Bill stopped people-watching and looked quizzically at Jack.
“Photographs of the lake.”
“What?”
“The photographs on the wall at the lake house.”
“What about them?”
“There was a selection of various meet-and-greet-type photos, right? Pretty standard, I’d say.”
“And?”
“Some of the others were of the lake outside. The same lake you can literally see out the glass doors behind you when looking at the wall.”
“People are strange.” Jack shrugged.
“I think they have been swapped out. Some particular meet-and-greets are less favourable now the war is over. The Kleins are known to entertain officers from the boat club at their regular candlelit suppers, and I think they are none too keen to let the Yanks know they rubbed shoulders with club-foot Joey and his friends, every chance they had.”
“Goebbels?”
“So Albie said, anyway. Good friends, apparently. Klein was a party member in the early days, back when Hitler was just a beer hall rabble-rouser, by all accounts. Some even say he was at the putsch that got Hitler his jail time.”
“I bet a lot of party badges got flung into Lake Wannsee in April forty-five before the Russians arrived.”
Bill checked his wristwatch and then peered across at Ronnie. He was still sitting in the chair, pretending to browse the paper. From their angle, Bill had no clear view. He just hoped Ronnie was paying proper attention.
“I wish we had someone more reliable.”
“He’s a great bloke but he wasn’t in the Legion for his crossword solving skills, that’s for sure,” Jack said with a chuckle.
A small group of people alighted the tram and spread in various directions. A well-dressed woman in her forties smiled provocatively at them as she passed in the direction of the train station. As she turned away, her large jaunty hat obscured her face. That didn’t bother Bill, as it wasn’t her face he was watching anyway. She clutched a little designer handbag and her hips swayed when she strutted. Bill watched her stalk her way out of view along the avenue.
“Nice day for it,” Jack interrupted.
“I only wish it were, Jack,” he sighed and took a large draw from his pipe. Returning his gaze to the window, he saw Albie carefully fold his newspaper and stand up.
“It’s on.” Jack leaned against the wall and narrowed his eyes like a hawk observing its prey.
Bill looked away and continued smoking. “What’s happening?”
“Ronnie is heading to the exit … Our target is heading to the wall of boxes … Glancing around … Checking his pockets … Found the key, opening it now.”
“Stay on it,” Bill replied and, leaving Jack, walked off down the avenue.
Bill looked down into his hand at the little key he had taken from Irene’s bedside drawer as he walked. The key to box ninety-four. In her last moments, as the life drained from her body, she had given him a clue. It was all she could do to help him. Killing Hasi and securing revenge for Violette had been her aim, and she had done her duty by their friend. Ensuring Bill could nail her killer appeared to be her last request. Bill knew this now. He still couldn’t say for sure, even to himself, that he loved her, but his heart longed to see her again.
He risked a quick look through the glass as he saw Errington pocket the envelope and hurry back through the door he had emerged from, past the giant front desk. Ronnie walked casually out the main doors, barely even looking up, then made his way into a throng of pedestrians, busy in their own world.
“Hook, line …” Bill said to himself as he crossed the busy road.
As he headed north, the tram drew up to the stop, and he hopped aboard. It lurched forwards, fighting its half-seized brakes as it shook back into life. Looking back towards Jack as the tram passed, he watched a car pull up. Jack nodded and jumped into the impressive pre-war BMW roadster. In the last moments, before they were out of view, he saw Jack shake hands with Fabian, as the red car with the mismatched driver’s door purred back into life and screeched a risky U-turn across traffic and made its way back towards the east of the city.
“… and sinker.”
Bill puffed his pipe nervously, whilst Igor twittered away about nothing in particular as they walked. Bill wasn’t listening as he attempted to play out the final act in his head. No matter how many times he had attempted one of Violette’s infernal spidergrams, it had ended in him tearing it up. Like he ever needed a reason to turn to drink.
“Did you hear me, Bill?”
“What?” he snapped back.
“Sorry, I just wondered if you are sure about all this?”
