Detective Kubu 01; A Carrion Death

by Michael Stanley

  Kubu was suddenly interested. “What do you mean, it wasn’t real money? Do you still have the coins?”

  Mashu nodded, reached into his pocket and came up with a small, grubby change bag. He dug in it and produced three coins, which he handed to Kubu. The bag rapidly disappeared again.

  Kubu looked at the coins. It was Angolan money totalling five new kwanza, worth nothing in Botswana and not much more in Angola.

  “I’ll give you five pula for these,” he offered Mashu. Mashu could hardly believe his luck, but with the suspicion of the very poor, he asked slyly, “Perhaps it’s worth more?” Kubu tossed the coins on the table and said, “It’s okay. I don’t really need them. You can keep them.” Mashu folded at once and took the pula.

  That was all that Kubu got out of him. Not much to go on really, but more than he had expected. He finished by asking Mashu to let him take his fingerprints. Mashu was very nervous about this and actually asked if he should see a lawyer first. Kubu just laughed. He doubted that Mashu had ever even sold petrol to a lawyer. Inevitably, while Kubu was taking the prints, Noko entered the room.

  “What has he done?” he demanded. “Are you arresting him?”

  “No, no, he’s done nothing,” Kubu said patiently. “I just want to check his prints against the one we found on the cash slip.”

  Noko nodded, but looked at Mashu suspiciously. Kubu tried to rescue the situation by commenting on how helpful Mashu had been and even shaking hands all round. All he got for his trouble was a smudge of residual ink from Mashu and some automobile grease from Noko. Giving up, he settled for directions to Rucksack Resort.

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  CHAPTER 16

  Rucksack was quite different from Dale’s Camp. As Kubu drove up, he could tell immediately that this was not upscale accommodation. A dozen or so tents were pitched around the central buildings. This was a backpackers’ resort—for people who wanted to see Africa on the cheap. They would spend four or five weeks in a bus, trekking across Africa.

  Kubu introduced himself at the reception desk. He asked the receptionist to arrange for him to see the manager in about half an hour, asking if he could use a large towel so he could wash the dust off in the meantime. This was not a place with porters, Kubu thought. He decided to get a steelworks for himself.

  The receptionist suggested he make use of the public showers in the campsite and gave him a towel. Kubu had the impression that she did not want him sponging himself off in the men’s room next to the dining area. A half-naked hundred-and-forty-kilogram black man might upset the guests, even if most of them were young.

  Looking around, Kubu realised that the focal point of the resort was a large bar that offered simple food as well. It was a low-budget operation designed for low-budget visitors.

  “Is that the usual barman?” Kubu asked the receptionist.

  “Oh yes,” she replied, smiling. “And owner, manager, bouncer and general handyman. We only have a small staff here.”

  “I’ll speak to him as soon as I am presentable,” Kubu said.

  Fifteen minutes later, Kubu went over to the bar and introduced himself. The barman told Kubu that his name was Dieter Papenfuss from Switzerland. He had set up the camp five years ago and enjoyed providing young people with inexpensive accommodation in his favourite country in the world.

  “I did a trans-African safari fifteen years ago,” he explained. “We were twenty students in an overland truck. We spent a week in Botswana, mainly in Chobe and Savuti. I fell in love with it then, and I still love it now. I meet many young people here, and a few older ones too, who do not have the money to pay high prices. I charge everyone the same, no matter how rich or poor. I think having two prices is ridiculous—one for locals and one for foreigners. It will kill the tourist trade eventually. People are very greedy.”

  Kubu shared these sentiments but did not say so aloud. He liked Papenfuss’s accent, which was definitely Germanic, but was quite soft with a purring sound at the back of the throat.

  “Mr Papenfuss. As you know, a body—”

  “Everybody calls me Dieter!”

  “Thank you, Dieter. A body was found near the Kamissa waterhole. We think it had been there for about four or five days. I spoke to a bus driver you know: Koos van der Merwe. He said that one of his group did not show up for a trip back from Khutse a week ago. Apparently he and another traveller had a big fight here in the bar.”

  “Ja. It is correct. Two students were arguing about the Bushman people—whether the government was right to resettle them out of the Kalahari. One, a Dutchman, said that since they had ancestral lands there, they should continue to live where they pleased and to wander as they needed. The other, who was from Germany, said they were interfering with a great wilderness area, hurting conservation of an irreplaceable ecosystem, and that the government had every right to give them some land of their own. They had too much to drink, and it became a very angry argument. The Dutchman called the other a Nazi for suggesting the Bushmen should be transported, as he called it. He said the next thing would be to exterminate them because they were a nuisance, just like the Germans had tried to exterminate the Jews. Mein Gott—what a fight. I had to bang their heads together and throw them out.”

  “Did it seem that one wanted to kill the other?” Kubu asked.

  “I doubt it—but they were very angry. I think the Dutchman was still angry about what the Germans had done in World War Two. Several members of his family were killed, I think. Maybe he was Jewish. They were young, with hot heads and too much beer and schnapps. I think they would have liked to hurt each other. But kill? No.”

  “But they were still angry the next morning. Van der Merwe told me they sat at opposite ends of the bus.”

