Dying to Tell (12 page)

"It might have made more sense for us to plan this together, Kiyo." (Why I was so calm about it I wasn't sure. Still half-drunk, I supposed.)

"You are right, Lance. I am sorry. I did not think I could do any harm."

"And did you?"

"No. No harm. Perhaps good. As I was climbing the stairs towards flat four, the door opened and a man came out."

"Erich Townley?"

"I think it must be. Right age. Right .. . appearance."

"What is the right appearance?"

"You will see for yourself."

"How's that?"

"We passed on the stairs, but I doubled back and followed him out into the street. Do not worry. He did not see me."

"I hope you're right."

"I am. Trust me, Lance."

"I'm not sure you're making it easy."

"Listen." Hashimoto lowered his voice and leaned across the table towards me. "I followed Townley to a bar a little way down Mehringdamm. I think he is still there now. It is a chance to speak to him. To ask him questions when he thinks all you are doing is '

'"You"?"

"It will go better if you approach him, Lance. I am too ... conspicuous."

"A second ago you were telling me how he hadn't noticed you."

"But we need him to notice. You. Not me. It will be easier for you."

"Easier for me to do what?"

"Just talk to him."

Hashimoto gave me what I think he meant to be an encouraging smile, but it came out as more of an anxious grimace. Though as far as anxiety went I reckoned I might soon be ahead of him. "Your "plan" is for me to try to chat him up, is it?"

"Chat him up?"

"You know what I mean."

"Ah yes. I see. Well.. ." Hashimoto spread his arms. "The thing is, Lance .. ."

"Yeh?"

"I think you might be his type."

The bar was as close as Hashimoto had promised. Big blank windows somehow failed to reveal as much as a first glance suggested they might. The interior looked dark, half empty and faintly mournful. (It was reassuring, in a way, to realize that Sunday evenings in Germany weren't much jollier than in England.) Hashimoto took himself off to hover at a bus stop on the other side of the street. Leaving me, after some hesitation, to go in.

A bloke matching Hashimoto's description of the man on the stairs was sitting on a bar stool drinking some colourless spirit or other and smoking a fat French cigarette. He was wearing jeans and a white shirt under a three-quarter-length black coat that the sticky warmth of the place hadn't persuaded him to take off. He was tall and thin, knees jutting, back and head bent like an angle poise lamp. (The bar was clearly built for stockier customers.) His face was lined and drawn, his hair too grey and long for someone so thin on top. I didn't yet know if I was his type, but I was already absolutely certain that he wasn't mine.

The rest of the clientele was scattered around the shadow-cowled tables. Several of them looked pretty stoned. Best way to appreciate the Gothic decor, I supposed, not to mention the New Age funeral-march music seeping out of the cobwebbed loudspeakers. Maybe it got livelier later. And maybe I didn't want to be there when it did.

I plonked myself on the stool next to Townley (he was the only customer sitting at the bar), ordered a Budweiser and ran a few possible chat-up lines past myself. I didn't reckon I was going to be able to force any of them out until I was too drunk to remember Townley's response if I was lucky enough to get one. The situation had all the makings of a grade-one fiasco. (And whose fault was that?) Then a strange thing happened. Townley spoke to me.

"You American?" (He obviously was, albeit with a clipped vein of Mitteleuropa in the gravelly drawl.)

"No," I tried to reply, but my throat wouldn't co-operate until I'd repeated the word twice. "No, no."

"Can't imagine why anybody who wasn't American would order a Bud. Real horse piss."

"I didn't know there was anything real about it."

He laughed at that. "You're English, right?"

"Yen." The Budweiser arrived, glassless and gleaming. I took a swig. "And you're American."

"I'd have to own to that, yuh. Half American, anyways."

"And the other half?"

"Local."

"You live here?"

"Yuh. But you're just visiting, right? Vacation?"

"Business."

"What kind?"

That was a tricky one. "Does it matter?" (I had to hope it didn't.) "This is still the weekend."

"Not that you'd know it, huh?" He glanced around. "Deader than the Third Reich."

"How long have you lived in Berlin?"

"Quite a while."

"My name's Lance, by the way."

