The Woman from Bratislava

by Leif Davidsen

  ‘It’s only for a couple of days.’

  ‘Please yourself. You will do anyway.’

  ‘It’s my job.’

  ‘This is our life.’

  He stood for a moment – all of a sudden he simply could not be bothered saying any more or explaining any further.

  ‘I’d better see to the sushi.’

  ‘Actually, I think I just lost the notion for sushi, Per,’ she said, picking up the remote control and demonstratively turning up the sound.

  24

  TEDDY AND PER WERE on the plane to Frankfurt, and after only an hour together with Pedersen at the airport and fifteen minutes in the air, Toftlund was already sick of this infuriating, opinionated motormouth of a man who seemed to imagine that the whole world was interested in his views on everything under the sun. Toftlund had nothing against a bit of conversation, but for his own part he was careful not to express his opinions on any topic. If he had any fault to find with Lise it was that she could not watch the news or read an article in the paper without instantly feeling moved to say what she thought. As if you were not really living unless you were expressing an opinion, preferably in the media. Toftlund held, as he saw it, to a few basic convictions, but it was also his belief that there was more than one answer to most questions, that nothing was black and white, but that more often than not life was made up of shades of grey, with each answer giving rise to fresh questions. He was, in his own eyes, the down-to-earth sort. He was not particularly interested in abstracts. It was a waste of time. He was interested in practicalities: how to carry out a specific task, be it buying a carton of milk, getting a suspect to confess, or eliminating him or her from his inquiries. That was more than enough for him. Not so Teddy Pedersen. With him everything had to be considered from every angle and duly commented upon. That, so it seemed, was intellectuals for you. Or academics rather. They could never accept anything at face value, always had to be picking holes in an argument or twisting something simple and straightforward so that it suddenly became complex and obscure. Life was difficult enough as it was without making it even more complicated with these eternal ‘what-ifs’. This same trend was becoming more and more prevalent in television journalism too. What if the government resigned? What if a fire broke out in the tunnel under Storebælt? What if you were to drink four litres of chlorine a day – would you get cancer? Why couldn’t one just take things as they came. When you got right down to it, though, it probably just went to show how astonishingly little actually happened in Denmark. They had to make simple things seem complicated or make up stories to fill air time and newspaper columns.

  Toftlund sighed. He missed Lise, he was fed up with his job and sorry about the way they had parted. Lise with her big belly and a polite, but cool: ‘Have a good trip.’ The words had sounded right, but the tone had been all wrong. As if he were going off on a well-deserved holiday. ‘It’s only for a few days,’ he had muttered, feeling angry and resentful and upset. She had closed the door when the taxi appeared, nosing its way uncertainly down the road, the estate they lived on being so new that it probably had not yet made it into the latest street map.

  He did not feel like eating the cold snack which was SAS’s idea of a breakfast or early lunch. Instead he shut his eyes, fell asleep and did not wake until he felt the plane beginning its descent to Frankfurt Airport. In the window seat, Teddy was gazing out at the clouds that seemed almost to wrap the aircraft in grey cotton wool. He reeked of free red wine and an early brandy, but he held his peace, and Toftlund felt actually better for his nap and decided to be a little more tolerant. It was April 23rd; they emerged from the layer of low, grey cloud to see green fields below them. Spring – the real thing and not the prolonged, half-hearted forerunner to it – was just around the corner, he would go home and very soon there would be three of them, all set to embark on a new life together, because this baby would change things for ever.

  It was not easy to maintain this buoyant mood once inside Frankfurt’s grubby, chaotic airport, which accorded so badly with the German reputation for cleanliness and order.

  ‘Frankfurt is sheer hell. I’d swear it was designed by a mad Russian with Italian blood in his veins,’ Teddy moaned as they lugged their bags towards the escalators leading to Gate B41. Toftlund could not help laughing. The description was so apt: the crowds of travellers trailing over the grimy floors, the acrid smoke rising from a group gathered, as if for a prayer meeting, around a foul-smelling ashtray with a sign above it saying: ‘Raucher’.

