The Balkan Assignment (8 page)

didn't see the thin blade of the knife that Maher held pressed against his throat.

"I will tell you once," he said quietly, almost in a whisper. "There are two things you must never do. One is you must never lay your hands on me again. The second is you must never call me a Nazi. If you do, for either one I will kill you." He said it quietly, but death was a centimeter away from Mikhail.

The two men sat hunched and staring at one another for a long moment before Klaus withdrew the knife and slipped it away. Both men stood up on the wing and Mikhail turned angrily away as if to climb down for the dock.

"Get into the boat," Maher said. "We still have work to do." The Yugoslav hesitated, I could almost see his mind churning with the indignity Klaus had thrust upon him; weighing his pride against his greed. Finally, he turned back and climbed down into the stern of the calque. The greed had won out this time. But it was very clear that sooner or later, the two of them would have to finish what had started tonight.

Maher followed him without a word to me and in a few minutes, the calque was lost in the gloom that had now completely spread across the bay. The high-pitched keen of the winds covered even the sound of its engine. I can remember shivering, perhaps with the cold, but more likely with the shade of some ancestral fear of a cold, windy night eons lost when death had come brushing past.

It was close to nine o'clock before I had the landing light rerigged in the wing and finished up. The calque had made one full trip to and from the cave, reloaded with the last of the equipment and returned a second time. I was cold and hungry and the thought of tinned meat and cold tea was too much for my stomach. According to Mikhail, the village contained more bars than houses. In one of them, I thought, I should be able to find a hot meal and a phone.

The restaurant was a low, kerosene-lantern-lit shed and indescribably dirty. But I was so tired, I really did not care . . . and besides, I had eaten in worse places in Vietnam. The proprietor was half asleep behind the wooden platform that served as a bar. There were still several

people at the scattering of small tables and all looked up curiously as I entered. After the cold night air, the tiny coal fire at one end of the room accentuated the decadesold smell of sweaty bodies and burning kerosene, making the place indescribably close. I chose a small table near the door and ordered coffee and the stew of goat meat that was the only item on the menu. When it came I had second thoughts. From the smell I was not sure that it was goat. From the warm, rancid fat floating in the plate in large, halfmelted chunks, I was not sure that it was food.

"Please eat. We have a department of health that looks in every week."

"I know. That's one of the few benefits of living in a socialist country . . . you can go anywhere into the boondocks and you won't die from food poisoning . . . usually." I hadn't seen Vishailly standing near the bar, but he'd seen me come in. I waved to indicate the other chair and he sat down heavily. The man looked tired, not just tired from one or two nights of little sleep, but from decades of insufficient rest. Seen close up and in better light, his face was heavily lined and the shock of long hair was shot through with steel-gray. The backs of both hands were blotched red and purple and the fingers of his left hand were twisted, as if they had been broken all at the same time and reset improperly. But his eyes were what told you that he was not the overworked civil servant he appeared to be. Deeply hooded in folds of loose brown skin, they stared out in a perpetual frown; the perfect policeman's stare.

The waitress shuffled over with a foggy glass and a bottle and he nodded his thanks and turned back to me. "Have you fixed your airplane yet?"

"No," I said rubbing the back of my very weary neck. "A fuel pump is gone and I don't have a spare." "What will you do to fix it?"

"Nothing much I can do until the morning. I figured I'd phone Brindisi and ask them to send over a spare. Shouldn't take much more than a couple of days." Vishailly nodded and swirled the liquor around the inside of the glass. "You cannot find a spare on the island, or something that will do in its place?"

"I'm all for buying locally, but here, I doubt it. This isn't a piece of equipment that you can pick up in the local shopping center." Vishailly glared at the sarcasm in my voice, but I was too damned tired to care.

"You are an American?"

"Yeah, how'd you guess?" I was wishing that he'd go away somewhere and let me eat the mess in front of me in peace. I never was a very good liar under the best circumstances and dead tired as I was, I was either going to fall asleep or make a stupid mistake. Vishailly didn't answer my return question.

"We don't do things the American way .. ."

