Anne saw the older man enter the East Berlin apartment block and walk with a determined step, avoiding the streetlamp’s pooling light. She knew it was Kruger. His tan raincoat reached his knees, he moved cautiously, and his Soviet-style fedora was pulled down on his forehead. Before entering the dark building’s front door, he glanced over his shoulder, and then disappeared inside. When she saw a light go on, she counted the four floors to his apartment, and confirmed that windows in the neighboring apartments were dark. She quickly crossed the street.
Inside the vestibule, vandals had spay-painted DEATH TO STASI on one wall and graffiti defaced the apartment directory. Several names were listed, but a few residents’ names were missing, including those on his floor.
Anne pressed the bell of a lower floor.
“Who is this?”
“I’m from the fifth floor.” Anne spoke into the staticky intercom and gave a name from the directory. “I left my keys upstairs.”
Anne opened the buzzing door and entered the lobby. She passed the elevator and climbed the stairs, knowing she was less likely to encounter a resident who might later be questioned by the VoPo. The staircase entered the fourth-floor hall through a heavy fire door. She dismissed the apartment with children’s toys outside and debated which of the remaining two was his, and settled on the door with twined newspapers outside.
Anne knocked twice, softly. “Hallo.”
Kruger opened the door a crack and peered across the chain. “How did you get in?”
“A woman in the lobby.”
He looked at her for a moment. “You’re early.”
She begged an apology. “The bus came sooner than I expected. I have information for you. As I said on the telephone, there are a few questions. A proposal.”
“More questions? I told him what I need.”
“It will only take a few minutes. Winslow sent me.”
“What proposal? Speak up.”
“Asylum.”
He hesitated. “Come in.”
The chain was undone, the door opened, and Anne found a slight man wearing a cardigan sweater over a shirt and tie and house slippers. His suspicious expression relaxed when he saw that no one accompanied her. He double-locked the door.
“East Berlin is safe,” he said. “Not as safe as it was, but safer than West Berlin. Hooligans spray-paint obscenities and call it free speech.”
He led her through a spacious living room with dull modern furniture, a glass dining table, and an abundance of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Hardcover and paperback books in Russian and German were arranged by author and she saw the names of respected writers whose works were officially out of favor. She followed him to a study with two windows that looked down onto the street. There was a carved wooden desk, a divan, two facing chairs, more bookshelves, and a Spanish guitar in its upright stand.
Kruger turned off the speaker and it was only in the resulting silence that she realized that Baroque guitar music had been playing. She sat forward on a chair, knees together, and watched him sit opposite. Her mouth had gone dry. In Kruger’s presence, she felt the urgency of what she had come to do. Seated, she was visibly nervous.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She forced a smile and avoided his eyes. She saw that the study was in the process of being packed up. Cardboard boxes were filled with files and memorabilia that would accompany him on a journey, and by the door, standing alone, one suitcase ready for immediate flight.
“I met with Winslow,” Kruger said. “He didn’t mention you. We talked about things from long ago. He had a lot on his mind. Are you cold?” He pointed at Anne’s leather gloves and raincoat, which she had not removed.
“This won’t take long.”
He shrugged. “It was two days ago. He wore a nice suit, as if a good tailor and a starched shirt would impress me. He brought a bouquet of flowers and an expensive wristwatch.” Kruger laughed. “I told him that I didn’t have a price, but if I did a Cartier watch was a pathetic gesture for what I know.”
His eyes came back to her. “I wanted to show him I could be hospitable, so I offered him a Cuban cigar, and then I discovered he is one of those maniacal American anti-smokers. He asked me not to smoke in his presence. I said if he didn’t like my habit, he was free to leave.”
Kruger smiled. “I enjoyed watching him suffer.” Kruger hit a pack of cigarettes on his forearm and offered one to Anne. “Do you mind?”
Anne shook her head.
“The doctor tells me to stop, but old habits are hard to break, even when I know the dangers, so I indulge myself and this gives me a little pleasure when big pleasures are hard to come by.”
Anne knew that his garrulousness was the gloss of a calculating mind, and she knew not to be seduced by his false candor.
Kruger held the lit cigarette high and to one side of his head, smoke curling, and he studied her for a moment. “He said that Virginia was pleasant but that Santa Barbara had better year-round weather. I joked that Siberia too could be agreeable during certain times of the year.” Kruger drew on his cigarette and exhaled slowly. “This is what you’ve come to discuss?”
“Yes.”
“He invited me to visit Langley. He offered to pay for a facelift to make me feel safe from the KGB’s assassins.” Kruger dismissed the thought with a careless wave of his hand. “I’m not afraid. Let them find me. In the early days of the GDR, there were still many Nazis among us. I lived with the enemy then, and I do so again. So, this is not the first time I’m going through this. We succeeded in spite of the weak among us. Under Socialism, we had nothing to fear, no crime, no prostitution, no unemployment.”
“Only people looking for work,” Anne said softly.
“Ah, ha!” he blurted out, indignant. “What do you know? You don’t remember what it was like before. How could you? But now, it’s irrelevant.” Kruger nodded at the boxes. “I will be traveling soon. The border with Poland is still open. I had a friend in Moscow, but now I hear he no longer trusts me. I could give you a whole lecture on trust.” Kruger leaned forward and stared. “Well, speak up. You’re nervous. Take your coat off.”
“I’d like to talk about the Romeo project.”
“That? It was inconsequential. If you want me to cooperate, let’s talk about how I built the institution of State Security after the War. We started with nothing.”
