White Eagles Over Serbia (10 page)

As he pulled on the heavy riding-boots he gazed out at the early morning landscape, the green rolling country that swept away southward towards the dark mountains which as yet were simple mauve smudges upon the skyline. They were able to make good time along the excellent metalled highway which leads out in a series of graceful curves and loops towards Topola, rising like a swallow through cuttings and dipping in and out among the richly-cultivated hills. Vineyards stretched away on either side of them and Methuen could not resist giving Porson a short lecture on the Serbian wines he had once studied with affectionate care. This was a celebrated part of the wine country. “Out of bounds alas!” said Porson, “or I should by now have collected enough material for a monograph. We get inferior stuff in town!”

The black Buick held on to them, staying always about three hundred yards behind. Methuen took a peep at it through the curtained window. “They are awfully close,” he said, and Porson smiled a knowing smile as he answered: “Wait till the dust begins. They have to eat our dust all the way into Macedonia. You should see them when we arrive at Skoplje—as if they were all wearing powdered wigs and false moustaches. Don't worry, Methuen. We'll have plenty of time.”

Methuen smoked and pondered as the great car whistled onwards. His fishing-rod and the bulkier part of his equipment he had wrapped in the light bed-roll. Into the various pockets and slings of his magnificent coat he had placed his pistol and compass, some solid fuel, a half-pint Thermos, and his beloved
Walden.
“By God,” said Porson, “anyone would think you were going to stay for months.” “I am,” said Methuen grimly. The sun was quite hot by now and Porson said approvingly: “There's going to be a hell of a lot of dust. Good show!”

They swayed and scrambled through the cobbled streets of Mladenovac and whistled out into the countryside beyond. The Buick came smoothly on behind. Blair produced some biscuits and an excellent bottle of white wine which they shared. Their spirits rose, but behind the fooling of Porson, Methuen sensed a tension and a reserve which had been absent before. For his part, though he looked out at that smiling landscape with familiar pleasure recaptured in memory, he felt the dark wings of danger spreading themselves above them—and out of it all the thought of Vida's death rose up to afflict him, leaving him with a slow-burning resentment and determination.

“You won't forget to ring up Belgrade,” he said, “and drop any messages there are for me in the ditch as per arrangement.” Porson nodded. “On my way back. We'll start at midnight and be with you just before light.”

Half-way between Mladenovac and Kralevo the road began to deteriorate into patches of pitted cobbles, and then as they swept round a wooded curve Porson said: “Now watch this.” The asphalt abruptly ceased and the car wallowed on to the pitted country road of dust and loose stones. A cloud arose round them which powdered the lower branches of the trees. “Look behind,” said Porson gleefully. Methuen did so. They were throwing up a smoke-screen of bilious yellow dust—impenetrable in volume. “God,” he said, with genuine pity for the Buick-load of police which followed them. “From here on they drop about a quarter of a mile behind,” said Porson gleefully. “Sometimes we annoy them by slowing up too.”

Kralevo passed in a cloud and the note of the car changed as they headed across the plain for the mountain-range which now loomed up at them from the south; the river sprawled to the left of them gleaming green and yellow in the flat plain. The road and river converged slowly upon the looming shadowy gorge which marked the entrance to the Ibar valley. “Pretty soon now,” said Porson in a voice which betrayed an ill-controlled excitement. Methuen puffed quietly at his cigarette before tossing it out of the window.

At the entrance of the sullen gorge, where the mountains rise to right and left, the road, railway and river, having conducted a seemingly endless flirtation, are suddenly squeezed together and pass through the narrow rock entrance side by side. Here the Ebar becomes swift, brown and turbid; giant poplars and willows, their roots gripping the shaly banks like knuckles, shade the whole length of the road. The air becomes dense with the smell of water, for several smaller rivers have cut their way through the mountain to empty themselves into the Ibar, and the crumbling rocky walls which flank the gorge are bursting with freshwater springs. The valley for all its gloom is alive with the ripple of bird-song which mingles with the thunder of the Ibar's waters as they roar down towards Rashka.

