The Amateur Spy

by Dan Fesperman

  “You are American?” he asked in English. He looked to be in his sixties.

  “Yes.”

  “Where are you from?”

  “Boston.” The truth was too complicated. And I was already wondering if this encounter had been arranged. I half expected him to thrust a folded message into my hand, but he kept his distance.

  “I live in America fifteen years. Houston. Exxon Corporation. Then Saudi Arabia for last ten.”

  Right across the desert from Amman. The coincidence seemed too close for comfort.

  “Dhahran?” Taking a guess.

  “Yes. You know Dhahran?”

  “Sure.” Another stop along the way during the Gulf War. “Can’t get a beer there.”

  “Yes, no beer.” He smiled and nodded. What did he want? “Where you go? You stop, drink a beer?”

  He nodded toward the café tables. Was he scrounging for a drink? But he was too well dressed to be a bum.

  “Sorry, but I’m on my way somewhere. Have to go.”

  He nodded again, seeming disappointed. I glanced over my shoulder a block later to see if he was following, or snapping a photo. But he was gone, or at least I couldn’t find him. I still craved a drink but was too wary to stop until I wound up back at the hotel, where I took a beer from the minibar. Then I telephoned the Grande Bretagne.

  “Mr. Omar al-Baroody, please.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  A few clicks, a ring tone, and then Omar’s voice.

  “Hello?” He had arrived on schedule.

  I hung up, walked back to the Grande Bretagne, then spent the next several hours peeking around the edge of a Herald Tribune. Either Omar had already gone out or he had decided to eat in his room. At any rate, he was a no-show. At ten I walked to a souvlaki place in Monastiraki, then returned to my room and laid out clothing and supplies for the next morning as if preparing for battle. Then I crawled beneath the sheets and shut my eyes.

  An hour later I was still awake, agitated by the idea that Mila was mere minutes away. She was probably drinking coffee after a late dinner with her aunt and cousins. They would be laughing around the table as they passed platters of pastries and fruit.

  It took only half an hour to dress and ride the Metro to within a few blocks of her aunt’s building. The apartment was on the sixth floor at the far end, and I easily picked out the balcony from my vantage point in the street. A light was on. She was up there—I knew it. My spirits lifted in anticipation, and I set out for the entrance.

  I had scarcely stepped into the parking lot when the main door, thirty yards away, opened with a burst of animated conversation. I stopped in the shadows, hesitant, while four people stepped into the glare of an overhanging streetlamp. One was Mila. She spoke Greek, and her fluting voice was quite a contrast to the despairing tones of our last conversation. This was the Mila who could charm your socks off.

  I was about to call out her name when I realized that the foursome was actually two couples. Two men, two women. If I hadn’t known better I would have guessed from their body language that they were double-dating, headed out for a late night on the town. The second woman was Mila’s cousin. The men were strangers. I opened my mouth to speak, but the words dammed up. Not now, something told me. Too awkward. Too much of a surprise in present company.

  By the time they had climbed into a car I was regretting my reticence. This was foolish, a product of my old insecurities about marrying a younger woman. For Chrissakes, she was my wife and we were in love. There was no reason she should stay cooped up every night just because I had temporarily deserted her for a nest of Middle Eastern snoops and fanatics.

  But it was too late. The doors slammed shut, the engine started, and the car rolled away while I remained in darkness. It turned up the street, taillights receding.

  It was about then that an engine started on a dark sedan parked across the street, opposite the parking lot. I hadn’t heard its doors shut, and its headlights remained off as it pulled away from the curb. More paranoia on my part? I didn’t think so. And at that moment I boiled over. Enough of this meddling in our lives.

  I ran into the street, making it just in time to stop the sedan. The driver slammed on the brakes and laid on the horn. I stepped forward, placed both palms on the hood and glared into the smoked windshield. The engine revved, but I didn’t budge. When you’ve been thrown to the cobbles by a mob in Bakaa you develop quite a tolerance for petty threats like this one. I slammed a fist on the hood.

  “Open up!”

