Sections 7 & 8

Section 7

Pastor Martin Kuhne had barely slept.
Frau Kuhne berated him, accusing him of endangering their lives once more by his foolish attachment to notions of freedom and open society.
“Have you forgotten,” she demanded, “How close we came to being killed?” She pointed to her lame left leg. “Is this not sufficient to remind you?”
In vain he tried to explain that the shocking telephone call he had received came from the past and had nothing to do with his present.
“People are dredging up old history to frighten us. I will let Silber know. He will deal with it.“
This sent Ilse off in fresh paroxysms of anger. “This will involve us once more in these games between spies,” she protested.
“No. It will give Silber and his people the opportunity too focus on the mischief makers and control them,” he reassured her.
From the depths of his memory he dragged an old contact number. He had not used it for years. He hoped it was still operational and that if it was not that his using it was harmless. He knew that it had connected to a number in Berlin, he presumed in the British Embassy. He hoped the British Embassy was still in the same place or that if it was not the phone to which this was the number had been relocated.
“Hello.”
The female voice was calm, unmistakably British, incurious.
“Gottlieb for Extension 27 please,” Martin said.
“I'm sorry. Mr Rice is not available just now, goodbye.”
Relieved, Martin hung up. The old formula had been acknowledged with the right counter words. Now he would have to wait.

The group at table 16 in the Dog and Partridge chatted generally until their meals were served. Then Major Crane spoke to Wiggins.
“I've been looking over the old files, John. I've seen the pattern, an operation planned, resources put in place, then the operation either aborted on the basis of information about intelligence held by the Stasi or disrupted by Stasi intervention. Either way we seem to have known an awful lot about what went on inside the Stasi or they seem to have been able to find out a lot about our plans.”
“That's only before the Wall fell,” Wiggins pointed out.
“That's right. Then the wall comes down, we keep up a presence in the East to keep an eye on the old Stasi infrastructure, make sure its not revived and we find that the same thing is happening. Too much of our intelligence is known to the German service before we have formally shared it.”
“The whole issue of sharing muddied the waters.”
“I've seen that. A lot of the top people, politicians especially, didn't understand the pervasiveness of the Stasis networks, a whole population nearly, working for them. You made that point and I think you were right about the danger of that. I'm sure that it was exploited by the former Stasi people and by the German Intelligence service when they were offered it. I think too that the top people gave too little attention to the danger from those disaffected by the fall of the wall. One of your reports points out the numbers who were actively frightened of unification.”
Wiggins nodded appreciatively. The Major had done his homework.
“What was this about the Middle East dimension, John? I got a bit lost there. I suspect there may be papers missing. In fact I'd like to have you review the files and see if that is the case.”
“That was the most recent development before I was withdrawn from Germany. The GDR had strong links with Libya and with the Syrians and the Palestinians. It maintained cordial relations with other Arab states where it could. It assisted a number of the European and middle eastern terrorist groups on the sixties and seventies, facilitating training and supplying arms and materiel.”
The Major nodded.
Wiggins went on, “Obviously at the state level this ended when the wall came down and Germany was reunited but there were still many terrorists in Germany as well as a lot of Germans, former Stasi members in particular, with links to them, sympathy for their causes and a knowledge of how to procure and supply the arms and materiel they needed. I think that I said in one report that the fall of the wall had privatised the fostering and encouragement of these groups..”
Again the Major nodded. Then he said, “And you came to suspect that members of the German intelligence service were drawn into this.”
“I thought so, yes. And then things got worse.”
“Escalated, you mean?”
“In a sense. We're talking about the late eighties and the nineties. The Afghans have defeated the Soviets; the Russians are getting a hard time from the Chechens; European terrorism is under control to a great extent but in the Arab world there is a surge of confidence. The middle eastern terrorists have no sponsorship from western governments but have a credibility they can take to other marketplaces; their demands increase; the customer is always right; their demands are met.”
“But how do they finance their demands in the absence of state sponsorship?”
“The market place meets the problem by helping the development of other markets where the customer can supply a commodity which will generate liquidity. Specifically the rogue element of the German intelligence service began to assist the Arab terrorists in developing and supplying drugs. A man called Mahmud came from Amman to Berlin to discuss this with interested parties. I watched him arrive at Templehof and I followed him into the city but I lost his trail as a result of instructions I got through our liaison office. There were a number of similar failures, all attributable to the same cause.”
“Ah,” said the Major. “And in time to submitted a report linking these failures and asking that they be reviewed. But that never happened. Instead you were reassigned from field duties in Germany and brought back to the UK. Right?”
“I assumed that review never happened. Obviously I was moved out of a position where I might have found that out.”
“But Mahmud is still at large in Germany?”
"I think so, based on the information I get to see."
“Involved in what? Terrorism? Drugs? Both?”
Wiggins shrugged. “I can only evaluate the intelligence. I don't gather it. From what I see my answer would be, “Both.””
“What can we do about it if you're right John?”
“We need to neutralise Mahmud.”
“Neutralise?”
“Take away his marketplace.”
“Won't he find another?”
“Probably; but not one as ready to supply him with the materiel or information he needs to support his clients. His value will drop considerably and his purchasing power will evaporate.”
“What if we were to remove Mahmud from the picture?”
“He would be replaced. His value is as a conduit. His clients would find a new Mahmud; the renegades would actively encourage them and help them.”
“So we must tackle the problem head on and take out the renegades, you think?”
“I'm sure of it.”
“Well,” said the Major, “I agree with your analysis and your conclusions John.” He smiled, then went on, “But how are we to achieve the solution we need.?”
“There are three elements to deal with. We should review the service record of the operatives who have worked in the East German office over the past twenty years and decide how to dispose them so as to avoid their continued involvement in the work of the office as it bears on this subject. We have to review the history of all Stasi operatives known to us in an effort to identify those who may be involved in this operation. We must review the records of those operatives from German intelligence with whom the East German office or the Stasi personnel have dealt to decide if they are involved.”
“I have it in mind that when we have identified those who should be suspected of being involved with this operation we must devise a plan that will either bypass them or establish their involvement without arousing either their suspicions or the suspicions of the others involved. It occurs to me that a scheme of this sort my be mutilayered”
Wiggins agreed. The Major continued, “Will you come back to London with me John so that we can make a start on this work as soon as possible?”
Again Wiggins agreed. Soon the four left the pub. Wiggins thanked Bland for his assistance and got into the car with Seb and the Major.
Before the Major joined them he spoke to Bland to thank him for his work in bringing Wiggins to the meeting and to warn him to take care in case his part in the scheme they had discussed might be discovered.

