by Malla Nunn
Emmanuel gained ground. Nobody followed. Exodus had turned the car to face the dirt road. The leather suitcase thumped into the back of the DeSoto next to Natalya and Nicolai.
‘Go, go, go.’ Emmanuel clambered into the front seat and slammed the passenger door closed. The car accelerated and the tyres kicked up dirt. Bushes scratched against the doors and the passenger side mirror exploded. Chrome and glass flew into the air. Natalya screamed. A second bullet went wide and hit the feathery tops of a flowering reed bed.
Emmanuel peered through the dust cloud trailing them. There was a flash of white skin and a dark suit. It was impossible to make any kind of identification. Natalya was doubled over with her hands jammed over her ears but Nicolai held himself upright, cool under fire.
‘Come on. Come on, girl.’ Exodus shifted the gears and stamped on the accelerator till the DeSoto’s six-cylinder engine roared. The car fishtailed onto the main road doing fifty. A big black Dodge with a dent in the front grille was pulled over to the side with its bonnet open. There were no driver or annoyed passengers near the vehicle. No one had walked the dirt road to ask for help.
‘That’s his car,’ Emmanuel said. ‘He parked it up here and worked his way around to the back of the house.’
‘And who is he?’ The gunshots had stripped Exodus of his charm and exposed the man himself: angry enough to chew iron nails.
‘I don’t know,’ Emmanuel said.
The fake mechanical breakdown, the silent disposal of the dog and the rear boundary attack were the marks of a professional. That word, ‘professional’, had come up at the scene of Jolly’s murder. Neither Brother Jonah nor Joe Flowers seemed to fit that description. The pale-skinned tradesman, however, fitted it perfectly. That suspicion didn’t make the situation any clearer. There was no logical reason for the tradesman to tail him. One good thing had come from the ambush: he wasn’t paranoid. He was being followed. That was a small consolation.
‘Should have known,’ Exodus muttered and overtook a rambling family sedan on a blind corner. ‘You look like trouble. But I think, no, he is okay this one. He has the nice clothes and he has the money. Big, big mistake.’
The sedan blasted its horn but Exodus didn’t ease up. He stayed bent over the wheel with the throttle jammed to the floor. Vegetation flew past the windows in a smudge of green.
‘Try to get us to town alive,’ Emmanuel said.
‘My side mirror is gone,’ Exodus said. ‘Now we are running like dogs. Why is this, Mr Emmanuel?’
Emmanuel couldn’t offer an explanation.
They turned into the settlement of Fynnlands and the speedometer dropped to sixty. There was no sign of the black Dodge but it was too early to be relieved: they had to get off the Bluff and disappear into the backstreets of Durban. The DeSoto rumbled over the bridge and cruised past the mangrove swamps, then plunged between the red-brick warehouses and factories along Edwin Swales Drive.
‘We have to get off the main road,’ Emmanuel said. Taking the major link back to the town centre would be too easy a trail for the shooter to follow.
‘You’re going back to the passenger wharf.’ Exodus was adamant. ‘What you and your friends do after that is your own business.’
‘Think,’ Emmanuel said. ‘How did the driver of the black Dodge find us? Did he just take a lucky guess or did he follow us from the passenger wharf?’
‘Masende!’ Exodus used the Zulu word for ‘testicles’ and hit the steering wheel with his fist.
‘Exactly,’ Emmanuel said.
The Basotho driver turned left and headed for the suburban streets of Congella. Three pretty white girls in flowered cotton shifts and scuffed shoes played hopscotch on the pavement. They watched the DeSoto’s progress with curiosity. Later, if the driver of the Dodge stopped and asked the girls if they’d seen a nice car with silver trim, they’d say, ‘The one with the kaffir and the white man sitting next to each other? That one?’
‘Sunday-driver slow,’ Emmanuel said. ‘We don’t want to attract attention.’
‘Then you must get in the back seat like a proper baas. These white people, they don’t like a black man to drive for himself. We must only walk or ride bicycles.’
They dropped to thirty miles per hour and cruised through the sleepy Sunday streets. Cloud shadows drifted across the red-tiled roofs and darkened the slender fronds of the royal palm trees on the roadside.
