Glienicke, Berlin: Friday, December 13th
“Are we set?”
“Yep. My guys are briefed. They know to keep out of the way and to keep their mouths shut. As far as they’re concerned this is strictly a Company matter.”
Frank had arrived first and had parked under the trees where it was darkest. He stuck his head through the window of Wilderness’s rented Mercedes, twenty yards back from the American side of the bridge.
“What’s your name today, Frank?”
“Fuck. I forgot already. I dunno. Molloy or Murphy, something like that. Just call me ‘Colonel.’ It’s safer.”
The great advantage of the Glienicke Bridge, which in better days had linked Berlin to Potsdam, was that it was not a designated crossing point, it was hardly ever used—no regular human traffic—so the road leading down to it had become little better than a cul-de-sac. It had a simplicity that border crossings in central Berlin could hardly afford. No floodlights, no barbed wire, no concrete chicanes, just well-mannered guards from the USA and the DDR. They probably swapped cigarettes and moaned about boredom to each other.
Wilderness saw the lights of a car coming up behind them.
“That’s Eddie,” he said. “Don’t bug him.”
“Yeah, yeah—as if …”
Wilderness and Frank met Eddie and Bernard between the two cars.
Bernard was very formal, shook hands with both of them. He’d be polite to his own executioner, Wilderness thought.
Eddie looked worried, but he always did. It was a cold December night, under a sliver of moon. He’d far rather be in bed. In any situation like this his mind would be saying, “Can I go now?” while his lips said nothing.
Wilderness said, “Are we waiting on the Kopp brothers?”
“Nope. We got here half an hour ago. They’ve been scoping out the opposition with night sights.”
“And?”
“Hard to tell. Let’s just say the Russians haven’t mobilised a division. Six, maybe seven guys.”
“So, where are the Kopps?”
Frank pointed to his car under the trees.
“They’re over there by my car.”
“I can’t see anyone.”
Then one twin or the other moved. He was completely black—a tight-fitting black track suit, black gloves, a black balaclava, burnt cork all over what little of his face showed—and a Russian-made, gas-operated Dragunov sniper rifle in matte black. The only reflective surface was the lens on the night sight.
“If you can’t see me, neither can they,” Rikki said.
Wilderness looked at his watch. He couldn’t even see the hands. Rikki looked over, his eyes accustomed to the dark.
“Six minutes to twelve. Don’t go just yet. I have something for you.”
He opened the boot of Frank’s car and took out a bulletproof vest.
“I could only get one,” he said. “Put it on.”
Wilderness hefted the vest.
“I’m not the target,” he said. “Bernard, take off your overcoat.”
“Joe, really?”
“Just do it.”
The Kopps fitted the jacket around him—death’s tailors.
Wilderness said, “Bernard. You have your gun?”
“Yes. In my pocket.”
“Safety on?”
“Then flick it off and rack a bullet into the chamber. And don’t get between these blokes and their targets.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Give them a sight line. When we’re facing people try not to stand directly opposite.”
“Do we know what we’re facing?”
“Frank reckons six or seven at the most.”
“Ah.”
“Ah what?”
“If they’re all on the bridge at the same time …”
“Then yes, it will be a shoot-out.”
At two minutes to midnight a US Army corporal raised the barrier—a touch of the ludicrous as he saluted—and they set foot on the bridge. Somewhere behind Wilderness the Kopps had chosen their positions, but he did not look back.
They’d taken twenty paces and Bernard asked softly, “Have you ever killed anyone, Joe?”
“Yep.”
“I haven’t.”
“Bernard, you picked a fine time to tell me.”
A couple of feet beyond the centre line, the official border, over the Havel, Kostya stood with his hands in his greatcoat pockets. He looked about as comfortable as Eddie. A small woman wrapped up against the cold stood six feet to his left. There was no one else.
“Nell. Show me your face.”
Nell unwrapped her headscarf.
She did not smile, she did not speak.
Kostya said, “We must wait.”
“Wait for what?”
Wilderness could see movement at the East German end of the bridge, figures vague as ghosts. The Russians might have their own snipers, and he’d never know.
“We wait. That is all. Not for long.”
“You have Nell. I have Major Liubimov …”
“Please, Joe. This will not take long.”
He could outshoot Kostya blindfolded.
He could shoot Kostya now and the three of them could run for it.
He didn’t want to shoot Kostya.
He did not want to run for it.
He wanted to walk away quietly with every piece of the puzzle back in place.
From the far end of the bridge, a stately, possibly fat figure lumbered towards them, the hips swinging slowly, the feet wide apart, plonking down with bodily weight, the head swathed in fur and scarves.
As it grew near Wilderness could see a silver box clutched between gloved hands—about big enough to hold a large chess set. Then proximity told and he perceived the outline for what it was—female. And with proximity, uniform—a full-blown KGB general.
She clutched the box with one hand, and with the other pulled off her hat; a mass of greying ringlets cascaded down and Wilderness found himself looking once again into those brown and beautiful sad eyes. General Zolotukhina … Volga Vassilievna.
She dropped her hat and touched Nell lightly on the arm.
“Go now,” she said.
Nell looked baffled, did not move.
Wilderness called on her by name.
“Nell?”
Nell looked back at him—eyes wide.
Wilderness said, “Nell, just walk past me, keep on walking and don’t look back.”
Nell crossed the line on the far side of Bernard Alleyn.
Wilderness was tempted to look back in her direction, but did not want to find her looking back at him. He listened to the click of her heels on the asphalt, every step sound-diminishing, every step nearer her freedom.
Bernard waited. Did not move. Hands in his pockets. One of them, Wilderness hoped, wrapped around the butt of his gun, safety off.
Wilderness could not hear Nell anymore.
Silence. Wind upon water.
Then Volga looked straight at Bernard.
“Comrade Liubimov. I am the bearer of sad news. Your mother, Krasnaya, is dead—Nastasya Fillipovna died in April. Died like so many, in the first breath of spring. She was a loyal servant of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and was cremated with all military honours. And she was my dearest friend. Shoulder to shoulder we stood in October 1917. Side by side we took Berlin in 1945. I have here her ashes. I am sorry to drag you away from the life you have made, but I felt I should deliver them in person, and as I could not come to you, you needs must come to me. My deepest condolences, comrade. Krasnaya was a hero. May she rest in peace … in Ireland.”
She held out the silver box.
Bernard took it, the perplexed look in his eyes yielding to tears.
Such is irony that for the first time, Wilderness could discern in this tearful adult the little boy sitting on his mother’s left arm, looking out at the world from half a million posters—Krasnaya and son—defiant.
Then Volga turned to Wilderness.
“You see, Joe. You need to know who to trust.”
She smiled. Held out her hand for him to shake.
One shot rang out.