Friday 20 June, 9.10 p.m. St Pauli, Hamburg
.
As MacSwain held the passenger door of the silver Porsche open for her, Anna swept her eyes casually back along the street. The battered yellow Mercedes surveillance car was parked about twenty metres back and she caught sight of a faint movement behind the windscreen. They were in position and ready. She smiled at MacSwain and climbed into his car. Anna glanced into the cramped rear seat of the Porsche and saw a large wicker basket sitting on the leather upholstery. MacSwain took his place behind the steering wheel and caught her quizzical look.
‘Oh that?’ He smiled knowingly. ‘I thought we’d have a picnic.’
Anna’s smile suggested that she was intrigued and relaxed, but a knot tightened deep in her gut: a picnic basket suggested a remote location. And the more remote the location the more difficult it would be for back-up to follow without being spotted. It took all her will-power not to glance into MacSwain’s wing mirror to check that her support was behind them.
‘So …’ she began in an intrigued tone, ‘where are we going?’
‘It’s a surprise,’ said MacSwain with a smile, but without taking his eyes from the road.
Anna sat half turned in her seat, watching MacSwain’s profile. Her posture was one of relaxation and ease, despite the stretched steel tension she felt in every minute movement.
Anna repeated the phrase I
don’t feel too well
over and over in her mind, as if placing it within instant reach.
They drove out of St Pauli. East and then south.
I
don’t feel too well
: Anna turned the phrase over once more and closed her mind around it like a grasping hand.
Friday 20 June, 9.05 p.m. Speicherstadt, Hamburg
.
Fabel had been right: there had not been enough room behind the pillars for a man to conceal himself. But there had been enough room for a slim, lithe woman, with iridescent gold hair and an aura of youthfulness; strategically placed so that a few swift, silent steps would take her up behind anyone trying to reach the cabin door.
Fabel’s fear subsided slightly when the pressure of the gun muzzle was removed from his neck as soon as he had been disarmed. Looking past the Slav in the doorway, Fabel could see Mahmoot sitting at the far end of the office. He looked less than relaxed and there was a bruise on the right side of his forehead. Apart from that he looked okay. The Slav stood to one side to allow Fabel to enter. If Fabel was going to make a move, it would have to be now. But there was no move to be made.
It was as if the Slav had read Fabel’s mind. ‘Please do not do anything rash, Herr Fabel.’ The accent fitted with the face. Fabel wondered if this was one of the Ukrainian Top Team; if he was looking at the face of Vasyl Vitrenko. ‘We do not intend you, or your friend here any harm.’
‘It’s okay, Jan,’ Mahmoot called from the far end of the office. ‘They’re cops … kind of. I wouldn’t have got you to come here if I thought there was a real danger.’
The Slav indicated a second chair, next to Mahmoot. ‘Please, Herr Fabel. Sit down.’ When Fabel complied he turned to the girl and spoke in German. ‘Martina, please give the Hauptkommissar his weapon back.’
The girl expertly slipped the magazine out from the grip of Fabel’s gun and handed them to him separately. Fabel holstered the Walther and put the magazine into his pocket. As he did so, he noticed that the girl carried the same model of automatic as Hansi Kraus had picked up in the disused Schwimmhalle. The only difference was that this gun was not decorated with the presentational inlays and tooling.
He turned to Mahmoot. ‘You okay?’
Mahmoot nodded. ‘I’m sorry about this, Jan. But I think you ought to hear what they have to say. They reckon they’re after the same guy you are. They’ve been watching you for some time now – and they tailed me after our meeting on the ferry.’
Fabel turned to the Slav, whose smile did not engage his cold green eyes. ‘You’re some kind of Russian law enforcement? If so, why didn’t you go through the proper channels? I have to tell you that you’ve broken several German federal laws … the city is currently crawling with police hunting you after your attack on me …’
Mahmoot turned quickly in his chair and made a move to get up. The blonde girl waved the barrel of her automatic, indicating for him to remain seated.
‘You were attacked?’
