Now I See You

by Holmes, Priscilla; Holmes, Priscilla;

  It all seemed so normal, but the horror of what had happened pressed against the backs of my eyes and clogged my throat.

  All I wanted was to get back to Hill Street, normalise my life and erase the horror of the past few hours from my thoughts. The thought of Sue Kellon’s dead body was a dull ache in my chest.

  I walked back into the hospital emergency unit, searching for Zak. I found him talking to the obnoxious Mandile. He turned as I approached, rolling his eyes in the direction of Mandile.

  ‘Zak, I’ll stay here and wait for McEwen to recover. Why don’t you go back to the station and wait for me to bring her in for questioning?’

  ‘Absolutely not DI Tswane, I think you should go back to the safe house and change.’

  He gestured at the blood stains all down my shirt.

  I tried to argue, but the sight of the blood was enough to make me agree with him.

  ‘I think we can leave this in the capable hands of Director Mandile until McEwen can be questioned. I’ll drive you back,’ Zak said smoothly.

  Mandile agreed. ‘Yes, yes, just leave it all to me; I’ll let you know when she is ready to be transported back to the station.’

  ‘Nothing’s going to happen here for a few hours,’ Zak said quietly. ‘Let’s get out of these clothes and freshen up.’

  Zak drove me back to the house. His eyes were shadowed with fatigue. It was one of the few times I’d seen him anything but cool and in command. It was strange. Seeing Khumalo vulnerable didn’t make sense, but then, nothing about this day made sense.

  ‘You okay?’ His voice was devoid of emotion.

  ‘I’m managing,’ I said. ‘What about you?’

  ‘It’s never easy.’

  I fumbled the key into the lock with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking, dropping it twice before I pushed open the door. Zak followed me in. He was wearing his police face again. Wary. Emotionally inaccessible.

  ‘The trick is to focus on what we’re trained to do,’ he said. ‘It’s our job. We had to choose who was going to die. It would have been you if Julia McEwen hadn’t yelled at her to stop.’

  I closed my eyes. ‘I know.’

  I focused on Zak for a long moment. ‘We should have waited for the back-up team. You were right.’

  ‘We all have to make difficult decisions at times in this job. Sometimes we make mistakes. We’re police officers, aren’t we? And days like today are when the job takes it right out of you. Only problem is, when it takes it out of you like this, there’s nothing to fill the hole that’s left.’

  For a second we looked at one another, a clear moment of shock and loss. I bit my cheek hard. If anyone thinks police officers can shoot people then go off and eat a Wimpy breakfast, they’re terribly wrong. Trauma and guilt aren’t easy companions.

  ‘Why don’t you make some coffee while I have a shower, Khumalo. I’ll be down in a minute.’

  ‘I’ll hang around ’til you’re done. Just to make sure you don’t fall over.’

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ I said.

  ‘Shall I scrub your back?’ Zak gave a small smile. I knew he was trying to make me feel better. I was grateful for that.

  ‘Beyond the call of duty,’ I said.

  I went upstairs, and stepped into the shower. I had just killed a woman and it felt as if her blood was all over me; my hands, my breasts, embedded in my finger nails, streaked down my legs. Standing under the gushing hot water, letting it pour all over me, I felt I was washing away some of the trauma and guilt. I wanted to stay there all day long, stand there letting the water wash me clean.

  When I heard Zak’s footsteps coming up the stairs two at a time, I grabbed for a towel.

  ‘Are you alright?’ he asked and pushed open the bathroom door. It was steamy and I could hardly see him, but his broad shoulders took up almost all the room. I wanted to move forward and bury my face against those broad shoulders, feel his power and strength. I stepped forward and the towel fell. I stood there naked in front of him, unmoving. His eyes ran over my body, but when he looked into my eyes, they were full of something soft, something gentle and kind.

  He pulled me to him, wrapping his arms around me. Every move he made was instinctive and sure. He wove himself around me, caressing the air between us. He rested his cheek on the top of my head. ‘I can manage most things. I just couldn’t manage seeing you killed in front of me. You may have saved my life, Thabisa. When a person saves your life, they become very special to you, very special.’

