The Screams of a Rose Petra was sitting at her make-up table and brushing her hair when Billings entered the master bedroom. He stared at her reflection in the oval mirror. Petra was used to her lover admiring her, but today, something in his eyes told her that admiration was the furthest thing from his mind. Slowly, she put down the brush and turned toward him.
"What is it, Charles? Why the serious look?" she asked, while flashing one of her winning smiles.
"Who are you?" he answered her question with his own.
"What do you mean, who am I?" she laughed. "Are you suffering from a sudden case of amnesia?"
Billings walked up to her and threw the photograph that Bond had given him on the table. As Petra realised what was in the photo, blood drained from her face. She almost panicked, but then managed to regain her composure.
"So, this is what's got you all worked up? You think that I'm having an affair with this guy? Oh Charles, you silly man. This is Jarmo, Oskari's cousin. He sometimes helps manage The Crazy Lobster when Oskari has to go out of town. I just came over to ask for some stuff that I'd left in the attic and forgotten about until now."
"Drop the act, Petra," Billings shouted. "Well, that is not even your real name, is it? Why don't you start by telling me what it is, or would you prefer that I call you Black Rose?"
She flinched when he spat out her code name, but Billings had to give her some credit. The girl is tough, he thought, as she pretended to become angry, playing the part of the innocent maiden whose virtue had been wrongfully called into question.
"Have you gone mad? I don't know why you are acting this way. If this is your idea of a joke, let me tell you, Charles, it is not funny. Not at all, and I want you to stop it, right now."
"Oh, I don't find this humorous either, I can assure you. Look, I know that this man is - actually, I should say
was - Vladimir Sarkovsky, a KGB thug. He was sent here to take out Bond, and maybe even me, in retaliation for Bond killing the sniper. So what were you two talking about? Were you giving him the key to our house, and telling him when's the best time to surprise me?" Billings raged. He suddenly grabbed her arm in a vise-like grip that made her wince in pain. "TELL ME!" he bellowed.
"You're hurting me!" she shouted. "Let me go!"
Their voices reached Bond, and he finally decided that he had to do something before Billings went too far. He rushed up the stairs, but as he got to the narrow hallway that led to the master bedroom, 007 saw Billings closing the door.
"No! Wait!" Bond yelled, but the other man slammed the door shut. Then there was a sharp, metallic sound as Billings slid a deadbolt home, locking Petra and himself in the room.
Bond threw himself at the door, hitting it squarely with his shoulder, but the heavy wooden door hardly moved. Like their owners, the houses in this town were a sturdy breed, built to last through decades, maybe even centuries, of unforgiving weather. Bond could feel that this door would stand up to anything that he could throw at it, and knew that the only way he was going to get into the room beyond was if Billings let him in. All he could do now was to watch the drama unfold through a narrow crack between two of the massive oak planks that made up the barrier in front of him.
"Listen to me, Billings," he tried to reason with the man. "Don't do anything foolish. Let me bring her back to MI6 headquarters. We have people who are experts at making prisoners talk, and I guarantee you they'll make her give up her secrets, every last one of them."
However, Billings didn't seem to hear what Bond was saying. He gave Petra a hard shove, and she went flying across the room and fell across the bed. Slowly, he walked toward her, while pulling out the Colt Python that he had kept tucked into his waistband. Almost nonchalantly, he came over and stood towering above her, pointing the huge gun at her head, with the muzzle touching her forehead.
"I'm afraid I am completely ignorant when it comes to the art of interrogation, and how to extract information with skills and finesse. Therefore, I'm just going to have to rely on my trusty, not-so-little friend here. The game's very simple, really. Either you tell me everything I want to know, or I blow your brains out. Now, shall we play?"
"Charles, listen to yourself. You're
insane. Please, put away the gun," she begged him. "I'm Petra, and you
love me, remember?"
"You're right, I love Petra. However,
you are not her. In fact, the woman that I love is dead, and I truly want to kill you for taking her away from me. So if I were you, I would start talking as if my life depended on it, because it does."
