The Balkan Assignment

by Joe Poyer

  "I see that your friend has returned. I will say good night then."

  Vishailly turned and made his way up the steep street. The conversation in the restaurant and the ethereal quality of the night, now that the bora had died away, all seemed part of a dream and I wondered if I wasn't overtired after the long flight and the hours spent working on the engine. The feeling persisted as I wandered down the street, past goggling, whitewashed buildings well worn by the scouring winter winds and rains and the dry heat of summer.

  By the time I reached the PBY Klaus was asleep, stretched out in a sleeping bag in the cargo space. He woke long enough to mutter that Mikhail was staying in the cavern to keep an eye on the equipment. I nodded and undressed to crawl into my own sleeping bag and fell asleep almost instantly.

  "The next morning—yesterday, that is—I, went back up to the village and as Vishailly predicted, it proved impossible to get through to Brindisi. We did get through to the mainland and Vishailly used his authority to speak directly to the airport managers in Zagreb and Ljubljana, but without any luck. The Pratt & Whitney field office in Belgrade did manage to come up with a fuel pump that would fit, however, but refused to deliver it. So, Vishailly suggested that I take the morning mail boat to Mostar and catch the night train to Belgrade."

  By the time I finished the story, it was nearly five o'clock. Beyond the window, the city was wrapped in the thick winter darkness. The sky had become dull pink as a result of the city lights reflecting from the underside of the clouds and a desultory trickle of snow lent a peaceful aspect to the streets. The sounds of traffic came faintly through the sealed window, but otherwise it was perfectly quiet in the room. Ley swung his legs from the couch and stood up and stretched, then wandered over to the window to stand staring out for a long minute. I remained in my chair, contemplating the last of the gin.

  "It is a very interesting story, that you tell . . . and you tell it well."

  I looked over at him, but said nothing.

  "As I told you this morning, it is a story that I find difficult to believe. But, the fact remains that Colonel Mistako is now dead . . . that could be a coincidence .. . that he was killed by two mysterious gunmen for some other reason . . . but I doubt it very much.

  Also, I believe that you are completely unaware of the reasons behind this, ah, treasure hunt, I believe you could term it."

  Ley shrugged and turned away. "As I said, I have no instructions and, therefore, no business remaining in Yugoslavia. It is now their problem and up to my superiors to reopen contact if help is requested. You have answered all my questions as best you are able, in my opinion."

  He picked up his coat from the table, slipped it on and headed for the door. Before opening it, he turned to me once more as if to say something, then shook his head.

  "For your own sake, I advise you to be careful. This is a dangerous affair you are mixed in. I do not care if you manage to extract the gold from under the noses of the Yugoslav police . . . that is their business. The statute

  of limitations on war crimes has expired and Yugoslavia's laws are their own concern. I will, of course, have to report what I learned from you to my superiors, and in due time they will notify the Yugoslav Government . . . a matter of several days. This should not interfere with your activities then. But I caution you again, this affair is that of the NeoNazis, not as you believe a matter of a simple treasure hunt." Ley smiled briefly and left, and I thought I had seen the last of him.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Ley shook me awake as he piloted our ancient carriage down the last stretch of a long hairpin turn that emptied out ahead into a broad, flat plain apparently running on to the Adriatic. We had crossed the Alps, probably faster than it had ever been done before . . .

  at least in the dead of winter. It was still dark, but the sky was clear and the full moon, starting for the western horizon, lit up the valley. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and focused on my watch; just before six.

  "How far to the train wreck?" T croaked out.

  Ley chuckled. "So, you are awake. I was thinking that I would have to carry you onto the train; like a baby you were sleeping!"

  "Yeah, like a baby," I repeated. "How far to the train wreck?"

  "It will not be a wreck, only a delay. Perhaps another five minutes or more. The train should have stopped more than two hours ago. By now, the rail will be almost fixed."

  "What if we get there after they fix the rail?"

  "They will not leave," he said complacently.

  I wriggled around in the narrow seat, trying to stretch some of the numbness out of my stiffening body. Then I took the P-38 out of my pocket and carefully reloaded it with the fresh clip I had taken from Bowen's body.

  Ley glanced over at me. "I hope you don't mind," I said in a tone that I hoped would brook no opposition. "I intend to hang onto this."

  Ley was silent for a moment, concentrating on his driving. "Then you finally believe that your friends are involved in some type of plot to recover this gold cache and use it for purposes of the Neo-Nazi party?"

  "Whoa, I haven't said that. Yes, I will admit that something is going on. Whether or not it has anything to do with the gold we are after, I don't know. Somehow, associating with you, I seem to have gotten myself involved. But I do not admit that Klaus or myself are involved in any such Neo-Nazi plot. You still haven't shown me anything but the flimsiest circumstantial evidence."

  In fact, I had been giving a great deal of thought to whatever was going on, trying to fit Klaus into it. I had known him for nearly two years now and we were probably each other's closest friends . . . if that is the term you could use to describe our association. I had spent considerable thought the past few hours—whenever events allowed—trying to fit Klaus into the plot that Ley had woven. And, fresh in my memory was Mistako's unofficial skepticism. It didn't necessarily follow that just because he was dead he had been killed by the Neo-Nazis, or that whoever killed him was tied up with our activities on Kornat Island. I had only Ley's word for that, and he was an admittedly prejudiced witness.

