Lehrter Station

by David Downing

  ‘From me.’

  ‘You will betray your country?’ Russell half-asked, half-stated. He supposed it had been implicit in all that the Russian had said, but he still found it hard to believe.

  ‘It doesn’t feel like betrayal,’ Shchepkin told him. ‘When Vladimir Ilyich told us that the Revolution had no country, I believed him.’

  ‘Okay. So that’s how we survive in the short run. But I’m still the juggler with tiring arms, remember? How do we persuade Stalin to leave me alone, and let you and your family go?’

  ‘That’s harder. And I can only think of one possibility – we need something on them which trumps everything else. A secret so damaging that we could buy our safety with silence.’

  ‘Is that all?’ Russell asked sarcastically. He had found himself hoping that Shchepkin had a plan with some chance of success.

  ‘It won’t be easy,’ the Russian agreed. ‘But we’ll be working for people with secrets, and trading them ourselves – we’ll have to keep our eyes and ears open, follow any thread that looks promising. It may take years, but I can’t see any other way out. Can you?’

  ‘No,’ Russell admitted. This one didn’t look too promising, but Shchepkin knew his world best, and any hope at all was better than none.

  ‘Then, let us work together. I will see you in Berlin.’

  ‘Okay. When do you expect me to start?’

  ‘As soon as possible. Once you reach Berlin, you will go to the Housing Office at the junction of Neue König and Lietzmann. You know where that is?’

  ‘Of course. But we’re counting our chickens a bit – what if the Americans won’t take me on?’

  ‘They will. But if by any chance they refuse, then come to our embassy here – I will leave instructions. In the last resort, we will get you there.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Now I must go – our train is at two.’

  ‘When’s the game – Saturday?’

  ‘I think so. The football is nothing to do with me – I check the hotels, arrange excursions, look at the police arrangements.’

  It was the first time Russell could remember the Russian actually volunteering information about himself. It seemed a good omen.

  Shchepkin made to leave, then abruptly turned back. ‘One last thing. I forgot to tell you. Make sure the Americans keep your mutual arrangement from the British – the NKVD have several plants in MI6.’ That bombshell dropped, he walked off across the park without a backward look, leaving Russell to ponder his brave new future. He wished he’d had one of those new-fangled recording machines, so that he could listen to Shchepkin’s reasoning again. Over the years the Russian had never been less than convincing, but Russell knew from bitter experience that some things were always spelt out better than others. What were the hidden catches in this scheme, he wondered. Other, that is, than the obvious one, that he’d need acting lessons from Effi to pull it off.

  He decided to visit the American Embassy that afternoon, while he could still remember the script. Working his way through the streets around the British Museum, he wondered whether Shchepkin declaring war on Nemedin was good news or bad. Letting himself get sucked into a war between competing sections of Soviet intelligence seemed, at first glance, like a poor career move. But it might give him room to manoeuvre, play off one against the other. Or give them both a reason to kill him.

  After lunch at his usual Corner House, he walked down Oxford Street and turned left at Selfridges. The American Embassy had moved to Grosvenor Square in 1938, and he had visited it several times since, mostly in connection with his own pragmatic adoption of US citizenship. The welcome had seldom been effusive – Americans might, as they sometimes claimed, be the friendliest people on God’s earth, but only when encountered on their home turf.

  He opted for the direct approach. ‘I need to see the attaché who deals with Intelligence matters,’ he told the young man on reception.

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then I suggest…’

  ‘He will want to see me. Tell him John Russell has a proposal for him.’

  The man gave him another look, and decided to pass the buck. ‘Please take a seat,’ he said, and reached for the telephone. Two minutes later another, younger man descended the stairs, and led Russell back up to a small office half full of cardboard boxes, where he laboriously transcribed every detail from Russell’s US passport. He then stared at the photograph, as if wondering whether he should sketch a rough copy. Apparently deciding against, he told Russell to wait where he was, and stalked off down the corridor.

  A quarter hour went by, and then another. It was getting dark outside, and Russell guessed that the Embassy was now closed for the day. A cursory investigation of the cardboard boxes revealed that each was full of Hershey bars. He pocketed a couple for the children, and, after another fifteen minutes had ticked by, a couple more for the adults to share.

