The sky was grey by the time I got back to my rooms. I heard a handful of rain against the french windows, and seconds later there was a short flash and a huge clap of thunder that sent the pigeons on my terrace flying for cover. I stood and watched the storm as it rocked the trees and flooded the drains, discharging the atmosphere of all its surplus electrical energy until the air was clear and comfortable again.
Ten minutes later the birds were singing in the trees, as if in celebration of the purgative squall. There seemed much to envy them in this swift climatic cure, and I wished the pressure I felt on my own nerves could have been as easily resolved. Trying to keep one step ahead of all the lies, my own included, I was rapidly coming to the end of my own ingenuity, and I was in danger of losing the tempo of the whole affair. Not to mention my life.
It was about eight o'clock when I called Belinsky at Sacher's, a hotel on Philharmonikerstrasse requisitioned by the military. I thought it might be too late to catch him, but he was there. He sounded relaxed, like he'd known all along that the Org would take his bait.
'I said I'd call,' I reminded him. 'It's a bit late, but I've been busy.'
'No problem. Did they buy it? The information?'
'Damn near took my hand off. K/nig drove me to a house in Grinzing. Possibly it's their headquarters here in Vienna, I'm not sure. It's certainly grand enough.'
'Good. Did you see anything of Mnller?'
'No. But I saw someone else.'
'Oh? And who was that?' Belinsky's voice got cool.
'Arthur Nebe.'
'Nebe? Are you sure of that?' He was excited now.
'Of course I'm sure. I knew Nebe before the war. I thought he was dead. But this afternoon we spoke for almost an hour. He wants me to help K/nig find our dentist friend, and to go back to Grinzing for a meeting tomorrow morning to discuss your Russian's love letters. I've a hunch that Mnller's going to be there.'
'How do you make that out?'
'Nebe said that there would be someone there who specialized in all matters relating to the MVD.'
'Yes, coming from Arthur Nebe that description might well fit Mnller. What time is this meeting?'
'Ten o'clock.'
'That only gives me tonight to get things organized. Let me think for a minute.'
He was silent for so long that I wondered if he was still on the line. But then I heard him take a deep breath. 'How far is the house from the road?'
'Twenty or thirty metres at the front and the north side. Behind the house to the south is a vineyard. I couldn't tell you how far the road is on that side.
There's a row of trees between the house and the vineyard. Some outbuildings as well.' I gave him directions to the house as best I remembered them.
'All right,' he said briskly. 'Here's what we'll do. After ten, I'll start to have my men surround the place at a discreet distance. If Mnller is there, you signal to us and we'll close in and pick him up. That's going to be the difficult part because they'll be watching you closely. While you were there, did you happen to use the lavatory?'
'No, but I walked past one on the first floor. If the meeting is in the library where I met Nebe, as I imagine it will be, that will be the one in use. It faces north, towards Josefstadt and the road. And there's a window, with a beige roller blind. Perhaps I could use the blind to signal.'
There was another short silence. Then he said: 'Twenty minutes past the hour, or as near as you can manage, you go to the music-room. When you're in there you pull the blind down and count for five seconds, and then push it up for five seconds. Do it three times. I'll be watching the place through binoculars, and when I see your signal I'll sound the car horn three times. That will be the signal for my men to move in. Then you rejoin the meeting, sit tight and wait for the cavalry.'
'It sounds simple enough. A bit too simple really.'
'Look, kraut, I would suggest that you hang your ass out of the window and whistle Dixie but that might attract attention.' He gave an irritated sort of sigh. 'A swoop like this needs a lot of paperwork, Gunther. I have to work out code names and get all kinds of special authorizations for a major field operation. And then there's an investigation if the whole thing turns out to be a false alarm. I hope you're right about Mnller. You know, I'm going to be up all night arranging this little party.'
'That really knocks over the heap,' I said. 'I'm the one on the beach and you're bitching about some sand in the oil. Well, I'm really blue about your damned paperwork.'
Belinsky laughed. 'Come on, kraut. Don't get a hot throat about it. I just meant that it would be nice if we could be sure that Mnller will be there. Be reasonable. We still don't know for sure that he's part of the Org's set-up in Vienna.'
'Sure we do,' I lied. 'This morning I went to the police prison and showed Emil Becker one of Mnller's snapshots. He identified him immediately as the man who was with K/nig when he asked Becker to try and find Captain Linden. Unless Mnller is just sweet on K/nig, that means he must be part of the Org's Vienna section.'
'Shit,' said Belinsky, 'why didn't I think of doing that? It's so simple. He's certain it was Mnller?'
'No doubt whatsoever.' I strung him along like that for a while until I was sure of him. 'All right, slow your blood down. As a matter of fact, Becker didn't identify him at all. But he had seen the photograph before. Traudl Braunsteiner showed it to him. I just wanted to make sure it wasn't you who gave it to her.'
'You still don't trust me yet, do you, kraut?'
'If I'm going to walk into the lion's den for you, I'm entitled to give you an eye-test beforehand.'
'Yes, well that still leaves us with the problem of where Traudl Braunsteiner got hold of a picture of Gestapo Mnller.'
'From a Colonel Poroshin of MVD, I expect. He gave Becker a cigarette concession here in Vienna in return for information and the occasional bit of kidnapping.
When Becker was approached by the Org he told Poroshin all about it and agreed to try and find out everything he could. After Becker was arrested, Traudl was their go-between. She just posed as his girlfriend.'
'You know what this means, kraut?'
'It means the Ivans are after Mnller as well, right?'
'But have you thought what would happen if they got him? Frankly there's not much chance of him going on trial in the Soviet Union. Like I said before, Mnller's made a special study of Soviet police methods. No, the Russians want Mnller because he can be very useful to them. He could, for instance, tell them who all the Gestapo's agents in the NKVD were. Men who are probably still in place in the MVD.'
'Let's hope he's there tomorrow then.'
'You'd better tell me how to find this place.'
I gave him clear directions, and told him not to be late. 'These bastards scare me,' I explained.
'Hey, you want to know something? All you krauts scare me. But not as much as the Russians.' He chuckled in a way that I had almost started to like. 'Goodbye, kraut,' he said, 'and good luck.'
Then he hung up, leaving me staring at the purring receiver with the curious sensation that the disembodied voice to which I had been speaking belonged nowhere outside my own imagination.
Chapter 32
Smoke drifted up to the vaulted ceiling of the nightclub like the thickest underworld fog. It wreathed the solitary figure of Belinsky like Bela Lugosi emerged from a churchyard as he strode up to the table where I sat. The band I had been listening to could hold a beat about as well as a one-legged tap-dancer, but somehow he managed to walk to the rhythm it was generating. I knew he was still angry with me for doubting him, and that he was well aware of how, even now, I was trying to fathom why it was that he hadn't thought to show Mnller's photograph to Becker. So I wasn't very surprised when he took hold of my hair and banged my head twice on the table, telling me that I was just a suspicious kraut. I got up and staggered away from him towards the door, but found my exit blocked by Arthur Nebe. His presence there was so unexpected that I was momentarily unable to resist Nebe grasping me by both ears and banging my skull once against the door, and then once again for good luck, saying that if I hadn't killed Traudl Braunsteiner then perhaps I ought to find out who had. I twisted my head free of his hands and said that I might as soon have guessed that Rumpelstiltskin's name was Rumpelstiltskin.
