by Fritz Galt
“Your perfume.” The jasmine drifted swiftly through his memories. It summoned back hot nights in Skopje and refreshing mornings waking up to the sound of robins that chirped from pine trees out her bedroom window. He smiled. “Such nice memories.”
She gave him a sharp look. “I am not a memory.”
Indeed she was not. In fact, she looked more wholesome and vibrant than ever. America had done well to plant her in Macedonia to represent her country.
“I have to be honest,” she confessed. “I was halfway expecting you today.”
That jerked him back to the present. He was a wanted man, wanted by the Serbs and wanted by the CIA. He had run afoul of all authorities in his quest to hunt down the smirking Yugoslav president who had butchered hundreds of thousands in the land he seemed hell-bent on destroying. “I noticed that you didn’t seem surprised on the intercom.”
His eyes flitted around the room. It seemed too quiet for an embassy. Where were the other officers?
She handed him a slip of paper. “A man named Zoran tried to reach you. He left you his phone number in Belgrade.”
Alec took the number. People like Terry shouldn’t be talking with warlords like Zoran. “Mind if I use your phone?”
She was sizing him up. “I don’t think you’ll want to use that phone. It’s bugged.” She grabbed her purse. “Let’s go next door.”
She led him past a spotless reading room where Macedonian locals bent over books and thumbed through magazines. There was no computer terminal in sight. It felt like the ancient past, when everything was on a human scale.
Downstairs, they stepped briefly onto the sidewalk, then dipped into the pastry shop next door. Alec walked up to the counter and ordered a couple of coffees. He remembered Terry’s favorite: “Turkish with loads of sugar.”
“I know. You don’t have to tell me.” The proprietor was a genial Albanian who had served Terry every morning for three years.
While Terry waited for the coffee, Alec walked to the back of the shop and dialed the Belgrade number for Zoran that she had given him. It was a hotel. The operator transferred him to Zoran’s room.
“Did you run into Dragana in Skopje?” Zoran asked.
“Just someone who turned out to be her former grandmother.”
“Spare me the details. What’s happening there?” Zoran sounded bored over the phone.
“Well, I’ve got good news and bad news,” Alec said. “I located Karta, but it’s not here. Dragana is taking it to Mt. Athos.”
“Good. President Nikic is traveling there Saturday.”
“So is the Prime Minister of Greece.” Alec fell back against the plaster wall. “Why’s that good? Dragana forged Karta to whittle the Serbian Kingdom down to the size of a pea.”
“She does have a way about her.”
“It’ll provoke the Serbs.”
“…and the door will open wide for us to invade Macedonia,” Zoran completed the thought.
“So Patriarch Savic’s proclamation with the Greek patriarch is off?”
“New map, new strategy.”
Zoran would win either way. The Serbian and Greek heads of state would meet to carve up Macedonia between them. Who knew how many Macedonians and Albanians in Macedonia would be run out of their homes, their lands seized, their daughters violated and their young men sent to extermination camps? “I can see that you have things well in hand. I guess you won’t need me any longer.”
“Take a vacation,” Zoran said. “You’ve been chasing your own tail for too long.”
Alec looked across the shop at the pretty young Miss Whitcomb, who leaned against the pastry counter and chatted with the owner.
“Shouldn’t I go to Athos, too? I know some people at the consulate in Thessaloniki. They can get me onto Athos.”
“Why would we need you there? Take a long break.”
Alec was about to respond when he saw shadows race up to the pastry shop window.
He dropped the phone and lunged for Terry. He grabbed her without explanation and pulled her to the rear of the shop.
Bullets sprayed the front window. It shattered like a waterfall of glass.
The shop’s owner shrieked. Then someone barked out military orders in English. Three men in black masks and turtlenecks jumped through the shattered window with their assault rifles drawn.
Alec lifted a metal chair with one hand and hurled it across the shop. It bounced off the coffee cups on the counter and knocked the assailants off balance.
He pulled Terry through a door and bolted it shut. They were in a pitch-black room that smelled of flour.
“They’re going to kill us,” Terry squealed.
“No kidding. You tipped ’em off.”
“I didn’t think they’d actually do it.”
“You led me into a trap.”
“I didn’t want them messing up the library.”
“Smart thinking. Knock me off in a pastry shop.”
He found a back door and pressed the handle. There was no reaction on the other side, so he gave the door a sudden heave.
They flew out into a sunny alleyway. As Alec pulled Terry after him, they both seemed to realize that somewhere along the line, she had turned into his hostage.
“Where’s your car?” he whispered harshly.
She was hyperventilating and couldn’t speak.
“Just show me.”
She pointed to a car behind the library. It was a red Corvette, with its convertible roof open.
“Throw me the keys.”
She dug them out of her purse.
“I can’t talk,” she whispered hoarsely.
“Good. It’s better that way.”
Within seconds, he had strapped her well-proportioned body into the passenger seat and locked the door. She could still get out, so he found a ten-pound chunk of rock and raised it overhead.
“Sorry about this.”
She cringed as he let the rock drop.
His aim was perfect. It knocked the nub off the door lock, thus preventing her from escaping.