"Bully for you." Surprisingly the stew was edible; in fact, despite its appearance, it was quite good. Perhaps the fact that I was half starved had something to do with that. Vishailly watched me eat for a few minutes, saying nothing and ignoring my bad manners in not offering to listen further to him.

Finally, he brought himself to the next question. As I ate, I watched him carefully. His face worked as he thought, but in no discernible pattern.

"Where is your friend now? Klaus Maher is his name?" I shrugged. "Either out on the bay somewhere in that damned boat he dug up or else back on the plane, asleep. It's his money, and I don't care where he goes or what he does."

"As long as he pays you?"

"So long as he pays me," I echoed.

I couldn't take any more of this tired, dedicated old man. "Look, do you have something you want to ask me? Korstlov told me who you are and what you do. If you have any questions, just come right out with them. I'm just a businessman—not a very successful one mind you—who has the major piece of his capital equipment busted and losing money for every minute it sits out there in the damned harbor on this Godforsaken island.

"

"No," he said finally. "I merely thought you would like some company while you ate your dinner. We Yugoslays try to be friendly to foreigners."

"Thank you for your kind thought, but no. I'm too damned tired to enjoy conversation with anybody right now. So, if you will excuse me, I'm going back to the dock and get some sleep."

Vishailly stood up slowly. Everything the man did

seemed to be in slow motion, and I wondered how true this impression really was. I remembered how he had spun on his heel and disappeared up the cliff after his go-round with Mikhail.

"You will find that from here the only telephone connection with Italy is through the switchboard in my office. That is in the building at the end of the street. If you will come after nine o'clock in the morning, I will be glad to give you what assistance I can." I stood up also and dropped a couple of bills on the table next to the plate. "Thanks," I said, trying to sound as sincere as the offer called for. "I imagine that I will need all of the official help I can get to unravel the Italian overseas operator." Vishailly smiled for the first time. "And our own local operator as well. She is almost deaf."

I let that one hang.

We walked out together into the sharp air of the night. Overhead, the sky had cleared off and was full of stars. A soft moon was edging up over the faintest line of the mainland to the east. The moon was bright enough to outline the way down the broad street to the rickety scaffolding of stairs leading down to the harbor. We both paused to look down the steep line of cliff at the PBY, caught snuggled against the quay, her wings and the line of the tail outlined in silver. Nestled under one wing was the calque.

"I see that your friend has returned. I will say good night then." Vishailly turned and made his way up the steep street. The conversation in the restaurant and the ethereal quality of the night, now that the bora had died away, all seemed part of a dream and I wondered if I wasn't overtired after the long flight and the hours spent working on the engine. The feeling persisted as I wandered down the street, past goggling, whitewashed buildings well worn by the scouring winter winds and rains and the dry heat of summer.

By the time I reached the PBY Klaus was asleep, stretched out in a sleeping bag in the cargo space. He woke long enough to mutter that Mikhail was staying in the cavern to keep an eye on the equipment. I nodded and undressed to crawl into my own sleeping bag and fell asleep almost instantly.

"The next morning—yesterday, that is—I, went back up to the village and as Vishailly predicted, it proved impossible to get through to Brindisi. We did get through to the mainland and Vishailly used his authority to speak directly to the airport managers in Zagreb and Ljubljana, but without any luck. The Pratt & Whitney field office in Belgrade did manage to come up with a fuel pump that would fit, however, but refused to deliver it. So, Vishailly suggested that I take the morning mail boat to Mostar and catch the night train to Belgrade."

By the time I finished the story, it was nearly five o'clock. Beyond the window, the city was wrapped in the thick winter darkness. The sky had become dull pink as a result of the city lights reflecting from the underside of the clouds and a desultory trickle of snow lent a peaceful aspect to the streets. The sounds of traffic came faintly through the sealed window, but otherwise it was perfectly quiet in the room. Ley swung his legs from the couch and stood up and stretched, then wandered over to the window to stand staring out for a long minute. I remained in my chair, contemplating the last of the gin.

"It is a very interesting story, that you tell . . . and you tell it well." I looked over at him, but said nothing.

