Zagreb Cowboy (24 page)

STRUMBIĆ WAS IRRITATED
enough even without having to spend an age wandering around the old hospital. It had turned into a hot summer, and he was getting tired of sweating. It took him two full circuits before he found the right room. He walked in without knocking.

The patient, a heavy mass of white flesh looking like something a whale had regurgitated, opened his eyes and smiled.

“Julius. Hey, how nice of you to visit.”

“Branko. What happened to you? I’ve been calling for over a month now. You haven’t sent me my mail. Nothing.”

“Sorry, Julius.” He shrugged apologetically, nudging the drip that ran out of his arm. Another tube ran into his nose. “I’ve been in here. Really. I couldn’t do much about it.” His voice croaked with disuse.

“You couldn’t get anyone to organize my mail for you?”

“I had other things on my mind.”

Strumbić sat down, slightly mollified. The man really did not look well.

“What happened to you?”

“Some thrombosis, some clot or other. I had bad circulation anyway, and things seemed to gum up. They had to take my leg off. Stupid thing. Still itches.”

“Scratch it, then.”

“I can’t. It’s not there.”

“What do you mean it’s not there?”

“They cut it off.”

“What?”

“My leg,” the man said, pointing to where the sheet dropped flat against the bed, just above his right knee. “They took my leg off.”

“Well, that should fix your itch.”

“No, that’s the point. It itches where my leg ought to be. I can’t scratch it because there’s no leg. But it itches like crazy. Drives me nuts.”

“Listen, Branko, I’d love to chat, but I’m in a bit of a hurry. Where are your keys? I need to get into your place to pick up my letters. Something funny’s going on.”

“What’s that? Nothing to do with me, I hope. I’ve been honest as the day is long. To you, anyway.”

“In those last two batches you sent, the estate agents wrote they’d taken money out of my account. Ten thousand out of my account. Twice. I’m starting to get worried.”

“Ten thousand lira?”

“No, pounds, you idiot.”

“Wow. That’s a lot of money.”

“You’re telling me.”

“They can take money out of your account just like that?”

“Sure, they can do it. I just didn’t expect them to. It’s for emergencies. You know, if the windows all blow in or something, they’ve got the funds to fix stuff.”

“Maybe some accident happened. Did they say why?”

“There’s some big works needing to be done on the building, something about making sure it doesn’t slide down the hill. It’s been up there for a hundred years and there wasn’t any sign of it going anywhere when I bought the place. I’m getting a funny feeling somebody’s stitching me up.”

“Why don’t you call them up and ask them what’s going on?”

“I did. That peach who’s looking after it has been on holiday. They say. I hope she hasn’t run with my money. As far as I can understand, the rest of the idiots in that office keep telling me that these things happen, that the woman’ll call when she gets back. But I’m smelling a rat. If they’ve taken any more money, I’ll pop a blood vessel. I’m going over to have a look.”

“So you didn’t come over just to visit me?”

“Course I came to visit you. How else would I get your keys? Jeez, Mestre is a tip.”

“You know, Julius, you never paid me for that last little job.”

“What’s that, then?”

“You know, when your friend came off the boat and I made sure he didn’t have any unwanted attention.”

“Yeah, thanks. You sure I didn’t pay you? I’m pretty sure I paid you.”

“No, you didn’t pay me.”

Strumbić pulled out his wallet and put a couple of ten-thousand-lira notes by Branko’s bedside.

“Listen, thanks. That’ll be useful. I can’t get around and I haven’t got any cash to pay anyone to get me stuff from the shops. Cigarettes and a little drink and some magazines and stuff. It’s gets pretty boring in here.”

“Think nothing of it. I’ll never know why you settled on such a craphole like Mestre. Must be the ugliest place in Italy. Took some sterling detective work to find a place like this in a country with so many beautiful towns.”

“Hey, it was useful, wasn’t it? I mean, close enough to Venice for me to get to your friend before anybody else did.”

