Silent Predator

by Tony Park

  ‘I’m sorry, Robert, if that upstart caused you any concern,’ the company chairman said as Tom followed them. It seemed the RAF man knew Greeves personally.

  ‘No problem at all, Hugh. The opposition ran a line a few months ago about “taxpayer-funded safaris”. The World bit and even had a cartoon of me in a pith helmet,’ Greeves laughed. ‘I do love Africa, but that’s not why I travel there for business, and I’m keen to shut those sorts of questions down as quickly as possible. I do not want the people of Britain thinking I’m using my position to get free air miles.’

  ‘Of course not,’ the chairman said. ‘I’ll put out a statement today, if you like, saying that you refused to allow us to pick up the bill for your accommodation at the safari lodge.’

  ‘Thanks, but I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ Greeves said.

  ‘Why not, it’s true. I can also mention the company – at your suggestion – sponsoring an AIDS education program and providing funding for a workplace clinic for the workers we will employ in South Africa if we get the deal.’

  ‘All good stuff,’ Greeves agreed, ‘but I want to downplay this visit. When you win the contract, go large with it in the north – that’s where it’s the most important. I want to see your factory expanding, Hugh. I’m not the story here, your men and women on the factory floor are.’

  Tom thought he sounded like he actually meant it.

  The visit to the HIV-AIDS clinic in Islington was a low-key affair. The job was over in half an hour and consisted of Greeves meeting the director, his staff and a couple of outpatients.

  Tom had expected there to be media present, perhaps even one of those naff big cheques for Greeves to hand over as part of a naff photo opportunity. There was neither. Tom had thought it odd, in any case, that a defence minister would be handing over funding for something which was clearly a health ministry responsibility.

  As they drove through London to Westminster, Greeves finished annotating the last of a stack of briefing notes he had pulled from his briefcase. Tom saw his chance to raise the concerns he had about the lack of protection officers. ‘Sir, I’d like to bring some additional security equipment with us to South Africa – a passive alarm system which I’d set up on the door and balcony of your suite at Tinga.’

  ‘Are you asking me or telling me, Tom?’

  ‘It’s not intrusive, sir, and I wouldn’t be monitoring you, only the access to your room. It’s my recommendation, sir, given that we’re one man down on the team.’

  ‘Very well.’ Greeves signed another file and closed his bag.

  Their car pulled into the security parking area beneath Portcullis House, the multistorey labyrinth of parliamentary offices opposite the Palace of Westminster but joined to it by underground passageways.

  During the afternoon tea in the anteroom of Greeves’s offices, Tom introduced himself to Helen MacDonald, the press secretary. Tom was curious about why the minister was presenting a cheque to a healthcare organisation which was clearly outside his portfolio.

  ‘It’s his own money,’ Helen said, sipping a cup of tea while Greeves entertained some housewives, local businessmen and a gaggle of grey-haired grannies.

  ‘Really?’ Tom was surprised. ‘How much?’

  ‘He wouldn’t want me to say, even if I knew – but you can bet it’d be at least five figures, from what I know of his past donations to charity. He’s a true philanthropist, is our Robert.’

  Tom nodded, impressed. He knew Greeves was rich, but he didn’t know that he was generous as well. ‘Why didn’t he get some publicity for it? Help raise awareness of AIDS and all that?’

  ‘I used to try to get him to let me tell the media, but it’s a firm rule of his never to publicise his personal donations.’

  ‘I suppose he doesn’t want to be hit up by every other charity in the country,’ Tom speculated.

  Helen shook her head. ‘No. You know, I think he does it in private because it’s the right thing to do. He’s not like any other politician I’ve ever come across, in that respect. Not cynical – at least, not in that way.’

  Tom told Helen about the questioning from the journalist, Fisher. ‘Nothing to worry about,’ she said. ‘They’re flogging a dead horse, but do try to keep him out the way of photographers in South Africa. The World’s gunning for him for some reason.’

  There was nothing Tom could do to stop anyone taking a picture of Robert Greeves in a public place, especially in another country, other than try to alter their routes to avoid the paparazzi. To try to outrun them could be fatal – as had been the case with Princess Diana – and to manhandle reporters and photographers who weren’t actually physically threatening someone was considered to be assault. Still, Tom held his tongue and simply nodded to Helen. He was sure she knew the limitations he worked under.

