City of Blood

by Martie de Villiers

  ‘Go away.’

  ‘He said he’s got a job for me.’

  ‘Go away.’ His hand moved in under his shirt. I expected to see a gun and froze, then I swung round, ready to run, but the man called me back. ‘Eh, come back tomorrow. I’ll tell him you were here.’

  More laughter sounded from inside the house. My plan for creating a diversion didn’t work. I didn’t even know if Abaju was in the house. I hoped he wasn’t, because if he was, he might be in the office and he’d catch Msizi. I hurried round the block and sneaked back down the alley to the rear of the house. No sign of Msizi. I hid behind the rubbish again and got the phone out.

  ‘Twenty minutes, bru,’ Adrian said.

  ‘Twenty minutes? You are slow.’

  ‘Eh, we got to get it right. Get the place surrounded and all.’

  I ended the call and went back to watching the little window. Ten minutes passed. I grabbed a handful of gravel and chose a smallish stone from it to throw at the window. No reaction. No Msizi. More gravel connected with the window. Nothing. And then the phone rang. The noise gave me such a fright that I almost dropped the phone in the street.

  ‘All right, Siphiwe,’ said Adrian. ‘We’re on the move. You sure Abaju’s there?’

  How could I be sure? These cops, they wanted me to do all the work.

  ‘I think so,’ I said, while at the same time trying to hear if there was any noise coming from the other side of the wall. If they had heard the phone ringing . . . But it was all quiet. Not for long. The police were on their way. This time I put the phone on silent. My fingers were shaking.

  I threw more gravel at the window, and when Msizi’s head appeared, I was so glad to see him that I smiled and waved and clapped my hands silently. He wriggled his shoulders through the window, but instead of climbing out, he threw a plastic bag down at me. I tried to catch it, but it bounced off my fingertips. I bent down to get it, and when I looked up, Msizi had disappeared. The bag was full of money.

  I checked my watch. Seconds ticked by. One minute. Then another. Soon the police would charge the house. The Nigerians would not like it and they and the police would start shooting at each other. If Msizi was still inside, he’d get hurt. Another bag hit me. I waved at Msizi to get down. This bag was filled with money too. I couldn’t believe how much money there was. Msizi vanished again.

  ‘No,’ I called after him. ‘Get out now!’ I didn’t care if anyone heard me. We had to go. The phone vibrated against my leg. Adrian again.

  ‘Green light, bru. If you’re still around, get out of there.’

  I counted to one hundred. A shrill whistle pierced the air. That must be one of the lookouts at the end of the street. A woman screamed and a dog started barking. I did not hear sirens, but I hadn’t expected to. Car doors slammed. Gunshots. Men were now yelling at each other. Some were swearing. Others called, ‘Cops, cops.’ Tyres screamed. Someone on a megaphone shouted, ‘This is the police.’ The helicopter reappeared and circled the house. Policemen hung from its sides. Ropes dropped down. I knew the Nigerian would make straight for the office to save his money or to destroy his drugs.

  ‘Msizi, get out of there,’ I shouted as loud as I could. His head appeared again. He tossed another bag over the wall and disappeared.

  ‘Get out,’ I yelled over and over again.

  There he was in the window, this time with his green school bag, dropping it down to me. It did not clear the sharp glass on the wall, and one of the straps got caught.

  All I wanted was Msizi to get out of that house.

  37

  ADRIAN WAS SOAKED in sweat. He was in the back of a police van, racing towards the biggest raid of his life. He struggled to keep his thoughts together. It didn’t help that Ferreira, who sat next to him, was talking non-stop.

  ‘This is war, my boy. You shoot to kill. And always cover your buddy’s back.’

  ‘I know, sarge.’

  ‘You’ll be OK, so long we watch out for each other. Stay one step behind Rob and cover his back. I’m at your shoulder all the time. You don’t mind me. You mind what’s ahead of you.’

  ‘I know, sarge.’

  ‘Yeah, I know you know. Fucking hotshot, you are.’

