by David Laws
Harry leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling, mumbling, as if to himself, over and over, “Crazy! Just crazy!” Then he lurched upright and pointed. “So you said nothing and stuck your head in the sand.”
Erika wrinkled her brow in confusion. It was obvious this particular piece of English idiom was beyond her, so he persisted: “You were frightened of it, you were hiding from it, you weren’t facing up to the problem…”
Contrition ran only so far with Erika. She pointed a sharp finger. “If you’d have been me, wouldn’t you have kept quiet?”
“No!” Harry said firmly. “I’d have done something about it.”
“Oh yes, I suppose you would, and that’s exactly what I was scared of, you getting excited and writing about it and causing trouble and bringing disaster to my door.”
This was followed by a taut silence. It seemed that for the moment they had both exhausted their anger. After a while she said, “Anyway, I just forgot about it and got on with my life.”
“Yes, and then you trip off in all innocence to the Stasi archive and give them my address.”
“Easy to be wise after the event,” she said.
“Yes, and damned stupid before it. You should have showed me the file.”
“Well, what now?”
“Expose the blighters, of course! They’re still spies. Still a possible menace to this country.”
“That’s why I’m scared again,” she said. “Someone’s got to know about all this and doesn’t want the names published. That’s obvious, isn’t it? They’re out to stop it. They’re after the document, so they’re after me. They think I still live with you, and that’s why your place is in such a mess. They’re ruthless, Harry. Look what they did. It was terrible. They ripped your flat apart.”
“Thanks for that,” he said.
“And how long will it be before they get hold of my address in Barton? Before they track us down? What then?” She made a helpless gesture and cast an anxious glance in the direction of her boy. “We can’t go back home, Harry – and you can’t go back to your place, either.”
Harry looked to the ceiling once more. “Charming,” he said. “Now you’ve got me living out of a cardboard box.”
Harry thought best with a pint in his hand, so he ordered another of Hector’s specials, a Brass Monkey, plus a Martini for Erika and a ginger ale for the boy, before sitting down in a deeply reflective mood. “Let’s consider this sensibly,” he said. “Why would they wreck my place if you weren’t in residence? How would that help them?”
“Maybe looking for clues,” she said. “An address, a letterhead, a workplace note – something to put them on the trail. Or maybe just a warning. ‘Stay away from this!’”
“We still can’t know for sure it’s about this file.” He fingered the blue folder tentatively. “Could be something else. Just a robbery.” Even as he said it, he doubted it, given that his watch, TV and other valuables had been left undisturbed.
“It’s obvious,” she said, “because of what happened to Renata and Anneliese. No doubt at all.”
Harry took another gulp. “Tell me,” he said with a sigh.
Renata and Anneliese were her friends, part of the women’s committee. They’d gone to the occupation that day, agreeing to meet later at Renata’s place to discuss the day’s events.
“Well?” Harry prompted.
“Didn’t happen. Meeting aborted,” she said. “Too risky. Stasi still on the streets.”
“So what did happen?”
“The two of them emigrated to the West. To the Federal Republic. And that’s the point. Now they’re missing. I’ve tried contacting them. Not a peep out of Anneliese. Complete blank and nobody knows where she’s gone.”
“Renata?”
“Today I discovered she was killed in a road accident.”
“An accident,” he echoed.
“Believe it was an accident if you like,” she said. “Both of them went back to the Stasi archive to look at their files, that much I do know, so someone obviously got to the archive records and milked their new addresses. Traced them, just like they traced me. Same route, same threat, same danger.”
Harry stroked his chin. The logical connections were plain to see, too compelling for further doubt. He decided to believe her. To take her seriously.
“Can we get together on this?” she asked. “Can we go somewhere they won’t find us?” This was surely a mark of Erika’s fright, the measure of her desperation. It was a strange turn-up. “What else can we do?” she asked, and he couldn’t remember the last time he had seen her at a loss. “Somehow, we have to disappear,” she persisted. “Find somewhere they can’t trace us.”
