The clubhouse was a long, flat building of the kind that members often spend years scrabbling and begging for materials with which to build, and, like the gardens, was shut up for the winter. A low wall made of concrete blocks enclosed a beer garden, and a trio of flagpoles stood to vacant attention.
There was no wind at all today, I could feel and smell gelid sea air creeping through the trees from the coast. I could see the trampled path among the trees, but the snow immediately in front of my vantage point lay as smooth as it had fallen, disturbed only by bird and animal prints.
Beyond the trees lay the beach, dusted with snow and frost, then the sea ice, restlessly cracking and rafting up on itself. It was a good place to wait and observe, if a little cold.
Merkur came marching along less than twenty minutes later, as energetic as when he had set off. His head was bare and his coat unbuttoned. He stared straight ahead as he walked, no interest in the trees around him, nor the frost-dusted dunes beyond. I stayed out of sight—the subject had already seen me twice. Even if I was prepared to assume that he hadn’t actually noticed me so far, he would if I began to cross his eyeline too often.
As he came alongside, I edged along the wall of the clubhouse, waiting at the back of the building for him to come into view again. Once he’d passed, I lit a cigarette and watched the retreating figure as it flickered between the tree trunks. Should I return to the car, drive a bit further to Diedrichshagen and see if I could pick up his trail there? I was curious to know whether he would get the bus back to Warnemünde, as recommended by the receptionist, or press onwards to Heiligendamm.
I took another pull on my coffin nail and decided I’d seen enough to chalk up Merkur’s current outing as an innocent walk. It was time to return to Warnemünde and wait for him in the warmth.
As I was about to turn away, another figure came into sight. He was going at the same rate as Merkur, but with his shorter legs was struggling to keep pace. I recognised the type: a colleague—it’s not just the citizens of this Republic that can recognise one of the Firm at twenty paces.
The observer hurried after Merkur, he had no sense of panache or style, was interested only in fulfilling his duty. But to be fair to my unknown colleague, there was only the one path, he couldn’t lose his mark—the only skill he needed was the ability to drop out of sight if Merkur unexpectedly started to take more of an interest in his surroundings.
We’re like weeds and bad luck, where there’s one of us, there’s more—although, not for the first time, I was the exception that proved the rule. I lit another cigarette, and remaining under cover behind the building, looking down the side, towards the path and waiting patiently for eye number two. Here he was, nearly a hundred metres behind his comrade and just as out of shape.
When both colleagues had disappeared from sight, I returned to the car, following my own footsteps back through the snow. And as I walked, I thought.
Merkur was attracting a lot of interest—not only had I been sent up here to get a handle on his intentions, but the local office had sent a chambermaid to look through his belongings. And on top of all that, he now had a tail.
What had Merkur done to make the locals start snooping around?
Let’s assume for a moment that the receptionist found his query about rambling along the dunes suspicious enough to report—that could, just possibly, explain these two overweight goons on the path. But it didn’t explain the chambermaid and her instructions to catalogue Merkur’s belongings.
Berlin had ordered me to stay out of the locals’ way as much as possible, but I didn’t see how I could oblige, considering the level of scrutiny Merkur was being subjected to.
23
Warnemünde
I wasn’t sure of my next move. With a team, I would have been able to cover all the routes Merkur could have taken on his way back to Warnemünde: the bus stop in Diedrichshagen, the Promenade in case he returned on foot, and the hotel entrance just to be sure. Instead, I drove back to Warnemünde and went to see my friends at the Kurhaus observation post opposite the main doors of the Neptun.
A knock on the door, clapperboard held up, same procedure as last time. Only Glasses-moustache was alone that day. Enquiring as to the absence of the long-haired operative may have been the polite thing to do, but I didn’t bother. My only job was to sit here and wait for Merkur to return—at which point I would latch onto him again and see what he did next.
It was a long wait—Merkur didn’t return until after dark. From the Kurhaus, I watched him approach the doors of the Neptun, I could see him through the tall windows of the lobby as he pressed the button for the lift. Only then did I slowly cross the car park, adjusting my pace to avoid entering the hotel before he was safely on the way up to his floor.
Once he was out of the way, I sat down in the lobby bar, finding a seat near a few Western businessmen talking about a shipbuilding order. They were a loud group, not only the conversation—their suits demanded attention. I felt well camouflaged sitting behind them.
I passed the time sipping an overpriced Radeberger beer and filling in my expenses notebook. When that was done, I ordered another beer and waited some more.
Folk up here are a bit slow—they take their time when they’re speaking and have a good think before they answer any questions. I was never quite sure whether they were being canny, continuously weighing up their options, or were generally just a little backwards. If it’s the latter then it was rubbing off on me—I’d sat there for an hour before realising that Merkur might have gone to the nightclub again—he wouldn’t need to come through the lobby to get there.
I took the stairs, flashing the Kripo disc at the staff member on the door to the Daddeldu and pushed through the already packed club. I headed for the bar first, then worked my way along to the corner where I’d seen Merkur the evening before.
