Requiem in E Sharp

by Joan De La Haye

  Louis made it across the kitchen in a few quick paces and grabbed her right upper arm. Coffee spilt over the edges of the mug, puddled around the base and slowly dribbled down the kitchen cabinet to the floor.

  “What’s your problem now?” she asked him. “Haven’t you killed anyone lately?” She regretted the words the moment they left her mouth.

  The back of Louis’s hand connected with her cheek. The force of it pushed her back against the kitchen counter. Her back arched and her hand hit the coffee mug. The mug fell to the tiled floor and shattered into pieces. The spilt coffee pooled on the floor like blood. His hands were on her throat and tightened. His fingertips dug into her soft flesh around her windpipe.

  “So you want to kill me too like you did your mother?” Her voice was a hoarse whisper escaping with the last of her breath. His grip on her throat loosened. She fell to the floor and gasped for breath.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.” He went down on his knees in front of her. “I love you. I could never ...”

  “Get away from me,” she hissed, kicking him and trying to scramble as close to the safety of the wall as possible.

  “I don’t know what came over me. I’m sorry,” he said, as he stood up.

  “I know what came over you, you sick murdering bastard!”

  “Don’t call me that. I did it all for you.”

  “That’s such bullshit, you did it all for yourself. I didn’t ask you to kill all those women. You killed them because you didn’t have the balls to kill your mother sooner.” She was on her feet and standing her ground without knowing how she came to be in that position.

  He jerked his right hand back past his shoulder. She flinched. His hand dropped before it connected with her cheek.

  “I’m not a coward,” he said, as he walked towards the door.

  “Are you going to kill some old woman again?”

  “You’ll see and just remember: you asked for this,” he whispered before closing the door behind him.

  Hysterical laughter echoed in the kitchen. It took a few minutes before Natalie realised that it was her own.

  THE NEXT MOVE HE PLANNED would kill two birds with one stone. He would teach Natalie and Nico a harsh lesson in manners. It would be one they would never forget. A slow smile crept along his lips as he knocked on her door. The light above the door was out. Luck was with him tonight. Even if someone saw him go in, they would never be able to give a decent description. The pot plants outside her door needed water and were starting to wilt. She'd never been much of a gardener. The wind howled through the passage and rustled the leaves of her plants. He pushed his hands deeper into his pockets.

  “Shit, it’s cold out here,” he grumbled to himself. “What’s taking the whore so long? She never used to be so slow.”

  He checked his watch: it was just after seven. He was cutting it fine, but it was worth the risk. He had to make sure that Nico would be here at just the right moment. She should be here he thought, as he knocked again and tapped his foot on the ground. He knocked again, harder this time. Her car was parked downstairs in its usual spot; he had made sure of that. Footsteps made their way to the front door. The lock jingled as the key was turned from the inside. The door opened as far as the security chain would allow it. She peered around the edge of the door and looked at him in surprise.

  “What are you doing here?” Janet asked. “I thought we agreed when Natalie had her ... accident that we wouldn’t see each other anymore.” She stammered like the guilty bitch she was. “What we had was great, but we agreed to stay away from each other for her sake.”

  “You mean you decided that we should stop. That's not why I'm here. We need to talk, and it’s windy out here, so if you don't mind, can I please come in?” he asked shoving his hands deeper into his jacket pockets.

  “Oh, sorry,” she said, closing the door. The security chain slid out, and the door opened once again. “Look, this is a bad time. Nico’s going to be here any moment.” She opened the door wider. “He'll have questions if he sees you here.”

  “I just wanted to get your advice on something. I won't be here that long,” he said as he stepped inside.

  The door closed behind him. The familiar feel of the wire scraping against the fake leather of his gloves brought back the pleasant tingle he always felt at these moments. Her life was in his hands. This is what God must feel like when he takes someone’s life, he thought.

  “What do you need my advice about?” she asked, walking past him into her lounge. “Has it got something to do with Nats?”

