CHAPTER NINE
The Middle Distance Aeroplane Company (Part 1)
"James, is that you? I can barely hear you."
"It's me," Bond assured Moneypenny. "I'm calling like I was asked to."
"There you go, that's a little better. You sound like you're telephoning from inside a submarine full of blenders."
"I assure you I'm not. At least, not one with blenders in it."
"I haven't got long, the Old Man has a meeting with the DG and he wants me there to take notes." A moment and Bond heard Moneypenny rifle through papers on her desk. "We received responses to those three names you forwarded to us. Sorry it took so long, there was a hold-up of some kind on one of them."
"All right."
"Kohner, Walter. A series of arrests dating back to 1935. Larceny, burglary, several assaults, several drunkenness in public. He had served in the Wehrmacht in the Oberkommando des Heeres, rank of gefreiter ⸺ lance corporal.
"Verhoeven, Horst. A series of arrests also dating back to 1935. Larceny, burglary, attempted murder ⸺ with a brick. Oh, violent man. Hmm, lots of violent arrests. Seems to have spent the war years hiding out. At least, nothing on record.
"Your last name caused the problem. Zublinsky, Alexander, false name. Apparently, it's a name that comes up periodically through a false paper mill, the sort of name and record that gets recycled again and again. Real name is Dmitri Torkinov, Russian."
"KGB?" Bond asked.
"Hardly. No criminal record, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have one. The suggestion is that he probably served with the Red Army in Berlin and for whatever reason, decided to stay. Probably working the black market in the Soviet Zone. As far as we can tell, no intelligence ties at all."
"So all three of these are simple street criminals."
"So it would appear."
"Thank you, Moneypenny."
"Oh, there was one more thing. Mr. Coombes assistant, that nice Southern gentleman ⸺"
"Devereaux," said Bond. "Jebediah Devereaux, of the Charleston River Devereauxs."
"You say so. Anyway, they're upset with you."
"Oh?"
"Apparently, you've not been checking in."
"I have been."
"No you haven't."
"I'm in regular communication with you, Moneypenny. And Universal Exports. And the Plywood Research Council."
"He means with the phone number that they provided to you."
Bond closed his eyes. He could feel a nascent pounding behind his eyes. "They never stipulated that I was supposed to be in regular contact, merely that I was to call that number if I had any questions or problems."
"And so far, no calls."
"I haven't had a problem small enough for them to handle."
"Well, they want you to call it more frequently."
"Of course they do."
"I'm sorry, James, I have to go. Is there anything else you need?"
"Thank you, Moneypenny, you're a wonder."
"Tschüss."
# # #
A female voice answered on the third ring. "Ja?"
"Guten Abend, ich bin Herr Green. Spreche ich mit Palette?"
"Einen Moment," she said. A moment later, she gave a different number.
Bond dialed the second number and got a different woman's voice. "Hallo. Wer ist das?"
"Ich bin Herr Green," he said again.
"Oh, yes," she continued in merry German. "The American."
'Oh, yes,' thought Bond grimly, 'the security. Absolutely stellar.'
"Is there a message for me from Palette?"
"They want to meet with you as soon as possible. Tonight. At eleven-fifteen, be at the U-Bahn station on Bersarinstraße."
"That's under the Frankfurter Tor, yes?"
"Yes. Be at the Frankfurter Allee exit where it meets Warschauer Straße. You will see a man in a light overcoat. He will hold a briefcase with a company name printed on its outside. That name will be 'Mittelstrecken Flugzeug Gesellschaft.'"
'Middle Distance Aeroplane Company,' Bond translated for himself. "Got it."
"He will give you an envelope with further instructions."
"Why not just read the message to me? Save us both all of this rigamarole."
"These are my instructions."
Bond had always thought of the Germans as a compliant, dour, compliant, orderly, compliant, well-organized, compliant people as a whole. Sourly, he said, "Anything else? Will he have a flower in his lapel? An eyepatch? Any code words or phrases?"
"Simply introduce yourself at Herr Green. He will respond as 'Herr Furst.' Any other response, deviate and depart. Assume you're being followed."
'Christ,' he thought to himself, 'more amateur hour.'
"We could've done all this over the phone, you know."
"That is all, Herr Green." She broke the connection before Bond could retort.
# # #
The Bersarinstraße subway station opened its doors in 1930. Its architect had designed the whole line, and in keeping with German uniformity, it was semi-identical to the other stations on the E-line, save that its color scheme was bright blue tile and its platforms were much wider than other stations, necessitating a double row of columns to support the roof. At the time, the city of Berlin was planning to install an elevated rail from the Warsaw Bridge to Frankfurter Tor.
Bond arrived at the station about fifteen minutes before the appointed time, and ran a quick walk around the various exits, looking for anything that he might construe as suspicious. The U-Bahn station was busy, disgorging patrons for Berlin's bars, cafés and nightspots, and whisking home the most industrious of her people.
Like much of Berlin's infrastructure after the war, the Bersarinstraße U-Bahn station had been renovated to the best of its capacity by the cash-strapped and overly-stretched city government, but it still held an air of dingy misuse. The station had suffered from air bombings twice, and the old scars were patched over but not removed.
The traditional and proud Insulaner, what Berliners call themselves, boiled out of subway cars and across the platforms and up the stairs to the street exits, to where they could grab a late meal, or go to one of the many vast tenements that made up this section of Berlin, or sit in one of its many coffee shops and, over Milchkaffee or Radler, argue politics or new taxes or the U.S. bombing of Bikini Atoll or where to go to next, until the waiters flushed them out, or take in a Kino, or go to one of the new Kabaretts which seemed to attract too many of the Allies that guarded Berlin against a wholescale Soviet take-over. Young men in dark woollen suits waited while their white-haired girlfriends adjusted make-up in whatever shiny surface they could find. A group of three young men, dressed in suits, were in animated conversation about a new movie that featured a fire-breathing radioactive dinosaur stomping on downtown Tokyo.
The man with a graphical representation of an Art Nouveau airplane, over the words 'Mittelstrecken Flugzeug Gesellschaft,' arrived five minutes before midnight, coming down the stairs to take up a position alongside a kiosk that sold magazines, newspapers and cigarettes, the three crucial ingredients for a healthy German.
At midnight on the dot, Bond approached the man. He was small in stature, severely balding and be-spectacled, and studied the crowd with an obvious inquisitive expression upon his face.
Bond said, "Hallo. Ich bin Mr. Green."
In a low voice, the man said, "Bitte sprechen Sie Englisch."
"Wait, what?" Bond asked.
"Scheiße," the man muttered to himself. Then in English, he continued, "Mr. Green, I am Herr Furst. It is good to meet you."
"But of course you are." The amateur theatrics of this group had eroded Bond's calm, and he no longer felt like playing along. "You got something for me?"
As the man from the 'Middle Distance Aeroplane Company' opened his briefcase, he said, "Why yes, Herr Green. I have some pamphlets right here."
As he reached in, Bond heard footsteps behind him.