Bond Movies 03 - Licence to Kill (17 page)

There was a light warm breeze and the buzz of an air-conditioning plant. The flags, one with the casino logo, the other the presidential flag, only moved slightly in the dry air. Bond stood above them, looking down into the street below. Cars came and went. Lights stretched out over the city and he could see a jet climbing out after its take-off from Isthmus City Airport.

Directly below the flagstaffs there was the sculpture of the reclining naked woman whose arms stretched upwards towards him. Below her, he knew, were the large armour-plated windows of Sanchez’s apartment, the boardroom and Lord knew what else – offices, a dining room perhaps? He took out the Jabberwocky, clipped it on to his belt, put on the earphones and moved the switch to
on.
A babble filled his ears so that he had to adjust the volume. Obviously the cocktail party was going well. There was time to spare as he wanted the whole crew – Sanchez, his various henchmen and the group of orientals – in the boardroom before he started the first part of his work.

He moved the toothpaste tubes of RDX into the breast pocket of his, now oil-streaked jacket, made certain the pen was within easy reach, then opened up the grappling iron again, this time clipping the rope on to the D-ring that Q had fixed to his belt, under the cummerbund.

Bond smiled to himself. The nylon rope was almost half an inch thick, and there was a lot of it. ‘How the devil do you get this much into the cylinder,
and
the grappling irons?’ he had asked Q.

Briskly, Q had replied, ‘All done by mirrors, 007. Surely you know I’ve been a member of the Magic Circle for a long time.’

Now, poised between the mastheads on the roof of Sanchez’s casino, Bond made fast the grapple to the stone surround, pulling, and testing to be certain that neither the grapple would slip nor the stonework give way.

The noise was dying down in his earphones as someone – he thought Heller – was calling the party to order and asking them to step into the boardroom. There was a gasp as Sanchez obviously did his trick of electronically sliding back the wall, then a change of sound as people moved through, a scraping of chairs, coughs, the whine of the wall moving back into place.

The moment had come, and Bond gently lowered himself over the edge. Through the earphones he heard Sanchez speak, calling the meeting to order.

‘I wish to welcome you here. By now you will have met my trusted staff. Mr Truman-Lodge, my financial manager, and Colonel Heller, head of security for all the Sanchez enterprises.’

Slowly, Bond allowed the nylon rope to unwind on its spring until he slid neatly into the outstretched arms of the statue.

Sanchez was still speaking.

‘This is an historic moment. East meets West. Drug dealers of the world unite.’ His audience chuckled as he continued. ‘Asia is a new market for us. Mr Truman-Lodge, here, will tell you the simple way in which we can all become billionaires ten times over. But I have another message for you. In this business there is a lot of cash; therefore there are a lot of people standing around with their hands out . . .’

‘In a word, bribery.’ Another voice, vaguely Chinese. It was followed by another laugh.

‘You said it!’ Sanchez again. ‘So you pay! Everyone and his brother is on the payroll . . .’

Bond stepped out of the statue’s arms, letting the rope lower him to the darkened window of Sanchez’s apartment. Light flooded from the next window, that of the boardroom where Sanchez was still speaking.

‘. . . So you buy a mayor, a police chief, a general, a president. The beauty of it is that one day you wake up and find you own the whole goddamned country. And that’s good, because then you just take what you want: a bank, a gambling casino, an airline concession. Why? I tell you why. Because it’s easier for a politician to take silver than lead.’ This, Bond thought, really brought the house down. He swallowed the bile in his mouth which came unbidden when he thought of the evil just a few feet from where he hung, precariously, on the long window ledge of Sanchez’s apartment.

He had tugged at the rope and now swayed safely with his feet inches from the lower edge of the glass. From here, he could reach both the top and left-hand side of the window. Gingerly, he removed the first of the family-sized toothpaste tubes, and began the arduous job of packing the pliable C-4 along the left downside of the window.

In his earphones, and in reality a few feet away, Sanchez continued.

‘You see, we have an invisible empire, from Chile to Alaska.’ What I wish to do, amigos, is to make
you
part of that empire. I want the Pacific to be our little puddle. You all have good business deals going for you, but by joining with me, you will see that it can not only be safe, but also truly rewarding. You can double your take in a month. After that? Well, I’ll let Mr Truman-Lodge explain some of it to you.’

