Krysalis: Krysalis (46 page)
Barzel was desperate to save his own neck, along with his books and comfortable life-style. He knew that his chances would be vastly enhanced by getting Anna back to base. But he’d been given the option of killing her, once that turned out to be the only way of ensuring
the safety of the Krysalis file. If it came to a choice between Anna and the file, the file won every time.
She was unstable.
Barzel had to make a decision about Anna. His inclination was to kill her now, before she could cause any more trouble. But oh! what a prize it would be if he could thrust her in front of Colonel Huper and say, “Here, look, I fought and I won.”
Then there was Kleist.
Barzel didn’t know what was going on inside that clever mind of his. He couldn’t be trusted … yet he played a central role,
the
role, in the management of Anna Lescombe.
Gerhard was speaking again.
“Her mental state is poor, Jürgen. Telling her about her husband like that, so brutally, was the worst thing you could have done. It’ll set her back years.”
“Does it affect our journey?” Barzel rubbed his neck in an effort to ease the tension. He knew this would tell Gerhard how worried he was, but that no longer seemed important. He had to seek a way through the maze of decisions, great and small, that shrouded his only hope of salvation.
“It certainly could,” Gerhard replied. “You’re concerned about the submarine?”
“Concerned,” Barzel thought savagely, is not the word. Suppose it doesn’t come? Or if conditions were rough that night, they might miss the rendezvous anyway. And NATO was bound to be on the prowl by then; what if the Soviet commander decided not to risk his craft for a bunch of East German subhumans? Why did it have to be a
Russian
submarine?
“It’s hardly my idea of fun,” he admitted sourly. “And with a madwoman to control as well …”
“She’s not mad. But if you continue to persecute her, she may go over the edge. Have you any idea what it would be like, in a confined space, locked in for days on end, trying to keep her sedated? I don’t know what drugs a typical naval medic carries, but I doubt if they’d do her any good.”
Naval medics … Barzel’s mind kept looping back to the submarine. They wouldn’t know until the last minute if the Soviet commander was prepared to honor the rendezvous. They’d be on the small island to the south, exposed, without any protection other than small arms, with nowhere to run if the sub didn’t surface. And if at that point they couldn’t control Anna, be absolutely confident of keeping her quiet …
“So what are you suggesting?” he asked, his voice harsh.
“I’m asking you to trust me.”
Barzel smiled glacially. “Of course I trust you, Gerhard, what nonsense.”
“That’s a lie. But somehow we have to make our way home. I can help you do that. It will stand me in good stead when we reach Berlin, I did my duty when help was needed most. Do you see what’s going through my mind?”
No, Barzel thought savagely. And I’d give anything,
anything in the world,
to know what you’re really thinking, my friend.
“Controlling the woman …” he said casually. “Do you have a gun here, Gerhard?”
“No, I don’t.”
Barzel nodded, pretending to accept the answer, but inwardly he wasn’t sure. He’d told Kleist always to keep a gun handy. He had to concede, however, that there were difficulties about bringing a firearm to a
place like this: customs might open his bags, the police could search Gerhard before he got on the plane, any one of a dozen nightmares might become reality. It wasn’t as if HVA had been given the job of arming Kleist on this island, their couriers’ methods were relatively foolproof. But Paxos had been kept secret from HVA. Despite what he’d said on the day of his arrival, the first Barzel had known of Gerhard’s hideaway was when Iannis talked.
If Kleist did have a gun here, it altered the picture, radically and for the worse. That was assuming he’d fallen in love with Anna again. Of course, if he hadn’t … Barzel stole a glance at Gerhard. His face was impassive, concerned. But he must have realized the point of the question about the gun.
He’d always been a convincing liar, one of the qualities that had attracted HVA to him in the first place. He possessed, in greater measure than any other spy Barzel had known, the magical gift of knowing when to depart from reality and when to keep the story firmly anchored in the actual world.
What am I to do?
he asked himself. How can I save my beautiful apartment, with its irreplaceable collection of books? Save myself, everything I’ve earned, worked for….
“What do you want me to do?” he said wearily.
“Accept that in medical matters I know what I’m talking about. When I tell you to go easy on Anna, it’s for a practical reason. Think in terms of crisis management, that’s all I’m asking. The rest—recriminations, interrogations—can wait.”
“All right.”
“Keep off the subject of David.”
Barzel nodded.
“Try to avoid her as much as possible. That goes for Stange, too.”
“I’m not letting her out of my sight again.”
“Then don’t make it obvious.”
Barzel stared at Gerhard. Either he meant what he said, or he was putting on the performance of a lifetime. “Tell me something,” he said.
“Well?”
“Do you love her?”
Gerhard laughed, ever so gently. “Yes. You know that.”
And for a second, Barzel actually trusted Kleist.
“So … you want her to escape?”
“No,” Gerhard replied. “I want her to come with us. Very much.”
“And you’ll help me keep control of her?” Barzel asked anxiously.
“Yes.”
Barzel stared down at the tenace. Perhaps he should change his mind about killing Anna? If Kleist was genuine … if the submarine came …
But before he could find his way through the next stretch of maze, they were interrupted by a scream from inside the house.
They ran back to find Anna howling, rocking back and forth, banging her fists down on the table, while Stange looked on in amazement. Barzel needed only a moment to appraise the situation.
“She’s hysterical,” he snapped. “Sedate her.”
