He picked up the telephone. Another soldier came in, a woman, stout, with UNRRA on her armband. She smiled, held out her hand, and Bette took it. Didn’t matter she was nearly thirteen.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Berlin: August – October 1945

‘How did they know? Informed guesswork,’ the major said. ‘We don’t have a mole in our outfit. The Soviets work the same way as us. Only less efficiently.’

He picked up a paper knife, tapped it against his forefinger, nodding at the officers either side of him. As it happened, Major Buchanan had called in Captain Thornton from the army garrison, and another officer John had never seen before. Major Somebody-or-other. He’d forgotten his name already. JIC. Joint Intelligence Committee. John was waiting for the bollocking, but his CO and the army officers were all smiles, as if John had excelled himself.

‘Some of the scientists they had their eye on slipped through their net. We got there first, evacuated them before they could.’

Major Buchanan put the knife on his desk, tilting the blade so the handle lifted up, rocking it like a see-saw. The JIC major leaned forward.

‘This young woman…’ He paused, looking hard at John. ‘There’s plenty of starry-eyed radicals and fellow travellers who are only too happy to ease the Russkies’ way in here.’ He nodded. ‘Our guess is that she was one of them. Used by the Soviets, dispensed with when she was of no further service. Pretty clumsy attempt to blackmail. Typical, mind you.’

He spoke sense, and yet, John thought, what he said was nonsense too. Lieselotte was young. He couldn’t see her as an agent. And even if she had been, why would they have murdered her if she could help them? Perhaps someone else had killed her, and the Reds were exploiting it? His thoughts hurtled round, ricocheting from front to back.

Unless she knew the bandy-legged Soviet officer and his skinny, spotty sidekick, had been instructed to seek John out and lure him to the bridge? It had been her idea to meet there. She knew it would be deserted. Had the Russians put her up to it? Had something gone wrong and they had eliminated her? Had she been about to blow her cover? Perhaps she wasn’t as innocent as she had seemed. The major was right. He’d know this sort of thing.

‘Wouldn’t waste tears over her,’ the major said. ‘Not worth it, women like that.’

John remembered their first meeting. There had been nothing contrived about it. A chance encounter. He found it hard to accept that he had been targeted, or that she had dangled herself as bait.

Lieselotte murdered, the imprint of the ligature fresh on her neck.

‘If you want to sacrifice your career, your reputation, perhaps, even, your life for her, that’s a choice you alone can make.’ He sniffed, twisted his mouth. You’re on your own, sir.