Gerald Seymour - The Untouchable

The crisp sun lit the valley.

From the door, looking down, he saw Husein Bekir with his fundamentalist son-in-law. Dragan Kovac spat a gob of mucus onto the concrete path that led from his front door. If they wore that uniform, camouflage markings and forage cap, they were fundamentalists and war criminals. He had no doubt of it. It was his surprise that a decent man like Husein Bekir – avaricious for land and money, but decent – allowed the man his daughter had married to flaunt that killers' uniform. He would speak to Husein about it when the fundamentalist criminal had returned to his unit… The uniforms, he had been told in the transit camp before he had returned to Ljut, were the cast-off clothes of the American army, and the weapons with which they were issued were

American; their instructors were American, and they would have American advisers when, finally, they attacked the defenceless Serb people and drove them from their homes. It was what he had been told and he believed it. He believed, also, that this criminal soldier would have killed Serb babies and Serb women without mercy; he had been told it.

Husein and his son-in-law were at the far riverbank, away from the ford.

Since he had come back, Dragan Kovac had spoken twice to his neighbour. The Spanish soldiers had told him, repeated it, drilled it into him as though he were an idiot, that he should not step off the track that went down to the ford or up to the village. They had asked him where the mines were laid, but his memory was hazy and he could not remember what type had been sown, in what quantities, or where. Dragan had walked twice down to the ford, on the hard track, and they had shouted across the river to each other. How was Husein? He was fine. How was Lila? She was fine. How was the house? It was fine… That was the first time. The second time they had shouted over the water about the weather, about the volume of the rain-fall and that it was worse than any year since 1989, and about small things, and about his friend's hope of being given a new tractor… No politics, and nothing about the mines. When the water level fell, when it was possible for Husein Bekir to cross the ford, he would come and they would play chess, and Dragan had promised to cook for Husein and fill him with brandy while they played.

The previous day, the son-in-law had slung a rope with a grapple-hook tied to its end over the river and dragged it tight till the claws caught fast in a withy clump then knotted his own end to an alder's roots.

Perhaps Husein's memory was better than his own, or perhaps the son-in-law was merely lucky and had the arrogance of youth. Hanging from the rope, the young man had hauled himself over the river. Even at that long distance, Dragan had observed the fretted anxiety of Husein as the son-in-law searched for the mines. They were the ones on stakes that were fired with trip-wires. Much of the grass was still thin from the fire Husein had lit before Dragan's return. The son-in-law found four of what the Spanish soldiers called the PMR3 fragmentation mines, which they said were the most dangerous. The fire would have burned the nylon wires, but the mines had survived the fire. Dragan had thought it crass stupidity, but the son-in-law with the four mines had gone along the bank of the river and he'd lost sight of him where the wood came down to the water. An hour later he had come back without the mines… He watched the young man cross the river on the rope then walk along the riverbank towards the tree-line.

There had been the detonation in the night, then silence.

He put on his boots, tied them loosely, and stamped off down the track. He shouted for Husein to join him and wove towards the ford. He kept to the centre of the track. He felt good now, but he thought Husein walked less steadily than he remembered, and Husein was a year and seven months younger than him. He waited until Husein reached the ford and felt satisfaction that he walked less well than himself. And Husein, also, had poorer hearing, so Dragan had to shout above the tumble of the water to be heard.

'What's h e… ' Dragan spat into the river and saw his phlegm bobble before being carried away '… what's he doing?'

'Yesterday he picked up four of the mines and moved them.'

'That's the job of a fool.'

'He said we should eat meat – that we eat too much of the soya and pasta shit that the military brings.'

'I heard a mine in the night,' Dragan replied sourly.

'The soya and pasta is good enough for me.'

'But not for my son-in-law. He took four mines from the field to the trees and looked for the tracks of deer. He moved the mines to kill a deer.'

'Has he killed a deer?'

'He's gone to see what he has killed. If it's a young deer it's good. It is God's gift. If it is a fox then the risk he took was wasted – he says we should eat meat.'

Dragan, with the pomposity given him by his police overcoat, said, 'It is better to have a life and limbs than to have meat.'

'He says he knows about mines.'

'Then he's a fool – you should eat pasta and soya.'

'Only once have we had fish since we came back.

We need more than pasta and soya, the children must have meat if they are to grow… It is because of your people that we have the mines in my fields.'

'The mines were put in the ground to protect us from barbarian criminals – like your son-in-law. Our officer called them "defensive mines".'

Husein Bekir had spread his arms, waved them as if to call on God as a witness, and raged, 'You shelled us, you fired on our homes.'

'You came and slit our throats in the night. You would have killed me.' The veins bulged in Dragan Kovac's throat as he bellowed his riposte.

'You fired shells on us, on our women and our children.'

'Enough, Husein Bekir, enough – can you not recognize that it is over, the war is finished?'

'How is the war over when your mines are still in my fields?'

Dragan laughed. 'I know the war is over when you are at my house and we play chess, and the brandy is on the table – and I will beat you on the table, and I will still be sitting when you are on the ground, drunk.'

'You have no skill at chess, you cannot hold liquor.

Never had… never could… never will.' The laughter cackled across the water. And over the laughter was the crack of the explosion.

His friend, Husein, with the poorer hearing did not hear the blast. He still laughed. Dragan Kovac, the powerful man who had been in authority, cringed.

The only time in his life he had ever run from the responsibilities of his position in Ljut was during the attack, and he had suffered – his God knew he had suffered – been imprisoned in the tower block in Griefswald as punishment for running. He had vowed then, many times, he would never flee his obligation again. He pointed to the wood. He stabbed at the wood with his finger. Husein Bekir's eyes followed the jabbing hand, laughter gone.

A narrow column of dark, chemical smoke rose from the heart of the trees, and above the smoke, crows circled and screamed.

Dragan saw Husein crumple. He said hoarsely,

'You cannot go there, friend. You have the children to look after, and Lila. You must not go.'

He had to strain to hear the voice. 'What if he is not dead? You said yourself…'

'Believe he is dead.' It was the nearest, spoken with gruffness, that Dragan could get to kindness. 'Believe it was quick.'

He watched as Husein turned and started up the track for his home. In the far distance he could see Husein's wife, daughter and grandchildren at the dour of their ruined house, and others in the village were running to them.

The minefield was active, spawning, and its reach had spread because four mines had been moved by his friend's son-in-law, and two had exploded, but two more were now placed in new ground, where none had been before.