‘What do you mean?’
‘She went with a man.’
‘What!’
Libby smiled. ‘Cornelius had found himself a lover. So Martha did the same. He was quite a bit younger than her, but she was nuts about him. I think it was as much the excitement of conducting an illicit affair as anything else, and this one was very illicit. I was all in favour of it, by the way. In fact, I was jealous; my own marriage was on the rocks and I could have used a toyboy to cheer me up.’
‘So that’s why she went up to Kupugani?’
‘That’s right. It was me who suggested it. I went to school with the owner, Phyllis Delahay. She’s an old friend. Kupugani is a beautiful place. Very discreet. And Martha needed somewhere discreet. Somewhere where her lover wouldn’t attract attention.’
‘Why would he attract attention?’
‘He was black. A black American.’
Benton! Benton bloody Davis. No wonder Martha wanted her mother to talk to him if anything happened to her. And what had Benton said? That he knew nothing, when in fact he knew everything.
‘You don’t look very happy with that information,’ Libby said. ‘I take it you know the man in question?’
‘I do. I used to work with him.’
‘Well, she never told me his name, but she did say he was a banker working with Cornelius.’
‘And you never told anyone else about him?’
‘No,’ Libby said. ‘There was no way I was going to talk to the police about it, especially since they almost certainly knew already, and her husband was out of the question.’
‘So why tell me now?’
Libby examined Calder’s face. ‘I trust you. God knows why, but I do. I’ve thought for a while now that it would be wrong to keep silent for ever. Someone has to know. Someone probably should tell Martha’s children; I’m not sure about that, I’ll leave that up to you. And someone needs to find out what really happened to her. Perhaps that person is you.’
‘Did Cornelius know about him?’
‘That’s the big question, isn’t it?’ Libby took a last drag on her cigarette and stubbed it out. ‘It seems to me that in these circumstances the husband is the most likely suspect. He was rich enough and powerful enough to ensure the police stayed quiet. Martha told me she was scared of him, especially when he was angry. He had a motive: men like that do not enjoy being cheated on, whatever their own record of fidelity. He probably didn’t do it himself: perhaps he paid someone. Who knows? But it would explain why no one has come to talk to me about her death until you show up on my doorstep eighteen years later.’
24
August 22, 1988
He’s coming to Cape Town! Tomorrow. I can’t believe it. Neels told me this morning. It was one of the few things we actually said to each other all day. Apparently he asks about me quite often. Apparently I made quite a hit with him, baking those cookies. I asked innocently whether he would be coming to dinner again. Neels said no. But I’ll see him. I’ll figure out a way of seeing him.
August 23
I called him! He really is back in South Africa already. He has wall-to-wall meetings with Zyl News people, but there’s a hole in his schedule tomorrow around one-thirty. I’m meeting him for lunch at his hotel. This is stupid, but I really can’t wait. I feel like a schoolgirl on her first date. No, her second date.
Talked to Todd last night. He’s looking forward to coming home. It’s only ten days away now. He sounds quite taken with this Francesca girl.
August 24
Boy, what a great day! We shouldn’t have done that, but I’m so glad we did. I want to tell the whole world how happy I am, if only for a few hours. But I can’t do that so I’ll just write it down here.
It’s obvious who I’m talking about from the last couple of days’ entries, isn’t it? It’s Benton. It’s so good to be with him. Physically, he’s young and strong and he has a great body. I like my men big, and he’s bigger than Neels. Oops – I didn’t mean that quite as it looks on the page. He’s tall and he has broad shoulders and he’s … Yeah. Well. Maybe I did mean that.
But he’s intelligent and he’s well educated and well read and yes he is black and yes there is something illicit about that which I find exciting and yes in this country black is the forbidden fruit and yes there is something exhilarating about showing these Nazis that a blonde white woman can want to have sex with a black man, can enjoy it, that it’s natural, healthy and right. It just feels right. I know it’s so wrong but it feels right.