  He pulled the wire out of his pocket, careful not to make any sudden movements. He wanted to give her the surprise of her life. The curve of her neck enticed him. She'd always loved it when he kissed her neck. She was two steps ahead of him. He closed the gap before she reached the couch. He crossed his wrists and flipped the wire over her head.

  “What the ...” were the only words that escaped from her lips.

  He jerked the wire through her throat, hard and fast, slicing the carotid artery. Blood flowed like a rich burgundy wine out of her throat and ran down the front of her white knitted jersey, turning it pink. Her body fell to the floor, and her blood seeped into her clean beige carpet. It was over too quickly for him. He had wanted to savour the moment, the way he had always enjoyed their games before. She had been willing to do the things that Natalie wouldn’t and then had the nerve to look down on him. He had wanted to make her suffer, to watch her squirm. He knelt over her body and turned her over. Her lifeless face, which had always taunted him in bed, then rejected him once she'd had her fill, stared back at him. His fists crushed into her face over and over again. Each time his fist connected with her face, he became more aroused.

  The climax that had eluded him while he slit her throat exploded in his pants.

  NICO WAS LATE FOR THEIR date. Janet had invited him over for a romantic dinner. This probably meant she had ordered take-out from the Chinese Restaurant around the corner. Janet did not believe in cooking: that’s why take-out restaurants existed. He took the stairs two at a time up to her second floor flat and was breathing heavily by the time he reached the landing.

  “That’s taken care of my exercise for the rest of the month,” he said as he huffed his way towards her door.

  The door was ajar. Janet was security conscious and never forgot to lock it, let alone close it properly. In fact, she always had the security chain hooked in place. A feeling of dread started to seep into his bones. He removed his Berretta from his ankle holster and pushed the door open with the toe of his shoe. His heart pounded. If anything happened to Janet, he wouldn’t be able to handle it. With his back against the door, he entered Janet’s small, dark hallway. The back of his shirt scraped along the rough wall as he made his way down the unlit passage. The open kitchen door was on his right. He crouched down on his haunches and peered around the kitchen door. The light from the hallway outside shone in through the window giving the kitchen an atmosphere of foreboding. It was strange and made everything look as though it was trapped in time. The objects in the kitchen had no definition, no body. It was as though they would disappear if he blinked. White plastic bags stood on the kitchen counter. A box from the Chinese Restaurant stood next to the bags. The red dragon emblem emblazoned across the front of the white box containing what was to have been his dinner.

  He closed his eyes and tried to convince himself that Janet was fine. That she would walk through the front door and ask him what exactly he thought he was doing crouching in the dark. She would see his pistol gripped tightly in his hands; she would raise her eyebrow; she would shake her head at him and tell him to put the damn thing away. She didn't like guns. He opened his eyes, but Janet wasn’t there. Somewhere deep inside him, a voice told him that she would never walk through that door again. He made his way quietly through her flat, careful not to alert anybody to his presence should there still be someone lurking, waiting for him.

  It was in the lounge
that his fears were confirmed. The moon shone through the window showing off the contrast between the rough carpet and the smooth surface of a puddle of liquid in the middle of the floor. In the darkness, he couldn’t make out what it was. His gut and experience told him that it was blood, but he prayed Janet had spilt a bottle of wine and hadn’t had a chance to clean it up yet. Quietly, he made his way to the centre of the room and the puddle. He dipped his right index finger into it and smelt the distinctive coppery tang. His heart lurched, and blood pounded in his ears. There was no doubt in his mind. It was blood: very fresh blood. The trail of blood led out of the lounge and down the passage towards her bedroom and bathroom. Watching where he placed his feet, he followed the trail that was seeping into her carpets.

  He paused at her bedroom door and forced himself to survey the whole room. Everything was still in its place. The bed was still made. Janet never could bring herself to leave home without making her bed. She even insisted on making his bed whenever she spent the night. He had laughed and teased her about it. He called it her bed fetish. The stream of blood led into her en-suite bathroom. The wrenching in his gut told him what he would find in the bath. It was an all too familiar scene. Stumbling over his feet, he dragged himself across the room towards the bathroom.

