The Time Roads (21 page)

“And if I do not?”

“We know about you. You wrote a coded message to Kiro Delchev, which means you must be from Éire or one of its agents. But you have chosen a curious time to ask for a private meeting.”

There were strange, contradictory signals here. The man, so ready with his threats, he understood, or thought he might. The woman, however, was not so easy to read. Nervous and afraid of her companion, and her tone seeming to imply more than the words themselves. “Are you friends with Kiro Delchev?” he asked. “Where is he?”

She hesitated. The man rapped out another question. The woman answered slowly, keeping her face turned away from her companion. Ó Deághaidh had the impression she was giving him a carefully edited version of their conversation.

Another long tirade from the man. Again she made the translation, though clearly an abbreviated one. “We can answer none of your questions. It is you who must tell us why you have come to Cetinje, and why now. Please,” she added in a breathless whisper. “If you do not, he will hurt you. He says it will be faster.”

“What about you?” Ó Deághaidh said. “What do you think?”

She made a brief, negative gesture. “I cannot stop him.”

“Cannot or will not?”

The man interrupted with a question. She turned to answer, but he shoved her to one side, pushed Ó Deághaidh onto his stomach, and wrenched his arms up until the bones cracked. Ó Deághaidh gasped and bucked against the agony.

Then it was over, leaving Ó Deághaidh sweating and panting. Above the roar in his head, he heard the buzz of voices, then footsteps retreating. A warm hand brushed his forehead. Someone placed a water canteen to his lips and held his head steady as he drank. The water tasted of cool minerals, and helped to clear away the bitter aftertaste of the chloroform.

“He has gone to fetch a friend,” the woman said softly. “Another man who watches for the patrols. He says that between them they will persuade you to talk.”

“And if they cannot?”

“Then you will die.”

“While you watch?”

“I’m sorry for you. But I can do nothing, nothing at all.”

“How convenient.” He had no need to pretend bitterness. His death would be the least of his failures.

The woman shook her head. “You do not understand. Ilja would—”

Ó Deághaidh drew a deep breath that eased the pain in his gut. “No, I do not understand. But I would like to.” He let a soft groan escape that was not entirely feigned. If only he knew how long before the man would return. The woman appeared unarmed. If he could distract her a moment, he might take her by surprise. “More water,” he whispered. “Please.”

She frowned and glanced over her shoulder. The moment her attention turned from him, Ó Deághaidh rolled onto his knees and launched himself at her headfirst. They both crashed to the ground. Ó Deághaidh rolled free and lurched to his feet. The woman scrambled away and fumbled at her boot.

“Hej! Valerija—”

Two figures rushed into the cave. It was the man who had questioned him before—Ilja, she had called him—and his companion.
Damn, damn, damn.
Ó Deághaidh wanted to snarl and curse, but he had no time. Ilja had drawn a gun. Ó Deághaidh aimed a hard kick at the man’s knee and connected. The man dropped with a strangled cry, his gun clattering to the ground. Meanwhile, the second man circled around, a knife in one hand. Ó Deághaidh backed away. A glance showed him the woman pressed against the wall on the far side of the cave. She too had a knife in her hand.

His opponent took advantage of Ó Deághaidh’s momentary distraction, snatched up the gun, and fired twice. Ó Deághaidh threw himself to one side. His shoulder burned. A shot must have grazed him. He spotted a flash of firelight against metal—a knife spinning on the ground. With his hands behind his back, he had to scrabble to catch hold of the hilt. There, he had it, and just in time. Regaining his feet, he saw the man was reloading the gun. Ó Deághaidh kicked at the fire, scattering hot ashes into the man’s face. The man let his gun fall and clawed at his face. Ó Deághaidh drove his shoulder into the man’s chest and shoved him against the cave wall. Before the man could recover his breath, he spun around and rammed the knife into his gut.

A gasp. A gurgled cry. Warmth spilled over Ó Deághaidh’s hands, and the stink of blood rolled through the air. Ó Deághaidh staggered to one side, trying to catch his breath, and the man slumped to the ground. A few coals from the scattered fire cast a red, uncertain light over the floor and ceiling. Except for the labored breathing of the man Ilja, it was quiet. Where was the woman? Had she gone for help?