“What did you do with della Torre?”

“I told him to get lost. I pointed him to the train station, and that’s where he headed.”

“Haven’t heard from him in months. You did a good job.” He pulled out another note and put it by the bedside.

“So you going to London?”

“Yeah. Needed to get out of Zagreb for a while anyway. Some
UDBA
guy is giving me serious grief, fucking Nazi. Looks like one too. And I’m being harassed by a couple of Bosnians who labour under the mistaken belief that I owe them. I’d kill them if I could just find them.”

“How you getting there?”

“I don’t know. I was going to drive. Booked a Merc from the car hire in Trieste. They kept telling me they had this great red sports car, just up my alley. Two-seater, soft top, pull all the birds I could possibly want. So I said put the red sports car aside for me. I get there and the bloody thing’s pink. Not red. Pink. I had to drive to Mestre in a pink Merc because I’d already paid for it. Bloody pink Merc.”

The man on the bed laughed until he choked.

“Were you talking in Italian?”

“Sure, those idiots don’t speak anything else.”

“You must have been saying
rosa
instead of
rosso
. Happens all the time.”

“Thanks for nothing, Mr. Berlitz.”

“You going to bring back the keys?”

“I’ll leave them with the old hag concierge in your building. I nearly punched her when she wouldn’t let me in your apartment.”

“Too right. I don’t want every Tom, Dick, and Harry walking into my place. Before you go, have you got any cigs?”

“Here,” said Strumbić, leaving a packet by Branko’s bed. “Just don’t blame me if you get cancer. Make sure you do something about that leg.”

“See you, Julius.” But Strumbić had already left the room.

• • •

The morning faded into the early afternoon, the patient slipping into the state of semi-comatose boredom that had made up his days since he’d woken up from the emergency operation more than a month earlier. They’d wheeled him in a couple of weeks before that, but he didn’t remember any of it.

His leg had been killing him, so he’d taken a taxi to the emergency room, and then when the doctor was checking him out, he’d fainted. Out cold for nearly three weeks. He was lucky to be alive. Or at least that’s what the nurses kept telling him. He didn’t feel so lucky when the matron came in to give him his painkillers after lunch and found the cigarettes by his bedside. She pocketed them. He was sure she was taking them for herself, but he wasn’t in much of a position to run after her.

Strumbić was long gone and Branko was dozing when the glass door to his room slammed shut, waking him. There were never any loud noises in this ward.

“Hey, Branko.” The nasal and aural foliage were unforgettable, but he couldn’t quite pull the name out of his memory. “Branko, remember me? It’s Anzulović. From the detective squad.”

“Anzulović? So it is.” Branko smiled. “What a treat. Nobody visits for weeks and then
bam
, two in a day.”

“Branko, this is Captain Messar.” Anzulović waved at a tall, blond man who looked as if he’d stepped out of some Second World War poster.

“Mr. Krushka,” Messar said.

“Branko, everyone calls me Branko. So, looks like my number’s up. You guys finally found me. Unfortunately for you, it doesn’t look like I’m going anywhere for a while, eh?”

“Mr. Krushka, we’re here on other business,” said the Nazi.

“Yeah? So I’m off the hook, am I?”

“No, the law will catch up with you eventually. But there are more pressing matters now.”

“Listen, Branko, we’re not here to give you a hard time,” said Anzulović, soothing the sick man. “What’s past is past. Times have changed. I mean, politics are all up in the air. I’m not even sure the indictment holds anymore. The courts would have to dig it up and make sure there’s no political motivation behind it and that it was purely a criminal matter. And you know how long these things take.”

“Yeah, it was entirely political. I had to run out of the country because of political persecution,” said Branko.

“And there I was thinking it was because you were about to be done for corruption,” said Messar.

“It was a frame-up. They could have had half the force up on charges worse than mine. And the only reason it was only half was because the other half were just too stupid to figure out how to make themselves a bit of extra dosh,” said Branko.

