The Wolf of Sarajevo

by Matthew Palmer

  “Do you know the story of Mujo catching the magic goldfish?” Nikola asked.

  “How many of those jokes do you know?” Eric interjected.

  “More than most. Now hush.”

  Eric held up his hands in mock surrender.

  “So Mujo catches the goldfish. The big one. The one that grants three wishes. And Mujo’s first wish is that bread grows from the trees. Sure enough, the branches are soon heavy with beautiful golden-brown loaves of fresh bread. His second wish is for the river to run with brandy instead of water. The fish shakes its head and the river begins to flow with amber rakija. Now Mujo is stumped. ‘You have a third wish,’ the fish says, ‘but you have to use it now. No saving it for later.’ ‘Okay,’ Mujo answers, ‘I guess I’ll have just one more liter of rakija.’”

  Sarah laughed harder than the joke merited and touched Nikola’s arm. Eric felt a brief and irrational stab of jealousy. Was she flirting with Nikola or manipulating him? With Sarah, it could sometimes be difficult to tell.

  Dragan looked at her appraisingly.

  “So I have heard from some friends of mine . . . mutual acquaintances, I believe . . . that you are interested in the activities of a certain faux Spaniard.”

  “I may be,” Sarah acknowledged.

  “One of these acquaintances is currently eating his meals through a straw.”

  “Really? That must be just awful for him.”

  “I hear that you may have had something to do with that. It’s an unusual skill for an economic officer, no?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Numbers can be pesky things. A girl likes to have options.”

  “Indeed.” Dragan’s smile was as enigmatic as anything that the Mona Lisa had ever managed.

  “I may be able to assist you in this,” Dragan continued.

  “You know something about Mali? Something useful?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Do you know who he is?” Sarah asked. “What he wants?”

  “No, but I know where to begin.”

  “What do you know?”

  “I know where the son of a bitch lives.”

  KRIVA RIJEKA

  OCTOBER 28

  13

  Marko Barcelona examined the empire he had built with the obsessive attention to detail of the clinically paranoid. He was not satisfied. All had gone well so far, remarkably well. But there was a weak point. A vulnerability. Mali worked it over in his mind as he might probe a loose tooth with his tongue. He could not afford any mistakes. Not now. Not when he was so close.

  His name was neither Marko nor Mali, and although his Spanish was nearly as good as his Serbo-Croatian, he was neither a Spaniard nor a Serb. Marko “Mali” Barcelona was a legend, a man with no past and no home and no history. He was an invention, a reinvention, really, of what he had been. His contempt for his former identity was so complete that he had all but banished it from his thoughts. It was painful to contemplate, and he had so thoroughly embraced his new identity that he thought of himself only as Mali.

  Before he was Mali, he had been a worm feeding on the decayed leaf matter on the forest floor, the droppings of his betters, his self-styled “superiors.” But he had spun a chrysalis around himself of power and money and knowledge, and he had burst forth a wolf. Transformed. Metamorphosed. He preferred being a wolf to being a worm by a wide margin, and he intended to keep it that way no matter what, or who, stood in his way.

  Mali’s office was deep inside the villa he had built for himself with the resources that flowed effortlessly from influence. He had always understood at a gut level that money was power, but it was only after his metamorphosis that he had come to appreciate the obverse. Power was money, or near enough to a one-to-one exchange rate so as to make no difference.

  Dimitrović had political power and Mali had Dimitrović. That translated into a significant share of nearly every business deal done in Republika Srpska, a kind of tax on the weak paid by the sheep to the wolves. This office was Mali’s wolf’s lair, his retreat. It was paneled in oak and lined with shelves of books in half a dozen languages. A few paintings hung on the wall, the muted palette of Serbian masters and the bolder colors of Russian artists from the avant-garde school.

