A Death in the Family
Page 12
Heads nodded and several men shouted, “Show them. We must show them.”
Julius looked around, pleased at the reaction. He needed to get the men worked up, willing to take the situation into their own hands.
“On Saturday at the kgotla, you must listen to the chief. If he agrees to what the mine offers, you must show him your support. But if he doesn’t agree…” He paused and looked around. “If he doesn’t agree, you must show your anger. You must show the old men that it’s your lives they’re taking away, your future they’re stealing.”
“They are thieves. Show them!” The crowd was getting agitated.
Julius raised his hand. “If the chief turns down the offer, you must take the elders and shake them and make them afraid, so they will change their minds, so you can have jobs.”
“We want jobs. We want jobs.” Now there was anger in the shouts.
It took Julius several minutes to stop the chant.
“You must show them, but you must not hurt them, because they are our fathers and our elders. Make them understand. But don’t hurt them.”
This was met with silence.
He stood up. “Soon we have jobs!” He turned and walked out to the cheers of the young men.
As he opened the door of his Toyota, he heard another chant from the shebeen. “Julius. Julius.”
This is what it felt like to be chief-in-waiting. He smiled, closed the door, and drove off.
CHAPTER 29
Kubu woke with a start to the shrill ringing of the phone. He grabbed it, his heart pounding. Joy sat up in the bed, also wide-awake.
“Yes?” He cleared his throat. “Assistant Superintendent Bengu here.”
He listened for a moment and then interrupted. “Just wait a minute.” Joy was listening to every word and holding his arm. “It’s all right, darling. It’s Edison. Nothing to worry about.” He felt her relax and lie back, and he returned his attention to the call.
“Who? Are you sure? Is he alive?” He listened a bit longer, then said, “I’ll head out there now. Keep the witnesses at the scene till I get there.”
He hung up, switched on the bedside lamp, and turned to Joy. “A man’s been stabbed. An American. I have to check it out.” Seeing the look on her face, he added, “Don’t worry. Try to go back to sleep.”
But she was already getting up. “I want to check on the girls. See that they’re all right. And your mother may have woken.” In the past, even if Joy had answered a late-night call, she would have handed the phone to him and been instantly asleep again. But that was the past.
* * *
KUBU’S MIND WAS still foggy with sleep, so he missed the turnoff to the apartment block where Peter Newsom lived. At last he found the street he was looking for and could see police activity a few blocks down. As he reached the taped-off area, he sat in the car for a few moments and took in the scene lit up by the police floodlights. Several uniformed policemen were keeping back a small crowd of onlookers. Edison was speaking to a group of young men, and Zanele and her team were inside the tapes scouring the area for clues. Kubu clambered out of his vehicle, walked over to Edison, and greeted him.
“This is Mandla Towene,” Edison said, pointing to a young man in an orange Illinois T-shirt. “He’s the man who reported the attack. He was leaving a shebeen on the next block with some friends and heard shouts. They ran over to see what was going on.” He paused. “How’s the victim?”
Kubu knew that Edison’s interest was not concern; he wanted to know if they were on another murder case.
“I phoned the hospital, but they couldn’t tell me anything. The doctors are putting him back together. It’ll be quite a while before we know much more. How did you know it was Newsom?”
“A lady identified him. His neighbor apparently.” He checked his notes, holding them to catch the light. “A Mma Kamanga. She saw the attack. She’s waiting in her apartment; I spoke to her, but I told her you’d want to talk to her too.”
Kubu nodded and looked around. The apartment building was on three levels and wasn’t in an expensive neighborhood. Somehow he’d imagined Newsom in a more upmarket area. The residents’ cars were parked on a paved area in front of the building. Kubu felt a twinge of disappointment. There would be no footprints for Zanele to work with. On the other hand, it was nearly a full moon, so maybe they’d get something from the witnesses. He turned to Towene, who was now sitting on the curb surrounded by his mates.
“You found the victim here?”
