A Spy in Exile

They hadn’t had a chance to copy the contents of the iPad. And one of the laptops they’d copied in full was a total disappointment. A tedious collection of academic papers on anarchism and radicalism and Marxism and countless other isms. Most of them in German and English. Some in Russian. The emails indicated that the computer belonged to Klaus. He also starred in a collection of photographs they found. Unable to crack his password, however, they couldn’t get into his Facebook account. Although the chances of finding anything important there were very slim, Ya’ara had a hard time giving up. She angrily tried the name Trotsky before flailing her arms in theatrical despair. His profile was blocked.

The second laptop paved the way for them. Nufar got to work on the copied material. There wasn’t much. A total of three folders bearing the names of three people. Bernhard Schlein. Peter Haas. Franz Mannesman. A quick Google search revealed them to be three very senior bankers—the CEO of Commerzbank, the CEO of DZ Bank, and the deputy CEO of Deutsche Bank. Each folder contained photographs, some of which appeared to have been downloaded from the internet, with others—images of residences—seemingly captured in secret. Schlein and Mannesman, it turned out, lived in large, luxurious private homes. Photographs of a modern, elegant high-rise apartment block appeared in the Haas folder. A circle marked an apartment on the seventeenth floor. An arrow pointed to the entrance to the underground parking garage. Apart from the photographs of the residences themselves, the folders also contained pictures of the bankers, alone or with family members—wives and children, with the homes appearing in the background. There were also images of the streets that probably led to the respective homes. Security cameras and police speed cameras were marked with circles. Marked out on maps of residential neighborhoods found in the folders were the homes of the bankers, as well as the nearest police stations and suburban train or subway stations. Public buildings in the vicinity were also marked on the maps. In the folders, too, were larger maps that displayed the areas within a fifty-kilometer radius of the three homes. Marked out on these maps were the nearby highways and the exits leading from them to the homes of the bankers. Each folder also included photographs, from a wide range of angles and distances, of several vehicles. All of them large, black luxury vehicles. One Maybach and two large Mercedeses. Some of the images were close-ups of the license plates of the vehicles. In all likelihood, they were the bankers’ official company cars. One of the pictures showed Schlein getting out of his ride, a driver in a dark suit opening the rear door for him.

Ya’ara went through the photographs of the receipts they found at the farm. Most of them were from stores and gas stations in the Bremen area. But almost half were from the Frankfurt area. Haas lived in the city itself. Schlein and Mannesman lived in small, affluent towns about a half-hour drive from the city. The receipts were conclusive proof that someone was covering the expenses of the group. Ya’ara hadn’t believed to begin with that the sloppy occupants of the farm could be running the show all on their own.

“Do you know what these are?” Ya’ara asked Aslan.

“Of course. Field dossiers.”

There wasn’t a shadow of doubt. The occupants of the farm had amassed intelligence on three subjects, in preparation for an operation—information on their residences, their vehicles, the roads in and out of the respective areas, the security measures in place in the vicinities.

All at once, the pieces of the puzzle slipped into place. Ya’ara looked at Aslan. The blood had drained from her face. She felt as if she was seeing ghosts. History never remains in the past, and here it was, coming back to haunt again.

“Do you realize what’s happening here?” she asked, as if she were talking to herself. “It’s looking like a rerun of Baader-Meinhof, but with smartphones and computers this time around. And the targets once again are the capitalist pigs. The bosses of the big banks, the despicable representatives of American imperialism. And the granddaughter of someone from the gang is at the very heart of the entire business, taking an interest in the dubious heritage of her grandmother from more than merely an academic perspective. And someone who is undoubtedly a Russian intelligence officer is mixed up with the group, and may even be steering them. And they’re conducting shooting drills with Kalashnikovs and nine-millimeter pistols.”

Aslan looked at her. He knew she might be right, but wondered at the same time whether it might not be a good idea to take a more cautious view of the situation. They were almost whispering, keeping their suspicions between the two of them.

“It could be other things too,” Aslan said, trying to remind her that doubt, too, played an important role in their line of work.

“Yes, you’re right,” Ya’ara responded. “The circumstances are different, the Soviet Union fell apart a long time ago, and the collective dreams have also changed. Still, I have no doubt it’s happening. That the Baader-Meinhof similarities and ties are not coincidental. You know, just like I do, that nothing is coincidental. I can’t believe it’s happening again.” She clasped her hands to her head. “Unfathomable madness.”