“The Amis had the idea that there’s a communist spy at the heart of French intelligence, and that he might be more inclined to believe what I told them about you playing both sides by my proving reliable in identifying Edgard de Boudel as he arrived back in Friedland as a returnee from a Soviet POW camp.”

“But the Amis canned that idea when you told them that you thought you had figured out a way of them getting their hands on me in person,” said Mielke. “Is that right?”

I nodded. “Which probably leaves your reputation un damaged.”

“Let’s hope so, eh?”

“Is there a spy at the heart of French intelligence?”

“Several,” admitted Mielke. “You might just as well ask if there are any communists in France. Or if Edgard de Boudel really did fight for the German SS and then the Viet Minh.”

“And did he?”

“Oh yes. And it’s a shame the Americans should have told the French about him now. Someone in GVL—Gehlen’s new intelligence organization—must have told them. You see, we had a deal with the GVL and Chancellor Adenauer. That the German government would allow Edgard de Boudel back into Germany in return for allowing one of ours back. It’s like this: De Boudel has inoperable cancer. But the poor fellow wanted to die in his native France, and this seemed to be the best way of doing it. Of sneaking him back into Germany as part of a POW repatriation and then into France without anyone objecting.”

“There’s not much love lost between the CIA and Gehlen’s GVL,” I said.

“It would seem not.”

“The German son seems to have turned his back on his American father.”

“Yes indeed,” said Mielke. “It’s odd, but you and Elisabeth are about the only two people who even know about my own father. So that was a real stroke of genius, my friend. Because, as it happens, a lot of what you imagined might be true is true. We don’t really see each other much anymore.”

“Does he live in the East?”