The Enemy

CHAPTER 5

Hamburg, Germany

Hamburger Kunsthalle was open until 9 p.m. on Thursdays so Victor spent an hour perusing the art hanging in the various galleries while he checked for surveillance. When he was sure no one was watching him, Victor lingered in the Gallery of Old Masters for his own pleasure, before buying a takeout coffee at the Kunsthalle’s tastefully decorated Cafe Liebermann, and left.

The art gallery sat overlooking the Elbe and Victor walked the short distance along the river bank to the ferry port.

He boarded behind an elderly couple who moved slower than he would have believed possible, waiting patiently until he had room to walk past. He took the rolled-up newspaper from a pocket of his overcoat, unrolled it and kept it in his left hand. In his right hand he held his coffee cup. After climbing the steps to the top deck, he found a spot on the port side from which he could watch the steps without being obvious. He counted twenty-two passengers.

The vessel was just under ninety feet long and twenty-four feet wide. Smaller than he’d expected. Good. Too small for anything to happen. If there was an ambush waiting for him, it wouldn’t take place here.

The waters of the Elbe were black like the sky above them. The horn sounded and the ferry pulled away. Victor pretended to be just another uninterested passenger while he studied the other people onboard. He was dealing with criminals, not trained operatives, and he saw nobody who could be either.

At each stop, he watched who embarked. The ferry was used by a range of people, some on their way back from work, others on their way out for the night, tourists, a few on the way to the night shift. He paid attention to anyone who wasn’t young or old, but no one gave him reason enough to watch closely. A couple sitting across from Victor had no inhibitions about expressing their affection for one another. He did his best to ignore them.

At the fifth stop three people boarded, of which a lone man registered on Victor’s radar. The man ascended the steps and with no subtlety paused to look around at the other passengers. He wore loose jeans and a long leather jacket. His square face was etched with purpose. After waiting too long to avoid being noticed he sat down in front of Victor.

‘Get off at the next stop and follow me,’ the man said without turning around.

At least you did that right, Victor thought.

Victor disembarked at the next stop. He abandoned the newspaper and switched the coffee cup to his left hand. In the distance, moonlit clouds silhouetted the harbour’s tall metal cranes. The air was cold. Victor’s suit jacket was unbuttoned. He had no gun to draw but it was easier to fight or run without a jacket than with.

The man in the leather jacket didn’t wait for him. He was already walking along the riverside in the direction of the harbour. He walked fast, his strides as purposeful as his face had been. Victor didn’t follow immediately but spent a moment observing the area. No one nearby.

Victor followed at the same pace as his guide to maintain the distance between them. He didn’t know where he was being led to or what awaited him when he arrived, so a little space between them was a necessary precaution. When his guide reached their destination, Victor would have some time to analyse the situation while he caught up.

They turned away from the river and along a canal that ran between huge warehouses with tall, arched windows. There were few streetlights and the area was quiet and dark. The sound of traffic was in the distance. Victor’s gaze swept back and forth, down and up, continually evaluating the environment for signs of an ambush and advantages to exploit in the event of one.

Working on the assumption that the guide was right-handed like ninety per cent of the world, if he drew a gun, he would naturally turn around in the opposite direction of his dominant hand to shoot at someone walking behind him. It was quicker that way. So Victor walked behind and to the right to maximise the turning distance, and therefore his own warning.

Up ahead the man stopped near to a wide alleyway. He turned to face Victor and waited for him to catch up. Victor decreased his pace, watching, listening. When he stopped before his guide, the other man gestured to the alleyway. Victor waited.

‘Down there,’ the man said. His hands were in the pockets of his coat.

Victor didn’t move.

The guide remained stationary for a moment. ‘I said down there.’

‘I heard you the first time.’

The purposeful face showed understanding. ‘Don’t like people walking behind you?’

‘No,’ Victor admitted.

The man nodded thoughtfully. ‘That’s smart.’

He took his hands from his pockets and walked first into the alleyway. He didn’t look back. Victor followed after a few seconds. There was nowhere to run or hide in the confined space of the alleyway so Victor stayed close his guide. If he pulled a gun, Victor wanted to be near enough to grab it.

