The Janus Man

Six

July 10 1985. Flight LH 041 arrived at Hamburg dead on time at 1255 hours. Tweed peered from his first-class seat through the window as the machine descended through a grey vapour. The greyness dissolved, Germany spread out a few hundred feet below.

He studied the jigsaw of cultivated fields and plantations of firs and pines. Narrow sandy tracks led inside the woodlands from the outside world. Peninsulas of housing estates poked into the fields, then the countryside was inundated by the urban tide.

More trees as the plane dropped lower. He remembered this approach to Hamburg, one of his favourite German cities. A stranger would never realize he was passing over the city. In the seat behind him Newman was not peering out of the window. His eyes were flickering over the other passengers, searching for anyone taking an interest in Tweed. They landed.

Tweed was the first passenger to walk down the mobile staircase, Newman the third. They had travelled from Heathrow as though they had never met. Tweed was standing by the carousel, waiting for his two cases, when Chief Inspector Otto Kuhlmann of the Federal Police joined him.

`Got a light?' Kuhlmann asked in German, holding his cigar.

`I think I can accommodate you,' Tweed replied in the same language. He lowered his voice as he flicked on the lighter and the German bent forward. 'I have two cases, as you suggested over the phone…'

`Point me to the first one. I'll take that.'

When the first case appeared Kuhlmann leaned forward and heaved it off the moving belt. He then had trouble relighting his cigar with Tweed's lighter. The second case appeared, Tweed grabbed it, accepted the lighter from Kuhlmann and they walked away together from the crowd gathered round the carousel.

Anyone watching would have assumed the two men had travelled together on Flight LH 041 from Heathrow. Outside the reception hall Kuhlmann led the way to an unmarked police Audi, they both climbed into the back and the driver left the airport.

`That little manoeuvre may have covered your arrival,' the German commented as they drove along tree-lined streets. Entering Hamburg was like driving into the country.

`May is the operative word. Where are we going first? I have a reservation at the Four Seasons…'

`Living high?'

`The best hotel is the last place the opposition will expect to find me. And I have an escort following in a cab. Robert Newman, the foreign correspondent.'

Tweed produced a photo of Newman from his wallet which Kuhlmann hardly glanced at. He took a deep drag at his cigar and shook his head.

`I'd have recognized Newman without a picture. I saw him back at the carousel. I was going to check his presence with you. If it's OK by you the first stop is the hospital where Fergusson was taken to and died. The doctor may be able to tell you something. Anyway, you're safe in Hamburg…'

`Let's just say I'm in Hamburg.'

The flight had still been in mid-air when the call to an apartment block in Altona, a Hamburg suburb, came through from London. The caller – from a booth inside the Leicester Square Post Office, which is actually off Charing Cross Road – spoke in German.

`Tweed is on his way. Flight LH 041, departed Heathrow 1120 hours, arrives Hamburg 1255 your time. Have you got that?'

`Understood. He'll be met at the airport. We have good time. Thank you for calling. Now we can have a limo waiting.'

Martin Vollmer, who occupied the Altona apartment, broke the connection, waited a moment, then dialled a number in Flensburg, Schleswig-Holstein, on the Danish border.

`Tweed is coming..

The wires continued to hum through a complex communication system across North Germany. Like a tom-tom beat the same message was repeated again and again. 'Tweed is coming… Tweed is coming… TWEED IS COMING…

By the time the flight had crossed the European coastline and LH 041 was over the mainland the phone rang in the bedroom of Erwin Munzel at the Hotel Movenpick, Lubeck. The blond giant had sat by the instrument for over an hour. He snatched up the receiver.

`Tweed is coming…'

The brief conversation ended, Munzel; registered under the name of Kurt Franck, left the hotel immediately and walked on to the main part of Lubeck situated on an island encircled by the river Trave. It was a hot day, the air was torrid as he boarded a bus for Eichholz.

Wearing jeans and a polo-necked cashmere sweater, he checked his watch as the bus left the island, drove over a bridge and headed east through a dull suburban district of four-storey apartment blocks.

In less than ten minutes he got off at the terminus. He had reached the border with East Germany – the no-man's- land which is a death-trap. A coach-load of American tourists escorted by the usual talkative guide stood staring east with all the fascination of ghouls observing a traffic accident.

Munzel pushed his way through to the front and gazed at the distant watch-tower. He checked his watch again and waited until it was 1.30 p.m. precisely. Then he pulled a red-coloured handkerchief from his pocket and slowly wiped the sweat off his high forehead. He repeated the gesture three times.

Inside the watch-tower one of the three guards stared through a pair of high-powered binoculars. He felt he could reach out and touch Munzel's forehead. Putting down the binoculars on a table he reached for the phone.

`That's Munzel reporting in,' he remarked to his companions.

The wires began humming in the DDR – the German Democratic Republic. East Germany. Within minutes, General Lysenko, seated at a desk next to Markus Wolf in the basement of a building in the centre of Leipzig picked up the phone when it rang.

