Deep Undercover

by Jack Barsky

  The signals were simple shapes, such as a circle, a line, and a plus sign, among others. Each symbol had a different meaning: come to meeting, container deposited, container retrieved, or radio transmission received. The most ominous signal was a red dot, which meant danger—run!

  I was also given a special route in Brooklyn designed for surveillance detection. This route was laid out in such a way that a resident agent could observe me and any individuals who might be tailing me.

  During one of Sergej’s visits to check my progress, he said, “You know, if I had your talent for language, I’d go undercover too.”

  “You would?” It had never occurred to me to wonder what Sergej wished or wanted to do. He was just my easygoing handler, who was always generous and nice to be around.

  “You’re going to become the kind of person that all the girls dream about.” He sighed, but there was a mischievous gleam in his eye.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I was at a movie the other day, a spy movie, and I overheard two girls who were seated behind me. One of them said, ‘I wish I could meet a guy like that.’”

  This made me laugh. It was true that I was about to be launched as an actual spy—and the aura of that could not be denied. However, undercover meant I couldn’t reveal my status to anyone.

  “Well, if I follow the rules, which of course I will, I don’t see how going undercover will benefit me in the same way it benefits James Bond.”

  We both laughed at this reality.

  Finally, the pieces were in order and I was ready to go. I had no one else to say good-bye to. Gerlinde was the only person in East Germany who knew where I was going and what I would be doing. The cover story for my family and a few friends was that I had made yet another career change—this time back to science. I was joining the agency Interkosmos 77, an organization of the Warsaw Pact countries dedicated to the exploration of space under the leadership of the Soviet Union. To give this cover credibility, the KGB provided me with an official-looking document stating that I was drafted for a five-year stint at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, a closed facility accessible only with permission from the Soviet government. This location was chosen to prevent relatives, particularly my mother, from attempting to visit me at my new place of employment, like she’d done in Moscow. I mailed this document to my mother, explaining the new direction I was taking.

  Next, I had to memorize the intricate details of a zigzag travel plan that started in Moscow and ended in New York City. These included specific airlines and flight numbers; meeting points and signal spots in Rome, Vienna, and Mexico City; and the names and biographical information of the fictitious individuals named in the three forged passports I would use en route.

  “You have one last task,” Sergej told me, arriving with a large stack of postcards and stationery.

  “The letters,” I said with a long sigh.

  “The letters. You better get started.” Sergej gave me a sympathetic look as I groaned. “You just gotta do it.”

  This was the most onerous task of them all. Because I could not just disappear for long periods of time without some sign of life, I had to write a series of postcards and letters to be sent to my mother and my brother at random intervals to keep them abreast of “current events.” The letters were difficult to compose because all the content was pure fiction. I also had to give the impression that I had read—and was responding to—their correspondence with me, even though I had no way of knowing what they might actually write.

  Of the many lies I told during my undercover career, these letters were the most difficult. After all, I was blatantly lying to my own mother.

  In later years, to make the letters more believable, I switched to a typewriter, signed the typed letters in my own hand, and left space between the last typed sentence and the signature for someone at the Center to add a few sentences if they deemed it necessary. I also left a few blank signed pages, in case a lengthier response was necessary.

  Completion of the letters brought to a close the almost five years of preparation for my undercover life in America. After one more painful and frustrating delay—a bad wisdom tooth that could have really caused problems if it had happened after I was deployed into foreign territory—I was psyched up and 100 percent focused on the mission and the future.

  ON THE DAY BEFORE THE LAUNCH, Alex showed up at my apartment wearing an expression I hadn’t seen on him before. He was typically so arrogant, and yet today he was almost solemn.

  “Albrecht,” he said. “Or should I call you Jack already?”

  “Not yet. I’m still Heiner until I get to Rome.”

  He nodded with a slight grin and once again became serious.

  “Listen. You have received the best training we could possibly give you. You are well prepared, and I have no doubt that you will succeed. But the key to your long-term success will be the acquisition of the genuine American documents we’ve already discussed.”

  I nodded. The plan was to start with a library card, which should be easy to acquire without much scrutiny, then move up the ladder to a driver’s license, a Social Security card, and finally a US passport, in that order.

  “If you return in two years with a genuine American passport, we will throw you a big party,” he said.

  “What’s so special about the passport?” I asked.

  “Think about it. With an American passport, you can travel almost anywhere and return to the US at will. Then let’s say we send you to Switzerland. You could open a business there and make a ton of money. We can make that happen. Once you are wealthy, you can return to America and infiltrate the upper echelons of society. With wealth comes influence, and you could find ways to gain access to the movers and shakers and the political decision makers.”

  “Brilliant!” I exclaimed. This was the first time that anyone had spoken to me about a long-range plan. Clearly, my mission was designed to extend beyond just a few years in the States. And acquiring the necessary documents was the key to everything.

