'He knew I was working for London.'

'But the Stasi are not going to blow the cover of a wonderful source like him in order to collar a minnow like you, Bernard.'

'Ouch, that hurt, Theo.'

I was sitting at his bedside, and now he reached out and clutched my sleeve. 'It's true, Bernd, he's one of them, believe me. Maybe I can't prove it, but we all know it. We know it in our bones.'

'You've got to do better than bones, Theo. It's a serious accusation.'

'He snoops around everywhere. The Church has given him some sort, of roving commission-standing in for clergy who are sick or on leave. He goes to Berlin. He goes to Dresden. He goes to Zwickau . . .'

'Zwickau? He was never a part of the Zwickau network.'

'On Sundays. He was conducting services in the church and assisting the pastor there.'

'When?'

'Two years ago. Over the busy Christmas period.'

'You saw him there?'

'Of course I did. It was his idea to put the antenna in the spire. The network had had radio trouble but getting the antenna really high solved it overnight.'

'I see.'

Theo persisted: 'The following year the whole Zwickau group went into the bag didn't they?'

'Not as far as I know,' I said, not wanting to break security. 'The last I heard they were still going strong.'

'I must have got it wrong,' said Theo in a voice that clearly told me that he knew he had it right. 'I suppose a rumor like that would be bad for morale, wouldn't it?'

'It's need-to-know, Theo,' I said. 'We shouldn't be discussing other groups.'

'You're a cold fish, Bernd. Did anyone ever tell you that?'

'Only my very close friends.'

'My oldest brother — Willi — was one of the Zwickau net. They took him away in the middle of the night, and that was the last we heard of him. His wife has written to everyone she can think of — First Secretary Honecker even — and all she gets back is a printed form. They can't even be bothered to type a letter for her.'

'He may be all right,' I said. 'They hold people longer nowadays . . . Yes, I remember Willi. I forgot that he was your brother; but don't jump to conclusions about the pastor. We can't move against him just because you feel it in your bones, Theo. Carry on with everything as normal. As you say, if he's reporting to the Stasi they will keep your network safe and intact indefinitely. Maybe the only reason you've been safe so long is be- cause they don't want to reveal that he is an informer for them.'

'If London sent you to give us the pep-talk, forget it. I know the old bastard betrayed my brother. He's a rattlesnake. We will settle it ourselves.'

'That's stupid talk, Theo. We don't do it like that. No one does.'

'And you swear this is not official? Why tonight, Bernd?'

'I just arrived. No one knows I'm here. I wanted to come and see for myself'

'Get out of here, Bernd. Go now. See no one else. Leave it to us to sort out.'

'Don't be a fool,' I said. 'If the network breaks up now — and he is an informer — they'll take you all into custody and toss you into a Stasi prison. They will have nothing to lose. The Stasi have independent powers of arrest and detention. They don't have to provide evidence to an examining magistrate or anything like that.'

He gave me a weary smile. It was like explaining the Christmas menu to a fattened turkey. To him such facts of life were obvious, but sometimes people like Theo have to be reminded of them. 'I know you mean well, Bernd. And I'm grateful.'

'Then do as I say.'

'Will you promise to go away and not contact him?'

'What difference does it make?'

'Please, Bernd. Please leave us alone. Give us a week. After that if we've failed we'll do it your way.'

'I doubt if your network could manage to operate without him.'

'Don't be stupid, Bernd. Of course we could. We've discussed it.'

I wondered how to reassure Theo. 'I'll vet him personally and if necessary London will neutralize him.'

'What does that mean?'

'We'll get rid of him. But it has to be done in some way that won't make all the alarm bells ring. London will probably arrange that he is sent to some other job in some other place by the Church authorities. Somewhere he can't do any mischief.'

'Pass me that glass of water and the red pills. I have to take two of them every four hours.'

'It's the only way, believe me,' I said, passing him his medicine.

'I hate him.' He gulped his pills and drank some water. 'You may have got it wrong, Theo. Keep it all going until we know what's really happening.'

'Are you going to talk to him?'

'I wanted to see you, Theo, to see how you were. Now I'll go back to Berlin. Forget I came here. Tell Betti the same.'

'She won't say anything, Bernd. Her family were high-ranking Nazis — her uncle was the Politische Kreisleiter. She grew up keeping her mouth shut.'

'Good.'

'When will I see you again?'

'Get your network people together,' I said without answering his question. 'Make sure they visit you here while you're sick. It's a perfect cover. Don't tell the pastor what you are doing.'

'No.' In his worried face I could see a thousand questions trying to get out, but he didn't ask me anything more. On his bedside table there were photographs of his wife and a portrait photo of their married son Bruno, who worked for the Schnell-Bahn, the elevated railway that was owned by the East and went through both parts of Berlin.

'Is Bruno well?' I asked politely.

'We haven't seen him for a long time,' said Theo. 'It's just as well; we don't see eye to eye about the regime.'

'He's trusted,' I said. 'He has to be careful what he says.'

'Yes, he's trusted,' said Theo, for his son was one of the carefully selected railway personnel whose daily duties took them into the West.

I got up and reached for my hat. 'Good luck, Bernd,' said Theo. 'Thanks for coming, and for the packet of coffee. I think a lot about the old days. I must have been crazy to stay here in the East. That damned Wall. I could see what was coming.'

'How could you be certain?' I said. 'Half the kids in the class had homes or family connections in the East.'

'But most of them knew when to get out. It didn't seem so important then, did it?'

'No,' I said. 'It didn't seem so important.'

*

I didn't keep my promise to Theo. He was sick and I didn't want to alarm him, but coming all this way without talking to the turbulent priest would have been absurd. So I went to his 'church' and waited until the last of the worshippers had left. The service had been held in a meeting hall that was a part of the crypt, all that remained of a church destroyed by wartime bombing. At the bottom of the steps, when I stepped into the light, the pastor looked up and smiled. He recognized me. It was only a few weeks before that I'd sheltered here with him. I was with the kid, Robin, and on the run from a grim half-hour in nearby Magdeburg. Now the pastor came forward and shook hands, gripping my arm with his free hand, like they do in Hollywood. He beamed. His rosy face was that of an elderly cherub.

'Good evening, young man,' he said. 'Have you come specially to see me?'

'Yes,' I said.

He indicated that I should follow him into a small side room where the smell of incense failed to cloak the stronger one of tobacco smoke. He closed the door and pulled out a chair for me, one of three hard little chairs arranged around a rickety table upon which I put my hat. Adorning the wall there were half a dozen hand-colored photos of previous pastors and an engraving of the church as it had been a hundred years ago. The pastor opened a metal locker in which he kept his street clothes and took his time as he divested himself of his clerical garments and put on an old gray suit. He then removed his steel-rimmed glasses and polished them with that dedication that is sometimes the sign of thoroughness, and sometimes a device for delay.