Mexico Set. Len Deighton

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      ‘It’s the same sort of thing,’ said Zena brightly.

      ‘It’s very different,’ said Werner. ‘When you recruit someone, and start them spying, you paint romantic pictures for them. You show them the glamour and make them feel courageous and important. But the agent you enrol knows all the answers already. Enrolment is tricky. You are telling lies to highly skilled liars. They’re cynical and demanding. It’s easy to start it off but it usually goes sour some way along the line and everyone ends up mad at everyone else.’

      ‘You make it sound like getting a divorce,’ said Zena.

      ‘It’s a bit like that,’ I said. ‘But it can get more violent.’

      ‘More violent than a divorce?’ Zena fluttered her eyelashes. ‘You’re only going to offer Erich Stinnes a chance to defect to the West. Can’t he do that any time he wants? He’s in Mexico. Why go back to Russia if he doesn’t want to?’ There was something deliciously feminine about Zena and her view of the world.

      ‘It’s not as easy as that,’ said Werner. ‘Not many countries will allow East European nationals to defect. Seamen who jump ship, passengers or Aeroflot crew who leave their planes at refuelling stops, or Soviet delegates who walk into foreign police stations and ask for asylum find it’s not so easy. Even right-wing governments send them right back to Russia to face the music.’ He bit into a biscuit. ‘Good Spritzgebäck, darling,’ he said.

      ‘I couldn’t get hazelnuts but I tried this other sort; with honey. They’re not bad, are they? Why won’t they let them defect? They send them back to Russia? That’s disgusting,’ said Zena.

      ‘Encouraging defectors upsets the Russians for one thing,’ said Werner. ‘If Stinnes said he wanted to stay in Mexico, the Soviet ambassador would go running along to the Foreign Secretary and start pressurizing the Mexican authorities to hand him back.’

      ‘In which case doesn’t Stinnes just say go to hell?’ said Zena.

      ‘The ambassador then says that Stinnes has stolen the cash box or that he’s wanted to face criminal charges in Moscow. The Mexicans then find themselves accused of harbouring a criminal. And don’t forget that someone has to pay the defector a salary or find him a job.’ Werner reached for another biscuit.

      ‘This is Mexico,’ said Zena. ‘What do they care about the Russians?’

      Werner was fully occupied with the biscuits. I said, ‘The Russians have a lot of clout in this part of the world, Mrs Volkmann. They can stir up trouble by getting neighbouring countries to apply pressure. Cuba will always oblige, since its economy depends totally on Soviet money. They can apply economic sanctions. They can influence United Nations committees and all the rigamarole of Unesco and so on. And all of these countries have to contend with a domestic Communist Party organization ready to do whatever the Russians want done. Governments don’t offend the Soviet Union without very good reason. Providing asylum for a defector is seldom reason enough.’

      ‘There are still plenty of defectors, though,’ persisted Zena.

      ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Many defectors are sponsored by the USA, the way that famous musicians or performers are, because of the bad publicity their escapes make for the communist system. And they can earn their own living easily enough. The remainder have to bring something worthwhile with them as the price of entry.’

      ‘Secrets?’

      ‘That depends on what you call secrets. Usually a country provides asylum to someone bringing information about the way the Soviets have been spying on the host country. For that sort of information a government is usually prepared to withstand Russian pressures.’

      ‘And for that reason,’ said Werner, ‘most of the decent Russians can’t defect and the KGB bastards can. Put all the defectors together and you’d have a ballet company and orchestra, some sports stars and a vast army of secret policemen.’

      Zena looked at me with her big grey eyes and said archly, ‘But if you two are right about Erich Stinnes, he’s a KGB man. So he could provide some secrets about spying on Mexico. So he would be allowed to stay here without your help.’

      ‘Would you like to live in Mexico for the remainder of your life, Mrs Volkmann?’ I said.

      She paused for a moment as if thinking the idea over. ‘Perhaps not,’ she admitted.

      ‘No, a man such as Stinnes would want a British passport.’

      ‘Or a US passport?’ said Zena.

      ‘American citizenship provides no right to travel abroad. A British passport identifies a British subject, and they have the right to leave the country any time they wish. Stinnes will give us quite a list of requirements if he decides to defect. He’d need a lot of paperwork so that he has a completely new identity. I mean an identity that is recorded in such a way that it will withstand investigation.’

      ‘What sort of things?’ said Zena.

      I said, ‘Things that require the cooperation of many different government departments. For instance, he’ll need a driving licence. And we don’t want that to materialize out of nowhere, not for a forty-year-old with no other driving experience on file and no record of passing a driving test. He’d need to have some innocuous-looking file in his local tax office. He’ll want a credit card; what does he put on the application? Then there are documents for travelling. He’ll probably want some freedom of movement and that’s always a headache. Incidentally he must give us some identity photos for his passport and so on. One good full-face picture will be enough. A picture of his wife too. I’ll get the copies done at the embassy.’

      Werner nodded. He realized that this was his briefing. I was talking around the sort of offer he would be able to make to Stinnes. ‘You’re assuming that he would live in England?’ said Werner.

      ‘Certainly for the first year,’ I said. ‘It will be a long debriefing. Would that be a problem?’

      ‘He’s always spoken of Germany as the only place he’d ever want to be. Isn’t that true, Zena?’

      ‘That’s what he’s always said,’ Zena agreed. ‘But it’s the sort of thing everyone says at the Kronprinz Club. Everyone is drinking German beer and exchanging news of the old country. It is natural to talk of Germany with great affection. We all do. But when you are offering someone a chance to retire in comfort, England wouldn’t be too bad, I think.’ She smiled.

      I said, ‘Dicky thinks Stinnes will jump at any decent offer.’

      ‘Does he?’ said Werner doubtfully.

      ‘London thinks Stinnes has been passed over for promotion. They think he’s been stuck away in East Berlin to rot.’

      ‘So why is he here in Mexico?’ said Werner.

      ‘Dicky thinks it’s just a nice little jaunt for him.’

      ‘It’s a convenient thing to say when you can’t think of any convincing answer,’ said Werner. ‘What do you think, Bernie?’

      ‘I’m convinced he’s here in connection with Paul Biedermann,’ I said cautiously. ‘But why the hell would he be?’

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