by Wilbur Smith
,[
leaf altar chest which still stood against the wall of his office.
'Is hid safe?" 'He is missing,' Manfred said. 'He may have drowned, or he ma be alive. Either way we are in a very serious predicament." 'Escaped?" Shasa asked.
'One of the survivors, a prison officer, says that there were two vessels at the accident scene, a large ship without lights that collidec with the ferry and another smaller craft that arrived seconds artel the ferry capsized. In the darkness it was impossible to see any details It is a distinct possibility that Gama was spirited away." 'If he drowned, we will be accused of murdering him,' Shasa saic softly, 'with disastrous international repercussions." 'And if he is at large, we will face the possibility of a populm uprising of the blacks similar to Longa and Sharpeville." 'What are you doing about it?" Shasa asked.
'The entire police force is on full alert. One of our best men, m) own son Lothar, is flying down from the Witwatersrand in an airforce jet to take charge of the investigation. He will land within the next few minutes. Navy divers are already attempting to salvage the wreckage of the ferry." For another ten minutes they discussed all the implications of the wreck, and then Manfred moved to the door.
'I will keep you informed as we get further news." Shasa followed him into the outer office, and as they passed Tricia's desk she stood up.
'Oh, Mr Courtney, that woman called again while you were with Minister De La Rey." Manfred and Shasa both paused, and Tricia went on, 'She asked for Squadron Leader Courtney again, sir, and when I told her you were in conference, she said she had news for you about White Sword. She said you'd understand." 'White Sword!" Shasa froze and stared at her. 'Did she leave a number?" 'No, sir, but she said that )ou must meet her at the Cape Town railway station at five-thirty this afternoon. Platform four." 'How will I know who she is?" 'She says she knows you by sight. You are merely to wait on the platform, she will come to you." Shasa was so preoccupied with the message that he did not notice Manfred De La Rey's reaction to the code name 'White Sword'. All colour had drained from Manfred's craggy features, and his upper lip and jowls were covered by a sheen of perspiration. Without another word he turned and strode out into the corridor.
The name 'White Sword' kept plaguing Shasa all though the Armscor meeting. They were discussing the new air-to-ground missiles for the airforce but Shasa found it difficult to concentrate. He was plagued by the memory of his grandfather, that good and gentle man whom Shasa had loved and who had been murdered by White Sword. His death had been one of the fiercest tragedies of his young life, and the rage that he had felt at the brutal killing came back to him afresh.
'White Sword,' he thought. 'If I can find out who you are, even after all these years, you will pay, and the interest will be more onerous for the time the debt has stood." Manfred De La Rey went directly to his office at the end of the corridor after he had left Shasa. His secretary spoke to him as he passed her desk but he did not seem to hear her.
He locked the door to his own office, but did not sit at the massive mahogany desk. He prowled the floor restlessly, his eyes unseeing and his heayy jaws chewing like a bulldog with a bone. He took the handkerchief from his jacket pocket and wiped his chin and then paused to examine his face in the wall mirror behind his desk. He was so pale that his cheeks had a bluish sheen, and his eyes were savage as those of a wounded leopard caught in a trap.
'White Sword,' he whispered aloud. It was twenty-five years since he had used that code name, but he remembered standing on the bridge of the German U-boat, coming in towards the land in darkness, with his hair and great bushy beard ded black, staring out at the signal fires on the beach where Roelf Stander waited for him.
Roelf Stander had been with him through all the dangerous days and the wild endeavours. They had planned many of their operations in the kitchen of the Stander cottage in the little village of Stellenbosch. It was there in that kitchen that he had given them the details of the action that would be the signal for the glorious uprising of Afrikaner patriots. And at all those meetings Sarah Stander had been present, a quiet unobtrusive presence, serving coffee and food, never speaking - but listening. It was only many years later that Manfred had been able to guess at how well she had listened.
In 1948, when the Afrikaners had at last won at the ballot box the power which they had failed to seize at the point of the sword, Manfred's hard and loyal work had been rewarded with a deputy minister's post in the department of justice.
