Gerald Seymour - Heart of Danger

She lay on her side. Some of the night he had been awake, but he was sleeping now. She lay on her side, her head held up by her crooked arm, and she watched over the peace of his sleep, and her fingers moved gently over the bared ribcage that showed the colouring of bruises. It was her impulse… Her mother's marriage had been impulse. Few would have looked at the harrowed man, her father, mourning the death of a loved one in the bombing of Magdeburg, and inconsolable, a teacher without a school. Her mother's impulse had brought long love, long happiness… She would tell her mother about Penn when she next flew to Munich for the weekend. She could see the two faces in the photograph frame on the bedside table, the young woman with thin lips and the baby without hair. But it was her impulse to protect the man who had walked alone into Sector North… not love, because she did not know love. Love was beyond her experience

… It was attraction and it was interest and it was fascination. She wanted to protect him, lie close to him, and in the loneliness of her life his sleeping body seemed to bring a comfort to her. And by protecting him, she thought she might show him her gratitude. He deserved her gratitude. He had done what she craved to do and was not able to, he had confronted the bastards of the uniforms and the guns, a tiny gesture, maybe, but few others did it. What she wanted, what she could not have, was to make happiness for him, to take him from the bed and march him into the old city and hear the music throb and take him in her arms and dance, dance wildly, dance till the dawn came. What she wanted was to dance with him and laugh with him and wear a flower that he had given her… but he slept and she protected him… And the morning would come too soon, and the aircraft would scream from the runway, and Penn would be gone back with his cuts and bruises to the young woman with the thin lips and the baby without hair.

He had walked into Sector North just to write a report, and the report was gone… And she had never met another man in her life who would have walked into Sector North just to establish the truth that was necessary for a report.

When he had woken, when he had sobered up, when he had gone on the plane, then she would return to the daily and nightly misery of the Transit Centre…

She sat in her car and watched the milk float judder down the street. She was parked up outside the terraced house. It was a neat street, decorated and smartened with bright window boxes of pansies and hanging ivy. When the milkman had passed, she left her car and went to the front door, and rang the bell. It was four minutes past six in the morning. She shivered. She waited. She stretched because she had been sat in her car for three and a half hours before the milk float had turned into the street. She heard slow feet coming clumsily down the stairs behind the door. She had been to his wedding, Charles was a friend of his parents. She flexed her hands, felt her nerves rasping. The door opened. Blinking eyes in the half-light, a loose dressing gown, bare feet, tousled hair.

"Good God, Mrs. Braddock… what on earth…?"

He was half her age, Charles said he was very clever. Charles had said that if her Dorrie hadn't been such a bloody messer then Jasper Williamson would have been the right sort of man.

"Please, I do apologize, I need advice."

Eyes narrowing. "What sort of advice?"

She stood on the step. He was the only one she could have come to, she could not have come to any of the fat cat lawyers who were Charles's friends.

She said in meekness, "International law, I suppose that's what it's called."

Eyes concentrating. "What sort of international law?"

She blurted, "Prosecution of war criminals."

Somehow, he understood straight away. "Because of Dorrie…? You'd better come in, Mrs. Braddock… "Fraid it's a bit of a tip. Had people in last night. I was sorry to hear about Dorrie… I can only tell you the basics."

He led her into the long living area, and he seemed not to know where to start with the filled ashtrays and the dirtied glasses and the emptied bottles, and she told him that he shouldn't bother. She took the two sheets of fax paper from her handbag and gave them to him, and he'd groped for the mantelpiece and his spectacles. She thought that he'd probably have reckoned Dorrie to be quite awful, like everyone had, like she had… He sank down onto the sofa and he started to read, and she began to collect up the glasses and the ashtrays and took them through to the kitchen. Didn't know much, did she? Knew how to bloody tidy up. Didn't know much about mothering, did she? Knew how to bloody wash up… He was reading slowly, and he'd found a pad of paper, and he'd started to take notes. When she had all the glasses and all the ashtrays and all the bottles away into the kitchen, when she had run the hot water into the sink, Mary came and stood behind him. She could read over his shoulder, what he read…

MILAN STANKOViC: (See MS above.) Commander of para militaries in Salika village. Formerly clerk to agricultural produce co-operative. Aged early to middle thirties. Tall (approx 5'll/6'1), athletic build, no facial distinguishing scars etc, beard and full hair dark brown, eyes grey-blue. Well dressed, suit for social evening, quite obviously the undisputed leader of the community.

After capture I was taken to Salika school hall. Punched by MS. Interrogated by MS through interpreter. Gave my name, confirmed my nationality to MS, told him purpose of my journey to Sector North. Told MS that he had been identified to me as the killer of DM.

My impression, MS deeply shaken by being named, through interpreter, in front of his village peers. From my kit he had seen photographs I carried of DM after exhumation, my impression was that he recognized DM's facial features. Evasive and unsettled when confronted with my accusation of guilt. After villagers beat me, he gave the order for me to be taken away, don't know intended destination, don't know whether I was to be executed immediately or later. Managed to break free in confused situation. I am not trained in Escape and Evasion I believe my life was saved by intervention of BS (see above). I have no doubt that DM was murdered by the direct actions, stabbing and beating and shooting, of Milan Stankovic of Salika village, in Glina Municipality. Faithfully, William Penn, Alpha Security Ltd. "Right, Mrs. Braddock, what do you want to know?" "I want to know how I can nail that bastard to the floor." "Give me a few minutes." She went back into the kitchen. She filled the kettle for coffee, and she started to rinse through the glasses. She saw that he was reading the two faxed sheets a second time. She wondered if he still thought Dorrie to be quite awful, like everyone had, like she had. A young woman came down the stairs, naked, so pretty, so different from the young woman in virginal wedding white, and didn't seem to notice that an intruder had usurped her sink and was making free with her coffee. The young woman picked up a packet of cigarettes and wafted away back up the stairs. Clever young Jasper, who would have been right for Dorrie if she hadn't been 'such a bloody messer', was pulling thick books off the shelves, and he took the coffee mug without comment. Mary dried the glasses. She cleaned the ashtrays. She stacked the empty bottles outside the back door. She wiped the wood surfaces down. She found the vacuum cleaner in the cupboard and ran it over the carpet. His head was down in the books and he had torn strips of paper as markers, and his pencil writing was filling the pages of the notepad. The young woman came down the stairs, white blouse and executive blazer and discreet navy skirt, with a briefcase, and kissed clever young Jasper, and was gone out onto the street. He didn't seem to notice her. He hadn't touched the coffee she'd made him. He put the books back onto the shelves. He stapled the handwritten sheets together, with the two faxed pages. "It's all there, Mrs. Braddock. It's a bit complicated, but if you take it slowly… I'm in court in an hour… Of course it's possible to prosecute, but what it needs is the determination. Without that determination then the world just rolls on. The notes are Halsbury's Laws, it's Volume 2… You'll have to excuse me, Mrs. Braddock, but I've got to move… You see it's not important whether Dorothy is now the English rose or whether she was an awkward little bitch, a crime is a crime is a crime. The British jurisdiction would be pretty complicated, what with Yugoslavia not being a country any more, and it being a civil war, but the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners sews it up. There's a procedure in place now for dealing with war crimes in former Yugoslavia. It can happen, if there's the determination… I've got to go and dress, Mrs. Braddock… Whether that determination exists, well, you'll find that out, it's not for me to say. Whether you can "nail that bastard to the floor", I just don't know."