“I’m in Main Department II.” Same outfit as Holger. That explained why he’d been the officer of the day on the other end of the hotline. “Five years ago, that’s when I first got here, it was the year that film, Star Wars, came out—have you heard of it? The queues outside the cinemas went round the block. Made me homesick, I’d join in just so I could pretend I was standing in line for a trolley at the supermarket.”
There was silence again, the car followed the tight slip off the motorway and onto a trunk road, the radio signal distorting as we went under a bridge, coming back stronger as we cleared the obstruction. Then Sanderling picked up the conversation again:
“At the beginning, I didn’t think I’d last five weeks over here, never mind five years. I thought I’d crack under the pressure and be recalled. But I survived my first mission and was given another, then another. Five years, never knowing when it was going to be the last time.”
“I’ve been having thoughts like that myself, just recently,” I replied.
“And now I’m leaving my life behind. My flat, all my possessions, my clothes and jewellery. Friends, lovers. Wonder what’ll happen when I get back to Berlin, what they’ve got lined up for me.”
“They’ll have something prepared. Cosy office, your own phone, dusty plants.” I was trying to be reassuring, I realised. It was ridiculous—when had I ever done reassuring?
“I’m finished, I want out. They’ve had all they can get—there’s no more of me left to give.”
“You’re never finished, not in this business. You’re in it for life. You know that,” I answered, not unkindly, but Sanderling put a hand on my arm, quietening me.
Um halb-fünf, hier sind die Nachrichten auf HR3, burbled the radio, excited to be bringing the news in the middle of the night. Cologne. The condition of a senior officer in the Federal Crime Agency has been described as critical following a suspected terrorist incident in Bonn last night. At this time there are no indications that there are any other victims. A spokesman from North-Rhine Westphalian police has described the situation as contained. Police are searching for the suspects, a male and a female, who are believed to have left the Bonn area, heading south in a grey Renault 30.
We sat in silence, watching the motorway unwind in front of us. When the newscaster began to inform us of current and expected temperatures, I switched her off.
“Well, someone’s doing their best to make sure we’re coming back, so you’d better get used to the idea. Forget the music, forget the nice clothes, the friends and the comfortable life. You’re leaving it all behind—we’re going East, so stop talking about what you’ve lost, it’s not doing either of us any good.”
30
West Germany
Bad Hersfeld
We left the motorway at the next junction and wound into the hills in search of a clean car. We caught a suitable candidate in our headlights in the second village, a medium-sized Mercedes parked by the side of the road, the nearby houses hiding behind tall hedges.
Sanderling let me out and I cracked the Mercedes’s door with no difficulty. Leaning down to pull away the moulding around the steering column, I stripped the wires and touched them together to start the car. The dash lit up, showing I had half a tank of petrol to play with, and with Sanderling following behind, I headed for the nearest town of any size, a dump called Kirchheim. We wiped down the Renault and left it outside a block of flats.
From there it was just a quarter of an hour down back roads to Bad Hersfeld. It would have been better to muddy the trail by getting rid of the Renault somewhere further south, but we were already behind schedule.
We found the phone box in the centre of Bad Hersfeld, at the foot of a steep hill dotted with well kept houses and tidy gardens. On the other side of the road, the gloomy street lighting struggled against the deep shadows cast by the field-stone wall that surrounded a ruined monastery.
I dialled the local number from memory, letting it ring twice before hanging up and dialling again. This time I let it ring four times then cut the connection and left the cabin.
Reading the map by the light of a filtered torch, I gave Sanderling directions to a large cemetery on the south-east edge of Hersfeld. At the back gate there was space for a few cars to park, and beyond that a field separated us from the motorway. The roads were quiet, no traffic at all on the Autobahn—it led directly to the border crossing into the GDR at Wartha; all roads heading east were practically dead ends.
I was nervous, not so much about going home but about how long it was taking to get there—it was already after five in the morning, people would soon stir, workers make their way to the early shift and traffic head for the border crossing. I felt exposed, sitting in a car in a town I’d never been to, hadn’t done preparation for being in and not knowing what, if any, operational support I could expect if I got into a tight spot.
It was the news bulletin that had disturbed me, the mention of the car we’d been travelling in. My first thought had been that it was our side, leaking just the right amount of information, not so much as to be dangerous, but enough to make sure we’d feel the pressure to come home. But now I had the opportunity to really think about it, I wondered whether the West German watchers in the car outside Bruno’s flat had been more awake than I’d given them credit for. Maybe they’d noticed not just the traffic in and out of the empty shop, but the vehicles we were using.
“Perhaps they’ll tell us to go through the Border Crossing Point at Wartha,” Sanderling said, more to break the silence than for any operational reason. “Just like Günter Guillaume, coming home in a limousine, with luggage in the boot and bunches of flowers in our hands.”
I didn’t agree. There’d be no hero’s welcome waiting for us, not like there had been for the agent who had worked his way up to the very top of Willi Brandt’s government before being caught and returned to the GDR after a few years in prison.
