A Shadow of Myself

by Mike Phillips

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ Liebl told him. George heard his breath wheezing. ‘I don’t want to hurry you. You can let me know tomorrow.’ He paused. ‘Don’t leave it too long.’

  The phone went dead.

  ‘What is it?’ Radka asked.

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ George told her.

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’ she asked angrily. ‘Your father’s only just arrived.’

  ‘It’s Joseph,’ he said. ‘I have no time to explain. He’s in trouble.’

  He walked out then, ignoring the sound of her voice calling to him, paused in the doorway of the sitting room and told Kofi that he was going to meet Joseph.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Kofi said, getting up.

  ‘No. No. You still have plenty to talk about.’

  That had been a couple of hours ago. George had driven directly to Liebl’s office in the Prenzlauer Berg. The neon sign was lit, but the door was locked and although he shouted and knocked on the glass no one appeared. He got back in the car, his brain churning, and drove to Joseph’s hotel. It had suddenly occurred to him, hoping against hope, that this might simply be one of Liebl’s tricks, designed to break his nerve. He rang Joseph’s room from the lobby, but there was no answer. Still moved by the fast receding hope that Joseph might suddenly appear fresh from a walk around the city, he approached the porter standing by the entrance.

  ‘I was looking for my brother,’ he said. ‘He speaks English, and he looks like me.’

  In other circumstances saying that would have given him a quiet pleasure.

  ‘Ah yes,’ the boy said, his eyes surveying George in a single sweep. ‘I saw him today. He was going to Kreuzberg.’

  Back in the car George telephoned Valentin and told him about Joseph getting into the taxi and where the boy said he’d been going.

  ‘Who do we know in Kreuzberg, a man who knows both you and Liebl?’ Valentin asked.

  George had been thinking along the same lines. Since the meeting in Prague, they had known that Liebl was getting his information from Gunther. At the beginning George had assumed that Gunther was merely one of Liebl’s many casual contacts. Later on, doing business with various other dealers, he had picked up hints which told him that Gunther’s connection with Liebl was something altogether different. As a Stasi agent Liebl’s style had been to intimidate or blackmail people into doing what he wanted. Nothing had changed. On their first meeting George had let Gunther know that he could lay his hands on as many objects as he could market. That would have been enough for Liebl.

  ‘Meet me in Kreuzberg,’ he told Valentin.

  They sat in silence for a few minutes, watching the front of Gunther’s shop. Nothing happened.

  ‘What are we waiting for?’ Valentin said. ‘Let’s go and take a look.’

  He dug into the pocket of his overcoat and took out the Beretta he always carried nowadays. Out of habit George had locked the one that Valentin had given him ‘for protection’ in the boot, and for a moment he wondered whether to take it with him, then decided that one gun between them was enough. Valentin pulled the slide back with a snap, checked that the chamber was clear and slammed the magazine in.

  ‘Okay,’ he said, draping his overcoat over the gun. He looked round and smiled at George. ‘I think it might be time for a little crude violence.’

  They got out and walked up the road towards the shop. The blinds were drawn down over the glass pane in the door, but they could see that there were still lights on in the interior. George turned the handle and pushed but nothing happened. He looked at Valentin and shook his head. Valentin looked around. The street was quiet. They had seen a couple of men coming out of the video store next door, but apart from that there was no one close by. Valentin swung the butt of the Beretta and knocked a hole in the glass, then losing patience, kicked a big hole in the middle of the pane and pushing the blind aside, stepped in. Following him in, George saw Gunther bending behind the counter. There was a clicking sound and a scrabbling of paws. A dog came round the counter, already running, the brown body streaking towards them. He was a couple of feet away in the seconds it took to see him coming, and Valentin, caught by surprise, without enough time to raise the gun and aim, shot him from low down by his side. The bullet took him somewhere in the body, throwing him up in the air and into a stand packed with military overcoats. For an instant he thrashed among the clothes, snapping and growling, then he came again, dragging his hind legs along the floor, emitting a sobbing whine, his muzzle dripping blood and gaping open with the lust to kill. Valentin took careful aim and fired again, blood spraying over the floor as the bullets splattered into the animal’s flesh, but the dog, relentless as a robot, didn’t stop moving, trying to drag himself forward, until the third shot. Valentin walked forward, took aim again and shot him in the head.

