blue stripes and wide navy blue trousers. She let the party draw ahead of her and then skirted some showcases to arrive at a door in the corner of the room. She glanced round quickly and Bond stepped back into the passageway. When he peered out she was opening the door and looking inside. Bond saw her head tilt. After a moment’s pause, she closed the door and rejoined the party, who were being informed that a fastidiously ornate model of a sailing boat would fetch over a million dollars were it ever placed on the market. The party moved out of the room with a chorus of respectful ‘oohs’.

Bond crossed swiftly and opened the door. He looked into a small courtyard with a flight of stairs going up to a heavily studded wooden door. There was a gateway with a wrought iron gate and beyond that a vista of green slimy wall with grey water beneath it. Bond closed the door thoughtfully and hurried in the direction that the party had taken.

Holly was walking across St Mark’s Square as Bond came up beside her, making an exaggerated gesture of astonishment. ‘Why — Dr Goodhead. What a surprise! ‘

Holly’s lip curled slightly. ‘I can only hope your presence here is a coincidence, Mr Bond. I dislike being spied on.’

‘Don’t we all,’ said Bond agreeably. ‘It makes me almost as piqued as having my brains scrambled on a sabotaged centrifuge.’

Holly’s tone was almost prim. ‘Really, Mr Bond, you appear to suffer from a persecution complex.’

‘Events tend to encourage it,’ said Bond drily. ‘Can I ask what brings you to Venice?’

Holly waved a dismissive hand at a photographer who was angling for a shot. ‘I’m addressing a seminar of the European Space Commission.’

Bond shook his head admiringly. ‘Heady stuff. I keep forgetting that you’re more than just a very beautiful woman.’

Holly stopped and faced him. ‘Mr Bond, if you’re trying to be ingratiating, don’t bother. I have more important things on my mind.’

Bond’s expression became serious. ‘They’re what I’d like to talk to you about. How about dinner this evening?’

Holly shook her head. ‘This evening I’m giving my address.’

‘Can you think of a reason why we can’t have a drink afterwards?’

Holly smiled a thin smile. ‘Not immediately — but I’m certain I shall.’

She started to walk away but Bond was quickly at her side. ‘The least I can do is escort you back to your hotel. The Daniell, I imagine?’

Holly’s eyes narrowed. ‘You have been spying on me.’

‘No, it’s the direction in which you’re walking. The Y.W.C.A. is the other end of town.’

Holly suppressed a smile as they passed the Ducal Palke and crossed the long bridge to the Riva degli Schiavoni. ‘I might ask you what you’re doing here. The 747 came down in Alaska, didn’t it?’

‘I’m more interested in where the Moonraker came down,’ said Bond. ‘I didn’t find anybody in California who was prepared to look farther than the other side of the Bering Strait.’

‘Perhaps you didn’t talk to the right people.’

There was a note of criticism in Holly’s voice that Bond found puzzling. Apart from Drax and Holly, Trudi was the only person he had questioned in detail. ‘How’s Trudi Parker?’ he asked casually. ‘She seemed to be getting a bit bored with her job.’

‘She’s dead,’ said Holly calmly.

‘Dead?’

‘Rather a horrible accident. Mr Drax was out shooting and the Dobermanns attacked her.’

‘And nobody was able to control them?’

‘She’d wandered off into the woods by herself, apparently. The dogs must have picked up her scent. Chang went after them but when he got there it was too late.’ She shuddered convincingly. ‘It’s horrible, isn’t it?’

Bond felt like throwing up. Just a few days before he had been making love to the girl. Now she was dead. Perhaps because of him. His bitterness was laced with strong measures of guilt which he funnelled instantly into a determination for revenge.

‘Accidents appear to be proliferating,’ he said grimly. ‘You must fear for your own life sometimes.’

Holly looked at him levelly. ‘I think we both have our fears, Mr Bond.’ She held out a hand in a gesture of dismissal. ‘Good luck with your inquiries.’

Bond shook the hand. ‘And with your address. I’ll see you later.’

Holly’s expression was sceptical but she said nothing. She turned on her heel to continue walking along the quay.

Bond’s face was set in grim lines as he retraced his steps to find his gondola. Trudi must have been killed because somebody knew that she had been in the study with him. His own life had probably been spared because two ‘accidents’ in the space of a few hours would have aroused suspicion even in Drax’s stronghold. But here, in Venice, he was vulnerable again. It was open season for James Bond. He lengthened his stride and found Franco fending off an American matron who was clearly more interested in his body than his gondola.

Bond adopted a mealy-mouthed English accent. ‘I’m frightfully sorry but I’m afraid I engaged this chap for the day.’

The woman’s eyes challenged him contemptuously and the word ‘faggot’ almost formed itself on her lips. She turned away, making no secret of her disappointment.

Bond stepped into the gondola. ‘Have you seen anything unusual, Franco?’

