by Mark Dawson
Morgan slowed and parked the car against the kerb. Jimmy drove on, took the first left and parked. He opened the door and stepped out, hurrying back to the main road. Morgan was walking away from his car. Jimmy crossed over, looking straight ahead, and paused to fiddle with his shoelace as Morgan continued along the pavement on the opposite side. Jimmy waited and watched; Morgan walked for fifty yards and then turned on to a narrow path that cut across a patch of snowy ground to the entrance of a particularly ugly block.
The Wall loomed to Jimmy’s left, a brutal slab of concrete that reached high overhead. He knew that there was no way he would be able to follow Morgan inside the building; he was fortunate that he hadn’t been made so far, and to push his luck any more would be asking for trouble. He waited a moment to see whether Morgan would re-emerge and, when he didn’t, he retraced his steps to the payphone that he had seen on the street near to where he had parked the car and called the number that Mackintosh had given him.
29
Mackintosh took Jimmy’s call, noted down the details, and put the phone down. He opened his Rolodex, found the number for the Berlin Infantry Brigade, and called it. He had a brief conversation, left clear instructions, and put the phone down again. He left the consulate in a hurry, got into his staff car and headed east, fighting against his impatience and driving with the care and attention that the icy streets demanded. It would do him no good at all to slide into the back of another car on the way. On the other hand, he knew that his impatience was warranted; the building that Walker had described included an apartment that was known to western intelligence as a Stasi bolt-hole. If Morgan was going to run, they would exfiltrate him from there. And if they did that before Mackintosh arrived, then the traitor would be in the wind and all of Mackintosh’s plans would be for nothing.
He couldn’t allow that to happen.
He arrived in Kreuzberg and saw the red Audi parked next to one of the big blocks. The building was grey and uninviting. It was four storeys tall, pocked with mean little windows and communal balconies. The Wall was close, and anyone above the second floor would be able to look out over it, across the death strip and into the East. The building was as ugly as its neighbours, scarred with graffiti, its windows dark and unwelcoming. Banners had been hung from the upper windows, high enough to be seen from the East. One of them had an obscene cartoon of Erich Honecker and Mikhail Gorbachev.
Mackintosh drove on; he turned onto a side street and recognised the Mercedes that he had arranged for Walker. He parked behind it and hurried back on foot.
There was a small children’s playground on the opposite side of the road. Walker was waiting there, partially hidden from the entrance to the block. He saw Mackintosh and stepped out so that he could see him. Mackintosh crossed the road and joined him next to a broken swing, the seat hanging down from one chain.
“He went in there,” he said, pointing at the block.
“Has anyone else gone inside?”
“I haven’t seen anyone. Why?”
“There’s a Stasi safe house on the fourth floor.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because we had it under surveillance last year.”
“And you haven’t done anything about it?”
Mackintosh spoke with exaggerated patience. “What good would that do? They’d just move it somewhere else and then we’d have to find it again. It’s useful to know where it is so we can keep an eye on it.”
Mackintosh saw two men approaching them from the other side of the street. Mackintosh gaped at them, and then pulled Walker farther away from the street. The men stopped opposite the door to the block. One of them went inside and the other one stayed on the street.
“Who are they?” Walker asked.
Mackintosh didn’t respond; he felt a flash of anger that he thought might overwhelm him.
“Who are they?” Walker pressed.
Mackintosh paused until he had regained his composure. “The man who went inside is Axel Geipel. He’s a colonel in the Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung, the Main Directorate for Reconnaissance.”
“And?”
“He’s the most senior Stasi officer in West Berlin.”
“And the two of you don’t get on?”
“We have unfinished business,” Mackintosh muttered.
“And the one waiting outside? His bodyguard?”
“Yes. Probably from the Dzerzhinsky Regiment.”
Mackintosh took a step forward and looked at the building again. It loomed over them, a grim and disfigured monolith, hundreds of people—thousands of people—swallowed inside it. The second man still stood on the street, the tip of a cigarette glowing as he inhaled on it. The man stomped his feet against the cold; Mackintosh stepped back again.
“Morgan’s been in there thirty minutes,” Walker said.
“I frightened him—he thinks he’s about to be blown. He ran straight to Geipel, probably to ask him to activate his exfiltration plan. They’ll be getting him ready to cross the border.”
“So what’s the plan?”
Mackintosh frowned and rubbed his forehead. “We wait.”
“What for?”
“Backup. It should be on the way.”
Walker gazed up at the building. “What is it that you need from him?”
“I want to know who he’s working for.”
“And now you do—he’s working for Geipel. What else?”
“I want to know how to get to two people: Günter Schmidt and Karl-Heinz Sommer.”
“Who are they?”
“Schmidt is an asset I wish to recover. Sommer is a man I want to kill.”
