“I can’t stay in Berlin.”
“No. We’ll get you to the West.” Suddenly sure, now that he’d said it. “I have friends there. We’ll fix it, all right? Do you need anything else? Don’t open the door to anybody. Just me. Three knocks like that, okay?” He knocked lightly on the night table. “Three.”
“Like in a story,” Erich said and for a second he did seem like a child, tucked in, drowsy, trusting.
“Good night, my friend,” Alex said. His responsibility now. The last thing he needed. He looked down again. Not a child. An old man’s face, gaunt, a death mask.
Get out of it. Go down to the bar and find Brecht or some other alibi. But his mind was racing, planning. He felt in his pocket and pulled out a business card. Ferber. Happy to give him a tour. He’d need something to get them to keep Erich. Some chip. He owed Fritz this much at least. His stomach tightened, a dread he could feel rushing through him, like blood. Knowing he’d pay somehow. Don’t. And then the odd relief of having no choice, suddenly calm, the way it had felt standing up to the committee.
3
RYKESTRASSE
THE MAN WAS STANDING next to the statue of Gretel, his back to Alex, collar pulled up against the cold. A worker’s cloth cap and peacoat, slightly bent over, no longer young. Earlier there had been a woman with a dog but no one since, so it must be him. But how to do this? No password or coded signal, just turn up in the park. The fountain basins, drained for the winter, were covered with snow, the Grimm figures and the Baroque colonnade beyond like pieces of confectionary, but he couldn’t look at them forever. It must be him. Or just an old man out for a walk.
“Herr Meier?” the man said, barely turning.
“Yes.”
“You got the message. Good. Dieter,” he said, introducing himself. “We can talk here, there’s no one. You have a cigarette maybe?” A Berlin accent, brisk.
“What’s up?” Alex said, offering it.
“You, Herr Meier, what else?” He leaned in to light the cigarette. “You haven’t tried to contact anyone, I hope?”
“No.”
“Good. And if anyone tries to contact you, don’t respond.”
“Just you.”
“That’s right. Campbell’s orders. At BOB they think Willy was running you himself. Whoever ‘you’ are.”
“And the Russians?”
“If they knew, you wouldn’t be here. The two who saw you in Lützowplatz? No longer with us, alas. A rare distinction, Herr Meier. Unknown to the Russians, unknown to the Americans. How many in Berlin can say that?”
“If I’m so unknown why did they try to kill me?”
He shook his head. “Not kill you. Kidnap you. Maybe turn you. Trade you. Any possibility. But the point was to find out who you were. So they follow Willy and what happens? They still don’t know.”
“You’re sure?”
Dieter nodded. “A source there.”
“What about them? Do they have a source with us?”
Dieter sighed. “Well, they must. How would they know to follow Willy exactly then? So there’s a leak. He was right, it turns out.”
“Who?”
“Campbell. He wanted someone outside BOB. An independent contractor.”
“That’s you?”
Another nod. “So you talk only to me. Until he comes. That’s his message to you.”
“And what if it’s you, the leak?”
“Well, it might be. You decide. Do you enjoy such puzzles? Maybe you like to think the worst. Me, I like to hope for the best.” He turned to the statue, looking at it. “The witch wanted to bake her in the oven. What kind of men do you think they were, the Grimms, to tell children such stories? How the world really is. So,” he said, shifting gears. “It’s clear? You don’t contact anyone. Just me—if you can trust me. Come here for a walk. I’ll find you. If there’s something wrong, Peter will—”
“Peter?”
“The boy at the hotel.”
“His name’s Peter?” Alex said, unexpectedly thrown by this. “How old is he anyway? I mean, a child, how did he get—”
“My nephew’s son. So it’s safe. He doesn’t know. He thinks I’m working in the black market. So he’s training for that. It’s exciting for him. It’s what he wants. That’s the choice now in Berlin. Be a criminal or a spy. So, a criminal. I don’t blame him. The money’s better.”
“They why don’t you do it?”
The man looked at him, then rubbed out the cigarette. “You want to know why I do this? If you can trust me? So. I work for the Americans because they’re not the Russians. That’s the politics of it, nothing else. I used to think things. A better world. Anyway, better than the Nazis. Then the Russians came. They raped my daughter. They made me watch. Then they beat her—she was fighting them. And she died. So that’s my politics now. Stop the Russians. You think it’s wrong to use Peter? He doesn’t do much—messages, little errands. Those last weeks of the war I saw boys younger than him hanging from trees—traitors because they ran away from the Volkssturm. And then the Russians came. There are no children in Berlin.” He motioned toward the statues. “So maybe they were right, the Grimms. Come, walk with me.”
They headed behind the colonnade into the park.
“Have they asked you to do things?”
“Like what?”
“The radio, for instance. A talk. Why you chose the East. How it’s the right path for Germany, a united Socialist Germany. Maybe a literary interview. Whatever they suggest, do it. The more valuable you are to them, the safer you are. Don’t worry,” he said, suddenly wry. “No one will hear. No one listens to their radio.” He paused. “You’re in the Party?”
“No.”
“Join. Make them feel sure about you.”
“Brecht didn’t.”
“Well, he’s Brecht.”
Alex looked at him, amused. “That’s what he thinks too.”
“He’s a friend? Do a radio with him. The Kulturbund party, it was a success? Comrade Markovsky was there, I hear.”
“Yes.”
“So you met? And how was that?”