Well, only Stalin throttling a nun would trump what Merzhanov’s film allegedly showed.
But it wouldn’t be easy. Russell had to collect Janica and the film, and then get the lovebirds out of Europe, all without raising any suspicions among his American colleagues. And then he and Shchepkin had to make their deal with Beria, the psychopath in charge of the world’s largest plain-clothes army. In return for their keeping silent about what was on the film, he would need to promise no Soviet disclosure of Russell’s role in securing the German atomic papers for Moscow, allow them both to retire from Soviet service, and allow Shchepkin’s wife and daughter to leave for the West.
Put that way, it sounded like a pipedream.
But try as he did, Russell could see no logical flaw in the plan. Executing it was another matter, though. How the hell would they contact Beria—c/o the Lyubyanka? He hoped Shchepkin would know.
There was no instant way of getting hold of his Russian partner. Russell could and did arrange an emergency meeting with a phone call, but the place and time were already pre-set. The former was chosen at the end of each regular meeting, the latter always noon on the following day, which gave him eighteen hours to wait.
He didn’t say anything to Effi that evening—he didn’t want to raise her hopes—but once she’d fallen asleep in his arms, he allowed himself the luxury of some daydreaming. If he could escape the Soviet embrace, then the American one would be easier to shrug off. He could be a real journalist again, not in Berlin perhaps, but in England or America. Effi already had one offer from Hollywood, and he was sure she’d find work in either country. It would be so good to live near Paul again, and he didn’t think Rosa would really miss Berlin.
‘And with one bound he was free,’ he thought.
Or one spool of film.
Masaryk Station.
On Saturday morning Russell pleaded work as his excuse for abandoning Effi and Rosa, who’d planned a family walk in the Grunewald. After seeing them off, he started out for the Funkturm, the spot he’d chosen for the emergency treff with Shchepkin. He was almost an hour early, which gave him ample time to dwell on the memories the structure evoked. The radio tower—Berlin’s smaller version of the Eiffel—had been badly damaged in the final weeks of the war, with one leg severed and the restaurant burnt out, and was still closed to the public. But in pre-war times, when Paul was living with his mother and stepfather, this had always been his first destination of choice, and the two of them had spent countless Saturdays together staring out across the city from the observation platform.
Shchepkin was also early, as if he’d somehow got wind that something important had happened. Natty was the word, Russell thought, as he watched the Russian walk towards him. Effi had been reminded of a theatre director she once worked for, and Russell could just imagine Shchepkin among Berlin’s pre-Nazi avant-garde.
As they circled the tower together Russell went through everything that Merzhanov had told him. By the time he’d finished describing the plot of the film, the Russian’s pinched expression was as bleak as he’d ever seen it. ‘Is this all possible?’ he asked Shchepkin. ‘Do you know about this house outside the city?’
‘Yes, it exists.’
‘And could Beria have been there?’
‘He was here around that time although I can’t remember the exact dates. And there have been rumours over the years. I never respected the man, but they weren’t the sort of rumours that anyone who cared for the Party could bring himself to believe. That he had young girls abducted off the street in Moscow and taken to his dacha—that sort of thing. Something like this would be worse, much worse.’
‘The film might be a fake,’ Russell offered.
Shchepkin shook his head. ‘We’ll know when we see it, but somehow it all rings true.’ He fell silent for a few moments. ‘So you intend to collect the woman from Prague, reunite her with her lover, and send them both off to South America, yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘I can see two major problems.’
‘Only two?’
‘At first sight. One, you’ll need papers to get her out of Czechoslovakia. I may be able to help with those, but it’s far from certain. Two, you have to persuade your Mister Johannsen that Merzhanov deserves such special treatment. What has he done to deserve it?’
‘I’m working on that,’ Russell said, somewhat less than truthfully. The problem had occurred to him, but so far he’d chosen to ignore it.
‘I think I can help there,’ Shchepkin told him. ‘I’ll meet you tomorrow with something special. I don’t know what exactly, but something that’ll make Merzhanov seem worth the extra effort. You’ll have to be the ventriloquist.’
