The Field of Blackbirds (A Jeff Bradley Thriller)

by Thomas Ryan

  The ship lurched as it executed a one-eighty-degree turn. After a pause, its huge engines growled into reverse. Propellers spinning like giant eggbeaters churned the surrounding surface into froth. Slowly the vessel began moving sternwards. Friends and families on the dock jostled as they sought to catch glimpses of loved ones amongst the dozens of passengers leaning over the railings. Backpackers milled about near the top of the ramp posing for last-minute photos.

  Caldwell swayed as a slight shudder ran through the deck signalling that the ferry had docked into its final position.

  Passengers began to crowd the stern. Caldwell found himself pushed backwards. Already he could see it was going to be impossible to maintain a cover on the decoy courier. ‘This is hopeless, Dimitris.’

  Although Caldwell yelled, the din from the excited crowd made verbal communication next to impossible.

  ‘Do not worry, my friend. I have two men guarding the case. They’ve been instructed to keep to the left-hand railing. If an approach is made, we will be ready for it.’

  Halam watched as the boarding ramp settled onto the dock. Within minutes the passengers would begin disembarking. In his ear, on an open line, Halam could hear his brother’s steady breathing. Halam’s thumb was already caressing the detonator trigger in his pocket.

  ‘Count to ten, then do it,’ Zahar said, then rang off.

  Halam counted down . . . five – four – three – two . . .

  The boom from the explosion reverberated across the dock area just as Caldwell reached the top of the ramp. The sight that greeted him resembled nothing less than a volcanic eruption. Flames and sparks and shredded metal spewed skywards. A car flung into the air hurtled back onto the tops of waiting cars in a sickening crunch of metal and shattering of glass. Caldwell’s ears rang. Inside the enclosed space of the ship the sound of the blast was deafening.

  Passengers around Caldwell froze en masse. Eyes peered back and forth as brains struggled to cope with the phenomenon. No one moved.

  ‘It’s a bomb.’

  The shout came from someone near the bottom of the ramp.

  Caldwell watched as wide-eyed fear descended onto the faces of those closest to him.

  ‘Jesus.’ He knew exactly what was about to happen. ‘Dimitris.’ He turned, searching the crowd. The big Greek was nowhere in sight. ‘Dimitris.’

  Passengers behind him started to surge forward like a cresting wave that threatened to wash him overboard. Caldwell found he had little choice. He strong-armed his way towards the outer side of the deck and grabbed hold of the railing. Panicking feet stampeded down the ramp. Caldwell watched in horror as people in front stumbled and fell. He knew some would be crushed to death as that human tsunami cascaded over them.

  Zahar moved quickly in the chaos. He closed in on the courier, pressed the muzzle of his gun against the man’s head and pulled the trigger. In the aftermath of the bomb, the silencer Zahar had fitted was probably redundant. He snatched the case from the dead man’s grasp and disappeared into the crowd.

  Like everyone else, the eyes of Dimitris’s second-in-command had switched in the direction of the explosion. When he looked back, the decoy courier was nowhere to be seen. His first thought was that the momentum of the crowd had forced the man in the baseball cap further down the ramp. Then, through a gap in the rushing legs, he saw a motionless shape in a brown jacket slumped against the superstructure. His gut lurched. Obscenities poured from him as he shoved passengers out of his path. When he reached his fallen comrade, he knew he needn’t check for a pulse. The hole in the side of the man’s head told him everything.

  Caldwell watched Dimitris standing over the body, shaking his head. Red-faced, Dimitris turned and delivered a resounding slap to the face of his second-in-command.

  ‘Fools.’ He turned to Caldwell and pulled a GPS tracker out of his pocket. ‘They can’t have got far. We still have this. I will seal off the area. We will find the bastards.’

  Caldwell looked over Dimitris’s shoulder at the local map on the display on the GPS tracker. The Greek turned a half-circle as he followed a flashing red dot.

  ‘We’ve got them.’ But his shoulders suddenly drooped. ‘Oh no. It can’t be.’

  ‘Why? What’s wrong?’