  ‘Arschloch!’ Gunther screamed. ‘Arschloch! You didn’t have to kill him.’

  His voice was high pitched. It sounded hysterical, and George realised, with a shock, that he was crying, the tears running down his face in an uncontrollable stream. He came from behind the counter and knelt by the dog. ‘Arschloch,’ he muttered.

  Valentin took him by the collar and pushed the gun under his chin so that Gunther was looking up at him.

  ‘You’re next,’ he said calmly, ‘unless you tell us what we want to know. We don’t have time to waste.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with me,’ Gunther said immediately. ‘Liebl told me to telephone and ask him to come here. I thought he wanted to talk to him but he sent two wrestlers to pick him up. I think they took him to Potsdam.’

  ‘Get the car,’ Valentin told George. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  George walked quickly up the road. If anyone had noticed what was happening at Gunther’s shop they were minding their own business. In this part of the city discretion was the rule, and short of a struggle out in the open, the other residents would mind their own business. It was a safe bet also that the neighbours were well accustomed to peculiar comings and goings in the junk shop. In this street if Gunther had been a Turk or Kurdish it might have been a different matter, but as it was the pavements stayed empty. George drove the car in front of the entrance and parked. With the blinds drawn and the lights out no one would notice the hole in the door until the morning, he thought, and if Gunther co-operated he’d be back patching it up before anyone could walk off with his stock.

  Before George could get out Valentin emerged from the doorway, pushing Gunther ahead of him. They got in the back and George stepped on the accelerator and took off.

  ‘Langsam bitte,’ Valentin said in an affected voice which was his ironic reprise of George’s habitual request for him to drive more slowly. ‘No one is chasing us. Langsam bitte,’ he said again, teasing.

  ‘Where are we going?’ George asked, pretending not to notice.

  ‘Potsdam. Our friend is going to show us the way.’

  Gunther had been carrying a tangle of leather straps and a coil of what looked like nylon clothesline.

  ‘What’s all that for?’ George asked him.

  Valentin held up the leather straps as if demonstrating a household product.

  ‘These are dog leashes. He says there are dogs there. He knows them, and he doesn’t want me to kill them. So he’s going to tie them up when we get there.’

  Valentin burst out laughing as he said this. In the driving mirror Gunther’s eyes blazed in fury.

  ‘What about the rope?’

  Valentin laughed again.

  ‘You’ll see.’

  ‘You didn’t have to kill him,’ Gunther repeated, his voice choking.

  ‘Yes, I did,’ Valentin told him. ‘We had these little bastards in the army, and I know what that clicking shit means. Killing him was the only way. So shut up about the fucking dog.’

  ‘Who’s Liebl working for?’ George asked Gunther.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Gunther said snappishly. He folded his arms and turned his tear-streak
ed face towards the window, looking out into the darkness. Valentin grimaced at George and put his hand on Gunther’s neck.

  ‘I don’t have time,’ he said. ‘And I don’t have patience. George is your friend. I am not. If you don’t tell us everything you know I’m going to squeeze your puny little neck. First it hurts, then you’re unconscious, then you die, but I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to squeeze you till you pass out, then I’ll wake you up and do it again.’ His voice turned reflective. ‘Of course, I may make a mistake.’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ Gunther snapped. He sounded more peevish than frightened. ‘I’ll tell you everything I know, but I warn you I know nothing.’

  The Russians had come to his shop a few days ago. He corrected himself. They were Georgians, not Russians, but it was really all the same to him. Liebl had sent them. They said that the paintings he’d been passing on belonged to them. They wanted to get in touch with the black Russian who’d given them to him. They only wanted to talk to him, they said. George heard the echo of Gunther’s terror, and he guessed that sending a couple of Georgians had been one of Liebl’s little touches, intended to produce precisely that effect.

