Brandenburg

by Henry Porter

  ‘We won’t be hearing much from them for a while,’ he said, taking the interrogator in an arm lock. ‘Right, you bloody toe-rag, show us where these U-boats are.’

  Outside in the yard nothing stirred as they made their way towards the van bay. Eventually they would have to pass through the office to reach the truck, but this wasn’t their immediate problem. The entrance to the U-boat cells lay across from the office and van bay, and they would have to pass through an area that could be observed from the watchtower some way off on Genslerstrasse. Rosenharte led the way around the corner of the old brick kitchen block, hugging the wall. Ulrike clutched his hand while the Bird followed with his arm hooked round the man’s neck. In the shadows of the old Nazi kitchen they could make out the steps sunk like a well on the side of the building. When they came to the bottom the Bird said, ‘Now get them to open up, you little cunt.’

  The interrogator pressed a bell and announced himself through an intercom. Immediately the door was pulled open and Rosenharte sprang inside with Ulrike behind him. One man, almost a caricature of the medieval jailer, was inside. He had protruding, expressionless eyes, a vast stomach and two or three days’ worth of stubble. He staggered backwards. On a table beneath a lone naked light was a pair of reading glasses, a newspaper, a large bottle of beer and a cigarette smouldering in an ashtray. Though the air was rank with mustiness and urine, Rosenharte could see no evidence of the cells. He moved to a low door below the spine of the building and told him to unlock it and lead them to Kurt. A look of awkwardness came into the man’s eyes. He glanced at the interrogator. ‘This facility hasn’t been used for years. He’s the only one here - just for the night, you understand.’

  ‘Take us to him,’ said Rosenharte very quietly, before ducking to get through the doorway.

  They followed the beam of the guard’s torch as it dodged along a narrow brick passageway. Overhead a number of pipes shuddered and made a dull clanking noise, but little else moved in the thick dankness of the U-boats. It was easy to imagine that they were submerged a mile beneath the ocean, locked in an isolation tank. The man stopped outside a door painted the same light blue-grey as the prison gates and turned a key in the lock, which allowed him to draw a bar across the surface of the door and tug it open. There was no light or sound in the void beyond. Rosenharte snatched the torch and, pushing the guard aside, went in. Kurt was propped against a stone ledge. His arms and legs were bound up in a kind of canvas jacket so that he could not stand, lie or sit. He was wet through and deathly cold. Rosenharte tried to undo the ties but realized he’d need more than one pair of hands. He picked him up and helped him into the passageway, knocking his head on the low ceiling several times in the process, and told the guard to undo the jacket. This he did, shaking his head with a look of theatrical remorse, as though he was as shocked as they were. The interrogator stared down without feeling.

  ‘Did you order this?’ demanded Rosenharte.

  ‘No, he’s not my prisoner.’

  ‘Colonel Zank?’

  The man seemed to nod.

  At length Ulrike helped Kurt to his feet. He stood naked and white in the light of the torch. He managed a smile, but was mostly taken up with trying to control the shaking in his arms and legs.

  ‘You,’ she said, waving the gun at the interrogator. ‘Take off your jacket and trousers and shoes and give them to my friend here - and that nice sweater too. Move it.’ Rosenharte saw real anger in her eyes, and fleetingly noted that although she had been treated badly too, and over a much longer period, she had no pity for herself. Kurt was her only concern.

  The interrogator undressed, dabbing at the cut on his head. Then Rosenharte pushed him into the cell, consigned the fat guard to the neighbouring hole and locked both doors behind them.

  Kurt could feel nothing in his feet and they had to help him up the passageway. When they got into the light at the entrance to the U-boats they saw that he had been beaten very severely. There were welts on his forehead and chin, and he was bruised on his back, feet and legs. The sharp pain he experienced on the in-breath suggested that at least one rib was broken on his left side. They sat him down at the guard’s table and gave him pills to swallow with the remainder of the beer. Ulrike held his shoulders and kissed the top of his head.

  Eventually he rose and stretched his arms, but he was still unable to put any weight on his feet.

  ‘You two bring him,’ said the Bird, moving to the door. ‘I’ll go ahead and get the truck started and the gate opened up. Don’t worry about the guard. I’ll sort him out. Leave it two minutes, then come.’

