by Fritz Galt
“Mick?”
He turned around and felt her body against his. The tension of life behind enemy lines showed on her face.
“Yeah?” he said.
“Now that they’ve kicked Bernie out,” her mouth closed in on his, “we might be next.”
“I need Marines at my front door and back door, or I’ll sleep in the chancery,” Mick said as he entered the security bubble.
“I’m not posting Marines outside the embassy compound,” Ed Carrigan replied coolly. “They’re here to protect this facility.”
“I was just chased on foot by an army of hitmen.”
As Chargé d’Affaires at the American Embassy in a crumbling Yugoslavia, Ed produced a rare smile. “Congratulations, Mick. You’re now head of covert operations in the Balkans.”
Mick squeezed his eyes shut. “So this is what the job entails. No wonder Bernie got himself booted.” He slumped into a chair. Things were moving too fast for him that morning.
“We need you to clean up after him,” Ed said.
“Then post a guard,” Mick said.
Ed nodded. “We’ll give you our roving security guy.”
“Zvonko?”
“That’s his name.”
Mick mentally reviewed the past two hours. Alec had been in position to kill him, but for some reason, he did not. God only knew why not. And the man in the woods had aimed a video camera at him, not a gun.
At last, Mick relented. “Okay, we’ll put Zvonko up in our house.”
“And you’ll complete Operation Rinse Cycle.”
Mick focused on the hole left by his boss. “Bernie told me nothing about the operation. I don’t know squat.”
“It’s going down tonight. Let me bring you up to speed.” Ed leaned back in a swivel chair. He was a large man with a broad, intelligent forehead and a shaggy haircut that looked over six months old. “Bernie concentrated on money laundering that circumvented UN sanctions. He was specifically interested in breaking up illegal oil purchases. We’ve been short-staffed since the draw-down two summers ago and had to use economic officers like Harry Kahler.”
“Kahler? Working undercover?”
“Along with some Marines,” Ed admitted.
“Why not just land a U2 spy plane at the airport? What happened to professional tradecraft? The Marines are just young kids. And Harry Kahler…?”
Ed shrugged. “It was Bernie’s call.”
“Putting all our assets at risk over an economic issue?”
“I know that stopping bloodshed and ethnic cleansing is foremost on everyone’s mind, but violation of UN sanctions has widespread implications that reach far beyond the Balkans. The UN’s credibility is at stake. And if we’re successful, we can put real pressure on this regime.”
“Scrap the operation,” Mick said. “I’ve never used Marines before and I never will. They aren’t trained for this, and they’re conspicuous as hell.”
“Detachment Commander Richey has given his consent. If you need any other personnel, discuss it with me first.”
Mick tried to measure Ed’s resolve.
Ed was a mere stand-in for the ambassador. In May three years before, Washington had grown furious over Serbian aggression in Croatia and recalled its ambassador. That left the overworked State Department man to try and hold a band of American diplomats together in a voiceless, toothless mission in a rapidly disintegrating country.
Yugoslavia had shed three of its former republics: Slovenia, Croatia and Macedonia. Meanwhile, Serbia and Montenegro were hanging tough, but the republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina was still fighting for its independence.
In the meantime, the rump Yugoslavia had dismantled its “self-management” system and removed all restraints on capitalism. That had torn the economy, and people’s lives, apart. Factories had closed, apartments were raided and the mafia ran every aspect of the country. Troops and private militias surged into neighboring countries returning with their trucks full and bayonets dripping with blood.
As the CIA’s new Station Chief, Mick had become both Ed’s responsibility and his equal. Ed supplied resources to him, including security, housing and cover. But the Central Intelligence Agency was his boss, and he could seek higher authority. In the end, however, it was not advisable to defy the man under whose roof he lived.
“Okay,” Mick said at last. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“One good piece of news,” Ed said. “You and Natalie will leave post in two weeks.”
Mick’s jaw dropped.