  “Ja. Ja. But you must remember they are young, with pride.”

  “While they were here, Dieter, did either mention that they were changing their plans and not returning with the bus? Apparently the Dutchman—his name is Tjeerd Staal—left the tour at Khutse.”

  “Nobody mentioned anything to me. You may want to ask the receptionist. She is very popular because she is young like the students. She often has a drink or two with them after work. No, I think you are barking at the wrong bush. These are kids, not animals.” Dieter’s tone indicated that he had made his final pronouncement on the subject. “May I offer you a drink, Mr Detective?”

  “Aaaah, yes. Thank you. A double steelworks would be wonderful.”

  “Nobody knows you here. You can have a real drink if you want. Nobody will tell.”

  Kubu smiled. “Thank you, but I need something long and cold.”

  After lunch, Kubu talked to the pretty receptionist, who told him that her name was Siphile. She remembered the fight and the two angry men. She, too, did not think that one would kill the other. They both seemed quite sweet, she said. Both had offered her a drink, but she had declined because she was still on duty. Anyway, by the time she was off duty, the fight was over, and the two had been banished from the bar. So she did not get to speak to them again.

  Kubu thought that this whole trip had been a waste of time. Just two hotheaded kids having a fight! Shortly afterwards he waved farewell to Dieter and started the long drive home.

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  CHAPTER 17

  Although the next day was Saturday, Kubu was in the office by nine. He wanted to see if anything new had turned up while he was touring the southern Kalahari. He sat down to check his messages, his ordinary mail, his e·mail, and other paperwork.

  As usual, it was a mixed bag. He was disappointed to find no missing-persons reports that could possibly shed light on the victim. He listened to several messages asking for return calls on other cases he was working on. There were no e·mails of real interest. He wished he could stop those promising to improve his manhood or to provide graphic videos of horny teens ‘at spring break’, which he assumed was some sort of bacchanalian festival in the United States. He speculated how long the e
·mail system could survive the onslaught of pornography and solicitation.

  The highlights were the reports from Forensics and from Ian MacGregor. Forensics concluded that, based on the photos made of the tyre tracks, the tyres were Yokohama Geolandars—a common bush tyre in Botswana. The boot prints were inconclusive because the soles were too worn and the outlines indistinct. Not much to go on here, Kubu reflected.

  He turned to the pathology report from Ian MacGregor. He took out his notebook and settled down to read it carefully.

  The first paragraph described the remains, their condition, and where they had been found. The second paragraph stated that some of the conclusions needed to be regarded as speculative, given the fact that so much of the body was missing.

  The deceased was a white male, between twenty-five and thirty-five years old, who had been dead between four and eight days. The victim’s estimated height was between 1.7 and 1.8 metres. It was not possible to estimate his weight. The deceased had brown hair. It was likely that death had been caused by a hard blow to the back of the head that had severely damaged the skull and broken the neck. It was not possible to identify the type of weapon that had been used. The left arm appeared to have been struck by a sharp instrument and broken off at the elbow. The humerus showed signs of blows. The elbow did not have the teeth marks expected if a hyena had chewed the arm off. That lower left arm was not with the remains the pathologist had received. X-rays showed that the deceased had at some stage in his life broken both arms, the left above the elbow and the right close to the wrist. Both fractures had healed well. It was not possible to tell when the breaks had occurred. The separated leg belonged to the rest of the body; there was no evidence of the other leg.

  As Kubu had surmised, the teeth had been knocked out. Great force had been used because many of the teeth had sheared off, leaving the roots in the skull. In fact, fifteen of the roots were still embedded in the jawbone. None of the teeth had been recovered. For such damage to occur, it was likely that an implement such as a screwdriver or crowbar had been used.

  With respect to the sample of stained sand that Kubu had brought back, the coloration was due to human blood. The sample had been sent to the lab for DNA testing against samples from the corpse, even though they were not sure whether it would be usable. However, no results had come back yet.

  MacGregor ended by saying that there was nothing to provide a positive identification of the deceased. The only hope was to check the medical records of any potential victim to determine whether there was a match on breaks in the arms. The X-rays were on file, as would be the DNA tests.

  “Not much help there,” Kubu said to himself despondently.

  He sat for a few minutes going over everything he knew. He had nothing of substance except the long shot that the corpse was one of the backpackers who had been fighting at Rucksack Resort. He wondered whether it was worth putting in any effort to find Staal and Tannenbaum. Eventually he reluctantly decided he would have to. So he asked one of the junior detectives to check with the airlines to see whether either of the two men had changed or confirmed their reservations.

  “Well,” he said out loud, “there’s nothing else I can do at the moment. It’s Saturday, and I have a date with my wife.” He slipped the case file into his briefcase and headed for home.

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  CHAPTER 18

  Kubu turned in to Acacia Street and drove the block and a half to his home. He stopped in front of his wrought-iron gate covered with mesh, and climbed out of the car to open it. Immediately a fox terrier threw itself at the gate, yapping hysterically. Kubu smiled. “Ilia. Good girl. Down, baby. Down.” He lifted the metal latch and swung one half of the gate open. Ilia now jumped up and down, bouncing off Kubu. “Down, girl!” Kubu wondered why he ever said anything, because it never had any effect.

