Assignment - Mara Tirana

by Edward S. Aarons

  Mara nodded and hastily stepped into the rough barge-woman’s costume that Gija had provided. She looked pale and shaken. On the steel deck overhead came a sudden clumping of authoritative boots. Gija cracked his knuckles nervously. There would be a tight dragnet in the area, Durell thought: the reward for their capture would be high. He wondered if the other crew members could be trusted. But it was too late for any other course of action. As for Gija’s display of anger, stemming from a personal reaction to Mara, there would be some way to make use of it, Durell decided. Everything around him had to be seized as a tool to further the job ahead.

  Then his thoughts were interrupted by a sudden angry pounding on the cabin door.

  CHAPTER XI

  The inspection of the Luliga took more than an hour. And afterward, the river patrol crew at the check point was in no hurry to leave. The two officers who scanned identity papers and cargo manifests looked wet and cold from the fog on the river, and they readily accepted Captain Galucz’ offer of coffee and plum brandy. Durell went forward to the board cargo hatches. The Luliga was a fine new craft, ably powered by her twin semi-diesels. He estimated her cargo at about 3,000 tons, and gave credit to the rapacious efficiency of the Soviet Control Commission that regulated the river.

  Gija stepped out of the mist behind him, his tall figure outlined momentarily against the yellow light from the pilot-house door. Water dripped from the wet cargo booms. An accordion played a Hungarian melody somewhere, but its location was lost in the night gloom over the water.

  As far as Durell could see, the ship channel was crowded with barges, tugs and scows brought to a halt by the border, inspection. Fishing-vessels, pleasure-boats and steamers all rode at anchor against the thrust of the current. The fog made curious halos around the riding lights astern.

  Gija mounted the cargo hatch and leaned against a steel stay, his collar raised around his neck. His voice was quiet.

  “You and the girl did well. You showed no nerves. I was worried about Mara, but she pulled herself together.”

  “She’ll do all right.”

  “Does she mean anything to you?” Gija asked.

  “No.”

  “She—I can’t get her out of my head. Do you trust her?”

  “Yes. I do, now. Not at first. But now I do.”

  “What do you think of that business of her baby brother, hey? Could we get Mihály to the barge?”

  “It’s asking for extra trouble,” Durell said.

  “We’re equipped for it. Our outfit can certainly handle one more, after all the dozens and even hundreds we’ve taken east or west. We’re not far from Racz.” Gija laughed softly. “You see, she has been persuading me, too. A remarkable girl.”

  “We have no weapons,” Durell said. “We could use a gun.”

  Gija laughed again. “We have enough to arm a brigade.” He stamped his foot on the hatch cover. “Under here are grenades, mortars, field rockets, rifles, machine-pistols, and ammunition. All nicely wired, too, if Tomas has done his job.”

  “Wired?”

  “If we get into serious trouble, we go sky-high. Tomas has his orders. We blow up the barge with its cargo, and anyone aboard with us.”

  Durell looked sharply at the pilot. “You would really do that?”

  Gija shrugged. “It would be better than answering questions.”

  Durell nodded. “How long are we to stay here?”

  “An hour or two. Or a day or two. The ways of official check points are inscrutable. So far, there’s nothing to worry about.”

  “A day or two of delay may be too long,” Durell objected.

  “You must be patient.” In the misty dark surrounding the barge, they heard the distant clangor of a bell buoy marking the channel ahead. Gija added: “I know your only objective is to rescue the astronaut, Major Stepanic. But you cannot do this without me. Only I can take you to him, because only I know where he is to be found.”

  “And where is that?”

  “With my people, in my home. Don’t worry. It may be even a week before it is done, but I will take you to him.” “We could travel faster overland.”

  “You would never get far into the mountains where Stepanic is hiding. The country is too primitive. A stranger would be noticed at once. You need a guide,” Gija said. “You need me.”

  “What are you hinting at?” Durell asked. “Is it money? Do you want pay for the job?”

  “I could put a knife in your belly for your insults. There is that much of the Balkans in me.” Gija’s teeth gleamed as he grinned. “But I understand how it is with you. Your job is to get Stepanic. Nothing else must interfere, eh?”

