by Mike Nicol
‘Just do this right this time, Curtains. No bugger-ups.’
‘Nee, Majoor.’
Kaiser Vula about to disconnect, remembered what else he’d asked of Joey Curtains.
‘You traced that investigator yet?’
‘Ja, Majoor. I know where he lives. What’s the major want me to do about it?’
‘Nothing,’ said Kaiser Vula, amazed that Agent Joey Curtains had got something right.
‘I got pictures.’
‘Good.’ Kaiser Vula unable to say good work. Said, ‘Send them to me.’
‘Ja, Majoor.’
The major disconnected before Joey Curtains lifted his blood pressure another notch. Glanced across at the lovely Nandi. Her face so young. So perfect the profile.
She turned to smile at him. ‘Who was that?’
‘One of my men.’
‘Is he on an operation?’
‘Something like that.’ Major Kaiser Vula alert to the smile in her voice.
‘What’s it called?’
‘What? What d’you mean what’s it called?’ Smiling back at her.
‘You always give them names, your operations.’
Kaiser Vula reached across, squeezed her thigh. ‘It’s a secret.’
‘Does the president know?’
‘The president has his mind on many things.’
‘You know,’ said Nandi. ‘No one would believe me if I told them about you. Even when I tell them I’ve been to the palace. They’ll all think I’m joking.’
Kaiser Vula shook his head, took his eyes off the road to give her the stern look. ‘Not a good idea. Better if you don’t say a word.’
‘What?’ Nandi pulling back. Raised eyebrows, mouth open. That pretty tongue lying pink behind her perfect teeth. Their whiteness that so dazzled him. ‘You’re kidding.’
‘I’m not.’
‘No ways. No ways, mister. I go to the president’s palace for a weekend I want to be able to say so.’
‘Look.’ Kaiser Vula leaning towards her. ‘You can’t, alright? For my sake, you can’t. You know what I do. How many times’ve I said it.’ Holding a finger to his lips. ‘Secret. Okay. Secret.’
Nandi turned away from him. ‘Why, darl, why can’t I tell anyone?’
‘Those’re our rules. Between you and me.’
Nandi doing a pout. She did it well. Sometimes enough to make Kaiser Vula relent. Not this time. He focused on the road. Spinning down the fast lane, a Merc behind him wanting to overtake. Kaiser Vula ignored the guy’s flashing lights.
Put through a call to Prosper Mtethu. The old man greeting him in Zulu.
‘You have everything arranged?’
‘Yes, Major.’ Respect in the voice. None of Joey Curtains’ nonsense.
‘There must be no problems.’
‘No problems, Major.’
‘And tonight,’ said Kaiser Vula. ‘This must happen tonight.’
‘It is planned, Major. Major must not worry.’
‘You get him to do it.’
‘Yes, Major.’
Kaiser Vula glanced in the rear-view mirror at the agitated Merc driver. A white man, grey hair, his mouth working, a hand waving to clear the lane. Kaiser Vula smiled. Slowed down to the speed limit.
‘You phone me when it’s done.’
‘Yes, Major.’
‘Whatever happens. You phone me.’
‘Yes, Major.’
‘I must know.’
‘That is understood, Major.’
Kaiser Vula disconnected. Took another look at the Merc man, now bluster-faced. Moved left into the middle lane. The Merc accelerated past, the man gesticulating his fury.
Kaiser Vula stared at him: impervious with dark glasses.
‘Another one of your men on the operation?’ said Nandi.
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Your operation without a name.’
‘That’s right.’
Nandi leaning towards him. ‘You don’t mind if I tell just one person.’ Her hand sliding over his thigh into his crotch. ‘Please.’
‘I do,’ said Kaiser Vula. ‘You will never get to the palace again.’
28
Vicki Kahn went right from the hotel past a small park, the snow still thick there under the shrubbery, turned left towards the Karl-Liebknecht-Strasse. No footsteps echoing behind her.
The cold bit her nose, made it run. Why people handled this sort of winter was crazy when elsewhere in the world there was sun. She dug her hands into her coat pockets, hurried on.