“Let me tell you about a phone call I just received. With Bernie kicked out, the Director of the CIA decided to recall all intelligence assets in Yugoslavia. You’re outta here in two weeks.”
“How about my brother?”
Ed didn’t respond directly. Instead, he reached for a classified cable and put his reading glasses on. “This is just in from our station in Athens. ‘Greek troop movements north. Tank column seen heading into the Greek province of Makedonia.’”
Makedonia was Greece’s northernmost province bearing virtually the same name as the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia.
Greece’s historical claim to the general area was well known. After all, Philip of Macedon and his son, Alexander the Great, were two of Greece’s greatest heroes.
Ed cleared his throat. “Seems like Greece didn’t like what your brother did to the peacekeepers along the Macedonian border with Serbia. Seems they consider Yugoslav incursions into Macedonia a threat to Greek security.”
“I can’t find and stop Alec in two weeks.”
Ed leaned forward and glared over his glasses. “Frankly, your brother is your own business. If he starts another Balkan War, I don’t have any knowledge of his presence. I don’t want the US blamed, incited, or involved. Your people inserted him in here. You get him out. And do it within two weeks.”
Chapter 7
Gypsy Island had once been a proletarian paradise. It had offered open green spaces, fishing holes, soccer fields, sandy beaches and a safe marina.
That night, all Mick saw were drifting hordes of disgruntled war refugees lurking among cardboard lean-tos and metal shacks.
The waterfront mixed the displaced with those eking out a living on the margins of the law. Riverboat restaurants attracted drunken revelers, con artists and prostitutes. It also attracted criminals, who ruled the city streets partly as thugs and partly as national heroes.
Dogs lay on the wharf, their ears propped up and listening.
The island lay along the Old Belgrade side of the Sava River just before it converged with the mighty Danube. Earthen causeways connected the island with the city. No higher than a sandbar in places, the island’s shantytown was often waist-deep in floodwater.
In the stagnant air of frying fish and flotsam, decrepit houseboats creaked against the riverside quay and beckoned to evening strollers. Signs of “Hot Tub,” “Ladies’ Night,” and “Darling,” attracted customers off the wharf and onto the decks. Boats offered brandy, beer, catfish and river trout. Some sought to attract gamblers. Others advertised strip shows inside.
Mick leaned against the wharf’s changing cabin. He didn’t like the setting, the cast of characters or the script. The operation seemed too messy and ill planned. During his career, he had seen too many ops go awry and end in disaster simply because in the planning stages, emotion ruled over reason.
Staff Sergeants Sandy and Tyrone, trained for embassy duty, not undercover work, ambled to the far end of the waterfront. Barely twenty years old, they were ordered there by a Detachment Commander who must have been overcome by the desire for action.
Then there was Economics Officer Harry Kahler. Harry was a corny guy from the Ozarks. He dressed like a raunchy professor, rarely shaved and told off-color jokes. If German marks showed up anywhere along the riverfront that night, Harry would find them.
Mick heard Harry mumbling near the entrance to the wharf and rolling a fistful of Yugoslav dinars in his hands.
Whenever an adv
enturous couple or group of young recruits passed him, Harry stepped out of the shadows of a floating restaurant. “Have any German marks?” he said in Serbian. “Good price.”
The restaurant was a houseboat gaily lit by Christmas lights. A lewd poster hung prominently from the deck. The restaurant name “From Russia with Love” was trite, but most likely accurate. Russian prostitutes were specifically recruited by such business ventures. The owner gave Harry the eye, but probably appreciated the crowd he attracted.
Mick reviewed the plan. The operation was a simple way to plug the flow of foreign money into Yugoslavia.
The fact that racketeers extorted money out of their fellow man didn’t matter to the American Embassy, but the fact that foreign currency permeated the border into gangster-operated banks did. Why? Foreign currency bought oil and weapons and could keep the regime in place forever.
Tracing those mainly European bills back to their source helped the CIA nab conspirators in the West who actively broke UN trade sanctions.
