John Pearson - James Bond - The Authorised Biography

‘Particularly of a morning. Sir Miles has always been an early riser. Merry as a lark, and never any trouble. But lately he's been getting up late and missing breakfast. Hammond here has heard him talking in the night. It's our belief, Commander, that he's being blackmailed.’

‘Blackmailed?’ said Bond.

‘That's what I said, Commander.’ She dropped her voice. ‘Twice recently we've had this man phone – with a foreign accent.’

‘What sort of accent?’

‘Just foreign. Not nice at all. And afterwards Sir Miles has been just terrible.’

Neither Bond nor Tanner had considered blackmail, but, as they realized, it was a possibility.

‘After all,’ said Tanner, ‘he is human.’

‘Is he?’ said Bond.

‘And there he is without a woman. He's just the sort to get himself involved with some cold-faced jezebel and then not know how to handle it.’

‘D'you think it's political?’ said Bond.

‘Let's just hope not, although it's quite a danger. Think what an enemy would pay for a set of compromising photographs of the head of the British Secret Service!’

‘I already have,’ said Bond.

Bill Tanner and James Bond both realized that they were in a difficult position. Theoretically, their course was clear. They had a duty to inform the head of the security forces of their suspicions. But they knew quite well what this would mean. The Secret Service and Security were at daggers drawn. Think of the rumpus that would follow – and think what would happen if their suspicions were unfounded! Clearly they had to be a lot more certain of their facts before they could do this. Instead they both agreed that they would carry out their own investigation. It was a risky business. If anything went wrong they would inevitably be blamed, but, as Bill Tanner said, ‘whatever the old devil has been up to, we owe it to him to do what we can to stop it going any further.’

Bond agreed.

As Chief of Staff, Bill Tanner had no difficulty tapping M.'s home telephone. It was a fairly routine operation in conjunction with the Post Office. The only problem was that officially M. had to see and approve all orders of this sort (and be prepared to justify them to the Home Office). His Chief of Staff for once made sure he didn't.

At the same time, Bond began checking on all M.'s acquaintances. There was a younger brother, once an Oxford don and now retired. There were a few friends from the navy. There were, as far as Bond could see, no women in his life. He tried to find out more about M.'s holiday. He had apparently gone alone. Bond rang a friend in the Greek Embassy to ask about the island of Spirellos.

Next day they had their first success. The phone-tap had worked. The mysterious caller with the foreign accent had rung up again and on the tape there was recorded the brief stormy conversation he had had with M. The man was saying he must see him. M. had told him to go to hell, and the man had said that that was fine and he must take the consequences.

To Bond and Tanner this confirmed what they suspected. M. was clearly being blackmailed and, thanks to the Post Office, they had a lead to go on. Tanner had been able to get the call traced to an address in Kensington. It was a flat and it was owned by an Italian. His name was Del Lungo. He was a photographer.

It was no time for too much subtlety – the stakes were too high for that. Tanner had his car parked underneath the office, and that evening, after dinner, he and Bond drove round to the small turning off the Cromwell Road where Del Lungo lived.

At first they ‘cased’ the place. It was a typical Victorian block with a big front entrance and a mews behind. Del Lungo had a first-floor flat. A light was on. Bond and Bill Tanner waited. Just before midnight it went out.

Bond was a skilful burglar. During his wartime training he had spent several weeks learning ‘breaking and entering’ from an old lag specially brought up from Dartmoor to instruct the members of the Secret Service. Bond had considerable talent in this direction, and it was not difficult to reach the back of Del Lungo's flat from the garage opposite. He hauled Bill Tanner up after him, then began tackling the window. It was a simple sash affair with a ‘burglar-proof’ catch. Bond cut a circle from the glass, lifted the catch, and they were in.

Bond worked professionally. He and Bill Tanner both wore rubber gloves and silk stocking masks; as soon as they were in they cut the telephone. From then on the burglary was simple. The photographer was in bed with a woman. Bond switched the light on and Bill Tanner bound and gagged them. Then the real work started.

There were three big filing cabinets in the studio that led off from the bedroom, and they were filled with negatives. Somewhere, presumably, among this mass of celluloid lay the few pictures that could destroy M.'s reputation and career. But there was no guide to where they were. There was no filing system. Every negative had to be examined.

It was an interesting collection. The Italian was a press photographer who worked mainly for society magazines. There were a lot of very famous faces, and not only faces. For Del Lungo obviously ran a sideline in the sort of pictures people would pay a great deal not to have published. Bond says there were some real surprises: he rather wishes he had had more time to savour them.

They had been working nearly four hours when they found what they were looking for. There were six negatives; by the look of them they had been taken by some sort of long-range camera. But even so, they were quite recognizably of M. He was on a beach. In some he was quite alone, and in others he was with people of both sexes. All were as naked as the day that they were born.

‘Oh my dear Lord,’ said Tanner. ‘What has the silly old buffoon been up to?’

It was just after four when two figures climbed out of the first-floor window of the block of flats, slid down onto a garage roof, then disappeared into the shadows of a wall. Five minutes later, James Bond and William Tanner of the Secret Service were driving safely back to Chelsea. On the way they stopped at a telephone box and rang the police to tell them there had been a burglary at the photographer's address.

‘You know, I rather enjoyed our night's work,’ Tanner said.

‘Perhaps we should do it for a living,’ Bond replied.

When they got back to his flat, they had a drink, turned in for three hours’ sleep, and woke to eat the biggest breakfast May could cook for them.

Over breakfast they discussed the photographs. They were both embarrassed by them. The idea of M. in such a situation was so undignified that, as Tanner said, ‘it's as if you're looking at a picture of your parents.’ Bond nodded, and suggested that they ought to place the negatives in an envelope and post them straight to M. Tanner agreed.

‘Let's just hope,’ he said, ‘that once he gets them his temper improves.’

‘Amen to that,’ said Bond.

But that wasn't quite the end of the story. Presumably M. got his photographs, and certainly he had no more phone calls from the man who took them. Bond's spot of burglary had saved the Secret Service from a squalid piece of blackmail. But two days later Bond discovered more about the pictures. They were not quite what he and Tanner had originally imagined.

Bond was rung up by his friend in the Greek Embassy. He was apologetic for the time he had taken over Bond's inquiry.

‘Inquiry?’ said Bond.

‘Yes,’ said the Greek. ‘About that island called Spirellos.’

‘I'd clean forgotten about it,’ said Bond.

‘Perhaps you should go there for a summer holiday,’ said the Greek. ‘It's a nudist island, like the Ile de Levant off Toulon. It's very smart – lots of young girls, and I'm told it's very popular with old men like you.’