“An Austrian Gypsy?” Sylvia asked.
Petermann smiled. “There are no Austrian Gypsies,” he said. “Credit Hitler with that.” It was difficult to tell if he approved.
“Blame would be a better word,” Valentine growled.
Before leaving, they pressed the policeman for a way to find the Gypsy clan that made its living moving people across the border. Petermann pointed again to the map and with his finger made a small circle on the Italian side. “They’re usually somewhere in this region, but it would be like looking for air.”
“If you know what they’re doing, why don’t you arrest them?” Sylvia asked.
“To arrest them you need to catch them in the act,” the Austrian said. “They’ve had centuries to hone their skills. Their services are secured through intermediaries. If a client sees them they’re killed. Even when we catch an illegal, which sometimes happens, they can’t identify anyone. Simplicity and deception are the essence of all their schemes.”
“You think this is Frash’s work?” Valentine asked when they were outside.
“No gunshot wounds and both of her eyes are intact.”
“You buy it that she was rock-hopping alone?”
“Not with semen in her.”
“Could have been with somebody, then gotten separated. Could have been with one of the German hikers who found her, I suppose.”
“To me separated followed by dead spells missing. If somebody lost her, how come nobody’s asked? The semen says that somebody should have.”
Valentine stared off at the dark peaks to the south. “If you know you’re being hunted and that normal routes over the borders are being watched, you’ve got to find an escape hatch. You can try on your own—and our boy has experience—but there’s some risk in that. Then you hear about a neat little Gypsy scheme—crossing for cash, no questions asked. Maybe you learn this from a nice Gypsy lady who volunteers to be your go-between. What the hell, you like female company and she’s got to make the contact, so why not take her along? You can always dump her later.”
“I hate this guy,” Sylvia said.
“You’ve got to admire his ingenuity,” Valentine said.
“If it’s Frash,” she cautioned. “We don’t know that yet.”
He rubbed his hands together and took a deep breath of mountain air. “Then the sooner we find that Gypsy outfit, the sooner we can fill in this square.”
“Are you proposing a posse of two?”
“Nope. We’re going to call in the cavalry.”
“Come again?”
“Make that Cossacks,” Valentine answered.
159FRIDAY, MAY 12, 1961, 6:12 A.M.The Italian-Austrian Border
Bailov had twenty men in four teams of five, all with standard Spetsnaz arms, their weapons having been sent to Vienna in diplomatic containers over a period of years and stored for the eventuality of war. Valentine lay on a bed of wet pine needles beside the colonel, while a few meters away Sylvia sprawled beside the tattooed Russian called Melko. She was whispering to the man, who smiled enthusiastically.
Bailov craned his neck to look at the sky through an opening in the treetops and checked his watch. “Dawn soon,” he said, as much to himself as to the Americans. A radio operator was hunkered down beside him, his radio pack giving him the silhouette of a hunchback. The colonel picked up the receiver-transmitter and depressed the transmit button. “This is Gladiator. Where are my children?”
“Brother One is in a grassy area south of the camp. There are seven wooden caravans down this way, horse-drawn. No motorized vehicles, no movement inside the perimeter, no one in sight and no dogs. The horses are on rope hobbles.”
“It’s quiet in the camp,” Bailov told Valentine.
“Orders?” the radio voice asked.
“Hold where you are,” Bailov said.
Valentine saw that the Russian was calm, his breathing slow and normal. He seemed to listen carefully and pause before talking, obviously allowing himself time to think and to ask for information efficiently, all the signs of a professional.
“Brother Two?”
“We’ve been all the way through the camp. Nothing but snores,” the voice reported.
“Sentries?”
“Nyet,” Brother Two said. “The henhouse awaits the fox with open arms.”
Bailov grinned and nodded. “No sentries,” he said in English to Valentine. “Brother Three?”
“We’re approximately twenty meters east of the easternmost caravan. All quiet here. We’ve heard at least two babies cry, one in the caravan closest to us and another two wagons west.”