Tears started running down Petra's face, as she began to realise how hopeless her situation was. At that moment, she decided whatever information she had was not worth going to her grave for, and words began to come out of her in a rush.
"My name is Ludmilla Veranova, and I'm a KGB agent. My mission was to seduce you and gain your trust in order to get access to confidential MI6 information."
"And you've succeeded brilliantly, by making a copy of my code book and giving it to the KGB, enabling them to break our cipher and decode our secret messages," Billings continued.
"Yes," Ludmilla admitted, "but I didn't know that they were going to kill that scientist. That's the truth, I swear."
Billings ignored her and went on: "What about my contacts in Russia? Did the KGB find out who they were?"
"Yes. Based on the nature of the information that was being leaked out to MI6, the KGB was able to gradually narrow down the list of suspects until they finally figured out the moles' identities."
"So they know about both of them?" Billings asked.
"Yes, they know about Mihailov, and Armenienko."
"Why haven't they been arrested, and even executed?"
"They are still free because the KGB is using them for counter-intelligence purposes. That's Kaminsky's idea. The KGB has been feeding your moles false information for months. MI6 has been getting exactly what Kaminsky wanted them to have."
"Oh God," Billings exclaimed in despair. "All the damages that this false intel must have caused... And it's all because of YOU!" he shouted, and pressed the gun against her head again. Ludmilla recoiled away from him at first, but then something snapped inside her, and she decided to stand up to him and call his bluff, not believing that he was truly capable of hurting her.
"If you're going to kill me, go ahead. Do it," she said defiantly, while leaning forward to press her head to the muzzle of the Colt. When Billings hesitated, she gave a harsh laugh. "Just as I thought, you're all talk. I knew that you couldn't kill me. You don't have what it takes to be a killer."
As her words grew bolder, a visible transformation occurred in Ludmilla. Her pretty features hardened, and her face became a cold mask, smirking at Billings, daring him to prove her wrong, and mocking his inability to do so.
"So you found out that I'm a Russian agent. Well, you have your job, and I have mine. We just happen to be on opposite sides of this little thing called the Cold War. It's nothing personal, really. I'm sorry if your feelings got hurt, but you can't tell me that you didn't have fun having a woman like me as a lover. In a way, it's your fault that you're now in this mess. How could you seriously believe that
I could have fallen for someone like yourself?"
"Shut up," Billings said while backing away, pressing his hands to his ears to block out her words, which were as painful to him as little daggers piercing his body.
However, Ludmilla would not stop now, not when she could sense that the balance of power had shifted, and she was hurting him, and gradually gaining the upper hand.
"I may be young, but I've had some beautiful men, men who are younger, stronger, and better lovers than you. Did you know what our teacher, Svetlana, used to do? She would, from time to time, organise these parties where a group of us girls would be driven to Director Kaminsky's private villa. There, a bunch of young KGB officers would already be waiting, and we were to practice our seduction skills on them. We would have a competition among ourselves to see who could pick up the best men of the lot. I almost always won. The last officer that I was with was so young and handsome. His name was Alexei Diemetrovich, and he was a striker on the Russian national soccer team before joining the KGB. He was so strong, he could probably put you in the hospital with one blow. On top of all that, he was a great lover. In fact, sometimes when you and I were together, I used to pretend that it was him I was making love to, not you."
"You b!tch!" Billings shouted, and struck Ludmilla hard across the face with the back of his hand. She screamed and fell back on the bed. Her hand went up to touch the red mark on her cheek, while her eyes opened wide with shock. Bond thought he could also detect fear in them. This must have been the first time Billings had ever hit her, and she must have suddenly realised that she had pushed him past a line that should have never been crossed.
