awful pub, no back-up present, and she'd fought her way out, just a slip of a woman with rusted gold hair and a flat chest and rounded shoulders, who had taken her coffee and walked slowly back to her office like she was a bored woman, not a top-grader…
The big man, the voice of command, the one who had swayed when he had seen the photograph, the one who had hit him first, broke the cordon circle. The big man came towering towards him.
Penn blinked up and tried to retain the focus of his vision… couldn't break the hallucination. There were two women in his mind. Both top-graders… The woman with the rust-gold hair, bored in London, in the coffee queue, who had the courage to fight clear of a killer enemy… and the woman with the cropped hair, the mischief smile in her photograph, who had the courage to bury her fear when the killer enemy closed. He was so wanting to be brave. Bravery might just be survival, or it might just be dignity, or it might just make the fucking knife and the fucking bludgeon and the fucking pistol shot fucking easier… The hallucination rode him. Talking in the open-plan office area of A Branch, chattering idly about the hostages in Lebanon, and the big mouth, graduate 2.2 Reading, claiming that he would have gone for escape; and the simpering mouth, graduate 2.1 Warwick, whining that she would have gone for a runner; and Penn, non-graduate, trying to contribute quietly that an escape attempt took more courage than anything, and being ignored… and just the idle chatter of a hallucination in a quiet hour of a London office because fucking escape was not on the reality agenda… The big man pulled him up.
The big man had a loose beard grown free across his face, not trimmed. Between the matt of the beard growth, the tongue of the big man wiped his full lips. Above the growth of the beard were the eyes, evasive. The face, the eyes and the mouth, as Penn saw it, were empty of passion.
The woman beside the big man held the photographs outside the envelope, as if she did not wish again to look at them. She wore a bright full skirt, flower-patterned, and an ironed white blouse that was simple, and there were sweat streaks in her hair at her forehead.
Penn stood and hoped that he would find the courage.
The question was put to him. The woman interpreted the question.
'Who are you?'
Trying to speak strongly. 'I am William Penn. I am a British citizen.'
The answer was repeated by the woman to the big man. A second question. 'Are you a mercenary from the Ustase scum?'
Trying to stare into those evasive eyes… 'I have no connection with the Croatian army.'
'A lie. You wear the uniform of the Ustase scum.'
'I bought the camouflage uniform on the black market in Karlovac.'
The big man made the question. The woman interpreted the question. She spoke formal taught English. 'What was the mission?'
Penn heard it, the revving of heavy engines behind him. No one moved around him. They hung silently on the questions put by the big man and the answers given by the woman beside him. Could not know where it would lead him, where it would take him, but knew the importance of bold talk…
'The village of Rosenovici, across the stream, was taken in December of 1991. There were wounded men in the village who were sheltered in a cellar during the final attack on the village…'
'What has that to do with a mercenary?'
'… The wounded men were taken from the cellar after the fall of the village. They were taken to a field, they were sat in the field, laid out in the field, while a bulldozer dug…'
The interruption. The woman had translated in a quiet voice while he talked, and the circle craned for her words.
'What has that to do with…?'
'… While a bulldozer dug a grave pit. The wounded men were then killed with knives, and were bludgeoned, and were shot, and they were buried…'
'What has that…?'
'… They were buried in a mass grave in the corner of the field …'
'What…?'
'… Buried in the mass grave in the corner of the field was a young woman. The young woman was not wounded in the battle for the village. She had chosen to stay with the wounded. She had chosen to be with them at the end. She was not a fighter, she had no guilt. She was butchered in the pit dug by the bulldozer 'Why was she important… ?' Staring all the time into the face of the big man, and the eyes above the matt of the beard darting away, and the tongue in the midst of the beard sliding on dried lips. '… She was English, and that is why I came. She was not Serbian and not Croatian and not Muslim. She was not a part of the quarrel. She was English and her name was Dorrie
…' Staring into the face, and hearing the drip of the translation. He had spoken the name and there was a little gasp and a small murmur in the circle around him. He was trying to hold the pain and the tremble, trying to ape the mischief moments of Dorrie Mowat. '… Her name was Dorrie Mowat, and there was no cause for her killing. It was cowards' work killing Dorrie Mowat.' 'Who sent you?' 'I was sent by the mother of Dorrie Mowat. I came to find how Dorrie Mowat died. I came so that I could tell her mother how she died, in a pit. And I came so that I could tell her mother who killed her, the name of the man, the man who was responsible…' Penn felt the moment of power. He heard the engines of big vehicles away behind the door. No one moved in the circle around him. He didn't know where it would lead, couldn't know… 'Who knew her? Who knew Dorrie Mowat?' He heard the echoing ring of his voice. The woman interpreted. 'Who met her when she lived in Rosenovici before the fight, before she was butchered?' He turned from the shifting eyes, from the licked lips. It was all a fraud. 'Did you know her…?' It was a fraud because it was pretence that he held the high ground, when he held fucking nothing
… He searched the faces. An old man, a young man, a teenage girl… It was a sham act. 'You, did you know her…?' He searched the faces, challenged them, and they would not meet him. He ranged over the faces of the circle.
'Who met her…?'
He reached the woman who held the photographs, who interpreted the questions and answers. She dropped her head.
'I met her.'
Penn whispered, 'Why did you meet her?'
'I met her so that I could talk English with her. I met her before the fight for the village so that I could better my language of English.'
Penn said, 'I came so that I could tell Dorrie's mother the name of the man who killed her daughter, so that she would know the name of that man. I came to prepare a report for Dorrie's mother, I came to find the evidence against that man…'
He saw the fingers of the woman twisting on the photographs, tearing them and she did not notice.
'What was the name?'
The wall around him was of shame. He had won his dignity, as Dorrie had claimed hers. He had stamped his death warrant, and fuck them. The circle about him was of guilt. She would be laughing at him, laughing loud, from her mischief face. Dignity was won… Somewhere he heard the roar of lorry engines pulling away… Fuck them, because they couldn't hurt him, if he had his dignity, they could only kill him. It was Penn's moment. It was, to him, as if he were alone with the big man facing him. It was as if all else was suppressed, as if each other person in the circle held no importance. It was a handsome face, a leader's strong, good face.
'I have the evidence for my report that Dorrie Mowat was killed by …'
Penn heard the voice of the woman who interpreted.
'… Was murdered by Milan Stankovic.'
And in front of him the face flushed in anger, and the fists caught at him.
Penn shouted, 'His name is Milan Stankovic.'
Men around him, the circle broken, hands grabbing him. He saw the face the last time, the anger flush in the matt of the beard, and the woman who had interpreted was sobbing. He kicked and he struggled, and he was forced towards the door of the hall. He had his fucking dignity. He bit at the hands that held him. His fucking dignity, what Dorrie had had. He writhed with them as they pushed him through the door, into the night. The lorry in the line was starting to roll. The line of the lorry lights speared the darkness of the village and the lorry was in front of him, beginning to move. The opening of the door of the hall flushed the inside light onto the Union flag on the lorry's