Vicki found the bus stop, waited there with four other people: three oldies, a metalled teenager jigging to her tunes. Watched a young man approach, on his phone, carrying a take-away coffee. All of them wrapped up in their lives, the way any good spook would be.
When the bus came, Vicki took a seat three rows from the rear door. The pensioners sat in the section behind the driver; the jigger stood beside the middle doors; the man on the phone headed upstairs. In Detlef Schroeder’s spy city the youth would be the agent. Maybe.
Before the bus pulled away, she heard someone bang through the rear door, plonk into the seat behind her. Someone panting. A woman by the waft of scent. Vicki tensed, decided, okay, she’d take Detlef Schroeder’s advice. Kept her senses riveted to any movement the woman made.
The bus ground its slow passage down the Unter den Linden through a chaos of roadworks, building sites, traffic snarled in the disruptions. Vicki stared at buildings she couldn’t name, wondering what would be the best here. Move to another seat? Get out?
The bus was almost at the Brandenburg Gate. Tourists everywhere taking photographs with iPads, cellphones, even cameras. She could get out here, mix with the tourists. That would give the follower some excitement. Or do as Detlef Schroeder had suggested and hop off in the Tiergarten.
Vicki got up, stood near the middle doors, waiting for the bus to stop. Glanced back. The seat behind hers empty. A knot of people at the rear also about to get off. A young woman among them, elegant in coat, gloves, a black ushanka, the earmuffs hanging loose. She carried a briefcase.
Nice hat, thought Vicki. Perfect for this weather.
The young woman paid her no attention, alighted, heading across the street towards Hotel Adlon. Not her then. Vicki sat down again. Decided to take a chance. Detlef Schroeder might like his constant tradecraft but the Cold War was over. The old spies needed to move on. Far as she could see, she was clean.
At Zoo recognised one of the pensioners with a wheelie shopping bag, and the far-away teenager. Didn’t notice the young man until she stepped onto the 148. He was standing in the middle section, his coat open, his scarf hanging loose. Still talking on his phone. She walked past, sat again three rows from him. He kept on chatting, leaning into a corner.
Not many passengers but he chose to stand, absorbed in his phone. When he wasn’t talking, was checking email, SMSing, scrolling his screen. Vicki kept him in the corner of her vision, wondering what were the chances of coincidence. Her training telling her, it’s him. He’s your tracker.
Imagined Henry Davidson sniffing, doing one of his mini-lectures during a meeting. Striding up and down the room. ‘There are no coincidences, ladies and gentlemen. Well, not true, there are, there are coincidences all the time. Except. Except when you see a coincidence your first thought is?’ He’d stop, stick out his chin, look down at them through his glasses. ‘Your first thought is?’ None of them would say a word. ‘Your first thought is’ – Henry hamming up his idea of a London cockney copper – ‘’Allo, ’allo, ’allo, what’s going on here, then?’
At Savignyplatz, Vicki brushed past the young man on her way out. Met his eyes briefly, a surprise there that she’d bumped him. He frowned, followed her off the bus. On the pavement keyed in a number.
Jesus, thought Vicki, now what?
Heard him say, ‘Ja, ja, alles gut,’ then head off across the road.
’Allo, ’allo, ’allo, what’s going on here, then?
Bes
t to pretend ignorance. Not let her followers know she knew. A need, though, to up her game.
Vicki turned to face the buildings, found the one where Detlef Schroeder lived. Buzzed her way through the first door into the courtyard. At the hinterhaus buzzed again at Detlef Schroeder’s number. The intercom crackled. ‘Come up to the second floor,’ he said.
29
Detlef Schroeder was waiting for her.
Older than Henry Davidson, she reckoned. Henry was mid-sixties, this man had ten years on that at least. Unless the cancer had taken its toll, aged him. He stood there in a patterned jersey, suit pants, slippers. A tall, bald man wearing thick-rimmed spectacles. His lips a damp blue. Patches of white stubble under his chin, on his neck. Haphazard shaving.
‘So,’ he said, drawing out the sound, ‘like a vision from the past. You remind me of a most striking woman.’
Vicki shook his hand, the grip firm, but he held too long while he stared at her.
