The James Bond Anthology

There was a hum of excitement and a fluttering of catalogues. Mr Snowman wiped his forehead with a white silk handkerchief. He turned to Bond, ‘Now I’m afraid you are more or less on your own. I’ve got to pay attention to the bidding and anyway for some unknown reason it’s considered bad form to look over one’s shoulder to see who’s bidding against you – if you’re in the trade that’s to say – so I’ll only be able to spot him if he’s somewhere up front here, and I’m afraid that’s unlikely. Pretty well all dealers, but you can stare around as much as you like. What you’ve got to do is to watch Peter Wilson’s eyes and then try and see who he’s looking at, or who’s looking at him. If you can spot the man, which may be quite difficult, note any movement he makes, even the very smallest. Whatever the man does – scratching his head, pulling at the lobe of his ear or whatever, will be a code he’s arranged with Peter Wilson. I’m afraid he won’t do anything obvious like raising his catalogue. Do you get me? And don’t forget that he may make absolutely no movement at all until right at the end when he’s pushed me as far as he thinks I’ll go, then he’ll want to sign off. Mark you,’ Mr Snowman smiled, ‘when we get to the last lap I’ll put plenty of heat on him and try and make him show his hand. That’s assuming of course that we are the only two bidders left in.’ He looked enigmatic. ‘And I think you can take it that we shall be.’

From the man’s certainty, James Bond felt pretty sure that Mr Snowman had been given instructions to get the Emerald Sphere at any cost.

A sudden hush fell as a tall pedestal draped in black velvet was brought in with ceremony and positioned in front of the auctioneer’s rostrum. Then a handsome oval case of what looked like white velvet was placed on top of the pedestal and, with reverence, an elderly porter in grey uniform with wine red sleeves, collar and back belt, unlocked it and lifted out Lot 42, placed it on the black velvet and removed the case. The cricket ball of polished emerald on its exquisite base glowed with a supernatural green fire and the jewels on its surface and on the opalescent meridian winked their various colours. There was a gasp of admiration from the audience and even the clerks and experts behind the rostrum and sitting at the tall counting-house desk beside the auctioneer, accustomed to the Crown jewels of Europe parading before their eyes, leaned forward to get a better look.

James Bond turned to his catalogue. There it was, in heavy type and in prose as stickily luscious as a butterscotch sundae:

THE TERRESTRIAL GLOBE DESIGNED IN 1917 BY CARL FABERGÉ FOR A RUSSIAN GENTLEMAN AND NOW THE PROPERTY OF HIS GRANDDAUGHTER 42 A VERY IMPORTANT FABERGÉ TERRESTRIAL GLOBE.

A sphere carved from an extraordinarily large piece of Siberian emerald matrix weighing approximately one thousand three hundred carats and of a superb colour and vivid translucence, represents a terrestrial globe supported upon an elaborate

rocaille

scroll mount finely chased in

quatre-couleur

gold and set with a profusion of rose-diamonds and small emeralds of intense colour, to form a table-clock.

Around this mount six gold

putti

disport themselves among cloud-forms which are naturalistically rendered in carved rock-crystal finished matt and veined with fine lines of tiny rose-diamonds.

The Globe itself, the surface of which is meticulously engraved with a map of the world with the principal cities indicated by brilliant diamonds embedded within gold collets, rotates mechanically on an axis controlled by a small clock-movement, by

G. Moser

, signed, which is concealed in the base, and is girdled by a fixed gold belt enamelled opalescent oyster along a reserved path in

champlevé

technique over a moiré

guillochage

with painted Roman numerals in pale sepia enamel serving as the dial of the clock, and a single triangular pigeon-blood Burma ruby of about five carats set into the surface of the orb, pointing the hour.

Height: 7½ in.

Workmaster, Henrik Wigström

. In the original double-opening white velvet, satin-lined, oviform case with the gold key fitted in the base.

* The theme of this magnificent sphere is one that had inspired Fabergé some fifteen years earlier, as evidenced in the miniature terrestrial globe which forms part of the Royal Collection at Sandringham. (See plate 280 in

The Art of Carl Fabergé,

by A. Kenneth Snowman.)

After a brief and searching glance round the room, Mr Wilson banged his hammer softly. ‘Lot 42 – an object of vertu by Carl Fabergé.’ A pause. ‘Twenty thousand pounds I am bid.’

Mr Snowman whispered to Bond, ‘That means he’s probably got a bid of at least fifty. This is simply to get things moving.’

Catalogues fluttered. ‘And thirty, forty, fifty thousand pounds I am bid. And sixty, seventy, and eighty thousand pounds. And ninety.’ A pause and then: ‘One hundred thousand pounds I am bid.’