No Sleep for the Dead

Chapter 16

‘But that’s impossible.’ Riley now knew what had affected Palmer so acutely. Seeing a face from the past, while knowing that face should no longer exist, must have been world-shattering. At least it hadn’t been his former colleague, Reg Paris, that he’d seen. ‘Did you see the car?’

‘No. A couple of guys who did said it had been ripped apart like a wet paper bag. Not even the seats were recognisable. Whatever was left of the bodies was flown back to England once the inquest was completed. Two days after the crash, I was assigned to embassy duty in Stockholm with orders to leave immediately. When I got there I rang my CO to ask about the funeral. He said the family had requested a private ceremony and that it was none of my concern. Done and dusted.’ He gave a thin smile. ‘I didn’t think to ask about the other man, and was junior enough to do as I was told, so I forgot about it.’

Riley nodded, thinking it was time to mention her meeting with Charlie. Hopefully, Palmer would see she had been trying to help. As usual, however, Palmer was sharp to catch on.

‘You know, don’t you?’ he accused her. ‘You weren’t the slightest bit surprised by my mention of Reg Paris.’

Riley tried to look apologetic but failed, because she wasn’t. ‘Sorry, Palmer, but I was concerned when I couldn’t contact you. I contacted your friend Charlie. He looked up the accident report.’

Palmer looked puzzled. ‘Christ, that was a shot in a million, wasn’t it?’ Then he nodded. ‘My notes.’ He stared at her. ‘You’ve been in my office.’

‘Guilty as charged. I happened to see Charlie’s name in your Rolodex. He was the obvious person to ask. I gave him the notes off your desk, thinking it might be a clue to where you were. You’d made doodles which included Reg Paris’s name, although I didn’t recognise it at the time. Charlie used some whiz-bang search engine to check the database and came up with the accident report.’

Palmer put on a look of feigned disgust. ‘Christ, you can’t trust anyone these days. So much for the Official Secrets Act.’ He half smiled. ‘But thanks for the concern. I’d better give Charlie a ring. He’ll never forgive me for not telling him.’

‘So who was he?’ asked Riley after a few minutes. ‘The man killed on the border? I suppose that’s why you went to Germany?’ She added by way of explanation: ‘I heard the airport announcement when you rang me.’

Palmer sat back and linked his hands behind his head with a deep sigh. ‘Actually, I’m not sure why I went back. Seeing that face again stirred it all up. I suppose it wasn’t buried as deep as I’d thought.’

‘You wanted answers. You thought he was dead. It’s natural.’

‘Yeah. I don’t know what I expected to find, but the border seemed the best place to start. I figured if I discovered what had really happened, including who the runner was and why this man — Radnor? — was there, I might discover the reason for the deception. At least, as far as I was concerned.’ He took out his notebook to refresh his memory. ‘Unger, the lawyer I met over there, filled in the gaps for me. The runner’s name was Claus Ulf Wachter. He was in his forties, a middle ranking bureaucrat attached to the East German Ministry of Arts and Culture, responsible for museums and galleries.’

‘What connection would Radnor have had with them?’

‘No idea. The Intelligence community normally confine its interest to other things. But who knows what devious paths they pursue? Could be Wachter knew someone with access to useful information in the military field. In any case, he was probably skipping out before he got caught.’

‘Doing what?’

‘Hands in the till, from the information Unger dug up. At the time, a lot of state-owned artwork, especially by Soviet artists, was going missing and finding its way to the west. There were no reliable inventories, so it was fairly easy for stuff to be siphoned off. Wachter was thought to be involved.’ Palmer shrugged. ‘They were desperate times for some people. Who would miss what they didn’t know about? It would have been easy work with someone on the inside. Then with the collapse of Communism and the Wall coming down, there was a flood of people getting out and the system simply unravelled. This time though, the new people weren’t coming out through tunnels, across the wire or in small boats. They were leaving legitimately. And lots of them had access to money and weren’t shy of using it. Once they got out, they wanted mementoes of the Homeland.’

‘With Wachter as the source? But he was killed before the Wall came down.’

‘There’s where I got lucky. One thing about the East Germans: their museum inventories may have been full of holes, but they kept detailed records on people — especially the likes of Claus Wachter. Some interior police transcripts named Wachter among several officials who were under suspicion for theft of government property. I think he knew his time was up. Maybe he got greedy and was moving too much stuff, and came to their attention. They were all being watched at that time, with Stasi spies everywhere.’

‘So if he was working for Radnor,’ said Riley, ‘he’d have instinctively turned to him for help. It would explain why Radnor and his men were there that night.’

‘It might,’ Palmer agreed. ‘But it doesn’t explain why one of Radnor’s men was ready to shoot him.’ He related Hemmricht’s story, with Riley listening in astonishment.

‘Couldn’t Hemmricht have been mistaken?’ she said. ‘He was just a boy at the time. It would have all been… I don’t know — soldiers and guns and stuff.’

Palmer shrugged. ‘What other reason was there? They wouldn’t have been ready to take on the border guards; that would have been tantamount to starting World War Three. For some reason, Radnor didn’t want Wachter to make the crossing. Makes me wonder what he wanted to hide.’

Riley chewed it over. Something had suddenly begun tugging at her memory. Connected with Radnor. Was it something she’d heard or just an assumption? She poured more wine. ‘Re-wind a moment,’ she said, closing her eyes. ‘Something you mentioned just now hit a nerve.’

‘East Germans,’ Palmer recited, going along with her. ‘Border guards, Wachter, Hemmricht. Shooting, farm animals, ditch.’

