Retribution (32 page)

‘Anything known?'

‘Not a thing. He's the original faceless man. No criminal record, clean bill with the IRS and he pays all his parking tickets on the nail. Model freaking citizen, in fact. If he gives up anything about Kassim, I'll let you know.'

Harry was surprised to hear Deane swear, and guessed the frustration of not being able to get ahead of Kassim was getting to him.

‘How real is the connection to HIG – Hezb-e-Islami?' He'd been sceptical at first when Deane had sent him the breakdown of the inter-intelligence agency analyses. But the more he thought about it, the more it seemed to make a weird kind of sense. Presented with someone like Kassim and his thirst for revenge, any organization looking to make a tactical strike against the UN using the power of the press and the internet, both of which they could harness simply by releasing the news, could hardly fail to make an impact.

‘It's real enough. The bigwigs' thinking is that HIG is acting as a facilitator for a bunch of different groups – but mostly themselves. Anything that puts a dent in the UN right now is fine by them. And if they can put an end to the career of a hotshot like Kleeman at the same time, all to the good.'

‘One hand washes the other.'

‘Exactly. And the ripples move outwards, causing a lot of turbulence. It's win-win for them: they get to dictate what happens
and
gain the kudos, but at no great risk.'

It was a different kind of war, thought Harry, but a war all the same.

‘It'll soon be old hat,' Deane continued. ‘You and I know that. But it's already achieved what they wanted, which is to undermine us.'

‘And Kleeman.'

‘Yeah, Kleeman. Even if we find by some miracle that it's all an elaborate put-up job and Kassim's a fake, I think that asshole's finished.'

‘That sounds definite.'

‘Well, this is for your consumption only. Five years ago, Kleeman's wife, Rose, was admitted to a private clinic in Hyannis Port, Cape Cod. She and Kleeman had been staying on Nantucket Island. She claimed she'd choked on a piece of fish at a beach barbecue one evening, and had stopped breathing for a while. Kleeman used his UN muscle to get the US Coast Guard to fly her to the mainland.' There was a soft rustle of paper. ‘The clinic recorded the treatment and passed a report to the local police department. During the examination they found severe bruising at the base of the throat, consistent, the ME said, with someone pressing the windpipe with both thumbs. She had related bruising to the back of the neck consistent with finger pressure, and a nurse noticed older bruising to her lower back, buttocks and legs.'

‘What did Kleeman say?'

‘Nothing. His wife said the neck thing had happened when her husband tried to dislodge the piece of fish, and the leg and back bruising was after a fall while out hiking.'

‘Could both be true?'

‘Yeah. But the clinic's director does consultancy work with specialist medical teams. He's seen similar lower-body injuries in rough-sex or rape victims.'

‘Did it go any further?'

‘No. With no complaint from the wife, the police could take no action.'

‘Why has it come up now?'

‘Records. When someone gets a high profile in the UN like Kleeman, we trawl through their lives to see what's waiting to come out and bite us. If we don't, the press will. Although if your suspicions are correct, it's all a bit late. Anyway, six months ago Kleeman made one of several visits to London, part UN business, part private. One evening he cried off a semi-official dinner and ate in his room. Said he felt tired.'

‘It happens.'

‘Not that tired. A girl was seen leaving his room just after three a.m.'

‘Ah.'

‘When I say girl, I mean thirteen years old. A Thai girl in the employ of an escort bureau. Apparently Kleeman's used them before. The British CID traced her and got a statement from her and her employers. They said Kleeman likes it rough and the same girls never go back.'

Harry saw where this was going. It was tenuous but showed past behaviour consistent with a man with a taste for violence. But did it make him a rapist and killer?

‘What's the risk to the UN?'

‘Kleeman desperately wants to get to the top of the UN ladder,' Deane said. ‘That's why he scheduled his recent round of visits to Beijing, Paris and London . . . to gather support among other members. Kleeman's a planner . . . he takes the long-term view, like the Chinese. He's looking five years ahead, but on current performance and with no hard proof of bad news, he could make it in three. He's already got a number of foreign government representatives on his side, promising commercial ties and trading agreements if they play ball and their UN representatives give him favourable backing.'

