The Assassins by Alan Bardos (read novel full .TXT) 📕

Breitner handed him a glass of water. Johnny spilt most of it, but enough went in to make him start to feel human again.

'I didn't go to public school. Well, not one you'd have heard of, anyway.' Johnny didn’t think there was much point in trying to explain the subtleties of the English class system and the ranking of its schools.

'That explains your rather ungentlemanly behaviour.'

Johnny knew that Breitner was right; he'd made a total arse of himself. 'This assignment's a joke. I thought if I could win the money back - now look where I am.'

Breitner smiled warmly. 'As it happens, you're in exactly the right situation to help me.'

'Help you?' Johnny almost laughed at the barefaced cheek of it.

'Yes, help me,' Breitner repeated impassively.

Johnny pointed at the bruising on his face. 'You've got a very funny way of asking for help over here.'

Breitner led Johnny out of the cell and into the medical aid room. An orderly started to clean Johnny's cuts while Breitner floated about in the background, ever the enigmatic foreigner. He turned abruptly as a young man entered the room.

‘Mihajlo Pusara, what do you want?’

‘Mr Breitner, I understood that you wanted a clerk to take notes.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Forgive me I was told…’ The young man turned and looked in horror at the state Johnny was in, Johnny took an instant dislike to him - he was far too good looking. The last thing Johnny wanted was to be reminded that he might have lost his looks, thanks to this dandy little Hungarian.

‘This is a special prisoner - no one is to know that we have him. Is that understood?’ Breitner shouted and Johnny wondered if he might have had some kind of military training.

‘Yes, sir. I won’t mention it to anyone.’

Breitner walked up to Johnny and grabbed him around the neck. ‘This boy is a troublemaker; he insulted the Governor last night.’ He slapped Johnny a stinging blow around the face. ‘I will show him how we treat troublemakers who insult their superiors. Now get out.’

Pusara looked sickened as he left. Breitner turned his attention back to Johnny. ‘I am afraid that such things are necessary.’

 Johnny grinned back belligerently; he’d had worse from his stepfather and wasn’t going to show any weakness to a man like this.

'Now you say you're here to report on the nationalist problem in the Balkans. Are you interested in how Austro-Hungary plans to combat nationalism?' Breitner asked, matter-of-factly.

Johnny shrugged and fought the urge not to whimper, as pain raced down his back.

'Franz Ferdinand plans to reform the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy when he takes the throne, creating a kind of federal state with Austria at the centre. He also plans to increase the franchise to include minorities within the Monarchy, thus reducing the power of my beloved Hungary; he thinks this will stem the rise of nationalism and stabilise the Monarchy.'

'Will that be enough to stop you going the same way as the Ottoman Empire?' Johnny asked, enjoying the chance to put a dig in.

Breitner grimaced at the comparison. 'In the West, you define a people by the borders of where they live. In the East, such boundaries do not exist; your nationality is what you feel in your heart and the blood that pumps through your veins. As I explained before, the Young Bosnians want to unite the South Slav people in some form of self-rule. The complications are endless, but the only thing you can be sure of is that they want to be free of Austria's corrupting influence.'

The orderly finished dressing Johnny's wounds and left. 'A lot of our population are loyal to the Monarchy and will welcome the reforms, but the nationalists are not going to quietly submit to Austrian rule, with a few extra rights given to them as an Imperial gift,' Breitner added.

Johnny tried to straighten himself up, but his shirt was too badly torn. The last vestiges of his identity had been ripped from him. 'It sounds as if you sympathise with them,' Johnny said.

'I understand them. I am also subject to Habsburg rule, but ultimately I believe in the stability and security the Monarchy provides, which is something the nationalists fear. They don’t want the people happy and content, as part of Austro-Hungary.'

'I need something a bit more substantial than that to tell my overlords,' Johnny said, giving up on his shirt. He was nowhere - no shirt, no money and no information worth a damn. Breitner handed him a clean, white shirt with a stiff collar and a pair of black trousers.

'Put these on and we'll have breakfast.'

*

Breitner found his office even more cramped and stuffy than usual, as he prepared coffee for his guest. He wasn't sure if this was the right course of action, but he needed to find out what was going on. It felt incredibly like the debacle that had got him sent to this place. That had started with intercepted mail and a suspicious address.

His career had been progressing nicely and when Redl moved on to continue his meteoric rise, everyone had moved up the ladder. The new chief brought in a system for checking suspicious mail, for which Breitner was responsible. It was dull but important work and it appealed to his meticulous mind.

A routine check of a suspect package found that it contained a large amount of money and two addresses known to be used by Russian agents. He had had the package resealed and returned to the post office for collection. It was thought that a mole in the army staff was passing information to the Russians and the amount of money found suggested to Breitner that the package was the first thread in uncovering the traitor.

Nothing happened for six weeks, then the package was eventually claimed by none other than Colonel