“Yes, well, like I told the detective,” Towene said, indicating Edison, “we heard this guy screaming. So I ran over, and when I got here, he was lying on the ground with blood all over him. He didn’t look good, so I phoned 999. Josh, here, has done a first-aid course, so he checked if the guy was still alive and said we shouldn’t move him.”
“Did you see anyone?”
Towene nodded. “There was someone running up the road, but he had a start on us. And we were more worried about the guy who’d been attacked.”
“Can you describe the man? The one who was running off?”
Towene shook his head. “He was running fast and was quite far away from us already.” He shrugged.
Kubu tried a few more questions, but it was clear that the group had responded to the cries but observed little. The white man collapsed in the parking area had attracted all their attention.
Kubu told Edison to get their names and addresses. “Oh, and check the underside of their shoes to see if they stepped in the blood. It might be important for Zanele to know. Then they can go home.” Perhaps they would recall something more in the morning, but Kubu doubted that, especially if they’d had a lot to drink.
“Where will I find the woman who identified him?” he asked Edison.
“She’s in number three on the first floor.”
* * *
MMA KAMANGA WAS an elderly lady with gray creeping into her hair. She opened the door at once when Kubu knocked, and she nodded when he introduced himself. “Come into the kitchen. We can sit at the table. I just made myself some tea to calm down. Would you like a cup? It’s bush tea.” Her voice wasn’t steady, but Kubu couldn’t tell whether that was due to age or the shock of the evening’s events. He wasn’t fond of rooibos tea, but he accepted a cup to make her feel more comfortable.
“Is Rra Newsom…?”
Kubu nodded. “He’s alive and at the hospital. We won’t know anything for a while, but I think he’ll be okay.”
The woman relaxed a bit, and Kubu decided he could get to the point.
“Please tell me exactly what you saw.”
She thought for a few moments. “I’d switched off the television and was going to bed. I remember hearing a car pull up. The window was open because it was quite warm. I suppose it was a few minutes later when I heard a scream, and I went to the window to see what was happening. A man was attacking Rra Newsom! I think he had a knife.” Kubu nodded and waited for her to continue. “I had to find my cell phone in my bag so I could call 999. It only took a few seconds, but by the time I got back to the window, the attacker was running away, and then that group of young men arrived.”
“How did you know it was Rra Newsom being attacked?”
“I know Rra Newsom. And they were just outside my window!”
“Can you describe the man, the attacker?”
She paused, thinking. “I think he was wearing dark clothing. I can’t really describe him. It was hard to see even with the moonlight, and it was all over so quickly. The man was smaller than Rra Newsom, but he was rushing him and slashing at him. That’s why I thought he might have a knife.”
“What happened after that?”
“I went out to see if there was anything I could do. I stayed with Rra Newsom until the ambulance came. Later I spoke to your detective.”
“Weren’t you concerned about joining a group of strange men with the victim of a knife fight?”
She shook her head. “I’m old,” she said.
Kubu then as
ked her about Newsom himself. She had chatted to Newsom a few times and even invited him to tea once but really didn’t know much about her neighbor. He worked for some mining company. He was an American. He kept flexible hours and was sometimes away on a trip for several days. He was friendly and polite. He didn’t have many visitors.
Kubu scrounged in his wallet and found a picture of Goodman Kunene and passed it to her. “Have you ever seen this man?” he asked.
She shook her head at once. “No, I’ve never seen him. Who is he?”
“Someone Rra Newsom knew,” Kubu replied. He checked his watch. By the time he reached the hospital, there should be news of Newsom. He thanked Mma Kamanga for the tea and her help and asked her to call him in the morning if she remembered anything else.
* * *
AS KUBU DROVE to the Princess Marina, he considered what he’d learned from Newsom’s neighbor. It wasn’t much. He’d hoped for an insight into the American but had been disappointed. And, of course, the fact that she hadn’t recognized Kunene proved nothing one way or the other.
