CHAPTER TWO - ROSWIRTHA
Some intelligence agents spend years at spy school, studying hard to camouflage themselves, but still emerge heavy and lumpy, with flat police feet unmistakably semaphoring their presence. Others sail through their training years with barely a care in the world, either blending naturally with their backgrounds, or possessed of such charm that no normal person could ever possibly suspect them.
Roswirtha Schulz was a star in the charm class, as clever as she was beautiful, with a spirit as magnetic as her burnished copper hair, and brains as sharp as her deep green eyes. Intelligence communities the world over traded myriad Schulz stories over their bourbons and vodkas, cognacs and slivovitzes and beers: her flight from the CIA in Paris, shedding her clothes in the Crillon, screaming blue murder, and escaping in a scrum of rescuing males, was part of the stuff of legend. She was said to have seduced government ministers by the dozen, and to have driven a score of South Americans to suicide.
But now she sat in the departure lounge at Heathrow's Terminal One pretending to read a Financial Times and her green eyes were watchful. She was under orders to wait for a tall man in a dark blue suit, blue shirt, and blue tie, a typical British gentleman type carrying a rolled up copy of The Times, to exchange passwords, and to pick up a small green package of microfilm, explosive documentation on the Teutonic Knights, throwback bunch of ageing fascists dedicated to stirring up trouble amongst ethnic Germans in Poland.
'The British are fed up with the Americans making mischief', staff colonel Koppel had murmured at the end of her briefing in East Berlin. 'They want to get rid of the Knights as much as we do. This will help us put them out of business once and for all.'
Roswirtha, always polite to her boss, had nodded politely. But she had known better - British intelligence had secretly succumbed to her charms. She had cut a deal, and the tall man would be an emissary from a very senior official with a flat overlooking St. James' Park, and a fine taste in armagnac and brandy. He would be bearing a very special gift, a hommage to copper hair and green eyes, and it would be proof once more of her excellence.
She smiles to herself behind her paper, a small secret smile, because even the most devastating beauty valued confirmation, and looked at her watch quickly. Her man was late.
Suddenly an unexpected commotion caught her eye. A wan, hungover figure clutching a blue overnight bag with a Berlin baggage tag hurtled into the departure lounge, to stop, panting. Roswirtha's green eyes veiled under copper lashes. His suit was blue, he had a blue shirt and blue tie, and he was very English. She had already noticed him waiting to check in, and now she could sense him staring at her hopefully. But she knew instinctively that he had no green package, for he was much too uncontrolled and spontaneous to be an intelligence officer. A nice looking man, tall and slim. But the wrong kind of man.
She prepares to freeze him into oblivion. Then she hesitated, and took a quick second look, and shaded dismissiveness into charm. He really was rather dishy, in a very hungover English sort of way, and chance romances might have a sweetness all of their own. Perhaps she would relent, and allow herself to glance at him enticingly out of the corner of her eye, enthral him, and let him take her out to dinner in Berlin.
A second figure loomed beside her as she ponders how best to manage such an interesting diversion.
‘Sorry I'm late.’ A high, almost falsetto voice squeaked down at her. ‘Had trouble parking.’
Roswirtha frowned slightly. This was her man, a tall figure with almost white hair and pale watery eyes, stiffnecked and stiffsuited, a typical British civil servant, and not nice looking at all. Her green eyes searched, and saw that the hungover figure had noted their meeting, and was backing away towards the bar. It was rather a shame. She sighed to herself - work could sometimes be such a bore - and flashed a most beautiful smile at her retreating admirer.
The tall man scowled. ‘He plainly thinks you're wasting your fragrance on the desert air.’
Roswirtha bridled with a touch of irritation. ‘That's my line, not yours.’ She was annoyed, the exchange had been planned, down to its finest detail, and her contact was supposed to quote a poem: 'Full many a flower was born to blush unseen...', with her completing the couplet.
However this Mr. Clever British Civil Servant was obviously unreliable, and unable to follow correct procedures. She continued to gleam, noting with satisfaction that her wan admirer was now with a group of companions, but still watching her hopefully. She warmed her gleam into a fresh small smile, and felt a small surge of triumph as he smiled back, edging a little apart from his group to signal that his hopes were still running high.