‘Who gave you the mermaid picture that I showed you at the passenger quay?’ Emmanuel said. It would be just his luck to have rescued a Russian couple with no connection to Jolly Marks.
‘The big man. He and the girl, they came together with the picture and the address for the house in the bush.’
‘Thursday night?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time?’
‘Maybe just before midnight. I was outside the Seafarers Club. Three pounds to drive to the Bluff.’ Exodus laughed without humour. ‘The money was too, too good. Now I see why.’
‘They had a suitcase,’ Emmanuel said. ‘That should have told you something strange was going on.’
‘The girl is ripe and the man was in a big hurry.’ A long pause followed and then a rush into speech. ‘I thought maybe the man wanted to stay at the house so he could have fun before the baby came.’
‘I see.’
A simple explanation for the trip had not even occurred to Exodus. That was what working outside the confines of polite society did: it blunted the idea of normal and sometimes destroyed it. Emmanuel wondered if he’d pushed his ex-wife Angela too far and asked her for things that were common in the world of soldiers and police detectives but unacceptable in a ‘decent’ marriage.
‘Chasing the money Always chasing the money.’ Exodus was rueful. ‘That is where I’m at fault, Mr Emmanuel.’
‘Did you see Jolly Marks that night?’ His failure as a husband was fodder for a late-night drinking session sometime in the future.
The DeSoto’s speedometer needle dropped to fifteen and two coloured boys on bicycles flew by. Exodus’s dark hands gripped the wheel hard and his knuckles turned white under the pressure.
‘A bad thing has happened to that boy,’ he said and sucked air into his mouth like a rugby player who’d just been tackled and had the wind knocked out of his lungs. ‘That is why you are asking these questions.’
‘Jolly was killed in the freight yard on Thursday night somewhere between 11 p.m. and one in the morning.’ Emmanuel guessed at the times. The details of the coroner’s report would never be made available to him.
‘Ayyyee…’ Exodus made a sound that combined both helplessness and despair. It was a uniquely South African expression of grief. ‘Who would do this thing?’
The man was visibly shaken and Emmanuel’s gut feeling about him solidified. Exodus was an ambitious black man who loved money, American cars and nice clothes, but he was no killer.
‘Could one of your clients with unusual tastes be involved?’
Exodus shook his head. ‘I do not touch that kind of business. The backroom fights, yes. The card games, yes. The man who wishes to lie with a man or a woman of any colour, this I also do. Blood and children together I do not do.’
Emmanuel circled back to the first question. ‘Did you see Jolly that night?’
‘No.’ Exodus answered without hesitation. ‘Business, it was slow until this man came with the piece of paper with the address. I took the money and drove to the house. No problems.’
‘And after?’
‘I went home to my mother’s sister’s house in Cato Manor. On Friday morning I drove three girls to a party at a sugar mill outside Stanger.’
‘A two-day party?’ Emmanuel said. This was a chance for Exodus to get the events of the last few days straight. Only a watertight chronology would satisfy the detective branch if they tracked down the Flying Dutchman.
‘The men were having a party but the girls, they were working. You understand?’
‘Yeah, I understan
d.’
This backed up what Khan had said about Exodus being out of town until Sunday. The Indian criminal knew what he was talking about. Emmanuel filed the fact away for future reference.
A hard metal click came from the rear seat and Emmanuel swivelled around to check on the Russians. Natalya had opened the lid of the suitcase and removed a hip flask and a small gold box. She picked four red tablets from the box and fed them to Nicolai.
‘What are those?’ Emmanuel said.
‘Pain.’ Nicolai took a gulp from the flask that Natalya pressed to his lips and swallowed the pills.
Emmanuel leaned into the passenger compartment, determined to extract some information from the Russian man before the drugs took effect. ‘Who’s trying to hurt you, Nicolai?’
‘Many people.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I am Nicolai Andrei Petrov.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I was not supposed to leave.’ The Russian leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes. ‘Now they will find me and make me go back.’
‘Who are they?’ Emmanuel said but got no response.
