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to blackmail. Now this Stasi scumbag was playing it back to him, using his report to test the woman’s identity.
    ‘You know,’ she said, folding her fingers under her chin, ‘I remember everyone in that office. I can see them all now. Where did you sit? Not on the right, because the Italian and Spaniard were there. What were their names? Perhaps you remember. Carlo and . . . ?’
    She was playing him at his own game. Heise opened his arms as though to say that he couldn’t be expected to remember everything.
    ‘Then on the left,’ she continued, ‘were the secretaries and the research group. Perhaps you were part of the research group?’
    Heise hesitated. ‘No . . . I did not have my desk exactly there.’
    ‘But where then?’ she said. ‘Not in the Director’s office, surely?’
    ‘No, down the hall.’
    She frowned and shook her head. ‘That’s not possible.’
    ‘Well, perhaps she will remember you later,’ said Rosenharte helpfully. ‘I should explain that we are seeing each other for the first time in fifteen years. Maybe one ghost from the past is enough this evening, eh?’
    The man straightened. ‘You will excuse me for interrupting. Bon appetit .’ He nodded to both of them before retreating to his own table, where he acted perplexity and awkwardness to his dining companion, a younger man with a conspicuously pallid face and heavy spectacles.
    ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I know what this means to you now.’
    ‘Do you?’ asked Rosenharte under his breath. ‘Do you really know what has just taken place? I mean really?’
    ‘Yes. You supported my identity as Annalise, so you are now committed.’
    ‘You understand it intellectually.’ He put his hand up to her face again, a gesture that had the advantage of hiding his own expression from the men at the other end of the pontoon. ‘I will listen to what your side have to say, but they must give me an assurance that they will do nothing to endanger my brother’s life. That’s the condition of my cooperation. He has two children. If anything goes wrong, the children will be taken from him and their mother for good. Is that all clear to you . . . and to your associates?’
    She nodded. ‘I have children of my own,’ she said.
    ‘Yes, but unless you have lived in the East, you cannot appreciate the cruelty of the Stasi. An enemy of the state - a dissident or spy or just some punk in Prenzlauer Berg - must be overcome by hatred. And this is not just a matter of sentiment, you see, but a duty that requires each officer to destroy the enemy of the state in the way that is calculated to hurt them most. You know about the Chekists in Russia?’
    ‘As a matter of fact I do; I did Soviet studies at university. The Cheka - Commission to Combat Counterrevolution Sabotage and Speculation. I always liked the idea of combating speculation.’
    ‘Well you’ll know that the Stasi follow the Cheka. They specialize in an institutional vindictiveness, formalized hatred of an order that even you cannot comprehend. If it means taking the children from a woman who has already had one nervous breakdown, then they’ll do it. If it means causing my brother to suffer further heart problems, then they’ll do it.’ He brought his hand down and looked at her. ‘There can be no mistakes. Until we get out of this restaurant you must do what I say. Remember, I knew Annalise. I know the way she would have behaved in this situation. You must be guided by me.’
    ‘I hear what you’re saying, but you really must stop showing it in your expression.’
    They continued with their meal, drinking more than was good for them and occasionally managing uproarious laughter. Just after eleven the wind changed. Instead of the sea breeze, much cooler air came straight from the mountains and made the little skiffs and dinghies moored along the side of the canal bump into each other. The pontoon began to shudder and strain at the chains that anchored it to the side and bottom of