by Andy McNab
‘Can’t wait.’
We started down the track.
‘If it gets really fucked up and we have to split, we’ll meet up where we turned into the forest. For fuck’s sake, don’t go too far into the treeline – it could be mined. I’ll do the same, see if we can link up. If that doesn’t happen in six hours, we’re on our own.’
Jerry nodded slowly. ‘In the cave, I never thought I’d get this far, man. I’m still shitting myself.’
I delved into what was left of my PVC coat pocket. ‘You still got the pistol mags?’
He nodded as I passed him the Daewoo. ‘Seeing as your old mate Osama has obviously shown you how to use the fucking thing.’
Salkic’s directions were spot on. Six hundred metres later, the track was blocked by two giant wooden hedgehogs. ‘Heads up, here we go.’
As we got closer, Jerry spread both his hands on the dashboard. Good move. We wanted them in full view of any nervous people with weapons.
I followed Salkic’s instructions to the letter; stopped, left the lights on, engine running.
The two hedgehogs had been laid out to create a chicane that would just about take the van between them. I couldn’t see a thing ahead of it, just the track continuing a short way, then disappearing into the darkness.
Jerry stared into the void. ‘What now?’
‘Just as he said. We wait.’
I began to wind down my window. Before I even got half-way, there was movement in the treeline to my left. A powerful torch beam hit the side of my face. I kept my hands on the wheel and my eyes straight ahead.
‘Ramzi?’
‘No Ramzi. Nick Stone.’
The voice from the trees was immediately joined by others, muttering a whole lot of stuff I didn’t understand. I could feel the engine chugging away through the steering-wheel, and made sure my hands didn’t move off it.
A group of men stepped out of the forest. They were dressed in a ragbag of uniforms: American BDUs, German parkas, tall leather boots, a variety of furry hats. Every one of them carried an automatic weapon.
Both doors were pulled open. We were hauled out of our seats and round the front of the vehicle, where they could have a good look at us in the headlights. But it didn’t feel like we were prisoners: we were controlled rather than dragged.
I kept my arms straight out in a crucifix position, and started shaking with the cold as they removed my bumbag and ran their hands over me. I saw my AK lifted out of the VW. A voice kept talking to me in Serbo-Croat, but the only word I understood was ‘Ramzi’.
I tried my best to explain. ‘Hospital. Boom! Bang! Doctor.’ I didn’t know what the fuck they thought I was talking about, but I didn’t want to risk any sudden movements to help make things clearer.
Jerry’s pistol and mags were taken off him, along with his bumbag. My hands were pulled down by my sides and the guy who’d done it seemed to be telling me to relax. They were now containing, not controlling.
There were four of them. They were all much older than Salkic, more Nasir’s vintage. They were old enough to have been through the war, and it showed. A couple had scars on their faces, and the sort of look in their eyes that said they’d seen and done things they didn’t need to talk about. I wondered if any had fingers missing.
Their weapons were clearly well oiled and maintained; some AKs and a number of Heckler & Koch G3s, a 7.62mm assault rifle with a twenty-round mag.
One of them – who seemed to be calling the shots – had big curly hair that fell way past his shoulders from under his Russian fur hat. A Motorola crackled somewhere in his thick sheepskin glove. There was some quick-time gobbing off, with ‘Ramzi’ and ‘Nick Stone’ making regular appearances. Eventually he passed it over to me, and pointed at the pressle.
‘Hello? Are you Nick Stone?’ The voice was male, educated, authoritative.
I hit the pressle. ‘Yes. I’ve got someone else with me, Jeral al-Hadi. The photographer.’ I thought it sounded a bit better having a Muslim in tow.
‘Where is Ramzi?’
Didn’t they know what had happened?
‘He’s alive. So is Benzil. They’re back in the city.’
I rattled through what had happened at the cave.
‘Wait one minute, please wait.’
I hoped it wouldn’t be much more than that. I was freezing.
