The New old Bridge

Malina Kharobochka finished, closed the snaps on her suitcase, and stood it on its edge. She looked through her dormitory window at the clock at the top of the administration building. Still three hours before she had to be at the bus station. She looked at the last piece of paper, a to-do list, pinned to the corkboard over her desk. All the items on the list had neat little ticks against them.

She was going to miss the desk, with its dozen little slots across the top, and its six fussy little drawers underneath them. She had found it when she was working at the demolition of the old secret police station her first year here, and she and four of her friends had a great adventure getting it here and up the stairs and into the room. She had found someone else who liked it, and she was due in half an hour with some of her friends to take it away. It was the last thing of hers in this room that had been hers for four years. It had stored all her index cards, notebooks, letters, and textbooks in precise order. Now it stood empty. As much time as she had spent there, the emptiness of the desk was somehow more desolate than the emptiness of the small closet and the bare shelves next to the mirror over the dresser.

She sat down and looked into her purse. Wallet, bus ticket, a woefully small amount of cash, passport, transit visa through Bosnia, address book, a packet of letters, and one last letter from her father. Back when she was very young, he had been a machinist at the mine. After independence, he had become mayor. His letters combined the fussiness of a workman making parts to the smallest possible tolerance and the pomposity of a senator launching a battleship just a little larger than his ego.

"Dear Sweet Malina!" he wrote. (Her father loved alliteration, and Sweet & Malina in Croatian were only one letter different)

"I am excited at the news of your graduation with high honors from the institute. I am very proud of your dedication, hard work, and excellent results."

I also note that finding a job in your field in these troubled times is extremely difficult. There are many new teachers and no new teaching jobs this year. However, I have talked to Agafna Petrovna and she agrees that the school needs an English teacher and that since Mosei Abramovich is nearing retirement, we could use another math instructor. If you agree to come back and teach here, we can give you the normal salary for teachers here, a 25 square meter apartment (the apartment over the castle gate is available), and a garden plot near the school. The plot available has four apple trees, three grape vines and is next to the pond.

While I understand your desire you see the wide world beyond our town, a girl must eat, so this position is available to you.

Malina reflected over her choices. There were few options. Several of her friends had gone to Italy and Austria to work there.

As far as the Italians and Austrians were concerned, the pay was awful, but by Croatian standards, it was princely. She unfolded her money... barely enough for a kilo of sausage and some apples, which was all she would have to eat on the trip. She had never been profligate. But neither was the student stipend here.

There was a knock at the door. Malina looked at the clock through the window again. The girl was here for her desk exactly on time.

Mayor Kharobochok straitened the paper on his desk as he waited for the other members of the civic committee to settle in their chairs for the meeting in his neat spare office. The desk had little cubbies for papers, each with its precise label. The pen set was exactly in the center of the desk and every other item on the desk had its precisely appointed spot. The file cabinets behind his desk had neat labels in precise script in the exact center of each drawer.

The other members of the Civic Committee were seated at the table that had been aligned with the Mayor’s desk. Four chairs were on either side of the table, each with a small carafe of wine, a glass, and a dish of raisins and dates. Along the left side were Tyumenova, the director of the high school, Mostich, the city engineer, Arkakyovna, the city clerk and Rasvetovich the director of the electrical plant. Along the right side were Stukholov, the chief of police, Rinokin, the chairman of the city market, Nalevni, the city attorney, and Razpetrov the director of the copper mine.

Stukholov looked up from his notes. "I understand your daughter got her teaching diploma. My congratulations." Mostich, Arkakyovna and Nalevni started to applaud, while the rest murmured their congratulations.

Mayor Kharabochok said "Literature, English, and Math. She is due home next week, and I hope to have a position and a place for her when she gets back."

He looked at the clock on the wall. 10:00 precisely. He turned to Molstich "Sergei Ivanovich, what is the latest word about repairing the Kostomost bridge?"

Mostich opened a folder in front of him and picked up some papers and passed them to the other committee members. "We got another estimate from a firm in Korea. It is the same as most of the other estimates. A four-lane bridge across the gorge that will support a 50-ton load will cost 17 million US dollars. It is actually a cheap price, as they assume they will be using mostly local labor, but even so, the ironwork will have to be done in specialty shops in Korea, and the ironwork will either have to come in through Bosnia and pay a duty when it comes in there, or we will have to pay for specialized trucks to bring the steel along the coast road, and the road is too narrow and twisty to the north to get the framework through. That will raise the price another three million dollars either way."

Rinokin slammed the table and glared at Razpetrov. "I still don't see why we need to be so greedy about a four-lane bridge and a 50-ton load. Two lanes and 20 tons would be ample to get our produce out, and allow the farms from across the Kost to access our market."

Stukholov leaned over and said "I want the four lanes because I remember the chaos from market days when the old bridge was still standing."

Mostich added "Really, the extra strength and width don't add much to the cost. A smaller bridge would still cost 12 million, and we would still have the problem of bringing in the materials."

Razpetrov sighed "The extra capacity is going to be academic anyway. We are going to have to shut the mine again soon. The toll has been raised for the ore trucks by 9 cents a ton, and the smelter has lowered the price by 6 cents, and Andre Petrovich told me there is going to be a price increase in " natural gas"

Rasvetovich sat up "3 cents per thousand cubic meters. Mikhail Josefivich and I figure each cent increase in the price of gas increases our expenses by 1/2 cent per ton."

Razpetrov continued "Last week our net revenue per ton was 2 cents. When the new prices go into effect on Monday, we will be losing 14 cents per ton. We can’t lower wages any more. And if we can’t get a better price from the smelter within a month, we will have to let the mine go."

Nalevi folded the estimate in a neat square. "We have been through this before. They need our ore, and they need the tolls from our trucks. They usually relent after a couple of weeks."

Razpetrov looked at his notes. "Maybe yes, maybe no. They have a new source of ore from Turkey that comes in by barge and has a bit more metal than ours. They have never needed us to supply them all that much, and now they don't need us at all. Plus, the price they get for the finished metal has been declining as well."

Rinokin put his chin in his hands. "Is there any chance the UN will relent and fund our bridge?"

Nalevni shook his head. "They are adamant that they want the persons responsible for Kinderfriend’s death 'brought to justice'"

Tyomenova leaned forward and glared at Rinokin "I Believe It Is The Opinion Of Ev-Ery-One That In The Case Of The Criminal Kinderfriend, Justice Has Been Done"

Rinokin patted the air "What about the Americans? They are usually annoyed at the UN for something or other all the time"

Nalevni tapped the table. "Kinderfriend was an American national. They also are annoyed."