Fabel nodded. ‘Your new friends are not as cuddly as they seem.’
‘I’m sorry about that, too, Herr Fabel,’ said the Slav. ‘But I could not afford the …
complication
of being taken into custody at that point. I’m sure you appreciate that I could have done you real, lasting harm had I chosen.’
Fabel ignored the statement. ‘Who are you? Who do you work for?’
The Slav’s smile again failed to ignite in the cold green eyes. ‘My name, at this stage, is unimportant. My colleague –’ he nodded in the direction of the golden-haired girl – ‘and I are officers of the Ukrainian counter-terrorist police. The
Berkut
.’
‘Ukrainian secret service?’
‘No … that would be the SBU – the
Sluzhba Bespeky Ukrayiny
– who, unfortunately, probably have their part to play in this drama.’
‘And what have these murders to do with terrorism?’
‘Directly? Nothing. Herr Fabel, I will explain everything in due course. I’m afraid there is a great deal to explain and my German has its limits, so I ask you to be patient. The main thing is I believe we would both benefit from an exchange of information.’
Fabel gave the Slav a hard stare. His German seemed pretty solid to him, despite the heavy accent. ‘What were you doing in Angelika Blüm’s apartment? And what were you doing outside the murder scene in St Pauli?’
‘As your friend has indicated, we have an interest in the same case. Prior to her death, Frau Blüm was investigating certain property transactions involving the Eitel group of companies, yes?’
Fabel gave a non-committal shrug.
The Slav smiled. ‘These property deals were established to benefit Klimenko International, which is a Kiev-based consortium. These premises we are in have only recently been vacated by Klimenko International.’
‘These deals were illegal?’ asked Fabel.
The Slav waved his hand dismissively. ‘Technically? Probably. They depended on information being passed on to Klimenko from official sources in the Hamburg government, perhaps more
predictively
than the authorities would have liked.’
‘Let me guess, the focus of these deals would be the Neuer Horizont partnership?’
‘You are perhaps more familiar with the situation than I thought. Yes, Herr Fabel, that is correct. There are pieces of real estate all around Hamburg that are, in themselves, of little commercial value. But once it becomes known that an area is due for regeneration or high-value development, then the value of the ground itself on which each piece of real estate stands appreciates spectacularly.’
‘So Klimenko International and Neuer Horizont stand to make a fortune by buying cheap and early.’
‘That was the idea. I will tell you something now that I will never again repeat and which you will never be able to prove. Klimenko International is a front for my government. The Ukraine is a poor country, Herr Fabel. It has, however, the potential to become a very wealthy and influential part of Europe. There are those who would use any – and I mean any – tool or weapon at their disposal to ensure that this potential is fulfilled. Klimenko International was one such tool. To answer your question … the reason I was at Frau Blüm’s apartment was to find out if there was anything there that would incriminate my government or which would aid me in fulfilling my mission here. I will explain the objectives of that mission shortly. I thought there was a chance that your people might have missed some paperwork or information that would not have been immediately associated with the killing but would relate to the Klimenko operation. I underestimated you.’
‘That wasn’t all down to us. Whoever killed Angelika Blüm wiped her computer and, we suspect, removed files from her apartment.’
The Slav stared blankly at Fabel and ran his hand across his scalp, palming the coarse white bristle; then he continued in his heavily accented, grammatically perfect German: ‘There is a third element at work here. One of which you are already, in part, aware.’ He paused for a second, as if punctuating the delivery of the information to emphasise the importance of what was to follow. ‘The front man here for the Klimenko operation was Pavlo Klimenko, the putative head of the consortium. Klimenko is, in fact, an officer of the SBU secret service with an impressive service history with the military. Unfortunately for those behind this “enterprise”, other interests had already been at work for some time. You know the name Vasyl Vitrenko?’
Fabel nodded. ‘He is supposedly the head of a Ukrainian crime gang. A new one that is taking over the activities of all others in the city.’
