The Janus Man

Twenty-Seven

Through his field-glasses Falken watched the armoured car coming down the track off the highway. He held the lenses to his eyes for only a few seconds and then lowered the binoculars.

`I can see its wheels kicking up cinder off that track,' he commented. 'It's slithering all over the place.'

`If necessary it will slither down to the end of the slope and then drive on to here,' Gerda warned.

She ran out of the kitchen, followed by Falken. Newman stayed to one side of the window, watching through a patch of clear glass in the condensation. He didn't think they could fight the Army. And the retreat from the back of the cottage was across fields of ripening rye. They'd be spotted instantly.

He watched the ugly vehicle wrestling with the cinder track. Again he had gone ice-cold, as he had when they encountered the Schneider patrol back in the forest. Then he stiffened, his eyes narrowed. He waited a moment longer. To be sure.

`Come back here!' he shouted.

Gerda slipped into the room, holding the Uzi. Behind her Falken appeared, a Walther automatic pistol in his right hand. Newman gestured for them to keep away from the window.

`What is it?' Falken asked in a crisp voice.

`It's going away. They were simply using the track to turn the armoured car so they could go back the way they came. They must have lost their way…'

`I do believe you're right,' Falken responded, peering out of the window from the other side. 'It is illegal to make a U-turn. They were worried a staff car might come along if they tried it.'

Newman watched the car proceeding eastwards along the elevated highway. Gerda stood beside him, he heard her let out her breath. Newman showed her his moist palms and wiped them dry on the back of his trousers.

`Feel my heart, Mr Thorn,' she said. 'Go on, feel it.'

He hesitated, then placed his hand over her left breast. He held it there and she smiled up at him, a Mona Lisa smile. Falken grinned and shoved the Walther inside, his jacket pocket.

`Beating like a tom-tom,' she said. 'You feel it?'

'I feel it…'

She left the room again and Newman looked at Falken who still had a grin on his face. He came close to Newman, whispering the words.

`She likes you. If something happens to me, you do what she says. You obey her. Then you will be safe.'

`Nothing is going to happen to you.'

`In this game fate deals different cards. We just had a good card. Maybe the next one…' He broke off as Gerda returned and said the meal was ready. Newman left them to lay the table in the sitting-room. As he walked through it he noticed Gerda had put back the windcheater on the floor, presumably concealing the Uzi. From the canvas hold-all she had carried from the Chaika, Gerda produced black bread, cheese and some apples. He went outside to the back of the cottage to get some fresh air.

After they had eaten their simple meal and drunk black coffee, Falken took out the Border Police folder and the trimmed photo of Newman from the table drawer he had slipped them inside earlier.

`As I said, always assume the worst. We assume that Schneider reported the incident. So, they look for an impostor who carries a River Police folder…' He took the pot of glue out of the drawer and squeezed a very small amount in the centre of the back of the trimmed photo. Using his fingertips, he smeared the glue smoothly, removing any excess from the edges. He lifted the photo carefully, reversed it and placed it exactly inside the blank ruled rectangle in the new folder.

`Now we wait until it is dry, then we make it official.' He took a rubber stamp from his pocket together with an inking pad.

`Once I stamp the photograph with the official seal you are in business. The Border Police,' he repeated. 'Again in plain clothes, again on special assignment…'

`Tracking drug dealers again?'

`That would be excellent. Oddly enough, there has been much talk on our grapevine – which extends not only all over the DDR, but also beyond its frontiers to the East. Talk of the movement of a huge consignment of heroin. That you don't mention.'

`When we are on the move again you expect us to be stopped?'

`Inevitably. There are checkpoints everywhere. Constant patrols. And, I am a magician. I believe I told you before. You are no longer Albert Thorn. You have become Emil Clasen. Do not forget. And Gerda knows.'

`What about my River Police folder?'

`That I destroy. Burn to ashes in that fire…'

`That fire worries me,' Newman remarked, 'if you don't mind my saying so. The smoke from the chimney shows someone is here. I thought of that when I was watching the armoured car.'

Falken leaned forward and squeezed Newman's arm. 'I could use you in Group Five. But we have two choices – freeze to death or risk the fire. After all, Norbert has a fire all the time he is here. It is cold and damp by the canal. And no one can remember when Norbert is supposed to be here or back at his flat.'

`You seem to have thought of everything.'

`I wonder what I have not thought of? That is what always is haunting me.'

Karl Schneider drove back slowly along the road, his eyes switching from left to right and back again. Dressed in farmer's clothes, he wore a shabby peaked cap and under his left armpit he felt the bulge of the 9-mm Walther tucked snugly inside its shoulder holster.

