by Mark Burnell
Savic answered to Dragica Maric. Stephanie had never considered that. There had been no evidence to suggest it. Since his teenage years Savic had been a leader. It had been his street-gang in Belgrade. Inter Milan had been his paramilitary unit. Gemini had been his idea. Where and when had Dragica Maric entered his life?
'Does Milan make you happy?'
An echo of another question Maric had once asked. Do you love him? Another time, another gun, another city: New York. Another man: Komarov.
'Yes.'
Maric just looked at her, the stare rendering words redundant.
'You don't believe that either?' Stephanie asked.
The tone of the reply couldn't have been more scathing. 'Sure. Why not? Once you had a man like Kostya, now you have a man like Milan. Why wouldn't you be happy?'
'He's different, that's all.'
Maric laughed loudly. 'Different? He certainly is! Having had both of them, I can confirm that.' Stephanie flinched. Maric had been looking for it and it spurred her on. 'Milan is exactly what you'd expect. Basic and unimaginative. An agricultural thruster. Not like Kostya. He's a little rough round the edges too, but he has a certain … something, don't you think?'
Stephanie wanted to accuse her of lying. She didn't think being naked had ever felt so uncomfortable. It was as though the duvet didn't exist.
Maric sighed wistfully. 'Maybe it's all those tattoos. How much is Milan paying you for Shatri?'
'Nothing.'
As soon as she said it she knew it was a mistake.
'Nothing? You're doing it for him?'
Stephanie stayed silent.
Maric's eyes narrowed. 'Well, well. He must be a lot better than he used to be. Perhaps I should try him again. Either that or your standards have dropped, Petra. Maybe any passing prick is enough for you these days.'
Stephanie could see that Maric didn't believe that either. 'Why don't you tell me what you're thinking?'
'I think you're fucking him because you need to.'
'Really?'
Maric nodded. 'Which is the worst option of all from my point of view. But that's the kind of person you are. I wonder if you'd have sex with me, if you felt you needed to. My feeling is, you would. My feeling is, you'd do anything.'
'You're talking about yourself, Dragica.'
'No, Petra. I'm talking about us.'
She's pointing the SIG Sauer P226 at me. Her choice of gun isn't a coincidence. She knows it's what Petra uses. If she has to kill me, it's the perfect weapon. But she doesn't want to. She likes me.
'Can you find Shatri?'
'I think so.'
'What's in it for you?'
I take a long time to answer. 'That's my business.'
'Not when I'm pointing this at you.'
'Yes. Even then.'
I know she won't pull the trigger. She couldn't in New York and she had more reason then than she has now.
'I need to be sure about you, Petra.'
'Is that why you came here from Moscow?'
She nods.
'You don't have to worry,' I tell her.
'How can I be sure of that? How can you be sure of that?'
I look into her eyes. 'Trust me, Dragica. Our worlds won't collide. Savic has something I want. When I get it, I'll be gone.'
'What is it?'
'Like I said before, that's my business.'
'Not good enough.'
'It will be when I deliver Farhad Shatri and the list.'
'Go on.'
'There's no need. We've reached the end. If you shoot me you won't get Shatri or the list. You're the one with the gun. You choose.'
Slowly she eases the safety back on. Then she takes another sip from her mug and suggests I get dressed. My clothes are scattered throughout the apartment. I slip out from beneath the duvet and get up. The floor is cold. Maric goes into the bathroom and returns with a dressing-gown, which she throws to me.
It's hers. I pull it on.
Half an hour later we're in the Atlantic, a café on Bergmanstrasse. I'm taking my first sip of black coffee. I ask her what she's told Milan.
'That we had business in the past and there were things we needed to sort out if you were going to be involved.'
'And he went for that?'
'Of course.'
Dragica's too clever to cause trouble without a reason. She opens a pack of Marlboro Lights. 'Did you know that Milan and Arkan were friends?'
A hand-grenade casually lobbed into the conversation.
'He's mentioned that he knew him. I didn't know they were friends.'
'More than just friends, Petra. Comrades. Kindred spirits.' She lights her cigarette. 'I wonder how Milan would react if he discovered that you killed him.'
