Bond and Xiomara arrive in Buenos Aires

Fifteen and a half hours later we circle the river Plata to catch morning light and place the plane’s moving miniature shadow over the old docks of Buenos Aires’ Puerto Madero.

Xiomara looks dazed after broken sleep, interrupted when the Boeing 777 engines struggled for updrafts in turbulent electrical storms over the Atlantic, and not eased by Club Class travel, the best that Savident would authorise despite Q’s protestations that his daughter deserved better.

Below, Buenos Aires looks peaceful, a city ready to start another day. Tiny cars move slowly along the Gral Pablo Riccheri. The runways of Ezeiza airport come into view and the undercarriage clanks as it is lowered for landing.

Q has, however, managed to fix his daughter’s luggage by hacking into the British Airways web and authorising strict priority. Stateside, a pink suitcase bearing a diplomatic seal is guarded by a young Porteno. Xiomara retrieves her smartphone from her rucksack and pings a matching code to a device held out by the youth. Now identified, he leads us both through passport control, following in the steps of flight staff pulling their little wheeled cases.

Arriving at Ezeiza, there is one special moment that must be explained. It comes as the electric doors open from the calm of flight-side into the chaos of the arrivals hall. Signs are raised, voices call out, families greet and hug, children dart, drivers stand around with gourds of Mate that they sip from steel bomillas. The slow sepia film from the far side now becomes a technicolour slide-show of flashing images. You have arrived in Argentina!

But, dear reader, I cannot leave you standing in the heat of the arrivals hall despite its fascination. Xiomara mutters something about a remise, but I push her to the front of the Manuel Tienda Leon queue. ‘She wants two tickets for Retiro… cash in pesos’, I growl.

New agents always make the mistake of believing they are invisible. In reality, their every travel move has been tracked - their flight booking, the credit card payment, the plane manifest - then the remise car that has been strategically arranged by the host government.

We are now walking along the covered walkway to the Leon coach stand. A clerk checks us off on his wind-torn departure sheet and issues a raffle ticket as receipt for the pink case that he stows beneath the bus.

Leaving Ezeiza airport for the city is always a crush, but the aggressive coach drivers prevail over the cabs. We move out onto the east-bound dual carriageway, past farm houses, villas and shanty towns, along the elevated section of Au 25 Mayo, down into Constitucion, through Av Paseo Colon to the coach station at Madero. This is the point at which we may shed our identity.

The guard allows only coaches and selected private hire taxis to enter the Tienda Leon compound. It is here that we make the switch. I decline the little grey car that would take me and a Dutch tourist a seven minute drive to the micro centre, whilst Xiomara, dragging her pink case, climbs into a people carrier with four Japanese travellers to head for her apartment in Palermo Soho. Both vehicles exit the compound, Xiomara trying to speak Japanese, and the lone Dutch tourist wearing his new folding panama hat.

Checking around me, I set of at brisk pace to Lavalle, cutting across Plaza Roma, and along Tucuman and into the pedestrianised Av Florida. But instead of turning north towards Haedo, I turn south to Florida 537, a yawning down-at-heel shopping complex, replete with broken escalators and boarded frontages. My destination is locale 299 which bears a torn sign reading ‘Argenper’ and another reading ‘Propiedad para Alquilar’. Reaching above the door I feel for the padlock key. The chain drops with a clang. Eerily, I hear behind me the faint sound of a harmonica echoing through the empty mall, and as I close the door a tiny wheelchair descends the ramp.

In the next episode, Bond heads on to Palacio Haedo, his new home in Buenos Aires. 

The lull before the storm

 Alone on my return journey I take the direct route via William IV and Orange Street to Jermyn Street, entering Ormond Yard by the Duke of York. Before leaving the Savoy I had opened Hammond’s envelope to discover a British Airways ticket for a 10pm flight the following evening. I realise that this will be my last springtime stroll before arriving to a southern hemisphere autumn.

The leather travel bag rests in accumulated dust on top of the wardrobe. Its cabin size is perfect and will hold everything I need to take. I fold spare underwear and socks between two shirts and reach for my toilet bag containing a Geo F Trumper razor, cologne and toothbrush. Then I spy the trusted, 1996 Minolta TC-1 that somehow I had never had the heart to return to Q’s predecessor. ‘Analogue film, untraceable and small enough to slip into a jacket pocket’, I mutter to myself as I consider whether to pack the folding Panama.

