The Budapest Protocol (30 page)

The cameramen openly focused on those wearing badges or holding banners supporting Edith Leclerc. A middle-aged man with straggly grey hair and tortoiseshell glasses held his hand over the lens when the camera-man approached. “Dirty fascists,” he shouted. Two Gendarmes immediately dragged him away. He protested and tried to wriggle free. Alex watched as a Gendarme swiftly tapped him on the crown. He collapsed, a thin rivulet of blood trickling down his head. The Gendarmes moved forward, banging their truncheons against their riot shields. The passengers looked nervously at each other, and filed silently out of the station. Alex’s hands began to sweat as a familiar tension gnawed in his stomach.

The Muslim prisoners are lined up against the wall. They do not look like soldiers, just young and middle-aged men, dressed in jeans or sports suits. Some are still in their teens. They stare at Alex, their eyes burning and pleading, desperately hoping that his presence can somehow save their lives. The Serb commander struts up and down, his massive paunch distending his black combat fatigues. He pulls off his ski-mask. An almost tangible fear ripples through the prisoners. He is notorious, a poet-turned-killer, a sycophant first of Tito, now of ultra-nationalism.

He walks up to an elderly man and presses the pistol against his head. “Where is your Allah now, Turk?” he demands. The Muslim begins to pray, “La-illah illa Allah, wa Muhammad rasul Allah, there is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is the prophet of Allah.” The poet-killer presses the trigger and the Muslim’s head explodes. He flies back against the wall, leaving a crimson smear as he slides to the floor. “Ooops, my trigger finger slipped,” says the commander, laughing out loud. The prisoners on either side of the dead man shake uncontrollably.

The paramilitaries pass a bottle of plum brandy from hand-to-hand, as they laugh and joke. The hot summer air fills with the smell of human waste. The bottle is passed to him. He takes a swig. The drink sears his throat and he coughs. A paramilitary slaps him on the back, laughing. A bus arrives. The men are herded on board at gunpoint. “See, reporter, how humane we Serbs are with our prisoners,” the commander says to Alex, his deep-set eyes dull and unfocused. “We even provide transport for them. Don’t follow us.”

Alex had waited, hiding in the remains of a burnt-out house. The shooting had started about half an hour later, the crackle of the guns echoing across the valley, mingled with screams and cries. First the long fusillades of machine gun fire, the screams and pleas, then the snap of single pistol shots. He hid in the house until dusk, and walked through the forests to the field. The men and boys lay scattered like broken rag dolls.

This is how it starts, thought Alex, as he stared at the Gendarmes and the Pannonia Brigade. Setting neighbour against neighbour, first with words and uniforms, then with knives and guns. Or newer, more scientific, methods. The images flashed through his head: the burning packet of Czigex in Novy Marek; Sanzlermann’s election posters; corpses in the Bosnian field; his grandfather dead, his ghetto diary. Miklos, he now knew, was the first victim, Vince Szatmari, the second. He had stood by and watched in Bosnia. He would not stand by now.

Natasha was waiting outside the Yugoslav Embassy as a police helicopter clattered overhead. Even in jeans and a long out of fashion Afghan coat she still looked like a model, Alex thought ruefully. He really had the worst timing in the world. Kissing Zsofi’s cheek on Margaret Bridge when Natasha ran by and then, just as it looked like she might still be interested, there was Zsofi again – knocking on his door at midnight. Never mind, he told himself determinedly, there were more important issues at stake.

“Did you see the Nazis at the station?” she asked.

He nodded. “They got what they wanted. So far.”

They crossed Dozsa Gyorgy Street and walked through Heroes’ Square. Natasha handed Alex a USB stick. “Here are your files from your office computer. Back them up please. And the Trojan Horse is delivering. Gabriella opened the email this morning at 8.20am. Her computer is connected to Klindern’s. There is a key-stroke logger built in to the Trojan Horse, which recorded their passwords and sent them back to me. I’ve got them all.”

“That’s brilliant. Where are they?” asked Alex as he put the USB stick in his pocket.

“In here,” Natasha said, tapping her head. “But if you want to get into the KZX computer we will need to move fast. We should try tonight as they are bound to find the Trojan Horse eventually, and that will trigger a security alert. They will change all the passwords. We need a safe place. Not your apartment or Kitty’s. Unless you have other plans.”