One of his first acts had been to send for the files of the unsolved attempt on the life of Jan Smuts, and the murder of Sir Garrick Courtney. Before he destroyed the files he read them through carefully, and he learned that they had been betrayed. There had been a traitor in their gallant band of patriots - a woman who had telephoned the Smuts police officers to warn them of the assassination.
He had guessed at the woman's identity, but had never extracted his full retribution, waiting for the moment to ripen, savouring the thought of revenge over the decades, watching the traitor's misery, watching her growing old and bitter, while frustrating her husband's efforts to succeed in law and politics, in the guise of mentor and adviser, steering him into folly and disaster until Roelf Stander had lost all his sustenance, his property and his will to carry on. All that time Manfred had waited for the perfect moment for the final revenge stroke - and at last it had arrived. Sarah Stander had come to him to plead for the life of the bastard he had placed in her womb - and he had denied her. The pleasure of it had been exquisite, made more poignant by the years he had waited for it.
Now the woman had turned vindictive. He had not anticipated that.
He had expected the blow to break and destroy her. Only the greatest good fortune had given him forewarning of this new betrayal she planned.
He turned from the mirror and sat down at his desk. He reached determinedly for the telephone and told his secretary, 'I want Colonel Bester in the bureau for state security." Bester was one of his most trusted officers.
'Bester,' he barked. 'I want a detention order drawn up urgently.
I will sign it myself, and I want it executed immediately." 'Yes, Minister. Can you give me the name of the detainee?" 'Sarah Stander,' Manfred said. 'Her address is 16 Eike Loan, Stellenbosch. If the arresting officers cannot find her there, she should be on platform four of the Cape Town railway station at five-thirty p.m. this afternoon. The woman must speak to no one before she is arrested - your men must make certain of that." As Manfred hung up he smiled grimly. Under the law he had the power to arrest and detain any persons for ninety days, and to hold that person completely incommunicado. A great deal could happen in ninety days. Things could change, a person might even die. It was all taken care of. The woman could cause no further trouble.
The telephone on his desk rang, and Manfred snatched it up, expecting it to be Bester again. 'Yes, what is it?" 'Pa, it's me - Lothie." 'Yes, Lothie. Where are you?" 'Caledon Square. I landed twenty minutes ago, and I have taken over the investigation. There is news, Pa. The divers have found the ferry. There is no sign of the prisoner's body but the cabin door has been forced open. We must assume that he escaped. Worse than that, somebody engineered his escape." 'Find him,' Manfred said softly. 'You must find Moses Gama. If we don't, the consequences could be disastrous." 'I know,' Lothar said. 'We will find him. We have to find him." Centaine refused to eat the food in the parliamentary dining-room.
'It's not that I am fussy, ch6ri, in the desert I ate live locusts and meat that had lain four days in the sun, but --' She and Shasa walked down through the gardens, across the top end of town to the Car Royal on Greenmarket Square, where the first oysters of the season had arrived from Knysna lagoon.
Centaine sprinkled lemon juice and tabasco sauce, scooped a gently pulsating mouthful from the half shell and sighed with pleasure.
'And now, ch6ri,' she dabbed the juice from her lips, 'tell me why yca are so far away that you do not laugh at even my best efforts." 'I'm sorry, Mater." Shas
a signalled to the waiter to top up his champagne glass. 'I had a strange phone call this morning - and I haven't been able to concentrate on anything else. Do you remember White Sword?" 'How can you ask?" Centaine laid down her fork. 'Sir Garry was more dear to me than my own father. Tell me all about it." They spoke of nothing else for the rest of the lunch, exploring together ancient memories of that terrible day on which a noble and generous man had died, a man who had been precious to them both.
At last Shasa called for the bill. 'It's half past one already. We will have to hurry to reach the House before it begins. I don't want to miss any part of Verwoerd's speech." At sixty-six years of age Centaine was still active and agile, and Shasa was not forced to moderate his stride for her. They were still talking animatedly as they passed St George's Cathedral and turned into the gardens.
Ahead of them two men sat on one of the park benches, and there was something about them that caught Shasa's attention even at a distance of a hundred yards. The taller of the pair was a swarthycomplexioned man who wore the uniform of a parliamentary messenger. He sat very stiffly upright and stared straight ahead of him with a fixed expression.
