do their work for them.
But that was not the reason that he would make the telephone call. The defence of the interests of his country would govern his action, and this was a time when the policy of the Chancellery demanded an improvement of relations with the 'other Germany'.
He dialled the home number of a young art teacher living in the city of Stuttgart.
After his dinner in the restaurant of the International Hotel, Johnny set out for Heydeck Strasse. Alone on the streets, with only the echo of his footsteps for company, his Own shadows swinging to meet him.
One last push in the morning, Johnny, then the bloody thing's finished.
Chapter Eighteen
Standing on a chair, Johnny stowed the package on the wardrobe shelf above his hanging jacket and spare pair of trousers. Saturday morning.
The package was lighter than when he had brought it into his room because the Stechkin automatic pistol now rested on his hip, held there by the pressure of his belt, pressed against his skin. He had armed the pistol, slotted it with a magazine. There were extra blankets on the shelf and the maid had already tidied his room while he had taken coffee in the hall and guarded the package between his legs. It would be safe on the shelf, safe till the grenades and the other magazines and the shoulder stock were needed.
When he left the room he locked the door behind him, pocketed the key. Down the corridor to the lifts. Johnny let himself out at the sixth floor.
How do you feel, Johnny? Bloody grim, like nothing ever before.
Worse than standing before the Lord Chief Justice when he'd finished the summing up, put down his pencil, sucked at the stuffy air of the courtroom, pronounced his verdict. Worse than then. Worse than that time when he'd turned into Cherry Road and known that all the neighbours knew, and known his mother would be in the kitchen and all he would see of her welcome would be a cup of tea.
Just a job, Johnny, just do your best. Go tell Mawby that, go tell Mr bloody Mawby in his pinstripe suit.
Room 626.
They're all behind you… Mawby, Carter, Smithson and Pierce, even old George, they're all behind you. Right behind, back over the bloody border.
Room 626.
Corridor's clear. Get on with it, lad, don't hang about.
His legs were tight and his muscles fluttering, and there was a pain in his stomach and the forward gun sight bit at his buttocks. In you go, Johnny.
He knocked at the door, knocked twice and sharply.
The girl was in front of him. The dullness of the corridor and the light of the room behind her contrived to shadow and grey her face. He saw the blotched smears at her cheeks, the trembling of her fingers at the door jamb.
Johnny spoke in German. Curt and boorish because he must dominate from the start. He had come to issue instructions, not to plead, that was the Holmbury doctrine. 'I'd like to see your father, Miss Guttmann.'
He was expected. There seemed no surprise, only a deep tiredness that he read from her eyes, and almost the trace of relief that a nightmare might be nearing its end. She gestured that he should come into the room, then as an afterthought she moved aside to permit him to pass her.
An obsessive fear of flying led to Hermann Lentzer using his car for the long journey from the outskirts of Bonn to West Berlin. After Cologne he would join the E 73 autobahn that would take him beyond Dortmund.
He would transfer then to the E 8 and from there it was straight for 280 miles via Hannover and Braunschweig and Helmstedt to Berlin. The Mercedes would swallow the distance.
His documents rested in a leather handbag on the imitation fur cover of the seat beside him. His radio was tuned to the station designed for long distance travellers, light music interrupted only by news of road works and traffic accidents that might cause delay. When he returned the following day he would be hugely richer and more importantly he would have kicked the pigs of the DDR, bruised their testicles, chalked up one more scream of pain and anger.
If the frontier crossings were not slow he would be in West Berlin by early afternoon.
Otto Guttmann was sitting in a low chair near to the window. Johnny towered over him.
'Doctor Guttmann, we have some matters to talk of.'
'We have been waiting for you…'
'Have you followed the instructions, have you spoken to anybody of the photographs and the train?'
'Only to Erica, only to my daughter.'
Otto Guttmann wore the visage of the priest, of one who has been persecuted and who has felt the slings and arrows. He was not lying, Johnny knew that. The quiet, steady, deliberate voice could not have mustered an untruth.
'Willi is alive and well, Doctor Guttmann. This evening he will be waiting fifty kilometres from here…'
'Waiting for what?' The old man's head swayed as he watched through the window the careering flight of a pigeon.
'He will be waiting for you, Doctor Guttmann. From midnight he will be waiting at Helmstedt, waiting for you both to come through the border.'
' It is a sick, cruel game that you play…'
'Not my game, Dr Guttmann. It's the facts that are sick and cruel.
You've been in mourning for a boy who's fit and strong and breathing, that's sick, and that's a fact. Your son defected, that's cruel, and that's a fact. We didn't make him, we didn't know him till he came over. If that hurts, I'm not to blame. But there's another fact… tonight Willi will be waiting and you can join him.'
There was a grim smile on Guttmann's face.
Did you leave him too long, Johnny? Too long, so that the introspection has strengthened and not broken him. Not clasping your bloody hand in gratitude, is he? Far from it. There was a calmness about the old man. A serenity, a sense that he was above and beyond anything that Johnny could do to him.
' It is not possible for us to go to the West,' he said simply.
' It is possible. It is arranged, and it will happen.'
' I am an old man. Once I had a wife and she is lost to me. Once I had a son and he too was taken. I no longer believe in promises. I trust only in Erica's love. That is enough for me.'
Harder, Johnny, go harder. Obliterate the disbelief. You have to, Johnny, you have to be bloody vile. 'Doctor Guttmann, listen carefully to me. Your son had no accident on the Lake of Geneva. His actions were intended only to deceive, they were eminently successful. Of his own volition Willi came to London. Once there he renounced the countries of his birth and of his adoption. He has put himself at our disposal
'You are British.?' The whisper, the incredulity from behind.
Damn the girl, damn her for the spoiling of the mood, damn her for bringing her father's gaze darting to the source of interruption. 'Be quiet, Miss Guttmann. He put himself at our disposal. He co-operated fully with us. He is well and happy now, you can see that from the photographs. He has told us of you, Doctor Guttmann, he talked a great deal of you… he is ashamed of the hurt that he has caused you. Six weeks ago we began to plan a way that would bring you in safety to your son's side. By this time tomorrow you will be reunited with Willi. If you follow me that will happen — I guarantee that, Doctor Guttmann — if you do not take this chance the opportunity will never be repeated. You have one chance, one chance only that you may take advantage of. A car will come down the autobahn tonight from West Berlin. It will carry the necessary documents. The car will pick you up and drive you to Helmstedt. The offer stands for this night… for this night only… there will never be another car..'
Johnny saw the old man's eyes drift away from him.
Otto Guttmann no longer listened. 'You know that I am elderly, you think, too, that I am a fool?'
Johnny was halted and the words, careful and rehearsed, deserted him.
There was a limpness in his reply, forced by the bluntness of the question. 'I know that you are no fool, you have a reputation for brilliance in your held of study.'