"As I told you this morning, it is a story that I find difficult to believe. But, the fact remains that Colonel Mistako is now dead . . . that could be a coincidence .. . that he was killed by two mysterious gunmen for some other reason . . . but I doubt it very much. Also, I believe that you are completely unaware of the reasons behind this, ah, treasure hunt, I believe you could term it."

Ley shrugged and turned away. "As I said, I have no instructions and, therefore, no business remaining in Yugoslavia. It is now their problem and up to my superiors to reopen contact if help is requested. You have answered all my questions as best you are able, in my opinion."

He picked up his coat from the table, slipped it on and headed for the door. Before opening it, he turned to me once more as if to say something, then shook his head.

"For your own sake, I advise you to be careful. This is a dangerous affair you are mixed in. I do not care if you manage to extract the gold from under the noses of the Yugoslav police . . . that is their business. The statute

of limitations on war crimes has expired and Yugoslavia's laws are their own concern. I will, of course, have to report what I learned from you to my superiors, and in due time they will notify the Yugoslav Government . . . a matter of several days. This should not interfere with your activities then. But I caution you again, this affair is that of the NeoNazis, not as you believe a matter of a simple treasure hunt." Ley smiled briefly and left, and I thought I had seen the last of him.

Ley shook me awake as he piloted our ancient carriage down the last stretch of a long hairpin turn that emptied out ahead into a broad, flat plain apparently running on to the Adriatic. We had crossed the Alps, probably faster than it had ever been done before . . . at least in the dead of winter. It was still dark, but the sky was clear and the full moon, starting for the western horizon, lit up the valley. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and focused on my watch; just before six.

"How far to the train wreck?" T croaked out.

Ley chuckled. "So, you are awake. I was thinking that I would have to carry you onto the train; like a baby you were sleeping!"

"Yeah, like a baby," I repeated. "How far to the train wreck?"

"It will not be a wreck, only a delay. Perhaps another five minutes or more. The train should have stopped more than two hours ago. By now, the rail will be almost fixed."

"What if we get there after they fix the rail?"

"They will not leave," he said complacently.

I wriggled around in the narrow seat, trying to stretch some of the numbness out of my stiffening body. Then I took the P-38 out of my pocket and carefully reloaded it with the fresh clip I had taken from Bowen's body.

Ley glanced over at me. "I hope you don't mind," I said in a tone that I hoped would brook no opposition. "I intend to hang onto this." Ley was silent for a moment, concentrating on his driving. "Then you finally believe that your friends are involved in some type of plot to recover this gold cache and use it for purposes of the Neo-Nazi party?"

"Whoa, I haven't said that. Yes, I will admit that something is going on. Whether or not it has anything to do with the gold we are after, I don't know. Somehow, associating with you, I seem to have gotten myself involved. But I do not admit that Klaus or myself are involved in any such Neo-Nazi plot. You still haven't shown me anything but the flimsiest circumstantial evidence."

In fact, I had been giving a great deal of thought to whatever was going on, trying to fit Klaus into it. I had known him for nearly two years now and we were probably each other's closest friends . . . if that is the term you could use to describe our association. I had spent considerable thought the past few hours—whenever events allowed—trying to fit Klaus into the plot that Ley had woven. And, fresh in my memory was Mistako's unofficial skepticism. It didn't necessarily follow that just because he was dead he had been killed by the Neo-Nazis, or that whoever killed him was tied up with our activities on Kornat Island. I had only Ley's word for that, and he was an admittedly prejudiced witness.

But, as I said, I probably knew Klaus better than any

one in the area and I was not sure that he could ever be

involved in anything as wild as this. On the other hand, I couldn't be sure that he would not be. Klaus was a funny guy. Some of the statements he had made in the past, now that I thought about them, would almost lead me to believe that he never really had gotten over his Nazi days. From age ten to thirty his whole life had been given exclusively to the Nazis. You don't break habits learned that young easily. Then again, where did Mikhail fit into all this? Despite what seemed to be his hatred for the Yugoslav Government that he helped create, I think his experience with the Nazis was traumatic enough to make damned sure that he would never co-operate with them in any way, shape or form. But that also went for any government or political movement. Mikhail was an anarchist of the old school, forced to become so by circumstances. I didn'