He listened, said 'yes' or 'no' several times, then replaced the instrument. Typically, he kept the chief of East German Intelligence in suspense while he lit a cigarette fitted with a cardboard holder.

Markus Wolf, in his sixties, sat like a graven image, his horn-rimmed glasses perched on his prominent nose. Wolf had the patience of a cat playing with a trapped mouse.

`Tweed is coming…' Lysenko told him eventually. `So, we wait…'

`He has taken the bait. He has arrived in Hamburg. Soon we'll hear he has arrived in Lubeck.'

`After a while, possibly. I know Tweed. He is the most cautious and wary counter-espionage chief in the whole of the West. Do not expect too much..

`I expect Munzel to kill him.'

`Probably. Let us be patient. We must be even more patient than Tweed. The one who wins this duel will be the man with the greatest stamina..

`You are a pessimist..

`No, just a realist.'

The first man to receive the news from the phone box inside the Leicester Square Post Office, Martin Vollmer, waiting in his apartment at Altona, had made one further phone call after contacting Flensburg. Which is why a taxi with its Frei light doused had followed the unmarked police car from the airport to the hospital.

He parked at some distance from the Audi as Kuhlmann climbed out, followed by Tweed. He watched them enter the hospital and settled back to wait further developments. He was so intent on observing what happened beyond his windscreen that he omitted to check his rear view mirror.

Leaving the airport building, carrying his case, Newman at once noticed something odd. His whole experience as a foreign correspondent had trained him to spot the out-of-the-ordinary. He saw the Audi transporting Tweed turn out of the airport. Looking for a cab he also saw the taxi lacking the Frei sign illumination.

The odd thing was the vehicle was occupied by the driver alone. The coincidence was that this driver decided to leave the airport without a fare at the precise moment the Audi drove off.

Getting inside the next waiting cab, he handed the driver a ten-deutschmark note. 'That's your tip,' he said in German. `And I may add a bonus. Just follow that black Audi, please. You'll be helping the Drug Squad,' he added.

Newman kept a close eye on the Audi. This action automatically made him observe the cab which appeared to be following it. As they turned into the kerb by the hospital Newman warned his driver to stop immediately. This placed his vehicle a dozen metres behind the other cab now parked by the kerb.

He paid off his driver, stooped to pick up his case and noted the registration number of the waiting cab. Then he walked into the hospital Immediately his nostrils were assailed by the aroma of hygienic cleansing liquids. Newman detested all things medical. Still, he consoled himself as he entered the reception hall, it was in the line of duty. Damnit!

`I can have that cab driver picked up,' Kuhlmann suggested when Newman finished his brief report. 'We'll grill the hell out of him…'

`If I might make a suggestion,' Tweed intervened. 'Don't alert him. Have him followed, identified – if possible. But on no account should he be intercepted.'

`You're blown,' Kuhlmann warned: 'That driver could be our only lead to who organized the tracker – and from the airport. That is very serious. After the precautions we took. I'm telling you.'

Kuhlmann was short, broad-shouldered, had a large head and a wide mouth, his thick lips clamped on his cigar which was unlit. Dark-haired, his eyebrows were thick and his manner and speech suggested a very tough character. In his forties, Newman estimated.

`Not to worry,' Tweed said. 'And let's play it my way. Low profile. Incidentally, normally this would be a case for the local police. How was it they brought you in?' Tweed turned to Newman. 'Chief Inspector Kuhlmann is from the Federal Police in Wiesbaden.'

`Because they have a bright police chief here,' Kuhlmann told them. 'Name on the deceased's passport rang a bell. He put it through the computer at Cologne. Fergusson came up as one of your people. So, I phoned you. Which is why I'm here, why you are here. This case could have international implications…'

`Then the BND could get involved.' Tweed sounded bothered as he referred to the German counter-intelligence HQ at Pullach just south of Munich. 'Low profile,' he repeated.

`Let's go see the doctor who attended Fergusson,' Kuhlmann said impatiently. As they walked down a clinically spotless corridor he continued explaining. 'Two uniformed policemen on night patrol saw Fergusson's body floating up against the lock-gates leading from the Binnenalster to the Elbe. Hauled him out with a boat-hook, found he was still alive, rushed him to this hospital. He died an hour later..

`How did he come to get into the water?' Newman asked.

`Blow on the side of the skull. Could have slipped, caught his head on the stone wall before he hit the water, so they say. Accidental death would have been the verdict.' Kuhlmann chewed at his cigar, unhappy that he couldn't light up inside the hospital. 'Accidental death,' he repeated. 'Except your people don't have accidents. Here's the doctor's office. Schnell is his name. Speaks good English. Take your choice of language.'

Dr Schnell, a small, plump-faced man, wearing a white coat, rose from behind his desk and Kuhlmann made brief introductions, then launched straight into his interrogation.

`How did Ian Fergusson die?'

'He stopped breathing…'

`That's not funny. Tweed here was a close friend of his.'

'I had no intention of treating this tragedy humorously, Mr Tweed. But it's up to the pathologist to answer that question. Fergusson's body has been transferred to the morgue.'

