Werner rubbed his hands together and then sniffed at them. There was still the fishy smell of the smoked eel. He splashed some of the alcohol on his napkin and rubbed his fingers with the dampened cloth. 'When I went over there I thought it would be a waste of time.'

'Did you, Werner?'

'I thought if London Central want me to go there and cobble up some sort of report I would oblige them. But I didn't believe I could find out very much about Stinnes. Furthermore I was pretty well convinced that Stinnes had been leading us up the garden path.'

'And now?'

'I've changed my mind on both scores.'

'What happened?'

'You're concerned about him aren't you?' said Werner.

'I don't give a damn. I just want to know.'

'You identify with him.'

'Don't be ridiculous,' I said.

'He was born in 1943, the same year that you were born. His father was in the occupying army in Berlin, just as your father was. He went to a German civilian school just as you did. He is a senior-grade intelligence officer with a German speciality, just as you are a British one. You identify with him.'

'I'm not going to argue with you, Werner, but you know as well as I do that I could prepare a list a mile long to show you that you're talking nonsense.'

'For instance?'

'Stinnes has also had a Spanish-language speciality for many years, and seems to be a KGB expert on Cuba and all things Cuban. I'll bet you that if Stinnes was lined up for a job in Moscow it was to be on their Cuba Desk.'

'Stinnes didn't originally go to Cuba just because he could speak Spanish,' said Werner. 'He went there primarily because he was one of Moscow's experts on Roman Catholicism. He was in the Religious Affairs Bureau; Section 44. Back in those days the Bureau was just two men and a dog. Now, with the Polish Church playing a part in politics, the Bureau is big and important. But Stinnes has not worked for Section 44 for many years. His wife persuaded him to take the Berlin job.'

'That's good work, Werner. His marriage?'

'Stinnes has always been a womanizer. It's hard to believe when you look at him but women are strange creatures. We both know that, Bernie.'

'He's getting a divorce?'

'It all seems to be exactly as Stinnes described. They live in a house – not an apartment, a house – in the country, not far from Werneuchen.'

'Where's that?'

'North-east, outside the city limits. It's the last station on the S-Bahn. The electric trains only go to Marzahn but the service continues a long way beyond.'

'Damned strange place to live.'

'His wife is German, Bernie. She came back from Moscow because she couldn't learn to speak Russian. She'd not want to live with a lot of Russian wives.'

'You went out there?'

'I saw the wife. I said I was compiling a census for the bus service. I asked her how often she went into Berlin and how she travelled.'

'Jesus. That's dangerous, Werner.'

'It was okay, Bernie. I think she was glad to talk to someone.'

'Don't do anything like that again, Werner. There are people who could do that for you, people with papers and back-up. Suppose she'd sent for the police and you'd had to show your papers?'

'It was okay, Bernie. She wasn't going to send for anyone. She was nursing a bruised face that was going to become a black eye. She said she fell over but it was Stinnes who hit her.'

'What?'

'Now do you see why it's better I do these things myself? I talked to her. She told me that she was hoping to move back to Leipzig. She came from a village just outside Leipzig. She has a brother and two sisters living there. She can't wait to get back there. She hates Berlin, she told me. That's the sort of thing a wife says when she really means she hates her husband. It all fits together, Bernie.'

'So you think Stinnes is on the level? He has been passed over for promotion and he does want a divorce?'

'I don't know about the promotion prospects,' said Werner, 'but the marriage is all but over. I went to all the houses in that little street. The neighbours are all German. They talked to me. They've heard Stinnes and his wife arguing, and they heard them shouting and things breaking the night before I saw her with a battered face. They fight, Bernie. That's an established fact. They fight because Stinnes runs around with other women.'

'Let me hang this one on you. This business – the arguments with his wife, his womanizing and his being in a dead-end job – is all arranged by the KGB as part of a cover story. At best, they will lead us on into this entrapment to see what we're going to do. At worst, they'll try to grab one of us.'

'Grab one of us? They won't grab me; I've just been twice through the checkpoints. I see no reason to think they are going to grab Dicky. When you say grab one of us, you mean grab Bernie Samson.'

'Well, suppose I do mean that?'

'No, Bernie. It's not just a cover story. Stinnes punched his wife in the face. You're not telling me that he did that as part of his cover story too?'

I didn't answer. I looked out of the window. Already the workmen were back from lunch and at work on the demolition. I looked at my watch; forty-five minutes exactly. That's the way it was in Germany.

Werner said, 'No one would go home and hit his wife just to fit in with a story his boss invented.'

'Suppose it was all part of some bigger plan. Then perhaps it would be worth while.'

'Why don't you admit you are wrong, Bernie? Even if they thought they were going to get the greatest secrets in the world, Stinnes did not punch his wife for that reason.'

'How can you be sure?'

'Bernie,' said Werner gently. 'Have you calculated the chances of my going out to that house and seeing her with a bruised face? A million to one? If we were discussing rumours, I might go along with you. If I had only the reports of the neighbours, I might go along with you. But a man doesn't smash his wife's face in on the million-to-one chance that an enemy agent would take what you describe as a dangerous chance.'

'You're right, Werner.'

He looked at me a long time. I suppose he was trying to decide whether to say the rest of it. Finally he said, 'If you want to hear what I really think, it comes closer to home.'

'What do you really think, Werner?' Now that the last remaining wall was down, they started to bulldoze the rubble into piles.

'I think Stinnes was in charge in Berlin until your wife took over his department. She told you Stinnes was her senior assistant…'

That was obviously not true. If Stinnes was her senior assistant the last person she'd tell would be me.'

'I think she threw Stinnes out. I think she sent him off to Mexico to get him out of her way. It's the same when anyone takes over a new department; a new boss gets rid of all the previous top staff and their projects.'

'Maybe.' I looked at the workmen. I'd always thought that old buildings were better made than new ones. I'd always thought they were solid and well built but this one was just as flimsy as any of the new ones that greedy speculators threw together.

'You know what Fiona is like. She doesn't like competition of the sort that Stinnes would give her. It's just what Fiona would do.'

'I've been giving a lot of thought to what Fiona might do,' I said. 'And I think you're right about her wanting to get rid of Stinnes. Maybe she's decided to get rid of him for good and all.' Werner looked up and waited for the next bit. 'Get rid of him to us by letting him get enrolled.'

Werner closed his eyes and pinched his nose between thumb and forefinger. He said, 'A bit far-fetched, Bernie. She went to England to warn you off. You told me that.' His eyes remained shut.

'That might be the clever part of it. She warns me to lay off Stinnes; she knows that it will have no effect on me.'