18.3 An Astronomical Twilight

Soon, they were seated around the vintage table in the corner office.

“Samvel Salazar from Armenia brought this case to my attention with your findings and photographs,” the minister began, “Macedonia is itself in question. Its name, its people, the ethnic groups and heritage, its borders. It’s in dispute. Nothing belongs to them. It’s a long story. The Greeks claim it, the Bulgarians, the Slavs and the Italians, the Albanians, the Serbs, the Byzantine Empire and later the Ottomans conquered this land forcing its people to convert to a religion unheard of. People left their homeland. Similarly, conquests in other parts of Europe drove migrants to settle here in this land which was once the Empire of Alexander the Great. I’m not a historian but I’m an architect. I ought to know something about this land where monuments were erected, pillars were built, where they laid a foundation of a civilisation and indeed, this is the most beautiful part of the world.”

Minister Ram continued, “I have spoken to the most powerful man in entire Yugoslavia, the hero of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, Lazar Koliševski, who fought in WWII and made Skopje the fastest growing city under his leadership. He wants to see that Macedon Air prosper in business. That means we cannot ditch the airline no matter your funds were misused. Our part of this investigation is over. The only question that remains is who sent you here and I am not going to ask. I called you here in response to Salazar’s request to give you an easy passage out of the Soviet Union. I believe it’s arranged!”

“It is,” confirmed Levan, “by Aeroflot heading to Akara on Saturday, 9^th April, a day later.”

“While you are here,” wished Minister Angelozzi Tetriverdzi, “take a look at these pictures and see if you can recognise these faces.”

Tyler Friesen picked the black and white photo and glanced at it, “I believe this is Jair Sivils and Alexey sitting next. I cannot tell this man on the left and the one with his back on.”

“The one on the left is Randall Gumper and the man without a face is Bodan Vanev, taken by KGB agents at Ibiza in 1964.

“The rutile ore consignment was stopped by the Blue Berets upon an order from Tbilaviamsheni as Alexey might have requested. If the Russians did it, they would have seized the aircraft and the crew. I have information that I can share with you and information I cannot part with but I’m going to give you some of these photographs that you can take home. You know, Mister Friesen, you’re more useful to us back in the States than being here. You have a lot to dig on these guys. I hope you will contact us if you find something new. If you don’t, that is perfectly alright. Unfortunately, I have none in my possession of a secret doc passed to the KGB.”

“That means I have no evidence to show,” voiced Tyler Friesen.

“Don’t worry,” cried the minister, “This one is a colour photograph of one of those two Antonov aircrafts in operation under Macedon Air in Skopje. Now they have three in the fleet…one is a Tupolev 104.”

Tyler was shocked to find its finished livery of a white body with orange and blue stripes precisely like he perceived during an out-of-body experience a year ago.

“Do you know this gentleman?” minister passed another black and white portrayal.

“A familiar face,” he was in for another surprise for that was the face of the man he saw during the astral projection wearing a Blue Shade 84 uniform of the USAF, “MAXWELL!”

Minister shook his head, “His name is Lieutenant Melville Bradely. He’s the procurement officer at the firm in Nevada, Area 51, and acting for Lockheed Corporation to obtain rutile ore. This picture was taken in Tenerife in 1961.”

“I thought the KGB said he is Maxwell!” Tyler recalled what he heard from Colonel General Yakov.

“They lied to you. They still do not know Robert D Maxwell. They tried to unearth him by planting an FBI card on Jaco Ferre. They messed it. This lieutenant keeps his usual routine, sometimes you may bump into him on Haven Street in Las Vegas. Bradley frequently flies in and out of McCarran International Airport.”

Tyler sat at a loss of words. How deep would you go on prying on people and what kind of stress it would put them in! But the KGB did it. That was why he omitted a large portion of his sleuthing from the book ‘Merkabah’ and wrote about the adventure. Tyler Friesen felt that he wasn’t responsible to solve any of these issues.

“Do you like cars?”

“I do,” uttered Tyler in dry throat.

“Let’s go to the stables and see my collection of cars. I have forty. Six American muscle cars, a Ferrari, an Aston Martin and a Harley Davidson motorbike. Western cars. Come!” he rose pushing back the chair like a kiddish fool and too eager to show his hobbyhorses.