THE PRICE OF FREEDOM

PART TEN:

Miro chattered away as they made the short drive from the centre of the city to the more exclusive suburbs. Even here, though, there were reminders of the civil war that had almost ripped Slavakrajina apart. Not all the bullet holes that had pitted walls had been filled in and painted over, and every now and then there was only a space where a building had once stood.

War was no respecter of status or wealth.

Finally, Miro turned into a driveway, stopping at the closed gates. Rolling down the window, he pressed the call button on the security box. There was a moment’s silence then a voice answered, “Hallo…”

Miro said who they were and that they had an appointment. The disembodied voice confirmed the appointment and told them to drive up to the house. In front of them, the gates slid open.

Miro drove through, following the sweep of the driveway up the house. Dino whistled softly in appreciation of the sprawling, one story building, modelled loosely in a ranch-house style. “The family has money…”

“Had,” Miro corrected. “Most of the fortune was lost or seized during the civil war.”

“Really,” Dino commented, filing the information away for later use.

As Miro pulled the car to a stop, a tall, silver-haired gentleman walked out to greet them. He walked with a slight limp and the aid of a silver-handled cane.

He waited on the porch as Miro and Dino climbed out of the car and walked towards him. Studying him from behind sunglasses, Dino noted the straight, military bearing and the lines of a face that bore a striking resemblance to the photograph of Ljiljana Bukuvecs: the same, high cheekbones; long, straight nose; shape of mouth. Only the jaw line was different: stronger, more square.

And the eyes…

There was something cold and calculating about his eyes that Dino immediately distrusted, although he decided to reserve judgment on that, knowing that it could simply be a reaction to the police turning up on his doorstep to ask questions.

 “Gentlemen,” he greeted as they reached him, “I am Gervaise Armande…”

“Inspector Miroslav Vilaslavevic,” Miro introduced, flashing his ID card. “And my colleague, Dino Scarletti…”

“Inspector… Mr. Scarletti…” Armande acknowledged, “Please, come in.” He turned, heading back into the house, asking, “Can I offer you some refreshment? Tea? Coffee?”

Miro looked at Dino. “Coffee would be good,” Dino told him.

Armande stopped, looking at him. “I can tell by your pronunciation of our language that you are not a local man, Mr. Scarletti,” he commented, then asked, “Italian?”

“American,” Dino supplied.

Armande looked at Miro. “I take it you speak English?” he asked.

“I do,” Miro responded in English.

“Then,” Armande replied, also in English, “in kindness to our foreign guest, we shall speak English.”

Dino smiled, trying to remain objective, reminding himself that English was Armande’s second language and that perhaps he hadn’t really implied a slur on Dino’s nationality with his intonation on the words “foreign guest”.

Armande turned, leading them through the house. Dino took in everything, from the fine Persian rugs on the floor to the paintings on the walls. Armande showed them out onto a large veranda overlooking the back gardens and the breathtaking view of the mountains behind.

“You have a beautiful home, Gospadin Armande…” Dino remarked, using the Slavakrajinan title instead of the English nomenclature Mister.

“Thank you,” Armande replied, indicating that they should take a seat at the large, garden table.

“I saw the after-effects of the civil war on some of your neighbour’s houses,” Dino commented as he took a seat. “Was your home badly affected?”

Armande smiled, sitting down. “We survived better than others,” he replied.

“Inspector Vilaslavevic explained on the way here,” Dino went on, lightly, “that much of your fine art was stolen or destroyed…”

“Indeed,” Armande told him. Voice just a little too polite for Dino’s liking, Armande countered, “You are perhaps here to tell me that it has been recovered?”

“Unfortunately, no,” Dino replied.

“Then why are you here?” Armande asked, looking from Dino to the Inspector.

“Well, it’s like this,” Dino began. “Miroslav and I have worked together on various occasions, and one  evening, when I was at his home sampling his wife’s excellent piragi, his daughter happened to mention about a new friend she had made, who had moved to the city from a village in the mountains.”

He went on, “Miroslav started to explain about the devastation that the civil war had caused in some of the outlying communities and when I mentioned that to some of the people back home, they expressed an interest in helping somehow.”

Dino paused as a young woman came out onto the veranda carrying a tray.

“I passed on the interest to Miroslav,” he went on as she put the tray down, placing a coffee pot, crockery, cream and sugar on the table.

