by Greg Iles
"The message, Colonel?" Sergeant Clary repeated.
"What? No, Sergeant. Dismissed."
"Sir." Clary beat a hasty retreat from the office, certain that his
colonel would want to ponder this unpleasant development over a shot of
the good stuff.
"Clary!" Rose's bark rattled the door. "Is Major Richardson still down
the hall?"
The sergeant poked his head back into the office. "I'll run check,
sir."
"Can't you just buzz him?"
"Uh ... the major doesn't always answer his pages, sir.
After five, that is. Says he can't stand to hear the phone while he's
working."
"Who the hell can? Don't people just keep on ringing the damned thing
when he doesn't answer?"
"Well, sir ... I think he's rigged some type of switch to his phone or
something. He just shuts it off when he doesn't want to hear it."
Rose stuck out his bottom lip. "I see."
"Checking now, sir," said Clary, on the fly.
Since 1945, Berlin has been an island city. It is a political isiana,
quadrisected by foreign conquerors, and a psychological island as
insulated from the normal flow of German life as a child kidnapped from
its mother. Berlin was an island before the Wall, during the Wall, and
it will remain so long after the Wall has fallen. Kidnapped children
can take years to recover.
The American community in Berlin is an island within that larger host.
It clusters around the U.S. Military Mission in the affluent district of
Dahlem, a giant concrete block bristling with satellite dishes, radio
antennae, and microwave transmitters. In this city of hastily built
office towers, bomb-scarred churches, and drab concrete tenement blocks
whose color accents are provided mostly by graffiti, the American
housing area manages to look neat, midwestern, suburban, and safe. Known
as "Little America," it is home to the sixty-six hundred servicemen,
their wives, and children who comprise the symbolic U.S. presence in
Berlin.
These families bustle between the U.S. Mission, the Officer's club, the
well-stocked PX, the private Burger King and McDonald's, and their patio
barbecues like suburbanites from Omaha or Atlanta. Only the razor wire
that tops the fences surrounding the manicured lawns betrays the tension
that underpins this bucolic scene.
Few Americans truly mix with the Berliners. They are more firmly tied
to the United States than to the streets they walk and the faces they
pass each day in Berlin. They are tied by the great airborne umbilical
cord stretching from Tempelhof Airport to the mammoth military supply
bases of America. Major Harry Richardson-the man Colonel Rose had sent
Sergeant Clary to find-was an exception to this pattern. Richardson
needed no umbilical cord in Berlin, or anywhere else. He spoke
excellent German, as well as Russian-and not with the stilted State
Department cadence of the middle and upper ranks of the army. He did
not live in Dahlem or Zehlendorf, the ritzy addresses of choice, but in
thoroughly German Wilmersdorf. He came from eL iiiuiieyed family, had
attended both Harvard and Oxford, yet he had served in Vietnam and
remained in the army after the war. His personal contacts ranged from
TJ.S. senators to supply sergeants at distant Army outposts, from
English peers to Scottish fishing guides, from Berlin senators to
kabob-cooks in the Turkish quarter of Kreuzberg. And that, in Colonel
Rose's eyes, made Harry Richardson one hell of an intelligence officer
Harry saluted as he sauntered into Rose's office and collapsed into the
colonel's infamous "hot seat." The chair dropped most people a head
lower than Rose, but Harry stood six feet three inches without shoes.
His gray eyes met the stocky colonel's with the self-assured steadiness
of an equal.
"Richardson," Rose said across the desk.
"Colonel."
Rose eyed Harry's uniform doubtfully. It was wrinkled and rather plain
for a major. Harry had won the silver star in Vietnam, yet the only
decoration he ever wore was his Combat Infantryman's Badge. Rose didn't
like the wrinkles, but he liked the modesty. He clucked his tongue
against the roof of his mouth.
"Bigwig Briggs is flying in from Bonn tomorrow," he announced.
Harry smiled wryly. "I thought he might."
"You did. Why's that?"
"Stands to reason, doesn't it? With the ham-fisted way the Soviets have
handled the Spandau mess so far, I figured the negotiations would have
to be bumped up a notch on both sides. Sir."
"Can the 'sir' crap, Harry. Just what do you think did happen last
night?"
"Do you have anything that wasn't on TV?"
"Nothing substantive. Master Sergeant Jackson pretty much confirmed the
press accounts of the incident, and the German police aren't saying
squat. Christ, you'd think if the Russians wanted to file a complaint
against the Army, they'd give it to us and not the goddamn State
Department."
Harry rolled his eyes. "If it's got anything to do with Spandau, the
State Department doesn't trust us, and you know why."
"Bird," Rose muttered. He sighed wearily. In 1972 the first U.S.
commandant of Spandau Prison, Lieutenant Colonel Eugene Bird, had been
relieved of his duties for secretly bringing a tape recorder and camera
into Spandau over a period of months and compiling a book on Rudolf
Hess, which was published in 1974. The colonel's entrepreneurial spirit
hadn't exactly improved the relationship between the Army and the State
Department,.