I spend a moment to glance around my small apartment. Low ceilings and small windows add to its dingy, dated and worn appearance. Perhaps I should have hired a cleaner, or had a wife? The black Bakelite phone with a dial and silent bell is like everything else here, just on the brink of redundancy. I run a finger along the spines of a single shelf of books, each copy saved to denote a year, or mark a stage of life. In the morning when I depart, the less comfortable suit, two remaining shirts, a pair of handmade shoes and half-empty bottle of Talisker single malt will remain as sole witness to my having lived here.

After a fitful night’s sleep I rise early to breakfast on Mr Barrick’s game pie at the Red Lion at the end the Yard, then for Argentine pesos to the bank in Jermyn Street and finally, the newsagents to stop the papers.

‘When will you be back, Mr Bond?’ asks the owner. ‘I really don’t know’, I reply, ‘It all depends on Scottish Referendum Fellowship funds’, I add inscrutably as I turn to leave.

Mireille arrives by limousine at 6 pm prompt, far too early for a Heathrow journey that should take but an hour.

‘Your cologne suggests to me that you are going on a date’, she observes playfully.

‘What, Mireille, are you coming too?’ I retort. But I see in her response that this time she will not escape London for Buenos Aires.

Out through Hammersmith on the Great West Road, and beyond Chiswick we pick up the M4 leading to the dreaded London Orbital and the airport. We sit in silence, with just the occasional exchange, Mireille knowing not to ask or to fuss. Her driver’s pass allows us to escape the airport charges, slipping through on a priority route to arrive directly outside the terminal. Grabbing my bag I flip my flight jacket against the cold rush of early evening air and proceed through the electric doors to terminal five.

In the next episode, Bond arrives in Buenos Aires after a sixteen hour flight. Who or what will await him there?

'Have we a deal, Bond?'

Richard Hammond quickly slips his nail file into his pocket. Paul Savident closes his iPad. Norm wanders across to the table. Q and Xiomara appear to be in a lively mood, sitting side-by-side at one end.

‘This is just as I imagined it’, she says to her father, ‘all cloaks and daggers’.

M looks remarkably relaxed, and for once, not at all irritated by the banter.

‘Right, straight to business. Bond, we want you to return to Buenos Aires with Xiomara. Cameron has asked for her to be your number 2 in place of Moneypenny. She speaks Spanish like a Porteno, can count - so she will manage the expenses - and she can handle a 9mm Glock.’

I sit transfixed. Is it now my task to nursemaid this child? Am I to train her up simply to take over my job?

‘I know what you are thinking, Bond’, M continues, ‘yes she is young and relatively inexperienced, but we need someone - how can I put this - a little more ‘dope’, if you get my meaning?’

I look down at my cuff links and drop my glance further to my black leather Jermyn Street Loakes. Perhaps I am near, or even beyond my sell-by date?

‘If it is any consolation, James, you will have the Haedo apartment whilst you are there. Oh, and by the way, Raul hasn’t been rumbled so he will meet you at Ezeiza in your beloved Bentley S2 Continental.

Dear reader, it is best at this stage that I tell you a little about Buenos Aires, just in case you feel left behind.

Palacio Haedo was built in 1860, and restored in 1923 , making it one of the oldest buildings in Buenos Aires. It retained all of its original features as befitting a national historic monument - including its ancient plumbing and heating. For my previous visits to Buenos Aires, this had been the grace-and-favour apartment provided by His Majesty’s government. Raul was its gardening caretaker, supported by Cleo his black cat.

When workmen moved in to restore the building in 2022 it was expected the Malvinas-obsessed government of Alberto Fernandez & Cristina Kirchner would repossess the whole building for the Administration of National Parks; however Lord Cameron managed to persuade their chain-saw wielding successor, Javier Milei, to discretely forget the British presence on the top floor - and it seems, miss the Bentley Continental bearing British plates hidden under a dustsheet in an underground garage.