  He disappeared through the doorway and shot up the steps. A minute passed before they moved into the dark space outside the door and began to help Kurt take the steps one by one. As they reached the open, Rosenharte heard some movement off to the left. He let go of Kurt and turned round to see a group of three men running towards them in the shadow of the kitchen block. He raised his gun and took aim.

  Two men with pistols emerged into the light, with Colonel Zank following. He was smiling and slightly out of breath. ‘Put down your weapons. You cannot escape.’ Ulrike had moved away from Kurt and levelled her gun at Zank.

  ‘We may be outnumbered,’ she said, ‘but you’ll die with us.’

  ‘You’re a pacifist,’ said Zank teasingly. ‘You only take punishment; you don’t hand it out.’ He looked at Rosenharte. ‘You should have seen what I did to her; I began to wonder if she got off on it . . . But then perhaps you would know about that better than I.’

  ‘There’s no question you will die,’ said Rosenharte.

  Zank laughed. ‘You’re interested in birds, aren’t you, Rosenharte?’

  ‘Birds! What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘Little Ulrike told me that you were interested in birds. Perhaps you know about the Larsen trap?’ He moved towards them, one hand in his pocket, the other holding a standard-issue handgun. ‘Do you know about the Larsen trap?’

  ‘No.’ He moved a pace backwards to keep the other men in view.

  ‘It’s a new invention from Sweden that traps magpies. You first catch one magpie and you put it in a cage with several compartments. Then you set the cage out in the open and the trapped bird - aptly named the caller - summons other magpies which enter the trap one by one.’ He pointed first to Ulrike with his gun then turned it to Kurt and Rosenharte. ‘One, two, three. Soon you’ve trapped all the magpies in the locality - and all from one bird singing its little head off.’ He stopped. ‘I knew you would come, Rosenharte. I left Colonel Biermeier free because I knew she would call him. And I was sure that a vain romantic like you wouldn’t leave her.’

  Rosenharte moved closer so that his gun pointed at the middle of Zank’s forehead. ‘Your world is over - the little traps you set for people, your power to destroy good men like my brother and Kurt. Your obvious delight in tormenting a beautiful and brave woman. You’re a sick bastard, Zank, but more important you’re the past, a leftover from the time when this disgusting place was built.’ He gestured with his left hand at the Nazi kitchen block to divert attention away from the Bird, who had slipped without a sound from the office above the van bay and had rolled a clutch of round objects behind the men. ‘And that’s why you’re going to let us walk out of here.’

  Zank was saying that once caught, magpies never left the trap, when three small explosions occurred behind him, causing his two companions to reel backwards and start shooting wildly in the direction of the Genslerstrasse watchtower. Rosenharte was ahead of the game because he had at least expected something to happen, though he couldn’t have predicted the blinding flash of the stun grenades or the clap of localized thunder that was now occupying the greater part of his consciousness. He spun round and saw that Kurt and Ulrike had fallen to the ground. As he moved to haul them up, he was aware of the Bird rushing at Zank’s men, hitting them with terrifying force, one in the throat and the other in the small of his back. It appeared an almost preordain
ed sequence as he recoiled, crouched, slid to the left, then rose behind Zank to hook an arm around his neck and place a gun beneath his chin. He waved to Rosenharte and shouted for them to make for the truck. As they scrambled into the office and passed the unconscious gatekeeper, he saw the Bird backing towards them with Zank held like a child’s soft toy in one long, powerful arm. With his left hand he chucked two more objects into the compound, then delivered a single blow to the crown of Zank’s head. Zank crumpled at the base of the steps.

  A few seconds later they were all three crowded into the front of the truck. The Bird revved the engine and reversed furiously out of the bay, clipping the edge of the electronic door that some remote hand had ordered to close. The vehicle spun round and they caught a glimpse of dense white smoke leaking over the prison walls.

  ‘Well, what now?’ said the Bird with a lunatic grin. ‘Know anywhere you three can put up for the evening?’

  37

  A Magnificent Blunder

  ‘Where are they?’ demanded Harland.

