Dust Devils

by Roger Smith

  Her aunt stood, her one leg withered from an old curse. Complaining about the ache in her back, she ducked out of the low doorway, gasping. Stood panting like a hyena out in the bright sunlight.

  Sunday folded her jeans and her work costume into a plastic shopping bag and left the hut. She followed her limping aunt along the footpath, a shortcut to the road, where Ma Beauty would flag down a minibus taxi to take them to town for the inspection.

  The white cop stank of something sweet. Some perfume, mixed with his sweat and the smell of stale tobacco. The Boer was in shirtsleeves, necktie loose at his throat. He leaned across his desk and offered Inja a pack of Camels. "Smoke?"

  Inja shook his head. He had no use for tobacco. The white man lit a cigarette, sucked in deep, then exhaled, never taking his eyes off Inja.

  He'd clapped Inja on the back when they'd met, saying "Captain Hans Theron. Like Charlize, 'cept I got better tits." Laughing, showing his teeth. Speaking English with that accent like a bone was stuck in his throat.

  Inja knew these white men. Boers. He'd killed enough of them back in the apartheid days, up in the bush war. Spent time in dark cells being interrogated by them. They smiled and joked while they tortured you. Inja buttoned his coat. Put his hands in his pockets. The office was as cold as a meat locker.

  Theron was watching him. "So my friend, tell me how you found this piece of shit who killed Ben Baker."

  Inja thinking, I'm not your friend, you white pig. But shrugging, staying relaxed in his chair. "It's part of an ongoing investigation. I can say no more."

  For a scrawny man, Inja had a deep voice. A beautiful voice, able to summon the poetry of his ancestors when he spoke in Zulu. His English was less florid, but his voice still carried authority.

  Theron ran a hand through his thick hair, looked past the beige vertical blinds that caught the breeze from the A/C and tapped the glass of the window. Stared out over Cape Town, the city that had a mountain growing out of its middle as if a giant mole rat had burrowed beneath, leaving high-rises and houses clinging to the lower slopes of the mound.

  Theron turned to Inja. "Look, I'm not bloody stupid. I know your boss, the honorable minister of fucken justice, is also your tribal chief up in Zululand. And he was like this with Ben Baker." Holding up his hand, index and middle fingers squeezed together. "Right?"

  Inja said nothing. Stayed as impassive as one of those soapstone carvings the tourists bought up in his home town.

  The Boer shrugged. "Good luck to them. Couldn't give a shit. Couldn't care if they were screwing each other up the ass. But I'm hearing, lately, that Baker was under investigation. The opposition having another nerve jerk about corruption. That Baker was maybe going to talk to save that fat backside of his, ready to squeal about all the fucken money he's poured into your boss's pocket. Then he ends up dead. And you, a Zulu warrior far from home, got a dead fucker in your truck with Baker's cell phone in his jeans and the gun that killed him in his jacket. Makes me think, my friend. Makes me think."

  Inja stared him down. Silent. Theron, cigarette dangling from his lip, opened his desk drawer and brought out a bottle of Klipdrift brandy and two glasses. Squinting through the smoke, he splashed three fingers of liquor into each glass and pushed one across to Inja.

  Theron lifted his glass. "Good luck."

  Inja didn't return the toast but he drank, smelling the sharpness of the fermented grape, feeling the burn of the alcohol warming him from inside. He liked brandy. Preferred it mixed with Coke, but he'd drink it neat.

  "Look, Mazibuko, I'm not going to be a stupid cunt about this. I'm on my way out, I know that." He pinched the flesh of his cheek between thumb and forefinger. "We all know that white isn't this year's color. They put me in charge of the Baker investigation because they needed a fucken stooge. Someone to get his ass kicked by the media and the politicians till his nose bled. So, I'll take this body and this gun and I'll go to the press conference and I'll take the credit for cracking the case." Staring at Inja with those shrewd blue eyes. "But I'm gonna ask you just one more question, my friend."

  Inja drank. Said nothing.

  "Is this whole fucken thing gonna blow up in my face? Are you gonna make more shit down here or are you gonna get your black ass the hell back to Zululand?"

  Inja shrugged. "My flight to Durban is booked for tonight."

