Trigger Mortis Read online

  ‘After that, I did a stint on the Wall of Death, tearing around this giant barrel on an old Indian Scout Motorbike. You had to go about forty miles an hour to stay on and they made a big deal because I was a girl. “Little Miss Daredevil” they called me, but I don’t think anyone was very impressed because I looked like a boy and a pretty mean one at that.

  ‘Maybe I’d still be there now, although even then the whole place – the boardwalk, the amusement park – was beginning to shut down. But then my mom died – it was liver cancer – and an uncle I’d never heard of turned up, took one look at me, and dragged me off to Washington, DC. That was when my whole life changed. Actually, it was more than that. It was like it had never happened. Ralph and Gracie were good people. They had no kids of their own and they were horrified by what they saw. They were determined to turn me round. They put me into school and then college and forced me to catch up on six years’ lost education. They changed the way I looked. They changed everything about me. It was church every Sunday, meals round the table, no drink – and definitely no swearing. Ralph worked at the Treasury Department and he got me a job as a secretary in research. Now I’m an investigator. I still live in DC. I have a nice apartment. I live on my own. That’s how I like it.’ She changed gear and pulled into the outside lane. ‘And now let’s talk about something else. Or you can turn on the radio. We’ve still got another three hours to go.’

  The sun had begun its downward curve but the afternoon heat was still close and intense when they arrived at the construction depot that belonged to Blue Diamond and where Jason Sin was now based.

  It was five o’clock – exactly thirty hours until the Vanguard launch. But what possible link could there be between this place and an event happening more than four hundred and fifty miles away? What interest could SMERSH, with all its power and ambition, have in a grimy industrial wasteland where industrial diggers sat next to beaten-up forklifts and garbage trucks with spools of wire, cement blocks and all the other detritus of the construction industry? Even as Bond watched, crouching beside the car on the edge of a slight hill, a low-loader – Jeopardy had called it a lowboy – arrived at the main gate and began the painful manoeuvre that would allow it to enter. There was certainly plenty of security. A single-storey office, brick with a large observation window, guarded the entrance and there were at least half a dozen men in attendance, some of them Korean, checking the driver’s papers, the vehicle, the driver himself. The compound, shaped like a rectangle and at least two hundred yards in length, was dotted with metal poles supporting night vision cameras and arc lights, the whole thing surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with rolled barbed wire. CAUTION – HEAVY PLANT ENTERING. NO TRESPASSING read the sign in large letters that meant it. There had to be something here that was worth protecting but, crouching on the outside, Bond couldn’t imagine what it might be.

  The left-hand side of the compound was dominated by a huge warehouse, corrugated iron with a soaring zinc chimney that reminded Bond of Enterprises Auric in Switzerland. It was triple-height, with massive sliding doors that were already opening to let in the lowboy. Inside, Bond heard machinery – hammering, and the scream of an electric saw – and got a glimpse of gantries and a dull yellow light, but he could see nothing more. Opposite, there were temporary offices and living quarters built like Nissen huts, a car park with around a hundred cars, and some sort of administration block. And Sin himself? He had to live in the house that overlooked the central courtyard, a building that seemed strangely familiar to Bond. It was white, elegant, two-storeys high, built some time in the nineteenth century and definitely not American. Of course! It was crazy, but he knew exactly what he was looking at. Like many schoolboys before him, Bond had been dragged round the house where the poet John Keats had lived in Hampstead, north London. This building was an exact copy.

  How were they going to get in? Bond was aware of the ticking clock. At Wallops Island, final checks – ensuring that all vehicle systems were in order – would be well under way. They couldn’t cut through the wire. Even assuming they could purchase the necessary equipment, Bond was certain that there would be some sort of alarm device built in. Making any sort of move in full daylight was out of the question. There were people everywhere, men and women criss-crossing each other’s paths, taking no notice of each other, some in hard hats, some carrying pieces of equipment. Like it or not, they would have to wait for darkness. And then? The main gate was the only way.

