Then again, in the heat of the moment she mightn’t stop to consider her own best interests. And even if she did, Merzhanov would clearly be more than upset, which might prove just as damaging. If the film was to have any value to Russell and Shchepkin, then it had to remain their secret, and the best way of ensuring that was to keep its suppliers happy.
Merzhanov seemed blissfully unaware of the possible flaw in his scheme; but Russell already suspected that Janica had thought the whole thing up, and that she might well have a back-up plan. Well, she wouldn’t need one. A deal was a deal, and Russell would bring her out. Or probably die trying.
‘We must keep this absolutely between us,’ Russell told the Russian. ‘I will tell my boss of course, but no one else. As I’m sure you know, the MGB has spies in this sector-in this building, most likely-and if word of all this gets out, your life won’t be worth a kopek. So you mustn’t mention Beria or the film to anyone. Understood?’
‘Yes,’ Merzhanov said, with only the slightest hint of doubt.
‘It’s for your own safety,’ Russell insisted. BOB’s other Russian-speaker, Don Stafford, wasn’t due back until the following Friday, so Merzhanov’s chance of spilling the beans was minimal, but the need for secrecy was hard to exaggerate. ‘And I’ll need to borrow the photograph,’ Russell said. ‘For new papers,’ he added, when Merzhanov expressed reluctance. The Russian handed it over with the sort of reverence a Biblical scholar might have shown for a first edition of the Sermon on the Mount.
Once Merzhanov had been taken away to new accommodation on the floor below-a cell in all but name, but a comfortable one for all that-Russell just sat there for several minutes, wondering at what had just-apparently-fallen into his lap. This was it, the thing that Shchepkin had named in London’s Russell Square more than three years earlier. He could still him say it: ‘Something on them that trumps everything else; a secret so damaging that we could buy our safety with silence.’
Well, only Stalin throttling a nun would trump what Merzhanov’s film allegedly showed.
But it wouldn’t be easy. Russell had to collect Janica and the film, and then get the lovebirds out of Europe, all without raising any suspicions among his American colleagues. And then he and Shchepkin had to make their deal with Beria, the psychopath in charge of the world’s largest plain-clothes army. In return for their keeping silent about what was on the film, he would need to promise no Soviet disclosure of Russell’s role in securing the German atomic papers for Moscow, allow them both to retire from Soviet service, and allow Shchepkin’s wife and daughter to leave for the West.
Put that way, it sounded like a pipedream.
But try as he did, Russell could see no logical flaw in the plan. Executing it was another matter, though. How the hell would they contact Beria-c/o the Lyubyanka? He hoped Shchepkin would know.
There was no instant way of getting hold of his Russian partner. Russell could and did arrange an emergency meeting with a phone call, but the place and time were already pre-set. The former was chosen at the end of each regular meeting, the latter always noon on the following day, which gave him eighteen hours to wait.
He didn’t say anything to Effi that evening-he didn’t want to raise her hopes-but once she’d fallen asleep in his arms, he allowed himself the luxury of some daydreaming. If he could escape the Soviet embrace, then the American one would be easier to shrug off. He could be a real journalist again, not in Berlin perhaps, but in England or America. Effi already had one offer from Hollywood, and he was sure she’d find work in either country. It would be so good to live near Paul again, and he didn’t think Rosa would really miss Berlin.
‘And with one bound he was free,’ he thought.
Or one spool of film.
Masaryk Station.
On Saturday morning Russell pleaded work as his excuse for abandoning Effi and Rosa, who’d planned a family walk in the Grunewald. After seeing them off, he started out for the Funkturm, the spot he’d chosen for the emergency treff with Shchepkin. He was almost an hour early, which gave him ample time to dwell on the memories the structure evoked. The radio tower-Berlin’s smaller version of the Eiffel-had been badly damaged in the final weeks of the war, with one leg severed and the restaurant burnt out, and was still closed to the public. But in pre-war times, when Paul was living with his mother and stepfather, this had always been his first destination of choice, and the two of them had spent countless Saturdays together staring out across the city from the observation platform.
Shchepkin was also early, as if he’d somehow got wind that something important had happened. Natty was the word, Russell thought, as he watched the Russian walk towards him. Effi had been reminded of a theatre director she once worked for, and Russell could just imagine Shchepkin among Berlin’s pre-Nazi avant-garde.
As they circled the tower together Russell went through everything that Merzhanov had told him. By the time he’d finished describing the plot of the film, the Russian’s pinched expression was as bleak as he’d ever seen it. ‘Is this all possible?’ he asked Shchepkin. ‘Do you know about this house outside the city?’
‘Yes, it exists.’
‘And could Beria have been there?’
‘He was here around that time although I can’t remember the exact dates. And there have been rumours over the years. I never respected the man, but they weren’t the sort of rumours that anyone who cared for the Party could bring himself to believe. That he had young girls abducted off the street in Moscow and taken to his dacha-that sort of thing. Something like this would be worse, much worse.’
‘The film might be a fake,’ Russell offered.
Shchepkin shook his head. ‘We’ll know when we see it, but somehow it all rings true.’ He fell silent for a few moments. ‘So you intend to collect the woman from Prague, reunite her with her lover, and send them both off to South America, yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘I can see two major problems.’
‘Only two?’
‘At first sight. One, you’ll need papers to get her out of Czechoslovakia. I may be able to help with those, but it’s far from certain. Two, you have to persuade your Mister Johannsen that Merzhanov deserves such special treatment. What has he done to deserve it?’
‘I’m working on that,’ Russell said, somewhat less than truthfully. The problem had occurred to him, but so far he’d chosen to ignore it.
‘I think I can help there,’ Shchepkin told him. ‘I’ll meet you tomorrow with something special. I don’t know what exactly, but something that’ll make Merzhanov seem worth the extra effort. You’ll have to be the ventriloquist.’
‘That should work,’ Russell agreed, mentally rehearsing the process. ‘I am his only channel of communication until our other Russian speaker gets back. And I’ll just have to move Merzhanov south before he does.’
‘Yes,’ Shchepkin said thoughtfully, as if something had just occurred to him. Then he allowed himself a wry smile. ‘If the Americans find out about the film, and realise that you’ve chosen not to tell them, that will be the end-you must realise that. At best they will sack you. At worst, I don’t know. Either way, your use to us will be over. You and I, we will both be loose ends that need cutting off.’
He was right, Russell thought, but what choice did they have? He didn’t want to grow old checking Doctor Kaluzny’s patient reports, doing odd jobs for men like Youklis and his Russian equivalents. How many Sasas would there be in that future?
He smiled at the gloomy Russian. ‘So let’s make sure we don’t fuck it up.’
The next morning, Russell went back to the Fohrenweg basement for a two-hour session with Merzhanov. He had nothing new to ask the Russian, but he needed to establish a time in which the information Shchepkin was providing could actually have been divulged. For the most part they chatted about their time as soldiers-Merzhanov was interested in Russell’s experiences in the First War, and he was still shocked by what he’d witnessed himself during the Red Army’s four-year war against the Germans. The Russian also talked more about Janica, with a fondness Russell found unusually touching. He found himself hoping that the Czech girl was worthy of such devotion.