Raymond Benson: Doubleshot

M pushed the button for the green light as Bill Tanner continued his report.

“The FBI in America picked up the plastic surgeon, Dr. Morelius, in California. Unfortunately, he never actually broke the law. He was paid by the Union to perform a legitimate service. The FBI had to let him go.”

“But he’s insignificant in the grand scheme of things,” M replied.

Tanner nodded. “The director of the FBI assured me that the doctor had the living daylights scared out of him. He’s being placed in their Witness Protection Program. Hopefully he will identify his employers, and if he’s lucky he can have a legitimate practice in another state.”

Sir James Molony opened the door and entered. M remained seated and said, “Good morning, Sir James. Please sit down. How was your flight from Gibraltar?”

“Fine, thank you,” Molony replied, sitting across from her. Tanner pulled up a chair after offering the staff neurologist a coffee.

“I appreciate you cutting short your lecture tour to attend to Double-O Seven,” M said.

“Believe me, madam, it was a blessing in disguise,” the doctor answered. “I can’t tell you how bored I was after two months of talking to young people all over the world who had no interest at all in what I was saying. I was quite ready for something to interrupt it.”

“How’s James doing?” Tanner asked.

“He’s doing quite well. The operation was a complete success. He should be feeling himself by now. We discharged him from hospital yesterday and he’s recuperating at the hotel there. I expect that he’ll fly back home in a day or two.”

“Tell us exactly what was wrong with him,” M prodded.

Molony sipped his coffee and placed it on the edge of the large glass-topped desk.

“As you know, Double-O Seven had a lesion on his temporal lobe. This was probably caused by the injury he sustained in the Himalayas three months ago. It was the source of his headaches, as well as what I would clinically diagnose as panic attacks. Dr. Feare, may her soul rest in peace, had originally detected the lesion with an EEG and prescribed a medication, carbamazepine, which might have cured him without the need for surgery. However, when I examined the pills he had been taking, I discovered that he had the wrong pills. They had been disguised as the correct ones. He was taking haloperidol, which is often used as a treatment for a number of psychoses. But if used improperly, it can make some conditions worse. As a result, Bond suffered from post-traumatic epilepsy. He would hallucinate, have delusions of paranoia, and even experience poriomania, or blackouts. This sometimes happens with hard-case alcoholics. They’ll pass out somewhere and wake up in a completely different location. How they get from one place to the next is a mystery to them. The same thing happened to Double-O Seven. More than once. I’m still trying to determine how he got the wrong medication in the first place. Dr. Feare’s prescription was correct.”

“I think Mr. Tanner can answer that one,” M said.

Tanner cleared his throat and said, “Sir James, I’m afraid I have to inform you that one of your employees is a traitor. Double-O Seven alerted us to the fact that Michael Clayton, one of the Union members he first encountered in London, had a cousin who was also well connected with the organization. After we further investigated the man’s background, we determined that he did indeed have a cousin—Deborah Reilly.”

Molony’s eyes bulged. “Good Lord, that’s my nurse!”

“I’m afraid so,” Tanner said. “MI5 arrested her yesterday. She was pretty tight-lipped until we confronted her with all manner of evidence. She confessed to switching Bond’s medication, even disguising it as the proper pills. We believe she was instrumental in setting up Double-O Seven for Dr. Feare’s murder.”

Molony shook his head. “It’s extraordinary. She’s been with me for several years. How could this have happened?”

“She was obviously promised money. She was apparently terribly devoted to her cousin. He probably got her involved. When she learned that he was dead, she broke down and told all,” Tanner explained.

“So, you see, the Union was on to Bond all the time,” M said. “Your nurse provided them with the information that he was not well. When we told Double-O Seven that we had found her, he remembered that he had seen her in Soho the day before he left for Africa. She had paid a visit to one of her cousin’s adult bookshops, apparently to deliver information or something to Clayton. Bond couldn’t place her at the time.”

“She wasn’t a terribly pleasant person, I must say,” Molony admitted. “She was an excellent nurse, though. She correctly prescribed what kind of medication would, at the very least, have some kind of psychological effect on the patient.”

Tanner continued. “From what we’ve gathered from preliminary interrogation of this fellow Yassasin, one of the Union’s founding members, an American, James Powers, was also responsible. Apparently he was a brilliant surveillance expert. He had been watching Double-O Seven from the moment he had returned from the Himalayas. Powers even followed Bond to Jamaica and back. He got to know Double-O Seven’s daily routine. Quite frightening, really.”

“How effective will the surgery be?” M asked, veering the conversation back to 007’s health.

“One hundred percent, we hope,” Molony replied. “James has been through a lot, but he has a strong reserve. I believe he’ll pull through with no lasting side effects. He just needs some time.”

“Thank you, Sir James,” M said.

She glanced at Bond’s medical records on the table in front of her. She found a photograph of him and picked it up. “The Union really came up with something extraordinary, didn’t they?” M asked rhetorically, shaking her head.

Tanner nodded. “They led Bond by the nose and made him think that he was the one making discoveries and finding clues. They even had us for a while—we really thought he had gone off his rocker and joined the Union.”

“It was what they wanted us to think,” M said. “But the Union underestimated one thing,” M said, running her index finger along the edge of Bond’s photograph.

“What was that, ma’am?” Molony asked.

“My belief in him.”

Further south, on the continent of Africa, another man was touching a photograph of James Bond, but he couldn’t see it. Somehow, though, he was able to absorb the subject’s essence simply by holding the object in his hands. He could sense that this man was a far more complex and resilient human being than any of the Union’s analysts could have guessed.

Le Gérant sat in his new quarters in Marrakesh, a plain, sun-baked stone building not far from the Djemaa el-Fna. When he had received the news that the Gibraltar operation had failed dismally and that his chief strategist was in captivity, he had dismissed the cercle fermé and retreated to his study. He had asked not to be disturbed and had remained in his private quarters for twenty-four hours.

Le Gérant usually had a finely tuned sense of humor. His father had taught him that, along with keen business acumen, a ruthless efficiency in dealing with obstacles, and organizational skills that commanded respect and discipline from every division of his domain. Le Gérant was very good at what he did. Still, he could remember his father repeatedly driving the point home: a businessman should never lose his sense of humor, no matter what happened.

At this point, however, Le Gérant knew that he had lost it and wondered if he would ever get it back.

Twice now this Double-O agent had made the Union look foolish. Le Gérant was not going to let it happen again. If it was a war that MI6 wanted, then it was a war they would get.