“Go to the West?” He stopped. “Leave? You don’t understand what we’re trying to build here.”
“You’re building a prison. You just can’t see it. You’re one of the guards right now, so it looks all right to you. See how it looks tomorrow. If you’re dumb enough to hang around that long. Markus, I’m offering you a chance.”
“To be a traitor.”
“A chance for you and your mother.”
“Mutti? You want her to go to the West too? She would never—”
“It would be nice to think there was another way to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Make you see. Have you been out to Sachsenhausen? That’s where she’s been. Worse. It would be easier if you could see that, how things really are. But it’s probably too late. The hook’s in. So we have to take a different approach. You know how it works. Some leverage. Some pressure. Snap.” He made a closing sound with his fingers. “And you’ve got him. Like you had me.”
“So you’re blackmailing me.”
“And how does it feel? Ask Roberta. Ask any of them. Your GIs.” He cocked his head. “You’re finished there.”
Markus said nothing, staring, his mouth slightly open.
“I’m offering you a lifesaver. Grab it. Get your mother and go to twenty-one F?hrenweg in Dahlem. Now. Before anybody starts asking questions about him.” He looked toward the trunk. “Before your friend there starts telling people what an exciting day he had. You really think you can talk your way out of this one? Nobody’s that good. The Russians never blame themselves. They’ll blame you.”
Markus looked up, a point that finally seemed to hit its mark.
“Who are you?” he said, his voice distant. “I never thought, when you came—”
“Neither did I.”
“I thought we were friends.”
“Did you?” he said, suddenly dismayed, seeing Kurt’s little brother. “Then trust me now. It’s your best option. The only one.”
“You don’t do this for me. For you. To make yourself important. And then what about me? What’s my future?”
Alex looked at him.
“I don’t know. But at least you’ll have one.”
* * *
Dieter met him at the hospital lot.
“Where’s Campbell?”
“In there.” He pointed to the trunk.
Dieter looked up. “You?”
“Why would you think that.”
“I started going over things. After you left. Who else knew you were taking Erich to RIAS?”
“Only you. And Campbell.”
Dieter took this in, then nodded. “What are you going to do with him?”
“Take him back to BOB. I couldn’t just leave him in the street. After the ambush. You don’t desert somebody when he saves your life. Takes a bullet for you.”
“Ah.”
“He died for the Agency. Who’s to say otherwise? The Russians? They get quiet, times like this.”
Dieter looked at him, a smile at the corner of his mouth. “Amateur,” he said. “It’s lucky I was there. So you have a witness.”
Alex looked at him, a conversation in a glance. “Yes, lucky.”
“And did you find out? Whether he told them about me?”
“No. Sorry.”
“Well, but the odds are yes. And who risks his life for odds. You’re going out to Dahlem?”
“You want a lift? Markus may be arriving later.”
Dieter raised his eyebrows.
“I’ll tell you in the car. But I have one more thing,” he said, glancing toward the hospital. “I won’t be long.”
“I’ll wait for you on the other side. By the Gate. You don’t want to risk a border check with a body in the trunk.”
“But you risk it.”
Dieter shrugged. “And what do you want to do about Markovsky?”
“Can you get Gunther to bury him as Max Mustermann? The Russians love a mystery. Let’s give them one.”
“He won’t like that.”
“Nobody will ever know. Except you and me.”
Dieter looked at him. “And whoever killed him.”
“That’s right. And whoever killed him.”
“Another mystery,” Dieter said. “You ought to stay in this work. You have the nerves for it.”
“What, and work with you?”
“They’re all amateurs out in Dahlem. New to it. The Russians aren’t amateurs. For this one thing, they have a genius.” He paused. “You could be useful. I’d help you. You’re in this now.”
“I’m not in anything.”
“No?” Dieter said, glancing at the trunk. “Once you start, you know, it’s hard to turn your back. No one else understands how it is, what we have to do, unless they’re part of it too. It’s important work. You could be valuable.”
“Is this what BOB said to you?”
Dieter smiled. “No, I was easier. They got me for a letter. To wash my sins away. ‘A Nazi of convenience,’ that’s the phrase they used.”
“Were you?”
Dieter shrugged. “Everyone on the force. Now an Ami of convenience. You do what you have to do. Terrible things sometimes,” he said, looking toward the trunk again, then back at Alex. “You try to keep a piece of yourself. Something they can’t get. And then it’s over and you think, my God, I did that. I was part of it. So in the end what did you keep? And now,” he said, extending his hand to take in the car, the city beyond. “A new side. More things we don’t talk about. You think you don’t pay, but—you carry it with you.” He looked over. “If you go on with this work, keep something for yourself. Not just a piece. Otherwise they’ll take it all. And then you’re not good for anything else.”
Alex felt cold on the back of his neck.
“Well, my friend, better hurry,” Dieter said. “You still have a body to explain.”
* * *
Irene was sitting up, wearing a pink bed jacket, frilly, with girlish silk ribbons. She giggled at his expression.
“Elsbeth’s,” she said. “She dresses like a doll. So, finally. That strange man before. ‘Don’t leave the hospital.’ Why? ‘Wait for Alex.’ So now we can go?”
“Are you all right?”