Stukhalov shook his head. "I don't understand why they are being so stupid about this. We showed them the children's bodies, and it is pretty clear that after Kinderfriend died, the disappearances stopped."

Arkakyonva stopped doodling "He had important relatives in Washington. They make a great deal of fuss over there about impartial justice, but Kinderfriend has relatives who pass money out in Washington, and we are foreigners who want money. In cases like this..."

Tyomenova interrupted "The Damned Bridge Is Not Worth Thirty Pieces Of Silver. We should never let the UN in here, with their rapes of our girls and the murders of Kinderfriend"

Stukhalov said "We couldn't have stopped them. Plus they did slow down the deaths from the Bosnians for a while. That was a horrible horrible time"

Razpetrov took up his papers. "As you know, this mine has never been profitable. We got a small subsidy in the days before independence, but with Independence, the authorities in Skopjie couldn't continue the subsidy, and no private buyer wanted it, so the town has continued operating it. During most of the troubles, it was possible to keep the pumps going. It was felt that after the troubles were over, we would still have a market for the ore. But with the dynamiting of the Kostomost, we could no longer send the ore north for refining, where we got a good price for it, but only could send it south, where the price, as you know, is lower, and there are the tolls in addition. Also, we have to face the fact that the quality of the ore in the mine has been declining for years, It would have been nice to have a refinery here, but pre-independence the planners liked to have the high-value processing done in Serbia, or over a national border so as to encourage national unity. Now that we are part of the EU, and subject to EU environmental rules, building a refinery would be prohibitively expensive. I don't believe we can continue to operate the mine anymore. "

"Just keeping the pumps going with no ore extraction would cost 250 euros per day. I don't know if we can afford that, but if we don't do that, the mine will flood, and re-opening, it would be prohibitively expensive. We stop the pumps, we close the mine for good."

Razpetrov replied "Very much the same way as always. The wages never have been great. Most of the workers have their own place, and there is always a garden attached. I understand even most of the other city workers like the school teachers and the police have gardens to supplement the pay. And that 250 euros a day it costs to run the pumps, that comes out of some other fund. The town here without that bridge is slowly becoming a ghost town. The children are moving away. Most of the commerce here in town is selling each other stuff out of our gardens."

There was a silence for a while. Rinokin said, "Well, the question is, who wants to close the mine, any hands?" Tyumenova, Akakyevich, Rasvetovich, Rinokin and Mostich raised their hands.

Razpetrov said "This Friday is payday. We can shut down at the end of first shift at 15:30. That gives us time to do all the safety checks and so on as we close down. It will take till Friday to do that anyway. Why don't we call in the priest, have a service on it, or something? Sort of a funeral?"

Razpetrov shook his head. "No, with a mine you don't just pull a switch to shut down operations. The word would leak out anyway."

Rinokin asked, "Who here wants the service?" No one raised their hand for a moment, then all hands slowly went up. "Fine, I will get with the priest and Stukhalov and we will make arrangements for a service to start around 14:00 on Friday."

Kharobochok said "Fine, the decision of the council is that we close the mine on Friday and have a service when it closes. Rinokin and Stukhalov are a committee to organize the service. We don't spend any more money on the mine."

"Next item. I have a new schedule from the advertising firm about the Castle. We have been spending 500 euros per month advertising the castle for sale. Our agents have yet to advise us of a single response. We have cut the price twice. Do we still advertise? Do we change schedules? I have put their new schedule in your papers. I have to admit I think I made a mistake in promoting this idea. It is more of a fort than a romantic castle that some mad millionaire might want to buy. Plus there is the reality that when people think of this region all they think of are the wars going on around here."

Tyumenova asked "Why are we advertising so heavily in Europe? We should probably spend more of our money in America where they don't have castles."

Nalevi said "American prices are a bit higher. But I agree, there is no one interested in our castle in Europe"

Arkeyeveich added "Plus there is that 'dot com' thing going on over there. Lots more millionaires there nowadays. Most of them are young and a little naive. "

Stukhalov chuckled. "I remember back in the pre-independence days that there were quite a few wealthy idiots running around here on their father's bankroll. It is a big country. Somewhere there is an idiot with a lot of money who would buy a used castle."

Mark Howe sat in the waiting room of his lawyer's office leafing through a magazine. He was the one incongruous note in the reception area with its plush carpet, rich paneling, abstract art, and a pretty receptionist typing at a pace of 90 words per minute. The person sitting in the reception area of Dewey and Howe should have been wearing an expensive suit rather than jeans and he should have been carrying a briefcase rather than a bike helmet and a backpack. The Dewey and Howe offices were set up for rich corporate clients rather than scruffy bikers.

Of course, all offices where you have to wait in the anteroom for a meeting, the personnel office, the dentist, the doctor, and the lawyer all subscribe to the same set of magazines that no one, but someone stuck in an office anteroom, ever seems to read. They are about golf, sailing, Hollywood celebrity diets, gardening, and real estate. Mark leafed through a real estate magazine offering luxury properties until he found one ad that intrigued him.

A slightly older version of Mark came into the reception area. This one looked like he belonged. He had the expensive suit and the Italian shoes. Mark saw him come in. "Hey Ethan, you ready?"

Ethan Howe nodded his head. "I hope you made a huge bit of time for this Mark. It is going to take all day. Plus we have to go to the courthouses to get the judges to sign off on it." Come on back. You know the way.

Mark and Ethan walked back into the warren of offices. Ethan rated a window near the corner, but not in the corner. Mark said "I found something in this magazine I am interested in. Do you mind if I keep it?"

"No, I don't know where they come from. I never read them. They must come from some weird alternate universe. Are you still doing SCA?"

"Sure, we have a wedding for Bill Campbell and Naomi Fredricks on Saturday. I hired a bagpiper."

"Sure. It is an SCA wedding of course. He will do the reception. After the reception, he is going to serenade their hotel room."

"Sure. After they get settled in he is going to play some music for them. I suggested 'The Campbells are Coming.' "

On Ethan's desk was a huge stack of folders. Ethan sat behind his desk and grabbed the top one as Mark settled in the chair in front. There was a bottle of water and a pen in front of him. Ethan opened the first folder.

