Part 23 (1/2)

”The same. It is easy, isn't it, to identify another soldier? Something gives it away. Something about the way we hold ourselves.” He pulled up the chair and sat down. ”How was your soldiering?”

”Lots of running around and shouting.”

”Have you fought in wars?”

”Yes.”

”Ireland?”

”Yes.”

”Iraq?”

”Yes.”

”Kosovo?”

Hicks could place the accent now. He hadn't heard it for many years, but the suggestion reminded him of the time he had spent in Pristina.

”Yes,” he said. ”You, too?”

”That was my war. I was born in Prekaz, in Drenica. Central Kosovo. It has many hills, many sheep and cattle, very little money. My father and his father were Kosovo Albanian guerrillas who fought the Serbs. They fought t.i.to and then Milosevic. I could not read or write, but I listened to their stories when I was young and I remembered them all. They taught me to fight as soon as I could walk. My mother has a picture of me with an AK-47 that was taller than I was. The Serbs were brutal, Hicks. But the Kosovars were strong men. They still are.”

Hicks's muscles were cramping, but there was nothing he could do to relieve them.

Pasko continued, ignoring Hicks's discomfort. ”I undertook my military training in Labinot-Mal, in Albania. There were one hundred of us. When we returned, we continued the fight for independence. We sabotaged Serbian interests. We killed their soldiers. Eventually, Milosevic paid attention to us. He sent his soldiers to Prekaz. They had tanks and helicopters. They had artillery. They fired indiscriminately. Women and children were killed. Old men who could not fight. Eventually, there was a siege. They threatened to kill everyone unless we surrendered. They would have done it, Hicks, so we did.”

Hicks opened his eyes again. ”What does this have to do with me?”

”Be patient. We were taken to the Serbs' police headquarters in Pristina. They beat us for a week before they even asked us what they wanted to know. They used bedposts. They used knives and clubs. Electricity. They injected us with drugs. They starved us. Eventually, I was released. I went back to Albania. We had a staging post in the town of Kukes. There was an old factory there. I was put in charge of interrogating the prisoners that we captured. There were Serbs, Kosovo Albanian collaborators. These men did not have information, Hicks. They had nothing we did not already know. It wasn't about information. It was about creating an example. It was about making them fear us. My superiors wanted to create a myth, someone who would terrify the Serbs. I happened to be very good at what I was asked to do, and they had given me ideas. I was chosen to fulfil that role. My name is still known in Serbia. They called me kirurg. It means surgeon.”

Hicks strained against the bonds. It was fruitless; they were too strong and, even if he had been able to remove them, what was he going to do? He was weak from whatever sedative they had used to knock him out, and he was badly outnumbered.

”Let me sleep your drugs off,” Hicks said. ”We can talk about this afterwards.”

Pasko shuffled around in the chair so he could get to the box on the table. ”My son was killed when the girl was taken from the flat. I know that you did not kill him. I want you to tell me who did.”

”I don't know what you're talking about.”

Pasko turned back. ”Sarah told me what happened. Your friend attacked the flat. Mr. Smith. He was interested in one of our other girls. He took Sarah and promised that he would look after her. But then he left, and he introduced her to you. That is correct, is it not?”

”I don't know anything about that.”

”I am not surprised that this would be your att.i.tude,” Pasko said. ”Let me ask you another question. Do you know what you are lying on?”

”I know it's not very comfortable.”

He chuckled. ”And we have not even started yet. It is a parilla. It means cooking grill. The person answering the questions is placed atop it the same way that meat is placed upon a barbecue. It was introduced in South America during the 1970s and 1980s. Pinochet used it extensively. We built this to his design. If you look to your left, you'll see the wall socket from which the electricity is drawn. It is fed through this control box”-Pasko tapped the box on the table-”and then attached to the victim with electrodes.”

Pasko held the box up so that Hicks could look at it. It was a simple design: there was an on-off switch and a rheostat that would control the voltage. Pasko reached down for a wire mesh bag that was attached to the end of one of two wires that led from the box.

