John Gardner - Licence Renewed

Unused weapons of all makes, types and sizes, were contained in the Armourer's amazing treasure trove of a store; and he produced one of the old Brownings, still in its original box, thick with grease and wrapped in yellow waxed paper. No mean feat, as this particular gun has long since ceased to be manufactured.

The Armourer knew 007 well enough not to have the pistol touched by any member of his staff; calling Bond down to the gunsmith's room, so that the weapon could be cleaned off, stripped, checked and thoroughly tested by the man who was to use it. If Bond had been scheduled to make a parachute jump, both the Armourer and Q Branch would have seen to it that 007 packed his own 'chute. In turn, it was the only way Bond would have it done. The same applied to weapons.

Late one afternoon Bond found himself down in the empty gunsmith's room, with the run of the place, plus the underground range, while he went through the exacting chore upon which his life might depend.

He was, therefore, surprised when, just as he started to clean the grease from the Browning, the door opened to reveal Q'ute, dressed in brown velvet and looking exceptionally desirable. Major Boothroyd, she told Bond, had suggested that she come down to watch the cleaning and preparation of the weapon.

'Why should he do that?' Bond hardly glanced up at the girl, conscious for the first time that her cool manner constituted a direct challenge. He had worked hard over the past days: now a sensual snake stirred in the back of his mind. Q'ute would make a relaxing partner for the evening.

Q'ute swung herself on to the workbench, after making certain she had chosen a clean patch of wood. 'The Armourer's giving me a weapons' course, when I'm off duty,' she told him. For the first time, Bond noticed Q'ute's voice had a throaty quality to it. 'I'm not very good with hand guns, and he says you are. He mentioned that the weapon was of an old type as well. Just thought it would be a good idea, if you didn't mind.'

Bond's strong, firm hands moved expertly, even lovingly, over the pistol as he silently chanted the stripping routine.

'Well, do you?' Q'ute asked.

'Do I what?'

'Mind me watching?'

'Not at all.' He glanced up at the girl, whose pretty face, behind the large spectacles, remained impassive. 'Always best to handle weapons with care and gentleness,' he smiled, as the movements of his hands over the mechanism became increasingly erotic.

'With care, of course,' Q'ute's voice took on a slight edge of sarcasm. Now she repeated, parrot-fashion, from the Service training manual, ' "Weapons of all description should be treated with great care and respect." Don't you carry it a bit too far, Commander Bond?'

Hell, he thought. Q'ute was a good nickname for her. Bond even slowed down the movements of his hands, allowing the process of stripping to become more obvious as he silently repeated the instructions:

Grasp head of recoil spring guide; push towards muzzle to release the head of the guide from the barrel. Draw out barrel from breech end. Remove stocks, giving access to lockwork. Dismount slide assembly, starting with firing pin and continue normally...

'Oh come on, Commander Bond. I do know something about weapons. Anyway, nobody believes all that stuff about guns being phallic symbols any more.' She tossed her head, giving a little laugh. 'Stop playing strip the lady with that piece of hardware, if you're doing it for my benefit. I don't go for those paperback books with pictures of girls sitting on large guns, or even astride them.'

'What do you go for then, Q'ute?' Bond chuckled.

'My name's Ann Reilly,' she snapped, 'not that damn silly nickname they all use around here.' She looked at him, straight in the eyes, for a full twenty seconds. 'As for what I like and dislike — go for, as you put it — maybe one day you'll find out.' She did not smile. 'I'm more interested in the way that automatic works, why you chose it, and how you got that white mark on your hand.'

Bond glanced up sharply, his eyes suddenly losing their humour and turning to ice in a way that almost frightened Q'ute. 'Someone tried to be clever a long time ago,' he said slowly. In the back of his mind, he remembered, quite clearly, all the circumstances which had led to the plastic surgery, that showed now only as a white blemish, after the Cyrillic letter Ш — standing for SH — had been carved into the back of his hand in an attempt by SMERSH to brand him as a spy. It was long ago, and very far away now; but clear as yesterday. He detected the break he had made in Q'ute's guard with his sharp cruelty. So long ago, he thought: the business with Le Chiffre at Royale-les-Eaux, and a woman called Vesper — about the same age as this girl sitting on the workbench, showing off her shapely knees and calves — lying dead from an overdose, her body under the sheets like a stone effigy in a tomb.

The coldness in Bond's mien faded. He smiled at Q'ute, again looking down at his hand. 'A small accident — carelessness on my part. Needed a bit of surgery, that's all.' Then he went back to removing the packing grease from the Browning. All thoughts of dallying with the Q Branch executive called Ann Reilly were gone. She was relatively young and still learning the ways of the secret world, in spite of her electronic efficiency, he decided.

As though to break the mood, she asked, in a small voice, 'What's it like to kill somebody? They say you've had to kill a lot of people during your time in the Service.'

'Then they shouldn't talk so much.' It was Bond's turn to snap. He was reassembling the gun now. 'The need-to-know system operates in the Service. You, of all people, should know better than to ask questions like that.'

'But I do need to know.' Calmer now, but showing a streak of stubbornness that Bond had detected in her eyes before this. 'After all, I deal with some of the important "gee-whizz" stuff. You must also know what that covers secret death: undetectable. People die in this business. I should know about the end product.'

Bond completed the reassembly, ran the mechanism back and forth a couple of times, then picked up one of the magazines containing seven Browning Long 9mm. rounds that would shatter a piece of five-inch pine board at twenty feet.

Looking at the slim magazine, he thought of its lethal purpose, and what each of the little jacketed pieces of metal within would do to a man or woman. Yes, he thought, Q'ute — Ann Reilly — had a right to know. 'Give me a hand;' he nodded towards a box on the workbench. 'Bring along a couple of spare magazines. We have to test this little toy on the range, then work's over for the night.'

She picked up the magazines and slid down from her perch as she repeated the question. 'How does it feel to kill a person?'

'While it's happening, you don't think much about it,' Bond answered flatly. 'It's a reflex. You do it and you don't hesitate. If you're wise, and want to go on living, you don't think about it afterwards either. I've known men who've had breakdowns — go for early retirement on half pension — for thinking about it afterwards. There's nothing to tell, my dear Q'u... Ann. I try not to remember. That way I remain detached from its reality.'

'And is that why you clean off your pistol in front of someone like me — stripping it as though it were a woman?' He did not reply to that, and she followed Bond quietly through the corridor that led to the range.

It took Bond nearly an hour, and six extra magazines, before he was completely happy with the Browning. When they finished on the range, he went back to the gunsmith's room, with Q'ute in his wake, and stripped the gun down for cleaning after firing. As he completed this last chore, Bond looked up at her. 'Well, you've seen all there is to see. Show's over. You can go home now.'