When it came to people like Lev Cohen, Professor Cohen, the information he passed on was highly valued by Moscow but it had taken Aarons several meetings before he understood why Cohen cooperated. They met usually at an Italian café near Washington Square, usually in the evening after Cohen’s day’s work was over. It was at one of those meetings that Aarons realised that Cohen was not, despite his information, one of those who wished Moscow well.
He was in his early forties, a dapper man with a Douglas Fairbanks moustache and his black hair creamed back slickly so that it showed the lines of a comb.
“D’you read this material I give you?” Cohen raised his eyebrows quizzically.
“I photograph it.”
“Do you understand it?”
Caution made Aarons avoid answering. Instead he said, “Why do you ask?”
Cohen smiled, a brief, cold smile. “I guess that’s answer enough. If you understood it you’d realise that the last stuff I gave you was vital material.” He paused. “Have they commented on it yet?”
“No. But they’ve received it. I know that.”
“They’ll ask you to find out how I’ve got it.” He paused and sipped his beer as if he needed its support. “And I won’t tell you, my friend. And they’ll want more and you can tell them that I’ll want real money from now on and proof that they’re meeting their obligations at the other end.”
“How do you want them to provide proof?”
“They told you of the deal?”
Aarons hesitated because they had not told him of any deal and then he said, “You tell me. Let’s make sure that there’s no misunderstanding.”
“The deal is that Manya is not harassed and is safe. Safe from everything. Not only safe from you people but safe from the Germans.” He leaned forward as he went on. “Photographs, declarations, letters from her. I tell you now that if anything happens to her then I not only cease to cooperate but I’ll go to the FBI and tell them what I’ve been doing. No matter if I go to jail or anything else.”
“What did you mean when you said, ‘safe from my people’?”
“Safe from the secret police or the army, whoever you work for.”
“Tell me about Manya.”
“So they didn’t tell you?”
“No.”
“At least you’re honest, my friend.” He sighed. “In 1936 I went to Berlin to work in the experimental physics department at the university. Moscow gave me permission to go. In fact they encouraged me. I was thirty then and Manya was nineteen. We wanted to marry but they said we had to wait. In 1939 I was dismissed from my job at the laboratory. They said quite openly that it was because I was a Jew.
“Moscow told me to apply to come here to the USA. Because of my qualifications and expertise there was no problem. I was offered a teaching post at UCLA and a year later the offer came from New York University. The deal with Moscow was that Manya would be allowed to come over in a year. Before the year was up the Germans invaded and that was it. Then I heard that Manya had been arrested and sent to a labour camp. I raised hell about this and after two months I got a message saying it was all a mistake and she was now back in Moscow and safe. Since then all I’ve had is two letters from her, but they were obviously dictated. Like I said, I don’t trust Moscow.”
“Would you trust me to find out what’s happening?”
“I don’t trust anybody any longer. But I’d like to know what they tell you.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
CHAPTER 14
The Lysander flew low across the Channel and came in over the French coast well south of the landing place. Malloy had been shown large-scale maps of the area where they would land. It was to the north-east of Chartres, a small village called Gallardon.
The plane banked, the pilot looking for the markers, but it had taken two sweeps across the fields before they spotted the flares and the pilot turned the plane into the wind and they came over the tree-tops to land in the field. The drill was that the passenger had two minutes only to get out and any waiting passenger had to be aboard in the same time. Malloy slid down the side of the fuselage missing the short ladder and the pilot threw out the two canvas bags. There was no return passenger and the pilot kept the engine running, waving as he set the plane rolling forward over the bumpy tussocks of the field.
For a moment Malloy was alone, watching the Lysander as it lifted up over the woods into the midnight sky. Then a hand was on his shoulder, roughly turning him around and he saw the face of the man whose photographs they had shown him. For a moment he was silent and then he said softly, “J’ai deux amours.” The man smiled and said, “Mon pays et Paris,” and he said it like Josephine Baker sang it, making two syllables out of “pays.”
The man picked up one of the bags and signalled to Malloy to pick up the other bag and follow him. As his eyes adjusted to the moonlight Malloy saw that there were now three men ahead of him, turning from time to time to check that he was still there. At the edge of the woods they stopped and one of them put his finger to his lips and then whispered, “We stay here tonight because of the curfew. OK?” Malloy nodded and followed the man to a small clearing in the woods. There was brown, dry bracken piled up in heaps and the first man said, “You’ll be comfortable on the fougère for tonight.” As Malloy rearranged one of the heaps of bracken the three men came over and the first man held out his hand.