  Tom travelled armed with his Glock, Asp, knife and ammunition as they passed through Heathrow escorted by two uniformed police – one with a Heckler & Koch – and a security officer from British Airways special services. Once through immigration he, Greeves and the minister’s policy advisor, Bernard Joyce, parked themselves in the first-class lounge for the hour before departure.

  The flight was uneventful and Tom slept well in the first-class seat behind Greeves, though he couldn’t drink alcohol.

  At Johannesburg they were first off the aircraft, and the British Ambassador to South Africa was waiting on the air bridge, along with the South African Minister for Defence, Patrick Dule. Sannie was there, protecting the minister, and she nodded a curt hello to Tom. They were led by airport staff and security to a VIP lounge, where their passports were stamped by immigration officers and the two ministers had coffee with the British ambassador, who would not be accompanying them to Kruger.

  South African soldiers in dress uniform, incongruously armed with umbrellas, were waiting downstairs outside the terminal to cover the official party for the couple of metres to two cars parked waiting in the torrential rain. They were driven across the taxiways to a South African Air Force Boeing business jet VIP transport aircraft, which was waiting on the Tarmac with its engines already turning. This time they would be flying to the Kruger National Park. Tom sat at the back of the aircraft, but was still three seats away from Sannie, so he couldn’t converse with her.

  There was no one from the company which manufactured the jet trainers travelling with Greeves; this was ostensibly a political visit and, while Greeves would talk up the merits of the UK bid and its benefits to the British economy, he would also be discussing other defence issues with Dule.

  Dule was an affable, urbane, rotund man in a tailored designer suit with a crisp white shirt, burgundy silk tie and matching handkerchief in his pocket. Tom remembered Sannie’s bitterness about the poverty in which so many South Africans still lived. Majority rule hadn’t brought fresh water and decent housing to all, but it had made some well fed and well off, Tom reflected.

  Tom had been unable to put Sannie out of his mind completely these past couple of days. He’d also been unable to shake the feeling that something good had passed him by, and he wanted at least to make amends with her, if not pick up where he thought they had left off. She looked cool and sexy in her lightweight cream business suit. He had tried a smile on her as she took her seat on the aircraft, but she ignored him. It was annoying. For some reason he felt compelled to tell her that he had not slept with Carla Sykes. It was none of Sannie’s business, but he sensed she thought less of him because of what Carla had said.

  Carla had some cheek, he mused, telling Sannie she believed she had left an earring in his suite at Tinga. Perhaps it was because she had been with Nick – and somehow he felt he was intruding on something – or perhaps it was just her over-the-top personality, but he didn’t feel she should be the first woman he slept with after Alex’s death. He had felt the stirrings of physical arousal when they had been drinking together and Carla had laid her hand on his thigh, but he had put the inevitable thoughts out of his head. He’d nev
er had sex while away on a job; he’d been faithful to Alex during their marriage, and since then the opportunity had never arisen.

  He’d politely fobbed off Carla, saying he was tired from his flight and his game drive. Undeterred, she had said, ‘Well, that’s one cup of coffee you owe me when you come back with your VIP.’ He’d turned her around and gently ushered her out of his room.

  He wondered, as the aircraft took off, if Carla would still be interested in him when they returned. She had said, as she’d left, ‘I can’t promise not to try again.’

  ‘Mint?’ Bernard Joyce, Greeves’s defence policy advisor, asked him from across the narrow aisle. ‘Helps me unblock my ears when we take off and land.’

  ‘No thanks,’ Tom said.

  Helen MacDonald had told him: ‘You’ll like being away with Bernard. He’s a scream. Camp as a row of tents, and sharp as a tack. He’s ex-Royal Navy – youngest second-in-command of a nuclear submarine ever.’

  ‘I hate Africa,’ Bernard said, leaning across. ‘Bloody dust and heat, and all those wild animals.’

  ‘I saw a leopard on my first visit, just a few days ago,’ Tom said.