"Kind of a weird thing. You set up a corporation, make it a multi-million dollar player and have it pulled out from under you before you graduate college"

"I just got lucky. Naomi was working for Dr. Francis, and he needed help, so I built this little database application for him. He liked it and told a whole bunch of buddies of his about it, and suddenly we were a good size business. It was also lucky on our part that you helped the corporation. What was really lucky was that Naomi was such a marketing maven. The suits made a huge error when they canned her."

"Not really, it wasn't fun anymore, I was in way over my head and we were losing control of the product anyway. We were just a bunch of college kids who started out with a kitten and are suddenly dealing with a tiger."

"Ok, first up is the IRS. We had a long hard battle with them over this, but we prevailed in court. The sale was capital gains at 28% rather than ordinary income at 35%. A difference of about four million. Here is the judge's order, sign there, there, and there. We can just file your acknowledgment this afternoon. Usually, they want the paperwork done the same day, but the judge was understanding about you finishing up your finals for your degree. Do you want to hear all the gory details? No, didn't think so. That means your tax returns for 1997,1998 & 1999 are, as far as the capital gains issue is concerned, exactly as you filed them. Agent Alucard still had issues with depreciation and a few other issues, but since he lost on the capital gains issue, and we were pretty sure we would prevail on this too, he agreed to split the difference on 1999, and we have a clean audit for 97 and 98. Alucard wanted to go back to 96, but since your income was less than 15,000 that year and most of it came from Burger Barn, I think his boss slapped him down. There is also the value of the no-compete clause, and amortization on that. If you look at your billing records, that is about 70 hours of meetings with Alucard. Anyway, Alucard has signed off on all returns from 96 to 99, so you just need to sign off on them too, and we can file that. That finishes the IRS matters. Sign here, here here, and here, for each year. Don't forget to date them too. "

" Ok next is the paternity cases. There were six of them. We did DNA on all of them. They have been tossed out. Did you even meet the Robinson girl? In three of the cases, we got summary judgments of abuse of process. And in one of them, the lawyer is up before the Bar Association. Anyway, just sign here and there on each form, and don't forget to date them."

" Next is the SEC. It is a good thing we did the sale through this office, and that the sale happened after you were dismissed from the board. There is a lot of precedent and case law on the whole issue. It happens to lots of folks, but it is rare that the stock tanks so precipitously after a board change. We showed the SEC that the stock price went up after you and the others left, so you weren't selling into the downtick. We were also able to show that the sale wasn't related to any non-public information. The firing made the Wall Street Journal front page of the third section. We also got all the suits brought here and made into a class action, and the judge dismissed everything that concerns you and the other founding members of the corporation. As far as the rest of the board, there are other issues and the case lives on, but it no longer involves you. So here is the SEC judgment, sign and date there. And here is the judge's order consolidating the cases. This is just for your records. This is your dismissal notice on the inside information issue. Sign and date there and there."

" As the SEC matter involved criminal charges being filed, and bail being posted, the dismissal of the charges means that bail is exonerated. Here is the check for that. When you post bail, the court charges a fee for the privilege. That is why it is so light."

"There are a bunch of lawsuits that name you as a defendant after you left the board. There are a total of twenty-five over the course of the year, and there probably will be more next year, but we usually deal with them as they come up."

"There are also 10 strike suits out there. These are harder to push since Congress passed some tort reforms, but they still come up. We got dismissals on all but two of them, and I don't think they have a snowball's chance. We asked for settlement terms as you asked, but they are still ridiculous. You can sign off on them and get ten more of them, or fight them off and beat them down. I think if we go toward trial, they will make a better offer, and we may get them dismissed too. The lawyers for both of these cases are somewhat notorious for leaving their clients high and dry during settlements. They just want costs. These are the kind of vultures that give the bar a bad name, so even though going to a jury is risky, especially in that jurisdiction, settling with them is riskier yet."

"Now there is the EEOC matter. This is the hardest one to deal with, but I think we got a good settlement on it. The board settled out of court, but there is still the matter of you being the person in charge of hiring for Medisource. That means you are personally liable for the decisions you made that fall afoul of EEOC regulations, and because Medisource was a vendor for the state and several colleges, you have some explaining to do on that. Since you seem to have done most of the initial hiring out of the local SCA chapters, and there is a scarcity of minorities in the SCA in the area, the EEOC argued that you were being deliberately discriminatory in an illegal way. We pointed out that the SCA is in compliance with EEOC rules, and that you are perfectly within your rights to use them as a hiring hall if you wish, they didn't see it that way. We managed to win quite a few judgments, and they seem to see that they have only a very small chance of winning a judgment, so they have sent us an offer for a consent decree. Essentially, you are saying you didn't violate the law in the first place, and you won't violate it in the future, but if you do get in trouble again, you will have contempt slapped on in addition to whatever else happens. They also wanted a small fine, which is about 20% of what it would cost to defend against the case. The consent decree also gives you a safe harbor against suits from third parties, so it makes it a good deal. If you want to settle the EEOC case, sign and date here, here, here, and here."

" As to the strike suits, I have the settlement offers here if you want to sign off on them. I recommend against it. Good, We will just continue on with those."

"Now if you give me your driver's license, I can just notarize all these signatures."

Mark passed over the driver's license card and looked at the stack of files. "I think if Naomi came to me today and asked me to help her out with the office computer today, I would probably tell her to jump in a convenient lake. "

"Come on Mark, you had a lot of fun at the start. And after taxes and fees and all the rest of it, you personally have $45 million dollars and you aren't 23 yet. The rest of the group split about $30 million between them. Not bad at all."

"Even though I have to admit we need the suits, it bugs me that they pulled the thing out from under me like that. "

"I need you to sign all these lines here now. And you need to fill in your name and address in all these lines as well. No ditto marks. The problem with Naomi must be especially galling. "

"I don't like it, but I can understand it. She felt I was condescending to her all the time, even though she was producing most of the business for us. I still think she hasn't a clue what we did, but she was the only one of us who could explain it to anybody.

"I remember you trying to explain it to me, and I thought you were talking Martian or something."

