Two:
LAND OF DARK GOLDRaul Vazquez couldn’t see anything. The black hood which had encompassed his head for day after day was still in place. He couldn’t remove it because his hands were fastened loosely behind his back in a pair of cuffs. The only time he saw daylight, or what passed for it, was when, like a bird of prey, the hood was removed to allow him to eat. Like a hunting hawk, Vazquez had become quite docile. Any thoughts of escape were now banished to the back of his mind. His captors fed and watered him and he could wash and defecate. At these times his hands were free, although he had to remain in the little room where he had remained for these endless days. He’d stopped shouting and being angry and intolerant. It reminded him of the times he shouted at business men and police and Prime Ministers and received not so much as a glimpse of recognition. Vazquez reflected on his life during these shut off, solitary days and nights. While not happy, Vazquez was certainly peaceful.
Vazquez was a free lance journalist and a very troublesome one. He very wrote inflammatory articles for Jornal do Brasil and Correio Brazilense, amongst others, and was in demand by the most renowned international magazines, like Time, Economist and Business Week. He was sometimes described as a ‘Voice for the Wilderness,’ a rather poetic phrase that he appreciated the more he heard it. This title had been disposed to him because, in an earlier life, he’d been an idealist crusading environmentalist. He was still an active crusader, but age, as he told his wife, had caught him. Vazquez was born in London, to a Brazilian diplomat and an English mother. His parents divorced when he was a child, but his dual nationality allowed him to complete his education in Britain, eventually attending Edinburgh University, where he studied Environmental Science. His inspiration stemmed from the summers he passed with his father in Brazil, holidays spent on trips around the Amazon basin, the Mato Grosso and the Rio Grande. It was at Edinburgh that he met Judith Sutter, who he later married. They both shared a love of the rainforest and chose to live in the Amazon region, conducting experiments and surveys, studying the wildlife, the flora and fauna and the indigenous people. They lobbied governments and corporations, raised funds for charities, supported traditional tribal living, wrote revealing and often libellous articles and organised demonstrations, both lawful and illegal. Unfortunately much of the good work was buried under the derision heaped on their over the top protests and files full of court actions.
Vazquez’s most notable triumph had been the end of the Trans-Amazonica Project in the 1990s. This monumental road building project was considered by many experts to be an environmental disaster, destroying thousands of miles of pure rainforest and bringing pollution and disease to the natives. The roads didn’t just bring transport, they brought towns. ‘Where ever a road is laid, the people will follow,’ Vazquez and others had warned and eventually, under severe international pressure, the highway was closed from Itaituba. Now it hardly breached the densest parts of the rainforest.
But it had been a small, shallow victory. The power of the Amazon River and its many tributaries was still seen as an untapped resource by politicians. Vazquez’s heated protests against the H.E.P projects in the Tocatis Basin fell on deaf ears. Brazil needed electricity and Hydro Electric Power was seen as the way forward, even if it devastated the native way of life. Within a few short years shifting cultivation ceased, the herding of goats and pigs stopped and free flowing drinking, washing and fishing water vanished. In their place came over a thousand miles of lakes, eight huge dams and almost twenty smaller ones. The damage was irreversible. Raul and Judith Vazquez seemed to almost give up at this point, which is when he turned to journalism to present his arguments.
Perhaps, he considered, this was the reward one received for being perceived as a trouble maker. That disappointed him. The garimpeiros who had kidnapped him were the sort of people he could help if they listened. There was more deserving work than illegal gold prospecting, sifting the sand for the dark muddy specks of dust that, when melted together and polished, would be brilliant shining gold nuggets.
But Vazquez knew he was seen as a threat. They had boarded his canoe like pirates and fought him into submission. They brought him to this settlement they laughingly called Palacio do Norte, where he’d been tied and hidden in a windowless room with a floor of wooden planks that seeped mud when it rained. They threatened him with death and after two or three days, they made a crude video tape which they dispatched not to the Manaus police, but to his office in Sao Paulo, a detail they’d obtained from his now shredded belongings. The demands they had made for his safe return were outrageous. The deadline had come and gone and Vazquez had expected to be shot. Whatever the visiting stranger had said must have changed their minds. Since that curious, unseen visit he had been treated reasonably well.
Vazquez tried to count the days, but it had become impossible. His only means of retaining his sanity was to endlessly remember things. Anything, like the periodic table, the formulae for natural compounds, the genus of plant life, sporting events and records, dates from history, dates from his personal history and every country’s capital city. Or he sang songs by De Moraes, Jobim, Carlota, Sinatra, the Beatles and Beth Carvalho. He recited the love poems he had romanced his wife with. He prayed to god – any god.
Today had started like any other. He’d been allowed to urinate and provided with a bowl of water to wash his bearded face in. He’d eaten pork and beans and water for breakfast and then been re-cuffed and hooded. As always he’d been left alone for the day, excepting the regular toiletry interludes, until it was time for his evening meal. As always he tried to engage his keeper in conversation, but the responses were monosyllabic at worst, dull witted at best. The hood went back on and the hands were tied. Everything else changed that night.
It rained hard. The thud of raindrops sang to him in his intimate darkness until at last the deluge desisted and the strains of samba and bossa nova from the botecos took its place. He enjoyed the music and even hummed along to the Cuban ‘Guantanamera.’
Suddenly, he heard the sound of a massive explosion, followed by a series of smaller blasts. They weren’t close, but they were tremendously loud. He could hear screaming. The voices were all intermingled, shouting over each other. After several minutes of audible confusion, Vazquez thought he heard gunfire. His head flinched inside the confines of his mask. Behind him, there was an enormous bang and a splintering crash. Instinctively he turned away. Debris showered him. He curled into a ball, tucking his head into his chest. One of the walls of the room must have been blown inwards, but by what? He couldn’t smell gas or diesel. It didn’t feel much hotter, so surely there wasn’t a fire.
Vazquez heard more shouts. Some of them were definitely in English. The gunfire was closer, roaring outside the place he now thought would be his tomb. Someone entered the room and grabbed his shoulder, yelling and threatening to kill him. It sounded like one of his kidnappers. There was a rattle of gunfire and his captor collapsed across his legs.
Vazquez struggled to free himself from the unexpected load. Another hand touched his shoulder.
“Calm down,” said a new, English speaking voice, steady and authoritive. “Are you Raul Vazquez?”
“Yes,” he gurgled feebly and nodded. Hands freed the hood over his head. Vazquez shook his eyes clear. Above him was a hard, cruel looking face, whose own eyes, determined and steel blue, studied him. He was a white man, dressed in military combat fatigues.
“Who are you?” asked Vazquez.
“Bond, James Bond,” replied the stranger, “I’m your rescue party.”
***** ***** ***** ***** *****
Luis’s expression didn’t change as he stared through the curtain of rain. It had been a fairly wet summer, but this was a downpour of biblical proportions. The big heavy droplets thumped loudly on the roof of his little boat. Outside the river had turned into an enormous moving fountain as splashes from billions of raindrops collided with each other and spun away in all directions.