I gave the radio back to the glove and just stood there, the cold biting into every inch of me. It was like being back in the sheep hollow. I stamped my feet together and so did Jerry. Whoever was on the end of the Motorola gobbed off at one of the crew, who disappeared as the long-haired one offered us both a cigarette. I’d never smoked in my life, but I was almost tempted, just so I could cup my hands round a match.
Two green German parkas were produced and neither of us needed to be told twice to get them on, hoods up. These boys knew what it was like to be wet, cold and hungry, and only wanted that for their enemies. They’d be taking them back before first light, then.
We stood there for another ten minutes or so before the Motorola sparked up again, then we were herded into the back of the VW, alongside the spare diesel. I’d been right, it was much warmer. The long-haired one got behind the wheel and manoeuvred us through the chicane.
The track went straight for a while, then bent to the right and led towards a dirty white wall, about three metres high. Set into it was an archway, blocked by a pair of heavy wooden coach doors that were opening inwards as we approached.
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The van bounced to a halt. The long-haired one jumped out and slid open the side door. Light flickered on the other side of the archway and a small man in a long black coat, fur hat and sheepskin boots appeared, an oil lamp clutched in his hand. It was Nuhanovic. Although his face was mostly obscured by his collar and hat, I could see he’d binned the beard. It didn’t seem to make much difference: he still came across like somebody’s favourite uncle.
‘Please come in.’
His eyes were bright and piercingly intelligent. The corners of his mouth were lifted in a half-smile, but I wasn’t sure whether it was aimed at me and Jerry or his long-haired mate, who shepherded us in, then turned the VW back down towards the checkpoint.
We followed Nuhanovic through into a cobbled courtyard. He only came up to my chin, but there was no doubt who was in charge here.
‘I have dry clothes for you, and hot water. Once you are comfortable, we will eat and talk.’ He spoke slowly, in heavily accented but perfect English, and chose each word with a lot of care.
Directly in front of us was a long, one-storey building with a veranda that ran its whole length. The place was in darkness.
He led us to the left, along the line of the wall, to where another, taller building joined it, forming an enclosed courtyard. We followed him and his oil lamp up a very old and creaky external wooden staircase on to the first-floor veranda. Warm light glowed behind the blue-glass panels in a door to our left.
He opened it and ushered us through. We hesitated, starting to take off our boots before crossing the threshold.
‘Please, no need, just enter.’ Nuhanovic took a closer look at Jerry’s face. ‘That wound needs to be cleaned.’
The room, maybe four metres by five, was heated by a blazing fire. Logs were stacked against the wall, and the air was heavy with perfume and woodsmoke.
Our shadows flickered on the walls. An oil lamp in the corner provided the only other light, and lavender oil simmered in a little brass tray above the flame. The happiest sight was the steaming brews that stood on two brass trays by the grate. I headed straight for them.
Jerry joined me, trying to kickstart his circulation in front of the fire. Above it, hot water bubbled in a clay tank decorated with inlaid pieces of coloured glass.
Nuhanovic stayed by the door. ‘The water should be hot enough for you to shower. Please, change, be comfortable and then we can talk.’ He turned to leave.
‘I’m Nick.’ I motioned with my hand. ‘T
his is Jerry.’
That half-smile returned. ‘And I am Hasan.’
He closed the door behind him.
Jerry didn’t need any second invitation. He turned the small brass tap at the bottom of the tank and hot water streamed into a large clay jug beneath it. I poured out the brews. I was pleased to see it was tea rather than that Arabic coffee shite, although I would have gone for anything even half-way warm. I threw in a handful of lumps of crystallized brown sugar. The glass burned my fingers and lips as I started sipping.
Jerry filled the jug, and started to get undressed in front of the fire. I kicked off my boots, refilled my glass and took a look around. Two sides of the room were dominated by long seating areas littered with cushions. Some basic clothing had been laid out for us. There was no decoration on the dirty white plastered walls.
A slatted wooden door opposite the fire led to a toilet, a simple box with a hole in, with a washing bowl and hand towel alongside. There were no electric sockets or fittings that I could see. It was as if we’d been transported back two hundred years.
