Facets of Death

by Michael Stanley

  As Mabuku turned to leave, Gobey stopped him. “I’d like a word with you before you go, Assistant Superintendent. I’ll walk with you.”

  Mabaku was puzzled but nodded, and they headed off together.

  “This business stinks, Jacob. You know I’ve been liaising with Debswana and the Diamond Police, and we were reviewing the plan that was put into action today. Let me explain how it was meant to work. You’ll need to know that.”

  Gobey took a few minutes to outline the contingency plan and answer a couple of questions Mabaku had.

  “I think someone found out that we were going to tighten security,” Gobey continued, “and took their chance while they could. The question is who told them. Keep your wits about you at Jwaneng, Jacob. The bad smell may be coming from there.”

  Chapter 16

  Mabaku was left with Detective Sergeant Robert Samkoa to accompany him to Jwaneng. He wouldn’t have been Mabaku’s choice. He wasn’t the CID’s smartest detective—in fact, he fell short of that by quite a long way. But he was solid, if lacking imagination. Mabaku wished he had an experienced detective who had a real spark, someone who would surprise him and come up with an angle that he hadn’t thought of himself. Talking to Samkoa was more or less the same as thinking aloud.

  As he walked back to his office, he almost bumped into Kubu coming from the coffee room holding a brimming cup. He was the only detective who hadn’t received an assignment. Mabaku hesitated. The young man was certainly intelligent and seemed smart enough to do what he was told and not get in the way. At worst, he would learn something about procedure; at best, he might have a useful insight or two.

  “Bengu, dump that coffee. You’re coming with me to Jwaneng. There could be a lot to do there. Hurry up.”

  Kubu instantly threw the coffee in the sink, checked that he had his notebook, and then hurried to catch up.

  That’s about the fastest I’ve seen him move, Mabaku thought with amusement.

  Mabaku stuck his head into Samkoa’s office. “Go home and get a change of clothes. Be back here in thirty minutes.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You too, Bengu.”

  Kubu hesitated. “Sir…”

  “Yes, Bengu. What is it?”

  “I walked here this morning. It’ll take me more than half an hour—”

  “Come with me. I’ll get some clothes, then swing by your place.” Mabaku strode towards the parking lot.

  “Yes, sir,” Kubu gasped as he struggled to keep up.

  * * *

  Closer to forty minutes had passed when the three of them headed out to Mabaku’s Land Rover. Kubu climbed into the back, and they joined the traffic leaving the city after the workday.

  “Normally Debswana transports the diamonds by private plane from Jwaneng to Gabs,” Mabaku told Samkoa. “The Debswana processing plant here in Gabs is practically at the airport, and they have strong security around it. But this morning the Jwaneng airport had to be closed after a plane caught fire on the runway. I’m sure that wasn’t a coincidence.”

  Kubu nodded—he’d heard this at the meeting. Samkoa didn’t respond.

  “Anyway, when the airport closed, Jwaneng used their backup plan. They called out three armoured vehicles from Gaborone.”

  Now Samkoa did have a question. “Why take the risk? Why not just wait until the airport reopened?”

  “We’ll ask them that. Anyway, the plan was to send three boxes to the processing plant. The security company men would have thought that each box contained a third of the consignment, but actually one box had all the diamonds, and the other two were full of gravel.”

  “So, even if one armoured vehicle was hit, they would have a two-thirds chance of keeping the diamonds,” Kubu ventured.

  Mabaku nodded. “Right. The question is whether the robbers knew about that part of the plan. If they did, they would want to know which vehicle the gems were in. They wouldn’t go through all this for a one-third chance of getting the diamonds.”

  “Yes, Assistant Superintendent. You’re right,” Samkoa responded.

  “And that means someone inside Jwaneng is working with them.”

  Samkoa nodded. After a moment he asked, “What happened to the men in the armoured vehicle that was hit?”

  “Two were shot dead. One was a woman. We don’t know where the third is.”

  They drove on in silence.

  Chapter 17

  Time dragged at Jwaneng. Major Chamberlain, Goodman, and Tau were in the major’s office, waiting for news of what had happened to the missing armoured vehicle and its cargo. Tau was doodling on a pad, looking unhappy. The major seemed calm, but Goodman knew him better than that.

  “I’ve been thinking about the fire on the plane,” he wondered out loud. “How did the hijackers even know there was something to hijack? They didn’t just hang around for two years waiting for us to use our backup plan.”

  “You think it was deliberate? That the plane was sabotaged?” the major growled. “I thought you said it was an accident?”

  “That’s what they thought this morning. But now…” He shrugged.

  Tau nodded. “Of course, they could have been tipped off. Several people knew we were using ground transport as a backup plan. Still, we’d better get the police to work with the civil aviation people to follow up Elijah’s idea. He could be right.”

  “You mean it was a setup? Goddammit!”

  “It’s just a possibility.” Goodman wished he’d raised the possibility just with Tau. Now he’d only worsened the major’s already foul mood.

  “One good thing,” Tau put in. “They can’t know which vehicle has the diamonds since no one knows that. It’s two to one that we still have the diamonds.”