  Theron smiled his easy smile. The one that never reached his eyes. "Okay then." He poured himself another brandy, stretched the bottle across the desk. Inja covered his glass with his hand, pinky ring catching a shaft of sunlight that pierced the blinds.

  The phone rang and Theron answered it. Swiveled in his chair, looking out the window. He grunted and said "Ja" a few times. Inja saw a photograph on his desk: a blonde woman with the face of a horse, smiling at the camera, her arms around two teenagers. The girl blonde, the boy dark haired like his father.

  Theron finished the call and stood, shrugging on his suit jacket. "I've got to get to that press conference. Let me walk you out."

  They left the office and headed toward the elevator. Theron pressed the button and almost immediately the doors slid open, revealing two young uniformed female cops inside. Half-breeds. They saluted Theron, who winked at them. The one giggled, caught the Boer's eye, then looked away. A blush on her high cheekbones. Theron jangled keys in his pocket, hummed to himself as they rode down. The elevator pinged and the doors opened onto the parking garage.

  Inja's rental truck stood near the elevator, the garage nearly empty of cars on this Sunday afternoon. After he'd shown his ID to the cops at the diner they'd spoken to headquarters and one of them had driven into Cape Town with him, the other following in the cop car. The body of the Xhosa idiot had long been removed from the rear of the Toyota.

  The Boer was speaking, "Interesting call I got, upstairs. A car went over the pass outside Franschhoek a few hours back. Silver Volvo. Burned out. Belonged to a woman called Rose Dell. Sound familiar?" Inja shook his head. "Worked for an organization Baker funded. Her name has come up a few times during our investigation. Heard rumors that Baker was screwing her. Apparently she was one of those hot pieces of colored ass." Laughing. "Lot hotter now."

  They had reached the truck. Inja unlocked it, thinking of the sheep's head that he was going to eat on the way to the airport.

  "Apparently the woman and her two kids were killed but her husband was thrown clear. He survived." Theron had Inja's attention. "Funny thing is, he's saying a black truck forced them off the road." The cop lifted a shoe and nudged the bullbar, where silver paint had been scraped onto the black. "You watch yourself now." Smiled. Turned to walk away.

  Inja said, "Wait."

  The Boer faced him. His smile even wider. "Something I can do for you, my friend?"

  The stink of death almost made Dell lose his nerve and flee the police morgue. He sat in the lobby, spaced out from painkillers and shock, trying not to breathe. Waiting for a young police constable – a dead ringer for Rosie's younger sister – to come and lead him to the bodies of his wife and children.

  It was a hot day and this part of the Cape had been affected by rolling power cuts for the last week. So, no matter how much disinfectant they sluiced onto the tiled floor, the smell of death was always going to win. Dell opened the door to the sidewalk and inhaled fresh air. Stood in the sunshine looking over the strip mall and taxi stand, up at the mountains where it had happened, not even three hours ago.

  The clinic had given him a pair of flip-flops and a striped pajama top. He still wore his jeans. They carried the story of his birthday in bloodstains and rips. Almost fashionable.

  He touched a hand to the bandage on his head. Another bandage wrapped his ribcage. He'd suffered lacerations and bruised ribs. The disintegrating windshield had left a filigree of superficial glass cuts on the skin of his back. Otherwise he was unhurt. Shock and grief, not injury, had felled him when he'd tried to walk away from the accident scene.

  Really lucky, the paramedics said as
they scraped him from the blacktop and brought him back down to Franschhoek, to the clinic where everybody had been so bloody nice he'd nearly cried. No crying, he'd sworn to himself. Not yet. Not until he found out who'd killed his family.

  "Mr. Dell."

  He'd slumped down on the sidewalk like a homeless man, and looked up to see the cop standing over him. Her name was Constable Goliath, which was hilarious because she was tiny. Skinny brown arms sticking out from her short-sleeved blue uniform. The big black boots and the weapon holstered at her hip made her look like something from the manga cartoons the twins had loved.

  "Mr. Dell, are you okay?"

  Gripping the buff brick wall, he hauled himself to his feet. "I'm fine. Thank you, Constable."

  She put a hand on his arm. "You really don't have to do this, you know." Rrreeely.

