‘Who is it? Don’t you trust them?’
‘No, I don’t trust them – nor should you!’
‘Tell me who it is you suspect.’
Roland took a pencil from the desk and pulled a discarded sheet of paper out of the bin. He scribbled Peter’s name and passed it to Zech.
‘Who? We have no one of that name in this group.’
‘The man who came in late! The man you spoke with at the commencement of this meeting. He’s Peter.’
‘Maybe you’ve mistaken him?’
‘I haven’t mistaken him – he’s my brother-in-law and he defected from the West thirteen years ago. The Stasi will be watching him like hawks and without a doubt they’ll be controlling him.’
‘But he’s at the heart of this movement. He was one of the instigators. I’ve heard him give talks and he talks from the heart.’
‘Of course he would, Zech. He’s a puppet and his masters are pulling the strings. He has no choice but to infiltrate a movement such as this.’
‘So what do we do? Shut it down? And for how long?’
‘I don’t think you’ve got a choice.’ Roland glanced out of the window to the street. Two storeys below, his eyes fixed on a sinister man who appeared to be watching the entrance to the building. ‘See that man? The one standing there facing us in that ludicrous fur coat, hat and silly glasses? That’ll be the minder. He’s not even bothered about being conspicuous – he’s watching in plain sight. They can pick us off anytime they like.’
Zech rounded on him: ‘Don’t you think I’ve been careful? How stupid do you think I am? Do you think I just wandered in here? He’s our guy – he’s watching our backs. No, you don’t need to know his name. We’ll check your brother-in-law. If he is a spy we can deal with him.’
‘What do you mean, “deal with him”?’
‘We would question him – at length if need be. What do you think we’d do? Shoot him? This is a Christian peace movement, Roland. Our aim is to turn swords into ploughshares across the world. We’re not murderers. We know we’re being watched and listened to very closely, but there’s nothing anyone can do. We’re not breaking the law in seeking worldwide condemnation of nuclear weapons. Both Germanys have to lead the world in this respect – the responsibility for world peace is on our shoulders.’
‘But in the process we’re bringing down the government, aren’t we? Isn’t that what we’re about? Destroying Honecker and his cronies?’
‘We’re bringing about change, Roland. That’s what this is about – change. It’s not a coup. We’re not looking for revenge; we’re trying to create a stable, new Germany that unites us all. And a man like you can help us achieve that.’
Confrontation
In his head, he went over the scene again and again: Zech and Peter talking earnestly out of earshot. Maybe Peter was behind Zech’s approach to him – Peter was the real motivator behind this particular group and had requested that his brother-in-law be included for whatever reason. After all, everyone had been approached individually – chosen as disciples and based on some estimate of trustworthiness. But a Judas would bring ruin to them all.
The risk was too great. Roland could not go back to the group with Peter there. Thank God Peter hadn’t spotted him. What a stupid thing to even consider! Getting involved with a bunch of subversives, and for what? Imprisonment? The loss of his family?
So, for a time, he put the whole crazy idea behind him – no more meetings.
It was then that the woman at the fence returned to haunt his sleep in particularly vivid dreams. Each and every night without fail she would reach out to him before dying in his arms. So real were the dreams he could smell her aroma; feel the material of her bloodied clothes; even making love to her as she called out his name repeatedly before eventually accusing him of rape.
In these nocturnal visions he begins as her saviour, then her lover, then her tormentor and eventually her executioner. In each dream he knows her so well, their history shared; he calls her by a familiar name that he can never remember upon waking. And every time, her facial features morph into those of Heike.
‘You should see the doctor about your nightmares,’ Heike scolded him as she cradled his sweating body in her arms, his screams having shattered the night’s peace.
‘The whole place is a nightmare,’ he replied, ‘… the whole stinking place.’
Some days later, by chance, he ran into Zech at a tram stop, which was odd in that for so many years their paths had not coincided, yet in recent months they seemed destined to meet as if on a collision course. Maybe Zech had been following him.
Zech wasted no time: ‘I dealt with the “problem”. You need to come to another meeting.’
‘Why?’ asked Roland incredulously.
‘Because there’s so much work for you. The movement needs a talented writer like you. Words free this country, not guns or tanks.’
‘And just who will free me when the Stasi decides enough is enough?’
‘The world order is changing, Roland. Things are moving swiftly. Soon there won’t be a Stasi or a politburo. But we’ve got to give freedom a final push. They’re already hesitating.
‘If we don’t do this, if we leave it to the world’s politicians, then this country and Eastern Europe will never be free. We’re taking inspiration from the Poles and the Czechs, and now it’s our turn, Roland. Come on! Join us in the struggle.’
Roland’s eyes scanned the broad, busy street for a bolthole, but there was nowhere for him to hide. He knew that in the days to come he would have to stand up to be counted, because to leave it to others was comparable to an act of cowardice. Suddenly, on the opposite pavement, he spotted the face of a stranger he knew only too well: a woman walking, her eyes downcast, her hands buried in the depths of her raincoat pockets, her long, dark hair covered by a floral-patterned scarf. His heart missed a beat; it was the woman at the fence; the woman who haunted his sleep. There could be no mistake. She was just metres away, alive, at liberty, and en route to who knew where.