Billings turned away from her for a moment and faced the door. His face was just a couple of feet away from Bond, and through the crack, 007 could see that some profound change had just taken place inside the man. People always say that one of the first casualties of war is innocence, and Bond felt that this was just as true in the Cold War that they were in. Certainly he saw the innocence in Billings die at that moment, to be replaced by something else, something cold, sinister and ugly, and as old as time itself. As he looked through that hole in the wooden door and into the other man's eyes, Bond saw a glimmer of the madness and malice that had suddenly flared up and were now taking over the formerly shy, harmless MI6 agent. In his line of work, Bond had come across many brutal, ruthless men in his time. However, the evil that was lurking in those men had been there for so long, it had become an integral part of their nature. This was the first time that 007 witnessed the birth of evil inside another human being, and it chilled him to the bones.
As Billings turned back toward her, Ludmilla stammered: "I.. I've told you what you wanted to know, so please let me go."
"No," he replied flatly.
"You can let that man take me back to MI6 headquarters," she desperately tried another tactic, while pointing at where Bond was standing. "I know a lot more about what goes on inside the KGB, and I'm sure there are people back in London who would love to hear some of the things that I have to tell."
"You've told us quite enough, my dear," Billings said, while rummaging through the top drawer of the dresser next to the bed. He pulled out a little box that had been hidden under some clothes.
Terrified by his cold, detached demeanor, Ludmilla fell to her knees in front of him and threw herself on his mercy: "Please, Charles, I beg you. Whatever you're thinking, please reconsider. If I had ever meant anything to you, please listen to me now. Let Bond take me back to England. They'll lock me up and throw away the key, and you'll never have to see me again."
"Petra meant the world to me, but she's dead. You, on the other hand, mean nothing to me. In fact, I've decided that prison is too good for you. You've killed Petra, and you've killed me as well, or at least the part that's good and decent in me. Why should you be allowed to live? No, you should not. I'm going to enjoy watching you die," Billings replied, while enjoying the pain and terror that his words were inflicting upon her.
"No, Billings! Don't do it! Don't throw your career and your life away because of her. Let me take her back alive, and let MI6 deal with her. They'll make sure she pays for what she has done!" Bond yelled. He gave the door a couple of violent kicks, which had absolutely no effect.
Billings ignored him completely. He pulled Ludmilla up roughly by the arm and pushed her onto the bed again. Then, he dragged the chair in front of the make-up table over and positioned it between himself and her. He placed the Colt and the small box he had retrieved from the dresser on the chair. After he was finished, he knelt down on one knee, placed his hand under her chin and lifted her head up to make her look at the two objects arranged side by side on the wooden chair.
"I'll let you decide how you'll die," he addressed her like a professor explaining a scientific experiment to a particularly dense student. "I can either shoot you in the face with this gun, or you can take what's in this box here. It's your choice. Now, I must warn you that should you choose the first option, it is very likely that all this God-given perfection (he tenderly traced the contour of her face with his right index finger) will be completely obliterated. You see, this weapon fires .357-caliber bullets. With you being a swallow instead of a field agent who may have to face combat, I don't expect you to be familiar with types of firearms and ammunition, so I won't blame you for not knowing what such bullets can do. You'll just have to take my word when I tell you that when fired at point-blank range, this kind of bullet will cause so much destruction that the victim's face will simply be damaged beyond recognition. The good thing about this scenario is that death will surely be instantaneous, and if you're dead, perhaps you don't care what your face will look like. Then again, vanity is a powerful thing in women, especially those who look like you do, so I just thought that I ought to give you this warning."
The horror that filled Ludmilla's eyes gave Billings the answer, and the gratification, that he was looking for. He then proceeded to explain the second option:
"The other way for you to check out is to take the pill that's in this box. It's a cyanide pill, and it's a common practice, at least within MI6, for all field operatives whose jobs entail the risk of being captured and interrogated, to be given such pills. This is my pill, but I'll be glad to give it to you, unless you have one of your own?"
Ludmilla slowly shook her head, causing Billings to give a short laugh.
"Your superiors must have so much confidence in your ability to blind me with your charms that they don't even bother to give you a quick-exit pill. Well, as I said, you are welcome to use mine. I don't mind it at all. With this pill, all the damage will be on the inside, so you won't have to worry about that pretty face of yours. However, death won't come so quickly, and you'll suffer a bit. The question is: is that a price you're willing to pay?"