Schneider was driving a farm truck carrying a load of hay in the open back. He had been driving for two hours and the sun was high in a clear blue sky. The country fields spread out on either side and he felt he was back in the old days. Thcy had been good times. Often a girl to take behind a hedge. They knew a thing or two, those country girls. That was before he had met Alma.

His expression grimaced at the thought. She was the one who had prodded him into joining the Border Police. 'You ought to better yourself, serve the State…' Screw the State. She was ambitious was Alma. For herself. Nagging cow.

He forced her out of his mind. Concentrate on the job. The reference to promotion was uppermost in Schneider's mind. If he had more money he'd get himself a girl on the side. Some nice willing girl to take his mind off Alma. He'd show her – where ambition led. To an intimate place.

He had driven over the elevated highway once without taking any notice of the lock-keeper's cottage, his attention distracted by a man on a motor-bike who overtook him. Not by the man actually. By the girl who rode pillion behind, trying to hold down her skirt which kept flying up, exposing a pair of slim legs. Stupid tart, wearing a skirt on a pillion. If he'd been the motor-bike rider he'd have shown her how stupid she was.

He came to the point where he'd completed his run, then turned back. This time when he approached the elevated section he was on the side of the highway nearest the cottage. He saw a curl of smoke rising from the chimney. Pretty warm day for a fire. Then he remembered the canal alongside the tumbledown building. That place would always be damp.

His eyes roved over the cottage, took in the little shed near the back. That would be the outside lavatory. In the middle of the field of rye rose a large canvas-covered hump. He slowed down, studying it curiously. The front of a farm tractor protruded from the open end of the huge sheet of canvas. He frowned, slowed further. No farm tractor was as big as that – as long as that.

Slyly, he kept on driving until he was well past the cottage. He came to where a cinder track led down into a hollow. At the rear of the hollow was a pile of hay. He glanced in the rear-view mirror, saw the highway was deserted, turned down into the hollow and pulled up. Should he radio Leipzig? No. He'd check the cottage first: if he found the fugitives the credit would be his.

Schneider approached the rear of the covered tractor by a devious route, circling round the back where the ground sloped down, out of sight of the cottage. About a hundred metres from the hump he dropped to his knees and crawled slowly through the rye, now high enough to hide him completely.

Reaching the back of the hump, he stood up after listening for several minutes. He lifted the canvas and stared at the rear end of a Chaika. Something the man with glasses in Leipzig had said came back to him. Three bicycles found hidden beneath some undergrowth.

His mind worked slowly. They'd have needed other transport. They'd never have walked the long distance to the nearest village. They'd have needed a car. Maybe a Chaika?

The peasant cunning of Schneider, the foxy character Markus Wolf had immediately observed, told him he was on to something. He'd watch the cottage before he made a move. He had the high-powered field-glasses in his jacket pocket they'd given him in Room 78.

He found a small hillock surrounded with rye, lay down on it and focused his glasses on the tiny shed which was the lavatory. Whoever was inside had to come out to relieve themselves. That way he'd find out how many of them there were – who they were. It was only mid-afternoon. Plenty of time before dark.

An hour later a man walked out of the cottage and headed for the lavatory shed. Schneider focused his glasses. Thorn! Albert Thorn! That bastard River Police officer. And through the glasses he did look rather like the man whose picture he'd been shown on a poster in Leipzig.

Schneider rested the glasses on the ground, still lying full length amid the rye. Thorn had gone inside the shed, shut the door. Schneider hauled at the butt of the Walther and let go as his sweaty hand slipped. Cursing, he dragged a handkerchief from his pocket, wiped both hands.

Grasping the Walther again, he heaved it clear of the holster. Holding the weapon in his right hand, he flicked up the safety catch with his left thumb. The gun was ready to fire. He laid it beside the glasses which he raised again to his eyes.

Ten minutes later he watched a second, taller man emerge, walk to the shed. Looked like the swine who'd been with Thorn, the man who hadn't said a word. He was sure it was him. Schneider sweated some more, this time with excitement. He'd wait until dusk. Then he'd move in on them.

Newman and Gerda sat round the table in the living-room. It was Gerda's turn to watch the road and she was in the kitchen. She had made more coffee and the two men drank and talked.

`This witness you told me about,' Newman said. 'Can you tell me anything more about him?'

`It's a her. She was loyal to the regime until her son kicked over the traces. Some misdemeanour, insulting a Vopo when he was the worse for drink. They put him in a labour battalion. She's hated their guts ever since. She's sixty-something. I want you to hear her story from her own lips.'

`About Dr Berlin?'

`About Berlin, yes.'

`Afterwards I go back over the border past that watchtower?'

