Complete Works of Ian Fleming, page 190
So he was a commander. It was the only rank I liked the name of. And of course he was bound to have put the captain’s back up — an Englishman with all this authority. And with the CIA and FBI of all people! Nothing would irritate the regular police more. I decided to be extremely diplomatic.
We sat down and, after the usual police preliminaries, I was asked to tell my story.
It took two hours, what with Captain Stonor’s questions and men coming up from time to time to whisper hoarsely into his ear, and at the end of it I was exhausted. Coffee was brought and cigarettes for me (‘Not while I’m on duty, thank you, Miss Michel’), and then we all relaxed and the stenographer was sent away. Captain Stonor sent for Lieutenant Morrow and took him aside to radio a preliminary report to headquarters, and I watched the wreck of the black sedan, that had by now been hauled up the cliff, being towed over the lawn to the road. There the ambulance was driven over beside it, and I turned away as a wet bundle was carefully lifted out on to the grass. Horror! I remembered again those cold, red-flecked eyes. I felt his hands on me. Could it have happened?
I heard the captain say, ‘And copies to Albany and Washington. Right?’ And then he was back sitting opposite me.
He looked at me kindly and said some complimentary things. I looked appreciative and said, ‘No, no.’ I asked when he thought I could get on.
Captain Stonor didn’t answer immediately. Instead he slowly reached up and took off his cap and put it on the table. The armistice gesture, a copy of the lieutenant’s, made me smile inside. Then he rummaged in his pockets and took out cigarettes and a lighter. He offered me one and then lit his own. He smiled at me, his first non-official smile. ‘I’m going off duty now, Miss Michel.’ He sat back comfortably and crossed his legs, resting his left ankle on his right knee and holding the ankle. He suddenly looked like a middle-aged man with a family, taking it easy. He took his first long draw on his cigarette and watched the smoke drift away. He said, ‘You can be going any time now, Miss Michel. Your friend Commander Bond was anxious that you should be put to as little trouble as possible. And I’m glad to accommodate him — and you. And,’ he smiled with unexpected humour and irony, ‘I didn’t need Washington to add their wishes in this matter. You’ve been a brave girl. You got involved in a bad crime and you behaved like I’d wish any child of mine to behave. Those two hoodlums are both wanted men. I’ll be putting in your name for the rewards. Likewise to the insurance company, who will certainly be generous. We’ve booked those Phanceys on a preliminary charge of conspiracy to defraud, and this Mr Sanguinetti is already on the run, as the Commander suggested this morning he would be. We checked with Troy, as we would have checked anyway, and the normal police machinery is in motion to pick him up. There will be a capital charge against Mr Sanguinetti, if and when we catch up with him, and it may be that you will be needed as a material witness. The State will pay for you to be brought from wherever you may be, housed and taken back again. All this,’ Captain Stonor made a throwaway gesture with his cigarette, ‘is normal police routine and it will look after itself.’ The astute blue eyes looked carefully into mine and then veiled themselves. ‘But that doesn’t quite end the case to my satisfaction.’ He smiled. ‘That is, now that I’m off duty, so to speak, and there’s only just you and me.’
I tried to look just interested and nonchalant, but I wondered what was coming.
‘Did this Commander Bond leave you any instructions, any letter? He told me that he had left you asleep early this morning. That he had gone off around six and had not wanted to wake you up. Quite right of course. But,’ Captain Stonor examined the end of his cigarette, ‘your evidence and the Commander’s is to the effect that you shared the same cabin. Quite natural in the circumstances. You wouldn’t have wanted to be alone any more last night. But it seems rather an abrupt goodbye — after an exciting night like that. No trouble with him, I suppose? He didn’t, er, try to get fresh with you, if you get my meaning?’ The eyes were apologetic, but they probed into mine.
I blushed furiously. I said sharply, ‘Certainly not, Captain. Yes, he did leave a letter for me. A perfectly straightforward one. I didn’t mention it because it doesn’t add anything to what you know.’ I ran down the zip on my front and reached inside for the letter, blushing even worse. Damn the man!
He took the letter and read it carefully. He handed it back. ‘A very nice letter. Very, er, businesslike. I don’t get the bit about the soap.’
I said shortly, ‘Oh, that was only a joke about the motel soap. He said it was too strongly scented.’