Harry decided to travel the obvious route. “We could appeal for police protection, I suppose.”
“Will they protect us? Put us in a safe house?”
Harry slowly shook his head. Witness protection was for serious criminal cases. No regular police official was going to place much credence on their story. It was too speculative, too inherently unlikely to convince a Bury policeman. And Harry was only too well aware of his fractious relations with Sergeant Rudd at the police station. He could well anticipate his barely concealed derision. All Harry and Erika would get was dismissive advice: take care, lock the doors at night, call us if you see anything suspicious. Not much help if Erika and he really were up against a serious bunch of hatchet men.
He could sense the visceral strength of her fear. Perhaps it was also his own laziness at the prospect of clearing up his flat. Perhaps he was secretly pleased to be on level terms with her once again, to feel needed. Whichever it was, he made a snap decision. He would do it her way. More chin stroking, then Harry said, “I’ve an idea.”
“What?”
He didn’t answer; instead stood and collected his coat. “You stay here,” he said. “I’ll be back shortly.”
Harry stood quite still for several minutes at the corner of Church Row and Cannon Street and studied the doors, alleyways and vehicles. No loiterers, no street cleaners, nobody reading a paper or smoking a cigarette, no one mending a car.
He peered again at the familiar little square that was his home turf. Many years ago, grass grew where parked cars now jostled for space, and the place then had the more appealing name of Pea Porridge Green. All appeared quiet in the fading afternoon sunlight: grey bricks, some fancy gold knockers and colourful doors flush to the pavement bringing a splash of brightness – blue, purple, red and green. Across the square a brewery truck was parked under the wide archway leading to the yard behind the pub, the most dominant building in the square, painted all over in a dull sand yellow. On the pavement a woman and a child studied a menu board outside the restaurant.
Harry hung back, wondering about foreigners who might – or might not – be keeping watch on Cannon Street. How would they disguise themselves? There was precious little cover. At the same time he considered the several different emotions whirling around his head: wonder that Erika was being drawn once more into his life, and the protective instinct that meant he would work to keep her safe. But there was that other, altogether more upbeat prospect: the enormous opportunity that had suddenly dropped into his lap.
He peered once more around the corner. The square was still languidly indolent, so he left his position and crossed to Number 21, letting himself in with as much stealth as he could manage. He ignored the mess in the living room and went directly to the bedroom where he filled a rucksack with phone, laptop, cash, cards, wallet and keys. As he did so, he caught a glimpse of himself in the wardrobe mirror. One big grin. One huge slice of good luck. The Blue List was a big story, and Harry liked big stories. It was true, he hadn’t had one for some time, had been forced to get by on small-time freelance work, mainly court reporting on a linage basis to the local provincial daily, and the occasional aerial photograph taken from th
e cockpit of the Tiger Moth. In his cups he was apt to look back with pride on past successes – exposing a pharmaceutical pricing scam and the illegal sale of small arms to an African republic – but there hadn’t been a major success to chalk up for quite some time. The Blue List was his chance. It wasn’t just a change for the better. Stasi spies in Britain? This was The Big One, bigger than all the others. A series of questions began to form in his mind: were the spies still active? To whom were they reporting? How would they react when exposed?
And there was something else. Perhaps the Stasi, with a limitless trail of hidden intelligence, was about to give up some of its secrets. There was one particular secret Harry had been chasing for years. Not just for good copy, but for himself.
Then, light of step, he descended the stairs, moved back on to the street and spotted Bertie Tufnell’s taxi, a beaten-up black Austin that had seen better days down in the Smoke. He whistled, and it stopped. “The Old Cannon,” he told Tufnell.
“Do me a favour, I want a fare, not a five-yarder for someone who’s already pissed!”
“Remind me to report you for refusing a fare.”
