This time not only
does Bond get the girl, but he marries her too. Marking the second book of
a trilogy, On Her Majesty's Secret Service is best read after Thunderball.
The story starts in
Royale-les-Eaux with
Bond saving a girl from drowning herself, who turns out to be the daughter
of the head of the Union Corse, Corsica's equivilent to the mafia.
He asks Bond to marry his daughter and as a favour for saving here offers
any assistance he can. Bond is trying to track down SPECTRE's leader, Blofeld,
after Thunderball,
and the information eventually takes him to Switzerland, where the criminal
organisation is planning to attack the UK using biological warfare.
We learn more about the
location of Royale-les-Eaux than Fleming had given away in Casino
Royale. Bond is driving his Bentley
for a night at the tables of the casino, when a girl in a white Lacia Flaminia
Zagato Spyder overtakes him. He is on "that
fast but dull stretch of N1 between Abbeville and Montreuil" and takes chase.
The first opportunity we really have to place Royale is when Bond reaches a
sign saying "Montreuil 5, Royale-les-Eaux 10, Le Touquet-Paris-Plage 15". He
then follows the girl through Montreuil and over the Étaples-Paris level crossing,
after which "the left-hand turn for Royale came up". This is where things don't
add up though - the distance from Montreuil to the coast is a total of more
than 20 km, rather than the 10 km on the sign. However, 12 km from Wailly-Beaucamp
is Berck-Sur-Mer, known at the turn of the 20th century as Berck-Plague. This
has the requisite casino and a beach, two attributes essential for Royale-les-Eaux,
and at the turn of the 20th century became a place to visit for its air and
light, much in the same way as Royale was visited for its spring water. Probably
Royale is a mixture of several of the casino towns in the area and placing it
precisely is futile.
The film suffers from
having George Lazenby as Bond, but is very close to the book, and ultimately
one of the best.
Follow the links below
for the books and films:
On
Her Majesty's Secret Service 