  “So, think passport first,” Alex said. “Then everything else you can do with regard to connecting with interesting people, or even collecting political intelligence, will just be the gravy.”

  As we discussed these things, the irony was not lost on me that I was to become a rich capitalist in order to bring down all the rich capitalists and create a world ruled by the working class.

  After Alex left, I went back into execution mode. Emotionally, I was calm to the point of almost total numbness. I imagined that astronauts felt this way right before launching into space, or soldiers right before battle. I took a long walk through a nearby park and reflected on my past. Gradually, I stepped through the stages of my life that had brought me to this most critical point.

  I thought about my family and friends but most importantly about Gerlinde. My tender love for her and the certainty that she would be waiting to eventually build a future together gave me great strength and solace.

  Sergej and a driver showed up at my apartment early the next morning. I had been up before sunrise after a rather restless night. Just as he had before my trip to Canada, Sergej checked my clothes and luggage for accidental giveaways from the East.

  Then, out of the blue, he asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Heiner Müller,” I answered promptly and without hesitation.

  “Where do you live?”

  “Hamburg.”

  On he went through a litany of questions that might be asked at various checkpoints.

  The one checkpoint where nobody asked questions was passport control at the Moscow airport. As was our custom, I slipped into the departure hall via the side door. Sergej held the door open but stayed on the other side. We nodded to one another and I was on my way—officially deployed as an independent operator behind enemy lines.

  The route I would take to the United States had been expertly devised to make it impossible to trace Jack Barsky, American born and bred, back to Mosco
w.

  My first flight took me to Belgrade, the capital of Yugoslavia. During the three-hour flight, I sat like a zombie, unable to do even light reading.

  I snapped out of it as soon as action was required. After retrieving my suitcase at the Belgrade airport, I boarded a bus to the railway terminal. There, I bought a ticket to Rome on a train scheduled to leave that evening. There were no first-class tickets available, so I regretfully purchased a seat in a regular compartment.

  The temperature in Belgrade was still summerlike, so I spent the two-hour layover outside the terminal sitting on a bench, smoking cigarettes and staring into space. Before boarding the train, I bought an English paperback novel, which served me well when the other seven passengers in my compartment turned out to include some rather shady characters. I was exhausted, but I didn’t dare close my eyes. My handlers in Moscow had warned me about pickpockets in Yugoslavia and Italy, and I was traveling with thousands of dollars in cash stuffed into various pockets—not to mention the all-important passport that I couldn’t risk losing. As the hours dragged on, the paperback certainly helped to pass the time.

  Upon arrival in Rome, I booked a room at a nondescript hotel near the Vatican and headed out immediately to indicate my arrival in town by leaving a chalk mark on a lamppost in a designated location. Normally I would have followed a surveillance-detection route before such an action, but I didn’t have a predefined route, and I was dog-tired after my overnight train ride. So, instead, I rather nervously broke the rules on the first day out on my own.

  The next stage of the plan was to meet my contact the following evening to receive a “virgin” passport, without a stamp from Yugoslavia.

  It was already getting dark when I left the hotel for the meeting. I couldn’t help but feel nervous walking on poorly lit streets in a strange city, with almost $10,000 in cash. But I also didn’t want to take the risk of leaving the money in my room. I walked from a busy area filled with the roar of cars and motorcycles to a quiet street where my steps echoed down the cobblestones. Finally, I approached the intersection near the north wall of the Vatican where the meeting was to take place.

  My contact was right on time. We exchanged code phrases and quickly swapped passports. I returned to my hotel under a different name, walked briskly up the stairs to my room, and locked the door behind me. Before going to bed, I rehearsed the cover story that went with my new identity.

  The next morning, I checked out early, took a taxi to the main train station, and bought a ticket to Vienna. This time, I managed to obtain a first class seat for the thirteen-hour trip, but even the relative comfort and safety of the first class cabin did little to ease my fears about losing my passport or offset my fatigue.

  It was wet and stormy when I arrived in Vienna, and the weather made it impossible to check for surveillance before I placed the signal indicating that I had arrived in the city and was ready for a meeting the next day. Even the umbrella I had borrowed from the hotel could not protect me from the driving rain. But with everyone scurrying about with heads down to avoid the rain, nobody paid attention to the tall, dark figure who stopped under a lamppost along Hormayrgasse, quickly looked around, and placed a chalk mark on the pole.

  I was afraid the signal might be washed away by the rain, but the next day my contact showed up right on time in front of a baby furniture store named Träum Schön (Sweet Dreams). It was an awkward exchange because the other man butchered the code words almost beyond recognition, but I walked away from the meeting with yet another identity. I was now William Dyson, a Canadian from the city of Toronto. I gave myself an extra day for rest and checked into a downtown hotel under the Dyson name for one night.

  On the morning of my departure, I took a cab to the airport and bought a one-way ticket to Mexico City on Austrian Airlines. The flight left that afternoon, but when we arrived in Madrid, an airport strike delayed the flight for an extra day.

