The Slivnicas were a rare family for foresight. The plan for sinking Gottlob Wut in his bathtub was approved by the Ustashi. And the penalty of one hundred to one being carried out on Serbs for the death of a German was not unfamiliar with the Ustashi either. They'd been setting up Serbian massacres since the middle months of '41. There had been some countermassacres as well, but the Ustashi were numerically far ahead; they had a percentage proclamation just like the Germans' - one hundred Serbs for each Ustashi killed. If anything was accomplished by this, by the summer of '42, it was the feeling among Serbs that all Slovenes and Croats were Ustashi terrorists - among Slovenes and Croats, that all Serbs were hairy Chetniks. A fine muddle was made, as Bijelo Slivnica wisely foresaw, and Tito's partisans were growing stronger on the fringes of every mess. The Germans were spread out thin, from Slovenjgradec en route to Moscow, and the Italians now held the Dalmatian coast of Yugoslavia and royally supported the Ustashi.
'Wut is nicely settled,' said Bijelo Slivnica through a huge sandwich.
But my father had a bit of foresight himself.
On a Sunday morning in August, known as Wut Sunday among the Slivnicas, my father sat in the bathroom while Gottlob Wut soaked. When Zivanna Slobod went to check her oven Vratno said, 'There's a strange car across the street from us, Wut - a strange, large family on some sort of outing.'
'That so?' said Wut.
My father lifted up the flush-box lid and held it in his lap.
'Need exercise?' said Wut.
'I'm supposed to kill you,' Vratno said. 'I'm supposed to sink you under this toilet top and shoot your lady when she brings in the pastries.'
'Why's that?' said Wut.
'Oh, it's a real mess,' my father said.
'Are you a Chetnik,' Gottlob asked, 'or a partisan?'
'I'm presently employed by the Ustashi,' my father said.
'But they're on our side, now,' said Wut.
My father explained: 'They were also on the side of Guido Maggiacomo at the Grand Prix of Italy in 1930. So I imagine it's awkward for them too.'
'Oh, dear, I see,' said Wut. 'Of course, it must be very difficult for them, I'm sure.' He stood up, embarrassed in his tub; his countless, indented scars held the bath water and dripped like wounds still open.
When Zivanna Slobod came back to the bathroom, she noticed that her ritual had been upset and she dropped her pastries in Gottlob's abandoned bath. Wut himself was putting the toilet top back in place, and Vratno was getting into a Slivnica Wehrmacht uniform. Wut then uniformed himself, while the blubbering Zivanna was fishing a nut loaf out of the bath water. Surprises did not become her.
Surprises weren't very becoming to the Slivnicas, either. When Gottlob Wut, all alone, came out on Smartin Street and wandered leisurely toward the motorcycle unit's garage, Bijelo Slivnica simply must have said: sit tight. Because the carload of the whole family sat there, watching Wut and waiting for Vratno to make a dash.
They waited all the while it took Wut to start one of the 600 cc sidecar models and roll it into the open doorway, pointed out - to go. Then Wut took the carburetors out of all the remaining motorcycles in the garage, except the 1939 Grand Prix racer. Wut put all the carburetors into the waiting sidecar - along with a toolbox, points, plugs, cables, assorted engine parts, a primary and a drive chain, topographical maps of Slovenia and Croatia, and two dozen grenades; he cupped one grenade in his hand and started up his racer.
The Slivnicas were still waiting when Gottlob Wut came back up Smartin Street on the Grand Prix racer, stripped of trimmings, and they must have thought Wut was having trouble with his bike, because he was riding bent over and had one hand cupped under his gas tank - where his fuel line might have come loose. The Slivnicas watched Wut weave up the street toward them, head down and fumbling under the gas tank, and quite possibly they never saw him roll the unpinned grenade under their car.
I believe that Bijelo Slivnica and his unpleasant family were still sitting tight when the car blew up.
The noise of which brought my father bolting out on Smartin Street and up behind Wut on the racer, Gottlob turned back to the garage and established Vratno on the running, warmed-up sidecar model 600.
'Why'd you do it, Wut?' my father asked.
'For some time now,' said Gottlob Wut, I've wanted to be on the road again.'
But whatever the reason Wut gave, there was this understood: they were even. My father had not submerged Gottlob Wut, and Gottlob had not abandoned my father.
They weren't followed. Scout Outfit Balkan 4 was hard to find on Sundays, and when found, they were hard to mobilize - owing to a lack of carburetors.
When they got to Dravograd, Wut and my father heard the carefully censored news. A well-liked Ustashi family of six had been killed - sabotaged on Smartin Street, Slovenjgradec. Ustashi and German troops seized Zivanna Slobod, notorious Serbian prostitute - and the murderess responsible for this crime. In accordance with German and Ustashi proclamations, one hundred Serbs will be shot for each German or Ustashi murdered. In Slovenjgradec, Serbs were being sought to answer for the crime. Six Slivnicas equals six hundred Serbs - Zivanna Slobod and five hundred and ninety-nine others.
And in Dravograd my father was thinking: But there were seven Slivnicas. Bijelo, Todor, Gavro, Lutvo, Baba, Julka, and Dabrinka makes seven. Whichever one escaped saved the lives of one hundred Serbs, but my father, who was unconcerned with politics, wasn't comforted by that thought.
'I think it was Dabrinka who wasn't blown up,' Vratno told Wut. 'She had the least flesh to get in the way of flying stuff.'
'Doubtful,' said Wut. 'It must have been the driver. He was the only one who might possibly have seen it coming, and he had the wheel to hold on to - to keep himself from going through the roof.'