“Hey! That’ll cost you,” she said, finding her voice.
He sprinted around the car and gunned the engine to life. Then he wheeled out of the parking lot. “Which way to Greece?”
“Turn left.”
“How far is it?”
“Go straight, and you’ll be there for dinner. You can just let me off here.”
At least she still had her sense of humor.
“You can choose the restaurant,” he offered instead.
“Can I decline?”
“Not really, but don’t consider this a kidnapping.”
“Then how come it feels like one?”
He stroked his chin. “We have some time. Let me explain a few things to you.”
Chapter 31
“What’s this?” Alec picked up a slim black device attached to the dashboard.
“A car phone.”
“Cool. Can you dial the embassy in Belgrade?”
Terry took the phone, punched in a dozen digits and shoved it in his face. He grabbed the phone and listened as he steered the car south with his other hand.
“Da?” a male voice answered.
Alec had expected an American operator. “Who’s this?”
“Captain Prokic speaking.”
“Isn’t this the American Embassy?”
“Not any longer.” The phone went dead.
He turned to Terry. “What’s with the embassy in Belgrade?”
“What embassy? They evacuated four days ago.”
He shook his head. Why was he always the last to learn these things?
He thought about the evacuation for a moment. What made the Americans leave? Americans and Serbs had had historically strong relations, stemming back to both world wars. He contemplated several possibilities: security, political protest and the potential bombing of Belgrade.
“Why do you think they evacuated?” he finally asked.
“Maybe it has so
mething to do with Serbia moving troops into Macedonia,” Terry said.
“They did?”
“They will soon enough. They’re massing at the border.” She looked at him and frowned. “What century are you living in, anyway?”
He stared straight ahead as the road ran up to thickly forested mountains. “I need to reach Mick.”
“Don’t look at me. He’s your brother. I wouldn’t know where to start looking for him.”
“Let’s start with the Yugoslav desk at Langley. Only, you call.”
Within seconds Terry was talking to a duty officer. “Wake up over there. This is Skopje. Patch me through to Mick Pierce.”
Alec guided the car upward through a patch of mist. The top of the mountain would be the southern border with Greece.
She handed him the phone.
“Mick Pierce, here.”
“What the hell are you trying to do to me?” Alec shouted into the car phone. They swept through a tall stand of pines near the mountain pass. “A truckload of hitmen just tried to gun me down at the embassy in Skopje.”
“I swear I didn’t have anything to do with that.”
“Then who did?”
“The man you want to ask is Lance Pickett.”
So Mick took no blame for Alec’s dire circumstances. That was true to form. “Pickett? Your friend, the head of the Directorate of Operations?”
“One and the same. He has been eager to get the Company out of Eastern Europe.”
“Over eager, I’d say.”
“Listen,” Mick whispered. “I’m here to protect you.”
“I don’t need your protection,” Alec said. “You’re just messing everything up.”
He peered at a row of booths growing visible in the mist. He had reached the border with Greece. It was nice to think that his brother was on his side. Maybe Mick could prove it by authorizing them to cross the border. “Where exactly are you, Mick?”
“I’m with Natalie at the embassy in Bulgaria.”
“Well, that’s certainly useful.”
For some reason, the Macedonian border guards had abandoned their posts. In the eerie quiet, he pulled through empty booths and onto a patch of no-man’s land.
“Look, I feel like I created this whole mess,” Mick went on.
“Not only did you create this mess, you’re making it worse. Now call off the attack dogs.”
“I’ll send the word up the line,” Mick assured him.
Then Alec saw it. The Greek military had a division of tanks in a kilometer-long column waiting to cross the border. The Greek border guard held up a hand for him to stop. He pulled to a halt.
“Listen, if you want to do something useful,” Alec said, “get me across this border. I’m a wanted man, I don’t have any documentation, and I’ve run out of assets. I don’t dare show my face at another American government installation, and the Greeks have a line of tanks pressed against my nose.”
“Right. You’re at the Greek border. Put them on the line.”
“Passports,” the guard said. The rifle in Alec’s face was hardly welcoming.
“American Government,” Alec said, and handed the car phone over to the man.
It took a few minutes for the guard to sort things out with Mick. Then he disappeared into his booth to place a call up his chain of command. The soldiers who blocked the car watched every move Alec and Terry made. At last the guard came back and waved them through.
Alec pulled forward and eased around the tanks. They began to pass tank after tank. Outfitted in full battle gear, the troops looked tense.
Alec grabbed the phone. “That worked. Thanks, bro. Now I need another favor. Get me onto Mt. Athos.”
“Hey, I might be powerful, but I’m not a god. The place requires the church’s permission. And it’ll be a military fortress come tomorrow when the Yugoslav president and Greek prime minister meet there.”
“That’s precisely why I need to go.”
“Alec, I’m afraid if you show your face on Athos, the entire CIA will be held responsible once war breaks out. You’re already complicit in this business.”
“You sound like one of them.”
“That’s because I am one of them. And everybody’s going to associate you with them, too.”
“How could they? Our association ended the moment you and the troops blew out of Srebrenica and left the town and all the refugees, not to mention my girlfriend and me, stranded there to face the Serbs.”
