by Jon Zackon
“That night at the Eden Roc … I was waiting for you to pick me up … something just reminded me of how she went for me. It put me in a terrible mood. I began to worry that you wouldn’t care or understand. Perhaps you weren’t even serious about me.”
“Not serious?”
“Oh, I know you are now, silly. But I was feeling so fragile and …”
She’d been sniffling, now she began sob.
“Poor Ruthie,” I said.
When she’d stopped crying, I said, “You know, Steven misled me. Totally.”
“Oh, Steven. He invents things about me. He’s always been the same. Anyway, only my mom and dad really know what went on.”
“Ah, I was going to ask you about your mom. Does she know we’re here together?”
“Of course, Danny. She made us the hamper. She thinks you’re good for me. Personally, I can’t see why.”
Ruth was back to her old self. Which, along with all the things she’d just told me, left me feeling happy enough at last to drift back to sleep.
***
Hours later we were greeted by the sort of African morning that could stir the most jaded soul. A sparkling sea, an indefinable freshness in the air and, low in the east, a rising sun in a clear sky.
What a shame we could not make time stand still, although we tried our best, dallying in bed.
Ruth packed a picnic basket and we took a detour to the settlement’s general store to buy a watermelon.
“It’s a must,” said Ruth. “Watermelon and picnics on the beach go together.”
As a Jo’burg boy, ignorant of such things, I trusted her judgment.
Family parties dotted the sand. Children threw balls to each other.
Ruth went back to the house, returned with an old tennis ball, and taught me to play leggy – in her opinion the perfect beach game. Two players stand about ten yards apart and spread their legs. The person with the ball bowls underhand or sidearm, with the aim of getting the ball between the other player’s legs. That counts one point. The defender tries his – or her – damnedest to keep the ball out without moving one’s feet. All infringements count one point against. Catching the ball on the full wins you a point. So the best ball to bowl is a Yorker, which bounces fractionally short of an opponent’s outstretched fingers.
Ruth played with the same recklessness she showed at tennis, occasionally flinging the ball yards wide, or over my head, and giggling while I had to run back to fetch it.
We’d brought an umbrella, so we sat in the shade and smooched. As usual, the sand soon grew too hot to walk on. We didn’t bother to move, except for the occasional sprint into the sea.
I took photographs of Ruth running out of the surf and waving – looking like a starlet in a Malibu photo-shoot. Then I inveigled a passing teenager to take a picture of Ruth and me hugging against a backdrop of sea and rocks.
Back under the umbrella the talk turned towards what we wanted to do with our lives.
“I might be able to apply to Baragwanath for an internship,” said Ruth. “But I’m not sure they’d accept me, so don’t hold out too much hope.”
She was referring to the enormous hospital south-west of Jo’burg that catered for the Rand’s black population.
“That would be terrific,” I said. “We could be together.”
It fitted in with her desire to help Africans. She’d once told me that in Durban there was one doctor for every three hundred white people. In Zululand, just up the road, the figure was one doctor for every twenty or thirty thousand people. There was another factor, of course. In common with many of our generation she was in open rebellion against her father’s conservatism.
“And what about you, Danny?”
“I’m going to have to try Fleet Street at some time, Ruthie. Perhaps in three or four years’ time. Every journalist wants to succeed there. It’s like having an honours degree.”
“Both my parents were born in the UK, you know. I could happily live there for a while.”
“My dad was born in Belfast, of all places,” I said. “It’s left him terminally sentimental. He sings Danny Boy when he calls me, for God’s sake. Thinks he’s an Irish tenor.”
“What does he do?”
“He trained as an electrician but when he came back to Jo’burg after serving in the war he started up an electrical goods shop in Orange Grove. It’s one of several in the area, so he doesn’t do that well. We’ve never been poor but it’s unlikely we’ll ever be rich.”
“Where’s Orange Grove?”
“It’s a suburb about five miles north of the city on Louis Botha Avenue, the main road to Pretoria. We live nearby in Norwood.”
“You never talk about your family, Danny.”
“No, well, it’s because we are such a boring lot.”
“I don’t believe you. There’s you for a start.”
I’d been keeping my eye for some time on a lone fisherman standing on rocks about half a mile away. Every now and then his rod bowed and he seemed to be having some luck. I watched as he carefully packed his kit, shouldered his rod and started home. In his free hand were several good-sized fish on a rope.
He had to pass our way to get to the car park. I waited until he was close and accosted him.
“Those look fantastic,” I said.
He looked down and said, “Ja, two bass and three steenbras. Not bad.”
“I’d like to buy one from you.”
“Sorry, not for sale. I’ve got kids.”
But five fish? How many kids did the guy have?
“Five rand, for just one.”
“No, sorry.”
“Ten … OK, fifteen.”
That made him think. “Man, you strike a mean deal,” he laughed. “Go on, you can have this small steenbras. Great to eat. I suppose you want me to gut it?”
He found a knife in his haversack, scaled the fish in seconds, gutted it expertly and handed it to me.
