David Monnery - Bosnian Inferno

‘So what’s brought you all the way to Glasgow?’ Docherty asked.

Davies grimaced. ‘Duty, I’m afraid.’ He took a sip of the malt. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any point in beating about the bush. When did you last hear from John Reeve?’

‘Almost a year ago, I think. He sent us a Christmas card from Zimbabwe – that must have been about a month after he got there – and then a short letter, but nothing since. Neither of us is much good at writing letters, but usually Nena and Isabel manage to write…What’s John…’

‘You were best man at their wedding, weren’t you?’

‘And he was at mine. What’s this about?’

‘John Reeve’s not been in Zimbabwe for eight months now – he’s been in Bosnia.’

Docherty placed his pint down carefully and waited for Davies to continue.

‘This is what we think happened,’ the CO began. ‘Reeve and his wife seem to have hit a bad patch while he was working in Zimbabwe. Or maybe it was just a break-up waiting to happen,’ he added, with all the feeling of someone who had shared the experience. ‘Whatever. She left him there and headed back to where she came from, which, as you know, was Yugoslavia. How did they meet – do you know?’

‘In Germany,’ Docherty said. ‘Nena was a guest-worker in Osnabrück, where Reeve was stationed. She was working as a nurse while she trained to be a doctor.’ He could see her in his mind’s eye, a tall blonde with high Slavic cheekbones and cornflower-blue eyes. Her family was nominally Muslim, but as for many Bosnians it was more a matter of culture than religion. She had never professed any faith in Docherty’s hearing.

He felt saddened by the news that they had split up. ‘Did she take the children with her?’ he asked.

‘Yes. To the small town where she grew up. Place called Zavik. It’s up in the mountains a long way from anywhere.’

‘Her parents still lived there, last I knew.’

‘Ah. Well all this was just before the shit hit the fan in Bosnia, and you can imagine what Reeve must have thought. I don’t know what Zimbabwean TV’s like, but I imagine those pictures were pretty hard to escape last spring wherever you were in the world. Maybe not. For all we know he was already on his way. He seems to have arrived early in April, but this is where our information peters out. We think Nena Reeve used the opportunity of his visit to Zavik to make one of her own to Sarajevo, either because he could babysit the children or just as a way of avoiding him – who knows? Either way she chose the wrong time. All hell broke loose in Sarajevo and the Serbs started lobbing artillery shells at anything that moved and their snipers started picking off children playing football in the street. And she either couldn’t get out or didn’t want to…’

‘Doctors must be pretty thin on the ground in Sarajevo,’ Docherty thought out loud.

Davies grunted his agreement. ‘As far as we know, she’s still there. But Reeve – well, this is mostly guesswork. We got a letter from him early in June, explaining why he’d not returned to Zimbabwe, and that as long as he feared for the safety of his children he’d stay in Zavik…’

‘I never heard anything about it,’ Docherty said.

‘No one did,’ Davies said. ‘An SAS soldier on the active list stuck in the middle of Bosnia wasn’t something we wanted to advertise. For any number of reasons, his own safety included. Anyway, it seems that the town wasn’t as safe as Reeve’s wife had thought, and sometime in July it found itself with some unwelcome visitors – a large group of Serbian irregulars. We’ve no idea what happened, but we do know that the Serbs were sent packing…’

‘You think Reeve helped organize a defence?’

Davies shrugged. ‘It would hardly be out of character, would it? But we don’t know. All we have since then is six months of silence, followed by two months of rumours.’

‘Rumours of what?’

‘Atrocities of one kind and another.’

‘Reeve? I don’t believe it.’

‘Neither do I, but…We’re guessing that Reeve – or someone else with the same sort of skills – managed to turn Zavik into a town that was too well defended to be worth attacking. Which would work fine until the winter came, when the town would start running short of food and fuel and God knows what else, and either have to freeze and starve or take the offensive and go after what it needed. And that’s what seems to have happened. They’ve been absolutely even-handed: they’ve stolen from everyone – Muslims, Serbs and Croats. And since none of these groups, with the partial exception of the Muslims, likes admitting that somewhere there’s a town in which all three groups are fighting alongside each other against the tribal armies, you can guess who they’re all choosing to concentrate their anger against.’

‘Us?’

‘In a nutshell. According to the Serbs and the Croats there’s this renegade Englishman holed up in central Bosnia like Marlon Brando in Apocalypse Now , launching raids against anyone and everyone, delighting in slaughter and madness, and probably waiting to mutter “the horror, the horror” to the man who arrives intent on terminating him with extreme prejudice.’

‘I take it our political masters are embarrassed,’ Docherty said drily.

‘Not only that – they’re angry. They like touting the Regiment as an example of British excellence, and since the cold war ended they’ve begun to home in on the idea of selling our troops as mercenaries to the UN. All for a good cause, of course, and what the hell else do we have to sell any more? The Army top brass are all for it – it’s their only real argument for keeping the sort of resource allocations they’re used to. Finding out that one of their élite soldiers is running riot in the middle of the media’s War of the Moment is not their idea of good advertising.’

Docherty smiled grimly. ‘Surprise, surprise,’ he said, and emptied his glass. He could see now where this conversation was leading. ‘Same again?’ he asked.

‘Thanks.’

Docherty gave his order to the barman and stood there thinking about John Reeve. They’d known each other almost twenty years, since they’d been thrown into the deep end together in Oman. Reeve had been pretty wild back then, and he hadn’t noticeably calmed down with age, but Docherty had thought that if anyone could turn down the fire without extinguishing it altogether then Nena was the one.

What would Isabel say about his going to Bosnia? he asked himself. She’d probably shoot him herself.

Back at the booth he asked Davies the obvious question: ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘I have no right to ask you to do anything,’ Davies answered. ‘You’re no longer a member of the Regiment, and you’ve already done more than your bit.’

‘Aye,’ Docherty agreed, ‘but what do you want me to do?’

‘Someone has to get into Zavik and talk Reeve into getting out. I don’t imagine either is going to be easy, but he’s more likely to listen to you than anyone else.’

‘Maybe.’ Reeve had never been very good at listening to anyone, at least until Nena came along. ‘How would I get to Zavik?’ he asked. ‘And where is it, come to that?’

‘About fifty miles west of Sarajevo. But we haven’t even thought about access yet. We can start thinking about the hows if and when you decide…’

‘If you should choose to accept this mission…’ Docherty quoted ironically.

‘…the tape will self-destruct in ten seconds,’ Davies completed for him. Clearly both men had wasted their youth watching crap like Mission Impossible .

‘I’ll need to talk with my wife,’ Docherty said. ‘What sort of time-frame are we talking about?’ It occurred to him, absurdly, that he was willing to go and risk his life in Bosnia, but only if he could first enjoy this Christmas with his family.