Solo

down Petersham Road, along the river’s edge, found the narrow lane, turned the corner and parked. It was just before six o’clock and he rather liked the idea of being the first to arrive at her little party. A few minutes alone would negate or confirm any lingering doubts he had about her.
    Bryce Fitzjohn’s home turned out to be a pretty Georgian ‘cottage’ with a walled garden, the grand houses of Richmond Hill rising behind and beyond. Bond surveyed the driveway and the house’s facade from across the lane. Worn, patinated red stock-brick, a slate roof, a moulded half-shell pediment over the front door, three big sash windows on the ground floor and three above – a restrained and elegant design. They weren’t cheap, these refined houses on the river – so she wasn’t short of money. However bitter her divorce had been, perhaps it had proved lucrative, Bond wondered as he crossed the road, noting that there were no cars parked outside. He was the first to arrive – excellent. He rang the doorbell.
    There was no response. Bond listened, then rang again. And again. Now new intimations of alarm began to cluster. What kind of invitation was this? Bond was unarmed and felt suddenly vulnerable, wondering if he was being watched from some vantage point. He looked around him and stepped back out on to the road. A mother pushing her pram. A boy walking his dog. Nothing out of the ordinary. He returned to the house and slipped through the ornate iron gate at the side that led to the walled garden. Bond saw well-tended herbaceous borders edging a neatly mown lawn with a large stone birdbath set on a carved plinth in the centre. At the bottom of the garden, under a gnarled and ancient fig tree, was a wrought-iron bench and table. All very ordered and civilised. Bond followed paving stones set in the turf round to a conservatory at the rear. Beside it was a door that led into the kitchen.
    Bond peered through the window. Here, laid out on a scrubbed pine kitchen table were trays of canapés, ranked glasses of various sorts and bowls of nuts, cheese balls and olives. So, there
was
going to be a party . . . But where was the hostess? Bond thought about returning home to Chelsea, but his curiosity was piqued and he felt it was his professional duty to find out if there was anything more clandestine going on here. He just had to gain access to this house. Needs must, he thought to himself, and reached down and removed one of his loafers. He twisted off the heel, revealing the two-inch, dirk-like stabbing blade that projected from it, sheathed by the specially constructed sole. He slipped the blade into the gap by the Yale lock, probed, eased and then turned it, feeling the tongue of the lock spring back and the door yield. He pushed it open. It was all too easy, this breaking and entering.
    Bond replaced the heel and slipped his shoe back on. He allowed himself a couple of seconds’ reflection – he could close the door and return home, no one would be the wiser – but he felt that having achieved ingress, as it were, it would be wrong not to explore further. Who knew what he might discover? So he stepped in and wandered around the kitchen, listening intently, and, hearing no sound of anyone stirring, he helped himself to a chicken vol-au-vent and then a triangle of smoked salmon. Delicious. There was a drinks trolley with an impressive display of alcohol set upon it. Bond contemplated the array of bottles (some serious drinkers were expected, clearly) and was tempted to have a dram of the Scotch on offer as it was Dimple Haig, one of his favourites – but decided this wasn’t the moment. Then he decided it was, so he poured three fingers into a tumbler and left the kitchen to investigate the house.
    The rooms were high-ceilinged and generously sized on the ground floor: there was a dining room and a drawing room with fine cornicing and French windows that gave on to the lawn. To the other side of the entrance hall was a cloakroom-bathroom and a small study. He spent some time in the study, one wall of which was lined with bookshelves – mainly biographies and non-fiction, he saw, with a distinct showbiz slant. He opened the bottom drawer of the small partners’ desk that sat in a corner (always start with the bottom drawer) and was surprised to find a cache of large glossy professional photographs of Bryce Fitzjohn nearly and provocatively naked. In some she was wearing a tiny leather bikini; in others she