`You go back over the border, yes.' Falken checked the time. `Nearly dusk. Your turn to take over from Gerda. Stay on watch too long and your concentration goes. Like those people at airports who check the X-ray machines. Take your coffee with you.'

Newman walked into the kitchen, put down his cup of coffee on the iron range. Gerda was stifling a yawn as she stood by the window. It was almost dark inside the cramped kitchen.

`Your turn?' she asked and gave him a warm smile, handing the glasses over.

`Treacherous light this,' he said as he moved to the window. 'You imagine you see things.'

`So, stay alert. Don't let your imagination wander.'

She gave him a friendly punch on the forearm and disappeared into the living-room. He heard her say she was going out to the lavatory. There was a slam as the heavy front door closed. Then a sudden silence.

In the blue dusk he could see the headlights of cars moving along the highway. People going home from work. More traffic than there had been since they'd arrived. In the west the invisible sun had sunk behind a ridge of the distant Harz. Behind the ridge, sharp as a knife edge, the world seemed to be on fire.

He raised the glasses to his eyes, slowly scanned the fields between the highway and the cottage. The rye crop stood still in the windless evening. The blips of light continued moving along the highway, nearly all in an easterly direction, towards Halle. Fewer of them now. Rush hour was fading.

`Emil,' Falken called out from the next room, using Newman's new name, 'everything quiet?'

`Not a sign of life – except cars on the highway..

`Come in here for a minute then. Something you need to know.'

Newman found the German sitting at the table, studying the new Border Police folder. He had already burnt the River Police document. Albert Thorn had ceased to exist, gone up in flames. Newman sat down. Behind him he heard Gerda unlocking the door, returning from the lavatory.

`Keep your hands on the table! Move and I'll blow your heads off…'

Newman stared at the open doorway where Gerda stood, key in her left hand, her face pale, grim. Behind her stood a man in farming clothes, peaked cap pulled down over his low forehead. For a moment he had difficulty in recognizing Karl Schneider. The German had no difficulty at all.

`Ah! Mr Albert Thorn! Of the River Police? And Mr What's-'is-Name. Lay your bloody hands flat on the table! Both of you! Lean forward! You want a bullet in the guts?'

Gerda still stood frozen, as though with fright. Schneider used his left hand to give her a violent shove in the back. She nearly fell, but recovered her balance and turned to face him. His gun still covered Newman and Falken.

`Make the wrong move and they get it,' he told her. 'A third bullet for you, my pretty one…'

He stepped back, used his left elbow to slam the door closed, then stepped forward again. Schneider was pleased with himself. It showed in the triumphant sneering grin on his pasty face. He had crawled through the rye patiently until he reached the rear of the shed which served as a lavatory. Now he knew there were only three of them. The girl didn't count. Two of them. He'd waited until she had left the shed, walked the few paces to the front door, inserted the key and opened it. Then he had rushed forward behind her. They'd be proud of him in Leipzig. He would get his promotion. He could smell treason inside this cottage.

Schneider flexed his left hand as the circulation returned. It had been cold out there in the dusk. Inside the cottage it was warm. He felt the warmth reacting on his chilled face, on both hands. They'd forgotten to provide gloves. But they'd hardly have foreseen this situation, the vigil he had kept on the hillock.

`Go and sit down at the table, you stupid cow,' he ordered Gerda. 'You've had your piss,' he added coarsely.

She released the key. It clanged on the flagstone floor. His eyes dropped, looked up quickly. 'Thought you could distract me, you fornicating bitch? I suppose they've both had some?'

He leered, then his eyes glanced at the open folder in front of Falken on the table. Newman sighed inwardly. If Schneider needed any proof of their guilt – and there had been a chance they could have talked their way out of the trap – the folder had ruined it. Gerda, still standing, spoke in a mocking tone.

`You want us to think you did all this by yourself? Where is the rest of your patrol?'

`By myself? Yes! No one else. Just me. I found you! By driving along the roads. By keeping my eyes open. You think you can fool a farmer by covering a tractor which has to be as big as a Russian tank?'

`I don't believe it,' Gerda jeered. 'A squalid little lout of a man like you? A peasant…'

Schneider levelled the gun midway between Newman and Falken with his right hand. His left hand bunched into a fist. He hit her a savage blow in the face. At the last moment she moved her head slightly, then fell back under the impact. She sprawled on the floor, sobbing.

There was a snap. Falken had closed the folder. Schneider eyed the folder. 'Open that, you bastard,' he ordered. 'I want to see it – see the photograph…'

A rattle of gunfire reverberated. From Schneider's breastbone downwards a row of bright red medallions seemed to sprout, as though stitched to his thin coarse jacket. Schneider was hurled back against the door as if pushed by a giant hand. His eyes bulged with astonishment. Newman felt himself jump with shock. The red splotches began to coalesce into one long streak as he slid down the door, sat on the floor, legs sprawled across the floor.