‘I see. Yes, sure. Well, that’s fine, Miss Michel’ The eyes were kindly again. ‘Well, now. D’you mind if I say something personal? Talk to you a minute as if you might be my own daughter? You could be, you know — almost my granddaughter if I’d started early enough.’ He chuckled cosily.
‘No. Please say anything you like.’
Captain Stonor took another cigarette and lit it. ‘Well, now, Miss Michel, what the Commander says is right. You’ve been in the equivalent of a bad motor accident and you don’t want to have any nightmares about it. But there’s more to it than that. You’ve been suddenly introduced, out of the blue so to speak, and violently, to the underground war of crime, the war that’s going on all the time and that you read about and see in movies. And, like in the movies, the cop has rescued the maiden from the robbers.’ He leaned forward across the table and held my eyes firmly in his. ‘Now don’t get me wrong about this, Miss Michel, and if I’m speaking out of turn just forget what I’m going to say. But it would be unreasonable of you not to create a hero out of the cop who saved you, perhaps build an image in your mind that that’s the sort of man to look up to, even perhaps to want to marry.’ The captain sat back. He smiled apologetically. ‘Now the reason I’m going into all this is because violent emergencies like what you’ve been through leave their scars. They’re one hell of a shock to anyone — to any dam’ citizen. But most of all to a young person like yourself. Now I believe,’ (the kind eyes became less kind) ‘I have good reason from the reports of my officers to believe, that you had intimate relations with Commander Bond last night. I’m afraid it’s one of our less attractive duties to be able to read such signs.’ Captain Stonor held up his hand. ‘Now I’m not prying any more into these private things, and they’re none of my business, but it would be perfectly natural, almost inevitable, that you might have lost your heart, or at any rate part of it, to this personable young Englishman who has just saved your life.’ The sympathy in the fatherly smile was edged with irony. ‘After all’s said and done, that’s what happens in the books and in the movies, isn’t it? So why not in real life?’
I stirred impatiently, wanting this stupid lecture to finish, wanting to be gone.
‘Now I’m coming to the end very quickly, Miss Michel, and I know you think I’m being very impertinent, but ever since I got past middle-age on the force, I’ve been interested in what I call post-natal care after a case like this. Particularly when the survivor is young and might be damaged by what the young person has been through. So I want to leave one thought with you if I may, and then wish you the best of luck and a happy journey on that crazy little scooter-thing of yours. It’s just this, Miss Michel.’
Captain Stonor’s eyes continued to look into mine, but they had lost focus. I knew I was going to hear something from the heart. This is a rare thing between generations — between grown-ups and children. I stopped thinking of getting away and paid attention.
‘This underground war I was talking about, this crime battle that’s always going on — whether it’s being fought between cops and robbers or between spies and counter-spies. This is a private battle between two trained armies, one fighting on the side of law and of what his own country thinks is right, and one belonging to the enemies of these things.’ Captain Stonor was now talking to himself. I imagined that he was reciting something — something he felt very strongly about — perhaps had said in speeches or in an article in some police magazine. ‘But in the higher ranks of these forces, among the toughest of the professionals, there’s a deadly quality in the persons involved which is common to both — to both friends and enemies.’ The captain’s closed fist came softly down on the wooden table-top for emphasis, and his inward-looking eyes burned with a dedicated, private anger. ‘The top gangsters, the top FBI operatives, the top spies and the top counter-spies are cold-hearted, cold-blooded, ruthless, tough, killers, Miss Michel. Yes, even the “friends” as opposed to the “enemies”. They have to be. They wouldn’t survive if they weren’t. Do you get me?’ Captain Stonor’s eyes came back into focus. Now they held mine with a friendly urgency that touched my feelings — but not, I’m ashamed to say, my heart. ‘So the message I want to leave with you, my dear — and I’ve talked with Washington and I’ve learned something about Commander Bond’s outstanding record in his particular line of business — is this. Keep away from all these men. They are not for you, whether they’re called James Bond or Sluggsy Morant. Both these men, and others like them, belong to a private jungle into which you’ve strayed for a few hours and from which you’ve escaped. So don’t go and get sweet dreams about the one or nightmares from the other. They’re just different people from the likes of you — a different species.’ Captain Stonor smiled, ‘Like hawks and doves, if you’ll pardon the comparison. Get me?’ My expression cannot have been receptive. The voice became abrupt. ‘Okay, let’s go then.’
