An aged tanker of around ten thousand tons deadweight was secured alongside the top of the T. It stood well out of the water, its deck perhaps twelve feet above the quay. The tanker was called Blanche, and the Ant of Antwerp showed at her stern.
DR. NO Chapter 19
The men from the SS Blanche would have dug him out.
DR. NO Chapter 20
Throughout his writings, Ian Fleming would include the names of his friends (and sometimes enemies) in his books.
This one makes me laugh. Blanche is a reference to Blanche Blackwell his (intimate) friend in Jamaica. Describing the fictional ship as An aged tanker of around ten thousand tons deadweight was, as Mathew Parker notes, “a sign that their relationship had reached the point of affectionate teasing”.