  His eyes focused on me. I trembled as he pulled me closer. His hands moved over me, and I didn’t stop him. He lifted my braids and bit softly into the back of my neck. I could feel his teeth as he breathed in my hair, my body. He guided my face to meet his, ran his tongue over my lips caressing me softly at first, then more firmly. I was drunk with his mouth, the hair on the back of his neck, his powerful shoulders, his hands and the danger of it all. It took a few seconds for the full realisation to hit me. I was naked, wrapped in Zak Khumalo’s arms and kissing him back.

  ‘This is a mistake,’ I said, struggling to pull away. A last ditch stand against the tide of desire that was flooding through me. Lust is like vertigo; you get dizzy and fall into danger. Falling for a friend or colleague is disastrous, it’s like stepping into a shower that you know will scald you. But nothing mattered. It was too late.

  ‘Are you afraid?’ he answered.

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘Do you want this, Thabisa? Say it... or I’ll stop now.’

  I knew that if I stopped to think, my logical, practical self would win and I would send Zak away. So I shut out the voice of reason.

  ‘I want you,’ I said and moved closer.

  ‘I’ve wanted you for so long, Thabisa. But only if you’re sure.’

  ‘I’m sure,’ I whispered, aware my quick intake of breath gave me away. The need for comfort in this man’s arms was escalating into white hot desire.

  I gasped as his fingers made contact with my flesh. He moved his hands over my scars, testing the raised flesh left by the ritual punishment. Then kissed the raised scars, staring down at me with such compassion I almost wept. I wrapped my arms around his neck with a strength that alarmed me. Complications, problems, implications... all reservations melted as I locked my body against his and surrendered. Zak picked me up, carried me into the bedroom and slammed the door shut with his foot.

  29

  6 July 2006 – 5.00 p.m.

  Zak dropped me at the station before he went to his hotel to shower. When he returned he was dressed in his usual black. I watched him cross the street. Look at him, I said to myself. A dark swagger of a man. As he walked through the traffic women watched him. Inside the station a young policewoman hung off her desk, flicking her hair as he passed her.

  He was all lean planes and angles and hard muscle. And now I knew those cool brown eyes were liquid chocolate when he was aroused.

  He smiled when he saw me.

  I smiled back.

  I would have to think very carefully about Zak Khumalo. But not today. Today I could only remember his mouth, his powerful body moving with mine, his eyes watching my face as I cried out in pleasure. I could only remember the dark bedroom, the single bed, far too small for two, the sheets tangled round us as he explored my body. The way he gazed down at me, then traced my mouth with his fingers.

  My cheeks flushed and I buried my face inside a document on Bea’s desk in case people could read my mind and see the pictures inside it. My whole body was chiming like a bell. Surely everyone could hear?

  Bea kept glancing at me suspiciously. Today she was way beyond voluptuous in a sparkly silver spandex dress and four-inch spike heels.

  ‘What’s up, Thabisa?’ she asked eventually. ‘There’s something going on here.’

  ‘I hate to say this, Bea,’ I said, ‘but you’re trespassing.’

  ‘So there is something going on, I knew it!’ Bea did an exaggerated eye roll. ‘Okay, I won’t ask another question. B
ut whatever it is, I wish I’d got some of it too!’

  Mandile had brought Julia McEwen back from the hospital. By six that evening we were in the interview room with the tape recorder, the plastic- moulded chairs, the dead plant and the tiled floor.

  Mandile wanted to conduct the interview, of course. He was bursting with self-importance, already had his notebook out. When Zak told him that wasn’t going to happen, he hissed, ‘What do you mean? You can’t do this; it’s my case.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Zak, ‘DI Tswane is the best interviewer in our unit, and this is a Serious and Violent Crimes Unit investigation. She conducts the interview. Just leave this to us, that’s why we’re here.’

  With bad grace, Mandile sat back in the corner of the room, casting spiteful glances at us both.

  Julia McEwen looked waif-like in Bea’s borrowed jeans and an oversize blue jumper. Her face was gaunt, her pale eyes enormous. A pulse hammered in her throat. She sat silent, blank. I watched her raise one hand to brush her hair off her forehead, saw a blue vein beating at her temple. She had long, slender fingers, bare of any rings.

