Cobra (4 page)

The woman put on her glasses and said: ‘He cleared the dinner table, and lit the fire.’

‘What time?’ asked Cupido.

‘At exactly nine o’clock.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘That was our agreement with them.’

‘The bodyguards?’

‘Yes. Breakfast at exactly eight o’clock, house cleaning at nine, lunch at one, dinner at eight p.m. Final clearing, and hospitality at nine. They are very strict, they have a lot of rules.’

‘Like what?’

‘They screened all our people. Only six were cleared to work when they rented the guesthouse, two for breakfast, two for house cleaning in the morning, and two for dinner and evening hospitality. It made things very difficult . . .’

‘Why?’

‘Because sometimes members of our staff are ill, or they want to take a vacation . . .’

‘So why did you rent the house to these people?’

‘They pay almost double the going rate.’

Cupido shook his head again in amazement. ‘OK. So Cyril January was one of the cleared people?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did it work? Did he have keys?’

‘No, no, if they wanted to enter, they had to call one of the guards when they were at the door.’

‘How?’

‘With a cellphone. They had to say a code word. They had to say “breakfast in the green room” if it was safe, or “breakfast in the red room” if they thought there was danger.’

‘
Jissis
. And then the guard unlocked the door?’

‘Yes.’

‘But you said there were two people serving dinner?’

‘Yes. Cyril’s daughter . . .’ De Haan’s eyes filled, and her voice became hoarse. ‘I’m sorry. His daughter, she’s only eighteen . . . She served dinner with him, and they cleared the table, and then she left with the trolley. Cyril was doing hospitality . . .’

‘What does that mean?’

‘Chocolates on the pillows, check the bathroom supplies, like soap and shampoo and shower gel and hand cream, and light the fire . . .’

‘Do you know what time he usually finished?’

‘Between nine and half past.’

‘And his wife thought he went to town last night?’

‘He did do that sometimes.’

‘Where would he go?’

‘To friends.’

‘And he would stay out all night?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘What was the procedure when he left the house?’ asked Griessel.

‘He just left, and they locked the door behind them.’

‘And this morning?’

‘One of our agricultural workers saw Cyril’s body. At about six-thirty, on his way to report for work. And then he saw the front door of the guesthouse was open . . .’

‘OK,’ said Cupido, ‘we’ll have to speak to the daughter . . . We have to speak to all the staff, in about . . .’ he looked at his watch, ‘in about an hour’s time. Can you assemble them for us?’

Cupido began to rant as they walked towards the car, just as Griessel knew he would.

‘“They pay almost double the going rate.” That’s the trouble with this country, Benna. It’s just naked greed, no fucking ethics. Everybody just wants to score, it’s just
skep, pappie, skep
, before doomsday comes. Seventy thousand bucks for a week’s personal security? We’re in the wrong business, I’m telling you. And that lesbetarian wants to
bliksem
me? What for? Because I tell it like it is? She can’t do that, I mean, what do you say? There’s just no appropriate response to a lezzy, you’re
gefok
if you say come try me, you’re
gefok
if you zip your lip. There should be a law against that sort of thing. Wants to
bliksem me
? With seventy thousand in her back pocket and her Calvin Klein suit and that hair . . . And what is this here? German owner of a Boer farm with a French name where a Brit is kidnapped. Fucking United Nations of Crime, that’s where we’re heading. And why? ’Cause they bring their troubles here. Like those French at Sutherland, and the Dewani thing, and who gets the rap? South-
fokken
-Africa.’

They got into the car.

‘I’m telling you now, the perpetrator will be a foreign citizen, but d’you think the TV will mention it? Not on your life, it’ll be like “crimeridden society” all over again, all that
kak
. It’s not right, Benna. Wants to
bliksem
me. But they screen the little
volkies
in slave uniforms and let them clean up after their whitey backsides until ten o’clock at night. Chocolates on the pillows . . .’

‘Forensics are here,’ said Griessel when he spotted the white minibus parked at the guesthouse, beside the SAPS photographer’s Corolla, and the two ambulances.

‘They’ll have to get a move on – we have to search the Brit’s room.’

‘And the Giraffe.’ Beside the big Ford Territory of the Directorate of Priority Crime Investigations – DPCI, or the Hawks – stood tall, thin Colonel Zola Nyathi, commanding officer of the Violent Crimes Group.

As the first Hawk on the scene, Griessel reported as succinctly as he could. He was aware of the colonel’s sharp eyes on him, with that unreadable, unchanging poker face of his.

When he had finished, the Giraffe said: ‘I see,’ and stood with his head bowed, deep in thought.

Eventually: ‘You’re JOC on this one, Benny.’

‘Yes, sir.’ His heart sank, because the last thing he needed in his current situation, was the responsibility of the so-called Joint Operations Command.

‘You already have Vaughn. How many more people do you need?’

He knew the Hawks liked big teams who could hit hard and fast, but he was still sceptical about this approach. Too many people falling over each other, especially on an investigational level. And he knew command didn’t always mean control over the direction of the investigation. ‘Four detectives, sir.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I’ll get Cloete out. And start oiling the consulatory wheels.’

Captain John Cloete was the Hawks’ media liaison officer. And Griessel knew they were going to need all the help they could get with the British Consulate. For though the Brits weren’t as bad as the Canadians, and the Canadians were not as difficult as the Chinese – embassies were not keen to share their citizens’ information, especially when there was crime involved. And in any case, they were bureaucratic dead-ends. So all he said was: ‘Thank you, sir.’

