VII
Fuelled by my irritation partly at my cousin, partly at myself, I decided to deal with whoever it was tailing me. He was about five seconds behind me. Although it was mid morning when most people were at work, there were plenty wandering the old streets, some tourists with maps and backpacks, the majority peering aimlessly into plate-glass shop windows. Any disturbance would rouse them out of their retail torpor and panic them.
Cutting through the old Nikolaiviertel down Propstraße, I walked briskly across the front of the St Nicholas church. At the corner, I dodged sharp left into the recess made by the lady chapel, slid across the brick and stone end wall and down the side into the shelter of the arched doorway. On an exact slow count to five, the brown-haired man appeared round the corner.
I held my breath, not daring to move, only hearing my heart pumping. The man stopped, panned around searching for me in the empty open space in front of him. Mild panic on his face, he glanced down the side of the chapel, not seeing me hidden within the deep door arch. He narrowed his eyes, then took a few cautious steps. I remained rock-still until he came level with me. Jumping out, I slammed into him, stuck my foot out and overbalanced him so he fell into the trees by the chapel door. I grabbed his wrists, secured them with nylon looped cord from my pocket. A few choice Germanic swear words were muffled by his face being pushed into the grass. Kneeling on his back, I glanced around, anxious to check we hadn’t acquired an audience. Nobody was looking. Cars puttered along, words and laughter from across the road floated in snatches, but no shouts or alarms.
I bent down and put my mouth to his ear.
‘Now, this can be easy or hard – your choice.’
He grunted.
‘Who are you and why are you following me?’
‘Verpiss Dich, blöde Sau.’
I smacked him round the head.
‘Language! Let’s try again and speak nicely if you don’t want to lose an ear.’ I jabbed his lobe with my pen.
He wriggled, trying to get up, but I lifted my knee a few centimetres and brought it down hard on his lower back, right on the kidneys.
‘Who are you working for and why are you following me?’
Another grunt but no words.
I fished in my inside jacket pocket for my new transceiver. Highly secret, and we were actively discouraged from using them in public, but I was well hidden.
Eight minutes later, a mushroom-coloured VW Beetle drew up by the chapel door. Two casually-dressed women jumped out, left the engine running, nodded at me and hauled the brown-haired man to his feet between them. Without pausing, they pushed him into the back of the car, face down on the back seat and drove off.
*
‘Would you care to explain why I have a Prussian national in my secure room?’ The Praetorian commander growled at me and jerked her head towards the observation panel in the door. She’d called me through to her room in the military office downstairs as soon as I’d finished preliminary checks on the brown-haired man.
‘I apologise for the inconvenience, Major, but he’s been tailing me ever since I arrived. He was being a hard case when I confronted him and I worried about causing a public scene.’ This military commander was definitely old school and very starchy. I stood my ground and waited.
‘Very laudable, but if we get stuck with a charge of kidnapping, we’ll be in the shit up to our hairlines.’
‘Believe me, I wouldn’t have called in for a security detail unless I had my concerns.’
‘What do you think he is?’
I glanced through the obs panel at the man now shoeless, tieless and coatless. ‘He can’t be police or security services. He’s not precise enough in his technique. And he’d be shrieking blue murder by now, insisting on calling his department. And he’s unprofessional enough to carry ID with him. Name of Ernst Beck.’ I’d found his driving licence in a concealed pocket in his coat.
Her eyes looked me up and down. ‘Well, maybe you’re more familiar with that side of things.’
‘Do we have any worthwhile contacts or liaison with the local police?’
She looked away. ‘Sadly not. Ever since that stupid bastard Melitus went on a drunken spree and smashed up three Prussian police squad cars, the best we’ve achieved is frosty – a vast improvement on glacial at the time of the incident.’
‘What happened?’
‘Melitus was my number two and when his promotion didn’t come through, he went on a bender.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘We have bi-monthly liaison meetings as before with a well-mannered inspector who makes copious notes but now stuff-all gets achieved. Even after we paid for all the damage.’