“Dark VW Polo approaching from the rear, two occupants,” Sanderling interrupted my thoughts.
I adjusted the central mirror and watched the Polo pull in behind our car. The driver’s door opened and a short but well padded man got out. Sanderling’s hand dropped to the map compartment in the door, pulling out one of those new-style Glock pistols. She chambered a round.
Holding the Wamme in her right hand, she got out, making sure to keep the pistol behind her body, out of sight of the occupants of the Polo.
Without the benefit of a weapon, I opened my own door and got out, too.
The cold was shocking, heavy frost glistened on the cemetery wall, the short man was pulling his coat tighter around himself, hunching his shoulders to shorten the parts of his neck exposed to the air.
“The night train doesn’t leave until shortly before midnight,” he said, looking between Sanderling and myself.
“We must have an old timetable,” I replied.
Sanderling’s hand disappeared into her coat pocket, it emerged a moment later without the Glock.
The man made a sign to the passenger in the Polo, who got out and loped past us without looking our way. He got into our Mercedes and, reaching under the steering column, started the engine.
“Any luggage in that car, anything you want to take with you? If so, you’d better grab it,” said Shorty, holding the back door of his Polo open for us. “Get a move on, we’ve a tight schedule to keep to.”
31
West Germany
20km south-east of Bad Hersfeld
The road snaked around hills and between forests before climbing through half-timbered villages that were pasted to the slopes like model railway scenery. We met nobody on the road and our driver pushed the Polo to its limits, winding through the greenery, darting through settlements before the locals even noticed our passing.
We were at the very edge of West Germany, an area blighted by the border. Farmhouses had fallen into ruin, villages had been half-abandoned and the roads were little better than field tracks. Then the field tracks narro
wed further, the forests thickened until the car couldn’t continue.
“This is us.” The driver stopped the Polo, had already put it in reverse, ready to leave as soon as we got out. “Carry on down this lane, it zig-zags around a bit, but watch out for a sharp left in about a kilometre. The lane heads north and you leave it there. Follow the hedge along the side of the field, two hundred metres later there’s another hedge with a ditch behind it. That’s the border. Cross the ditch, you’re in forward territory of the GDR.” The driver had his eyes glued to the rear-view mirror, checking for other vehicles, but he hadn’t finished with the instructions:
“Stay on the territory of the GDR, but follow the ditch for another two hundred metres until you reach the first line of the border defences. You’ll be met by uniformed Border Scouts who will take you through the fence. You see anything on this side of the border, any headlights, anyone on foot, hit the dirt. You might have noticed the cops are looking for you, so it’s possible the Bundesgrenzschutz will also be on the alert. Now, get going!”
He took his foot off the clutch even before we’d got the doors shut, and the Volkswagen slithered into a field entrance before turning to go back the way we’d come.
The air was so crisp it scraped my insides. Once the car’s rear lights had faded, the only light was from the stars and the crescent moon hanging above the valley to the south. Trees pressed in on the north side and we walked in their shadows, ready to take cover if we heard or saw any movement.
We made slow progress, skidding on the ice in the ruts of the lane, stopping often to listen for vehicles, remaining aware for any patrols by the West German BGS border police. The forest on our left petered out, leaving us on the open side of a ridge.
The sharp turn northwards came soon after and we turned off the lane. We were half-way across the ploughed field when we heard the chopper. I didn’t have to say anything to Sanderling, she had her nose pressed in the hard soil before I’d even thought about reacting. We each lay in our own furrow, hoping the low moonlight wouldn’t cast long shadows of our prone forms.
The helicopter came from the north, still invisible behind the ridge, then, with a clatter of rotors, it flew almost directly overhead before banking to starboard, following the line of the border. Identification was easy: the open trusswork of the tail was silhouetted for a moment against the moon—an Alouette II light helicopter, used by both the Bundeswehr and the BGS.
We stayed low as the helicopter flew on, not moving until the beating of rotors were far to the south, then, checking our limited horizons, we ran the last hundred metres to the hedge at the far end of the field, stumbling over the frost-hardened earth.
The hedge along the ditch was sparse, branches bare but armed with thorns. I parted some twigs to let Sanderling through, all the time looking over my shoulder towards the lane, keeping an eye out for signs of human activity. If the chopper crew had been using night vision goggles, we’d have shone like coals in a stove and someone would now be on their way to investigate.
Safely through the hedge, Sanderling turned to hold the branches apart for me and we jumped the ditch. A few metres further on, a concrete post, painted in black-red-gold told us we’d made it home.
The going on this side was even rougher, nature had been allowed to return, high tussocks of grass grew between stands of slender birch. But we walked more freely now, less worried about being stopped.
We were edging around a spiky bush and had ended up near the ditch again—so close I could hold my arm out and my fingertips would be in the West. That’s when the BGS patrol spoke:
“Not another step.”
32
Inner-German Border
Hessen / District Suhl
I froze, only my eyes moving as they tried to penetrate the shadows beyond the hedge.
