Agent Provocateur

A shot in the dusk is scarcely news at Tirana--that little, vile, ill-favored capital. But last week the bullet was Italian, the blood Albanian. That was news. The shadowy man who fired the shot made good his escape--perhaps he was not Italian after all--but soon Albanians and Italians were arguing in the streets with shiny steel. Five men lay dead at last, according to report. Two dead were Italian, and all the living knew that Italy might intervene under her new treaty with Albania (TIME, Dec. 13) for vengeance. Through the crooked, cobbled, time-stained streets Fear stalked last week, with the numbing rumor that he who fired the first shot was an Italian agent provocateur. Why not? A few more such incidents, and Il Duce can mature his reputed scheme to seize Albania under pretext of "intervention to maintain Albanian sovereignty."