‘That should work,’ Russell agreed, mentally rehearsing the process. ‘I am his only channel of communication until our other Russian speaker gets back. And I’ll just have to move Merzhanov south before he does.’
‘Yes,’ Shchepkin said thoughtfully, as if something had just occurred to him. Then he allowed himself a wry smile. ‘If the Americans find out about the film, and realise that you’ve chosen not to tell them, that will be the end—you must realise that. At best they will sack you. At worst, I don’t know. Either way, your use to us will be over. You and I, we will both be loose ends that need cutting off.’
He was right, Russell thought, but what choice did they have? He didn’t want to grow old checking Doctor Kaluzny’s patient reports, doing odd jobs for men like Youklis and his Russian equivalents. How many Sasas would there be in that future?
He smiled at the gloomy Russian. ‘So let’s make sure we don’t fuck it up.’
The next morning, Russell went back to the Föhrenweg basement for a two-hour session with Merzhanov. He had nothing new to ask the Russian, but he needed to establish a time in which the information Shchepkin was providing could actually have been divulged. For the most part they chatted about their time as soldiers—Merzhanov was interested in Russell’s experiences in the First War, and he was still shocked by what he’d witnessed himself during the Red Army’s four-year war against the Germans. The Russian also talked more about Janica, with a fondness Russell found unusually touching. He found himself hoping that the Czech girl was worthy of such devotion.
By midday Russell was in the Potsdamer Strasse café Shchepkin had specified for the hand-over. This time there was no conversation, just the usual rolled newspaper casually left, which Russell scanned and took with him. On a Tiergarten bench half an hour later he read through the papers inside, which contained a complete breakdown of the new KI organisation in Berlin, complete with names, ranks and personal habits which might expose the officers involved to successful blackmail. As a bonus, Shchepkin had included the names of two MGB agents employed by the American Zone administration in Frankfurt.
It was more than enough to warrant two exit visas. Now all he had to do was convince Eustis that he was hearing it all from Merzhanov.
With Russell still absent on duty, Effi and Rosa went over to Dahlem without him. Hanna had just arrived back from her parents’ farm in the American Zone, and Lotte had her new boyfriend Karl on display—a serious young man who seemed painfully inhibited by the various members of her extended family: the American major, the British journalist, the notorious actress, even the famous young artist, who drew him with a star-struck look on his face.
Annaliese arrived late and without Ströhm, who was also spending the Sunday at work. Ströhm had sent a message to Russell hoping they could meet for a drink sometime in the next few days.
Late in the afternoon, all the guests shared a tram to Ku’damm, and then went their separate ways. It had been a good day, Effi decided, as she and Rosa climbed their stairs. Thomas seemed rejuvenated by politics, and her worries about Rosa seemed less substantial than they had. Thinking back over the long conversation at table, Effi could hardly remember an optimistic statement, but it didn’t seem to matter—whatever the world might throw at them all, somehow love and friendship made l
ife worth living.
She found Russell scribbling away at the table, surrounded by sheets of Cyrillic script. ‘This has to be done tonight,’ he said apologetically after embracing them both. ‘I need it for the morning.’
‘But what is it?’ Rosa asked.
‘I can’t tell you that. It’s top-secret.’
‘But something to do with the Russians?’
‘You’ve guessed it.’
‘Let him work,’ Effi told her. ‘We’ll find something to do in the other room.’
It was several hours before Russell had finished re-casting Shchepkin’s information as an imaginary interview with Merzhanov, and by then Rosa was fast asleep. It was time, he decided, to tell Effi what was happening. After sitting her down on the sofa, he went through the story, omitting nothing. ‘And before I go to Prague,’ he concluded, ‘I want you and Rosa on a train to Frankfurt.’
She ignored that. ‘You’re going back to Prague,’ she said incredulously. ‘Just the name gives me the shivers. Every time you’ve been there something terrible has almost happened—sometimes it actually has. You were shot there! Only last week you were beaten up in one of their jails.’