Jerry had ripped all his kit off and was busy drawing cold water from a barrel into a second jug. He obviously knew his way around nineteenth-century plumbing. He unhooked the chain that held the ornate brass bucket above the stone shower tray to the left of the fire. Letting it run through his hands until the bucket hit the shower tray, he poured in water from each jug until he was satisfied with the temperature.
I eased open the blue-glass door to check outside. The terracotta rooftops were covered with frost. Above them, a million stars glistened in a pitch-black sky.
The other side of the compound was in total darkness. The guys on stag must have been freezing. I could make out the shape of another building beyond the one-storey one, which was where the family would have lived. It was the usual Muslim set-up. Visitors would be kept this side. If they were here for business, they’d be confined to the ground floor. The first floor would be reserved for family guests, as they would be able to see into the private courtyard that separated the two areas. Weren’t we the lucky ones?
These places were completely surrounded by thick walls, and were a nightmare to get into or out of. They’d even made sure the treeline was a fair distance from the walls to prevent any climbers.
I saw movement in the guest courtyard. A couple of bodies were standing under the veranda. Fair one; I’d have had eyes on us two full-time as well. They’d probably been there when we came in.
We needed to get ourselves sorted out if we were going to be running around in the forest once we’d dropped Nuhanovic. We needed to get warm, dry and fed.
Jerry gasped. I couldn’t tell whether that meant the water was too hot, too cold, or he just didn’t like it hitting the bits I’d split open. I closed the door, went over to the shower and stood right next to him. Some of his hot water splashed over my face and soaked into my clothes. It felt great.
I murmured into his ear. ‘Even if there’s no electricity, the room could still be bugged, OK?’
He nodded.
I moved away to the fire as he cut the water before soaping himself down. I finished mixing my own as the water splashed in the shower once more with Jerry on rinse cycle, and got my kit off.
Less than twenty minutes later we were both dressed in baggy cotton trousers, white T-shirts, thin padded jackets and Turkish slippers. We finished off the brews as our kit steamed gently in front of the fire.
The smell now reminded me of the drying rooms in training camp. You’d come off exercise after days in the wet, and nine times out of ten the heaters didn’t work and you’d have to wear the same wet gear until it dried out on you. When they did, we’d all be like pigs in shit, but no amount of lavender oil could have shifted the stench our kit left behind.
As I sat there in front of the flames, the stubble on my cheek rasping against my hand, my eyes started to droop. The drying rooms made me think of the Regiment, then Danny Connor, and Rob. I jerked them open and checked Baby-G. It was just after ten. Baby-G made me think about Kelly, which also made me think about Zina.
I tried watching Jerry patting his scabby nose with a towel, but my eyelids had a will of their own. Maybe I dozed.
There was a knock on the door, I didn’t know how much later. Jerry jumped up and opened it. Nuhanovic remained outside this time, his lamp throwing shadows across the landing. Maybe he didn’t like the smell. ‘You will require your coats.’
I started to put on my kit, now just damp rather than completely soaking, over the clothes we’d been given. I’d decided to take everything except the sacks and my PVC special. Who knew how this eat-and-talk fest would end?
Nuhanovic said nothing as Jerry followed my example, just watched in mild amusement. We finished with our parkas, zipped up as tight as they would go. As we followed him back down the stairs, he explained the layout of the place as if we’d just arrived for a dinner party. ‘It was built by a very wealthy Turkish trader in your sixteenth century. It hasn’t changed that much.’
I couldn’t see anyone under the veranda as we headed across the visitors’ courtyard to a doorway where the two buildings met, but I knew they were out there somewhere in the darkness.
Inside, his oil lamp bathed the wide stone passageway with light, and his voice echoed as he carried on his pre-dinner-party waffle. ‘The story is that the trader’s wife was so beautiful he didn’t want anyone to see her, so he built this house in the middle of nowhere. He was a jealous man, you see. But it still wasn’t enough, so he also planted the forest to prevent even the house being seen.’
‘That why you live here?’