Captain Stonor got to his feet and I followed. I didn’t know what to say. I remembered my immediate reaction when James Bond had shown himself at the door of the motel— ‘Oh, God, it’s another of them.’ But I also remembered his smile and his kisses and his arm round me. I walked meekly beside this large, comfortable man who had come out with these kindly meant thoughts, and all I could think was that I wanted a big lunch and then a long sleep at least a hundred miles from The Dreamy Pines Motor Court.
* * * * *
It was twelve noon by the time I got away. Captain Stonor said I was going to have a lot of trouble from the press, but that he would stave them off for as long as possible. I could say all I wished about James Bond except what his profession was and where he could be found. He was just a man who had turned up at the right time and then gone on his way.
I had packed my saddle-bags and the young State Trooper, Lieutenant Morrow, strapped them on for me and wheeled the Vespa out on to the road. On the way over the lawn he said, ‘Mind out for the potholes between here and Glens Falls, miss. Some of them are so deep you better sound your horn before you get to them. There might be other folks with little machines like this at the bottom of them.’ I laughed. He was clean and gay and young, but tough and adventurous as well by the looks of him and from his job. Perhaps this was more the type of man I should build dreams about!
I said goodbye to Captain Stonor and thanked him. Then, rather frightened of making a fool of myself, I put on my crash helmet and pulled down my saucy, fur-lined goggles, got on the machine and stamped on the starter pedal. Thank heavens the little engine fired right away! Now I would show them! By design, the rear wheel was still on its stand. I let in the clutch fairly fast and gave a quick push. The spinning rear wheel made contact with the loose surface of the road, and dust and pebbles flew. And I was gone like a rocket and, in ten seconds through the gears, I was doing forty. The surface looked all right ahead so I took a chance and glanced back and raised a cheeky hand in farewell, and there was a wave from the little group of police in front of the smoking lobby block. And then I was off down the long straight road between the two sentinel rows of pine trees and I thought the trees looked sorry to be letting me get away unharmed.
Unharmed? What was it the captain of detectives had said about ‘scars’? I just didn’t believe him. The scars of my terror had been healed, wiped away, by this stranger who slept with a gun under his pillow, this secret agent who was only known by a number.
A secret agent? I didn’t care what he did. A number? I had already forgotten it. I knew exactly who he was and what he was. And everything, every smallest detail, would be written on my heart for ever.
ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE
The tenth novel in Fleming’s James Bond series was first published in the UK by Jonathan Cape on 1 April 1963. The initial and secondary print runs sold out, with over 60,000 books sold in the first month. Fleming wrote the book in Jamaica whilst the first film in the Eon Productions series of films, Dr. No, was being filmed nearby. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is the second book in what is now regarded as the “Blofeld trilogy”, beginning with Thunderball and concluding with You Only Live Twice.
The plot concerns Bond’s ongoing search to find Ernst Stavro Blofeld, after the Thunderball incident. Through contact with the College of Arms in London, Bond finds Blofeld based in Switzerland. After meeting him and discovering his latest plans, Bond attacks the centre where he is based, yet Blofeld escapes in the confusion. During the story, Bond meets and falls in love with Contessa Teresa “Tracy” di Vicenzo and they are married, though Blofeld’s subsequent actions will result in disastrous events.
Fleming makes a number of revelations about Bond’s character within the narrative, adding an emotional depth to Bond that is not present in the previous stories. In common with Fleming’s other Bond stories, he uses the names and places of people he knew or had heard of and Blofeld’s research station on Piz Gloria was based on Schloss Mittersill, which the Nazis had turned into a research establishment, where they examined the Asiatic races.
The novel went on to receive mostly positive reviews in the British and American press and it was adapted to run as a three-part story in Playboy in 1963 and then as a daily comic strip in The Daily Express newspaper from 1964–1965. In 1969 the novel was adapted as the sixth film in the Eon Productions film series and was the only film to star George Lazenby as Bond. The director Peter R. Hunt, along with producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, decided to produce a more realistic film that would follow the novel closely. It was shot in Switzerland, England and Portugal from October 1968 to May 1969. Although its cinema release was not as lucrative as its predecessor You Only Live Twice, it was still one of the top performing films of the year. Critical reviews upon release were mixed, but the film’s reputation has improved over time, although reviews of Lazenby’s performance continue to vary. During the making of the film, Lazenby had decided that he would never play the role of Bond again.
