I slid along the front of the bar, aiming to get a better view, and as I edged around a gaggle of Saxons, the Westerner looked up. He was about ten metres away, for a moment the lights shone directly on him, and as they switched to strobe, his eyes glinted, staring through me.
The strobe stopped, there was a second or two of complete darkness before the coloured lights returned, and at that moment, Merkur turned away. I was certain it was him, and I also had a strong feeling that he’d seen and recognised me for what I am.
I pushed my way back through the dancers, heading for the entrance. The teenager who had jostled me on my way to the bar saw me coming and got out of the way, his friends giving me ineffectual evils as I shoved past.
New Order died, and the heavy beat of our home-grown Mont Klamott took over the dance floor.
Out the door, past the cloakroom and into the storm.
19
Warnemünde
Merkur had looked directly at me in the disco. These things happen. But the look on his face, that wasn’t random—he had been waiting for me, for someone from the Firm to find him.
I angled my head into the wind to let it blow the stupid thought away.
“You’re getting old, Reim,” I told myself, letting the storm take the stupid words away, too.
But I wasn’t getting old, I was on the way up. I’d made a good start in my new department, I had a KGB officer offering help—I’d have a few more pips on my epaulettes before they were finished with me.
I shook my head, letting more wind in through my ears. Winter was making me meschugge. The endless grey more than the cold, it makes everyone go weird.
Or the Tote Oma—could be indigestion.
I turned away from the sea, allowing the wind to push me along the Promenade, past the tea pot café and the lighthouse, down to the harbour.
The wind followed me around the corner, both of us heading along the Alter Strom quay. I kept a hand clamped on my hat as I passed piled wooden crates and red-painted trawlers breasted up, their stays clattering and singing. Lines groaned and wooden hulls grumbled on the swell.
On land, snow lay around, hard packets of whiteness shining in the dim streetlamps, warning me to tread carefully. One slip and I’d be over the edge, freezing to death in the oily water, unless I was crushed between the quay and the hull of a cutter stinking of dead fish. I shook my head. Definitely the black pudding talking.
Slippery steps led up to the Fischerklause bar. I hung onto the railings and hauled myself past terraced flower beds heaped with snow. The door opened, a couple of men in pea coats and felt caps staggered out, followed by the smell of fresh cigarette smoke and stale beer. The door hung for a moment before it was caught by the wind and banged to. I stood aside, and the two fishermen pushed past, arm in arm, bellowing at each other in Platt.
I pulled the door open again and stepped inside, holding tight so that it wouldn’t slam.
The bar was narrow and not too long, booths lined one wall, a ship’s lantern hung above each table, and marker buoys, nets and large model ships cluttered up what little vertical space remained. Unlike most bars I knew, this one was only dimly lit, which made looking at the clientele bearable.
I found an empty booth—in the summer there wouldn’t be space for the likes of me, but on a Tuesday evening in the middle of winter, even I was welcome. I’d hardly sat down before a waitress bought a bottle of Rostocker and a glass. She marked the beer mat and left again, uninterested in whether I had a thirst for anything other than beer.
But beer was what I wanted, the bar was warm, no-one had paid particular attention to my arrival and I had a table to myself. I was beginning to like Warnemünde.
Only when I’d finished the first beer and my fingers had thawed out did I begin to ask myself what I was doing here. The idea of meeting the maid in a pub was wrong, breaking every paragraph and clause in the book. Not only was I meeting someone else’s IM, but doing so in a crowded public space.
And what had I been thinking of, turning up an hour early?
But it’s not hard to spend an hour in a bar, drinking and being annoyed with oneself. I know, I’ve had practice.
20
Warnemünde
At ten to eleven, I started to pay more attention to the door. The place was so small, it wasn’t hard to keep an eye on comings and goings—so far we’d lost two fishermen and gained what must have been half a brigade of fishwives. I could tell they’d just finished a shift processing fish at the Fisheries Production Co-op because they were still in their work-clothes, reddened hands reeking of herring.
At seventeen minutes past eleven—just when I was beginning to believe I’d been stood up—the door whirled open, sucking out the warm fug and admitting a young woman in a well-cut woollen coat, a scarf wrapped over her head. I kept only half an eye on her, wondering how someone from the West had stumbled upon this bar. But when she unwrapped the scarf and took her coat off, shaking wet snow onto the floor as she did so, it became clear that this was no Westler—under the coat she was wearing a domestically produced sheath dress in a chestnut, mustard and umber Argyle pattern.
Having hung up her Western coat and shaken out her loose hair, she turned to survey the booths. Her eyes met mine, and only then did I recognise her. The maid.
I stood up as she came over, trying to signal to the waitress, who was steadfastly looking in any direction but ours.
“You thought I wasn’t coming?” she asked as she settled herself across the table. Behind her, one of the fish workers was telling a story, the others snorting into their drinks.
I looked my guest up and down, admiring the transfiguration. As if sensing my distraction, the waitress chose that moment to make her way towards us. She edged around the fish processors, adroitly avoiding the stained and scarred fingers of the fishermen.
