Unconventional Warfare

The gendarme ignored the displayed satchel, his eyes never leaving Bagdasarian’s face. His hair was tightly cropped and Bagdasarian could see bullets of sweat beading on the man’s forehead. The smell of body odor was acrid.

“Give me the pistol.”

“Go to hell.”

The drunken gendarme’s eyes lifted in shock and his face twisted in sudden, instant outrage. He snapped straight and twisted the MAT-49 around on its sling, trying to bring the muzzle up in the cramped quarters.

Bagdasarian’s free hand shot out and grabbed the submachine gun behind its front sight. The big man locked his arm and pushed down, preventing the gendarme from raising the weapon. The gendarme’s eyeballs bulged in anger and the cords of his neck stood out as he strained to bring the submachine gun to bear.

“Leave him!” a deep bass voice barked from somewhere behind the struggling gendarme.

The man cursed and tried to step back and swing his weapon up and away from Bagdasarian’s grip. The Armenian stepped forward as the man stepped back, preventing the smaller man from bringing any leverage to bear.

An ability to call up instant explosive anger and balls like brass fixtures was the way Bagdasarian had risen to the top in the hyperviolent world of Armenian organized crime. He didn’t take shit. Even if it cost him his life.

They moved into the room through the door and Bagdasarian heard chair legs scrape against floorboards as men jumped to their feet. He ignored them, making no move for the butt of the 9 mm PPK plainly sticking out of his jeans.

The man grunted his exertion and tried to step to the outside.

Rafik Bagdasarian danced with him, keeping the gendarme’s body between him and the others in the smoky room. His grip on the front sling swivel remained unbroken. Finally the gendarme dropped his bottle and grabbed the submachine gun with both hands. The bottle thumped loudly as it struck the floor but did not break.

Liquid began to gurgle out and stain the floorboards.

“I said enough!” the voice roared.

The gendarme was already using both his hands to snatch the submachine gun free as the order came.

The Armenian released the front sling swivel and stepped to the side. The gendarme found his center of balance around the struggle abruptly gone and overextended himself. Already drunk, he toppled over backward and struck the floor in the pool of reeking alcohol spilling from his dropped bottle.

Cursing and sputtering, the man tried to rise.

Bagdasarian surveyed the room. He saw four other men in the same soiled and rumpled police uniforms, each one armed either with a pistol or a submachine gun. All of them were gaunt and lanky with short hair except for the bear of a man bearing the gold braid epaulets of an officer.

The man rose from behind a table and hurled a heavy glass tumbler at the gendarme Bagdasarian had spilled onto the floor. The glass struck the man in the face and opened a gash under his eye, high on a prominent cheekbone where Bantu tribal scars had been etched at puberty and rubbed with charcoal.

“I said leave him!”

The shock of being struck snapped the embarrassed man out of his rage. He touched a hand to the cut under his eye and held up his bloody fingers. He looked away from his hand and nodded once toward the man looming up behind the table before rising.

The officer turned toward Bagdasarian. “My apologizes,” he said. “My men worry about my safety.”

“Understandable, Colonel Kabila.” Bagdasarian nodded. “I worry about my own safety.”

“Come now, you are in the company of police officers.”

“Yes, I am,” Bagdasarian agreed.

“Foreigners are not usually permitted to carry weapons in our land.”

Bagdasarian threw the attaché case down on the table. “That should more than cover any administrative fees.”

“Is it in euros?”

“Francs,” Bagdasarian corrected.

Kabila nodded and one of the gendarmes at the table reached over and picked up the attaché case. He had a sergeant’s chevrons on his sleeve.

Bagdasarian saw there were two very young girls pressed up against the back wall of the shack. Their eyes were hard as diamonds and glittered as they took him in.

The gendarme sergeant pulled the case over and opened it. The sudden light of avarice flared in his eyes, impossible to disguise. Bagdasarian shrugged it off.

While the sergeant counted the stacks of French currency, Colonel Kabila reseated himself.

He snapped his fingers at one of the girls and she jumped to pick a fresh glass off a shelf beside her. She brought it over to the table and poured the colonel a fresh drink from an already open bottle. Bagdasarian could feel the intensity of her gaze.

Kabila regarded the Armenian through squinty, bloodshot eyes. He picked up a smoldering cigar off the table and dragged heavily from it. His men made no move to return to their seats. Kabila pulled his cigar out of his mouth and gestured with it.

“Sit down.”

Bagdasarian pulled out the chair from the end of the table opposite Kabila and eased himself into it. The two men regarded each other with coolly assessing gazes while the sergeant beside Kabila continued counting the money. Kabila lifted his new glass and splashed its contents back without changing expression.

“Shouldn’t a man like you be out selling drugs in the nightclubs?” Kabila asked.

“Shouldn’t you be out in the delta or back east, fighting?”

Kabila shrugged. “That’s what the army is for. I fight crime.”

“How’s it pay?”

“Not as well as you do, I hope.” Kabila smiled. He wasn’t smiling when he added, “For your sake.”

The gendarme sergeant looked up from counting the money secured inside the attaché case. Kabila’s eyes never left Bagdasarian. “Is it all there?” he asked.

“More.”

“More?” Kabila asked Bagdasarian.

“There’s a bonus in there. You’re going to have to travel outside the city.”

“Up river?” The colonel sounded incredulous.

“Yes.”

“I am a policeman.” Colonel Kabila smirked.

Bagdasarian followed the line of Kabila’s sight across the room to where the gendarme he had scuffled with stood glowering.

“Any way you want it, Colonel.”