THE HEART OF DANGER (34 page)

194

that had been worthwhile. She had captured him, with her taunt

beckoning, with the laugh of her lips and cheeks. That horrid young

woman, he would have loved her. Penn wanted to be near to Rosenovici

before darkness. That angel, he would have loved her. He had put

down

the book because there was not enough light through the window for

him

to read more. He was still cold. The Headmaster sat in his chair.

He

was hunched, bowed, with a blanket of thick wool across his shoulders,

and he rubbed hard at his upper thighs to put warmth in them. All

through the day he had been cold. His trousers, soaked from the

wading

of the river at the ford that was not guarded by the scum boys of

the

militia, could not be hung on the line to dry outside in the day's

spring sunshine. It would have invited suspicion to have displayed

his

wet trousers for the village to see. His shoes, mud-caked, could

be

left, discreetly, at the kitchen door because no one from the village

now came to their house, that much was guaranteed. The plague was

on

his house, but his trousers would have been seen from the road and

his

wife had not complained to him, just laid them wet and filthy over

the

wood frame in front of the kitchen stove. Although he shivered, he

felt a sense of true liberation. It had been good to pray in that

place of evil, kneeling in the mud, crying silently for the

forgiveness

of them all. He did not think it an idiocy, which was what his wife

had said it was, that he had waded the ford to go to pray in that

place

of evil ... He made out a movement through the window, the hurrying

walk of villagers going towards the crossroads near the church. He

stood up from the chair and pressed his face against the cold glass

and

craned to see where the villagers went, hurrying. He saw the white

jeeps stopped near the church, and he saw, in a blur, the Canadian

policeman who had promised to bring him books for his school in return

for the sharing of his secret, and the Political Officer who was an

educated man. He felt his strength because he had prayed in that

place

of evil, knelt in that muddied pit that shamed them all, and he would

wade the ford again that night, ask again for their forgiveness, pray

195

again that the guilty would face harsh retribution. He knew that

some,

a few, had the courage to stand up because he had heard it on the

foreign radio. There were some, a few, who had sheltered and hidden

their neighbours, Croat or Muslim. There were some, a few, who had

stood against the tide and shouted against the barbarism of the

concentration camps and the killings and the digging of graves in

the

dark silence. It was worth praying for, harsh retribution for the

guilty. The Headmaster climbed the stairs of his house. It was

right,

when he went to see the UNCIVPOL Canadian and the Political Officer,

that he should wear his suit. "We have a job to do, and the job is mandated by the office of the Secretary General of the United Nations

.. ." The Political Officer was Finnish, but it was many years since he had lived in the family home at Ivalo, up north by the Arctic

Circle, close to the Russian border, and many years since he had

served

in the offices of the Foreign Ministry, down south in Helsinki. The

Political Officer was a United Nations man, had been for seventeen

years. He did not know whether he had offended a particular

dignitary,

whether he had made waves where oil should have been poured, but

following an investigation that he had led into the use of United

Nations facilities by the families of diplomats accredited to New

York,

he had been shipped overseas. His wife's home, where she was with

the

children, was New Jersey. His home, where he was alone, was the spa

town of Topusko. Perhaps it was his penance, for digging too deep

into

claimed expenses, that he was posted to Topusko in Sector North.

"When

you hinder me, then you hinder the world. It is a great conceit for

a

little man to hinder the humanitarian efforts of the world community

..

."

The Political Officer had come to Salika to offer what he called

'moral

weight' to the efforts of the Canadian and Kenyan police officers.

He

used big language, and he recognized that his words fell empty.

"You should know, Mr. Stankovic, that each obstruction of our work 196

is

logged and filed. If I were in your position, Mr. Stankovic, I

would

be unhappy that my actions had attracted so many reports .. ."

"Go get the shit out of here."

He regarded the man as a brute. The Political Officer's training

was

in the quiet world of diplomats and bureaucrats and functionaries.

He

assumed that he was regarded as a dull man at cocktails and poor

company at the dinner parties of the social circuit, but he believed

himself to be a man of rectitude and decency. Because of what he

believed himself to be, any meeting with Milan Stankovic, was

personal

pain .. . and there were so many like men scattered among each valley

of the area that he covered from the spa town of Topusko. The length

of Bosnia, the width of Croatia, there had been atrocities and graves

dug, through the length and the width there were thousands of old

women, old men, washed-up debris on a shore, who died alone for the

want of a parcel of food brought in secrecy ... He made the point

of

calling this one by the title of "Mister', little victories were hard to come by and Mister Stankovic always wore military fatigues.

"We have the right of free access anywhere in this territory .. ."

"You go where I say, only where I say. I say you get the shit out."

Nothing of his upbringing in Ivalo had prepared him for confrontation

with the likes of Mr. Milan Stankovic, nor for the others similar

to

him who ruled over similar villages. Nothing of his short work in

the

Foreign Ministry in Helsinki had prepared him, nor anything in the

hushed corridors beyond the Secretary General's inner sanctum.