  Goodman checked his watch again. Five fifteen. By his reckoning the lead vehicle should be arriving at Debswana’s processing plant in Gaborone in about fifteen minutes. If it had the diamonds, all would be well. If not, it would be fifty-fifty the robbers had them. He had a bad feeling that they’d lost the middle vehicle and its cargo with it. He put his hand in his pocket and rubbed his good-luck charm.

  The phone rang, and the major grabbed it.

  “Yes, Deputy Commissioner. What news? I’ll put you on speaker.”

  They listened to a summary of the discovery of the armoured vehicle and of the two murdered Gaborone Cash in Transit guards.

  The major said nothing, but his face registered shock.

  “They killed the security guards?” Tau’s voice was unsteady. “Why? They’re always instructed not to resist… Was there a shoot-out?”

  “We don’t know that yet,” the deputy commissioner replied. “The third guard is missing. He was probably abducted and forced to give a false position of the vehicle to confuse us, but he managed to slip in a phrase that alerted the company that something was wrong. I don’t have much hope that we’ll find him alive.”

  “Three men killed. That’s terrible. Simply awful,” Goodman put in, shaking his head.

  “One was a woman.”

  There was silence for a few moments.

  “What about the cargo?” the major asked.

  “It’s gone. The back of the armoured vehicle was blown open.”

  “Hardly a surprise,” the major said dryly. “What’s your plan?”

  “We have roadblocks and army helicopters patrolling the border fence with South Africa, and the regular border crossings are on alert. They’re searching all vehicles going through.”

  “Too little, too late. They’ll be down some side track by now and will slip across the border at night somewhere.”

  “It’s been less than an hour since we discovered what was happening!” the deputy commissioner pointed out sharply.

  Chamberlain ignored that and turned to the others. “Either of you have any questions? Any input that could he
lp the police?”

  Goodman shook his head, but Tau told the deputy commissioner their thoughts about the plane.

  There were a few moments silence before the response. “We also thought of that. We’re looking into it.”

  “Nothing more from our side then, Deputy Commissioner,” the major said. “Please keep us in the picture.”

  “We’ve the best detectives from CID Headquarters on the job. Assistant Superintendent Mabaku should be there in about two and a half hours. He’ll need to interview you all as soon as possible. Will you still be at your office at the mine?”

  “Interview us? This evening?”

  “We need all the information we can get as soon as we can get it.”

  “We’ll be here,” the major assured him, and then hung up.

  Time dragged on again.

  Chapter 18

  Just before 5:30 p.m., the first of the cash-in-transit vehicles pulled up to the Debswana complex in Gaborone. It now had a police escort, and there was another police vehicle with flashing lights waiting for it at the security gates. The guard waved it through, and the vehicle headed straight into the loading shed at one side of the processing complex. Two policemen, armed with automatic weapons, covered it.

  The two men in the front of the armoured vehicle climbed out, obviously relieved that their trip was finally over without incident. They greeted the policemen and then gave the man in the back the all clear. He opened the back door, and the police told the two waiting Debswana personnel that it was safe to approach. One signed off the paperwork, and the two of them carried the box into the facility.

  Once it was in a secure room, they opened a sealed envelope and took out six keys—each one would open one of the six locks on the total shipment. The first key they tried didn’t work for either of the locks, but the second key opened one. It was eventually the sixth key that opened the other. They lifted the lid and stared down at a mass of gravel.

  “That means there’s an even chance that the robbers got the diamonds,” one said finally. The other nodded. He dug his hands into the gravel, but there was nothing else below the surface. “I thought maybe they’d camouflaged them.”

  The other shook his head. “They would have told us. Let’s go and tell the boss. The next vehicle is only due in half an hour.”

  They closed the lid and locked the box again. Then they headed into the building to report the bad news.

  Chapter 19

  Director Gobey and Detective Sergeant Neo reached the main office of Gaborone Cash in Transit around 5:30 p.m. It was a large complex, sporting a tall aerial construction on the roof. A high-security fence ringed it, and an armed guard stood at the gate.

  “It looks well secured,” Gobey commented with approval. “But that doesn’t help if someone on the inside is working for your enemies.”

  They were immediately taken to the office of the managing director, Pieter Henkel, who rose to shake hands and offer seats at his small conference table. Everything in the office was functional. No framed certificates or pictures of family. The desk was tidy, apart from a file, which lay open with its contents spread around the desk.

  “Is that the Debswana protocol, Rra Henkel?” Gobey asked.

  Henkel nodded. “And the contract and so on.”

  “And you followed all the steps as approved?”

  Henkel nodded. “As soon as we received the alert that one of the vehicles was in trouble, we contacted the nearest police station—Sejelo in this case, then the deputy commissioner’s office, and finally Debswana itself.”

  Neo jotted it all down in his notebook. Then Gobey asked, “Who has access to the protocol documents? Are there other copies around?”

  Henkel looked up, surprised, but then he understood where Gobey was going. “You’re worried someone here may have leaked the protocol. No, this is the only copy, and it’s normally locked in one of those cabinets.” He indicated a bank of filing cabinets opposite his desk.

  “And who has keys to the cabinets?”