“Miroslav kindly did some digging and discovered that you were a trustee of at least one charity fund that had been set up to help the people most affected by the ravages of the civil war…”

Armande waited until the young woman had disappeared before asking, “And what sort of donation were your… friends… thinking of?”

“Well,” Dino told him, “There would be a minimum deposit of one hundred thousand dollars…”

Gervaise Armande’s whole demeanour changed.

“You understand,” Dino went on, “that many of my friends have grandparents and great-grandparents who emigrated to the United States from the ‘Old Country’ and who still have strong roots with Italian life… Tell them that Rome is closer to Prasjeka than Chicago is to New York, and they start to take interest…”

As had Gervaise Armande… “That is a considerable amount of money…” he oozed. “That would pay for many school teachers…”

Dino gave him a gracious smile. “Well, I’m here to find out more about the trust funds: how you raise your money; where it’s held; how it’s handled; where the money goes; who decides what projects have priority… that sort of thing…”

“I am quite sure that we can supply all the answers you need,” Armande responded. “Perhaps we could even arrange a visit to one of the current projects? How long are you planning to stay in our country, Mr. Scarletti?”

“I don’t have any immediate plans to leave,” Dino replied.

~*~

The room was elegantly furnished in a way that hinted of money without throwing it in your face, everything subtly understated in soft blue tones. Only the occasional knick-knack, obviously antique and carefully placed where they could be seen, indicated any sort of army connection. The candles and tall vase of flowers on the mantelpiece reminded Jim MacFadgeon of his own home, putting him at ease.

Mentally, he made a note to buy his wife a huge bouquet of flowers when he got back home. Lilies… She loved lilies… The pink-and-cream, star-shaped ones…

“It dates back to the Battle of Plassey…”

Jim looked round at Julia Thorne, confused, “Pardon?”

“The sword,” she continued as she put a tray of coffee and biscuits on the table in front of him. “Seventeen Fifty-Seven, the Battle of Plassey on the Bhagarithi River… India…”

She sat down, her smile fading as she saw the continued confusion on his face, “I’m sorry, I thought you were looking at the sword beside the mantle…”

He smiled, a hint of a blush touching his ears, “Actually... I was looking at the flowers. My wife’s like you, she loves candles and flowers. I was thinking of getting her a bunch when I get back…”

“I think she’ll love that,” Julia told him. “Cream? Sugar?”

“Moo and two, please…” Jim confirmed.

She nodded, pouring the coffee, handing the cup to him, offering him a biscuit, then getting straight down to the matter at hand. “Now, please, tell me, what the hell is going on, Mister MacFadgeon?”

“Jim,” he corrected. “Please, call me Jim… And the only thing that’s really important right now is that Dino Scarletti is one of the best negotiators in the business. And he knows exactly who he’s dealing with, which always makes things easier.”

She considered that for a moment then asked, “Are you in the business, Jim?”

Smiling wryly, he shook his head, “No… Not me… I run a personal security firm out of Leeds…”

“But you were,” she pushed. “I can spot an ex-army man from twenty paces… And I’m sure I remember you…”

“Aye,” he confirmed. “Tel and I were in Twenty-Two Squadron together…”

“Is that why you were out there?” Julia tried. “I mean, I don’t understand. Why would you be involved with this whole bloody mess if you aren’t in the K&R business…?”

“Because a mate of mine got in touch, telling me that Tel was in trouble,” Jim told her, truthfully. “So I headed out to see if I could help.”

She looked at him for a long moment then announced, “There’s something you’re not telling me, something that you either can’t or won’t tell me. I’m assuming that it’s can’t, or you wouldn’t be here…”

Jim only smiled, saying nothing, neither confirming nor denying her deductions. Then he shrugged, admitting, “I promised Scarletti that I’d come see you when I got back…”

Julia snorted in disgust, “That’s more than bloody Luthan Risk have done! I called them, you know, when I heard about it on the news. The officious cow I spoke to, Mr Havery’s Personnal Assistant or some similar jumped-up position, all but told me that I wasn’t worthy of a phone call because I was only Terry’s EX wife…”

She laughed coldly, “Well I soon put her bloody right! Ex-wife, I may be, but I’m still the mother of his son! So I just bloody told her! I had better start getting some answers quick-smart or there will be hell to pay.”

