‘No. He told him nothing.’
‘Then how’d he find out?’
‘I don’t know.’
Skender thought on that for a moment as he stared into Cano’s eyes. The Englishman had no doubt got Skender’s phone number from the same source who had given him the names. That had to be a pretty high-up source. ‘Why do you think he isn’t connected to anyone?’
‘This was a revenge killing.’
‘How would he know it was your brother who killed that Englishwoman if he’s not connected with someone who would know?’
‘I’ve no idea. But he ain’t business. He don’t even live in this country. He came over because the Englishwoman was killed and the next thing is Bufi gets taken out and then my brother.’
‘And so he just happens to find out and marches into the Santa Monica courts, through a dozen cops, kills Bufi in his cell, escapes, then kills your brother right in front of you – and you think he’s just an ordin ary guy.’
‘Okay, so maybe he’s got talent. My point is, he’s not connected to us. This wasn’t about business. Look, boss, I know how sensitive things are right now. I’m not about to do anything stupid. Let me find out who he is, then I’ll come to you with what I’ve got.’
‘You know where he is?’
‘No, but I have an idea how to find out. I want this guy, boss. I’ve never asked you for anything before, but I’m asking now. It’s the Kanun of our
Skender walked away and stood looking into space while Cano watched him. Skender’s immediate impulse was to have Cano killed as soon as possible and end it there. But deep down he knew only too well the meaning of retribution for wrongs committed against one’s family. The Kanun was a set of norms that constituted the Albanian syndicate’s common law, a code that had been in place for centuries and was used by all the
Strangely, while listening to Cano, especially the part about his new nemesis being an Englishman, Skender had been reminded of his own youth, for it was a man from that country who had been responsible for the destruction of his entire family. Skender was from the Geg tribe who occupied the mountainous regions of Northern Albania. Unlike most of his current peers, Skender’s family had not been linked to crime but were strongly political. They’d been followers of Zog, the ousted King of the Albanians.
When Mussolini invaded Albania in 1939 the King had fled to England. Geg chieftains, one of whom was Skender’s father, organised an anti-communist royalist group and in 1952, a few years after Skender was born, the King, whose son Skender was named after, joined a plot organised by the US and Britain to help the loyalists overthrow the Albanian communist government that had by then taken power.
Hundreds of Albanian emigres and refugees were recruited, many by Skender’s father, and infiltrated back into Albania for the coming fight. However, the plot was revealed to the commun -ists by the infamous British double agent Kim Philby. Practically every Albanian infiltrator and many of the Geg tribe, including Skender’s parents, were brutally murdered.
Skender was barely six years old on the morning when the killers came to his village. There had been no warning. No one was to escape death, no matter what their sex or age. Skender remembered waking up to the noise of screams and gunfire. He climbed out of the bed he shared with his older brother and two sisters and ran to the window to see what was happening. The first sight he saw was the woman who lived across the road being dragged outside with her three children after her husband had already been shot. Skender watched in horror as they were killed by a combination of rifle fire and sword thrusts.
Seconds later the front door to his own house was kicked open and more gunfire erupted. They killed Skender’s mother first and as his father rushed out of the back room with his gun raised he was cut down by a volley of fire from several government soldiers. Then came the sound of someone running up the stairs. Skender reacted instinctively. He jumped up onto the windowsill and pulled himself over it. As he hung on to the window frame the bedroom door burst open and shots rang out. A bullet smashed through the window and Skender let go to land hard on the small roof along the front of the house before rolling off and hitting the dirt road.
A soldier immediately saw the little boy but instead of shooting he raised his sword and ran at him. Skender scrambled to his feet and sprinted around the side of the building with all the strength he could muster. The soldier followed but Skender knew his own backyard and, being a fraction of his pursuer’s size, was able to dart through a hole in a wooden fence as the sword swung down. He rolled down the steep slope in between the houses. Skender was free from that pursuer but there were many more soldiers in the village and the sound of wholesale slaughter had risen to a frenzy.
Skender continued to run, not knowing where to go other than downhill since it gave him the greatest speed. He paused between two buildings to consider his options. The sounds of screams and shooting surrounded him and all he could think of was continu ing on to the bottom of the village, across the road and into the river.
A bullet hit a wall inches away from Skender, painfully splattering his cheek with plaster. He looked up to see a soldier aiming a rifle at him from a window. The next bullet hit the ground between his feet and he was off running again, ducking between houses and sheds, pushing through flimsy fences that corralled various livestock and on until he reached a road. He ran across it without a glance in either direction. As he leaped up onto a bank on the other side a hand grabbed him by the neck, twisted him round as if he was a doll, and raised him off the ground.
Skender could barely breathe. His vision blurred but he could see the huge grinning face of the communist soldier, a monster of a man with bad teeth and a beard. Skender pulled at the man’s gnarled fingers and kicked out with his shoeless feet in a vain effort to release himself. But the man just grinned, even as he removed a knife from its sheath and drew it slowly across Skender’s throat, cutting deeply into it. The man then walked a few yards, holding the boy at his side like a dead chicken, and unceremon -iously threw him into the swiftly flowing river that was full and freezing at that time of year. Skender plunged beneath the surface and was dragged and rolled along the gravel bed. He fought to reach the light and when he broke through to air he took in great gulps, unaware that much of it – as well as some water – was coming in through the slit in his throat. He had to fight not only to stay on the surface but also to keep his throat clear enough to take in precious air. He slammed into a boulder and managed to grab hold. Then, with a supreme effort, he pulled himself up onto it. While he gulped in air he could still feel fluid going down his throat and as he violently coughed and retched he could see that it was blood, not water. He gripped the wound and scrambled across some other boulders to the river bank, keeping a tight hold of his throat. He ran through a wood, not knowing where he was heading. Like a frightened, wounded animal he was desperate to find a cave or a hole to burrow into and hide.
Skender must have covered half a mile or so, stopping every now and then to cough up blood that had trickled into his lungs. As he pushed on through a clump of bushes he was suddenly grabbed, pulled to the ground and held down by his shoulders. When he looked into the eyes of his attacker he saw that the man was not in uniform and that the people with him were villagers like himself. They were two families with several children and they all looked as frightened as him.
Skender then started to choke uncontrollably and on seeing the blood gushing out of the slit in the boy’s throat the man quickly turned him over. Skender had been lucky. When the communist soldier had held him up to kill him he had pushed Skender’s head as far back as it could go, thereby forcing the carotid arteries behind the front of his windpipe. When the knife had been drawn across his neck the windpipe had been cut but the blade had not penetrated deeply enough to sever the two arteries either side. Had Skender’s head been bent forward he would have died in seconds.
As soon as Skender had recovered from his choking fit the man got him to his feet with warnings that they all had to get going. He forced Skender to keep his chin firmly pressed against his chest. One of the women placed a strip of cloth around his neck and after a while the bleeding subsided. Skender could now breathe without spitting up blood every few seconds.
For several days he remained with the family as they made their way through the mountains, holding on to the person in front of him while keeping his chin pressed against his chest to keep the wound closed. Eating the soup they gave him was almost intolerable – every swallow caused a searing pain – but he forced himself to eat,
