Deception (15 page)

Ulf refused to say more as Harry drove, other than giving directions. Towards the river, he said. Towards the border. Other than that, he slumped in his seat, rubbing his hands on his knees and staring out at the passing countryside, his expression troubled.

A few minutes later, they left the streets behind them and entered a narrow track leading into open countryside. The land was lower here, and Harry caught a glimpse of water in the distance. The surface was deeply rutted and puddled by recent rain, and the vegetation on either side brushed against the wings of the Golf with a soft hissing sound. When they came in sight of some trees, Ulf signalled for Harry to stop.

‘People do not come down here now,' Ulf said quietly. ‘Only the young who do not care for history. For others there are too many bad memories still. Just beyond the trees is the border and the river Oder. It is not encouraged to approach. But there is one man named Wilhelm who walks here often. He found a coat containing the phone and the passport. Someone had thrown it away.' He looked at Harry. ‘We should not be here, Harry. For Wilhelm, who found the coat, it is OK  . . . because everyone knows he is a little mad.'

Harry got out of the car and stood for a moment, scanning the surrounding countryside. It was pleasant enough, although a little bleak compared with the other side of Schwedt, but that may have been due to the circumstances. He tried to imagine what would have brought Barrow and his passport and phone down here, and where he'd been going.

There was only one way to find out.

He walked along the track away from the car. It was overgrown and showed signs of little use, and any tyre tracks further back were no longer evident. Behind him, he heard Ulf open and close the car door.

‘Where did he find the jacket?'

Ulf explained, pointing towards some bushes near a strand of pine trees. A clutch of crows in the upper branches watched as Harry approached, then took off with a clatter of wings and coarse cries of alarm.

Harry checked the bush, but saw nothing to indicate why the jacket had been left here. He shivered. It wasn't cold, but the atmosphere here, close to the pine trees, was suddenly gloomy, as if a dark cloud had drifted across the sky above them.

Or maybe it was the crows, and what might have happened here.

He turned as Ulf joined him, and walked towards the trees. Trees and crows, he thought, remembering a small village in south-western Kosovo. That had been a pleasant place, once. A place for picnics and children playing, a secluded spot in the evenings for lovers to walk and find each other. But horror had come calling early one morning as dawn was breaking, and everyone in the village had disappeared. Several days later, in a copse of pine trees just outside the village, someone from a neighbouring hamlet scouting for pine cones had reported a gathering of crows. An investigation by UN personnel had found the trees were now concealing a mass grave.

Harry found the body moments later. The grass leading up to it had been disturbed, the flattened path pointing like an arrow. The first thing he saw was the blaze of pale flesh and the darkened crust of dried blood where the birds had been feasting on the soft tissue of the face and chest. There had been no real attempt to bury the man or conceal what had been done here.

‘Ulf,' he called, and pointed to the flattened area leading up to the body. The doctor joined him, treading carefully, and muttered an oath.

‘This is the man?'

Harry nodded. ‘It's him.'

TWENTY-FIVE

T
hirty minutes later, the scene was the focus of attention of a cluster of local police vehicles and an ambulance, all bustling for space on the narrow track. While waiting for them to arrive, Harry had taken a look around the immediate area and found the pickup truck with a map on the dashboard. The paper was too fresh to have been here long, and he knew it must have belonged to Graham Barrow. Other than that, the pickup was clean.

At first Ulf had argued about the wisdom of calling the police. But Harry had prevailed, explaining that Barrow may have been a deserter, but he'd been a soldier first. It would be the only way he would ever return home.

It would also bring to the attention of anyone watching that the body had been discovered. As a precaution, he had called Ballatyne and explained what he'd found.

Ballatyne seemed unperturbed at Harry's decision to involve the police. ‘Probably the best outcome. Keeps it officially believable. What cover story are you using?'

‘I'll use the WO-Two cover, chasing down a missing squaddie.'

‘OK. I'll get on to the MOD and our embassy in Berlin and prep them. Tell the cops you're operating out of London. It'll save any of our bases being dragged into it.'