"Don't make me do this, please!" she begged again. "Let me live! What I did, I did for my country. I didn't mean to hurt you."
"Ah, but you did hurt me. You destroyed my dream. Did you know that I was thinking of bringing you back to England, starting a family, and working hard so that I could make something of myself and give you and our children a life of carefree luxury? Now I realise I'm nothing but the King in the Fools' Hall of Fame. You killed my dream, and with it the best part of me. So you see, you have to pay the ultimate price. Now, what's it going to be? Bullet or pill? Don't try my patience any longer."
As Ludmilla realised that there was no mercy left in Billings to appeal to, a look of resignation came over her. Sobbing softly, she looked at the two instruments of death on the chair. It took her a couple of minutes to make her decision, but to Bond looking on helplessly, it seemed like an eternity had passed before her trembling hand reached for the black box. She lifted it up and held it gingerly in her hands as if she were handling a live rattlesnake. With her right hand, she reached inside the box and pulled out a small, gray pill. She turned it over a few times in her palm. How can something so small and ordinary-looking have such a deadly power, she thought. Then, she straightened up, wiped away her tears, and settled herself down. She had decided that if she had to die, she would do so with dignity and defiance. She fixed her eyes, cold with hatred, upon Billings and said simply: "Enjoy this now, but I'll see you in He!l!" Then she threw the pill into her mouth, tossed her head back and gulped it down in one quick motion.
In such a concentrated dose, cyanide is a very fast-acting poison. Still, to Bond, it seemed that Ludmilla's death throes went on forever. First, her mouth gaped wide open as she laboured to suck in air in short, agonising gasps. Then, as the poison reached her nervous system, she fell to the floor, where her thin body started to thrash and jerk as a series of seizures hit her. At the same time, her wheezing and gasping for air went on, as death by cyanide has symptoms that are very similar to death by suffocation. Ironically, while the lethal substance was killing her by denying the cells in her body access to oxygen, it also had the startling effect of bringing blood closer to her skin's surface, making her skin glow with a warm, pink radiance. Thus, in dying, Ludmilla Veranova looked more ravishingly beautiful than ever.
Meanwhile, Billings sat immobile in his chair, watching his former lover writhe and suffer at his feet. His face showed a rapt fascination, like the expression of a science student observing the death of one of his lab rats in an experiment, and nothing more.
Bond had seen, and heard, enough. He turned away, walked downstairs and out into the street, where he could no longer hear Ludmilla struggling to draw her last breaths. Bond had once told someone, rather facetiously, that flowers screamed when they were plucked. He himself never believed in such nonsense, of course, but on that day, Bond heard the dying screams of a Rose, and he found them pitiful and unbearable. The early morning air outside was chilly, and a cutting wind was blowing, but Bond felt relieved to escape into its embrace, away from the confines of the little cottage where, on this particular morning, evil reigned supreme.
EpilogueRain had started to come down on the northern corner of Jamaica, and the sound of raindrops pitter-pattering on the roof filled the silence that came over the bedroom after Bond had stopped telling the story. Both he and Jacquie didn't speak for a while. His mind was still back in Finland, in the house where he witnessed the death of love and innocence. Jacquie was also profoundly affected by the tragedy, as it opened her eyes to a side of human nature that she hadn't known even existed. It was she, however, who finally broke the silence:
"What a sad story! Things always get ugly when love turns into hatred, but I have never imagined that someone can go so far to get his revenge," she shuddered. "I suppose Billings had to spend the rest of his life in prison to pay for his crime."
"He paid for it all right, but not by going to prison. When I took him back to England, when he was being interrogated by MI6, he asked for permission to speak to M, my boss."
"He did? Whatever for?"
