But for now they remained united, because Spiridon was giving the impression, if not of heeding his brother’s advice, then at least of weighing it. Initially, after the death of Nikola Musulin, Spiridon had spoken only of revenge: of returning to Serbia, gathering their forces, and punishing those responsible. But a night’s sleep at the farmhouse of Gavrilo Dražeta appeared to have mellowed him somewhat, if only temporarily, and on the long drive southeast, Spiridon had listened more than he had spoken.

If they went back to Serbia, Radovan explained, they’d be killed. No one in Belgrade – not in government, not in the police, not even among the gangs and syndicates – wished to see a descent into open criminal warfare. It would be bad for the country’s image, especially as it attempted to present its best face to the European Union. Shortly after their return, the Vuksans and anyone who stood alongside them would be quietly vanished, and nothing would ever be heard of them again.

There were also established cultural reasons for maintaining the status quo. Back in the good old days of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, under the firm hand of Marshal Josip Broz Tito, criminals were generally allowed to go about their business as long as they conducted it beyond the country’s borders and repatriated some of their profits to benefit Yugoslav society. Following Tito’s death in 1980, the country had become economically and politically unstable, leading to fractures along ethnic and nationalist lines, and, ultimately, war.

Now, more than two decades after the first eruption of the conflict, something resembling stability reigned, admittedly with certain qualifications. The Chinese were investing heavily in Serbia in preparation for the country’s eventual integration into the EU, and the Russians, as usual, were doing their best to sow discontent in the region, including working to prevent the former Yugoslav federal state of Macedonia – or North Macedonia as it was now known – from joining NATO. Meanwhile, a version of Tito’s law once again applied to the more ambitious forms of Serb criminality: it was strictly export-only. In Serbia, as in Russia, the real criminals now wore suits and roamed unchallenged through the National Assembly.