“Tell me about the book,” I demanded.
“Yellow cover. Large writing and pen and ink illustrations, about this big,” replied the second babysitter, holding his hands twenty centimetres apart. He was a rotund corporal with fair hair and a brush moustache.
“And the subject didn’t have any other reading materials?”
“No, Comrade Second Lieutenant, apart from a newspaper.”
That made me sit up. Nobody had mentioned a newspaper before. “When did he read a newspaper?”
The corporal looked like he was going to scratch his head, but had enough discipline to keep his hands down. It took him ten seconds or so to answer. “After Hannover, before Herford,” he decided. “The sun was going down, I remember seeing the subject tilt the newspaper to the window to catch the light so he could see more clearly.”
I flipped my notebook open and checked the times the train stopped in Hannover: 1553, and Herford: 1659. The sun went down just after four o’clock at this time of year. Corroboration, of a sort.
“Tell me about the newspaper. What was it, East or West? Was he reading it or doing the crossword? Where did he get it from?”
Another pause while the corporal thought about it. “I don’t know, Comrade Second Lieutenant.”
I dismissed him and told him to send the other babysitter in again, but that one hadn’t seen Bruno reading a newspaper at all.
The newspaper could have come from anywhere. The explanation might be simple and innocent: another passenger had left it behind, or Bruno had bought it in the Mitropa cafe in Königs Wusterhausen.
And the not so innocent explanations? Bruno left the train at some point to buy the paper from a kiosk on the platform. The paper contained a message, it was passed on by another passenger—or even the conductor.
15
Berlin Lichtenberg
I wanted this report off my desk. The case wasn’t going anywhere and I had nothing to say that I hadn’t said before: there was no reason to suspect Bruno’s babysitters of selling him out.
At least I had enough new material to justify the extension; I had interviewed the two babysitters who hadn’t appeared in the original collated reports, and I had the new information about the newspaper Bruno had been reading between Hannover and Herford.
If Major Kühn was a bastard he’d throw the report back at me, tell me to track down the man who missed the train in Beeskow and order me to find out how Bruno had got hold of the newspaper.
I’d finished typing and was wondering whether to deliver my words of wisdom to the secretary before I went home, or whether it could wait until Monday. I slid it into a cardboard folder and was writing out the details on the front when Holger knocked and came in. I was bored and tired of the day, the last thing I needed was to let Holger drag my mood down even further.
But when I glanced up I had to take a second look. My friend was leaning over my desk, hands resting on the chipboard surface. His eyes glittered with energy.
“Drink?” I offered, wondering what had happened.
“Thought you’d never ask!” This was more like the Holger I knew.
I pulled the bottle and glasses from the bottom drawer and poured out a couple of measures. As I handed his glass over, Holger looked me in the eye and proposed a toast:
“To success!”
I met his eye and asked him which particular kind of success we were drinking to.
“Success in finding out what happened to Bruno, of course.”
I took a swallow of Doppelkorn and thought how to respond, but Holger started talking without any prompting.
“Have you finished the report for Major Kühn?” he asked.
“Wasn’t much to add.” I patted the folder in front of me. “But since you ask, when you were on the train to Cologne, did you notice Bruno reading a newspaper?”
Holger reached for the bottle and added a dash more to his glass, holding it up and raising his eyebrows in query.
“No, why?” he said once he’d had a taste of the schnapps.
“Just something one of the other babysitters said.”
“Between Königs Wusterhausen and the border?” Holger frowned.
“No, on the other side. After Hannover.”
“Listen, Reim: you’ve been good to me these last couple of weeks. I wanted to say thank you. Why don’t you come round for tea? Ilona would like to meet you properly.”
It was a gracious offer, and the thought of seeing Ilona again made me want to accept. But I declined. It wasn’t my thing, going to a colleague’s for supper, particularly not colleagues I was officially investigating. And anyway, I was wondering why the change of subject.
“No, you must come. I told Ilona you’d say no, and she commanded I insist.” He stood up and clicked his heels, as if he’d just received an order from a superior officer.
“OK,” I capitulated. “But only on condition you tell me why you’re so chipper all of a sudden. Last night you weren’t looking so optimistic.”
“I realised I had nothing to worry about. I’ve got you on my side, and you’ve already told the major that there’s no evidence against me. So why am I worrying?” He looked at his glass while he said this, the words and his tone of voice were convincing, but nothing else about him was. “Besides,” he continued. “I reckon I’ve got a lead on this mole.”
16
Berlin Weissensee
I arrived in Weissensee with a bottle of Russian Champagne for Ilona and a bottle of Schilkin vodka for Holger.
“Sovietskoye Shampanskoye!” Ilona cried when she saw the Crimean sparkling wine. She gave me a kiss on the cheek before taking the bottle into the kitchen. I heard the fridge door open.
“Reim, in here.” Holger gestured from the living room.
I went in and put the vodka on the dining table next to the Christmas tree. Since I was last here the decorations had been hung and the lights switched on. I looked at the twinkling tree, bright and colourful, and thought back to the only time we’d had one in our flat. My wife, Renate, had brought it home the first winter after we married and I’d made such a fuss about outdated Christian superstitions and the duty of Party members to agitate against such pernicious bourgeois traditions that she’d never bothered again. And now she was gone.