The toothless old man, fortified by money and hard liquor continued to look ahead, concentration etched across his face. He didn’t want to stop, not even in this weather. He’d warned of the consequences in these parts of the Negro basin. They could be boarded and, once they found the guns, there would be shooting and killing. His boat might be destroyed or confiscated. Luis was happy to take risks, but not if it meant losing his one source of livelihood. Luis slept, ate and worked on his little cargo vessel, toiling up and down the rivers of Amazonia, delivering anything from food and clothes to medicines and live animals. Occasionally he transported people. The four men he had with him today had paid him handsomely, which was why he was taking such a risk travelling this far north. He knew it was lawless territory and had only agreed to take them after a long nights drinking at Raquel’s. Silently he cursed himself.
James Bond turned away. It was only late afternoon, but the sky had disappeared. It was as dark as an Amazon night, illuminated only by the rapier spark of lightning. They had travelled through several short sharp showers today, but nothing to match this. And they were only an hour or so from their destination according to Luis. Assuming he could be believed. Bond looked over the other three men in the boat.
There were the two Brazilian policeman and Keith Wilkinson, a member of the Special Boat Service. Raimundo and Branco had been assigned to Bond on the recommendation of the fat District Commissioner, who wasn’t warm to the idea of foreign police operating on his patch. However the Commissioner did see the publicity potential in Bond’s mission and, after reading the sealed orders from Brasilia, he’d politely insisted two of his best officers escorted Bond. Local knowledge was invaluable in the Amazon, he had said. Bond believed him, but was less inclined to trust the two men, who were bad drinkers and sullen sorts.
Wilkinson had been hand picked by Bond, who knew him from training exercises in the Brecon Beacons. He was a tough soldier with years of experience, including a stint fighting in the jungles of Sierra Leone. Bond trusted him
The low rumble of thunder filled the cabin. Bond lit another cigarette and caught Wilkinson’s eye. The S.B.S. man looked to be half asleep, but Bond knew he was merely resting his limbs and mind in preparation for action. There was unspoken conspiracy between them. There was nothing to do but wait while the sky emptied itself.
It took almost a full hour for the storm to subside and the dark cloak of cloud to be replaced by the deep violet of the night sky. The gloomy wash took back its slow, stately appearance, with only the white ripples of the boat’s wake disturbing the shiny chocolate surface. The river was one of hundreds of tributaries that flowed into the mighty Rio Negro, and at well over a mile wide in places it was an awe inspiring sight on its own. Just visible to the naked eye were the tops of the thirty metre high trees of the rainforest. They seemed far off by day and at night they disappeared completely, blending into a blur of black sky.
Wilkinson opened his eyes. “It’s stopped raining, boss,” he stated, simply.
Bond nodded and Wilkinson made for the deck to prepare the Sea Eagle 9.52 dingy.
Raimundo half turned. “You want some help?” he asked, his thick accent making his English almost impenetrable.
Bond shook his head. “Keith’ll be fine.”
While Wilkinson inflated the little craft, Bond ran through the plan with the two policemen. Bond and Wilkinson would make for the shore in the dingy. They would cover the last mile or so on foot. Meanwhile the Brazilians would be landed at the quay and hopefully have time to recce the garimpo. Bond had little choice in leaving this task to the policemen. The garimpeiros were a wary breed. They didn’t like strangers in their world and an unfamiliar face was considered a threat. If an estrangerio wasn’t the law, he was a thief. Bond asked the two Brazilians to go unarmed. They complained bitterly, but Bond had faced them down; they had to blend in as best as possible. Bond pacified them by insisting he would hand back their weapons as soon as it was possible, but he sensed surliness in their attitude.
Luis alerted Bond with a touch on his arm. He pointed into the centre of the darkness where a series of tiny yellow lamp lights flickered. “Palacio do Norte,” he said.
Everyone turned to look for a few seconds. On the edge of the great river, almost hidden from above, was a small town. Luis said as many as three hundred people lived there. The town had food stores, a gasoline station, a harbour master, bars, brothels and a workshop. It served the miners and hunters, their wives and families, the tradesman, the prostitutes, the drunks and all their assorted hangers on. It also housed one man, a prisoner: Raul Vazquez.
Bond had spent fifteen days tracking, tracing and looking for clues and information. This was the sixth day he’d spent edging further up the river system, deeper into the heart of the world’s last great wilderness. He felt he was reaching his goal, that somewhere in the never ending forest of green, their lurked his enemy and his prize. Beautiful as it was, Bond had come to appreciate why men like Marlow and Kurtz were driven mad in the jungle. Perhaps it was the same madness, a gold fever, which drove the prospectors to make these ransom demands. Perhaps, Bond considered, he was equally mad for trying to stop them.
After about twenty minutes, Wilkinson signalled the Sea Eagle dingy was fully inflated and loaded. “Ready to rumble, boss.”
“Good,” Bond turned to the others, “Time,” he said and all five men synchronised their watches.
Luis cut the engines on the boat allowing it to drift for a few minutes. He cast a few glances about him. This would be the rendezvous point and he’d promised to wait here, only closer to the shore. Nervous as he was, Luis wasn’t about to let anybody down.
A fresh brooding cumulous nimbus passed across the moon face, turning off the last natural light. The silence was eerily interrupted by the lapping water and the distant cry of the howler monkeys. Even further away Bond thought he could hear a faint samba beat.
Wilkinson slipped confidently into the little vessel, settling onto his knees. The black oval looked sturdy enough. Plastic boards rested on top of a six inch inflatable keel and the wide pontoons leant extra strength. The dingy was designed to take an outboard motor, but Bond didn’t want unnecessary noise, so they were using paddles. With a final word of encouragement to the others, Bond stepped into the boat.
The craft felt vulnerable on the wide waters. Swollen by the rain, the river flowed stronger than usual and the journey quickly became arduous. Bond followed Wilkinson’s stroke and they progressed at an angle to the current, ensuring they were not capsized. Aided by his N.V.S.6 night vision helmet, Wilkinson negotiated eddies and waves with competent ease. The image intensifiers made his vision almost as clear as it would be during day light. Bond had chosen not to use the helmet, which he found cumbersome, and he paddled blind, relying on the skills of the S.B.S. man.
Once or twice they hit a high breaker, which shattered over the prow of the craft, soaking the two men and throwing them off balance. Bond’s lower legs began to ache from the kneeling position. A two inch deep pool of water sloshed in the bottom of the dingy, which became more of a raft as it sank lower into the river. Ignoring their lack of comfort, the two men continued with steady stokes, always keeping the yellow lights ahead and to the left. Gradually Bond began to distinguish the forest from the blackness surrounding them.
Then his paddle slapped onto something thick and rubbery. It was a huge water lily big enough to sit a baby on, and it was one of thousands which crammed this stretch of the shore. The two men dug their paddles between the leaves and stalks of the dinosaur plants. The dingy made restricted progress through the green mass. There was almost no current, but the last few metres seemed the hardest.
Wilkinson stopped paddling and tested the river bed with his oar. “Solid,” he pronounced and promptly jumped over the side. Bond followed suit.
The river water went up to his thighs. The two men waded the remaining ten or so metres to the river bank, hauling the inflatable beside them. The river bed sloped gently up toward the forest and the bank melded into a dark mass of half submerged tree roots, grasses and soft soil, meshed with binding weeds and mosses.
