by Ian Patrick
Yes, he remembered both the men. No question. They were always hanging around. They would often go through those doors, there, see, over there… No, he didn’t know where those doors went, but...
He paused in mid-sentence. Thabethe looked at him.
‘Is what? What you say?’
‘That man, coming there now, walking past the lady with the blue dress.’
‘Yes? Is what?’
‘Those two men, in the photo, sometimes they come out walking with that man over there.’
Thabethe snatched back the photograph, threw a fifty rand note on the table, left his beer and, keeping his distance, followed Tony through the crowds in the casino.
17.55.
Ryder bent again over Trewhella’s twisted, empty corpse. Empty. Empty not because of the pints that had bled out through the evil hole in the forehead to congeal, black-red, across the living-room carpet. Empty because of total absence. Abandoned. Discarded. A shell.
He had seen many corpses, but he had never thought that death would ever show itself quite like this. It had sucked the entire history from this previously warm and much-loved body. It had left behind a mere husk, as dry and brittle as cracked autumn leaves with no further purpose. The formerly bright and mischievous two blue marble eyes now stared blankly up at him, half covered by translucent eyelids. There was nothing behind them. They sat there in their sockets, with no connection to a living brain. Mere absence, total and complete and desolate. What lay before Ryder was no longer his partner. There were no more jokes. No more innuendoes. The end of laughter.
He stepped backward, taking care to avoid any interference with what would now become the unit’s top crime scene. He had no desire to touch the thing that lay before him. The countless movie scenes he had observed – many of them in the presence of this same movie-loving rogue and best friend – in which the dead loved one was scooped up into frenzied arms, accompanied by sobs and tears and anguished moans, were as far from this numbing reality as he could possibly imagine.
As he straightened his weary spine to achieve his full six feet and two inches of stiff angular height he felt the troublesome L4 in his lower back complain yet again. The dull pain added to his desperate weariness. Utter fatigue. A numbing lack of any emotion at all. It was as if the emptiness of the corpse had attached itself to him. He felt decades older than his forty years as he turned, dry-eyed and ice-cold, to leave the scene for the impossible task of breaking the news to others, to friends and relatives and former lovers and ex-wives and colleagues who hadn’t already heard...
It was going to be a long, tough night.
The forensics people made way for him, respectfully, as he walked back in a haze through the apartment to the front door, removing the gloves and the rest of the PPE kit they had handed him upon his arrival. They muttered their condolences as he passed them the objects. As he reached the front door, the crowds were being pulled back behind the barricades across the street and for thirty yards on both sides, up and down.
The barricades were opened, temporarily, with the approach of more blue lights. Three more cars. Four. Five. Among those that screeched to a halt, spewing both uniforms and plain-clothes, he noticed Koekemoer, Dippenaar, Cronje, Cronje’s intern, and various others from the unit. Then Captain Nyawula pulled up, with Pillay driving. They got out of Pillay’s car, saw Ryder, and waited for him to walk over to them.
WEDNESDAY
07.55.
Fiona had killed the alarm after Ryder finally went to sleep, at around 3.00 am. Half a bottle of Laphroaig had helped. He had gone ice cold, silent, and completely immobile as he fell asleep in her arms. She had never seen that before.
He had had some bad experiences over the years. Seen quite a few cops take a hit, some of them people to whom he had been very close. One, like Frikkie van der Westhuizen, had been such a good buddy, before Ed came along. Frikkie had survived for eight days with sixteen stab wounds in him, before he finally passed. Ryder had handled that with no apparent emotion. But she knew him well. Knew what was going on inside him at the time. She had been a tower of strength to him. She knew that. He knew it. It was only at the funeral that he’d choked up a bit when speaking over Frikkie’s grave. He came through that, but he had then been obsessed with finding Frikkie’s killer, working round the clock and presiding over the team that eventually nailed him. It was only when they put the guy away for thirty-five years that Ryder seemed to reach some kind of acceptance.
Before that, there had been Ntshaveni, up in Johannesburg. Best buddies with Jeremy, but for such a short time. Ntshaveni and his wife had been frequent guests at their home, and the children had played together, and the two detectives had cracked many high-profile cases together. They had been through so much in such a short time before Ntshaveni was killed in a hail of bullets. Ryder had then pursued the four thugs relentlessly and had personally taken down each and every one of them, almost as if he was driven to pay back a debt to Ntshaveni’s three children. He had not rested until three of the perpetrators were behind bars, each of them for a minimum of thirty years, and the fourth was six feet under, where he belonged. The Ryders had then followed up and made a massive contribution to the education of Ntshaveni’s children, and made a point of seeing them and their mother whenever they were up in Johannesburg.
Ed’s death was different. This was a game-changer. Fiona thought that this time something had given way inside Ryder. He had seldom spoken to her directly about the politics behind the work. Apart from the usual office gossip and the occasional despairing comment following a media scoop on the latest police corruption scandal. Last night was different. What he’d babbled out through his drunken haze, before he finally passed out, had scared her. The corruption. The bribes. The senior guys who were faceless but seemed to determine so much of what happened on the ground. The cases that made it through days and nights and weeks and months of painstaking detective work and then blew up because of clever defence lawyers or overworked State Advocates or because of some unknown instruction from above. Or because of some bribe, and the resultant disappearance of crucial papers or evidence.