Outside the brewery, he insisted Tufnell wait while he collected his ‘friends’ – Erika and the boy – then directed the cab right across town as far away from Barton as possible, out along the Whepstead road.
“Much better – I can do you for a tenner for this one,” Tufnell said.
Despite the expense, Harry remained buoyant. On the way he pointed out landmarks on a side of the town that was unfamiliar to Erika – the old jail, a workhouse, a fort, the old hospital and the new.
“That’s what I like about you, Harry,” she said. “Even when I’m out of my mind with worry, you come out with all this history crap.”
“But you need to know, this isn’t just anywhere. You should appreciate what happened here in the past, the people who walked these streets, lived their lives here, the generations past – it’s a town of long traditions.”
“Oh, balls!” she said.
At this, Harry marvelled at how her grasp of the English vernacular had taken on a new stridency. And then again he asked himself why he was doing her bidding. What was it about this woman that had him in her thrall? He’d never wanted to settle; he recognised that about himself. The steady job and the role of conventional family man did not appeal. He liked the unpredictable. He was an adventurer – and Erika was another adventure. She was different, and there was something about her he didn’t quite understand. Perhaps it was the fascination of a person from another culture, nationality, philosophy of life, habits, routine. Perhaps it was the allure of the unknown, the puzzle, the enigma.
By now they were turning into an expansive driveway with laurel hedges on each side and a big house up ahead on a slight rise. As they drove towards it they could see a long double-storey red-brick building with white French windows and a porticoed entrance set back from a close-cut lawn bordered by roses, primroses and dahlias. Seventeenth century tarted up to look cute and smart.
“Wow,” Erika said, “this place looks a step up from anywhere you’ve ever taken me before. What goes on here?”
Harry grinned, paid off the cab and jingled a large bunch of keys. “Welcome to Blackthorpe Grange,” he said.
Chapter 5
27 days to go
Erika was doing an excited tour of the house. A dining room with a huge wooden tallboy displaying a Japanese-style Spode Imperial dinner service, a living room with gold-coloured sofas and a coal fire, and bedrooms showing old beams decked out with blue carpets and Chinese rugs.
“How come, Harry?” She beamed.
Young Stefan didn’t look up, sitting on a gilt chair playing with a mobile that displayed an impressive list of apps.
“Got one there for making people disappear?” Harry inquired, but knew the monosyllabic Stefan wasn’t into jokes. He turned to Erika. “Looking after the house for a friend,” he said. “And I’ve got the use of his classic car.”
A smile. “That should please you,” she said. “You’ll have to show me later.” But for the moment her attention was on the trinkets. She was playing with a pair of cut-glass salt cellars and a model black cat from the mantelpiece. That was her thing, Harry recalled. Always in and out of gift shops.
“We should be safe enough here,” he said. “Your scary men with strange accents won’t have a clue. We’re right across the other side of town. Nobody knows we’re here. Nobody knows about this place.”
Erika’s smile faded at mention of this and she began a close examination of the ground floor, checking all the windows, testing the catches, trying out the bolts on the doors.
Harry frowned and set about getting the TV and music centre working, selecting Handel’s Coronation Anthem from the CD box. One of her favourite pieces, he remembered.
“Soothing sounds to calm the savage breast,” he said with a grin, and he could see her struggling with that one. Was it an insult? No, an English idiom, a new one to add to her collection.
Then he cast about for a distraction. “Seen the kitchen?” And while she was deep into a tour of all the drawers and cupboards, he said, “How about something to eat? Bet the fridge is full.”
There followed predicable complaints about what she found there. “All very English, Harry – just chops, little else.”
He smiled reassuringly. “Sure you’ll find something to keep us going.” It was her joy, cooking. He recalled it as one of the principal benefits of their time together – what he regarded as exotic and what she said was “just plain poor people’s diet”. Hefekloesse – yeast dumplings with pork – sauerkraut and schnitzel, or Konigsberger klopse, meatballs in a caper sauce with green berries.