“So which were you?” Messar asked Anzulović.

“Oh, I was definitely in the stupid half. That’s the only reason the
UDBA
took me on. I got a sufficiently low mark on their intelligence tests,” Anzulović replied, unperturbed by the insinuation.

“I can vouch for that,” said Branko. “Never met a dumber cop. Haven’t got a clue how he made detective inspector.”

“Alright, you don’t have to lay it on with a trowel,” said Anzulović. “And if you’re so smart, how come you ended up running to a shithole like Mestre?”

“I like to be near refineries; you never know when you might need to fill up.”

“Enough of the pleasantries,” said Messar. “We’re here about Julius Strumbić.”

“Who?”

“Strumbić.”

“Name rings bells, but I can’t put my finger on it.”

“Shame when old age catches up with you and you can’t remember your old partner on the force.”

“Oh, you mean
that
Julius Strumbić.”

“Are there many that you know?”

“Loads and loads. Used to meet a new one every other week. Got very confusing.”

“It seems Julius Strumbić has been phoning a number in Mestre for the past few weeks. Yours, I believe. In fact, we got word he might be heading this way. Any idea what it’s about?”

“Love to chat, but the throat dries up lying in a hospital bed. Water is such a poor lubricant, don’t you think?”

“So what might be sufficiently soothing?” asked Messar.

“Oh, a nice bottle of whisky or brandy. One of the big ones,” Branko said.

“Get him some cheap vodka, half-bottle,” Anzulović said. Messar took one of the ten-thousand-lira notes from Branko’s bedside table.

Branko stayed quiet until Messar got back, and then he drank down two fingers of high-octane spirits in a swallow.

“My thanks to you gentlemen. Gets the engine running. Haven’t had a drop since they took the old leg off. It’s like coming home after a six-month tour in the army.”

“We were having a conversation about Strumbić,” said Messar.

“Were we? Remind me, name rings a bell.”

Messar got up out of the worn visitors’ chair, the foam padding coming out of its torn covers, walked around the bed, and punched Branko in the stump, first shoving a corner of a pillow into his mouth to stifle his scream.

“Hey, Messar, all he needed was a couple more glasses of this stuff and he’d have been happy to talk. You don’t need to torture the poor guy,” Anzulović said, jumping off the windowsill where he’d been perched.

“Now, you are not going to shout and make a fuss, or you die of a suspected heart attack in the next ten minutes,” Messar said. “And you are going to talk about Strumbić. Nod if you understand. Shake your head if you want me to keep the pillow in your gob.”

Branko nodded vigorously. He’d actually developed a tinge of colour. Didn’t make him look any better. Messar left him to catch his breath.

“So why was Strumbić calling? What does he want?” Anzulović asked.

“I wasn’t there to take his calls. I swear. I’ve been in hospital. Whoever’s been monitoring his calls for you people should have been able to tell you that.”

“He rang from phone boxes. All we got was the number, not the content of the conversation. Why would he be calling? What deal have you got going with him, other than the fact that you two did very dirty stuff together once upon a time?”

“Nothing. I swear. I’m just a post box for him. He gets mail sent to him here. I forward it, that’s all.”

“Where do you send it?”

“To some girlfriend of his. It gets packed with underwear for her. Frilly black stuff. Customs never bothers with that sort of thing. I don’t think they know how expensive it is.”

“Where’s the mail from?”

“England.”

“Where in England?”

“London.”

“We can go back to my way of playing the game. Where in London?”

“How do I know? I just collect the stuff and send it on. If there’s a real emergency, somebody might phone. But they know I don’t speak English and nobody’s ever had reason to call.”

“Any more of these letters at your apartment?”

“I haven’t been there to collect them in a while. I’ve been indisposed.”

“I think we might check. Where are your keys?”

“Haven’t got them. They must have fallen out of my pocket when they cut my leg off. Try the concierge at my building. She’s a lovely, accommodating old lady.”