John Gardner - Seafire

Initially, the building had probably been a small town-house for some local worthy. From the half-timbered exterior and the visible leaded windows, he reckoned that it probably had a largish entrance hall, with rooms to left and right, while upstairs it possibly maintained what had originally been three bedrooms.

On reaching the door he found that it was a solid oak panel with metal bindings and hinges, into which had been set a large Yale-type lock – much bigger than the kind of thing you saw on houses in the rest of the world, but still small enough to slip with a thick piece of celluloid or a credit card.

He took a good look at the doorjamb and all the windows, and sought out any telltale wiring or electronic boxes signaling a sophisticated alarm system. There were none, and the telephone wiring came in high, from an overhead pole on the right-hand corner at the front of the building. Bond knew by the size of the telephone input box that it was unlikely to contain any extra surprises.

He pressed the bell, and some seconds later the door was opened. He found himself staring into a pair of large gray eyes topped by amazingly long lashes. Below the eyes was a pert little nose and below that a wide mouth, obviously designed by the Almighty to set a completely new standard of temptation for men. The woman wore her think blonde hair in what at one time would have been called a French plait. Nowadays he had no idea what they called the style, but the hair was so perfect and thick that he had an immediate desire to plunge a hand into it and see if there were gold coins hidden under the smooth glossy surface.

The vision looked to be in her mid-twenties and was dressed modestly, in a manner at variance with her looks – and also the twinkle in her eyes. A second later he saw a black-haired young woman, identically dressed, in a kind of long black nylon coverall that certainly hid whatever street clothes either of the girls wore. This signified that the young women wore these rather ugly uniforms as a protection against damaging or marking their own clothes while laboring in Saal, Saal u. Rollen's vineyard.

By the time he could draw his eyes away from the blonde's charms she had asked if he was Herr Boldman. He somewhat haltingly said yes and he was here to see Herr Fritz Saal.

The smile remained warm, embracing even, as she asked him to follow her upstairs – something she said in a slightly arch fashion that made it into a more personal invitation.

He pulled himself out of his reverie and looked around, realizing that he would have to examine the lower interior of the building more thoroughly on the way out. His casual glance revealed nothing in the shape of electronic code pads for alarm activation. In fact, all the electronics appeared to be two computers and a large laser printer. The dark girl he had glimpsed briefly was now seated behind one of the computers, rattling away at the keyboard as though her life depended on it, which, he thought, bearing in mind the association of the Saals with Max Tarn, it probably did.

As he had thought, there were three doors that led from a small landing at the top of the stairs, plus a short corridor that slid off to the right and ended in another door, which, he concluded, was a bathroom.

The three doors were individually marked with the names of Herr H. Saal, Herr F. Saal, and Heir K. Rollen. The blonde vision tapped at Heir F. Saal's door, opening it immediately and announcing, "Herr Boldman."

Fritz Saal appeared to be sitting behind a huge desk angled into one corner of the room, but it was only when Bond gave him a smiling bow that he realized Herr Saal was standing, prior to coming around the desk.

It was impossible to put an age on the man, and his appearance immediately brought to mind the Tenniel drawings of either Tweedledum or Tweedledee from Through the Looking Glass . The head was slightly out of proportion to his stature, which was, to be politically correct, impaired. In plain language he was a dwarf of around four feet two inches, including the obvious lifts built into his shoes. Like others in his predicament, Saal made up for his lack of inches by a cheerful, even ebullient, manner. He greeted Bond with a firm handshake, and very quickly it became obvious that his height in no way affected his voice, charm, or business acumen. Returning to his desk, Saal pushed two folders toward him. They were both of moderately sized estates – though one was a working farm – and for the next half hour or so they discussed the possibilities.

Eventually, Bond said that what his consortium was really looking for was a place the size of – he went through a show of looking up the name in a notebook – Tarnenwerder, which he was under the impression had been left to wrack and ruin.

Saal shook his head sagely. "Tarnenwerder," he said without the hint of a smile, "is something else altogether. To be truthful, Mr. Boldman, I'd rather not discuss it."

"I understood that you had dealings with that particular property."

"No. No, I personally have no dealings with it. My brother, and our father before us, deals with Tarnenwerder. In fact, the place has been on our books for many generations. If I had my way, we would have passed it to another firm decades ago, but I fear that I rarely get my way in this company. You see, it's the only thing my brother Helmut deals with, and we have not spoken for twenty years on account of it." He gave a sad little laugh. "I would have left this firm years ago if it hadn't been for our strange legal position. No male of the Saal or Rollen family is allowed by our company articles to leave the firm, except, of course, in the event of death."

"That's a strange legal point."

"Very strange, and drawn up a number of centuries ago. The firm is tied to Tarnenwerder and the von Tarn family as if by an unbreakable umbilical cord. Unhappily, the very anomaly of the company articles makes it more binding. Originally, the Saals and Rollens were the stewards of the von Tarns. They moved up in the world to become lawyers, but the von Tarns saw to it that we remained, for all time, joined hip and thigh."

"And all this has caused a split in your family?"

"As I say, I have not spoken to my brother in twenty years – and he's seven years older than I. His wife does not speak to my wife. To the end of their days, my mother was on good terms with me, and my father did not even acknowledge me in the street. It's a strange world, and has nothing to do with my shortness of stature. Every fourth male Saal is born a dwarf." He made a small waving motion with his hand. "Yes, we're supposed to talk about ourselves in a different way these days, but I have never been politically correct – and the politics of my country are slowly descending into the pit of the 1930s again. Did you know that?"

"I have heard about it, and have seen some of it."

"If you want concrete proof, just go over to Tarnenwerder at nine o'clock tonight and you'll see what our ancestors saw in the 1930s. History, particularly when it is the history of politics, is a circular thing. As the Americans say, what goes around comes around. The scourge of the thirties and forties is coming around yet again."

They talked for another fifteen minutes, with Fritz Saal making notes regarding the mythical consortium and its requirements. Bond gave him the London address and he said he would be in touch.

Saal walked with him to the door and out onto the landing. They were just shaking hands once more in farewell when the door to K. Rollen's office opened. Bond stepped back a pace, for the man who looked out from this office was a giant. He stood around six foot four, had hands like bunches of steel bananas, a large shaven head, and a face that reminded him of a gargoyle.

"It's all right, Kurt," Saal said gently. "Nothing for you to worry about."