  “Nothing,” Durell nodded.

  “Not your woman, who was kidnapped, or Mara Tirana and her problems. These are human beings who do not concern an efficient machine like you, eh?”

  “I have my job to do,” Durell said.

  “Yet it would be easy to make the girl happy. I know the town of Racz. I even know the theater-school where the boy is studying. A little effort on our part—not even a delay —we won’t drop below Budapest for thirty hours yet, I guarantee.”

  Durell lighted a cigarette, one of a Russian pack that Gija had supplied, along with his bargeman’s clothes. The match made a tiny explosive light in the mist. He knew how Gija felt. He had seen this look on men’s faces before, but it never grew easier. In the course of every job there was human tragedy that needed and begged for help—but which he was forced to pass by in order to accomplish his mission. The job always came first. It had to be like that. The dedication to the assignment was too great to balance against individual misery.

  Or was it? he wondered. For the first time, he was touched in a personal way. There was Deirdre to be abandoned this time. She could be one more victim of tragedy.

  His fingers trembled slightly as he dragged on the cigarette. He did not want to think about Deirdre in Kopa’s hands. He could not trust Mara’s promise that Deirdre would be rescued in the process of going after her brother. It was too thin a chance, too risky. Stepanic was the only matter to consider. To find him and get his capsule instruments and get out. There was no time for personal tragedy, for love or hate or another’s death.

  He shook his head and threw the cigarette overboard.

  “You will not go to Racz?” Gija asked softly.

  “No.”

  Mara was in the upper bunk when he went below. She seemed to be asleep, but he wasn’t sure. Her face was turned to the steel bulkhead, and all he could see of her was the sweep of her hip under a gray blanket and the gleam of her yellow hair. He remembered how she had looked when she offered herself to him and he glanced at her again. Her breathing was too deliberate, her body too rigid. She was not asleep. But she did not want to talk to him. He turned off the tiny light and undressed quietly in the dark and slid into the lower bunk beneath her.

  He could not sleep. He thought of Harry Hammett, and how Harry had died, with the inevitable surprise of a strong man when death caught up to him. The barge rocked easily in the current of the river. Before he slept, he felt the stir of the diesels again, and the barge began to move slowly, at ten knots, down the ship channel. Gija would be at the wheel, familiar with every turn and twist of the river as it entered Hungarian territory. Between Esztergom and Vac, he remembered, the river valley would narrow until it made its great turn to the south.

  In the darkness of the cabin, he felt a strange affinity with the river. It was like the Mississippi on which he had been bom and raised, a channel that had known the shouts of conquerors and the tumult of trade. Benign and destructive, serene and stormy, the river had its own essential personality, independent of the men who used her. It could be bridged and dammed, but its essential flow could not be stopped. And this was where a river was unlike the current of a man’s life. . . .

  He fell asleep suddenly, and in his sleep he felt the Luliga push on. Some time in the night, the barge halted again, and when he awoke, it was daylight.
/>   And Mara was gone.

  He dressed quickly, aware of a stillness and a thick gray mist beyond the cabin porthole, where he could dimly make out the flatness of a reedy shore and a feeling of infinite plains stretching far into the distance. There was no sign of Mara, and he was chagrined that she had been able to dress and slip out of the cabin without alerting him. But it was not until Gija entered that he realized what her absence meant.

  “Have some coffee,” Gija said. “Captain Galucz wants to put you two to work, like deckhands—” He paused, handing Durell the thick china cup, and stared at the empty bunk. “Where is she?”

  “Out on deck, I assume.”

  “No one is on deck. I just came from forward.” “Then with Captain Galucz.”

  “He is having coffee alone. Are you hiding her somewhere?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Did she leave the barge last night?”

  “How could she? We’ve been in midstream all night.” “Oh, no. We’ve been tied up five miles above Racz for

  the last two hours.” Gija looked suddenly anxious. “If this is a trick—”

  Durell pulled on his heavy sweater. “Come on. She may be aboard somewhere.”

  “I tell you—” Gija paused, bit his lip. “All right. But I don’t like it. You were cruel about refusing any hope for her brother—”

  “Shut up,” Durell said. “We’ll find her.”

