that there was something intensely, spiritually erotic about a beautiful woman playing music.
It seemed, as he watched, that Pamela first projected her spirit and emotions into her instrument, the bow an extension of her arm, fingers and strings inseparable, then she became the music, flowing and soaring with its rhythms and melodies, dipping and swooping, eyes closed, oblivious to the world outside.
Or so it seemed. Though he had taken a few hesitant steps towards learning the piano, Banks couldn’t actually play an instrument, so he was willing to admit he might be romanticizing. Maybe she was thinking about her pay- check.
Erotic fantasies aside, it was all perfectly innocent. They had coffee and a chat afterwards, then Banks headed back to Batorac’s house.
Vjeko Batorac lived in a small pre-war terrace house in Sheepscar, near the junction of Roseville Road and Roundhay Road, less than a mile from Jelacic’s Burmantofts flat. There was no garden; the front door, which looked as if it had been freshly painted, opened directly onto the pavement. This time, a few minutes before six o’clock, Banks’s knock was answered by a slight, hollow-cheeked young man with fair hair, wearing oil-stained jeans and a clean white T-shirt.
“Molim?” said Batorac, frowning.
“Mr. Batorac?” Banks asked, showing his warrant card. “I wonder if I might have a word? Do you speak English?”
Batorac nodded, looking puzzled. “What is it about?”
“Ive Jelacic.”
Batorac rolled his eyes and opened the door wider. “You’d better come in.”
The living-room was sunny and clean, and just a hint of baby smells mingled with those of cabbage and garlic from the kitchen. What surprised Banks most of all was the bookcase that took up most of one wall, crammed with English classics and foreign titles he couldn’t read. Serbo-Croatian, he guessed. The “Six O’Clock News” was on Radio 4 in the background.
“That’s quite a library you’ve got.”
Batorac beamed. “Hvala lipo. Thank you very much. Yes, I love books. In my own country I was a school- teacher. I taught English, so I have studied your language for many years. I also write poetry.”
“What do you do here?”
Batorac smiled ironically. “I am a garage mechanic. Fortunately for me, in Croatia you had to be good at fixing your own car.” He shrugged. “It’s a good job. Not much pay, but my boss treats me well.”
A baby started crying. Batorac excused himself for a moment and went upstairs. Banks examined the titles in more detail as he waited: Dickens, Hardy, Keats, Austen, Balzac, Flaubert, Coleridge, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Milton, Kafka…Many he had read, but many were books he had promised himself to read and never got around to. The baby fell silent and Batorac came back.
“Sorry,” he said. “We have a friend takes care of little Jelena during the day, while we work. When she comes home she…how do you say this…she misses her mother and father?”
Banks smiled. “Yes, that’s right. She has missed you.”
“Has missed. Yes. Sometimes I get the tenses wrong. What is it you wanted to see me about? Sit down, please.”
Banks sat. This didn’t look or smell like the kind of house where one could smoke, especially with the baby around, so he resigned himself to refrain. It would no doubt do him good. “Remember,” he asked, “a few months ago when the local police asked you about an evening you said you played cards with Ive Jelacic?”
Batorac nodded. “Yes. It was true. Every Monday we play cards. Dragica, my wife, she is very indulgent. But on Mondays only.” He smiled. “Tuesday I do not have to go to work, so sometimes we talk and play until late.”
“And drink?”
“Yes. I do not drink much because I drive home. The streets are not safe at night. But I drink some, yes. A little.”
“And are you absolutely certain on that Monday, the sixth of November, you were playing cards with Stipe Pavic and Ive Jelacic at Mile Pavelic’s house?”
“Yes. I swear on the Bible. I do not lie, Inspector.”
“No offense. Please understand we have to be very thorough about these things. Was Jelacic there the whole time?”
“Yes.”
“He said that he walked to Mr. Pavelic’s house and back. Did he usually do that?”
“Yes. He only lives about five hundred meters away, over the waste ground.”
“I’m curious, Mr. Batorac-”
“Call me Vjeko, please.”
“Very well, Vjeko. I’m curious as to how the four of you got together. If you don’t mind my saying so, you and Ive Jelacic seem very different kinds of people.”
Vjeko smiled. “There are not many of my countrymen here in Leeds,” he said. “We have clubs and societies where we meet to get news from home and talk about politics. What you English call a very good grapevine. Ive knew Mile from the old country. They are both from Split. I met Stipe here, in Leeds. He is from Zagreb and I am from Dubrovnik, long way apart. Have you ever visited Dubrovnik, Chief Inspector?”
Banks shook his head,
“It is a very beautiful city. Very much history, ancient architecture. Many English tourists came before the war. You have missed much. Perhaps forever.”
“When did you come here?”
“In 1991, after the siege. I could not bear to see my home destroyed.” He tapped his chest. “I am a poet, not a soldier, Chief Inspector. And my health is not strong. I have only one lung.” Vjeko shrugged. “When Ive came from Eastvale, he came into contact with us. He told us his parents were both killed in the fighting. Many of us have lost friends and relatives in the war. I lost my sister two years ago. Raped and butchered by Serb soldiers. It gives us a common bond. The kind of bond that transcends-is that right? Yes?-that transcends personality. After that, we just started meeting to talk and play cards.” He smiled. “Not for money, you understand. My Dragica would not be so indulgent about that.”
Almost on cue, the front door opened, and a pretty, petite young woman with dark hair and sparkling eyes walked in. “What would your Dragica not be so indulgent about?” she asked with a smile, going over and kissing Vjeko affectionately before turning to glance curiously at Banks.
Vjeko told her who Banks was and why he was there. “I said you would not be indulgent if I played cards for money.”
Dragica thumped him playfully on the shoulder and perched on the arm of the sofa. “Sometimes,” she said, “I ask myself why you must stay up most of the night playing cards with those people instead of keeping your wife warm in bed and getting up when little Jelena cries. Ive Jelacic, particularly, is nothing but a useless pijanac.”
“Pijanac?” Banks repeated. “What is that?”
“Drunk,” said Vjeko. “Yes, Ive is…he does drink too much. He is not a pleasant man in many ways, Inspector. You must not judge my fellow countrymen by Ive’s example. And I do not put forward the tragedy in his life as an excuse for his behavior. He lies. He boasts. Most of all, he is greedy. He often suggests that we play cards for money, and I know he cheats. With women he is bad, too. Dragica cannot bear him near her.”
“That is true,” Dragica told Banks, shuddering at the thought and hugging her slight frame. “He undresses you with his eyes.”
Banks remembered Susan Gay’s reaction to Jelacic’s ogling and nodded.
“Please excuse me,” Dragica said. “I must attend to Jelena.” And she went upstairs.
“He is rude, too,” Vjeko went on. “Ill-mannered. And I have seen him behave violently in pubs, picking fights when he is drunk.” He laughed. “When I put it like that, I wonder why I do spend time with him. It is a mystery to me. But one thing I can tell you is that Ive wouldn’t kill a young girl that way. Never. Perhaps in a fight, in a pub, he could kill, but not like that, not someone weaker than himself. It is a joke with us that Ive always picks on people bigger than himself, and he usually comes off worst.”
“Do you know why Mr. Jelacic left Eastvale?” Banks asked.
“He told us that a svecenik, a man of God, made homosexual advances towards him.”
“You said he was a liar. Do you believe his story?”
