John Gardner - Never send flowers

Bond questioned him about the way security worked, learned about the underground tunnels which allowed maintenance and emergency access to any part of the park, while employees also kept a strict eye on each of the rides and experiences.

`There are people down there watching all the time tending the TV monitors, the computers that run the main shows, and the audio-animatronics, the robot people and animals.

The accent on everything down there is smooth and efficient running. The visitors and their safety come first." As he talked, Ben pointed out the various routes and sights on the large plan. They went on for over two hours, after which Bond asked to be left alone with the chart.

Now it starts, he thought, and for the next hour and a half, he examined the map, thinking himself into David Dragonpol's mind, trying to follow the serial assassin's logic. What would he do? How would he go about something as calculated and cold-blooded as this particular killing?

When he had made certain decisions, he rang M's office. `I'm ready to put my suggestions to the whole team, sir." `I'll get them in here. Some of them are probably asleep, but let's do it now.

As he entered the now crowded office, the first person he saw, waiting for him by the door, was the delectable Ann Reilly, assistant to the armourer, Head of Q Branch, and, therefore, known to all as Q'ute. She was still as desirable as ever a tall, elegant, leggy young woman with sleek and shining straw-coloured hair which she wore in an immaculate, if severe, French pleat.

`M says I'm to give you anything you're going to need,' she said, with her eyes wide and innocent.

`Chance, my darling Q'ute, would be a fine thing, as they say.

`Oh, you're hooked well and proper, James. I've met the lovely Fredericka, and you might not escape from that one's clutches.

`Actually I might not want to.

`Good. Now what do you need?" He had already prepared a small list which he handed over, telling her that Ben should take the stuff with him back to Paris. `I'll brief him before he goes." She nodded and departed to search the Q Branch stores for the listed items.

As he turned back into the room, he found Fredericka beside him.

`That Q'ute person?" she began.

`You haven't been playing fast and loose with her, have you, darling James?" `A little fast, but never loose." `Well forget it, my dear. I'll scratch her eyes out and rip the hair off her head if she ever makes a move." `It's your subtle approach I love so much, Flick.

`Well, I do have one boon to crave." `And?" `M says I can't come with you. He's told me that Euro Disney is out of bounds to me. He's even suggesting that I should go and pamper myself in some health farm.

A place called Shrublands." `I'd try and talk him out of that, Flick.

I went there once and it almost killed me." `James, I want you to talk him out of keeping me away from Euro Disney." He put his arms on her shoulders and looked into her face. `No, Flick. Nothing against your experience and training. Nothing against your sex.

Nothing that's politically incorrect. But I'm going alone, and it's the only way. This is one of those times when we have to play it mano a mano, as they say." She was about to protest when M called everyone to order. `Captain Bond has come to certain conclusions,' he said, setting the stage for his agent to talk.

The plan of the Euro Disney complex was pinned to a board which Bill Tanner had placed on an easel. Bond walked over to it and began crisply.

`Please interrupt at any time. First, I believe that Dragonpol will spend Saturday night and Sunday morning inside Euro Disney, setting things up.

`That's impossible, James. Nobody gets to stay inside. Our security. ` Ben started.

`Just one minute, Ben." Bond silenced him with a look. `We're not talking about just anybody, we're talking about a very experienced serial assassin who can walk through walls. He has his own little theme park. I've seen it, and, believe me, he's forgotten everything your people know about audio-animatronics, or optical illusions. I promise you that, however tight your security might be, Dragonpol will stay where he wants to stay, and be where he wants to be. If I'm right, he'll certainly be in the park over Saturday night." Ben went silent, allowing him to continue.

`What I've tried to do is put myself in Dragonpol's mind: tried to follow his logic; tried to think as he thinks, and plan as he plans." `We understand all that, James,' M cut in. `What we need to know is how do you think he'll go about it?" `I think he'll use explosives, and I think he'll hit either here, or here." His finger stabbed at the chart, pointing to two of the main attractions of the park Pirates of the Caribbean and the short trip on the riverboat Mark Twain.

`Why exactly?" `Because there's water, and a certain amount of cover. One is enclosed, the other's on the surface.

But in both cases he could detonate devices himself." `So how and when would he get explosives into those areas?" `I've already told you, sir. He'll bring them in either late on Saturday night, or in the small hours of Sunday morning. Possibly only hours before the party arrives. That's how I'd do it, if I were setting them up for a kill.

To me these are the only two places, and I'm going to try and stop him late on Saturday or, more likely, early on Sunday morning.

`And if you're wrong? If he has some other scheme?" `Then either I'll be killed; or the royal party'll be killed; or you'll have to keep them a hundred miles away. You see, sir, there is one other, remote and that's the operative word-remote possibility." `Which is?" `That it's already set up. That he can kill them the moment they walk through the gates; and that he can do it without being there at all." M gave a worried grunt. There were shuffles and murmurs from everybody else.

`You've chosen me for the white knight." Bond actually smiled at them. `You either let me do it my way, and trust me, or you put someone else on the horse.

There was a long silence. Nobody looked in either his direction or at M. Finally it was M who spoke.

`All right. Good luck, James. You're the white knight.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

DEATH AMONG THE MAGIC

Later, Smiling Ben told him that this was one of the best Saturdays Euro Disney had experienced in 1992: a year which had been, according to Ben, `A natural disaster on account of the weather." Today Disneyland was packed, and the sun shone, dancing off the turrets of the castle, glittering from the water around Big Thunder Mountain, and infecting the crowds with amiable good humour.

Most of the children, and some adults, wore mouse ears and carried balloons. The rides emptied as everyone took to the open spaces, crowded the sidewalks of Main Street USA, up through Adventureland and around Discoveryland, to see the afternoon's Grand Parade.

The Parade was one of the things he remembered clearly from his visit to the Magic Kingdom in Orlando. Here in France it seemed bigger and better than he recalled, but possibly this was a trick of memory and distance in time. It exploded on to the streets and walkways in a wonderfully choreographed snake of colour, movement and music. The marching bands swept by in celebration of the cheeky little mouse who had stolen the minds and hearts of the world for over six decades, their baton-twirlers leaping, hurling their sticks high, twisting, cartwheeling and seemingly doing impossible acts of juggling. Costumed young men and women dancers appeared to have walked straight out of a Hollywood movie which was, after all, the general idea.

The bands and dancers were interspersed by a moving panorama of floats: Snow White stood by the Wishing Well, while the Dwarfs downed; Cinderella's Pumpkin Coach was pulled by six decorated carousel horses; Captain Hook's ship carried Peter Pan, Wendy and the Lost Boys on a moving painted sea. There were Pooh Bear; Beauty and the Beast; Robin Hood and the foxy Sheriff; the animals from the Jungle Book; and all therest, with some Disney characters walking and jumping along, mixing with children in the crowd.