  She looked fragile, broken, but what was going on in her head? She was a mystery woman right down to the bone.

  For a sliver of a moment our eyes met, and I saw the vacant expression I’d seen many times at car crashes and murder scenes, a look saturated with shock and pain. This wasn’t the detached calm she’d shown when she first came into the police station. This was something else. Real shock. Julia McEwen had been exposed to what a life of crime really was.

  ‘Would you like to tell us everything from the start, Mrs McEwen?’ I asked gently.

  Julia McEwen stared blankly at the wall in front of her.

  I waited. I was good at waiting. One of the reasons Matatu had chosen me for the Eagles. I had an instinctive feel for interviews like this: when to wait, let a silence grow, when to push for an answer. If you leave a space empty long enough, eventually somebody will speak to fill the silence. There was no need for rough tactics, just a need for patience. I had learned the art of silence from my grandfather; nothing would make him speak unless he wanted to. So I waited until Julia McEwen’s eyes focused on my face. Finally, she nodded slowly, her face haggard.

  I switched the recorder on. Julia struggled to speak.

  The process of taking a statement was often long and boring, but this was riveting, almost unbelievable information. Her abduction from the restaurant, the first heist, the killing at Kenton-on-Sea, robberies, hold-ups, attacks. Sue Kellon and Julia McEwen had rampaged across the Eastern Cape causing mayhem and grief wherever they went. Several times, Zak, and I, and even the petulant Mandile glanced at one another in disbelief at Julia’s descriptions.

  ‘Why did you and Sue Kellon break into the bank vault last night?’

  ‘To get documents.’

  ‘What sort of documents?’

  ‘They were for Ollis Sando. He was her lover.’

  Julia didn’t seem to realise the significance of what she had said. I glanced at Zak, who raised his eyebrows and shook his head.

  ‘Ollis Sando? The politician?’ he asked.

  ‘Nonsense’, Mandile said. ‘She’s talking fiction.’

  ‘Sue knew Ollis. Intimately. They were involved for many months. She knew the name of his wife, she even described a long scar on his back. Ollis and Sue were in this together. All of it.’

  ‘Together? What do you mean?’

  ‘She was being blackmailed by him.’

  ‘Can you tell us how this happened?’

  Julia described Sue’s affair with Sando, her voice high and unsteady. Zak, Mandile and I listened intently, occasionally asking questions.

  ‘What was the hold he had over her?’ I asked. ‘It was evidently so strong she risked her life for him.’

  ‘It was like some sort of weird power-play between them. That was her driving force. He kept pushing her to see how far she’d go – until it all went too far. With the death of the Russian businessman, Ivor Petronov.’

  ‘That’s the man who committed suicide in Johannesburg last year?’ Zak asked. ‘It wasn’t suicide.’

  Zak narrowed his eyes.

  ‘Are you saying that Sue Kellon was involved in Petronov’s death?’

  ‘Yes. She was... involved.’

  ‘Did she say... how?’

  McEwen nodded. ‘Sue killed him and Sando fixed it to look like suicide. You police officers really do need to look deeper than the surface evidence.’

  It was an odd remark. And one that made me think Julia McEwen wasn’t as fragile as she looked. She was more in control than we thought. It was time to push a little, see what came up.

  ‘Right, Mrs McEwen,’ I stood, folded my arms and faced her. ‘Knowing Sue Kellon was a murderer who was involving you as an accessory, why didn’t you attempt to escape? People were wounded and killed. You had plenty of opportunities. We know she allowed you out on your own. Walks, shopping. Right down to the toy shop where you bought the helium canisters. She didn’t have a gun on you then. You had plenty of chances to escape. So why didn’t you?’

  Silence.

  ‘Please answer my question, Mrs McEwen.’

  I watched McEwen’s face closely, taking a clinical interest in her reaction as she thought what to say.

  ‘You liked her, didn’t you? You liked it all. The planning, the excitement – even the killing? Your reaction to her death was... excessive, if you were just a “captive” as you claim to be.’