Jim smiled. Julia Thorne was not a woman he would ever want to get on the wrong side of, he considered. “Dino mentioned that Luthan Risk had given you the run-around…”

She flashed him a conspiratorial smile, “In certain situations it’s awfully usefully to have a Father and a Grandfather who were Generals… They managed to find me Dino’s number in Prasjeka. Otherwise I would still have been waiting for a half-decent explanation of what’s going on. To tell Henry, you understand…”

She added that last bit a little too fast and Jim found himself wondering if, in different circumstances, Julia Thorne might not have been an ex-wife at all…

“Is he still in school?” he asked.

Julia nodded. “He asked if he could stay there. I thought that would be far better for him than taking him away and leaving him with nothing to do but think… and let his imagination run away with itself. Familiar routine to keep him distracted and all that…”

She hesitated for a moment then asked, “Why Terry, Jim? He was out there to help. Why did they snatch him? I don’t understand…”

“Sometimes there’s no answer to things like this,” he told her, gently. “Being in the wrong place at the wrong time is all it needs. The only thing that matters now is getting him out. Luthan Risk will pay whatever it takes and Dino is one of the best negotiators in the business… He’ll get Terry out of this mess. He’s never failed in any of his negotiations.”

She nodded, lifting her eyes from her coffee cup and asking, “What’s he like?”

“Dino?” Jim grinned, telling her, “He’s a red-headed, Irish-Italian Yank who enjoys a glass of fine malt…”

Julia smiled back, reassured by the simple, too-the-point description. “I like him already,”

~*~

Terry heard the key in the door and rolled to his feet, jumping back a few steps to sit on the bed. As the door opened, he was reaching for the bottle of water.

Ljiljana walked in, a small bundle in her arms. She looked at him, frowning at the sheen of perspiration on his face. Concerned that he may have developed a fever, she walked over, putting the bundle on the bed and touching his forehead with the back of her fingers. “You are ill?”

He didn’t seem to be feverish.

“No,” he told her.

Stepping back, she considered him for a moment. He matched her gaze, looking back at her.

Bracic was right, she reflected: the Lieutenant was a fine-looking man. He had been a good-looking man when their paths had first crossed, but maturity sat well with him. He was broader across the shoulders; more defined in the arms; suited the slightly longer hair…

And the defiance in his eyes.

She smiled.

She was surrounded by handsome men: good-looking men with good bodies who obeyed her without question… mostly. That didn’t mean that she was falling for them. Bracic was right to counsel her about caution, he was only looking out for her… but he was wrong.

Behind her, Bracic appeared at the bedroom door.

Still smiling, she reached for the knife in her belt, sliding it free and dropping to her knees, slicing through the plastic ties that secured the Lieutenant’s ankles. She stowed the knife, getting back to her feet, ordering, “Stand up.”

He obeyed, rising from the bed to stand in front of her.

She picked up the bundle from the bed, handing it to him. “Clothes, towel, soap for shower,” she told him simply.

“Thank you,” he told her, taking the items and walking past her towards Bracic.

Bracic followed him into the bathroom. Terry put the bundle down in the sink, examining it. There was no razor this time, but like Ljiljana had said, there was shower gel, a pair of green fatigue pants and a towel.

“You shower,” Bracic told him. “No curtain…”

He stepped forward, warning the Lieutenant, “Yesterday was not good thing. Run again? We break legs or…” He paused, as if searching for the words, finally continuing, “keep you… knocked out… Chloroform… Understand?”

Terry turned his head,  looking at him, keeping his face neutral and telling him,  “I understand…”

Then he looked away, picking up the shower gel. He didn’t think they would carry out their threat to break his legs. It was difficult enough being on the run and having to move a man against his will, without the added encumbrance and complications that broken bones or bullet wounds would cause.

Chloroform, on the other hand, they had already used on him. Its after-effects weren’t exactly pleasant. He’d been lucky when they had chloroformed him before: he wasn’t so sure he’d be that fortunate again and he needed all his wits about him.

Besides, the suspicions that he’d had about the way he was being treated and the reasons behind that treatment, had been confirmed in the conversation earlier. They were dealing with him as they would a prisoner of war; and far more decently than some of the hostages who had been held by other groups. For the moment, he was safer doing as he was told and waiting for Dino to get him out.

There was no point in him getting himself killed or badly injured in some insanely heroic escape attempt. An absentee father at the end of a telephone line was better than a dead father in a grave.