“No. I don’t. I’ll find somewhere,” said Alex, as they walked into the park.

Metal fences ringed the rally area. Police checkpoints at three entrance points controlled entry and exit. A queue stretched back several hundred metres. “Peace, tolerance and diversity,” proclaimed the backdrop banner over the large wooden stage. The centre-piece was a giant photograph of Edith Leclerc flanked on both sides by a montage of multi-cultural Europe: children of every shade of white, brown and black played together, while a multi-national orchestra posed with instruments. A ring of Gendarmes surrounded the stage.

“Come on, we’re not waiting in line,” Alex said and led her to the centre checkpoint. Police and Gendarmes carefully checked identity cards, writing down every person’s name and identity number. Any questions about the intrusive checks were met with a curt reply about ‘security procedures’ and ‘terrorism alert’. Anyone protesting was arrested. Many were turned away. Others left the entrance queue once they saw the checks. A Pannonia Brigade cameramen steadily swept his camera up and down the line. Alex and Natasha walked to the front.

“Press,” Alex said to a policeman at the entrance, showing his and Natasha’s press cards.

The policeman looked Alex up and down. He had a wide Asian face and blinked repeatedly as he examined their press cards. “Cover for me, will you, Pisti,” he asked, turning to the nearby Gendarme. “I’ve got two troublemakers here. You two, over there,” he snapped.

Alex began to protest when he interrupted. “Just come with me. There’s nothing to worry about,” he said, his voice low and reassuring as they walked into the park. He stopped by a clump of trees. Alex saw that a rip had appeared in the corner of Leclerc’s picture behind the platform.

“I know your names. I read your interview with Sanzlermann. I’m going to pretend to be radioing headquarters to check you out,” the policeman said.

Alex looked at the policeman. “Is there something you want to tell us, officer?”

“Yes. We don’t like this. We don’t like it at all. People have a right to demonstrate, to vote for whoever they want. That’s why we brought down the communists. The Panonnia Brigade, those hooligans, are now going to be an auxiliary police force. What a joke. The Gendarmes are taking more and more of our duties. Half of them haven’t even been trained. Csaba Zirta is posting an election ‘liaison officer’ to every police station. To discuss security issues raised by the campaign, supposedly. But every one is from Sanzlermann’s party. There’s nobody from Leclerc’s side. This is nothing to do with police business. They are using us. You understand?”

The policeman looked up to see the Gendarme walking towards him. “They’re clear. Go on, on your way,” the policeman said, looking meaningfully at Alex.

They walked into the enclosure and stood at the front. A multicultural children’s folk dance troupe left the stage to enthusiastic applause. The smell of roasting chestnuts and burnt leaves wafted across the rally. There were barely 200 people in the crowd. Long queues snaked back almost to Heroes’ Square. Edith Leclerc took the stage fifteen minutes late. She stood in front of the microphone, a stout, matronly figure, with gold-rimmed glasses and coiffured grey hair, dressed in a sensible navy skirt. Her bodyguards stood on either side of the stage.

“My fellow Europeans, I am so happy to be in Budapest.
Jó estét kívánok mindenkinek
, I wish you all a good evening,” she proclaimed, in a clear tenor voice, triggering a ragged cheer. “Excuse my pronunciation, but now in the new Europe we have so many new languages to learn. These are trying days for us. Our dream of a peaceful, tolerant continent is turning into a nightmare. The tragic news from Paris overshadows our gathering. We mourn for those killed, and pray for the injured.”

Alex watched the rip in the banner behind the stage spread further down. The torn parts flapped in the wind. Leclerc turned round, and waved at one of her officials to try and fix the tear. “There are those who would wall off our continent against the rest of the world, who have a vision of an exclusively white, exclusively Christian Europe – I don’t have to tell you who they are – they are wrong. Their ideas are based on hate, and prejudice,” she proclaimed, as the crowd murmured its assent.

“Should we condemn all immigrants because of a few extremists? Of course not. Their actions, as terrible as they are, can never justify this, for example,” she said, gesturing at the Gendarmes in front of the stage, and the outer ring of police, still painstakingly checking identity papers of the last die-hards, determined to attend the rally. “For there is a time when protection becomes intimidation, and our hard-won freedoms are sliced further and further back, until they no longer exist,” she continued, her voice rising in strength and passion. “When sinister and unaccountable interest groups, powerful economic and political forces seek to control our fates.”

