The James Bond Anthology

‘You mean you would have married me?’

Bond nodded.

‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘My God.’ She turned and clutched him, pressing her face against his chest.

He held her closely to him. ‘Tell me, my love,’ he said. ‘Tell me what’s hurting you.’

Her sobs became quieter.

‘Leave me for a little,’ she said and a new note had come into her voice. A note of resignation. ‘Let me think for a little.’ She kissed his face and held it between her hands. She looked at him with yearning. ‘Darling, I’m trying to do what’s best for us. Please believe me. But it’s terrible. I’m in a frightful …’ She wept again, clutching him like a child with nightmares.

He soothed her, stroking the long black hair and kissing her softly.

‘Go away now,’ she said. ‘I must have time to think. We’ve got to do something.’

She took his handkerchief and dried her eyes.

She led him to the door and there they held tightly to each other. Then he kissed her again and she shut the door behind him.

That evening most of the gayness and intimacy of their first night came back. She was excited and some of her laughter sounded brittle, but Bond was determined to fall in with her new mood and it was only at the end of dinner that he made a passing remark which made her pause.

She put her hand over his.

‘Don’t talk about it now,’ she said. ‘Forget it now. It’s all past. I’ll tell you about it in the morning.’

She looked at him and suddenly her eyes were full of tears. She found a handkerchief in her bag and dabbed at them.

‘Give me some more champagne,’ she said. She gave a queer little laugh. ‘I want a lot more. You drink much more than me. It’s not fair.’

They sat and drank together until the bottle was finished. Then she got to her feet. She knocked against her chair and giggled.

‘I do believe I’m tight,’ she said, ‘how disgraceful. Please, James, don’t be ashamed of me. I did so want to be gay. And I am gay.’

She stood behind him and ran her fingers through his black hair.

‘Come up quickly,’ she said. ‘I want you badly tonight.’

She blew a kiss at him and was gone.

For two hours they made slow, sweet love in a mood of happy passion which the day before Bond would never have thought they could regain. The barriers of self-consciousness and mistrust seemed to have vanished and the words they spoke to each other were innocent and true again and there was no shadow between them.

‘You must go now,’ said Vesper when Bond had slept for a while in her arms.

As if to take back her words she held him more closely to her, murmuring endearments and pressing her body down the whole length of his.

When he finally rose and bent to smooth back her hair and finally kiss her eyes and her mouth good night, she reached out and turned on the light.

‘Look at me,’ she said, ‘and let me look at you.’

He knelt beside her.

She examined every line on his face as if she was seeing him for the first time. Then she reached up and put an arm round his neck. Her deep blue eyes were swimming with tears as she drew his head slowly towards her and kissed him gently on the lips. Then she let him go and turned off the light.

‘Good night, my dearest love,’ she said.

Bond bent and kissed her. He tasted the tears on her cheek.

He went to the door and looked back.

‘Sleep well, my darling,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry, everything’s all right now.’

He closed the door softly and walked to his room with a full heart.

27 | THE BLEEDING HEART

The patron brought him the letter in the morning.

He burst into Bond’s room holding the envelope in front of him as if it was on fire.

‘There has been a terrible accident. Madame …’

Bond hurled himself out of bed and through the bathroom, but the communicating door was locked. He dashed back and through his room and down the corridor past a shrinking, terrified maid.

Vesper’s door was open. The sunlight through the shutters lit up the room. Only her black hair showed above the sheet and her body under the bedclothes was straight and moulded like a stone effigy on a tomb.

Bond fell on his knees beside her and drew back the sheet.

She was asleep. She must be. Her eyes were closed. There was no change in the dear face. She was just as she would look and yet, and yet she was so still, no movement, no pulse, no breath. That was it. There was no breath.

Later the patron came and touched him on the shoulder. He pointed at the empty glass on the table beside her. There were white dregs in the bottom of it. It stood beside her book and her cigarettes and matches and the small pathetic litter of her mirror and lipstick and handkerchief. And on the floor the empty bottle of sleeping pills, the pills Bond had seen in the bathroom that first evening.

Bond rose to his feet and shook himself. The patron was holding out the letter towards him. He took it.

‘Please notify the Commissaire,’ said Bond. ‘I will be in my room when he wants me.’

He walked blindly away without a backward glance.