The Berlin Assignment (27 page)

“Excellent work, Alex. Suspected as much. I know from experience
how challenging such events can be. The line between what goes right and what goes wrong can be faint, difficult to define. Too bad about that one egg…and on the President too.”

“Indeed,” said Graf Bornhof.

As Graf Bornhof spoke, Seidel, the Himmler clone, had been fingering a stack of newspaper clippings. “Correction,” he drawled in a gutturally modulated southern states' accent. “See here. A diplo was in the line of fire too.” He pulled out a story with a paragraph circled in red and placed it in front of his boss who pushed it impatiently to the side.

“A diplomatic incident as well? Oh dear, worse than I imagined,” McEwen said.

Graf Bornhof didn't bite. “Shall we commence?” he said.

The agenda had two items: Phase Three of the handover and, at McEwen's request, the need for an urgent twenty-four-seven, double-key operation.

No aspect of the partnership undertaking caused McEwen more pain than Phase Three. Phase One catalogued Berlin Station operations. Phase Two passed electronic listening facilities, targeted mostly at Russian military camps around Berlin, plus surveillance responsibilities of
German
threats in Berlin, over to Uncle Teut. But
Phase Three
hurt. McEwen was to bare his covert networks and transfer control.

With two half-round slotted keys, McEwen opened a case. He removed a dozen thin files marked
Top Secret
. He grabbed the top file, his least complicated operation, a pipeline into Berlin's Lebanese underworld. Three Arab-Israelis with Beirut credentials had infiltrated the Lebanese community. The information haul – details on arms deals, timetables for shipments of chemical weapon ingredients, circumventions of export controls on inertial guidance systems – was significant. The meta-diplomat, master of Berlin Station, described the network, the procedures for information downloading, the intercepts of shipments
destined for Libya, Iraq, Iran. When McEwen finished, Graf Bornhof took the file, studied it, asked questions and passed it to his subordinates who also looked it over.

They worked their way meticulously through all the files. Information on the breakaway republics of the former Soviet Union had been obtained from a group of social workers looking after refugees. There was a nearly completed organization chart of the Berlin branch of the Russian mafia put together by a diverse group – office cleaners, taxi drivers and some long haired youths running a bogus parcel delivery service. Reports had been assembled on an international armaments dealers' association that met in a picturesque villa on the Tegeler See, using as cover an annual conference there on improving aid flows to poor countries. McEwen also had a handle on an international biological warfare cartel run from the laboratories of the Free University under the code name
Sherry Trifle
. And an army of paid informers in the Russian Army in East Germany had been productive over the years, but this group was beginning to disperse. Clerks in three banks in Berlin reported on the laundering of profits from European sales of pirated video and audio tapes from China. The fake patents business, the heroin trade, shady forms of counter-trade, Russian girls sent into prostitution around the world: the files were portraits of the black side of humanity. They symbolized McEwen's view of the world, and his stand against it.

As Phase Three proceeded and McEwen's world passed into the responsibility of Uncle Teut, the ticking of a wall clock sounded like a dirge. Regularly a cuckoo defiantly stepped out, but its voice had been suppressed, so there was only the sound of a mechanism whirring. Which was how McEwen felt. He darkly believed that the clock, so sadly emasculated, had been hung there for a purpose.

Seidel, eyes full of admiration, was the most vocal of the three. “Hey!” he would say. “This is neat. Real good. Full marks. Congrats.” Graf Bornhof was fascinated too, but more subdued. “Ingenious,” he
occasionally allowed. “Clever. Innovative, Randolph. A master's touch.”

McEwen didn't need to be told that. Innovation was his hallmark. He'd always been months ahead of global developments: Rhodesia when it became a break-away republic; Uganda at the time of Idi Amin; Jo'burg when apartheid was at its ugliest. He had had a stint in Cairo where he predicted the assassination of Sadat. In New Delhi he knew Indira Gandhi would not live much longer. Some of his networks still functioned, still churned out information, just kept ticking over – as regular as the bloody cuckoo clock. Berlin Station was the culmination. A lifetime of experience had come together. It had a master's touch. He had predicted three anti-communist revolutions in eastern Europe. But the Wall was a very special chapter.
Twelve hours. London knew twelve hours in advance that the Wall would open. Uncle Sam was informed by London thirty minutes later. We knew every peep made in the East German Central Committee. Had for years. And what did Uncle Teut know? Nothing beyond what he watched on television. The Chancellor was out of the country when it happened. He had to hurry back the next day!
Resentment welled up in McEwen. Look at them. Three excited children eager for the goodies which Master Randolph was hanging on their Christmas tree.