‘Isn't that against the spirit of the UN?' Harry asked.

Deane grunted. ‘I don't think anyone's been so overt about it before now. Usually people like Kleeman go for a seat in government, where they can exercise control in their own country. But things are changing; power in the UN is sexier – and global.'

‘What do you want me to do?'

‘Keep Kassim off his back and make sure Kleeman comes back here to stand trial. In a perfect world it would be better if we let Kassim do his job and sink the twisted fucker. But this is a Special Envoy of the United Nations we're talking about. I'll tell our mission HQ in Pristina that you're coming.'

‘Fine,' Harry said. ‘But let's keep contact to the minimum. There's still a danger Kassim might pick up information about us coming.'

‘No problem. Lubeszki's the only contact you need.'

As Harry and Rik made their way to El Segundo for the military flight, a cutting wind was battering the doors of the main terminal building at Pristina airport, showering the glass with a volley of collected litter and sleet. Kassim shook off the thin layer of icy water dusting his shoulders and shivered in the sudden down-blast of warm air from a heater above his head. Out on the far side of the car park sat a Toyota pickup he'd bought an hour ago from a street dealer working the airport terminal. The man had been desperate for a sale but Kassim had driven a hard bargain. The vehicle was battered but serviceable, and would blend in perfectly. Not that he planned on keeping it for long, but it was safer than having taxi drivers asking too many questions.

It had been strange using his native language once more, although he no longer felt any affinity with the country; he'd been out of it too long now, and it was a different world in every sense. He'd brushed off the dealer's queries about his accent with vague half-truths about working abroad. Fortunately the man's desire for money had quickly overtaken his curiosity.

Kassim eased through the crowds of travellers, greeters, traders, military and other security people milling around the main concourse, and found a snack stall where three UN policemen were taking a break. Tall and blond, in crisp blue shirts and trousers, they exuded a foreign healthiness alien to Kosovo. Scandinavians, Kassim guessed, and felt a stab of anxiety as they all turned and looked at him. When he held out a pack of cigarettes and an open palm with a questioning look, they seemed to relax before moving aside with sympathetic smiles. Another soul trying to make a buck, their attitude seemed to say; why hassle the poor bastard?

He nodded his thanks, reflecting that it was unlikely anyone else would trouble him while they were here. Hiding in plain sight, he'd learned a long time ago, was very effective if applied properly.

He bought a plastic mug of thin tea and took the opportunity to study the terminal building. A much-promised rebuilding project he had read about on the flight in seemed to have made little headway, and like the potholed road outside, the terminal held little welcome for first-time visitors. The main danger for Kassim was that it was small enough for him to stand out more than he liked; the plus side was that if danger presented itself, he would see it coming.

The UN policemen finished their drinks and moved away, and Kassim realized they had been watching the arrivals board. Simultaneously, there was a growing commotion among a small group of press cameramen gathered near the arrivals door, hoisting their equipment ready to capture footage of whoever was about to emerge.

Two of the policemen went to stand in front of them, while the third joined a couple of troopers from an American infantry regiment standing by the main exits. Outside, two more troopers in full battledress stood watching the approach road and car park, their Hummer vehicle standing a few yards away.

Kassim sipped his tea and yawned deliberately, turning to check the arrivals board. As he'd expected, the UN envoy was going to be heavily guarded while he was here, with a very visible security presence.

And it wasn't going to do him a single bit of good.

T
he compound near Mitrovica hadn't improved at all over the years since Harry had last seen it; it seemed smaller than he remembered, with fewer containers and the concrete base pitted and cracked, weeds sprouting towards the grey daylight. The floodlights high on the gantry looked battered and weather-beaten, and the gantry itself had a line of rust running its length like dried blood. Most of the Portakabins had been burned, and one only had to turn and look at the surrounding mesh fence with a roll of razor wire along its top, to gain the feeling that this was a ghost camp long overshadowed by the spectre of what had happened here.