Natalya stroked her husband’s wiry beard and laid her head on his shoulder. The couple rested in the way that soldiers rest after the fight. Emmanuel backed off. Many nights in the winter fields of Europe he had longed for the comfort of sleep himself. When they arrived at Chateau La Mer he’d let Nicolai and Natalya have an hour of dreams. He couldn’t afford to give them any more time than that.
‘Where must I go to?’ Exodus said.
‘Willowvale Road in Glenwood,’ he said.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Hélène Gerard sat in the shade of the veranda and cradled a full glass of red wine. She wore a bright orange cocktail dress with a full skirt but no shoes. As the DeSoto pulled into the drive she stood and approached the stairs, smile at the ready.
‘Detective Cooper, welcome back.’ She waved towards the odd assortment of passengers in the fancy car. ‘I see you’ve brought some friends with you. Will they be staying?’ The tip of Hélène’s nose was red and the skin around her eyes was puffed and swollen; the result of an afternoon of heavy drinking interspersed with tears. Her brightly coloured dress and bare feet - resort wear for carefree days - had not chased the Sunday blues away.
‘We’ll be staying for a while,’ Emmanuel said and opened the passenger door. He offered Natalya a hand but she ignored it and struggled out of the DeSoto. She massaged the small of her back and swore in Russian; a modern-day Eve, cursed with the nurturing of male seed and the bearing of children.
‘This is Natalya,’ Emmanuel said. ‘She doesn’t speak English but she might like a meal and a bath.’
‘Yes, of course.’ Hélène navigated the stairs from the porch to the drive slowly, hands gripping the railing for balance. ‘I’ll make sure she has everything she needs, Detective Cooper.’
‘Thanks.’
Emmanuel watched the drunken Frenchwoman and the pregnant Russian climb the stairs to La Mer like invalid companions on an excursion.
Hélène hesitated at the front door. ‘You’ll tell the major?’ she said.
‘Of course.’
One day soon, Emmanuel figured, the mystery of the sad French-Mauritian and her absent husband was going to be solved.
‘Thank you, Detective.’ Hélène mimed the actions for washing hair and eating while she led Natalya into the house.
Emmanuel leaned into the passenger compartment of the DeSoto and found Nicolai slumped against the leather. The whites of his eyes showed between half-closed lids and a faint beat pulsed at the base of his neck.
‘Nicolai.’ Emmanuel slid into the car and tapped a bristled cheek. ‘Nicolai. Are you awake?’
‘Tired. I sleep, yes?’
‘Not yet,’ Emmanuel said. ‘Soon.’
The big man struggled to sit up but did not have the strength to shift his large frame off the seat. Blue smudges darkened the skin under his eyes.
‘Lie back,’ Emmanuel said and the Russian collapsed into the folds of his winter coat. The painkillers might have had barbiturates in them. It hardly mattered. Pills or not, Nicolai was too weak to help the investigation for a few more hours. The run of bad luck continued.
‘Give me a hand,’ Emmanuel said to Exodus. ‘We have to get him into bed. I’ll take his shoulders. You take his legs.’
Exodus left the sanctuary of the DeSoto reluctantly. Mixing in white people’s business was part of the job, but this situation was more complicated than dropping a man off at a hush-hush multiracial brothel or setting up a private poker game.
Emmanuel pushed Nicolai across the seat and, together with Exodus, manoeuvred the Russian up the stairs and into La Mer. The interior of the house was dark and cool. A kettle whistled in the kitchen. They carted Nicolai to Emmanuel’s room and put him into the provincial-style bed, where his solid body made a trench in the goose-down quilt.
‘I must go,’ Exodus said and backed out of the room quickly. He kept his gaze to the pine floorboards so that it was clear to Emmanuel and to anyone else that while he had been in the house he had not seen anything.
‘Do you have any friends or relatives outside of Durban?’ Emmanuel asked when the Basotho man had shuffled out onto the veranda.
‘My father’s brother is in Port Elizabeth.’
‘Stay with him for a few days.’
The police would stop searching for the Flying Dutchman the minute van Niekerk’s forty-eight-hour deal expired.