  ‘I just need to join the cortège of sinners over there,’ Teddy said. ‘We’ve got loads of time.’

  He strode across to the huddle of smokers, lit a cigarette and inhaled it greedily. Toftlund waited patiently, surveying the scene: the hordes of people, like lost souls struggling to find their way through the jungle of signs: C20–98, A20–90, B20–41 – it was more like an intricate code devised by some crazy cryptologist. The only orderly elements were the white trains on the elevated railway which shuttled back and forth, picking up passengers. He realised he had a hollow feeling in his stomach. He had never been to Albania before. That was part of it. He knew it was a country in turmoil, swamped by the greatest refugee disaster in living memory. It was poverty-stricken and falling apart and, like the other former Soviet bloc countries, still laboured under the heavy legacy of communism. And in Albania, what is more, a distinct and very weird Chinese-Albanian brand of communism cooked up by that megalomaniac Enver Hoxha. He had sealed the country off from the rest of Europe, consigning it to a paranoid, self-sufficient dictatorship which left it destitute, despised and degraded. Now it styled itself a democracy with a market economy, but as far as Toftlund could gather from the short briefing document from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which had been handed to him by a tight-lipped, coolly correct Charlotte, said democracy was a pretty abstract quantity and the so-called market economy a madman’s version of raw capitalism in which mafia-style organisations controlled both the grey and the black markets, which were far bigger than the white.

  But the other reason for that sinking sensation in his stomach was the nature of the assignment. Finding Mira Majola, who could be operating under any name, in a chaotic country containing over half a million unregistered refugees, seemed like an impossible task, but he gathered from the Emergency Service Agency that some form of registration was always carried out when exhausted, hungry, thirsty refugees turned for help to the UN or one of the many private relief organisations already working in Albania. He had sent copies of the material which they at PET possessed to the Danish office at Durrës, which was responsible for coordinating the efforts of the UN and the Danish Refugee Council.

  This was the Albania he was describing to Teddy when the two of them finally succeeded in negotiating the airport’s bewildering maze of corridors and reached the departure lounge. They stood at the back of the queue, surrounded by dark-haired people, most of them young men. Flights to Albania were as unreliable as the Danish April weather. They had been lucky even to get a connecting flight from Frankfurt with Slovenia Air to Ljubljana and from there to Tirana. At least that way they were spared a long, slow flight on one of the air force’s Hercules troop carriers.

  ‘All perfectly correct, Toftlund,’ Teddy declared in his distinctive, melodious and slightly drawling voice. ‘But to that you can add clan wars and blood feuds dating back three generations. First Hoxha’s lunatic brand of communism, then rampant capitalism, with everybody investing like mad in pyramid schemes which, of course, came tumbling down with a bang. Bandits and muggers at every turn. Every man has his Kalashnikov, stolen when the shit hit the fan in ’96. Albania is one fucked-up country, I’m telling you.’

  ‘Have you been there before?’

  Teddy laughed and took a long draw on his cigarette – the signs said No Smoking, but the dark-skinned, long-haired youths around them didn’t give a toss about that. There was one young man who stood out from the rest. He looked like a Serb with hi
s fair, crew-cut hair. He had soldier written all over him, and there was a menacing litheness about his muscular frame which the discreet suit, button-down shirt and subtly patterned tie could not disguise. He had square-cut features and small close-set eyes. What looked like a knife scar ran across his cheek from his nose. Like Pedersen and Toftlund he took it easy and let everybody else push and shove their way towards the two buses they could see parked outside the departure lounge. Wherever there was war you found the merchants of death, the vultures of want and the craftsmen of espionage, Toftlund thought to himself, as he listened to Teddy’s constant chatter, which continued as they hung on to the straps in the bus on the way out to Slovenian Air’s big Airbus – the proud sign that Slovenia was a new, free European country, now first in the queue to join the good guys in the NATO and EU clubs:

