Zagreb Cowboy Read Online Free PDF Page B

a deal? No revenge?”
    “We’ve got a deal, Julius. Now, for the love of God, spill.”

JULIUS STRUMB I Ć WAS supposed to have gone home for lunch on the Wednesday afternoon, but he couldn’t face his wife. The day before, she’d found a packet of condoms in the pocket of his uniform trousers and had given him grief all night.
    Mr. and Mrs. Strumbić had no need for them. They’d never been able to conceive, and they’d long since given up trying. So on finding the condoms she’d immediately thought the worst of her husband. He’d been put on the spot. He’d come home too soon after a bottle of wine and wasn’t thinking clearly. He’d told her it was for some undercover work. He should have said they used them to keep their gun barrels dry when working in the field. She’d have understood that.
    No, he should have told her the truth. That they belonged to a prostitute. He could have left it at that. Implied he’d arrested her and merely pocketed the rubbers as evidence or something. It wasn’t like he ever used the things.
    So he went out for lunch on his own, tired from a long night of being harassed. Even when he went to sleep on the sofa, she followed him to make sure he got an earful. She was there when he woke, sitting and staring with those slitted Slavic eyes that made her look like a wolf, starting up again from the exact point when she’d finally let him fall asleep.
    He went to a place around the corner from the railway station. It was one of the few remaining restaurants in this part of town that didn’t just serve meat on a stick. He was halfway through his boiled potatoes and schnitzel, tough grey meat under greasy breadcrumbs, when the two men came in. They ignored the waiter and the empty tables and headed straight for him.
    “There’s somebody who’d like a word with you,” said the taller, skinny one. He had a Bosnian accent. The other one was shorter, square-built, once muscular but now with some extra weight on his frame. They both had slicked-back hair and pointy shoes. The look might have been retro, except Strumbić had a feeling their style was a hangover from the first time round. Whoever they were, they looked the sort who made sure the opposition limped off the pitch when they played a friendly game of football.
    “He can make an appointment with my booking sergeant. I might be free next month. Of course, if you two were to start sucking each other off in here, I’d make sure you had an interview a lot quicker than that. I’m working vice this month.” He had to put some effort into cutting the veal. Maybe it was just the blunt knife.
    “Heh. Hear that, Besim. The man made a joke,” said the skinny one to his companion. He turned back to Strumbić. “You probably don’t understand. This is a friendly invitation. We do unfriendly ones too.” The man smiled as if it cost him money.
    Strumbić put his cutlery down and looked at them. They might have been regular hoods. Or they could have belonged to one of the security services. The UDBA often employed criminals, though sometimes it was hard to tell them apart from the secret policemen.
    They didn’t show any ID, though that could have meant something or nothing. The secret police didn’t always feel the need to introduce themselves formally. On the other hand, they weren’t dragging him out of bed at three o’clock in the morning, so it probably wasn’t official and might not have been unfriendly.
    “I guess you know what the proper channels are if you want a formal conversation.”
    “Just a chat. And not with us. There’s somebody else who wants a word with you. It’s not far. It won’t take you long.”
    Strumbić thought about it. These guys were too much like hicks to be secret police. But you could never be certain. If it was the security services and he made their lives difficult, they’d just try to kick his ass that much harder with their steel-capped boots. But that depended. The Croatian government