The Ian Fleming Files (50 page)

Fleming smiled. “I punched it out of a Nazi’s mouth,” he thought of
telling her but instead said: “Tiffany’s.” He reached behind him for something.
“Here Ann, take a look at this.”

It was a glossy brochure. She opened it and turned the colorful pages
showcasing tropical scenes.

“What is this, Ian?”

“Paradise,” he said, taking the book. “Oracabessa, Jamaica. The land is
dirt cheap. I can get a winter place there for the same price as a motorcar.
I’d write in the mornings, snorkel in the afternoons.”

Ann looked puzzled. “Write? Write what?”

“In eight weeks I can have a first draft. That’s four hours a day,
producing two thousand words a day.”

“First draft of what?”

“I think I might follow in my brother’s footsteps. Noel Coward got me
thinking. He has a place there too by the way.”

“You’re going to write a novel?”

“Not a novel. A book. Nothing literary. An entertainment. I have an idea
but, uh, it’s rather autobiographical. Probably too much.”

“Am I in it?”

“Sort of. You might be edited out.”

“Edited out!”

“We’ll see. I already have the story down.”

“What’s it about?”

Fleming paused. “This regular guy who just happens to be a spy. An
assassin, really. He exists in this shadowy netherworld. Still fighting the war
after the war’s over. He goes from one woman to the next, from mission to
mission. He never ages, never tires, never has to worry about the mortgage or
bills or kids or any stuff like that. It’s the life every man wishes he could
live, exploring the world as he saves it, conquering its beauties, impressing
everyone with his intellect, always ready with the right line at the right
moment. Funny. Suave. Irresistible to women.”

“The perfect male fantasy,” Ann said.

Fleming was struck by her words. “Yes, exactly. Fantasy… The spy story to
end all spy stories. Do you think it will sell?”

Ann pondered. “Depends. You’ll need a good name for your hero. Something
catchy. Have you thought of one yet?”

“As a matter of fact I have.” He paused.

“Are you going to tell me?”

He turned to face her, sensing the moment was historic.

“The name’s Bond, James Bond.”

THE END

DEAR READER,

I hope you enjoyed this installment of
The Ian Fleming Files
.
Reviews are very important to authors. If you get a spare moment, kindly leave
a short review of
Operation Parsifal
on Amazon.

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Thank you!

Damian Stevenson

CHAPTER ONE                MONDAY
              AUGUST 29, 1941

TWO COLD-EYED GURKHAS mentally recorded the
arrival of Ian Lancaster Fleming of the RNVR (Special Branch) at 19:00 hours on
August 29th 1941 but there was no visible acknowledgment of this on their faces
nor in their body language as the thirty-three year old secret agent hurried up
the stairs to the Ripley Building, nodded at them out of habit - even though he
might as well have nodded at two statues - and walked quickly through the glass
doors of Admiralty House.

The desk sergeant stared soberly at Fleming's
credentials before thumbing a concealed button triggering the lock on the final
barrier into headquarters. Fleming pocketed his ID and proceeded on, eschewing
the iron-latticed lift and opting instead for the dimly lit stairwell. He
briskly scaled stairs two at a time pausing on the second floor to hail a row
of secretaries toiling away in the vast archives of intelligence assisting
code-breakers and researchers into the night.

"Any of you ladies crack Enigma
yet?" he cried out impishly. 

There was no response, none of the usual
cooing comebacks with inviting smiles and batting eyelids - the reason he took
the stairs in the first place. The atmosphere was tense. Fleming shrugged,
continued on his way. 

He emerged from the stairwell looking vexed
and with the gnawing sensation that he was out of the loop. Needled by not
knowing, he thoughtfully crossed the empty carpeted hallway to a closed black
door bearing a small brass plaque etched with the legend "Room 39"
and entered without knocking. In a small vestibule area he stood anxiously
before a padded baize door and waited for the red light above it to turn green.
He removed his hat, a black-ribboned snap-brim gunmetal grey fedora, and hung
it on the vacant rung of a beautifully lacquered walnut hat-rack. Something
caught the corner of his eye.