Bailov looked up at the sky again and rechecked his watch. “Brothers, this is Gladiator. The time is zero-six-twelve. We move in five minutes. Brother Three, take targets seven and six. Brother Two, you’ve got numbers three, four and five. Gladiator will harvest the first two. Remember, no sound; go in fast, get them out and on the ground. Quickly. Silencers and knives, but only if necessary. If anybody fucks up, in a week he’ll be mining uranium with a spoon.” He winked at Valentine.
The two Americans had contacted the Russians in Vienna and asked for help. They had met outside Nauders, the Russians arriving in two unmarked trucks; though they were armed, they wore civilian clothing. Sylvia noted that their disguises were much better than those Soviet agents usually employed. They were learning.
The group drove to an area near the border and crossed on foot. Five scouts, operating well ahead of the main force, had located the camp at zero three hundred. It took two more hours to reconnoiter the encampment and develop a plan. The two Americans were exhausted from the pace and altitude, yet the Russians seemed to handle the exertion effortlessly. Valentine saw that they were careful in their preparations and not anxious to rush into danger without a solid assessment, which was in sharp contrast to their image in the U.S.
“Let’s hope it’s the right bunch,” Valentine whispered.
“We’ll secure them first and establish identities later,” Bailov replied.
At six-seventeen Bailov took his P-8 pistol out of its holster, chambered a round and clicked the safety off. “Silencers and knives only,” he repeated into the radio. “Go now.”
By the time he could react, Valentine found himself several paces behind the Russians, who bolted forward in a crouch.
It took less than fifteen minutes to empty the caravans, with no shots fired. The Gypsies were assembled and made to sit on the ground, legs in front of them, their hands clasped on the back of their necks. The captives consisted of seventeen adults, only five of them males, and nine children. Four infants were left sleeping in the caravans. The soldiers shone their flashlights into the captives’ faces as the sun began to rise. The Gypsies were attentive but did not seem overly concerned.
“Which of you is the leader?” Bailov asked in German.
No response. He nodded to Melko, who came forward and spoke to them in Romany. “The leader will identify himself or in thirty seconds I will begin cutting off testicles.” He pulled out a knife and made a show of stropping the edge on his trousers.
A wide-shouldered man stood. “I lead.”
Melko approached him, then regarded the people around him. “He’s the right one,” he said, seeing it in the others’ faces. “A few days ago you took a gadjo across the border,” he went on
“You speak our language well,” the Gypsy said.
Melko smiled. The lyudi had frequent contact with Russian Gypsies, whom the Soviet government had tried unsuccessfully to assimilate into society. In some camps in the gulag there had been two factions vying for power: Gypsies and urki, professional criminals. Gypsies were as familiar to Melko as the ways of his own people. Their patterns of behavior were predictable: first they would try charm to disarm you, then move on to lies; if these failed, they would shift to anger and threats. Violence was the desperate last choice, seldom used. “Where is the gadjo now?”
“We’re simple shepherds,” the man said earnestly.
“Who do you think you are, barging into our camp? We’ve done nothing wrong.”
Melko smiled. “You shear your own fleece?”
“Of course,” the man said.
Melko grabbed one of the man’s hands and examined it. “The only sheep whose fleece you seek are gadje.” Melko turned to Bailov. “Check all their hands. Fleece contains lanolin, which makes the skin smooth and removes calluses.”
There were no smooth hands among the adults.
“Tell us about the man,” Melko said politely as he returned his attention to the Gypsy leader.
“A curse on you,” the man said. He spat at Melko’s feet.
Melko picked up four large stones and placed them at the corners of a rectangle. The Gypsy was staked to the ground and his wrists and ankles placed over the stones. He didn’t struggle, but his dark eyes flashed hatred.