Wilkinson clambered onto the shore camouflaged instantly by the foliage. Bond passed him the large rucksack they had brought and the two shadows man handled the dingy out of the water. Bond joined him on the shore. The two men made a perfunctory covering for the boat and then emptied their boots of river water. Together they broke open the rucksack and began to check their weapons. Even in the darkness these two men could feel their way around a familiar gun. They were armed with Heckler and Koch M.P.5 sub machine guns. These were the S.D.3 type, a silenced version, which also benefitted from a retractable stock. Bond liked the M.P.5 series. It used interchangeable parts across the range, had a tidy A4 trigger and, if required, could be fired in three round bursts. Bond also carried a S.I.G. Sauer P250, but he wasn’t expecting to have to use small arms. He expected Wilkinson would have his stainless steel commando dagger with him. They also had plastic explosives, already loaded into smaller knapsacks.
The two men set off, following the curve of the shore, never straying far from the waters edge. Wilkinson led, again using the N.V.S.6. The forest was less daunting up close and Bond found his sight and senses becoming more aware of the sounds and sensations among the trees. Underfoot his boots squelched onto wet moss and ferns. Occasionally he skipped over a huge root fanning out from its parent tree like a buttress. Saplings and bushes brushed against him, some at his feet and ankles, others waist high or taller and with leaves that flicked rain water and whose edges scratched like paper. It wasn’t very hot, though Bond could hardly feel the difference, for the humidity was so high it gave the sensation of walking in a sauna. Every breath he took tasted of fowl sweaty air. He was covered in a thin film of perspiration and his combat clothes hang heavy on his frame.
They had been walking for almost twenty minutes when Wilkinson came to a stop, his left hand held up. Bond halted. The two men said nothing, remaining still and silent, listening to the noise of the unfamiliar rainforest. Bond was correct; in the background he could clearly hear a samba beat. Yet there was another noise in the air: the low rumble of an engine.
Wilkinson crouched and moved simultaneously, using the largest bushes for cover. Bond followed him. The diversion was taking them away from the river. The rumble was growing steadily louder until it became an inescapable, thudding, mechanical drone. Over Wilkinson’s shoulder, Bond could see lamp lights among the trees.
They drew closer. Ahead of them was a clearing some twenty metres across. It was, disguised from the river and from the air by an arrangement of green tarpaulins and camouflage netting. Spanning the ground were a series of sloping wooden troughs. Several industrial sized water hoses snaked away from the troughs and back through the trees towards the river. The rumble emitted from a large diesel fuel generator that powered the lights and the pumps. Two men were sharing a beer, relaxing a little, discussing the hard days work. That was too bad for them.
Bond and Wilkinson struck silently together. Two sudden blows to the neck. The two men collapsed in a muddled heap. The contents of the bottle spilled over the ground.
“Waste of a good beer,” chirped Wilkinson, “You think they’ll have some more?”
“Save it for the return journey, Keith,” said Bond, “You see to these two. I’ll fix some charges to this generator.”
“No worries.”
Bond checked his watch. He’d give it ninety minutes. He only wanted this to be an extra diversion if things looked to getting nasty.
Wilkinson removed the night vision helmet and busied himself tying knots.
Meanwhile, Bond delved into his knapsack and pulled out two tiny packages of M183 demolition charges. Q-Branch had spent quite some time altering and perfecting these to give the right results on detonation. Each packet contained between a quarter and half a kilo of Composition 4 plastic explosive and a tiny combined timer and detonator. The idea was to create maximum damage with the lightest material available. Q-Branch swore these would destroy whatever they were likely to be attached to and Bond didn’t want to be around to find out. When the detonators activated the C4 would ignite in milliseconds, the gases expanding at over 27000 feet per second. These little packages were deadly.
Wilkinson was finished before Bond, the two men bundled together back to back by the hands and feet. Their mouths contained strips of their muddy shirts.
“All done?” he asked.
“Just about,” replied Bond, setting the final timer. “Okay, good. Let’s take the path they used. It should lead up straight to the town.”
Bond led this time. The track was well worn and they made quick and easy progress. Bond saw more veiled glades dotted among the trees, both left and right. Most were similar establishments to before, but gradually they changed. A succession of small dwellings appeared, clustered in groups of three or four. They were small bare huts and made from the timber of the trees that had been cut to make the clearings. They didn’t have windows, but light crept underneath the doorways of some. The two men passed five such congregations, some quite close to the track.
Ahead, the lamps from the settlement flickered between the trees. The noise of the generator finally dispersed to be replaced by the sounds of the samba party. Bond recognised the strains of Bebel Gilberto’s ‘Samba de Bencao.’ It was a cheerful, summery tune. Bond nearly hummed the melody. It would be a pity to break up the party.
Three:
PALACIO DO NORTEThey heard voices. Two figures, a man and a woman, appeared at the turn of the path. Bond shrank back. Wilkinson was already following suit. The couple were in the throes of a volatile love affair. The man was half-drunk and the woman did most of the talking, complaining in haughty tones. They stopped directly in front of Bond’s hiding place. Bond stayed low, his face pressing against the sodden ground, his ears listening to the continuing animated argument. Damn them, he thought, annoyed; tell her you love her, you son of a bitch, take her home and screw her.
At last after much gesticulating and shouting, the couple departed towards one of the wooden huts. Bond glanced towards Wilkinson. His expression matched Bond’s. Precious minutes had been wasted. When the door closed behind the warring lovers, they pressed on, more cautiously none the same.
It was hard to make out the shape of Palacio do Norte. Luis had described it as ‘one long dirty street’ and he wasn’t far wrong. A clutch of bigger huts stretched up from the river. They shared much the same construction as Bond had seen earlier, their roofs topped with a tight weave of branches and epiphytes. A few feet up in the trees was raised a roll upon roll of camouflage netting in a crude attempt to mask the town from air bourn spies. Most of the buildings had open fronts, suggesting they were shops or stores. Two of them were open to the air and full of people. They had to be the local botecos. These huts faced each other across the street and played the same music, which blared like a rock concert across the town, even drowning out the sound of the electricity generators. Maybe that was the point, considered Bond. It would be a useful cover for the next part of the operation.
Amongst the drunks and the whores, Bond caught sight of Raimundo and Branco, who seemed to have blended in well and had the ear of a tough looking, grizzled garimpeiro.
Bond and Wilkinson skirted the main road, to the rear of the quieter establishments, until they arrived at what passed for the harbour. There was no quay. The boats were strung together in five rows, the nearest to the shore were tethered firmly to big iron stakes hammered into the ground. Bond didn’t see a harbour master’s hut. There only appeared to be one man on the shore, who sat smoking on an upturned wooden beer crate. A second guard patrolled the far end of the flotilla, walking on loose planks stretched over the boats. Both men were armed with rifles. On the far side of the boatyard there was a nest of oil drums, covered by a huge tarpaulin.
“Bingo,” Wilkinson’s teeth glinted, “That’ll make a pretty fire, boss.”
“All right, Keith,” said Bond, checking his watch. The luminous dial had ticked on. They needed to move fast. “Ten p.m. for this lot. Let’s hope our Brazilian friends aren’t just socıalısing.”
The two of them split up. Wilkinson crawled onto the first string of boats. Most of the vessels were flat keeled, open topped river boats. They were sturdy and strong, designed to be anchored in position, floating like a buoy in the river. The boats contained hoses, tools, pumps, small generators, engines and fuel cans. Everything a river prospector needed.
