The Company We Keep

by Robert Baer

  To put my time to good use, Bob wants me to go to Frankfurt to pick up a new armored SUV that’s been waiting there for us. It comes with British military plates, which, with all the European troops arriving in Sarajevo, will give us an added measure of anonymity. Bob will leave the city briefly too, since he needs to return his rental car in Geneva. I’ll catch a ride with him as far as Geneva, and from there a train to Frankfurt.

  In training they used to drill into our heads the wisdom of backing off the moment you think you’re about to be “burned”—caught red-handed. Listen to your paranoia, live to fight another day. But this guy taking pictures of the apartment isn’t a figment of my imagination. Someone knows we’re here and is playing with us. It spooks me that I don’t know who.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  A sunny place for shady people.

  —W. Somerset Maugham

  Sarajevo to Frankfurt: DAYNA

  A few miles after we cross the border into Croatia, Bob pulls over to the side of the road and noses the car into a clump of trees where it’s not so conspicuous. He asks me if I mind if he makes a call.

  I watch as he pulls out our Inmarsat satellite phone, opens the hood, and attaches the phone to the car battery. He finds a number in a black notebook and dials.

  “Kif halik?” I hear him say, Arabic for “How are you?” He talks for the next five minutes in rapid Arabic, none of which I understand.

  A step van slows down as it passes to take a look at us, but then speeds up. I turn to see if any cars are coming, but none is.

  When Bob finishes, he unhooks the Inmarsat, puts it back it in the rear seat, and gets back in the car.

  “Mind if I stop in Nice to see a friend?”

  “OK with me,” I answer.

  “It’s for dinner. But I’m not sure you would want to come.”

  I don’t ask who the friend is. I just assume that it has something to do with work. Probably he’s an informant. And truthfully I don’t mind. He can stop anywhere he likes. I’m just happy to have a break from Sarajevo.

  We’re just north of Split, driving along the Adriatic. It’s becoming warm when we both notice how the water in the inlets is crystal clear, right to the white, sandy bottom. Without warning, Bob abruptly crosses the lane and drives down a path to the water. “How about a quick swim?” he asks.

  He rummages in the back of the car, looking for a bathing suit. This is really nuts, I think, but the water is inviting. Bob goes behind some trees to change. I slip into a bathing suit in the car.

  I float on my back while Bob swims out from shore. There’s no one in sight, and Sarajevo is instantly airbrushed from my mind. I want to stay here all day, but then Bob is standing on the shore, holding a towel for me. “Let’s see if we can make Nice by tomorrow afternoon.”

  I put my clothes back on over my bathing suit. We stop for a quick beer and a sandwich at the next village, and then get back on the road.

  Bob tells stories, and when he’s tired of talking, we listen to music on the radio.

  I’m barely awake by the time we start up the Julian Alps, the mountains that separate Slovenia from northern Italy. At the Italian border, Bob fumbles with two passports before he picks one to show to the guard. Walking around with documents in two different names is completely transgressive, but right now I’m too tired to care.

  By the time we get to Trieste, I’m pinching myself to stay awake. Bob is lost, but I just stare straight ahead, praying there’s a hotel open this late. Miraculously, he finds one. He checks us in and comes down to the car to hand me my key.

  We’re off early the next morning and gobbling up the miles until, halfway across Italy, the car starts coughing. Bob stops at a service station. The mechanic looks at the engine, but only scratches his head. By the time we finally drive up to Avis rental at Nice Airport, it’s belching smoke. I’m afraid it’s going to explode and jump out, backing away from it, as Bob runs inside to find the manager. I can’t imagine what Avis is going to say.

  A week or so ago, when we thought that our cars were starting to get noticed, Bob called Avis from the satellite phone at the Butmir house to see if he could return it in Zagreb, Croatia, and get something different. The Avis lady was under the impression he was still in Switzerland, where he rented the car, and reminded Bob in no uncertain terms that he could not take the car out of Europe. I’m wondering how much trouble he will get into if they figure out he’s had the car in a war zone.

