Read Bond 02 - Live and Let Die for Free Online Page A

to look after the Harlem end, and you two are to go down to St Petersburg tomorrow. Leiter’s to find out what he can there and then move right on to Jamaica with you, Mr Bond. That is,’ he added, ‘if you’d care to have him along. It’s your territory.’
    ‘Of course,’ said Bond. ‘I was going to ask if he could come anyway.’
    ‘Fine,’ said Dexter. ‘Then I’ll tell Washington everything’s fixed. Anything else I can do for you? All communications with F.B.I., Washington, of course. Leiter’s got the names of our men in Florida, knows the Signals routine and so forth.’
    ‘If Leiter’s interested and if you don’t mind,’ said Bond, ‘I’d like very much to get up to Harlem this evening and have a look round. Might help to have some idea of what it looks like in Mr Big’s back yard.’
    Dexter reflected.
    ‘Okay,’ he said finally. ‘Probably no harm. But don’t show yourselves too much. And don’t get hurt,’ he added. ‘There’s no one to help you up there. And don’t go stirring up a lot of trouble for us. This case isn’t ripe yet. Until it is, our policy with Mr Big is “live and let live”.’
    Bond looked quizzically at Captain Dexter.
    ‘In my job,’ he said, ‘when I come up against a man like this one, I have another motto. It’s “live and let die”.’
    Dexter shrugged his shoulders. ‘Maybe,’ he said, ‘but you’re under my orders here, Mr Bond, and I’d be glad if you’d accept them.’
    ‘Of course,’ said Bond, ‘and thanks for all your help. Hope you have luck with your end of the job.’
    Dexter flagged a cab. They shook hands.
    ‘’Bye, fellers,’ said Dexter briefly. ‘Stay alive.’ His cab pulled out into the uptown traffic.
    Bond and Leiter smiled at each other.
    ‘Able guy, I should say,’ said Bond.
    ‘They’re all that in his show,’ said Leiter. ‘Bit inclined to be stuffed shirts. Very touchy about their rights. Always bickering with us or with the police. But I guess you have much the same problem in England.’
    ‘Oh of course,’ said Bond. ‘We’re always rubbing M.I.5 up the wrong way. And they’re always stepping on the corns of the Special Branch. Scotland Yard,’ he explained. ‘Well, how about going up to Harlem tonight?’
    ‘Suits me,’ said Leiter. ‘I’ll drop you at the St Regis and pick you up again about six-thirty. Meet you in the King Cole Bar, on the ground floor. Guess you want to take a look at Mr Big,’ he grinned. ‘Well, so do I, but it wouldn’t have done to tell Dexter so.’ He flagged a Yellow Cab.
    ‘St Regis Hotel. Fifth at 55th.’
    They climbed into the overheated tin box reeking of last week’s cigar-smoke.
    Leiter wound down a window.
    ‘Whaddya want ter do?’ asked the driver over his shoulder. ‘Gimme pneumony?’
    ‘Just that,’ said Leiter, ‘if it means saving us from this gas chamber.’
    ‘Wise guy, hn?’ said the driver, crashing tinnily through his gears. He took the chewed end of a cigar from behind his ear and held it up. ‘Two bits for three,’ he said in a hurt voice.
    ‘Twenty-four cents too much,’ said Leiter. The rest of the drive was passed in silence.
    They parted at the hotel and Bond went up to his room. It was four o’clock. He asked the telephone operator to call him at six. For a while he looked out of the window of his bedroom. To his left, the sun was setting in a blaze of colour. In the skyscrapers the lights were coming on, turning the whole town into a golden honeycomb. Far below the streets were rivers of neon lighting, crimson, blue, green. The wind sighed sadly outside in the velvet dusk, lending his room still more warmth and security and luxury. He drew the curtains and turned on the soft lights over his bed. Then he took off his clothes and climbed between the fine percale sheets. He thought of the bitter weather in the London streets, the grudging warmth of the hissing gas-fire in his office at Headquarters, the chalked-up menu on the