We were oh, so restrained at lunch. I didn’t touch him apart from a quick kiss on the cheek when we met. People turned and stared, I mean Benton is a very tall man and he dresses very well, and I recognized one of Neels’s business acquaintances. Although we didn’t tell Neels we were meeting, we will tell him we had lunch afterwards. It will be natural, innocent.
Then we blew it. We only had an hour and a half for lunch before Benton had to go to his next meeting and time was nearly up when he grinned and said he needed to make a call. He was back a minute later to say that something had come up on another deal he was working on and he would have to go up to his room and sort it out. It would mean he would miss his next meeting at Zyl News. We left the restaurant, he went upstairs to his room, I spent five heart-thumping minutes in the bathroom, it seemed such a long time, and then I took the elevator up and joined him.
It was fantastic!
I told Benton about Operation Drommedaris. I made him promise not to discuss it with anyone, no one at Bloomfield Weiss and certainly not Neels. I had to tell someone about it, and he’s the one person I know who I trust and couldn’t possibly have links to the Laagerbond. I didn’t tell him about the man Moolman, but he could see I was scared.
It sounds like my suspicions are well founded. The people at Bloomfield Weiss and Zyl News have been trying to figure out how they can raise their bid for the Herald. They are all desperate. Zyl News is bust if they don’t do a deal, but if they overpay it’s bust too. Then last week Neels announced to Benton and his boss that he had a possible new source of funds. He was very cagey about where these funds came from and Benton is suspicious. Even though the origin appears to be South African, Neels assured them that there would be no exchange-control issues. Money is money and Bloomfield Weiss aren’t about to ask difficult questions.
Benton says that Beatrice Pienaar goes everywhere with Neels. She’s in South Africa right now. But this time, in Benton’s arms, I don’t mind so much. In fact, it makes me feel less guilty.
I told him I have to see him again soon. He’s flying up to Jo’burg tomorrow to do some more due diligence on the Zyl News papers there, and he says he can stay on for the weekend. Neels is flying back to Philadelphia tonight, so it might work. We’ll have to be much more careful. I said I would find somewhere discreet for us to go, somewhere outside the city. I’m not sure where, but I will think of something.
I still feel scared about all that Laagerbond stuff, but I’m scared and excited at the same time.
God, I can’t wait till the weekend!
August 25
We had a board meeting of the Guguletu Project today. Libby and I went for a walk in the Kirstenbosch Gardens afterwards. I love that place: it’s halfway up the eastern side of Table Mountain and you get a view of the huge sprawl of townships on Cape Flats, including Guguletu. All the plants in the gardens are native to South Africa. It’s where I got most of the ideas for the fynbos beds at Hondehoek.
I told Libby about Benton; I couldn’t help it. She was encouraging almost to the point of jealousy. I really don’t give her marriage to Dennis much more time. She was also amazed by how young he is. It’s true that he is ten years younger than me, but he doesn’t seem that way to me. God knows what he sees in me. Libby said something bitchy about the boss’s wife. Maybe there is something in that. Maybe I’m his forbidden fruit.
We discussed the problem of where to take him. I told her I’d like to show Benton the bush, the re
al Africa. I had thought about Mala Mala, but that place is so popular now. Then she suggested a game farm that an old friend of hers from school owns. It’s very private, very discreet, and there are plenty of lions. I love watching lions. It’s called Kupugani, which means “raise yourself” in Zulu. It’s named for that big campaign in the sixties to give away the surplus milk produced by white dairy farmers to starving Africans. It was quite subversive in its time. Phyllis, the owner, is a widow and shares Libby’s liberal views. Libby’s quite sure that Phyllis wouldn’t mind a mixed-race couple, in fact Libby thought she would get a kick out of it.
The idea appeals. Libby said she’d call her friend. I’ll need to come up with a good excuse. Or will I? Neels jets around the world at will with his girlfriend without asking my permission. Why should I ask his? I’ll just say I need to go away for a couple of days.