  At first, nothing. Then the window on the driver’s side glided down, and a face poked into view. Young fellow. Short dark hair. Stupid sunglasses. He’d probably put them on for my benefit.

  “You must be Freeman. Mind getting out of the way?”

  The accent was American, right off the Jersey Turnpike.

  “Tell Black this has to stop.”

  “They warned us you might be dropping by.”

  “Enough! You tell him that. I know the stakes, but I’m doing my job.”

  “It’s like this every night, you know. With your wife and all.”

  “Did you hear me?”

  “Parties. Nightclubs. Same joints all the time. She gets around. Maybe you’d like to read the logs?”

  I slammed down a fist again and stepped around the fender toward the driver. As soon as I cleared his path the car roared forward with a screech of rubber. He still hadn’t turned on the headlights. I watched, fuming. When he reached the end of the block he turned right, just as Mila’s car had done. As if he knew exactly where to go.

  18

  My life as a full-time stalker began promptly at nine the next morning, when I arrived at the lobby of the Grande Bretagne with a folded newspaper and a foul disposition. It was the day of Omar’s appointment with the mysterious K, according to his date book. I had already fortified myself with three cups of Greek coffee and a sugary pastry after not getting to sleep until nearly three. Every time I closed my eyes I imagined the worst possible scenes. In some, Mila was pursued down darkened streets by the asshole from the sedan. In others she was in the arms of a Greek lover, slouched on a leather banquette at some disco bar.

  I opened a fresh copy of the Herald Tribune. Members of an airline flight crew offered additional camouflage, milling around their luggage by the revolving door.

  I kept thinking of the driver from Jersey. A liar, no doubt. Just trying to get my goat, which he had done with ease. He must have laughed for blocks. But what would I say now when I finally saw Mila? Warn her? Scold her? The elevator doors opened, and I glanced over the paper. Another stewardess, carrying a Styrofoam cup of coffee, followed closely by a pilot who wore a smug look that said he had scored. Love was in the air in Athens, and wasn’t that just my luck. I shook out my paper and angrily turned the page.

  Knowing Omar’s penchant for tardiness, I was surprised to see him bound out of the elevator at 9:45 for his 10 a.m. appointment. He carried only a rolled-up magazine—a recognition signal, perhaps?—and headed straight for the exit. I didn’t stand until he was pushing through the door. If he hailed a cab I would have to run for my scooter. Instead he turned left, still on foot, toward the five-lane bustle of Vassilissis Amalias Avenue, and by the time I emerged blinking into the sunlight he was crossing toward the parliament building and the National Garden.

  I barely beat the light, while fretting over the possibility that he would turn and see me. I had already decided that if he spotted me I would laugh and exclaim loudly at the joyous coincidence. He had always been a great believer in Kismet, and he knew I would also be traveling in Greece. He headed up the crowded gravel sidewalk, and I dropped back long enough to buy a pretzel ring from a street vendor. Was this the right distance, the proper technique? I had no idea. I knew only that I felt a little silly yet also a little scared, as if I should be watching my own flanks as well.

  Omar turned left some fifty yards ahead, disappearing through a wrought-iron gate into the green coolness of the
National Garden. When I reached the entrance I spotted him receding through the shadows of the trees, and I set off down a gravel path in pursuit.

  The park was a calm oasis amid the city’s smog and car horns, with a dense canopy of palms and casuarinas, and lush hedgerows. But the isolation made me stand out more. I put on a pair of sunglasses, feeling ridiculous but safer.

  Omar took a left fork from the main path. A wooden arrow indicated he was heading for the botanical museum or the park café. He almost never did business without a cup of coffee, so I was betting on the café. A horde of schoolkids approached from the opposite direction, darting and chattering like birds. Once they passed, Omar and I were practically alone, and I felt more exposed than ever. He paused next to a small brick building. Probably the botanical museum. A sign said it was closed for renovation. Omar seemed to be looking for somewhere to sit.

  I ducked left down a narrow path through a maze of hedges, while still catching glimpses of him through the foliage. He was lingering by the museum, a tiny brick building with faded green shutters and a terracotta roof. Finally he sat on a bench just to the left, looking nervous, watchful. Or maybe I was projecting my own emotions. The newspaper in my right hand was damp with sweat.