Several known black marketeers ran a scam with Ukraine whereby Ukrainian ships transferred oil to Serbian barges, whose crew paid them in German marks. The UN couldn’t trace the oil back to Ukraine, since the transactions took place in secret somewhere on the high seas. Where the Serbs got their marks was what the CIA wanted to know.
The goal of that night’s operation was to purchase marks, preferably from some bigwig banker, and scan the money under an ultraviolet light.
American operatives in Germany had targeted several Germans they suspected might be illegally sending money to Yugoslavia. At great personal risk, the operatives had intercepted large sums of money that the suspects had withdrawn in Germany. They used a dye that was invisible to the eye to imprint the money with the date and name of the suspect.
If such information glowed under the UV light, Mick and the CIA would know who was breaking the sanctions.
With luck the money would appear that night.
Mick’s job was to watch the shady characters walking the wharf. Harry would pass the marks he obtained to Sandy or Tyrone, who would scan the money with a black light. If Sandy or Tyrone gave Mick the hand-to-the-hat gesture, Mick would follow and identify the character that traded in the tainted marks.
Trailing that person and linking him to the illicit oil trade would round out the story and put the conspirators in Germany behind bars.
Sandy fit the part well. His blond crewcut under a beret wasn’t entirely out of place on the wharf. Tyrone, however, had one critical disadvantage. He was black and stood out in the crowd.
Mick watched them closely. Because the two Marines didn’t speak Serbian, they decided not to speak at all, even to each other. That made for a solemn pair, huddled with their backs to the world smoking cigarettes.
In the meantime, Harry had made a sale. A swank couple stopped by to trade in marks. The man sported an ivory gabardine suit and the woman tottered in spiked heels and wore a black cocktail dress cut high above her knees.
The couple climbed onboard and settled down on folding chairs for a cigarette and drinks. As Sandy and Tyrone advanced on Harry to collect the money, Mick spotted trouble.
A rowdy gang of young men and women sauntered up the concrete wharf. They gathered around Harry.
“I want marks,” one man said to Harry.
Mick edged closer.
“I have dinars,” Harry said. He seemed unfazed by the request.
“Why should I want dinars?” The man spat at Harry’s feet. “I want your marks.” The women at his side tittered nervously.
Sandy and Tyrone couldn’t turn back and stumbled into the group.
“Who are you looking at?” the man sneered into Tyrone’s dark face.
Tyrone looked at Sandy.
“You looked at her,” the man said. “I saw you look at her.”
Tyrone pretended to prattle in some language to Sandy. The two turned away from the group.
“Piece of shit,” the young woman shouted. Her dark eyes flashed and crimson lipstick curled in contempt.
Tyrone knew an insult in any language, and paused.
“Here.” Harry reached into his pocket. “You want marks?”
It was too late. Two men from the group charged Tyrone. Sandy placed himself in front, but Tyrone shouldered him aside.
Mick sprang toward the group.
The two attackers clawed the air as they circled in a crouch.
“Here’s the money,” Harry yelled.
The crowd swelled.
A knife appeared in one man’s hand and glinted against his black leather jacket.
Tyrone didn’t react when they jumped him from both sides.
Sandy tossed one man off Tyrone’s back while Tyrone took his best swing at the man with the knife. The knife sliced his arm and sleeve. Tyrone spun the man around and grabbed him from behind. Even with an injured arm, Tyrone lifted his muscular assailant off the ground.
Mick rushed into the collection of leather jackets, halter-tops and fishnet stockings.
He lunged to grab the knife, but missed as the attacker tossed it to the man behind Tyrone. Mick hit the ground hard, and Tyrone was too slow to turn around. The second goon staggered forward and thrust the knife toward Tyrone’s back.
Mick took another desperate lunge at the blade. His fingers grabbed thin air as the knife plunged deep into the small of Tyrone’s back.