I think that Moolman has gotten the message that I have stopped asking questions about the Laagerbond. I haven’t seen any sign of him for almost two weeks now since I caught him hanging around outside Caroline’s school. But you never know, I’m still scared. I decided to write a letter to Mom in case something happens to me. I know it will freak her out, but at least I can trust my own family to do the right thing.
25
Calder kept a careful watch in his rear-view mirror all the way from Yeoville back to Sandton. The traffic was heavy and he was no expert at counter-surveillance so he couldn’t be certain whether there was anyone on his tail. As he approached the northern suburb, he took a diversion through a white residential neighbourhood, driving around two or three blocks and then back on the main street to Sandton. Nothing followed him.
The wealth of Sandton amazed him anew after the dilapidation of Yeoville. The whites had abandoned the centre of Johannesburg to create their own fortress of privilege, comforting to the well off, threatening to the dispossessed. They were behaving just like rich white people did all over the world. Libby had a point, Calder thought.
He parked the car in a well-secured underground bunker and took a lift up to the hotel forecourt and walked inside. Someone was waiting for him in an armchair facing the entrance.
Cornelius.
Calder checked the rest of the lobby. Empty apart from the hotel staff. He looked behind him. Two middle-aged women with cases were climbing into a cab.
‘I’m alone,’ said Cornelius, getting to his feet.
‘What are you doing here?’
‘I came to see you.’
‘From London?’
‘You’ve done an awful lot for my family over the last few weeks,’ Cornelius said. ‘I thought you deserved an explanation. In person.’
‘Todd talked to you?’
‘He did. Come on. Let’s get out of here.’
Calder followed Cornelius out of the hotel and through a series of walkways, constantly looking over his shoulder as he did so. In a few minutes they came to a kind of modern piazza, presided over by a thirty-foot bronze statue of Nelson Mandela and with a fountain in the middle. Around the piazza were a series of cafés and restaurants under awnings. It was cool, and very few people were sitting outside. Cornelius had no problem finding a quiet table.
‘Todd’s doing well,’ Cornelius said.
‘He shouldn’t have spoken to you. I didn’t want him to.’
‘I’m sorry about your sister,’ Cornelius went on. ‘And very grateful for all you have done for Todd and Kim. I realize you nearly got yourself killed on two occasions for them.’
‘Three,’ said Calder, remembering Visser’s bullet. ‘And I’m doing this for me now. How did you find out where I was?’
‘Kim told me.’
Calder remembered the voicemail message he had left for her. But why had she disclosed his location to Cornelius, of all people?’
Cornelius ordered coffee. Shoppers strolled through the square. A gaggle of white teenage girls paused in front of them, giggling and shrieking. One of them pulled out a dinky mobile phone and started flicking her thumbs while the others looked on.
‘It’s true that Daniel Havenga came to see me at Hondehoek with a friend, Andries Visser. It’s also true that they offered to finance the bid for the Herald. And not just that. They wanted to provide funding for a string of newspaper and magazine acquisitions afterwards.’
‘Did they say where the money was coming from?’
‘Yes. Something called the Laagerbond. They said it was a highly secret group that existed to promote the interests of the Afrikaner nation. They didn’t believe in violence or even in the continuation of apartheid, which they recognized was an obsolete ideology, but they did believe in the power of public opinion. They had access to substantial funds which were lodged in Switzerland. Daniel said the group wasn’t part of the government and it would continue to exist if the government fell. They wanted to fund someone, a man with influence in the world’s media, who could build an international stable of newspapers and magazines which would put the Afrikaner point of view in the future. Daniel felt that the main threat to Afrikaners was international public opinion. He had seen what had happened to Nazis after the fall of Germany and he didn’t want something similar to happen here. He said he believed that Afrikaners were not evil, but someone had to persuade the rest of the world of that. Me.’
‘What about the Cape Daily Mail?’
‘They were happy to see that closed. They wanted me to keep hold of the other South African papers, although in the climate of US hostility to investment in South Africa at that time, I think that would have been difficult. Their idea was that my papers would gradually take on a more favourable editorial slant, not necessarily pro-government, but pro-Afrikaner.’
