The Misogynist

One: Driving through the slate grey, damp, uninviting back-roads of north-east Bosnia, Kaylan Walsh drew similarities to his hometown some thirty years earlier on the south coast of Ireland. As his white 4x4 drew to a halt, Kaylan was unerringly aware that the assembled crowd’s gaze had shifted from the gaping scar in the earth that lay before them to him, and the double lettered emblem which he represented emblazoned on both door and roof. He stepped to the rear of the vehicle and assembled the paraphernalia of his office. White disposable jump suit, Nikon standard issue camera, Dictaphone, facemask and stonewall expression. “Levescic, local police,” a weathered, rain sodden man proclaimed, rough hand outstretched with formality rather than sincerity. “Kaylan Walsh, UNWCT,” came the reply. “I can assume that your in charge here?” “No, Mr Walsh, thankfully you are in charge now. I have secured the site as you requested but,” head turning and speech slowing, in the manner of a Russian agent in a Bond movie, “you will understand that this is a close community and the local people will no doubt be here soon in numbers, when word of this spreads.” “I understand. Thank you Officer Levescic, my team will arrive shortly and will set up an exclusion zone for purposes you will, I am sure, understand. We will take statements and carry out any identification that is possible as soon as our initial findings are recorded. I can rely on you relaying this to townsfolk for us?” The officer did not reply, turning instead on his heel and barking instructions to his henchmen who, in turn, relayed them to the small, silently respectful crowd. Kaylan, although aware that Levescic probably despised both him and the office which he represented, was grateful that this officer both spoke some English and seemed glad to be passing the hideous burden on to someone else. Kaylan was able to speak in the native tongue but not well enough in regard to the gravity of the present situation. For all the endless interviews and painstaking evidence gathering that his job entailed, this was the moment that always haunted him. The first sight of a mass grave, a glimpse into man’s depravity, the cold methodical routine in which he had to carry out his work, when the anguished wailing of the bereaved seemed the only fitting response to the situation. Alone, he approached the edge of the pit. “Ten to twelve metres long and maybe five wide,” he muttered into his palm. “Approximately fifty metres from the road, and three metres deep. First estimations would suggest that there are thirty-plus corpses. All appear to be male and all are fully dressed.” A pause. “No approximation can be made as to how long they have been here. And although there is the onset of flesh decay, skeletal material is not as yet in evidence.” The putrid stench that at first made him shy away now filled his nostrils and unbelievably, trance-like, drew him ever closer to this, the latest atrocity that had been discovered. The sight and stench of human remains could wipe out all other senses to the point of numbness, near flotation within oneself, not believing quite where one was, or the truth about the vile inhumanity the world demanded he uncover. Femurs, mandrels, speculas, grotesquely unambiguous in appearance left in positions, jigsaw-esque, with a surreal, almost questioning property that, at first glance, confused even his hardened mind. These bodies had not been placed in the hole, they had instead landed top of each other before, presumably, being covered over immediately after the killing. Photographic evidence of the holocaust that he had endured, analysed and finally written about as a graduate at Dublin’s Queens College could not begin to compare with the horror of the real thing. Just when he thought man could not possibly stoop lower than in the last find, the next re-shocked the investigator’s mind into the evil that had been committed. Each case seemed to get steadily more harrowing, as if they were making their finds in order of them being committed and in order of their depravity. This of course was far from the truth as these were random killings by men whom, although they had probably shared the same agenda, may never have even met. This was Polom, near Srebrenica, north-eastern Bosnia, 1995.