Evil Deeds (Bob Danforth 1) (45 page)

Michael got in the front seat of the Mercedes, next to Stefan’s son. Stefan, seated behind the teenager, said, “Captain, this is my wife, Vanja, and my son, Attila.”

Michael turned to look at Vanja and said, “Hello.” The woman smiled and tipped her head in return.

As Attila pulled away from the side of the road and followed the U.S. Army truck, Stefan said, “Vanja, this is Captain Michael Danforth.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Michael said, noticing the woman’s jaw drop and her eyes widen while she stared at him. She looked over at Stefan. Michael thought he detected nervousness in her expression. But he remembered Stefan reacted the same way when he saw his nametag. Maybe
Danforth
is a dirty word in their language, Michael thought.

Michael shifted his gaze to Stefan. “Now would be a good time to see your log, Mr. Radko,” he said.

“Go ahead, Vanja. Show him what you wrote down,” Stefan ordered.

Michael looked back at Vanja and watched her pull three thick sheaves of paper tied with ribbon from a large straw bag. Placing them on her lap, she took the top packet, reached out, and handed it to Michael. He untied the ribbons, removed a blank cover sheet, and noticed the handwritten words on the next sheet. “What language is this?” he asked.

“Roma,” Vanja said. “The Gypsy language.”

“How am I supposed to understand this?”

“You are not, unless you can read Roma,” Stefan said sarcastically.

“So these could be love letters, for all I know?”

“Captain Danforth, you will just have to take our word for it,” Stefan said. “Every one of those sheets of paper is a separate eyewitness account of a crime committed by one or more Serbs against a Kosovar Albanian, Bosnian, or Gypsy.”

Michael again wondered, Can I trust someone whose own daughter describes him as a sonofabitch?

“Now that I have delivered what I promised, tell me how you know Miriana.”

Michael swung around in his seat again and looked back at Stefan. Before he could respond, Vanja yelled something in a high-pitched voice and a language Michael didn’t understand.

In a paternalistic tone, Stefan, using English, told her, “Now, now, dear. You must not be rude. English please.”

“He knows Miriana?” Vanja cried, now staring at Michael. “How? Is she all right? Where is she?” She looked back at Stefan. “Why did you not say something earlier?”

Stefan patted her hand. “Give him a chance to answer.” He had a smug look on his face.

Michael turned away from Stefan and looked once again at Vanja. Her face was etched with anticipation. Her hands were finger-laced together against her chest as though in prayer. Stefan moved across the seat, coming closer to Vanja and put his arm around her. But he was staring at Michael, slit-eyed, somehow triumphant. Miriana has her mother’s eyes and nose, he thought, and her father’s cheekbones and hair color. But her complexion fell somewhere in between her mother’s fair skin and her father’s dark coloring.

“Miriana’s well,” he said. “I don’t know the whole story, but my father had something to do with getting her to the United States. She’d helped him with some assignment.”

“She is okay . . .?” Vanja’s voice broke.

“She’s great,” Michael said, seeing immediate relief spread across her face.

“Assignment?” Stefan demanded in a sharp voice. “What business is your father in now?”

Michael thought Radko’s use of the word “now” was odd, but he brushed it off. “He’s a . . . consultant,” Michael said. “Anyway, I met Miriana at a party. She told me her last name is Georgadoff. If she hadn’t told me your name, Mr. Radko, I wouldn’t have made the connection.”

Michael noticed a suspicious look in the man’s eyes, a look that said he doubted Michael had told them everything.

Michael told Attila to park the car in front of a communications tent fifty yards off the road.

“Wait here,” Michael said. “I’ll be right back.”

He stepped inside the tent and over to a Sergeant seated in front of a radio. “Sergeant, see if you can raise Colonel Sweeney for me.”

“Yes, sir. This may take a minute, Captain. Where will you be?”

“Right here, Sergeant, waiting impatiently.”

“Gotcha, sir.”

“I am confused, Stefan,” Vanja said, while the Radkos waited in the Mercedes outside the American tent. “Is the American officer who I think he is? Can that be possible?”

“The Americans have a saying: It is a small world.” He smiled, but there was no joy in it. “Yes, he is exactly who you think he is.” Yes, my wife, Stefan thought. And his father is the man who killed my son, Gregorie. The man who could have caused the death of our beloved daughter. And now his son knows Miriana. That look in his eyes when he says her name!

“
Babo
, Mama, what are you talking about?” Attila asked.

“Shut up!” Stefan growled.

Colonel Sweeney paced the wood floor of his command tent at the 82nd’s base camp. He slapped the easel-mounted map and said to his operations chief, “Chuck, we got units covering a thousand square miles trying to assist the refugees. We can’t spread our men out like that. I want our people in platoon-sized units. Nothing smaller. Get–.” The phone on his desk rang. He leaped to answer it and barked, “Sweeney.”

“Colonel, it’s Captain Danforth. I’ve got an interesting situation here. I think you need to meet some people I ran into.”

“What kind of situation?”

“One with political implications, sir. I’d rather not discuss it over the radio.”

“Okay, Mike. Bring them in.” Sweeney cut the connection. Now what? He thought. But his phone rang again with yet another problem, and he quickly put Danforth’s comments in the recesses of his mind.

An hour later, Sweeney felt his pulse accelerate while Michael described what was allegedly written on the pile of papers lying on his desk. He tried to keep his excitement from showing on his face, but he couldn’t keep his hands from trembling. He noticed the man named Radko standing on the other side of his desk staring at his hands and quickly moved them under his desk.

Sweeney stared at Radko and the woman and teenaged boy standing with him. “I can’t read Roma,” he said. “How can I know these papers are what you claim them to be?”

“There are several hundred Gypsies caught up in the mass of people on the road north of here,” Stefan said. “Pull any one of them out at random and let him translate the papers. As for their authenticity, every one of the people we interviewed is also out on that road. Your men can find them – every refugee is being registered by name and village. The names of those we interviewed are in those pages. When you find them – in a week, or month, or so – they will verify the information in their statements. Every word we wrote down is true. It would take weeks for you to duplicate what we have already done. The International War Crimes Tribunal would love to get these documents. We can get more statements than these. Why not put us to work? We know and understand these people. We can get more out of them than your NATO clerks safe in their little offices would ever be able to get.”

“Whoa, slow down,” Sweeney said. The Colonel sat quietly in thought for a moment. “Mr. Radko, I’m going to do exactly as you suggest. If what you say is true, you and your family can be a big help to us.”

He turned to Michael. “Captain Danforth, take the Radkos to the processing center. Move them to the head of the line. Once they’re registered, see they receive housing. Assign one of your men to help them get settled.”