When Kubu arrived at the hospital, the news was good. Newsom’s wounds were not life-threatening, and he was recovering in a private ward. Kubu sat in the waiting room, nodding off from time to time, until the doctor agreed he could see Newsom, provided it was only for a few minutes.
The American was barely awake. The anesthetic was wearing off, and he’d been given painkillers and a tranquilizer.
Kubu pulled a chair up to the bed and sat down heavily. “How are you, Mr. Newsom? A lucky escape, I think.”
Newsom nodded. “I’m okay.” His speech was slow and slurred. “But I’m in pain. Up to my eyeballs in drugs. Come back later. I don’t want to talk now.”
Kubu made no move to leave. “I won’t be long. We need to start looking for the person who attacked you right away. By tomorrow, the trail may be cold.”
Newsom sighed and tried to concentrate. “All right. I got back around ten, parked, and started for my door. The man attacked me from behind. With a knife. He knew what he was doing. Meant to kill me.” He stopped talking and closed his eyes. After a few moments, Kubu was worried that he’d fallen asleep. Eventually, he opened his eyes and continued. Kubu had to lean forward to hear him. “Some young guys came, I think. I remember lying on the ground, and they were looking down at me. Then the ambulance came. I don’t remember much after that.”
“Can you describe the man?”
“He was wearing a ski mask.”
“You said he knew what he was doing with the knife. How do you know that?”
“I was trained in hand-to-hand combat. In the marines.”
Kubu eyed Newsom’s bandages and his arm in a sling. “But you couldn’t handle him?”
“Marines was long ago. I’m rusty. And an attacker with a knife is a big problem.”
Kubu changed tack. “I’m worried that this attack is linked to the Kunene issue. We don’t know what was behind that. Now someone comes after you.”
Newsom just shook his head.
“I don’t believe in coincidences, Mr. Newsom. A close contact of yours is murdered, and a couple of weeks later someone tries to kill you. You said yourself your attacker was a professional.”
It was a few moments before Newsom responded. “Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I was taken by a thug after a few bucks.”
“And he never demanded money or your cell phone? Look, Mr. Newsom, don’t waste my time. I was pulled out of bed in the middle of the night for this.”
“You think I got cut up to ruin your night?”
Kubu sighed and stood up. Kubu was sure Newsom knew a lot more than he was letting on, and he was determined to get that information first thing in the morning. “Okay. Let’s pick this up later. You need some sleep. And so do I.”
* * *
KUBU PHONED EDISON and told him what he’d learned. Then he drove home, bone-weary. It was around two a.m., and he hoped he could still get a few hours’ sleep. Despite his exhaustion, his mind was active, turning over different ideas, mixing them up, and then rearranging them. Intuitively, he was sure there was a link between the murder of Kunene and the attack on Newsom. But what was that link? They knew each other, and both were involved with mining, but that was as far as it went. And the attacks were very different—Kunene abducted and gassed in a quiet road, Newsom assaulted outside his apartment by a trained knife fighter. Who would gain by eliminating a civil servant in the Department of Mines and a consultant, he wondered? Perhaps they’d stumbled on something that was supposed to remain hidden?
Then he tried to put it all out of his mind as he concentrated on driving, easing through the red traffic lights in the sleeping city.
CHAPTER 30
Kubu woke with a start to the Grand March from Aïda. As he grabbed for his cell phone, he checked his watch. It was after eight! He had a vague recollection of deciding on a few more minutes in bed when Joy rose to manage the kids. That had been over an hour ago.
“Hello?” he croaked. Then he cleared his throat and tried again. “Assistant Superintendent Bengu here.”
The voice on the other end was respectful almost to the point of obsequiousness. “Assistant Superintendent, this is Constable Kanye here. I was sent to the Princess Marina Hospital to provide security, sir. Thank you for trusting me with that assignment, sir.”