It wasn’t the easiest search. Disco-lights flashed and swept across my eyes, Western suits and Eastern teenagers danced to Michael Jackson and drinkers holding the best beers and spirits from East and West obstructed my progress. For a moment I thought I’d found him—a tall man, full head of light grey hair, dark blue check jacket. But when I worked my way round the room far enough to see his face, it was obscured by heavy, horn-rimmed glasses.
I was concentrating so much on figures above average height that I didn’t notice the squat man until I felt his eyes on me. I lowered my gaze, searching the mass of dancers. There he was, the one watching me: red face and greasy, thinning hair, grey jacket over patterned shirt, no tie. Not dancing; standing and staring at me. This was one of the goons who’d chased after Merkur this morning.
I crossed the short distance between us, stopping just a few centimetres short. That was enough to make him jumpy—members of the Firm aren’t used to being bearded. I tapped him on the chest and jerked my head towards the bar. When I set off, he followed.
Behind the bar, a door led to a stock room, the bar tender took one look at the pair of us and decided it wasn’t worth asking what we were up to. I shut the door behind us, pulled my clapperboard and gave the short man a flash.
“This morning you were following a subject named Seiffert. Where is he now?” I said.
His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down, and his eyes slid around the room. I didn’t need to wait for his answer to know he’d lost Merkur.
“When did you last see him?”
“We followed him back to Warnemünde, comrade. The subject was heading for the hotel, but then …”
“What time?”
“Twelve-o-four, comrade.”
Without wasting another moment, I opened the storeroom door and dived back into the din—Phil Collins was intent on perforating my eardrums with assurances that I couldn’t hurry love—but I didn’t want relationship advice, I wanted Merkur.
I ran up the stairs, followed by the colleague, crossed the lobby at a fast pace and demanded reception tell me whether Seiffert was in.
The receptionist checked
the hook, the key was hanging there.
Merkur wasn’t in the hotel.
24
Warnemünde
It was a little short of the agreed hour when Anna walked through the door of the Fischerklause. I watched her slip her woollen coat off, revealing a wrap-over dress with black and red zebra stripes. Her fair skin and light eyes glinted in the glow of the kitschy lanterns, and the red in her dress nicely set off her loose blonde hair. She had a large red Lederol handbag looped over her shoulder, and she swung it off as she sat down, letting it fall to the floor under the table.
“For a hotel worker, you seem to spend a lot of money in the Exquisit shop,” I said in way of greeting.
Anna pouted a little, but didn’t deny that she frequented the expensive boutiques that sold limited edition, locally produced clothes and fashion items.
The waitress came over without prompting and examined Anna’s outfit, obviously having similar thoughts as I had, although I might have detected a hint of envy in her features.
I ordered another beer for myself, Anna wanted a Selters sparkling water, and we sat and smiled shyly at each other until the drinks came.
“No dancing tonight,” Anna observed. The music system had been packed away and tables had appeared where the previous night couples had danced. She sipped her drink, looking up from under her eyelashes. “That’s a shame.”
“We could go somewhere else, if you wanted to dance …” I suggested.
Another sip of her water, another glance up at me. But in lieu of an answer, she reached into her bag and passed a film cannister over the table.
She watched anxiously as I took possession of the little tin, hiding it in the palm of my hand as I shunted it towards me. She gave a little sigh as I dropped it into my pocket, as if she’d worried I may examine it right there in the restaurant, although I couldn’t think why that would have been so bad.
Once the film cannister had disappeared, Anna reached down again, this time lifting her bag onto her lap. She laid a pad of drawing paper on the table, then took out a leather pencil case.
“Do you mind?” she asked, already taking a pencil out.
I didn’t object, so, holding the paper at an angle so I couldn’t see, she began sketching. She looked up often, her tongue caught between her front teeth as she examined my face.
I drank my beer, ordered another, while Anna, absorbed in her task, left her glass on the table. She had a habit of pushing her hair behind her right ear, I noticed, and her tongue would disappear when she drew, but come out again when she looked at me. I watched that tongue and thought about things I shouldn’t have.
Finally, she put the pencil on the table and took a sip of Selters.
“May I see?”
She shook her head. “That was just to get a feel for …”
“For me?”
“Yes.” But she was already burrowing in her pencil case again, pulling out a few sticks of charcoal wrapped in tissue paper. She turned the page, starting on a fresh sheet.
Time passed easily without the need for conversation. She drew, I drank. I imagined it was just the two of us in the bar, no need for romantic music, or dancing. I could have sat there all night, watching that tongue dart between those lips.
She let me see the picture this time. She laid the charcoals back on the tissue paper, wrapping them up in a neat bundle, then tore the page out of the pad and laid it on the table.
I turned it around and leaned forward to see it better. It was clearly me she’d drawn, no doubt about it, but it wasn’t a portrait of anyone I knew.
“Am I that … do I really look that brutal?” I asked.
The tongue again, as her eyes scanned my face. “Look at the eyes,” she commanded.
I looked at the eyes. Deep, dark rings beneath. She was a good artist, I gave her that, but I wasn’t sure she’d captured me.