  ‘Somewhere in Prenzlauer Berg. They’re being sheltered by political friends of Kafka.’

  ‘You know the address?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ said the Bird.

  They were standing in the car park near the three-storey building that housed the endless deliberations of the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party. Theoretically Harland was there to cover the meetings as a member of the press corps, but it had just been announced that news of the day’s proceedings would be given at a conference held at the new International Press Centre. When the Bird’s call came through it had been the best rendezvous he could think of.

  ‘Why didn’t you get the address?’

  ‘Because we had to split up. Half the bloody Stasi were pursuing us at one point. We did pretty well to get away in that little car.’

  ‘Anyone hurt?’

  ‘The lad’s not in great shape, but he’s got guts and he’ll pull through.’

  ‘But you don’t know where they are. That’s the point, isn’t it? I could do without this today. I’m meeting the Russian and I still haven’t heard from Griswald. Why the hell didn’t you take them over last night? You had everything you needed.’

  ‘Keep your shirt on, Bobby.’ The Bird shook his head in annoyance. ‘Look, this little unofficial op of yours resulted in springing two bods from Hohenschönhausen. I believe that’s a Cold War first. It should be written up with a dramatic flourish in the annals of Century House by one of those pert little numbers in Records. Come on, Bobby, we did well. We couldn’t go last night because Rosenharte and Kafka wouldn’t leave the other man. Besides, we still need a picture of her for her passport.’

  Harland made an apologetic nod. Cuth was right: he had done magnificently.

  ‘You seem out of sorts, Bobby. Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘No, I’ve got a lot on, that’s all. And those bloody idiots in London just won’t free the funds we need. We’re on the threshold of the greatest intelligence coup in the history of the Cold War, and they’re still scratching their heads wondering about flaming cost-benefits. This could save millions on the budget. Literally millions. To say nothing of increasing security tenfold.’

  ‘It’s that good, is it?’

  ‘Better. It’s so good you and I could retire and leave the running of the Intelligence Services to Jamie Jay.’

  The Bird smiled. ‘A likely outcome, I’m sure. What happened to the young sprog, anyway? I rather liked him.’

  ‘As a matter of fact he’s temping at the Stadium for a few weeks. I think they got tired of his boundless enthusiasm in the Gulf so I said I’d happily use up his excess energy. He appeared at the tail end of last week, listening to language tapes. He’ll bring the passport over this afternoon.’

  ‘So we just wait for the call from Rosenharte?’

  ‘Yep, then you arrange the reception committee the other side. Get Kafka and the other chap any treatment they need. Put Rosenharte in a hotel. And we’ll follow up from there in a few days. Rosenharte will want to go see his sister-in-law. There’s all that to fix. But that’s Jay’s job.’

  The Bird was smoking a rare cigarette and had begun to pace in a circle. ‘So let me guess: you’re buying something from the Russians. Right, Bobby? That could only be information.’ He paused and considered this. ‘Jesus, what a bloody merry-go-round we’re in. Buying intel’ from one lot of Commies about another lot of Commies. We live in interesting times, Bobby. Interesting times. How good is this info?’

  ‘Sorry, Cuth. I can’t tell you, certainly not here. But you’ll be the first to know if we get the go-ahead. We’re getting a sample delivery this afternoon.’

  ‘That sounds familiar. Are you sure they aren’t having you on? I mean it doesn’t take an IQ higher than the average biscuit’s to see they might well be playing a return match for your little jape with the disks. One lot of false information in exchange for another lot.’

  ‘I think not.’

  ‘Where are you going to get this free sample?’

  ‘At the conference this afternoon.’

  ‘Well, I hope there’ll be a suitable number of unwashed scribes in the room, otherwise you’ll stick out like the Pope’s prick.’

  ‘There will be,’ said Harland. ‘This is a big day. The Council of Ministers is going to discuss the new travel regulations and the GDR economy. Actually, I’ve picked up a lot of useful stuff this week. For one thing, Mielke’s still very much in the saddle at Normannenstrasse, even though he’s resigned.’

  The Bird’s attention had wandered. ‘Look, old cock, I need some breakfast and a kip. I’ll be in touch later.’