"Pleased to meet you, Lance. I'm Erich." He shrugged. "Born Eric. Straddling two nations makes you kinda schizo."

"I suppose it must."

"Smoke?" He offered me one of his cigarettes.

"No thanks. I, er .. ."

"Believe the Surgeon-General's warning."

"Yeh, but..." I caught his gaze and tried to hold it. "Do I look like I lead a clean and pure life?"

"Not exactly. No one could in here, though."

"I've got nothing against vice, Erich." I unveiled a less than heartfelt smile. "Nothing at all."

"You've come to the right city, then. Berlin's got it all, if you don't mind delving into dark corners."

"Depends what I'm likely to find there."

"Whatever you're looking for."

"Sometimes I'm not sure."

"Maybe you need a helping hand."

"Maybe I do." (This was all going too fast for my liking. What had Hashimoto got me into?) "There are lots of things a guidebook doesn't tell you."

"Doesn't dare to tell you."

"Worried about scaring people off, I suppose."

Tough on those who like to be scared." He paused for effect. And the effect was quite something. "Just a little."

"Yeh."

"So, is this a walk on the wild side for you, Lance? A nibble at forbidden fruit away from the wife and kids?"

"I don't have any family."

"That's smart of you. Neither do I. Apart from my mother. Everyone has to have one of those."

"Plus a father."

"Technically, I guess."

"Is your mother German?"

"Yuh. She lives here in Berlin."

"And Dad?"

"He doesn't live in Berlin." Townley was still smiling, but there was a hardening edge to that smile. I was edging close to dangerous territory.

"But this is where they met?"

"Where people meet isn't important. It's what they do after they meet that matters."

True enough." (Too true, as far as I was concerned.)

"What shall we do? Now we've met."

"What do you recommend?"

"I'd have to know your tastes."

"They tend to the exotic."

"Right." Townley took a long, thoughtful draw on his cigarette, then said, "There's a place I know. Several places. I reckon you might enjoy them. Interested?"

"Sure." (Horrified was nearer the mark.)

"Let's go, then."

"OK."

"We'll call in on my mother on the way. She lives just round the corner." (They both did, of course, but I wasn't supposed to know that. Maybe Townley didn't think admitting to living with his mother was likely to impress me. But we were going to see her, apparently. It was a puzzle how he meant to deal with that, a puzzle I couldn't help being drawn by.) "She's expecting me." (But not me. No, she definitely wasn't expecting me.) "Don't worry. We won't stay long."

We turned left as we exited the bar and headed south away from Yorckstrasse. Not that I could share my concern on the

point with Townley. Nor could I risk looking back to see if Hashimoto was following us. I felt stone-cold sober and more than a little perturbed. Which meant, given how far from sober I really was, that I was actually very frightened indeed.

"I had it with the States a long time ago," said Townley. "Sooner or later, you have to decide where your soul belongs."

"And yours belongs here?"

"Absolutely. What about you?"

"Still trying to decide, I suppose."

"Well, you're younger than me, aren't you? How much younger, I wonder?"

"Er, that would depend on how old you are, Erich."

"So it would." Townley chuckled. "That's what I love about strangers. There's a whole .. . back-story .. . waiting to be told."

We turned right at the next junction, which was a relief. Maybe, I thought, this was the quickest route to the part of Yorckstrasse the Townleys lived in. Then again, maybe not, because Townley immediately crossed to the other side of the street and started along a path that led straight into the ill-lit heart of a public park.

"We'll cut through here," my companion said, as if it explained everything. I had an impression of a wooded slope ahead of us. Dim, widely spaced lamps shone thinly on ponds and rock eries The way was dark and winding. Soon, we'd begun to climb. I dragged my feet, to little effect. What I wanted to do was the one thing I couldn't afford to do: turn back. "Keep up, Lance. It'd be easy to get lost in here."

"Are you sure we aren't already?"

"Oh yuh. I know my way."

"Glad to hear it."

"What line of work did you say you were in?"

"I .. . didn't, did I?"

"Maybe you didn't at that. So, let me guess. Could it be... shipping?"