  But Mara Tirana was not aboard.

  No one had seen her leave. But twenty minutes later, Durell was convinced she was not on the Luliga. Every possible hiding place had been searched. She had gone ashore, quietly, and alone.

  Captain Galucz chewed on a roll liberally spread with cheese and swallowed scalding coffee. He grunted and heaved in his leather chair, hugging his stomach. His bearded face was hard and angry as he looked from Gija and Durell, a few moments later.

  “So what do you intend to do about it? Your little bird decides to enjoy dry land. Is it something to worry about?”

  “Yes,” Durell said. “She may be caught and turned back to Kopa. If that happens, she will tell the security police about the Luliga.”

  Galucz looked up from under shaggy brows. “True, Gija?”

  “She would not talk willingly.”

  “But she does know about us. The American is right. You’ve both been fools. You should have slept with her in your arms, American, and held on tight, hey?” Galucz grinned, but his eyes were like stones. “Gija, can you find her if you go after her?”

  “She is obsessed with rescuing her little brother, at Racz.” The pilot shrugged. “It is not far to Racz from here.” “But it could be a trap,” Durell pointed out. “Kopa will be waiting there, too.”

  Galucz shouted suddenly: “Well, do we let Kopa fry her on his griddle and hang us all? Where will we be then?”

  Durell had no reply. He felt a momentary anger against the girl, and brushed it aside. He could not blame her. He looked up and saw the fat captain and Gija waiting for his decision.

  “Can you let me have a gun?” he asked.

  Gija waved a generous hand. “Take your pick of the cargo. Do you want me to go with you?”

  “Yes,” Durell said. “Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER XII

  The fog lay over the Danube in a muffling blanket that smothered all life and sound. It was the fog this time, and not the security check points, that halted the Luliga’s progress down the Danube.

  Durell and Gija tied their skiff in the high reeds along the black clay bank. Gija had chosen the eastern shore. When Durell looked back, the barge was lost in the river mists. He knew that beyond the river were the Dinarides, where the famous grapes of Badacsony ripened in season. But now there' was only the chill of fog and the faint luminosity of the sun lost behind an impenetrable, dripping grayness.

  “There’s a highway and some riverside cafes beyond a fishing village here,” Gija said. “If we get to one and mix with the passengers from a river steamer, we can take a bus to Racz. . . . Do you speak Hungarian?”

  “Only a little,” Durell said.

  “Then let me do the talking, eh? Damn the girl—if she’s caught, we’re all angels, because she’s sure to talk about the Luliga. . ." Gija scrambled up the bank “Here, we have to walk this way.”

  Durell had chosen a Magnum pistol from among the stores in the barge cargo holds. He kept it under his belt. Gija had a knife and a smaller gun and brass knuckles.

  The highway followed the river embankment for about a mile. The morning had an unreal, misty quality, with the river lapping gently below them in the reeds. They passed a long string of rafts chained together, held against the current by a wheezing little tug. Several times they heard the harsh alarm of warning bells from vessels in the fogbound channel. There was little traffic on the road, except for an occasional truck rumbling out of the mist, using headlights, bound for Budapest.

  Gija was talkative. He had been a barge pilot for four years, three of them in the refugee underground system, and he knew the Danube intimately. He had no special ambition except to persuade his family to get back to the United States. Durell picked this up and questioned him, and this time Gija held nothing back.

  “My people are at Zara Dagh, a mountain near Viajec. Trapped there for the rest of their lives, maybe. You wonder why I don’t use the underground system to get them out? It would blow the thing sky-high, right? I’d be questioned, and who knows where that would lead? I can’t always be sure we’ll have a cargo of munitions to end their curiosity.” “Is Stepanic with your family at Viajec, then?”

  “On Zara Dagh, yes. In case I—if something happens to me, you’d better know. You get off the barge at Cerna-Voda—there’s a railroad bridge crossing from Bucharest to Constanta. You might have to use it, to get away. As for Stepanic, he’s all right. A few days’ rest will fix him up fine. And Lissa, my sister, being a nurse, can help him along.”