It was not a moment to hesitate; he had to confront her. Much to Zech’s astonishment Roland sprinted across the road, adroitly avoiding traffic and other pedestrians and causing one irate taxi driver to blow his horn and shake his fist. Roland called after her: ‘Excuse me!’
She stopped and turned. ‘Yes?’
His momentum hit a brick wall. What could he say or do? Passers-by glanced at them standing paused in the middle of the pavement like two stage-struck actors who couldn’t recall their lines. ‘Yes?’ she repeated, unsure of just what he wanted from her.
He raised his hand in surrender: ‘I’m sorry! I thought for a moment you were someone I knew.’
In the group, people talked earnestly in pairs rather than a discussion that involved everyone. This left Roland feeling somewhat isolated.
The “journalist” in him wanted to mix and enquire: find out who everyone was and what they were doing there; find out what they expected and just when there might be a satisfactory outcome. Did they expect to fight and die? Or be imprisoned or banished to God knows where? He wisely kept quiet, buried his head in a book on grass management and tried to conceal his nerves.
Zech beckoned him over: ‘Roland? Come with me please.’
Good! At last maybe he’d be given something to get his teeth into and then get home. It had been a long day.
He followed Zech across the creaking floorboards into an anteroom cluttered with boxes of old books and library stepladders in need of repair. Three men were waiting for them – two were smiling strangers, one most certainly wasn’t: it was Peter.
‘What on God’s green earth are you doing?!’ exclaimed Roland on recognising his brother-in-law. ‘Don’t you realise our connection?’
‘Max is fine about it, Roland,’ said Zech.
‘Max? Max? His name isn’t Max, i
t’s Peter – Peter Savers – and he’s my wife’s brother! What’s more, he’s a defector from the West. They watch his every move!’
Peter lit a Juwel cigarette before offering the packet around – calm and composed as could be. ‘Roland is right – absolutely! They monitored my every move from dawn to dusk and every minute in between. And there was good reason for that – I’d just kicked in from the West and they didn’t know who the hell I was.’
Roland couldn’t believe his ears; it was Peter; there’d been no confusion on his part. How could any of them survive this now with such a traitor uncovered?
‘Once they’d finished interrogating me,’ Peter continued, ‘I was put into a job in engineering, working in the steelworks at Hennigsdorf. In my spare time I studied hard at night school. I wanted to get into a university if that was possible, in engineering, and my factory enabled that.
‘After I graduated I became a teacher at a polytechnic. My dreams had all come true: I was a happy man teaching metal craft and even physics on occasion. Then, last year, a group of my students approached me and asked if they could express themselves like people did in the West, and I was from the West so…
‘I asked them what they meant by that and what they intended and they told me that they wanted to erect a bulletin board where all students could pin their thoughts and feelings on anything and everything, from the meaning of life to Erich Honecker’s sex life. They wanted to see just how far they could test the system.
‘Well, there was nothing that could be said about Honecker’s sex life that we knew of; it had to be factual – no jokes, you understand. So a number of them wrote about their support of what was happening in Poland with the labour strikes, or the dangers posed by the neo-Nazis, or a soldier’s love for his machine gun, that sort of thing. They even began a petition criticising Honecker’s annual military parade. I encouraged all this; I saw no harm, as times were changing – I thought.
‘The bulletin board quickly became a source of anger as other students and teachers criticised its content. But in our defence we said that that was what democracy was and that was what such a bulletin board should do if it was to work effectively – get people talking, discussing and arguing things out. But there were those who demanded retribution, as all this was heretical in their eyes. They wanted the ringleaders kicked out of the school and the education programme. The ringleaders, however, wanted to see it through – a storm in a teacup in their heads and mine.
‘Within days it got serious – overly serious. The students were effectively put on trial by their fellows and teachers, while those who had originally welcomed the idea of such a bulletin board distanced themselves. A kangaroo court was set up, but not everyone was compliant. They were very brave despite being so young.
‘You know, for those kids expulsion meant never getting the job they wanted, yet they were bright kids. Their future was decided from then on – street cleaners, toilet cleaners. They were humiliated in front of everyone in the school and summarily kicked out – their personal details immediately passed to the Stasi.
‘As for me, of course, I was sacked with immediate effect for having encouraged this and then arrested and questioned at length. I was threatened with jail, but released. Possibly because they believed that I’d been planted by the CIA and if I’m at liberty I’ll inadvertently lead them to others.’
‘Well, you’ve succeeded, because you’ve led them directly to us!’ stormed Roland.