  The same light that illuminated the kitchen shone in through the high bathroom window. He stood at the door. Fear froze him in time. He had no sense of how long it took him to take in the bloody scene in front of him. It seemed to take forever to raise his eyes from the tiled floor to the bath. The light from outside illuminated what was left of Janet’s face. Water, dyed red from her blood, ran over the edge of the tub and dripped onto the white tiles. Sinking to his knees, he rocked backwards and forwards mumbling incoherent words. Tears streamed down his face.

  It took an hour before his brain started to work again and he realised that he had to report the fact that the love of his life had been murdered by the man he had failed to bring to justice. Once his mind started to work again, he fumbled in his jeans’ pocket and pulled out his cell phone. The cell phone’s screen lit up with a green glow. Staring down at the luminous screen he tried to remember what number he was supposed to be dialling. After what seemed an eternity, he managed to make his shaking fingers cooperate and dial Pete’s number.

  LOUIS SAT IN HIS CAR parked on the corner across from Janet’s block of flats. He rubbed his raw knuckles as he waited. They reminded him of the beating he'd given that two-faced slut. He watched Nico arrive in his old Datsun bakkie. A smile had played on his lips as he imagined what Nico’s reaction would be to finding Janet’s body floating in her bathtub. He could see the water turning red with her blood. Looking at the photo's he'd taken on his digital camera gave him a rush all over again. If only he could have taken a photo of Nico's reaction. His cock was rock hard and strained against his jeans.

  He wondered if Nico would cry or get angry and break things. The idea of solid Nico losing his mind was entertaining. Would the tragedy of losing his girlfriend drive him over the edge? The idea made him laugh out loud. It was a strange, almost hysterical, laughter that seemed to reverberate around the confined space of his Golf.

  An hour and a half passed while he waited for the show to start. Must have been a slow night. It usually took the cops a lot longer to show up, if they showed up at all. He'd heard of cases where it took them more than two hours to arrive on a scene. But if the cops were doing their jobs, he and other security guys would be out of jobs. A police car careened around the corner on two wheels and squealed to a halt in front of her block, followed closely by an unmarked police car. A man wearing a pair of wrinkled black pants and old, well-worn Adidas sneakers got out of the unmarked police vehicle and walked through the front entrance followed by other policemen in uniform. Louis recognised him as the man who worked closely with Nico. He struggled to remember his name. There were several articles in the Pretoria News that mentioned both Nico and the new arrival. The name sat on the tip of his tongue. He felt it tugging at the back of his mind.

  “Fuck it! What is his name?” he asked himself out loud and smacked his palm against the steering wheel.

  While he struggled to remember the man’s name, another car pulled up, and Laurel and Hardy got out and followed the others inside.

  “Dr fucking Papenfuss,” he said and smacked the steering wheel once again. “I knew I recognised that fucking piece of shit.”

  The arrival of the police cars on the scene made his heart pound. The adrenalin that had rushed through his veins while he killed Janet started to flow once again. It was the kind of high that no drugs could emulate. The crime scene vehicle arrived. It was a white truck with a single blue line in the middle of it. The arrival of all the players meant it was time for him to go. That black photographer would be out any moment to take photos of the area and of the faces in the crowd. As much as he wanted to stay and watch the show, he couldn’t risk being seen. He reversed out of his parking spot under the trees and drove away slowly. There was no need to rush.

  14

  Pete stood in the doorway. The light from the hallway illuminated his tall crumpled figure from behind. The light gave him the appearance of having a bright yellow and white aura surrounding him, making him larger than life. Then again, Nico admitted to himself, in his present state of mind anything appeared to be bigger than life. He saw everything through a haze, and the world moved in slow motion. This must be what they call an out-of-body experience he decided. It felt surreal, as though he were watching it all through someone else’s eyes. He watched Pete walk, in slow motion, over to where he was crouched, leaning against the wall opposite the front door. The touch of Pete’s hand on his shoulder made him shudder.