"The point," Rose went on, "is that the ambassador will be here in the
morning, and he'll want to grill me for breakfast. I want you with me
when I talk to him, and I want to know everything he's going to say
before he says it."
"No problem, Colonel."
"Okay, Harry, what's your read on this thing?"
"I'm not sure yet. I was over at Abschnitt 53 for a few minutes this
morning-"
"You what?"
"I've got a friend over there," Harry explained.
"Naturally." Rose opened his bottom drawer and set the bottle of Wild
Turkey between them on the desk. "Drink?"
he asked, already pouring two shots.
Harry accepted the glass, raised it briefly, then drank it off neat and
wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "As I was saying, Colonel, I
dropped by there just to get a feel for what was going on.
The problem was, I couldn't even get near my guy's office. I got
through the reporters okay, but inside the station it was wall-to-wall
cops. There was a squad of Russian soldiers guarding the cellblock, and
they weren't ceremonial roosters. One guy was wearing a sergeant's
uniform, but he was no noncom. Wasn't even regular army. KGB down to
his BVDS."
Rose groaned. "Is this the Hess thing again?"
Harry shook his head. "I don't think so, Colonel. They've run Hess
into the ground already. Pardon the pun, but it's a dead issue."
"So, what is it?"
"I think this is a Russian territorial thing. Spandau was a Soviet
&
nbsp; foothold in West Berlin-small maybe, but they don't like giving it up."
"Hmm. What about the Russian accusations that someone murdered Hess?"
Harry sighed. "Colonel, I don't think the Russians ever believed
Prisoner Number Seven was Hess. But if this is about Hess, I think we
should stay out of it. Let the Russians knock themselves out. They've
been obsessed with the case for years. But I don't think that's it. I
think it's Russian paranoia, plain and simple."
"Jesus," Rose grumbled, "I thought'the goddamn Cold War was over."
Harry smiled wryly. "The reports of its death have been greatly
exaggerated. Which reminds me, Colonel, I caught a glimpse of Ivan
Kosov at that police station this morning."
"Kosov! What the hell was that old bear doing in our sector?"
Harry shrugged. "We'd better find out."
"Okay, what do you need?"
"Do you have a list of all personnel with access to the Spandau site
last night? Ours and theirs?"
"I'll have Clary get Ray down here to crack the computer file."
"Don't bother, I'll get it."
"Ray's the only one with the codes, Harry. He buries that stuff deep."
Harry smiled thinly. "Just get me into his office."
Rose cocked an eye at Richardson, then pushed on.
"There's something else. I know you're pretty chummy with some of the
Brits over here. Been fishing in Scotland with a few ministers and
such. But on this thing-the Spandau thing-I'd like to keep the Brits
out of it. Just for the time being. It's a matter of-"
"Understood, Colonel. You're not sure they've always played straight
with us on the Hess affair."
"Exactly," Rose said, relieved. "Even if you're right about this not
having anything to do with Hess, I'd feel better keeping it in-house for
a while."
"No problem."
Rose smiled humorlessly. "Right. I'll just-"
"Shit," Harry muttered. "There is one problem. I've got a racquetball
date this evening with a girl from the British embassy."
"Cancel it."
Harry looked thoughtful. "Colonel, I understand your thinking on this,
but don't you think breaking the date might call more attention@',
think!" Rose cut in with surprising "I'll tell you what force. "I
think the goddamn Brits killed Hess! And during our goddamn guard
month! How about that?" His face flushed. "You think I'm crazy,
Major?"
Harry swallowed his surprise. "No, sir. I wouldn't say that scenario
was outside the realm of possibility."
"Possibility! Ever since Gorbachev came out with the goddamn glasnost,
the limeys have been quaking in their boots thinking the Russians would
go soft and let Hess out to spill his guts to the world.
The Russians were the only ones vetoing his release those last few
years, you know. The Brits knew if they ever had to step in and veto
it, all the old questions would start again." Rose nodded angrily. "I
think those smug sons-of-bitches slipped one of their ex-SAS killers
over the wall last month, strangled that old Nazi, and left
us holding the goddamn bag! That's what I think about the
British, Major! And you will cancel your racquetball date as
of now. Is that clear?"
"Absolutely, Colonel."
"I want your report on my desk by oh-eight-hundred," Rose growled.
Harry stood, saluted, and marched out.
"Clary!" Rose's gruff baritone boomed through the open I
door.
"Yes, sir?"
"Let Major Richardson into Captain Donovan's office.
He's got a little work to do on the computer."
"Yes, sir."
"And Clary?"
"Sir?"
"I want one of those phone gadgets like Richardson's
got."
Grinning, Sergeant Clary backed out and pulled the door
shut.
