The Serpentine Road (23 page)

Smith looks at him; he is exhausted.

‘I haven’t even got enough for a bus fare, man.’

‘Is that why you wanted me here?’

Smith stands up.

‘No.’ He draws himself up, pushes his shoulders back gingerly. It is, De Vries thinks, a tired attempt to display some pride. ‘I wanted to tell you. I wanted to warn you. I don’t want your money. I’ve made it so far.’

‘We weren’t in that house. We didn’t see what happened. You and I only guessed what those guys did. No one is going to bother with you, or me.’

‘Johan told me.’

‘I don’t want to know. I thought about it long enough.’

‘He just cut them down, man. They didn’t know anything. They were random. He fucking shot them one by one. Children in front of parents, little kids.’

‘Two kids got out.’

Smith looks up at De Vries.

‘Got out? What do you mean?’

‘You didn’t see them? I saw them, two of them, after the shots. They got out the back of the shack, ran away.’ De Vries feels his heart in his chest, his throat dry. For a split second, he is back there, in the rain and the dark, the sweat thick on his face; the images of the Victoria Drinking Halls, smoking and black, disemboweled, still fresh in his mind.

‘You only had to look at Johan’s eyes. He remembered every day. It wasn’t like the army, man. These people weren’t enemies, weren’t threatening us. They were just there and Nel wanted them dead.’

‘Nel was a brutal fucker, but it was twenty-one years ago.’

‘He put his hand in their blood and smeared it on the guys. He fucking blooded them, man, like fucking hunting dogs.’

De Vries gets up.

‘All right. That’s enough. This gets us nowhere . . .’

‘Sheldon and Johan and Joe . . . They’re all dead . . .’

‘They were all SAPS. Even if they are connected, there are other reasons why someone would do this.’

Smith shakes his head.

‘You don’t believe that.’

‘I do.’

‘You’re going to tell someone that these crimes are connected? That they must be connected?’

De Vries knows that this is the question he will be asked; he does not know the answer. There is little co-operation between areas and provinces, no database against which to check for similar crimes. Each of the detectives looking at these cases will not be aware of the other, such is the size of the country. Yet, if he links the crimes, he resuscitates everything that happened on that January evening twenty-one years ago: what was said and done; what was not said.

‘Stay alert. Leave it with me. I’ll look for Mike de Groot. We’ll make sure he’s safe, you’re safe. It’ll be okay.’

Mitchell Smith scratches himself some more, crosses the room to what could once have been a modern hi-fi unit but now stands empty except for a cracked pottery chicken in blue and white. He opens the drawer and pulls out some pictures.

‘Take this, then. That was us . . . I don’t know, seven, eight years ago.’ He points to the man at the end of the picture. ‘That’s Mike. He didn’t know what the fuck was happening, but we took him with us anyway.’

‘Took him?’

‘Beers, man. We took him for beers.’

He unlocks the door and steel gate, follows De Vries down the path to the boundary of his dusty garden. De Vries opens the gate, turns to say goodbye, but finds Smith following him.

‘I’ll walk to your car.’

De Vries looks at him, puzzled. Smith says: ‘Last ten days, I’ve been out once to get food, buy some electricity. I don’t feel safe here. I don’t want to go out. I don’t want to stay in.’

De Vries sees desperation on the man’s face and cannot decide if it is justified or if a slow hysteria is taking over his mind.

‘These are hard times for all of us. Change is always hard. Keep going and they’ll get better.’

He gets into the car, winds down the window. Smith is on the street by the car.

‘You think so?’

De Vries nods, starts his car, rolls away. A few houses down, he says out loud: ‘No.’

By 9.30 a.m.,Vaughn reaches his building, his mind full of three murders hundreds of kilometres away, possibly connected; possibly connected to him.

He rides up in the lift, deep in thought, and finds the squad-room almost empty, no sign of Don February. On his desk, he finds a summons from General Thulani’s office. He walks back out into the squad-room, pours almost a full mug of coffee from the dregs at the bottom of the jug, adds three sugars, drinks it down like medicine. In the lift’s mirror, he picks coffee grounds from the tip of his tongue, feels grittiness in his throat.