“No, to be honest, Igor. I don’t know if this will go down how I plan at all. I can’t even promise you we’ll all be getting out alive. Did you bring a gun, as I asked?”
As if to answer him, Igor pulled out a giant Broomhandle Mauser, complete with wooden shoulder stock from under his long coat.
“I said to bring a gun, not an artillery piece!” Bill shook his head. “And put it away for God’s sake!”
“It’s all I have.” Igor shrugged and hid the cannon back under his armpit.
As they entered Anna’s bar, Bill flipped the sign to closed, and they made their way down the stairs. He saw that they were the first to arrive.
The regular brunette barmaid beamed a smile as they entered and instinctively reached for two glasses, placing them on the bar. Although, there was nothing regular about her. She disappeared from view as she squatted behind the bar.
“Good to see you, Igor, how’s the new job?” she enquired as she bobbed, pleasingly, back up.
“Better paid than the last one,” he quipped as he grabbed at one of the glasses with a giant fist.
“Your German has certainly improved,” she teased. “Even if the company you keep hasn’t.”
Bill raised an eyebrow at her, and she winked in reply. Bill remained transfixed by her green eyes if only to avoid staring at her half-open shirt. “I think it would be remiss of me not to ask if you would like to go out for dinner?”
“What makes you think I eat dinner, Casanova?”
“I know a nice place. They have the best food in Berlin. It’s on me, of course.”
“Well, it’s been a while since I ate a decent piece of veal. Do you think they could manage that? Oh, and you’d better know that I only drink champagne.”
“I bet you do. I’ll see what I can do. Look, I am expecting someone for an important meeting, but I have a car waiting for you out back. A black Mercedes to take you shopping. I’ll square it with Anna, don’t worry. This should be enough for a new outfit.” Bill passed her over a fold of US dollars.
“Wow, you are keen. I’m not a whore, you know. I’ll not be kissing on a first date, and I want to be home by eleven.”
“Of course. I expect nothing but your company for the evening.”
She smiled and pushed the money down her shirt. “I’ll leave you the bottle,” she said as she walked around the bar and leaned in close to plant a kiss on Bill’s cheek.
Igor chuckled as he helped himself to the open bottle. Bill grinned his inane smile and watched her walk away. Her black stockinged legs crossed slightly as she walked. She paused a moment to look back at him, smiling with only her eyes, before heading through the rear door.
“So far, so good,” Igor sniggered, with his glass at his lips. “She’s dangerous that one, Bill.”
“So I gather.”
“She worked with the resistance in Austria. Killed a man with her bare hands, they say. She must have a hell of a grip.”
“I hope so, Igor. I hope so.” Bill laughed and slapped the colossal man’s meaty shoulder.
As Bill knocked back his drink, in the large mirror behind the bar he spotted Errington appear in the doorway.
“Bill?”
“Take a seat, sir.”
He looked hesitant.
Bill drew his revolver. “Please, I insist.”
Errington’s eyes widened as he quietly sat at the nearest table and placed his palms down on the top.
“So, I guess you think you know what is going on then?” Errington remarked.
“You have been paying Misselwitz and his gang of thugs and murderers to recruit former Nazis.”
“It’s government policy now, I’m afraid, Bill. Telephone Whitehall and they’ll confirm. You are in way over your head. Your career with the government is over, you’ll be in the shit for this.”
“So, what’s new? I’m always in the shit. It’s only the depth that varies.” Bill pulled out a pack of smokes and threw them onto the table, as Igor moved around and took Errington’s small Walther out from inside his jacket. “I’m sorry it has to be this way, sir.”
“Look, Bill, the order for this operation has come directly from Atlee.”
“I know. I have already called London.”
“So, what is this all about? You can’t think I had anything to do with Irene’s death? Remember it was me who set you two up together here,” he reasoned as he lit up a cigarette between trembling fingers.
Bill watched him quiver and tremble like a worm in a science beaker. “I know you are not a soldier, Errington. You are quite safe from me.”
“I was just following orders.”