Tyrone reacted as if he had been merely punched. Like a shark shredding bait in its jaws, he lifted the man into the air and twisted him back and forth. The knife flew loose from his back, clattered across the concrete and splashed into the water several yards below.
Tyrone dropped the punk on his head. The man lay prone.
Tyrone turned to take on Sandy’s man.
Mick grabbed Tyrone. “Scram,” he said. “Get outta here.”
He pulled the young Marine away from the crowd. Blood soaked Tyrone’s shirt. “Let’s go to the street. I have a car.”
Tyrone relented and Mick led him on a sprint down a dark roadway through the woods.
Sandy fell in behind them. “What the hell was that all about?”
“Just get to the Jeep. We’ll sort it out later,” Mick said.
“What a pack of losers,” Sandy said. “You showed them.”
“It felt good,” Tyrone shouted into the night. “It felt good.”
When Mick pulled up to the embassy garage fifteen minutes later, Tyrone had developed a cough.
Sandy helped Tyrone out of the front seat while Mick sprinted upstairs to the guard desk. The blond Yugoslav was another longtime embassy employee whom Mick still recognized.
“Is the doctor in the Club?” Mick said in Serbian.
“No, sir.”
“Call him, please.”
The guard dialed John Moore’s home number and handed over the phone.
“A Marine has just been stabbed in the back. We’re at the compound. What should we do?”
“And a good evening to you, too,” John said.
“Right.” Mick tried to relax.
“Is it superficial? Is he bleeding?”
“Deep wound, lower back. Probably internal damage.”
“Damn it. The hospitals have locked us out. Their emergency rooms won’t take Americans.”
“Even the Military Hospital?” Mick had hoped that they could count on some residual good will with the Yugoslav Army.
“Not even them. Bring him up to the Medical Unit.”
“Do you have the equipment you need? Otherwise I can try to bluff my way into a hospital.”
“Who got hurt?”
“It’s Tyrone. We could say he’s a student from the Sudan.”
“Won’t work. Let me call a local physician for backup. I’ll see you in twenty minutes. In the meantime, keep him warm, horizontal and wrapped.”
John, a lean, good-looking and ambitious Regional Medical Officer, had already pulled out his address book.
He dialed a local numb
er and listened to heavy static. Finally, the phone rang on the other end.
“Da?” a man answered.
“Dr. Andjelic, good evening.”
“Good evening, John. You sound tense.”
“We have a critical case at the embassy. A stab wound. Could you give me some help?”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
John set the phone down and took a deep breath. Finally the dull routine of physical checkups and inoculations was broken. He could treat an actual patient.
Then he noticed his wife, Tammy, holding the front door open.
“Drive safely,” she said.
He took the car keys from her gentle hand and gave her a long, meaningful kiss.
Mick stumbled down a dark hall with Ed Carrigan on their way to a secure room. “The doc says that the knife may have bruised Tyrone’s kidney, but that’s all.”
“Thank God.” Ed closed the conference room door behind them and fell into a seat.
“Tyrone will need some bed rest and observation,” Mick said. “In a couple of days, we should move him to Berchtesgaden.”
“Damn it,” Ed said. “He’ll need ground transportation. The airport’s closed as of today.”
“That’s why he needs time to recuperate first. The roads could burst his stitches. He got stuck good.”
“How did he get into a fight?”
“Go easy on him,” Mick said. “Tyrone wasn’t any more prepared for this than a civilian would be. At least he had the combat training.”
“Sometimes I feel so boxed in. There’s a dead end no matter where you turn.”
“I know the feeling,” Mick said. “On the good news front, we found our marks.”
“Huh?”
“The operation worked. The non-medical one. As Harry was standing there watching Tyrone bleed all over the D‑Block Medical Unit, he thought he’d test his take for the day. Sandy still had the ultraviolet light, and the two of them scanned the bills that Harry had collected. And what do you know? One set of bills had the stamp. Believe it or not, the operation worked.”
“Do you know who gave him the bills?”