  The desk was massive. It had been moved in during construction because it would not have fit through the door. A side table held a decanter of Scotch and a humidor of cigars. Crown Royal and Cohibas. Tito’s favorites. It was an homage of sorts to the master manipulator, the little peasant boy from a Croatian village who had risen to a position of absolute power from which he could thumb his nose at both East and West.

  Mali slapped the top of the desk, feeling the sting in his palm. It was made of solid oak. But the solidity, he knew, was an illusion. His empire was built on a foundation of lies and deception and the control he could exert over one man. As long as Mali had the tape, Dimitrović was his to control, and the dead man’s switch, Emile Gisler, kept him untouchable. But if Dimitrović disappeared. If he was hit by a truck, or knocked off by a rival, or even simply lost out in a power struggle, Mali’s empire would melt away like a morning frost.

  He would need to build on his position, use this window to make himself independent of Dimitrović. Then, when the RS had formally separated from the horrifying accident of history that was Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mali’s position would be secure. He would no longer be merely a wolf among lesser wolves. He would be a king.

  It was ten o’clock in the morning, but he poured himself a drink. Crown Royal over ice from a silver bucket engraved with the Serbian seal. The seal was a cross with four C’s that were really Cyrillic S’s. They stood for the phrase Samo sloga Srbina spašava: Only unity can save the Serbs.

  Mali did not give a shit about that. He had no interest in Greater Serbia, the pathos of a battle lost some five hundred years ago on Kosovo’s field of blackbirds, or any other project of ethnic aggrandizement. Mali was interested in wealth and power. The only kind of power that mattered. Dominion over other men.

  There was a knock on the door.

  “Come in,” Mali shouted. The door was steel with a ceramic core. It was bombproof, bulletproof, and nearly soundproof. But he could not be bothered to use the intercom system. Mali set his drink down on a coaster. It was, he understood, a bit fastidious, but that did not bother him. He considered it, together with his well-developed sense of paranoia, a source of success.

  His personal secretary opened the door. Marija was a statuesque blonde with dark roots and expensive tastes. She managed his calendar and fucked him with the same cool efficiency. She was a professional.

  Mali had no illusions about the nature of their relationship. He was not a handsome man. He was overweight with sallow skin and a nose that could charitably be described as prominent. In a country where a hundred and ninety centimeters was considered average height, Mali barely cracked a hundred and sixty. But he was not ashamed of his nickname. Mali might not be physically imposing, but he was the real power in Republika Srpska. That gave him stature well beyond his mere physical size. Money more than compensated for his appearance, and power, as Kissinger had famously observed, was the ultimate aphrodisiac. If that troll Henry could get laid, then it must be true.

  “Darko Lukić is here,” Marija said. “He’s waiting upstairs.”

  “Is he sober?”

  “Mostly.”

  “Try to keep him that way. Give me ten minutes and then bring him down.”

  “Of course.”

  Marija turned to open the door, and Mali had a good look at the way her perfectly shaped ass filled out her Prada skirt. He felt a brief flash of desire and thought for a moment about calling her back and delaying his meeting with Lukić another ten minutes. He had had her more than once on the leather couch in the corner. The moment passed. There would be time for that later. He had work to do.

  There was a buff-colored fo
lder on the desk next to his drink. An Avery label stuck to the tab read DARKO LUKIĆ—SERBIA/BOSNIA. Mali sat in the leather desk chair and opened it. The first page was a biography of Lukić stamped TOP SECRET/EMERALD WAVE. The file had been stolen from the archives of the American CIA, which was not an easy thing to do.

  Emerald Wave was an older project code name, a compendium of biographic material from the Balkan wars on players both major and minor who were considered candidates for PIFWC status. That was the awkward acronym, pronounced piffwick in international circles, for persons indicted for war crimes. Most of those included in the Emerald Wave program were either dead or serving long prison sentences. A few had escaped the long arm of international law, most for lack of evidence rather than lack of culpability. Darko Lukić was one. If there was a hell, Lukić’s reprieve from the consequences of his “work” in the 1990s would be only temporary.

