Day of Judgment

The engine was plain to see, roped into position on the truck’s flat back. The Vopo returned the documents. ‘All right – on your way.’

He raised the red and white pole, the truckdriver pulled out from behind the hearse and started towards the gap in the wall.

The lieutenant nodded to his men. ‘Open it.’

‘You don’t understand,’ Meyer pleaded. ‘She was in the Spree for a fortnight.’

‘We shall see, shall we?’

The Vopos got the lid off. The stench was so immediate and all-pervading that one of them vomited at the side of the hearse. The other flashed his torch for the lieutenant to peer inside. He moved back hurriedly.

‘Put the lid on, for God’s sake.’ He turned to Meyer. ‘And you, get that thing out of here.’

The truck passed through the barriers on the other side and pulled in at the checkpoint hut. The driver got out, a tall man in a black leather jacket and flat cap. He produced a crumpled packet of cigarettes, stuck one in his mouth and leaned forward to accept a light from the West German police sergeant who had moved to join him. The match, flaring in the sergeant’s hands, illuminated a strong face with high cheekbones, fair hair, grey eyes.

‘Don’t you English have a saying, Major Vaughan?’ the sergeant said in German. ‘Something about taking the pitcher to the well too often.’

‘How do things look back there?’ Vaughan asked.

The sergeant turned casually. ‘There appears to be a little confusion. Ah yes, the hearse is coming now.’

Vaughan smiled. ‘Tell Julius I’ll see him at the shop.’

He climbed into the cab and drove away. After a while he kicked one heel against the front of the bench seat. ‘Okay in there?’ There was a muffled knock in reply and he grinned. ‘That’s all right then.’

The area of the city into which he drove was one of mean streets of old-fashioned warehouses and office blocks, alternating with acres of rubble, relic of the wartime bombing campaign. Some fifteen minutes after leaving the checkpoint, he turned into Rehdenstrasse, a dark street of decaying warehouses beside the River Spree.

Half way along, a sign lit by a single bulb read Julius Meyer and Company, Undertakers . Vaughan got out, unlocked the large gates, opened them and switched on a light. Then he got into the truck and drove inside.

The place had once been used by a tea merchant. The walls were of whitewashed brick and rickety wooden steps led up to a glass-walled office. Empty coffins were stacked on end in one corner.

He paused to light a cigarette and the hearse drove in. Vaughan moved past it quickly and closed the doors. Meyer switched off the engine and got out. He was extremely agitated and ceaselessly mopped sweat from his face with the grimy handkerchief.

‘Never again, Simon, I swear it. Not if Schmidt doubles the price. I thought the bastard was on to me tonight.’

Vaughan said cheerfully, ‘You worry too much.’ He leaned into the cab of the truck, fumbled for a hidden catch so that the front of the bench seat fell forward. ‘All right, you can get out now,’ he said in German.

‘This is a life, this life we lead?’ Meyer said. ‘Why do we have to live this way? What are we doing this for?’

‘Two thousand marks a head,’ Vaughan said. ‘Paid in advance by Heini Schmidt, who’s got so many of the poor bastards lined up over there that we can do it every night if we want to.’

‘There’s got to be an easier way,’ Meyer told him. ‘I know one thing. I need a drink.’ He started up the steps to the office.

The first passenger, a young man in a leather overcoat, crawled out of the hidden compartment and stood blinking in the light, clutching a bundle. He was followed by a middle-aged man in a shabby brown suit whose suitcase was held together by rope.

Last of all came a girl in her mid-twenties with a pale face and dark sunken eyes. She wore a man’s trench-coat and a scarf tied peasant-fashion round the head. Vaughan had never seen any of them before. As usual, the truck had been loaded in advance for him.

He said, ‘You’re in West Berlin now and free to go anywhere you please. At the end of the street outside you’ll find a bridge across the Spree. Follow your nose from there and you’ll come to an underground station. Good night and good luck.’

He went upstairs to the office. Meyer was sitting at the desk, a bottle of Scotch in one hand, a glass in the other which he emptied in one quick swallow.

He refilled it and Vaughan took it from him. ‘Why do you always look as if you expect the Gestapo to descend at any moment?’

‘Because in my youth there were too many occasions when that was a distinct possibility.’

There was a tapping at the door. As they both turned the girl entered the office hesitantly. ‘Major Vaughan, could I have a word with you?’

Her English was almost too perfect, no trace of any accent. Vaughan said, ‘How did you know my name?’

‘Herr Schmidt told me when I first met him to arrange the crossing.’

‘And where was that?’

‘In the restaurant of the old Hotel Adlon. Herr Schmidt’s name was given to me by a friend as a reliable man to arrange these matters.’

‘You see?’ Meyer said. ‘Every minute it gets worse. Now this idiot hands your name out to strangers.’

‘I need help,’ the girl said. ‘Special help. He thought you might be able to advise me.’

‘Your English is really very good,’ Vaughan told her.

‘It should be. I was born in Cheltenham. My name is Margaret Campbell. My father is Gregory Campbell, the physicist. You’ve heard of him?’

Vaughan nodded. ‘Between them, he and Klaus Fuchs handed the Russians just about every atomic secret we had back in nineteen-fifty. Fuchs ended up in the dock at the Old Bailey.’

‘While my father and his twelve-year-old daughter found sanctuary in East Germany.’

‘I thought you were supposed to live happily ever after,’ Vaughan said. ‘Socialist paradise and all that. Last I heard, your father was Professor of Nuclear Physics at Dresden University.’

‘He has cancer of the lung,’ she said simply. ‘A terminal case. A year at the most, Major Vaughan. He wants out.’

‘I see. And where would he be now?’

‘They gave us a place in the country. A cottage at a village called Neustadt. It’s near Stendal. About fifty miles from the border.’

‘Why not try British Intelligence? They might think it worth their while to get him back.’

‘I have,’ she said. ‘Through another contact at the University. They’re not interested – not any longer. In my father’s field, you’re very quickly yesterday’s news and he’s been a sick man for a long time now.’

‘And Schmidt? Couldn’t he help?’

‘He said the risk involved was too great.’

‘He’s right. A little border-hopping here in Berlin is one thing, but your father – that’s Indian territory out there.’

Whatever it was that had kept her going went out of her then. Her shoulders slumped, there was only despair in the dark eyes. She seemed very young and vulnerable in a way that was curiously touching.

‘Thank you, gentlemen.’ She turned wearily, then paused. ‘Perhaps you can tell me how to get in touch with Father Sean Conlin.’