  I decided this must be his rendezvous point. It certainly offered seclusion. And with the building closed there was little chance that others would interrupt. The only sounds were the squawks of ducks and geese over at the children’s zoo. From where I was now I wouldn’t be able to hear a thing, so I looked for a closer position.

  In front of Omar’s bench was a patch of grass, so you couldn’t sneak up from that direction. To the rear of the building were more hedges, so I set out for them, circling Omar until I came up behind the building, just around the corner from him. As I did so, I heard a sudden burst of conversation. His contact must have arrived, but where had he come from? Only now did I bother to wonder if someone had spotted me creeping around.

  They were chatting freely. I wasn’t yet close enough to make out the words, but oddly enough it sounded like German. I edged behind a large hibiscus toward the corner of the building, angling for a peek. The bench was now about twenty feet away. Yes, the language was definitely German, and Omar had just come into view. He sat beside a stoop-shouldered man with a shock of silver hair and a black wool blazer.

  About then, someone fired up a chain saw over toward the zoo, so I had to ease closer to hear. Through the bushes I now spotted another bench that was behind the building, and far enough around the corner from Omar’s that they wouldn’t be able to see it. I squeezed through an opening in the hedge and took a seat, just as the chain saw went silent.

  I was now only about ten feet away from them, but still hidden. My German was rusty, but I made out a few words, especially from Omar, whose diction was painfully slow. He called the man Herr Doktor Rieger. Or Krieger, perhaps, recalling the “K” in the date book. The Herr Doktor’s accent was difficult to place. Austrian? Bavarian, maybe, with a few notes picked up from living abroad. Maybe he lived here now.

  Krieger said something about a professor, and then mentioned money. Omar clearly said, “Funfzehn Uhr,” or 3 p.m. What little I picked up during the next half hour didn’t add up to much beyond a vague combination of money, a professor, and another possible appointment. One problem was the German’s muffled voice. Was he a donor? If so, this certainly wasn’t the optimum place for writing a check.

  I slid down the bench to peek around the corner, realizing belatedly that now they would be able to see my shadow. I considered sliding back, but then the shadow would move. So I froze. That meant I was caught a few seconds later when the silver-haired man emerged around the corner and looked at me in surprise.

  Omar wasn’t with him, fortunately, but I had to restrain a gasp. I looked down at my newspaper and felt his gaze as he shuffled past, footsteps crunching the gravel at the deliberate pace of an old man. He was so close I smelled his aftershave, plus a whiff of wool and cigarettes. Then he cut through the hedge at the same spot I had used moments ago. It was the only way to and from my bench that didn’t cross in front of the building—the route of a sneak—and he must have realized I had taken it as well.

  Five yards past me, he stopped and turned.

  “Wieviel Uhr, bitte?” he asked in German.

  I looked up, feigning ignorance, glad that I had put on the sunglasses.

  He asked again, this time in halting English as he pointed to his wrist.

  “The time, please?”

  I tried to give my English a Greek accent.

  “Just after ten thirty.”

  “Danke. Thank you.”

  I looked back at the paper and listened until I no longer heard his footsteps. Then I took a deep breath, counted slowly to thirty, and stood. I peeked around the corner to make sure Omar was gone and then went looking for the German. At his speed he couldn’t have gone far.

  When I reached the main path I spotted his silver head moving toward the entrance Omar had used, and I walked briskly to narrow the gap. He turned right, as if heading toward the Grande Bretagne. But instead of crossing the boulevard he walked onto the plaza in front of the parliament building, where he joined a crowd of about a hundred people watching the change of the guard.

  I had seen the ceremony before with Mila. The tunics and tasseled caps of the traditional Greek uniforms were mildly interesting, and their high-stepping was mildly comical, like a Monty Python silly walk. But usually only newcomers watched, which told me that either the Herr Doktor wasn’t a local or he was waiting to see if I would follow, so I took care to conceal myself in the crowd.