As Graf Bornhof and his men looked through the files, McEwen thought about the next agenda item. He rehearsed what he had on the consul. The case was not yet well-enough defined, but an instinct told him it was big, a major post-Cold War operation. If handled with discernment, Friend Tony would be his valedictory address. He had worked on the twenty-four-seven proposal for hours. Sipping port, puffing Havanas, he had read through his material, sifted, re-read, thought. His chin had dropped to his chest and he had closed his eyes. Who owned Friend Tony? What was the game? He had contemplated the quarry to try to gain entry to its soul. A patient, cunning man, the consul, a type that's the most dangerous of all.

The handover, coupled with explanations, questions and further
elucidations, neared completion. McEwen indicated casually that a few, rich items were not yet ready for Stage Three. “The diplomatic scene, for one,” he said. “Subversion arriving via the diplomatic bag, that sort of thing. Insight about that channel has consistently been put to good use elsewhere: Mozambique, the Kurds, the Tamils. Next time, Alex? Is that alright? Move along to agenda item two?” McEwen was fiercely calm.

“Of course,” said Graf Bornhof. “A snack, Randolph? Are you familiar with
Nürnberger Lebkuchen
? A local delicacy. It competes with shortcake I'd say, and Christmas pudding.”

“Better than both, I'm sure,” Randolph McEwen said politely, taking two.

“Agenda item two then,” Graf Bornhof said brightly.

“We have a little problem in Berlin at the moment,” the master of Berlin Station began thoughtfully. “Actually, it could be a big problem if something isn't done. If things get out of hand you might have to do the clean up, Alex.”

McEwen returned Graf Bornhof's pleasant gaze. He described the proven value over the years of a reliable source in one of the diplomatic missions, the initial suspicions the consul had triggered, the Spandau mystery, the solitary walks in East Berlin. He laid emphasis on Hanbury's diffidence, the best ever seen, an extraordinary manipulation of an image. Expertly, always in a low, sometimes mournful voice, eyelids drooping, McEwen wove the facts into a story. A troubled upbringing, a two year gap in the official biography, the evidence in the Stasi archives. “Those files are useful, Alex. I've looked at them. They record secret meetings Hanbury had in the late sixties in East Berlin.” McEwen's voice dropped further still. “At the same time he was arrested at a disturbance instigated by the Red Army Faction in West Berlin, but immediately released. Lack of evidence. Next, he's home. He joins the Canadian foreign service.” McEwen's tranquil hands momentarily unclasped with disbelief, as if the lunacy of it was too great to comprehend. He remained lost in dismal
thoughts, shaking his head, until Graf Bornhof asked him to continue. With a tremor the master of Berlin Station restarted.

“He throws a blanket over the Berlin period. No one knows about it. He embarks on a dull career. More than twenty years of foreign service humdrum. A feint, Alex. A marvellous example of taking time to acquire perfect cover…” McEwen's voice trailed off. “I don't have all the answers, but I know this: he's been a sleeper all these years and now he's becoming active. Something big is happening. We must step in. Twenty-four-seven. I don't see an alternative. We ought to set it up, double quick.” The master stopped; his eyes narrowed to slits.

Graf Bornhof cleared his throat. “Well,” he said, “food for thought, if not quite sustenance for action.” “And this guy is Canadian?” said Heine in his Ivy League accent. McEwen nodded wearily. “I'll be damned.” Heine continued. “Then he's the one that got it at the rally. Look, he's the other guy that got an egg.” He pushed the press clipping back under Graf Bornhof's nose who, with scarcely a glance, shoved it towards McEwen. “Jumpin' Jesus,” Seidel said. “We're letting him get that close to the President?” McEwen nodded. He appreciated the alarm. “Let's not rush,” cautioned Graf Bornhof. He pointed out that twenty-four-seven operations were difficult to set up, and expensive; there were legal implications deriving from the constitution; it had to withstand the scrutiny of the courts. “I know,” the master said wearily. “I know all that.”