Melko searched the fire pits, hefting several stones before finding the one he wanted; it weighed three or four kilos and was wedge-shaped. “Tell us about the gadjo,” he said again. His voice was soft and encouraging; no threats were made, or even implied; one reasonable man was talking to another.
“I curse the grave of your mother,” the Gypsy said in an equally reasonable tone.
Without warning, Melko raised the stone over his head and brought the pointed edge down hard, smashing the man’s left wrist. His scream shattered the morning silence and his people immediately began to curse and weep.
“The gadjo,” Melko repeated.
“Your mother was a whore,” the Gypsy said through clenched teeth. Pieces of bone stuck out of the crushed wrist.
“Sad but true,” Melko said. When he smashed the second wrist, the man passed out. “Find water,” he told one of the soldiers, who emptied a canvas bucket on the leader.
When the Gypsy revived, Melko knelt on his right leg. “You’ll pick no more gadje pockets,” he said regretfully, “but you can still walk. Reduce your losses while you can.”
“I would crawl on my belly like a snake to spit on your grave,” the man howled.
Melko looked at Bailov and his men, raised an eyebrow, shrugged and struck downward again, this time smashing the Gypsy’s right ankle, which bled heavily.
Still the leader would not relent, so the Russian broke the other ankle, causing the Gypsy to convulse.
“More water?” the soldier with the bucket asked.
“Nyet,” Melko said.
They waited for the man to regain some semblance of consciousness.
Valentine had seen scores of men tortured during the war, but never one with this sort of tolerance for pain. He felt ashamed when the bile rose in his throat, forcing him to swallow several times. When he looked over at Sylvia, he saw that she was staring back and forth between the man on the ground and Melko. What was she thinking? What had the two of them been so buddy-buddy about earlier?
Melko squatted and drew his knife across the Gypsy’s cheek. A small cut spilled a trickle of dark blood. Then he inserted the knife in the waistline of the man’s trousers and cut them away. The Gypsy tried to squirm but the effort rekindled his pain and forced him to lie still. Melko pressed the flat of the knife between the man’s legs. “When does a man stop being a man?” he asked in Romany.
The Gypsy’s eyes glazed over and tears ran out of his eyes as he described Frash in near-perfect detail.
Valentine handed Melko a photograph. “Ask him if this is the man they took across.”
When asked, the man shook his head.
Valentine held the photo out to Sylvia. “Lumbas,” he said. He handed Melko a second photo, this one of Frash; the Gypsy nodded.
“Where did you take him?” Melko asked.
“He got out before the end,” the man gasped. “With the whore.”
“What whore?” The man described a woman he called Kenya, his words coming in spurts. Melko looked up at Valentine. “A woman acted as go-between. They got out of the wagon before they reached their destination.”
Sylvia came forward and held the Polaroid of the dead woman so that the Gypsy could see it. He spat at the photograph and turned his face away. She looked at Valentine and said, “Bingo.”
“Your man is in Austria,” Bailov said.
“Looks like,” Valentine said.
“Why?” the Russian asked.
“We’re not sure,” Sylvia said.
Bailov checked his watch: zero seven fifty. “Let’s go,” he told his men.
Melko grabbed Bailov’s sleeve and said, “We should finish him.”
“There’s no reason. We’ve gotten what we came for and he’s in no shape to cause trouble.”
Melko kept his hold. “He’s lost face. A Gypsy leads until he fails. They’ll pack up and leave him just as he is.”
Bailov understood and nodded to one of his men, who stepped forward and fired a round into the Gypsy’s forehead. The bullet hit with a dull, cracking sound, like two stones struck together.
The group began the return march at the same pace they had maintained on the way out. “Jesus,” Valentine complained, struggling to keep up. Birds sang in the trees and there was the smell of rain in the distance.
After a while the Russians stopped, fanned out and lay down among the trees on the side of a hill covered with small white flowers. “Why are we stopping?” Valentine asked, his lungs burning.
“Last night was difficult,” Bailov said. “When it’s time to push, we push. When it’s time to rest, we rest.”