  He phoned Siphiwe. Opposite him Robert was talking to the captain. They had a wide cordon around the house. They planned to tighten the noose as they moved in. No one was to get away. Every car leaving the area would be stopped and searched, everyone in that house taken in for questioning. Since Siphiwe’s tip-off, Robert and the captain had spent hours planning this. No one else knew about it until this morning and even then no one knew the location. But they all knew what to expect. Fucking fireworks. No doubt they’d have an arsenal in there and they wouldn’t be shy to use it. Captain Piliso was going in with them. Ferreira, Horne, Stevo, the boys from Organised Crime and the usual Flying Squad boys who didn’t want to miss out on the action.

  The two lookouts standing on the corner were targeted by some Organised Crime boys dressed as tramps, plus two others on bicycles, glaring in orange construction-worker overalls. They hit them fast and hard and kept them silent. The kids on the other end of the street weren’t that much of a problem.

  They moved in from the south initially, with six vans racing down the street. By the time the kids whistled their warning, they were on top of the guard at the gate. He went for his gun. The captain shot him in the head. The first shot of the day. No words spoken. No time.

  Two Organised Crime detectives were ahead of Adrian and Robert, shouting at the man in the door to drop his weapon. He didn’t. One of the detectives took him out and Robert leaped over his body. They piled through the door. Adrian kept up with Robert. Ferreira was behind. Adrian fired two shots at one of the guys in the living room who didn’t get that he was outnumbered. A bullet flew over his head and slammed into the wall.

  From that point on, he had no idea what went down in the rest of the house. Robert bolted up the stairs. Adrian followed, but by the time Robert disappeared round the corner, Adrian was still at the bottom of the staircase and there was this jockey-sized man charging down the stairs, no shirt and trousers down his ankles, but with an expression on his face that said he was ready to fight.

  Adrian saw no weapon on him, but he kept coming. Maybe he was drunk or high on crack, maybe it was just adrenalin. Ferreira shouted at him to shoot him.

  Adrian double-checked: no gun, no knife – he came at him with his bare hands and he must be half his size. Nutter. He swung his right fist and connected with the man’s head. Pain shot through his knuckles into his wrist. He’d swear he’d broken a finger. The little man dropped like a sack of shit at his feet, eyes rolling over. He might as well have shot him.

  He tried to shake the pain off. Behind him Ferreira was laughing. Adrian hurdled over the unconscious guy, taking the stairs three at a time to catch up with Robert. The chopper roared overhead. More shots were fired in the backyard, where the main battle was being fought, in front of the kitchen and around the garage. Not his problem at the moment.

  He turned left at the top of the stairs, first checking for danger on the right, then moving down the corridor. There was Robert, standing in a doorway, legs spread, gun pointing into a room.

  ‘I’m here, bru,’ Adrian said so Robert knew he had his back. He heard Ferreira’s heavy breathing as he made his way up the stairs. Adrian looked into the room over Robert’s head. A man stood in the middle of the floor. Shoes, polished like mirrors. White shoes, to go with the suit. Sylvester Abaju.

  Abaju stood with a mocking smile on his face. A tall man, elegant with his fancy suit and blue silk tie. Smooth features, high cheekbones, long, narrow nose, exactly like he looked in the identikit. Smart-arse.

  He made the mistake of trying to chat with Robert. Same old story. A suspect would see them together, a big white boy looking like he wanted to beat them up – which mostly he did – and Robert, who was small and never showed when he was angry, so they reckoned he was the one
to start a conversation with, like he was less threatening. Big mistake. Robert would just look straight through them. Anyhow, Mr Smart-arse was talking and he had a real classy English accent too.

  ‘What are you going to do, cop, eh? Arrest me? Do you think you can arrest me? Do you think you can put me away this time?’ He laughed. ‘Let me explain to you how it works.’

  ‘You’re a dead man,’ Robert said in Zulu. He raised his gun and fired twice, hitting Abaju in the chest.

  Adrian stood frozen while Robert stepped into the room. Adrian followed automatically.

  ‘Shit, bru,’ Adrian said, his gaze fixed on Abaju. His blood was already being sucked up by the rug that covered the white tiles – he’d bet it was one of those expensive Persian rugs. In the house beneath them, someone shouted at a screaming woman to shut the fuck up.

  ‘He was going for his gun,’ Robert said. ‘You saw that, Adrian. Going for his gun.’

  At his feet Abaju was dying. He didn’t take long, then his breathing stopped and his arms stopped jerking.