‘They let me go when they found out I worked for the Soviets.’
‘Can’t Shchepkin do that part? Isn’t Czechoslovakia one of their countries now?’
‘I don’t think it works like that. And I dread to think what Janica would do if a Russian approached her at Masaryk Station.’
‘How will you get her across the border?’
‘I haven’t decided yet. As my daughter maybe. Shchepkin’s looking into papers, and if he can’t help, I’ll have to see Max.’
Her eyes lit up. ‘How old is Janica?’
‘She looks about thirty. Why?’
‘Because I asked Max to forge some papers for Lisa Sundgren’s daughter. She’s only twenty-one, but I can probably take a few years off Janica.’
‘Wait a minute …’
‘No, this is fate. I’m coming with you.’
‘Oh no.’
‘Oh yes, and I’ll tell you why. Where’s the best place to hide a reel of film?’
‘In a projection booth?’
‘Almost. Among other films. You told Jaromír Císař how much I liked his work, and he said he’d like to work with me. Well, I can go and see him, and tell him in person that I’m interested in working with him. And I can take some audition reels with me—DEFA were always good about giving us copies of the rushes. And we can hide your film among them.’
It did sound almost perfect, but …
‘And if it looks like I’m choosing the Czech version of DEFA over the Americans, the Soviets will be overjoyed,’ Effi went on excitedly. ‘Which should stop them thinking about Rosa.’
‘But what about Rosa?’ Russell asked, hoping to bring her back to earth. ‘If both of us end up in a Czech prison …’
‘We won’t. Didn’t you just remind me that they let you go because you work for the Soviets?’
‘Yes, but …’
‘I know what you’re saying,’ Effi conceded quickly. ‘Of course I do. And I also know that if worst came to worst, Zarah would be as loving a mother as I would. But it won’t. I won’t let it.’
At ten o’clock on Monday morning, Effi presented herself at Max Grelling’s Ku’damm apartment. He was in his dressing gown, and the bed through the doorway still seemed occupied, but he smiled when he saw her, and urged her into the well-stocked kitchen, where coffee was loudly percolating.
‘Would you like a cup?’
‘I wouldn’t say no.’
Grelling took the pot from the stove, and lined up a couple of cups. ‘Do you need the papers after all?’
‘Yes, but for a different woman. I have her photograph here. It’s not in very good shape, I’m afraid.’
Grelling passed her a cup, and examined the picture. ‘Can’t you give up rescuing people?’ he asked.
‘Apparently not.’ The coffee was wonderful.
‘Well, this one doesn’t look twenty-one,’ he said.
‘Could you change the birth date?’
He shook his head. ‘Not without leaving a mark. It would pass a normal scrutiny, but I think you’d be better changing the woman’s appearance. Anyone who checks photographs on a regular basis knows that very few people look just like their picture, and they’re much more likely to accept a discrepancy there than they are in the writing.’
‘You’re the expert,’ Effi told him. ‘But I am in rather a hurry.’
‘Of course. Who is this woman?’
‘She’s a Czech. And she’s not Jewish, if that’s what you’re wondering.’
‘Ah. But for you … Will Wednesday do?
‘That would be perfect. And can I insult you by offering payment?’
‘Insult away.’
Russell read a newspaper on the tram journey out to Föhrenweg. The Soviets had indeed abandoned the Kommandatura, but only after the American representative Colonel Howley had flounced out. Since Shchepkin had known about the Soviet decision two days earlier, Russell could only assume that Howley had been stupid enough to hand the Soviets a propaganda victory on a plate. Elsewhere in the paper there were rumours that the Arabs were considering a ceasefire in their war with the infant Israel. If they thought time was on their side, they had another think coming, Russell thought. Now that the Brits had got out of the way, the Jews would only get stronger.
It was also reported that Eduard Benes had resigned as President of Czechoslovakia on grounds of ill health. He might be sick for all Russell knew, but his departure still felt like the end of an all-too-short era, one in which people still believed that social democrats and communists could work together. If they couldn’t do it Prague, then they couldn’t do it anywhere. Now it would be a fight to the death.