  Julia McEwen’s eyes were flat, coldly speculative. Her hands slithered across her lap and she raised her shoulders in a shrug. ‘No comment,’ she said.

  Complete silence.

  Zak cleared his throat, and then spoke, ‘We’re going to charge you, Mrs McEwen. Director Mandile will read out the charges. After that you will be taken to Port Elizabeth and held in custody pending a trial. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘Do you wish us to contact your husband?’

  She looked up quickly. ‘No.’ She spat the word. ‘Definitely not.’ Yet another side of Julia McEwen.

  Director Mandile’s stale smile was stapled across his face as he read the charges out. ‘I am a police officer. I am arresting you on the following charges: Armed robbery. Assault with a deadly weapon. Accessory to murder. You have the right to consult with a legal practitioner of your choice, or should you prefer to, to apply to be provided by the State with the services of a legal practitioner. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say may be used as evidence in a court of law. You have the right to apply to be released on bail.’

  He closed her file with a satisfied snap. ‘I look forward to meeting you again, Mrs McEwen. I hope you find the accommodation in Port Elizabeth to your liking.’

  He turned to us, with narrowed eyes.

  ‘I hope DI Khumalo and DI Tswane that you will let me have your reports as soon as possible. I want to check that you have recorded everything correctly.’

  Julia McEwen remained seated, staring blankly into space as Mandile left. As I walked across to her and asked her to stand, she rounded on me.

  ‘Why did you kill her, you bitch?’ The charm and grace had vanished. She strained forward in her seat, her face contorted into a snarl. For a moment I thought she would attack me, but Zak moved forward and held her back. She tried to push him away. She stretched out her hands towards my throat, yelling, ‘Fucking police! Brute force and violence, that’s all you morons know. You didn’t have to kill her. I know who you are, DI Tswane. I’ll come for you one day.’ Then she spat into my face.

  Zak pulled Julia McEwen roughly by the arm. ‘I don’t think DI Tswane has to worry about your vendetta,’ he said. ‘You’re going to be behind bars for a hell of a long time, Mrs McEwen.’

  He handed me his handkerchief. I wiped the glob of spittle off.

  In the main reception area, Julia McEwen stood facing me, a police officer on either side. As they led her away, she
turned back to face me.

  Then she smiled. A slow, dangerous smile.

  But it wasn’t Julia McEwen’s smile that kept me awake that night, tossing and turning that night. It was the thought of a scar crawling up a broad back.

  ‘What sort of scar?’ I had asked in the interview.

  ‘It went right up his back from his buttocks to his neck. It could have been laser tattoo removal, Sue thought. Of a snake.’

  30

  15 July 2006

  Men swung in a circle, singing and stamping, striking their fighting sticks on the ground. Women clapped and ululated. I’d arrived in the valley just as a ritual killing was about to take place.

  It was a Saturday afternoon, and I’d travelled all day. I’d left Grahamstown before dawn; four hours later I left the car, put on my backpack and started to hike the great folds of the mountains, praying I wouldn’t meet a leopard.

  As I descended into the gorge, I was struck by the beauty of it all. A green world swirled below me. Far down in the valley, I glimpsed round mud huts, spirals of smoke. The sun was burning, and I longed for a cool swim in the river, but more than that, a long talk with my grandfather. I felt strong, hoping that I could make a breakthrough. He needed to know what I’d come to tell him.

  Tom’s words echoed in my head as I made my way down: ‘You’re the key... ask yourself how you can help him.’

  When I arrived at my grandfather’s homestead, it was deserted. His youngest wife, Nomvula, was sweeping the huts. She looked up in surprise as I appeared, and blushingly explained that the whole village was attending a ceremony for the Malumi family, at their homestead.

  ‘Why aren’t you with the others?’ I asked.

  ‘Ngosi told me to stay behind and sweep,’ Nomvula said quietly, averting her eyes.

  ‘Did she indeed? Well, now you’ve swept, so let’s both go and join in. Ngosi used to say that sort of thing to me all the time when I was living in the valley.’

  Nomvula suppressed a smile.

  I linked arms with her and we walked along together with Nomvula gazing in undisguised admiration at my hair and clothes.