by Alan Bardos
The Assassins
Alan Bardos
© Alan Bardos 2016.
Alan Bardos has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published by Endeavour Press in 2016.
This edition published by Sharpe Books in 2021.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Historical Notes
Chapter 1
14th May, 1914. Johnny Swift carefully signed and dated the note and was rewarded with another stack of chips. He was starting to think that he should have tried a more sophisticated strategy. He steadied himself and redoubled his bet on nineteen.
The croupier smirked at him and sent the ball spinning. Johnny gripped the roulette table, struggling to suppress his anxiety as the ball circled the wheel. He straightened his shoulders, trying to distance himself from the other wretched people around him. He wasn't done yet.
The ball started flicking about the pockets and Johnny caught his breath as it landed on nineteen. Then Fortuna grinned and the ball flicked straight out again.
The croupier swept away Johnny's chips and he redoubled his bet on nineteen. Statistically, he knew that his number would come up eventually. Doubling his bet ensured he'd win back everything he'd lost tonight and make a return equal to his first bet. However, he was finding that he could easily run out of money before that happened.
He'd never liked the public school ethos of the taking part being more important than the winning. It seemed particularly absurd now.
The ball mesmerized him as it whirled around the wheel, this time landing on zero without any preamble. Johnny choked. Zero was his usual number of choice, but as nineteen was his age, he’d thought it would be lucky. He persevered, redoubling his bet.
There was only enough money left for one more turn of the wheel. He considered trying to swindle another note. He was so deep in the abyss now that a few more hundred couldn't possibly make a difference. It was all about staying in the game, but that became increasingly unlikely as the ball plopped down on eight.
He crossed his arms in frustration, hugging himself in an effort not to smash the bloody contraption. As he did so, Johnny felt a sheet of paper crumple in his jacket pocket. It was a simple piece of cheap rubbish and yet it was the instrument that had led to him making a whole series of rash decisions.
The first and most crucial of these decisions was made in Zurich. Johnny had been sent there by Sir George, his superior in the Diplomatic Service, to deliver official correspondence and deposit funds into his Swiss bank account. It was a regular trip, and he enjoyed the perk and was generally able to overlook the fact that he was being used as a glorified errand boy by a man he detested. The telegram summoning him back forthwith had shattered his revelry. He was normally allowed a week to complete 'his travels' and he'd made arrangements. An urgent recall was unheard of for someone of Johnny's limited responsibility. He could only assume that Sir George had found out about one of his indiscretions, most likely a gambling debt. Johnny was finding them impossible to manage.
There had been little choice but to double up and make a last stand. He'd had the necessary documentation for Sir George's account and had been able to make a sizeable withdrawal, once he'd perfected Sir George's signature - he'd seen it replicated by an expert a thousand times before. Johnny had planned to win enough to pay the money back and head off whatever trouble lay in wait on his return. That money had long since gone and he'd had to resort to further deception.
A woman next to Johnny brushed against his arm, obviously trying to attract his attention, which was par for the course as far as he was concerned. The idea that there was a woman impervious to his brash, physical charm, forged by the playing fields of England, was beyond his comprehension.
Johnny stood up to his full height of six foot. He was immensely proud of his build which combined the elegance and grace of a winger, with the strength of a front row prop. Almost out of instinct, rather than from any sense of desire for the woman, he tilted his head at an angle, showing off the fine line of his cheekbones. It was, he realised, his appeal to women that had got him into this mess.
He glanced across the casino and saw Lady Smyth, looking bored and annoyed, as she distanced herself from the rabble. Her sequined dress gave the impression of shooting stars bursting into showers of light, and Johnny thought that it bestowed a bearing and dignity on her which was way beyond her twenty one years. It would be bad enough for her to be in a place like this, he thought, but to be in a place like this and be losing must be intolerable.
La Fontaine d'Espoir was a down at heel, back alley gambling den, kept open by a nod and a wink. It was not the sort of establishment that Lady Smyth was used to, especially in comparison with the splendour and opulence she usually enjoyed in Vittel.
Johnny wondered if it was called The Fountain of Hope in reference to the town's famous spas or the despair of its patrons, who like Johnny, had well and truly fallen through the cracks by the time they'd made it there. The desperation in their eyes was blatant. He caught Lady Smyth's eye and looked away before she saw the same desperation in his own.
The woman next to Johnny was actually pressing against him now to get to the table, all modesty gone in her attempts to place her bets. Her future was also at stake - financial security or the streets. Johnny had seen many such women who'd lost their position in society and in dire need, would ply their trade in the slightly more up market brothels he'd patronised before...before he'd met Lady Smyth.
The last of his rash decisions had been to send her a telegram confirming their arrangement to meet at the spa; he'd needed to see her. She was the most daunting woman Johnny had ever known and if anyone could make him forget the trouble he was in, it was her. Lady Elizabeth Smyth could make him forget everything.
He pushed out his last stack of chips, doubling up his bet on nineteen again, and the croupier sent the ball spinning round with his customary smug sneer, which Johnny found particularly galling. They both knew he was on his last legs.