  ‘I was in Albania in the seventies, as a young tourist. It wasn’t really my area, but I tagged along on a Danish Albanian Friendship Assocation trip. It was the weirdest, most surreal experience. The delegation was led by a Danish rock band. They were crazy about Albania. It was exactly like a piece of absurd theatre. You weren’t allowed to utter one word of criticism, if you did you were banished to your hotel room. What I remember most is the quietness and these little toadstool-shaped bunkers scattered all over the place, from which each and every Albanian was supposed to pick off invading troops with his own little rifle. It was a ghastly place, but the others couldn’t see that. There was nothing to eat, nothing to read, just lies upon lies and an endless succession of kindergartens and factories with robots parrotting whatever the great leader said. Brezhnev’s Russia was a liberalistic paradise compared to Albania back then. I said as much in an article I wrote when I got back. That was the end of the invitations from that particular quarter, and since the place went bust I’ve had no desire to go back.’

  ‘What possessed well-educated Danes to support such a regime?’

  ‘Don’t ask me. Why do people seek Utopias? I’ve no idea. My own sister has always been that way inclined. They want to be confirmed in their belief that everything is for a purpose. They want to believe there is a higher cause which is worth serving. If there’s no God then you have to come up with a replacement religion.’

  ‘But Hoxha! Albania!’

  ‘In their eyes it was original, pure, anti-materialistic. You know – merry peasants and singing milkmaids all alone in the cruel world, forsaken by the Soviet Union and China, threatened by the US and Italy. It beats me. Lenin’s useful idiots came in many shapes and forms, but it’s all water under the bridge and no one wants to hear about it any more.’

  Teddy was first out of the bus. Like Toftlund he had on a pair of sensible Goretex boots. They had heard about the mud in which the refugees were almost choking. They slept in open fields, or under plastic sheeting on the small carts they had pulled behind their tractors on their flight from the terror of the Serbs. Otherwise, though, Teddy was clad in what he called his uniform: a pair of creased grey flannels with a tweed jacket over a self-coloured shirt and a thin pullover. Over his arm he carried a coat of an indeterminate beige. Toftlund was in blue jeans, a grey shirt, a blue sweater and a scuffed brown leather jacket. The rest of their things they had in their respective holdalls. Toftlund was pleased and possibly a little surprised to see that Teddy, like himself, travelled light. He sometimes forgot that Teddy might, in actual fact, be the more widely travelled of the two of them, particularly as regards those parts of the world which had until ten years ago been sealed off behind the Iron Curtain.

  Ljubljana Airport was not very big, but it was packed with people. Again mainly young, swarthy men smoking, drinking and gabbling animatedly in Albanian. In a square box of a room with a bar in the middle Per and Teddy paid nine Deutschmarks each for a beer and a slivovitz. The place reeked of black tobacco. Two women in white uniforms with Red Cross badges stood out like sore thumbs among all the battle-ready youths. Toftlund gazed out at the snow-clad mountains in the distance, their tops blanketed by grey cloud. A thermometer gave the temperature as being fifteen degrees celsius. They were travelling towards spring. The noise and the smell of so many people was appalling. Toftlund wandered over into a corner in search of a little peace and quiet. He managed to get a signal on his mobile and Lise answered right away.

  ‘Hi, sweetheart. It’s me,’ Toftlund said.

  ‘Per! Where are you?’

  ‘In Ljubljana. It looks like we’ll be taking off again shortly. I’ve missed you.’

  ‘I’m glad you called. We miss you too.’

  ‘I’m not sure if my mobile will work in Albania.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that. Just take care of yourself.’

  ‘I will …’

  ‘And Per …?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m sorry about the way I said goodbye.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it.’

  ‘But I do.’

  ‘I’ll be home soon.’

  ‘Just you look after yourself and I’ll take care of everything at this end.’

  Toftlund could picture her: standing in the kitchen maybe, looking out at the bare trees and shrubs, and a shower of rain perhaps, or the sunshine. But as always, spring felt as if it would never come.

  ‘I’ll be home soon,’ he said again.

  ‘I know. Take care.’

  ‘I will. And Lise …?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you too. And we’re fine. It won’t be long now.’

  Her voice cracked slightly, but he was happy to hear it, and for once he had managed to say what he felt. It helped to express one’s feelings. When he switched off his mobile he realised that Teddy was standing right behind him.