  Her accent made him think of Rosie's parents. He'd have to break the news to them. It would destroy her father, the man who had spent years driving a garbage truck to save up the money to get his exceptional daughter an education. To this day he battled not to call Dell "Mr. Rob".

  "We could get dental records sent from Cape Town tomorrow to make the identification," the constable said. "You shouldn't do this to yourself."

  Dell shook his head. He had to do it. Otherwise none of this would be real. He'd put them in the ground and still not believe it had happened. "I want to. Take me to them. Please."

  She nodded. Led the way through the lobby to a pair of scuffed swinging doors, painted a pale yellow. Two small frosted windows stared at him like blind eyes. She stopped with one of the doors half-open and the smell of decaying flesh rushed out and hit Dell. He worked hard to hold down his puke. The cop looked like she was going to speak again, then she shook her head and let him enter.

  A man in a stained white coat lurked near the back of the room, beside a wall of metal freezer drawers. He had skin the color of flat beer, four strands of black hair lying like tendrils across his bald skull. He came forward when he saw Dell, passing a fan that fought a losing battle against the heat and the stench. The wind of the fan lifted the hairs on his head, and they stood like antennae for a moment, until he moved out of range and they flopped down again.

  There were five chrome tables in the room. Two of them were empty. Three of them were covered by black waterproof plastic. Dell could see shapes under the plastic. The man looked at the constable who nodded. He took the corner of the first cover and drew it back, in one practiced motion. Dell had to grab hold of the table to stop himself from falling.

  Later, he remembered only flashes. Like jump cuts from a movie. Remembered the buzzing strip lights in the ceiling, the whirr and rattle of the fan. Remembered the sound the man made, a constant sniffing and swallowing, his Adam's apple a yo-yo beneath his wrinkled skin. Remembered the young constable looking away from the tables. Used all of these images to try to erase what he saw when each cover was lifted.

  Tommy's features burned away. His right arm sheared off above the elbow, hanging by a piece of charcoal flesh. His one kid-size Chuck Taylor almost intact around a severed foot.

  Mary's brain visible beneath a skull that had been shattered like an egg. A clump of dark hair still twisting from the side of her head. Her legs ending at the knees.

  Rosie a torn torso with charred intestines. Beautiful hands gone, blackened stumps in their place. Legs twisted and broken. Eyes empty holes in scorched bone.

  Dell turned for the exit, fell through the swinging doors, toward the sunlight. Stood on the sidewalk and sucked air. The world went on outside. Cars drove by. He heard the blare of hip-hop pumping from a sound system. Saw a man and two kids walking out of a KFC, carrying tubs of fried chicken.

  The smell of his family's burned flesh was still thick in Dell's nostrils. He spewed. Vomit hot on his bare toes. Crouched with his hands on his knees, gasping, necklaces of drool dangling from his mouth. A woman in bright green hair rollers stared at him from inside a dented car, her face like a closed fist. Dell wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. Stood up. Saw the young constable watching him from the morgue doorway. Looking like she wanted to cry.

  A white Volkswagen with the South Africa Police Services blue and gold insignia on the door pulled up. A colored man in plain clothes climbed out, observed Dell for a moment, then went across to the constable. They spoke. The constable glanced at Dell, then back at the man. When she looked at Dell again, something in her expression had shifted.

  The plainclothes walked over to Dell, flipped open his ID. "I'm Lieutenant Palm."

  Dell nodded, waiting for the cop to give him information on that bastard in the black truck. The madman who had destroyed his life. Then he realized how strong the painkillers and the shock were, because he could have sworn he heard the cop reading him his rights.

  "What?" Dell said. "What's going on?"

  The cop cuffed Dell's hands in front of him. He hardly felt the pain when the metal gripped his torn and bruised flesh. The man grabbed his arm and walked him toward the car. Put a hand on Dell's bandaged head and pushed him down into the rear of the Volkswagen.

  The cop was speaking. "You're under arrest for the murder of your wife and children. Do you understand?"

  No. He didn't understand.

  The car sagged as the cop sat behind the wheel. He cranked the engine and the Volkswagen took off. Dell looked up at the young constable as they drove by. An expression of loathing on her face.

