The Untouchable (43 page)

He knew about the brother, Knut, who had hanged himself aged sixteen, twelve years before as an escape from the demon depression' of the winter's darkness.

She told him everything and asked him nothing. Her life cascaded over him. It was so rare for him to be treated to such trusting, personal confidences. Then, when she had finished with the Lofoten Islands, and the hanging of her brother, she switched effortlessly to her career working with refugees in Somalia and East Timor, Mozambique and Kosovo; he knew where Kosovo was, had a vague idea of where Somalia and Mozambique were positioned on the African continent, but had never heard of East Timor. He didn't like to display his ignorance, thought it lessened him. He didn't want to be small in her eyes.

They turned off the main road and the jeep began to bump up a rough track. 'You are all right, Mr Packer?'

'I'm fine, I'm really enjoying myself.'

'I am not talking too much?'

'Not at all You fascinate me. You make me think that I've led a very sheltered life . . . Everyone calls me Mister. I'd like you to, please.'

She pulled a face, then she giggled. 'It is a very strange name but it that is what you w a n t . . . We are nearly there. The village is called Visnjica. You will remember that? Visnjica in Opstina Kiseljak.'

Mister said, didn't think about it, 'They all sound the same to me, these names.'

'But you must remember the name and the district Mister. Surely, when you go home, you will tell the charities who have made the gift where their generosity has gone. It is important, surely.'

'Yes,' Mister said. 'It is important.'

On the yellowed grass between the track and a small river, in spate, were the heavy tyremarks of the military vehicles parked up. He saw armoured personnel carriers, flying the German flag, an ambulance and jeeps. Beyond them, over the river, above the trees where snow was scattered, two heavy helicopters hovered, then descended.

'Typical of the Germans to strike completely the wrong note. We are trying to tell frightened people that it is safe to come back to their homes. The people have been the victims of war, perhaps the most savage Europe has seen, and we are telling them that the danger is over. But this is the area of responsibility of the German military, and they have VIPs coming by the helicopters and it is necessary for them to make a show. They are so clumsy, so bovine . . . In Norway we do not have a good experience of the Germans.'

She left the driver with the jeep. They walked into the village, a long ribbon of scattered buildings that stretched up the hill on both sides of the track. Behind them the helicopters disgorged generals, men in suits and women in smart dresses. Some houses showed no war damage, cattle bellowed from the barns behind them, and smoke puffed from the chimneys. But most were destroyed, their roofs sunk between the four upstanding walls, the undergrowth high around and inside them. A few had bright new tiled roofs and new walls of red brick or concrete blocks, new windows and doors, and washing draped in front of them. Men, women and children walked from them towards the track and formed a thin line of welcome.

' The village, before the war, was home to Croats and Muslims It is easy, Mister, to believe the war was only made by Serbs. The Croats were as bad as the Serbs They waited until the Muslims were defenceless then attacked them. Before the war there were three hundred Muslim families here, and sixty Croat families then there was the ethnic cleansing. The Muslims were expelled, their houses were destroyed -

not m lighting but by explosives after they had gone.

Most went toGermany, but they have been expelled again, so they try to return to their old homes and to live beside their old neighbours, who became their enemies. Of three hundred, we now have the first twenty families back. They find their homes have been looted, everything of value has been taken, and is now inside the houses that are not damaged-TVs, stoves, baths, bulbs, even the electric wires, and the cattle, sheep and goats. It is not easy, but my job is to help to rebuild the relations between neighbours.'

Women with small children and babies, and old men With dulled laces, stood in a knot outside a square set building, that had no roof, no glass in the tall windows, and a wide hole where the door should have been They had their backs to the ruin as if it did not exist The women wore old coats against the chill, and the wind snatched .at their headscarves; the men wore berets and thick sweaters, had weathered faces that were expressionless, and the children stared back at Mister and held limply to toys. In the field beside the building were short, freshly painted white pegs.