Ruth decided we’d eat on the patio, which overlooked the beach. She fried the fish in a little butter and added a sprinkle of lemon juice. And so we sat outside, drinking in the view as we ate.
“This has to be the tastiest fish I’ve ever eaten,” I said. “Full marks to the chef.”
“It would have been almost impossible to ruin it,” said Ruth.
That night we danced to a radio in the lounge. Then Ruth found Voice of America and we listened to Willis Conover telling the world about the greatness of Coleman Hawkins. Every now and then, as Conover played The Hawk’s classic tenor solos, the station would fade away, only to return a minute or two later. This was down to Soviet interference, we decided knowledgeably. But the buffeting gave the music an even more romantic, ethereal quality – as if it was coming to us from another planet.
We moved into the bedroom and Ruth lay down and curled up. I joined her and saw that she was crying. I felt I should keep my distance but she rolled over and clutched me.
“Love me, Danny,” she said.
She cried as we undressed. She cried as we embraced. She was still crying when we moved apart. Then she started to laugh a little, drying her tears with the palm of her hand.
She sighed, and I couldn’t make out if she was still laughing, or still crying.
***
I was dreading our last morning. We had breakfast in gloomy silence and sat around not doing much. But my mood was about to be rescued. I went on to the patio, looked out to sea – and couldn’t believe my eyes.
“Ruthie, come here quick,” I shouted. “There’s a school of porpoises out there.”
She came running out.
“Dolphins,” she said. “This coast is famous for them. Much bigger than porpoises and a much lighter colour.”
We could see half a dozen of the magnificent creatures tumbling and spilling through the swell.
“Hang on,” said Ruth. She went inside and returned with binoculars. “My dad got these just for watchin
g them.”
“God, they’re so playful,” I said. “They’re obviously so happy with life.”
“Yes, they don’t have our problems.”
“Why do they come here?”
“It’s the clear water that I told you about.”
“Do you think the dolphins keep the sharks away?”
“Maybe. But the water might have something to do with it.”
I spent the next twenty minutes watching the school sporting themselves, almost as if they were putting on a show for those of us around the bay. Then suddenly they were gone.
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget that,” I said, going indoors.
“And the rest of our honeymoon?” said Ruth. “That you can forget?”
“Come here, you silly thing. What did you say your name was?”
We had cold fish and tomato salad for an early lunch, loaded the car and, heads bowed, drove off with no looking back.
But I couldn’t bear it for long.
“Stop on the ridge. Please,” I said.
I got out of the car and drank in my last view of Ballito Bay, mesmerised by the drama of waves breaking into white foam and racing to shore. I could almost feel them crashing into me and over me, fresh and exciting.
But there was no escaping my fate and soon I turned back to the car, feeling both helpless and hopeless.
***
Ruth droppped me outside my flat. She got out and we kissed in silence. She was crying and I struggled to choke back my own tears. We’d already made all sorts of arrangements to keep in touch. She had long, heavy shifts ahead of her and it was quite possible that I would not be able see her before I left.
As she drove off I thought about the rest of the day. I was due at work at six but before that I had to take my car in for servicing in readiness for the four hundred and fifty mile journey back to Jo’burg.
I collected my mail from a pigeonhole in the foyer. Among the bills and circulars was a letter from my mother. I didn’t recognise the handwriting on a second letter, so I opened it first out of curiosity.
It was from Fazal. It read:
Dear Danny,
By the time you get this I will be safe and my family and my friends will be safe, so it will be an end to fear. I have done enough damage and now I have acted to repair it.
I am writing to thank you, Danny. You were the only workmate who showed any interest in what I was trying to do. And then I think I was unfair to you. You remember what you told me about the knife? Before I could seriously investigate it, another avenue presented itself. I am not going to tell you what it was, except to say it was this second thing – and not the knife – that was the cause of my undoing.
So Danny, you were in no way to blame for anything.
You will see that I have quite deliberately made this letter as vague as possible. Just in case, though, promise me one thing, Danny – that you will destroy it without letting anyone else read it. Otherwise, what I am doing will have no meaning at all. If you think about it, you will realise why.
You were a good friend, Danny, for which I truly thank you.
Goodbye,
Fazal
What the hell ... were a good friend? Goodbye?
Jesus Christ! I thought, this isn’t a letter, it’s a suicide note.
The phone rang. Conrad.
“Where on earth have you been, Danny? I’ve been trying to get you for days.”
“Tell me about Fazal.”
“Yeah. The silly fucker’s gone and topped himself.”
Chapter 23
FAZAL’S father had found him hanging from a beam in a backyard shed. According to Conrad, there was a note lying on a nearby table. This was last Friday. A post mortem was held over the weekend and no one at The Messenger knew of the tragedy until Monday afternoon, by which time Ruth and I were already heading for Ballito Bay.
As there were no suspicious circumstances the body was released to the family after three days. The funeral was held on Tuesday, the soonest possible time, which was in accordance with Islamic tradition. So I had been cheated out of saying goodbye to a friend.
An inquest had been opened and adjourned until mid-December, by which time I’d either be gone from Durban or dead.