  ‘How much did they pay you?’ George asked.

  ‘Nothing.’ He hesitated. ‘They said there would be a reward if I succeeded in reaching you. But I had no choice. They threatened to kill me on the spot and they meant it. These people are animals.’

  ‘What names?’

  ‘Names? I didn’t ask their names.’

  ‘So what’s this got to do with Liebl?’

  ‘Liebl said he would deal with them if I did exactly what he told me. Today he telephoned and told me to tell your brother you were waiting for him.’

  ‘What is this place in Potsdam?’ George asked.

  ‘It’s mine,’ Gunther answered.

  His father had been a wealthy businessman. When his family came West the state had confiscated the house and it had been used by one of the ministries.

  ‘The court gave it back to me last year. Liebl uses it sometimes.’

  ‘What for?’

  Gunther shrugged.

  ‘Business.’

  They were trundling over the Glienecker Brücke now and Valentin uncoiled the clothesline. He tied one end in a slip knot round Gunther’s neck, examining his work with a critical eye, as if he was getting him dressed for a party. Gunther took it calmly, looking ahead as they came to the end of the bridge and pointing the way for George, as if there was no one beside him fiddling with his throat.

  ‘What is that for?’ George asked, unable to contain his curiosity.

  ‘Our friend loves dogs so much,’ Valentin said, ‘I wanted him to feel what it was like to wear a collar. When we get there I’ll have him on a leash.’

  He pulled the line till it was tight around Gunther’s neck.

  ‘How does it feel?’ he asked in a considerate tone, but instead of replying Gunther turned to look out of the window, ignoring him.

  In a few minutes they were cruising slowly along a quiet street lined with high brick walls, the tops of swaying trees obscuring sight of the houses.

  When they pulled up in the drive the house was dark, but in the circle of light cast by the headlamps they saw the two Dobermans standing patiently, one immediately in front of the car, another by the door.

  ‘I’m going to let you out to tie up the dogs,’ Valentin told Gunther carefully. ‘Stay where I can see you. If you try anything I’ll shoot you and I’ll shoot the dogs, and then I’ll go in there and shoot your canary.’

  Gunther got out of the car with Valentin letting out the line through the window. He bent over and attached the leashes to the dogs’ collars. Then he tied them to one of the posts which marked the line of the drive. Valentin and George got out of the car, and Valentin tugged gently on the line.

  ‘You go first.’

  Gunther tried the key in the lock, but it didn’t open.

  ‘It’s bolted.’

  He lifted the big brass knocker and banged on the door.

  ‘It’s Gunther,’ he shouted. ‘Open up.’

  When they heard the bolts being drawn on the inside Valentin took up the slack on the clothesline and held it up with his left hand, tight round Gunther’s neck. With his other hand he pointed the gun. George had taken his Beretta from the boot of the car. It was a twin of the Centurion Valentin carried, but he held it down by his side, leaving the theatre act to his cousin.

  The door opened slowly. The man in front of them looked like a hulking shape in the darkness of the hallway.

  ‘Where are the others?’ Valentin asked. ‘Tell them to come here.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re the only one here?’ Valentin said. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Call them,’ Gunther said impatiently. He put his hand up, trying to ease the tension of the cord round his throat. ‘Call them.’

  The man in the doorway turned his head, shouted, and another shape appeared. Together they looked formidable and oddly flamboyant. They waited for a few seconds, but no one else came.

  ‘Is that all?’ Valentin asked.

  The man nodded, and Valentin motioned them back.

  ‘Walk in front of us,’ he said.

  ‘Do it,’ Gunther told them, and they walked down the hallway in procession.

  ‘Where is he?’

  No answer, then Gunther cried out in a strangled voice as Valentin twisted and tugged at the rope round his neck.

  ‘Show him. Show him.’

  At the top of the stairs one of the men unlocked a door and they saw Joseph lying slumped on the bed. George’s heart leapt. He pushed past Valentin, shoving the wrestlers out of the way.

