The Heart of Hell by Alen Mattich Read Free Book Online Page A

sympathies during the Second World War was to become allied with the Serbs. The new masters of Croatia were as fanatical as any revolutionaries and as cynical as old Communists — which many were, having been part of the Yugoslav government for decades. “Some jokes don’t seem so funny from inside a prison cell.”
    “ Plus ça change ,” della Torre said, but he felt less brave than he sounded. “So, what did you want to tell me about?”
    “The Americans want to talk to you.”
    “They have my reports.”
    “Deputy Minister Horvat has been persuaded to allow the Americans to interview you.” Horvat ran military intelligence, and therefore he was their lord and master. He was a political operator of the highest order, so if he was allowing the Americans access to della Torre, they must be providing him something valuable in return.
    “I won’t ask how you know,” della Torre said. “Have you got a role in the investigation?”
    “No, notionally it’s still in the hands of the Dubrovnik police.”
    “And I take it the police in Dubrovnik have got so much on their plate, the Americans aren’t making any headway.”
    “Not much.”
    “And it’s driving them nuts because they can’t do anything about it.”
    “You could say,” Anzulović agreed.
    “Except they offered something to Horvat and now he’s letting them have me?”
    “To talk to. Maybe.” Anzulović got up. “Listen, Gringo, why don’t we go out for a coffee.”
    Years of working for UDBA , where phones and offices were commonly bugged, had conditioned them to be wary of speaking too openly.
    Della Torre noticed that Anzulović had left his full mug on the desk. He made a mental note to pour it into his indestructible potted rubber tree when he got back.
    It was a relief to leave the office, even if the streets were looking scruffy. Buildings were inflamed with an eczema of graffiti while litter flecked the pavements like dandruff. Shops were short of everything. And though there was plenty of food for sale in the markets — the autumn harvest had been good — few people were buying, and the day-end spoils of mouldy and bruised vegetables were picked over by refugees who’d swollen the city’s population.
    As they passed the cinema, della Torre saw Anzulović glance longingly at the posters advertising the latest Hollywood import. His former boss couldn’t resist even a second-rate film already forgotten everywhere else in the world.
    The pedestrianized street was guarded by a sculpture of a man standing in a slouch, wearing a long overcoat and a hat pulled down over his eyes. It was of a writer, though he looked more like a secret policeman. A monument to the unknown spook.
    They sat at an outdoor café table under the statue’s gaze, facing the Square of Flowers. Della Torre was about to make a wisecrack about the symbolism but thought better of it. There was something about Anzulović’s mood.
    People had long underestimated Anzulović. His lugubrious demeanour and hangdog face made him unprepossessing. In serious discussions, he preferred to listen rather than to talk. With politicians he kept his mouth shut so that he seemed part of the furniture. Another know-nothing career apparatchik. About five years after Tito’s death, when the Yugoslav parliament finally made an effort to show it could rule responsibly rather than just exist as a dictatorship’s marketing tool, one of its first major expressions of power had been to hold the UDBA to account.
    To that end, the lawmakers grafted an internal investigative unit, Department VI, onto UDBA and gave it to Anzulović. The UDBA hierarchy took a brief, supercilious look at Anzulović and accepted the imposition. After all, what threat could this time-server possibly pose to them, especially if he was kept at arm’s length in Zagreb, well away from the centre of power in Belgrade?
    By the time they appreciated that there was substance to this man who’d worked his way up