Then, he heard the echo of gravel falling. The woman was making her escape. He stumbled through the dark toward the sound. A few false starts and he discovered the opening to a narrow tunnel that slanted upward. From above came the thudding of footsteps over hard-packed dirt, the scent of crushed pine needles, the kiss of air upon his cheek. That way, yes. He scrambled up the tunnel. Very soon he came into the open, a hillside dotted with pine trees and fields of grass and wildflowers. Lights from a city speckled the plateau below. Cetinje.

His breath puffed out in noiseless laughter. No shirt and no shoes, no papers or money, and any shelter miles away. At least the night was warm and dry. He set off down the rocky slope, away from the cave and toward the city below.

*   *   *

The hard stones cut his bare feet, and he stumbled more than once, but he did not pause until he reached a stand of pine trees. There he wedged the hilt of his knife into a split trunk, then sawed through the ropes binding his wrists. The blade pierced his skin several times during that long painful exercise. Afterward, he washed his wounds in a mountain freshet, and the shock of cold water jolted him awake as nothing else could. His belly shivering, he set off down the mountainside, gathering up droplets of strength from a source he had not realized existed within himself, exhilarated, laughing aloud at finding himself alive and free. It was not until he reached Cetinje, and the alleyway where he would spend the night, that despair overtook him. If he did not solve this mystery, he would truly have nothing at all. No honor. No kingdom. No future. He wept until his throat burned, then wept again, shaken by his sudden loss of control.

*   *   *

The rising sun pulled him back from the despair, but it could not restore his former sense of purpose entirely. He spent two days wandering Cetinje’s poorest districts, begging from those marginally better off than he. Seeing his tearstained face, they called him a madman, but they were gentle with him nevertheless. A local wisewoman dressed his wounds and blisters. A butcher’s apprentice fed him with bones and scraps of fat. He clothed himself from trash heaps—a soiled jersey, a pair of boots beyond repair, which he fastened with twine. At night, he wrapped himself in a stolen blanket and slept underneath the glittering stars, uncertain whether he played a role, or lived it.

“You are a curious man,” said Natka, as she offered Ó Deághaidh a mugful of hot ale. She was an old woman, her hands like rough slabs from washing pots for a riverfront tavern. It was she who had supplied Ó Deághaidh with socks to pad his ill-fitting boots, and a ragged coat for nighttime, which sometimes turned cool in spite of the approaching summer. “But then, you are probably filling in the empty places.”

Ó Deághaidh drank down the ale, wiped his mouth on the back of his sleeve. He had spent the day listening for any talk about foreigners, murdered men, or Kiro Delchev’s whereabouts, with no success. “Nothing into nothing,” he replied, slurring his words to cover his accent. “Hard to fill that up.”

Natka regarded him with a look much keener than before. “Or maybe, too much all at once, and it makes for confusion.” Then she laughed, and her eyes disappeared into the folds of her fleshy face. “Oh, no. We neither of us have too much, do we, my friend?”

She gave him a couple stale bread rolls for later, and an old woolen cap she claimed no longer fit her youngest grandson. “We have some wet days coming,” she said, brushing away his thanks.

Ó Deághaidh shuffled away toward the upper streets, to a market square that lay between the riverfront and the university district. No luck, none at all. It was as though these men had not existed. As though he had dreamed that episode in the cave.

You know you did not.

I’m not certain what I know.

He had the knife. That much was certain, and he kept it as a talisman. And when his confidence failed him, he chanted the names: Ó Cadhla, Mac Gioll, Ó Breislin, De Paor, and Ó Luain. One of them the traitor. One had betrayed him, first in Vienna and now here, in Cetinje. Mac Gioll or Ó Luain? He discarded those names and picked them up again, unable to decide their character. Ó Cadhla. The minister best situated for such deeds. But surely he was too clever to place himself under suspicion. Ó Breislin? He no longer knew. De Paor? There was ambition in that man’s voice, but so there was with all the queen’s ministers.

At the water pump, he rinsed his mouth and absentmindedly chewed one of the rolls. He ought to save them for later, but perhaps old Sima in the rag sellers’ district might have a pot of stew cooking today. Sima always had the best gossip, though it paid to double-check anything he said.