‘A man with binoculars has been watching the Piazzetta for a long time from the top of the Campanile. You see —’ he nodded discreetly as he began to paddle ‘— they glint in the sunlight.’ •

Bond looked and nodded. It might be a tourist. It might be somebody reporting his movements. He must keep on the alert but not fall prey to exaggerated fears. ‘Take me up to the Rialto,’ he commanded.

‘
Si, signore.
’ Franco took the gondola away from the cluster round the jetties and headed towards the church of Santa Maria della Salute and the mouth of the Grand Canal. Bond sat back in comfort and looked at the façades of the noble buildings; the warm pink brick and the blackened stone. The water lapped noisily and there was a sad smell of age and decay. Bond thought of Trudi again and felt a fresh pang of bitterness and misery sweep over him. He was in a dirty business and kind, ordinary people with whom he came into contact ran the risk of dying. As he grew older it was something that worried him more. His increasing awareness of the limitations of his own mortality was making him more compassionate about the lives of others. It was something, he considered ruefully, that in due course could make him a liability to the service.

Franco turned into a narrow waterway at the Grande Hotel Europa e Britannia and the noise and bustle of the Grand Canal was replaced by the mournful
slap, slap
of muddy brown water against the slime-covered stones. Buildings rose on either side like the walls of a canyon and Bond turned his head to see a fat rat watching him from the mouth of a pipe. Far above there was an unnerving cackle of female laughter and the grinding noise of a window being forced shut. A low bridge loomed up and Franco almost knelt as they went beneath it. On all sides they were enclosed, and the atmosphere was claustrophobic. Bond slid his hand down to his waist to feel the comforting outline of hi§ Walther PPK, keeping his eyes moving warily. There were balconies far above, and suddenly a flowerpot seemed to tremble. Bond flinched and then saw that the movement was caused by a cat picking its way along a balustrade.

No sooner had he relaxed than a funeral launch appeared, nosing its way into the canal ahead of them. The launch was black with an elaborate coffin mounted forward of a low cabin. Wreaths lined its sides. Before the coffin, the helmsman, dressed in black and wearing dark spectacles, controlled the launch. The sight was a depressing one at the best of times, and in this dark and narrow waterway was made doubly sinister by its surroundings. Bond found his attention caught by the Charon at the helm. The dark spectacles gave the man an appearance that was unaccountably evil. And the hat. It was odd that the helmsman of a funeral launch should wear a flat black cap. Bond looked at Franco, who had taken off his straw and was holding it respectfully across his chest. The launch was a dozen yards away. The helmsman crouched over the wheel. Bond could make out shadowy figures in the cabin.

Bang!

With a noise like the lid of a jack-in-the-box springing open, the top of the coffin burst into the air and a man sat up clasping a sub-machine gun. His first volley of shots ripped into Franco’s chest and expelled him from the boat as at the tip of a lance. Bond threw himself flat and thrust out an arm. His finger collided with a button which he pushed as a second volley of sub-machine gun fire honeycombed the woodwork behind him. There was a grinding noise that struggled for survival against the metallic bray of the automatic, and the gondolier’s platform slid back to reveal an inboard motor and a tiller. As Bond grasped the tiller, so the engine roared to life and the prow of the gondola leapt into the air.

The boat surged forward as another hornet swarm of hot lead lacerated the air above Bond’s head. There were shouts of rage and defiance and loud scraping noises as the launch swung round to give chase. Bond found himself menaced by another gondola and steered a perilous passage between it and a wall before emerging in an open basin. There was no indication of which exit to take so he swung the tiller over and sped up the narrowest waterway he could find. Only a few yards’ progress was necessary for him to realize that he had made a mistake. Ahead lay a high brick wall signalling that he had entered a cul de sac. Still lying at full length, he manipulated the tiller and passed under a narrow bridge. Behind him he could hear the manic screech of the launch’s motor. It was closing the distance between them fast. There was a sound like somebody stamping on a matchbox, and Bond looked back to see that the coffin and the top of the cabin structure had been torn off as the launch roared under the low bridge. The helmsman did not give up easily. He knew that if he caught up with Bond he could run him down as a motorist with a couple of beers inside him might smear a rabbit just for the hell of it.

Now the brick wall was looming up fast. Bond cut the engine and turned to face the way he had come. The prow of the gondola thumped into the wall. Bond was shaken but pulled out the Walther PPK and held it before him in two hands. The muzzle wavered slightly between the two circles of dark glass that showed above a mouth parting in triumph. Bond knew that it had to be — now! A sharp crack and the helmsman’s head jerked out of view.

Bond did not pause to congratulate himself on his marksmanship but leapt sideways for a metal railing running along the sidewalk. His hand closed on it and his feet braced against the wall. He jerked himself up and threw a leg over the rail as the launch smashed through the gondola and into the wall. There was a violent explosion and a wave of heat that singed the hair on the back of his head. Bond staggered against the wall and squatted down with his arm across his face. Behind him the launch burnt with a hungry crackling noise that soon extinguished the faint screams coming from the concertina-ed wreckage. Windows opened, people began to shout and cry out, a crowd converged. Bond found himself standing next to the American woman who had tried to obtain Franco’s services. She looked at him, puzzled.