  He leant over to pat the dog, which immediately set off a frenzied bout of licking. Kubu swung open the second half of the gate and climbed back in the car. Ilia jumped in and sat upright in the passenger seat, panting loudly, stumpy tail wagging furiously. Kubu drove into the garage.

  Kubu was proud of the garage, because he had designed it himself. He and some friends had built it about three years ago. At least, that was his story. Deep in the recesses of his mind, he would occasionally acknowledge—only to himself—that his friends had built the garage, while he directed. The garage was typical of this part of the world, with brick walls, corrugated-iron roof, two little windows, and a small lock-up room on one side—his workshop, he called it, even though he had never used it to build or work on anything. The garage door was metal and could be manually raised or lowered. For the most part, the door remained open day and night, all year round. Not only was it a little awkward to open and close, but it made a screeching sound as it moved along its tracks. Kubu had promised Joy at least nine months earlier to grease it, but kept putting it off because he knew he would have to do the work himself. Standing on a ladder with his hands covered in grease did not fit Kubu’s image of himself.

  Kubu and Ilia got out of the car. Ilia’s exit was dramatic and accomplished by jumping out of the passenger-side window; Kubu’s was laborious as he heaved himself once again out of the car. Before he had one foot on the ground, Ilia was jumping up and down with her tongue dripping on to his shoes. Kubu retrieved his briefcase from the back seat and walked towards the door on the front veranda. He climbed the three steps on to the veranda concrete floor, lovingly treated with red floor polish. The canvas blinds on each side of the steps were rolled up, allowing the late-afternoon sun to stretch across the floor.

  There were four easy chairs with seats and backs made from a latice of riempie. Kubu found such chairs quite comfortable, but preferred to have cushions both under him and behind his back. One of the chairs had a stack of such cushions, covered in a relatively subdued pattern. Next to the door was a table on which food and drinks could be placed. Kubu glanced at the table and shouted, “I love you, my darling. I love you.” He put down his briefcase and walked over towards a large glass of steelworks. He took a couple of sips, savouring each, and then drained the rest in noisy gulps.

  “Would you like another one, my dear?”

  Kubu turned towards the door where Joy stood with a glass in her hand. She had a naughty smile on her face as she walked over and kissed him. “It’s been a long day,” she said. “I’m sure you could do with another.”

  Kubu took that glass in his other hand. For a moment he was nonplussed; he had no way to embrace her. He put the empty glass down and hugged her. “I am the luckiest man in Botswana,” he said. “No one else has a wife like mine.”

  “Don’t you ever forget that,” she responded, trying hard to scowl, wagging her finger in front of his face. She, too, felt blessed that she had met and married as warm and unusual a person as Kubu.

  She thought back to when they had met, shortly after she joined the police as an administrator. She worked in Records and had helped the big detective to find some information from past cases. They had hit it off, and he had asked her out. A year later they were married. She shook her head at the memories. The whole relationship had been such a surprise.

  After they married, Joy resigned from her job because she did not want to be in the same building as Kubu.

  “As much as I love you, dear,” she had said, “I am not sure I could stand being around you twenty-four hours a day!” Although he feigned pain, Kubu secretly agreed. Since she was an independent person, he said, she should do what she thought best. So Joy went to work full time at a day-care centre for AIDS orphans and other underprivileged children.

  Half an hour later, Kubu and Joy strolled around their small garden. Kubu had showered and wore shorts. He was barefoot—his preferred fashion. The garden did not meet the standards of Home and Garden, but the two thought that trying to emulate an English garden in the parched earth of Gaborone was ludicrous. It was like the ex-pats trying to imitate a snowy English Christmas e
ven though they were in the middle of summer. He had even seen them spraying Christmas trees with fake snow and eating traditional Christmas dinners, complete with plum pudding and brandy sauce, even though the temperature outside was forty degrees Celsius. It was far more enjoyable, Kubu thought, to go with the flow and eat cool fruits next to a friend’s swimming pool, while sipping an excellent chilled South African sauvignon blanc.

  Kubu looked at his house—a typical middle·class home, made from brick with red interlocking tiles on the roof. It was designed for outdoor living, with large front and back verandas where they spent most of their free time. He was very proud of his home, particularly when he thought of how he had grown up in far more modest surroundings. He was forever indebted to his parents’ foresight and patience in supporting his education, and yet he had also noticed a growing gulf between him and them, not because they had experienced any change in affection, but rather because his life had become incomprehensible to them. A house with a garden, a car, a refrigerator stocked with ginger beer and occasionally a fine wine—these were all mysteries to Kubu’s parents, a world they could not comprehend.

  Kubu looked at his garden and felt content with its embrace of the semi-desert conditions of Gaborone. Even though his favourite plants—the living stones or lithops—were not prolific in Botswana, they had about twenty species in their garden. They were remarkable plants, masters of camouflage, their shape, size and colour causing them to resemble small stones in their natural surroundings. To minimise any evaporation, their leaves had become so truncated that they had lost the appearance of a normal leaf and had become rounded like a pebble.