Using the nominal cover available, Wilkinson began to approach the river watchman. Bond kept half an eye on the shore man, judging distances, and the other half remained occupied with the river watchman. The latter was walking back towards Bond, completing a full circuit of the boat boards. Bond had lost sight of Wilkinson.
Suddenly a black shape rose out of the floor behind the watchman, a six inch flash of silver in its hand. The watchman died silently as the commando blade severed his jugular and his windpipe. Wilkinson took the weight of the body and lowered it gently onto the boat deck. Instantly he spun back towards the river, impersonating the watchman.
Bond saw the shore man move. He unslung his rifle and walked cautiously to the boats. “Chico,” he called.
Bond didn’t hesitate and with a rustle of branches, he sprung out of the undergrowth. Startled, the man only half turned. His mouth dropped open, ready to shout, before Bond landed a left jab firmly on his jaw. The man fell backwards, more from the shock. His eyes widened in fear as Bond’s right hand scythed down and chopped at his throat.
Quickly, Bond looked up the street. No reaction. No one in Palacio do Norte seemed to really care. A lambada was playing and some of the girls were dancing, the men cheered encouragement and occasionally joined them for a step or two between swigs of beer. Bond hauled the guard out of sight and crossed to the other side of the boatyard.
The fuel dump smelt strongly of petrol, bringing tears to Bond’s eyes and tickling his already barren throat. Bond eased the cap from one of the drums and rolled it over. Gasoline glugged from the spout forming a rich oil slick that ran to the river and spread ever wider along the trampled soil. Bond dug into his knapsack again and pulled out several of the special M183 devices. Quickly he moulded the explosives and inserted the detonator and timers into the little balls of clay, setting them as agreed to ten o’clock.
Bond propped himself up against another drum, lurking in the darkness. He kept his eyes focussed on the street, praying nobody came his way or even gave him a glance. He checked his watch: 9.52. Keith was cutting it fine. It seemed to take Wilkinson most of those eight minutes to reach him.
“All sorted, boss. Those babies are going to make one hell of a noise.”
“Good. Let’s move on.”
The two men made their way behind the fuel dump and vanished into the thicket. Bond led them away from the river towards the rear of the lively botecos. They nestled into the undergrowth and watched the dancing girls, one of whom was now performing on a table, her skirts above her flabby thighs. Raimundo and Branco were both moving towards the back of the bar, aware of the time. Bond glanced down at his watch: 9.59. He hoped they were far enough away; he’d never actually seen these explosives in action. The second hand ticked off the final digits and suddenly it was ten o’clock.
Everything was normal. Then everything was chaos. The massive explosion at the fuel depot ripped through the boatyard. A ball of orange fire and black smoke shot upwards and outwards, scorching the sky and igniting the trees that towered over the town. At the same moment a whole series of explosions erupted on the river, tossing boats and equipment high into the air. A sheet of flame stretched across the shore, rising ten feet or more and burning blue and yellow.
People screamed. The woman dancing on the table was thrown from her pedestal, breaking her leg horribly under her. Others were tossed against the counters, the furniture and the floor as the shock wave of the blast hit them. Stunned for a few seconds, the once happy mob stared agog at the destruction. More people ran into the town from the huts, shouting and yelling, demanding to know what was happening. Secondary explosions continued to rip through the fuel dump and the fire started to spread upwards through the trees.
Some semblance of action took shape and the townspeople, women and children as well as men, moved to extinguish the horrific fires that had just devastated their livelihood. They ran en mass for the undamaged water hoses and pumps.
Raimundo and Branco had stayed put. They were man handling the tough, bearded garimpeiro back against the bar.
Bond and Wilkinson strode confidently out of the trees, their M.P.5s at the ready. Wilkinson fired a long volley of shots across the bar and the bullets shattered bottles and mirrors. Amazingly the lambada was still playing, but the gunfire obliterated the tiny sound system, leaving only an echo of the sensual music from the other deserted bar. Wilkinson took up a position covering the street. The garimpeiro had hardly flinched.
Bond stepped over the prostrate dancer and tossed the policeman their standard issue .38 revolvers.
“Who’s this?” he asked.
“He says he’s called Carlos,” grinned Branco, keeping hold of the man’s trouser belt, “And he claims to be a garimpeiro. But what sort of a garimpeiro walks around with this in his trousers?”
Branco reached behind Carlos and extracted a big grey revolver, shoving it into his own trouser belt.
“Will he talk?” said Bond, urgently. He was pleasantly surprised by the two men’s good work. “Ask him where the hostage is.”
There was some urgent translating. Bond didn’t need the answer interpreted. He stared at Carlos’ sweating face. “Ask him again,” said Bond, taking out his P250 automatic.
Carlos seemed less sure, but still insisted he knew nothing.
Coolly, Bond raised the automatic and fired. The two 9mm bullets tore into Carlos’ shoulder. A fine fountain of blood spat out from his wounds. In seconds his blue shirt was a dark inky brown.
“Tell Carlos that he’s lost the use of his left arm for life. If he doesn’t tell us where the hostage is, I’ll ensure he loses the use of his balls.”
Carlos managed to give them directions before he passed out.
The general panic caused by the bombs allowed the four men to walk unheeded up the main avenue and then across towards a clutch of three huts. The fires still raged and cast an eerie yellow glow over everything. Smoke billowed through the trees carrying with it the malt whiskey smell of smouldering wet timber. Above them, Bond saw the flames licking their way along the camouflage. It wouldn’t be long before everything around them was aflame.
The approach to the dwellings was blighted by wisps of smoke which drifted across the path. But there were no fires here; even the huts were in darkness. Bond and Wilkinson took the lead. The Brazilian’s held back as instructed, covering the rear and protecting the escape route.
There was a movement from outside one of the cabins. Someone was standing up. Instantly, Bond and Wilkinson separated, darting left and right. Wilkinson shot first and the reply was immediate. Bullets whizzed through the trees. Leaves and branches shook. Bond saw a second man emerge from the hut and fired. The man ducked backwards into the doorway. Bond wasn’t interested in this hovel or the second one. It was the last of the three he wanted; the one Carlos had identified.
Leaving Wilkinson to the crossfire, Bond skirted around the little encampment. He couldn’t see a guard, but he expected there would be one, possibly two. He crept closer, always ensuring he was side on to the building.
Bond still had some of the plastic explosives left. C4-M183 was designed to be attached to something, to blow away immovable objects. It didn’t work in the same way as a stun or blast grenade. Yet, Bond was willing to try anything to flush out the guards. He pulled out one of the small packages and moulded the explosive around the detonator. He set the timer to two seconds.
With a deep breath Bond clicked the timing mechanism and lobbed the home-made grenade towards the hut. It exploded on impact with the ground with a shattering pounding bang. The force of the blast had a spectacular impact, blowing a hole in the side of the hut and creating a gaping a crater in the ground. Debris from the hut and from the ground fluttered to earth like dying butterflies. Bond made a mental note to tell Q-Branch how well it had worked.
He was up and running. Recklessly, Bond kicked open the door and felt the wasp sting of bullets zip past his ear. Bond fired blindly as he rolled, coming up on one knee the MP5 at his hip aiming in the direction of the gunshots. It was dark and he couldn’t see. The man’s own trigger finger was fast, but he was as blind as Bond and missed again. Bond saw the burst of flame and delivered two three-round bursts straight at it. The man’s body danced in the strobes of light as the slugs bit into his chest.
