I collapsed back on my bed and Jerry sat up on the edge of his to keep eye-contact. His face was alive for what seemed the first time in many days.
‘We found some nurses. A Frenchwoman, Nicole, was in charge. We expected to be fucked off with all the usual shit about UN regulations and journalists, but they were cool.
‘They told us the UN had tried parachuting food and medicine into the place at night. The women and children would hear the chutes open and run outside, waiting for the food to land. It was dark and they had tin cans on sticks with candles burning inside them. The Serbs just picked them off, firing at the lights.’ Jerry shook his head sadly. ‘Fuck, man, there was a story every way you turned.
‘In the morning Jason and I walked down into the village to look at their hardware. These Muslims were fighting back with anything they could get their hands on. Guys were fighting from trenches in gardens, from cellars. They were like ants, everywhere. I got sixteen rolls that morning.
‘Then all hell broke loose. We were walking back up the hill to the house when we started taking incoming. There was this young boy, no more than ten, just staggering about, bleeding and crying. His mother had a huge chunk of shrapnel in her back. The grandmother was trying to help.
‘Jason ran to fetch Nicole while I went to see what I could do. Not much, as it turned out. She was dying.
‘The boy had shrapnel in his hand. Nicole and her team did what they could for the two of them, but even I knew the mother needed surgery, and fast. Nicole wanted to take her to the UN base a couple of Ks away down the road. We had a vehicle, they didn’t. How could we just stand by and do nothing?
‘We got to the house, carrying the woman between us. The driver was up for it so we threw the back seats down and got her in. Jason and I got in with her; the kid and the grandmother sat in the front.
‘We’d only driven a mile or two out of the village when we ran into a Serb patrol. They told us to turn back – this lot were all of “fighting age”, even the grandmother. Luckily there was one carton of cigarettes left, and Jason did the deal.
‘Within half an hour, we were at the base. The boy’s name was Fikret, and he wanted to play for Manchester United when he grew up. He was a good kid.’
By now the empty Coke can was resting on my chest. His voice faded, and I turned to see him staring at the floor. ‘That it?’
‘The doctor said the mother’s only chance was to get to a proper hospital. She’d have to be evacuated in one of their APCs, but Fikret and the grandmother couldn’t travel in the APC as they weren’t wounded. UN regulations. Fuck that. He could have allowed them to travel if he’d had the balls.
‘I didn’t have the heart to tell Fikret. He was busy. His mother was swinging in and out of consciousness, and he was holding her hands, stroking her hair.
‘The APC turned up, and that UN fuck still wouldn’t let them travel with her. I gave him a hug. He cried on my shoulder for a bit, then he got himself together and explained what was happening to the grandmother.
‘As soon as the APC had left, we were all escorted off the base. We couldn’t drive them back to the village because we had nothing left to trade if we ran into the Serbs again. He knew that, and just took his grandmother’s hand and headed home. My last shot was of their backs as they walked up the road.’
I threw the Coke can at the waste-bin and just clipped its edge. In the old days I’d have lobbed it to the nearest Muslim so he could make a hand grenade. It seemed a waste of metal to follow UN regulations and crush it so that I didn’t break the arms embargo. ‘And that’s when you picked me up?’
‘Yup. And I know you don’t want to hear it, but I need to say thanks for saving my life.’
‘Thank-you accepted.’
He smiled. ‘I know you don’t mean it, but it makes me feel better. You want a coffee or something? I’ll go down.’
Jerry strapped on his bumbag. One of the downsides of being a photo man is the kit always has to be with you.
‘Yeah, why not? Frothy, no sugar.’
I watched him leave, and as the door closed behind him my eyes were drawn to the emergency-information sheet pinned to the back of it. I got up and studied the diagrams, but none of them seemed to show me what to do if I needed to run away from people armed with AKs. I dug around for my room card and went out on to the landing.
The coffee area was hidden under its stripy canvas canopy, but Jerry hadn’t got there yet. He was pacing up and down just outside the main doors, the Thuraya against his cheek. He wasn’t just testing for a signal, he was talking. The conversation ended and he disappeared under the tent.
I was back on my bed, channel-hopping for CNN or BBC World, when he came back with a cup and saucer in each hand. His coffee was black, with several sachets of sugar sitting in the saucer.
‘You sure that’s healthy?’
‘Few extra calories never hurt anyone.’ He handed me mine.
‘I meant all that phoning. You’re going to end up with a brain tumour.’
‘Just a quick one to DC. He’s got nothing new.’
It was eleven forty-three. The second prayer of the day was some time after midday. Times changed, depending on where you were in the world and daylight saving, all that sort of stuff. ‘Maybe we could make Zuhr?’
Jerry called down to Reception. They’d know prayer times, which would probably be in the papers anyway. Even if we missed the Salkic guy this time round, we could hang about, have a brew and something to eat, and try again during Asr.
Jerry got off the phone as I checked my bumbag. ‘One twenty. Plenty of time.’
We tuned the TV to a German soap with Serbo-Croat subtitles, put the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, and headed for the lifts.
I looked down into the atrium. A group of five American troops were sitting by the coffee shop, getting into their brews and cigarettes. In this part of the world, they wore green BDUs and were part of SFOR. They’d probably been stationed in Germany before being posted here, and counted themselves lucky. Going by the size of them, they had a KFC at the camp gate that only sold family buckets. They didn’t look like their lean and mean mates who were getting the good news in Baghdad.
69
The air was crisp outside, just cold enough to see a little vapour as we breathed. We were going to need coats.
We picked our way across the wide dual carriageway that used to be Snipers’ Alley. Traffic careered along the outside, and trams moved fast down the middle. Instead of turning left to the city centre, we were going to cut straight on down to the river, less than two hundred metres from the hotel.
Some of the trams rattling past looked as though they were left over from the war. Jerry read my thoughts. ‘Least they don’t have to be dragged along by trucks, these days.’
We passed the burnt-out shell of the parliament building I’d been looking at from the hotel. The underground car park was obviously still usable: two policemen were on stag at the entrance, checking cars in and out.
Nearer the river, we found ourselves among older, grander, more lavish Hungarian-style buildings. They were still inhabited, but had taken a fearsome pounding. The other side of the Miljacka, less than forty metres away, was where the Serb front line had penetrated this part of the city; even the wired glass protecting the balconies was still splattered with strike marks. Lumps of grey plaster had been blown away, exposing the brickwork beneath.
As far as I could tell, the only difference between then and now in this part of town was that the roads were no longer covered with rubble, or blocked off by trucks and sheets of corrugated iron to provide cover from sniper fire. I remembered seeing four wooden cargo containers at the bottom of this very road, piled on top of each other to create a screen. The Serbs still took random potshots into the woodwork, and occasionally managed to drop the
