steal?”
Della Torre squirmed as he took a corner, slowed down, and then drove over the curb to park on one of Zagreb’s wide cobbled pavements, the car pointed towards the door of the little café just far enough from their offices that there was little chance of bumping into colleagues, but close enough for Anzulović to walk into work.
The older man turned towards him but della Torre sat facing forward. “Hobby files,” he said. “Background stuff.”
“Oh? You mean the sort of things you’re strictly forbidden from keeping?”
“It makes life easier.”
“What, keeping dead investigations around just in case they come in handy? Notes on things you might find useful sometime in the future? I’m afraid, my boy, what’s logical for a normal cop is very bad form for the UDBA . What do you think would happen if there was an internal investigation and they found you with a filing cabinet full of stuff you weren’t meant to have?”
“I kept it locked . . .”
“So how did this person get your files?”
“I unlocked it.”
Anzulović sighed. “Let’s get some breakfast, and I’ll see if I can dig any more out of you before I die of old age.”
They sat in a booth and ordered coffees and rolls that looked vaguely like French croissants. Della Torre studied his boss. He was in his early fifties, lugubrious, with a long face and a pot belly on an otherwise thin frame. He had permanent black bags under his eyes. A thatch of black and grey hairs grew out of his potato nose, matching the ones sprouting from his ears.
“So do you know what was in the stuff that was stolen?”
“Something about Pilgrim.” Della Torre had his notebook out and was going through the back pages, where he kept brief descriptions of cases that struck his curiosity.
“You know, that notebook is just as bad as keeping illegal files. What happens if it gets stolen?” Anzulović said.
“Good luck to anyone trying to decipher it.”
“If it’s the UDBA they won’t have to. They’ll just beat you until you tell them, and then they’ll use it as evidence that you’re a spy and hang you. Unless they shoot you. No wonder somebody lined you up for the nine-millimetre solution.”
“Thanks for cheering me up.”
“So what is this Pilgrim file about?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I’ve got a little in here, and I’ll tell you what I can remember, but I have no idea why anyone would be touchy about it.”
“Give me a go.”
“The reason I took an interest is because one of the Montenegrin’s files mentioned Pilgrim. So when I ran across the Pilgrim file, I . . . well, I thought it might come in handy one day.”
The Montenegrin had been a thread running through della Torre’s professional life. He’d been a senior agent, on the liquidation teams. And then, around the time Department VI had been formed, he’d been promoted to be the head of the UDBA ’s wetworks. Its killers. The people della Torre was charged with investigating.
It was the Montenegrin who’d approached della Torre that first time in London — back when the UDBA was still some mysterious, malign, distant force — and demanded co-operation from the student lawyer.
“And?”
“And nothing. It was a real curiosity. It had something to do with centrifuges the Swedes were selling that went through Belgrade sometime in the mid-1980s.”
“To Belgrade?”
“No, they moved on. I don’t know where to.”
“So?”
“It was strange, that’s all. They were centrifuges made in Sweden by some German company based in Cologne that for some reason was connected to the Montenegrin.”
“Centrifuges? You mean the things hospitals use to do stuff to blood?”
“I guess so. My notes don’t say what they’re for. But there were a lot of them. Thousands.”
“Sounds like a lot of blood,” Anzulović said.
“Who knows, maybe it has something to do with AIDS ?”
“Horrible disease. Killed Rock Hudson. Not the greatest actor, but God’s a
Della Torre squirmed as he took a corner, slowed down, and then drove over the curb to park on one of Zagreb’s wide cobbled pavements, the car pointed towards the door of the little café just far enough from their offices that there was little chance of bumping into colleagues, but close enough for Anzulović to walk into work.
The older man turned towards him but della Torre sat facing forward. “Hobby files,” he said. “Background stuff.”
“Oh? You mean the sort of things you’re strictly forbidden from keeping?”
“It makes life easier.”
“What, keeping dead investigations around just in case they come in handy? Notes on things you might find useful sometime in the future? I’m afraid, my boy, what’s logical for a normal cop is very bad form for the UDBA . What do you think would happen if there was an internal investigation and they found you with a filing cabinet full of stuff you weren’t meant to have?”
“I kept it locked . . .”
“So how did this person get your files?”
“I unlocked it.”
Anzulović sighed. “Let’s get some breakfast, and I’ll see if I can dig any more out of you before I die of old age.”
They sat in a booth and ordered coffees and rolls that looked vaguely like French croissants. Della Torre studied his boss. He was in his early fifties, lugubrious, with a long face and a pot belly on an otherwise thin frame. He had permanent black bags under his eyes. A thatch of black and grey hairs grew out of his potato nose, matching the ones sprouting from his ears.
“So do you know what was in the stuff that was stolen?”
“Something about Pilgrim.” Della Torre had his notebook out and was going through the back pages, where he kept brief descriptions of cases that struck his curiosity.
“You know, that notebook is just as bad as keeping illegal files. What happens if it gets stolen?” Anzulović said.
“Good luck to anyone trying to decipher it.”
“If it’s the UDBA they won’t have to. They’ll just beat you until you tell them, and then they’ll use it as evidence that you’re a spy and hang you. Unless they shoot you. No wonder somebody lined you up for the nine-millimetre solution.”
“Thanks for cheering me up.”
“So what is this Pilgrim file about?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I’ve got a little in here, and I’ll tell you what I can remember, but I have no idea why anyone would be touchy about it.”
“Give me a go.”
“The reason I took an interest is because one of the Montenegrin’s files mentioned Pilgrim. So when I ran across the Pilgrim file, I . . . well, I thought it might come in handy one day.”
The Montenegrin had been a thread running through della Torre’s professional life. He’d been a senior agent, on the liquidation teams. And then, around the time Department VI had been formed, he’d been promoted to be the head of the UDBA ’s wetworks. Its killers. The people della Torre was charged with investigating.
It was the Montenegrin who’d approached della Torre that first time in London — back when the UDBA was still some mysterious, malign, distant force — and demanded co-operation from the student lawyer.
“And?”
“And nothing. It was a real curiosity. It had something to do with centrifuges the Swedes were selling that went through Belgrade sometime in the mid-1980s.”
“To Belgrade?”
“No, they moved on. I don’t know where to.”
“So?”
“It was strange, that’s all. They were centrifuges made in Sweden by some German company based in Cologne that for some reason was connected to the Montenegrin.”
“Centrifuges? You mean the things hospitals use to do stuff to blood?”
“I guess so. My notes don’t say what they’re for. But there were a lot of them. Thousands.”
“Sounds like a lot of blood,” Anzulović said.
“Who knows, maybe it has something to do with AIDS ?”
“Horrible disease. Killed Rock Hudson. Not the greatest actor, but God’s a
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