Tatyana looked through her binoculars. “The trick to finding a target is to lock on it first with your eyes, then slowly raise the glasses up. It’s tough without a good reference point when you’re searching for something in trees or at sea. There’s definitely an art to using them.”
And an art to such a seductive touch. Standard KGB training?
“Okay, I’ve established a perimeter,” Tatyana said. “The Stasi can’t get anyone with a listening device close enough to monitor us without being noticed.” Her words yanked Faith back into the Cold War. Tatyana continued, “There are a couple of trees we have to avoid. Follow my lead.”
“Any Stasi squirrels we should be on the lookout for?”
“Trust me, they’ve bugged certain trees.”
“And I swear I just saw a squirrel with an attaché case handcuffed to its paw.”
“Only the Mossad rivals the Stasi in paranoia. You wouldn’t believe the trivia they gather on people. Archival packrats, to misquote Stalin. They gather so much, they have nothing.”
“So this bird fetish is a ruse to get them to give us some privacy?”
“It’s a useful hobby. I actually love birding. I once traded in a lot of favors for a six-month stint in Cuba so I could see a hummingbird in the wild. The humidity is unbelievable, though I admit the Latins know how to enjoy life. I’ll never forget the brilliant colors. Europe seemed so dull afterward.” Tatyana began walking, her brown eyes vigilant.
Faith fell a few steps behind. Tatyana pointed out another feathered comrade, stretching her arm toward high branches. From an angle, Faith spotted a scar on her right shoulder. Definitely a scar from a bullet wound. What was she doing with this woman? Tatyana wasn’t a KGB case officer, running agents from a cushy office like Faith had assumed. She was a field operative, someone from the frontline. She was danger.
“So is this business or pleasure?” Faith said.
“Both. We get far too little pleasure in this life.”
“Thanks for not bullshitting me with the cultural attaché front.” Faith wished she had.
Tatyana stopped and looked Faith in the eyes, holding her gaze for several seconds-several seconds beyond innocence. “We both know who I am and what I want.”
Faith was sure of neither.
Tatyana stalked another spellbinding bird in the branches. “I was surprised to see you in my office yesterday. That morning I was working on how we were going to arrange a chance to chat with you. To be quite honest, I had no intention of working with you myself until I had the pleasure of meeting you in person.”
“Let me be up-front with you. I have no intention of working for the KGB, GRU, CIA, KKK or any other three-lettered band of thugs. I’m not an agent. I’m a professor and a businesswoman.”
“And one with good taste. I like some of the things I hear you’re buying. I’d never thought about the artistic merit of our applied arts before. Our museums have never taken such interest.” Tatyana noticed a large bird on the trunk of a tree and raised her binoculars.
“If you know anything about me, you know I’m fiercely neutral. I make the Swiss look partisan. As many times as you guys have approached me, I’ve never agreed to work with you, or anyone else, for that matter. Every shop in the business has come after me.”
“Except the CIA,” Tatyana said. “A typical case of them not recognizing homegrown talent.” Tatyana tracked the woodpecker as he munched insects on his way up the tree. “The Stasi has plans for you. They’ve taken a lot of precautions to limit who knows what you’re doing for them.”
“Wrong. They never made it a secret. They even took me to some cheesy Stasi cabaret the other night.”
Tatyana turned her binoculars on a man feeding pigeons, but looking away from the birds he was feeding. “They’ve given you some very public opportunities to turn them down-even in front of their own staff and a couple of our liaisons. We don’t like it when they run black ops and don’t let us in. Have you agreed to work for them yet?”
Faith remained silent. She raised her binoculars to her eyes to conceal her fear. What had she done? She had only wanted to be seen associating with the Soviets to make herself too risky for the Stasi to trust with a secret mission behind the Russians’ backs. Now it was evident it was not only a stupid idea, but a fateful one. After a meeting with the KGB, she would be too much of a liability as long as she was alive. No one could ever survive playing the Stasi off against the KGB. No one had ever dared.
Tatyana continued, “Faith, I know they either have already or soon will threaten your life-and you will agree. Everyone does. And no one will blame you. Being a Stasi agent isn’t a fate worse than death, though the career can abruptly end that way.”
“I want to be left alone!” Faith surprised herself with her vehemence.
“You need to make a good show of rejecting me in a few minutes when we get to the park bench.”
“I’m not working for you.”
“You’re trapped. I have substantial resources.” Tatyana put her hand on her arm, but Faith pulled away and walked ahead of her.
“I can take care of it myself.”
“One woman alone can’t win against the entire state security organ of the GDR-not even the great Faith Whitney.”
“At last count, I’m way ahead in the game. In Vegas, that’s time to cash out and walk away.”
“I’ve been to Vegas. High rollers like you can’t walk away. I’d hate to see something happen to you. The Germans are a tidy people. They’re not going to use an American smuggler to pull off something behind the KGB’s back and then leave her around to boast about it. They need you now, but a time will come when they won’t. Black ops agents don’t have a long shelf life.”
Faith stopped.
Tatyana didn’t give up. “After this is over, we can help you in ways you’ve never imagined. Have you ever wanted an export-import business out of Moscow? We can arrange for you to have permission to scour our countryside for your treasures. Cooperate and we can expedite export formalities.”
“You’re a temptress, but a staid Moscow storefront doesn’t sound very sporting,” Faith lied. “I need something more-some information.”
“Have you agreed to work for them?”
“They threatened my life.”
“I know.” Tatyana rested her hand on Faith’s back as she pretended to point out a bird.
The solace felt genuine and Faith needed it at that moment. She gazed through the binoculars. “I don’t know what they’re up to. That’s all the help I can give you. I don’t want to be an agent, and I sure don’t want to be a double agent.”
“My dear Faith, you knew this day would come. Accept it gracefully. What kind of information do you require?”
“Everything the KGB knows about my father.”
“That would mean going into the archives, but I’ll see what I can do. Right now we’re going to move over to that bench where our friends are listening. You’re going to follow my lead and turn me down so they have no doubt that you’re not working for me.”
They approached a park bench. A young woman pushed a baby stroller nearby and the senior citizen continued to toss seeds to the pigeons, but he now appeared to be watching the birds instead of them. Tatyana sat down. “So, how did you find your first birding experience?”
“I never realized there were so many different ones here. I never paid much attention to anything other than gulls on the bridges and pigeons everywhere.” Faith scratched a loose chip of paint from the bench. She was shaken and she hoped she was convincing enough. Everything depended upon it. If the Stasi believed she was talking to the KGB about them, they would kill her.