Alan Furst: Spies of the Balkans

“What will you do, Sibylla, when we close the office? Do you need help? With anything?”

“I’ve made my arrangements, chief.”

“Yes?”

“I have a job, as a bookkeeper, at the hotel where my husband works. Nice people, the couple that own the place.”

“And if the Germans question you?”

“Maybe they will, maybe they won’t, but, if they should, I don’t know anything, I was just a secretary. And there’s a chance they’ll never know I was here. The owners said they would backdate the employment records, if I wanted them to.”

“Will you do that?”

“Maybe. I haven’t decided.” After a moment she said, “I don’t know what you have in mind, but, whatever that might be, if you need somebody to help out you only have to ask.”

“Thank you, Sibylla.”

Zannis sat out the day, then went up to see his family at six. This he dreaded, and found what he’d known he would: the chaos of departure. The open suitcases, piles of clothing that were never going to fit, a blackened pot that sat on the table, waiting for a miracle. In the middle of all this, his mother was cooking a lamb roast. “We have a lot to give away,” she said.

“Why not just leave it here?”

“It will be stolen.”

“Oh, you can’t be sure of that.”

His mother didn’t answer.

“The Naxos sails at one-thirty,” he said. “We’ll go an hour early.”

“Well, we have packing to do in the morning. The bedding….”

Zannis found the retsina and poured himself a generous portion. “One for me too, Constantine,” his grandmother said, staring at a ladle, then putting it aside.

The following morning, he telephoned Sibylla and told her he wouldn’t be in the office until later, maybe two o’clock. Then he set out for the central market, Melissa rambling along with him, for the errand he couldn’t face but now had to. After hunting through the goods in several stalls, he bought a khaki pouch with a shoulder strap, possibly meant for ammunition, from some army in the city’s history. Returning home, he went to the kitchen, washed Melissa’s dinner and water bowls, wrapped them in newspaper, settled them in the pouch, and added her leash; she might just have to wear it. Then he went into the other room, but Melissa wasn’t there.

The door to the apartment stood open. He only locked it at night, its latch hadn’t worked for years, Melissa could push it open with her head. Oh no . Hoping against hope, he looked under the bed. No dog. “Melissa? Melissa!”

She knew . Strange mountain beast, she knew what it meant-her only possessions packed up in a khaki pouch.

Zannis trotted down the stairs. He’d thought this through-there was no possibility she could stay with him. Fighting in the mountain villages meant near starvation-crops burned, houses destroyed-and the animals, even beloved animals, didn’t survive it. Out on Santaroza Lane, he called her name, again and again, but there was only morning silence.

He set out on her daily route, finding no help along the way because the street was deserted. He went as far as the corniche, then worked back toward the top of the lane, past the fountain, searching every alley and looking at his watch. By now, he was supposed to be with the family. Where had she gone? Finally he turned into the alley where a neighbor kept her chicken coop and, at the very end, there she was. Lying on her stomach, head resting on crossed paws, looking as miserably sad as any dog he’d ever seen. He squatted by her side and stroked her head. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You know you’re going away, don’t you. Well, good girl, it has to be. Now you have to take care of the family.” When he stood up, so did she, and walked back to the apartment, head carried low, close to his side. Facing the inevitable.

He arrived at the house in the Turkish quarter after eleven and shooed the family along in the last hectic stages of packing-God only knew what would be forgotten. He made sure that his mother put a packet of money in a safe place-the envelope pinned to the inside of her coat. Made Ari responsible for Melissa’s traveling bag, looping the strap over his shoulder. Secured his grandmother’s valise with a length of cord. And found a taxi.

By twelve-thirty they reached the dock; the Naxos already had steam up. Spreading out from the foot of the gangway, a great mob of people, some two hundred of them. And loud-babies wailing, people arguing and swearing, or shouting to friends. He maneuvered the family toward the gangway, then settled in to wait until they would be permitted to board. The tickets! Frantically he patted his clothing, eventually discovering he’d moved them to a safer pocket. Now a few harassed customs officials appeared and tried to form the mob, hauling trunks and suitcases and bags, into a line. But, clearly, that wasn’t going to work.

Suddenly, gunfire.

The rhythmic thump of Bofors cannon. Amid screams, as people dove to the ground, Zannis searched the horizon. Far above the puffs of exploding shells in a blue sky, a small aircraft, perhaps a German reconnaissance plane. Some officer at the antiaircraft battery down the bay had evidently spotted the insignia with his binoculars and given the order to fire. No chance of hitting it, not at that altitude. And the plane didn’t evade, simply circled the city, then turned out to sea and disappeared into the haze. From the crowd, more than a few cheers. An old man, standing near Zannis, said, “Where is our air force?”

The gunfire had certainly affected the passengers on the wharf. What had been an unruly mob now formed itself into a long line, leading to a wooden table and two customs officers sitting on folding chairs. When it came the turn of the Zannis family, he hugged and kissed them all, knelt and embraced Melissa, now miraculously wearing her leash, and, taking his glasses off to wipe his eyes, watched their blurred forms wave good-bye as they climbed the gangway.

In the office, a telegram awaited him, sent from Basel.

HAD TO GO AWAY STOP BUSINESS CLOSED

STOP MAY GOD WATCH OVER YOU STOP

SIGNED FRIEND FROM BERLIN

“At least she’s safe,” Sibylla said. “And I suppose the operation couldn’t go on forever.”

“No, I guess it couldn’t. Maybe someone else might have taken over, but with war coming in Yugoslavia that won’t be possible.”

“She did what she could,” Sibylla said.

“Yes,” Zannis said. “She did.”

Next he went off to the Bank of Commerce and Deposit on Victoros Hougo Street. He’d paid for the family steamship tickets with his own money, but he wasn’t going to abandon the secret fund-money was crucial to resistance. He was, however, not the only person in town that afternoon clearing his account. There were fourteen people ahead of him on line-all waiting for the bank officer who handled “special accounts.”

The man was not holding up well; he seemed to Zannis pale and anxious. “I regret, sir, there are no dollars, not any more. Maybe tomorrow, we might have some, but I wouldn’t wait, if I were you.”

“No British money? Gold sovereigns?”

The man closed his eyes and shook his head. “No, sir. Not for weeks. Gold is very desirable now.”

“What do you have left?”

“Drachmas, of course. Spanish pesetas, and Swiss francs.”

“Swiss francs,” Zannis said.

The officer, having set the account’s file card down before him, went into the vault and returned with a metal drawer that held packets of Swiss francs, a pin forced through the corner of each stack of one hundred. “Do you have a briefcase, sir?”

Zannis produced it and, recalling the French king in the back of his royal automobile, slid the packets into the case.