  The Emerald Wave files were more than dry recitations of birthdays, work history, and schooling, which in the case of Lukić were February 13, 1970; spotty; and none. The prosecutors were open to offering deals to the little fish if they would turn on the big fish. The Emerald Wave files were intended to be of use to case officers in recruitment and were geared toward identifying weaknesses that could be exploited.

  Darko Lukić seemed to have many of these.

  Lukić was a drunk. He was a religious fanatic with an image of Saint George tattooed on his chest. His commander in the war had suspected him of being mentally unbalanced, even delusional.

  But he was also a gifted shooter, an absolute ace with the Zastava M76 that was the standard-issue sniper rifle in the Bosnian Serb army. From strongpoints overlooking Sniper Alley, Lukić had routinely made shots from more than a thousand meters in the rain, wind, and fog.

  Lukić seemed to have something of a sadistic streak as well. There were reports in the file from his commander that praised his skill while noting with a certain squeamishness his demonstrated preference for shooting children and pregnant women.

  This was just the kind of conscienceless killer Mali needed.

  Exactly ten minutes after Mali had sat down at the desk, the beautiful Marija returned with Lukić in tow.

  Lukić looked at least two decades older than the age given in his file. He had the hollow-eyed look of a serious drinker. Mali hoped that alcohol had not sapped either his skills or his will. He only needed Lukić to make one shot. But he would get only one chance.

  “Sit,” Mali said, pointing to one of the small armchairs on the far side of the desk.

  Lukić sat. He seemed tractable enough, someone used to taking orders.

  “Drink?” Mali asked.

  “Please.” The note of eagerness in his reply was a definite warning flag, but Mali poured him two fingers of Crown Royal over ice. He wanted Lukić relaxed and pliable.

  Lukić was dressed in all black, a black wool sweater, black canvas pants, and a black watch cap. The shock of hair that stuck out from under the cap was black. So were his eyes and, Mali both hoped and expected, his soul.

  “Darko, do you know who I am?”

  Lukić nodded. “Mali Barcelona,” he said.

  “Good. I asked you to come here today because I was worried about you.”

  Lukić looked confused, which was a perfectly reasonable response to Mali’s out-of-the-blue expression of concern. It was likely that even his own mother had given up worrying over her son some years earlier.

  “Worried about me?” Lukić asked.

  “Yes. The last years have not been easy for you, have they?”

  Lukić shook his head.

  “Since the war ended, things have been hard.” It was a statement, not a question.

  Lukić just looked at him.

  “Have you had steady work since the war?”

  “Steady? No.”

  “There’s not much work for a man of your particular skills on the outside, is there? Oh, they like you well enough when you’re doing their dirty work, killing their enemies. But when the fighting’s done, they act as if they’ve been secretly ashamed of you all along, don’t they?”

  Lukić nodded. His face softened, and Mali thought that he might be on the edge of tears. But the old soldier quickly swallowed whatever emotions Mali’s line of questioning had uncovered, and his expression returned to its impassive norm.

  “You are a son of war, Darko. You should be honored for your service.”

  “Yes,” Lukić agreed.

  “Do you still have it? Are your skills still sharp?”

  The vague, glassy look in his eyes faded, and they snapped into focus. They were the eyes of a predator. A hawk or even, like Mali, a wolf. Lukić looked at Mali with the intensity he had once directed through the scope of his rifle. It was almost like a physical force, like he was seeking to impose his will on Mali’s. It was its own answer to the question.

  “Yes, they are,” Mali said appreciatively. “Darko, I need you to kill someone for me. From a distance. A considerable distance. You would be doing a great service to your country and your people.”

  “Who do you want me to kill?” Lukić asked.

  “A woman. That won’t be a problem, will it?”

  Lukić should his head slowly.

  “I thought not.”