The senior uniformed officer nodded at Ulf and the two men had a brief exchange. Then Ulf turned to Harry. ‘I know this man. I have worked with him. He is from the local state police. He has asked me to look at the body before they move it.'

‘Good idea.' Harry looked at the policeman. ‘Thank you.'

A few minutes later, Ulf stood up from the body and said, ‘He was shot once. It came near the heart. No other wounds that I can see. Only the  . . . the birds.'

Before he could say more, another vehicle arrived. Two men climbed out and approached the trees. Their arrival seemed to have an effect on the other officers present, and Harry heard Ulf take in a sharp breath.

‘
Bundespolizei
,' he murmured. ‘Federal investigators. They have responsibility for the borders and will take over from the local police. They will not approve of us being here.'

The first man, short and balding, stepped forward and spoke to the senior uniform, leaving his younger colleague, who had a ginger tinge to his hair, studying the body.

‘You are?' the short man said, turning to Harry. His English was unhesitating and fluid.

Harry considered his response, but there was only one way to play it.

‘My name's Tate,' he said, and handed over his passport. The policeman flicked through it and passed it to his colleague.

‘For your information, my name is Drachmann and my colleague is Müller. Why is an Englishman here –' he gestured around him at the trees and bushes, and then at the body – ‘in such a quiet place?' His eyes flickered coolly across to include Hefflin in his words. ‘Perhaps you do not know, but this is a restricted area, Mr Tate. Do you not have restricted areas in England?'

‘I'm sorry,' Harry said carefully. ‘That was my fault. I put pressure on Mr Hefflin, here.' He indicated Ulf, who looked relieved but still worried.

‘Pressure?'

‘Yes.' He produced the Warrant Officer card and passed it over. ‘I came looking for a member of our military who has gone missing. Mr Hefflin was handed his passport and a mobile phone, and called my number. I came to see if the soldier was in the region.' It was as near to the truth as he wanted to get, and he hoped Ballatyne had the clout with the British Embassy in Berlin to back it up when the official questions progressed further along the diplomatic and police lines.

‘And why would this  . . . man be here?'

Harry shrugged. ‘We can only make a guess at that. He left his unit and disappeared, that's all we know.'

‘A deserter?' Drachmann looked faintly disapproving.

‘Technically, yes. But there may have been extenuating circumstances. He has been under severe stress recently.'

‘Afghanistan?'

‘Yes. We wanted to find him before he did anything drastic. My job is to persuade men like this to return to their units.'

The policeman nodded and pursed his lips. ‘It is understandable. He is important, this man?'

Harry hesitated. Drachmann was quick on the uptake. ‘He has – had – specialized knowledge, yes. We wouldn't want it to fall into the wrong hands.'

‘Of course. I understand.' Drachmann nodded slowly. ‘But I have two questions: how did you know he was here? And how did Herr Hefflin know to contact you?'

Harry took a deep breath. This could be tricky and he hoped Hefflin was quick on the ball. ‘I was in London. I was keen for Barrow to get in touch with me, so I left a voicemail message with my number. When Mr Hefflin called me to say he'd found the passport and phone, it seemed reasonable to come and look around. I thought Barrow might have been in a car accident. I asked where the items had been found, and when Mr Hefflin told me, I persuaded him to bring me down here. Any blame for him being here is mine.'

The policeman lifted his eyebrows, but did not seem overly impressed. ‘You did not think to work through the proper channels? We have a common interest here.'

Harry smiled briefly. ‘I was impatient. I thought if I could find Sergeant Barrow and persuade him to go back, it would involve the minimum of fuss  . . . for him as well as us. I'm sorry if I've gone about this the wrong way, but I'm sure you understand.'

To his surprise the man nodded and handed back his passport. ‘And is this definitely Barrow? You can formally identify him?'

‘Yes. It's Graham Barrow.' Harry handed him Barrow's passport.