‘That’s a bit childish, isn’t it?’
‘Come on, you know with your background how they get huffy if you affront their sense of correctness.’
I pressed my lips together biting back my reply. I couldn’t help my paternal ancestry any more than she could, and the Prussian connection was two generations back, but the last thing I needed was her antagonism.
‘You can have the use of the room to interrogate him,’ she said, ‘but whatever happens, he has to be out of here within twenty-four hours.’
*
I nodded at the medic. She unclipped the lid of a plastic box she’d set down on the table and selected a disposable syringe. She stripped the cellophane packet off and picked out an ampoule. Our prisoner watched as she drew the pale yellow liquid into the syringe body. He strained against the handcuffs securing him to the chair. The fear shone out of his eyes, he opened his mouth, but said nothing. She depressed the plunger a millimetre and a tiny bubble of liquid escaped from the end of the needle. She glanced at me. I gave a tiny shake of my head.
‘Whoever sent you to follow me obviously doesn’t care what happens to you,’ I said to the man. ‘You’ve been here several hours and nobody’s come knocking. That makes you a freelancer or criminal.’ I scribbled some odd words on a printed sheet pinned to my clipboard as if making notes. It was a standard visa information request form, but he didn’t know that. ‘You have no backup or perhaps you’ve been abandoned.’ I leant towards him. ‘So why should you protect them?’
He shook his head and looked down.
‘Is it really worth it?’
He glanced at the syringe and swallowed.
‘Why don’t you start at the beginning when I went for that walk on my first evening here?’
He looked up, surprised.
‘Oh, yes, I know you’ve been following me all the time, but I became a little bored after a while and decided to end it.’ I snapped my fingers a centimetre in front of his eyes. He jerked his head back.
‘In the olden days, a Roman punishment officer would have beaten you to a mass of bloody flesh, drawn a few teeth and fingernails, lashed you and anything else he could think of. Some of them were quite creative. This is the twentieth century so we’re more civilised, but not that much more.’
I leant back in my chair. ‘I’m going to give you five minutes. After that, my colleague will inject you with a chemical which will not only make you talk but also make you feel sick as a pig for a week and destroy all possibility of successful romantic encounters for a month, even two after that. Think about it.’
I bent over the desk and pretended to write more notes, and ignored him. Glimpsing through my eyelashes from time to time, I watched. His eyes darted around the room and after a couple of minutes, he started to tremble. Small beads of perspiration appeared on his forehead. After four and a half minutes, I glanced at my watch and yawned theatrically.
‘Right, twenty-five seconds to go.’ I stood up and pulled my chair back. ‘You will excuse me, Ernst, if I step back. I don’t want to be covered in your vomit.’ I nodded again to the medic. She pulled his sleeve up, wiped it with a sterile gauze pad and laid the needle on his arm ready to inject him.
‘No,’ he croaked and struggled, pulling his arm back as far as he could.
‘No?’
He glared a
t me, then looked away.
‘I don’t know who they are,’ he muttered to the floor.
I signalled to the medic to proceed.
‘No. Wait! They post me a letter with a docket for the key to a box at the Anhalter Bahnhof. I pick up the key and my instructions there. I’ve done other stuff for them before. Deliveries, escorting, you know.’
I nodded my head. People as well as drugs and numbers, no doubt. Charming.
‘When I’ve made the delivery, the money’s waiting in the box a day later. I put the key in an envelope and hand it in to the left luggage for a docket and post that to a postbox address.’ He glanced at me. ‘All I found for you was a photo, a name and instructions to follow you and make a note of where you went and who you met.’
‘And how do you report back to them?’
‘I leave my notes in the box at the station.’
‘Never been tempted to see who picks them up?’
‘I did once.’ He shuddered. It was then I saw the ridge on his nose wasn’t a natural shape. I walked over to the table and picked up a buff-coloured notebook, read the jottings.