‘Have we a deal, Bond?’ continued M, almost without stopping either for breath or indeed for an answer.

‘Then what are the rest of you here for?’, I ask.

‘Norm will travel with you to Buenos Aires, but we have other work for him, so he won’t be under your feet. And of course, Paul and Richard will be your handlers.’

The prospect of returning to Argentina’s capital to enjoy asado at the Olivos Military Club, and drink coffee at Palermo’s street cafes, was at the forefront of my mind as M turned to leave. So too was the draw of nights-into-mornings dancing Argentine tango to Golden Age orchestras in the milongas of Buenos Aires.

‘Here’s your tickets, James’, says Richard with a flick of his grey-blond curls, as he drops a manila envelope on the table. ‘We thought you would want them ‘old school’ darling, rather than digital.’

Q hobbles off after M, leaving me alone with Xiomara.

‘It will be like old times, but different, Mr Bond’, she says to break the silence. ‘And it may be your last chance to dance tango?’ she adds as she pushes her smart phone into her little rucksack and gets up to leave.

In the next episode Bond is given a few tips by Q and prepares to depart the UK for Argentina.

Bond is called in by M for a new assignment

At Ormond Yard there is a lift of sorts but being so incredibly slow nobody seems to use it, preferring instead the back stairs. That’s probably also because the building comprises only four floors, and the tiny top apartment has always been mine.

Winding up the cream blinds admits morning sunshine glancing across the roofs of Westminster, still damp after overnight rain. Today I have no need of either umbrella or raincoat as M insists that agents are collected by official car, a device to ensure that we are never late for appointments. I have brushed off my best Savile Row suit, bought as a pair two decades earlier, and found an appropriate silk tie to lift the pin stripe.

A double blast from a car horn tells me, not only that the car has arrived, but that the driver must be my old ministry colleague. You will recall Mireille from our earlier exploits in Buenos Aires, her Quebecois French undiminished despite years living in London working for the ministry. ‘Bonjour, James, ca vas?’

As my few readers will know, I am neither the most cheerful person in the morning, nor the most loquacious, but Mireille’s infectious smile lifts my mood.

‘You know, Mireille, I could have walked from the flat to the MOD in twenty minutes, and I expect you are going to trundle me round St James’s, Pall Mall and Cockspur Street to get there.’

None of the ‘trundling’ if you don’t mind, James, I’ll have you know that we have a new Vauhall flotte.’...‘And you’ve got the right route, but the wrong destination’, she adds with a half-smile.

M’s office is on the eighth floor of the Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall; but true to type, it seems that she has arranged our meeting instead at the Savoy Hotel in the Strand. Mireille will drive to the Strand entrance. M, however, will no doubt walk by the back streets to Savoy Place where she will slip in through the staff door, just as she did at Bar Notable Los Laureles in Buenos Aires.

Vollam, Savoy’s head doorman, instructs me to go straight to the Sorcerer room on the first floor, hidden away in the hotel’s beating heart. It is themed in scarlet and black, dominated by a large circular table surmounted with an elaborate chandelier. Everything about the room speaks of M, her tastes, her authority, her transition, and her sense of danger.

As I enter M is standing by the window looking down into Savoy Court. ‘Did you know Bond that this is the only road in London where we must drive on the right?’

At the table sit Paul Savident and Richard Hammond, the former checking figures on a spreadsheet, whilst the latter files a broken nail. With his back to the fireplace stands Norm, international photographer, the government’s principal agent in Northern Ireland. Behind me I hear voices, raised, but not in argument. They are the type of voices that you may hear frequently in grand hotels, raucous with a slight upper-crust polish. As they approach, their identities become clear:…Q… and his daughter, Xiomara.

‘Well, its like the old days…almost’, I say, immediately regretting my comment. Could Xiomara’s presence ever make up for the missing Moneypenny? My mind flashes back to the ‘Monumento Al Plus Ultra' at which Moneypenny met her death from a single-action semi-automatic M1911 pistol. I cough to clear my throat, ‘Good morning, M; good morning everyone - how nice to be back!’

In the next episode, Bond gets his instructions for his next assignment. What will that be? And will this be initiation for Xiomara?