"Of course, the big blow-up was over making the application open source and totally portable"

"Well, essentially it means that anybody can look at the code and modify it and upgrade their own system. She thought that we should keep all that stuff proprietary, but I knew from the beginning I wasn't going to do this forever. It is better for the customer that they didn't have to depend on us to do the upgrades. She convinced the suits, but I still think changing to closed source was a bad move. 95% of what we sold was upgraded from open source. Open source means faster bug fixes and fewer bugs. You can't hire enough testers to make bulletproof code. With open source, you get them for free. No longer my problem anymore. Hers either. I think she also has the idea that I pushed her out."

"Ok, last set of signatures down along here. Also, write your name and address here again. No dittos. Do you have any further projects?

"I was thinking of buying some real estate in Europe. A sort of fixer-up castle I saw advertised in this magazine"

"Sort of. I have been thinking of moving out of state for quite a while. My brother likes working with my dad, and I didn't get along with him ever, so my brother is probably going to get the business. And there is the problem any time I meet a girl these days, and she finds out who I am, she immediately wants to sleep with my bank account. Makes it kind of hard to meet someone if you are always suspicious of everyone."

"Let me say, professionally, that this is a very bad idea. Personally, as your cousin, it sounds kind of fun. I am pretty sure what with all your SCA friends, owning a castle sounds like a cool idea."

"Well, cousin, if I actually buy the place, You and all my SCA pals have an open invitation. As my lawyer, can you look into this, check the bona fides, and if it is for real make an offer for 20% off the asking price? It says here it comes with a 500-hectare forest preserve, a 50-hectare water meadow, whatever that means, the total estate is 2000 hectares. If a hectare is the same as an acre, this is kind of steep, I think. But land must be a great deal more expensive in Europe."

You still have to hang around for depositions on those two strike suits, but I think buying land in Europe is even more of a problem than it is here, so the actual closing might not be for four months at the earliest. And two months of that is just the due diligence of checking out the offer. So you should have no problem being done with everything by then. You going to tell anyone else about this?"

"I don't see why I should. I have told most everyone I was planning on moving as soon as I got my degree. No one expects me to get a job just yet. I was thinking of flying over to Italy anyway, and this place is close by there. I might just check it out."

Malina looked out the window at the drawbridge to the castle. The drawbridge was over a 8-meter deep gorge and the small stream that flowed down the gorge made a comforting hush from way down below. The drawbridge was also in very bad repair. Several of the planks were rotten and the chains were red with rust. The windows in her apartment were over the gate to the drawbridge and were relatively small on the street side, but 3 meters long on the bridge side. The German soldiers who had manned the gatehouse had left some amazing drawings on the wall. Her father had provided some whitewash and now the apartment was quite different than the dusty smelly hovel that had greeted her two weeks ago. She had brought some curtains from home, and several hard days of scrubbing had made the windows shine and gave the floors a soft glow. The apartment now had a gas stove, but there were quite a few drawbacks even yet. Water had to be brought up from the well in the square, and the toilet was a garderobe over the gorge, which made her nervous the first several times she had used it. The gorge was full of bushes with berries on them, and there were birds flittering back and forth along the gorge. She had spent the morning weeding her garden and gathering up the first vegetables of the season. Like everyone else, she had put in potatoes, carrots, celery, and onions. With that, you had soup. There were ducks floating around the pond, but she had no idea how one harvested the eggs. She had four chickens to tend to every day as well. She had also planted peppers, tomatoes, and radishes. She ruefully reflected that the garden was a large part of her salary, but classes would have to be short in the fall and spring if she were to be able to take advantage of this perk. It was nice to have a garden after her four years in the city though. There had been no gardens available at the college. She just wished she could have planted more flowers.

She moved across the apartment. It was one long room with her bed in a curtained area near the door, with the tiled kitchen on the opposite end. She had a barrel of water next to the stove. It was about half empty. She had time, she might as well fill it. She gathered up her buckets on the yoke and headed down the stairs.

The bottom of the stairs opened up in front of the great barred gate. There was a tourist standing in front of the gate with a book in his hand. Since it was late afternoon, the street was deserted, except for the tourist, who looked confused. He was long and thin and had a large pack on his back and he was seated on an expensive bike. He saw her coming out of the gatehouse. "ze -drab oh. Ge djah to ohlje et? " He looked at her with a worried expression.

She was confused for a moment. This was nothing like Croatian. Then she Figured out what he was trying to say. She replied in English "By you have English?"

"It upstairs. Follow " She paused a moment to pluck some leaves off a nearby fig tree and then she went back upstairs, leaving her buckets at the foot of the stairs.

At the top of the stairs she pointed to the curtained area that enclosed the garderobe. He said "Thank you!" and quickly went to the curtain. He pulled back the curtain and looked into the area behind. "Fuck!!" he said. He looked around. "Any toilet paper?" She handed him the fig leaves. He looked at them uncomprehendingly. He sighed and pulled the curtain back.

Malina walked down the stairs and picked up the buckets and when to the well in front of the guardhouse. After she had filled the buckets she put them on the yoke and carried them upstairs. The tourist was looking lost again. She dropped the buckets and filled a basin and put it on the table. She got soap and a towel and handed them to him. He got the message and he washed his hands in cold water. Meanwhile, she poured the buckets into the water barrel.

He wandered over to the big window. He looked at the large castle, more a fort, across the moat. He turned to her "Can you give me a short tour of the castle?"

She said, "I Will have to ask my father." She saw his expression. "By him the keys." They went down the stairs and walked to the new part of town. They went into an administration building and walked up two flights of stairs and down the hall to the grandest-looking office in the building. She spoke quickly to the secretary and told him "Wait."

In her father's office she saw Rinokin, the director of the city market. They both looked glum.

She said "We have a real live tourist. He wants to see the castle. What should I tell him?"

Her father said "He is no use to us. Tell him to see the castle is $137" He turned to Rinokin said "The Bosnians are refusing any trade until we give them that much for the last load of paper products. So trivial a sum until you don't have it."

Rinokin agreed. "They won't let anyone in with their vegetables for the market in the next village. We don't have any cash to pay them. Except Croatian Kuna, and they won't accept those"

She walked out and told the tourist "To see castle $150. It very dangerous. You must sign paper for UN saying you know danger"

"This is highway robbery" he complained as he reached for his wallet. He took out seven $20 bills and two fives and counted them to show her.

She went back into the office and fanned the money on the desk. "Quick! The keys to the castle!"

Lt Colonel McCrumb ticked off another item on the UN's list on the agenda for new personnel here on the Bosnian border. The last one was the one he hated.