Newman glanced at Gerda as Falken leapt up. She lay propped on one elbow, the Uzi in her right hand, the inner lining of the windcheater showing where she had grabbed the weapon.

Falken bent down, checked Schneider's neck pulse. 'He's still alive. Amazing. Give me the gun…'

He took it from Gerda, walked back to Schneider, placed the muzzle against the side of the German's head after adjusting the Uzi's mechanism. He fired one shot. The head jerked, flopped sideways. Falken checked the pulse again. 'Now he's dead.'

`The blood!' Gerda scrambled to her feet. 'There must be no blood on the floor..

Opening a cupboard, she hauled out two grey blankets. With Falken's aid she laid out the blankets on the floor, lifted the body on to them, wrapped it up like a parcel, tucking it in at head and foot.

Falken picked up the key from the floor, opened the front door, peered into the night, then disappeared. He returned almost immediately carrying a loop of rope. 'The mooring rope for barges,' he explained to Newman. 'Go to the kitchen and check the window…'

Newman ran into the next room, which was still in darkness, felt his way round the few pieces of furniture, stared through the window. His night vision came to him quickly, helped by the headlights of two cars driving along the highway. No sign of any movement in the fields.

`Nothing I can see,' he reported, going back into the livingroom. 'I'd better check outside…'

He must have come in from the fields at the back – he found the Chaika,' Gerda said, bent down over the grisly bundle.

`You can use a Walther?' Falken asked. 'Good. Take this.'

Newman released the safety catch, opened the front door, stepped outside quickly and closed the door behind him. The cold of the night hit him after the warmth of the cottage. Holding the Walther in both hands, extended in front of him, he explored round the cottage, down the tow-path to the bank of the canal.

Then he took the more difficult route to where the canvas covered the tractor and the Chaika. At frequent intervals he paused and listened. The night was heavy with silence, the nerve-wracking silence you only experience after dark in the country. He resumed his walking, heading for the most likely hiding-place for the rest of a patrol. Behind the covered vehicles.

He was almost convinced Schneider had spoken the truth when he said he'd come alone. But it had to be checked. Assume the worst. An excellent maxim. He found no one behind the canvas hump. But, kneeling down, feeling the ground carefully, he detected flattened rye where Schneider must have waited and watched. For God knew how long. But he'd had the patience of a farmer.

Newman returned to the cottage.

The corpse lay on the flagstone floor. Wrapped in two grey Army blankets. Further wrapped in a sheet of canvas. And round two parts – the chest and the knees – the whole parcel was coiled with two heavy, rusting chains. Falken, who had opened the door, went back to the table where Gerda sat, shivering, small hands grasping a mug of steaming black coffee.

`No one out there,' Newman reported. 'He was on his own.'

`I knew that,' Gerda said in a cold voice, 'he boasted about it. But you were right to check. There is still coffee in the pot.'

Newman sagged in a chair opposite Falken. He suddenly felt unutterably weary, drained of energy. He drank some of the coffee Falken had poured, then looked again at the body.

`Where did you get the chains?'

`Snow chains. For Norbert's car in winter. We think the body must be weighted. To make it sink.'

`In the canal?'

`Out of the question.' Falken's tone was abrupt. 'It might be found. Then old Norbert would be in terrible trouble. We cannot risk that.'

`Bury it,' Newman suggested. 'During the night.' `Impossible. The ground is too hard. We have to think of something else.'

`Such as?'

`I have no idea.' Falken sounded irritable. 'For God's sake let me think.'

`That was the first man I have ever killed,' Gerda suddenly remarked in a choked voice.

Newman laid a hand on hers. 'Try not to dwell on it. Remember, we'd probably all have ended up dead if you hadn't acted. I do understand how you must feel…'

`Leave her alone,' Falken broke in roughly. 'He was an enemy.'

`No need to get so tough about it,' Newman snapped back.

Gerda grasped his hand, squeezed it. 'You are a nice man, but he is right. Sympathy can undermine resolution. We have to be hard to survive…'

`And you,' Falken told Newman, 'may have to be hard before you cross the border again. I have decided we must leave this place early. Tonight, in fact. The people who sent Schneider may come looking for him. Your schedule is speeded up…'

`And what about the body?' Newman demanded.

`That is a problem. I am still trying to solve it…'

It was a novel problem for Newman. He'd never realized before just how difficult it was to dispose of a corpse so it would not be discovered.