The tall man sniffed reproachfully. Schulz was better looking than her pictures, but gave an impression of being more than a little flighty. It was sometimes hard to fathom how the reds chose their people. He reached into his pocket and dropped his package quickly into her hand, scrupulously avoiding eye contact. Supping with the devil was always a dangerous game, even with the longest of spoons, and he was determined to stay well clear of possible infection. Yet temptation could also be hard to resist, and he pushed his copy of The Times at her as he prepared to hurry away. ‘Glance at page four when you have a moment.’
Then he turned and strode off, without a word of farewell. He had supped, even if he had used a very long spoon, and it was time for him to drive home and return to the real world - it was Saturday morning, and he had roses to prune.
A golden voice echoed through the departure lounge, calling the flight to Dusseldorf and Berlin. Roswirtha flipped the newspaper open quickly. She was irritated. Why should she be interested in British news when she was on her way home?
Somebody, probably the stiffnecked man, had circled a paragraph boldly with a red felt tip. She glanced at it idly, and then shivered as though she had suddenly been caught in an icy blast. The paragraph was brief, a curt announcement that Berlin's Tegel airport had been forced to close for unexpected repairs, with flights diverted to Tempelhof. But it was a hammer blow.
Tegel, Berlin's bright new international airport, was in the French sector, and safe, because the French mistrusted the CIA and detested anything that smacks of German revanchism. But Tempelhof, an old airport dating back to the Third Reich, and now mainly used for cargo flights, was in the American sector, and the CIA held sway.
Roswirtha bit her lip. The Knights would have people waiting, might even have arranged for flights to be switched, and she would be trapped. Her mind whirled like a windmill in a storm, searching, seeking, endeavouring to shape new plans. Delahaye would be waiting for her at the Berlin Hilton, and she must not delay: a group of very senior German Democratic Republic, Soviet, and Polish military, intelligence and political experts were due to meet in Pankow on Sunday to discuss the Knights' elimination.
She could evade ambush plans by leaving the flight at Düsseldorf - the British still retained a residual authority, and she would be protected. But somehow the package must fly on. She looked around the departure lounge, searching for a knight of her own, some chivalrous rescuing chevalier in white armour, and her eyes lit on her handsome admirer at the bar, and she smiled to herself.
She would smile at him, and charm him, convert him into a courrier, and he would take her place. She got to her feet, making sure that her admirer had a good view of her legs, hesitating for an instant, as though waiting for something to happen. Then she sighed imperceptibly, and her body language was wholly one of need as she begam to walk slowly towards the departure gate, making sure that the Berlin tag on her Mulberry overnight bag was clearly visible.
Lindsay watched with growing interest. Lester and his three other journalists had already joined the line of people shuffling out of the lounge towards the departure gates, and he was all on his own. He quickly drained the remains of his glass, and fell in behind the copperhaired woman - she had smiled at him, and a smile might provide a foundation for an acquaintance leading on to dalliance.
‘You’re going to Berlin?’ His murmured question was polite. He would be charm personified.
Roswirtha dimpled. It was a trick she had practised as a girl in front of her bedroom mirror. ‘I’m in the fashion business. There’s a show.’
They began to talk as they shuffled forward, trading occupations and destinations, measuring and assessing each other.
Lester waved as they boarded the plane. He had kept the seat next to him vacant, but Lindsay demurred, staging an elaborate escape. ‘Can't, Peter, so sorry.’ The sound of the plane's engines whining into warmth made him almost shout. ‘Just met an international fashion buyer. Must do some networking.’ He had recovered his ticket, and now he had a higher priority.
Lester winked equably, and wondered why it was that freelance journalists always pulled the best talent.
Roswirtha glowed internally. Fortune was smiling, and this nice English journalist would just fit the bill. She played her fashion card deftly, explaining that she was working to a tight schedule packed with haute couture receptions and backstage discussions. But she also hinted delicately that she might well - if she was so minded - be able to carve out a free moment or two, and smiled invitingly. With luck he would take her package to Berlin whilst she baled out at Dusseldorf, to complete the rest of her journey by road – she had a special number to call at difficult times, and the autobahn trip would only take about three hours. She shifted their conversation into politics and East-West relations to help strengthen her ground.
‘My father was a socialist, almost an anarchist.’ She breathed the word almost apologetically. ‘The Nazis sent him to a camp, and hanged him. Our life was very hard, especially in the last years of the war. We were non-people, just like Jews. We had to hide.’