  He’s back in five minutes, dangling a set of keys. “They gave us a bigger car, gratis.”

  “What did you tell them?”

  “I told them their damn rent-a-wreck ruined our vacation. They’re embarrassed.”

  He loads up the new Renault luxury sedan. I don’t know if he thinks I disapprove or what, but he says, “Well, I did have the car for six weeks at full rate.”

  A mile before we come to the village of St-Paul-de-Vence, Bob turns off on a narrow road and then up a long driveway lined with pines. We round two tennis courts and pull up in front of the Mas d’Artigny, a dazzling hotel with lots of glass, polished white marble floors, antique Provençal furniture, and a swimming pool that runs into the hotel itself. All of the rooms have unblocked views of the Mediterranean.

  A haute-bourgeois couple on a divan shoot us a disapproving look as we stand at the front desk. I’m instantly conscious of my jeans, dirty boots, and T-shirt. The bellman ambushes me, grabbing my duffel bag. Normally I’d hold on to it, but this isn’t a place where you schlep your own anything.

  I find Bob at the concierge desk. “We can’t stay here,” I whisper. “They’ll kill me if this place appears on my alias credit card. What is it, five hundred dollars a night?”

  The desk clerk turns up from her computer and hands Bob one room key. He looks a little chagrined and then says something to her in French. She nods and hands him the telephone. He talks to someone in Arabic. She takes back the phone, listens, and says, “Oui, monsieur. D’accord.” She produces a second room key, which Bob hands to me.

  We stand at the elevator, the bellboy behind us. “Don’t worry about it,” Bob says. “The room’s taken care of.”

  “I can’t let you pay.”

  “I’m not. Made up your mind about dinner tonight? You’re certainly welcome.” I tell him I’ll be just fine on my own, and he hands me the car keys. “Take a drive along the Riviera.”

  The bellman takes me to my room, a suite. It’s as elegant as the lobby. Brocade curtains and bedspread, a walk-in closet, a huge marble bathroom with a tub and an enormous shower featuring two showerheads the size of dinner plates and a heated bench. The soap is hand-milled.

  I open the duffel to see if I can find something that doesn’t make me look like a refugee. The best I can do is a pair of black ankle pants, gray ballet flats, and a lightweight ivory cashmere pullover. I won’t exactly fit in here, but maybe the other guests will stop staring at me.

  Bob has already left for dinner by the time I come down, and I drive to St-Paul, a walled medieval town with cobblestone streets. I find a bakery and have pastries and a glass of cold milk for dinner.

  The next morning I find Bob in the lobby, checking out.

  “We’re invited to lunch,” he says.

  “Thanks, but I’ll wait for you here.”

  I’m still not exactly sure whom Bob’s meeting, but I guess an informant. Driving across Europe with an operative to dump a car is one thing, but meeting an operative’s informant without clearing it with Washington is crossing one of those bright, shining red lines.

  “They’re expecting you. You can’t say no.”

  Before I can say anything, a handsome young man with curly raven hair and brown eyes comes across the lobby toward us. He’s wearing a linen shirt, pressed slacks, and soft leather loafers without socks. He hugs Bob, then turns to me and shakes my hand. He says his father and mother will be delighted to meet me. There’s nothing I can do now.

  Outside, a teal Bentley with white leather s
eats stands softly idling. The young man holds the door for me to get in the back, while Bob climbs in the front. We drive up a steep hill lined with great sprawling houses enclosed in walled compounds with security cameras and guardhouses. We slow down in front of one, and a ten-foot gate opens into the courtyard of a house that wraps around the contour of the mountain.

  I follow Bob and the young man into the house and out onto a stone terrace that overlooks a tiled infinity pool. There’s a jet of water at one end, a young girl in a bikini swimming. Two other young men come up to me to shake my hand. The girl climbs out of the pool and runs up the ten steps to introduce herself to me.

  A man with a shock of gray hair walks across the terrace toward us. He’s in a blue blazer, a pair of white pants, and white shoes with gold buckles.

