neared the coast the highway opened up and the foliage thinned. The warm morning sun glinted off the road as they passed Koper and Izola, and Charles watched the low shrubs, the Mediterranean architecture, and the ZIMMER-FREI signs that littered each turnoff. It reminded him just how beautiful this tiny stretch of coast truly was. Less than thirty miles that had been pulled back and forth between Italians, Yugoslavs, and Slovenes over centuries of regional warfare.
To their right, they caught occasional glimpses of the Adriatic, and through the open window he smelled salt. He wondered if his own salvation lay in something like this. Disappear, and spend the rest of his years under a hot sun on the sea. The kind of climate that dries and burns the imbalance out of you. But he pushed that aside, because he already knew the truth: Geography solves nothing.
He said, “We can’t do this unless you tell me the rest.”
“What rest?” She spoke as if she had no idea.
“The why. Why Frank Dawdle was sent down here with three million dollars.”
To the rearview, she said, “War criminal. Bosnian Serb. Big fish.”
A small pink hotel passed, and then Portorož Bay opened up, full of sun and glimmering water. “Which one?”
“Does it really matter?”
He supposed it didn’t. Karadžić, Mladić, or any other wanted ić—the story was always the same. They, as well as the Croat zealots on the other side of the battle lines, had all had a hand in the Bosnian genocides that had helped turn a once-adored multiethnic country into an international pariah. Since 1996, these men had been fugitives, hidden by sympathizers and corrupt officials, faced with charges from the UN’s International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. Crimes against humanity, crimes against life and health, genocide, breaches of the Geneva conventions, murder, plunder, and violations of the laws and customs of war. Charles gazed at the Adriatic, sniffing the wind. “The UN’s offering five million for these people.”
“Oh, this guy wanted five,” Angela said as she slowed behind a line of cars with Slovenian, German, and Italian plates. “But all he had was an address, and he demanded the money up front so he could disappear. The UN didn’t trust him, turned him down flat, so some smart young man at Langley decided we should purchase it ourselves for three. A PR coup. We buy ourselves the glory of an arrest and once again point out the UN’s incompetence.” She shrugged. “Five or three—either way, you’re a millionaire.”
“What do we know about him?”
“He wouldn’t tell us anything, but Langley figured it out. Dušan Masković, a Sarajevo Serb who joined the militias in the early days. He’s part of the entourage that’s been hiding the big ones in the Republika Srpska hills. Two weeks ago, he left their employ and contacted the UN Human Rights office in Sarajevo. Apparently, they get people like him every day. So little Dušan put in a call to our embassy in Vienna and found a sympathetic ear.”
“Why not just take care of it there? In Sarajevo?”
The traffic moved steadily forward, and they passed shops with flowers and international newspapers. “He didn’t want to collect in Bosnia. Didn’t even want it set up through the Sarajevo embassy. And he didn’t want anyone stationed in the ex-Yugoslav republics involved.”
“He’s no fool.”
“From what we figure, he got hold of a boat in Croatia and was going to wait in the Adriatic until 7:00 P.M. on Saturday. Then he could slip in, make the trade, and slip out again before he’d have to register with the harbormaster.”
“I see,” Charles said, because despite his returning stomach cramps he finally had enough information to picture the various players and the ways they connected.
“Want me to take care of the room?”
“Let’s check the dock first.”
Portorož’s main harbor lay at the midpoint of the bay; behind it sat the sixties architecture of the Hotel Slovenia, its name written in light blue against white concrete, a surf motif. They parked off the main road and wandered around shops selling model sailboats and T-shirts with PORTOROž and I LOVE SLOVENIA and MY PARENTS WENT TO SLOVENIA AND ALL I GOT … scribbled across them. Sandaled families sucking ice cream cones and cigarettes wandered leisurely past. Behind the shops lay a row of small piers full of vacation boats.
“Which one?” asked Charles.
“Forty-seven.”
He led the way, hands in his pockets, as if he and his lady-friend were enjoying the view and the hot sun. The crews and captains on the motor-and sailboats paid them no attention. It was nearly noon, time for siestas and drink. Germans and Slovenes dozed on their hot decks, and the only voices they heard were from children who couldn’t fall asleep.
Forty-seven was empty, but at forty-nine a humble yacht with an Italian flag was tied up. On its deck, a heavy woman was trying to peel a sausage.
“Buon giorno!” said Charles.
The woman inclined her head politely.
Charles’s Italian was only passable, so he asked Angela to find out when the woman had arrived in Portorož. Angela launched into a machine-gun Roman-Italian that sounded like a blast of insults, but the sausage woman smiled and waved her hands as she threw the insults back. It ended with Angela waving a “Grazie mille.”
Charles waved, too, then leaned close to Angela as they walked away. “Well?”
“She got here Saturday night. There was a motorboat beside theirs—dirty, she tells me—but it left soon after they arrived. She guesses around seven thirty, eight.”
After a couple more steps, Angela realized Charles had stopped somewhere behind her. His hands were on his hips as he stared at the empty spot with a small placard marked “47.” “How clean do you think that water is?”
“I’ve seen worse.”
Charles handed over his jacket, then unbuttoned his shirt as he kicked off his shoes.
“You’re not,” said Angela.
“If the trade happened at all, then it probably didn’t go well. If it led to a fight, something might have dropped in here.”
“Or,” said Angela, “if Dušan’s smart, he took Frank’s body out into the Adriatic and dropped him overboard.”
Charles wanted to tell her that he’d already ruled Dušan Masković out as a murderer—there was nothing for Dušan to gain by killing a man who was going to give him money for a simple address with no questions asked—but changed his mind. He didn’t have time for a fight.
He stripped to his boxers, hiding the pangs in his stomach as he bent to pull off the slacks. He wore no undershirt, and his chest was pale from a week spent under Amsterdam’s gray skies. “If I don’t come up …”
“Don’t look at me,” said Angela. “I can’t swim.”
“Then get Signora Sausage to come for me.”
Before she could think of a reply, Charles had jumped feet-first into the shallow bay. It was a shock to his drug-bubbly nerves, and there was an instant when he almost breathed in; he had to force himself not to. He paddled back to the surface and wiped his face. Angela, on the edge of the pier, smiled down at him. “Done already?”
“Don’t wrinkle my shirt.” He submerged again, then opened his eyes.
With the sun almost directly above, the shadows beneath the water were stark. He saw the dirty white hulls of boats, then the blackness where their undersides curved into darkness. He ran his hands along the Italian boat at number forty-nine, following its lines toward the bow, where a thick cord ran up to the piles, holding the boat secure. He let go of the line and sank into the heavy darkness under the pier, using hands for sight. He touched living things— a rough shell, slime, the scales of a paddling