She was silent for a moment, offering a silent hommage to the past. It was all fiction, of course, because her father had fled to the Soviet Union at the very first murmurs of Nazi troublemaking, to spend the years of the Third Reich machining engine parts in a Siberian factory, whilst she had starred as a bright Young Pioneer. But it was a good story.
Lindsay touched the back of her hand, stroking it gently, and wondered how quickly he would be able to tempt her into his room.
The moment was ideal. Roswirtha took a deep breath. ‘But I am also afraid, because Berlin could be dangerous for me.’ She twitched nervously, her eyes as liquid as the eyes of a frightened doe.
Lindsay sipped at a glass of BEA champagne. He nearly choked, staring at her unbelievingly. He boded no danger to anyone. Then he realised that she was speaking of something totally different.
‘People may be waiting for me.’ She hesitated, her eyes searching Lindsay’s face as though uncertain whether to trust him. ‘The fashion show is not everything. I have a mission as well.’
Lindsay remembered the bearded immigration officer at Heathrow. ‘You're a spy?’
‘I carry messages.’ Roswirtha invested the word with a world of hidden meanings. ‘Usually they are little things: documents, reports. They fit in well with my work.’
‘But not now?’
‘No.’ She hesitated again, and now she was gambling. She had a picture of this man in her mind, of how he could be persuaded, and controlled. But it was possible to make mistakes. ‘Now I have something a bit more important, something that matters between East and West.’ She paused, shaping her words. ‘I thought this flight would go to Tegel, and I would be safe: I could make a rendezvous. But now the plane will go to Tempelhof, and Tempelhof will not be safe.’
‘Why not?’
‘It is in a different sector.’
Lindsay was momentarily baffled.
Roswirtha bit her lip. It was an action that signalled hesitation, but in fact heightened her colour and her attractiveness. ‘Tempelhof is a CIA station.’
Lindsay felt a sudden thrill sweep through him. Playing secret agents offered much more excitement than writing travel pieces. ‘What have you got to deliver?’
Roswirtha shrug despondently, as though she had taken all the cares of the world on her shoulders. ‘It is just a little package. But it is very important.’
Lindsay took a deep breath. Now he knew why Roswirtha had smiled at Heathrow, and why she was letting him hold her hand. But these things were mere incidentals. He had a beautiful woman seated next to him seeking a favour, and he lived in a world where gratitude always merited a matching reward. He was also British, representing The Times, and need fear nothing in Berlin, where four Allied powers still ruled, albeit divided by the Wall. ‘Where do you have to take your delivery?’
Roswirtha turned her fingers under his so that they were holding hands, and sensed the quick sharp excitement that she always felt when she landed a new man. She smiled, her green eyes glowing, and could see Lindsay melt in her flame. ‘It will be very easy for you.’ She paused. ‘I have to meet a friend called Delahaye in the coffeeshop at the Hilton at six this evening.’
She opened her bag to take out a small package wrapped tightly in green plastic, perhaps half the size of a pack of cigarettes, dropping it into Lindsay’s jacket pocket.
‘This is a microfilm of some very important documents - it will help destroy some madmen who seek to turn the clock back, and fuel old hatreds. They know it is on its way, and they may have been following me. They may have also seen me talking to you.’ Now her voice was strong and staccato: she was giving a briefing. ‘They may seek to search you at Tempelhof, and you will not be able to refuse.’ She paused for a moment, as though thinking, even though she had already worked out a detailed plan of action. But men did not like being taken for granted. ‘You have friends on this flight...’ Her voice tailed away.
Lindsay nodded - he had already explained his trip, and Lester's anxiety and some, though not all, of the PR man's promises.
‘He asked you to sit with him. That is good. Sit beside him on the flight from Düsseldorf to Berlin, and pop it into one of the pockets of his overnight bag - they will not be locked if they are empty. Then you will be clean if you are searched, and you can ask for it back when you reach your hotel.’
Lindsay listened, and a small voice at the back of his mind told him to be careful. He might be sailing into dangerous waters, and risking his neck. He hesitated for a split second. But then his courage returned. He was balancing a small risk against a tasty reward, and the payoff would make everything worthwhile. He raised Roswirtha's fingers and touched the tips gently with his lips.
‘When will we meet again?’
She smiled, and her smile filled with promise. ‘I will try to be in Berlin tonight. But I will call you at the Interglobal if I am delayed. I want to see you again, Englishman, and you will deserve a reward.’