Bond heard the shouts from the next room even above the din from outside. Gently he eased open the door and peered into the gloom. He could just make out the scene inside the next room.
The hostage lay on the floor. He was hooded and cuffed. One of the kidnappers was crouching over him, gun in hand. The man shouted, but Bond wasn’t listening. His finger squeezed again and the kidnapper collapsed like a rag doll over the body of Raul Vazquez.
Bond pulled the hood off the man’s head. The bearded, grey face stared wide eyed at him. “Who are you?” he asked.
“Bond, James Bond. I’m your rescue party.”
Vazquez looked like he was about to faint. Bond shook him urgently. “Keys?” he shouted. Vazquez nodded at the corpse next to him. Bond searched the dead man’s pockets and found a ring of keys, one of which fitted the cuffs.
“I hope you can still run,” said Bond, taking in the man’s bedraggled state.
“I will now.”
Satisfied, Bond led him to the gaping hole in the wall and together they jumped out of the darkness into the black of night. They landed in the crater, its edges still baked with heat. Bond forced Vazquez to scramble out and then followed him. Together they slipped unnoticed into the forest, leaving the sounds of battle behind them. Bond pushed Vazquez ahead of him and back to the main street where, through the trees, he could see the waiting figures of Raimundo and Branco. There was no sign yet of Wilkinson. Bond wasn’t concerned; Keith knew the drill.
They stepped into the avenue which was now flooded with thick smoke. Bond beckoned to the policemen, who jogged towards them. They ran down the street, avoiding the startled glances of the townspeople, who were still frantic in their efforts to quell the burning boatyard.
Indistinctly Bond heard the rattle of a machine gun. There was a groan and a thud. Twisting to look, Bond saw Branco collapsed in a heap. He seemed to be breathing but he wouldn’t be going anywhere soon. Bond cursed. He hadn’t surveyed the street for shooters; that was the Brazilians’ job. What the hell had they been doing?
Bond knelt and unleashed a volley of shots through the clouds of grey and black, more as a deterrent than with any hope. His eyes scanned the gaps in the smoke, seeking the gunmen. He retreated, firing again.
Bond urged Vazquez and Raimundo into the trees. “To the right,” he shouted, directing them to the path. He fired a final time and followed them.
The forest was catching fire here too. It was only the dampness of the foliage that prevented the blaze from spreading faster. The choking smog seemed to follow them everywhere. Bond coughed as he ran, his eyes streaming with the biting pallor. Even so he noticed that Raimundo had a laboured gait. The policeman paused at the pathway, uncertain which way to turn.
Bond caught up with them. Something wasn’t right. He reached forward, taking hold of Raimundo’s shirt. He ripped it open and three bags of gold dust dropped to the ground.
“Jesus Christ!” shouted Bond, “We don’t have time for this! Come on!”
Bond shoved Vazquez up the path. Behind them Raimundo was picking up his booty. Suddenly there was the whip crack of bullets and Raimundo turned to defend himself. Bond kept running as he glanced back. Out of the steaming trees a small group of armed men emerged, like wolves devouring a prey. Raimundo didn’t stand a chance.
When Bond reached the floodlit clearing, he was surprised to see Wilkinson propped up against the generator, a broad grin brightening his face.
“You made it then?” he asked jovially.
Bond nodded. “Our friends didn’t. Any need to ask what happened to you?”
“Not unless you want to. We’d better get moving.”
Wilkinson gestured down the path, where the pack of wolves was in pursuit. Bond pushed the panting Vazquez ahead. Wilkinson took the rear point, unleashing staccato bursts of gunfire at the approaching gunmen, who scattered into the undergrowth.
It was hard running in the dense forest. Their feet sank and slipped on the murky terrain and the branches and lianas smacked into their faces. Bond prayed they had gained enough distance from the clearing. They had. Just.
When the generator exploded the earth shook and the flames and shrapnel shot out in all directions, tearing through the low lying bushes, setting fire to ferns, nettles and fungi. Whatever the outcome for the wolf pack, they didn’t pursue their prey any longer.
The three fugitives reached the rendezvous unmolested and in good time. Luis’ boat sat a little way off the shore, his lights and engine doused.
Bond gave a satisfied, grim smile as he helped Vazquez into the Sea Eagle dingy. The garimpeiros were too busy putting out fires to follow them. They’d be hard pressed to find a usable boat anyway. Vazquez was free and virtually safe. Mission accomplished, as they say, despite the loss of the two policemen who had been too greedy for their own good.
Yet something nagged at Bond’s mind. This was a well organised and brutally armed settlement, not a tin pot bunch of scavengers and opportunists. They certainly weren’t expert terrorists, but they were well equipped to protect themselves and the mining operation. Too well equipped, pondered Bond and cast his mind back to Carlos’ quivering face in the bar. How, thought Bond, does a poor garimpeiro obtain a brand new Baikal MP446, the modern Russian “Viking” revolver?
Four:
THE HUMMING BIRDBond began to question Vazquez the morning after his rescue, sitting along side him on the deck of the motor boat, the intermittent thunderstorms having finally abated. Vazquez was in his early fifties and the remnants of his once long hair straggled dirty and unwashed about his face. It was streaked with the on set of age. Behind the black and grey beard, he had a fallow skin that had once been a shiny tan, but was now a wrinkled, ghostly pale. His body looked weak; Bond expected his recent diet had been poor. His clothes hung off him. The smell of his barren cell stuck to him. But his eyes were alight and sparkling and his manner was exuberant. He spoke very fast when excited about a subject and Bond had to ask him to slow down occasionally. The activist’s thick accent lent an annoying lisp to his ‘w’s and ‘l’s.
“I know about the illegal mining. Everybody does,” explained Vazquez, “They’ve been all over the Amazon basin since the 1980s, but recently I’d heard worrying reports: increased environmental damage, racketeering on a grand scale, blackmail, murder, that sort of thing.”
“So the gold mining is getting out of control?” prompted Bond.
“For sure, for sure, since they found the first seams on the Sierra Palada, the garimpeiros have pumped thousands upon thousands of tons of oil, litter and human waste into the rivers. There are no environmental or ecological practices and because every miner is working illegally, there’s no employment law, no health and safety. In fact, there’s hardly any law at all.”
“Sounds like the wild west,” chipped in Wilkinson, who was lying in a hammock, listening to the conversation and smoking Brazilian Fly cigarettes.
“You saw it for yourself.”
Bond nodded. “Can’t the government do something? Surely the police or the military could intervene?”
“Well, it’s nothing new. The authorities have kept a good control in the last decade, so I was very surprised to hear there was fresh criminal activity.”
“You’re certain it’s criminal? Your captors aren’t just opportunists?”
Vazquez shook his head. “No, no. In fact, I’d heard several rumours about a pseudo-political organisation; something like a Brazilian Shining Path. It sounded like a great story. It ticked all the boxes. I was going to expose this underground society. Tell the world what they were doing to the rain forest.”
“What exactly are they doing?”