‘We will need to keep this, Mr Tate. And you will have to make a statement at the station in Schwedt. Perhaps you would be good enough to go there. One of my men will accompany you.' He stared at Ulf. ‘
Herr
Hefflin also.' He motioned to the waiting ambulance men to take the body away. ‘I will have the area sealed while we carry out more intensive investigations, although I do not think there will be much to tell us who killed this man.' He didn't look happy at the thought, and Harry got the impression that if things got sticky, he was going to have to rely on Ballatyne to call in some favours, status non-attributable or otherwise. Being stuck in the German justice system wasn't going to help him find Paulton or Vanessa Tan.

TWENTY-SIX

F
ar away from Schwedt, in Bremen's discreet Bürgerpark, a short drive from the city centre, Deakin was pacing the elegant columned foyer of the Park Hotel, his face taut with anger. He had just taken a call from the man following the mystery investigator. ‘I don't bloody believe this,' he hissed. ‘Petersen picked up our man coming through Tegel and tracked him to some place called Schwedt, on the Polish border. First thing he does on arrival is talk to a local guy, and less than an hour later they find Barrow's body and call in the Federal cops.' He snapped the phone shut with venom. ‘Christ, of all the places  . . . how in God's holy name did he find it so quickly? They might as well have fitted Barrow with a bloody tracking device!'

Greg Turpowicz was unmoved by Deakin's mood. He thought the Brit was getting way too stressed for his own good. It was something that had been showing more and more just recently. Instead he gazed thoughtfully at the magnificent domed ceiling above them and said softly, ‘I know Schwedt; it's in the middle of nowhere. Petrochemicals and paper, mostly. Jesus, if that's where Beavis and Butt-head did their jig with Barrow, and this guy found it already, they didn't exactly break their necks trying to hide the evidence, did they?'

‘They do a job we don't want to,' said Deakin defensively. It had been his decision to take on the two Bosnians and he disliked any criticism of their methods. ‘They're not sophisticated but they're good at what they do.'

Turpowicz shook his head, recognizing the futility of arguing, and walked over to a coffee table in one corner of the foyer, where they had been sitting waiting for their meeting. He turned the open laptop to face him, calling up the photo from the Continentale in Scheveningen, and stared at the picture as if trying to read beneath the face. ‘This guy's smart; he moves quick and he asks all the right questions.' He looked at Deakin. ‘Why do I find the hairs lifting on the back of my neck, Deak? Who the fuck is he and what are we going to do about him?'

Deakin shook his head. ‘I don't know yet. Let me think about it.' He sat down and took out his phone, and dialled a number. He checked in case anyone was close, but the hotel was quiet and nobody was paying any attention save for a slim Chinese man in a neat suit, standing by the reception desk. They had marked him down as a security man the moment they arrived. ‘Petersen? Are you still in that place  . . . what's it – Schwedt? Right. Stay put. I don't care how you do it, but I want the name of the man you've been tailing. Drop some money on the local cops if you have to.' He switched off the phone and looked at Turpowicz. ‘Good enough for you? We'll find him and deal with him.' His face was bleak.

Turpowicz grunted and checked his watch. ‘Where's Paulton got to? I thought he was supposed to be in on this with us, putting up some front.' It was a reminder that they had agreed on a united display to show the Protectory's substance, something the Chinese were in favour of when negotiating.

Deakin waved a hand. ‘He's busy on something else; sent a text to say go ahead without him. Anyway, once the monkey we're seeing hears what we have for him, I don't think he'll care about how many we are. He'll just want results.'

‘If you say so. Better not let him hear you call him a monkey, though. They can be a bit touchy about body image.'

But Deakin was ignoring him, his mind already on something else. Seconds later he was on his phone again, talking to Nicholls. ‘Did you get the photo I sent you?'

‘Yes. Is there a problem?' Nicholls sounded cool.

‘There could be.' He brought Nicholls up to date on the discovery of Barrow's body. ‘Whoever this bozo is, he's getting too close.'

‘I agree. But what do we do about it? Or are you planning on setting your tame bouncers on him?' Nicholls had no more love for the Bosnians, Zubac and Ganic, than Turpowicz, an opinion he had never bothered to conceal.

‘Forget them. You need to contact our man in the MOD. Send him the photo and see if the face comes up on the official files. If he's an investigator, he'll be on record somewhere.'