Behind me, the clink of a bottle told me I was about to get some of the vodka I’d brought. I turned around in time to take a glass from Holger and we looked each other in the eye as we threw back the alcohol, Russian style.
“With good vodka you need food—a slice of black bread …” Holger said in a mock Russian accent.
“Don’t overdo it—just hold it next to the glass,” I replied, hamming it up just as Holger had.
Holger burst into laughter, and I grinned, remembering the KGB colonel we were mimicking—he’d once given us a lecture on co-operation between the fraternal socialist forces for peace.
“Do they really say that, about the black bread, do you think?” Holger wondered as he left the room.
A moment later he was back with a couple of cold Wernesgrüner beers. “Hannes is at some FDJ thing so it’ll just be the three of us tonight. Sit down, make yourself comfy.”
Instead of sitting down, I went into the hall and turned left to get to the kitchen, pausing to admire the view as Ilona bent down to fetch some plates out of a cupboard.
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Could you take the tray in?” She gave me a smile that warmed my insides in a way vodka alone could never do. “You’re a darling—Holger would never think to ask.”
Normally, I’d never have thought to ask either, but for one of Ilona’s smiles … I carried the tray through, shaking my head at my giddiness.
I laid the table while Holger watched me with a smile on his own face, but it didn’t have half the effect his wife’s had.
“It’s very simple, I’m afraid,” Ilona said as she brought a steaming tureen into the living room and set it down in the middle of the table. �
�Just potato soup with sausage. Holger didn’t give me any notice at all, and by the time I got to the Kaufhalle, they’d sold out of anything interesting.”
Holger lit a cigarette as Ilona cleared the table.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that—why don’t you go out on the balcony?” she muttered.
Holger ignored her and offered me the deck and a box of matches. I lit up as Holger went to the living room door.
“We’re going to need a bit of peace and quiet here,” he called as he shut the door.
I sucked on my cigarette while I waited for Holger to make the first move. Whatever was coming, it was the reason I’d been invited for dinner.
“You found another couple of babysitters?” he asked.
I nodded and took the bottle of beer he’d opened for me. There was silence for a moment or two, then I told him how I’d found out about them.
“Funny thing is, your name was on the distribution list, so you should have known about them.”
“Must have missed that one.” Holger took a puff of his cigarette and followed it up with a swig from the bottle. “How long were they with us for?”
“Cologne. After that it was just you and Bruno.”
Holger looked thoughtful for a moment or two, then put his next question. “So you’ve interviewed all of us babysitters, right? What did the others say?”
If I’d been debriefing Holger a couple of days previously, he was now effectively interviewing me, wanting to hear everything I’d found out over the last week. I was uncomfortable about it, but I told myself that the reason I’d been so conscientious in this investigation was to clear my friend’s name, so it made sense to fill him in on what I’d learnt.
After the beer was finished and the vodka had made a reappearance, I asked Holger about his current theories about the mole. Whatever he’d found out had been good enough to cheer him up, so it was worth hearing.
But Holger wasn’t having any of it. “You’ll have to leave this with me for a bit—you know how it is, source protection and all that.”
“Just tell me in general terms.”
“Not possible. I’ll tell you about it as soon as I can.” If he was trying for reassuring, he hadn’t succeeded.
17
Berlin Lichtenberg
I handed in my report last thing on Friday, just before leaving the Centre, and since then hadn’t heard from Major Kühn. But my new department had finally taken note of my existence and I was ordered to report to Captain Dupski. The captain, a slight man with regulation cropped hair and a non-regulation stammer, provided me with a stack of files to tidy up so they could be archived.
The work wasn’t challenging, but it kept me out of trouble.
By Wednesday, I’d begun wondering why there’d been no word from Holger. Hadn’t he promised to tell me about this new lead he had on the mole? For the rest of the afternoon, in between comparing files and marking duplicate reports for destruction, I played around with the idea of going to see Holger, finding out what he knew. It irked me, all I’d done for him and now he was keeping information from me.
On the other hand, some instinct from deep inside—the self-preservatory one that I usually ignore—told me I’d done my part. I’d helped Holger as much as I could and there was no need to encourage him further.
It was mid-afternoon when my phone rang; I was to report to Captain Dupski.
“Kegeln,” he announced before I was even properly through the door. “You’re a bowler—says so here in your cadre file.”
“With respect, Comrade Captain, I’m a poor bowler.” It’s true, during my last posting with HA VI, I had been in the Kegelteam but only because some sort of social engagement with other members of the unit had been expected. They’d tossed balls around and knocked down wooden kegels or dolls or whatever they’re called and I got the drinks in.
“Well, as long as you know …” he paused to allow his stammer to settle. “As long as you know how to hold a bowling ball—we’re a man short and we have a match against HA II/2 tomorrow evening. We need to win.”
Audience effectively over, I left the captain’s office with instructions to see the Feldwebel down the corridor.
“Practice tonight at 1900,” he told me. “You know where the bowling alley is? Next to the barbers in House 18.”