  They had a meal together and Bond outlined his plan. At first, Jeopardy was reluctant. If he was going in, she wanted to be with him, but he managed to persuade her to see things his way.

  ‘I can’t do this without you, Jeopardy, and whatever I find, you’ll be the first to know.’

  The sun had set by the time they returned and the long shadows colluded in their approach. The evening had a close, clammy feel, indigo clouds passing sluggishly overhead. The compound was quieter now, at least on the outside. Bond could hear the work continuing inside the warehouse, the grinding of machinery, the sound of a man shouting. The smell of dust and machine oil lingered in the air. Jeopardy was beside him. The two of them had a good view of the main gate and they could see that there were still many vehicles coming in and out. That was good. That was what they needed.

  A truck was approaching. Bond could tell it was going to turn into the compound; it was already slowing down. He nudged Jeopardy and together they scrambled down the side of the hill until they reached the fence, then followed it along to the main gate. They were both wearing dark clothes. Provided they kept away from the side of the road, it was unlikely they would be seen. They stopped about ten yards from the security office. The truck turned and its headlights swept briefly across them.

  ‘Now,’ Bond said.

  Jeopardy left him, straightening up and walking towards the entrance as if she had every right to be there. Four men had come out, once again checking the driver and the inside of the front cabin, but suddenly they had something else to contend with, a young woman who had appeared from nowhere.

  ‘Can you help me?’ Bond heard her say. ‘My car broke down. It’s just up the road.’

  ‘I’m sorry, lady. You can’t come in here.’

  But she was already inside the complex. She had walked in front of the truck, through the open gate. She was moving forward, making for the door of the office.

  ‘Lady! Do you mind?’

  ‘I just need to make a call.’

  Three of the men were closing on her. The fourth had stayed with the driver. Nobody noticed Bond on the other side of the truck as he slipped through the open gate then followed the fence as it stretched into the darkness. He had done it! The warehouse was in front of him. He had already decided that it was there that he would begin. Sin might be inside the white house. There might be files and photographs inside the administration block. But it was whatever work had to continue beyond nine o’clock at night that interested him. Jeopardy would make a nuisance of herself for the next ten minutes, refusing to leave until she had made a call to a non-existent garage. Hopefully, that would leave the way clear for him.

  He kept close to the fence, being careful not to touch it. There were no cameras anywhere near, at least, not that he could see. The sliding doors had closed again, apart from a narrow crack. No way in there. He reached a wall of corrugated iron and began to follow it round, hoping for a secondary entrance. And found one, round the side, not used often. He could tell from the clumps of wild grass that had been allowed to grow in front of it. There was a single lock – a Yale cylinder. Provided it hadn’t been allowed to rust, it would present no problem to Bond who had come equipped. He knelt down and slid open the heel of his left shoe. There was a miniature pick and a tension wrench embedded inside. Bond set to work. Less than two minutes later there was a click and, using all his strength, he was able to wrench open the door. He was in.

  The door led to a metal staircase surrounded by a rough, concrete wall. Bond t
ook out his pistol – now fully loaded – and made his way up, listening out for any sounds above the dull throbbing and the clatter of metal against metal that had met his ears the moment he entered. The stairs continued. There were no doors, no corridors on the first two floors. At last he saw an opening ahead of him and, through it, the yellow glow of the warehouse interior. He still had no idea what he was about to find. Could there be a perfectly simple explanation for all this activity? No, dammit. Blue Diamond was meant to be an agency for low-grade contract work and employment and this place advertised itself as storage for heavy plant. Sin was hiding something. There could be no doubt.

  Bond emerged onto a narrow gantry high up in the warehouse, with the sloping ceiling just above his head. He looked down in disbelief. He had thought this would be the moment when everything made sense but instead he was more baffled than ever.