  ‘Go check what’s through there,’ Robert said, pointing at a connecting door. ‘I heard something.’

  ‘Bathroom,’ Adrian shouted. ‘No one here.’

  There was a shower, a sink and a toilet. Dirty lace curtain in front of an open window, blowing in the wind. He turned his head slightly. He thought he heard someone on the roof, but then it went quiet again. He went back out, where he did another quick scan of the room. An office, by the look of it, desk, chairs, filing cabinet, TV in the corner, rubbish bag lying on the floor next to Abaju’s body.

  ‘Adrian?’ There was a note of uncertainty in Robert’s voice.

  Adrian looked at him. Robert’s eyes were guarded, as if he thought he’d let him down.

  ‘He was going for his gun,’ Robert said.

  ‘I know, bru.’ Adrian stared at the dead man, whose white suit was washed in blood. He would have, he decided. If he’d had the chance. He would have shot them both dead. Walking around the desk, he found the Vector lying on the floor behind it. He lifted the pistol up with his pen. ‘Bet he took it off a cop,’ he said and put it on the desk.

  Next time he looked, Robert had placed the pistol in the dead man’s hand. It should have bothered him, what Robert had done, but it didn’t. Maybe that meant that he was callous in some way, but this was war – and hell, if you couldn’t trust your partner to get you out of a tight spot . . . What did bother him was that safe. It had been left wide open and all they found inside was a kilogram of cocaine, and on the rug, a small bin bag stuffed with hundred-rand notes. Now that he found weird.

  They searched the top floor room by room, discovered two women in their underwear, huddled in a corner in one of the bedrooms. They cuffed them to the bedpost. Then they went downstairs to join the others. The gunshots had stopped. It smelled of a slaughterhouse.

  Someone had stepped in a pool of blood and left a trail of bloody footprints leading into the kitchen. In the backyard the captain was shouting orders, shouting into his radio for the fucking medics to hurry up. Adrian squinted as the sunlight hit his eyes, then he saw Stevo sitting on the kitchen steps, blood running down his legs, and he forgot all about the safe and the way Abaju had died.

  38

  THE NOISE FROM the surrounding streets flooded the alley. Gunshots. Women screaming. Men shouting. Msizi glanced backwards and twisted sideways to get through the window. He clung to the drainpipe, then dragged himself up onto the roof, where he skidded down the tiles towards the tree. Once more I thought that he would fall, but he regained his balance and grabbed hold of the branch hanging over the roof. I could see from his clumsiness that he was scared, but he made it into the tree, halfway to safety. I checked the alley to both sides. Nothing, but the noise was closing in on us.

  Msizi had not yet cleared the wall. He looked down at me from between the leaves and branches, glanced back at the house and then, without hesitation, leapt out of the tree, straight at me, like a toddler jumping into an adult’s arms. I tried to catch him, but it was like trying to catch a flying rocket. We both fell onto the pavement. Msizi’s elbow hit my nose and blood streamed everywhere. His knees slammed into my ribs, and I felt them hurting where the Nigerian had kicked me all those months ago. It didn’t matter. I had caught him.

  Msizi was already on his feet, jumping up and down, trying to reach his school bag which was caught on the broken glass. He was far too short. I could reach it but could not pull it down. I couldn’t leave the bag there for the police to find – Msizi’s school bag with his name written inside with black pen. Name and address.

  ‘Use the knife,’ Msizi shouted. I looked at him to see what he was talking about. There was no time to tell him off for stealing a knife from Grace’s kitchen, no time to tell him off for anything. I grabbed the knife from him and cut the straps and caught the bag as it fell. I grabbed his shoes too.

  We ran. My nose was bleeding. Msizi’s shirt had ripped at the sleeve, where it had caught on a branch. Blood was running from the cut in his arm, but he was tough. If only we could reach home, Grace would stick a plaster on the cut. He’d be OK. We stopped five blocks away to catch our breath and to look out for trouble.

  ‘Put on your shoes. Quickly, Msizi.’

  He sat down on the pavement. The sound of police sirens was all around us now. Everywhere I saw flashing blue lights, as if the whole city’s police had converged on this one spot. But the cops let us be. A young man and a little boy were of no interest to them. I hid my nose behind my hand and pinched it above the nostrils to stop the bleeding. Msizi was holding on to his arm. We strolled past the cops, as if we were in no hurry. I hoped Adrian was OK. I hoped he didn’t get shot at.