“And once you have Schmidt and Sommer is dead, you’ll let me go home?”
Walker stated the impossible with such blissful ignorance it was almost charming. “If that happens I’ll take you home myself. You have my word.”
Walker nodded, turning back to the building.
“How easy will it be to get to Geipel?”
“He’s a Stasi officer. Not easy at all.”
“How many men do you think are inside?”
Mackintosh exhaled. “A small operational team. They’ll have Stasi officers in the flat—a couple, perhaps. Geipel makes three. The bodyguard makes four. Morgan makes five.”
“All armed.”
“The Germans—very likely. I doubt Morgan is.”
“Which flat is it?”
“414.”
Walker reached into his jacket and took out the pistol that Mackintosh had given him. “You got one, too?”
“No, James—this is too dangerous.”
“You have a better idea? They don’t know we’re coming. Come with me or don’t—it’s up to you. But I have no choice. I’m not doing a twenty-year stretch in Wormwood Scrubs. But I’m not going to do a twenty-year stretch in this shithole either.”
Walker put his hand with the gun into the outside pocket of his coat and set off toward the entrance to the block. Mackintosh reached for him and snagged his shoulder just as a car rolled slowly by them.
Mackintosh recognised the driver.
Walker saw the car, too. “Who’s that?”
“Backup.”
Mackintosh signalled for the car to turn down the road where he and Walker had parked and led Walker there to meet them.
30
Mackintosh opened the rear door of the car and got inside. Walker went around and got into the other side. Cameron and Fisher were in the front.
“Thanks for comin
g, lads,” Mackintosh said to them.
Cameron turned around and nodded at Walker. “Who’s this?”
“He’s working with me,” Mackintosh said.
“Who are you?” Walker asked, staring the man out.
Cameron eyeballed him right back. “You got a problem, pal?”
“I don’t know. Do I?”
“This is Walker,” Mackintosh said. “He followed Morgan for me. Walker, this is Cameron and this is Fisher. They’re soldiers. We’re all on the same side so, if it’s all right with the three of you, do you think you could shut the fuck up and listen to me?”
The outburst broke the ice. Walker looked satisfied and the two soldiers didn’t press things.
“Aye,” said Cameron, holding Jimmy’s eye for another beat before relaxing and sitting back in his seat. “Fine.”
“Soldiers?” Jimmy asked.
“SAS,” Mackintosh explained. “The Stasi ambushed us a week ago—Sommer and his men killed two of my agents, and nearly killed us, too.”
“And we’re not too thrilled about that,” Cameron said.
“They’re going to help us get to Morgan and Geipel.”
Mackintosh had kept in touch with the two men after the ambush. This wasn’t an official deployment. They would be court-martialled if their involvement in Mackintosh’s plan ever came to light, but they had seen what Sommer and his men had done—opened fire on unarmed civilians, executed a diplomat rather than take her in for treatment—and they said they figured payback was in order. Mackintosh had been grateful, and knew that he was fortunate. The two of them were experienced killers. They had both been on the SAS team that had wiped out eight IRA on-the-runs, Republican heroes who hid in the Irish border counties. They were the kind of men Mackintosh would have dearly liked to have on his team, but Bloom had nixed that and so he had been creative.
Mackintosh noticed that Fisher had a plain black bag on his lap. Fisher unzipped the bag and took out a small submachine gun. Mackintosh recognised it: a Heckler & Koch MP5-SD 9mm, the model with the integrated suppressor. Fisher removed the magazine, checked that the weapon was not charged, pulled the charging handle and locked the bolt. He inserted the magazine, slapped it home, released the bolt and then engaged the safety. His movements were smooth and practised, as though he were shelling peas.
There was a similar bag next to Walker in the back. Cameron turned around again. “Pass me the bag.”
Walker did as he was told and watched as Cameron prepared his own weapon.
“What’s the SP?” Fisher asked.
Mackintosh nodded to the apartment building. “Morgan sold us out—we know that now. He’s in a Stasi safe house on the fourth floor of that building with at least one other man, and probably more. There’s also a guard inside the entrance.”
“And you want us to take them all out?”
“Everyone but Morgan and a man called Geipel. He went up there ten minutes ago.”
“We know Morgan,” Fisher said. “Describe Geipel.”
“Thirties, six feet tall, black hair.”
“Wearing?”
“I didn’t get a good look.”
“He had a coat down to his knees,” Walker said. “Beige trousers. Black boots.”
“That’ll do,” Cameron said. “You want us to do it now?”
“Yes, please,” Mackintosh said.