  ‘What have you done to him?’

  ‘Relax,’ one of the men said. ‘Only sleeping pills.’

  George knelt beside Joseph to feel his pulse, and Joseph opened his eyes slowly when he felt George’s hands, a languid smile on his face. George slapped him lightly.

  ‘Come on. Can you get up?’

  ‘I was asleep,’ Joseph said, staring as if George was an apparition from his dreams. ‘How did you find me?’

  ‘Later,’ George told him.

  Joseph shook his head and began climbing slowly off the bed. When he put his foot on the floor a bolt of fire shot through his leg and he swayed. George caught him and held him upright.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘My leg. The fucking dog bit me.’

  ‘He won’t bother you again,’ Valentin told him. ‘The dog is dead.’ He laughed. ‘So let’s get out of here.’

  They left the room, George supporting Joseph with an arm around his shoulders. When they were out on the landing Valentin ushered Gunther and the two wrestlers in, then locked the door.

  ‘It will take them a long time to get out of that door,’ he said. He rapped on it to show how solid it was.

  ‘There’s a man downstairs,’ Joseph said. ‘He bandaged my leg.’

  ‘There’s no one downstairs,’ George told him.

  ‘He said the cellar. I want to say goodbye to him.’

  Actually the experience seemed like a nightmare, and he wanted to see the old man again to make certain that he was real.

  ‘This isn’t a social occasion,’ George said. ‘We don’t want to hang around here.’

  ‘One minute.’

  There was a door under the stairs. Valentin drew the bolts back and they went down into a basement which seemed to run the length of the house. It was carpeted and lit by a row of neon bulbs, the walls covered in white paint. A snooker table stood in one corner, three young Kurds gathered around it. They had dark skins and the beaky profiles which marked them out as having origins in the Middle East, but otherwise they looked like the sort of young people who could be seen in the streets of any Western capital on any day, each one with a cigarette in one hand and a cue in the other. At the foot of the stairs there was a sofa on which three women sat, dressed in black, headscarves drawn ov
er their faces. There were another dozen or so people in the room, and when the door opened they crowded round the stairs, then drew away at the sight of the gun in Valentin’s hand, like a flock of sheep huddling together. They were muttering and whispering, though, producing a buzzing sound, like a roomful of big lazy flies. Salim emerged from the crowd when he saw Joseph.

  ‘What’s happening, my friend?’ he called out.

  ‘Who are these people?’ Valentin asked.

  ‘We’re waiting for our papers,’ a boy in the corner of the room with a snooker cue in his hand called out in German.

  ‘Oh. Dokumente,’ Valentin muttered to George, losing interest.

  Joseph limped across the floor to shake hands with Salim. As he approached the group melted away in front of him.

  ‘I’m not going to hurt anybody,’ he said to Salim.

  Salim shrugged.

  ‘They don’t like men with guns. Anything can happen.’

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ Valentin said.

  ‘Good luck,’ Joseph told Salim.

  The old man smiled, but he didn’t reply. George tugged at Joseph and they climbed slowly back up the steps. At the top Joseph heard the click of the snooker balls, and looking round he saw that the refugees had lost interest and gone back to whatever they were doing, the buzzing sound of their voices rising. Only Salim was still standing at the bottom of the steps, and when he saw Joseph looking he raised his hand in farewell.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Slumped in the back seat, Joseph was asleep before the car had travelled more than a hundred metres.

  ‘That was too easy,’ Valentin said. ‘If he was serious we would still have been looking. I think he was playing with you.’

  George hadn’t thought about it, but as soon as Valentin said this he found himself agreeing. Sending a car for someone to keep a non-existent appointment was an old Stasi trick, and Liebl couldn’t have known that Joseph would be dumb enough to fall for it. On the other hand, even if his brother had known the call was a fraud, the attempt would have been alarming enough. This was the sort of psychological manoeuvre in which the Stasi had specialised. The message was that his family could be reached anywhere at any time, and Liebl would have expected him to understand.