  ‘Bully for you. Completely unnatural, if you ask me, driving around with no doors and windows, three feet away from lions and hyenas and the like.’

  ‘As opposed to cruising around half a mile under the water?’

  ‘Ah,’ Joyce said, raising an eyebrow, ‘I imagine our big-mouthed Kiwi spin doctor has been giving you the gossip on everyone?’

  ‘It’s all been good so far,’ Tom assured him.

  ‘I’m sure it has. We’re an odd bunch, we loyal foot-soldiers of Robert Greeves, but he’s a great man, Tom, don’t doubt it.’

  He nodded. He was starting to think so himself.

  Three of Tinga’s open-sided Land Cruisers were waiting at the Skukuza airstrip.

  Once the official airport for the Kruger National Park, the Skukuza runway, which was inside the park’s borders, had been reserved for private charter aircraft since the building of a new regional international airport near Nelspruit about forty kilometres to the south.

  ‘Welcome, Minister Dule, Minister Greeves,’ Carla Sykes said. She looked sophisticated and attractive, despite the shimmering heat haze rising from the Tarmac. Tom reminded himself to concentrate on the job.

  At Dule’s urging, Greeves posed for a photograph of the two of them, with three air force flight attendants, in front of the Boeing.

  ‘Oh, I found my earring by the way,’ Carla said both to Sannie and Tom as they all waited for the picture to be taken. ‘It wasn’t in Tom’s room after all, it was in the library!’

  Sannie van Rensburg wondered who Carla had been fucking in the library. She was still angry at herself and her petty jealousy of the woman, and she tried to concentrate on the broad back and bald black head of Patrick Dule. She was in the back row of seats of the Land Cruiser carrying the two dignitaries, while Tom sat in front, next to Duncan Nyari.

  There was something about Carla that grated on her – many things, in fact – but it was hard to fathom why she felt as strongly as she did about the woman. So she slept around, big deal, but it didn’t seem appropriate, she thought, for a woman in her position to flaunt herself in front of guests, particularly when they were there on business, as Tom Furey had been.

  She chided herself again. Hadn’t she almost slept with her workplace superior? How professional was that? Anyway, all these thoughts only served to remind her that business and pleasure most definitely did not mix. It was good to be back in the bush again so soon. The sights and smells and general feeling of wellbeing she got from the Kruger Park almost made up for the fact that she would be missing her kids by nightfall. Little Christo had recovered from his head wound and was back at school. He’d asked if she would be seeing Tom, the Englishman who played football. ‘I want to show him my scar,’ he’d said.

  Tom glanced back at her. She looked away, scanning the bush for wildlife and other lurking dangers.

  Three of Tinga’s staff were waiting for the vehicles. Two carried platters filled with cool drinks; the third, a tray stacked with cold hand towels. Carla leapt from the Land Cruiser she had shared with the ministers’ staffers and started organising other employees to escort everyone to their rooms. The politicians were looked after first. The South African minister’s policy advisor was an Indian woman called Indira. Sannie found her brusque and bossy, unlike the minister, who was actually quite charming.

  ‘Sannie, won’t you please take my bag to my room. I have to go and check the meeting room for the minister,’ Indira said to her.

  ‘I’m sure the staff can do that,’ Sannie replied. She wasn’t the minister’s bag carrier, and she certainly wasn’t Indira’s lackey either.

  ‘Hello there,’ Tom said, walking up to the two women. ‘Sannie, have you let Captain Tshabalala know that we’ve arrived?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said, knowing she sounded irritated and seeing that he picked up on her feelings. She had overreacted, but he was telling her how to do her job now. She guessed that Tom was simply trying to ensure everything was being done by the book, and he couldn’t have known that Indira had just irked her as well. ‘Yes, Tom,’ she said, her tone softer now. ‘I’ve made the call.’

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’ll take a stroll along the boardwalks on either side of the lodges.’

  ‘I’ll check out the conference room. The meeting’s not due to start for half an hour – it’ll give the politicians time to freshen up.’

  He nodded, looked at her as though there was something else he wanted to say, but she guessed the presence of Indira, who was squawking into her cell phone beside her, stopped him. He left and she went off to the conference room, leaving the bags with Indira, who gave her a pained look, which Sannie ignored.