We're both in the lobby of the Hotel Inter-Continental in Belgrade on 15 January 2000. Arkan is walking towards me, Ceca close by, his so-called protection everywhere and nowhere. The lobby is crowded. Somewhere, among the throng, Dragica is watching. I don't know that, though; I only discovered that later, in New York. Arkan sees me. Just for a second, our eyes connect. And he knows.
I've never forgotten it. Fear fuelled by premonition.
Dragica blows smoke in my face. 'Milan asked me once if I saw the gunman.'
'What did you say?'
'I said I had. He asked me what he looked like. Typical … to assume that it had to be a man. You know how I described you?'
'How?'
'Short and fat with a beard.'
Despite myself, I laugh. And everything changes. Dragica laughs too and a barrier breaks. A waitress saunters over to the table. I order another cup of black coffee and a croissant. Dragica dithers, then chooses hot chocolate. I can't picture her dithering. Then again, in my world, reputation and reality rarely match. John Peltor – once a US Marine, now an assassin – makes marmalade in his spare time.
The table we're sitting at is made of wood. Square in shape, there is a pane of glass set into it. Beneath that are hundreds of roasted coffee beans, tightly packed. I'm reminded of the one million tiny figures beneath the glass floor at Gilbert Lai's house at Deep Water Bay. I wonder if Dragica has been there too. Does she know Lai? Or is she one of the European contacts – the best imaginable, he'd said – that Savic provides for him? There are a couple of men on a table on the other side of the café. They've been watching us since we came in.
'What do you reckon they make of us?' I ask.
Dragica tilts her head one way, then the other. 'I think … you'd be a magazine editor and I'd be … an architect. We're in the right part of town for it. We look okay. What do you make of them?'
Both skinny, one with a trimmed goatee beard, the other with a thick polo-neck, a shaved scalp and natty little glasses with a dark blue frame. 'The same.'
She laughs again. 'You're right! We should leave.'
And so it goes on. Dragica Maric and Petra Reuter together over breakfast. It is, possibly, the most surreal experience of my professional life. Despite every decent instinct within me, I have a good time. She's bright and funny. We talk about work and we talk about other things. Countries we like, cities we hate, fashion, music, politics, mutual acquaintances. We don't talk about men.
I avoid Gemini but ask her about the Balkans, and she's candid. The most surprising thing she tells me is that she felt catastrophe was inevitable the moment Milosevic became president. 'Arkan, Mladic, Karadzic – they all believed in the bullshit. At least, at first. And, in Mladic's case, right to the end. But there were many who knew it was going to be a disaster before it had even begun. We were fighting fires before the arsonist had struck a match.'
'How come?'
'Because we didn't have a cause. And we didn't have a leader. We had a bureaucrat; Milosevic was a gifted organizer. He was good at reacting to events but he could never shape them. He had no vision. No long-term plan. Kosovo was a matter of political expediency. He picked it up and ran with it for short-term gain. Sure, it was a problem. The Serbs in Kosovo were being bru
talized by the Albanian majority. It needed fixing, certainly. But there was never any doubt over Kosovo's place at the heart of Serbia. Now, however, the concept of independence for Kosovo is closer to being a reality than it was before. That is Milosevic's legacy. We are worse off, in every possible way. Do you know what it's like to be a Serb today?'
'What?'
'It's like being a German in 1945. You're guilty by association.'
'Dragica, you're guilty by deed.'
She smiles. 'I know. And I accept that. But I'm talking about ordinary Serbs. Milosevic and his cronies sold them out. Look at the Zemun gang in Belgrade today. Still ruining the lives of regular people. Is it a surprise they killed Zoran Djindjic? No. The only surprise is that they didn't manage it earlier.'
'They came close.'
'Amateurs. Neanderthals.' She can't mask her contempt. 'Compared to you or I, Petra, who are these people? Nothing. Not even the shit on our shoes.'
She tells me she heard about Waxman and Cheung while she was in Los Angeles. Finally, we come to New York. The only moment in my life when I knew I was going to die. When I'd got beyond thinking I might. The only moment when I was ever resigned to it.