Captivated, Johnny watched the ball spinning around the wheel. He loved the way it dropped and flitted about, teasing and caressing his hopes and dreams, before finally landing in a pocket.
'Yes! Huzzah!' Johnny was shouting before he'd fully registered what had happened. 'Nineteen! It's actually, bloody-well landed on nineteen!'
That wiped the smug look off the croupier's face and he sullenly pushed a large stack of chips towards Johnny.
'Thank you. I think I'll call it a night, ' Johnny said, smirking. He hurriedly started pick
ing up the chips, ignoring the piteous looks from the people around the table.
'Come on, Johnny - play up and play the game!' The crisp, precise voice of Lady Smyth was like cold steel. The jolt caused him to drop his chips. She'd pushed through the crowd and was standing over him. 'You've hardly broken the bank at Monte Carlo.'
'Lady Smyth, we've had our win. The strategy worked,' Johnny said discreetly.
'Aren't you bored with playing the inside, Johnny?' She always looked down on his success as slightly tasteless, believing that it wasn't the winning that counted but how boldly one played. 'Why don't you take a chance on the outside, for once?'
Lady Smyth's elegant, cat-like features formed a smile, her words a not so subtle reminder that he was an outsider. He might look the part, in her husband's old evening dress, but he wasn't quite the thing. Johnny gave in to his anger and pushed the chips back out onto the table.
The ball bounced and flicked about the wheel with all the mean-spirited flirting of a bored and frustrated debutante. Johnny had thrown everything on red. It seemed the most fitting. The ball bounced slowly to a stop and the croupier smirked for the last time. 'Noire.'
The crowd stared at Johnny. They knew what it meant and thanked whatever luck they had left that they weren't him.
Johnny pulled together the last shreds of dignity that his education had given him and addressed the crowd. 'I may have lost everything tonight, but as Sir Cecil Rhodes said: "I am an Englishman, so consequently have won first prize in the lottery of life." '
He bowed stiffly and guided Lady Smyth out into the foyer before she could goad him into making any more bets.
'You lose with such style, such vigour,' she purred. 'Oh, to show such superiority, such contempt for money!'
'Where there is disaster to be averted, I will bring catastrophe,' Johnny said glibly and then stepped outside.
The night air cleared Johnny's head and focused his mind. He'd won Lady Smyth's admiration at the expense of every penny he could get. He now owed over two and a half thousand pounds. Not a huge amount, in the grand scheme of things, and certainly not enough to break the bank at Monte Carlo, but it was enough to break him. The sheer scale of it staggered him, when he chose to think about it. Assuming he kept his position in the Diplomatic Service, he could work for twenty years before coming close to repaying it.
Johnny knew he'd have to return to Paris; there was nowhere else for him to go. He shoved Lady Smyth into a cab, in as gentlemanly a manner as he could manage under the circumstances, and climbed in after her, shouting, 'Station!' at the driver.
'But we've only just got here,' Lady Smyth snapped. She still didn't grasp the full enormity of Johnny's situation. To emphasise the point, he took the telegram out of his pocket.
'Sir George has called me back to Paris, Lady Smyth. Our happy time is over.'
'I do wish you'd call me Libby, when we're in private.'
'I'm required at the Embassy, immediately.'
'Nonsense - I'm sure my husband can spare you for a day or two. All he does is gorge himself on the latest scandal in the popular press.'
'You could still take your spa treatment,' Johnny suggested. Sir George tried to moderate his wife's wayward nature with soothing spa cures, even to the extent of allowing her to go out of season. It made an excellent pretext for Johnny to meet her, away from the inquisitive eyes of Paris's diplomatic community.
'That's not the treatment I yearn for.' She ran a suggestive finger down Johnny's face, but nothing could soothe the churning in his stomach.
'You needn't worry about the money,' she said, sensing his anxiety.
'What?'
'I renewed all of the notes before I left Paris. We've got a month to pay it back.'
That gave Johnny some comfort, but he was too stunned by what had just happened in the casino to really care about next month.
'So we might as well spend a few days at the spa and have another little flutter. I'm sure we can find somewhere decent that will still take our notes.'
'My instructions are explicit, Lady Smyth. I really must go back,' Johnny replied, starting to feel temptation well up inside him.
'I see. George did mention something about one of his juniors being for the high jump,' she added casually.
Johnny convulsed. 'He...what?' A thousand possibilities flooded his mind, but he instinctively understood why he'd been recalled. 'Sir George must have found out about us.' Johnny looked at the telegram in his hand, not quite believing it to be true, but if Libby had settled the debts, it was the only possible explanation.
Chapter 2
'It is announced from Sarajevo that the Archduke Heir Apparent and his wife will come to Sarajevo and participate in manoeuvres.' The cafe's gaslight flickered as Gavrilo watched Nedjo read the newspaper clipping. Franz Ferdinand's arrogant face stared back at them.
