Free The Janus Man by Colin Forbes

middle?'
    `Exactly. At least the western channel to Travemünde is under Western control. So passenger ships from Sweden and Finland can cross the Baltic and berth there. It's one of the weirdest spots on earth. And that, I remember reading, is where Dr Berlin has his residence,' Tweed remarked.
    `The odd thing is he only spends part of his time there. He's like a grasshopper. I remember some of the old Kenya hands used that very word. Hops all over the world, they said. But no one knew where..
    `Then you'd better find out. I think we are coming in to the outskirts of Lübeck. I wonder what it holds for us?'
    The taxi ride from the Hauptbahnhof to the Hotel Jensen was only a few minutes. They could have walked it. Approaching the bridge crossing the river on to the island Lübeck sits on, they passed a curious pair of medieval towers, leaning precariously and topped with witches' hat turrets.
    `The famous Holstentor,' Tweed remarked. Lübeck's trademark. That and marzipan...'
    They met the blonde-haired woman as they carried their cases inside the Jensen. In her early forties, Newman estimated, she was tall, slim and had a pointed chin and startling blue eyes which stared straight at him.
    He stood aside to let her pass and she smiled, still staring, then disappeared into the outside world. Newman looked back at her and the man behind the reception counter grinned.
    `You know her, sir?' he asked in English.
    `Unfortunately, no. She's staying here?'
    `Oh, yes. A guest each year during the summer season. That is Diana Chadwick. A very popular lady...'
    `With any normal man, I should imagine...'
    `I shouldn't say it, perhaps.' The man paused and smiled again. 'Very popular with most men, yes. But not always so popular with the members of her own sex. They fear the competition, I sometimes think.'
    `Diana Chadwick,' Newman repeated while Tweed filled in his own form. 'I've heard that name somewhere...'
    `She used to be a famous society beauty in Africa many years ago.' He smiled a third time. 'Not too many years, I hasten to say...'
    `Not Kenya by any chance?' Newman asked.
    'I think possibly it was Kenya. Go to Travemünde, ask some of the British boating crowd there. She spends a lot of her time with them. Thank you, sir,' he said to Tweed, and pushed the pad towards Newman for him to register.
    General Lysenko had insisted they moved their centre of operations to a fifth-floor office in the seven-storey concrete block of a building in Leipzig. He stood by the window now while Markus Wolf arranged his files brought up from the basement.
    `I felt like a bloody mole trapped underground in that basement,' he snapped. 'We're likely to be here sometime, I take it.'
    `Munzel can move very quickly,' Wolf replied in his slow deliberate voice. 'Witness how he dealt with the British agent, Fergusson, and that piece of garbage, Palewska. On the other hand, with a man like Tweed he will take his time. Patience is so often the key to success, I find.'
    The Intelligence chief glanced at Lysenko to see if he had got the message. No, he hadn't, he decided. He explained at greater length.

`First, Munzel has made his second report via the Eichholz watch-tower. He has signalled the arrival of Tweed at the Hotel Jensen in Lübeck. We spun out a string for Tweed to follow — and he is following it. Second, Munzel will want to study his target, get to know his habits, his way of going about things.
    Only when he has a complete picture of Tweed will he strike.
    And in any case, Balkan will soon arrive in Lübeck. Our eagles are gathering...'
    `There is a time limit.'
    `No, General, there is no time limit.' Wolf's graven image of a face became bleaker. 'From my informant inside the Berliner Tor in Hamburg I hear both the deaths of Fergusson and Palewska are regarded as accidents. That shows Munzel's great competence. It is only this pest of a Federal policeman,  Kuhlmann, from Wiesbaden, who is unconvinced. A clever man, Otto Kuhlmann …'
    'He may