Rose looked longingly at the Wild Turkey bottle, then
slipped it back into his bottom drawer. He closed his eyes,
leaned his chair all the way back and propped his legs up on f
the huge desk. That Richardson is one strange bird, he
thought. Damn near insubordinate sometimes. But he gets
the job done. Rose congratulated himself on a f me piece of
human resource management. Harry can handle the fairies
,from State, he thought with satisfaction, and I'll take care of
the,friggin' Russians. And if the Brits stick their stufft noses
into it, the devil take the hindmost.
6. 10 pm. mI-5 Headquarters. Charles Street, London, England Sir
Neville Shaw looked up from the report with anger in his eyes. As
director general of mI-5, he had witnessed his share of crises, but the
one he now faced was one he had long prayed would remain buried in the
ashes of history.
"This, cock-up started almost twelve hours ago!" he snapped.
"Yes, Sir Neville," admitted his deputy. "The unit on the scene
reported it to General Bishop in Berlin. Bishop informed mI-6 but saw
no reason to apprise us. The Russian complaint went to the Foreign
Office, and the F.O. apparently felt as the general did. We've got one
contact on the West Berlin police force; he's the only reason we got
onto this at all. He can't tell us much, though, because he's stationed
in our sector. These German trespassers were taken to a police station
in the American sector. The thing's been on the telly over there since
this afternoon."
"Good God," Sir Neville groaned. "One more bloody week and this would
have been nothing but a minor flap."
"How do you mean, sir?"
Shaw rubbed his forehead to ease a migraine. "Forget it.
This was bound to happen sooner or later. Damned journalists and
curiosity hounds poking at the story for years. Matter of time, that's
all."
"Yes, sir," the deputy director commiserated.
"Who did we have at Spandau, anyway?"
"Regular military detail. The sergeant in charge said he knew nothing
about any papers. He didn't have the foggiest idea of the
implications."
"What monumental stupidity!" Shaw got to his feet, still staring at the
report in his hands. "Can this Russian forensic report be relied upon?"
"Our technical section says the Soviets are quite good at that sort of
thing, sir."
Sir Neville snorted indignantly. "Papers at Spandau- Good Christ.
Whatever has turned up over there, ten to one it's got something to do
with Hess. We've got to get hold of it, Wilson, fast. Who else was at
Spandau?"
"The Americans, the Frogs, and the Russians. Plus a contingent of West
Berlin police."
Sir Neville wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I could hang
for this one, that's sure. What do we have in Berlin?"
"Not much. What we do have is mostly on the commercial side. No one
who's cleared for this."
"I didn't think anyone was cleared for this rot," Shaw murmured.
"All right, you get me four men who are cleared for it-men who can quote
me the bloody Official Secrets Act-and get them here fast.
Arrange air transport to West Berlin straightaway. I want those lads
airborne as soon as I've briefed them."
"Yes, sir."
/>
After an almost interminable silence, Shaw said, "there is a ship,
Wilson. I want you to locate her for me."
"A ship, sir?"
"Yes. A freighter, actually. MV Casilda, out of Panama.
Get on to Lloyd's, or whoever keeps up with those things.
Talk to the satellite people if you have to, just find out where she
is."
Perplexed, the deputy director said, "All right, sir," and turned to go.
At the door he paused. "Sir Neville," he said hesitantly. "is there
anything I should know about this Hess business? A small brief,
perhaps?"
Shaw's face reddened. "If there was, you'd know it already, wouldn't
you?" he snapped.
Wilson displayed his irritation by clipping out a regimental "Sir!"
before shutting the door.
Shaw didn't even notice. He walked to his well-earned window above the
city and pondered the disturbing news.
Spandau, he thought bitterly. Hess may stab us in the back yet.
In spite of the ticklishness of his own position, Sir Neville Shaw
smiled coldly. There'll be some royal arses shaking in their beds
tonight, he thought with satisfaction.
Right along with mine.
He reached for the telephone.
625 pm. #39 Liitzenstrasse, West Berlin
Hans reached the apartment building too winded to use the stairs.
He wriggled into the elevator, yanked the lever that set the clattering
cage in motion, then slumped against the wrought-iron grillwork.
Despite his frayed nerves, he was smiling. Heini Weber could joke all
he wanted, but in the end the joke would be on him. Because Hans knew
something Weber didn't: where he had found the papers. And that single
fact would make him rich, he was certain of it. He jerked back the
metal grille and trotted to the apartment door.
"Ilse!" he called, letting himself in. "I'm home!"
In the kitchen doorway he stopped cold. Wearing a white cotton robe,
Ilse sat at the table holding the papers Hans had found at Spandau.
"Where did these come from?" she asked coolly.
Hans searched for words. This was not the way he'd planned to explain
the papers.
"Your night duty was at Spandau Prison, wasn't it?' "Yes, but Liebchen,
give me a chance to explain. It was a secret detail. That's why I
couldn't call you."
She studied him silently. "You haven't told anyone about this, have
you?"
Hans remembered his conversation with Heini Weber, but decided that