Terry lifted his head again, looking at Bracic, assuring him, “I won’t run again, mate… I give you my word...”

Bracic tilted his head, narrowing his eyes, looking back at the Lieutenant. His gut feeling was that the Lieutenant was being genuine. That instinct was reinforced when the Lieutenant took a deep breath and then went on, “I have a son…”

Terry stopped before his voice failed on him. The emotion that those four words unleashed swept over him, taking him by surprise. He looked down at the sink, swallowing against the constriction in his throat before looking back up at Bracic, continuing, “I want to see him again…”

Bracic regarded him for a long moment. Behind the Lieutenant’s eyes there was a deep emotion that he was holding tightly in check… an emotion that Bracic understood only too well.

Pushing back the sorrow that threatened to gather in his chest, Bracic nodded, telling him, “I… had daughter…”

The softly spoken words threw Terry and he clenched his jaw, trying to remain objective, trying not to feel any sympathy for Bracic… failing miserably.

For a long moment both men regarded one another, an unspoken understanding passing between them.

Bracic stepped back, finally, towards the door, telling him,  “Okay, Lieutenant…  Shower now…”

Terry nodded, turning. Then he stopped, turning back, quirking an eyebrow and asking, “Uh… How do you work this?”

Bracic grinned, chuckling softly, telling Terry, “Move back.”

Terry did as he was told, moving back against the wall to let Bracic in.

“Cold water,” Bracic told him, turning a tap. Water flowed into the bath. “Hot water…” he continued, turning the other tap. “Pull here,” he went on, indicating a little lever, “for water through shower…”

~*~

Dino was silent on the drive back to the police station from the Armande house. Miro left him to his thoughts, turning on the radio instead.

He hadn’t known the American for very long, but he could tell from the curt politeness with which Dino treated Armande, that Dino was wary of him. Something about the man obviously troubled Dino, and Miro found himself wondering if Dino was troubled by the same things that piqued his own unease, or if the American had seen something he had missed.

Miro reviewed the meeting, replaying it in his mind, paying particular attention to the comments Dino had made and the questions he had asked. Finally, as they reached the police station, he thought he had the answer.

Pulling into his parking space outside the building, he switched the engine off, turning to Dino, announcing, “The house was too rich…”

Dino looked at him, “What?”

“Gervaise Armande is man who likes to live well. The house was too rich… All the paintings, the floors and beautiful carpets, they cost money. And files say Armande family lost much of their fortune in civil war…”

Dino considered him for a long moment before suggesting, “They could have had things in storage, outside of the country…”

“But we do not think so,” Miro countered, “That is why we say nothing on way back. We go over and over things in our head and more times it goes over, more questions appear to be asked… For man who has little money, he is very rich. You wonder where money comes from and so do I. You and I are both thinking same thing - that perhaps all of donated money does not find its way to trust funds…”

“I was hoping,” Dino admitted after a moment, “that if it might work out for us: that we could negotiate with Armande directly… but I wouldn’t trust that man as far as I could throw him…”

He sighed, shaking his head. “Bukavecs and her people are doing the wrong thing for some very compassionate reasons…” he went on. “They’re putting their lives and, right now, Terry Thorne’s life at risk for those reasons… and this slime-ball is skimming money off the top to decorate his house and buy his fine wine…”

Turning, he looked at the Inspector, “I need to check the files again, Miro. I thought I knew Bukavecs… how she ticked… how the whole group ticked… and I think I still do… but I need to check again. I need to make sure that there’s nothing of Bukavecs’ Uncle in her… ”

Miro smiled, telling Dino, “You would make very good policeman, my soldier friend! Now, you come up to office, look at files, I make coffee and we have long discussion about Gospadin Gervaise Armande, put our soldier-policeman detective heads together and see what findings we have…”

He dropped a reassuring hand on Dino’s shoulder, “If Armande skims money it is different matter, yes? It is fraud, not kidnap. It is two different things. It does not affect Terry… However, when we have Terry back here, safe, I think I have word with friends in fraud squad, make investigations on Armande… When Terry is safe…”

He lifted his hand, turning away, smiling, “Until then, I think I find out more about pretty young woman who serves coffee to us at Armande’s. Perhaps she can be persuaded to give us a little more information…”

~*~

“British Airways have a flight leaving Heathrow for Prasjeka at seven-fifteen this evening...  AeroKrajin have one leaving Gatwick at eight-thirty…”

Julia Thorne checked the time, wondering, not for the first time that afternoon, what the hell she was doing.