“Okay, so the rest of the world has failed you. I have personally failed you. Now let’s get on with our lives.”
“This is how I’m getting on with my life.”
“And what do you expect to do on Mt. Athos?”
“I’m packing a gun. The Yugoslav president will finally be exposed. You fill in the details.”
Mick paused. “You’re going after Miroslav Nikic, the Butcher of the Balkans? Admirable, but insane.”
“What does sanity have to do with it? This is the Balkans.”
“Listen, Alec. I can get you onto Mt. Athos under one condition.”
“What?”
“You go there to find out what the hell is going down between Yugoslavia and Greece, and you don’t kill the president.”
“I can’t guarantee that.”
“Consider this. You think the Company is after you now. If you instigate another Balkan War by knocking off the Yugoslav president…”
Alec was quiet for a long time. All he could hear was the whoosh of his tires and the sharp flapping sound of wind in his hair. “Okay,” he relented. “I’ll ditch the gun. I just need to get there and find out what’s going down.”
“That’s the idea. Now how can I trust you?”
“Do you have any choice?”
“Not really. Nor do you. If you cross me, so help me, I’ll step out of the way and let the Company go after you.”
“Fair enough.”
“So,” Mick went on, “I want hard evidence of what he’s up to. And I want you to contact me as soon as you can. I want taped conversations, written agreements, corroborating evidence, anything you can lay your hands on that’ll bring an indictment against President Nikic at the War Crimes Tribunal. So far we have zip.”
“I’ll get what I can.”
“Now,” Mick said. “Where are you headed?”
Alec hesitated. He still wasn’t sure he could trust his brother. But if it weren’t for Mick, he’d be in the custody of Greek border guards.
He dropped the phone into his lap and turned to Terry. “You heard our conversation. We need to go to Mt. Athos.”
She pointed out a road sign to Kavalla. “Turn here.”
He picked up the phone. “Looks like we’re going to Kavalla, Greece.”
“I know where it is,” Mick said. “We have a VOA transmitter there. What’s your handle these days?”
“Call me Sledgehammer.”
“Okay, Mr. Hammer. Look for Scott Powers tomorrow. And Alec? I’m glad we had this talk.”
Alec hung up thoughtfully. How strange that Mick did something helpful for once.
Mick handed the phone back to the Marine at Post One in Sofia and sat down.
“Are you okay, honey?”
It was Natalie leaning over the counter and examining him with concern.
He smiled faintly. “Better than I ever thought possible.”
He remained seated for a long time before using the phone again. He had to reach his contact at the American Consulate in Thessaloniki, northern Greece.
The Marine handed the phone back.
“Scott, this is Mick,” he said once the call went through.
“Mick. Holy cripes. I thought you quit years ago.”
“I did. Now I’m back.”
“Well, what can I do for you?”
“We’re in big trouble. Langley has a warrant out on my brother. You probably have standing orders to shoot him on sight. I need you to give him a break. In fact, you’ve got to help him out.”
“I’ve seen the orders. What has he done?”
“We’ve uncovered the biggest conspiracy since the Bosnian War. The Company wants no part of it and doesn’t want it pinned on them. Then along comes Alec trying to stop the war on his own. That’s all Langley needs, a former operative run amok. The fact is, I’ve engaged him to defuse the plot.”
Scott Powers sighed. “I guess I’ve got to trust you on this. What can I do for him?”
“Meet him in Kavalla. His handle is Hammer. He’s with Terry Whitcomb, the Center Director in Skopje. He’ll need both you and your boat.”
“This is entirely off the record?”
“Right. I’ll try to get down there by late tomorrow.”
“This one’s for you, Mick.”
Mick hung up and sighed with relief. Then he turned to the Marine.
“Can you put me through to the monastery at Ravanica, Yugoslavia?”
“Curse these bloody roads,” Jack Hamlin said between his teeth.
The Jaguar’s headlights fell on numerous potholes on the Bulgaria-Yugoslavia road.
Once in Yugoslavia, the gorge dropped straight into the frothy Nisava River. A railway carved through the opposite embankment. The highway dodged in and out of coal-black tunnels. His headlights barely illuminated the smudges of pedestrians flattening against the walls.
As the valley opened up, his headlights fell on half-built houses, makeshift restaurants and tire repair places. A small black Bulgarian car was peddling goods to a horde of locals. Under the light of the stars, two horses pulled a hay wagon.
He met his first Yugoslav military checkpoint at the bypass to the town of Pirot. A young soldier flagged him down.
“Diplomat,” Jack shouted out his window, and the soldier waved him through.
Over the next three hours, he encountered every combination of militia, police, armored personnel carriers and tanks. He gripped the steering wheel so hard he could barely move his fingers.
Five hours after leaving Sofia, he saw a pink glow on the horizon. Belgrade was the gravitational center of Serbia, and he had felt its pull as far away as Kladovo. Soon he was passing in front of dimly lit apartment buildings.
Mick Pierce’s directions had been flawless. Jack drove through the restful woods of the Dedinje section and pulled directly into Gerard Vaillant’s driveway. A local guard took his name, made a call, then let him enter the grounds of the French diplomat.