Fifty feet down the alley, the man stopped again. He used a key to unlock a metal door set into one of the warehouses. Hinges squealed.

‘Here we are,’ he said.

The guide looked at Victor, gave a knowing smile when Victor didn’t move, and then stepped through first.

Victor followed.

Inside, fluorescent ceilings lights illuminated a vast open space full of stacked crates and boxes. The air was cool and damp, smelling faintly of mould, rotting wood and marzipan. Victor stayed close to the guide. There were no people that he could see or hear.

The guide led Victor to the far side of the warehouse, heaved across the metal shutter of a freight elevator and stepped inside. He closed the shutter after Victor entered and pressed the button for the third floor. It took a few seconds for the ageing machine to come to life and squeaks and clanks accompanied their ascent. They left the odour of marzipan behind but the smell of mould and rotting wood deepened. Victor tilted his head to the left and then right to crack his neck.

He saw their legs first. Two pairs of boots and faded blue jeans standing near each other. He could hear one part way through telling a joke — something about a prostitute and a vacuum cleaner. He stopped speaking before the punchline as Victor came into view. Of the two, he was obviously the muscle, six-four and around two-twenty or — thirty. An even layer of stubble covered his head, chin and cheeks.

A woman stood close to the muscle. She was in her forties, five-nine, average build, lank black hair hanging over her ears. Her weighty duffel coat was buttoned all the way up. Victor smelled cigarette smoke and felt his mouth water. Four stubs lay crushed out by their feet.

The shutters clattered open. Victor stepped out, surveyed the level. Fewer boxes and crates than the ground floor, more open spaces. Empty metal shelving units, metal pillars. Old cement sacks lay in one corner, a stack of dust-covered plastic sheeting near the woman. The air was damp.

Three banks of fluorescent strip lights, of which only the middle bank was switched on, hung at regular intervals from the ceiling. There were no covers, just bare tubes, some burned out. Just enough light to illuminate the centre of the warehouse level. The floor to Victor’s left and right faded into darkness except where the arched windows were set.

Victor noted the ways in and out. On the wall on the far side of the woman and the muscle, a sign above a half-open metal door denoted it as a fire exit. Along the same wall, near to a stained stainless-steel sink, another opening led through to an adjoining room. Sickly green and flaking paint covered the far wall. Dirt and grease smeared the bricks and filled the gaps between them. In places long cracks cut through the mortar.

The guide stood near the elevator. Victor walked forward. The flooring was narrow planks of wood. Some were cracked, loose, warped or missing entirely. Victor felt soft, rotting boards under his shoes and took a step to more solid footing. He positioned himself so he could keep the guide within his peripheral vision while he faced the woman.

For a long moment no one spoke. Victor assessed the woman and her hulking friend, as he knew he was likewise assessed. What they made of him, he didn’t know. Victor was careful with his body language and facial expression to convey no threat while projecting no weakness.

‘You must be the buyer,’ the woman said eventually.

Her voice betrayed a measure of surprise. Whatever the woman had been expecting, Victor knew he wasn’t it.

He nodded. ‘And you must be Georg.’

‘Not my real name, of course.’

‘Of course,’ Victor echoed.

Georg said, ‘You’re not what I was expecting.’

‘I know.’

The overhead lighting created deep shadows under Georg’s cheekbones, nose, bottom lip. Her eyes were almost invisible in the darkness of their sockets.

‘Are you carrying any weapons?’ she asked.

‘Not unless you count my coffee.’

Georg’s thin lips stretched outwards slightly. ‘That’s good,’ she said. ‘But I have to say I’m more concerned about firearms than I am hot beverages.’

‘I have no gun.’

‘You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t take your word for it.’ She raised a gloved hand, motioning to the muscle while her gaze stayed locked on Victor. ‘Make sure he’s telling the truth.’

The huge guy next to Georg strode towards Victor, eyes narrowed, thick jaw clenched, elbows bent outwards as though he was so laden with muscle he couldn’t walk any other way. The effort to intimidate was basic at best, especially when as he got closer it became apparent that a quarter of the bulk was made up of fat. Victor kept the observation to himself.

