Heinsdorf shook his head slowly. “No,” he said, “you will be either an accomplice — or dead.” He stood up, pulled an old-fashioned watch from his vest pocket and studied its dial. “You have,” he said, “until your plane leaves to decide which. I shouldn’t imagine that would be very long now.” He snapped the watch lid shut and slipped it back in his pocket. “By the way,” he said as an afterthought, “I trust you aren’t foolish enough to think you can leave this airport. You wouldn’t get ten steps beyond the entrance.”
“I could yell copper,” I said, “and leave with a police escort.”
Heinsdorf let out a great guffaw. “And turn your package over to the West Germans for nothing? I know your allies, but surely there are limits to even the closest friendship between countries. Especially since there may be American names on that list.” He shook his head again. “No, my friend, I don’t think you will do that.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “When you want me — and you will want me — I will be on the Observation Deck.” He was still laughing as he walked out the door.
I was beginning to resent the way first Dietrich and now Heinsdorf had promoted me to the status of friend on the least provocation.
Dietrich.
I sat at the table for a few moments, biting lightly on my knuckle. Then I went to a phone booth.
I waited for Dietrich in the coffee shop, ignoring the preliminary announcement of my flight. Things shouldn’t get really critical until the final call was sounded, but just the same I was beginning to sweat when Dietrich finally arrived.
Following instructions, he ignored me and sat down at a table slightly to my rear. I let him get settled, then drained the last of my coffee and stood up. He followed me out and across the lobby to the Observation Deck, keeping a good twenty feet behind me.
Heinsdorf was standing at the railing, watching a huge jet, its wingtips trembling, lumber by on its way to the takeoff point. He glanced at me briefly as I came up, then turned back to the jet.
“These machines fascinate me,” he said. “So massive and yet so fragile.”
“If you say so,” I said. “Look,” I went on, “I’ve been thinking over your offer. And the money’s not enough. I want fifty thousand — U.S. dollars.”
Heinsdorf frowned. “I have no authority to go beyond ten thousand,” he said slowly.
“Then do what you have to and get that authority,” I said harshly. “Otherwise I destroy the package. And I don’t think your employers would like that.”
Heinsdorf pursed his lips and thought that one over. “I’ll have to make a phone call,” he said. “Will you wait for me here?”
I shook my head. “It’s a little too open out here to suit me. I’ll wait back in the coffee shop.”
He nodded and left the platform. I waited a minute, then left, still trailed by Dietrich. Instead of going straight back to the coffee shop, though, I cut over to the public washroom. Dietrich followed me in a couple of seconds later.
“All right,” I said as soon as I was sure we were alone, “that man I was just talking to — who is he and who does he work for?” Dietrich would know if anybody did. A freelance operator’s survival depended on his keeping an accurate Who’s Who of Spies in his head.
He shrugged. “Like you,” he said, “he uses many names. One I heard recently was Heinsdorf. It may have changed, though.”
“It hasn’t,” I said. “Now, who does he work for? The highest bidder?”
“No.” Dietrich’s voice reflected his distaste. “He’s a fanatic. A Maoist.” Fanatic was the worst epithet Dietrich could use. It meant someone who acted out of ideology rather than selfish interest. And who was, therefore, even for this business in which everyone was a liar and a cheat, particularly untrustworthy.
“Such nice people I’m meeting these days,” I said. “See anybody else you know around the airport?”
“No one I know,” Dietrich said. “But there were two KGB types resting in your flight lounge.” He shook his head. “Some day they will learn, perhaps, not to go to the same Stalinist tailor.”
That at least bore out Heinsdorf s allegation that he wasn’t the only one after the package. It was beginning to look too as if he’d also been right when he said I didn’t stand a chance.
I took five 100-DM notes from my wallet and handed them to Dietrich. “Go back to your office,” I said. “If I want you again, I’ll call you there.”
Dietrich folded the bills lengthwise and wrapped them carefully around the first two fingers of his left hand. “It puzzles me, though,” he said slowly, “what all these people are doing here, in this airport, at this time.”
“Keep that up,” I said, “and you may find out what happens to curious people. You wouldn’t like it. Now,” I went on, “we’d better not be seen leaving together. You first.” I turned and bent over the washstand to scrub my hands.
Five minutes later a machinery salesman from Dusseldorf pushed open the door and was the first to discover me sprawled on the floor, the attaché case open and empty beside me. There was a strong odor of chloroform still hanging in the air.
Being a good German, he ran yelling for Authority. And within seconds an airport policeman was there, bringing behind him the inevitable crowd of the morbidly curious.
By now I was sitting up and the policeman knelt beside me. “What happened here?” he said.
I grabbed the attaché case and stared into it. “My God!” I cried. I swallowed hard and shook my head as if to clear it. “This is too important a matter,” I said. “I want to see someone from the Verfassungsschutz immediately.”
The policeman stared at me blankly. Then he did what every policeman does when faced with an unfamiliar situation — he fell back on routine. He took out his notebook and poised his pencil over it. “Your name, please?” he said.
Over his shoulder I could see Heinsdorf at the rear of the small crowd turn and whisper something to the man next to him. Then they both were gone.
“There’s no time,” I said to the policeman.
“Your name?” he insisted.
In the end I was taken to a police station where I was allowed to tell my story to a series of officials of ascending rank until finally I was brought before one who made only a token pretense of not being connected with the Security Police.
“So,” he said, “you admit to being an espionage courier operating on the soil of the Federal Republic.”
“Yes,” I said. “It would be senseless to deny it, because I need your help in keeping that list out of the wrong hands. You’ve got to stop Dietrich and Heinsdorf from getting away.”
He picked up a pencil and tapped the eraser end idly on the desk he was sitting behind. “No one is going to get away — or go anywhere for that matter,” he said, “except you.” His voice was cold and professionally unsympathetic. “You’re worse than a spy. You’re a spy who has failed. You’ve compromised yourself, your country, and the Federal Republic in such a manner that the affair cannot be hushed up. However, to avoid further embarrassment to an allied power, we will give you the option of leaving the country immediately without contacting anyone.”
He stopped tapping and looked up at me. “The alternative is prosecution in the Federal courts for an infringement of German sovereignty.”
I chose the plane.
As I was being hustled out of the police station I caught a glimpse of Dietrich being brought in. His face was pale and frightened. I almost felt sorry for him. The police are never gentle with his kind. Still, better the police than Heinsdorf.
My regular contact was waiting for me at Kennedy International. His name was Kiefer and he was a tall gangling man with a prominent Adam’s apple and a nervous habit of blinking his eyes every two or three seconds.