The Balkan Assignment (16 page)

The cove formed by the peninsula was larger than it appeared from the air and it took ten minutes to locate the mouth of the creek that I had spotted so easily from the air. I ordered Klaus out onto the nose to act as "pilot" to warn of sand bars or other obstructions.

If I remembered the map, this section of the coast was relatively uninhabited. The few people who did live in the vicinity were grouped together in small villages scattered along the coast and made their living almost exclusively from fishing. They certainly weren't going to be out hunting for us.

By the time I shut down the engine, the sun was beginning to edge up over the eastern horizon. The pinkish sky of early dawn was empty and damnably cold. A rare bird occasionally broke the stillness, but other than that, we might have been on another planet. To the east, the peaks and slopes of the Dinaric Alps, Dalmatia's eternal barrier to the interior, were sharply etched against the sky. The upper slopes were thickly covered with snow and the scene reminded me of the long hike from the train to the village with Ley three nights before.

Klaus and I warped the PBY with hand lines to a mooring in a small cove near the river's mouth. When she was secured, we trudged slowly back to the PBY, to find Mikhail sprawled in the copilot's seat, clutching his aching head. Klaus glanced at me and began to laugh softly at first and then harder and harder until he was bordering on hysteria. Perhaps it was nervous release, but I joined him and we laughed until tears came. Mikhail was offended; he thought we were laughing at him and, in fact, we probably were as he did look ridiculous with his eyes screwed up against the pain, crusty blood lining the side of his scalp, and both hands pressed tightly against his temples as if holding his head together. But, eventually, he couldn't hold out any longer and joined in. Those few moments of hysteria were a safety valve, dissipating the tension and terror of the past few hours completely. We were alive and given that, were optimists enough to believe that we could do anything. After we had calmed down, Mikhail felt clear-headed enough to break out the primus stove and fry eggs and bacon from our rapidly dwindling stores. Coffee and a hot breakfast can do wonders, no matter the situation. It was Mikhail who put into words what Klaus was reluctant to say and I was not about to: we had to get rid of the PBY. There was no other choice. She looked like she had come through a twenty-year siege. I had never seen so many bullet holes in an aircraft, at least one that had remained in the air as long as she had. But Mikhail was right, even though I did not want to admit it. The starboard engine was a total loss. There was not a whole cylinder head left; all twelve had at least a fin shot away and several were utterly smashed. The wings were so full of bullet holes, that even at the low speed we had been making, the slip stream had begun to peel the wing covering. The windshields were also a total loss, and worse yet, the fuselage was beginning to take on water. She was a total loss short of a complete machine shop and at least one, possibly two new engines. In addition, there are not many PBYs still flying. As far as I knew, I had one of the very few still in commercial

service anywhere in the world. That fact, coupled with her bright silver paint and glaring red name, made her instantly recognizable.

"So what do we do for transportation?" I asked sarcastically. Mikhail glared at the tone of my voice. But not Klaus. Herr Kapitän was already beginning to regain his composure. Now that the gold was out of the dank cavern where the crushing memories flourished, he was ready to assume command again.

"We must unload the gold and destroy the aircraft, soon, before it is spotted from the air,

" he stated in his best command voice.

"So how do we get wherever the hell it is we are going?" By way of an answer, Klaus pulled a coastal map out of the map case and unfolded it on his lap.

"We are about here," he said pointing to a spot twenty miles south of the southern end of Kornat Island and about thirty miles south of the coastal town of Sibenik. Do you agree?

"

When I nodded, he went on. "Then one of us will have to find a way into this town," he pointed to Sibenik, ",and rent a truck to transport the gold. Then he will have to arrange to purchase or rent an aircraft, drive back here, pick up the other two . . . who meanwhile will have destroyed the aircraft, and drive us all back into the town. We will load the gold on board the new aircraft, file a flight plan for Belgrade and leave in the opposite direction."

"Just like that?" I asked.

Klaus inclined his head with a bright, quizzical look and nodded. "Yes, like that."