Post Revival

One of the many delights of story telling through a blog is that our tiny handful of readers must wait for the next episode. A downside for new readers is that the story is back-to-front. Of course there is that little link on the left that will give you the composite story in chronological order, so all is not lost. I would urge those coming to the Bond and Moneypenny for the first time to consider starting from the beginning if they would like to know how the story, and the characters developed.

For the moment, my friend, co-writer of Moneypenny, is engaged in a busy professional and social life and has little time to write her part. Having the urge to become a famous writer, this will undoubtedly change. But for the time being, it is just me, Bond....and perhaps due to Q's insistence, his energetically ambitious daughter Xiomara?

Moneypenny died by gunshot wound on 17 November 2019, and Bond returned to London. As this is a revival of that story, I have included here our first episode again, so that readers may settle back into the tale.

Bond is present at a Whitehall lockdown party when he is introduced to Q's daughter, Xiomara. You will already have gathered that she has many of the attributes that were displayed by Moneypenny in our last story, but with very different flaws. She is young, energetic, beautiful - but gone is Moneypenny's naivety, to be replaced with a measure of headstrong recklessness. The writer expects that this will make Xiomara more accessible to our younger readers. 

Before we continue with the story, let me congratulate you, my dear reader, for persisting with our blog. You are one of a small band of dedicated, discerning readers, for which I (and Andreea) thank you.

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'Bond, Bond old boy, over here if you please, quick as you can.'

Without effort Q could be the most irritating, intrusive and demanding colleague. His mind worked so fast that, save for M, few could keep up with him.

'What appears to be the matter Q', I asked, listening nervously for the sound of a smoke alarm, or sight of Boris's former Chief of Staff.

'I want you to meet someone, James. This is Xiomara. Isn't she beautiful Bond? Well so she should be - she is my daughter, and she has decided to keep the family tradition going by joining the department'.

Standing to his left, Xiomara luckily bore few genetic traces from her father. She was slim, with a neat blonde bob and sparkling eyes that reminded me a little of Moneypenny. 'Pleased to meet you, Mr Bond', she said in a vaguely French accent, and with that she held out a delicate hand in greeting.

'I don't believe it, Q, where has she been all of this time?', I asked, convinced that this was one of his usual jokes and that she was just another of the latest MI6 recruits.

However, rather than holding back in Q's presence, Xiomara was totally forthcoming. 'I was caring for my mother in Canada but daddy said I should come over and get a proper job. And here I am'. 'Now get me a Martini if you would Mr Bond. Daddy says that I have a lot to learn, and I should start now before you disappear from the field.

Whilst, of course, flattered that Xiomara considered my experience as an agent had any current relevance, I was not too sure how to take her comment about 'disappearing from the field'. Did she know something that I didn't? Was M about to call me back to her office on the 8th floor to present me with a watch, assuming that convention still persisted in the ministry? 

But the energy of her laughter and beaming smile told a different story, one of collaborations yet to come, perhaps a new start following a dreary pandemic. 

'I don't suppose you have ever been to Argentina?' I questioned, absurdly casting my mind back to morning coffee at street-corner cafes with Moneypenny. 'Well, actually, no as it happens, Mr Bond. But I expect you will have seen M's latest docket?' 

Of course, I had not. Being away from the ministry, albeit just a seventeen minute walk from my apartment in Ormond Yard, I was totally out of the loop. My days had been spent exploring the antique shops of Burlington Arcade and sipping Constans' excellent Martinis at the Ritz's Rivoli bar. In fact I had not set eyes on a docket for three years.

'What does it say, this docket?' I asked, attempting to sound casual, but being inwardly intrigued. 

'Its about Lord Cameron's recent visit to meet President Javier Milei. David wants us back there on a trade mission.'

Two facts brought a lump to my throat. First that Xiomara appeared to be on first-name terms with the Foreign Secretary, but more important, that a plan was afoot for my return to active duty in Buenos Aires.

'Have you ever danced Argentine tango?' I inquired casually.

'No, but I am sure you can teach me that as well', she rejoined.

In the next episode, Bond prepares for departure to Buenos Aires, and we hear a little more about Xiomara.