  When I got off the plane in Mexico City, it felt as if someone had aimed a giant blow-dryer at my face and turned it on high. The contrast between the raw autumn weather in Vienna and the ninety-degree heat in Mexico was stunning.

  With five days to kill in Mexico City, and not knowing a single word of Spanish, I took the time to catch my breath from all the travel and adjust to the time change before the big event: my entry into the United States of America. During my stay, I received one radiogram from the Center; but when I deciphered the code, it contained only well wishes. There were no additional instructions that could possibly be given at this point. I wrote a report about my trip in secret writing and mailed it to one of my convenience addresses, but then for the rest of the time, I slept and sat in the shade out by the pool.

  After my short week in Mexico, I bought a ticket for an American Airlines flight to Toronto with a stopover in Chicago. For some reason, just before I left for the airport, I remembered Nikolai’s strange routine. So I sat down and observed a moment of silence—a prayer that was not really a prayer. My American adventure was about to begin.

  AT 7:06 P.M. ON OCTOBER 8, 1978, William Dyson stepped off an American Airlines plane at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago and proceeded toward Customs and Immigration. At 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday, October 10, William Dyson vanished into thin air.

  William Dyson is the only one of my fake identities I can clearly remember, because . . . well, it’s memorable. Dyson was supposed to be a resident of Toronto, but he had never been there, and never would.

  When I entered the customs area at O’Hare, I faced the most intense sixty minutes of my entire life. As I joined the long line for Immigration, my six-foot-three-inch frame rising above all the average-sized people around me, I felt as if I had a neon sign around my neck that said, “Watch Out for This Guy.” To any bystander, I was just a lanky fellow with European features, piercing blue-green eyes, and dirt-blond hair, but I was carrying two items that would have raised suspicion from even the most junior customs officer. In my carry-on bag, I had a high-quality Blaupunkt shortwave radio, and the pockets of my burgundy leather blazer were bulging with wads of crisp $100 bills totaling about $7,000. On top of that, my light-blue Samsonite suitcase was only half full, with an unusual assortment of clothes for someone returning from a trip to Mexico.

  I was prepared to explain everything about my unusual circumstances, and I had rehearsed it many times in my mind, but at the moment, I didn’t want to have to explain anything.

  I took a deep breath to calm my nerves, feeling certain that my thumping heartbeat and sweaty palms would be a dead giveaway. As the line inched forward, I was convinced that something about me would prompt the agent behind the counter to ask me to step out for some questions.

  Then it was my turn, and the officer waved me toward his desk.

  I stepped forward and handed him my passport.

  “You live in Toronto?” he asked, looking at me and then back to the pages of the passport.

  “Yes.” I swallowed hard and hoped he didn’t notice.

  “Are you in Chicago for business or pleasure?”

  “I just want to do some sightseeing before I head home,” I said.

  The immigration officer took one more look at me, stamped a page in my passport, and handed it back. “Enjoy your time in the Windy City,” he said.

  I walked forward, feeling almost ashamed for the near-panicky fear I’d felt during such a routine process.

  Customs was even easier. I had filled out the form truthfully, stating that I had $7,000 in cash. Apparently, the amount did not raise any eyebrows. Neither did the jumbled-up contents of my suitcase when the customs agent opened it to look for contraband.

  I was now officially inside the United States of America.

  As soon as I was out of sight of customs, I set down my luggage with a huge sigh of relief and lit a cigarette. It was perhaps the most satisfying smoke of my life. As the tension in my mind and body eased, I suddenly felt exhausted. All I could think was, I need to find a hotel. I need to get so
me rest.

  Suitcase in hand, I made my way out to the curb and boarded a bus with “Downtown” marked as its final destination.

  Once we entered the city, I spotted a sign for a Hilton hotel. Getting off the bus without hesitation, I walked into the lobby and approached the front desk.

  “Good evening,” I said to the young clerk who was standing there. “I need a room for the night.”

  “I’m sorry, but we’re all sold out,” she said in a tone that let me know she really wasn’t sorry.

  I stared at her in disappointment. “Really, you have nothing?”

  She looked at her board again, and with some hesitation said, “Well, there is a room right next to the pool area. We sometimes rent it out as a last resort.”

  “I’ll take it,” I said without asking any more questions. I desperately needed some rest.

  After registering as William Dyson and prepaying in cash, I followed the directions from the front desk clerk, walked to the end of a long hallway, and unlocked the door to my room. What I found was a normal hotel room, with one exception: The entire back wall was made of glass, which afforded a full view of the indoor swimming pool. This was not exactly the type of accommodation an aspiring undercover agent would find ideal for his first night behind enemy lines. I immediately pulled the curtains to cover the glass wall.

  If this had been a movie, my next stop would have been the hotel bar for a martini—shaken, not stirred. But this was real life, and as I sat down on the bed to rest my weary feet, it suddenly hit me: I’m in America, and I’m truly on my own!