  The lowboy he had seen earlier had been parked in the middle of the warehouse and now it had been loaded up. A Vanguard rocket was lying there on its side, strapped down by a series of chains in a manner that was somehow reminiscent of Gulliver taken prisoner on the beach. It was an exact duplicate of the rocket he had seen at Wallops Island – even down to the colours and the markings. But there was one significant difference: this rocket clearly wasn’t intended to fly. Only the second and third stages had been constructed – from the nose cone down to the oxidiser tank and rocket motor. The first stage, the one that would actually propel it into the air, was missing. Worse than that, it seemed to have been cut off. The metal skin was torn and truncated as if some giant (Gulliver again) had snapped it in half. Workers – about half of them Korean – were securing it. Others were unfolding a huge tarpaulin. It was about to be transported somewhere and no one was to see what it was.

  Looking around him, Bond realised that he had seen the warehouse before. This was where the photograph had been taken – the one he had found in Sin’s office in Germany. There was a second load on the far side of the enclosure, this one, unfortunately, already covered. It wasn’t rocket shaped. It was a large box, big enough to contain a car. The men were preparing to lift it, using a heavy block and tackle. Presumably it was a companion to the rocket. A launch pad? But how could that be when there was only half a rocket to launch?

  At any event, Bond now knew that Sin wasn’t sabotaging the Vanguard. He was copying it. Except that couldn’t be right. Why would he bother? And where on earth could he be taking it? Only one thing was certain. Bond had to get out of here and tell Jeopardy what he had found. The two of them had to pass on the information to their respective secret services.

  But he couldn’t leave, not yet, not with the puzzle still unsolved. He was in the lion’s den and who could say what other secrets it might conceal? He had seen enough in the warehouse and hurried back down the stairs to the door. Crossing the courtyard would be too dangerous with all the cameras and the guards but that still left the house. And that, surely, was where he would find Sin.

  He emerged into the warm night air and continued around the back of the warehouse. The replica of John Keats’s house was ahead of him and there were just fifty yards of open ground to cover. Bond had taken the first three steps when, with a silent explosion, night became day and the entire compound burned itself into the back of his eyes. Every single arc lamp had been turned on, the combined wattage almost blinding after the soft acquiescence of the night. Bond froze where he was, one arm thrown protectively across his face, the Remington M1911 clutched above his head. At the same time, a voice burst out of speakers positioned all around.

  ‘Attention, Mr Bond! Step forward and show yourself. Throw down your weapon. We have Miss Lane and if you do not comply in ten seconds, she will be dealt with.’ There could be no mistaking what the speaker meant. ‘You will see her at the main gate. The countdown begins now. Ten . . . nine . . .’

  Bond squinted through the light. Yes. There she was, standing between two men. She had been hurt. They were having to hold her up.

  ‘. . . eight . . . seven . . .’

  A third man was holding a gun, pointing it at her head. Behind them, the entrance was shut with several more men on guard. More workmen were closing in from all sides. If Bond was going to run, if he seriously thought he could fight his way out, he had to do it now.

  ‘. . . six . . . five . . . four . . .’

  The countdown continued, a grisly reminder of the one that would be taking place on Wallops Island in just over twenty-four hours. What had happened? How had they got the upper hand?

  ‘. . . three . . .’

  Bond had to get the information out. He had to stop the launch. He had to let M know that he had stumbled onto something as bizarre as anything he had ever encountered. But the man with the gun was solid, implacable. Jeopardy was helpless. He couldn’t leave Jeopardy to die.

  ‘. . . two . . . one . . .’

  Holding his Remington so that everyone could see it, Bond walked out into the open. He threw the gun down and stood there waiting as Sin’s men closed in.