‘Vasyl Vitrenko is – was – a full colonel in the
Berkut
. Vitrenko has a service record that many admire to the point of adulation. Others see him as a monster. As the Devil. In another place, in another time, I was charged with the responsibility of finding and stopping Vitrenko’s worst excesses. Vitrenko has gathered around him ten of his former subordinate officers – men who served under him in Chechnya or Afghanistan, or both – each of whom has a record of both outstanding bravery and exceptional cruelty. Each of these officers remains fiercely loyal to Vitrenko. What is more, Vitrenko has promised to make them all millionaires. A promise he is already close to fulfilling. One of these officers was a Major Pavlo Klimenko.’
‘So Vitrenko snatched your crooked little scheme away right from under you?’ Fabel gave a bitter laugh.
The Slav’s green eyes glittered in the bleak artificial light of the Portakabin. ‘That is correct, Herr Hauptkommissar. But before you get too smug, I would point out that your government is capable of underhand dealing too. What was the objective of the operation involving the unfortunate Herr Klugmann?’
‘I’m not prepared to discuss that with you.’
‘No? All right, Herr Hauptkommissar. Allow me to answer my own question. You believe that Herr Klugmann was carrying out a surveillance and intelligence-gathering operation on the activities of Vasyl Vitrenko and his crew. Correct?’
Fabel shrugged and nodded.
‘Not so, Herr Fabel. Herr Klugmann had only one objective: to contact and negotiate with Vasyl Vitrenko. Klugmann was an operative of the BND and he had a deal to offer. Your government, in the full knowledge of Vitrenko’s murderous past and his criminal present, is prepared to offer him immunity from prosecution and a lucrative deal.’
‘Why on earth would the German federal government do business with a known major criminal?’
‘Because of September 11th, 2001.’
‘What?’
‘Eight of the ten suicide bombers that carried out the attack on the World Trade Center in New York lived in or passed through Hamburg immediately before the attack. It has been a matter of considerable embarrassment both to the city and national governments. In short, you Germans would do anything to help the Americans. And the Americans need all the help they can get. Vasyl Vitrenko is a highly intelligent and educated man; he is also a leading expert on Afghanistan and Islamic terrorism. The CIA have made it clear to BND that they would be greatly obliged if they could land Vitrenko for them. Your colleague, Klugmann, was briefed to begin negotiations; the apartment in which the girl was killed was set up as the venue for those negotiations.’
Fabel looked hard at the Slav, and then at the girl with the blonde hair. It wouldn’t be the first time expedience and the imperative of ‘the greater good’ had bulldozed over the rule of law. The Slav watched Fabel impassively, giving him the time to consider his response. Eventually Fabel said: ‘But the only contact Klugmann had with the new Ukrainian outfit was someone called Vadim. Other than that there was no contact.’
‘Not so. What you have to ask yourself, Herr Fabel, is who the source of that information was and if they have a vested interest in misleading you. Vadim is indeed one of Vitrenko’s men – Vadim Redchenko – and Klugmann will have had contact with him as the principal intermediary. But Klugmann had three separate meetings with Vitrenko. What the final outcome was, I can only guess. But the evidence of Vitrenko’s decision is bloodily apparent.’
‘You’re saying that Vitrenko is committing these horrific murders?’
‘I am certain of it, Herr Hauptkommissar.’
Friday 20 June, 9.25 p.m. Altona, Hamburg
.
Anna had managed to chat with MacSwain in a relaxed manner, but her occasional casual glances away from his profile and out through the side window or windscreen of the Porsche had been like the casting out of safety lines, each time anchoring on a road sign or a landmark. They were heading towards the Elbe. Where the hell was he taking her?
‘I’m intrigued,’ Anna said, levering as much calm into her voice as she could muster.
MacSwain smiled knowingly. ‘I have something rather special in mind for you, Sara. I promise you this is something you won’t forget …’
Paul Lindemann winced as if MacSwain’s phrase, heard through Anna’s wire, had stung him. He turned to Maria who sat next to him in the back of the Mercedes panel van. ‘I don’t like this at all …’