“Gold mining’s a competitive business and the rewards are massive. For an ordinary garimpeiro it can mean a cost of living rise of over twenty-five percent. Not to be sniffed at. A mine owner could treble that. They take the rough with the smooth too. If the police come in and close a township down, well, the garimpeiros will move on elsewhere. Take Boa Vista on the Rio Branco. It’s a gold town in everything but name. Officially mining is banned in the Yanomami Reservation, but it still goes on. Sometimes the natives are complicit, taking a cut themselves or leasing the land. And all the gold, silver and tin finds it’s way to the merchant houses in Boa Vista, who pay a princely sum. The city would collapse without it. It’s a state capital that virtually condones illegal activity.”
“So what’s the story on the Rio Negro?” asked Bond, “Why were you kidnapped?”
Vazquez shrugged half heartedly, as if the matter wasn’t of much concern to him. Bond vaguely remembered the man had been in prison for a few short spells and guess incarceration was fairly familiar too him.
“I’ve got some contacts with IBAMA, that’s the Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources, a long name for pretty useless outfit. They’re mostly scientists who do a lot of tests and surveys and moan a lot.”
Bond lit one of his own Fly Lights. He offered the pack around. While Wilkinson readily accepted, Vazquez declined with a wave of his index finger, as if to tell them they were both naughty boys. He continued talking, picking up the pace of his story.
“Recently they’ve been debating the high levels of mercury found in their samples. Previously it was always assumed this was the result of lax mining standards, but tests on unaffected soil samples are revealing surprisingly high results. It seems the forest itself, as it decomposes, contains masses of the stuff. As deforestation increases, so does the silt washing naturally into the water. It all contains mercury. It’s a good hypothesis and there are grounds for believing deforestation contributes to the problem. But the mines and the shanty towns don’t disturb the forests that much. And on the Rio Negro, they don’t even dig for gold – they suck it off the river bed.”
“How does that work?”
“Well, most digs are similar to open cast coal mines. An area of forest is felled and the stumps and undergrowth are burnt to cinders. Then they dig down into the soft earth, excavating a pit big enough to operate power hoses which blast away at the loose silt, forming a small lake. Next they use pumps to suck the slurry through a pipe. The slurry is filtered over a series of wooden grills, leaving a gravelly residue. Then the miners pan the grit by hand. A days work probably only yields fifty to a hundred grams of dust from which everyone has to take a cut: the owner, the tenant and the garimpeiro.”
“I think we destroyed something similar last night,” said Bond.
Vazquez nodded.
“The last part of it, yes. It’s a slightly different process on the Rio Negro. It’s what we call a black river and it doesn’t flow as fast. The garimpeiros own sturdy boats, like those you blew up. These contain all their equipment. One man, sometimes two, will dive underwater, breathing through hoses and often without eye goggles. They carry suction tubes with them which they drive into the river bed. The water pumps suck the sediment through pipes all the way to the river bank, where it’s filtered over the grills as before. That’s what you saw. There are at least five hundred boats along the Rio Negro doing just that and, unlike some more established communities, they don’t worry too much about using mercury.”
The grey head drooped solemnly. Vazquez paused a moment, to catch his breath. His expression was mournful, the tale of woe was telling on him.
“It’s a deadly poison of course,” he continued, “Did you see how many of the miners have thin hair? That’s the first sign and then the lungs. Anyway, the miners use it as an amalgamator, binding the dust fragments together. I only had primitive testing equipment with me, which I used lower down the river, but I estimated the pollution levels were nine times higher than normal. That’s about ten thousand tons of mercury washed into the river.”
Wilkinson let out a long low whistle.
“Of course I don’t have the evidence now,” continued Vazquez, choking on his words, “But that amount of mercury just about kills everything. Eventually.” He shook his head ruefully, “If those bastards hadn’t destroyed my equipment.”
Bond wondered for a moment if Vazquez was more concerned about his science than his life. Bond was only interested in the cold hard facts of his kidnap. “How do they get hold of so much mercury? Where’s it coming from?”
Vazquez raised a thumb by way of congratulations. “My thoughts too; of course the garimpeiros are tough guys. If they have to they’ll carry sections of a bulldozer on their backs through miles of jungle and assemble it on site. They’ll cut landing strips in the forest to bring in supplies. But the mercury... now, that takes a specıalıst, a legal supplier.”
“And you found out who it is?”
“Alas not, I didn’t get close enough. The garimpeiros have never been talkative. It can cost lives.”
Bond remembered Raquel, the brothel madam, who had gladly introduced them to Luis for a hundred Reais. The old boatman himself was more expensive, but fell to the twin tactics of booze and a well oiled palm.
“Money talks, Raul,” he said, “That’s how we found you.”
“Indeed. And that’s how I got caught: asking too many questions. I spent a few nights in a boteco, drinking with the local garimpeiros. There was a lot of resentment in that garimpo. It wasn’t a big settlement, but the prospectors were under a lot of pressure to join some sort of organisation. I thought they meant one of the unions, like SYNGASP or the Roraima Association. These half-hearted groups have been around for decades demanding legalisation and legislation.”
“But it wasn’t.”
“No. I got this garimpeiro drunk and eventually he told me about this big settlement, not a few assorted miners, but a full blown town hidden in the jungle. He called it Palacio do Norte.”
Vazquez paused and shook his head again. “I just didn’t believe him. Then he told me about the men who worked there, tough men, foreigners as well as Brazilians. They had the best equipment and were starting to monopolise supplies, including food, diesel, spare parts and, of course, the mercury. It was affecting everyone on the Negro, forcing the supply prices up and the gold prices down. Every so often they talked about a big man, a giant, who came to the mines and wanted them to accept the same supply terms. They didn’t always comply, but he was an intimidating man and it was becoming difficult for the less well off, the less well organised to refuse. The garimpeiros were being starved out of existence.”
“Squeezed between a rock and a hard place.”
“Exactly – they could either leave the area or join the organisation.”
“What’s this organisation called?”
“He said it doesn’t have a name; just a mark, the tattoo of a humming bird.”
The jovial sound of Keith Wilkinson laughing rang out across the deck. “This sounds like a load of Fu Manchu to me. So those guys were all members of some sort of secret society?”
Vazquez gave him a cool, disinterested look, as if his opinion wasn’t worth two pennies.
Bond thought for a moment. He was certainly concerned about the men and their armoury, but only in so much as they had endangered the lives of others. As for the hostage takers motives, Bond needed to think back a little further. What had they said on that grainy camcorder recording? Something about preserving the future; but whose future, the rainforests or their own? Raul Vazquez’s arrival would have set alarm bells ringing for this unnamed group, this protectorate, for he was exactly the sort of man who could expose them and ensure any territorial kingpins were summarily brought to justice. At the very least, he’d destroy the garimpos along the Rio Negro.
“It isn’t a cult, Keith,” he stated, “There are enough strange religions in Brazil as it is. Those guys weren’t looking for money or recognition. They were warning people to stay away. What I don’t understand, Raul, is why they didn’t simply kill you. That would have made the consequences of trespass perfectly clear.”
“Neither do I,” answered Vazquez, “I expected it. When the pirates boarded my boat, I tried to fight, but what is one against six? When I awoke I had no idea where I was. My head was in that cloth sack. I was blind and disorientated. They only removed it for meal times. If I’d been a weaker man...” His voice tailed away, “That sort of treatment can drive a man insane, you know.”