‘When are you due to report on me?’
He jammed his lips together, then glanced down at the needle still resting on his inner forearm. ‘This evening.’
*
Disguised as a respectable Prussian woman in a two-piece green Loden suit embroidered with formal black swirls at the neck, I drank my Kaffee as if I were a bona fide traveller. Clusters of tables and chairs lined the edges of the grandiose cream and brown marble booking hall of the Anhalter Bahnhof. Apart from the discreet advertisements, it didn’t look as if it had changed since the 1880s. The interior had been damaged in the Great War, but with characteristic Prussian thoroughness, the new government had restored it to its original appearance.
The heavy brogues I was wearing were making my feet ache, and I wasn’t altogether sure I’d be able to run after anybody in them. I’d passed under the portico at the entrance which looked like one from home, but it was fake; the building was in the pseudo Renaissance style they’d all loved in the previous century, with Prussian iron girders holding the classic facade together.
I raised my cup again and glanced at the block of private boxes. Ernst Beck had left his notebook in his allotted box and scurried off to the platforms clutching the ticket I’d given him for Munich along with a wallet stuffed with the new intra-Germanic marks. He kept glancing round like a frightened rabbit convinced a fox was going to snatch him and bite his head off.
I’d been there two hours and fifty-three minutes and I’d read every word of the Berliner Tageblatt including the stock market reports – it was that tedious – when I caught a movement by the bank of boxes. I eased my knees from under the table, ready to stand without making a fuss and carried on as if I was absorbed in the newspaper. A sturdily built man, probably in his forties, in a dark casual jacket and slacks over a roll-neck top, slipped a key out of his pocket and opened the door of the box in one smooth movement. He slid the notebook out, slipped the key into an envelope, stepped over to the left luggage counter and queued behind a student complaining about having to unpack the whole of his rucksack on the counter. My target slicked his hand over his thin hair that shone with grease and shifted his weight from one foot to the other while he waited.
I stood, grasped my small travel bag full of old clothes and crossed to the information kiosk where I intended to check the time of a fictitious train. From that angle, I’d keep my target in view while appearing to act normally.
The man’s turn came and he handed over the envelope containing the key to the clerk in exchange for a paper docket. He nodded to the clerk and moved away. I tracked him with my eyes as he headed for the front exit fifteen metres away. His pace was steady, easy to follow, but I didn’t want to risk him climbing into a taxi and me losing him. If I set off smartly, I’d get to the front at the same time. He might even hold the door open for me.
That thought making me smile, I turned and bumped straight into another human body.
‘Entschuldigung,’ I said, and stepped to the left. He mirrored my movement. I went the other way and he did the same. He smiled and shrugged. I glanced at the front exit. My quarry was nearly there. I took a wide step to my right to get round the idiot in front of me, almost too wide and nearly lost my step in my brogues. He put his hand out to steady me.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, get out of my way,’ I pushed past him and almost ran towards the tall glass door. As I grasped the thick brass handle and heaved the door open, I spotted my target slipping into the back of a private car. I waved my hand frantically for a taxi, but the last one was vanishing into the Berlin traffic. Hades, there was no other form of transport, private car, or trader’s van. Nothing. Not even a bloody bicycle. And my quarry’s car had disappeared.
*
‘If you hadn’t done so well with the silver people, I’d have you recalled and chucked out. You’re acting like a bloody idiot. Mind you, what did I expect from a thick squaddie?’
Plico’s face on the video-conferencing terminal was turning an interesting shade of dark grey. A vein running up the side of his round head wriggled as if it were a worm trying to surface.
‘One, why in Hades didn’t you report the tail to me? We would have assessed it and mounted a proper surveillance operation. Two, you had no right to use the Praetorians in the legation. I suppose you pulled some old girls’ act with the commander. Three, detaining a Prussian national illegally – need I explain? Four, taking no backup and no vehicle on the last leg was beyond stupid and, of course, you lost him.’
