The Serbs Chose War, Ruth Mitchel 34. I PREPARE TO JOIN GENERAL MIHAILOVICH I HAD BEEN WAITING ANXIOUSLY for news of the Chetnik plans. At last, on May 17, it came. There were certain people I saw almost daily, if only from a distance. They would signal if there was anything important and then meet me in prearranged places, most often behind a certain food shop. This day at about ten o'clock I entered the shop and was signaled to wait until some Italian soldiers had bought and departed. Then I slipped out through the back door. There, in the dappled shadow of a grape trellis, stood a large dark man upon whose neck I could have fallen: Vaso, my Montenegrin frontier policeman. Quickly he told me that June 28, the great and sacred Serb festival, anniversary of the Battle of Kossovo, would be the date for the Chetnik rising. I was to make for Nikshich (in Montenegro), where he himself would meet me and guide me to Draja Mihailovich, the leader. Mihailovich? The name meant absolutely nothing to me that day. It was not uncommon-I knew several men of that name. But Draja Mihailovich? I did not remember ever having met him. He was a regular army pukovnik (colonel), it appeared, who was now taking chief command of both the remains of the Army and of the Chetniks. But where was my old chief, the Duke Kosta Pechanats? Vaso's mien darkened; he shut up like a clam. Pechanats was nowhere; he didn't matter any more. For those who have never had to hear that their own commander was suspected of being a traitor, I will say that it is an extremely nasty experience. After a last quick drink of slivovits, we had to part-Vaso to slip away on another job, I to plan how I could get to Nikshich. Clearly it had better be soon. For I had heard ominous news from another source. I had a dependable friend in the town, a plucky Serb to whom I had often had occasion to be grateful. He had warned me urgently that a Moslem called Mustafa Hasanovich had got hold of a photograph of me in uniform, snapped, it appeared, on the platform at Sarajevo. My friend had heard that Hasanovich intended to denounce me to the Gestapo. This man Hasanovich was a notorious character, thin-haired, utterly brainless, but still graceful, a vieu flaneur with melting, long-lashed eyes which he used to fascinate visiting ladies into his antique shop to buy at fancy prices. I bought antiques, but not from him: his charm tax seemed to me too high. It may have been his first complete feminine failure, and the reactions of this pet of the foreign women can be imagined. I interpreted his threats to denounce me as blackmail to force me to buy in his shop. I ignored them-unfortunately for me. For now the dreaded Gestapo was to take over the same strangle hold on this Italian-occupied territory of Dalmatia that it had on Italy itself. The last Jewish refugee departed on May 20, the very last night. The ships for the north were packed to suffocation. Angelo Farhi, so kindly, so intelligent, so helpful, and so utterly unconscious of what I was doing, presented me with two badly needed shirts and, still begging me to come, went away. And not dry-eyed. The millstones of trouble, anxiety, and sorrow seemed to grind away the artificial husks of society, leaving only the fine flower of sincerity. One really must give credit to the Italians. They tried to be decent in every way they could: anyone could get permission to go north toward Italy. (They later tried hard to protect unarmed Serbs against the Croat butchers, and often succeeded.) But southward-that was something quite different. That meant toward the Bocca di Cattaro, the inland bay for centuries most eagerly desired by Italy as a perfect naval base. In that direction was only war, to be anxiously avoided by any innocent tourist. For an English-speaking foreigner to want to go south could only mean mischief. Yet south I must go, right into this Bocca, to the very inmost corner, to Cattaro (Kotor) itself if at all possible. In that way my mountain climbing would be shortened by many days and my danger of capture correspondingly reduced. This little old town, lying on the water as if it had slipped down off the steep mountainside, had only one road running through it. This of course would be heavily guarded. But I knew a little donkey track which, winding northeast, skirted the Cetinje plateau where the Italian troops were concentrated and would take me toward Nikshich. But any chance of getting a permit for Cattaro, even if I found some means of transport, seemed out of the question. Nevertheless I got both. My good friend discovered that a sailing ship would be leaving at 4 A.M. on May 23 from Gruzh for Cattaro with food supplies for the Occupation troops. The captain was "persuaded" at a very fancy price to take me, but only on condition that I possessed an official permit for the journey. How was I to get one? An order had been issued that all country people who had fled into Dubrovnik were to return to their homes and farms. Food was getting scarce: as many mouths as possible must be got rid of and food production raised. As I passed through the town early on May 21 I saw a line of peasants, mainly women, waiting in front of the Hotel Posta, where an office had been opened to issue the necessary permits. Should I try for it, or should I only be drawing dangerous attention to myself? I decided to try with caution. I joined the line behind a fat and chatty old girl whose ample skirts and bosom provided good cover. At a long row of desks Italian army clerks were distractedly struggling to understand a babel of requests in a strange tongue. When in due course we moved to the front my old lady launched into a loud and matey explanation of her wish to visit her children and grandchildren, all named. The none-too-bright clerk, baffled and hopeless, lapsed into dull despair and at last wrote down what he thought was the name of a village, the only one he could catch- perhaps that of a grandchild-and languidly pushed over the pass. Her thanks were profuse but left him despondent. Now came my turn. Bored stiff, he hardly looked up. I had decided to try northward first and, if that worked, to risk southward. My American pass did not startle him-all strange papers were alike to him. He took my particulars mechanically, as if only half awake. I quietly said, "Spalato" (Split); he wrote it down. Coming southward, I said, "Korcula"; he wrote it down. Gently I said, "Bocca di Cattaro" and then quickly "Return." Slowly, so slowly, he wrote it down. Silently he handed over the paper as the next person crowded up. I seized it and fled. (This pass was found by the Gestapo, used against me at my court-martial and, perhaps by an oversight, left in my passport. I have it here before me.) At dawn on the 23d I should be away to join Draja Mihailovich! I remained quietly at the hotel that day. Until the last possible moment I must arouse no suspicion that I was planning to leave. On the morning of the 22d I arranged with a near-by youth to carry my bag next morning across the intervening hill to the harbor. I myself would go openly with my basket as if to buy fish, which was quite usual. I have always found that for jobs of this sort boys of about fourteen are ideal. Always eager for anything with a touch of mystery about it, they pass almost unnoticed, either by older men or by women. A parcel is in Europe the natural appendage of boys, and should they excite remark they always have a cheeky answer to allay suspicions: men instinctively avoid back-chat with young smart alecks. They often get by where much cleverer people would stick. I knew a bright-eyed little devil who had run several useful errands for me-but this time he was to be disappointed. Previous Chapter | Content | Next Chapter The Serbs Chose War, Ruth Mitchel