'Can we leave it in the past?' Dragica asks.
'It is in the past.'
'Can we keep it there?'
'There's no reason not to.'
She nods slowly. 'And is there any reason not to talk about the future?'
'What future?'
'Any future. Our future.'
'You and I?'
'Why not?'
'Milan's already tried to tempt me.'
This surprises her. 'With what?'
'A long list of Albanians.'
She giggles like a teenager. 'Some men … I don't know. It seems cruel to say it. Or even to think it.'
I am thinking it. We're in tune.
She says, 'I had in mind something a little more imaginative.'
'Like what?'
'I don't know. I just think we'd be good together.'
What was it that Claesen had said in Marrakech? That Dragica and I were a reflection of one another? Superficially, perhaps. And sitting here, having a good time with her, I might even believe it. But I have to remind myself of the critical difference between us. Dragica is real. I'm not.
'It's a neat idea. But I think I'll pass.'
She smiles. 'Another time, maybe.'
'Maybe.'
'You don't mean that.'
'No,' I admit. 'I don't.'
'You're wrong, you know.'
'Not to mean it?'
'Not to believe it.'
'To believe what?'
'That we'll work together. That we'll be together. We will. One day …'
At six she met Asim Maliqi at Gorlitzer U-Bahn. They headed up Oranienstrasse.
'I can't get you close to Farhad Shatri. It's impossible.'
'I thought it might be. But I had to ask. Thank you for trying.'
He shrugged off her gratitude. 'If you were to obtain this list, what would happen to Savic?'
'That would depend on what I did with it. At the very least he'd be arrested and prosecuted. More likely someone would have him killed.'
'What about you? Would you do it?'
'Again, that would depend.'
'But you wouldn't exclude the possibility?'
'What are you driving at, Asim?'
'I can't deliver Shatri but I have something else. Maybe it's useful. Maybe not. If I give it to you I want something in return.'
'What?'
'If this information helps lead you to the list, I want you to promise me that you'll kill him. For Hamdu.'
They walked in silence for a while, until they reached Oranienplatz. Then Stephanie said, 'If your information helps, Milan Savic is a dead man. You have my word on it.'
Maliqi nodded. 'There was an intermediary between Shatri and the vendor of the list.'
'Who?'
'I don't have her name. But she knows Savic well. And she flew from Hong Kong to London to meet Shatri.'
'She?'
Maliqi nodded. 'The intermediary was a woman.'
'What else?'
'She might be a journalist. That's all.'
'How do you know this?'
'Please don't ask. As it is, I'm betraying a family confidence.'
Which was as much evidence as she needed. He shook her hand formally, then walked away in the direction of Moritzplatz.
She spent the night with Savic, fuelling the same fantasy as the night before, distracting him from the subject of Dragica Maric. She found it less easy to distract herself from the same subject. It was harder to play the slut after Maric because Savic was diminished. Yet he was the one who needed the list. Maric didn't. And that was why he remained vital to Stephanie because she needed it too. In that, at least, they were united.
It was almost three in the morning when he hauled himself off her back, leaving sweat along her spine. He rolled onto one side, panting heavily, scratching his hairy belly.
'I love you, Petra.'
Sore and sweaty, she said she loved him too, and wondered if he'd ever said it to anyone else. Or was it only to her, his very own Ceca?
'What are you thinking?' he asked.
I'm wondering about all the different ways in which I could turn Asim Maliqi's wish into a gruesome reality.
She was smiling. 'Nothing.'
In the morning she caught a Lufthansa flight to Heathrow, then called Mark at work. He was busy so she left a message on his mobile.
'Darling, I'm back. It's time to tell you everything. I'll see you tonight. I'll bring something special to drink. Call me when you get a chance.'
Dragica Maric was back in Moscow. And back in perspective, too. Calculating and ruthless, she was the de luxe version of Petra. Stephanie remembered that now, having somehow overlooked it when they were together. Then again, that was one of Maric's weapons; in her presence, people were rendered defenceless.
At Maclise Road there was a message on the answer-machine. 'Hi, Steph. It's Rosie. I just want to have a word. Call me when you get a moment.'