"Ha," I snorted. "You seem to have forgotten one or two little items. First, this is a Communist country and I don't care how far outside the Communist bloc it really is nor how far they have managed to come in the past ten or fifteen years, it is still a police state. And in police states you don't just wander around the countryside hitching rides and renting airplanes . . . especially if you are a foreigner with an expired visa . . . and wanted for the murder of a policeman."

I waited expectantly for Maher's rebuttal and was mildly disappointed when it did not come.

"I agree with you. But, we do have a Yugoslav citizen with a valid passport . .." It was Mikhail's turn to snort skeptically. "My documents are no more valid than yours."

"In addition to which," I picked up, "none of us dare show our faces anywhere in Yugoslavia or the civilized world for that matter. Good old solid citizen here has shot a cop . .. and you know as well as I do what that means. On top of which, they know damned well that we have gotten away with one million dollars worth of gold. We need transportation; preferably another aircraft. This happens to be Yugoslavia and we have absolutely no chance of getting, another aircraft, legally or illegally. Airfields are the first places they'll clamp down on."

• "I understand perfectly," Maher answered in a calm voice. "I repeat, I am well aware of the obstacles, but I do have a proposal to make."

"Well all right. Let's hear it," I conceded grudgingly. Maher nodded politely. "Thank you. One of us must walk out to the highway, which the map shows parallels the coast in this region, but five miles inland. He must then obtain a ride into Sibenik and on to the airport." Klaus held up a hand to forestall questions. " Please let me finish. He must arrange to rent an aircraft, preferably a large, commercial one with a pilot. By hiring a pilot, we will decrease the owner's suspicions that we may fly off with his aircraft, never to be seen again."

"Okay," I growled, "what next? How do you hire an aircraft in this country in the first place; assuming, of course, that you reach the airfield. None of our papers are any good and whoever goes will need to show some form of identification."

"That must be left to the imagination of the individual. You offer the owner money, a bribe . . ." Maher's patience broke down at this point. "We are not children," he snarled. " If we must bribe the man, we bribe him. If we must hold a pistol to his head, we will hold a pistol to his head."

"Who will be this person to go?" Mikhail asked suspiciously. Klaus turned to him with an angry look. "You, of course. You are the only one here who is Yugoslav, are you not? You are the only one here who speaks Yugoslav fluently, are you not?"

"And while I am gone, you two make off with the gold. No!" Mikhail slammed his fist down on the arm rest. "We will divide the gold now, right here. Then it will be each man for himself."

"For God's sake, Mikhail," I said wearily. "It's thanks to you that we've gotten into this mess. Use-your head. Just how far do you think you are going to get carrying 750

pounds of gold on your back? Klaus has a good point; if we use our heads, we can get a truck to haul the gold out of here."

"Bah! Either one of you I would not trust to go away alone. We will divide the gold into three parts and each make our way as best we can."

"If one of us is caught, then all are in danger," Klaus observed drily. "The police will not need any great imagination to realize that we are on the mainland rather than across the Adriatic. To divide the gold at this point is the most foolish thing that we could do.

"There is something in what Mikhail has said, though," Klaus continued, turning to me. " If two of us were to go and one stay behind, then no one can turn traitor.

"Yes," he continued thoughtfully, "if Mikhail and I went to Sibenik to hire an aircraft and bring back a truck, then Chris could stay here, unload the gold and get rid of the airplane while we were gone."

"No." Mikhail's, face was set. "I do not trust him any more than I trust you."

"Do not be such a fool," Klaus sneered. "Just where would he possibly go with a ton of gold and an airplane that cannot fly?"

Mikhail was silent for a long minute, then he looked up, angry and unhappy. "Perhaps it is the only way."

The two of them left an hour later. I watched them go with relief, heading into the marsh in the direction of a secondary road which the map showed connecting with the highway leading to Sibenik. Klaus's last word was that if they hadn't returned in three days, I was to hide the gold somehow and go back to Brindisi and wait. Great, providing I could find a way to get myself out of Yugoslavia. It was a mighty long walk north to. Trieste and the Italian border . . . some three hundred miles, and all of it through rugged coastal mountains. I would be as conspicuous as an eskimo in Tahiti. The fog had not thinned . . . in fact, watching the two men disappear, it seemed thicker, heavier. I was grateful enough for the fog, but at the moment it did nothing at all to lighten my spirits.