What would happen in the coroner’s court was totally predictable. Fazal’s parents would testify that he had been severely depressed and the verdict would be suicide while the balance of mind was disturbed. Every suicide got the same verdict and in my opinion it was lazy and wrong. People kill themselves for various reasons, often because they are so damn sane. Is it unbalanced to try to escape from unbearable pain or intolerable heartache?
I knew very well why Fazal had taken his life but dared not say. It was all there in the letter, thinly veiled, yes, but obvious in the context of recent events. It was what he didn’t deny that was important. He might as well have written, “KOOS VAN BLATTER BRUTALISED ME AND THREATENED TO KILL MY PARENTS,” in capital letters and red ink. Or blood. But of course he couldn’t take a chance on any of that being read out to a coroner. Koos was too bloody vindictive. He’d definitely want to exact revenge on the family, or so Fazal would have thought.
In short, Fazal killed himself to protect his parents. While he was alive there was always a possibility that he might say or do the wrong thing and upset Van Blatter. In which case, he firmly believed – with some justification – that the fucking maniac would carry out a promised attack.
If Fazal had been raped, as I suspected, the shame he must have felt would certainly have made it easier to kill himself.
The only denial in the letter concerned my involvement. Fazal could not allay my feelings of guilt, but he’d tried. I wasn’t even convinced that he was telling the truth when he referred to a second line of inquiry that he’d dug up. But it didn’t matter. I’d never know if it was true or not, would I?
I did not tell Conrad about the letter. I remained convinced that the fewer people who knew about Koos the better. He was unassailable, protected by the law on every side. He might as well have been a god – vengeful and possessing the power of life and death over us mere mortals. I would put nothing past him. In quiet moments I had even begun to worry about the safety of the people I loved. But then I’d shrug and tell myself to stop being paranoid.
After Conrad rang off I sat on the floor and sobbed. I wondered if Fazal would ever get justice. There was no reason to believe that the oppression of South Africa’s non-whites would end for a long time to come. And if it ever did, who’d remember Fazal then? And what about the Indian boy whose death Fazal was investigating? Then there was the mysterious case of the reporter sacked over a year ago during a similar investigation. Given that I was growing paranoid, it wasn’t difficult for me to see the presence of Koos’s cruel hand behind all of these events.
As for myself, it seemed logical that he wished me dead. He was an expert reader of people and probably felt I couldn’t be frightened off in the same way as Fazal was. For one thing, my family lived in Jo’burg, which was another world to Koos. Getting to them was possible, but would cause him a great deal of trouble.
Anyway, he’d better hurry up if he wanted to kill me. There was only tomorrow and part of Friday – and then, hopefully, I’d be safe from his grasp for good.
***
In between subbing stories on Wednesday night I found time to go around inviting various staff members to a farewell drink-up at The Mayfair on Thursday evening. I phoned Ruth, who said she wouldn’t be able to make it, which was hardly surprising.
I also phoned my mother. I’d already called her to say I was coming home. Now I told her I would be leaving Durban on Friday morning, hoping to be home that night. But if I was running late, she shouldn’t worry. Rather than drive through the night, I might check into a hotel in Harrismith, more or less the halfway point, and coast into Jo’burg on Saturday.
With my departure so imminent, my resolve began to waver.
I spent Thursday looking over my shoulder again, especially as I walked to The Mayfair.
The drink-up turned out to be a bit of a shambles. At least a dozen people called in but didn’t stay long. They’d all heard that I had somehow offended Durban City Police and the CID. They also knew that I was refusing to explain it. I suppose that created a barrier to normal conversation. It was easier for them to go than to stay.
Conrad had brought Moira and soon only a sad little group was left. I was disappointed that neither the editor nor Gordon Clare had showed. But Neal Smythe was there and seemed genuinely sorry that I was going.
“As far as I’m concerned, you can always have your job back, Danny,” he said between tots. He handed me a letter. “It’s a reference from the editor.”
I opened it and saw it was brief. There was no mention of the police. Instead, it said I was a good, hard-working reporter and would grace the staff of any newspaper.
I thought it was the bloody least he could say. But I kept my thoughts to myself and instead I said, “It’s quite complimentary.” That cheered everyone up a little.
Conrad gave me a lift home. I shook his hand, gave Moira a kiss, and they drove off.
In the foyer I stopped to talk to James. I told him it was my last night in the block. I thanked him for protecting me and gave him a small present. He seemed genuinely upset that I was going.
As I was travelling by car I didn’t bother to pack properly, just chucked a few things in a case with the intention of throwing the rest in the boot.
I didn’t sleep very well, which was becoming the norm. My thoughts kept returning to Fazal. Everyone had let him down, most of all me.
***
It was Friday morning, November 30th, 1961. Time to leave Durban. I got dressed, had some tea and toast and walked to the garage, getting there, as arranged, at ten o’clock.
The car wasn’t ready.
I got angry. “For fuck sake, you promised me,” I shouted at the service manager. “I have to leave Durban today. I don’t have a choice!”