"He wanted to make her a deal he knew she couldn't refuse. You see, he was damaged goods, and even worse, an embarrassment to MI6. Just imagine the headlines if the papers ever got a hold of this racy story of a British spy who was seduced by a beautiful KGB agent, then unwittingly passed on false information to MI6 for months, before finding out the truth and murdering the KGB agent in a fit of rage. They would make it the scandal of the decade, and Her Majesty's Secret Service's reputation and credibility would be permanently tarnished. However, M couldn't simply order that Billings be executed. Having him serve a lengthy prison sentence would achieve nothing other than wasting a good chunk of taxpayers' money. Billings knew all this, and offered her a way to make him disappear while potentially turning a major debacle into a stunning victory. He volunteered for what basically amounted to a suicide mission: go into Russia alone, seek out and assassinate Sergei Kaminsky, the Director of the KGB, and his lover, Svetlana Tarasova, head of the program that produced agents like Ludmilla. Of course, MI6 would first kick him out of the organisation, which they were going to do anyway, so that they could wash their hands of him and anything that he might attempt to do. If he were captured during the mission, they would have what's called total deniability. Furthermore, there was no fear that Billings might give up valuable information if he were interrogated by the KGB. They already knew about the moles that he was running, and the cipher that he was using (which would never be used again, of course). Besides those bits of now-useless information, our man didn't know anything that could hurt the British Secret Service in case the Russians were able to pry it out of him. It was a win-win scenario and M took the not-so-risky gamble. She sent him off on his personal vendetta, knowing that if he were to succeed, she would have scored what was probably the greatest coup of her career."
"Poor man. In a way, I felt sorry for Billings," Jacquie said while snuggling up to Bond. "He probably felt he had nothing to live for any more. What happened to him in the end?"
"Billings had two things going for him: determination, and a total disregard for his own safety. That made him a dangerous man. A few weeks after he had made the deal with M, MI6 learned that Kaminsky was going to spend a weekend at his private dacha on the shore of Lake Ladega, accompanied by Svetlana Tarasova. This was the opportunity of a lifetime, so a plan was quickly put together. Billings went to Helsinki where, disguised as a Finnish sailor, he boarded a freighter carrying tons of canned fish that were to be exported to Russia. The freighter went across the Gulf of Finland, then navigated up the long Neva River, and finally docked at a port along the shore of Lake Ladega. Billings slipped ashore, and went to a predetermined drop spot where some clothings, fake Russian identification documents, some money, and most importantly, a disassembled sniper's rifle, had been placed for him to pick up. Armed and ready, he positioned himself along the narrow country road that led to Kaminsky's vacation home, and waited for the KGB Director and his girlfriend to show up. When the black sedans came (the bodyguards' car, followed by Kaminsky's car), Billings opened fire and killed all the occupants of the second Mercedes. However, Kaminsky was a cagey old fox. Unbeknownst to everyone except those in his innermost circle of trust, he always traveled disguised as one of his bodyguards, while the bodyguard would take his place in the main car. That was how he barely escaped Billings' ambush. Enraged that someone had come so close to killing one of the most important men in the Soviet Union, the formidable KGB machine kicked into overdrive. They tripled the security forces along the border, and conducted an intensive manhunt. Within a few days, they had captured Charles Billings. They put him through a rigorous interrogation that went on and on because they didn't believe what he was telling them. Kaminsky's ego didn't allow him to accept that a rogue agent acting alone, without on-going support from the British Secret Service, could have almost succeeded in killing him. Hence, Billings was subjected to all kinds of terrible torture the KGB could dream up. It was as if Fate had decided that he had to pay for what he did to Ludmilla. However, no matter what they put him through, Billings refused to sign a confession stating that he had been sent by M, and that the assassination was an MI6 operation. At the end, Kaminsky gave up and ordered that Billings be shot. The Russians didn't know that they were giving the poor bugger exactly what he was looking for. He probably faced the firing squad with open arms and a smile on his face."
Bond's voice trailed off, and silence once again descended upon the small cottage. He could find nothing more to add to his story, while Jacquie reflected upon the tale of betrayed love and shattered dreams. After a few minutes, she reached for Bond, pulled him toward her and started to make passionate, almost feverish, love to him. It was as if the act of love and its primal healing power were the only things that could, for a few moments at least, erase the memories of the tragedy of Charles Billings from her mind.
Edited by dsomerset, 06 November 2007 - 06:27 PM.