  But, as I said, I probably knew Klaus better than any

  one in the area and I was not sure that he could ever be

  involved in anything as wild as this. On the other hand, I couldn't be sure that he would not be. Klaus was a funny guy. Some of the statements he had made in the past, now that I thought about them, would almost lead me to believe that he never really had gotten over his Nazi days. From age ten to thirty his whole life had been given exclusively to the Nazis. You don't break habits learned that young easily.

  Then again, where did Mikhail fit into all this? Despite what seemed to be his hatred for the Yugoslav Government that he helped create, I think his experience with the Nazis was traumatic enough to make damned sure that he would never co-operate with them in any way, shape or form. But that also went for any government or political movement.

  Mikhail was an anarchist of the old school, forced to become so by circumstances. I didn'

  t know; I was at a loss and I was tired, cold and hungry. Not a good combination on which to do heavy thinking.

  Ley finally shrugged. "If I haven't convinced you by now, you will have to convince yourself. Your loyalty to your friend is most admirable. I hope it will not be the death of you."

  "Very funny!"

  Ahead, a string of lights began to grow out of the snow-covered landscape, and Ley slowed the car. He glanced at his watch and nodded.

  "This will be the train. You will have to cross the field from where I stop. Of course I cannot come with you or they will know that something happened to you during the night besides a sound sleep."

  The road paralleled the railroad track several hundred yards distant. And that damned snow looked deep. Then I remembered what I should not have forgotten; the very thing that would ruin Ley's carefully laid plans.

  "The fuel pump," I shouted, "that damned fuel pump!"

  Ley just hooked a thumb at the back seat and there
it was, the carton with the Pratt & Whitney Eagle staring at me, only slightly the worse for wear. In everything that had happened, Ley had remembered to bring that damned thing along. And I couldn't even recall seeing him carrying it.

  The lights from the train were clearly visible by now and Ley flicked the headlights off and coasted to a stop.

  "Go to the second to the last car at the rear of the train. You will find the door open. Go into that car, pull the emergency cord twice as you do so and go directly into the lavatory and wait until the train is underway and at speed. Then return to your compartment.

  Make sure that no one sees you."

  I nodded and reached for the door, the fuel pump carton securely under my arm. Ley grasped my shoulder.

  "Remember, you are involved, whether you like to believe it or not. After the gold is recovered and flown to wherever they will take it, you will be of no use to them. Watch yourself at all times. If you wish to get in touch with me, I will notify you after you return to the island how to do so. Do not be surprised at my choice of messengers."

  "Your incontrovertible proof," I reminded him. "I still haven't seen it . . . or was it supposed to be Bowen's dead body?" I finished, perhaps more cruelly than I should have.

  Ley winced and spread his hands dejectedly. "It was not on his body .. . a photograph and a dossier. Perhaps the murderers took it. We will never know now."

  I nodded and shoved open the door, thoroughly con-

  fused. "Also remember," he called after me, "two men are already dead. Do not become number three."

  With that, he yanked the door shut and drove away leaving me standing on the side of that damned road. God, it was cold. A fresh wind coming with dawn was blowing snow in long streamers across the field. At the least, the miniature ground blizzard would serve to hide my approach from anyone on the train who might be watching.

  I slogged across the road, climbed over the couple of strands of barbed wire that still remained visible and struck out across the field, trying to shield my eyes from the driving snow with one hand. It seemed like hours before the brightly lit bulk of the long train loomed up before me, cutting off the force of the wind. I scurried into the shelter of the train and worked my way down to the second car from the end. Ahead, faintly over the wind and the whisper of the driving snow, I could hear the racket of a power hammer putting the last spikes into the ties. As Ley had said, the door to the second to the last car was open. I had no trouble climbing in, found the cord and pulled it twice. My only bad moment came while locked in the lavatory. Someone banged on the door and hollered in German or Italian. I cursed him back in Yugoslav and the door slammed as whoever he was went looking for another comfort stop. Other than that, I just kept falling asleep until, near seven o'clock, the train finally got underway. A few minutes later, I had made it back to my compartment, not really caring whether or not anyone saw me, locked the door, removed my boots and fell dead asleep.

  The mail boat came slowly through the two flanking massifs that guarded the harbor to Kornat Island like sleeping lions turned to stone by the slow passage of centuries. The snow that I had left only hours before in the mountains was here a driving rain that slanted down from leaden skies, whipping the waves of the Adriatic to a froth. The mail boat was an old coastal patrol boat taken from the Germans after the war and used for a time in the miniature Yugoslavian navy as an anti-submarine craft, then coastal patrol again and, finally, in the waning days of its existence, as a mail boat. I got her history from the captain, a grizzled veteran who had started as a cabin boy in a four-masted schooner when my father was still

  a child. He was so overjoyed to have someone to talk to . .. listen to him, rather . . . that he insisted upon conducting me personally on a tour of all forty feet of the craft as she pitched and rolled through the waves and wind. Oblivious to the greenness that was beginning to sallow my complexion, he droned on and on until the sight of the entrance to the harbor dragged him reluctantly away to oversee the docking that no doubt the crew of four, and perhaps the boat by herself, could have accomplished purely by reflex.