“I won’t make the seven-fifteen one…” She was closer to Gatwick anyway.

“Let me just confirm the seat on the AeroKrajin,” the booking agent on the other end of the phone told her. “You can pick the ticket up and pay for it at the check-in desk…”

Julia was telling herself that she was doing this for Henry: that if she was out there in that god-forsaken country she would be able to give her son a better idea of what the hell was happening to his Dad… but deep down inside, the little voice of her conscience was tugging guiltily at her, pointing out that it was nothing to do with Henry and everything to do with her…

Or, more exactly, everything to do with both the terror that had gripped her dreams from the evening she had driven up to the school to try to explain the situation Henry, and with what Jim MacFadgeon had skillfully avoided telling her that morning.

When she had explained things to Henry, he had reacted much like his father would have. He had sat listening to her, head tilted slightly to the side, lips pursued into a tight line, his face otherwise expressionless… Henry had inherited her blond hair, but in all other respects he was Terry’s son.

“But they’re going to get him out, right?”

“Dino is doing everything he can,” she had assured him. “And he’s one of the best. Everyone I’ve spoken to says so…”

He had nodded, sitting silently for a while as if mulling over all the information.

“Are you going back to London?” he had had asked, finally.

“No… I’m staying in the guest house in the village for tonight…”

And that, she had thought as she had finally headed for the guest house, was that…

Except that it hadn’t been…

Her dreams had been filled with memories of a decade before: of the frustration, helplessness, grief and fear she had battled from the moment she had been told Terry was MIA, until she had seen him alive and well in the Army hospital; of rocking Henry to sleep on those few, terrible nights of not knowing, promising herself she wasn’t going to cry and failing miserably; of the dark, ugly bruises that had mottled Terry’s chest and back; of sitting watching Terry sleep that first night he had been allowed home…

He had never spoken of what had happened, and she had never asked. She was a soldier’s daughter as well as a soldier’s wife and she knew better than to try and get any answers out of him. Getting him back alive and well had been enough.

Now, however, the not-knowing was haunting her, because after Jim MacFadgeon had left earlier in the day, she had started thinking about everything he’d said and had avoided saying… and now she couldn’t get rid of the idea that he had been the Sergeant who had been MIA with Terry all those years ago, and that Terry had now been kidnapped in the same country where he and the Sergeant had been MIA.

What the hell had he been thinking? How the hell could he have been so stupid as to go back there?

Anger flared again, as it had done every time she had thought about it since the notion first occurred to her. For a brief moment she almost told the booking agent to forget the whole thing, that she had changed her mind…

Then the quiet voice of reason reminded her that it had been ten years ago… And it had been a different country then… And Terry’s job was all about rescuing people…

Couldn’t bloody rescue our marriage though, could you! she thought, acidly.

She rubbed her face, taking a deep, calming breath, determined to remain objective and not give in to the antagonistic irritation that always swept over her when she thought too long about Terry. She was still mad at him. Three years since the divorce and she was still mad at him…

Despite all the promises to herself, and having not spoken to the friend who had suggested it since she had denied it all as bunkum, Julia once more found herself dwelling on Libby’s insinuation. Was she really mad with Terry? Or was she actually mad at herself for letting things escalate to such a degree that she had pushed him away and allowed the space between them to widen until it was an unbridgeable gulf?

Because he had been right and her fears had proved unfounded… Civilian life hadn’t daunted him at all. In fact, from what she had heard, he was reveling in it.

Reveling so much that he’d missed most of Henry’s rugby matches last season despite promising to be there!

But wouldn’t that have happened, anyway, if he’d still been in the army?

Damn you, Terry! How the bloody hell do you manage to complicate my life even when you’re thousands of bloody miles away?

She had been a comfortable divorcee, content to make the occasional amusing, if barbed, comments at her ex-husband’s expense, not-quite screwing him into the ground for maintenance, running her own antique business and “doing lunch” with the girls…

And then he’d gone and got himself kidnapped… and now she was buying a bloody airline ticket, running as fast as she could towards him, telling herself it was all for her son… refusing to even entertain the idea that, deep down, she might still care for him and be desperately worried about him…

ON TO PART 11

BACK TO LIBRISCROWE

BACK TO INDEX