He took the bag and leaned down over Hicks's body. ”Excuse me,” he said as he leaned across and fitted the bag over Hicks's t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es.

Now Hicks did strain, but it was no use.

There was a wooden handle on the table with a metal end. The second wire was attached to the handle, and Pasko picked it up. ”The Chileans, in particular, were inventive. For a woman, they would attach the wire to a wetted steel wool pan scrub and insert it into her v.a.g.i.n.a. For men, they would take a thin metal rod and insert it into the urethra. I have a rod like that in the tray here. Perhaps we will use it later.” Pasko took a piece of cloth from the table, folded it into a single strip, and then secured it over Hicks's eyes, knotting it behind his head. ”One of the distinguis.h.i.+ng features of this equipment is that the shocks are high voltage but low current. You know what that means, of course. The shocks will be excruciating, but they won't kill you. I've used this equipment on people for days at a time.”

Hicks couldn't see a thing through the blindfold. He felt a ticklish sensation across his ribs and realised that Pasko was running the metal end across his skin. He couldn't help himself: he instinctively arched his body away from it, but there was nowhere for him to go.

”Let's try again. Who is the man who killed my son?”

Hicks gritted his teeth in antic.i.p.ation of what he knew was about to come. ”I don't know what you're talking about.”

He heard the click of the switch and then felt a cold sensation as the metal was held against his knee. A bolt of pain flashed from his groin and then down his leg, sending spasms through the muscle and lighting up every nerve ending. He grunted in pain.

”His name is John Smith. Tell me about him.”

Hicks took a moment to regain his composure. ”The straps are chafing a bit around my wrists,” he managed through the pain. ”I don't suppose you could loosen them a bit, could you?”

Pasko laughed. ”You are a funny man, Mr. Hicks. Unfortunately for you, I have all day. And I will get the information I need.”

Hicks heard the flick of the switch again.

Part 5.

Italy and France.

Chapter Forty-One.

MILTON WATCHED as the faint outline of land became visible through the haze on the horizon. The word was pa.s.sed back along the boat, and people stood to look. The journey had been long and fraught, and, now that the end was in sight, there was an outpouring of relief.

It was the afternoon of the second day at sea. They had been travelling for thirty-six hours. The worst moments had come during the night. A huge freighter had crossed their path, worryingly close, and their boat had bucked and kicked across the troughs of wake that had been left in the sea. Spray had lashed them and the boat had oscillated to and fro, the captain taking the wrong angle and allowing the waves to strike them side on rather than carving through them. The pa.s.sengers had exchanged terrified glances, and some of them had started praying. Milton had stayed where he was, his fists clenched, knowing that there was nothing that he could do to affect whether they continued or capsized. The smuggler with the pistol had waved for them all to sit down where they were and, after two or three minutes of uncertainty, the sea calmed down again and they were able to continue. Milton had watched the freighter as it disappeared behind them, visible for another hour until the lights winked out against the horizon and they were alone beneath the stars again.

The pilot nudged the boat to port, the change of direction allowing Milton a better view of the terrain ahead. It was an island; he thought, at first, that it had to be Lampedusa. The island was the first trace of Europe, part of the Pelagie Islands that lay between Italy and Tunisia. As they drew nearer, though, the island grew larger and larger, and Milton realised that it couldn't be Lampedusa.

It must be Sicily.

Details resolved out of the misty haze as they drew closer. Milton saw rocky outcrops of limestone and dolomite, stripped clean and barren thanks to the attention of the wind and the lack of rainfall. He saw buildings and other s.h.i.+ps, and then a harbour, the concrete wall of the dock a distinctive grey stripe against the limpid sea.

They drew closer. Milton had expected them to aim for Lampedusa since it was closest, and he had studied the geography of that island before he departed, in preparation for landing there. His knowledge of Sicily was not quite as current. He could be looking at Agrigento or Gela, perhaps. He knew that those towns were on the southern coast of the island. Wherever it was, this particular harbour might have been pleasant at one time, but it was scruffy and down-at-heel now. Most of the businesses that Milton could see were closed, shutters locked down and emblazoned with graffiti.