Anne listened to the egotistical bragging spewing from his mouth and she felt that things were not happening as she expected. Her mind tried to shut out his grandiose ideas of his accomplishments and she willed herself to repeat the steps she had rehearsed.
“Fine,” he finally said, “we can talk about that. The CIA, MI6, and the BND had nothing to match our success. We used psychology and an understanding of the human psyche. All they had were crude traps with prostitutes and queers.” Kruger scoffed at the countermeasures of his Cold War adversaries.
“I read my file.”
Kruger raised an eyebrow. “Everyone had a file. There is nothing special in having a file.”
It was Kruger’s arrogance more than his coldness that angered Anne. She saw in him a pattern of predicable bullying, followed by smug reasoning that she had come to despise in a certain type of German.
“You’re wrong,” she snapped.
Kruger looked at her curiously, recognizing a shift in her tone. “You make a mistake in thinking your file is about you. There is nothing personal in the choices we made. There is nothing special in a file—or in one life.”
“I want you to talk about that.”
Kruger narrowed his eyes. “I am happy to talk, but I don’t have a lot of time. What does this have to do with asylum?”
Anne’s hands trembled and she made an excuse for her nervousness. She repeated to herself the words that she had rehearsed. “Your crime,” she whispered.
“My crime?” He dismissed her claim with a wave of his hand. “The GDR was an eloquent expression of Socialism. Now our methods of keeping order are ridiculed. Souvenir hunters gleefully buy up uniforms and medals that we proudly wore until a few months ago.”
“Water, please.”
“Speak up.”
“Do you have a glass of water? My mouth is parched.”
“Water, yes. There is tap water. Sit. I’ll get water.”
Kruger had reached the study’s door when he turned suddenly. “You know what Brecht said? A good Communist has many dents in his helmet and few of them are from his enemies. I should have been more careful with Stefan Koehler.”
When Kruger was gone, Anne stood. She took the 9mm Makarov pistol from her raincoat and undid the safety. She confirmed there was a bullet in the chamber. The pistol was heavy in her gloved hands and she concentrated her mind on what she came to do.
“What’s that?”
Anne swung around and faced Kruger in the study’s door, holding a glass of water. She aimed the pistol at his chest, hands trembling.
Kruger’s eyes were wide. “Who sent you?”
“You used me. You murdered him,” she said, repeating the accusations she had rehearsed.
Kruger became visibly irritated. “He brought dishonor to us. He betrayed his country. He paid the price a traitor pays.”
“And me? A pillow over my head. Kill me—for what? To protect your failed ideology and a sick, defeated country.” The drumbeat of revenge beat in her chest. A small voice cried in her fevered mind. Shoot him! Shoot him!
“I can see you’re a smart girl. This won’t go well for you. Give me the gun.”
Anne’s arms were outstretched pointing the pistol. She felt the hypnotic force of his calm eyes and his lucid reasoning slowly weaken her resolve.
“Come. Let’s talk.” His voice was sympathetic.
Anne felt a sudden paralysis in her hands and the pistol began to drop. Shoot him! Shoot him!
“Who put you up to this?”
“No one,” she mumbled.
“I don’t believe you. The Soviets? The West Germans? Mossad?” Kruger took a step forward and offered the glass of water that he held in his hand. “Sit. Let’s talk. Have drink of water. No one needs to know about this. It is easy to allow yourself to be used, but I can see that you bear no ill will toward me. I know what you are made of. Killing a man goes against your faith.”
“Stop talking!” she screamed. Her hands trembled.
“You can explain that I wasn’t home. They’ll believe you. Give me the gun and you’ll be free to go. Ah, look! You’re trembling.”
Anne watched him take another step forward. She saw his calm eyes become intimidating and grow bold as he took another step, reaching for her weapon. Suddenly he lunged forward to wrench the pistol from her hand, cursing.
Anne fired once. The bullet entered Kruger’s open mouth and it exited the rear of his skull. The sound of the deafening gunshot knocked out her hearing, but then the silence ended and she was aware of the tyrannical ticking of the cuckoo clock on the wall. She stood over Kruger, who lay crumpled on the Persian rug, a crimson stain widening under his head. The water glass had fallen from his hand and was shattered on the floor. His eyes were wide and vacant, already his face had the pallor of death. She had planned to shoot him a second time in the nape of the neck, a signature of Soviet assassins, but she didn’t have the stamina to fire again.
Anne felt nothing. No anger. No contempt. She felt only the grim satisfaction of having done what she came to do. New blood wiped clean the stains of old blood. She looked at his face and, in that moment, she whispered, “Omnis vincit amor.” She hadn’t planned to say it, but contempt fell from her mouth like a judgment. Love conquers all.
A plaintive coo-coo from the clock’s mechanical bird marked the hour and reminded Anne what she must do. She placed the Soviet service pistol near the front door where it would have been dropped by a fleeing assassin. From his attaché case she took one file, examined it, and then took another, quickly leafing through the typed pages. She didn’t find what she was looking for and she laid the files on his desk in deliberate disarray to give the impression the intruder had searched for something of importance. She contemplated the body on the floor and then slipped his wallet from his jacket pocket. The folded, torn page with bank instructions was inside. She wasn’t surprised. Fugitives hold secrets close but a means of escape closer. She found a hidden microphone behind the speaker. Out of an abundance of caution, she removed the cassette tape and tore out the microphone. There would be no record.
Anne picked up the desk telephone and called Cooper. She said what she would repeat several times that night, and then the next day at police headquarters.
“When I arrived, I startled a man, who fled. Inside, I found Kruger’s body. He had been shot once in the head. I ran after the gunman, but he was already gone. He dropped his pistol when he left.”