“Yes, I do,” replied Bond. His personal experiences of torture were equally harrowing. He briefly recalled the time he came into contact with a mad man who used the hood technique not only for torture, but for training and control. The thought of it made him clench his teeth. “Did you hear or see anything at all?”
“Not much. I mean, I knew where I was, I used to hear people joking about the silly name the place had, but generally they were fairly quiet. I probably know the football scores better than anything else. And I hate football.”
“You must have seen your gaolers,” stated Wilkinson.
“Oh yes, whenever I took the hood off there was always someone with me. But you’ve killed most of them.”
Bond thought he said that a little too cheerfully.
Vazquez seemed to be reflecting. He scratched his ear and flicked away the body of a mosquito. There was a thin trickle of blood on his fingers.
“But there was a man. Yes... someone different.”
“What do you men ‘different’?”
“Well, I never saw him, but a few days after my capture, after they’d made the tape, I had a visitor. It was a strange moment. He was very close to me, standing and then squatting. He asked me my name in Spanish and then in Portuguese. He had the trace of a foreign language on his tongue. I told him my name and explained why I had been visiting the garimpos, but half way through I heard him walk away and talk with the others. They were discussing what to do with me. It was this man who told them not to kill me.”
“Did he have a name?”
“I don’t know, James. It’s odd. I wasn’t sure, but I was certain one of them called him Golias.”
“Golias?”
“Goliath.”
Bond repeated the name under his breath. So, the giant man of the Rio Negro had a name.
Bond mulled the problem over and started to ask more detailed enquiries of Raul Vazquez until he was certain the environmentalist had revealed everything. Then over the next three days, Bond got Vazquez to repeat the story several times, questioning him again and again, asking for more details, for names, locations and times. When Bond was satisfied with an aspect of the story, he made notes in his own unique shorthand. He was always the last to retire and every night Bond took to bed with him the sweat and the smell of the Palacio do Norte, the fear of the giant man and the mystery of the Humming Bird.
Five:
DEATHLY SILENCEBond was still pondering the riddles while eating yoghurt, exotic fruit and black coffee in the breakfast lounge of the Hotel Manaus. Externally the hotel wasn’t much to look at, offering a mint green facade, but inside the Manaus was wood trimmed, well lit, modern and pleasantly staffed. The rooms lacked nothing and Bond had at last enjoyed a comfortable night’s sleep, one without the drone of insects and the lap of water.
The hotel resided in the very heart of Manaus, facing the world famous Teatro Amazonas. Bond had stood at his window that morning and squinted into the sun. There was a glare to his left where the light was fractured on the jade and amber ceramic tiles that covered the theatre’s distinctive dome. Over one hundred years old, the grand neo-classical columns and friezes told a story of a city once steeped in opulence. The surrounding buildings, as well as those which lined the Praca Sao Sebastiao, revealed a more modern touch. Cars and buses made their slow journeys around the city’s central square. Bond closed the curtain to cut out the brightness. After so many days and nights of brooding tropical storms over head, the unadulterated sunshine hurt his eyes. The sky was a sea blue choked only with pollution and not a wisp of cloud in sight.
Bond considered that if Manaus hadn’t already been built, no one would believe it. The city sat in the centre of the largest rainforest on earth and on the banks of the world’s greatest river. It was an incongruous pocket of over two million souls, a bustling metropolis among the dense Amazon jungle. It was founded by the rubber barons and this was reflected in the ornate colonial style facades that peppered the old town.
Bond liked the quaintness of the old quarters, but slowly high rise urbanity was encroaching year by year, both into the old sections of the city and the surrounding forest. And still more people thronged to Manaus, the twin promises of work and wealth lured thousands here. There was a cosmopolitan feel to Manaus, for alongside the Native, African and Portuguese Brazilians, Bond saw and heard Japanese, Indian, Malay, East and Western Europeans and plenty from the Americas. Most tourists arrived by plane, but some still preferred the traditional route and joined the merchants, builders, gamblers and sailors who entered via the international port, a harbour deep enough to accept ocean going vessels while still being over a thousand miles from any sea.
Bond couldn’t help but admire the place. It had a vibrancy and life that defied its physical position, torn out of the heart of darkness. The city ebbed and flowed like the river and Bond wanted to be a part of it. He would have been too, had he not needed to watch over Vazquez. Bond had spent the last evening thinking about the rodizo at Churrascaria Bufalo, where skewer after skewer of meat came sizzling to the table, all washed down with bottles of ice cold Brahma.
The Manaus had not been Bond’s hotel of choice. They had originally been based at the more upmarket Da Vinci, but Bond decided to make an immediate switch. It was a worthwhile precaution. The garimpeiros had been well armed and, according to Vazquez, well informed. Even assuming Branco was alive and hadn’t talked the trail could be picked up at any of the trading posts and villages Luis chose to stop at.
The hotel was the sort of establishment Bond preferred when remaining low key, being swanky, but a little out of fashion. He organised two interconnecting rooms and left Wilkinson to watch their charge with strict instructions to stay inside. Meanwhile Bond caught a taxi to Av. Djalma Batista; Vazquez needed some decent clothes and Bond, not being the best of shoppers, headed for the huge Amazonas Centre, which at least afforded plenty of choice. On his return, Bond made the taxi wait while he settled the bill and collected the bags from the Da Vinci.
Despite the loss of the Amazon Free Trade Zone, the clothes were still inexpensive. It was no exaggeration to say everything bought in Manaus was cheap. Subsequently the city bucked the trend in Brazil with a thriving, growing economy. Vazquez seemed quite taken with the garishly coloured threads and Bond left him to C.N.N.
They had docked a little before midday, Luis’ little boat chugging the last few miles peacefully and in glorious sun. The port authorities asked a few cursory questions and Bond was relieved not to have to explain the disappearance of Raimundo and Branco. He would tackle that issue later, possibly with the help of the British Consulate.
Bond took the first watch, up to midnight, as Wilkinson had manned the forward post for most of the river trip. He also wanted to write a preliminary report based on Vazquez’s observations. Bond sank a tumbler of vodka before opening his notebook and laptop. The task took him almost four hours. There was a lot of information. For a man who had been locked up blind and tied for almost a month in a hell hole like Palacio do Norte, Vazquez had proved remarkably lucid. Bond hoped the man’s journalistic instincts weren’t exaggerating any details.
When Wilkinson relieved him, Bond took a long shower and sank into the cool sheets for an exhausted sleep. After waking, Bond made sure the others were packed in preparation for the morning flight. Now they were sharing their first civilised breakfast, but Bond still had one more awkward task to perform. He hadn’t yet told Vazquez the terms and conditions of his rescue. He considered now might be the last reasonable time.
When M had asked Bond to take the assignment, he had objected. Surely it was a matter for the Brazilian authorities, he argued. M understood his misgivings, but this was a personal request from the Foreign Secretary. After learning of her husband’s kidnap, Judith Vazquez didn’t even bother contacting the police in Brazil. So low was her husband’s standing, they would probably be glad to get rid of the nuisance journalist. Instead she spoke to the British Embassy. The F.O. had worked swiftly and tactfully. The Double-O section was ‘volunteered’ to rescue Vasquez, on a single condition from the Brazilian government: once free, he and his wife had to leave the country for good. Britain was seen as a reasonable destination.
