by Deon Meyer
'Why did the girls bring backpacks with them to the club?'
'Those bags ...' Sands said. 'They never went anywhere without them. It's a girl thing, I think. You know, make-up and stuff...'
Griessel considered the bag that Oerson had brought. Small and compact. That made sense. He would have to sort through the plastic refuse bag, but not here. He would have to go back to Caledon Square.
'Jeremy speaking,' Oerson answered his phone and Fransman Dekker could tell he was a coloured man, and he was probably in a car.
'Bro', my name Fransman Dekker, I'm SAPS, howzit that side?' he said, because Griessel had warned him the Metro officer was a 'difficult character'.
'No, things going with springs, and you?'
'Just so, bro', listen, there was a helluva surprise in that bag of stuff your people found, a shoe, number ten and a half, if I can just find out where it was picked up.'
'No idea, bro', but I'll get the men to come in and tell me.'
'Many thanks, it's a murder case, I have to run, you know how it goes.'
'I know. Give me ten minutes, I'm sort of tied up at the moment.'
'Will you call me?'
'Daatlik, bro'.'
Dekker rang off and knocked on the door of the accountant, Wouter Steenkamp. There was no answer so he opened the door. Steenkamp was on the phone, saying:'... fucking police will have to help, or I'll have to make another plan.' He saw Dekker and said over the phone 'Hold on,' then to Dekker: 'The press are blocking reception. You'll have to help control them.'
'OK.'
'They'll help,' he said into the phone. 'Right, bye.' He looked at Dekker expectantly.
'I will go and tell them to wait outside. It would be best to lock the front door.'
'What a mess,' said Steenkamp.
'Just wait here, we need to talk some more,' said Dekker.
'Now what?'
'New information,' said Dekker before leaving to go and manage the media. 'There are some who say you are cheating them.'
'Your people can go,' Vusi said to Galina Federova.
'So, you will not arrest anybody.' She was sarcastic, cigarette between her fingers.
'No. They've been a big help.'
Griessel thought Vusi was too polite; he should tell the fucking foreigner he would throw her ass in jail if she wanted to be funny. He realised his patience was worn thin. He had to get out of here, away from the smell of alcohol and the sight of bottles. The fucking thirst was just below the surface. He had absolutely no idea what he was going to do next. They knew the girls had been here, they knew there had been discussions and arguments. They knew two men had left shortly after the girls and they knew there had been a chase down Long Street, but all of that helped fuck all, because it could not tell them where she was. And then his cell phone rang and he plucked it out angrily and said: 'Benny Griessel.'
'I've been to see Alexa Barnard, Benny,' Doc Barkhuizen said.
'Is she OK, Doc?'
'She's pumped full of medication, but you know what lies ahead for her. She's a strong woman, Benny. Beautiful too. I can see why you're so concerned about her.'
'Fuck off, Doc.' As Doc Barkhuizen chuckled on the other end, he heard the beep of another incoming call.
'She said when you have a chance, she would like to talk to you. Something to do with her husband.'
'Doc, I've got another call, it's a bit crazy right now, thanks for going to see her. We'll talk later,' he said and accepted the other call.
Griessel said his name and a woman with an American accent asked: 'Is that Captain Benny Ghree-zil?' He thought, wasn't that what I just fucking said, but he answered civilly: 'Yes.'
'My name is Rachel Anderson. My dad said I should call you.'
The name burned right through him, through the disappointment over Mat Joubert, through the frustrations of the day and the desire to drink, jolting his body as he said: 'Jissis.' Then 'Yes, yes, are you safe, where are you?' Adrenaline and relief washed through him, he took two steps to Vusi's shoulder and put an urgent hand on it. His black colleague looked around and he said: 'Rachel Anderson,' and pointed at the phone. Vusi's whole face lit up.
'Yes, I'm with a Mr Pete van der Liengen, the address is ...' Griessel heard a man speaking in the background. Then Rachel's voice again:'... Number six Upper Orange Street... In Orainisiegh?'