He looked at me with that strange half-smile. ‘I live for my work, Nick. I am not blessed with a beautiful wife . . .’
The door at the end of the passageway opened on to the family courtyard. The building facing us was flanked left and right by the exterior walls. Set in the centre of the one to the right were the coach doors. We followed him over the cobblestones, past another set of heavy doors. Ahead of us, a light glowed behind a window.
‘But I am a nomad, Nick. I do not live anywhere. I move from place to place. Concealment is my greatest weapon, just as it is for the aggressors who avoid justice for their war crimes. It seems I have something in common with my old enemy, no?’
My eyes were fixed on the glow from the window. We stepped up on to the wooden veranda and he opened the door; this time he motioned for us to leave our boots outside. The threshold was two feet high. ‘Mind your toes.’ He lowered the lamp a little. ‘These are designed to keep little children in the rooms, but they claim a lot of flesh from adult feet.’
We were in a large square room. Fragrant perfume wafted from a pair of oil lamps in each of the far corners. Here, too, low seating ran the entire length of two walls. A fire raged in the centre of the third.
Waiting for us in the centre of the rug-covered floor were three large cushions set round a big brass tray, on which were a coffee pot, glasses, and a medium-sized brown-paper bag.
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We all took our coats off and hung them on the wall hooks to the left of the door. He was dressed in a simple black dishdash, black trousers and socks. My socks had dried like cardboard; it wouldn’t be long before they warmed up and started stinking the place out.
This room was also very plain, decorated only with some framed verses from the Qurŕān. The light from the two oil lamps was enough to show that although Nuhanovic’s skin wasn’t translucent like Benzil’s it was almost unnaturally clear and wrinkle-free.
The top panel of the door to our left was a decorative carved grille. We could hear the clanking of pans and the good-humoured murmur of people at work coming from the other side of it; even better, we could smell food.
Nuhanovic held out a bony hand to Jerry. ‘Welcome.’
Then he took another step forward and shook my hand too. His grip wasn’t firm, but it was quite obvious that, like Benzil, his strength was in his head; he didn’t need it
anywhere else. In this light, and up close, his dark brown eyes were even more piercing. They didn’t roam, they looked where they wanted to look and stayed there until they’d seen enough.
‘Nick, Jerry, please . . .’ He gestured towards the cushions. ‘Welcome.’ He had his own teeth, but no teeth were that naturally white.
Jerry and I sat cross-legged with our backs to the door. He took the cushion opposite, the paper bag to his left, the coffee to his right, and started pouring the heavily perfumed brew, holding the spout right near the glass then lifting it away steeply. It was like watching some kind of ceremonial ritual.
I accepted a glass. His hands were still as perfectly manicured as they were in the ‘Chetnik Mama’ picture.
The coffee tasted just the way it smelt, so I added a couple more lumps of crystallized brown sugar.
Nuhanovic passed a glass to Jerry and once again glanced sympathetically at his damaged face. ‘This has been an eventful time for you both. My people will discover what has happened to Ramzi and Benzil. I’m sure Nasir has taken care of everything; he normally does.’
He fixed us each in turn with his steady gaze, his eyes giving nothing away. ‘But please explain to me again, in greater detail, the events that have beset you.’
For the next ten minutes his gaze only shifted once from my face, to pour more coffee for himself and Jerry. I gave him the edited version of why we’d gone to Baghdad, how we’d come to meet Benzil, seen Goatee, and what had subsequently led us here – Jerry for his picture, me because Nuhanovic found it interesting that I was at the cement factory.
He shook his head gently and listened while pouring again for Jerry. I left my glass a third full. Once you’ve emptied it, the host’s duty is to offer a refill, and I’d had enough. I’d managed to avoid the perfumed shit for the whole of this job, and I wasn’t about to get hit by it now.
I didn’t want to waste any more time talking about things that didn’t matter. I didn’t know how much of it we had. ‘Our passports, phone, money . . . Will we get them back?’ I smiled. ‘One of the curses of the West. We feel naked without them.’