  “Just me. And my secretary. Sometimes she needs to get to documents when I’m not in the office.” He hesitated and then added, “She’s been with me for nearly ten years. I built this business. She helped.”

  Gobey shook his head. “That doesn’t take her off the suspect list. I’ve had cases with staff working at companies for far longer than that before they turned to crime. And you are the only person here who knows about the Debswana plan?”

  “Yes. None of my guards knew that only one of the vehicles had the diamonds.” He paused for a moment and looked down at the table. “Now two of them are dead and a third, Salekany Kenosi, is missing. I’ll have to visit their families and explain what happened. Once I know that myself.”

  Gobey knew only too well what sort of job that was. “We’ll send a senior officer to inform them, Rra Henkel. But I’m sure they’ll appreciate a visit from you also.”

  Henkel just nodded, and Gobey changed the subject.

  “When exactly did you discover that something was wrong?”

  “I can get you the exact time, but it was close to four fifteen p.m. The operator who was in contact with the convoy and tracking the vehicles noticed that the satellite feed giving the second vehicle’s location had stopped moving. He called me, and we tried to contact the vehicle, without success. We had a fourth vehicle for backup, and we called it to investigate.”

  “You didn’t contact the police at that point?”

  “It was just the satellite tracking. Nothing from the driver or the guard in the back with the cargo. She was able to alert us independently of the driver. That was Sheila Naledi. She was the best person in the team. Now she’s dead.” He shook his head. “What a waste of a young life.”

  “But she didn’t alert you. Although a robbery was underway.”

  Henkel looked upset. “Something must’ve failed with the backup system. We’ll have to—”

  “Does that happen?”

  “Well, the vehicles are checked and serviced and the systems tested. Usually before they go on an assignment, but…”

  “But?”

  “I had to pull in these vehicles urgently to meet Debswana’s demand for immediate support. We didn’t have time to test everything first.”

  “So, the vehicle could have been tampered with some time before.”

  “In theory, yes. But who would know that that particular vehicle was going to be used? And that I’d get that call from Jwaneng? It was all completely unexpected. No, it must have been an unfortunate equipment failure.”

  “Maybe so. We’ll know more once we’ve had some time with the vehicle.” Gobey glanced at Neo to be sure he was noting everything. Then he turned back to Henkel. “How does the tracking work?”

  “It’s a state-of-the-art system, and we’re the only company in Botswana that has it. It’s expensive, and it’s only used if the client is willing to pay a big premium for it. Debswana wanted it, of course. The idea is quite simple—it’s a GPS with a transmitter that pushes updates to a satellite about the vehicle’s location every few seconds. The satellite sends the info to our control room, and then a computer plots the vehicle’s location on a map display, so we can see exactly where the vehicle is.”

  “Exactly?”

  Henkel shrugged. “Within twenty or thirty metres.”

  “So, when the signal stops at a single point, it means that the vehicle has stopped there?”

  Henkel hesitated. “Well, yes…except that if we lost the satellite feed, the map would indicate the last known position. I thought that might have happened.”

  “And do you sometimes lose the signal?”

  Henkel looked down at the table again. “It’s never happened in my experience.”

  “But you didn’t alert the police for another twenty minutes. That twenty minutes could have been critical in catch
ing the robbers.”

  “I suppose so. We were concentrating on trying to find the vehicle. We didn’t even know where it was. Then we got a call from Kenosi. Have you found him yet?” Gobey shook his head. “Well, he used the emergency phrase that alerts us that he’s talking under duress. After that, we followed the protocol at once.”

  “Can you tell where that call came from?”

  “We discovered that it was picked up by our office in Kanye and then relayed to us. So all we know was that it was from that general area.”

  Gobey frowned. “That’s disappointing. I’d hoped that it would give a clue to which way the robbers had headed.” He climbed to his feet. “Thank you, Rra Henkel. I know you have a lot to deal with right now, but we’ll need to ask you some further questions as the case develops. For now, we’d like to talk to the operator concerned and have him show us the tracking system.”

  “He’s still tracking the third vehicle. The first one made it safely to its destination just before you arrived. But I’ll show you the system, and you can talk to the operator as soon as he’s finished.” He checked his watch. “In about ten minutes.”

  Chapter 20

  Kubu couldn’t believe his luck. He’d resigned himself to pushing on with the suitcase puzzle at the CID while the others solved one of the most exciting cases in the CID’s history. Now he was right in the centre of it with the assistant superintendent himself. He wondered why Mabaku had decided to include him. He didn’t know Samkoa, so it was unlikely to be his suggestion. Could it have been the director when he grabbed Mabaku after the meeting? Kubu didn’t think so. The director had much too much on his mind right now to worry about a new detective. Whatever the reason, Mabaku had decided to include him in the trip, and Kubu was determined not to let him down.

  As Mabaku negotiated the traffic, Kubu thought about what he knew about the heist. He was sure Mabaku was right about the robbers knowing which vehicle had the diamonds, and in that case, the detectives needed to determine who’d provided inside information from the mine. But he suspected that there was a twist involved somewhere. He hoped he would be the one to spot it.