Needless to say, Kubu had had nothing to do with the assignment other than phoning the previous night to request a constable to keep an eye on Newsom. “Yes, Constable. Get to the point. I’m very busy this morning.” Kubu had meant to report on the Newsom matter to Mabaku first thing.
“Yes, sir. Of course. Sir, I was sent to provide security for a Rra Newsom. But he’s not here, sir. I thought I should let you know at once.”
Kubu sat up. “What do you mean he’s not there?”
“Well, the nurse said he left early this morning. He’s not here.”
Kubu was now fully awake. “Let me talk to her.”
Kanye put the nurse on the line. “Yes, Assistant Superintendent, Mr. Newsom checked out early this morning. It was just after my shift started.”
“Nurse, please give me the details. When exactly did he leave?”
There was a pause as she consulted her records. “Quarter past six this morning. He signed all the documents and paid his account with a credit card.”
“Did he leave alone?”
“No, two people came to fetch him. Not Batswana. Americans, I think.”
“And where did they go?”
“I’ve no idea. Maybe to his home. I have the address he gave us.”
Kubu knew where Newsom lived, so he brushed that aside. “He looked pretty bad when I saw him last night. Was he well enough to leave the hospital?”
The nurse sniffed. “I can’t tell you anything about his injuries. It’s patient privilege.”
“He was cut up with a knife. Anyway, that isn’t what I asked you.”
“He left in a wheelchair. They brought their own.”
“Please put Constable Kanye on the line again. And tell him to hold on. I’ll be right back.”
Kubu put down the cell phone and scrabbled in his wallet for Newsom’s card. He dialed his number on the landline and waited, but it went to voice mail immediately: “Hello, this is Peter Newsom. I’m returning to the United States. I will check my e-mail, but for urgent issues you can contact me at my office number 00-1-212-555-0188. Thanks.” The phone cut off without the option of leaving a message. Kubu jotted down the number, obviously a US one.
Kubu switched phones. “Constable Kanye? Are you there?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why did it take you till now to get to the hospital?”
“I only came in to the station an hour ago, sir.”
Kubu cursed under his breath. It was his own fault. He should have emphasized that he wanted the protection immediately, but he hadn’t imagined someone would try anything with Newsom in the few remaining hours of the night.
Kubu hung up and tried to clear his mind. Why had Newsom left? Concern about Batswana doctors? He didn’t think so. His injuries apparently weren’t that bad. He recalled Newsom’s reluctance to talk the night before. Either Newsom was spooked by the knife attack, or maybe he had done something illegal and felt that Kubu was getting too close. It was all very unsatisfactory. Kubu cursed again, aloud this time.
He picked up the cell phone and dialed the US number. After two rings, he heard a recording.
“This is Newsom Consulting. Please call during business hours, eight a.m. until six p.m., Monday through Friday, or leave a message at the tone. Thank you.”
The phone beeped, and Kubu left a message asking Newsom to contact him, giving his cell phone number.
After a moment’s thought, Kubu guessed who Newsom would ask for help. He phoned the US embassy and asked to be put through to Ms. Connie Olsen. He reached her immediately, and she responded without hesitation to his questions.
“Yes, Assistant Superintendent, that’s correct. Mr. Newsom has returned to the US. His wife was understandably upset about the attack on him, and he preferred to be at home to recuperate.”
“You make it sound as though he’s there already! He was here in Gaborone two hours ago.”
“He’s in South Africa and will be leaving for the United States from Johannesburg later today.” Olsen’s voice betrayed no emotion.
“Damn it, Ms. Olsen, are you aware that he’s an important witness in a murder case here? I believe that may have been connected to the assault last night.”
“Exactly, Assistant Superintendent. He felt he wasn’t safe in Botswana. That’s why we assisted him with arranging the trip home.”
“I need to speak to him immediately!”
“Assistant Superintendent, Mr. Newsom is a US citizen. There is no question that someone attacked him last night and injured him seriously. It’s our responsibility to assist our citizens in danger in foreign countries. Have you found his attacker?”
“It’s only been a few hours.”