"Now listen up on this last one. The life you save by paying attention will be your own. LEAVE THE CHILDREN ALONE. I know none of you are inclined that way... " "Yeah, right," he thought. "That is why at least four of this lot were looking forward to that." He continued "But I must inform you that the locals around here are extremely protective. We can not do anything about it if they decide that you are doing anything to harm them."

"The locals around here were not into shooting each other. We mostly kept the bad guys from other areas coming in and causing problems, like the group from Sarajevo who blew the bridge. We didn't stop them in time. The Croats around here are mad about that as well. They blame the UN for that. "

"We do not cross into Croatia here. Not since the disappearance of Andrew Kinderfriend. Someone, no one knows for sure it was Kinderfriend, who raped and murdered three girls, ages 9, 14, and 12. The Croats around here are sure it was Kinderfriend. After his disappearance, the killings stopped. The Croats demanded we leave. If they find one of you, they will strip you naked, bind you with barbed wire and leave you on the Bosnian side of the border fence. You have been warned"

He paused for a moment. "If the Bosnians suspect you of interfering with the children, male or female, they will geld you and leave you bound with rope in the motor pool with a sign on you saying 'OUT'"

Remember the punishment for the unauthorized use of a firearm on the Bosnian side of the border. We don't want to be the weakest party in a three-way war. The punishment I mete out will be severe.

On the Croatian side of the border you will die for that. They will not give us the body.

"The UN is trying to keep the peace here, and they will not come to your aid if it is suspected you are interfering with the children. Neither side trusts us because of the misbehavior of a few UN personnel. Both sides will cooperate when their children are involved."

He organized his papers waiting for the question that always got asked. From the back, it came "What happened to Kinderfiend?"

He put the papers in his briefcase and said "No one knows for sure, the Croats aren't talking. But, rumor has it that he was fed to the pigs on the Cooperative farm. While alive." With that, he walked out.

Malina stood in front of the gate to the bridge over the moat. She ticked off the points again. "One, you will not wander, two, I tell you something is dangerous, I mean it. Three stay away from the western wall, four do not go to the edge when we go to the boat landing, and five walk on the wall side of the stars. You understand? I am not going to go after you if you get in trouble."

She opened the gate a little bit and walked in, with him following. She closed and locked the gate behind them. Then they walked across the gorge on a bridge being careful to avoid the rotten parts.

He admired the architecture of the castle. It had some Italian touches, and some German features as well. He commented on that.

"This very old castle." She said. "It originally built by the Venetians when they built the bridge. When the Austrians took over they made some repairs and additions, like the tower atop Zub Dracona. The Austrians repaired the bridge as well"

She nodded. "UN worker named Kinderfriend liked little boys and girls. He rapes some, murders others. Someone make him disappear. UN blames Croatians. His father big noise in Washington, Senator, he pushes UN to punish us for killing son. UN blows up bridge."

"Wrong side of blanket he is born on. You know him if you follow news from here"

She nodded. "Here is main, I don't know the word in English, zaltita. Shops for people like armorers and arrow makers on ground floor. On northern side is path to gorge and at base of gorge is a small pier for small boats that would go to Adriatic.

"Half a sec first. I want to measure something." He took out a laser measurer and a small notebook. He walked to the entryway and measured east to west, then he walked to the path on the northern side and took the measure north to south. He noted the distances in the notebook.

"I am measuring distances with my laser measure. It is 44' 7 1/2" that way, 32' 4 3/4" that way. See?" He showed her the display. "It is so much more accurate and a lot easier to carry than a tape measure. " Next he dug in his knapsack and dug out his Croatian dictionary. "What did you call this?"

He looked over her shoulder. "Ward. Hmmn. Not a word I know in this context." He wrote in his notebook 'Main Ward'

"Not meters, feet. You want it in metric?" He pushed a few buttons. "North to south 13.6 meters... East to west, 9.82 meters." he looked around. "What is that structure in the corner over there?"

"That was water store. The spring is up there. In former times water from spring went into pipes which went into there. Store does not work anymore. The spring went a different way."

"Yes! limestone pipes went from there to the kitchen and even went to latrines."

"Let's go to the inner ward then, but first, what did you call the wall in front?"

"Here." She walked to the corner at the base of the barracks and walked up a step and turned right. "In former times they always put stairs this way so that the attacker's right hand is made useless for sword fighting with wall right here. Up steps. "

They went up a set of stairs, then turned left. "You notice the is no wall here. Always kept right hand free." They came to another large, tall gate. And another locked door, for which she had the key.

They went through the gate into a smaller space. "Inner vard. Here is where the officers lived, the kitchen, and the main dining hall."

He got out the laser measure. "Let's see, 12' 6", or for you metric people 3.81 meters by hmm 14' 9" or for you metric people 4.5 meters. "

Greetings from Venice. I just got back this morning from Kostomost. It was an amazing trip. There was a huge problem getting there, as you have to cross into Bosnia to reach the place, and the border guards and the UN staff are very surly.

There used to be a direct road in, but the bridge is out. The castle if you recall when I showed the ad to you is Zub Dracona, is at the north end of the town, and it rests between two gorges. The town is across the smaller gorge from the castle, and you can see a small drawbridge leading from the town to the castle from the other side of the larger gorge. There is a small stream that goes to the Adriatic, and there is a pier at the base of the cliff from the castle.

When you come in from the south, you see the castle resting on a small cliff. The castle seems to rest on a hill that rises up from the town. There are lots of farms on a large plain on the south side. To the east is a large forest. The border runs through it. The town seems to have moved south, as most of the buildings in the older part of town seem abandoned, while new apartment blocks between the mine and the school are where people live now.

The Bosnian guards have ridiculous rules on what the tourist can bring in, and they don't permit anything that might be considered "freight." This means that the people who live in the town to live kind of rough

It is a very quiet town now. People were out in the fields a lot. I got a tour from one of the few people living in the old part of town. She is the new schoolteacher and she is living in the gatehouse to the castle.

I think this would be a good place to camp out during the summer months. I haven't got any job offers, and the castle looks like something I can have fun with for a couple of years. So I think we can make an offer of about 40% of what they are asking, plus I want all the vacant buildings in the town, the forest, and the water meadows below the town to the Adriatic. If they are willing to give me the lands tax-free offer 60%, but you can negotiate up to 75% if they are willing to do the tax-free part. I think they will jump at any offer. I am mostly interested because of the forest on offer. However, it is not for the lumber I am interested in. First, because any forest harvesting requires approval from bureaucrats from Zagreb, and second because it is a minefield that no one knows where the mines are. I just like the idea of pointing to my demesne and saying "My Forest." It would probably be fatal to harvest a twig from there.