‘I only lost him because of some clumsy oaf not getting out of my way.’
‘Not good enough. Backup would have tailed him.’
‘Look, I’m sorry, but when you’ve stopped shouting at me and hold your breath for a minute or two, I’ll give you my side.’
He flicked his hand. ‘It’s done, let’s move on.’
‘But—’
‘Send me your report tomorrow and I’ll see if I can salvage something.’
I kept my hands under the table so he couldn’t see me pressing them together so hard they were nearly turning white. He was right, I should have taken backup and had a car ready. But I had to swallow it. You were only as good as your last mission. Mine was unofficial and I’d fouled up imperially. Never again.
‘At least we know he wasn’t official Prussian,’ I said to show him I wasn’t completely incompetent. ‘So who do you think was following me?’
‘The gods know and I don’t happen to have their telephone number.’
VIII
After Plico’s shredding, I’d stared at the blank screen in the legation communications room and taken some deep breaths to calm down. At least the terminal was in a private booth and I’d been using headphones. But it hurt all the same, especially as he was right.
The reception that evening at the Rotes Rathaus was sumptuous, generous and boring. At least half the Magistrat – the city council – were there as well as a crowd of trade officials. The austere columns, encircled three-quarters of the way up with bands of gold oak leaves and soaring towards the red vaulted roof, and the peppering of classical statues in the hall reminded me of home. And then of Marina.
‘Going well, I think,’ murmured a voice behind me.
I turned to find the first trade delegate, a glass of bubbling Sekt in her hand and a hint of a smile on her face.
‘Thank you, First Delegate, but it’s really due to the trade secretariat getting the right people along. I’m merely here to ease things along for my group in making those contacts.’
‘You underestimate yourself, Aurelia Mitela. A lot of them have come to see you. The Germanics all love a royal and you’re very close to the imperatrix.’
‘That’s nothing to do with me carrying out my job.’
‘I know that and you know that, but,’ and she nodded towards the Oberbürgermeister, ‘his calendar’s full for e
ighteen months, but curiously, he’s found a slot for tonight.’
Luckily, one of the Prussian commerce minister’s assistants came over to take us off for the official photos. As we dispersed from that set piece, my eyes hurting from the flashbulbs, I checked with the silver mine owners and refiners that they had found those people they’d wanted to meet. The Prussians were polite and smiling, even a little deferential, when I made the introductions, as the first delegate had hinted. Unnecessary, really; I was simply doing my job. I was trying to explain exactly that to a beautifully groomed and suited man in his thirties who gave me a lazy smile and shrug; he declared he didn’t need to work, so why should he? He gave me a puzzled look when I explained that unlike ancient imperial times, there were few free rides for anybody in Roma Nova. The patricians in particular had a duty to work and contribute to the state. But trying to get that through to him became the work of Sisyphus.
Prisca Monticola rescued me. ‘Ah, Third Delegate, could you help me with some introductions?’ She eyed up the exquisite creature talking to me and gave him a brilliant smile. ‘If you’ll excuse us, Herr Baron?’
She clasped my arm in a surprisingly strong grip.
‘He’s not really a baron, Prisca,’ I whispered.
‘I know, but he’ll be flattered. You looked desperate.’
‘He didn’t seem to understand the basic concept of work. Never mind that, how are you doing?’ People were drifting off politely bending over the first delegate’s hand and smiling their farewells. ‘Do you really want any more introductions?’
‘Mercury, no! If I have to try to convince another Prussian industrialist that a “sweet little thing” like me can run a multimillion-solidi company, I’ll burst. Gods, they’re so blinkered.’
I gave her a grin. She was in her late thirties, but looked younger with glossy dark brown hair cut in a gamine style. Her high voice made her sound fifteen.
AURELIA (Roma Nova Book 4) Page 6