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By Root 1868 0

7 December 1987, Paul Enke was found dead, at the age of sixty-three. Another death connected with the Amber Room. But this one barely raised a murmur in the press, as Paul Enke had hardly existed. Very few people were invited to attend his funeral at an East Berlin cemetery, his casket lowered into the grave in the rain, watched by a gaggle of sodden and disparate associates including his Lektor, Giinter Wermusch. And afterwards Oberst Seufert licked and stuck shut the composite file on a life. Enke, Paul, file number KSII404/82, was deactivated, filed away with the cold cases on one of the seven reinforced floors of the Stasi's central archive.

However, the hunt for the Amber Room would carry on. Despite the orders from Moscow of 1986 to desist from searching, the death of the agent closest to the inquiry and his main source in the West, the Stasi would not give up on 'Operation Puschkin'. We are amazed to see a report fired off to Deputy Minister Neiber: 'What can be done now that Enke is dead? How can we utilize Enke's contacts and extend them for further measures in searching for the Amber Room?' The Stasi was obsessed with finding the Russian treasure, even though they had discovered nothing new and had had all their old Erzgebirge theories seriously undermined. There was no good operational reason for the Stasi to persist (alone without their Soviet comrades), so the impetus must have come from on high, possibly a 'minister's must'. Maybe Erich Mielke was unable to let go of his fantasy of winning plaudits in Moscow by presenting them with the ultimate prize, the Amber Room.

We read in the Ministry of Truth files that within days of the funeral the Stasi approached Giinter Wermusch: 'After the unexpected death of Comrade Enke it became essential to find a person suitable to continue his work who would at the same time be acceptable to the public. Comrade Wermusch, who identifies himself totally with this task, has been persuaded by Seufert to accept the job.'11 So Wermusch was more than just an editor and had gone on to run part of the Amber Room inquiry.

His first job was to process and reply to all Bernsteinzimmer Report correspondents, aided by 'Bernd', a.k.a. Uwe Geissler, the Stasi informer we had met in 'Goat's Throat Village'. So this was how they knew each other. We recall that Wermusch had told us that he had travelled the GDR with Geissler after Enke's death, but he had not said it was on Stasi business (although nothing in the files indicate that Wermusch was a paid employee of the ministry).

Seven months after Enke's death, someone else we know well contacted Wermusch. We found this letter in the Ministry of Truth files. 'Villa Askania Nova, Schloss Strasse, Vaduz.' Baron von Falz-Fein.

18 July 1988, Dear Mr Wermusch! My German secretary is on holiday and I am thinking in French and Russian. I do hope that my [German] lines are comprehensible to you. George Stein: I do not know whether you are aware of my close cooperation with Stein. We were introduced ten years ago by Julian Semyonov in Bonn. As a five-year-old I saw the Amber Room and I was enthusiastic about its splendour. As a Russian I set myself an aim to help both of them wherever I could. I am sure you are aware that I spent a lot of money on Stein's trips and researches.

The same old story the Baron told us. Everyone connected to the Amber Room was regrouping and the Baron continued:

Archive Stein: I used to help Stein's children bridge the economic emergency they found themselves in and that is why I received [Stein's archive] after his death. It is now in the Sovetskaya Kulturnaya Obschestvo [Soviet Culture Fund]. The last information I have received was that the people engaged in translation have found many positive and interesting matters relevant to their researches. Paul Enke: a huge loss for us researchers. Julian Semyonov has given up on our work and taken off to Yalta.

In the absence of Enke, Semyonov or Stein, the Baron had a proposal:

International Commission. Such weekend hobby enthusiasts as we are, without