I will send a pictures and list of things I was shown. The dicey stairs, the bridge in need of repair, etc. I am thinking this would be a cool project. Call Art and Fred and see if they are in for some reconstruction. I know Art is not liking his job, and he likes doing fix-ups anyway.

The castle is not one of those romantic Walt Disney kinds of palaces. It is very much a fortified place where the local lord lived. I will send pictures. They had the impression that some crazy American would be willing to buy it if they pushed the romance part. There is nothing romantic about it.

Mayor Kharobochok stood at the copier watching the sorted copies of the extraordinary proposal went into the chutes. He was praying that he had enough toner. The members of the Civic Committee came in at top speed. When the last member of the committee sat down and the last faint copy of the proposal came out of the copier Mayor Kharobochok began passing them out.

He began speaking as he sat down. "I have this proposal that came to my fax machine an hour ago, It is not what we wanted, in some instances it is better, it is worse. It doesn't give us much more than 60% of our asking price, but it is a proposal in due form. and it is the only nibble of interest yet. It is from Slatkoça (sweetness), a corporation out of Zagreb, but the proposal makes clear it is from an American corporation. The fact it is a Zagreb corporation means that it is ready to do some work on the castle immediately. They specify that it is not a protected heritage site. And that all the properties it is going to insist that all permits will be granted at the village level, without question. They also want the bridge site from 10 meters on either side of the centerline and 30 meters from the center of the gorge. They want the water meadows along the Adriatic and the forest from behind the castle to the border. It specifies that any mine clearance, when approved by Skopje, would take place on their schedule. They want so much from us. I am inclined to reject it out of hand. But it is an awful lot of money. "

"Let's not be too hasty." Mostich was glancing through the pages. "We need it badly. The Bosnians are being assholes again as usual. True, most of the money will go to them. But we need so much that has to come from across the border."

"We need Schoolbooks. We need oil to make our schools in winter." Tyumenova took off her glasses. "Our children aren't going to learn much with their teeth chattering."

"Coal is expensive. " Rasvetovich said explosively. "we are going to have to run the electrical plant for only certain hours each day soon. And come the weather in October...."

"Can we negotiate with them? I know the Americans don't want to negotiate that much...." Rinokin looked hopeful

Mayor Kharobochok ruefully directed attention to this clause on the last page. "We have until 17:00 hours Friday Chicago USA time to make up our minds. After that...."

"I say no!" Arkakyovna was indignant. "They want to dredge in the water meadows and just dump the spoil in any old place. The families who died in the war were dumped somewhere, no one knows where in the water meadows. We should let them rest in peace."

"They just want a strait channel from the Adriatic to the castle's pier. Just say not to do any digging next to the cliff near where the police station was. And explain why." Stukholov said reasonably.

"They do know about the mines?" Razpetrov pointed out "Neither side provided accurate maps. to the extent they provide maps at all. We should put in a disclaimer about more than just the forest. They are all over.".

"And the coal delivery! This says here they get free electricity for five months after the delivery of forty tons of coal. They must think the electrical plant is on the south side of the gorge. We would be in a real fix if that were the case. Fortunately, we can get coal deliveries to the electrical plant without going through Bosnia. "

Tyumenova said, "Getting the oil for the school's furnace is enough of a problem."

Razpetrov agreed. "And the electrical plant workers all live in houses on that side of the gorge. Other people live in the houses over there. Not all the houses are vacant like they suppose. I live over there too. And you all know how much I enjoy going through the checkpoints every Friday.

"We have until midnight Friday to accept. If my understanding of where the time zones are is accurate. " Mayor Kharobochok shook his head. "Do we really want to do this? I call for a vote. All those in favor. Six yes votes. Oh well. We will create our basic minimum counter proposal and meet her at 22:30 Friday hours to vote on whether to send it in or not. I think after you have read it closely, you will all vote no."

Mayor Kharobochok sighed heavily. He looked at the clock. 9:30 on Friday. Almost time for the civic committee to meet. He didn't know how to explain the latest news from the Bosnians across the border. They were making the tolls payable only in Bosnian Marks. He would have to change his mind and agree to the American's demands. The members of the committee came in with angry faces. The rumor had got around.

They were all around the table. early. Mrs. Cenovnika was still putting the carafes of wine and dates on the table. He looked around. He decided to start early. "You have heard what they did at the border this morning? I don't have enough Bosnian Marks to go to the bank there and get some more. We will have to pool our resources. Their inflation rate makes getting too many of them at a time, But what can we do? Does anyone have enough marks to go over to the bank and get some more? How ate are we going to pass them out? We are going to have to ration them somehow. "

Rinokin slammed the table. "You know why we are all here. We all want to take the American's offer!..... with a few cosmetic changes."

Rinokin said "Arkakyovna, typed them up. He passed the four pages of proposed changes."

Rinokin shook his head. "They are rational people. We didn't couch them as demands. Just clarifications. We asked that since they didn't specify the orchards in our original offer, do they want them, or do they remain common property as always? That some people still live in the houses across the gorge, would they have to move out,? That was a real bone of contention. We asked to make sure they don't go digging in that part of the water meadows. We made sure that he understood about the mines. And that the electrical plant is on that side of the gorge, and the houses of the electrical plant workers living over there.That kind of thing. "

Mayor Kharobochok stood up. "So we are all agreed that we should agree to the offer with the stipulations?" They all raised their hands. "Very well. " he looked at the papers and saw they were all in order. Then he walked to the fax machine. ."It may take several tries. International phone calls are always problematic." He put the papers in the machine and dialed the number. It went through on the first time, the squeaks and squawks of a fax connection assaulting everyone's ears. The papers went through the machine slowly until they were all done.

Nalevni shook his head. "Not for hours. It is just midnight in Chicago What kind of office is it? The first people to see it could be from 6:30 to 900 tonight. They would need to talk it over like we did. I propose we meet here at 11:00 tomorrow morning. They might have an answer by then. And perhaps not. ".

shook his head. "We have done what we could. It is up to them now. Now, what are we going to do about the tolls?"