'Yes, yes, Oranjezicht, Six Upper Orange, just stay there, I'm on my way, don't open the door for anybody, I will call when I get there, please, Miss Anderson,' he pleaded. Dear God, this was good news. Griessel gestured to Vusi that they must go, jogged out the door and headed for the alley, faster and faster, hearing Vusi's shoes on the floor behind him.
'I'm not going anywhere,' said Rachel Anderson, and her voice sounded cheerful, as if she was looking forward to his arrival and Benny was out the back door, into the alley and running as fast as he could.
Barry stood on the back of his bakkie and watched the driver of the delivery vehicle get in and start the engine. He looked to the right where the upright, bold silver Peugeot Boxer panel van stood waiting. His phone was ready in his sweaty hand. He pressed the call button and held it up to his ear.
'Yes?' said the man with the grey beard.
'The truck is leaving.'
'Good. Can you see the panel van?'
Barry looked at the dirty, dusty Peugeot. 'Yes, they're moving.'
'Jay is going to call Eben, they will cover the back door. Then he'll turn the van around and come back to the front gate in Upper Orange, so the nose is pointing towards the city. When they get out and go through the front gate, you tell me.'
'Right. Stand by.'
Chapter 33
Piet van der Lingen stood next to his big work table. 'The police are on their way,' she said, 'Captain Benny Ghree-zil.' The old man witnessed a transformation - her eyes brightened and the tension melted away. He smiled at her with his white false teeth and said: 'We will have to teach you proper Afrikaans pronunciation - it's Griessel.' 'Gggg ...' she tried it, sounding as though she was clearing phlegm from her throat.
'That's it,' he said. 'And roll the "r" as well. G-riessel.'
'Ghe-riessel.'
'Almost. Ggg-rrriessel.'
'Griessel.'
'Very good.' They laughed together. She said: 'How will I ever be able to thank you?'
'For what? For brightening an old man's day?'
'For saving my life,' she said.
'Well, when you put it that way ... I demand that you come and have lunch again, before you go home.'
'I would love to ...'
She saw him look up and away, at the window, with sudden concern shadowing his face. Her eyes followed his and she saw them, four men coming up the garden path. 'Oh, my God.' she said because she knew them. She got up from the chair. 'Don't open the door!'The fear was back in her voice. 'They want to kill me - they killed my friend last night!' She ran a few steps down the passage, a dead end. She heard someone wrenching at the front door and spun around in panic.
Then the leaded glass of the front door shattered. She sprinted back across the hall on the way to the kitchen, the back door. A hand came through the gap to unlock the front door from inside. 'Come on!' she shouted at van der Lingen. The old man stood frozen to the spot, as though he planned to stop them.
'No!' she screamed.
The door opened. She had to get away and ran through the kitchen, hearing a shot in the hall. She whimpered in fear, reached the back door and spotted the long carving knife in the drying rack. She grabbed it, tugged open the back door, and stepped outside in sudden dazzling sunlight. There were two more between her and the little gate in the corner, charging at her, black and white, with determined faces. Urgent footfalls behind her, she had only one choice. She ran at the one in front of her, the white man whose arms were spread wide to seize her. She whipped up the knife, stabbing at his chest with hatred and loathing and shrill terror. He tried to pull away, too late, the knife piercing his throat. His e
yes filled with astonishment.
'Bitch!' the black man yelled and hit her with his fist. The blow landed above her eye and a cascade of light exploded in her head. She fell to the right, onto the grass, hearing their shouts. She struggled to get up, but they were on her, one, two, three of them, more. Another fist slammed into her face, arms pinned her down. She heard their short, brute grunts, saw an arm lifted high, something chunky and metallic swinging at her face, and then the darkness.
Griessel raced. He had taken the blue revolving light out of the boot and plugged it into the cigarette lighter. It was propped on the dashboard, but the fucking thing wouldn't work. So he just drove with the Opel's hazard lights flashing, but that didn't help much. He pressed long and hard on the hooter, saying to Vusi: 'I should have taken a car with a fucking siren.' They sped up Long Street through one red traffic light after another. Every time he had to slow down, stick his arm out of the window and wave frantically at the crossing traffic. Vusi did the same from his window.