  “Riley?” he says. “I’m delighted. My name is Ali. I hope Bob has made your trip here comfortable.”

  Ali has a strong Middle Eastern accent, but I can’t place it. His quiet but forceful tone is somehow calming.

  “Would you like an arak?” he asks. Arak is the Arab version of Greek ouzo. I tell him water. One of the boys comes back with an ice water. Bob takes an arak. Another son comes over with a box of Cuban cigars. Ali picks out one, squeezes it to make sure it’s fresh, and cuts it. He hands it to Bob. He picks one for himself. They light their cigars, and the three of us stand at the railing, looking at the azure sea.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I notice the cook shuttling back and forth from the kitchen with platters of fresh raw vegetables, grilled chicken, lamb, fatoush, tabouleh, freshly made yogurt, baskets of pita bread, and two bottles of white wine chilled on ice. I catch Bob’s eye and look at my watch. Is there any way we’re going to make it to Geneva?

  Through lunch the conversation is lively, Ali making sure all the children participate. His wife, a conservatively dressed woman, doesn’t speak English, but one of the boys translates for her. She asks me questions about where I’m from and what I do.

  “So, Riley, do you know Robert, Charlotte, and Justine?” the son who drove us here turns to me and asks.

  I have no idea whom he’s talking about, and only say no.

  After lunch, as soon as we are out of the driveway I ask Bob, “Did Ali pay for our rooms?”

  “It would have been impossible for us to pay. He would have reversed the charges on our credit cards. He considers the Mas d’Artigny his private guesthouse. What can I say, Arab hospitality.”

  As we drive down the hill to catch the freeway to Geneva, I reflect that I’d normally dread spending all these days in a car, but it’s actually been fun.

  It comes out of my mouth before I can stop myself. “Are you married?”

  “Yes, but she’s like a French wife.”

  I’m not going to touch that one, but I can’t help asking if he has children.

  Bob looks over at me. “Three.”

  “What ages?”

  When he tells me, I realize that’s who Justine, Robert, and Charlotte are. I look out my window, not wanting him to see me deflate.

  Before we get on the freeway to Geneva, a 200-mile drive north, I ask Bob if it’s okay to send Ali and his wife a thank-you note. Bob pulls over at a stationery store, and I go in and buy a card. When I come out, Bob hands me a piece of paper with a phone number on it. It’s for his house in France. He’s going there after he drops me off in Geneva. He says to call in case of an emergency.

  At that moment it dawns on me that Ali and his family must think I’m Bob’s mistress. It explains the one key at the hotel. I can’t decide whether I’m embarrassed or not. But I do smile inwardly at what is maybe the wildest thing about the whole trip. It’s not that we’ve gone from hell to heaven in a little over two days. Rather it’s that no one I’ve met, including Bob, even knows my real name.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  A house is made of walls and beams; a home is built with love and dreams.

  —Unknown

  Corgoloin, France: BOB

  When we finally get on the freeway, it’s too late to make it to Geneva for Riley to catch a train to Frankfurt. She doesn’t mind, and I tell her I know a couple places to stay along the way.

  We’re just outside Annecy in France when I pull into a gasoline station to take a look at the map. I put it between us, my thumb under Gsteig, a little Swiss village in the mountains above Gstaad. “Let’s go skiing,” I say. “I want you to see one of my favorite places in the world.” Her first look says, Should we really be doing this?

  It takes me only five minutes of convincing, my case helped by the fact that the next day is Saturday, and the office in Frankfurt is closed. “No one will know,” I say. Riley smiles and her eyes dance as if we’re pulling off the perfect prank.

  We stay at the Hotel Bären, a chalet in the middle of a verdant pasture. There are red geraniums in the windows, the only sound a waterfall that breaks above the village, and the occasional cowbell. Dinner is cheese fondue.

  In the morning we take the cable car up to the top of the Col du Pillon, where we rent ski equipment from an old woman with tight, weather-worn skin. She tells us that she raced for the Swiss Olympic team in the fifties.