On a small glass table beside a disorderly
pile of curling
Readers Digests
and a rather sad-looking pot of plastic
petunias lay a crisp black-bordered copy of
The London Times
with a
two-inch banner headline spread over seven columns that blared "British
Destroyer Torpedoed, 125 Lives Lost." Fleming picked it up and read.

On the other side of the baize, Admiral John
Godfrey sat behind his desk transfixed by
The New York Times
. He hurled
the Grey Lady onto his red-leather desk in dismay and reached for his unlit
pipe, cursing in his mind the tobacco rationing which limited him to two bowls
a day. To hell with it. Today he was packing a third. He rasped a red-tipped
Swan safety match across the strike pad beneath a jutting edge of his desk-top
and puffed vigorously to get the honey-colored leaf lit. He sat back and took
several long introspective draws.

Fleming was reading the black-bordered
article about the wrecked British destroyer when the light above the door
flicked green and the lock coughed open automatically, shaking him from his
communion with the news. He returned the paper to the table, squared his
shoulders and stepped into the room where he had so often received his fate.

He was immediately struck by how dark the
chief's office was. The only light came from a dying fire and a single corner
reading lamp with a low watt bulb. He could just make out Godfrey in the
shadows behind his desk ringed in whorls of blue smoke, puffing vigorously, a
Satanic figure half-hidden by wreathes of fragrant mist-like plumes.

Fleming stood vaguely to attention, trying to
seem indifferent to the silent treatment, an uncomfortable void made more acute
by the monotonous dull ticking of the old ship's clock on Godfrey's
mantelpiece, an empty thudding pulse which always made Fleming think of death. 

"Pompous East Coast wanker,"
bellowed Godfrey, shattering the silence.

Fleming twitched. "Sir?"

Godfrey hurled the
New York Times
into
the fire causing it to momentarily flare. "Joe Kennedy, our former
ambassador, the eloquent sod. It's easy to make a speech. Of course Roosevelt
bought it. Well, they'll be in the war soon enough whether they like it or
not." He  picked up the poker and began aggressively stoking the fire,
unclogging charred newspaper folds and opening air channels, causing huge
crackling flames to lick out.

Fleming ran a finger under his collar. He
felt thirsty. In his overheated mind, Godfrey was growing more demonic by the
minute and he still had no idea why he had been summoned. He took a deep
breath. Migraine pangs stabbed his skull. He was grateful for the darkness.

"We need our American cousins now,
sir."

"Now? More like six months ago."
Godfrey hurled the poker into the corner of the stone fireplace with a
resounding clang and moseyed back to his desk, picked up his pipe and
recklessly stuffed it with leaf.

"I have something the Yanks might
like," Fleming said cheerily, hoping to lighten the chief's lugubrious
mood.

Godfrey opened a drawer and extracted a bulky
file. "Are you by chance referring to the contents of this door-stopper?
Kindly tattoo "Brevity is the soul of wit" on the back of your hand.
The NID pays you to translate and give propaganda broadcasts." He dropped
the memo on his desk with an audible thud. "Not draft manuscripts. This
isn't a publishing house! I thought your brother Peter was the novelist in the
family."

"He is, sir, and quite successful
sir."

"Then I suggest you let him do the
writing. Your skills, limited as they may be, lie elsewhere.
I read ten pages of your tome. Fighting behind lines in
enemy uniforms? Sabotage? Safe-cracking? It's all so..."

"Unconventional?"
suggested Fleming.

"Moronic," declared
Godfrey.

"But the idea is too good, sir."

"Is it now?" Godfrey struck a match
and brought it to his face, as if timing the pipe's lighting to show his look
of absolute skepticism.

"A highly trained excursionary team,
sir."

"Speak, English."