The railway looked like a toy. It had been cut in the side of the mountain and the tracks passed through a series of rock-tunnels each of which was closely guarded by pickets. Methuen saw the diminished figures of these guards walking along the stone parapet, stopping to gaze down curiously at the car as it passed. Each section of tunnel had its own patrol, and the soldiers lounged in the sun on the stone balconies, idly smoking or tossing pebbles into the swift waters of the Ibar below.

“What about them?” said Methuen, and Porson said quickly: “The part where you jump is completely enclosed with greenery. They can't see. Only when you climb the hill you'll have to keep out of sight. Look, a train!”

They heard a series of muffled shrieks and a heavy rumbling across the river. The guards came to life and took up position. The rumbling increased in volume and finally an absurdly toy-like train emerged from the rock-tunnel with a puff of grey smoke—as if it had been fired from the mouth of a gun. It rolled slowly across the balcony-like parapet, trailing a long banner of sooty dust and smoke, and with a catarrhal whistle plunged once more into the rock, its wheels making a hard resonant noise, as of a billiard ball being rolled across a stone floor. Sixty yards later, before the tail of the train had come into view on the first parapet, the engine emerged once more with another cough. “In and out of the rock,” said Porson, “like a needle in cloth.”

“Hard work cutting that railway,” said Methuen with mild professional interest; the river looked too strong for any swimmer. “It's well guarded,” said Porson, “though one good burst in a tunnel.…”

They rolled onwards between the flickering crowns of the trees which reached up at the road from the river bank. Behind them the yellow cloud of dust volleyed away down the road reducing visibility to nothing. Yellowhammers and magpies frolicked in the trees, and here and there the stem rock-faces to their right stood back and fanned away into dome-like mountains, steeply clad with beech and fir, and showing small pockets of cultivation. A crumbling Frankish fortress dominated one height and Methuen caught the flicker of sunlight on something which might have been the barrel of a gun at the eastern corner. He had a small but powerful pair of glasses in his kit but there was no time to train them on this tempting target. “There's a company of soldiers up in the fort,” said Porson. “They supply the pickets for the railway. Two machine-guns. Nothing heavier.”

He was gradually reducing speed and the great car rolled effortlessly along the beautiful river road, in and out of the shadows thrown by the trees. They turned a corner and the fort was swallowed; and here the trees grew in great clusters, chestnut and eucalyptus raising their dusty crowns to the sky. “We're coming to it,” said Porson; round the next corner there was a white milestone by a ruined signalman's hut which was their marker. “All set,” said Methuen quietly and gripped his bed-roll as he let down the massive window of the car. “Do you see it?” The milestone climbed out of the mauve shadows of the rock-face and came towards them like a pointing finger. “Let her go. Good luck!” cried Porson. Methuen gave a heave and tossed his bed-roll into the ditch; then opening the door he plunged out after it into the deep grass, slipping and sliding to the bottom as the great car gathered speed and covered him in a cloud of pungent dust. Porson gave a hoot on the klaxon which echoed like the wild cry of some solitary bird among the rocks.

CHAPTER NINE

The Lone Fisherman

M
ethuen lay against the steep bank, his face pressed to the moist grass for what seemed hours. The noise of the Mercedes died away gradually and was replaced by the roaring of the Ibar in its stony bed. The cloud of dust thinned gradually and began to settle, while out of a neighbouring tree came the clear fluting notes of bird-song. He felt his own heart beating against the moist cool grass. Would the police car never come? He strained his ears for the sound of its engines; his heavy duffle coat was warm. A cricket chirped in the grass beside him. Then, after what seemed an age, he heard the whistle of the Buick's engine which gradually increased. “They're taking it pretty easily,” he said to himself. The car swept round the corner and he heard its radio playing a Viennese waltz. Then he was engulfed once more in the impenetrable wall of white dust and taking advantage of it he climbed to his feet, gathered up his bed-roll and galloped for the cover of the trees.