'It could have been worse, Mister. If it had not been for your generosity I do not think they would have come out of their houses to see the VIPs. The coats scarves, sweaters and toys came from Bosnia with Love. At least they are warm, and the little ones have something to amuse them. It is too much, I am sorry, to expect them to smile, but at least they have come

. . . The building is their mosque. It was not a military target, it was destroyed by their neighbours as an act of vandalism, and the graveyard, all the stones were smashed with sledge-hammers and pickaxes. In such circumstances, it takes great courage and determination to come home. If I ask the Croats who live here, who today hide, who destroyed the mosque, they will tell me it was outsiders who came, criminal scum, under the control of warlords. Perhaps in Sarajevo you have heard of the Muslim scum - Caco, Celo, Serif. The Croats had Tuta and Sela. The Serbs had many criminals - Arkan and Selsjek. I am not supposed to hate, it does not fit with the principles of the UNHCR, but I loathe those scum - they've sucked the blood from good, decent, simple people.'

There was a desultory clapping behind them. She held his arm, did it naturally and without premeditation, and turned him round. The uniforms, suits and smart-styled women were glad-handing their way up the track and through the village. Women were nodded to, men's shoulders were slapped, the babies'

cheeks were tweaked in the show of solidarity. He watched the cameras. It was an event. Earnest conversations started up and lasted long enough to be recorded and witnessed on film. A little scrum had developed at the front of the VIPs, and a sergeant of the German army, red-faced, attempted to push back the cameras and microphones, succeeded, then was outflanked to the right, drove the right back, and was outflanked to the left. Twice when he thought a lens was aimed towards him, that he would figure in the background of a picture, Mister did what was reflex to him and presented his back to them.

'We have to have them here because we need the publicity Id go round the world. The need for money for these people has to be reinforced with the pictures and the interviews - but it is degrading. They take the dignity from people. How can people talk, with honesty, about their situation when they have a camera in one nostril and a microphone in the other?

The media has no discipline. They are like frogs, slimy frogs, and you collect them in a bucket but as you put one in another slips out.'

They were both laughing. It was their own moment, and private. She took his hand. She was holding his hand as they laughed, and their faces were close, and he saw the while cleanness of her teeth and the tan of her skin. She led him further up the hill.

Mister let her hold his hand.

The shutter clattered on automatic. Through the viewfinder, using the 300mm lens, Joey watched them laughing and holding hands. Eight frames, or nine, and then his view of them was obscured by the old mill building above the stream. He lay on his stomach, crushing down last autumn's fall of leaves, and huddled behind the camera.

'What other charities, Mister, do you help?'

'Well, bits and pieces.'

'You can tell me - I admire your modesty. Too many people boast. Tell me.'

'I do things for a hospice. You know what a hospice is? Yes? I help them . . . I put a roof on a church

'Is that your life, Mister? Helping in Bosnia, helping in a hospice, helping a church?'

'Well, not entirely.'

She squeezed his hand. He felt the warmth of her smile.

'Come on.'

In the distance he heard the helicopter rotors start to turn. They'd barely been on the ground half an hour. The VIPs, in a slithering column, retraced their way through the village, and the media were boarding buses. The villagers drifted from the track and meandered in little groups towards the few rebuilt homes. He was surprised the visit had been so short, and she must have read his thoughts. She told him that it was important the visitors were not bored, were enthusiastic, went back to their offices and wrote the reports that would bring in more donations from their governments.

Children now surrounded the two of them as they walked along a mud-packed path. With one hand she held Mister's, with the other a child's. He saw the way they touched her, pinched at her coat sleeve, gripped the hem of her anorak, and he saw the love in her face for them. They went towards a narrow plank bridge spanning the stream. He felt the little tickle in his trailing hand and looked down sharply. A small boy had reached to take the trailing hand. Mister was about to reject him, snatch his own hand away. He'd never allowed his sisters' children to get close to him. His sisters always scolded their children if they came close to him and told them not to 'bother' their uncle. He knew nothing of the trust of children. He let the small boy take his trailing hand as they went across the loose-fastened planks of the bridge. A little girl came behind the boy and took his free hand for the bridge crossing, and Mister saw the upturned tag of her anorak; Marks & Spencer, a cast-off. As he came off the bridge, still holding the little boy's hand, Monika looked at him and winked. She approved. He could not remember the last time that pleasure and pride had coursed through him at such a small thing. She took him to a house.