Archie Lubeszki, the UNMIK security man, unlocked the gate and led the way inside. They had left his white UN vehicle on the road with a driver standing guard. The atmosphere was damp and sour, like an old garage long unused, and a lingering whiff of burnt wood hung in the air. In the remaining Portakabins, the electrical fittings had been torn from the walls, the wires left hanging bare, and whatever else had been salvageable had gone.

‘Locals,' Lubeszki explained. He was a stocky Canadian in his fifties with a beard and thick glasses. ‘They broke in a week ago without warning and trashed the place.'

‘If it had been me,' said Rik with feeling, ‘I'd have done the same.'

Lubeszki nodded. ‘I guess. But it's been here a while, so why now?' The last part was rhetorical.

Harry walked across to the huts and along what had been a linking corridor, his footsteps drumming on the warped and rain-soaked floor. A soulful hum sounded as the wind passed through broken windows, and a length of wallboard flapped like a funereal drumbeat. He shivered and tried to get some feeling from the place . . . some sense of memory. But it was too cold, too insulated now by time and events. Whatever badness had happened here had leached out of the place long ago, leaving nothing but a sense of failure.

Lubeszki led them round to the rear of the buildings. The perimeter fence stood less than thirty feet away. Beyond the mesh a stretch of rough grass and weeds ran into a thick belt of trees. The interior looked dark and forbidding, a shifting mass of shadows, and a dread hush hung over the place as if all life had been stilled along with the girl who had died here.

High on the fence was a scrap of pink ribbon. It was knotted in a bow and secured by a piece of wire.

‘They say that's where her dress caught on the wire,' Lubeszki explained. ‘As she went over.' His voice was neutral, neither confirming nor denying that he believed it. He pointed through the mesh to a spot on the ground beneath the piece of material, and the small wooden stake Harry had seen in the photograph. It had been replanted with a bunch of flowers; fresh and colourful, they looked recent. ‘And that's where she was found, right there.'

Rik stared up at the top of the wire and blew out some air. ‘Strong,' he murmured, ‘to do that.'

There was no arguing with that. The fence here was at least ten feet high. Harry couldn't recall if the roll of razor wire had been in place back then, but it would still have taken muscle to throw the girl over. Bikovsky could have done it; Pendry, Broms and Carvalho, too. Orti would have lacked inches, but he'd been a tough character. But not Koslov.

Lubeszki seemed to be reading his mind. He said, ‘She wouldn't have weighed more than a scrap. Folks here lived on what they could find and everyone was undernourished. Come on – I'll take you to see the woman who knew her.' He turned and led them out of the sad compound, locking the gate behind him. ‘Don't know why I bother doing this,' he grunted, snapping the lock into place. ‘Nobody's coming back here, not since the news broke and they trashed the place.'

That will change, Harry wanted to tell him. If Kleeman is the man, all hell will break loose and this place will become the most photographed symbol of failure on the planet.

The woman Lubeszki had found lived in a decaying ruin of a cottage halfway up a steep mountain track. Scattered piles of bricks showed that there had once been a huddle of houses here; too big for a hamlet, too small for a real village. But a community nonetheless. Hers was the only one still in use. Harry wondered aloud how she survived. And why.

‘She's still here because she refuses to move,' Lubeszki replied softly. ‘Beats me why, after everything that happened here. But I guess it's all she's got.'

He knocked respectfully on the warped wooden door. It opened to reveal an old woman in a black headscarf and a grey dress. She had a face lined by the elements and too much sorrow, her eyes dull and devoid of expression. Her cheeks were contoured by a lack of teeth, and she eyed the three men one by one, studying their eyes.

Lubeszki spoke gently, indicating Harry and Rik. The woman nodded and invited them in.

It was a tiny room piled with ancient, tired furniture that had long lost its bloom, a storeroom of effects that Harry thought probably reflected the old lady's life. She indicated a bench for the three to use and sat down on a hard-backed chair, and waited.