  ‘The signal’s moving towards the mouth of the harbour. Not along the streets. They must have a motor launch. I will try to contact the navy.’

  He dragged out a mobile and began punching digits into it.

  With all kinds of unhappy sentiments now crowding his breast, Caldwell looked out over the moonlit bay. In despair, he observed the chaos of dinghies powered by small outboards that were motoring across each other’s wakes as would-be rescuers sought to haul victims to safety.

  ‘Don’t waste your time, Dimitris. They’ve gone.’

  ‘But we can track them.’

  ‘If they have any sense, the case with the device will be in the water within the next few minutes.’

  Head shaking, Dimitris continued to watch the GPS screen glowing in his hand.

  Caldwell looked out towards the dock gates. Excited and frightened tourists mingled with locals to rubberneck at the unfolding fiasco. Amongst them village women dressed in black had already begun their traditional wailing. Sirens and flashing lights heralded the arrival of the island’s meagre ambulance and police contingent. Caldwell knew straight away that the local services would never cope. He suspected emergency helicopters would soon be on their way from the mainland.

  He picked his way down the ramp. Dimitris followed. Injured and dying people lay everywhere. Moans and occasional screams filled the air. Pleading eyes looked his way. Beseeching arms extended towards him. He had to shut them out. There was work to do. He checked his watch. His helicopter would be waiting. He leaned into Dimitris.

  ‘We need to have a serious talk with that courier from Kosovo. You agree?’

  ‘I will take pleasure in that, my friend. Tonight I lost a good man. We will get the information we need.’

  In the cabin, the wide eyes of Halam and Zahar stared at the opened suitcase.

  ‘Newspapers.’ Zahar’s voice came forced and hoarse. ‘Nothing but newspapers. The sons of dogs tricked us.’

  Hands shaking and knuckles gleaming white, he clutched on to the beam above the door and scanned the lights of fishing boats and distant taverns twinkling astern. The Greek boatman maintained speed, running-lights off. He had promised the brothers he had navigated these waters with his father from before he was out of nappies. For the money they had paid him he would get them safely to the mainland. After he rounded the southern tip of Syros he cruised into the calmer waters of the fishing anchorage. Zahar continued to look down on the useless pile of paper. The breath rasped in his throat. When at last he could engage with his brother again, Zahar saw the face of a depleted man. Depleted in the way he himself felt depleted.

  ‘Of course they tricked us.’ A slow shake of Halam’s head. ‘We knew this was a possibility when you saw the tail. It means they must have captured the real courier. The man you killed must have been a cop.’ An alarmed expression crossed his face. ‘Throw the case into the sea, Zahar. It will have a tracking device. Go. Go.’

  Zahar jumped like a man shot. Paper fluttered free as he grabbed the suitcase and leaped out to the deck. When he returned he found Halam thumping the table top with a clenched fist. He took up a position on the vinyl squab alongside him.

  ‘What are we going to do, Halam? We need that money. How can we go to Iran with nothing?’

  Halam rested elbows on knees. His head went into his hands. ‘Quiet, brother. I need to think.’

  Zahar sat back with a deep sigh. Halam would think of something. He always did.

  After a few minutes Halam’s head rose. Dark eyes fixed on his brother’s face.

  ‘We did not receive our payment. Kosovo still owes us money. Make
us some tea, Zahar, and we will discuss how to collect what we are due.’

  20.

  Agim Morina complied without question when the message came from Osman Gashi to meet him at the usual place in an hour. Morina – six-foot tall, blond-haired and solidly built – easily passed for Scandinavian, a physical attribute that often worked in his favour. It allowed him to move discreetly about the city. Fellow Kosovons who bothered to look his way assumed he was UN personnel, just as UN staff did. This was all to the good when it came to clandestine meetings which a year earlier he would never have even contemplated.

  As a captain in the newly formed Kosovon police force, he had a bright future. Paid a better than average income, life for Morina should have been comfortable. But apartment rents driven up by an influx of better-paid internationals, and a sickly son needing expensive medications, had sent his life into a tailspin.