  Sannie watched Tom walk away. She regretted snapping at him and wanted to tell him what Christo had said. Perhaps she would try to be a bit more civil to him later on. They might have time to chat while their principals were locked in their meeting and working lunch.

  A maid was placing jugs of juice and iced water in the private room, but otherwise it was empty. Sannie walked out onto the deck and surveyed the bush around the lodge’s function area. There were no animals in sight, and no sign of spoor or flattened grass to indicate anything or anyone had been circling the room in the last couple of days. It was all clear.

  When Sannie returned to the central reception area she saw Tom walking back from the far end of the boardwalk, but he was not alone. Carla was walking by his side – very close, as the walkway was quite narrow. She laughed, too loudly, at something he had just said and the cackle sounded to Sannie like a hyena’s call. Carla put her hand on Tom’s arm and any charitable thoughts Sannie had had disappeared.

  ‘Can’t wait to get the VIPs sorted,’ Carla said in an exaggerated stage whisper to Sannie as they approached her, ‘then we can all settle down to some lunch and gossip.’

  8

  Lunch at Tinga was every bit as good as Tom’s last meal at the lodge. This time they had kabeljou, a South African fish grilled and served with golden chips. A simple meal but very tasty.

  It started with him and Sannie sitting down together to discuss arrangements for the afternoon, and ended with Carla joining them and taking over the conversation. He could see now that Sannie quite clearly couldn’t stand the woman.

  Indira and Bernard popped in and out of the meeting at different times to make or take calls on their mobile phones, but for Tom and Sannie most of the afternoon was spent waiting. Carla left them to check on the guides for the afternoon game drive, but by that stage Sannie had already drifted away to read her novel, and Tom felt as though he’d missed another opportunity to talk to her. He went back to his room to change out of his suit into casual clothes for the afternoon drive.

  They boarded the Land Cruisers at four pm sharp. Both VIPs seemed cheery and friendly to each other, so Tom guessed the afternoon’s lunc
h and meetings had been positive.

  There were only two vehicles out on the drive. Indira and Bernard sat behind their respective ministers in the lead Cruiser, while Tom, Sannie and Duncan were in the second.

  ‘Nothing happened, you know, between Carla and me last time,’ Tom said quickly, getting it all out before she had a chance to interrupt.

  Sannie looked at him. ‘It doesn’t matter, Tom. I told you before, I don’t care.’

  He waited for her to say more, to fill the void, but she was a police officer too. She knew when to shut up. Stalemate.

  On the private dirt road leading out from Tinga, they passed small herds of impala and waterbuck, and three kudu. The kudus’ delicate features, big ears and doe-like eyes made them look the most innocent of creatures, Tom thought. Sannie remained silent and Tom, disappointed, told himself she was not going to crack.

  ‘Christo wants to show you his scar.’ She looked straight ahead, dutifully noting the zebra that Duncan had just pointed out.

  Tom smiled. ‘Greeves suggested on the flight over that if I came with him again, if Nick . . . well, you know, that I take some leave and spend a few days over here after his next visit. Perhaps I could drop in and say hi to the kids.’

  ‘That might be nice.’

  He could see she was gripping the bar in front of their seat, even though the dirt road was well graded and there were no bumps. Slowly, he told himself. This is a big move for her. ‘Perhaps dinner.’

  ‘That also might be nice. Tom . . .’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Just friends, okay?’

  ‘Fine by me.’

  ‘Here comes the tar road.’

  He focused his mind back on the job, though he felt a flutter of happiness for the first time in a long time. Instead of feeling as though he was being unfaithful, he thought Alex would have liked Sannie. They were both bright, articulate women who, unlike him, were good at expressing their feelings. Tom was sure that Alex, who had a passion for wildlife conservation, would have loved the African bush as much as Sannie did. Tom looked around as they turned onto the Tarmac. There was one car behind them, a white Corolla, pulled over on the side of the road. He saw the reflection of late afternoon sunshine on a camera lens. It was pointed their way, not into the bush. ‘We’ve got company,’ Tom said, reaching into the pocket of his shorts for a notebook and pen.