  The young man returned, looking pleased with himself. ‘Follow me,’ he said.

  They traipsed down a corridor, and descended several flights of stairs. The unmarked basement room into which Russell was ushered had no ordinary windows, but a deep ceiling well in one corner offered proof there was still some light outside. The colonel behind the neatly-organised desk looked around forty, and none too pleased to see him. His head was as close to shaved as made no difference, and his face seemed equally short on sympathy. The grey eyes, though, were conspicuously alert. Not a fool, Russell decided.

  A folder bearing his own name was lying on the desk.

  ‘John Russell,’ the colonel said, as if curious to hear how it sounded. His accent was Midwestern.

  ‘And you are?’ Russell asked.

  ‘Colonel Lindenberg. The attaché who deals with intelligence matters,’ he added wryly. ‘I believe you have a proposal for me.’

  ‘Yes. I’ve worked for your Government before, and I’d like to do so again. In Berlin.’

  ‘Yes? Why now? We asked you to work for us in 1942, but you refused. What’s changed your mind?’

  Russell considered explaining his earlier refusals and decided there wasn’t any point – the reasons he’d given at the time would be in the file. ‘I think I have a better appreciation now of what the Russians are capable of.’

  ‘Because of what you saw in Berlin?’

  ‘That, and what I’ve read and heard about their behaviour in other parts of Europe.’

  Lindenberg was looking at the file. ‘The Soviets allowed you to accompany the Red Army into Berlin, and then refused to let you report from there,’ he said, looking up with a smile of disbelief.

  ‘That’s what happened,’ Russell lied. ‘I tried to tell it the way I’d seen it, and they weren’t having it.’

  ‘That I can understand. But they let you go, and you’ve written nothing about it since.’

  ‘That was the deal,’ Russell said with a shrug. ‘My family for my silence.’

  ‘If the Soviets know you that well, what good would you be to us?’

  ‘Ah, now we come the interesting part. The Soviets have asked me to work for them, and guess what they want me to do? They want me to offer my services to you.’

  Lindenberg smiled at that. ‘Okay, I can understand why they’d want a guy of their own in our organization, but why would they choose a journalist who they’ve just had to gag?’

  Had that been a knowing smile, Russell wondered. Did Lindenberg already know of his meeting with the Russians? ‘Several reasons,’ he answered. ‘One, there’s hardly a stampede of applicants for a job like that. Two, they think I’m competent. Three, they know I’m having trouble finding work here, and that I want to go back to Berlin. Four, they know from experience that they can buy me off. What they don’t know is that my family is the only thing I’d sell myself for, and they’ll be safe here in England.’

  Lindenberg picked up a pen and started rotating it through the fingers of his right hand. ‘Let’s go back to the beginning,’ he said. ‘You’re
telling me that your reason for joining us is a new-found resentment of the Soviets?’

  ‘I didn’t say it was the only reason. My motives are mixed, like most people’s. I want to do my bit, maybe not so much for the West as for Berlin. It’s my home, and it’s been through hell, and it deserves better than a Russian takeover. And I want to help myself. I want to work as a journalist again, and that’s not going to happen here.’

  ‘Berlin’s no picnic these days.’

  ‘I know. But if I’m on your payroll, I won’t have to worry about food and accommodation.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be living in luxury.’

  ‘Of course not. But it’s hard to do any job well if you’re spending most of your time huddled round a fire wondering where the next meal’s coming from.’

  ‘True,’ the colonel conceded. ‘So how do you see yourself being useful? As far as I can tell, your work for us consisted of reporting on the political loyalties of a few Germans and Czechs.’

  ‘And nearly getting killed in Prague for my pains. I don’t know, is the honest answer. I don’t know what you’ll want from me. But I do know Berlin, and I do know a lot of Berliners, quite a few of whom are probably working for the Soviets by now. And I know the Russians, more’s the pity. I think you’ll find me useful, but if you don’t, you can always dispense with my services.’

  ‘And all you want is feeding and housing?’

  ‘I presume you pay your agents.’