‘A sexually aggravated murder of a respected clergyman and his wife in Worcester? That one sentence tells you what it will be.’ De Vries shivers and looks up at haughty Thulani in full dress uniform.

‘I think you should take this one. I spoke to the Captain down there. I get the feeling they are very keen to have some assistance.’

‘That is an unusual position, sir.’

‘It is. However, I think we should show that your department is not just here to take high-profile media cases, but that you are prepared to help, to get your hands dirty.’

De Vries smiles; he can never wash his hands free of the dirt.

‘I don’t see how we can take this on, sir. I would not have selected it as a case for our unit.’

‘I’m listening to the word from Pretoria, Colonel. The mood is that we have to work closely together, support each other within the service.’

De Vries sighs.

‘The investigative teams, as you know, are already stretched. We have one leader in physiotherapy, booked out for at least two more weeks, one on leave and Major Adams is in Paarl on the family farm murders.’

‘But you have concluded the Holt case?’

‘I am concluding it, yes sir, but I still have a few days on it.’

Thulani sits up, raising himself still higher.

‘Could that not be undertaken in conjunction with this new case?’

‘It could, sir . . .’ De Vries starts slowly. ‘But think how it would reflect on us if there were to be a mistake made at this point? Brigadier du Toit is insistent that we fully complete one task before another is begun . . . For reasons of certainty in court, clarity to the media.’

De Vries feels tangible pleasure in quoting back the rule book to a man like Thulani.

‘Could you at least go out there to see . . . ?’

‘Sir. In the minds of the media,Trevor Bhekifa is still connected to this matter. Until everything is demonstrated to be cut and dried, there will always be rumours. I understood that this was not acceptable.’

Thulani sighs, nods reluctantly.

‘It is not.’

‘That is what I thought, sir.’

‘Very well.’

‘Why did the caseload come to you, sir? As the senior officer in my unit, I should be handling allocation of new cases. You should not have been bothered with it.’

‘In the light of the protocols coming down from above, I thought it was appropriate to look out for opportunities to broaden our scope. Always, there are compromises. This matter will be another victim of our over-stretched system.’

‘Protocols from Pretoria?’ De Vries says casually. ‘Brigadier du Toit mentioned that a Major had been enquiring about the Holt case . . . Was that the same man who contacted you?’

‘Major Mabena?’

‘I think it was . . .’

He has no idea, but he now has a name.

‘He is an attaché between the administrators and the Police Ministry.’

‘I hope the Ministry aren’t unhappy with our work here in the Cape?’

Thulani shakes his head.

‘No, I am sure they are not. There is no reason to question our success here in Western Province.’

De Vries relaxes. Thulani is thinking only of himself, as Assistant Deputy Provincial Commissioner. He sits silently, watching Thulani begin to wonder if the enquiries were not about De Vries at all but, instead, his own office.

Thulani looks at him, registers his demeanor.

‘Go, Colonel. You look cold.’

De Vries sits in his office, waits for Don February to respond to his SMS. He looks up to see Norman Classon at the elevators, expects him to walk towards him, but instead he stands by the lift, talking to an occupant of the car. This continues for nearly two minutes. Finally, Classon turns, and begins to walk towards De Vries’s squad room and office. He knocks, lets himself in.

‘Good morning, Vaughn.’

‘You were deep in conversation, Norman . . .’

Classon frowns, then smiles, says: ‘Keeping our masters informed.’

‘Who was it?’

‘Julius Mngomezulu. Thulani’s liaison.’

De Vries looks up.

‘What were you saying to Mngomezulu? I told you before he can’t be trusted.’

Classon laughs uneasily.

‘Nothing. He asked me to tell him what was happening with the Holt case so he could inform Thulani. I told him we’re just checking out some possible problems.’

‘You did what?’

Classon holds up his hands.

‘I kept it vague.’

De Vries takes a deep breath; he knows that Classon is not an enemy, even if he is not a friend. Classon has been trusted before.

‘Don’t say anything to that little shit. You can’t know that what you say will get passed on accurately. He’s not a proper policeman despite that rank. He’s a secretary. You know we’ve had problems with him before.’

Classon slowly lifts his feet, finally takes the seat opposite De Vries.

‘Sorry,Vaughn. I didn’t know I was running into office politics.’