Riley shook her head. ‘No. Further back than that. It might have been something else… keep going.’

‘Farm, winter, military exercise, compensation.’

‘No. Keep going.’

‘Stasi, museums, artwork, Reg Paris-’

‘Artwork.’ Riley opened her eyes. ‘There was something about artwork… something recently.’ She snapped her fingers, searching her memory. ‘Jimmy Gough — the retired security guard. He said he walked past Radnor’s office one day and saw some icons on a table. He knew what they were, having served in Berlin. They’d just brought them up in the lift and unpacked them. He probably wasn’t meant to see them.’

‘Now that makes sense,’ Palmer sat forward and looked at Riley. ‘It would tie in with Wachter’s job. Radnor indulging in a spot of free enterprise while working for the government, making a bit of extra money on the side for his pension. Or is that too easy?’

‘It might explain why he didn’t want Wachter to come over,’ said Riley, feeling a ripple of excitement in her stomach. ‘Having an East German official blab to the authorities about what one of their spies had been up to on the side would have been difficult to explain. I don’t suppose the chief spooks encourage that sort of sideline.’

Palmer nodded. ‘If Wachter had half a brain, he’d have known deep down what Radnor’s real job was. There was certainly no way any ordinary Brit could make trips to East Germany at that time. Wachter might have even let slip that he knew, just to ratchet up the pressure to get him out. Radnor would have had no other choice, because if Wachter got caught by the East Germans, he would have blown Radnor’s cover, anyway.’ He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles and sighed. ‘Or are we moving too fast, here? This could be so wide of the mark.’

‘Go with your instincts,’ suggested Riley. She hadn’t known Palmer seriously express doubts before. He tended to cast them aside and go for direct action.

Before he could answer, his phone rang. It was Donald Brask. Palmer listened carefully for a minute or two, scribbling in his notepad, then thanked Donald and hung up.

‘Your visitor was using a hire car,’ he said shortly. ‘Registered to an executive rental company near Heathrow. Donald did some extra digging. The vehicle was hired for a minimum of three days by a woman named Fraser. She lives overseas but is registered at a hotel near Windsor. The driver was a local hire. His licence checked out clean.’ He looked up. ‘Described as tall and black, with dreadlocks.’

‘It’s him. But what does that tell us?’ asked Riley.

‘Only that there’s no obvious connection between them and Radnor.’ Palmer looked mystified and added darkly: ‘apart from us, that is. I need to take a closer look at the office.’

‘I doubt that will help. I didn’t see anything that would be a clue… unless you can figure out why a woman named Fraser from overseas would water your pot plant for you.’

Palmer shook his head. ‘Not my office. I meant the one in Harrow.’

In a warehouse on a small commercial estate to the west of London’s main sprawl, the man called Michael stood by a newly-arrived consignment of wooden crates and sipped from a bottle of mineral water. He had just arrived to help Radnor go through the shipment, and report on something he had discovered.

‘Palmer and the Gavin woman are being watched,’ he told him. ‘An old woman and a black. The black has long hair, braided like a girl.’

Radnor sniffed with distaste. ‘They’re called dreadlocks. So?’

‘He was chased from Gavin’s house by Palmer, but he got away.’

‘Interesting.’ Arthur Radnor stared at his mobile phone, which he’d been using before Michael arrived. ‘Maybe an old pigeon come home to roost.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Old enemies, perhaps. I had a contact in the police look at Palmer. A while ago, he was suspected of being involved in the death of a London gangster in Malaga. More recently, he was close by when two men, one an American, died in a vehicle fire. The American was a bogus priest heading a ring of blackmailers. He targeted runaway kids, dug up some dirt, and blackmailed the parents. If they didn’t pay, he killed the kids. The report suggested he was probably alive when he burned.’

Michael shrugged and stubbed his toe against one of the crates, which had been coated in heavy green paint. ‘Sounds as if he had it coming.’

‘Possibly. But on both occasions Palmer was working with the Gavin woman. It means Palmer’s no pushover, and the woman is clearly no shrinking violet.’ He gave a grunt of irritation. ‘I don’t like it. They’re professionals and plainly not frightened off easily. If they come after us, it could ruin everything.’

‘You worry too much. I have it under control.’

Radnor wondered if he did, and felt a twinge of unease. After a lifetime in the deception game, he had developed a mental antennae tuned to signs of danger. Occasionally, the threats had been unfounded. But there had been too many times when he had listened to good effect, and he wasn’t about to dismiss the warning signs now. He was still trying to come to terms with the potential implications of having the police swarming all over the building in Harrow, investigating Gillivray’s death. It wouldn’t take much for them to wonder about the other occupants, and to scratch beneath the surface, which was something he wished to avoid. The Azimtec paperwork and cover were perfectly good, and would withstand most cursory inspections. But experience told him that even with the best operations, there was always a chink somewhere. Michael, true to form, appeared oblivious to the results of his actions, and seemed merely intrigued by unfolding events, as a meteorologist might be curious about the movement of air.

‘We can’t afford to brush this off too easily,’ Radnor said finally, making a decision. ‘Palmer could be trouble, directly or indirectly.’

‘What are you suggesting?’

‘We should move. Another base, away from Harrow. Let the dust settle. In the meantime, the black and the woman watching Palmer might be a useful smoke screen to keep his attention diverted.’

‘What if they aren’t? What if Palmer and his friend get in our way?’

‘That’s your job. Make sure they don’t.’