  ‘Ah…’

  ‘I only want the going rate. I don’t expect to get rich, which is more than you can say for most Americans in Berlin. If you need character references I suggest you contact Joseph Kenyon – I assume he’s still at the Embassy in Moscow – or Al Murchison. He was my boss in 1939.’

  ‘Murchison’s dead. He was killed in the Pacific.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that. He was a good man.’

  ‘I didn’t know him.’ Lindenberg’s finger brought his rotating pen to a stop, and gave Russell a thoughtful look. ‘I’ll talk to some people,’ he said. ‘Come back on Monday morning and I’ll give you a yes or no.’

  Russell stood and offered his hand, which the American took. ‘Have long have you been in England?’ Russell asked him.

  ‘Too damn long,’ was the predictable reply.

  * * *

  ‘Do you trust Shchepkin?’ Effi asked, after Russell had finished describing his meetings with the Russian and Lindenberg. ‘He was the one who got you into all this.’

  ‘I don’t trust any of them,’ was Russell’s instinctive response. ‘But if I had to choose between him and Nemedin – and I probably will – it would be Shchepkin every time. He’s still recognisably human.’

  ‘So we wait,’ Effi said. They were whispering in bed, ears cocked for any indication that Rosa was no longer fast asleep.

  ‘We wait for the Americans, but whatever they say I’ll be going – the Soviets will still want me there to check up on the comrades.’

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  The feeling of relief was intense, but did nothing to dispel the accompanying anxiety. ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea?’ he asked her.

  ‘Don’t you want me to?’

  ‘Of course I do. I just… I just worry. Berlin sounds like hell on earth at the moment, and God knows how difficult the Russians are going to be. At least…’

  ‘But it can’t be as bad as the last few weeks of the war. They’re not still bombing the place, are they?’

  ‘No, but…’

  ‘The only question in my mind is whether or not we take Rosa,’ Effi insisted.

  ‘Well…’ Russell thought about offering an opinion, and realised two things. One, that he could see advantages to both options, and two, that this was a decision that Effi would – and should – take on her own.

  ‘The film offer came today,’ she told him. ‘A motorcycle courier brought it.’

  ‘Did you look through it yet?’

  ‘A quick look, yes. It’s not the script, just an outline, but there was a list of the people involved. You remember Ernst Dufring? I always liked his work, and apparently he’s back from America. And the storyline seems intelligent – it’s about how the members of one family come to terms with what happened under the Nazis, and the various compromises they have to make as individuals. In fact it’s more than intelligent. It actually sounds worthwhile.’

  ‘It does, doesn’t it?’ Russell wished he could say the same for what the Russians had planned for him.

  ‘We need to talk to Zarah and Paul,’ Effi went on.

  ‘Together or separately?’

  ‘Together, but without the children. Tomorrow night?’

  ‘Paul’s out tomorrow. He’s going to see a Bogart film. He didn’t actually say so, but I think he’s going with Solly’s secretary.’

  ‘No!’ Effi said, almost leaping up in bed.

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘That’s wonderful.’

  ‘Let’s hope. But the family conference will have to wait until Friday.’

  * * *

  The next two days were cold and rainy. Russell went out walking whenever the rain slackened, and read when forced back indoors. No matter how many times he analysed his situation, he came to the same depressing conclusions. And Shchepkin’s hope of eventually getting them out from under seemed more fanciful with each day that passed. It would, Russell thought, take another Russian Revolution to set the two of them free.

  When Friday evening came round, and he, Effi, Zarah and Paul were wedged knee-to-knee in the small kitchen, he tried for a more positive presentation. The others knew the background to his current predicament, but he went through it again, from Shchepkin’s knock on his Danzig hotel room door in the early hours of 1939 to Lindenberg’s casual acceptance of his status as an experienced spy. Which he supposed he was – people living ordinary lives didn’t find themselves in illicit possession of Baltic naval dispositions, SS pesticide purchases or atomic research documents. He wished he never had, but there it was. He’d signed up to this long game of consequences, and more would surely follow.

  ‘So I have to go back,’ he concluded.