  “How safe is he there?”

  “How safe is anyone? Believe me, don’t try to make it to Viajec alone, without me. Right now, you wouldn’t get far off the barge.”

  They came to the fishing village a few moments later. The houses were small, white-washed, with their sides to the streets and small windows opening onto gardens and courts, a relic of the days when this design was meant to keep out the inquisitive eyes of the Turkish pasha’s spies. The streets twisted and turned between rows of acacia trees dripping in the fog.

  “The kavehaz is this way, on Kiraly utca. It’s not bad,” Gija suggested. “We have time for a bite to eat before the bus comes.”

  The cafe was on a stone landing, where a small steamer was tied up, as Gija had predicted. It was warm and noisy inside, crowded with travelers, villagers and fishermen. Two Magyar csikos, cowboys from ofi the Hungarian Prairie inland, made room for them at a table, shoving their woolen subas to the floor. No one else paid any attention to them. Gija ordered coffee and rolls, and Durell listened to the ordinary talk around them. The two Magyar cowboys soon left, swaggering noisily, and a few moments later the bus was announced. Many of the steamer passengers decided to crowd aboard, and Durell and Gija joined them in the confusion.

  Half an hour later, they were in Racz. It was a small industrial town, with a large central square boasting a medieval statue of a mounted St. Stephen, in odd contrast to the Party headquarters building newly erected across the cobbled way. Opposite the headquarters was the Racz Conservatory of Theater Arts, a baroque building that rambled on into the side streets about the square. The fog was less in evidence in the town. People hurried along the sidewalks in grim silence, intent on their business. There seemed to be a pall over the square, broken only by the sound of sudden music from the drama school. A tumble of youngsters spilled down the broad steps, laughing and chattering, and vanished into one of the nearby káféhazes. Gija suddenly took Durell’s arm.

  “There she is, watching the boys. Will you just get that look on her face! As if she were starving.”


  Durell saw Mara at the same moment, but he pulled Gija back. “Be careful. She’s probably being watched.”

  “The how do we contact her?” Gija asked.

  “Let’s walk around the square and see,” Durell suggested.

  Mara once again looked shapeless and plain in her cheap coat, flat heels, and severe hairdo under a peasant’s scarf. Evidently Mihály was not among the crowd of youngsters who had just come out of the building. She looked uncertain, taking a step or two toward the cafe as if to question the boys, then turned back nervously to the corner where she could watch the main entrance to the conservatory.

  Gija bit his lip. “She looks desperate enough. Suppose you wait here, and I'll approach her. Nobody knows me. If I am interfered with—well, Mara said that Kopa set a trap here, but I see none.”

  “It’s here all the same,” Durell said. “I can smell it.” He considered the broad, cobblestoned square, the pigeons waddling around the statue of St. Stephen, the luminosity of a few electric signs shining through the mist. Music came in another burst from the conservatory. A traffic cop idled in his striped booth across the square, and a few trucks rumbled by. Nothing else. It was an ordinary bleak scene in an ordinary bleak town. Yet he sensed danger all around him, waiting to pounce and destroy. His glance swept the blank windows of the shops and apartments in the gray buildings around the square. He could not be sure what eyes were watching him even now, turning from the nervous girl across the way to him.

  “Suppose you stay here and watch Mara,” Gija said. “I’ll scout the back of the school. If I see anything, I’ll be back at once.”

  “Good enough,” Durell nodded.

  He watched the tall pilot stride off, hands in pockets, whistling a gypsy tune as he dodged around a clanging trolley car crowded with factory workers. The clock in the tower of the Party headquarters building showed past ten in the morning, and the fog began to lift. The light seemed brighter. He watched Mara. She stood in front of the kafdhaz now peering through the steamy window. Her movements were studiously awkward and heavy, like that of a peasant, hiding all the astonishing beauty he knew she possessed. He felt the pressure of the Magnum against his belly. He should not be here. There was a trap, he was sure of it. Yet he had no choice. The girl had left the barge, and if Kopa took her, nothing could keep the information about the Luliga from the security police. And with that, the mission to get Stepanic would be defeated completely.