  SARAJEVO

  MAY 12, 1993

  14

  He loved the world he saw through his sights. With one eye pressed firmly against the rubber seal of the German rifle scope and the other closed gently, not squeezed tightly, the world was narrow, constrained, and predictable. And Darko Lukić was its master. In this narrow world, he was a god. The god of death. He would reach out silently and unseen from his perch on Mount Olympus and deliver death unto whomever he had chosen.

  The rush of power that came with each individual act of killing had no equal. No drug could match it. Even sex was but a pale shadow of killing.

  The world outside his scope was a consistent disappointment. Without the German optics that brought focus and clarity, Lukić’s world was a disorganized clash of stimuli. It all moved too fast, with no order or direction. He preferred the deliberate and methodical to the spontaneous and chaotic. The rifle and its scope were the single meaningful organizing principles in his life. Without them, he was nothing, an insignificant speck of protoplasm washed back and forth by tidal forces beyond his control or comprehension.

  He hoped the war would never end.

  But how could it? At least not until one people stood at last alone and victorious atop the piled bodies of the others. This was a conflict with no end and no beginning. It had gone too far. It had settled into the bones of all three sides. It simply was.

  This conflict was timeless. It was . . . beautiful.

  Lukić pulled his eye away from the pleasingly simple lines of the reticle and took a quick look around. He worked alone without a spotter, and it was important that he not get so lost in the world through his scope that he left himself vulnerable. The foreign special forces—the British SAS and the American SEALs—had taken to hunting the snipers. If they could find your nest, they would kill you. Lukić had already lost three friends to the hunter-killer teams.

  They would not find him. Lukić had built his nest well. He was in an abandoned apartment block up in the hills that encircled the city. But he was not simply shooting out the window. That was the easiest way for the inexperienced to make the transition to the newly dead. Lukić would not let himself be silhouetted against the glass. There would be no muzzle flash from his rifle. Nothing to use to guide mortar teams or a countersniper. Lukić wasn’t even in one of the rooms along the outside wall. Earlier, he had used a sledgehammer to knock a small hole in that wall. A second hole in a wall between the living room and an interior bedroom was located about half a meter higher up. From inside that bedroom, perched on an old mattress resting on top of a pile of shipping cra
tes, Lukić could sight through both holes with a clean angle on the street that had come to be known as Sniper Alley. His alley. The name itself was a form of tribute being paid to the god of death.

  Lukić used his pocketknife to carve thick slices off a slab of dried smoked pork. To go with it, he had a small loaf of bread and a hunk of yellow monastery cheese that was starting to dry out. He washed it down with a swallow of rakija from a plastic Coca-Cola bottle.

  Okay, he thought, time to get to work.

  Lukić lay back down on top of the mattress in the prone position with his legs spread for balance and the butt of the rifle pressed tightly against his cheek and shoulder. The walnut stock was smooth and cool against his skin, like the touch of a woman.

  He would want a woman later. Killing always made him thirsty and horny. Fortunately, there was a camp near his base where the army kept some of the prettier Muslim girls who were made available to men who had done well. Lukić had had a few. Unlike some of the other men in the unit, he did not especially like forcing himself on them. It distracted from rather than added to his pleasure. But military life was full of compromise.

  The streets were nearly empty. It was late afternoon, and the good people of Sarajevo preferred to stay home if at all possible rather than roll the dice and take their chances with the snipers and the artillery. Lukić waited patiently. He was an ambush predator.

  The snipers played a game for points. Pensioners were worth half a point. They were slow. Military-age civilian men were worth one point. Children were worth a point and a half. They were smaller targets. Soldiers and women scored two points. Pregnant women three. Wounding a target and then killing one or more of the first responders trying to save the victim was worth a total of four.

  Lukić was so far out in front that his fellow snipers had conceded that they were all playing for second.

  A few civilians passed through his field of view, but none were at the right angle for a clean shot. Finally, his patience was rewarded. Two men appeared at the corner of Ulica Zmaja od Bosne and an alleyway too small to have its own name, the area he had identified as his primary target zone. They did not look like they were together.