‘I will go straight away.’ Exodus ran down the front stairs and unlocked the DeSoto’s giant boot. He stowed the handsome fedora in a round hatbox and then pulled out the workman’s overalls, which he slipped over his green suit and buttoned to the throat. The transformation from a worldly black man into a common servant had the quality of a magic trick. Then he lifted the carpet on the boot floor and removed a piece of folded paper, an exercise book and a pen.
‘What’s that for?’ Emmanuel asked.
‘A travel pass and a permission slip from the baas to say it is okay to drive his car to Port Elizabeth.’
‘What baas?’
‘You.’ Exodus brought the pen and the notebook to Emmanuel and handed them over.
Port Elizabeth was seventy miles down the coast but natives were not free to travel from one town to another without official consent from the government and their employer. A black man in a nice car was an invitation to the police to conduct a stop and search.
‘What must I write?’ Emmanuel said.
Exodus dictated. ‘ “This boy works for me. He is a good boy and a good driver. He is going to Port Elizabeth to do work for me. Please let him pass.” Sign your name at the bottom.’
Emmanuel wrote the note word for word. He felt an embarrassment that had lain almost dormant since childhood. Nine years old, working part-time at the local garage, he was given the job of signing the weekend leave slips for the four Sotho petrol pump attendants: grown men with wives and children and grey hair sprinkled among the black, allowed to go home on the authority of a white child still in short pants.
‘Much thanks.’ Exodus shoved the note into the work overalls and got into the car. He started the engine and reversed out of La Mer’s driveway, an adult man armed with written permission to travel over land once owned by his own people.
Emmanuel was no closer to knowing who had killed Jolly Marks or Mrs Patterson and Mbali the maid. The list of suspects wasn’t even a list, it was just a pair of names: Joe Flowers and Brother Jonah. Without the help of the detective branch and the foot police, identifying the driver of the black Dodge would be nearly impossible.
Emmanuel stretched the tension out of his neck and stared down at the sparkling white town below him. The pretty houses and colourful flowerbeds were ordered and peaceful. He knew from experience that looks were often deceiving.
A pain that could not be cured by morphine or any other drug pressed against Emmanuel’s sku
ll. The sergeant major’s voice would come soon, spitting and swearing. Expect pain. Accept pain. Peace comes after the fight, not before. He decided to surrender.
‘When you’re ready,’ he said, ‘I’ll listen.’
The voice remained silent.
A light shone from the front window of Sister Anne’s flat. Her father had been wheeled in for the night. The plan of attack was simple. He would enter the bedroom via the back window and catch Anne and Joe by surprise. If the window was locked he’d kick down the front door and try his luck. Emmanuel threw the Walther PPK into the Buick’s glove box. Introduce a gun and a simple plan split into a dozen new scenarios that mostly involved blood and a free ride in the back of a caged police van.
The wind had picked up and brought with it the smell of diesel and salt. Jolly’s little sister emerged from the building and sat on the top stair with her baby doll wrapped in a rag quilt. The night settled around her and strands of hair lifted from her shoulders in the wind. Emmanuel locked the Buick, climbed the stairs and sat down next to the girl. The aroma of fried onion drifted from the hallway.
‘It’s late,’ he said. ‘What are you doing out here?’
‘Baby can’t sleep. It’s too quiet inside and she likes to watch the lighthouse blinking.’
The intermittent flash of yellow from the Bluff lighthouse danced across the harbour but didn’t reach the shore.
‘Do you remember who I am?’
‘You’re a policeman.’ She rocked the baby doll back and forth in the cradle of her arms.
‘That’s right. I talked to you the other day. Do you know the girl Anne who lives above you?’
‘Ja. Anne has kittens.’
‘Have you seen her tonight?’
‘She took her pa inside. He was coughing.’
‘Is she at home, do you think?’
Susannah lifted the doll to her shoulder and stroked its spine with a tenderness that forced Emmanuel to look away. Old memories resurfaced. A fresh grave marked by a baby’s rattle instead of a cross. Women crouched in the rubble with their children held close even though their own bodies were no protection against bombs or bullets. He’d seen prams ushered through decimated towns by hollow-eyed women dressed in tatters. In war, women protected life as though it were a tiny flame in the wind.