'They have no electricity, only heating-oil for the fire and a gas can for the stove. A little paraffin is given them each month for light. If we get more people back, have more homes for them to move into, we can pressure the authorities to spend money and restore the electricity supply. There are three families living here, nineteen people. Work has been done on the ground floor, but not yet upstairs because they are waiting for more building materials to be brought. It is not possible for them to buy the materials themselves because they have no work, no money, but at least they are, again, in their homes . .. How many bedrooms do you have in your house, Mister?'

'Five.'

'How many people?'

'My wife and myself.'

They went inside. He hovered behind her, and she was greeted like a true friend. He saw in the gloom two of the boxes, unpacked, on which were scrawled Bosnia with Love. Leading to the one table were mud smears across the bare concrete floor. An old man sat in a chair near to the table and smoked; his pullover bore the woven insignia of the Edinburgh Woollen Mill and crossed golf clubs under the stitched writing, and he smoked as if that were the luxury left to him.

There was a line of institution beds, with metal frames, dull blankets. The little girl careered away and bounced onto a bed, but the small boy kept hold of Mister's hand. The women were of all ages, but only old men were crowding into the room. The child wanted, Mister thought, to hold the hand of his father

. . . There were four bedrooms always empty at his home by the North Circular Road. His father visited, occasionally, but would not stay over. His mother had never slept in his house. He and the Princess had no friends they would have invited, nor her father and mother. They never entertained in the dining room with the big mahogany table and the matching set of eight chairs. If it was necessary to entertain, for business, he went to a restaurant, the Mixer arranged a private room at the back, a Card sat in the kitchen and another stood at the private room's door. He had so many bedrooms. He had hotel bedrooms and service accommodation bedrooms and time-share bedrooms.

He had more bedrooms in Cyprus, the South of France, on the Spanish coast and in the Caribbean and

. . . He had the money to rebuild the village and bring every man, woman and child back to it and to dress all of them in Armani or Yves St Laurent, to give them electricity, plumb in the sewage, put boards and carpets under their feet and curtains at their windows, to build a factory for them, and to bring them pedi-gree cattle. If he had done that he would not have noticed the loss.

He was served coffee. To Mister it was bitter and the sludge at the bottom of the tiny cup caught between his teeth. It was the coffee of Green Lanes that he drank in the spieler cafes with the Turks, and he was practised in hiding his disgust as he drank. A dog-eared set of cards was cut. The stakes for the game were used matches, plucked from a filled ashtray and Mown on to remove the tobacco dust. It wasn't easy lor him to play, and twice he grimaced at Monika, The small boy held his hand, would not let go of it. He played, and the time slipped away. He made certain he was never the winner. At home, in London, he would never be a loser, and not a loser in the old city of Sarajevo when he played the high-stakes game with Serif, whom she called criminal scum. He lost the matches he had been given. She was at the far end of the room, with the women, and she glanced al him, lapped the face of her watch.

They went out into the dusk. It was only when they left that Mister realized a crowd had gathered in the room and outside the door to watch him fail at cards, and lo he close to her. She kissed many cheeks, he shook the many hands pressed on him.

On the slippery path he took her fingers so that she would not fall. It was an excuse. She wore good walking boots, he had smooth leather-soled shoes.

They went across the bridge, clung to a handrail that was a slack strand of rope, and walked on the track down through the village. The shells of the burned-out houses remained in darkness. Brighter lights shone out from the undamaged homes where the generator engines thudded and where uncovered windows showed the flicker of television pictures