John Gardner - Win, Lose Or Die

like: always accusing us of infesting his precious Harriers with Wrenlins.” She laughed. Throaty and infectious, Bond thought, something he would not really mind catching himself.

“Wrenlins,” he repeated half aloud. He had almost forgotten that old Fleet Air-Arm slang, culled and altered from the RAF’s “gremlins”.

Today’s young people, he presumed, would take for granted that gremlins were creatures conjured from Spielberg’s brain for a popular, if zany, movie.

Fifteen minutes later, they were sitting at a table in the quiet, neat restaurant ordering the pate and the boeuf Beauceronne that delightful and simple dish of rump steak cooked with bacon, potatoes and onions. Within an hour they were talking like old friends, and, indeed knew people in common, for it turned out that, while Clover’s father had been what she called “a humble man of the cloth”, his elder brother was Sir Arthur Pennington, Sixth Baronet and master of Pennington Nab, a stately home which Bond had enjoyed, in more ways than one. “Oh, you’ll know my cousins, Emma and Jane, then?” Clover asked, looking up sharply.

“Intimately,” Bond replied flatly, and with a completely straight face.

Clover let it pass and they discussed everything from the Hunt Balls at Pennington Nab, to life in the Royal Navy, taking in, on the way, jazz - “My bro’, Julian, introduced me to trad jazz when he was up at Cambridge and I’ve been an addict ever since fishing in the Caribbean, a favorite for both of them; skiing; and, finally, the novels of Eric Ambler and Graham Greene.

“I feel I’ve known you for a lifetime, James,” she said as they drove slowly back towards the RNAS.

It was, Bond thought, a somewhat trite remark, but possibly one of invitation. He pulled the BMW into a lay-by and cut the engine.

“The feeling’s mutual, Clover, my dear.” He reached for her in the darkness and she responded to his first rough kiss, though pulled away when he began to move in closer.

“No,James. No, not yet. It might become difficult, particularly as we’re going to be shipmates.”

“What d’you mean, shipmates?” Bond nuzzled her hair.

“Invincible, of course.”

“What about Invincible?” He gently backed off.

“Well, we’re both being drafted there for Landsea “89, aren’t we?”

“First I’ve heard of it.” Bond’s voice remained steady, while a snake of worry began to curl around his stomach. “First I’ve heard of Wrens going to sea as well - particularly during an exercise like Landsea

“89.”

“Well, it’s all over the place. In fact I’ve been told officially.

Fifteen of us. Me, and fourteen ratings - apart from the other ladies who’ll be on board.”

“And what about me?” Deep within him, Bond was more than concerned now. If it was common knowledge that he was being drafted to Invincible it would not take much intelligence for the unscrupulous to put two and two together, particularly if they had got hold of the information that three senior Admirals, including the C-in-C of the Russian Navy, were going to be aboard. His mind jumped back to the near-miss that afternoon, and he wondered if somebody was already trying to take evasive action and cut him out of the baby-sitting business.

Clover continued to talk, saying that she wouldn’t have said anything if she did not already know he was involved. “Of course it’s classified,” she sounded a shade defensive. “But security’s for those without need-to-know, surely.”

“And I have need-to-know?”

“Your name is on the list, James. Of course you have clearance.

“And these other women. Who are they?”

“We haven’t been told. All I know is that there are to be other women.

“Okay, from the top, you tell me all you know, Clover.”

Bond listened, and became more concerned. Concerned enough to make a very secure call for a crash meeting with M during the coming weekend.

“I shouldn’t go blabbing about this to all and sundry, Clover,” he admonished. “Not even good to talk to me about it,” he told her when they got back to the Wrennery.

“Well, kiss me goodnight, at least, James,” she pouted.

He smiled and gave her a peck on the cheek. “Not just yet,” he said solemnly. “Especially if we’re going to be shipmates.”

Though he laughed as he drove away, the entire events of the day were more than worrying. Bond made his crash call to M from a telephone box a mile up the road, off the Base. The Duty Officer, using a scrambler, arranged the meeting for Sunday.

The search for the Spanish pilot, Felipe Pantano, and his missing Sea Harrier had been called off at dusk, but would be resumed in the morning. Yet, long before the S and R helicopter teams had clattered out to look for wreckage and, possibly, a signal emitting life raft, Captain Pantano was sitting comfortably in the captain’s cabin of a small freighter, two hundred miles off the coast of his own country, Spain.

The freighter was registered in Oporto, Portugal. Indeed, Oporto, the harbour city famous for that most clubbable of wines, was where she was headed, and she sported the name Estado Novo on bows and stern.

Low in the water, the Estado Novo obviously carried a heavy cargo in her hold and a large container secured forward taking up the bulk of her deck space. On the ship’s manifest, the container showed as engineering equipment destined for Gibraltar, from a well-known British firm, and would not be subject to any customs scrutiny in Oporto where they would only stop for twenty-four hours to refuel.

Sitting opposite Pantano in the cabin was not the captain but Abou Hamarik, the strategist of BAST, who sat smiling and nodding as the swarthy little pilot told of how well the plan had gone.

“I’m sure nobody noticed that I had gone off the plot,” Pantano spoke in rapid Spanish, “and your people were waiting right on time.

It took less than five minutes.” He had taken off as number two in the quartet of Harriers, climbed to the correct height and had been careful to continue on the obligatory course.

The operation had been set up only ten days before, even though there was already a plan to filch the Harrier: in fact that was originally the reason for Pantano being sent on the course. For weeks, through their carefully planted penetration agents within the Spanish Navy, BAST had forced Pantano onto the Harrier course with the elegant expertise of a theatrical magician making a member of the audience take the Ace of Spades from a clean deck of cards. The unscheduled addition, to destroy Captain Bond, had only been slipped into place when another of their agents had confirmed what that officer’s role was to be during the all-important Landsea “89 exercise.

Just north of Shrewsbury, over a densely wooded area, Pantano had literally dropped his Harrier from the sky, using the vectored thrust of his engine and coming down vertically like an express lift. No pilot would have faulted his skill, for the Harrier had dropped at the exact, planned point, into a small clearing of trees. Pantano had only to make minor adjustments - moving forward and sideways - to slow down and gently bring the Harrier to rest in the clearing. There was a Land Rover parked nearby, and four men waiting for him. As Pantano had already suggested, the work of wiring up, fusing and fitting the Sidewinder AIM-qj missile (one of three stolen some four months earlier from an RAF base in West Germany) to the starboard outer pylon, would only take a very short time. Five minutes twenty seconds later Pantano’s Sea Harrier was rising fast from the trees, putting on forward speed and climbing away, back on course, but increasing his airspeed, going flat out. It was essential for him to catch up with the lead aircraft, piloted by Bond, and stay well ahead of the number three.