He stood still as large hands patted him down around the legs, arms and torso. He noticed the muscle had a. 45 calibre Colt tucked into his jeans, hidden but not well enough. He gestured for Victor to raise his arms, and he did. When the search had finished, the muscle walked back over to Georg.

‘He’s clean.’

‘I’m glad to hear that,’ Georg said to Victor. ‘It would have been very bad for you had we found anything.’

‘I can imagine.’

‘Your German’s excellent,’ Georg said, taking two steps closer. ‘But you’re not German. What are you, American?’

‘Sometimes,’ he answered.

Lines deepened in Georg’s forehead. ‘You’re really not what I was expecting.’

‘You said that once already.’

‘Let me explain myself.’

Victor brought the cup to his lips and swallowed.

‘In my line of work I meet all kinds of people, all different, but what I get for them tells me a lot about who they are. Let’s take you, for example. You don’t have to say what you do for a living as what you’re buying might as well be a business card.’

Victor remained stationary and silent. He didn’t know where Georg was headed, and he didn’t care, but it seemed polite not to interrupt.

‘I’m not sure what the correct euphemism is these days but I’ve dealt with your kind before,’ Georg continued. ‘Not often, but more than a few times. And when I have I’ve always been able to analyse that person completely within seconds of us meeting. It’s not difficult. They try so hard to make out they’re fearsome when they’re actually not, else they really are that scary and they don’t need to try.’ She paused. ‘But you’re neither.’

‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’

‘I’m not sure I meant it as one.’

‘I’ll still take it as a compliment.’

Georg stepped closer and stared hard at Victor. Her eyes were bloodshot, pupils dilated. On something stronger than just nicotine. ‘I’m really not going to find out who you are, am I?’

‘No,’ Victor said. ‘And you wouldn’t want to.’

‘A shame.’ Georg sighed and perched herself on a crate and used a hand to wipe something from her jeans. ‘Let’s do some business.’

Victor nodded. ‘I take it you have all the goods on the list.’

Georg counted off on her fingers as she said, ‘Russian army blasting caps, nine-millimetre pistol with threaded barrel, silencer, pick gun, and fourteen pounds of cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine with the bits to make it go ka-boom. Did I pronounce that right, by the way?’

‘You did,’ Victor assured. ‘I want to check everything.’

‘Of course, my boy, I would have expected nothing less. You’re a professional, after all.’ She drew out the words. ‘But so am I. And I’d like to see the money first.’

With his free hand, Victor slowly reached into an outer pocket. He did so while closely watching what the muscle and the guide were doing. There were no tension-relieving gestures, no shifting of weight, nothing to suggest they were waiting to put a pre-planned course of action into play when he showed he had the money. Satisfied this wasn’t an ambush, Victor withdrew the slim bundle of hundred-euro notes.

Georg dropped down from the crate and inched closer. She stared at the money. ‘That doesn’t look like enough to me.’

‘It’s half of it.’

Georg’s eyes rose to meet Victor’s. She spoke quietly, menacingly. ‘Then you’ve not only wasted my time but insulted me. And neither is a very wise move for a man in your position.’

‘After I have the goods you can come with me to pick up the rest of the money,’ Victor explained. ‘Or send one of your men to do so.’

‘That’s not how I do business.’

‘And ferries, empty warehouses and guards with forty-fives aren’t how I do business,’ Victor countered. ‘This is the price you pay for how things have been conducted thus far.’

The muscle touched a hand to his gun. His expression was half-surprised, half-annoyed. Georg considered for a few seconds.

‘What’s to stop me taking that money and having the location of the second half beaten out of you?’

The guide and the muscle both stiffened in readiness for what might follow.

Victor kept his gaze locked on Georg. ‘One, you’d lose a valuable future customer. And two,’ he said, voice calm, emotionless. ‘I’d kill you and your men inside ten seconds.’

The muscle didn’t like that answer. His scowl intensified and his knuckles whitened. The guide’s back straightened. Victor ignored them both. He watched Georg’s reaction, first shock and anger that eventually became a smile and Victor knew he’d played it correctly.

‘Okay,’ she said, ‘we’ll do it your way.’