"You brought…?"
"I am right in saying you are with the British authorities, and that you want to put Max Tarn into a high-security prison for a thousand years, aren't I?"
"A thousand and one, actually."
"Make that two thousand," said Flicka.
"Good." Trish accepted a glass of the Dom Perignon from Cathy, who had waved away Bond's offer of help. She took a long sip. "I need this. If I have to talk for a while, I need help at the moment."
"Take your time." Flicka patted her arm.
"You said that you brought Cathy and Anna into the marriage?"
"Look, Mr. Bond. I know I've been an idiot. I had the pick of the field. I could have married anyone. Max could be amusing, and he had other things to offer – like money. I married him for his money, that's plain and simple. I knew he got some of his kicks through hurting women, but before we married, I thought it wasn't all that dangerous. Games. You know the kind of thing. Then, well, he suggested that once we were married, I should have a couple of bodyguards. He said he'd arrange it. I said that I would arrange it. That's where Cathy and Anna come in."
"We offered a service for lots of people in the business," Cathy joined in. "We're trained in the martial arts, and we know how to shoot." She pirouetted and a small automatic pistol appeared from under her jacket. As Bond moved, she gave a small laugh and returned the weapon to its hiding place. "We can be a right pair of dangerous bitches when we want. Also, we got on well with Trish. She came to us with a proposition, and we ran with it."
"Max wouldn't have taken them seriously as women," Trish began.
"Max is still your average male chauvinist." Cathy shook her head, as though male chauvinists were an endangered species.
"It meant disguising them," Trish continued, "and they looked bizarre enough for Max to take them seriously as men. He has some odd tastes in bodyguards."
"You knew he could be violent. Did you also know anything about his business affairs?" Flicka again.
"Not until much later. The girls knew before I did, because Max gave them a couple of jobs to do. They weren't that happy about it, but they did try and shield me from the worst."
"Until it was too late." Anna sat in a good upright posture on one of the easy chairs.
"What is the worst?" Flicka asked. "The scope of his illegal arms dealing, or the contempt he shows by constantly abusing you physically?"
"Oh." She frowned and looked a little bewildered. "Then you don't really know Max at all. I can normally put up with his bouts of sadism, but about five years ago I discovered the end product of his deals and intrigues." She took another sip of her drink. "At first I couldn't understand when he became angry every time I visited Israel – I make a couple of trips here each year." She explained that some ten years before she had undergone treatment for a slight eye problem. "My doctor – Julius Hartman – did the procedure and follow-ups in Harley Street. Then, being a good Jew, he finally decided to leave London and live here, in Israel. So I had my six-monthly checkups with him. Here in Jerusalem. Anna and Cathy always came with me."
"Funny." Bond looked first at Anna and then at Cathy. "I thought I chased you two all over Seville on motorcycles. I thought I had killed the pair of you."
"You did what?" Anna sat up even straighter.
"If you left with Trish, you missed a little unpleasantness. I killed two of his toughs, and a man called Peter Dolmech got murdered."
"Oh, no." Trish Tarn put her hands to her face. "Peter? He was one of the nicest men around Max."
"He was also providing us with information and his luck ran out, I'm afraid."
"You probably did in Pixie and Dixie," Cathy supplied.
"Pixie and…?"
"That's what everyone called them. They had been stunt drivers at one time. Stunts with cars and motorcycles. Very nasty gentlemen. Did a lot of unpleasant jobs for Max. Their real names were never mentioned, and I got the impression they were wanted by the police in about seven different countries." Trish held out her glass for more champagne and took a deep breath. "But to get back to Max, I really laid into him when we got to Seville. I knew a lot more by then, but I was out of my mind with anger and grief. It would've been more prudent to keep quiet, but I told him the truth and this is the result. He was so furious that he did most of it. Connie Spicer broke my nose and jaw. Max, as you must know, suffers from a kind of folie de grandeur. He's done nothing but spread death and destruction for most of his adult life, but he thinks he can, in some way, make amends. When he does, he reckons that everyone's going to forget about the weapons and people – because he also deals in people, mercenaries mostly – and hail him as a hero. As the true hero. I shouldn't have told him on that last day in Seville."
"What was this horrific thing you told him, Trish?"
"You can't guess?" She gave a bitter little laugh. "I told him the truth, knowing that it would explode his mind. The truth. You see, I'm a quarter Jewish, on my mother's side, and me a good Catholic girl. My father was Italian, and my mother English. When I was coming up to my First Communion they told me. It was a big family secret. A quarter Jewish, and that was enough to spark off my dear husband when I threw it in his face."
"He just beat you up and then let you walk away?" Bond still only had an inkling of what she really meant.
"Not quite." Again the bitter laugh. "He lost control. Said he would have to bathe four times a day for the rest of his life, to get the Jewish filth from his body. He shouted at me. Said nobody must ever know; said he loathed himself. Did some damage to my face and ribs. I said I was going, so he put Connie in. I think the idea was to disable me so that I couldn't leave, but Connie hadn't banked on the girls."
"You took Connie out?" Bond's tone was one of admiration.
"We kind of incapacitated him." Cathy did her roguish smile.
"Let's say he won't be satisfying any ladies for a while. Yet, knowing Connie, he's probably able to hobble around by now."
"Trish, I'm sorry." Bond was searching for the right words, not quite certain that he understood the complete subtext of what she had told him. "Are you saying that Max has Fascist tendencies?"
This time her laugh was not bitter, but one of genuine amusement, and it was echoed by chuckles from Anna and Cathy.
"James," she said finally. "No, Max does not have Fascist tendencies. I thought you'd already know. In fact, I really believed that was why you're after him. Max Tarn is not just another Fascist. Max Tarn thinks of himself as the Nazi Messiah. He's the reincarnation of Hitler, Himmler, Goebbels – you name them, he is it. The whole arms-dealing thing has been a means to an end. Stage one in his comeback. Weapons poured into the wrong hands over the past couple of decades have been for one reason: the complete destablization of Europe – if not the world. He danced – really danced – with joy when the Berlin Wall came down. When the news came through he actually said, 'My time is now near. The destruction of the Wall will bring all true Nazis into the open. By the time I am ready, they'll respond to me just as those in the 1930s responded to the Führer.'"
He tried to disguise his horror and fascination. "And he let you walk away when you told him about your Jewish blood?"
There was a pause before Trish said, "It's not quite as easy as that, James. Like the Nazi leaders of old, he has that uncanny knack of being able to double-think. After the first few years of our marriage I realized that he really regarded me as a showpiece. He just may be able to ignore the tiny bit of Jewish blood in my veins. Max has a terribly long reach. He can probably find me and have me hauled back, though I think his hands're pretty full at the moment."
"Like the Nazis who turned a blind eye to Jews they needed in order to function?"
"Exactly. Do you know that Hitler was always aware that the gravediggers within the Nazi kingdom were Jews? They didn't touch them because they were necessary. Certain people are necessary to Max, and I might be one of them." She gave her head a little shake, as though trying to get rid of some nightmare. "Let me give you another instance. He owns – that's the right word, owns – an African-American girl who happens to be a junkie. He talks to her using the most appallingly racist language. That is when he's forced to go anywhere near her. But he tolerates her because she is an assassin who takes a pride in her work. Orders are given to her by either Connie or Goodwin, because, while they're loyal to Max, they do not really have the same scruples about being near her. When he's around, he makes certain she keeps to her own quarters. If she has to be in the entourage, he makes sure she travels in a different car."