Doubleshot

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 refreshed 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.

“This was recovered from the ferry’s camera in the dining area where the shootings occurred. It happened on Deck Seven, also known as the ‘boat deck.’ ”

They could make out a number of people dining at tables. There was a bar in the background.

“The Comarit ferry left Algeciras, Spain, at approximately seven o’clock last night. There were fifty-three passengers and eight staff. Most of them were Spanish or Moroccan citizens. The ten British citizens were businessmen and women in the hotel industry. You can see them sitting together at that table, there.” Hodge pointed to a large round table. “Now watch carefully.”

Three men came through a passage and entered the dining room. Two of them were strangers, but the third appeared to be James Bond. The trio produced automatic weapons and began to shout. There was no sound on the tape, so M and Tanner had to imagine what was being said. The reactions of the people in the room told all. Many of them ducked down under the tables. Finally, the British citizens stood warily and produced their passports to Bond. He then ushered them to the back of the room. The two Spaniards forced them to stand against the bar, their backs to the room. James Bond then stood behind them and opened fire, killing them in cold blood.

“My God,” M muttered.

As soon as the deed was done, Bond turned to the room and said something else. Then he did something strange. The killer placed his handgun on the counter. Hodge froze the frame, pressed a button, and zoomed in on the gun.

It was a Walther P99.

“Is that your missing handgun?”

Tanner squinted. “It’s a P99, all right.”

“The killer left it there on the counter, its magazine empty. We should have the serial number in an hour or two and we’ll know if it’s a match,” Hodge said. Then he manipulated the frame and zoomed in on the terrorist’s face.

Up close, there was no mistaking those features.

“We’ve positively identified the man as Double-O Seven,” Hodge said. “We think that after the shootings the three of them went down two levels, past the saloon deck, to the car deck. They probably hid inside a car or lorry until the ferry docked at Tangier. There were very few personnel aboard the ferry, so there was nothing they could do.

Once the boat got to Tangier, the police boarded, but someone started shooting. It’s still not clear what happened. The two Spaniards were killed, but Bond was nowhere to be found.”

“Damn it, it’s got to be a mistake!” M said. “Someone must be impersonating him!”

“Bond wouldn’t do this, Captain,” Tanner said.

“Nevertheless, I urge you to bring him in,” Hodge said.

“Is there anything else?” M asked.

“Yes.” Hodge handed a report to Tanner. “These are the police records on the two Spaniards. As you can see, they have a history of terrorist acts. If you’ll look at the most recent information on the ugly one, you can see that it’s unlikely that these men were working for Domingo Espada.”

Tanner and Mread it together. One of the men was wanted in Israel for a bombing. The Union had later claimed responsibility for it.

“The Union,” M said flatly. “Of course.”

“They’re trying to stir things up between Britain and Spain,” Tanner suggested.

“But why? What’s in it for them?”

Tanner shrugged. “Revenge?”

“We need to get this information to the PM and to Spain. It might help alleviate the tension if they know that the Union was behind this attack, not Britain,” M said.

“I’ll get on the phone right away,” Tanner said.

“What about Double-O Seven?” Hodge asked.

M set her jaw. “We have to hope that all of this is a tremendous error, but we also have to assume the worst. We must accept the possibility that Bond has joined the Union. They’ve been successful in recruiting our people before. I would be remiss in my responsibilities if I didn’t issue an all-points alert for the apprehension of Double-O Seven.”