It was an arm-wrenching job, squeezing out the C-4 in little snakes and running it, like putty, along the window’s edge. This became even more difficult when Bond had to reach up and pack the stuff along the top of the window itself. Truman-Lodge was being not a little boring.

‘Here is a demographic report which breaks down each territory by age and socio-economic group. You will see there is a huge potential demand for our product, given the implementation of aggressive marketing programmes . . .’

Bond was around a quarter of the way along the top of the window, when, concentrating on packing the C-4, he did not notice a missing piece of masonry below his feet. He slipped, swung dizzily downward, then had to manipulate the rope again to bring himself up. He said a quiet prayer of thanksgiving that he had managed to hold on to the tube, which was rapidly running out.

Manipulating the rope, he found himself rising too fast. He pulled to a stop, swung outwards and hit the window with an audible bump. Through the earphones he heard Truman-Lodge pause, then the scrape of a chair and the sound of footsteps, coming to investigate. Heller, he thought as he pushed himself away from the window again, swinging wide and hitting the stone to his left, dragging the rope out of sight, pushing his body close to the wall only a few inches away from the window.

Truman-Lodge droned on, ‘As in the United States, Senor Sanchez is prepared to sell exclusive franchises. The price is set, and there can be no haggling. One hundred million dollars for each territory. We supply first-rate merchandise exclusively to you. Ten tons a month. That’s twenty-thousand dollars a key Hong Kong, right? That works out at twenty-million per metric tonne, if you need that information. A fair price, I’m sure you’ll agree.’ There were quiet murmurs of assent.

Bond held his breath. He could feel, if not see, a figure inside Sanchez’s apartment. The seconds seemed like hours. Then, he heard the footsteps returning, and the W9 bug planted in the boardroom even picked up the whisper of Heller’s voice. ‘Nothing around. All clear.’

Bond swung back against the window again, finishing the first tube and unscrewing a second. He still had quite a way to go.

‘We guarantee quality and price for five years,’ Truman-Lodge said. ‘Any questions?’

By this time, Bond had managed to cover the top of the window and the left and right sides; now he allowed the rope to lower him below the level of the window, where he worked hard at setting the C-4 along the bottom edge of the glass. Truman-Lodge’s words came at the end of a lengthy speech, and there were general murmurs of acceptance. Then a heavily accented Chinese voice spoke up.

‘Senor Sanchez, since our arrival here we’ve eaten well, heard a lot of good stories, and generally enjoyed ourselves. However, you are asking us to put up a great deal of money to receive first-class merchandise. I like the idea, but, so far, we have no evidence that you can meet the demand. In other words, I, for one, would like to see the hardware.’

Bond finally came to the end of the lower section of window. He re-sealed the small amount of explosive in the tube, dropped it into his pocket, then felt for the pen.

Sanchez’s voice came clear into the earphones.

‘Mr Kwang. You don’t pay for hardware. You pay for my
personal guarantee and protection.
’

So, it was the big Hong Kong delegate who was turning difficult. Bond uncapped the pen and rolled one of the radio-controlled detonators into the palm of his hand. Recapping the pen, he pushed the detonator into the C-4, at the outer left-hand edge. It crossed his mind that very soon there would be a lot of flying glass. He could almost see the way the armoured thick glass would fragment and splinter, turning itself into a million crystals.

As Bond tugged at the rope to activate the spring mechanism which would take him to the top of the roof again, so Kwang was still arguing with Sanchez.

‘How do we
know
you have the capacity, Senor Sanchez?’

As Bond reached the top of the building there seemed to be a long pause before Sanchez spoke. As he allowed the rope to disappear into the grapple’s cylinder, and threw out what remained of the C-4 and the few spare detonators, Bond heard Sanchez undergo an amazing change of heart. Even his voice altered.

‘Hey, amigos, you’re right. We’re partners, no? Give it a couple of days. Until your colleagues arrive. A couple of days and you’ll all go to our main distribution centre. You’ll need to pack overnight bags. Now that’s settled, yes? Okay, on the far side of this room we have yet another surprise. A little festivity I have arranged for you with food, wine, women and song. Enjoy yourselves.’ There was a whining sound and gasps of pleasure.