‘Come inside, nur herein, bitte,’ he said, standing back. ‘I will make some coffee.’ As she squeezed past him he leant forward, sniffing. ‘You see, you awake my memories.’
Vicki scuttled into the overheated apartment, suddenly uncomfortably warm.
‘You even smell like someone I knew. Do you know that? We all have a smell. This doesn’t matter if you wash, this doesn’t matter if you have perfume, underneath is always your smell.’ He closed the door.
Vicki unwrapped the snood, left it hanging in two loops. Unbuttoned her coat.
‘Let me take your coat,’ said Detlef Schroeder, his hand held out to receive it. ‘Sometimes some of us have a family smell. Maybe this lingers in your family. After all these years to find that smell again. How wonderful. How strange this is.’ He took her coat, hung it on a rack beside the door. ‘We do not use this sense we have enough, I think. Animals sniff about the world all the time. Dogs want to smell you, and cats too. Sharks they tell us can smell blood in water, one part per million. That is, I think, something in the proximity of more than one hundred metres away. Fantastic, yes? In our world we have forgotten to use this sense we have.’ He reached out to rub her arm.
‘Watch his hands,’ Henry Davidson had said. ‘They’re all over the place.’
Vicki drew back. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know who you are, except one of Henry’s old contacts. Can you please tell me what this’s about?’
She watched his blue lips draw into a smile, not far off a sneer, his hand still lightly on her arm. A lecherous man. What was she doing here? What was behind this Davidson/Schroeder conspiracy?
The room was not only stuffy, it smelt of old newspaper, old carpets, old dust, cigarette smoke, gas. Piles of newspapers rose behind the settees. On every surface files, documents, notes. Old Persians covered most of the wooden floors. Vicki sneezed.
‘It is the change of temperature,’ said Detlef Schroeder. ‘We are snug in here, do you not think so?’ He let go of her arm.
‘I like your jersey,’ he said, admiring her. ‘They make a woman so …’ – he paused – ‘how shall I say it, so desirable. The soft wool against the skin. You have the same shine to your skin as the woman of my memory. Very lovely, yes, very lovely.’
Creepy. Very creepy. Vicki folded her arms across her tender chest. What the hell had Henry got her into? What the hell was she doing here? She should go.
‘You would like some coffee?’ Detlef Schroeder was asking.
‘Why’m I here?’ said Vicki. ‘What’s going on?’
He shrugged. ‘I have something to tell you.’
‘What?’
She watched him assessing her, hesitating. ‘It is important. But, please, I cannot tell you like this. We must be civilised.’
She kept her eyes on him, forcing him to break the stare.
‘Okay.’ He laughed. Teeth were missing at the back of his mouth, some of the grinders. ‘So? Coffee?’
‘Tea,’ said Vicki.
He frowned at her. ‘You don’t drink coffee?’
‘I do. Just not this early.’
‘For me it is the only time to drink coffee.’ His gaze dropping from her face to her breasts to her crotch. ‘You are married?’
‘What? What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘A friendly question, that is all.’
She shook her head, told herself, calm down, don’t let him creep you out.
‘A boyfriend?’
Nosey old bastard. ‘Yes.’
Again the damp smile. ‘Good, good.’ He beckoned. ‘Come with me into the kitchen for the tea-making.’
A grey light infused the kitchen as did the sweet tang of gas. Vicki stopped in the doorway. Noticed the breadcrumbs on the sideboard, showered like ash around the toaster. An open carton of milk on the centre table. A dish of soft butter, a knife upright in a pot of jam. Chunks of cheese, slices of salami.
‘How would you like a German herbal tea? Some ginger tea?’ he said. ‘This is my favourite.’ Searching among an array of tea packets until he found the right one. ‘Also a biscuit to nibble?’
‘I’ve had breakfast,’ said Vicki.
Detlef Schroeder ignored her, opened a cupboard of tinned food, packets, bottles of condiments. ‘Yes, here.’ He brought out an unopened packet of Maria biscuits. ‘The same as Marie biscuits in South Africa. Please.’ He tore open the packet, held it out. ‘Go on. They were a favourite.’