  They said goodbye. Harland’s gaze followed the remarkable figure of Cuthbert Avocet as he passed unnoticed through the news crews assembled outside the building to film the uniformed members of the Stasi, the Grenzpolizei and People’s Army as they arrived for the first session of the day. He reflected that whatever happened during the panicky deliberations of Egon Krenz’s government, the Bird’s exploits in Hohenschönhausen would provide far better copy than any journalist would find for himself that day.

  Ulrike’s friends, Katya and Fritzi Rundstedt, were two mathematicians who lived on the top floor of a once gracious nineteenth-century building in Prenzlauer Berg, which still bore the scars of Allied bombs and Russian shells. It stood on a gentle rise, and from the fifth floor you could follow the line of the Berlin Wall from the north, observe the bulge as it swooped round the old ceremonial and administrative centre of the city captured by the Soviet forces in 1945 and continued its jagged path southwards towards Schulzendorf. Rosenharte spent some time with Fritzi early on the morning of Thursday 9 November, watching the light and shade play across the free part of the city, picking out the crossing points and a corner of the Brandenburg Gate. They turned from the window with empty coffee cups and looked down at Kurt and Ulrike, who were still asleep on the floor in the adjacent room. Fritzi nodded benignly and they stole away to the kitchen.

  During the night Katya Rundstedt, a quiet woman with short grey hair and watchful eyes, had become worried about Kurt and phoned a doctor friend at the local hospital. Half an hour later he appeared to treat the fugitives without the slightest qualm. In Kurt’s case, he diagnosed two fractured ribs on the left side, together with several broken bones in his right foot, which had apparently been slammed in a cell door. Ulrike needed rest. The shock of nine days’ interrogation had buried itself deep inside her and he told Rosenharte that he mustn’t imagine she’d recovered just because she was showing such concern for Kurt. ‘It’s the beginning of the process of denial,’ he said, regarding him sternly over wire spectacles that made him look like Gustav Mahler. ‘You see, it’s difficult for someone who has such a positive view of her fellow human beings to accept that they are capable of such behaviour. It may shake her faith in those around her. I have helped several people who were in Bautzen and I believe that she risks depression and a possible br
eakdown if she doesn’t acknowledge her own suffering.’

  ‘You speak as though you know her.’

  ‘Yes, she’s been active in the same circles as me and my wife. We’re members of the same church. Your friend is a woman of rare spirit and very special qualities, Dr Rosenharte, but I’m sure you already know that.’

  Rosenharte had nodded and found himself suddenly overwhelmed by the thought of how close he’d come to losing her, and how much he wanted to look after her.

  At midday a photographer, another contact of the Rundstedts, came to take passport pictures of Ulrike and Kurt. Both were made up by Katya with foundation to cover their bruises and injuries. The photographer returned at two with the pictures and Rosenharte was able to fix Ulrike’s into the passport of Birgit Miller. Now all that remained was for the British courier to turn up with Kurt’s passport.

  At four he went to a phone box and dialled in the code for the second time that day, to be told that the man had crossed the border and was on his way to the meeting place arranged by the Bird in a park near Greifswalderstrasse station. The courier knew what Rosenharte looked like and would find him.

  It was a five-minute walk. Rosenharte went, promising himself this would be the very last clandestine meeting of his life. He was sick of the whole ridiculous business of subterfuge and spying.

  He chose a bench under a lime tree that had not quite yet shed all its leaves, and read a book he’d borrowed from the Rundstedt apartment. Some ten minutes later he was approached by a young man in a stone-washed denim jacket, scuffed suede ankle boots and black jeans. He sat down and asked for a light with an excruciating English accent. It was then that Rosenharte recognized the young man who had pulled him out of the gulf of Trieste.

  ‘You can speak English. No one’s going to overhear,’ he said, weary of hearing the British butcher his language.

  ‘Did I introduce myself before? I forget. I’m Jamie Jay of Her Majesty’s et cetera, et cetera and I’ve just put the passport in your pocket. So, we’ll expect you when we see you. Cross by Checkpoint Charlie any time after six. We’ll see you coming and have an ambulance ready for your friends. Everything is organized for you. Hotels, money, so on.’