Len Deighton - XPD

‘Tell me everything you know about Operation Siegfried,’ said Bock. He turned round with the frying pan and tipped the eggs on to the plates, two at a time. He was a muscular boy with a short haircut and a carefully shaved face. Under a shabby silk dressing gown he was wearing a clean blue shirt and the trousers of a grey suit. He saw the puzzled expression on Stuart’s face. ‘I have to go to work,’ he explained. ‘Jimmy is lucky he doesn’t have to disguise himself in these absurd uniforms.’

Stuart became painfully aware of the ‘uniform’ that he himself was wearing. ‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Now tell us about Operation Siegfried.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘We can get rough, Mr Stein,’ said Paul Bock. ‘You might find that hard to believe, but we can get very rough.’

‘I believe you can get rough,’ said Stuart. ‘So why don’t you believe me when I say that I’ve never heard of Operation Siegfried?’

Jimmy took the bread knife and roughly sliced some bread. He tossed a slice to each of the other men. Stuart dipped a piece of it into the soft yolk of his egg and ate in silence.

‘If you’ve got something to tell me, then tell me,’ said Stuart.

Paul Bock cut his egg into rectangles and ate it section by section between his fingers. ‘I work in the bank-a big German bank-no matter its name at the moment. We got this information from the bank’s computer.’

‘Is that difficult?’ asked Stuart.

‘This computer was a beauty,’ said Jimmy, rubbing his hand over his half-grown beard. ‘Could be this is one of the most complex of its sort anywhere in Europe.’

‘But we cracked it,’ said Paul Bock. ‘Or Jimmy did.’

‘Paul got the hardware keys,’ said Jimmy. ‘Until we could physically unlock the machinery, I couldn’t even begin. And he completed the first codes for the terminal keyboard. Then it got trickier. The bank have performance-measuring consultants who tune the computer; they notice the access per programme, and we didn’t want them to get suspicious. We had to trickle the stuff out bit by bit; spread it over a few weeks.’ He coughed and thumped his chest with his fist still holding the cigarette.

‘This material is ultra secret,’ said Bock. ‘There were many software keys, each one opening up more and more secret stuff.’

‘It’s like a series of doors,’ explained Jimmy. ‘You’ve got to unlock each and every one to get into the inner sanctum. And every door has a sort of burglar alarm that will close down the terminal and store a message saying that someone has attempted an unauthorized access.’

‘And you managed all that?’ said Stuart, not without a trace of genuine admiration.

‘Jimmy’s a wizard,’ said Paul Bock.

‘So what is Operation Siegfried?’ Stuart asked.

‘We are not quite sure,’ admitted Jimmy. He put his cigarette into the ashtray and began to eat.

‘There is a secret fund-a Trust, they call it-formed by some of the most powerful organizations of the Bundesrepublik,’ said Paul. ‘Steel companies, armaments, car-parts manufacturers, insurance companies, publishers and very big banks. We know that the senior trustee is a man named Böttger, who is president of a bank based in Hamburg. Like all the other men involved, he has never been associated with any post-war political party. That’s significant.’

‘In what way significant?’ asked Stuart.

‘If you were going to resurrect the Third Reich,’ said Paul Bock, ‘would it not be a good idea to tell your agents to avoid all political activity?’

‘The war was thirty or more years ago,’ protested Stuart. ‘You mean they’ve been asked to wait that long for Operation Siegfried?’ It all seemed highly unlikely.

‘They are patient and full of cunning,’ said Paul Bock. ‘The Third Reich was planned to last for one thousand years; Hitler himself said so. What is thirty or forty years to such people?’ He got up to put his plate in the sink. A floorboard creaked under his weight.

‘And you think these people are starting a Fourth Reich?’ said Stuart. ‘In what way is my name involved with such plans?’

‘We got your name from the computer,’ said Paul Bock. ‘We got a print-out and committed it to memory before destroying it. There were many names, each with a code word, the significance of which we have not yet decided; your name was the only one which sounded unmistakably Jewish It seemed to us impossible that you would be a supporter of their aims. Therefore you must be an intended victim.’

The two men, Jimmy and Paul Bock, looked at one another. They realized that they were not convincing their visitor. It had not been planned this way: to see Charles Stein up here in this grubby little house with the smell of yesterday’s boiled cabbage coming from next door. The plan had been to meet with him in the lobby of some luxurious hotel in central London, or even take him for a meal in a restaurant. Paul Bock looked round the greasy kitchen. Why should anyone take them seriously once they had seen this dingy slum?

‘It’s all true,’ said Jimmy. ‘You may not believe it, but it’s all true.’

‘We’ve done all we could,’ said Paul Bock, continuing the conversation with his friend as if their visitor had already departed. ‘We warned him.’

Boyd Stuart finished his egg. ‘What about some hard information?’ he said. ‘What about more names?’

‘We wondered if you could be on some sort of death list, Mr Stein,’ said Paul Bock politely.

‘And I’m wondering if you have been watching too much late night TV,’ said Stuart.

‘Get stuffed,’ said Jimmy. ‘We told you, and that’s that.’

Stuart pushed his plate aside and stood up to get a paper towel to wipe his fingers. Through the rain-spattered windows he saw a grim industrial landscape and the Grand Union canal, its stagnant water littered with ice-cream wrappers and floating beer cans. A narrow boat, timbers rotting, had settled low enough for scummy water to lap on to its deck.

Beyond the canal, the rusting tracks and rained shed were the remains of a railway system which had once made the world gasp with envy. A diesel locomotive came into view, hooted and stopped. Stuart tossed the paper towel into the bin under the sink and said, ‘What about a little more evidence?’

Paul Bock said, ‘We’ll talk about it.’ He took Jimmy out of the room and when they returned Bock was wearing the jacket of his smart grey suit.

‘Can you give me a lift to the tube?’ Bock said, looking out of the window. ‘I think I’ll need my raincoat.’

‘Certainly.’ Stuart turned back to Jimmy when he got as far as the landing. ‘But why the swastika badges and the Nazi decorations?’

Jimmy smiled. ‘Then I don’t have to feel bad about lying and cheating my customers.’

‘I see,’ said Stuart. He followed Paul Bock down the narrow staircase into the gloomy shop and out of the front door. Summer seemed a long way away; the clouds were still grey and there was only the faintest glimmer of sunshine on the horizon. They got into the Aston and Stuart followed the insane maze of one-way streets to the underground railway station.

‘I wish you’d give me more information,’ said Stuart as Paul Bock got out of the car. ‘Give me some details of the Trust: what is its address? Do you know how it is funded?’

The German leant close to the window. ‘Perhaps next time,’ he said.

‘Why not now? If my life is in danger the way you say it is, why not now?’

‘Because we don’t believe you are Mr Charles Stein,’ said the German. ‘Jimmy thinks you’re the police. I’m not certain who you are, but the computer print-out shows nearly one hundred million dollars against your name… I’ve worked in banks. You are not a man who’s ever had use of a fortune. Men who handle such money don’t come knocking on doors in King’s Cross early in the morning; they send others to do it for them. You tell Mr Stein to come in person.’ He smiled and was gone in the crowds hurrying into the station.