  SEVENTEEN

  No Gun Ri

  There were forty-seven white tiles stretching from left to right along the back wall. Thirty-five tiles reached from the floor to the ceiling. The window was barred and had no view beyond a patch of sky but Bond could tell that the building was being patrolled. He heard footsteps pass outside every twenty minutes, without fail. He could actually time them by his watch. There were other sounds too. The rumble of lorries, a distant telephone, somebody shouting. Bond had been left alone for nearly twenty-four hours. And then, finally, the door had been unlocked and there was Jeopardy, standing in the corridor between two guards, a gun pointing at her neck. There was an ugly bruise on the side of her face.

  ‘I’m sorry, James.’ It was the first time they had seen each other since they were taken and the words came pouring out. ‘They knew who I was. At the gate. They made me tell them—’

  ‘Enough! No talk now!’ One of the guards was Korean. He spoke bad English and it suited him. Bond could not imagine a single sentence that was intelligent or civilised coming out of that blank face with its spiky black moustache and swollen lips. ‘You come!’

  ‘Yes. I come straight away,’ Bond replied, laconically. ‘I don’t suppose there’d be time for a shower before dinner?’ It was five o’clock by his watch. Six hours until the launch.

  ‘No shower. You come now.’

  They were allowed a brief lavatory stop. After that, they were taken out of the building and into the courtyard, Bond following Jeopardy with two more guards bringing up the rear. These men knew what they were doing. Two in front, two behind, all of them exactly the right distance away, all of them of course armed. The little group walked towards the white house. Bond glanced at the construction that he had infiltrated the night before. It was empty. The lowboy, presumably carrying the upper sections of the Vanguard rocket, had gone.

  They entered the building and at once Bond saw that the interior was very different from the one he had visited as a child. He had vague memories of a home that was sparsely but pleasantly decorated with carpets and embroidered curtains, oil paintings, busts, antique furniture . . . everything you would expect of a nineteenth-century poet at the height of his powers. The replica, like the castle in Germany, had been stripped of any comfort or animation. As they continued forward past blank, undecorated walls, their feet resounded against bare wooden floorboards. Here and there the wallpaper hung down in shreds. The windows were naked, the place lit by lamp bulbs without shades. At first appearance it might have seemed abandoned but everything was well-lit and there were air-conditioning units, working against the warmth of the night. So what did these strangely barren living conditions tell him about the man who owned the place, a man who seemed to have little or no connection with the human race? Already, Bond feared the worst.

  They reached a door and for a moment Bond and Jeopardy were side by side.

  ‘Leave any move to me,’ he said, quietly. ‘If t
here’s an opportunity, I’ll take it.’

  Jeopardy glanced at him scornfully. ‘If I can bust out of here, I’m busting out of here,’ she muttered. ‘You try and stop me!’

  One of the men knocked on the door and opened it. Bond and Jeopardy were ushered into a square dining room with two symmetrical windows, a fireplace, a chandelier. A Regency table stood in the middle, flame mahogany with splayed feet. It was a beautiful piece of furniture, spoiled by the chairs, modern and ill-matched, that had been set against it. With so little effort, the room could have been warm and welcoming. Instead it had the same dead quality as the rest of the house. Jason Sin was already sitting on one side of the table, facing them. He was dressed entirely in black: jacket, barathea trousers, roll-neck jersey. With his black hair and olive skin, he appeared almost as a silhouette of himself. His hands were crossed in front of him, unmoving, on the table. Curiously, there was a deck of cards beside them.

  ‘Do, please, come in, Mr Bond, Miss Lane,’ he said. There was nothing in his voice; no welcome, no enthusiasm. He sounded bored. The table was laid for three. Bond and Jeopardy moved to the far ends, opposite each other, with Sin in the middle. Bond had expected the four guards to leave but they stayed in the room, two at the door, two on either side of him, so close that they could reach out and touch him. Their eyes were fixed on him. Bond looked down and saw that he had been supplied with a full set of cutlery with which to eat whatever meal was about to be served and it occurred to him that, given a few seconds, he could have snatched up the knife and used it on Sin. But not with the men there. Not so close.