Polesden signed for the vehicle delivered to him and dismissed the driver. He set off for Purley.
He soon found himself outside Oakfields. He noted that there was no car on the drive or parked outside the property. He noted too that there was no sign on the property to say that it any longer offered accommodation. He drove up the road a short distance and parked where he could observe whether anyone entered or left the house.
It was late afternoon before he saw a Rover turn into the drive of the house. He could see that there was only one person in the car, Bland himself he guessed.
He waited a short while then telephoned the house. Adopting the role of a direct marketeer he attempted to engage Bland in a conversation from which he might elicit information about the journey from which he had just returned. He had no success in this. Bland gave very short shrift to such callers.
Polesden debated the wisdom of a further call in the guise of a clerk in the service's Human Resources department checking some minor details of Bland's service record but concluded the risk of tipping off the subject was too great. He sat in his car until dusk began to fall, watching to see if Wiggins appeared. Then he drove away.

Seb drove the Major and Wiggins to Kennington and pulled in to the service yard of a small parade of shops. They got out and climbed an external staircase to the first floor balcony serving a row of offices. Seb unlocked the door of the office at the end of the block, adjoining the staircase. Wiggins noticed that the fascia board above the offices obscure glazed front window announced that the premises were those of “Gulab (UK)” and that the firms business was described as “import/export” but without the benefit of a telephone number or any other identification.
The office was furnished with a high counter running the width of the room, two desks, each with a computer and a telephones, and a filing cabinet.
The Major looked round and said, “Nerve centre for Operation Turnstile. Everything you need will come to the computers by secure link from my office. Time to go to work.” He turned to Wiggins. “Seb will brief you on access codes and so on, John. The first thing I want you to do is to review those past reports to see if you can reconstruct whatever may be missing.”
He turned and left the office. Seb switched on the computers and booted them up. “Access codes,” he said to Wiggins, “listen up sir.”
A half hour later the telephone on Wiggins desk rang.
“Crane,” the caller said. “There's been a squawk in from Eastern Germany. Old number and old codes so someone whose been out of the system for a while. One of your guys, John, Gottlieb. Came through Berlin this morning. Can you follow it up?”