The first task was to somehow get two thousand pounds of gold ashore. With the PBY

anchored well inside the river mouth, I was safe from detection by sea and by air . . . but only as long as the fog lasted. My cowboys and Indians idea of covering the PBY with branches lasted only as long as it took me to find out that the brush which looked so dense and impenetrable in the dark, was pretty sparse by daylight. I doubted if there was enough on the peninsula to hide one wing, let alone the rest of the aircraft. The river was narrow enough that the starboard wing overhung the soggy bank. But the cargo blister was still some fifteen feet away and the stream bed very steep. I clambered back into the tail section and dragged the heavy rubber raft out onto the deck. Sweating and swearing, I got it unpacked, inflated, patched and reinflated, in just under an hour.

In our hasty departure, all of the equipment had been left behind in the tunnel; including the winch. No one lifts five hundred pounds of gold and metal crate three feet up and then down five feet to a raft . . . not by himself anyway. So, two more hours were wasted rigging a makeshift winch with nylon rope, running it up and over the starboard blister coaming, the wing, and finally to the engine mount. I tore the cowling off the ruined engine and disconnected the starter motor from the main engine. The direct drive flywheel and shaft served as the winch drive, providing just enough leverage to pull one crate of gold at a time clear of the blister coaming and, hopefully, lower it gently into the raft. It worked, after a fashion, but it needed an awful lot of tugging and straining on the rope and running back and forth to the cockpit to manipulate the starter switch before the first ammunition crate was safely ashore.

Getting the crate up the tiny beach to the tent was another matter. If you have never had occasion to move five hundred pounds of dead weight, don't even bother to try. I was reduced to carrying the bars up the slope

two at a time to the tree-lined copse snug against a large flat rock where I had rigged two plastic tarps as a tent.

It was late morning and the fog beginning to thin by the time I got that last bar of gold into the tent and repacked in its crate. I had reluctantly concluded that there was no way out of having to get rid of the Catalina. For two years, sometimes frustrating, sometimes cooperative, she had been faithful to me in a faithless sort of way; she was a part of my life, but with half the police forces in Yugoslavia able to identify you at very long range by a shiny, bulky and now useless material possession, it is amazing how quickly you can sever all emotional ties.

Maybe she read my thoughts, because I had the devil's own time getting the portside engine to start. But finally, with the rubber boat in tow I taxied carefully out of the river mouth and headed for deep water. The poor old Catalina rocked along in the swells with a reluctant gait. After ten minutes of easy travel during which I carefully watched the engine temperature gauge as it inched up and over into the red again, I judged we were far enough out and swung the PBY about, feathered the prop and let it idle. The river mouth had disappeared in the fog pressing down in dreary silence. In any direction there was only gray stillness to be seen. Fine mist droplets slid down the windshield; the only physical objects in motion in my apparent universe. I lit a cigarette and warmed up the radio, figuring that there had never been a better time to shout for help.

I switched first to the marine band and tuned through the scale picking up odd bits of foreign languages and international code, then through the weather band ignoring the Met. reports in Yugoslav and Italian. My limited facility in each language combined with the poor quality of the reception made the reports incomprehensible. For some reason I could not locate an English broadcast. Finally, I gave up and clicked the switch down into the special position, picked up the microphone and transmitted my call sign. Immediately, as if waiting for me:

"Please limit your transmissions," a voice barked, excitement and strain evident in spite of the poor reception. "Do not transmit until told to do so." The radio went dead. Startled, I jerked my thumb away from the microphone

button. Obviously, Ley knew that something had happened. The snappy way the operator was prepared for me and the no-nonsense order to get off the air were impressive. I thought I had heard a teletype in the background . . . which indicated he was somewhere well-equipped with access to more than house current; logically a headquarters area and possibly even a ship near by. I waited impatiently for a further transmission, fretting while the temperature gauge on the idling engine went steadily further into the red danger zone and I expected the engine to quit at any moment. If that happened, I doubted if there was enough power left in the batteries to light the dial. Two minutes passed almost to the second, and they were back on the air.