'At least she should be safe,' said Vusi warily, ever the bloody diplomat. Griessel knew that what he really meant was: 'We needn't drive so madly - she said she was with a good man.'
'She should be,' Griessel said and waved wildly, hooting continuously, 'but I can't afford a fuck-up.' He put his foot down, and the Opel's tyres squealed.
Mbali Kaleni was driving serenely down Annandale in dense traffic near the turn into Upper Orange. She put on her indicator light to change lanes, waiting patiently, but no one would give her a gap. She shook her head, Cape Town drivers; in Durban this sort of thing would never happen. Eventually the stream in the right- hand lane thinned and she swung over, keeping the indicator on.
The traffic lights were red.
It looked like a hornet's nest, Fransman Dekker thought, the crowd abuzz, with microphones poised to sting you.
He stood on the stairs, and shouted loudly: 'Attention, everyone.'
They swarmed on him, there must have been twenty people, all talking, the stingers aimed at him in desperate hands. He could only hear snatches of the questions '... Ivan Nell shot him?''... the Geysers praying for?''... tried to murder Alexa Barnard?' 'Is Josh Geyser under arrest?''... Xandra dead?'
He held up his right hand, palm forward, dropped his head to avoid eye contact and just stood there. He knew they would quieten down eventually.
Kaleni saw them.
She spotted the panel van in front of the house, thinking at first it was those clowns from Forensics. She couldn't stand them, and wondered irritably what they were still doing here.
There was movement on the other side, the Belmont Avenue side, as she approached.
People were carrying something.
What was going on?
Closer still she saw there were four men in a hurry, each holding onto a piece of something. They moved crab-like along the pavement, but the picket fence hid their burden. She saw they were heading for the panel van parked in Upper Orange. Strange.
They were carrying a person, she saw as they came around the corner and out from behind the obscuring fence. She kept her eyes on them: it was the girl, lifeless, they were gripping her arms and legs. Mbali accelerated and her hand reached for her hip, pressed the leather loop off her service pistol, swung across the road and aimed for the front of the panel van. She was going too fast and could not stop in time, braked hard. In front of her one man jumped out of the van from the driver's side, holding a pistol fitted with a silencer. The small tyres of the Corsa squealed, the car skidded sideways, on a collision course for the kerb. She wrestled with the steering wheel and came to a standstill just a metre from the Peugeot, at right angles to it. Instinctively, she noted the registration number, CA 4 ...
She saw a pistol aimed at her, the windscreen starred and the bullet slammed against metal behind her. She wanted to dive down, but the safety belt held her.
'ujesu,' she said quietly and reached a hand to unclip it.
He shot her. She felt the dreadful blow to her body, but the safety belt was loose, she flattened herself, right hand reaching for her pistol. She lifted it and fired off three blind shots through the windscreen. The pain was an earthquake that rippled through her, slowly, unstoppable. She checked the wound. A hole below her left breast, blood trickling into a pool on the upholstery. Pity, she always kept the car spotless. She fired off more shots and sat up quickly. The pain ripped through her torso. Quickly she scanned for him through the windscreen. He wasn't there. Movement, here he was, just beside the door, pistol in both hands, long deadly silencer aimed at her eye. She saw a kind of African necklace around his neck, the beads spelling out a word. She jerked back her head, swung her pistol around in the certain knowledge of death. Fleeting sadness, so short, this life, as she saw his trigger finger tighten with purpose.
Griessel blasted a path through the traffic with his hooter and turned from Annandale into Upper Orange. A man in a fucking yellow Humvee gave him the finger, two cars had to brake sharply as he raced over the crossing. Vusi clutched the handle above the door, speechless.
Benny sped, on, accelerating out of the corner. They were nearly there. A madman in a big silver panel van came racing downhill in the middle of the road. Benny hooted again and swerved out of the way. He caught a glimpse of the driver's face, a young asshole with a fierce expression, then he looked up at the street ahead, which was suddenly empty. He changed down a gear, flattened the accelerator, engine protesting, another gear change, charged up the hill. This was his territory, his flat was only one block away in fucking Vriende Street; stupid bloody name, he still thought so. De Waal Park to the right, then Vusi said, 'It's just up there,' and they crested the rise. They both saw the Corsa at the same time, and neither spoke, because from the angle it had stopped, something was not right.