  Then came the morning everything changed.

  He was on a break and sitting in the cafe opposite the Central Police Station, mulling into his cup over his reduced prospects. A liberal dose of cognac in the coffee had done little to ward off a fit of depression.

  It had been a rainy day – or had it been sunny? He could not recall.

  Uninvited, an overweight man in an ill-fitting suit sat down at his table. Morina had been flabbergasted at the arrogance.

  ‘You are Agim Morina,’ the man said. His cheerful dispos-ition would have persuaded any onlooker that this was a meeting of friends. ‘My name is Osman Gashi. Maybe you’ve heard of me?’

  No movement of Morina’s head. Two white crescents appeared above his lower lids as his eyes swivelled upwards to view the intruder.

  ‘Yes. I know who you are.’

  ‘I only need a few minutes to discuss a matter. It could be very important to both of us. I wouldn’t have bothered you otherwise.’

  Morina spooned sugar into his coffee. ‘This morning I have no patience. I’ll ask you to leave just the once. If you don’t, I’ll march you across the road and you can spend the next few days in jail. Your choice.’

  To Morina’s great surprise, Gashi seemed unmoved by his threat. Worse, the broadened smile gave no inclination at all that he intended doing as Morina ordered. Morina’s head squared up. Indignation rose as the unflinching gaze of this disrespectful low-life met that of a Kosovon police captain. The sentiment became even more acute as Gashi continued talking as if he’d not even heard Morina.

  ‘The son of a friend is in your station arrested on a charge of car theft. But he wasn’t driving the car. He was merely an innocent passenger.’

  Morina felt his jaw tighten. So that was what this was all about. The man needed a favour. As a senior police officer he was not altogether unfamiliar with this kind of approach. Usually it came with a bag of money. But declining such requests had been a matter of pride for Morina. In his mind he was incorruptible. An honest man, just like the internationals. He knew others in the force routinely accepted bribes as a necessary means of supplementing their meagre incomes. However, even though he might not take bribes himself, he turned a blind eye to the activities of his colleagues. A crusader had no future in the Kosovon police force. The truth was that, incorruptible or not, he needed his job.

  ‘A friend of the boy picked him up and took him for a joyride. He didn’t know his friend had stolen the car. He’s innocent. But you know how it is in Kosovo, Captain.’

  ‘Do I, Mr Gashi?’

  ‘I think yes, officer. Citizens are thrown into Kosovon prisons on the flimsiest of evidence and held for months without trial. They serve their sentences before they get to court, guilty or not guilty. Surely you don’t agree with that?’

  ‘It’s not my place to comment on the rights or wrongs of the judicial process. I’m a police officer, nothing else.’

  ‘Look. You and I both know it’s crazy and unfair. This boy is only eighteen. He comes from a good family. A conviction will ruin his family’s reputation. And the trauma of prison could scar him for life.’

  Morina expelled a deep breath. ‘Mr Gashi. Even if I was to agree with you, and I am not saying I do, why me? Why aren’t you talking to the arresting officer or the investigating officer?’

  ‘The paperwork has begun. The decision is no longer in the hands of the arresting officers. Only you can stop it. The documentation can’t be allowed to get to the prosecutor’s office.’

  Morina fixed Gashi with a stare. What he said was true. Once the paper trail began, there could be no stopping a case going to trial. Of course, bribing the judge to manipulate the trial would be easy enough. And a prosecutor could always destroy evidence. But getting to trial took months. And the longer it took the more people in the loop to pay off. It was practical economics to stop things now. His brow furrowed.

  ‘I have an idea where this conversation might be going, Mr Gashi. And I warn you. Do not take it there. I strongly recommend you leave.’

  Gashi remained seated. An envelope appeared out of his pocket and found its way onto the table. It slid across to where Morina’s hands sat curved around his coffee cup. Morina was dumbfounded. He looked about. No one was watching.

  Gashi leaned forward.

  ‘You have a son who needs medical treatment. Your living conditions are not what you wish. Your wife is unhappy.’

