Quiller KGB

'A few numbers for you,' Cone said, and gave me a memo pad. 'Karl Bruger is the HUA captain who'll support your cover if needs be, and this is his office number. This one's the direct-line number of the military attache at the Soviet Embassy. You can call him if Yasolev isn't available and you need official assistance, urgent or otherwise. If the military attache isn't available this is the direct-line number of the Soviet ambassador. The code-intro in both cases is Liaison. And this one's the direct-line number of the cultural attache at the British Embassy, Dickie Pollock. He's been here for three years and he knows his way around, so he'll be your most useful contact. And here are some mugshots of Horst Volper.'

'When were they taken?'

'During the last two years.'

I put them away.

'All right,' Cone said, 'I'll let you try some of these clothes on. Let me know about the shoes especially. Might need to break into a trot here or there.' He said it deadpan. At the door he turned and levelled his squint at me and said, 'Yasolev's going to ask you how you'll be planning your access to Volper. Will you tell him?'

'No.'

'Do you know?'

'Yes.'

He took his hand off the door-knob and came back into the room a little. 'Are you prepared to tell me?'

'You wouldn't like it.'

He watched me steadily. 'How much protection are you going to need?'

'None.'

'My job,' he said, in his dry monotone, 'is to get you through Quickstep with a whole skin. I'd rather you didn't make it difficult for me.'

'Look, it's out of our hands. Put it this way: they went for Scarsdale and they got him. They thought it'd warn me off, but it didn't, so now they'll go for me. And that's the only access we've got, and I'm going to use it. Don't worry, they won't be long.'

7: AMNESIA

'Are they tarts over there?'

A man in a black leather coat rocked our table as he squeezed through.

'Verzeihen Sie.'

Place blue with smoke.

'Tarts?' Pollock said. 'I don't think so. I've never been propositioned, anyway.' A clean white smile, his glasses reflecting the coloured lights over the miniature dancefloor. 'I think they're just here for a good time.'

'Any swallows?'

'What? I suppose they might be, some of them, anyway. We get a few KGB chaps in here from their embassy, though of course they call themselves attaches of some sort or another. In fact a lot of the people who come here are from the embassies — American, British, French, Soviet. It's in walking distance for most of them. Are you sure you won't have anything stronger?'

'I'm too thirsty.'

'This is my favourite haunt, actually. I mean, apart from the embassy connection it's close to the Wall — that's why it's called Charlie's. There's always some kind of intrigue going on.' Another clean smile. 'People talking about getting across, especially now that the guards have stopped shooting to kill.' He waved for the waiter. 'But most of the talk's political, and of course very pro-Gorbachev at the moment. They're hoping he's going to do something big for Germany.'

'For the DDR.'

'For both, actually. Dasselbe nochmals, Willi. Everybody's seized on the idea of seeing one Germany again. You know something? A couple of months ago I had the chance of Rome — second cultural attache — think of all that gorgeous art! But I turned it down. I've got a feeling something rather interesting's going to happen here before long, and I don't want to miss it. I mean, later I can always say, I was there.' Quick smile.

One of the girls was watching me from a corner table, under the amber lamp.

'You think he is going to do something big?'

'Our Miki? Absolutely.' The waiter banged another pitcher of Heineker onto the table and altered the tab. 'Danke schon. Of course he's taking a huge risk with his glasnost policy. I mean it's all very nice to hear him talk about "more flexible" relations between Moscow and the satellites but it's going to stir up the people in the streets. Once they get a whiff of freedom they're liable to want the whole thing, and we could easily see an outbreak of rebellions like the one here in '53 and the ones later in Hungary and Czechoslovakia and Poland. That'd put Gorbachev straight out of office and bring the tanks in again. But you probably know all this.'

'Not all.'

'Does it interest you, or would you rather — '

'It interests me very much.'

Not actually watching me, just passing her glance across me now and then. Blonde hair, blue eyes, the archetypal Aryan, bare-shouldered in a slip of a dress, smoking the whole time. She'd come in soon after we had.

'Well, obviously,' Pollock said, 'the East Germans are fervently hoping for some kind of reunification, because so many of them have got relatives in the West and they've been cut off from them all this time by the Wall. On the other hand, some people are scared to death, because if Europe becomes denuclearised — which is the way things are heading — the US is going to withdraw most of its forces and that'll leave West Germany without a security umbrella — and she's liable to look for a new one in Moscow.' He spread his hands flat on the table and looked at me steadily. 'Can you imagine what the rest of Europe Would feel like with a reunited Germany as an ally, not a slave state, but an ally of Soviet Russia? That's why lots of people are scared stiff.' No quick smile this time.

'Jesus.'

'Didn't mean to spoil your evening.' He drank half his beer in one go and then looked at his watch. 'But anyway, I think they're wrong. I see a united capitalist Germany.'

'And anyway it'd take time.'

'Unless Gorbachev decides on a grand gesture. A symbolic gesture that would make its own statement and cut out half a dozen summit conferences.'

'You're thinking of something specific.'

'I am, actually. I believe it's on the cards, and that's why I'm staying on here, in case our Mikhail takes a sledgehammer to the top of that wall and knocks the first brick off.'

'You're serious, are you?'

'Absolutely. It'd be typical of him: he's a brilliant public relations man and a gesture like that would rate more live coverage world-wide than the Olympic Games. Go down in history, wouldn't he?' He finished his beer. 'Well, I've got to get some shut-eye. H.E. wants me up early for a meeting tomorrow. But I'd really like to leave you with something more interesting to drink.'

'I'm fine. I shan't be long myself.'

It was 11:13 when he paid the bill and told me to phone him if I needed anything and left me, pushing his way between the crowded tables and dodging a waiter's tray.

She came over within a minute.

'I didn't want you to be lonely.'

'I'm touched.'

'This is the first time I've seen you in here.'

'Yes?'

'My name's Hedda.' She pulled another cigarette out of the pack. 'What's yours?'

'Kurt.'

There was a lot of noise from the jazz trio and she leaned close to me over the table, her blonde hair hanging across her face. 'He's from the British embassy?'

'Who?'

'Your friend.'

'Yes.'

'I haven't got any friends.' Small, rather pointed teeth, a shred of tobacco on her lip, smoke curling as she spoke. 'I talk all the time about getting across, and it bores them.'

'About what?'

'Getting across.' She leaned closer, spoke louder. 'I'm completely fed up, you know? They call this a workers' and peasants' state but it's a two-class system — you've got West German currency or you haven't. The roof of the Metropole's full of Lancias and BMWs and all most people can afford is a Volkswagen. You're not here looking for somebody?'