“You’re on East German territory” said the BGS border guard in a Hessian accent. “Come towards me, don’t pause, don’t look around, just come towards me,
I could make him out now, dark green parka and beret, another man behind him, standing further back with a bulky radio pressed to his ear.
The one who had spoken was holding his hand out, taking care not to come too close to the ditch that marked the border. I could see his face, he had wire spectacles on, his mouth was set in a line below a thin moustache, and if he was surprised to see a man wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase out here on the border then he didn’t show it.
I looked around for Sanderling, but she’d disappeared from view. Somehow this fact brought movement to my legs again and without saying a word to the West German border policeman, I stepped away from the ditch.
“Towards me!” The BGS policeman didn’t shout, but his voice carried authority. “You’re going the wrong way!” He paced me on his side of the ditch, keeping me in sight as best he could when I headed further into the dry, winter vegetation. “You don’t want to do this, you really don’t—come towards me.”
Twigs were crackling under my feet now, I was moving as swiftly as I could, not caring whether my feet landed in the shadows or in the narrow flecks of moonlight that shone through the lattice of boughs above me.
“Halt!” The shout came from the other direction, from beyond where I’d last seen Sanderling. A Saxon accent. “Border guards of the GDR! Remain where you are—raise your hands!”
The BGS policeman fell back a step or two and shrugged off his rifle, pulling it around and holding it ready. His colleague ran up beside him, still jabbering into the radio.
“Hands up!” came the order again, yet another voice, another Saxon, away to my left.
A shot was fired, directly to the south of me, and to my right the Westler raised his G1 rifle, aiming it in the direction of the muzzle flash. His colleague let off a flare.
The landscape splintered into shifting patterns of light as the white flare whined upwards then started its long drift down. At the snapping of a twig, I swung to my left. A border guard, one of ours. His Kalashnikov was lowered and he was taking great care to keep me between himself and the Western BGS.
“Put your hands up and come this way,” he ordered.
I raised my right hand high, held the left arm in front of me, the briefcase dangling from the end. The signal rocket was still drifting down, shifting the shadows upwards, it made me feel I was falling forwards.
I could hear one of the Westerners as he gave a running commentary into his radio, but I ignored him, he was on the other side of the ditch, out of reach. Taking care where I was walking, I followed my border guard deeper into the thicket.
We’d gone about fifty yards, our route curving round to the south, presumably to where there was a gate in the fence. The white flare finished its descent but my eyes hadn’t adjusted to the darkness yet so I stayed close to the border guard. When he turned to check my progress I could see his face, light against his camouflage jacket and the bushes behind him.
I don’t know how far we’d gone, I couldn’t hear the BGS any more, perhaps they’d shut up and were just watching us. I was stumbling along, wanting to look over my shoulder, reassure myself they’d stayed on their side of the border. That’s when another shot cracked the night.
Not a flare this time but a single rifle discharge followed by a scream that echoed over the valley. Sanderling.
I stopped. I looked around, but Sanderling wasn’t in sight, I hadn’t seen her since the BGS had turned up.
I was still standing, gawping like an amateur when the border guard tackled me around the legs. As we landed, his rifle swung around, hitting me in the side and making me gasp in pain.
“Keep down!” he whispered sharply, still lying on top of me.
The pair of us lay there like lovers in the woods, listening for movement, waiting for another rifle shot. There was nothing, no further sound from Sanderling.
The border guard rolled off me when the beating rotors of the helicopter crushed the stillness like only a helicopter can. We crawled towards the moon as t
he noise of the chopper blanketed us, the pitch changing as it landed on the field just a few tens of metres beyond the border. A moment later it took off again, the Westerners behind us shouting information and orders, presumably to reinforcements who had just arrived. They struggled to be heard above the whirling rotors as the chopper hovered overhead.
“Run, follow me!” shouted my guard, holding his rifle in one hand and loping easily across the broken ground, stooping below the hanging branches.
I followed as well as I could, tearing my trousers on brambles and losing my hat along the way. When I got to the gate in the fence it was standing open, two guards beside it and another pair on the other side.
“Where’s my colleague?” I demanded.
“Let’s get you out of the forward area, Comrade,” said one of the guards, putting a hand on my back and firmly pushing me through the gate.
33
Vacha
A Stoffhund open-top Trabant jeep was idling on the patrol road, and I was bundled into the back, the engine skirling into life as soon as I hit the seat.
“Where’s my colleague?” I shouted to the Feldwebel sitting next to me, my voice competing with the shrill engine and the drum of tyres over perforated concrete slabs.
“She’s still in forward territory—the Border Scouts are bringing her in.” He turned away and pretended to be interested in the fences, the bunkers and the telephone columns that loomed out of and disappeared back into the gloom, as if he’d never seen them before.
We followed the patrol road along a river valley until the border swept away to the left when we stopped to open up a gate in the inner fence. From then on we were on civilian roads, and a yellow sign at the entrance to the small town of Vacha let me know exactly where I was. Through the town, along the side of the cable-works, across a small bridge and past a sentry post before climbing a hill to the Border Company’s base.
Berlin Centre Page 10
