Len Deighton - Berlin Game

My box of carnation plants was heavy enough to make me sweat by the time we got to the church at Buchholz, but Mrs Munte was not complaining. Perhaps she was much stronger than she looked. Or perhaps she'd chosen a lighter one for herself.

Buchholz marks the end of the number 49 tram route. In the cobbled village square were the bicycles of commuters who lived beyond the terminus. There were hundreds of them, racked, stacked, hanging and piled; the narrow pathways that gave access to them made an intricate maze. Within this maze a man was standing. He had a newspaper in his hands and he was reading from it in a preoccupied way that permitted him to glance round him, and to look down the street as if waiting for the tram to arrive. It was Werner Volkmann; there was no mistaking the big bearlike torso and short legs, and the hat that was planted right on top of his large head.

He gave no sign of seeing me, but I knew he'd chosen that spot so he could keep the car in his line of vision. I unlocked the doors and put the plants in the boot and Mrs Munte in the back seat. Only then – when Mrs Munte was shut in the car and couldn't hear us – did Werner cross the road to talk to me.

'I thought you'd be across the other side of town,' I said quietly, stifling the impulse to scream at him.

'It's probably okay,' said Werner. He turned to look up the street. There was a police car outside the post office, but the driver was showing no interest in us. He was talking to a cop in one of the long white coats that only traffic police wear. 'Four plainclothes cops visited your man's office this morning. It was nothing more than a few polite inquiries, but it scared hell out of him.'

'The same team who arrested Rolf Mauser are now raking through the Lauben and asking if anyone knows him.'

'I know. I saw them arrive.'

'Thanks, Werner.'

'No sense in me rushing in there to get arrested with you,' said Werner defensively. 'I can be more help to you free.'

'So where is he?'

'Brahms Four? He left his office soon after arriving at work. He came into the street holding a small attaché case and wearing a pained look. I didn't know what to do – no phone here to reach you. So I had one of my people grab him. I stayed clear. He doesn't know me. I didn't want him to see the warehouse, so I had someone drive him out to Müggelsee. The truck will go separately. Then I came up here to ask you whether we should still go ahead.'

'At least let's make the kind of attempt that will look good on the report,' I said. 'Let's take this old lady over to Müggelsee and put her in the truck.'

'You kept your man well wrapped up,' said Werner. Twenty years at least he's been operating in this town, and I'd never seen him until today.'

'Deep cover,' I said, imitating the voice of Frank Harrington at his most ponderous.

Werner smiled. He enjoyed any joke against Frank.

Werner got in the driver's side and took the wheel. He started up and turned the car south for Berlinerstrasse and the city centre. 'For Müggelsee the autobahn will be quicker, Werner,' I said.

'That would take us out of the East Sector and into the Zone,' said Werner. 'I don't like crossing the city boundaries.'

'I came that way to get here. It's quicker.'

'This is Himmelfahrt – Ascension Day. A lot of people will be taking the day off to swim and sun. It's not an official holiday, but there's a lot of absenteeism. That's the only kind of "ism" that's really popular here. There will be cops on the roads that lead out of town. They'll be taking names and arresting drunks and generally trying to discourage people from having a holiday whenever they feel like goofing off.'

'You talked me out of it, Werner.'

Mrs Munte leaned forward between the seats. 'Did you say we're going to Müggelsee? That will be crowded. It's popular at this time of year.'

'Me and Bernie used to swim out there when we were kids,' said Werner. 'The Grosser Müggelsee is always the first to warm up in summer and the first to freeze for ice skating. It's shallow water. But you're right, gn ädige Frau, it will be crowded out there today. I could kick myself for forgetting about the holiday.'

'My husband will be there?'

I answered her: 'Your husband is there already. We'll join him and you'll be across the border by nightfall.'

It was not long before we saw the first revellers. There were a dozen or more men in a brewer's dray. Such horse-drawn vehicles, with pneumatic tyres, are still common in Eastern Europe. But this one was garlanded with bunches of leaves and flowers and coloured paper. And the fine dapple-grey horses were specially groomed with brightly beribboned manes. The men in the dray wore funny hats – many of them black toppers – and short-sleeved shirts. Some wore the favourite status symbol of Eastern Europe: blue jeans. And inevitably there were Western T-shirts, one blazoned 'I love Daytona Beach, Florida ' and another 'Der Tag geht…Johnnie Walker kommt '. The horses were going very slowly and the men were singing very loudly between swigging beer and shouting to people in the street and catcalling after girls. They gave a loud cheer as our car went past them.

There were more such parties as we got to Köpenick. Groups of men stood under the trees at the edge of the road, smoking and drinking in silence with a dedication that is unmistakably German. Other men were laughing and singing; some slept soundly, neatly arranged like logs, while others were being violently ill.

Werner stopped the car well down the Müggelheimer Damm. There were no other vehicles in sight. Plantations of tall fir trees darkened the road. This extensive forest continued to the lakes on each side of the road and far beyond. There was no sign of Werner's big articulated truck, but he'd spotted its driver standing at the roadside. He was near one of the turnoffs, narrow tracks that led to the edge of the Müggelsee.

'What is it?' Werner asked him anxiously.

'Everything is in order,' said the man. He was a big beefy rednecked man, wearing bib-and-brace overalls and a red and white woollen hat of the sort worn by British football supporters. 'I had the truck here, as we arranged, but a crowd of these lunatics…' He indicated some small groups of men standing in a car park across the road. 'They began climbing all over it. I had to move it.' He had the strongest Berlin accent I'd ever heard. He sounded like one of the old-style comedians, who can still be heard telling Berliner jokes in unlicensed cabarets in the back streets of Charlottenburg.

'Where are you now?' said Werner.

'I pulled off the road into one of these firebreaks,' said the driver. 'The earth's not so firm – all that bloody rain last week. I'm heavy, you know. Get stuck and we're in trouble.'

'This is the other one,' said Werner, moving his head to indicate Mrs Munte in the back seat.

'She doesn't look too heavy,' said the driver. 'What do you weigh, Fraulein? About fifty kilos?' He grinned at her. Mrs Munte, who obviously weighed twice that, didn't answer. 'Don't be shy,' said the driver.

'And the man?' said Werner.

'Ah,' said the driver, 'the Herr Professor.' He was the sort of German who called any elderly well-dressed fellow-countryman 'Professor'. 'I sent him up to that lakeside restaurant to get a cup of coffee. I told him someone would come for him when we are ready.'

While he was saying that, I saw the black Volvo and the minibus coming down the road from the direction of Müggelheim. They would have made good time on the autobahn, flashing their lights to get priority in the traffic or using their siren to clear the fast lane.

'Get the professor,' said Werner to me. 'I'll drive the old lady down to where the truck is parked, and come back to meet you here.'