The Ocean of Time (35 page)

Yes, but why here, in Baturin? What could he possibly want in a dump like this?

It needs an answer, but not just yet. Instead I make another decision.

‘We’re pulling out,’ I say. ‘You, me and Rieber.’

‘What,
now
?’ And he looks horrified at the suggestion, like I’m being totally unreasonable.

‘Just as soon as we find Rieber.’

He stares at me, then, thrusting his gun into his belt, turns away. ‘Shit!’

I could, of course, jump out there and then, and get Zarah to activate the platform and bring the two of them back automatically, only I don’t know what Rieber is doing right now, and if he’s in company, then I don’t want him just disappearing. That
would
get back to Reichenau.

‘Where would he be right now?’ I ask.

‘With his whore, I should think.’

‘Where else?’

Koeler glances back at me, still angry. ‘How should I know? I’m not his keeper!’

Only he is. For that’s how we operate in Time. And that, for me, is as good a reason as any to get these two out of here at once. Things have gone badly with this operation, which is, after all, only designed to keep history on track. These two are minders, not makers of new historic pathways, but they’ve fucked up, and it’s all to do with their inability to get on.

Maybe Reichenau found that out. Maybe that’s why he’s here, where we’re weak. Only how did he do that? How exactly is he monitoring our operations, if that
is
what he’s doing?

Or am I just being paranoid? Am I attributing the man with knowing too much?

One thing I do know. His presence just now in the room has thrown me badly. Has made me question everything about our operations.

I even think I know what the book was, though I can’t be sure – only that it looked the same size and colour and …

And there were pictures on each page. Large pictures that might have been photographs.

Like the book his so-called daughter handed me that time.

I go cold. I look to Koeler and he’s still simmering with anger.

‘Where will he be?’ I ask a second time. ‘Have you
any
idea?’

‘He has a room,’ Koeler says quietly.

‘What? Separate from you?’

Koeler nods.

‘Urd save us … Take me there, now.’

Cossacks. There’s nothing in Baturin in November 1708 but Cossacks. And not even any of the important ones. Mazeppa’s fled to Charles, along with most of his important hetmans.

So what in Urd’s name would Reichenau want in Baturin?

Dead men, maybe. Or men who would be dead, if he didn’t take them. Men who weren’t in the future genetic history of the world? Yes. But why?

What is he up to?

All this is going through my head as, silently, Koeler and I walk back through the dark and dirty streets of Baturin to where Lothar Rieber has his billet.

Koeler knows I’m annoyed with him, and he probably also knows that he’ll be in big trouble with Hecht when he gets back to Four-Oh, but he’s also angry with me, and as we arrive at the inn where Rieber’s staying, Koeler turns on me.

‘It’s
Rieber
who’s fucked up!’ he says angrily. ‘
Rieber
who should be sent back! If he’d not been so fucking stupid with the girl …’ He looks down, trying to control himself, then looks back at me, speaking more calmly. ‘Leave me here. Please, Otto. I know so much. I’m so close to finding out what’s going on. Take Rieber, sure, but send me in another partner. Someone more reliable. I’ll do the job. Hecht knows I’ll do it. Only don’t close this down. Not yet. Please.’

‘Okay,’ I say calmly. ‘I’ll think about it.’

Only I won’t. I’ve made my decision. Just as soon as I have the two of them alone, I’m jumping straight out of there and then getting Zarah to pull them back. I can’t trust either of them any more. They’ve lost it. I can see that now. And when agents lose it …

We go inside, through the packed bar and on up a set of stairs at the back of the big room.

Rieber’s not in his room, but I know he’ll return. There’s nowhere else to stay. And so Koeler and I settle down, he on the chair, I on the bed, waiting silently, each with our own thoughts.

And finally he comes.

‘Edmund?’ And then he sees me and his eyes widen. ‘Otto? Otto Behr?’

‘Lothar …’

And I jump. Back to Four-Oh. Back to Hecht, and Zarah, and trouble …

Hecht looks up at me from behind his machine. ‘So?’ he asks.

‘He’s there,’ I say. ‘Reichenau. He was in the room in Baturin. I saw him.’

‘Did he see you?’

‘No. I was behind him. He took the book, then jumped.’

‘Book? Which book?’

‘I’m not sure. But it must have been important.’