Section 8

A “squawk” denotes contact from an agent outside the normal channels. Generally speaking this means a communication that is either urgent or concerns activity that is out of the ordinary. It does not necessarily denote an emergency. There are other procedures in such cases and there are codes available to assign levels of priority to a squawk. However, the basic rule is that a squawk is assigned to the officer responsible for the agent in question and receives as immediate attention as is possible.
The receipt of a squawk is notified to the Heads of the section and the relevant office. Wiggins's first concern was to know whether this procedure had been followed in relation to Gottlieb.
The Major assured him it had not. Gottlieb was no longer active. Conscious of the danger of compromising the service by giving too high a priority to inactive agents suddenly reviving in former iron curtain countries the Major had revised the protocols to eliminate the broadcasting of squawks from inactive agents and channel them exclusively through himself and the agent's handler.
Neither the Major nor Wiggins referred to Polesden but they shared a sense of relief that as the protocol had been changed he would be unaware of the squawk from Gottlieb and of its assignment to Wiggins.
Wiggins had been reviewing the reports from himself and his networks to spot omissions or deletions. As soon as the Major terminated his call he turned his attention to the squawk.
At six o'clock a small van in the livery of the Deutsches Bundpost pulled up outside Pastor Kuhne's residence. The driver carried a small parcel to the door and rang the bell. Inside the body of the van a second man, also in post office uniform watched the street through an elaborate system of view ports. While his colleague waited for the Pastor to open the door he took a series of photographs of the street scene, making sure there was a record of the make, model and registration number of all the vehicles that were parked in the street. When his colleague returned to the van having made the delivery it drove away, back to Berlin and its discreet garage near to the British Embassy. Even while it was on the road copies of the photographs were transmitted to Wiggins's computer and he began to analyse them.
Pastor Kuhne meanwhile began to review the documents which furnished him with instructions on the current routes and codes to be used to contact Wiggins. These include the allocation of new code names. Now Wiggins would be known as Eismann. Gottlieb became Sontag.
Wiggins waited to hear from him and studied the photographs. He particularly noted a blue BMW with a Cologne registration.

Polesden decided to drive straight home in the departmental car. He would return it in the morning. As his car crawled through the rush hour traffic he turned over an idea in his head, something he had thought about while he was watching Bland's house and then had dismissed. The more he worried at it the more sensible it appeared. When he arrived home he parked in the street then took out his mobile phone.
When the call was answered he identified himself with a code name and then ended the call. He waited to be called back and when he was he explained that he wanted to arrange a break in. He gave Bland's address and explained that he expected there would be only two, possibly three people there, that one of them might be John Wiggins and that he required any information that might link Bland and Wiggins and any information at all that pertained to Wiggins.
The caller confirmed that this could be done that night.

Bland was uneasy. A former head of section, he knew the extent of the informal information any officer in such a position could build up just by his day to day work. On the journey back from Chippenham he had begun to think about the ways in which an officer who was so minded might be able to exploit that network. That had led him to consider the ways in which it might be extended by an unscrupulous officer. By all accounts Harry Polesden might be such a person and since he was a former field officer the likelihood was that the network he could adapt to his purposes included some very tough people indeed.
He was not unduly concerned for John Wiggins. A field officer like John could take care of himself. He was sure that John had the same concerns as he was now having after hearing the history John had given to The Major. John had lived with these concerns and many more before them for years. Bland had seen his almost paranoid sense of caution in action from the day they had first met when John first came to stay at Oakfields guest house after being brought out of the GDR for the first time.
Likewise, the Major could look after himself, or more exactly, he had people to look after him. Seb was a very competent subordinate and his loyalty to his boss was plain. And there would be other Sebs in the service, working to other projects, even shadowing this one, Bland knew.
His concern was for Rose. She had only the haziest knowledge of what work he had done at what he told her was the Department of Information. Even after six years of retirement he had told her nothing of the true nature of the job. She had been pleased to assist with his work in providing accommodation for the curious mix of spent agents, minor defectors and potential double agents who had passed through the house when the had the guest house, but she had never pried into the truths behind the cover stories they had given. Bland had never regarded that work as dangerous. He had never regarded any of his work as dangerous and had sometimes envied an agent the exciting life he had had when he heard the stories tumble out during a debriefing.
Now, learning of the overspill from espionage into crime as it seemed to him, Bland was worried about the safety of his home while this operation was in progress.
“I think we need a holiday,” he said to Rose, handing her a glass of sherry as she prepared their evening meal. “Northumberland would be nice, don't you think?” She had been brought up near Alnwick and they had always relished the escape to the rolling moors and the almost deserted sea shores of Northumberland.
“Lovely,” she agreed. “When?”
“Soon as we can. Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
“We could leave tonight; drive for a couple of hours, then put up somewhere. Get the jump on the rush hour traffic tomorrow.”
“Are you sure? You've just had that drive with John. Do you want to go travelling again today?”
“I think that's what gave me the idea. I thought, if I can do something like this when an old friend drops in and needs a hand then why not for Rose. So there you are.”
“It would be nice. Are you sure we could just go off like that. We always seem to have so much to do here.”
“Best way to do it, Rose. If we have to sit down and look at diaries and fit it in around meetings and stuff we'll never do it. Let's just drop everything and go. If we have to break an appointment, we'll telephone our apologies and whatever.”
Rose lifted her eyebrows in surprise. This was not like her usually punctilious husband. All she said was, “If you're sure. Let's have dinner and then I'll pack.”

