gun that had shot and killed Captain Linden.'
'Someone switched it for Becker's own gun, eh?' I said. 'Yes, it's not the sort of thing you'd notice right away, is it? Very neat. A man, conveniently carrying the murder weapon, returns to the scene of the crime, ostensibly to collect his stolen tobacco. Quite a strong case there I'd say.'
I took a last puff of my cigarette before extinguishing it in Poroshin's silver desk-ashtray and helping myself to another. 'I'm not sure what I would be able to do,' I said. 'Turning water into wine isn't in my normal line of work.'
'Emil is anxious, so his lawyer, Dr Liebl, tells me, that you should find this man K/nig. He seems to have disappeared.'
'I'll bet he has. Do you think it was K/nig who made the switch, when he came to Becker's house?'
'It certainly looks that way. K/nig or perhaps the third man.'
'Do you know anything about K/nig, or this publicity firm?'
'Nyet.'
There was a knock at the door and an officer came into Poroshin's office.
'We have Am Kupfergraben on the line, sir,' he announced in Russian. 'They say it's urgent.'
I pricked up my ears. Am Kupfergraben was the location of Berlin's biggest MVD gaol. With so many displaced and missing persons in my line of work, it paid to keep your ears open.
Poroshin glanced at me, almost as if he knew what I was thinking, and then said to the other officer, 'It will have to wait, Jegoroff. Any other calls?'
'Zaisser from K-5.'
'If that Nazi bastard wants to speak to me he can damn well wait outside my door. Tell him that. Now leave us please.' He waited until the door had closed behind his subordinate. 'K-5 mean anything to you, Gunther?'
'Should it?'
'Not yet, no. But in time, who knows?' He did not elaborate, but instead glanced at his wristwatch. 'We really must get on. I have an appointment this evening.
Jegoroff will arrange all your necessary papers pink pass, travel permit, a ration card, an Austrian identity card do you have a photograph? Never mind.
Jegoroff will have one taken. Oh yes, I think it would be a good idea if you were to have one of our new tobacco permits. It allows you to sell cigarettes throughout the Eastern Zone, and obliges all Soviet personnel to be of assistance to you wherever it is possible. It might just get you out of any trouble.'
'I thought the black market was illegal in your zone,' I said, curious as to the reason for this blatant piece of official hypocrisy.
'It is illegal,' Poroshin said, without any trace of embarrassment. 'This is an officially licensed black market. It allows us to raise some foreign currency.
Rather a good idea don't you think? Naturally we will supply you with a few cartons of cigarettes to make it look convincing.'
'You seem to have thought of everything. What about my money?'
'It will be delivered to your home at the same time as your papers. The day after tomorrow.'
'And where is the money coming from? This Dr Liebl, or from your cigarette concessions?'
'Liebl will be sending me money. Until then this matter will be handled by the SMA.'
I didn't like this much, but there wasn't much of an alternative. Take money from the Russians, or go to Vienna and trust that the money would be paid in my absence.
'All right,' I said. 'Just one more thing. What do you know about Captain Linden? You said that Becker met him in Berlin. Was he stationed here?'
'Yes. I was forgetting him, wasn't I?' Poroshin stood up and went over to the filing cabinet on which the Tatar had left his empty glass. He opened one of the drawers and fingered his way across the tops of his files until he found the one he was searching for.
'Captain Edward Linden,' he read, coming back to his chair. Born Brooklyn, New York, 22 February 1907. Graduated Cornell University, with a degree in German, 1930; serving 970th Counter-intelligence Corps; formerly 26th Infantry, stationed at Camp King Interrogation Centre, Oberusel as denazification officer; currently attached to US Documents Centre in Berlin as Crowcass liaison officer.
Crowcass is the Central Registry of War Crimes and Security Suspects of the United States Army. It's not very much, I'm afraid.'
He dropped the file open in front of me. The strange, Greek-looking letters covered no more than half a sheet of paper.
'I'm not much good with Cyrillic,' I said.
Poroshin did not look convinced.
'What exactly is the United States Documents Centre?'
'It's a building in the American sector, near the edge of the Grnnewald. The Berlin Documents Centre is the depository for Nazi ministerial and party documents captured by the Americans and the British towards the end of the war.
It's quite comprehensive. They've got the complete NSDAP membership records, which makes it easy to find out when people lie on their denazification questionnaires. I'll bet they've even got your name there somewhere.'
'Like I said, I was never a Party member.'
'No,' he grinned, 'of course not.' Poroshin took the file and returned it to the filing cabinet. 'You were only obeying orders.'
It was plain he didn't believe me any more than he believed that I was unable to decipher St Cyril's Byzantine alphabet: in that at least he would have been justified.
'And now, if you have no more questions, I really must leave you. I am due at the State Opera in the Admiralspalast in half an hour.' He took off his belt and, yelling the names of Yeroshka and Jegoroff, slipped into his tunic.
'Have you ever been to Vienna?' he asked, fixing the cross belt under his epaulette.
'No, never.'
The people are just like the architecture,' he said, inspecting his appearance in the window's reflection. 'They are all front. Everything that's interesting about them seems to be on the surface. Inside they're very different. Now there's a people I could really work with. All Viennese were born to be spies.'
Chapter 7
'You were late again last night,' I said.
'I didn't wake you, did I?' She slid naked out of bed and went over to the full-length mirror in the corner of our bedroom. 'Anyway, you were kind of late yourself the other night.' She started to examine her body. 'It's so nice having a warm house again. Where on earth did you find the coal?'
'A client.'
Watching her standing there, stroking her pubic hair and flattening her stomach with the palm of her hand, lifting her breasts, scrutinizing her tight, finely-lined mouth with its waxy sheen, concave cheeks and shrinking gums, and finally twisting around to assess her gently sagging bottom, her bony hand with the rings on the fingers slightly looser than before, pulling at the flesh of one buttock, I didn't need to be told what was going through her mind. She was an attractive, mature woman intent on making full use of what time she had left.
Feeling hurt and irritated, I jack-knifed out of bed to find my leg buckling beneath me.
'You look fine,' I said wearily, and limped into the kitchen.
'That sounds a little short for a love sonnet,' she called out.
There were some more PX goods on the kitchen table: a couple of cans of soup, a bar of real soap, a few saccharine cards and a packet of condoms.
Still naked, Kirsten followed me into the kitchen and watched me examining her haul. Was it just the one American? Or were there more?
'I see you've been busy again,' I said, picking up the packet of Parisians. 'How many calories are these?'
She laughed behind her hand. 'The manager keeps a load under the counter.' She sat down on a chair. 'I thought it would be nice. You know, it's been quite a while since we did anything.'
She let her thighs yawn as if to let me see a little more of her. 'There's time now, if you want.'