Once, a

year after his posting to New York, jogging with his wife and his

three

children at night in Central Park, he had met such a beast, seen a

knife, handed over his wallet and his credit cards from the pouch

at

his waist. It had been his only experience of the beasts before

coming

to Topusko. But that beast had gone, running for bushes and shadows

197

and cover, had not stayed in conceit to confront the weakness of him

and his family ... He knew the Headmaster by sight, for conversation,

and he saw him coming up the road behind Stankovic. There was always

a

curious undressed look about a man without the spectacles that were

habitual to him. The Headmaster had twice offered him a game of

chess,

but there had never been the opportunity. There were deep

orange-blue

bruises on the Headmaster's face, and welt scars on his cheeks, and

the

lower lip was split and angry.

"We have a file on you, Mr. Stankovic, that grows more thick each

week. I promise you, from the depths of my heart, that we are not

stupid men. We have the file .. ."

The hand was on the holster, fiddling for the locking button of the

flap.

"We have a file. Maybe you will be an old man when the file is

presented to an examining magistrate. You are one of those, Mr.

Stankovic, who tells me loudly that Serbs and Croats can never again

live together I tell you, never is a long time. My experience, Mr.

Stankovic, those who shout loudest that there can never be

reconciliation are those who hide the greatest guilt .. ."

But the pistol was out of the holster. The Political Officer rated

his

file as a puny weapon when set against the Makharov pistol. The

pistol

was armed. The clatter of the metal parts seared at him. For

seventeen years he had believed in the power, glory, authority, of

the

blue flag. The reality was a loaded pistol on a village road. There was a shout from beside the Canadian policeman's jeep, a wiry little

man in camouflage fatigues trying to peer past the bulk of the

Kenyan's

body and into the back of the jeep. He said in his reports that went

to the desk of the Director of Civilian Affairs for on-passing to

the

Secretariat in New York that there was so much cruelty, so much fear,

and his power of intervention was so minimal. Milan Stankovic was

striding away towards the jeep, and the Headmaster had reached him.

"My friend, what happened to you .. , ?" The question of a fool.

198

The small piece of paper was put in his hand. He was told it was

a

prescription for the lenses of spectacles.

"We will have them made, my promise, we will bring them to you. Was it

him that did that to you .. . ?" The question of an idiot.

The Headmaster shrugged, turned away.

They had the door of the jeep open, and the Canadian and the Kenyan

were blocked from intervention by the rifles. He saw the bag lifted

out and held high, and passed to the hands of Milan Stankovic. It

was

because of the bag that he had come to Salika with the two policemen,

and the Political Officer had believed he possessed the seniority

to

argue his way through the roadblocks that curtained Rosenovici. The

face of Milan Stankovic was in front of him, and the face was contorted

in hatred. The white plastic bag was held up. The three cartons

of

milk were tipped out and each one in turn was stamped on. The three

loaves of bread were kicked, as footballs, across the road and into

the

rainwater ditch, and the cheese and the ham, and the apples from the

kitchens of the hotel at Topusko where he had his room.

Another failure.

Failure was the reality of the power, glory, authority, of the blue

flag.

He had good control of his voice, did not raise it. "What, Mr.

Stankovic, is a war crime? The killing of the wounded after the

finish

of a battle is a war crime .. . Who, Mr. Stankovic, is a war criminal?

The leader of the men who killed the wounded after the finish of a

battle .. . Do you sleep well, Mr. Stankovic, in your bed? Each

night

I add to the file .. ."

"Get the shit out, and stay out."

Another failure.

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The Political Officer could not see in the face of Milan Stankovic

if

there was guilt or shame or fear. He hoped they came, journeyed to

the

beast in the quiet of the night, gnawed at him. It was all he could

hope for, that the brute's face would, one day, quiver in guilt, shame

or fear, one day .. .

He was losing time.

With the lost time came impatience.

Penn wanted to be close up to Rosenovici before the total darkness

came

down on the woodland of birches.

With the impatience came arrogance.

The wire line that marked the perimeter of the minefield ran away

to

his left and seemed to reach as far as the edge of the tree line.

If

he were to skirt the mines going left then he estimated that he would

have to break the cover of the trees, and he reckoned there was still

sufficient light for his movement to be seen. He looked up to the

right and the barbed wire stretched away to a rock wall. To go round

the minefield, going right, he would have to backtrack and then climb

the cliff, and that would be serious delay. He wanted to be close

up

to Rosenovici .. . Penn could see the evidence of the mines.

The trees were thinly spaced here, as if they had been coppiced within

the last five years, and there was room for armoured personnel

carriers

or tracked vehicles to power between the tree stumps of the old

harvesting.

The evidence of the mines was from their antennae.

It was his impatience and his arrogance that led him to step over

the

barbed wire line. The antennae, as far as Penn could see, were laid

out in straight lines. The antennae of the mines were eighteen

inches

high, reaching to just below his knee cap. Penn had never been on

a

200

course, not for a weekend and not for half an hour, on mines. It

was

pretty obvious to an impatient and arrogant man, a man running late,

that the mines with the antennae were developed to catch the

undersurface of a vehicle chassis if the wheels or tracks rolled

clear.

He could step out briskly, and ahead of him was better light to tell

him that the last of the woodland was near. There would be better

light because a field was ahead, and if the map of Alija was correct,

if she had drawn it with accuracy, then the village of Rosenovici