  ‘Aw, isn’t that nice,’ Teddy said.

  ‘What the hell …! Are you in the habit of listening in to other people’s telephone conversations?’

  ‘I was born nosy, old boy. We could call this picture: Teddy Overhears Policeman’s Declaration of Love. I wasn’t being sarcastic. It’s great to be in love with your wife. If that was your wife, that is.’

  ‘It was,’ Toftlund replied irritably.

  ‘Your first?’

  ‘If you must know, yes.’

  ‘Ah, it’ll pass.’

  ‘What the blazes would you know about that?’

  ‘I’ve had three.’

  ‘A week from now I’ll be a father,’ Toftlund went on, growing even more annoyed – although as much with himself as with Teddy.

  ‘Is that a first too?’

  ‘Yes, dammit.’

  ‘Me, I’d need to count up how many I have and with whom.’

  ‘God, you’re asking for it,’ Toftlund seethed. ‘Yep, that’s Teddy. My wives used to say the same thing. And a lot else besides.’

  Toftlund glowered at him then stalked back to the bar to finish his drink before, at long last, their flight was called. Apart from those occupied by Teddy, Per and the two Red Cross nurses or doctors all the seats on the plane were taken up by young, black-haired men.

  ‘Cannon fodder for the UKC, the Kosovo Albanian liberation army,’ Teddy muttered as they fastened their seatbelts.

  ‘For once in your life would you shut up,’ Toftlund hissed back.

  ‘Off to the mountains to kill Serbs,’ Teddy went on, nothing daunted. ‘Drummed up from around Europe and the US to serve the great cause of Kosovo and the UCK. They don’t know what they’re letting themselves in for.’

  ‘Well, that’s not our worry. We have to find your half-sister. The rest is none of our business.’

  ‘You’ll find, Inspector, that in the Balkans things have a way of becoming your business whether you like it or not.’

  The aircraft accelerated. Toftlund looked away from Teddy and stared pointedly out of the window. The Airbus climbed steeply over the mountains. The minute the captain switched off the ‘Fasten Seatbelts’ sign and with it the ‘No Smoking’ sign one would have thought a fire had broken out i
n the cabin as all the Albanian youths lit up as one man. It was an incredible sight. Toftlund could not remember the last time he had flown in a plane in which people were smoking. Teddy chuckled and groped about in his own pockets while Toftlund felt the pungent smoke stinging his eyes and throat. The four flustered Slovenian stewardesses bustled up and down the aisle, pointing to the ‘No Smoking’ sign, which had come back on and flapping scandalised hands in front of their faces as they endeavoured, with remonstrations in English, to have the fire put out. The young Albanians simply carried on talking and smoking, until an older man – ramrod straight and with a flat, bald head – marched down from the rear of the plane, shouting and bawling in Albanian. The chastened youths tried frantically to put out their cigarettes, stubbing so vigorously that sparks flew up around their hands. Teddy laughed so hard that Toftlund thought he was going to burst a blood vessel.

  ‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ he gasped. ‘I just love Albania.’

  They flew over snow-capped mountains on the long roundabout route to Albania. The usual approach paths were closed to allow the high-flying NATO F-16 fighters to swoop unhindered from their bases in Italy across Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo with their deadly cargo of laser-controlled precision missiles. As the plane approached Rina Airport, between Tirana and Dürres, Toflund saw rivers like dun-coloured ribbons winding through the mountains, and small villages dotted here and there among green and brown fields. He felt hollow and tense, unsure what awaited them down there, and as usual when he felt a twinge of uncertainty he tried to concentrate on the task ahead of him. They began their descent and Per pointed out to Teddy the long, straight row of American Apache attack helicopters ranged up at the airport. Right next door was the American army camp: regimented khaki tents planked straight down in the mud like soldiers.

  ‘The Apache,’ Toftlund said. ‘The world’s most efficient attack helicopter. Wait till the Serbs get a taste of that.’

  ‘It’ll never happen,’ Teddy shouted above the din of the braking engines, hanging on for dear life to his armrest as the aircraft made its long descent, wallowing and bucking like a ship in a storm.