“Ah, yes, I see. Thank you, Frau Morenz.”
He put the phone down, worried. Morenz had lied. What was he up to? A weekend with a girlfriend in the Black Forest? Possible, but he did not like it. He put through a secure-line call to Pullach and spoke to the Deputy Director of the Operations Directorate, the division they both worked for. Dr. Lothar Herrmann was frosty. But he listened intently.
“The murdered call girl, and her pimp. How were they killed?” Herrmann asked.
Aust consulted the Stadt-Anzeiger lying on his desk.
“They were shot.”
“Does Morenz have a personal sidearm?” asked the voice from Pullach.
“I, er—believe so.”
“Where was it issued, by whom, and when?” asked Dr. Herrmann. Then he added, “No matter, it must have been here. Stay there, I will call you back.”
He was back on the phone in ten minutes.
“He has a Walther PPK, Service issue. From here. It was tested on the range and in the lab before we gave it to him. Ten years ago. Where is it now?”
“It should be in his personal safe,” said Aust.
“Is it?” asked Herrmann coldly.
“I will find out and call you back,” said the badly flustered Aust. He had the master key for all the safes in the department. Five minutes later, he was talking to Herrmann again.
“It’s gone,” he said. “He might have taken it home, of course.”
“That is strictly forbidden. So is lying to a superior officer, whatever the cause. I think I had better come to Cologne. Please meet me off the next plane from Munich. Whichever it is, I will be on it.”
Before leaving Pullach, Dr. Herrmann made three phone calls. As a result, Black Forest policemen would visit the designated vacation home, let themselves in with the landlord’s key, and establish that the phone was off the hook but the bed had not been slept in. At all. That was what they would report. Dr. Herrmann landed at Cologne at five to twelve.
Bruno Morenz cruised the BMW into the complex of concrete buildings that made up the East German border control and was waved into an inspection bay. A green-uniformed guard appeared at the driver’s side window.
“Aussteigen, bitte. Ihre Papiere.”
He climbed out and offered his passport. Other guards began to surround the car, all quite normal.
“Hood open, please, and trunk.”
He opened both; they began the search. A mirror on a trolley went under the car. A man pored over the engine bay. Morenz forced himself not to look as the guard studied the battery.
“The purpose of your journey to the German Democratic Republic?”
He brought his eyes back to the man in front of him. Blue eyes behin
d rimless glasses stared at him. He explained he was going to Jena, to discuss purchases of optical lenses from Zeiss; that if all went well, he might be able to return that same evening; if not he would have to have a second meeting with the foreign sales director in the morning. Impassive faces. They waved him into the Custom Hall.
It’s all just normal, he told himself. Let them find the papers themselves, McCready had said. Don’t offer too much. They went through his attaché case, studied the letters exchanged between Zeiss and BKI in Würzburg. Morenz prayed the stamps and postmarks were perfect. They were. His bags were closed. He took them back to the car. The inspection of the car was finished. A guard with a huge Alsatian stood nearby. Behind windows, two men in civilian clothes watched. Secret police.
“Enjoy your visit to the German Democratic Republic,” said the senior border guard. He did not look as if he meant it.
At that moment there was a scream and several shouts from the column of cars across the concrete dividing reservation, the column trying to get out. Everyone spun around to look. Morenz was back behind the wheel. He stared in horror.
There was a blue Combi minivan at the head of the column. West German plates. Two guards were dragging a young girl out of the back, where they had discovered her hiding under the floor in a recess built for the purpose. She was screaming. The girlfriend of the West German youth driving the van. He was hauled out in a circle of straining dogs’ muzzles and submachine gun barrels. He threw his hands up, bone white.
“Leave her alone, you assholes,” he shouted. Someone hit him in the stomach. He doubled over.
“Los. Go,” snapped the guard beside Morenz. He let the clutch in, and the BMW surged forward. He cleared the barriers and stopped at the People’s Bank to change Deutschmarks into worthless Ostmarks at one-for-one and get his currency declaration stamped. The bank teller was subdued. Morenz’s hands were shaking. Back in his car he looked in the rearview mirror and saw the youth and the girl being hauled into a concrete building, still screaming.