At the BOB HQ Russell found a yawning John Eustis in the canteen, and laid the fictional report in front of him. After skimming his way through the first few pages, Eustis suddenly pulled up short, and went back to the beginning. ‘Have you told Johannsen?’ was the first thing he asked after reading it properly.
‘I thought we’d get it all wrapped up and tied with a ribbon,’ Russell told him. ‘Get ourselves some brownie points.’
‘They wouldn’t hurt. I expect my new girl’s father is checking me out as we speak.’
‘Well then, let’s get Merzhanov back up.’
The hours that followed—around eighteen of them spread over two and a half days—were some of the most exhausting Russell had ever endured. Having turned Shchepkin’s breakdown of the MGB operation in Karlshorst into a series of individual profiles, he now had to cope with Eustis’s supplementary questions, a process which demanded almost instant creativity. In the time that Merzhanov took to answer Russell’s mostly footling questions—ones which bore no relation to those that Eustis thought were being translated for him—he had to think up answers for Eustis, mixing fiction with a few odd facts that he had wisely withheld from the written report. So Eustis would ask about one Russian’s apparent ascendancy over another, Russell would translate this as a question about Merzhanov’s army training, and then turn the Russian’s description of a Soviet boot camp into a probable consequence of the recent Soviet intelligence reorganisations, which he knew about from Shchepkin’s endless complaints.
Eustis never suspected a thing—he was, thank God, so used to their way of working together—but Merzhanov became increasingly baffled by the Americans’ apparently bottomless appetite for irrelevant details of his earlier life, and clearly puzzled by some of the unfamiliar Russian names which cropped up in Russell’s English translations. By Wednesday morning Russell was silently praying for his colleague to run out of questions.
He did so soon after eleven A.M., which gave them the rest of the morning to polish their report, before presenting it to Johannsen early that afternoon. Their boss was sparing in his praise—why hadn’t they told him straight away about the MGB plants in F
rankfurt?—but Russell suspected he was more pleased than he let on. The three of them were all CIC veterans, and Johannsen would make damn sure their new CIA bosses were aware of that fact.
That however was the end of the good news. When Russell asked permission to move Merzhanov on, he was told ‘not yet’—Johannsen thought the Frankfurt base would want to ask some questions of their own once they heard about the plants. As for sending Merzhanov and ‘his wife’ down the Rat Line, BOB simply couldn’t afford it—the quarterly budget had all been spent. And if all that wasn’t enough, Johannsen let slip that Don Stafford, the base’s other Russian speaker, was already back in Berlin.
‘But not working this week?’ Russell said, barely managing to keep the anxiety out of his voice.
‘Oh he’s working. He’s on Claptrap and the cleaners for the next few days.’
By the time he met Shchepkin, Russell’s panic had subsided. Before leaving the Föhrenweg building he had heard from Johannsen that Frankfurt would be on the line next morning, and that once their questions had been answered Merzhanov would be allowed to leave Berlin. Which left Stafford and the money as the next hurdles to overcome. Since Stafford was out in Steglitz dealing with Claptrap he shouldn’t present any immediate problem, but the lack of money certainly did. Russell and Effi didn’t have $3,000, and he very much doubted whether Thomas did either.
‘I thought you told me that only some people paid for this Croat’s services,’ Shchepkin said, once the problem had been broached.
‘Only Catholics travel free,’ Russell told him. ‘And they’re mostly fellow Croats or OUN Ukrainians like Palychko.’
‘Couldn’t you pass Merzhanov and his girlfriend off as Ukrainians?’
Russell beamed at Shchepkin. ‘Why not? I could even have him tattooed.’
He got back home to find that the Czech Embassy had welcomed Effi with open arms. ‘They could hardly believe it when I told them I wanted to visit Císař, with a view to working with him—one official gave me heartfelt speech about how few foreigners appreciated Czech culture, and another wittered on about how international socialism moves in mysterious ways. Or something like that. Anyway, you just have to go in and sign something, and you can pick up both our visas.’
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