"A unit dedicated to obtaining
intelligence. Not combat troops but information warriors. A team of proven
specialists whom we'd instruct how to break and enter guarded buildings without
detection, pick locks, crack combination safes, recognize valuable
documentation, so forth. We train soldiers to steal war secrets like London
thieves."

"This is the Naval Intelligence
Department, Fleming, not an East End pub."

"But why wait until a battle is mounted,
over -- and, if we are lucky, won -- to obtain intelligence when we can target
it independent of any military action?"

Godfrey took a long slow pull on his pipe.
"This sounds like another of your romantic Red Indian daydreams."

"No one's doing it. Just a kraut, Otto
Skorzeny, who as you know took our H.Q. in Crete without any fighting because
he had actionable intelligence."

"He also had control of the island
thanks to the wops and the Luftwaffe." Godfrey allowed a trace of
compassion to enter his voice. "This is interesting but time is of the
essence. Don't waste time on it with another four hundred page screed. There
are more pressing matters at hand. Our American cousins arrive in six days. You
were summoned here tonight for a very important, uh, assignment."

Fleming straightened his spine, felt a surge
of patriotism. "Ready and able, sir!" 

Godfrey sent a thin stream of purple smoke
his way. "Do you still have that bit of fluff in the CIE?"

Fleming was flummoxed. "Sir?"

"Airport Customs."

"I'm familiar with the acronym, sir. It
was the bit of fluff reference."

"Don't be coy with me, sailor. Muriel
Wright. I hope you were a gentleman. A diplomatic pouch from the USO addressed
to Allan Morrison should be arriving in her mail bag sometime around tomorrow
afternoon. I want you to intercept that package. Paddy will get you the
details."

"What am I stealing?"

"Are you deaf? A package from the
USO."

"I meant what's inside, sir."

Godfrey paused. "You tell me."

Fleming's mind ticked. "American troop
dispositions?"

Godfrey looked pleased. He swiveled his chair
and tapped his smoldering pipe at a chart of the Pacific. "We know the Yanks
are all over the South Pacific but where are they vulnerable? I want Section 17
to get a gander at the USO maps and pinpoint U.S. weaknesses."

"Bit of the old carrot and stick,
sir?"

"Carrot and stick? More like a red hot
poker up the backside." He thwacked the map with his open palm. "This
is a treasure map with no 'X' Commander. 'X' equals U.S. vulnerability. Find me
an 'X.' American participation in the war must be secured."

Fleming mulled it. "Do you mean Miss
Wright the dispatch driver?"

Godfrey's eyes flashed. He stood up and got
in Fleming's face. "Listen here Lothario, this skirt detail isn't any kind
of 'mission,' got it? Think of it as a favor. For me. I want to scare those
lily-livered Yanks into the war and into sharing secrets directly with us, not
M.I.-5. Savvy?"

"I thought we were flying to America to
meet with Hoover? Why are the Yanks coming here?"

"You misplaced two million pounds worth
of gold bullion last year, remember? That bastard Bock probably bought himself
a new Mercedes. And a plane. Two million! I've got the Treasury Department
breathing down my neck over office supplies. We can't afford a bus ride to
Stepney let along a boondoggle to the United States."

"Regarding the trained commando
idea..."

Godfrey cut him off. "Shelve it."

Fleming was bold. "We won't break Enigma
until we capture one of those wretched Nazi contraptions. You know it and I
know it. With a dedicated intelligence unit it might just be possible."

Godfrey looked directly at him as if weighing
a decision. "Report to Major Hargreaves in Section 2."

Fleming looked at him in disbelief. "Why
do I have to visit the psych-ward?"

"Because you need your head examined!
Capturing an Enigma machine with a bunch of souped-up tea-leaves? Get out of
here!"

Fleming turned and marched stiffly out the
room.

As he shut the baize door behind him
Godfrey's efficient and comely secretary Miss Paddy Blythe was getting herself
situated at the small desk in the vestibule. She looked bright and radiant,
full of the waning joys of summer, happy as always to see her favorite agent.