‘Did they want you to become a member of this Laagerbond?’
‘They didn’t say so specifically, but I got that impression.’
‘And you said yes?’
‘I said I’d consider it. And I did.’
‘But why? After all you had done to fight apartheid?’
Cornelius sighed. His eyes moved over to the giant statue. Nelson Mandela was laughing. It said a lot for a country that it would build a monument to its founder not looking grim and statesmanlike but having a good time. ‘By then I could see that apartheid was finished. What scared me was what would come later. South Africa was in the middle of a violent revolution. The townships were in flames, people were killing each other, my brother was blown up by guerrillas, the communists had an execution list with my name on it. I was torn. Part of me wanted to flee the country, go to America and start a new life. But part of me was reluctant to abandon my roots. My Afrikaner roots. Three hundred years of family history. Generations of hard-working, honest, decent people who suffered terrible hardship and survived through prayer and strength of character. I had denied them for most of my adult life, I had married two English-speaking women, but I knew that much of the Afrikaner way of life was good, and I didn’t want to see it disappear in flames.’
‘Did Beatrice Pienaar influence you?’
Cornelius glanced quickly at Calder. ‘You know about her?’ Calder didn’t answer. ‘Yes. Yes, she did. She was a perceptive woman: she felt that the Afrikaner nation was facing its biggest challenge. The answer wasn’t in preserving the past, it was the duty of her generation to find a position for Afrikaners in the world of the future.’ Cornelius smiled. ‘She sounded like Daniel Havenga’s pupil. And yes, she made me think that perhaps I had a duty as well.’
‘So. Are the Laagerbond funding your bid for The Times?
Cornelius laughed. He and Nelson shared the joke.
‘What’s so funny?’ said Calder.
‘I said no. After Martha died, I said no. Then I really did want to quit the country as soon as possible. I told Daniel and his friends I wasn’t interested, sold my newspapers here, and went to the States.’
‘But you bought the Herald?’
‘Yes. For some reason that I have never been able to fathom, Lord Scotton ignored Evelyn Gill’s
bid and went for mine. We bought the Herald, we turned it around, we battled through the recession of the early nineties and came out the other side all guns blazing. Zyl News never looked back. And we never took a cent of the Laagerbond’s money.’
‘Do you expect me to believe that?’
Cornelius looked at Calder levelly. ‘Yes. That’s why I came down here.’
Cornelius looked like a man who was used to getting his way. But he also looked honest.
‘Hold on,’ Calder said. He pulled out his mobile phone and called Tarek’s home number. It was a Saturday and Tarek’s small daughter answered with a disconcerting Home Counties accent. A moment later, Tarek was on the line.
‘Hi, it’s me,’ said Calder. ‘Any luck?’
‘Actually, yes. I spoke to our media analyst in New York. He’s been covering Zyl News for fifteen years and knows the company very well. When the first US acquisitions were made in the early eighties Bloomfield Weiss did some fancy stuff with parallel loans to get around South African exchange controls. But since then all their acquisitions have been made with either internally generated funds, the syndicated loan market, or high-yield bonds. The accounts are all public and they add up. Our guy is sure that there is no major South African financing.’
Calder glanced at Cornelius. ‘Thanks, Tarek.’
‘Wait,’ said Tarek. ‘We were discussing The Times takeover. My analyst said that the more interesting question is where Evelyn Gill’s funding comes from. We know he has relationships with Swiss private banks. Three years ago a Sunday newspaper in London ran a story that the money had ultimately come from Islamic sources, but Gill denied this and sued the paper successfully. My man believes that South Africa is a more likely possibility.’
‘Really?’
‘As it happens, I went to school with a guy called Jeff Tidwell, who was FD of Beckwith Communications until a couple of years ago.’ Calder knew that Tarek’s expensive education had included a stint at an English public school, before university in the States. ‘I called him yesterday. He said he had no idea what I was talking about, he said Gill had used his own funds all along, he’d never taken a penny from outside investors.’
See No Evil Page 28