'I quite understand.' Tweed paused, glancing at a dark haired nurse who stood behind Schnell, an attractive girl in her late twenties. 'Who was present when he was close to death?'

'Myself and Sister Bruns. That is why she is here.'

'He was still alive when he was brought in, I gather. Did he say anything? No matter how unimportant it might seem, I need to know everything – if he spoke.'

'Well, yes he did.' Schnell picked up a pencil and turned it slowly between sensitive fingers. 'It made little sense to either of us, I'm afraid…'

'He spoke in English or German?'

Tweed's gaze encompassed both Schnell and Sister Bruns who was watching him closely. He had the strong impression the girl wanted to speak but was inhibited by Schnell's presence.

'In English – which we both understand. He was in a bad way – the blow on the side of the head plus being half-drowned when the two policemen dragged him out. So he was pretty incoherent. I may not even have heard correctly…'

'Try and tell me,' Tweed coaxed.

`He had trouble getting the two words out which he repeated – if, I emphasize, I really did understand. First he said "Berlin". He repeated the name of the city twice. Then he repeated a man's name – "Hans" – and that, I'm afraid, is all he said…'

`You agree?' Tweed turned to Bruns and stared hard at her as she shook her head. 'There was something else?'

She took a deep breath. Beneath her uniform her breasts heaved. 'He was trying to say something before "Berlin". I'm quite sure of it…'

`Just having trouble speaking at all,' Schnell objected.

`No!' Bruns was vehement, holding Tweed's gaze. 'He said the word three times – and three times he tried to say something before it. Then when he said "Hans" he tried to say something else. After "Hans". Again it happened three times. I could not possibly be mistaken…'

`Really?' Schnell was ironic.

`I am quite sure of what I say. My hearing is very acute and I was watching him closely. Believe me, Mr Tweed, I am right.' `I believe you,' said Tweed.

At the morgue Tweed stared down at the white sheet covering the body of a man lying on the dissecting table. Kuhlmann had introduced Martin Kosel, the pathologist, an ascetic-looking man in his fifties who might have been displaying furniture for sale. Kosel pulled back the sheet and exposed the head and neck.

`That's Ian Fergusson,' said Tweed. 'He can't have been in the water long…'

`I couldn't comment before I've completed my examination,' Kosel replied, covering the corpse with the sheet again.

`But you will,' Kuhlmann growled. He produced a folder, shoved it under the pathologist's nose. 'Federal Police. We need an educated guess. Now. Assuming you are educated…'

`I resent that…'

`Noted for the record. The pathologist showed resentment. Now, let's get to it. When we checked his personal effects his passport was hardly damp…'

`It was inside the breast pocket of his jacket,' Kosel pointed out. 'And he was wearing a raincoat buttoned to the neck.. `A lightweight raincoat. His wallet, tucked inside his other breast pocket wasn't even moist. And the police patrol dragged him out when he was half-submerged under the water. I'd say he was found within five minutes of being dumped into that outlet from the Binnenalster. They came as close as that to catching the killer.'

`Killer?' Kosel protested. 'I haven't established the cause of death..

`You think he walked off the edge for an early morning swim? He was found floating by the lock-gates not five minutes' walk from the Jungfernstieg landing-stage on the Binnenalster. That whole area is well-lit by street lamps…'

`Maybe he was drunk…'

Tergusson never touched alcohol,' Tweed remarked mildly. 'So cancel that one,' Kuhlmann said.

The corpse smells strongly of alcohol – whisky I would say.'

'So, we can make some educated guesses?' Kuhlmann grasped Kosel by the arm and smiled grimly. 'You're doing fine. Keep it up. Now, let's come to the blow on the side of the head.'

`Encrusted with dried blood. He could have hit his skull on the stone wall when he went in.'

`Sure!' Kuhlmann waved his cigar like a conductor's baton. `He's crossing the bridge near the lock-gates. He climbs over the rail, then dives head first for the wall. Is that really what you're saying? That it is even physically possible?'

`It would seem unlikely…'

Newman intervened. 'He was a first-rate swimmer, too. If he had fallen in he'd have found a way out.'

`That information is useful,' Kosel responded primly.

`Your unofficial opinion would be also useful,' Kuhlmann pressed. 'Other people's lives may be at stake. Or do you want this place to be standing room only?'

`I can't be pressured…'

`Try me,' Kuhlmann challenged. 'We can take what's lying under that sheet away from you – bring someone in from Wiesbaden.'

`If he never drank… Kosel paused. He frowned as he looked at Tweed. 'It is beginning to seem someone made it look like an accident. The front of his clothes was soused with alcohol…'

`That's it,' said Kuhlmann. 'Take this card, keep it to yourself. Send your report to that address when you've done what you have to do.'

`Wiesbaden? It must be submitted to the Hamburg chief of police…'

`Hans Lenze, who is a close friend of mine, who knows I'm here, who told me about you. Do it any way you damn well wish – but that report goes to Wiesbaden. Now, let's get out of here and go look for fresh air.'