Dan Fesperman - Lie in the Dark

Walking into the hotel’s mall-like plaza was like stepping onto the floor of a deep canyon at dusk, dim and chilly, with a hollow echo from every step. Looking up toward the broken skylights eight stories higher one wouldn’t have been surprised to see stalactites dripping from the ceiling. Word had it that a French radio journalist had spent his spare hours here sharpening his mountaineering skills by rappelling down the inner walls.

The front desk was surrounded by a jerry-rigged frame of wood and plastic to hold in the warmth from a small space heater. The clerk was mistrustful until Vlado showed his card. He asked for Toby Perkins and was directed to room 434.

He trudged up a darkened stairwell to the fourth floor, then groped along a hallway until he could just make out the numbers on the doors. He knocked.

A voice answered from inside: “Nigel? Come on in.”

Vlado opened the door to see Toby Perkins, the same pink and well-fed face from the other day, seated at the end of an unmade bed, flipping through a small notebook.

“Well, then, our intrepid detective is it?”

“Inspector Petric, yes. I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“Not at all. A pleasant surprise, in fact. Given that interview a second thought, perhaps? Or maybe my little lecture on social responsibility hit home. No, not that for sure, I suppose. Either way, I was expecting my photographer but you’ll do much better. Delivering me a hot tip no doubt.”

There was that cherub’s grin again, a face right out of a jolly evening down at the pub. Vlado hesitated at the door.

“Please, please, come in,” Toby said. “Sit down and tell me what I can do for you. No more coffee, though, I’m afraid.”

The implicit rebuke stung, and Vlado supposed he’d deserved it. But never mind.

“It’s a favor I need, actually. Access to a satellite phone, if you have one,” and Vlado had already seen that he did. It sat on a chair by the window, its antenna opened like a white umbrella next to the window, which even here was a sheet of plastic.

“You’ve come to the right place,” Toby said. “’Was just getting ready to pack it up and maybe head for the airport a day earlier than planned. Getting so slow here lately. My rag was sending someone else in in another week and we figured we could let the place go uncovered for a while. Then ten minutes ago my desk calls and my bloody editor says he wants me here for the interim. Says he thinks things are due to heat up again soon. Calls it his instinct, but that’s editors for you. Always seem to know exactly what you don’t want to hear. Anyhow, no problem with the phone. Come on in and I’ll get it on the uplink for you.”

Vlado dug the phone number out of his bag.

“So then,” Toby continued, “where are you calling, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Vlado hesitated, then figured Toby probably would know by the country code anyway. No sense in trying to keep it a secret.

“Belgrade.”

“Well, then.” Toby’s smile melted into a look of curiosity. “Not too many Bosnian government employees are in the market for calls to Belgrade these days, I’d imagine. Family?”

“A friend.”

“Yes, well, as long as I’m not participating in anything illegal.” He said it laughing, a knowing twinkle in his eyes. “I can just punch up the numbers to get you up on the satellite, and you can hit the rest. Country code for Yugo is three-eight-one now, in case you didn’t know. Belgrade is still one-one.”

Vlado was about to ask meekly for privacy when Toby said, “And I’ll wait outside, of course, as much as it might be tempting to eavesdrop on a policeman’s call to the enemy capital. Besides, even if I could overhear you I don’t speak the language, and my interpreter’s been out all morning drinking coffee.”

“One other request before you go, if it’s all right.”

“Sure.”

“I see you also have a fax machine. If my friend here has something to send me, what number would he use?”

“Well, this is getting interesting, isn’t it. Tell me, is this something you might be able to talk to me about? When it’s all over, of course. And I’m assuming now this must have something to do with your work, at least peripherally.”

“Yes. Peripherally, as you put it. Perhaps it does. And if you can help me I can certainly promise you no one else will get any of this before you would.”

“An easy promise to make since probably nobody else has asked for it. But sure, I’ll go for that arrangement. An exclusive. Fair enough then. Well, here we go … Oh, and try not to run on too long, if you don’t mind. It’s ten marks a minute on my tab.”

Vlado listened to the dial tone come onto the line, then punched in the numbers, hearing a hissing sound followed by all the old wheezes and clicks one had grown used to in the phone transmissions of the former Yugoslavia. And as he waited for an answer he thought of his friend at the other end, Bogdan Delic. Vlado had known him in university and had stayed in touch off and on until the war began. He was an artist, or at least that’s what Bogdan had always called himself, garrulously moving from one odd job to another, hectoring galleries to show his work and staying up until all hours with his friends and bottles of homemade brandy.

He was the living denial of the term “starving artist,” with a wide rolling belly that sagged across his belt, and a big, husky beard that had taken over his jowly face. The last time Vlado had seen him he’d had two loud, grubby children in tow, and a reed-thin wife who never seemed to speak more than two words at a time. It had been vintage Bogdan, muttering and talking about all his old obsessions, as if oblivious to the scurrying children or the beleaguered looking waif of a woman who trailed behind. He’d even managed to ignore the rising wave of Serbian nationalism as it began to catch on in the streets of Belgrade. Well, Vlado thought, we’ll see how much of a Serb they’ve made out of him now.

And suddenly there was his voice at the other end of the line, as gruff and loud as ever. The connection was remarkable.

“Bogdan, it’s Vlado Petric. From Sarajevo.”

“Vlado? My God, is it really you? And from Sarajevo? It’s like being called by the dead. A call from Sarajevo. Is it as bad as they say?”

“I guess that depends on how bad they’re saying it is.”

Bogdan answered with his big belly laugh.

“Same old Vlado. Never gives away his feelings without a joke or a struggle.” It was an observation mildly surprising to Vlado, even a little annoying. But at ten D-marks a minute this was no time to explore it further.

“Belgrade hates you, by the way, not you personally but you as a resident of Sarajevo. And even I am growing a little tired of you. You’re all anyone in the world hears about from this war. The whole world feels sorry for you and hates all of us. We have no jobs, no gasoline, inflation that doubles every hour, but it is Sarajevo they weep for on CNN. But now that is off my chest, my friend. For Chrissakes, how are you? How is your family?”

“They’re gone.”

There was momentary silence at the other end, and Vlado realized he’d been misunderstood.

“Gone to Germany, I mean. Berlin. Since June ninety-two.”

“Good God. A long time. But they’re alive, at least.”

“Yes, alive and growing. Sonja is almost three now.”

Bogdan, with his own children, understood without another word the weight of that remark, and all its ramifications. He knew how quickly children changed at that age, and how quickly they grew apart from someone far away.

“So, listen, Bogdan, I am on a borrowed and very expensive phone and can’t spend much time. But what I need is a favor, if you can do it. I don’t think it will be risky, but if you decide it is then don’t bother.”