The first edition
Schloss Mittersill, the model for Blofeld’s research station on Piz Gloria
Piz Gloria, Switzerland
CONTENTS
Chapter 1. SEASCAPE WITH FIGURES
Chapter 2. GRAN TURISMO
Chapter 3. THE GAMBIT OF SHAME
Chapter 4. ALL CATS ARE GREY
Chapter 5. THE CAPU
Chapter 6. BOND OF BOND STREET?
Chapter 7. THE HAIRY HEEL OF ACHILLES
Chapter 8. FANCY COVER
Chapter 9. IRMA LA NOT SO DOUCE
Chapter 10. TEN GORGEOUS GIRLS
Chapter 11. DEATH FOR BREAKFAST
Chapter 12. TWO NEAR MISSES
Chapter 13. PRINCESS RUBY?
Chapter 14. SWEET DREAMS – SWEET NIGHTMARE!
Chapter 15. THE HEAT INCREASES
Chapter 16. DOWNHILL ONLY
Chapter 17. BLOODY SNOW
Chapter 18. FORK LEFT FOR HELL!
Chapter 19. LOVE FOR BREAKFAST
Chapter 20. M. EN PANTOUFLES
Chapter 21. THE MAN FROM AG. AND FISH.
Chapter 22. SOMETHING CALLED ‘B.W.’
Chapter 23. GAULOISES AND GARLIC
Chapter 24. BLOOD-LIFT
Chapter 25. HELL’S DELIGHT, ETC.
Chapter 26. HAPPINESS WITHOUT A SHADOW?
Chapter 27. ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD
The 1969 film adaptation
Chapter 1. SEASCAPE WITH FIGURES
IT WAS ONE of those Septembers when it seemed that the summer would never end.
The five-mile promenade of Royale-les-Eaux, backed by trim lawns emblazoned at intervals with tricolour beds of salvia, alyssum and lobelia, was bright with flags and, on the longest beach in the north of France, the gay bathing tents still marched prettily down to the tide-line in big, money-making battalions. Music, one of those lilting accordion waltzes, blared from the loudspeakers around the Olympic-size piscine and, from time to time, echoing above the music, a man’s voice announced over the public address system that Philippe Bertrand, aged seven, was looking for his mother, that Yolande Lèfevre was waiting for her friends below the clock at the entrance, or that a Madame Dufours was demanded on the telephone. From the beach, particularly from the neighbourhood of the three playground enclosures – ‘Joie de Vivre’, ‘Hélio’ and ‘Azur’ – came a twitter of children’s cries that waxed and waned with the thrill of their games and, farther out, on the firm sand left by the now distant sea, the shrill whistle of the physical-fitness instructor marshalled his teenagers through the last course of the day.
It was one of those beautiful, naive seaside panoramas for which the Brittany and Picardy beaches have provided the setting – and inspired their recorders, Boudin, Tissot, Monet – ever since the birth of plages and bains de mer more than a hundred years ago.
To James Bond, sitting in one of the concrete shelters with his face to the setting sun, there was something poignant, ephemeral about it all. It reminded him almost too vividly of childhood – of the velvet feel of the hot powder sand, and the painful grit of wet sand between young toes when the time came for him to put his shoes and socks on, of the precious little pile of sea-shells and interesting wrack on the sill of his bedroom window (‘No, we’ll have to leave that behind, darling. It’ll dirty up your trunk!’), of the small crabs scuttling away from the nervous fingers groping beneath the seaweed in the rock-pools, of the swimming and swimming and swimming through the dancing waves – always in those days it seemed, lit with sunshine – and then the infuriating, inevitable ‘time to come out’. It was all there, his own childhood, spread out before him to have another look at. What a long time ago they were, those spade-and-bucket days! How far he had come since the freckles and the Cadbury milk-chocolate Flakes and the fizzy lemonade! Impatiently Bond lit a cigarette, pulled his shoulders out of their slouch and slammed the mawkish memories back into their long-closed file. Today he was a grown-up, a man with years of dirty, dangerous memories – a spy. He was not sitting in this concrete hideout to sentimentalize about a pack of scrubby, smelly children on a beach scattered with bottle-tops and lolly-sticks and fringed by a sea thick with sun-oil and putrid with the main drains of Royale. He was here, he had chosen to be here, to spy. To spy on a woman.