He had put the roll away, reluctantly, when he saw the woman.

She was crossing the square, chin tucked down, a plain black scarf covering her head. She had a woven basket filled with books slung over her shoulder, and more books in her arms. A breeze caught at her skirts and she paused to untangle them. When she straightened up, her glance winged past Ó Deághaidh to some unseen distant point.

His heart beat faster. It
was
her. He was sure of it. He had not forgotten how she moved, nor that all-encompassing, dark-eyed gaze. Ó Deághaidh drank another handful of water before he pulled his new cap low over his forehead and slouched off in the same direction.

Two streets away from the square, the woman turned a corner. Ó Deághaidh hurried forward, only to confront the empty lane. He kept walking in case anyone watched from above. By now he had memorized all the back lanes and courtyards. He took a deliberately roundabout path to an alley across the river, where he spent the night. The next day, he wandered a district on the opposite side, following a drifting, rambling path, and ending up by seeming happenstance at Old Sima’s, where he consumed leftover stew and listened to Sima’s account of his grandson’s latest folly.

It was late on the third day, after hours of fruitless scouting, that he sighted the woman in a run-down neighborhood by the water. He followed her at a distance, through the back lanes and winding streets, back to the university district, not far from where he had first taken rooms. A few streets later, she ascended a pair of low steps and entered a three-story brick building. He sank down to wait. She might be visiting a colleague, a sister, anyone. He dared not make any assumptions.

Within a few moments—as long as it would take a weary and distracted woman to climb the stairs—a lamp blazed on the second floor. No sooner than he registered that when a shadow appeared against the window. A woman’s figure, slim and sharp. Almost at once the shadow vanished, as though she winced away from observation. Ó Deághaidh stared at the window with satisfaction.

I know you now,
he thought.

Several days of watching and planning followed. The rain Natka predicted had arrived, and the days were gloomy, alternating between downpours and a heavy drizzle, and a thick warm fog rose up from the wet streets, reminding Ó Deághaidh of Éire’s summer rains. He observed the woman from afar, as she walked to and from the university district. During the midday hours, he studied the face of every tenant, every visitor to the apartment building. The doors were locked at all times, he discovered. Tenants had keys. Visitors rang an electric bell to gain admittance. There was a door at the rear of the building, but the yard had no other exit than a path leading back to the main street. In between these sessions, he acquired rope, bandages, a lockpick, and a wrist sheath for his knife.

He chose an evening when the sun sank behind a veil of clouds and mist, so that twilight came unnaturally early. It was one of the days when the woman remained at the university until late. He would have ample time to break into her apartment, make a search, and prepare for her arrival. The weather worked to his advantage another way. There were few passersby, which meant few witnesses to his activities.

Ó Deághaidh loitered in an alleyway opposite the building until he sighted another tenant approaching. He waited until the man had unlocked the door before he crossed the street, as if bound for the next house down, and whistled softly to himself. Just as the other man entered, Ó Deághaidh doubled back and ran up the stairs to catch the door before it shut completely. He waited, breathless, until he heard the rattle of keys, then a second door within open and close, before he slipped inside.

He found himself in a small entry hall, dimly lit by the streetlamps outside. It was an older building, with cream-colored plaster walls and polished wood floors. A row of postboxes by the door carried apartment numbers but no names, and the boxes themselves held nothing of interest. Ó Deághaidh continued up the stairs to the second floor. Four apartments occupied the corners. There were nameplates beside all the doors. Ó Deághaidh checked those facing the street. One read Petrovi
ć
, one Delchev.

He stopped and his skin prickled. Of course. Surely it was the mysterious Kiro Delchev who had betrayed him to the kidnappers. He stood there, juggling the lockpick in his hand, unhappy with this new complication.

Footsteps on the stairway startled him out of indecision. He ducked behind the stairwell, hefted the knife in his left hand, and waited.

A woman left the stairs and headed straight to the apartment door labeled Delchev. No sooner had she turned the key and pushed the door open, than Ó Deághaidh rushed up behind her. He propelled her into the apartment, and before she could do more than gasp, he kicked the door shut and pointed the knifepoint at her exposed throat.