Mark finished his morning run and headed for the shower. It was a fast one. The water supply to the trailer was very small. He went back out and read his Croatian grammar. He shook his head. This would be a real problem

He wandered into the bedroom and saw a blinking lite on his answering machine. He sighed. That woman had discovered his phone number here. He hoped she wouldn't discover his trailer. Oh well....

The voice on the answering machine was his cousin Ethan's "I got a fax on my machine this morning. They sent a reply at 11:30 last night. I forwarded their response to Professor Stavitichik and he sent the translation. They agree in principle. They have quite a few stipulations. But nothing that will derail the sale, I believe. Call me."

He smiled and listened to the other message. Her again. The sooner he got to Croatia, the better. Her dulcet tones were like those of a cat sitting outside a mouse hole.

"In principle, yes. " Here Ethan into got his legal minutiae mode. "They seem to be unclear on what you want of the village north of the gorge. You only want 1,400 meters north of the gorge. That gets all the old houses. The new stuff is all beyond that. They thought you wanted everything. They stipulated that you couldn't have the electric plant. Or the waterworks. Both of which are 2km north of the gorge. They said you couldn't have the water meadow nine meters from the old police station, they mentioned that the police station was 25 meters from the gorge. Some people were killed and the bodies were dumped there during the war. European history always has blood all over it. Most of the stipulations you can agree to, are no problem. They want to make sure that you aren't asking for the common orchards."

Mark looked at the aerial photo of the town on the wall. "Asking for the orchards would be too much. And I preferred the old town anyway. There is no one living there, so I thought there would be no problem. I will send them an ariel photograph showing what I want. That will lessen the confusion. I will send you them and the lawyer in Zagreb a copy of the photo."

"It doesn't have to be high quality for this kind of thing. Why don't you get with Professor Stavitichik and have him tell them we agree with the stipulations in principle, but the lawyers send him our basic agreement, subject to all the minutiae? Make it clear that this is not our acceptance. This is just having a basic agreement. The real one will come from our man in Zagreb. Ask permission for sending a survey team. Tell them we want permission to use the castle as a base. "

Ethan sounded alarmed. "I don't think you should go into the castle yet. It sounds dangerous. The gatehouse where the English teacher lives... She is on the second floor isn't she?"

"Yes, there are rooms on the first floor, but they are small. The gate is pretty big and takes up most of the space. Can you come up with a paper that says they know what they are getting into in general, and across the drawbridge in particular?"

Ethan chuckled. "That will be pie. But make sure that they sign the forms before they get to the airport."

"Of course. I have learned that lesson the hard way. I think we will have a team ready to go by Tuesday. Have someone from your office deal with the paperwork, please. I want to get a plane to Venice tonight."

Ethan sounded cautious. "This could still fall through. Any particular reason for going to Venice ?"

"I knew who she was from the get-go, She is a shark. I paid cash every time I met with her. She kept wanting me to go to hotels with her every time we met. I stayed clear. "

Mark growled. "She said she was sounding me out about taking Medisourse out of bankruptcy. It turned out she didn't know the first thing about my concern, the small unsecured creditors. I doubt she is even a lawyer. After our second meeting, I dropped her. But she kept after me. "

"Live and learn. OK, send me the picture. I will forward it to our attorney in Zagreb. Along with the updated proposal. He should have it first thing Monday. When they will get it depends on how complicated the final proposal needs to be for the people in Skopje. I will get with the professor and have him acknowledging your interest. And to get the approval of the survey teams. Call me Monday."

Mark smiled. This looked like a fun project. And he will be a landowner with his own castle. Sweet. He looked at the fax machine. The engineering report from the Italians in Venice. He could look at that on the plane. It wouldn't be comprehensive, but it would would give him a starting point.

Malina arrived at her parent's house for Saturday supper. She greeted her four brothers and gave her mom a kiss. She put on an apron and helped with the supper.

Supper was uproarious with her brothers trying to show off the English they had learned from her tapes that had been smuggled in before the revolution. "You shouldn't use words like that!" she said over and over.

After supper she relaxed with her father and a glass of wine. Her brothers were doing the cleaning up, under the watchful eye of their mom.

Her father sighed and said "I didn't want to advertise the castle in the first place. We got a semi-firm offer from this American corporation. They plan on doing some construction. While the lawyers quibble on the final terms, they want to send a survey team. They asked for someone who speaks English to meet with them when they arrive Thursday. That will be you."

"Not unless the sale goes through. But the committee will come up with something then."

Her father grabbed a folder from the desk and gave her the Ariel photo. "This map shows what they want. All the water meadow. The whole of the old town that is across the river. The castle and the woods behind it. They know about the mines and they have no problem with them. They didn't want the orchard, so that sort of explains why they were willing to pay so little."

He spread his hand in resignation. "They didn't tell us. They will be in the old town too. But they don't need an interpreter. There is no one there."

Malina sat next to a tree reading a simple book in English. She was wishing she had done better in pronunciation drills. English had all these impossible noises. The 'th' sound especially. But the 'w' gave her fits too. She burned with embarrassment when remembering the tourist last month. He was always giving her blank stares. And all the strange terms for the castle. She looked at her watch. Almost 4:30. She had been here most of the day.

The Bosnian border guards came to attention. She stood up. There was a convoy of trucks and vans. That couldn't be them. She sat down again. Out of the last two vans, a colonel of the Bosnian police came out and began dressing down the guards. This might be interesting.

A bunch of Americans and Italians came out of the rest of the vans and trucks. They milled around on the Bosnian side of the border. She listened to the colonel. He was giving the guards a lecture. It seemed the guards were ripping off people crossing the border. That was hardly news. But the fact the colonel instead of demanding his cut was relieving them of duty and replacing them. Wait till she told her father about this.

One of the Americans recognized her. It was the tourist from last month. How embarrassing. She went up to the Americans and said "I am Malina Kharobochka. I will be your guide while you are here."

The tourist said "I am Mark Howe! This is Nancy Watson, my second in command here, and this is Thomas Wilkins. Fred Barns, Margaret Thatcher....no relation, Cedrick Jones, Annabelle Wilson, Steven Adams, and Ely Parker. Over there we have Gusseppi Romano and his wife. They are from the engineers from Venice. Why don't you get in the first van with me and we can get settled for tonight? We have had a most ..... interesting journey. "

Her father came by her apartment late that evening. She had seen him from her window and came down to visit with him. He pointed at the castle. "What have they been doing."