“Selters,” ordered my guest. I tapped my beer glass, but the waitress was already on her way back to the bar.
“You look …”
“Different?” she completed my sentence. “Feierabend. End of shift, it’s when I let the real me come out.”
Music was playing over tinny loudspeakers, Schlagermusik, sentimental ballads in German, a far cry from the synth-pop and rock I’d just left behind in the basement of the Neptun.
At the back of the pub, up a few steps in front of the bar, a handful of couples were dancing. I watched them for a second or two, then switched my attention to the fishworkers populating the seats either side of us. More had arrived, several were standing in the aisle next to our booth, too close for olfactory comfort.
“Care to dance?” I asked, watching surprise take up residence on her face. It was quickly evicted and replaced with a vague smile.
“You’re forward.”
It wasn’t a yes, but I took it as such. I stood up and walked around the table to take her arm. As she rose, I closed in and whispered: “Less chance of being overheard.”
She didn’t say anything to that, but she did come up the steps with me. The music had changed to slow, coastal folk sung in thick Platt. Probably about the loss of a mermaid-wife or a worm-ridden barge. Possibly both.
She came into my arms, and I steered her around the narrow dance floor. I’m not much of a dancer—it’s not part of my job description—but I did alright at avoiding her feet and those of the other couples.
“What do I call you?” I asked.
“You want my real name?”
I shouldn’t know her real name. If I’d gone by the book, I’d be meeting her in the company of her handler, codenames only. But this wasn’t by the book.
“I’m Borchert, Wolfgang,” I told her, using my current cover name.
“Pleased to meet you, Herr Borchert. I’m Anna Weber.” She leaned back far enough to offer me her hand.
I stepped away and shook her hand, then we danced in silence for a few minutes. Anna may even have been enjoying it. The song ended, the next one was just as wheezy, another schnultzy number.
“How long have you been at the hotel?”
“The Nepp? It’s my first season there.” She leaned back again, this time so I could see her wink. “You’re not local?”
“From Berlin. Up here enjoying the fresh air.”
“Are we fresh enough for you?”
“So far, all I know is that it’s damned cold!” I pulled her closer as I said it and she didn’t seem to mind.
We shuffled around the dance floor for a while longer, and I tried to think of something witty or impressive to say, but in the end I just decided she’d had enough of a warm up.
“Have you got the film?” I asked. I had other questions, but they could wait.
She gave me a look I didn’t know how to interpret, then: “It’s in a safe place, just as it should be, comrade.”
I should have taken the camera off her at the hotel. If she’d already passed the film to her handler there’d be a tug of war between the local office and Berlin over who got to see the negatives first.
“Do you still have it?”
She waited before answering, long enough for us to step from one side of the room to the other. “I still have it.”
“Bring it to me. Here, tomorrow. If your handler has any complaints, tell him to talk to ZAIG in Berlin.”
That impressed her, she went a little stiff in my arms. Maybe she’d heard that ZAIG has the ear of the Minister?
I let Anna Weber, chambermaid at the Hotel Neptun and part-time informant for the Stasi, leave first, watching her pull on her fancy coat, wrap the scarf around her blonde hair and set sail into the wild weather. I finished my beer and ordered a schnapps. When that was gone, I settled the bill and followed her into the night.
The streets were empty. Other than the bar, there were no lights in any of the windows. Just me and the roar of the storm.
But opposite, on the other side of the Alter Strom canal that sheltered the fishing boats, the ferry port was brightly lit. I stood for a while, observing with professional interest. There wasn’t much to see: buildings and walls hid most of the terminal from casual viewers, only the top of the linkspan ramp and an observation tower peeped over the wall.
How many locals and visitors to Warnemünde dreamed of getting the ship to Denmark? Right here in the middle of town, just a few paces from the railway station, the Gedser ferry came in twice a day. A reminder that we were at the edge of the world here, right on the border with the Non-Socialist Economies.
I looked at my watch, shivering as the wind found its way up my sleeve. The next boat wouldn’t arrive for another three hours, I wasn’t going to wait around just to gongoozle a train-ferry, no matter where it was bound for.
I turned my back on the wind and headed for my lodgings, hoping my decrepit landlady had left the door on the latch.
21
Warnemünde
I woke the next morning with a headache. A hangover? Not likely, I have to drink far more than that before my liver rebels. Which left Heimweh—maybe this was just how I felt when I left Berlin for too long?
I rolled out of bed, ignored the breakfast that the old biddy had laid on for me—matjes herring with onion in yoghurt sauce, but I did nearly stop when I passed the coffee pot, steam curling from the spout. I managed to keep my course and left the house.
The wind had died during the night, leaving still, crinklingly cold air. I stamped my feet as I went along and avoided the odd Trabant and Wartburg that were slithering along the iced roadway.
Once at the Neptun, I took a quick look at the breakfast room. It was barely seven o’clock, but the citizens of our Republic were obediently queuing for the first time that day while the Westerners were still tucked up in bed, safe in the belief that there’d be enough food for late-comers.
Returning to the reception area, I took a seat at the Round Bar in the lobby, making sure I had a good view of the lifts and the entrance to the breakfast room.