Alex sniffed. Wisps of grey smoke curled out from underneath the platform. The rip in Leclerc’s banner spread down, tearing it into two pieces. A flap of banner fell onto her face, and she stumbled in confusion, scrabbling to remove the sheet. Smoke poured from under the platform. Anxiety rippled through the crowd. People began to point at the smoke, and edge backwards. Flames licked at the wooden boards, spreading along the platform. Leclerc’s bodyguards rushed forward, peeled away the torn banner and escorted her off the stage. Natasha looked anxiously at Alex. He grabbed her hand and led her away from the burning platform, as the crowd scattered in all directions. Sirens wailed, sounding louder by the second.

* * *

Father Fischer watched attentively as Natasha attached the mobile telephone Alex had given her to her laptop computer. It was 10.00pm and she, Alex and the priest were ensconced in his office at the back of the church. Alex picked up a DVD box next to Father Fischer’s desktop computer. The lurid orange cover showed a racing car tearing round a grand prix track. “Ultimate Speed,” Alex read out loud. “You are the driver in the fastest, most exciting dare-devil 3D graphics computer car race game yet.”

The priest smiled bashfully. “God moves in mysterious ways.” He poured three cups of coffee and handed one each to Alex and Natasha.

“At more than 200 kilometres an hour,” replied Alex, smiling as he put the box down and accepted the coffee.

Natasha looked up. “We’re ready,” she said, ignoring Alex’s quip. “You do know that hacking into the KZX computer is illegal, Father?”

“Against man’s law, yes. Against God’s, I think not. Can they find us?”

“Good question.” She picked up the handset. “Every telephone has two unique identifying numbers. The networks can use these to locate any handset in the world – where there is network coverage – to within fifty square metres or so. In two or three seconds. The handset can also be used as a microphone to bug a room, even as a camera, if it has one, to take secret pictures of what the user is doing.”

“That doesn’t sound very secure,” said the priest.

“It’s not. But anyone watching us needs to know which handset we are using. If it was paid for with cash, ideally somewhere without a CCTV camera, by someone who cannot be connected to us, it’s untraceable. It’s just one of millions of mobile phones. Isn’t it, Alex?” she asked.

“That’s what I was told.”

Father Fischer looked troubled. “What if someone is watching you, knows where you are, and then gets the network to identify all mobile handsets in that immediate area? Couldn’t they make the connection?”

Natasha shook her head as she opened her internet browser. “They might be able to work out that we are here and using these handsets. But they cannot trace what we are doing on the internet because we are using a proxy server relay. At least not immediately.”

Father Fischer shook his head, puzzled. “A what?”

She looked up from her laptop. “I’ll explain. Whenever you log onto the internet you connect to your internet service provider, which gives your computer an identifier from its own list of internet addresses. An expert can see that we have an address from a Hungarian ISP and can guess we are connecting from nearby.”

Alex and Father Fischer listened, engrossed, as Natasha continued. “The proxy server relay anonymises us. It encrypts our data and routes our connection through a network of covert servers around the world. It’s like a continually evolving chain. Each server only knows the one it receives the data from and the server it forwards the data to. Nobody knows the whole path. So theoretically nobody can track us. Theoretically. But nothing is 100 per cent certain.”

“Impressive. How do you get these programmes? And who writes them and makes them available?” asked the priest, drinking his coffee.

“People who believe in the free exchange of information,” said Natasha. “You can download them from the internet.”

Natasha typed ‘
www.kzxindustrie.de
’ in Firefox. The screen filled with a picture of two children, one European and one Asian, playing happily together. “Bringing Health and Happiness to the World,” the website proclaimed. A flashing banner announced: see our new Croatian, Hungarian, Slovak and Romanian language websites. The screen showed a panning shot of the company headquarters in Munich, a collection of white, low-rise buildings, surrounded by landscaped Japanese gardens. Young executives bustled through the pristine, modern corridors. An options menu popped up at the side of the window. Social Responsibility; Our Global World and Corporate History.