Ian Slater - WW III

Then it happened. The other agent had assured him that everyone necessary from the trade legation in Berlin was ready. But now he learned that one of the men, the RSO, or resident station officer, had had to back out at the last moment because he felt someone, either from the West German police or from the Staatssichereitsdienst, the reinvigorated East German state security service that was supposed to have disappeared in the post-Gorbachev euphoria, was watching him.

The agent Chin had made the meet with realized that Chin was not listening to the explanation. Instead, the older man had stopped, hands in his light gray summer raincoat, looking up and down the street. “Those trees,” he said, “I’d forgotten—”

“What?” asked the other agent apprehensively. “Oh, yes, ginkgo trees — the same as home.”

“But they are not indigenous to Germany,” said Chin. “I remember it struck me the first time I was here. In—”

The other agent didn’t care about trees and, as delicately yet persuasively as he could, ushered Chin inside the apartment block. “I don’t know about the trees,” he told Chin. Chin could see he didn’t care, but the older man was smiling. It was an omen. How was it, how could it be, that the same beautifully exquisite fan-shaped leaves, native to his homeland, were here— across the other side of the world in Berlin? Still green and full of light, bravely growing and vibrant in the dying rays of the sun that were now flickering down through leaves intertwined with — or were they being strangled by? — the indestructible barbed wire that was still there. Through the branches of the ginkgo trees, he saw scrawled, “Freiheit!” Freedom. The um and the yang. From the turmoil of opposites would come the eternal calm. Such omens were no accidents, he believed — they only underscored the unity of all and the unhealthy futility of drawing borders through men’s souls. His country was on the edge of the precipice — the time had come for the clash of the opposites. From inevitable turmoil would come the eternal calm. “When do they start to load?” he asked.

“Eight o’clock,” answered the other agent.

Chin glanced at his watch. “Then we have two hours to fill.” The other man said nothing.

The five of them were in a room on the eighth floor, on the eastern side of the apartment. “Huh,” one of the agents grunted. “After Gorbachev they were going to be one big happy family.”

“That was before Suzlov,” said another agent. “Everything changes and everything stays the same.”

One of the three men who were introduced to Chin began brewing coffee, another passing around cigarettes from a gold-plated case. Chin hesitated. He’d tried too many times to give it up.

“American,” said the junior man, an army captain in mufti.

Chin took one, sat back, and felt himself relax, inhaling the smoke deeply, letting it settle in his lungs before blowing it out in a bluish-gray jet. He felt strangely at peace; everything would now be simply a matter of operational procedure, and the men under his command could tell from his face there was no turning back. Chin told them of the five U.S. and ROK servicemen who had been beheaded at Panmunjom. Seoul HQ, he said, had told him that they had a video of it, not a very good one, taken by one of the last units to get out of the DMZ but that Seoul HQ wouldn’t release it to the media. “Upset the folks at home,” Chin said. “What about the airport security tower?” he asked.

The younger one drew a sketch on the back of a copy of Abendzeitung. “We’ll take them out — or at least keep them occupied,” said the agent.

“Have you got suppressors?” Chin asked. “We don’t want any noise here putting us off.”

“Yes, suppressors, of course. Two rifles.” The agent identified the marksman, who inclined his head respectfully. Chin told him to destroy the sketch, then said nothing more. There was a long silence, the evening light growing dimmer.

Chin could sense the question in the air from all four of them but calmly kept smoking, composing himself. The marksman was looking over at the younger agent and the other two with the suitcases. “We were wondering, sir,” began the younger agent tentatively, “should we not do it now?”

Chin looked around at them, taking his time. “Are you afraid? I don’t want people who are afraid.”

“No, no,” hastened the younger agent with forced unconcern. “I merely thought that while there is light—”

“There is no point in half measures, son,” Chin responded. He paused, the end of his cigarette glowing more brightly now. No one put on any of the lights in the apartment. Nearing the end of the cigarette, Chin asked for another one, accepted it graciously, tapping it on the gold case, thinking for a moment about his young colleague who’d been trampled outside the Secret Garden. Chun looked up.

“Are there any other questions?”

There were none.

“Lee,” he signified to the young agent. “You should stay here to stop anyone at the door. Just in case. I will go up with the others.” Chin nodded toward the other three men.

“Sir?” asked Lee. “With great respect, sir, I would wish to be with my colleagues. We have served together in Berlin and-”

Chin shrugged easily. “Very well. I will stay here.” He looked around, seeing it would be no problem to put the sofa across the door. But in truth he expected no one. They had been very careful, they all said, leaving the embassy and all their homes in West Berlin at different times, using different routes. And Chun was now sure no one had followed him from Tempelhof.

When Chin glanced at his watch again, it was 7:30. “Go up in ten minutes,” he said quietly. “Has the roof lock been freed?”

“Yes, sir,” answered one of the men. “Everything has been prepared.”

In the wars of the early and mid twentieth century, the naval yards of Bremerton, west of Seattle, had seen many a ship launched and not return, but it was never something you got used to, most navy wives carrying it about with them until the day their husbands retired. Beth Brentwood, as had her mother-in-law and many navy wives before her, thought about it every night when she put the children to sleep and went to an empty bed. Sometimes she would take one of his shirts to bed with her.

She had prepared herself for the knock on the door, one of the things Ray’s mother had told her she must do as a service wife. It was no good trying not to think about it, Catherine Brentwood had told her — only fools told you not to think about death. We moved toward it since the day we were born. To imagine it, said her mother-in-law, and how it might come to your loved ones, could sometimes help dampen the fear. Once you’d imagined it in all its obscenity, it wouldn’t have such a hold on you. Besides, Beth knew, navy wives were expected to have the right stuff, too. And so, dutifully, Beth had imagined Ray’s death, or at least receiving the news of it. A naval officer, probably another captain, smart dark blue uniform with the pristine white cap and gold braid. A gentle knock on the door. Their eyes would meet and the first thing would be to get four-year-old Johnny, who right now could talk the leg off a chair, away from the door. Jeannie, eight next week, would realize, with her sensitivity, that something dreadful was up, and Beth knew she could appeal to her maternal instincts to look after Johnny while the naval officer, cap off, smiled down at the two children, waiting. Then when the children were out of the room… “Sorry, ma’am, but I have to tell you the USS Blaine—”

But it wasn’t like that at all. Jeannie had been bratty about cleaning up her room. “Daddy wouldn’t make me!”