  My new vantage point afforded a better look at his face. I guessed he was in his early seventies, and I found myself performing the old Israeli parlor trick of trying to calculate how old this German must have been during the war. Probably too young to have been a soldier. But definitely old enough to remember the postwar years of deprivation. Some of those Germans, I knew, had supported radical Palestinian movements during the 1970s, particularly in East Germany and leftist quarters of West Berlin. Maybe that was this one’s game. But why not just mail Omar a check? Why arrange a rendezvous in a city where neither of them seemed at home?

  The soldiers finished their business, and the crowd dispersed. The Herr Doktor walked to the curb to hail a taxi. A blue one pulled over almost immediately, and as he climbed inside I scurried across the street, still half a block from my scooter. A red light bought me a few extra seconds, and as I hopped aboard I saw the taxi angling up Panepistimiou.

  The best thing about riding a scooter is that you can easily maneuver to the head of traffic at every light. The worst thing is that all the other scooters do the same. Every green signal becomes a noisy scrum, and for the rest of the block it’s like traveling with a swarm of angry hornets. But I was able to keep an eye on the blue rooftop of the cab, and I soon moved to within a few car lengths. He continued six more blocks, passing the Court of Appeals and the National Library before veering left. After winding a few more turns the taxi dropped him at the Central Market, which was teeming with shoppers. I locked the scooter while keeping an eye on the Herr Doktor, then followed him inside.

  He had entered the butchers’ quarter. Although I am an enthusiastic carnivore, I had always been overpowered by this market’s smell of hacked flesh and its din of cleavers striking blocked wood. To my relief, he cut through a passageway into the fish market. The crowds made it hard to keep him in sight. Aggressive vendors held aloft huge, gleaming fish and shouted prices, while counter boys dumped new loads of ice.

  The Herr Doktor stopped at a table of zebra shrimp and held up two fingers. A boy moved into action, tossing handfuls onto a spring scale and then wrapping the order in white paper. The Herr Doktor couldn’t cook in a hotel room, so maybe he was a local after all.

  Back outside, he again hailed a cab, and by the time he got one I was ready to roll. He headed north, straight up Athinas through the hellish traffic of
Omonias Square before angling right up Marni to the open grounds of the National Archaeological Museum. I shot past while the Herr Doktor paid his fare, then walked the scooter back down the sidewalk as I watched him head up the steps beneath the entrance colonnade. Perhaps he was going to see the handiwork of his countryman, Heinrich Schliemann, who had unearthed the museum’s star attraction, the so-called Trojan gold of Mycenae.

  I entered the museum in time to see the Herr Doktor disappear up a marble stairway to the left, just past the ticket kiosk. I went that way, too.

  “Excuse me, sir,” a woman in the kiosk said. “Your ticket?”

  I shelled out the requisite price and bolted after him, but again the woman stopped me.

  “Sir, the exhibitions are this way. You are not allowed in the offices.”

  “But I have an appointment.” Then why had I bought a ticket? “I, uh, am accompanying the Herr Doktor. Doktor Krieger.”

  She frowned, but the name got her attention, and she consulted the visitors’ ledger, which Krieger must have just signed. I took the opportunity to lean over and double-check the name. Yes, it was Krieger, first name Norbert, although his handwriting was appalling. She snatched the book away, but not before I saw that his destination was room 212. The name of the person he was visiting had been illegible.

  “I am sorry. There is no other appointment with the professor listed. Would you like me to call him?”

  “No,” I said abruptly. “I’ll come back later.”

  I dashed out the door in flustered embarrassment, ticket still in hand, and then ducked behind one of the big columns to wait for Krieger to leave. It took nearly an hour, but he made it worthwhile. He was no longer carrying the bag of shrimp, and as soon as he strode into the sunlight he pulled a fat green envelope from an inside pocket of his jacket. He gave it a glance and thumbed the contents. It was a hefty stack of lavender paper, the shape and color of 500-euro notes. That meant it was an awful lot of money. At the street he hailed another cab, and his final stop came fifteen minutes later at a small hotel in Kolonaki. It was a far more modest place than the Grande Bretagne, and when he stepped out of the taxi I zoomed on past with a roar of the Piaggio.