  Morina’s body jerked like he’d been shot. ‘What? You’ve been spying on me? Spying on my family?’

  Gashi’s voice dropped. Despite himself, Morina found himself leaning forward to hear.

  ‘In that envelope is five thousand euros. On the first of each month you will receive two thousand euros.’

  Morina straightened. The veins in his forehead felt like they were about to burst. Never had he been insulted like this. And in public. He should arrest Gashi for trying to bribe a police officer. ‘I’m an honest man. You disgust me. Now leave. This is your last warning.’

  Morina pushed the envelope back across the table. Gashi made no move to pick it up.

  ‘Honesty is not always the best policy in Kosovo, Captain. I don’t work alone. I represent people who have the power to ensure your life becomes a lot worse than it is now. Your job is not as secure as you might think.’

  There it was: the stick beyond the carrot.

  Morina reassessed the man in front of him. He had misinterpreted Gashi’s relaxed manner as bravado, an error in judgment. This was not mere bravado; this man radiated absolute confidence. Other approaches, mostly from worried parents or friends, had been easy to brush aside. They were people who were powerless to threaten him or his family. With Gashi it was different. He was a thug, a gangster. No doubt he knew powerful people, possibly powerful enough to oust him from his job.

  Morina made a lightning reassessment. He eyed the envelope. Life would be easier, wouldn’t it? His wife happier? And what of his son? Wasn’t it a man’s greater moral duty to protect and provide for his family? Could he really afford to turn down this money?

  Taking the money, he knew, would change his life for ever.

  But what life?

  He reached for the envelope.

  Barely a whisper. ‘Give me the boy’s name.’

  A year and a dozen or so more jobs for Gashi later, and the brief for yet another job was approaching Morina’s table.

  ‘Gashi. There you are. Cognac?’

  A waiter nodded at Morina’s signal. A chair creaked in protest. Gashi planted his forearms on the table and leaned on them. ‘There’s a situation in the Prishtina Detention Centre. I’m sure you remember Arben Shala. Yes?’

  Of course Morina knew of Arben Shala. Shala’s arrest had already earned him a generous bonus. But he’d been furious when he discovered Shala was a New Zealand citizen. A foreign national could attract the interest of the international police. The only reason it hadn’t was because Shala had been using his Serbian passport. The sooner Shala wa
s gone from prison and out of the country the better.

  ‘Don’t worry. He’ll be released within the next two weeks.’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t wait that long.’

  ‘Wait a minute. I have no powers to release him earlier.’

  ‘Yes, I know this, Captain.’

  Gashi’s eyes held Morina’s. It took a moment before Morina understood. Once again in this man’s company he discovered an unpleasant knot forming in his stomach.

  ‘You can’t be serious. You’re not asking what I think you’re asking?’

  ‘Relax, Captain. Someone else will be doing the dirty work. It is afterwards I need your help. It won’t be difficult. I merely want you to act like the good police officer you are. When the investigation takes place, I want a finding of self-defence.’

  ‘But. The UN police . . . ?’

  ‘They won’t interfere with an internal investigation. You know that. There’ll be witnesses to support the finding. Leave that to me. The UN police will accept whatever you tell them, as long as everything’s neat and tidy and in its place.’

  An expiration of breath whistled through Morina’s teeth. ‘Look. These arrests on pretty flimsy grounds have become too damn frequent. Always they come through the central police station and always my name’s connected. A pattern’s emerging. Something like you’re now suggesting could motivate somebody to take a closer look.’

  Gashi placed a morning newspaper on the table and pushed it towards Morina. ‘Five thousand euros is pinned on page five next to an article on police budget cuts. There’ll be another five thousand when the job’s done.’

  As Gashi walked away, Morina searched through the pages until he found the envelope.

  21.

  How much longer do you think?’

  Jeff nudged Sulla.

  A huge yawn expelled a billow of condensation. Sulla’s eyes blinked open.

  ‘Mm? Oh. The last bus to Gjakova leaves in twenty minutes. Do not worry, they will come. They must catch that bus to get home.’