She had this repertoire of dishes which kept him intrigued and replete. Unfortunately, that had not been enough. She’d wanted to show it off. There was the expensively furnished Cafe Berlin in the Buttermarket, Bury’s prime shopping street, which ended in tears with the VAT man and a bust-up with Harry’s bank manager; and later a dinner party for friends that cost him an entire week’s wages and the loss of a big story. Complaints such as “I’ve got a deadline to meet” met with a blank look of incomprehension.
Suddenly he became aware of a wonderful aroma wafting from the kitchen. An old familiar smell. He savoured the meal to come, the exquisite taste, reminding him of the pleasures and the pains of the past. What she produced was another ‘poverty’ offering: bratkartoffeln – fried potatoes and egg – which Harry scooped up with nostalgic glee. Young Stefan was still silently glued to his device – a thumb on the screen and a finger on his fork – while Erika, putting down her fork, was definitely more animated.
Harry leaned back, taking advantage of her change of mood to engage in some catching up. “So, how’s the singing going?” he asked, recalling how she went off on a Wednesday to be a chorister at the Bury Choral Society.
She shook her head. “Not any more. I’m a player now.”
Harry repressed a chuckle. Flashes of enthusiasm were frequently followed by rapid switches of interest. Her sudden and short-lived passions, he called them. “And now?”
“Viola in the Bury Chamber.”
He’d often puzzled over this. How was it that such a changeable, hyperactive personality could settle to produce a sound of sufficient quality to be worth a place in a prestigious local orchestra? And then came the bitter twist. The last time she’d left him, she’d gone off with the choral society’s tenor.
“And you always seem to come back to me,” he said with a sigh, “after the others. What’s the matter with them all?”
She didn’t blanch, not a flicker of embarrassment as she said, “They’re nice enough to start with, but when the first crush is over and they’ve got what they came for and it’s back to normal life – that’s when you find out what they’re really like. Then I become routine. And I don’t get t
he attention I require.”
Harry nodded as if in sympathetic agreement. He wouldn’t say it, of course, but she required constant soothing, full-on attention.
“Sooner or later their focus drifts,” she said, “they have other priorities – but the priority should me! What is it with them? Football, beer, work? Then there’s Stefan. I know he can be difficult but the boy’s had a hard time. They need to be sympathetic, but they soon lose patience and I won’t have that.”
Harry nodded, his mind on earlier student days. Like their time in Leipzig. “I seem to remember there was someone back in the old country—”
Erika exploded. “Oh, him! Don’t talk about him!”
But she did, and he should have known better. The name was Fischer, and mention of it always set her off. Feckless, unreliable, a betrayer. How she caught him in flagrante delicto with a bus conductress. Her eyes were fiery and she was wagging an accusing finger. “If I ever catch you doing that—”
“Now hang on—” he said, but didn’t get any further.
“I’ll kill you,” she said, and for a fearful second Harry saw the look in her eye and almost believed she meant it.
But then he shrugged. Silly of him. It was just her way, picking up morsels of English idiom, clichés and phrases that appealed to her, and sprinkling them generously into conversations. It was just a phrase.
Elbows on the table, he made a steeple of his fingers. “So,” he said, “here we are again.”
“Well…” She looked at him evenly. “You’re not very exciting, Harry, but at least you’re reliable, a good man at heart; you’re the one person I can trust.”
Harry concentrated on the ceiling.
“Trust,” she said, “that’s the most important thing. I know you won’t let me down.”
Harry indicated the boy. There was a faraway look on Stefan’s face. Doubtless he was dreaming of some perfect and beautiful number. He had a mania for it. Counted the steps to a bus stop, light bulbs in rooms, tables in cafes, bottles in pubs, and spoke with an odd zombie-like monotone. “What about him?” Harry said. “Your nasties could follow him home from school… and he won’t be with it enough to shake them off.”