The single cab bakkie drove right in front of him, reversing out of a driveway from the left side of the street. Griessel slammed on the brakes and the Opel nose-dived, rubber screeched and smoked, and he skidded until the left wheels struck the kerb. 'Fuck,' he said smelling the burning rubber, jerked the Opel back, just missing the Toyota's front fender. He saw the man behind the wheel's big, wild, shocked eyes. Griessel looked at the Corsa, was the window smashed? He swung across the road and stopped behind the small white car, leapt out and heard the Toyota racing away towards the city. He glanced quickly after it, fucking asshole. He noted the street number on the wooden gate. Number 6. Bullet casing, he smelled cordite. Trouble here, bullet holes in the windscreen and the driver's window and there was someone behind the wheel, fuck, fuck.
'It's Mbali,' Vusi shouted as he pulled open the other door.
Griessel saw her head on her chest, blood on the headrest. He pulled open the door. 'Jissis,' Griessel said, trying to feel her neck for a pulse. His fingers slipped in the blood. He saw the wound below her ear, bits of jaw, white chips and a pulsing vein pumping out thick red fluid.
'Get the ambulance! She's alive!' He shouted louder than he meant to, his heart racing. He gently pulled her by the shoulder, until he had her turned over with her back to him, then he put his hands under her arms and felt more blood lower down. Carefully he pulled her out of the car and laid her on the pavement. Vusi came running around the car with his cell phone in his hand.
Two wounds, but the one in the side of her head was bleeding the most. He got up quickly and felt for his handkerchief, found it, bent beside Mbali Kaleni and pressed the hanky against the hole. He heard Vusi talking urgently over the phone. He swapped the hand holding the handkerchief and got hold of his phone, hearing a car skid around the corner in Belmont at great speed, he couldn't turn in time, just saw the tail, something. He looked at Kaleni, she wasn't going to make it, the ambulance would take too long.
'Help me,' he said to Vusi, 'I'm taking her myself.'
Vusi knelt beside him and said calmly, 'Benny they're on their way.'
'Jissis, Vusi, are you sure?' as he searched his phone for the Caledon Square number.
; 'They know it's a policewoman. They're coming.'
Griessel pressed the hanky harder. Mbali Kaleni moved, a jerk of the head. 'Mbali,' he said in despair.
She opened her eyes. Looked far away, then focused on him. 'The ambulance is coming, Mbali,' he wanted to encourage her: 'You're going to make it.'
She made a noise.
'Take it easy, take it easy, they'll be here soon.'
Vusi picked up Mbali's hand. He talked quietly to her in an African language. Griessel noted the small Xhosa man's calmness and thought Vusi might not be hardass, but he was strong.
Mbali was trying to say something. He felt her jaw moving under his hand, he saw the blood running out of her mouth. 'No, no, don't talk now; the ambulance will be here soon.'
He looked up at the house. 'Vusi, you will have to see what's going on inside there.' The black detective nodded, jumped up and ran. Griessel looked at Mbali. Her eyes were on him, pleading. He held the hanky tight against her neck, realising he still had his phone in the other hand. He phoned the station. They needed more people. Mbali Kaleni's eyes closed.
Chapter 34
At first she was only aware of the noise, voices shouting, the high revving of an engine. Then she felt the pain in her face and she wanted to put a hand over it, but she couldn't. There was the sensation of movement, a loss of balance, a vehicle turning sharply, accelerating.
Then she remembered everything and she jerked.
'The bitch is waking up,' one of them said. She tried to open her eyes, she wanted to see, but she could not. One eye was swollen shut, the other would not focus, her vision was blurred. Four people were holding her down. The pressure on her arms and legs was too much, too heavy, too painful.
'Please,' she said.
'Fuck you.' The words were spat out with hatred, flecks of saliva spattered her face. A cell phone rang shrilly.
'It's the Big Guy,' said a voice she knew.
'Fuck.' Another familiar voice. 'Tell him.' She flicked her eyes across, but could not see them, only the four holding her. They were all looking forward now.