Hecht looks past me at Freisler. ‘See if you can find out what it was.’

Freisler nods, but he doesn’t leave. He wants to hear what I’ve got to say.

‘They were speaking German,’ I say. ‘
Mechanist
German. Two of them, anyway. The third …’ But I don’t get to say what the third was speaking. Hecht lifts a hand.

‘Okay,’ he says. ‘You’ve done well. You should rest now. Go and see Zarah. I understand she’s arranged something.’

A rest
? I almost say something, but Hecht’s giving me that ‘don’t question it’ look, and I feel Freisler’s hand on my shoulder.

‘Come, Otto,’ Freisler says. ‘The Master needs to be left alone now.’

That’s strange, for I’ve hardly begun. But I’ve learned not to question things. Not openly, anyway.

Freisler comes with me, but before we get to the platform – while we’re still out in the connecting corridor – he turns to me. ‘You want to know what’s going on, don’t you?’

I laugh. ‘Of course I do. I’m rushed in to try to sort things out and then … nothing.’

‘That’s not entirely true. We sent you in again.’

‘You sent me in?’

‘You went and met Charles, in his tent, on the night before the battle, just as you were supposed to.’

‘And?’

‘It was a trap. You died. So we changed it. Made sure you didn’t go.’

‘How?’

‘We sent you somewhere else. Or, should I say,
are
sending you.’

‘Then Hecht knew about Reichenau already?’

‘Not until you told him. But that was last time. This is second time around.’

I see. Only I still feel a little angry at Hecht’s lack of confidence in me. Angry that he’s left it to Freisler to explain, as if I’m no longer in the loop.

‘Why is he doing this?’ I ask, half knowing that Freisler is the wrong man to ask; that if anyone should want me shut out, it’s probably Freisler.

‘Doing what?’

‘Excluding me. Keeping me in the dark.’

Freisler smiles. ‘Hecht is the strategist, Otto, not you or me. You must see that. We’re just the foot soldiers. Skilled, true, but foot soldiers nonetheless. Hecht alone sees the big picture. That’s how it is and always has been. He is the Master. So leave it to him. He knows what he’s doing.’

Hearing him say that I feel a little foolish, because I’d trust Hecht with my life – and in fact have done, many a time. So why question him now? If he says I need a rest, I probably do need a rest. Only …

‘Okay,’ I say. ‘A rest. But afterwards I want to know everything – everything
you
know, that is.’

‘Sure,’ he answers. ‘Whatever you want to know. Now go. Zarah’s waiting for you.’

And not just Zarah, but Urte and Inge and Leni. A regular little welcoming committee.

‘Where’s my pack?’

‘You won’t need one,’ Urte says.

‘And my clothes?’

Zarah studies me a moment. ‘Those will do. You can change when you’re there.’

‘So where exactly …?’

Urte puts a finger to my lips. ‘Just go.’

And so I find myself, less than thirty seconds later, standing on a broad dirt track between two stands of pines.

I have no idea where this is or when, only that it’s a fresh, warm day.

Birdsong echoes in the stillness.

I turn, looking back, but there’s nothing, and I begin to wonder if Hecht hasn’t, perhaps, planned this; whether, in fact, I’m exiled, stranded in some uninhabited time-stream.

And then I hear it. The sound of a saw.

I walk towards the sound and, after a while, a long, barn-like building comes into view, a great stack of wooden beams piled alongside. Two men – peasants by the look of them – stoop over a big, double-headed saw, drawing it back and forth across a massive pine trunk that’s spread across two large trestles.

I walk on. Coming into view just beyond the barn are other buildings:
izbas
mainly, but also a smithy, several workshops, another two barns, a church with a small blue cupola, and there, where the land climbs to the left, part hidden by the trees – a larger, better-built home – a proper two-storey
dacha
.

Russia. I am in Russia.

From the position of the sun, it’s mid-afternoon, or perhaps mid-morning, but as I walk on, someone appears at the door to one of the workshops – a keen-eyed man in his middle years with long dark hair and a neatly trimmed dark beard. Wiping his hands on his carpenter’s apron, he looks across at me, squinting into the daylight, then breaks into a beaming smile.

‘Meister Otto!’

It takes me a moment to recognise him, for he’s a good ten years older than when I last set eyes on him, but then I laugh aloud and, hastening across, wrap him in a great hug.