Gottlieb contacted Eismann through a secure connection. He explained that he had had a threatening call from someone who appeared to have Stasi connections who appeared to believe that Wiggins must be in Germany, probably in the vicinity of Halle. He told Wiggins of the mention of the name Mahmud. When he heard this Wiggins said that he would travel to Germany the following day to meet the Pastor in Leipzig. Meeting points, identification codes and fall back arrangements were quickly agreed. Wiggins then contacted the Major to have the travel arrangements authorised and put in motion. By this time both men were clear on the need to limit the extent to which information about Wiggins and his movements was open within the service. This entailed the generation of further code words, special operational accounts and the disturbance, late at night of senior officers.
As a result Wiggins missed Bland's call to him to say that he and Rose were now on the M25 travelling to Hertfordshire en route to Northumberland and his later call to say that they were spending the night in a charming old coaching inn near Baldock.
Omitting to check the messages on his phone Wiggins rang Bland's home number and was horrified to get no reply. He began to leave a message but was interrupted by Seb rudely seizing his arm and pulling the handset away from his mouth. He glared as Seb clicked the buttons on the handset rest.
“Think about it,” Seb told him. “If he isn't answering then he's either been prevented from picking the phone up or he's not in; who might be listening to your message or might pick it up later?”
Wiggins saw the sense of this immediately. “I hadn't seen it as operational, Seb. That's all.”
“You need to rest. Let's get out of here.”
Accommodation had been arranged at a nearby hotel, nothing elaborate abut close at hand and suitably anonymous. As they walked to it Wiggins worried at why Bland was not answering his phone. As they entered the lobby of the hotel he stopped Seb.
“Can we get some observation on Bland,” he asked. "It bothers me that there should be no answer to my call. He said nothing about planning to go out tonight.”
“I'd been thinking the same. Just as we were leaving I called a contact with the police. A car will give it a once over every two or three hours tonight."
“By the way," Seb went on. “Did you check your phone for missed calls? Just in case.”
Wiggins checked and found the two messages from Bland.
“I'd say that makes it more important that we have the police keep an eye,” he said after he had told Seb about the two messages.

Shortly after this exchange a shabby looking Vauxhall Astra drew up outside Bland's home. Two men got; a third, the driver made no move to leave the car.
“Come on Jay,” one of the others told him. We need all the help we can get with this. We need it as quick as we can make it.”
The driver got out. The three stood on the drive. Jay was detailed to check the garage. He did so and reported that there was no car there.
“Interesting,” the man who had ordered Jay to join them spoke. “I wonder if they're out.”
He went to the door and rang the bell. Even as he waited for the answer that his sixth sense told him would never come he was formulating the rambling tale about remembering a guest house here and looking for somewhere to stay that he would use if the door was answered.
None of the three heard the sound of approaching feet until they heard a discreet cough and, “Can I help you gents?”
They turned to see that between the road and the door were six uniformed police officers waiting to see what they might do next.
“Could I see what you have in the bag, please sir,” asked the nearest, a sergeant' pointing at the bag that hung round the neck of the man who had pressed the doorbell.