"Shipping? No. What '

I'm not sure what I saw or sensed first. A blur of night-shrouded movement. A scuff of shoe on asphalt. Something,

ms anyway, brought almost instantly into focus by a sharp pain as my right arm was jerked up behind me. I was pulled backwards, struggling to stay on my feet. A hand closed around my throat tight and choking. Try as I might to prise it away, I couldn't. Townley was strong far stronger than me. I felt the heat of his breath close to my ear and the steely hardness of his grasp. I tried to wrench myself free, but he held me fast, with a sort of practised ease that told me no amount of struggling would shake him off.

I tried to cry out for help. But all I managed was a hoarse splutter. We stopped moving.

"You are one dumb shit, Lance. You know that? You sidle up to me, all dewy-eyed and simpering, thinking I'm about to fall for your hollow-chested English charm. Do me a favour. Do yourself one. You're looking for your friend Rupe, right?"

His grip relaxed just enough to let me speak. "All right ... Yes, I am."

"Well, you're all out of luck. Because Rupe isn't here. And you're never going to find him." There was a noise behind me, thin and metallic a blade being flicked from a handle. "Your search is over, lover boy." He released my right arm and in the same instant grasped my left shoulder and yanked me round to face him.

All I had time to do was crouch forward to protect myself. It was nothing more than an instinct. I expected Townley to come at me with the knife. Into my mind flashed the acute but unhelpful awareness that I was about to be stabbed. But I never was.

Something struck Townley under his right arm something powerful, moving horizontally. He grunted and fell sideways, hitting the ground hard. As he did so, I straightened up and saw Hashimoto slowly lowering his left leg. He'd dealt Townley some sort of judo kick the sort that felt like a battering ram, to judge by the effect on its victim. Townley rolled onto his side, shaking his head as he propped himself up on one elbow.

"Stay where you are," Hashimoto shouted. (I couldn't work

out for the moment which of us he meant, so I played safe by standing stock-still.) "Are you all right, my friend?"

"Yes. I.. ."

"Who the fuck are you?" rasped Townley.

"Someone capable of breaking your arm or dislocating your shoulder or both should you force me to do so." (Hashimoto sounded hellish convincing to me, as I reckoned he probably did to Townley.) "You have an opportunity to walk away. I suggest you take it."

Warily and unsteadily, Townley scrambled to his feet, breathing hard. "Interfering bastard," he muttered.

"Go on along the path. Leave the park on the far side. We will leave the way you came in. Do not attempt to follow us."

"You're a Jap," said Townley. "A fucking Jap."

"And you are a violent and foul-mouthed man. It would be no hardship to knock a few of your teeth out. Why do you seem intent on giving me the excuse to do so?"

Townley looked at me, then at Hashimoto, then back to me. "Do you know each other?"

"Go now," said Hashimoto, quietly but firmly.

Townley hesitated, taking the measure of himself and his opponent. There was bluff on both sides. But who was the bigger bluffer? I wouldn't have wanted to bet on it. And nor, apparently, would Townley. "Fuckers," he said, almost as a protest. Then he pocketed the knife, turned on his heel and strode away, with a parting toss of his head.

It wasn't until we were back in the cafe at the corner of Mehringdamm and Yorckstrasse that I stopped shaking like a fever case and became capable thanks to two large brandies of something approximating to coherent speech.

"He was going to kill me, Kiyo. Do you realize that?"

"It certainly seemed probable."

"How can you be so bloody calm about it?"

"It is my nature."

Thank Christ you turn out to be some kind of black-belt judoist."

"In truth, I never progressed beyond the pupil classes. I was a great disappointment to my instructor. But I remember how to kick. For the rest, it is as well that Townley did not put my technique to the test."

"Now he tells me."

"Would you have preferred me to mention it in Townley's presence?"

I released a long, sincerely felt sigh. "I'd have preferred not to be in his presence at all."

"But, Lance, think how much we have gained."

I did think for a moment. "I can't see that we've gained a single bloody thing. We've learned nothing. And now he's on to us. Plus my shoulder may never work properly again." I flexed the joint painfully.

"You are forgetting this." Hashimoto slipped something from his pocket and jiggled it in his palm. It was a silver cigarette lighter. "See the engraving?" He held it up to the light and I made out three intertwined and curlicued initials on the back: EST. "Eric Stephen Townley, I believe."