Bond 02 - Live and Let Die Read Online Free PDF Page B

a small one … only some glasses … okay, thanks … of course not …’bye.’
    He skirted the debris, walked through the small lobby to the door leading into the passage, opened it, hung the DON’T DISTURB sign outside, locked it, and went through into his bedroom.
    By the time he had finished dressing there was a knock on the door.
    ‘Who is it?’ he called.
    ‘Okay. Dexter.’
    Dexter hustled in, followed by a sallow young man with a black box under his arm.
    ‘Trippe, from Sabotage,’ announced Dexter.
    They shook hands and the young man at once went on his knees beside the charred remnants of the parcel.
    He opened his box and took out some rubber gloves and a handful of dentist’s forceps. With his tools he painstakingly extracted small bits of metal and glass from the charred parcel and laid them out on a broad sheet of blotting paper from the writing desk.
    While he worked, he asked Bond what had happened.
    ‘About a half-minute alarm? I see. Hullo, what’s this?’ He delicately extracted a small aluminium container such as is used for exposed film. He put it aside.
    After a few minutes he sat up on his haunches.
    ‘Half-minute acid capsule,’ he announced. ‘Broken by the first hammer-stroke of the alarm. Acid eats through thin copper wire. Thirty seconds later wire breaks, releases plunger on to cap of this.’ He held up the base of a cartridge. ‘4-bore elephant gun. Black powder. Blank. No shot. Lucky it wasn’t a grenade. Plenty of room in the parcel. You’d have been damaged. Now let’s have a look at this.’ He picked up the aluminium cylinder, unscrewed it, extracted a small roll of paper, and unravelled it with his forceps.
    He carefully flattened it out on the carpet, holding its corners down with four tools from his black box. It contained three typewritten sentences. Bond and Dexter bent forward.
    ‘ THE HEART OF THIS CLOCK HAS STOPPED TICKING ,’ they read. ‘ THE BEATS OF YOUR OWN HEART ARE NUMBERED. I KNOW THAT NUMBER AND I HAVE STARTED TO COUNT .’
    The message was signed ‘1234567 …?’
    They stood up.
    ‘Hm,’ said Bond. ‘Bogeyman stuff.’
    ‘But how the hell did he know you were here?’ asked Dexter.
    Bond told him of the black sedan on 55th Street.
    ‘But the point is,’ said Bond, ‘how did he know what I was here for ? Shows he’s got Washington pretty well sewn up. Must be a leak the size of the Grand Canyon somewhere.’
    ‘Why should it be Washington?’ asked Dexter testily. ‘Anyway,’ he controlled himself with a forced laugh, ‘Hell and damnation. Have to make a report to Headquarters on this. So long, Mr Bond. Glad you came to no harm.’
    ‘Thanks,’ said Bond. ‘It was just a visiting card. I must return the compliment.’

4 ....... THE BIG SWITCHBOARD
     
    W HEN D EXTER and his colleague had gone, taking the remains of the bomb with them, Bond took a damp towel and rubbed the smoke-mark off the wall. Then he rang for the waiter and, without explanation, told him to put the broken glass on his check and clear away the breakfast things. Then he took his hat and coat and went out on the street.
    He spent the morning on Fifth Avenue and on Broadway, wandering aimlessly, gazing into the shop windows and watching the passing crowds. He gradually assimilated the casual gait and manners of a visitor from out of town, and when he tested himself out in a few shops and asked the way of several people he found that nobody looked at him twice.
    He had a typical American meal at an eating house called ‘Gloryfried Ham-N-Eggs’ (‘The Eggs We Serve Tomorrow Are Still in the Hens’) on Lexington Avenue and then took a cab downtown to police headquarters, where he was due to meet Leiter and Dexter at 2.30.
    A Lieutenant Binswanger of Homicide, a suspicious and crusty officer in his late forties, announced that Commissioner Monahan had said that they were to have complete co-operation from the Police Department. What could he do for them? They