“Your eyes,” she said, packing away her tools. “I see hurt in them.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, the conversation was far outside my range of experience—that’s not the kind of thing men say to each other. That’s not the kind of thing my wife would have said to me, even before she left me the first time. And it certainly isn’t the kind of thing women usually say to me when I’m trying to seduce them.
I looked up from my portrait, Anna was standing, already wearing her fancy coat, her bag slung over the crook of her arm, ready to leave.
“I thought we could go somewhere else?” I was already reaching for my coat, but she held her hand out, waving me back.
“Work calls. I’m on the night shift.”
I relaxed into my seat, picked up the sheet of paper again and began to roll it up.
“Don’t roll it, you’ll smear the charcoal,” she said, already leaving.
After she’d gone, I sat for a while at the table. I finished my beer then rolled the portrait—how else could I get it home?
25
Warnemünde
I spent the rest of the evening in one pub after another. None of them were quite to my taste, all had been dolled up for the tourists: clean, well decorated, pricey—although I didn’t find any as flashy or as overpriced as the Neptun lobby bar.
After the Fischerklause, I tried the Atlantik on the quay, moved on to the fish restaurant, but left after the first beer—the smell of frying cod was too much to take on an empty stomach. Wondering for no more than a moment whether to go back to the Fischerklause, I moved on to the night-bar at the Teepott, marvelling at the change of clientele from when I’d been there in the afternoon.
I was devoting myself to drinking—it had taken long enough for the waiter to bring my order, and I had a thirst on me—the schnapps was long gone and the beer wasn’t going to hang around much longer either. But my concentration was broken when some fellow, a local by his voice, demanded another guest at my table make space. I looked up, it was the overfed goon from the Daddeldu disco, the one who’d lost Merkur that day. He was squeezing a chair into the narrow gap opposite me.
“Mind if I join you?” he asked, sitting down and trying to catch the attention of an uninterested waiter.
I supped my beer and pretended to ignore him while watching out of the corner of my eye. In my professional and experienced judgement, he didn’t look too steady on his pins—I wasn’t the only one who’d been drinking that night.
When the waiter finally came over, my colleague ordered two beers and a couple of chasers. I looked directly at him now, his eyes were blurred and unfocussed, the finger he pointed in my direction was unsteady.
“You’re after him as well,” he slurred.
“Give me your clapperboard,” I demanded.
He pulled it out and slid it across the table—the action reminded me of Anna and her film cannister. I quickly placed my hand over the bound cardboard booklet to conceal it from any observers, not that anyone was interested, opening it below the table and flicking through until I reached the interesting pages: Unterleutnant Lütten Horst, Rostock District Administration of the Ministry for State Security.
“So Horst Lütten,” I said in a quiet voice, leaning forward. “Which department?”
“Department II.”
“OK, what’s counter-intelligence’s interest in the subject?”
“We get our orders, we do our job. How about you, what’s your interest?” Lütten leaned forward, placing one hand on the beer-damp table to steady himself, the other hand stretched out, wanting his clapperboard back.
“I get my orders—what else?” I said, keeping hold of his ID for the moment.
“So you won’t tell me?”
There wasn’t anything else to say, this conversation obviously wasn’t going anywhere, so I handed over his clapperboard and stood up. But as I did so, Lütten rose with me. He pressed his beer belly against the edge of the table, his slack face leered at me.
“You, comrade,” he said in a voice suddenly sober. “I know your kind, I’ve seen enough of them—you don’t ge
t to sleep at night, do you?”
26
Warnemünde
Saturday morning found me in my seat at the Round Bar in the lobby of the Neptun. It was called the Round Bar for a reason: everything was circular, from the wooden counter itself to the bucket seats and the tables. I felt a little out of place, holding the rectangular guide book that was my excuse for sitting here.
I was waiting for Merkur, but I had enough to occupy my mind without having to read the guide book. This morning, I’d spent a few minutes in the old biddy’s bathroom, looking at myself in the lace-edged mirror. I couldn’t see anything different in my eyes, they were as they always were. Perhaps not such a deep brown as they used to be, certainly more bloodshot, but still mine. There was nothing that told of the broken nights, the visits by a dead operative—the dark bags that Anna had drawn so precisely weren’t eloquent. And Lütten had seen nothing, it was just the drink speaking.
But don’t they say that drunks and children speak the truth?
At just before eight o’clock, Merkur exited the lift, took a brief look around the lobby and headed into the breakfast room.
Glad of the distraction from my own thoughts, I opened my notebook to note down the time, but looked up when he appeared again. He spoke to the receptionist—the same woman as the day before—who seemed confused by whatever he was asking.
Slipping notebook and pencil back into my pocket, I left my coffee and walked over to stand by the main doors. Repeating my performance from the previous day, I checked my watch and tapped my foot: impatient man waiting—a hackneyed but effective role, not least because I could hear the conversation going on at the reception desk.
“… can I walk along the coast as far as Heiligendamm?”
“If you walk as far as Diedrichshagen then you can catch the number 36 bus back.” After an initial slip, the receptionist had done well in covering her irritation at fielding the same questions she’d answered just twenty-four hours previously.
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