  It is warm enough to ski in shirtsleeves. I let Riley go down first. She’s a good skier, telling me that she’s skied all her life. After a couple of runs we stop for lunch at the little restaurant at the bottom of the glacier. We have enough cash between us for only a carafe of wine and French fries. (We aren’t about to use our alias credit cards here.)

  I don’t know what it is. The stillness, the beauty of the spot, but I tell her that I often dream about running away to live on the side of a Swiss Alp.

  She laughs. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  It occurs to me, sitting here looking across the Alps, that I brought Riley to lunch at Ali’s because I wanted to show her off. Beautiful, collected, quick with a laugh, someone you know right away won’t settle, she strikes me as the perfect confederate.

  That afternoon, after dropping Riley off in Geneva, I drive to the French house to see how the kids are doing and fix a few things around the house. Ever the procrastinator, I still haven’t managed to consummate my divorce. If my wife had it her way, we never would; she’s comfortable with the idea of marriage, if not the practice of it. She’s brought the children here to escape Washington’s heat.

  When I first bought the French house, I was certain that I’d own it forever, even retire here. Right away I started naming rooms, imagining the purpose they’d serve after the house was fixed up. The little room at the northeast corner of the house’s front, with its commanding view over the vines, the Saône, and Alsace-Lorraine beyond, I called the breakfast room. But since no one ever eats breakfast there, I now think of it as the castle keep. With the way the grapevines drop off so steeply in front of the house, it does give you the sense of being in a tower. If I lived here by myself I’d turn it into my study.

  In the winter, after a good, hard rain and a strong wind, you can sometimes see Mount Blanc from this room, a little white nipple poking out of the rust fields. In the summer, I open the room’s windows to let in the breeze off the vines, freshening the house. I often sit here imagining what it would be like living in the house year-round.

  I don’t mind at all the house’s cramped spaces, the rooms without windows, the rough pitch-pine floors. Someone in the village told me the house should have been five rooms, but the vintner who built it sixty years ago chopped it up into ten. The municipal water doesn’t run up to the house; instead, there are three cisterns. They freeze in winter, and you need a pole to break up the ice. There’s no central heating, either. Mornings you have to run down the stairs to light the cast-iron stoves—poeles, as the French call them. The nearest house is in the village, more than a half mile down the hill.

  For a while the house was a working vineyard. There’s still a press in the garage, and two great oak vats. But now the vintner above us takes care of the vines and harvests them. In the spring
he drives down the hill in his little old Deux Chevaux—a small, boxy station wagon that reminds me of a sardine can—with twenty boxes of wine for us. Every couple of years the wine gets a gold medal from the Ministry of Agriculture.

  When we first moved here—I was in Tajikistan—the kids went to school in the village. Their French soon was better than their English. I laughed when they’d call a fly a mouche. I wanted to keep them in school here, and afterward college. I pictured them coming home on breaks and vacations and even weekends. It all seemed idyllic. But back then I was under the illusion that a family can be built around a house.

  The next morning the sun is shining, and I find the children playing in the orchard. I ask them if they want to help paint. They say no and run through the vines into the forest on the side of the house. I find a paint bucket and a brush in the garage.

  My goal is to paint four shutters, the worst ones. When I bought the house, there were no shutters at all on the windows, and the wind made the curtains dance. But that spring I found a carpenter in a nearby village. When he came to measure the windows, he shook his head. This wasn’t going to be easy because all of the windows were different sizes. It took him two months to make the shutters. But they turned out beautifully, and he put them up with good strong hardware. I still enjoy waking up in the mornings and opening them to see the sun rising over the Saône.

  I know it sounds odd, but the forest-green shutters really do make the house, offsetting the dirty rose. The shutters need to be touched up every year because the wind in winter strips off the paint like coarse sandpaper. The French call the wind la bise. If I could spend the entire year here, it would be easy to keep up the shutters—one a month. That fits the rhythm of Burgundy.