Within a hundred yards of where he had jumped a narrow gorge opened at right-angles to the main river-gorge and here the swift and shallow Studenitsa river rolled and tumbled from a series of rock-balconies, covered with slippery moss, to join the larger river. The air was dense with spray, and the trees leaned out of the sheer cliff at all angles. The cover here was plentiful and good, and avoiding the mule-track, Methuen climbed deliberately up beside the river, slipping and sliding on the loose surface of leaf-mould, and pushing his way through the dense clusters of tree-ferns towards the summit, eight hundred feet above.

The going was hard but in the clear spray-drenched air of the valley he felt his spirits rise. From time to time he paused for a breather, gazing from some small clearing of greenery to where the road below him ran like a white scar beside the black river. At one point he came out on a spur overlooking the mule-track and saw a group of peasants driving two ox-carts loaded with wood down towards the valley. As far as his memory served him, there were only two small hamlets along the Studenitsa river, and the only human activity apart from land cultivation centred about a sawmill which flanked the monastery at the summit. Here he had camped once beside the smooth river and fished away the better part of a summer with a Serbian friend. In the evening they had walked up to the sawmill to drink plum-brandy with the monks and peasants and to share the fishing gossip of the community. Here too they had experimented with different ways of cooking trout, and he remembered clearly the taste of fish baked in the sour cream called
kaimak
which serves the peasant for butter.

But these memories did not cause him to relax his vigilance and he moved along in the shadow of the fir trees, keeping the river in sight but never venturing out into the open. In half an hour he had reached the summit and here the river broadened with the valley, while the hills opened into deeply indented upland valleys traversed by delicious footpaths which circled the squares of luxuriant maize and the dappled hayfields which lay open to the afternoon sunlight.

Here the oak forests ran down to the water's edge and he could walk on grass richly studded with flowers. The world seemed empty of human beings. To the east a flock of sheep grazed without a shepherd who was doubtless fishing in the shadowy river below the sawmill. Here too he came upon orchards full of plum trees and hedges riotous with blackberries so large that in spite of himself he stopped to gather some. Away to the left, hidden by a shoulder of hill lay the monastery, and from this direction he could hear the whimper of a saw; but he gave it a wide berth and struck up the valley, guided by his memories of a summer he had believed forgotten. He himself was rather astonished by the accuracy of his memory, for in his enchanted valley nothing seemed to have changed. In the silence the river ran on with its gentle rattle of water stirring pebbles—a pearly shadow of sound against which the songs of the birds rose bright and poignant on the moist air. The hedges were thick with a variety of flowers, and his quick eye detected the presence of old friends, yellow snapdragon, sky-blue flax. Here the hills ran away in a series of verdant undulations to where, softly painted against the sky, the towering mountains of central Serbia rose, lilac and green and red; and in all this lovely country there were no signs of life, no mule-teams raising dust, no bands of armed men watching from the woods. It baffled him to imagine how Anson could have got himself into trouble here, the going was so easy, the points of visibility so many, the cover so good.

The sun was still high enough to be hot and he was still sweating profusely from the steep climb, so he bathed his face in the icy river, and allowed himself a five-minute rest in a copse while he examined the hills around him with his glasses. There was little enough to interest him. Against one remote skyline he caught sight of oxen ploughing, and to the east he picked up a peasant house with pointed gables, but for the rest the world looked newly born: unpopulated. Yet here and there were large areas of maize and barley growing which argued the presence of husbandmen, and the sheep tinkled their way across the pastures to the north of him. High up in the cloudless June sky an eagle hovered. The light skirmishing wind blew puff-balls and bits of straw across the river.

Around one wooded curve of the river he came upon a solitary monk fishing under a tree and was forced to climb the hill from the back in order not to pass him, but even he hardly communicated a sense of life to the landscape in which he sat so motionless, back against a tree, his rod propped between his knees. Perhaps he was sleeping. Methuen watched him for a while from a clump of maize-stalks hoping to see him hook a fish, but in vain. The river ran as smoothly under his line as the grass upon which he sat. From time to time a nut dropped off the tree into the water. “Dry fishing,” said Methuen to himself, “that's the real ticket,” and scanned the dimpled waters to see what the fish were rising to: but this was the wildest self-indulgence and he pulled himself together.