‘Alexander Alexandrovich!’

‘Oh, Meister, it’s so good to see you! Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?’

‘I wanted to surprise you.’

But in that moment I have realised something; if Alexander is here, then maybe, just maybe …

‘Katerina?’

‘The mistress? She’s in the house. But wait … the cart. You must see the cart.’

‘The cart?’

‘The one you ordered built before you went away. It’s finished.’ He turns and gestures towards the workshop, wanting to show me, but I interrupt him.

‘Later, Alexander, I promise. But first …’

He bows, embarrassed. ‘Of course. Stupid of me.’

‘Come,’ I say. ‘Walk with me, Alexander Alexandrovich.’ And I place my arm about his shoulders as we walk up the slope, following the path.

He wants to tell me everything that’s happened since I left, but I tell him no. I don’t want to know. Not yet.

And as I walk up that path towards the
dasha
, I feel something that I haven’t felt for years. Fear, and an incredible sense of anticipation.

Stopping, I turn to him. ‘Will you wait here, Alexander? It’s just …’

‘Of course …’

And so I walk on, alone, until I’m standing before the door, in the shade of a trellis that skirts a well-tended garden. The house is silent. The only noise is the sound of a woodcock calling and the distant sound of sawing. And then I hear something. Children’s laughter followed, a moment later, by a sound I’d begun to think I’d never hear again. Katerina’s voice.

I push through, into the long, deeply shadowed hallway. There are coats and smocks hanging on the pegs to my right, and piles of boots and shoes of all sizes, while to my left there’s an open door, and through that door …

My voice fails. I try to call her but I can’t.

Katerina is as beautiful as ever, yet I realise that she has aged. Ten years? Fifteen? Only she is even more beautiful for that, her figure fuller, her hair longer and more lustrous. She is in blue, of course, her favourite colour, and as she turns towards me so her laughter turns to awed surprise. And then she shrieks and runs to me.

I tremble as she comes into my arms, as her mouth seeks mine and we embrace as if a thousand years have passed. As well they might have. Only it feels like the very first time I have kissed her; as if the years lie ahead of us not behind. And as I draw back from that kiss and see my eyes reflected in the darker pools of hers, I understand why I have felt dead these past few weeks, for to be away from her is to be away from life itself.

‘I’ve missed you,’ I say, my hand touching her neck, my lips gently meeting hers again.

‘Not as much as I missed you.’

‘I thought you were dead.’

‘Dead?’

‘Urd protect me, look at you …’

My blood is pounding and I want to take her there and then, only I realise suddenly that there are others in that great, airy room. I look about me, stunned, realising with a shock just what I’ve walked into.

Katerina laughs and leans in close, whispering in my ear. ‘You’ll have to wait.’

But for once I barely hear her. Taking Katerina’s hand, I move back a little from her, staring at each of the five young girls in turn, my astonishment making them giggle. They think it’s a game, but it’s not. I have never, in all my days, had such a shock.

I look to Katerina. ‘Are these …?’

She looks at me, then at them, and back at me, sudden understanding coming to her eyes. ‘Sweet Mother of God, you mean …?’

‘The first time,’ I say, my voice an awed whisper.

She stares at me a moment longer, then, swallowing, takes charge of things.

‘Girls … come and welcome your father home. Natalya, you first. And be polite now. Remember what you learned.’

And the first of them – the image of Katerina, only twelve, thirteen at most – gets up from where she sits on the window seat and comes across. She is dressed, like all of them, in a simple white cotton smock, against which her long dark hair falls in a cascade of glorious ringlets. Just looking at her takes away my breath, for this is my daughter. These are
all
my daughters.

She gives a little bow, then, smiling broadly, says, ‘
Welcome home, papa,
’ in perfect German.

I laugh, delighted, and look to Katerina. But the best is to come, for, reaching up, Natalya holds my neck, gently making me bend down to her, so that she can place a kiss there on my cheek.

A tear rolls down to greet her kiss.

Next is Irina, nine and a tomboy like her mother. After her comes Anna, seven and shy. Martha, five, proves the actress of the family, curtseying low and giving me a cheeky wink, while the baby, Zarah, three years old, refuses to approach me, holding on tight to her mother’s skirts. I pick her up and, by staring at her sternly and then making a face, force her into laughing.