Vicki obliged, thought it the best option, stop the old man’s fussing. Finished the biscuit in two bites. Helped herself to another.
‘You see. You also like them.’ He’d taken mugs from the wash-up stand, rinsed them, dropped teabags into both. ‘Now you must tell me why you didn’t get off in the Tiergarten.’ He set the electric kettle to boil.
Vicki frowned at him, shook her head. ‘You! It was you? That guy phoned you?’ She laughed. ‘I don’t believe it.’ He sets up this meeting, then has her followed. Jesus!
‘What do you not believe?’
‘That you would do that. Have me followed. Why, for heaven’s sake?’
Detlef Schroeder tapped his right index finger against his lips, staring back at her. Then held out his hands like a supplicant. ‘You want to know? Alright. There are quite some reasons. The first one is to make sure you are safe. For number two to see if you are of interest to someone else. For number three to observe your skills. Also I want to know if you will listen to me.’
‘And will I?’
‘I think so, yes, even though you disobeyed.’
Vicki kept her eyes on him. Unsure how to react. Henry had sent her here to learn a family secret. Henry Davidson did nothing unnecessarily.
‘What you must understand,’ said Detlef Schroeder, ‘is that there are people who still want to kill me.’
Vicki saw no humour in his eyes. He was serious. No twist to his lips, no half-smile. He meant it. He was living the Cold War still. A paranoid, or maybe he had good reason. Maybe this wasn’t a fantasy of spy VS spy. Maybe he wasn’t lost in dreams of the Cold War.
‘Who is going to kill you?’
‘There are some wanting their revenge. Some people in this city even.’
The kettle boiled, clicked off. Detlef Schroeder poured water into the mugs.
‘You must take this work seriously, Ms Vicki Kahn. It is not a game we are playing.’ He chuckled. ‘Doch, it is a game of course but it is a dangerous game. Too many people I have seen get hurt. Too many people killed. So when I say you should get off the bus in the Tiergarten, I mean this.’
He offered milk, sugar.
Vicki waved them away. Stretched for her mug of tea.
‘You must be more careful.’
Vicki snorted. There were the midnight phone calls but they had nothing to do with Detlef Schroeder. ‘There is no reason anyone here should be interested in me. My only purpose is to see you.’
‘Genau. Exactly. This is why you must be caref
ul. An appointment with me is enough to make people interested.’
Vicki lifted the bag from the liquid, dumped it on a saucer.
‘You don’t believe me?’
‘Why would you endanger me?’
‘It is a good question you ask. I do not bring you here lightly. I have something you must know.’ He got to his feet, steadying himself against the table. ‘Let us go in the sitting room, it is more comfortable.’ Detlef Schroeder guiding her with a hand on her back, letting his hand drop down the softness of her cowl to brush her bum.
Vicki took a quick step forward beyond his reach, sat in a sagging armchair, wasn’t going to have him dropping down on the couch next to her. He lowered himself, letting out a sigh as he sat, tea slopping from the mug onto his trousers. He was unconcerned.
‘Ja, this old-age business is not easy,’ he said. ‘Now, we must begin at the beginning.’ Smiled at her, gulped his tea. His blue lips taking on a shine. ‘Henry did not give you a clue why you are here?’
‘Not really. Except to say it was a family secret.’ Vicki sipped the tea, a strong metallic taste. Looked at the old man looking at her.
‘You are, what do the English say? Yes, you are her spitting image. A strange phrase, this spitting image. In Brewer’s, do you know Brewer’s? Once I looked it up. It means, I recall, the exact likeness, as if you were spat out of her mouth.’
‘I’m sorry, what are you talking about?’
‘Your aunt, Amina.’
‘My aunt?’
‘Yes, your aunt that was murdered in Paris.’
‘You knew her?’
‘When I look at you I can see her. In the shape of your mouth, you have the same eyes, in the way you are when you stand up, in your movements even.’ Detlef Schroeder laughed. ‘As if you were spat out of her mouth. This strange saying but it is true.’
Vicki drank more of the tea, at least it was warm. Where was he going with this? How could he have known of her assassinated aunt?
