directly to the Kremlin. A parallel might be found if mayors of your large cities or the governors of New York State or California were killed by Soviet agents, do you see what I mean?"
"It couldn't have happened at all-, it's counterproductive.
Moscow would never have allowed it."
"It happened here and Moscow covered it up. Wisely, I might add."
"Are you saying my brother, your husband's control, ordered him to assassinate such men? That's preposterous! It would make the U-2 fiasco pale by comparison. I don't believe you, lady. Harry's too smart, too knowledgeable to do anything like that; there could have been mass reprisals in the States, everyone one step closer to nuclear war, and nobody wanted that."
"I did not say your brother ordered my husband to commit such acts."
"Then what are you saying?"
"They were committed and Harry was Frederik's control."
"You mean your husband-"
"Yes," interrupted Karin de Vries softly.
"Freddie served your brother well, boring into the Stasi to the point where they threw him parties as a diamond merchant from Amsterdam who was making the apparatchiks rich. Then a pattern developed; times and locations coincided where powerful East Germans beholden to the Kremlin were assassinated. Separately and together, both Harry and I confronted Frederik. He denied everything, of course, and his innocent charm and his quick tongue-the same qualities that made him an extraordinary deep-cover operative-persuaded us both that it was coincidence."
"There's no such thing as coincidence in this business."
"We found that out when Frederik was captured a week before the Berlin Wall came down. Under torture, compounded by the injected serums, my husband admitted to the assassinations. Harry was among the first specialists to reach and tear apart the Stasi headquarters, and in his anger over Freddie's death he knew exactly what to look for and when it happened. He found a copy of the transcript and kept it on his person, bringing it to me later."
"Then your husband was a loose cannon, and neither you nor my brother saw through him?"
"You would have to have known Freddie. There was a reason behind his intemperance. He had a hatred toward the militant Germans, a deep loathing that did not extend to the tolerant, even penitent citizens of West Germany. You see, his grandparents were executed in the town square by a Waffen SS firing squad in front of the entire village. Their crime: bringing food to the starving Jews held behind an open barbed-wire enclosure in a field by the railroad yard. However-and this is most painful along with his grandfather and grandmother, seven innocent males, all fathers, were shot as examples for a disobedient citizenry. In the hypocrisy of panic, the De Vries family was stigmatized for a generation. Frederik was brought up by relatives in Brussels, permitted only on rare occasions to see his parents, who eventually committed suicide together. I'm convinced the terrible memory of those years stayed with Freddie until the moment he died."
Silence. And then the bewildered waiter returned with their glasses of wine, spilling part of one on Drew's trousers. He left, and Latham said, "Let's get out of here. There's a decent restaurant, a brasserie, around the corner."
"I know it too, but I would prefer to finish our conversation here."
"Why? This place is awful."
"I don't think it's right that we be noticed together."
"For God's sake, we work in the same place. Incidentally, why haven't I ever seen you at our embassy gettogethers? I'm sure I'd have remembered."
"Such parties are not a priority with me, Monsieur Latham. I live a very solitary and quite happy life."
"By yourself?"
"That is my choice."
Drew shrugged.
"Okay, then. You saw my name on our roster sent to The Hague, and on the basis of my being Harry's brother, you asked for your transfer. WhY?"
"I told you, I was cleared by NATO for maximum classified materials. Six months ago I took a secure--channel memorandum from radio traffic to the supreme commander, and being curious-as I was today-I looked at it. It said that one Drew Latham was being transferred to Paris with full Quai d'Orsay credentials, to explore the "German problem." It took no imagination to know what that was, monsieur. It was the "German problem' that killed my husband, and I remembered all too clearly your brother talking about you most affectionately. How he wished you had never tried to follow in his footsteps, for you were too quick-tempered and had no facility with languages."
"Harry's jealous because Mother always liked me better."