noted it and cautioned the man but he gave an almost indiscernible shake of the head to the shorthand clerk before turning his eyes to me. Levelly he asked, ‘Is that any use?’ It was my signal to depart.
‘Not as far as I can see.’
‘Frank wanted you to know,’ he added just in case I missed the message to get out of there and let him continue his difficult job.
‘Where is he?’
‘He had to leave.’ Bower picked up the phone and said they’d break for lunch in thirty minutes. I wondered if it was a ploy. Interrogators did such things sometimes, letting the time stretch on and on to increase the tension.
I got to my feet. ‘Tell him thanks,’ I said. He nodded.
I went out to where Teacher was waiting in the ante-room. He didn’t say ‘All right’ or make any of the usual polite inquiries. Interrogations are like sacramental confessions: they take place and are seen to take place but no reference to them is ever made. ‘Are you returning me to Kreuzberg?’ I asked him.
‘If that’s where you want to be,’ said Teacher.
We said our goodbyes to the Duchess and went downstairs to be let out of the double-locked front door by the guardian.
The streets were empty. There is something soul-destroying about the German Ladenschlussgesetz – a trade-union-inspired law that closes all the shops most of the time – and right across the land, weekends in Germany are a mind-numbing experience. Tourists roam aimlessly. Residents desperate for food and drink scour the streets hoping to find a Tante Emma Laden where a shopkeeper willing to break the law will sell a loaf, a chocolate bar or a litre of milk from the back door.
As we drove through the desolate streets, I said to Teacher, ‘Are you my keeper?’
Teacher looked at me blankly.
I asked him again. ‘Are you assigned to be my keeper?’
‘I don’t know what a keeper is.’
‘They have them in zoos. They look after the animals.’
‘Is that what you need, a keeper?’
‘Is this Frank’s idea?’
‘Frank?’
‘Don’t bullshit me, Teacher. I was taking this town to pieces when you were in knee pants.’
‘Frank knows nothing about you coming here,’ he said mechanically. It contradicted everything he’d previously said but he wanted to end the conversation by making me realize that he was just obeying instructions: Frank’s instructions.
‘And Frank keeps out of the way so that he can truthfully tell London that he’s not seen me.’
Teacher peered about him and seemed unsure of which way to go. He slowed to read the street signs. I left him to figure it out. Eventually he said, ‘And that annoys you?’
‘Why shouldn’t it?’
‘Because if Frank had any sense he’d toss you on to the London plane, and let you and London work it all out together,’ said Teacher.
‘That’s what you’d do?’
‘Damned right I would,’ said Teacher.
We drove along Heer Strasse, which on a weekday would have been filled with traffic. Every now and again there had been a dusty glint in the air as a flurry offered a sample of the promised snow. Now it began in earnest. Large spiky flakes came spinning down. Time and time again the last snow had come, and still the cold persisted, reminding those from other climates that Berlin was on the edge of Asia.
In what was either carelessness or an attempt to impress me with his knowledge of Berlin, Teacher turned off and tried to find a shortcut round the Exhibition Grounds. Twice he came to a dead end. Finally I took pity on him and directed him to Halensee. Then, as we got to Kurfürstendamm, he sat back in his seat, sighed and said, ‘I suppose I am your keeper.’
‘And?’
‘Frank might like to hear your reactions.’
‘Berlin is the heroin capital of the world,’ I said.
‘I read that in Die Welt,’ said Teacher.
I ignored the sarcasm. ‘It all comes through Schönefeld airport. Those bastards make sure it keeps moving to this side of the Wall.’
‘If it all comes here, then it makes sense that someone might try sending a little of it back,’ said Teacher.
‘Stinnes is top brass nowadays. He’d have a lot to lose. I can’t swallow the idea that he’s having an army courier pick up consignments of heroin – or whatever it is – in the West.’
‘But?’
‘Yes, there is a but. Stinnes knows the score. He’s spent a lot of time in the West. He’s an active womanizer and some types of hard drugs connect with sexual activity.’
‘Connect? Connect how?’
‘A lot of people use drugs only when they jump into bed. I could perhaps see Stinnes in that category.’
‘So I tell Frank you think it’s possible.’
‘Only possible; not likely.’
‘A nuance,’ said Teacher.
‘Once upon a time this fellow Stinnes was stringing me along … He told me he wanted to come across to us.’
‘KGB? Enrolled?’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘And you swallowed it?’
‘I urged caution.’
‘That’s the best way: cover all the exits,’ said Teacher. He was not one of my most fervent admirers. I suspected that Frank had painted me too golden.
‘Anyway: once bitten twice shy.’
‘I’ll tell Frank exactly what you said,’ he promised.
‘This is not the way to Kreuzberg.’
‘Don’t get alarmed. I thought I’d give you lunch before you go back to that slum.’ I wondered if that too was Frank’s idea. Mr Teacher didn’t look like a man much given to impulsive gestures.
‘Thanks.’
‘I live in Wilmersdorf. My wife always has too much food in the house. Will that be okay?’
‘Thanks,’ I said.
‘I’ve given my expenses a beating this month. I had a wedding anniversary.’
By the time we arrived in Wilmersdorf the streets were wrapped in a fragile tissue of snow. Teacher lived