160FRIDAY, MAY 12, 1961, 1:00 P.M.Vienna
Lejla and Kasi sat in a coffee house. He had wrapped two towels in brown wrapping paper, and it sat on the bench beside him.
A woman in a gray raincoat with a long face and narrow lips came to the table. “It’s crowded today. May I join you?”
Kasi pointed to the bench beside him. The woman sat down, unbuttoned her coat and set an identical package next to Kasi’s. “So much rain,” she said, “but it’s good for the flowers.” She ordered a Turkish coffee and a small cream cake but ate only a couple of bites before picking up Kasi’s package and leaving.
Ten minutes later the two Albanians left.
When they reached the flat, Kasi opened the package and held a garment out to her. “Try it on. You have to look natural in it.” Given her looks, it was going to be a long reach.
161FRIDAY, MAY 12, 1961, 8:00 P.M.Vienna
Sirini was surprisingly well organized; an oversized briefcase was loaded with labeled film canisters and held an envelope containing the exchange of several telegrams with the Austrian journalist. Sirini’s meeting was supposed to have taken place on Wednesday night, but Frash was in no hurry. The briefcase also held a portfolio of photographs, mostly skin shots of a woman with huge breasts, not particularly well framed or even in focus. If the Austrian woman was in such a bind that she had to hire Sirini, he guessed, she would be desperate enough to wait. He had driven to the outskirts of Vienna, taken a room at a small hotel near the airport east of the city and slept until he got his strength back. When he finally telephoned the reporter late in the afternoon there were equal portions of sharpness and relief in her voice. He let her ask for a meeting.
As it had been for centuries, Rotenturmstrasse remained the center of Vienna’s red-light district, an area where all things were possible and prices negotiable. The wide street stretched out behind St. Stephen’s Cathedral, an eight-centuries-old landmark with a single gaudy tower and a tiled roof in a garish zigzag pattern. Frash liked the idea of the city’s prostitutes working in the shadow of the church, the whores stopping to confess between tricks or on their way home from the cabarets.
The Rotenturm’s haunts were varied, old with new, sacred with the openly profane. The tavern was on a side street. It was dark inside, the walls bristling with dozens of small deer skulls with shellacked antlers, the tables crammed with men in plaid sportcoats drinking beer from pewter mugs. Most had their plates heaped with chunks of pork; eating kept conversation muted. He found a table that
afforded a good view of the rectangular room and ordered a pils.
Mignonne Mock had long, straight hair the color of paprika and freckles, and wore small gold loop earrings, a red skirt hemmed above her knees, high heels with open toes and no wedding ring. She came to his table and stood in front of him, obviously trying to come to a decision. “Sirini?”
“A little late,” he said, motioning for her to sit down, but she didn’t move.
“Let’s not misunderstand each other,” she said. “I’m the boss, and you’ve got this job only because of me. I decide the assignments, tell you where to go, and when and what to shoot. Deviate once and you’re fired.”
Frash grinned and bowed his head in obeisance.
“Where are your bags and equipment?”
“At my hotel.”
“We’ll pick them up,” Mock said. “You’re going to stay at my place. This is hard news now, not the paparazzi garbage you’re used to. When I get a lead, I move fast and I want you close. Have you got an automobile?”
Frash shook his head. He had left it in a car park, where it would keep until needed again. Better to let her think he was without means. “I flew in and took a cab.”
When they were outside she wheeled suddenly and poked him in the chest with a finger. “This is a working arrangement, not a screwing arrangement. Understand?”
He held up his hands. “Whatever you say, Duce.”
Mock’s stern gaze melted to a rare smile. “Good.”
Ali wondered how it would feel to wring her scrawny neck.
162FRIDAY, MAY 12, 1961, 10:40 P.M.Moscow
“This is Zakharov,” Khrushchev said without preamble. “He’ll be officially responsible for security in Vienna.”
The Domino Conspiracy Page 56