‘No. I changed my identity as best I could and it works, I know it works. Peter Savers is dead. He died at the Wall trying to escape eighteen months ago. You even witnessed his death, Roland. That was pure coincidence.‘
A CIA man approached me shortly after my release and I told him my story. There are spies operating here in the East as I’m sure you’re aware. Anyway, he planned an escape route for a man who was desperate to get to the West and arranged a false identity for him – my identity. In turn, I became Max Konczak – the son of a Polish war veteran. I shaved my head, my eyebrows, and the CIA man kindly broke my nose with a very adept punch. It was enough to alter my appearance somewhat. I also wear coloured contact lenses. Do you like my green eyes? Not the colour I was born with. ‘So, thankfully they didn’t look too closely at the man who died at the fence. The ID in his pocket did the trick. He was set up – a hapless victim. I was in the clear.’
‘What about the woman?’
‘She’s a CIA operative. She met him, took him to the fence and then alerted the guards by arguing with him. She wasn’t supposed to get shot, but that’s the risk you take. God knows how you happened to be passing. But it’s part of the reason why I asked Zech to bring you into this movement. We need you.’
‘Are you working for the CIA?’
‘No, I’m working for a new Germany. I will always be a communist, but what’s going on here is crazy! Honecker is a brute and that wife of his is even worse if that’s possible.
‘Don’t get me wrong, there is much that I love about our system, but the trial of my students turned my life around. This particular branch of the peace movement is motivated by those like me who want to bring about change for the better. Communism can include democracy – they are not exclusive.
‘This opposition has its roots in that school. Those kids were brave enough to stand up and be counted. We have to follow their lead. You know, as we speak, people on both sides of the Wall are beginning to learn about my students. Our people are seeing it on Western news media. People are beginning to question the system. They were bright kids from good families, but they were hung out to dry just for expressing themselves. That’s what young people do, no? At least, that’s what they should be able to do.
‘You see, it’s not just about what those kids said on the bulletin board; it’s about the standard of the education system here. And we’re a long, long way behind our cousins on the other side of the Wall.’
Roland was indeed aware that some students had been expelled from a city polytechnic. He’d even discussed it with Heike when they listened to the breaking story on Voice of America. How odd to think that Peter had played his part, or so he claimed. There was no choice but to trust him – things had gone too far.
‘Why didn’t you come and talk to us?’
‘What? And implicate you?’
‘No! Before then. Why not share your good news about your degree and your teaching post?’
‘Because we were better off apart. I wasn’t going to play into the hands of the Stasi by turning up at my sister’s every now and then, or writing letters. They expected us to be working as a team, and that included you! They watch Mama, you know, even though she’s in the West – they watch her. She’s an old lady who doesn’t deserve to come under surveillance because of what I did or what my sister did. They watch all our family in the West. They have files – I’ve seen them. And do you think they don’t watch you? Come on, Roland! They think that Heike is working directly for the CIA, that she’s a sleeper. You’re in danger – the three of you are in danger and you need to get out of here.’
Peter was absolutely right. We watched all of them, all of the time.
Later meetings were different. New faces were appearing. Strangers looking equally as lost and as nervous as Roland had done. But now there was a feeling of optimism in the air, the feeling that they were making a difference. People – strangers – were talking and making plans. Things were on the rise and happening quickly. The initial talk was always of Gorbachev and perestroika and especially glasnost.
‘Did you hear the BBC last night?’
‘Yes, I heard that. The Americans say it’s their influence that’s making a difference, and Thatcher says it’s her, but the BBC makes it clear – it’s Gorbachev. He’s moving mountains.’
‘I heard that he’s pulling troops out of Afghanistan.’
‘He’s meeting with Kohl and Honecker. At this
rate we could bring the Wall down by autumn.’
‘Reagan is doing his thing, too. He has an interest in a united Germany.’
‘He has an interest in his American empire. Don’t be fooled.’
No one believed that Honecker would bring the Wall down of his own volition or that Kohl might even pressure him to do so. There was nothing in their respective histories to suggest that either man would take one step toward demolishing the Wall and unifying Germany.
Someone suggested that Brandt would have brought the Wall down single-handedly. But the truth was that no one in the group wanted any politician to do that. Zech slammed his fist on the table: ‘We – the people – we’ll bring the Wall down and no one else!
‘It’s imperative we bring the Wall down before Honecker fortifies it with the latest terror weapons – lasers, security cameras, computer-controlled weapons that negate the use of guards. The stinking Wall might not have been Honecker’s creation, but he’s done more than any other leader to make it impregnable.’
Meetings were short, comprising just enough time to make contact, then decide the next part of the plan before everyone dispersed.
‘Roland – you meet up with Kristof during the week and find some way of making progress with the Lutherans. They’re planning a demonstration. Hans – check out Dieter Meier. Maybe he can help with leaflet distribution? …’
Pity the buggers outside on the street watching, taking notes, looking out for those who might be watching them. The fat man with the dark glasses and the dark woollen overcoat; he didn’t even try to blend into his surroundings. Next night, it was the tall, thin man who Roland believed followed him on occasion in the cold and rain. Roland’s nightmares were replaced by insomnia, something he’d never suffered from before. When he did eventually fall into a deep sleep, his dreams would expose him as being naked in public; naked at work even though everyone else was clothed; naked on the journey home, catching the train. People averted their eyes, but they all turned to look and comment on his nudity.
The Reunion Page 31