  “Are you all right?” Pete’s voice was low and sounded muffled to Nico’s ears. Somewhere down the road, a dog barked. Nico felt himself drift away. He didn’t want to feel the pain. He wanted Janet to stand up and get out of her bathtub and tell him that everything was okay. He could almost see her smiling at him.

  “Nico, are you all right?” Pete asked again, with the patience that only someone who has seen pain and tragedy too many times in his lifetime can summon.

  Nico felt Pete's hand on his shoulder apply pressure, and his voice brought him back into his own body. Janet’s smiling face faded into the darkness and was replaced by Pete’s worried face. The reality of Janet’s death hit him hard. Bile rose up from his empty stomach. He stumbled up on to his feet and staggered past Pete, out of the door and managed to get his head over the railing, where the little that had been in his stomach made its way out with full force.

  “At least you remembered the integrity of the crime scene. I just hope no one was walking past downstairs.”

  “Not now, Doc.” It was all Nico could manage to get out between heaves.

  “I’m sorry. Bad timing,” he said while patting Nico on his back. “Are you going to be okay to answer some questions?”

  Nico nodded, crouched down on his haunches and gripped on to the railing.

  “I’ll answer any questions you have, but I’ll never be okay again.” His voice croaked as he struggled to utter a coherent sentence.

  Heavy footsteps walked up to them. They stopped a few steps away. He glanced under his arm to see who the new arrivals were. He noticed the well-worn brown shoes first, on both pairs of feet, then one pair of skinny legs and one pair of well-rounded legs. One pair of slacks was perfectly ironed and the other he doubted had ever seen an iron. He looked up at the faces for confirmation. Laurel and Hardy stared back at him with expressions he couldn’t read. Laurel shuffled his feet, and Hardy coughed. Both dropped their eyes, unable to meet Nico’s anguished stare.

  “Don’t you have a crime scene to walk?” Pete asked them.

  “We’re waiting for you,” was Hardy’s response.

  “I’ll be with you in a moment. So get to work while I get a statement from the Captain, or do you have a problem with that?”

  “No, no
problem at all. But we want the Captain to join us at the station after we’re through here.”

  “What for?” Pete’s face started turning red as he asked Hardy. Nico had only seen his face go that red once before. It had been during Pete’s divorce, and his soon-to-be-ex-wife had been on the receiving end. He couldn’t remember the reason; Pete's ex-wife just had to walk into the room for him to be angry. There were only two people who could get that kind of reaction out of the doctor: Hardy and his ex-wife.

  “We’re just covering all our bases. We just want to get a complete statement from the Captain at the station. That’s all, or do you have a problem with that, Doctor?”

  “Me? Have a problem with the two of you? Perish the thought.”

  “Look, Doctor, we know that you have a man crush on wonder boy over there, busy puking his guts out. We don’t really want to know the details of your relationship, but we would, however, appreciate some cooperation from you while we work this case. Can you do that?” Laurel said, getting his two cents in.

  “Don’t get cute with me, Colonel. Now, before we turn this crime scene into a triple homicide, I suggest we all get back to work.” He turned to Nico, his voice losing the edge it had when talking to Laurel and Hardy and asked, “Do you think you can work the scene with us?”

  Nico felt his stomach tighten again and his face must have betrayed his feelings.

  “That's against procedure. Captain Van Staaden has been suspended,” Hardy said, his voice two octaves higher than usual.

  “I’m sorry, but I need your input on this,” Pete said, ignoring Hardy. He couldn’t meet Nico's eyes, and his voice took on a pleading quality. “You knew her better than anybody else. We need you. Hell ... Janet needs you to pull yourself together and help us find the guy who did this to her.”

  “You’re not playing fair, Doc,” Nico mumbled.