31
The entrance to the block was set within a recess, with a wide porch extending its roof out over the pavement. Cameron and Fisher went first, with Mackintosh and Walker a few feet behind them. Mackintosh saw the bodyguard who had delivered Geipel standing just inside the door. He was big, well over six feet tall and heavy with it. Mackintosh saw a flash of orange as he put a lighter to the cigarette in his mouth; the man put his back against the wall and inhaled.
Mackintosh turned to check behind him. Walker was there, ten paces back. There was no one else on the street. No one ahead, either. The only man he could see was the guard outside the building. The two soldiers slowed down. A car turned into the street. They waited until it had passed by before picking up the pace again.
Cameron reached the building first. The guard’s head turned as he heard the sound of his boots. The man looked him up and down, his cigarette poised to go back to his lips.
“Excuse me,” Cameron said.
He used English and the man’s forehead crinkled in confusion. Cameron drove the butt of the MP5 into the man’s face. He stumbled back, defenceless, and Cameron followed up. He grabbed the man by the scruff of the neck and brought the butt of the gun down, cracking it against his skull. The guard slumped forward; Fisher came forward and helped support the man’s weight. Cameron slipped around behind him so that he could loop his arms beneath the guard’s arms and they dragged him inside.
Mackintosh followed them into the lobby and looked around: it was wrecked, with paint peeling from the walls, puddles of water, and piles of trash that had gathered around the edges of the space, rustling in the wind that blew in through broken windows. Cameron dragged the guard across the floor, his heels scraping twin trails through the grimy slush that had been trodden inside.
Mackintosh quickly scanned the rest of the lobby. There were elevators, but the doors were covered with wooden boards. The fire escape was to the left, a set of stairs that ascended to the other floors. Cameron dragged the man through the door to a half landing where he would be out of sight of passers-by, and dropped him there.
“Ready?” Cameron said.
Mackintosh nodded.
“We’ll take the stairs. Walker—stay here with this guy. Keep him quiet. We won’t be long.”
Walker nodded.
Cameron turned to Mackintosh. “Do you have your weapon?”
Mackintosh opened his jacket to show his holstered Beretta.
“Take it out. We’ll go in first, but don’t hesitate if you need to use it.”
“Understood.”
“Let’s go.”
Cameron and Fisher started to climb with Mackintosh close behind them.
First floor.
Second floor.
Third floor.
They reached the fourth floor. There was a door and he pushed it open and stepped through onto the corridor beyond. There were windows along the right-hand side of the corridor. Mackintosh glanced through the first one that he reached and saw the Wall, the death strip and the watchtower that he had seen from the street. There were two guards in the watchtower, both armed with rifles.
The left-hand side of the corridor had a number of doors set along it. Cameron reached the first one, saw that it had the number 400, and then continued along until he reached 414. He paused outside the door and leaned closer so that he might be able to listen to the noises from inside. Mackintosh listened, too. He thought that he could distinguish three separate speakers: Morgan, Geipel and one other?
Cameron raised his hand and held up three fingers, confirming Mackintosh’s count. The soldier held the MP5-SD in both hands, right hand on the pistol grip and left hand cradling the receiver, took a step to the right, and then turned so that he was just off square with the door. Fisher came up and stood next to him, straight on with the door handle.
Cameron whispered: “Three, two, one, breach.”
Fisher drew back his right foot and kicked the door just beneath the handle.
The thin plywood splintered around the lock and the door flew back into the apartment. Cameron aimed forward, his elbows bent slightly. Mackintosh was in the corridor and couldn’t see inside, but he heard the report of the
MP5-SD as Cameron fired it. The suppressor deadened the sound a little, but it was still loud. There was a short pause and then the gun chattered again.
“Clear,” Cameron said.
Fisher went in next, and Mackintosh followed. He scanned his immediate surroundings. He was in a sitting room: there was a large window directly ahead and a door to his right. There was a beige sofa and two matching armchairs to his left and a coffee table to the right. The apartment was heated with coal that was burned in a free-standing ceramic oven. Cameron saw a pile of dusty briquettes in the space next to the window.
There were three men in the room: Geipel was sitting on the armchair at Mackintosh’s nine and two men he didn’t recognise were on the sofa at his eleven. Both of those men had been shot. Cameron’s gun was aimed at Geipel.
“How many others?” Cameron asked in German.
“One,” Geipel replied, his eyes going to the only other door that led off the sitting room.
Morgan was the only man who was unaccounted for.
Fisher approached the door. “Come out,” he called.
The door flew open to reveal a small, unpleasant bathroom. Morgan was standing there, a small pistol in his hand. He was four feet away and couldn’t miss. Fisher fired a three-shot burst and all three rounds found their mark. Morgan was struck in the throat and chest, a cascade of blood splashing out to spray over the stained porcelain and the dirty tiled floor. He fell back, stumbling over the toilet bowl and yanking down the mildewed shower curtain as he slumped to the floor.