  ‘Did you take the gun from the garden?’ I asked Msizi, when we’d left the police behind. ‘Did you?’

  His hand covered his mouth and he stared at me with large eyes. ‘I left it in the house.’

  ‘Why did you take it?’

  ‘To shoot them, but it had no bullets in. I checked.’

  I held my breath. Who had taught him about guns? ‘You should not have done that, Msizi. Boys should not touch guns.’ I couldn’t even shout at him. I was too tired. ‘It was a stupid thing to do, all of this.’

  ‘I left it on the floor in the office,’ he said. ‘The gun. I put it down behind the desk, when I got the key from under the carpet.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter now.’

  ‘Are you mad at me?’ he asked.

  I remained silent.

  ‘We can share the money, Siphiwe. Half and half. You were lookout.’

  ‘You are in big trouble, Msizi,’ I shouted at him. ‘Big trouble! Wait until I tell Grace . . . What were you thinking? You should be in school, not here, stealing drug money.’

  He lowered his head, resting his chin on his chest, but I didn’t think he realised what he had done, because three blocks further, when we stopped again, he said, ‘A good thing I brought the Checkers.’ He meant the extra plastic bags. ‘There was so much money, Siphiwe.’ His face lit up. ‘I filled my school bag, and the Checkers and the bag they had in the bin. I threw the rubbish out and put money in it and in my pockets, but I left the rubbish bag because someone came running up the stairs. I had to go. As I climbed through the window, he came into the office. I heard him swearing.’

  ‘You could have been killed. Stupid boy.’ I pointed at an alleyway. ‘Short cut.’ We had to keep moving. I looked down at the bags we carried and at the streets around us. These streets were home to some very bad people. Msizi seemed to think it was all over, that everything would go back to normal. I knew it wouldn’t be that simple. I didn’t want to think what would happen to us if we were caught with all this money.

  ‘Are we not going home?’ Msizi asked.

  ‘Later,’ I said. I was making straight for Marshalltown, for Loveday Street, where Hope would be selling her mangoes. This bad money could do some good as well. I saw her straight away, sitting in her usual s
pot.

  ‘Hope.’ She still looked frail and tired. ‘You must leave this place.’

  She shook her head. I didn’t wait for her to speak but gave her one of the bags. The money spilled out at the top. Too much to count. Her eyes widened.

  ‘You must leave now,’ I said. ‘Take your daughters and go to your people.’

  Her fingers shook as she tried to undo the knot in the bag. Tears rolled down her cheeks. ‘Ke a leboga. Thank you. God bless you, Siphiwe.’

  ‘Don’t ever come back.’

  ‘Sala gabotse.’

  Her greeting followed me down the street. Go well, it meant. Be safe. I didn’t look back because I too felt like crying. Once more I was leaving everything behind. Once more I was running away from all I knew. But looking at the tall buildings that blocked out the sun, I knew that this had never been my home. Just a temporary shelter, like a tin shack or like the pieces of cardboard the homeless used against the cold. All that kept me here were the people I knew.

  When I reached the corner, I grabbed Msizi’s hand and we ran. Msizi kept up with me. He could run like the wind that boy, just run and run for miles without getting tired. We made it to the shelter. We were safe.

  ‘Grace,’ I shouted at the back door. She opened the door for us. I still held Msizi’s hand and the bags of money.

  ‘Siphiwe?’

  ‘I must go, Grace,’ I said. ‘I must leave Johannesburg now.’

  ‘This is for the shelter.’ Msizi squeezed past me and pulled the notes from his pockets. ‘And for the church shelter too.’ Hundred-and two-hundred-rand notes, and they kept spilling out of his pockets and from where he had stuffed them into his shirt.

  Grace’s hand went to her mouth. ‘I don’t want to know,’ she said but I told her anyway.

  ‘You can take it back,’ she said.

  I shook my head. ‘The police are there now. They have raided the house, I don’t know what happened, but we can’t take it back.’

  ‘There will be trouble, Siphiwe,’ she said. ‘Those drug people, they will not forget this.’