Then the other dimension. The IPID investigations. Jeremy was the cleanest cop around, she thought, and he attracted clean cops to work with him. He was all for IPID inquiries. Let the public see that there was no simple whitewashing of actions by the cops. No problem. When an investigation looks necessary, then go for it. But what had begun to bug him recently was the sense that whenever IPID was called in someone up the food chain, thinking of their political profile rather than the case in hand, went miles too far, finding all cops guilty until proven innocent. Shouting about their suspicions in the media. Making themselves look like they were the real corruption-busters when, in fact, they were just milking the publicity. Major and Colonel Clean: we fight the good fight. Until the actual evidence, and the cops are exonerated. Then no apology. No climb-down. No sorry, I jumped the gun. Silence. That one didn’t work for them, so there’ll be another chance to proclaim their leadership in the fight against corruption.
Whose side were these guys on?
Ed’s death seemed to have pulled a cork out of the bottle as Jeremy spewed forth with all of this. She had held him in her arms, rocking him back and forth, as he went silent, and still, and eventually drifted off.
This was the first weekday in the nearly two decades they had been together that she knew him to sleep through daybreak. He had always got up with the light, Monday to Friday. Even after long nights. Always an early riser. That had proved very useful in this particular period, while Nyawula was experimenting with his team with new office hours: Early start, early finish. Let’s try it for a month, guys. They had all been up for trying it, and were currently halfway through the experiment. Another one of the many innovations that Nyawula had introduced. His popularity was growing within the unit.
But it made no difference to Jeremy, she thought. Something always got him up with the dawn. Except not on weeke
nds. Funny, that. How come the light never got to him on weekends? Weird. But always on a weekday, no matter what.
Except this time. Not today. She was the one to wake up first. She moved stealthily and slipped out of the bed. She took his iPhone with her, knowing that it wouldn’t be long before the calls started coming in. Condolences. Support. Shock. She would field the calls downstairs, and protect him, and give him a hot breakfast. With lots of coffee.
09.35.
Pillay left the Captain’s office a bit startled. The lines had been humming all night and they had worked through the whole thing, he told her, and those he reported to had in essence agreed with him. Nyawula’s superiors usually ended up agreeing with him. Except for Major Swanepoel. But in this case even he had supported the request. So the Captain wanted her to know how hard he had worked at this deal, to get her on board. Because he had faith in her abilities, he told her. He hoped she knew that.
She had nodded and made to speak, but he had interrupted her.
‘There are some rules being broken here, Navi. So please don’t take this as a formal arrangement just yet. It’ll take time to go through all the hoops, to satisfy the necessary protocols, and to sign off on everything, so we’ll only be able to make a formal announcement in due course.’
‘I understand, Captain.’
‘But for now just consider yourself as Jeremy’s new partner.’
‘Yessir.’
‘I’ll brief him first, so try if you can not to be in contact with him until you have the go-ahead. Hopefully within a couple of hours, if Jeremy comes in today. I’ll completely understand if he doesn’t.’
‘Me too, Captain’
‘You’ll receive the formal papers in a few days. Probably before the funeral, whenever that might be. I’ve thought long and hard about this, Navi, and I know it’s a really sensitive issue, but I also thought there might be some therapeutic value in announcing only at Ed’s funeral that you’ll be the one taking over from him. I know that you and Ed and Ryder and KoeksnDips and the others have enjoyed a pretty good relationship in the unit. It’s a difficult one, I know, but I’ve decided on balance to go for that option.’
‘Makes sense, sir.’
‘Above all, no-one must talk about a new partnership between you and Ryder beforehand. Especially at the function tomorrow night. That’s not the occasion to talk about things like this. Let’s try and keep it under wraps until the announcement at the funeral.’
‘Will do. You can count on me, Captain.’
‘Anyway, Navi. I’m sorry to have been so pernickety about this. In essence, despite all I’ve said, please consider the promotion a done deal. I want personally to let Jeremy know, so don’t be in contact with him until that happens. In the meantime you can get back on the job, and given the circumstances, by all means work alone for the rest of the day. But be careful, until you have a partner to watch your back.’
Pillay had been unusually at a loss for words throughout most of this exchange. She walked in a daze to her car, her mind now racing as she considered the ramifications.
Nyawula stood at the window and watched her cross the car park. One of the few, he thought. Now partners. Pillay and Ryder. And soon, officially, Detective Pillay. No longer Sergeant Pillay. He wished he could have a few more like them and like KoeksnDips. Trewhella had also been damned good, despite his methods. Poor bastard. He and Ryder had been among the best he had seen. Perfect balance: good cop, bad cop was the impression everyone had of them, but in fact both of them were good cops. The best, and refreshingly clean, both of them, with no hint of corruption. To have a team like that broken up caused a real problem for Nyawula. Maybe Ryder and Pillay together could plug the gap.
Which one would be the bad cop, and which one the good, he wondered? They were both extraordinarily tough.