The man beside him was also dark-haired but his face was colourless as putty, the dead black hair fell forward on to his forehead. He was leaning close to the parliamentary messenger, speaking into his ear as though imparting a secret, but the messenger's face was expressionless and he showed not the least reaction to the other man's words.
As they came level with the bench, Shasa leaned forward to see
?"
illi!
ú ?i a
;?
past Centaine, and at less than five paces looked directly into tl pale face of the smaller of the men. His eyes were black and impla able as pools of liquid tar, but as Shasa studied him, the m deliberately turned his face away. Yet his lips kept moving, talkir so softly to the man in the parliamentary uniform that Shasa couJ not catch even a murmur of his voice.
Centaine tugged at his sleeve. 'Chri, you are not listening to me 'I'm sorry, Mater,' Shasa apologized absentmindedly.
'I wonder why this woman chose the railway station,' Centair repeated.
'I suppose she feels safer in a public place,' Shasa hazarded, an glanced back over his shoulder. The two men were still on the benct but even in his preoccupation with other things, the passionle, malevolence that Shasa had seen in that tar-black gaze made hir shiver as though an icy wind had blown upon the back of his neck As they turned into the lane that led to the massive edifice of pm liament, Shasa felt suddenly confused and uncertain. There was to, much happening all around him over which he had no control. I was a sensation to which he was not accustomed.
Joe Cicero whispered the formula soly, 'You can feel the worm ii your belly." 'Yes,' the man beside him replied, staring straight ahead.
Only hi lips moved as he made the reply, 'I can feel the worm." 'The worm asks if you have the knife." 'Yes, I have the knife,' said the man. His father had been a Greek and he had been born illegitimate in Portuguese Mozambique of a Mulatto woman. His mixed blood was not apparent. It seemed merely as though he was of Mediterranean extraction. Only Europeans were employed as messengers in the South African parliament.
'You can feel the worm in your belly,' Joe Cicero reinforced the man's conditioning.
'Yes, I can feel the worm." Eight times in the past few years he had been in mental institutions.
It was while he was in the last of these that he had been selected and the conditioning of his mind accomplished.
'The worm asks if you know where to find the devil,' Joe Cicero told him. The man's name was Demetrio Tsafendas and he had been introduced into South Africa the previous year, once his conditioning was completed.
'Yes,' said Tsafendas. 'I know where to find the devil." 'The worm in your belly orders you to go straight to where the devil is,' Joe Cicero said softly. 'The worm in your belly orders you to kill the devil." Tsafendas stood up. He moved like an automaton.
'The worm orders you to go now!" Tsafendas started towards the parliament building with an even unhurried tread.
Joe Cicero watched him go. It was done. All the pieces had been placed with great care. At last the first boulder had started to roll down the hillside. It would gather others as it built up speed and momenttim, goon it would be a mighty avalanche and the shape of the mountain would be changed for ever.
Joe Cicero stood up and walked away.
The first person Shasa saw as he and Centaine walked up the front steps to the parliament entrance was Kitty Godolphin and his heart surged with excitement and unexpected pleasure. He hadn't seen her since that illicit interlude in the south of France eighteen months before. Shasa had chartered a luxury yacht and they had cruised as far as Capri. When they parted, she had promised to write - but she never kept her promises, and here she was again with no warning, smiling that sweet girlish smile with the devilment in her eyes, coming to greet him as innocently and naturally as though their last kiss had been hours before.
'What are you doing here?" he demanded without any preliminaries, and Kitty said to Centaine, 'Hello, Mrs Courtney. How did such a nice cultured lady ever end up with such an ill-mannered son?" Centaine laughed, she liked Kitty. Shasa thought that it was a case of kindred spirits. Kitty explained, 'I was in Rhodesia to get a profile on Ian Smithy before he meets Harold Wilson, and I made a side trip for the speech that Verwoerd is giving today, and of course to visit with you." They chatted for a few minutes, then Centaine excused herselfi 'I must get a good seat in the gallery." As she moved awiy Shasa asked Kitty softly, 'When can I see you?" 'This evening?" Kitty suggested.