  As the taxi rattled down toward the village, Sunday's dead mother spoke to her. Told her to open the book. Sunday was used to hearing her mother at night, lying in bed in Ma Beauty's hut, the iron roof cracking like gunshots as it cooled in the sudden chill. But the voice shocked her in the brightness of the packed minibus, Sunday jammed in beside her aunt.

  She squirmed forward, scratching in her bag, her nose almost touching the creased neck of the man in front of her, finding the torn spine of the book, easing it out onto her lap.

  Ma Beauty's elbow jabbed her in the ribs. "Sit still, you." The miserable woman, as sharp edged and spiky as the aloes that blurred by.

  Sunday opened the book, careful with the charred pages. It was her most precious possession. Too precious to leave in the hut when she went to work. Ten years ago Sunday, wandering among the bodies of her mother, father and cousin, had rescued the burned book from the smoking ruins of her hut. It had been a spiral-bound photo album, long ago. On what was left of the cover, smiling white people with hair like straw stood in the snow with planks tied to their feet.

  Inside, two singed and crumbling photographs remained. One was taken on her parents' wedding day, her father just a shoulder in a striped suit. Half of her mother's beautiful, smiling face burned to ash. The other a blurred snapshot of Sunday as a fat baby, sitting on a woman's knee. The woman's head was gone but Sunday knew it was her mother. The mother who spoke to her. Told her fingers to go to the rear of the book.

  On the inside of the back cover, trapped beneath warped and discolored plastic, Sunday felt the fragment of blackened cardboard. Like the printed cards Richard handed out to the tourists, advertising his services as a guide. This card was burned away except for a telephone number. Sunday had stared at it all these years, never knowing whose number it was. Or why her mother had kept it.

  The taxi skidded to a stop in a cloud of red dust and Sunday smacked her forehead on the seat in front of her. She looked up to see they were in the village, the passengers fighting their way out of the minibus.

  Ma Beauty scowled down at her. "Come on, you. We are already late."

  Sunday returned the book to her bag and followed her aunt out of the taxi.

  Bhambatha's Rock was one short street, ending at an iron bridge that spanned the dry river. Low cinderblock buildings flanked the road in two uneven rows, some untreated gray, others painted in blues and pinks faded by the sun.

  Sunday and her aunt dodged the cows and the goats and the drunks clotting the doorway of the liquor store, picked their way betwee
n vendors squatting in the dirt selling cigarettes and the cheap sweets that made your piss go pink. They arrived at a store, dwarfed by signs advertising Omo washing powder and Sunlight soap. A group of women and girls sat on the sand behind the store, in the shade of flat-topped thorn trees.

  A big woman waited for Sunday and Ma Beauty, casting glances at the watch that cut into her fat wrist. She wore a floral blouse, a gray skirt hanging to her thick ankles, elephant feet overflowing sandals that had been made for a more delicate body. A blue beret was pulled low on her head and she had a big imitation leather purse slung over her shoulder. Auntie Mavis. The sister of the ugly dog who had bought Sunday. Come to see the inspection was carried out in the traditional manner. And that the results were beyond dispute.

  The two women greeted one another. Sunday was ignored. Auntie Mavis spoke down her flat nose at Ma Beauty as she led the way to where around twenty teenage girls stood in line, chattering and giggling nervously. A young woman in too-tight jeans and evening shoes with rounded heels perched on a rock, writing the names of the girls in a notebook.

  Sunday's aunt dug in her pocket and produced a coin. "Here. Go pay."

  Sunday stood in line. Gave her name. The woman laboriously wrote it down, and pocketed the payment. Sunday joined the girls who waited but she didn't make conversation.

  A girl was called forward and disappeared behind a tree where an auntie in black and white beaded ceremonial headdress sat on a grass mat. A group of older women formed a cordon around the auntie, protecting the girl from prying eyes.

  A shout went up, and the women cheered and ululated. Calling out "Imomozi!" Vagina in Zulu. The girl stepped from behind the tree, proudly wearing a circle of white paste on her forehead that announced to the world that she was a Zulu virgin.

  One by one the girls went forward. And the cheers and shouts followed. Then a girl disappeared behind the tree and emerged to silence. No white marking. No cheers. Just shakes of the heads and clucking from the older women. Tears on the girl's face, her disgraced mother scuttling off after her.