Good job I didn’t have any plans for the evening.
Bowling was no fun, and that was no surprise. Maybe I could have used it as an opportunity to get to know others in my unit, but they were all best of pals, the banter had already started, there were wives and girlfriends to ask after and joke about. I was the new boy, only there to make up the numbers because Lieutenant Hötschelt had injured himself.
Things might have been different if I’d been any good at bowling, but my poor performance excluded me from the bawdy jokes about how Hötschelt had sprained his wrist.
So I rolled the ball towards the skittles, glad if I managed to make contact at all, and brooded over how scarce Holger had managed to make himself since the weekend.
The bowling alley was booked for the whole of the evening, but after they’d seen me in action, the team left me on the bench.
“Match tomorrow at 1900, doesn’t matter if you forget to come,” said First Lieutenant Willems, the team captain, after an hour. A dismissal if ever I’ve heard one.
I didn’t bother answering, I put my head down and left, walking down Ruschestrasse, turning right at the bottom and heading for the tram stop on Jacques-Duclos-Strasse. Without thinking about it, I ended up on the tram to Weissensee. Since I was already on my way, I decided to carry on and see whether Holger was at home.
“Comrade Reim!” Ilona greeted me with a kiss on the cheek. She seemed pleased to see me, and that was enough to make me pleased to see her. “Come on up, don’t let the weather in.”
I followed her up the stairs, I was pretty sure she was moving her behind more than she strictly needed to.
“Holger at home?” I asked as she let me into the flat.
“It’s Wednesday, Kegel practice night.”
“He’s on the team?”
“Big match tomorrow.”
Ilona was waiting to take my coat, and without thinking I slipped it off and gave it to her.
“Coffee?” she asked. “Or something stronger?” Was that a wink she just gave me?
Without waiting for an answer, she disappeared into the kitchen, returning a moment later with chilled sparkling wine, the Russian stuff I’d brought last Friday. “Let’s open this, Holger doesn’t appreciate Shampanskoye.”
Ilona came towards me, backing me into the living room. We went past a closed door, a poster of an album cover: the Puhdys’ Computer-Karriere.
“Hannes?” I asked, nodding at the door.
“Sleepover at a friend’s.”
“On a school night?” I asked, immediately feeling a little pompous.
Ilona had manoeuvred me to the couch by now, and with a gentle shove on my chest, she pushed me down.
“So, Comrade Reim,” she murmured. Then, in her normal voice, the one she used on Holger. “I can’t go on calling you Comrade Reim, that’s ridiculous. What do your friends call you?”
“Reim,” I said, looking at her bosom, just a few centimetres from my face. “Everyone calls me Reim.” She had her head tipped to one side, her soft hair fell over one eye.
With a smile, she held the bottle out for me. “Would you? I do think opening champagne is best done by a man.”
I popped the cork, and it bounced off somewhere behind the Christmas tree. Ilona had the glasses at the ready, and I drizzled the wine into them.
“When’s Holger due back?” I asked.
“Oh, he won’t be back before midnight. Sometimes he doesn’t come home at all after practice.”
I put the bottle down, and Ilona gave me a glass. She held hers up for me to clink, and she made her big eyes even larger, looking deep inside me.
“So, as you can see, we’re all by o
urselves.”
18
Berlin Friedrichshain
I skipped breakfast the next morning—my stomach felt like it had been force-fed sauerkraut; when I belched, the foul vapours even tasted of rotten cabbage. Add in the panzers rolling around inside my skull, and you’ll understand why I didn’t fancy my chances against a hard-boiled egg.
I managed a large glass of water, and in my book that counted as progress. It was enough to encourage me to head to the office.
I took the U-Bahn, a mistake that almost lost me the glass of water. The shrieking of wheels on rails was bad enough, but what almost did for me was the stink of the workers pressed into the wagon: body odour, stale sweat, musty clothes—all mixed in with the pervasive tang of brown coal ash.
Most passengers left the train at Frankfurter Allee, and I got off with a few other Ministry employees at the next stop. The climb up the steps to the road was the signal for the panzers to go on manoeuvres again, and when I reached the cold air of the street, I stood still for a moment, feeling sweat ooze from beneath the brim of my hat.
I’ve never believed in divine retribution, I leave that stuff to the bourgeoisie in the West. Crimean champagne and I had never got on, simple as that. But Ilona had been insistent. And that smile.
I groaned at the memory. Last night. Just too much Shampanskoye, I told myself. And the beer after that must have come from a bad batch.
I had no shame about what happened after the sparkling wine and the bad beer. Ilona had been in the driving seat and I had been a willing passenger. No, it wasn’t a guilty conscience about sleeping with Holger’s wife that was tormenting me—there was something else, pulling at the edge of my mind.
Must be the hangover.
Having safely reached my office, I broke the seal on my safe and took several folders out, opening them at random and spreading them across my desk.
I stepped back and considered the arrangement. It looked convincing enough. Sitting down, I leaned back and closed my eyes, hoping sleep would release me from my griping stomach and my rolling head.
Berlin Centre Page 5