My father was an anarchist, he told Fiona once when they were discussing some of the heresies, and that was the key to Renn's character, for Renn too was an anarchist in his soul. Fiona wondered if he realized it; perhaps he simply didn't give a damn any more. Some who'd waited too long for the millennium became like that. Renn's description of Pavel Moskvin – a 'Moscow-backed bully' – was freely offered to Fiona that morning before she'd met the man. And Renn was just as ready to be outspoken about everyone else in the building.
For the first couple of weeks Fiona had suspected that this outlandish old fellow had been put into her office as some sort of agent provocateur, or because no one else in the building would put up with such an oddball, but it didn't take her long to understand that in the DDR the bureaucratic process didn't work like that. It wasn't so easy, for even the most senior staff, to arrange to get the secretary that they wanted, and old Renn would not be an agent provocateur easy to run. The truth was that staff were assigned according to a rota in the personnel office. Her grade was eligible for a clerk of Renn's seniority and his previous boss had retired the week before she arrived.
Fiona and her secretary had spent all of Wednesday in a small conference centre in Köpenick Altstadt, in the wooded outskirts of Berlin. She had witnessed lengthy and sometimes acrimonious exchanges between her colleagues. There had been senior security men from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary meeting to discuss the still somewhat muddled and disorganized political reform groups, and religious groups, in the East Bloc. Agreeing upon a concerted policy of dealing with them was not so easy. Fiona was pleased at the material she was gathering. It was exactly the sort of intelligence that Bret Rensselaer was so keen on, and the anxiety the communist security men had revealed at this meeting in every way supported Bret's projections. When contact was eventually established with London she would have a policy formulated.
She was going through the meeting in her mind while they waited for the car that would take them back to the Mitte. The others had been collected by a bus from the transport pool but Fiona was entitled to her own car. Cars, more than any other perquisite or privilege, were a sign of status, and establishing status was all-important in the DDR. So they waited.
Fiona walked down to the river, admiring the cobbled streets and the crooked old buildings. Surrounded with trees, Köpenick's church and Rathaus huddled upon a tiny island at a place where the River Spree divided. On the adjacent island – Schlossinsel – there was a richly decorated seventeenth-century palace. In its magnificent Wappensaal Frederick the Great had stood trial for desertion. From where they were standing it was possible to raise a loud cheer for the dilatory rate at which East Berlin was being rebuilt. From this view it was easy to visualize Köpenick on the day that renowned bogus captain marched in to discover how devoutly the Germans revere a military uniform, no matter who wears it.
She had hoped that the fresh air would help rid her of her headache: she'd been having too many of these racking headaches lately. It was stress, of course, but that didn't make the pain any easier to endure.
'Herr Renn,' said Fiona: she never called him by his first name.
Renn had been looking at the traffic crossing the bridge. Soon the East would be clogged with cars just as the West already was. He looked at her. 'Did I forget something, Frau Direktor?'
'No. You never forget anything. You are the most efficient clerk in the building.'
He nodded. What she said was right and he acknowledged the truth of it.
'Do you trust me, Herr Renn?' It was a deliberate way of shocking him.
'I don't understand, Frau Direktor.' He glanced round but there was no one else standing along the riverfront: just workers and shoppers going home.
'I never get the minutes of the morning meetings until late in the afternoon of the following day. Is there a reason for that?'
'Everyone receives the minutes by the same delivery.' He gave a sly smile. 'We are slow; that is the only reason.' A large air-conditioned bus came crawling over the bridge. Pale Japanese faces pressed against its grey smoked glass. From inside it came the shrill commentary of the tour guide of which only the words 'Hauptmanns von Köpenick' could be easily distinguished. The bus moved slowly on and was lost behind the trees. 'They never go and see the Schloss or the Art Museum,' said Renn sadly. 'They just want to see the town hall. The tour guide will tell them about the bootmaker who bought an army captain's uniform from a pawn shop, assumed command of some off-duty grenadiers and arrested the mayor and the city treasurer. Then they will all laugh and say what fools we Germans are.'
'Yes,' said Fiona. Despite the Schloss and the dark green woodland and the clear blue lakes and the rivers, the only thing anyone ever remembered about Köpenick was its captain.
'The sad thing is,' said Renn, 'that poor old Wilhelm Voigt, the bootmaker, didn't want the city funds; he wanted a residence permit, and Köpenick had no department authorized to issue one. He wasn't a Berliner, you see, and his escapade was a fiasco.'
'I am not a Berliner, nor even a German by birth…' She did not finish.
'But you speak the most beautiful German,' said Renn, interrupting her. 'Everyone remarks upon it: wonderful Hochdeutsch. When I hear it, I feel selfconscious about my miserable accent.' He looked at her. 'Do you have a headache?'
She shook her head. 'Do you not sometimes wonder if I am a class enemy, Herr Renn?'
He pursed his lips. 'Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was born into a bourgeois family,' said Renn in what was a typically ambivalent reply.
'Leaving the birth of Comrade Lenin aside for the moment,' said Fiona. 'If there was an attempt to have me removed from this job, what would be your attitude?'
His already contorted face became agitated as he wet his lips and frowned to indicate deep thought. 'I would have to consider the facts,' he said finally.
'Consider the facts?'
'I have a wife and family,' said Renn. 'It is them that I have to consider.' He turned to see the river, slow and unctuous now; once it had been fast, clear and fresh. Not so long ago anglers had landed big fish here, but there was no sign of any now. He stared down into the water and hoped the Frau Direktor would be satisfied.
'Are you saying that you would throw me to the wolves?' said Fiona.
'Wolves? No!' He turned to her. 'I am not a thrower, Frau Direktor. I am one of the people who are thrown.' The church clock struck six. His working day was over and done. He opened his overcoat in order to reach into his back pocket for a flask. 'About this time I sometimes take a small glass of schnapps… If the Frau Direktor would permit.'
'Go ahead,' said Fiona. She was surprised. She didn't know that the old man was such a dedicated drinker but it explained a lot of things.
He unscrewed the top to use it as a cup, and poured a sizeable measure. He offered it to her. 'Would the Frau Direktor…?'
'No, thank you, Herr Renn.'
He brought it up towards his mouth carefully, so as not to spill it, bending his head to meet it. He drank half of it in one gulp, looked at her as it warmed his veins, and said, 'I'm too old to get into vendettas.' A pause. 'But that doesn't mean I have no guts for it.' A street-car went past, its wheels screaming protest on the rails as it turned the corner. 'Is the Frau Direktor quite sure…?'