A coffee arrived, better quality than that my landlady would be serving up—this was the real thing, unadulterated and from real beans, the smell of it was enough to vaporise my headache.
I was on my third cup when Merkur appeared. The lift doors opened, and he stepped out, wearing dark suit pants, a golfing pullover and brown deck shoes. Close up and in the flesh, he didn’t look as time-worn as his photographs and video footage—he steamed along, no aches and pains slowing him. As he exited the lift, he took a brief look around the lobby, his eyes resting on me for a measured half-second before he disappeared into the breakfast room.
I checked my watch: nearly eight o’clock. I reckoned Merkur would take about half an hour over his breakfast before returning to his room. After that, we’d find out what his plans for the day might be. I looked at my expensive coffee, still half a cup left. I could make it last.
But Merkur left the breakfast room a minute or two later. He trotted over to the reception desk, looking neither to the left or right, and waited patiently while the staff dealt with another guest.
I left my coffee on the table and headed to the main doors, standing just inside and pointedly hitching up my sleeve to see my wristwatch, as if waiting for someone. I was only a few metres away from Merkur, close enough to hear his conversation with the receptionist.
“I’m afraid not,” she told him. “As you may have seen, the sea is frozen—only the main fairways into the Alter Strom and the International Port are kept clear—boat trips will start again around Eastertime. But perhaps I could interest you in a visit to the old city of Rostock? Here’s a map showing …”
Although Merkur wasn’t interested in the helpful advice, he was polite enough to wait for the receptionist to finish her recommendations. Then he asked:
“And the coast? How far can I walk along the coast? As far as Heiligendamm?”
It was the first time I’d heard his voice, and I was no expert on the dialects and accents of West Germany, but I’d place him from somewhere in the north-west of the country, possibly a hint of Rhenish in his speech patterns.
The receptionist stopped for a moment, long enough to wonder whether the information Merkur had requested was the kind she should be giving out—the coast was sensitive: Easterners wondering whether it was worthwhile trying to swim to Denmark would want to scout out sites to launch their venture; Westerners might show too much interest in the various military and border defence stations that lined the coast. “Of course,” she replied, “there’s a footpath this side of the dunes, but it’s too cold at the moment to go far—the next village, Diedrichshagen, is about three kilometres away. From there you can catch a bus …”
Merkur’s attention was wandering again, I could tell by the way he lifted his head to look at the hideous ormolu clock hanging above the key hooks.
“Thank you, I shall walk along the beach after breakfast—you’ve been most helpful.” He left the receptionist to fold her map of Rostock, and me to go back to my coffee.
22
Warnemünde
By the time Merkur finished his breakfast and went up in the lift, I’d killed my coffee and buried it with a few cigarettes.
I sat patiently, observing staff and guests as they crossed the reception area: the citizens on tip-toe, awed by the splendour of the luxury hotel; the Westerners, self-importantly pacing around, indifferent to the best our Republic had to offer.
Merkur appeared forty-seven minutes later, kitted out in sturdy winter boots, loden winter coat and a warm fleece shapka hat that he must have picked up over here. He exited the lift and nipped across the lobby, reaching the glass doors before the doorman had a chance to open them for him.
I watched through the tall windows as he took the steps down to the promenade, only then leaving my seat at the bar and hurrying after him.
Once on the promenade, it wasn’t difficult to see Merkur, thirty metres ahead of me, his long figure easy to identify between the sparse traffic.
I waited at the corner as he hiked further along the edge of the dunes. He didn�
��t stop to admire the sparkling hunks of ice stranded on the wide beach, nor look up to appreciate the flawlessly endless cloud. He tucked his head into his collar, and loped along at a pace a younger man would be proud of.
I lost him to corners of buildings that cut into my line of sight, and decided that was the right moment to fetch my car. But when I reached it, the Wartburg wasn’t in the mood to start. Several minutes of jiggling the clutch and repeated pumping of the gas pedal persuaded it to give the idea of firing a go, but even when it caught, it faded again unless I continuously nudged the pedal. I sat in the cold car, watching the heater attempt to defrost the windscreen while the engine finally settled down into a more regular grumble.
After scraping the frost from the side windows, I poured a slug of vodka on a rag and wiped the frozen condensation from the insides of the glass. Once I could see the clouds of blue exhaust through the thawing back window, I put the car in gear and headed towards Diedrichshagen, which as the receptionist had helpfully pointed out, was the next village along the coast.
According to the map, at the end of the Promenade, where Warnemünde called it a day, a footpath threaded between a thin strip of woodland and the edge of the dunes. Further along, I found a garden colony that might offer cover for a parked car, and with a bit of luck would do the same for a stationary observer, too.
Before going into the allotments, I walked along the fence, checking for winter gardeners. The colony was empty, no footprints showed in the snow that blanketed the pathways and vegetable beds. After checking the road was clear, I swiftly climbed the locked gates.
As is the way with tourist maps, the details were vague—a clubhouse was represented by a beer glass randomly placed in the centre of the allotments—but I found the building on the far side, just a few metres short of the coastal path that threaded through winter bare trees.
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