Stephanie ignored it and erased it.
In Kensington Gardens autumn was in full cry, a strong wind ripping gold and ruby leaves from the trees. Between the showers there was sharp sunlight, peeping through racing cloud. Autumn had always been Stephanie's favourite season.
It was raining again by the time she reached Poplar Place, off Bayswater Road. She pressed the buzzer and a woman answered.
'DHL. I have a delivery for you. From Mr J. Barrie in New York. I need your signature.'
'Come up. Top floor.'
It was dark inside, the communal parts old but well cared for: a plain navy carpet, striped wallpaper – two shades of very dark red-framed watercolours on each landing, flowers in vases.
The front door was ajar. She entered, closing it behind her. Carleen Attwater stepped out of the kitchen, both hands in oven gloves.
'Could you hold on a minute. I just have to … we've met, haven't we?'
'I didn't think you'd agree to see me again.'
Attwater noticed there was no sign of a DHL package. 'Stern. He gave you my name …'
'Is something burning?'
She followed Attwater into the kitchen. The American took a dish from the oven, the pastry on the top slightly burnt. She placed it on a mat, then shed the gloves.
'I'm sorry. I don't remember you.'
'Stephanie.'
She tried to imagine Attwater as she would have been then. A little lighter, perhaps – war zones tended to assist weight loss – with more of a tan and a few less lines. In all, not much different. She was still a good-looking woman. Earthy, sexy, vital.
'That was a neat trick, using my ex-husband's name like that.'
'Neat but cheap.'
'Coffee?'
'Thank you.'
'Is instant okay?'
'Fine. Black, no sugar.'
She watched Attwater busy
herself with the kettle and mugs. On a blustery weekday morning in west London, in her well-appointed kitchen, in her comfortable flat, it was hard to picture her drenched in mud and blood. Absorbing the dead, living the nightmare.
'I wonder why you'd think I wouldn't want to see you. Are you still looking for Milan Savic?'
Stephanie felt the chill wind of Petra blowing through her. 'No. I've found Savic. I'm here for you.'
Attwater froze. She turned round slowly, perhaps expecting Stephanie to be armed. She offered the coffee mug. Stephanie was careful, knowing exactly what Petra would do in Attwater's situation.
'What do you want?'
'When was the last time you went to Hong Kong?'
Instantly Stephanie saw she was going to lie.
'I've never been to Hong Kong.'
'Not even when your husband was the Time correspondent there?'
'Well … obviously then, but …'
'You said never.'
'What I meant was …'
'Never, as in recently?'
She gathered herself for a counter-offensive. 'What are you doing here?'
'Tell me about the last trip you took.'
'I asked you a question …'
'Where you went, who you saw. what you brought back.'
Nothing. That was the word that formed in her mouth.
'Please leave.'
'Tell me what you gave Farhad Shatri.'
Her eyes were letting her down.
'You've got a lot of nerve coming here like this.'
'Is that right?'
'You're so wide of the mark, it's unreal. I don't know what you think you know but …'
'Savic wasn't a professional assignment, was he? You were in love with him.'
She took the blow like a seasoned professional; rolled with it, then struck back. 'Just wait a god-damned minute!'
'And you thought he loved you.'
The first one had winded her. The second one injured her.
'You don't know what you're talking about!'
'I do now.'
Attwater was trembling. She just stared at Stephanie, stranded somewhere between rage and heartbreak. While Stephanie herself felt only pity. In Berlin she'd goaded Savic, suggesting he was the type of man to go for a certain type of woman – big-breasted blondes with as little intellect as possible – and he'd denied it. I don't have a type. I even dated a journalist once.
'In the end it wasn't too much CNN or too much alcohol that did it for you, was it? Despite everything, it was love. Not a great catch, for sure, but in war, standards differ. He was a one-man cyclone and you got sucked in. It's not hard to imagine. You, an older woman, high on danger, high on accelerated living. High on the testosterone-fuelled attention coming from this younger man, who seemed to be at the centre of everything. What was the phrase you came up with? Heroin for the soul?'