“I’m afraid I won’t be coming with you, Raul,” Bond said, “I have to meet the District Commissioner this morning and explain the disappearance of two of his finest officers. Keith will be your minder and I trust him to look after you. You’re booked on the lunchtime flight to Sao Paulo. You’ll meet your wife at the airport. Then the three of you will be catching a special B.A. flight to London.”
Vazquez had scrubbed up well. His beard had disappeared and his face had some colour back in it. He was tackling a large breakfast of cold meats and bread rolls which seemed much too big for his waspish frame. Some of the old fight had returned to the worn features and now they positively bristled with contempt.
“London?” he sounded incredulous, “I’m not going to London. My work is here in Brazil.”
“Unfortunately the government doesn’t want you here, Raul. We came to rescue you on condition you accompanied us back to Britain.” Bond could see the anger etched on Vazquez’s face. “I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.”
“This is outrageous!” exclaimed Vazquez, raising his voice dramatically, “What about my rights? My civil liberties? I’m not leaving! I won’t!”
Wilkinson ducked his head in embarrassment. Bond sensed other diners casting curious looks their way. He didn’t want a scene.
“I think that’s something you’ll have to work on from London. I have orders to get you out of Brazil today.”
“Preposterous! Ridiculous!” muttered Vazquez and began to utter a series of expletives in several different languages.
Bond tried a different approach. “Think about your wife, Raul. She’s been through hell these past weeks. At the very least take some time to convalesce. The rest and recuperation will be good for you.”
“Rest and recuperation! Are you mad? I’ve got a job to do!” Vazquez’s voice raised another octave and his accent was disintegrating into an unintelligible babble.
Once again Bond wondered how much Vazquez valued his own well being. Not a lot, he decided. “I understand this is upsetting for you, Raul, but you don’t really have an option. You have to go back with Keith.”
Bond leant forward, pausing, like the best actors, for dramatic effect. Yet Bond wasn’t acting; this man’s behaviour was suddenly unbearable. His eyes narrowed as he looked straight into the blustering face. He reached forward and grasped Vazquez by the forearm. It was a powerful grip, designed to control, but not to maim.
“Don’t give me any trouble, Raul,” said Bond calmly, “If you do, I’ll personally take care of you.”
The threat had the desired effect. Vazquez stared back into Bond’s eyes. They were as cool as steel. He remembered the look. He’d seen it the very first time they’d come face to face. This man meant every word. The hand on his arm didn’t relax its grip.
Bond could almost see the journalist’s mind ticking off the various possibilities and probabilities. After a long pause, and having measured Bond’s severity, Vazquez gradually, but grudgingly, started to calm down.
“Okay. No questions,” he sighed, “For now I will do as you ask.”
Bond released the arm, but continued to watch Vazquez unwaveringly.
The man was thoughtfully rubbing the reddened skin while studying his brief tormentor with the eye of someone used to getting his own way through words and argument and possibly a little bluster.
Bond sipped his coffee nonchalantly. His demonstration of gentle persuasion had achieved the desired result. The eyes were sullen, resentful, but, like a naughty chastised child, they would obey.
“Thank you,” he said curtly.
Vazquez said nothing and the remainder of the breakfast passed without conversation. When Vazquez stood to leave, Wilkinson immediately went with him.
Bond followed several minutes later, returning via the reception desk where he requested that a taxi be ordered in half an hour and made enquiries about the hotel’s left luggage facility, as he was following his companions on a later flight.
As he strolled to the elevator, Bond was distracted by a scruffy looking man who sat on one of the big leather sofas in the lobby, a bottle of beer half empty on the coffee table in front of him. He didn’t look like the sort to be staying at the Manaus Hotel, much too unrefined. His too big cream suit was stained and creased. The man looked as if he was still drunk from the night before. As the lift doors hissed shut, the man’s head lolled to the side like a marionette with loose strings.
When Bond entered Vazquez’s room he was once again parked before the plasma television glued to C.N.N. He appeared to have calmed down from his rant and they exchanged nods of the head.
“All right?” he enquired.
“Yes, I’m sorry,” There was an air of resignation in Vazquez’s voice, “I expect the trauma is getting to me. I still feel on edge.”
“It’ll take more than a few days on the Rio Negro to forget what you’ve been through, Raul,” sympathised Bond, “You’ll be fine in London. We’ve got some good people who can take care of you. For now it’s for the best.”
“I do understand that. I just never thought...”
Bond thought for the first time Vazquez appeared to be overtaken by his ordeal. There was a trickle of water from the corner of his eye.
Wilkinson was standing patiently next to the window with his back to the wall, looking at the streets below while he waited. Bond beckoned him through the interconnecting door and they left the troubled soul to search itself while they ran over the escorting duties. The S.B.S. man nodded his assent and gave his normal “No worries, boss” and Bond was satisfied all would be well.
They collected their baggage, which amounted to three large army rucksacks and two smaller cases, and went downstairs. The receptionist informed Bond the taxi had arrived and Wilkinson accompanied Vazquez outside. A porter, dressed in an immaculate white suit, helped with the rucksacks.
Bond checked the bill for both rooms. Another porter collected Bond’s case and issued him with a ticket stub for the left luggage room. Satisfied, Bond proffered his credit card. As he tapped his PIN into the key pad he noticed the half-drunk beer bottle had been abandoned. There was no sign of the scruffy man. That was odd. If the man had left or been asked to leave, the bottle would have been cleared away. The machine winked its acceptance and printed the receipts with a brisk rat-tat-tat. Bond took his card and copy and turned, placing them in his wallet as he did so.
Across the atrium, Bond’s gaze fell on the row of smoked glass telephone booths. The scruffy man now stood bolt upright and alert as he emerged from the middle stall. The man smiled at Bond and his hand reached behind him.
There was a moment of silence during which Bond saw everything in the lobby with clarity. He took in every person, every piece of furniture, the pillars, the doors, the lights and the carpets. He measured distances and times and angles. Colours sharpened. Black became as remote as the night and white shone like the moon. The spotlights in the walls and ceilings were like setting stars on the midsummer morning. Far away the scruffy man’s arm was swinging upwards, a long barrelled revolver curled in his hand.
BOOM! BOOM!
The silence ended. Bond threw himself to the floor. The first salvo of shots splintered the front desk where he had been standing. Glass shattered with an ear splitting tinkling of bells.
Boom – BOOM – boom – BOOM – boom!
The retorts reverberated in the high ceilinged hall and mixed with screams and yells of alarm. Bond’s P250 was already in his hand and he tumbled three times, seeking cover. More bullets slammed through the leather sofa he found himself behind, betraying the direction the gunman was moving. Bond had seen people running around, desperately trying to escape the slugs and the ricochets and the noise. He hoped to god they had all found a safe haven.
Bond rolled aside again, instinctively rising to the crouching position and took aim diagonally across the hall. There was only one figure still standing and he was dressed in a filthy cream suit.
The P250 spat death twice and the gunman dropped to the floor. There was another longer moment of deathly quiet.
Slowly Bond rose from his knees. He noticed the half empty bottle had remained static on the coffee table before him. How bizarre, he thought.
Then, for the first time, Bond heard the roar of gunfire from outside and his heart and stomach sank.
Edited by chrisno1, 08 October 2009 - 08:08 AM.
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