Gerhard went quickly to his bedroom and came back carrying the black leather case in which he kept his syringe and ampules. Barzel and Stange held Anna down. She tried to bite Barzel but he was savage, rendering her semiconscious almost before the needle entered
the vein. Only when her eyes were shut and she lay still did he release her. “Make sure she stays that way,” he said.
“You think I have a factory for this stuff?” Gerhard’s voice was a mixture of anger and fear. “Look!” He held out the case for Barzel to see. “One left!”
“How long will that hold her for?”
“God knows. So much depends on her general health, her resistance.” He remained lost in thought for a moment. “Now’s Sunday … tomorrow lunchtime, I think. When are we leaving?”
“Eleven o’clock Monday night. Have you got any rope?”
“Rope?”
“To tie her up if she wakes, idiot!”
“There should be some in the kitchen.”
“Well,
find it!
Is this your idea of keeping control?”
“It’s the best I can do,” Gerhard hurled back defiantly.
Barzel wagged a forefinger under his nose. “You’ve got one more chance,” he muttered. “One. Screw up again, and she’s
dead.”
The three men alternated periodic watches after that, never leaving Anna alone. She first showed signs of life on Sunday night, during Barzel’s shift. When she was fully conscious but still unable to move, he summoned Gerhard and ordered him to put her into hypnosis. It didn’t work. So Gerhard reluctantly administered the second and final shot of sedative instead, praying he had guessed right.
For despite what he had told Barzel earlier, if he had calculated correctly, Anna would surface not at midday but at dawn.
37
Albert had endured an eventful night since fleeing Hampstead: first the MI5 clinic, anesthesia, stitches, then, since the crack of dawn, he’d frantically been trying to find someone prepared to caretake Montgomery while he was away. The old lady in the downstairs flat, who usually attended to the job, had chosen this of all times to visit her daughter. As a last resort born of desperation, he’d managed to saddle a deeply reluctant Fox, his chauffeur to the airport, with responsibility; and that, thought Albert, was only just, bearing in mind how he let me down yesterday evening.
What with one thing and another, he was feeling at a low ebb. His reaction on boarding the plane to find Bill Hayes in the next seat was therefore one of profound irritation. “Babysitting?” he inquired sarcastically.
“My role is designated a PAE one.”
“A
what?”
“‘Provide advice and encouragement.’ But me, I’m
way too old to play word games. I like babysitting just fine.”
Albert stared at him. “Why should I need advice and encouragement from you?”
“Because last night Bonn issued an ultimatum.” Hayes lowered his voice to a whisper. “Find Krysalis or we’ll blow the whole thing. Tell the world that in the event of nuclear war the United States intends to sacrifice a West German corridor five hundred miles across, total civilian population three and a—”
“You can’t be serious!”
“Better believe it. The West Germans say you British lost the fucking file, which you did, and allies like that they don’t need. And the Pentagon doesn’t exactly esteem your efforts up until now to find it again. I’m deleting some expletives in there, incidentally. What happened to your hand?”
Albert grimaced. “I caught it in a door.”
“Yeah?” Hayes treated the bandage to critical inspection. “My sympathy’s with the door,” he concluded.
Their plane reached the end of the runway and accelerated to take-off speed. Albert gazed out the window, seeing only a bleak prospect that owed nothing to Heathrow Airport. If West Germany carried out its threat, it could put an end to NATO, simple as that. Yet he understood the logic of their position, for Krysalis’ principal message was that if war came, they would be expendable. In which case NATO ceased to have relevance for them anyway.
Reluctantly he went back to his study of Anna’s case notes, now typed.
“You got the lady there?”
Albert nodded.
“I couldn’t understand a quarter of that shit.”
“It gives us a fairly comprehensive picture of who we’re dealing with, I’d have thought.”
I know what you’re going to do, madam. I know the way you think, feel, love. Now I am Anna Lescombe, née Elwell, oh yes …
“Does it by any chance tell us where she is?”
“We should know that when her husband arrives in Corfu.”
“I thought your police were holding him for questioning.”
“That
Concorde
business, you mean? Lescombe’s not a suspect, although he may have been the intended victim. Either way, we arranged for him to be processed very quickly. The last thing we want is to see him put out of the game.”
“That’s the very thing
we
do want! Did the other guy die?”
“Which other guy?”
“The man Burroughs stabbed, or whatever.”
“Yes, he died very quickly. I thought you might mean Burroughs. He’s dead, too.”
“What?”
“Hanged himself in his cell last night.”
“Jeesus!” Hayes shook his head. “Who do you reckon he was working for?”
Albert eyed him suspiciously. “Not you?”
“Oh, come
on!”
“Kleist, maybe. HVA.”
“Damn right. It’s got HVA scrawled all over it. When does Lescombe get to Corfu?”
“If Olympic Airways’ reservations computer is to be believed, in about five hours’ time.”
They were over the Channel by now. Albert gazed stonily at the seat in front of him, not wanting to see
the placid stretch of blue water below. Funny, when he was flying, the prospect of crashing on mountain or tundra never troubled him. But he could not contemplate ditching without a clench of the guts.
“Do you believe in this submarine thing?” Hayes asked.
The submarine. In the course of his panic-stricken telephone call to Albert on Sunday evening, Fox had let slip that there was some unspecified “connection” between Moscow’s sudden burst of activity and the need for early penetration of Kleist’s house, but … “I’m worried by the coincidence,” said Albert.