He noticed Nyathi’s gaze dwell on him a moment before the colonel nodded, turned, and walked back to his vehicle. He knew it was because he looked so terrible. He cursed himself again. Last night he should have . . .

‘Come, Benna,’ said Cupido, ‘let’s check how far Forensics are.’

In Dorp Street in Stellenbosch, a tour bus was parked in front of Oom Samie se Winkel, the now-legendary old-time store and tourist magnet.

Tyrone Kleinbooi eyed up the tourists on the pavement. Europeans, he recognised them by their pale legs, their get-up. He had given up wondering why European and American visitors were the only people in Africa who bought and wore safari outfits – the hunting jackets (with pockets for ammunition), the Livingstone helmets or wide-brimmed hats, the boots.

His senses sharpened. He focused on the group lining up at the door to get on the bus. At the back stood a middle-aged woman with a big raffia shoulder bag. Easy target. She would be expecting contact with other tour members. Her purse would be in the bag, right at the bottom, in the centre, big and fat, loaded with rands and euros and credit and cash cards, ripe for the picking. All he had to do was to take the hair clip with the little yellow sunflower that he had in his pocket, hide it in his hand, bend down in front of her, and pretend to pick it up.

Uncle Solly:
I had an appie who tried that trick with money, a ten-rand note. He flashed it at the mark, and the mark’s attention went immediately to his wallet. Now that’s just stupid. You use something that is colourful and pretty. But not money.

‘I think you dropped this, ma’am,’ he would say quietly, intimately, confidentially, with his big innocent look-how-honest-our-locals-are smile. And his even features. With his right shoulder nearly touching her.

With her eyes and all her attention focused in surprise on the hair clip, he would slide his right hand into the bag, get a sure grip on the purse.

She would beam with grateful goodwill, because these white people from the north are black people pleasers, probably feeling guilty about their own colonial escapades. She would reach out her hand to the clip, and then shake her head. ‘Oh, thank you, but it’s not mine.’ He would bump her lightly with his right shoulder as he withdrew his hand from the bag, and put the purse in his pocket.

The withdrawal is the key. Smooth and fast. Keep the wallet upright, don’t let it hook on anything – the last thing you want at that crucial moment is a snag. And remember, there are other people who might be watching, so you want everyone’s attention on the dropped object, you hold it high and handsome. And then you get the wallet out of sight, and your hand out of your pocket. Show it to the people, here is my innocent hand.

‘My apology, ma’am,’ he would say.

She would reply in a Dutch or German accent: ‘No, please, don’t apologise.’ Except the Austrian woman, two years ago, who said ‘thank you’ and took the clip out of his hand. He had the last laugh though. The profit from her purse was nearly two thousand rand.

He would smile, turn, and walk away, look back and wave at her.
Don’t rush it. Saunter,Ty. But be aware,
want jy wiet nooit
. . . You never know,
the words echoed in his head.

He was in between the tourists, next to the woman, ready, every nerve ending tingling, the adrenaline flowing, just enough.

And then his brain said, Don’t.

If it feels wrong, walk away.

He saw the pair of security guards just beyond the shop, their eyes on him.

He walked past, to Market Street, and his sister’s flat.

5

From the front door, Griessel and Cupido could see the two men from Forensics at work under the bright spotlights in the sitting room. And hear their heated rugby conversation.

‘I’m telling you, Bismarck is not a man, he’s a machine,’ said Arnold, the short fat one, vehemently.

‘You shoot your own argument in the foot,’ said Jimmy, the tall thin one. They knelt side by side, in the spacious lounge.

‘What makes you say that?’

As a team they were known as Thick and Thin, a relic of the tired old quip from the days when they first began to work together: ‘Forensics will stand by you through thick and thin’, which in turn had been inspired by fat Arnold’s previous Forensics partner, a freckled, cheeky and pretty redhead woman, who had self-deprecatingly referred to their partnership as ‘Speckled & Egg’. There was a fair bit of murmuring when she left in search of greener pastures, and Jimmy – male, and far less attractive – was appointed.

‘Bismarck is a machine? How does a machine get injured? Anyway, this year we will win the Cup, because your Sharks machine is going to seize up when the chips are down. Just like last year . . .’

‘May we come in?’ Griessel called.

‘Thank the Lord, the Hawks are here,’ said Arnold.

‘I feel so safe now,’ said Jimmy.

‘Are you wearing shoe covers?’ Arnold asked.

‘Haven’t you finished up front here yet?’ Cupido retorted. ‘Maybe you should stop talking rugby
kak
and get your arses into second gear.’

‘Rugby
kak
? What sort of Cape coloured are you?’

‘The sort who will kick your whitey arses if you don’t pull finger.’

‘If you’re a kicker, the Stormers need you,’ said Arnold. ‘All fifteen fly-halves are injured again.’

‘
Fokkof
,’ said Jimmy. ‘Come in if you have shoe covers on. There’s something very weird here you should see.’

The ‘something very weird’ was a cartridge case.

‘It’s a Cor-Bon .45 ACP +P,’ said thin Jimmy as he held it up for display with a pair of silver pliers.

‘Not all forty-fives can shoot the Plus P,’ said Arnold.

‘Only the more recent models.’

‘Your Plus P has a higher maximum internal pressure.’

‘And higher velocity.’

‘We can explain that in layman’s terms if you don’t understand.’

‘We know easy words too.’

‘So now you are ballistics
and
language experts?’ asked Cupido.

‘Your modern Forensic’s scientific knowledge is vast,’ said Jimmy. ‘Bordering on genius . . .’

‘In contrast with your average Hawk,’ said Arnold.