  ‘Have to?’ Paul asked quietly. ‘Couldn’t you – you and Effi and Rosa, at least – move out of their reach? America. Australia even. It’s not as if anything’s holding you here in England.’

  Russell shook his head. ‘I doubt there’s anywhere on earth beyond the reach of the NKVD. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life waiting for them to turn up.’

  ‘Neither do I,’ Effi said. ‘I’m going back too.’

  ‘Why?’ Zarah asked. ‘I mean apart from wanting to be with John?’

  ‘I’ve been offered a movie as well.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound like a coincidence,’ Paul said.

  ‘It isn’t. The Soviets have fixed it up somehow, but the film is being made by Germans, and I know a lot of the people involved. My problem is whether or not to take Rosa. I mean, there’d obviously be practical difficulties – I’ll be on set most of the day, and God knows what our living conditions will be like. But even if most of that could be sorted out, I’d still be taking her out of school, and back to a place full of terrible memories. And if I am going to find out what happened to her father, I’ll need to visit every Jewish refugee centre I can. Which would mean taking her from one dreadful place to another, raising and dashing her hopes over and over again.’

  ‘You sound like you’ve already made up your mind,’ Zarah said.

  ‘Perhaps, but I’m ready to be told I’m wrong. What do you think, Paul?’

  ‘I think she should stay here. As long as Zarah’s happy with that. I’ll do all I can, of course, but unless I give up my job most of the burden will fall on Zarah.’

  ‘It’s no burden,’ Zarah insisted. ‘If I had to I could manage on my own, and if Paul’s here as well… But I do think you should talk to Rosa,’ she told Effi. ‘Just in case. She’ll be upset, of course, but as long as you mak
e it clear that it’s only for a few weeks, I think she’ll take it in her stride. If I’m wrong, and she gets hysterical, then perhaps you should think again.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘And while you’re there,’ Zarah went on, addressing both of them, ‘can you try and find out what happened to Jens? I think he must be dead, but… well, I can live with the uncertainty, but Lothar… I think he needs to know what happened.’

  ‘What if he’s alive and we find him?’ Russell asked her.

  ‘Tell him… oh, I don’t know what to say. I don’t want him back, but Lothar does miss him, and we’ll be all going back eventually, won’t we?’

  ‘Probably,’ Russell said. It seemed the likeliest option.

  ‘Then if you see him, tell him Lothar and I are alive, and that when we come back Lothar will want to see him.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘But I think he’s dead,’ Zarah insisted.

  ‘If he isn’t, he’s probably in prison,’ Russell said.

  ‘Yes, of course. Poor Jens.’

  Poor Jens, Russell thought. One of the bureaucrats who had organised the deliberate starvation of Soviet cities and Soviet POWs. A mass murderer by any other name. And yet, somehow, ‘poor Jens’ seemed apt.

  ‘And then, being practical,’ Zarah added, ‘there’s the house in Schmargendorf. If it’s still standing, we should reclaim it. It is ours, after all. Mine, if Jens is dead.’

  ‘And my flat on Carmerstrasse,’ Effi said. ‘Thank God I only rented the one in Wedding. That’s just rubble now.’ She was, she realised with some surprise, beginning to feel excited at the prospect of seeing Berlin again.

  ‘And you must try and see Papa and Muti,’ Zarah told her.

  ‘I’m not sure I want to,’ was Effi’s retort. Both their parents had behaved appallingly when told of Zarah’s ordeal at Soviet hands, and Effi still found it hard to forgive them.

  ‘We have to try and set things right,’ Zarah told her sternly. ‘They’re old. And they don’t know any better.’

  * * *

  Russell and Effi’s imminent departure cast a shadow across the weekend, which cold wet weather did nothing to dispel. On Saturday morning Effi took Rosa aside, and told her, in as matter-of-fact a manner as she could manage, that she and John were going away for a few weeks. Rosa looked alarmed, but only for a few seconds, and once Effi assured her that Paul, Zarah and Lothar would be staying, the girl seemed almost eager to show how unconcerned she was. She was being brave, Effi realised, and wished with all her heart that there was no need. ‘We can write to each other,’ Effi told her, ‘and perhaps even talk on the telephone. And it won’t be long.’