Bond, now making for the rear of the roof, reckoned that the far wall of the boardroom also had a sliding mechanism leading to another large room. Heaven knew what kind of an orgy Sanchez had prepared for them there.

He looked over the roof-coping, down into the streets behind the casino. They appeared to be deserted. He knew the casino did not go right back to the end of the building, and that the exits were located in the sides.

For the second time that night, he fitted the grapple around the coping, tested it, and began to allow the rope to pay out, gently taking him down into the empty street below. As he dropped, so he heard another conversation. This time, he thought, in Sanchez’s apartment. Truman-Lodge’s voice said, ‘I don’t like this. That damned Kwang spells trouble. Why show them the laboratories?’

As Bond’s feet touched the pavement, Sanchez replied, ‘My dear William, would you put up a hundred million dollars without a little reassurance? Don’t worry. Nobody’s going to blow our operation.’

Brave words, Bond thought as he twitched at the rope, unhooking the grapple from high above him, reeling it in and telescoping the whole thing. Moments later he was hurrying across the road, heading for the half-demolished building.

Q sat patiently in the Rolls, around the corner from the ruins. He said nothing as Bond returned the collapsible grapple and took, in exchange, the signature gun. Then he simply said, ‘Good luck 007.’

Bond looked at Q for a long time. It was true, without this man, and those who worked with him in Q-Branch, he
would
have been dead years ago. ‘I take back what I said.’ He gave a hard smile. ‘You’re one hell of a field agent, Q. Get out now, while you can. I’ll see you back in London.’

Q did not reply. He merely put the window up and drove off into the night world of Isthmus City, leaving Bond to complete his work.

As he climbed over the ruins, looking for the best firing position, as low as possible, but with a clear view of the window, there was another short conversation, carried from the W9 under the chair arm in Sanchez’s apartment across to the Jabberwocky, and from there into Bond’s ears.

‘President Lopez is here, chief.’ It was Heller’s voice.

‘Hector,’ Sanchez said. ‘Please come in.’

‘There’s been a mistake with my money.’ This could only be President Hector Lopez. ‘Look at this, it’s only half the usual amount.’

A long pause, during which Bond found just the right place. An open space, with half a wall behind it, and rubble in front. He would be able to get a straight shot from the rubble, which he had begun to climb as he heard Sanchez’s voice.

‘My dear Hector. You were a little too quiet after I was arrested in the USA. You must remember that you’re only president for life, eh?’ The voice sent a chill down the back of Bond’s neck. He settled himself on the rubble and took out the pen into which he now slid two triple-A batteries. Clipping the pen back into place, he put it down with great care beside him. One press of the plunger and Sanchez’s window would disintegrate. Then one shot, and the Sanchez empire would begin to crumble. He settled into a comfortable aiming position, squinting through the small, night-enhancing telescopic sight. He could see Sanchez clearly, and Truman-Lodge. Windows gleamed along the entire length of the building’s top floor. Behind them figures moved. The oriental mission was having a good time. Well, he would soon put an end to that.

He was just swinging the sights back on to Sanchez’s apartment when he thought he caught a glimpse of someone familiar, framed for a second in a small window on the edge of the building, far right.

Bond focused on the window and his heart gave a leap. Two people were talking, waving arms in animated conversation. One was Heller. The other, he saw clearly, was Pam Bouvier. She had been too good to be true. Playing both sides against the middle, he guessed. Depression swamped him for a second as he watched Pam hand an envelope to Heller and then move out of vision.

His mouth hardened as he swept the sights back to Sanchez’s apartment. He had the cross-hairs smack on the man’s back, but knew that could change quickly once the window blew. Holding the rifle firmly in his left hand, he reached out for the pen, held it for a second, then pressed the plunger.

It was more of a crack than an explosion, but spectacular nevertheless. The window first seemed to become a sheet of flame, then a giant handful of diamonds which flew out, glinting and sprinkling their way down into the street.

He resighted, caught Sanchez clean in the cross-hairs, and squeezed the trigger. As he did so, something landed on top of him, the shot going wide and wild as Bond rolled to his right.