He had been pleasantly surprised that the Major had simply gone along with his proposal. It was unlike Swanepoel to let Nyawula just go ahead against strict HR policy and protocols. He usually put every obstacle he could in the way of Nyawula’s attempts to turn this into an efficient operation. Racist bastard. It often seemed to Nyawula that the Major couldn’t stomach a black officer making good. Always interfering. Usually wanted everything on paper, all the time. Dates, times, intentions: every damned thing that kept the team from getting out into the streets and doing the job they were paid for.
But at least for now he had patched up a big problem. Pillay would do well. He was sure of that. And Ryder would come around to accepting her as a replacement for his buddy
10.40.
Tony stood in front of Vic in his customary position. Vic’s voice was even raspier than yesterday, Tony thought. It seemed more breathless than he had ever heard it. It seemed to emanate from a deep well, the air being forced up through a mountain of flesh as if through a cancerous larynx before emerging in a hoarse vocalised whisper.
‘All hell’s gonna break over this, Tony.’
‘Sure expect it to, Vic. But, like I said, I really had to do it. The guy was getting too close. Like I told you yesterday, he had found the loose floor-board and the box and was about to go through the documents. What could I do? I’ve got the box in the car and I’ll put it into the wall in Overport. I’ll go over there right now.’
‘OK. That’s probably the best place for now. But I’m going to have to keep my ears close to the ground on this one, to see what action the cops are going to take. I suspect it’s going to be like starting a whole new war. What about Ryder? He’s a scary guy. Tough as nails, I hear, and apparently meticulous. Never lets go of a case. Follows it for years. I don’t like that.’
‘I’ll watch my back. In the meantime, we really should bring in a couple of guys to help us, now that Dirk and Jannie are out of it. Do you have anyone in mind? From Cape Town or Pretoria, maybe? What about that guy in Maputo who’s checking things out for you? What about Big Red? I’ve known him a long time, and you seemed to hit it off with him when you met, remember?’
‘Let me think through that. I’ve also thought of Red. After that little runt Jannie I think we need more muscle like you, and brains. Like you. I like Red’s muscle, but I don’t know his brains well enough yet. I’ll think about it.’
‘OK. I’ll wait for you, then. I know I can work with Red. He and I pulled some good stuff together in the old days. But I’ll wait for you to tell me.’
‘Will do. First I need to check that our lines are still safe. I’ll let you know. In the meantime you get into the Overport place and store the box, sort out today’s dispatch, and also clear out any traces that Dirk might’ve left. The cops might work on him inside, and get him to talk.’
‘Will do, Vic. Is there any way we can find out where they took Dirk? If we could find out then maybe we could get someone on the inside to ensure that he remains cool. He knows a lot about us. If he talks...’
‘I’m working on just exactly that. Leave it to me. I’ll find out where he is in the system. Could be anywhere between hospital and a cell. I’ll find him, through my connections.’
‘Sure thing. I’ll get on to Overport, then.’
Vic nodded and Tony turned to the door.
‘Watch your back, Tony. I’m hearing things about Ryder that worry me. The charra woman, too. I hear they’re gonna put them together, now.’
‘That so? That small chick ? With Ryder? After Trewhella? Sounds like a panic decision. I thought she was still a junior. Anyway, I’ll be careful. I can look after myself.’
‘You do that, Tony. The estate agent’s people are right now preparing Argyle Road. I want to check on their progress, then we’ll be good to go later today, I hope.’
As he left, and closed the door behind him, Vic sat for a moment, then reached for his iPhone. He punched in a number and waited for three rings before the call was picked up.
‘It’s Vic, Red. I need to come and check the boat. It would be good to talk. Are we good for any time tomorrow morning?’
11.00.
As Tony walked through the casino, Thabethe slipped off the stool in front of the slot machine and followed him. Yesterday he had followed the gangster to his car, but having no transport he had been unable to follow any further. He simply noted the details, and watched Tony purr away from the casino.
Today Thabethe had arrived in his own car. Hired from Spikes Mkhize at Nomivi’s for a cool four hundred rands cash for two days, special price for Skhura alone. A battered old red Mini, now barely roadworthy. Spikes had tried to interest him in the silver Honda Ballade, stolen in 2007, souped up and re-painted with new chassis numbers, and completely re-honed for speed and power, for only three hundred a day. Thabethe declined. He had to get used to driving. Better a bucket of bolts than a souped-up car that might attract attention, for now anyway.
He took some time to familiarise himself with the Mini, after his months in prison. But he soon got on top of it and had then driven slowly around the parking area until he found Tony’s car. Black Mercedes-Benz 2.1 Sport. Not parked in the same area as yesterday, but instantly identifiable. So he had parked a couple of bays away from it. Now, as Tony got into the Mercedes, Thabethe peeled off and walked over to the Mini.
He stayed a good hundred metres behind the Mercedes as he followed it onto Sandile Thusi Road and through to where it became the M17, then crossed over Lillian Ngoyi and Florida, followed by a couple of dog-legs and then on to Moses Kotane. As Tony slowed down, he fell further back. He then watched as his quarry pulled in and parked at the edge of the road.