“Just following orders,” Bill repeated. “The go-to excuse for an entire nation, and look where that got them.” Bill snorted in disgust, as he poured himself and Igor another ice-cold vodka. “I think you know me well enough to know I don’t make my move until I have all the facts. I have an interesting dossier of evidence in my possession. It confirms you have been recruiting former Nazis, under orders from the War Office, for British Intelligence. You were right about one thing though. There is a Soviet spy in our midst. You have also been collecting agents from Misselwitz on behalf of the Russians.”
“They’ll never believe you. You are making a big mistake if you share what you know. And, we both know that you aren’t going to just shoot me, or I’d be dead already.”
“Maybe I’m the one making the mistake here. Maybe not. With your connections, a call here, a favour there, you might well squirm your way out of this. They are unlikely to believe a mere agent accusing his commander of treason. So that’s why I won’t be the one bringing you in. When did you meet the Klein family?”
“The Kleins? How do you know about them?”
“I paid them a visit. More specifically, I paid a visit to their safe. A green Milners one. Identical to the one in your office. Not exactly common here in the Fatherland, are they? It’s not the safe that nailed you, Errington. It was the ledger inside.”
“Fucking German efficiency,” he spat.
“I assume you know about their odious past?”
“Everyone in Germany has a past, Bill. Most of them are odious.”
“The Kleins were at the pinnacle of Berlin society. Personal friends of Goebbels, early party members. I did a little digging. Mr Klein Senior had a gold party badge. You know what that means, right? One of the originals. Nazi through and through. How could you work with these people?”
“If you want to pick mushrooms, you have to crawl through the dirt.”
The distinctive smell of Senior Service cigarettes entered the basement bar as the door carefully swept open. Bill hadn’t seen Vera since the last time he left for France the month before D-Day in June of forty-four. She was wearing an immaculately tailored blue-grey tweed skirt suit with American-style black patent leather shoes. She plucked the cigarette from her lips as she entered and smiled at Bill.
“Sorry, I’m late.”
“Bang on time, Vera. Drink?”
She shook her head and fixed Errington with her characteristic piercing stare. Errington turned and looked at her, then simply returned to face Bill and smoked his cigarette.
“Well, as you can see. I can also call in favours. Your place in the peerage may protect you, Errington, but Vera has the ear of the king himself.”
“This is Igor, Vera. He is a good man and a valuable asset. He is at your disposal while you are in Berlin.”
The giant Igor did the best impression of an agreeable human he could manage and smiled at Vera.
“Bill has told me all about you, Igor. We may have some work for you after this if you are interested?”
“Thank you, ma’am, I would like that.”
“Very well. Take this prisoner upstairs and into the waiting car. I’ll be back out presently, and we will travel to the Gatow aerodrome together. We’ll sort you out with a decent meal and a bed for the night and do the proper introductions.”
Igor turned to Bill and grabbed his hand in a vice-like clasp. “Thanks, Bill.”
“I told you I’d pay you back. Stay lucky, Igor.”
Errington looked at Bill as Igor grabbed him roughly under his armpit, said nothing, and then looked down as he was spun around and out the door. Vera walked across to Bill and leaned back at the bar next to him.
“I was quite enjoying my final few weeks at headquarters until you interrupted,” she said, pouring herself a drink from the cold bottle, using Igor’s glass. “Life’s been pretty boring now it’s all over. I traced all my girls, but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t blame myself.”
“You can’t think that way, Vera. It is what it is.”
“I’d give anything to have them back home to their families, you know?”
“Thanks for everything you did for Violette. She’d be proud of all you did for her, and to know the king himself has honoured her service.”
“The things I’ve read and heard, Bill. I just … it’s all just so …”
“I know. There is nothing to explain. You were an excellent agent, Vera. Not to mention the best detective I’ve ever known. Thanks to you, we know what happened to them.”
Vera sipped carefully at her vodka, then pulled out another smoke and lit it with the table lighter on the bar.
“What about Irene? You think Errington could have done it?”
Bill put down his glass and turned to her. “No, but I know who did.”