Heine, taking a cue from his boss, became skeptical. “Let's falsify for a second,” he said. Falsification, the art of accomplished second-guessing, was an analytical tool he acquired at Harvard. “Flip it around. Put an opposite interpretation on the facts. The facts are good, very good. No quarrel there. Just falsify them. Interpret them a hundred and eighty degrees different. What's left? What's the haul then? What's the minimalist, not maximalist, view.”

“Quite a considerable bit, I'd say,” McEwen said icily.

“Let's have it, Randolph,” declared Graf Bornhof.

McEwen methodically opened a folder and removed a ribbon-wrapped sheaf. “We were able to keep an eye on him for a few days. We assembled a few shreds of information – that's all – shreds – not a full picture, not yet a vast panorama. Not long after he arrives in Berlin, he drops his guard. He tells a member of his office staff he plans to move about incognito. Why
incognito
, we ask. Another time he lets the word
reconnaissance
slip. Then he worries someone is monitoring his mail. We follow him. He heads for East Berlin,
twice
changing trains en route. He goes to Alexanderplatz in strikingly awful weather. He
pretends
he's a tourist. There's a downpour, but he persists. He sits down on a bench, the same one where twenty-five years earlier he met up with a member of East Germany's left wing. Do you know how far left the East German left was, Alex? It was so far left even Marx would have seemed far right. He sits in the rain and waits. For whom? I'll tell you. We know from the Stasi files he was waiting to take up contact with Günther Rauch. Do you know who Günther Rauch is, Alex?”

Graf Bornhof, half skeptical, half intrigued, shook his head.

“Günther Rauch is an extremist committed to unending revolution. When a revolution has been completed, people like him switch sides, so they can start a new revolution. They revolt against the revolters.
Permanent revolution
. As in
Mao
, Alex. I was
in
Peking. I
saw
the Cultural Revolution. Not pretty. Yesterday anarchists threw eggs at the President. Tomorrow Günther Rauch may chuck a bomb.” The master paused.

“Why that conclusion?” Heine asked.

“His background,” McEwen argued. “He was an arch-dissenter in the GDR. Committed to its overthrow. When it fell he led a collection of vigilantes to the Stasi complex and drove them out like Christ flailing the moneylenders from the temple. Did he consolidate then what he gained? Did he fall in love with democracy? Did he take a seat in Parliament like the other dissenters? No! He switched to the side
that used to jail him! Günther Rauch, Alex, is back to agitating for a proletarian revolution.”

All three men looked at McEwen. “I'm told, he's bitter,” mused McEwen. “Lifelong revolutionaries who are bitter do strange things.” He became confiding. “At a minimum he might be giving orders to knock off presidents of banks. At a maximum, who knows? Hijacking nuclear bombs? And now his old friend with diplomatic immunity has returned. Diplomatic immunity, Alex, can be handy if you plan to deal in dangerous materials.”

“It
still
doesn't add up to much if you change the perspective,” Heine objected once more.

“And I haven't bloody finished,” McEwen said testily. “Here's a list of people the consul is cultivating. A distillation of a distillation of who's who in Berlin. Why is he spending time with
all
the VIPs?”

“Oh shit. All diplomats do that,” snapped Heine.

“Possibly, in ideal circumstances. But ninety-nine times out of a hundred a diplomat wouldn't stand a chance cracking into society at this level. Somebody is catapulting him along. Question one – who? Question two – why? Think of the consequences of so much influence in high places.”

Graf Bornhof was shaking his head. “Randolph. Randolph.”

“I still haven't bloody finished,” McEwen said, eyes blazing. “A couple of days ago he contacted a female journalist. Not any journalist, but the one stirring up trouble in the East with her weepy columns on new social evils.”

“Her name?” asked Heine.

“Gundula Jahn. Heard of her?”

Graf Bornhof again shook his head. “We're only now gearing up in the East.”

“A file on her is being assembled as we speak. It comes as no surprise that the Stasi had plenty on her too.”