I blinked, then shook my head, that anxiety coming back.
“I heard sixteen dead.”
I didn’t bother saying I’d heard thirty. “Any family there?”
“No. You?”
“Agota and Bernard are in Tisakarad, but I’ll bet Ferenc has dragged them over there by now.”
We let that sit between us, because even though this was our space, neither of us knew for sure how well Gavra Noukas did his job, which was in part to keep an eye on us, and measure our political morality. It was always possible he’d bugged the place.
So she changed the subject. “What’s going on with Yuri Kolev?”
“Poisoned. And I don’t have any tenable leads.”
Then Katja put into words something that had been nagging at me. “It seems odd, though. Two men, Volan and Kolev, one retired and the other ready to retire. Killed a few days apart.”
“By that logic, I’m next,” I said, smiling.
“Watch out, Chief.”
My phone rang, but she made no move to leave. I picked it up. “Yes?”
“This is Records,” said the woman.
“Will you be drinking coffee today?”
She sighed loudly. “Just send one kilo for my effort.”
“Nothing?”
“The file on Lebed Putonski was signed out two weeks ago and not returned.”
“You’re joking.”
“If you knew me, Comrade Chief, you’d know how unlikely that was. The file should’ve been returned after three days.”
“If you can tell me who signed it out, you’ll get both kilos.”
“I’m not supposed to do that, you know.”
“Three kilos.” I didn’t have three kilos, but I was retiring. This would be my last bribe as a militiaman. Katja stared at me over the rim of her cup.
“You win. Name’s Rosta Gorski.”
I asked her to spell it, then scribbled it in my notepad. “What else did he sign out?”
She hummed. “Don’t tell me you have more coffee?”
“You need stockings?” I could take a couple of pairs from Lena if necessary.
“Hold on.”
I heard her set down the phone. Katja mouthed, What’s going on?
I shook my head and waved her out, but, like Lena, she wasn’t the kind of woman to be shooed off. She read what I’d written. “Gorski?”
I put a finger to my lips as the clerk returned. “Got a pen?”
“Shoot.”
“One Militia case file, number 10-3283-48.”
As I wrote the number in my notepad, my hand went cold. I knew that case intimately. “Go on.”
“And a bunch of personnel files. Names: Volan, Dusan. Sev, Brano… hey.”
My heart was palpitating, and my hand was damp. “What?”
“Youre here. Brod, Emil.”
For an instant I couldn’t speak. Katja, seeing my face, stood instinctively. I wrote one word- me — and said, “Go on.”
The clerk noticed my tone; when she continued, it was in a whisper. “Michalec, Jerzy, and Zoltenko, Tatiana. And that Putonski one. You got them all?”
I looked at the list. “Who gave Gorski the authority to walk out with all these files?”
“A minute.”
She set the phone down again, and I heard papers being shifted and flipped through. Katja was in her seat again but leaning forward to read the names. Brano Sev, she mouthed, a look of terror on her face.
“Comrade Chief Brod?” I heard-but it wasn’t the clerk. It was a man.
“Yes?”
“Comrade Chief, you know the regulations. As much as we respect your tenure, I’m afraid you’ll have to go through proper channels for your information.”
“Who am I speaking to?”
“Chief Administrator Zoran Aspitan.”
“Comrade Aspitan,” I said, making no effort to hide my annoyance, “you’re obstructing a murder investigation, which comes under the direct supervision of Comrade Colonel Nikolai Romek of the Ministry for State Security. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
There was a pause as Aspitan tried to gauge my conviction. Perhaps I wasn’t much of an actor, because he said, “Comrade, I seriously doubt the truth of what you say.”
“Do you?”
“If you like,” he said, “please have Colonel Romek contact me, and I’ll discuss it with him. Or, if you prefer, I’ll call him directly to sort this out.”
I was astonished by the chief administrator’s bravery. In those days, it was a rare virtue. “You’ll hear from him,” I said. “Very soon.” I slammed the phone down.
Katja was surprised by my anger. “What happened?”
Because mine was empty, I took her cup and drank the last of her coffee. Then I explained why I initially called the Central Archives- Gavra’s news, from Zagreb, that a man named Lebed Putonski had been killed. She said, “A Yugoslav?”
“No, one of ours. Ex-Ministry.”
“What was he doing in Zagreb?”
“I don’t know.”
As I told the rest, she rubbed her nose, which was something she did when deep in thought. “You’re telling me that a man named Rosta Gorski took out one case file and the files of six people. Two of them-Volan and Putonski-are recently killed, one of them is the first criminal you put away, one is Brano, and one is you?”
I nodded obliquely. “The last one-Tatiana Zoltenko-I don’t know her.”
“Kolev’s not on the list.”
“Gavra insists he’s connected.”
“But why your file? Why Brano’s?”
“Because you’re probably right.”
“About what?”
“All us retirees are in trouble.”
The stolen case file was, of course, my first one from 1948. When I fell in love with my wife; when she was kidnapped by Jerzy Michalec; when Michalec was sentenced to a life of hard labor. The case file linked Jerzy Michalec, me, and even Brano Sev, who made the final arrest.
But what about the others-Dusan Volan, Lebed Putonski, and Tatiana Zoltenko? Were they connected to the old case? I couldn’t recall their names, and without the original case file, I might never know.
I told Katja to sign out a Militia Karpat and pick me up in front of the central post office. Then we’d go talk to Volan’s wife. “You’ve got some mail to send?” she asked, puzzled.
“I’ve got a call to make.”
She decided not to ask anything further, so I grabbed my hat and headed out, down past the understaffed front desk, and out the front door. Lenin Avenue was also underpopulated for eight thirty in the morning, and at the post office only one window was open. A woman with dyed black hair and a sleepy expression watched me enter-I was the only visitor-and cross to the four bubble-enclosed pay phones against the faux-marble wall. I stuck in a two-hundred-korona coin, peering behind myself to be sure I was still alone. I was, but my fingers had trouble dialing the six-digit number Agota had given me.
“Hello?” said a man’s voice, wary.
“A message,” I said.