Gavrilo shared his friend's restlessness. They both knew that the visit by the ‘arch tyrant’ would give them the perfect opportunity to take a sweet and bloody revenge for the suffering his empire had inflicted on the South Slav people.
'Rereading the notice won't get us the means to destroy the Heir,' Trifko, the third person at their table, remarked curtly.
Nedjo reacted to the edge in Trifko's voice. 'I don't want to stop the visit. Like you, I want to go home and welcome them. It's our moral duty to give the Heir a proper reception.'
'Is that a boast or do you actually mean to take action? Trifko replied calmly, ignoring Nedjo’s bluster.
All three had resolved to take action a month earlier, after Nedjo had received the clipping from a friend in Sarajevo. They’d made contact with an ex-Partisan, a fellow Bosnian Serb, who’d once shared the same lodgings as Gavrilo. He’d agreed to help them obtain the means, but little progress had been made since then and tension was starting to show.
Gavrilo was equally frustrated, but for now he was content to let the other two squabble. Gavrilo Princip tried to have as little to do with people as possible. Wherever he went, people took him for a weakling, seeing only his gaunt features and slight build, the legacy of a childhood under Austrian rule. Gavrilo often played along, pretending to be weak, but he knew that one day he would prove them all wrong.
He gazed at the other two as they argued. Like Gavrilo, they had trimmed moustaches and wore dark suits, rejecting the traditional dress of their parents. Gavrilo had known Nedeljko Cabrinovic for two years. They were both nineteen and committed to their cause, but Nedjo was often too emotional. He had a tendency to speak without thinking and would brag about the heroics he'd perform. It seemed to Gavrilo that he was desperately trying to throw off the stigma of his father, who was generally believed to be a police informant.
Trifko Grabez, Gavrilo's old friend, would be nineteen the following month on Vidovdan, the Serbs' national day. The son of an Orthodox priest, Trifko often appeared reticent, but Gavrilo knew his physical strength ensured he could take action when needed, as he'd proved when he was sentenced to fourteen days in prison and expelled from Bosnia for hitting a teacher who'd insulted him. The experience had left Trifko with the desire to make his country’s invaders pay for what had happened to him. It was a desire that Gavrilo had encouraged since Trifko's arrival in Belgrade.
Gavrilo glanced at the gas light above them - it still seemed like a marvel compared to the darkness of the peasant house he grew up in. The light cast a glimmering sheen on the other youthful dissidents from Bosnia and Herzegovina who gathered in the cafes of Belgrade's Green Wreath Square to drink coffee and talk, always to talk. The Acorn Garland was the favourite venue, as this was where the veterans from the Balkan Wars came to tell their stories.
'I will commit a true and noble deed for our people,' Nedjo crowed, drawing Gavrilo out of his thoughts.
'Action, action - enough of words!' Gavrilo protested, unable to listen any more.
'We must have the means, Gavro,' Trifko said. ‘We still need weapons, money and a safe route out of Serbia and into Bos
nia.’
Gavrilo glared across the cafe at Milan Ciganovic, a decorated Partisan officer and their contact. He was at the centre of attention with a group of tough looking ex-Partisans.
Ciganovic hadn't been quite so commanding after the last Balkans War, Gavrilo reflected; he'd fallen on hard times like many former soldiers. Legend had it that Ciganovic had been so lice-ridden that he was actually thrown out of the Green Wreath Cafe. Gavrilo found that hard to imagine, to look at him now. A respectable clerk in the Serbian railways, he cut a powerful figure and Gavrilo knew that he wouldn't be moved or hurried.
'Perhaps I should go and ask Cigo for the means, now,' Nedjo said, seeing Gavrilo's apprehension. 'He will not refuse me!'
'Who could refuse the mighty hero?' Trifko said dryly.
Gavrilo cut them short, before they started to argue again. 'I will go.’
He made his way towards the veterans and Ciganovic looked up as he approached, calling across to him, ‘Gavrica!’
Gavrilo smiled wearily - he hated the nickname, 'Little Gavrilo'. ‘Do you have any news?’ he asked.
Ciganovic looked at his companions then back at Gavrilo. ‘News? There is no news?’ he answered mockingly.
The ex-Partisans laughed. Gavrilo shuffled nervously; he felt slightly uneasy in Ciganovic’s presence. Ciganovic was six years older than him and had actually done what Gavrilo could only dream of.
‘Come Gavrilo - sit and have a drink. I’m just teasing. There’s nothing doing.’ Ciganovic smiled good naturedly and offered him a glass of plum brandy.
‘I don’t drink, Cigo.’
‘No, of course - your cause is all you need.’ Ciganovic drank the brandy and added matter-of-factly. ‘Preparations can’t be made until it is known whether or not Emperor Franz Josef will survive the bout of bronchitis he’s currently suffering.’
Gavrilo hid his impatience - it was the same story he was always given. The gentleman with whom Ciganovic was working to get the means didn't think that Franz Ferdinand, as heir, would travel, in case the old tyrant died.