‘It’s not politics; it’s trust. I don’t trust a policeman in a tight, shiny suit and pointy shoes. Did you tell him about my interview with Bhekifa?’

‘I probably did. He was in that day, wasn’t he?’ De Vries nods. ‘You think he could have leaked that to the papers . . . ?’

‘Ja
... And there could be more, so we need a tight circle.’

‘More?’

‘Someone tried to get me moved onto another case today.’

‘Someone?’

‘A case elsewhere was brought to General Thulani’s attention, and it was suggested that I might be sent away to deal with it. I wonder why that was?’

‘Meaning?’

‘The Holt enquiry requires more work and I think someone high up doesn’t want that. You know how I get when that happens?’

Classon does.

In the cool, silent room, Eric Basson sits facing the door, behind a broad polished desk. John Marantz walks across the wide parquet floor, glancing up at the high stuccoed ceiling; he wonders why there is no furniture in the room save the desk and two armchairs. He meets the gaze of his host; it seems to bore through him. Basson rises slowly, offers his hand. His voice is quiet and precise.

‘I knew you were here, of course, but I had understood that we were never to meet, Mr Marantz.’

‘I’m sure it’s inappropriate.’

‘It is.’ Basson gestures for Marantz to sit opposite him. ‘London had mentioned that I might keep a discreet eye on you but, of late, that has seemed unnecessary . . .’

‘Good.’

‘But now . . . ?’

‘I knew you were here too.’

Basson smiles thinly, his eyes expressionless behind spectacles, rimless but for a thick tortoiseshell frame running across the top of the lenses. Marantz assumes that he is in his seventies and admires the understated suit and quiet tie, the calmness of his demeanor.

‘I’m here to ask for help, for a friend of mine: a senior officer in the SAPS.’

‘Not for yourself?’

‘No.’

‘But there is a motive? A debt, perhaps, to be repaid?’

‘No,’ Marantz says. ‘He is a good friend of mine. He supported me during my . . . rehabilitation.’

‘And, I assume, that this assistance you seek is to be provided without my making a long-distance phone call?’

‘I hope so.’

‘That places me in a very difficult situation.’

‘I was aware that it would, but I hoped that you would find a way.’

Basson looks at the table, stays silent. When he looks up, he says: ‘What is the name of this senior SAPS officer?’

‘De Vries. Colonel Vaughn de Vries.’

‘Yes, I know of De Vries.’ He tilts his head. ‘But, regrettably, that makes your request even more difficult to fulfill.’

‘Why?’

‘Because Colonel de Vries is unpredictable, because he exists on the edge of alcoholism; he has character flaws which make him, in my position, difficult to trust.’

‘I would argue,’ Marantz says, ‘that those traits you describe make him a more effective investigator. My experience of him is that he is unprepared to compromise in the pursuit of the truth.’

Basson smiles broadly now; even his eyes shine, momentarily bright.

‘Since your departure, I see you have lost none of your abilities to use the English language to mould an argument. A skill sadly lacking in these times.’

‘I’m sincere in what I say.’

‘Of course you are.’

Basson produces a packet of cigarettes, selects one and lights it. He says casually: ‘You were at Cambridge?’

‘Oxford.’

‘Of course.’

Marantz smiles.

‘Calibrating reactions?’

Basson tilts his head.

Marantz says: ‘You knew where I went to university. You wanted to see my physical reaction to an incorrect suggestion?’

‘If you say so.’

‘You were at Durham University.’

Basson smiles now.

‘Very good.’

Marantz shifts to find a comfortable position in his chair; he stares at the man in front of him. Basson says: ‘Are you considering a return to England?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘But you miss your work?’

‘I prefer not to be personally involved. But, information still interests me.’

‘And risk?’

‘In a controlled setting, yes.’

‘Your poker games. They allow you to fight the battle, but in safety. Am I right?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘But, I think you are taking a risk now: meeting me; asking me these things.’

‘When you have played and lost,’ Marantz says gravely, ‘these stakes seem comparatively modest.’

‘I heard what happened to your family. I’m sorry.’

Basson draws deeply on his cigarette, studies Marantz.

‘Such action has proved unique, at least as far as London is concerned.’