'Yes - oh no, damn it." He remembered his rendezvous with the White*Sword informer. 'Where are you staying?" 'The Nellie as usual." 'Can I call you there later?" 'Sure,' she smiled. 'Unless I get any better offers." 'You little bitch! Why don't you marry me?" 'I'm too good for you, buster." It had become one of their stock jokes. 'But I don't mind an order of small beer and chips on the side.
See you later:'
,;ii ;
is: ?
i4L i !?i
?
Shasa watched her climb the staircase towards the press galler) Over all the years he had known her, she seemed not to have aged day. She still had the body of a girl, and the light spring of youth iJ her step. He pushed back the sudden cold gloom of loneliness that threatened to engulf him and walked into the chamber.
The benches were filling. Shasa saw that the prime minister was il his seat at the head of the government benches. He was talking t Frank Waring, the minister of sport, and the only other Englishmai in the cabinet.
Verwoerd looked fit and vigorous. It seemed impossible that hid had taken two revolver bullets through his skull and had come bach with such power to dominate his own party and the entire chambeJ this way. He seemed to have an infinite capacity for survival and, oJ course, Shasa grinned cynically, the luck of the devil himself.
Shasa started towards his own seat, and Manfred DeLa jumped up and came to intercept him.
He seized Shasa's arm and leaned close to him. 'The divers have raised the ferry. Gama's body is not in it and the door to the cabin has been forced. It looks as though the bastard has got clean away.
But we have every exit from the country guarded and my men will get him. He cannot get away. I think the prime minister is going to make the announcement of his disappearance during his speech this afternoon." Shasa and Manfred began walking towards their seats on the front bench, when somebody bumped so roughly against Shasa that he exclaimed and glanced around. It was the uniformed messenger that Shasa had noticed on the park bench.
'Be careful, fellow,' Shasa snapped at him as he recovered his balance, but the man did not seem to hear.
Although his expression was vacant and his eyes staring and unseeing, the-messenger walked with a quick determined step, brushing past Manfred and heading towards the opposition benches on the left side of the Speaker's throne.
Suddenly the messenger seemed to change his mind, he veered across the chamber and hurried towards where Dr Verwoerd was sitting. The prime minister saw him coming and looked up expectantly, supposing that the man had a message for him. Nobody else in the chamber seemed to be taking any notice of the messenger's erratic behaviour, but Shasa was watching with puzzlement.
As the messenger stood over Dr Verwoerd, he swept his dark uniform jacket open and Shasa saw the silver flash of steel. 'Good Christ!" he exclaimed. 'He's got a knife." The messenger lifted the blade and struck once, and strangely the prime minister was smiling, as though he did not realize what was happening. The blade came free and the silver was misted pink with blood.
Shasa started forward, but Manfred still had hold of his arm. 'The Manchurian Candidate,' he hissed and Shasa froze.
Standing over the prime minister, the assassin struck again and then again. With each blow the blood spurted down his white shirt front and Dr Verwoerd lifted his hands in a pathetic gesture of appeal.
At last the men closest to him realized what was happening and they leapt upon the assailant. A knot of struggling men swarmed over him, but the man was fighting back with a kind of demonic strength.
'Where is the Devil?" he shouted wildly. 'I'll get the Devil." They bore him to the green carpet and pinned him there.
Dr Verwoerd still sat in his seat staring down at his own chest from which the bright flood poured. Then he pulled the lapels of his jacket closed as though to hide the terrible sight of his own blood, and with a sigh slid forward and crumpled on to the carpeted floor of the chamber.
Shasa and Manfred De La Rey were in Shasa's parliamentary office when Tricia brought the news through.
'Gentlemen, the party whip has just telephoned. Dr Verwoerd has been declared dead on arrival at the Volks Hospital." Shasa went to the liquor cabinet behind his desk and poured two glasses of cognac.
They watched each other's eyes as they drank silently, and then Shasa lowered his glass and said, 'We must start at once to draw up a list of those we can rely on to support you. I think John Vorster is the man you will have to beat for the premiership, and his people will already be busy." They worked together through the afternoon preparing their lists, placing ticks and crosses and queries against the names. Telephoning, wheedling and extorting, arranging meetings, making promises and commitments, trading and compromising, and as the afternoon wore on a stream of important visitors, allies and potential allies, passed through Shasa's suite.