She shook her head. "I am not sure. It started out with them shouting at the crew across the gorge. They had Theodolites and measured all over where the bridge used to be. I used to see the engineering students measuring all around campus. I don't know what they were doing today either, They were being so careful of the measurements. They did that for most of the morning, moving the sticks and the theodolites around. They had to have the boxes put just so. And the Italian gentleman was taking rocks from the ruins of the bridge. He was also measuring the depth of the stream at the bottom. He was very happy that the stream had 2 1/2 meters of water and the stream was three meters wide. "

" By the way.....they are paying me! Mr. Howe asked how long I had been waiting yesterday. I told him two hours. Then he paid me right on the nail. 1,770 kuna. He said that he rounded up my wages. He was paying me for five hours yesterday and nine hours today. He said he would pay me at the rate of $20 an hour. I gathered that this wasn't very much, several members of the crew looked askance at that. But they kept quiet."

She shook her head. "I feel I am getting paid for false pretenses. They gabble so fast! I can't keep up with them. I was one of the better students at the institute, but I can't keep up. And their vocabulary is so strange. I am pretty sure I could understand it, but they didn't teach us English math. I know English, I know math... but the combination done at incredibly rapid speed.... "

Mayor Kharobochok came up the stairs to Milena's apartment. She greeted him with kisses and led him to the comfortable chair. She gave him a glass of wine. and told him what they were doing. " They were measuring down in the water meadow today. Mr. Howe showed me how the Theodolite works. He was very proud of it. They have four of them between the two crews. He said they cost $3,500 each. That is a year's wages! for every one of them."

" They put stakes in the ground between the place where the old bridge was and the coast. They didn't like the marshy conditions, but they came prepared. They had misquito repellent too. They had chest-high rubber pants. They had one pair for me too." She looked daggers at her father. "I had a miserable time. We had to watch out for places where the channel was. And the marsh was muddy all over." She looked amazed "Did you know there was a Roman sea wall out there? Way back in Roman times they seem to have built a wall from north to south. ."

Her father nodded. "There are the remains of a Roman village down where the cliff gives way to a gentle slope. The misquotes are so ferocious out there. There is some great farmland. But no one goes near it. The Romans were hardy folks living with mosquitoes. Do you remember I told you not to go there? "

He shrugged. "The Roman village is part of his land now. He is measuring everything, he will find out about it sooner or later. He might actually be interested in it."

"They are putting stakes in the water meadow. I think they are planning to take down the Roman wall."

He shrugged. "We didn't know it was there. If they take it down it won't be much damage to 'our national heritage.' Especially since the wall is Roman as you say. Why are they going to do it?"

"I think that they hope to take barges from Venice or somewhere and bring construction materials down that way. They think the stream can be four meters deep and five meters wide from the wall to the castle. "

He looked up excitedly. "What kind of bridge are they going to build? An iron one? How much weight can it hold?"

She shook her head. "I don't feel that would be a good idea.You would get a bridge of some kind. We can't be choosy."

"My father is concerned about the strength of your bridge. How are you going to have it strong enough to support traffic"

"We intend to have the piers be 18" wide. and we are going to have the arch ring be 20" and the span be 12'. And we are going to have a concrete deck with lots of rebar. To guess the strength we can use a simple formula... " He looked through his papers "....(The square root of ( ½ arch span + the arch’s radius))/ 4 + .2..... No, that is how we figured how the optimum size of the ring should be. I will find it easily. I think. But the bridge will be more than strong enough for your ordinary needs."

Mark put a picture of the gorge from the roadway. "Here is where the old bridge was. From side to side, it is 19', 7 2/4 " inches. I want the new road to be 20 feet. "

Adams said "It is better to keep to the smaller dimension. One of the very best ways of traffic calming is to keep the roadways narrow. I would suggest putting the lights every 6', and next to the roadway, and putting the sidewalks on the outside of the lights. You want to keep the traffic at less than 30 mph. Preferably 20 would be better. The roadway makes a sharp turn after a bit. "

The other engineers all agreed. Tom said "I think we can set cobblestones in the bridge deck to slow traffic. "

Mark explained "The houses are very close to the road here. And as Adams said, there is a sharp turn just across the bridge. I think 30mph would be kind of fast. So I think setting cobblestones in the bridge deck would be a good idea. 30mph is almost 50 kilometers per hour. We want people going a lot slower than that."

Mark sighed. "Some things I have to remember. " He put another photo on the overhead. "This is the old police station. As you see, It is a relatively modern building, ad it uses the modern brutalist kind of architecture. so it doesn't fit with the rest of the buildings. I propose we just take it down and put a small garden in there. We would also put a historical plack there. " He changed pictures again. "This is the bridge location from the other side". He changed the pictures again. "This is an old bridge that is in China. I want the new bridge to take as many design elements as possible. I like the other arches within the main arch. And there should be an arched roadway. It should look like an ancient bridge, even though we are going to have as many safety features as we can."

Malina smiled "Officially we don't know about it. We don't know why they built it."

Margaret said "There should be a large Roman town down at the far end of the water meadows where the cliff gives way to a gentle slope. There must have been a bay here at one time. I think what happened was the Romans built a sea wall that blocked the river here, which slowed the water down and silted up the bay over the 2000 years. The bay should have been totally silted up after 700 years. The river has been trying to get past the wall since then. But the marsh has been building up over the years." Do you know my boyfriend Eric? He is studying archeology. He would love to dig up a real Roman town.

Mark said "I think the first order of business will be to breach the Roman wall and dig a canal from the castle to Adriatic. We can begin repairing the castle quickly after that. The first repairs to the castle will be to the drawbridge. It would be better if we could move lumber from the north. The road is so twisty. We are going to have to negotiate with crane operators in Skopje. I think we would have to bring the crane by barge. We will have to bring in everything by barge."

Margaret asked "What needs to come in first? And how are you going to handle the spoil? How long will it take for the dredge to get up to the bridge> "

Nancy laughed "Woha! They haven't signed yet. " She looked at Malina. "What does your father think."

Malima shrugged "He will be disappointed that the bridge will be so small. He badly wanted four lanes. But he is ecstatic that you are thinking of rebuilding it. Tyumenova and Rapetrov are enthusiastic, the rest less so. Father thinks you are too greedy and you want too much of the village.".

Mark looked surprised. "Most of the land I am asking for is unusable. The forest is heavily mined I understand. "

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