Could you drop me at Marko’s? asked the American.
What, now you have business with him? returned Enko, possessive and suspicious.
Sure, and then he’ll take me to Vesna’s.
Well, you’re on your own.
Are you free tomorrow?
What’s the plan?
We could maybe interview some police—
Why the fuck didn’t you say so when we were in there?
I didn’t want to interrupt your business.
You hear that, Amir? He didn’t want to interrupt our business.
That’s right. I like his style.
Enko said nothing. Pleased and proud that Amir approved of him, the American continued as if he had not heard: They must have some pretty good stories.
Sure. There’s this one guy, Senad, who… — Anyway, fuck it. We’ll pick you up at Marko’s tomorrow at ten. And I need an advance.
You’re advanced for four days now.
That’s my fucking business.
I can advance you half, but I might need some tonight if Marko and I go out.
You’re not going anywhere.
I can advance you half.
Then give me those binoculars.
At the end. By the way, how’s your mother?
Look. I want those binoculars.
I understand. And I’ll see you tomorrow at ten.
Now that Enko was accustomed to him, and also craved the binoculars, the journalist had come into possession of what Americans call leverage, if he only cared to use it; but in fact everything already served his purpose, so why disturb the system and the self-complacency of Enko, who, besides, had introduced him to Vesna? As the night reddened from a faraway shell, fire rising up, sparks buzzing beautifully down, he scanned through his notebook for today’s aphorisms from frontline heroes: It is our personal opinion, not authorized, and: It is impossible to control all the people under arms. Our general statement is against any bad thing. But it is war; it is a dirty war. He was in one of the black places whose burned smell would not leave his nostrils. Regarding Bald Man he felt indifferent, believing, as would a great writer or lazy journalist, that the situation of any native of this place who was enduring the siege (for instance, Vesna) should be capable of moving his readers. Like Enko, he imagined that he really knew something about others, and possibly he did. It never occurred to him to ask his superior colleagues at the Holiday Inn how famous or important Bald Man might be. No wonder he had never gotten ahead! In other words, he lacked the resources to visit the Pale Serbs in an armored car, and no one invited him to videotape the liberation of Hill 849.
So why was he being offered an interview with the prince of princes? Possibly Enko had grown fond of him; more likely, Amir put in a good word; most plausible of all, Enko, being proud of his service with Bald Man, and needing to accomplish some business or other related to that demigod, found it convenient to bring the dependent American along.
Speeding down the steep red-roofed street, which reminded the American of a scene in some Italian hill town, Amir rounded the corner, while Enko issued admonishments as to how to behave in the presence of Bald Man. The machine guns had been speaking all morning. The American gripped the back of Enko’s seat. They screeched into the courtyard. The square, ugly building, thoroughly bullet-pocked, was charred beneath one window, and the other windows were smashed in. A crowd of men in and out of uniform, evidently comrades, were standing outside. On the frontline he had met their like: wealthy in wounds, burns, nightmares and greenish-gold 7.62-millimeter casings. Enko raised his right arm in a cheerful salute; an old fighter slapped his shoulder. Leaning against the car, Amir lit a cigarette, narrowing his eyes; for an instant the American wondered who he really was. Unlike Enko, who remained mostly rigid in something resembling the loneliness of the frontline, Amir tended to be quite simply muted, watchful rather than aggressive; of course his apparent mildness was nothing more than opacity. Civilian men and women passed in and came out, and a little boy admired the palms of his hands. A window exploded far away. Enko entered the headquarters, the American following at a slight distance. Men in camo stood smoking. Enko approached a man who towered over him and in an extremely lordly way presented him with one of the American’s hundred-dollar bills. Then they toasted each other with coffee mugs of brandy spirit, while the American waited awkwardly. A man in camo put his arm around a woman and then those two went down the hall slowly, smoking, tapping ash into a plant’s pot which was already covered with cigarette butts.
Remember what I told you, said Enko. Keep your mouth shut unless he asks you something.
Sure, said the American, wondering how this would turn out.
A man in cammies and a black leather jacket, with his arm in a cast, strode slowly down the hall, his free hand on his gun. They followed him.
At a card table beside the city police commander, Bald Man sat reading some letters, playing with the trigger of a silver Sig Sauer which looked to be a new toy. The pistol was on safe. Whether it was loaded was not, of course, the American’s business. Bald Man, handsome and huge, with long hair like a Chetnik and bloodshot eyes like a heavy marijuana smoker, appeared to have woken up late. Gazing at Enko, the American saw in him the glowing face of a little boy who adored his father. A queue of sad women, shabby businessmen and old men with shaking hands stood in the attitudes of petitioners. The city police commander was watching Bald Man.
Bald Man raised his head. He saw Enko. Then he smiled.
Vesna lit another cigarette while he asked how she was, and she smiled at him; he feared she might be tired of him. But then Marina, another of the young Serbian women, said to him, her blonde hair tucked back, her teeth as white as the cigarette between them: Last night you were asking for my first memory of this situation, and the first memory is that I was in the club and I was coming back home really really late in the taxi, because my home is up in the hill by Mojmilo, not that I can go there anymore. The driver said: I don’t know why we are stuck here, because the light didn’t change. — So I paid him and got out, and then I recognized some of my neighbors, waving their arms, and I was embarrassed that they would see me, and I said to myself, why did I dress in this ugly yellow jacket like a life jacket? And my parents were watching some movie on the television, and I said to them, laughing and crying: There is a war in Sarajevo! There is the first barricade… — We were all expecting that this madness would stop. We could walk in and out. And then when the first grenade came in…
And the telephone lines were cut from this side, said the poet.
Let her finish, please, said Vesna.
No, said Marina. That’s all.
They waited for her to speak, but that was truly all. So the American, knowing this exchange between Marina and the poet to be significant but not on that account prepared to stop, for his mind’s predisposition to keep stories was as ready and partitioned as the narrow golden-buttoned side-leg pockets of Amir’s trousers, in which that person kept his wallet and a loaded magazine wrapped in paper, turned to Anesa, who almost tonelessly told how the siege had begun for her; and he wished he could listen to their stories forever, because it now seemed that he almost had what he wanted, which was to say the jewel of horrible meaning whose coruscations might dazzle some would-be murderer into holding his fire, or even help some fugitive from a rape camp to remember why she was damaged; his aspirations were ready to flow through Sarajevo and away, like the rippling, shallow Miljacka. Amir, who’d sent his children to Austria, drummed his fingers in time with the cassette player. The girls were black-eyed and smiling, turning their heads drunkenly, leaning chins on hands.