  Other than the roughness of the sea, the trip had remained uneventful from the time I awoke in the train compartment to the porter's knock. I ordered breakfast, dressed and by the time I had eaten, the train was rolling into the ornate structure that housed the Mostar terminal of the railway. A taxi had taken me directly from the train to the dock where the captain had delayed his departure to wait for me. I found out that the railroad had notified the harbor and airline authorities of their delay along the tracks, so that all schedules with connecting passengers could be held for them. I was surprised to say the least, after what I had been told of the inefficiency and lackadaisical manner in which the trains and airlines ran in Yugoslavia. Obviously, it just wasn't true.

  The tiny cabin space allotted to passengers for the four-hour run from Mostar to the island was located in the deckhouse directly under a wheelhouse that resembled nothing so much as the hurricane deck of a Mississippi river boat. I sat and watched the boat pick its way through the narrow entrance, thinking back over the events of the last twenty-four hours to Ley's final comments.

  The boat cut its way through the choppy waves to the long stone quay where my old PBY rode none too gracefully at her moorings. A rain-slickered figure was standing near the end of the quay and as the boat idled alongside, walked back with her to the mooring area. As we drew closer, I could see that it was Maher.

  Several conflicting emotions charged through me at the sight of him. Affection, distaste and suspicion all jumbled together. Then the captain bustled down into the passenger cabin with a slicker that he insisted I wear and leave with Major Vishailly when the rain had finished. Chattering profusely, he bundled me out onto the deck and waved good-by as I stepped down on the quay where Klaus was waiting to greet me.

  We shook hands and he asked how it went and I lied; uneventful. Belgrade had changed some in fifteen years and that the train ride had been comfortable but long, the broken track . . . the usual small talk with which friends greet each other. We crossed the quay and climbed down into the PBY. Klaus had broken out the small tent heater and the interior of the aircraft was warm and dry, if cramped. Klaus had had food sent down from the inn in the village and we dug into it while it was still warm.

  "Any problems with the fuel pump?" Klaus asked when we finished.

  "None. It was there and waiting. I had them do some machine work on the connections to fit some modifications I've made in the intake valves. They only charged half-aleg for that. Their rapprochement with capitalism seems to be proceeding quite well."

  Maher chuckled. "Greed seems to be the basis of all human dealings, no matter what the economic or political system, heh?"

  I snorted agreement . . . my own position clearly in mind. "I guess so. Anyway, it shouldn't take more than a few hours to install and another hour to make a quick test flight."

  "Perhaps you should do it immediately then."

  That surprised me. "Why, has the local fuzz been taking an interest in us?"

  "No, just the opposite, which makes me suspicious. Our Major Vishailly seems to go out of his way to leave us alone and even to be polite and helpful. Witness your easy passage to Belgrade. He has even stayed away from Mikhail, which is unusual for the conditions of their disagreement."

  "You think he knows what we are here for?"

  It was Klaus's turn to snort. "If we stay around too long, they would have to be fools to think otherwise. So far, our alibi is holding up. I cannot be sure, but I think the aircraft had been visited when Mikhail and I were away. Nothing was disturbed that I could see, but I could almost swear that someone had checked on the work you had done on the engine."

  "Well, there's no problem there. The old fuel pump is sitting on the cargo hold flooring in pieces. Anyone

  who knows the least thing about gasoline engines can see that both the housing and diaphragm are badly cracked and unsuitable. They could also see tha
t the crack is from wear and not deliberate."

  Klaus nodded. "Yes, that is true and I am not worried, not yet anyway. I have paid the usual look at the cavern as would befit the bored victim of an aircraft breakdown. By the way, it is as Mikhail says, impassable from this side. He told me that even before he sealed the cavern after the war to prevent tourists and curiosity seekers from killing themselves, the explosions had already collapsed enough of the cavern to make it impossible to work into the deeper chambers. From the force of the explosions as I recall, I never doubted it."

  "So how is work going on the air shaft approach?"

  Klaus smiled quite broadly. "Much better than I had hoped. The air shaft is hidden quite far back in a cove five miles from here in a location that renders it impossible to detect until you are actually on the beach. It cannot be seen from the water. Also, it is not as hard to get to as I remembered. It was very dark the night we came out and I was too exhausted to pay much attention to the surroundings. Mikhail found it quite easily from what directions I was able to give him, but admits he would not have been able to unless he had known where to look."

  "Before I left, he said something about having to do some blasting to clear the tunnel?"

  Klaus nodded and finished his coffee. "Yes. A part of the ceiling has collapsed.

  Otherwise, the shoring on this side is quite sound and there is no reason to believe that it will not be as sound on the other. The collapsed part is about three hundred meters down into the tunnel . . . and less than one hundred meters from the cistern. Mikhail plans a series of powder charges to split the larger rocks into many pieces. He has identified the key rocks, as he calls them, and thinks that when they are split apart, others will collapse enough to allow us to dig away a passage."