The Assassins by Alan Bardos (best novels in english txt) 📗

didn't mind standing a drink or two, but now he was paying the price. He really wasn't used to drinking wine, not by the jug anyway. Princip had managed to stay out of the drinking though and had been able to wake Ilic and himself, when they'd overslept.

The last thing Johnny needed was a train ride to goodness knows where. Ilic was furious with him; somehow the drinking to excess had been his fault and now all Ilic's plans had fallen through and their whole venture could collapse because of a foolish night of indulgence. Ilic went so far as to suggest that they had acted like common tavern roughs, or worse yet, the Austrians themselves.

Johnny fancied that Ilic had been looking at him rather curiously since they’d got on the train and he had started to test Johnny’s knowledge of Kierkegaard, Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman, all of whom Ilic had translated into Serbo-Croat. Johnny hadn't read any of them. He wasn't overly fond of poetry, or philosophy for that matter, which did nothing to ease the tension or prove Johnny's credentials as a Young Bosnian.

As the train went further and further into the unknown, Johnny started to worry that he was being taken out to be shot in the forests that endlessly rushed past the window. He decided to try and lighten the mood.

'Do you really need to wear a black tie today?' Johnny asked. Ilic never took it off.

'I wear it as a constant reminder of death.'

Johnny smiled. 'Yes, and when we're this hungover we don't need to be reminded of death.'

Ilic looked at him sourly. It hadn't been a good joke admittedly, but Johnny at least expected him to play the game.

'I have a stomach ulcer and shouldn't drink, ' Ilic replied sullenly. Evidently, he felt that was Johnny's fault as well.

It was a relief when the train stopped at Doboj and Ilic pulled him up from his seat. 'Follow me, but don't be seen. If you think I'm being followed by a police agent, distract him.'

Johnny stopped - he thought he might be getting set up to give himself away as an informant.

'How am I meant to distract a policeman?' Johnny asked.

'I don't know - sing him a song. You didn't have any difficulty singing last night.' Ilic smiled enigmatically and jumped off the train. Johnny vaguely remembered singing the Eton Boating Song, which had caused great amusement, but he was seriously starting to wonder if this whole thing was just an elaborate plan to get him out of the city, so that Ilic could discreetly dispose of him.

Ilic was met at the station by an elegant man in his early forties, with a thick handlebar moustache - not the usual sort he'd seen associating with the gang. The chap nearly broke down when he saw Ilic, but he managed to pull himself together and led Ilic out of the station.

Johnny followed from what he thought was a safe distance but he had no idea how to trail a man. He turned around; there didn't seem to be anyone about and having seen the state of the person Ilic had met, Johnny felt confident that he would be able to deal with them both, should they lead him down a blind alley.

He relaxed and gazed up at the medieval castle that overlooked the town, almost missing Ilic and his contact entering a tailor's shop. He glanced around but there was no sign of an ambush or a tail. He stepped into an artisan shop and started examining the wares on display, trying to appear inconspicuous. Something caught his eye amongst the coffee sets and brass plates. It was a curved knife, about six inches long, which looked like something from Beau Geste; Johnny thought it could come in handy if things turned nasty.

He bought the knife and returned to the street in time to see Ilic come out of the tailor’s shop with a box under his arm that had been tied up with thick cord. Seeing Johnny, he signalled frantically for him to come with him. Ilic was very nervous and Johnny guessed the reason, as he neared him. There was an ominous metallic clank from the box and Johnny suspected that he was desperately under armed. Whatever it was that fate was going to throw at him next, he knew that it was neatly tied up in that box.

The train journey back to Sarajevo was even more of an ordeal than the outgoing one. Ilic was extremely tense and so, in consequence, was Johnny.

'Do you believe in our cause, Jovo?' Johnny baulked at such a direct question. 'Do you believe that tyranny against the people justifies the use of violence to overthrow or kill a tyrant?'

'The tyrant must be destroyed,' Johnny answered. He'd heard Gavrilo talk like that and assumed that was what Ilic wanted to hear, but Johnny had misjudged him. Ilic became melancholy and stared out of the window as he spoke.

'My father was a cobbler. He died before I started school and left us in poverty. My mother took in washing to support us and then boarders. I had to share my room with Gavrilo. He had real fire, but knew nothing - a peasant from the mountains. I taught him about poetry, the Russian revolutionaries, political philosophy...' Ilic trailed off, lost in memory.

'You were a worthy teacher,' Johnny said.

'And now he has surpassed me, that small, sensitive boy, five years my junior. Tell me Jovo, what is your background? You don't strike me as a peasant's son.'

Johnny smiled, guessing what Sir George would have said about that statement. He couldn't tell if Ilic was probing further into his background or trying to remember why he was sitting on a train with a box full of illegal arms. The only thing Johnny knew for sure was