Killer Country

by Mike Nicol

  Pylon let it go. Probably this was why the man didn’t work for them any longer. Said, ‘What’s his address? I’ll find him.’

  The security man hesitated. ‘Someone’s gotta take you. Hang on, there’s personnel in the office.’

  ‘Hey,’ said Pylon, ‘I’m late already.’

  The security man nodded, not happy about this but giving the address anyhow. Said, ‘I’ll try him again.’ He pressed a button to raise the boom.

  ‘Do that,’ said Pylon. ‘Before you’re finished I’ll be knocking on his door.’

  Pylon drove in, following directions, passed golfers trundling home in their golf carts, couples gardening, children riding bikes and skateboards like here they weren’t at risk of being snatched away by paedophiles. Probably they weren’t. This was Treasure’s dream location, so up close to the mountain you could hear the francolins calling. Way better than a security complex in her estimation. After the new baby and the AIDS orphan she’d let him know that the dream location wasn’t far behind.

  ‘How about a unit in my golf estate?’ Pylon had responded.

  ‘Up the west coast?’

  ‘Forty-five minutes out of town.’

  She’d given him the you’ve-got-to-be-joking glare. ‘Hayi! At two o’clock in the morning it’s forty-five minutes maybe. Any other time of the day it’s double that. And where’s Pumla supposed to school? We’re supposed to change her school? I don’t think so.’

  Not the end of the conversation. Treasure had gone through to the kitchen and come right back. ‘Much better to take the profit and buy into somewhere established. That’s the option, okay? Somewhere the kids are safe.’

  He turned into Gary Player Close went to the bottom and came back, parking outside number twenty-five. Place looked like nobody had woken up yet. Curtains closed. Pylon switched off, sat a moment scoping the street. You looked closely it seemed Popo Dlamini’s neighbours were as dozy. Not much sign of life in their houses. And so quiet he could hear Popo Dlamini’s phone ringing.

  Wouldn’t Treasure love this. The mountains so clear you felt you could touch them. No more cluster clatter. The neighbours had a row you wouldn’t hear it in your bedroom. He got out of the Merc and flicked the remote locking. The car beeped. Probably in this sort of street that wasn’t necessary.

  Pylon went round his car and down the short path to the door, almost trod on an iPod. Neat device. The sort of thing he’d been meaning to get. He picked it up, flicked through the menu: scrolling a list of music, a lot he recognised. If this was Popo Dlamini’s they had more than business in common. He pressed the doorbell, heard it chime inside the house, competing with the phone. Then the phone stopped. Nobody’d answered it though. He rang the bell again. No movement inside. The phone rang once more and Pylon reckoned if the security boys were any good they’d be down within two, three minutes. Before then he tried Popo Dlamini’s cellphone. He could hear that going off, too. Fainter, maybe in a bedroom. The call went to voicemail and Pylon disconnected. He tried the door. Locked.

  Was standing there, considering taking the path to the front of the house when the security guard from the main gate cycled up.

  ‘Regulations,’ he said to Pylon, more out of breath than Pylon thought he should’ve been. ‘A call goes unanswered we’ve gotta find out why.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Pylon, still holding the iPod. ‘Best we try round the other side.’

  ‘Once more,’ said the security man, going through the routine of pressing the doorbell, knocking on the door.

  ‘Regulations,’ said Pylon.

  The security man grimaced. ‘We don’t do it they shit on us. The white major, our boss, is like manic.’ He also jiggled the door handle. ‘So okay let’s try the other door.’

  Pylon followed him round the house to a patio, open to a section of green rough and then the fairway. No golfers visible, only a pair of hadedas spiking through the grass, the sun glinting off the blue burnish of their backs.

  On the patio, a table laid out with plates, a bowl of salad, bread rolls. Two candles burnt out. On the grid of the portable braai, charred steaks over a heap of white ash and the smell of the fire still noticeable. The sliding door from the house to the patio wide open.

  Pylon thought, save me Jesus, going hard on the security guard’s heels through the clutter of garden furniture into the house. Took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom and the sight of Popo Dlamini collapsed against a couch with a third eye in his forehead, a track of blood down his face, that’d pooled on his chest. Other side of the couch a female body, her short skirt rucked up on her stomach, exposing a white tanga and long legs. He saw a wine glass smashed on the floor in the entrance to the room, a loop of wine spilt across the back of the couch. Like the glass had been thrown.

  The security guard said, ‘Oh shit!’ – started jabbering on his radio to the security office. ‘There’s a murder/suicide, number twenty-five.’

  Unlikely, thought Pylon, seeing a shell on the floor and peering for a closer look. .22 Long Rifle. Ordinary stuff, not even hypervelocity. Not a hollow point. You used this sort of ammo, you had to know what you were doing.

  The security guard was clutching his arm, saying, ‘We’ve gotta stay outside, Mr Buso. Please.’

  Pylon shook him off. ‘Sure, sure, let’s go.’ The security guard turning to leave while Pylon stepped over to the female body. The woman was lying front down, her head skewed sideways, her right cheek and eye a mess of gore.

  The guard shouting at him from the door, ‘Come on, get out, get out.’

  Even through the blood, Pylon recognising Lindiwe Chocho. He didn’t say anything, slipped the iPod into his jeans pocket and joined the guard outside.

  As cops and paramedics and ambulances screeched in, Pylon called their friendly cop: Captain Gonsalves. The very man in shit with Mace over the natural born killers, Paulo and Vittoria. From time to time Complete Security contributed to the good captain’s retirement fund. In return for favours. What they called among the three of them a working relationship.

  The phone went to ten rings before Gonsalves answered, Pylon about to hang up. ‘What’s it?’ said the policeman. ‘This’s a Sunday dammit.’

  ‘Little story about a murder,’ said Pylon. ‘Two murders actually.’

  ‘That you Buso? Where’s the Bishop fella?’

  ‘Around.’

  ‘But you’re in the shit again?’

  ‘Not exactly.’ In a sentence Pylon gave the guts and glitter of the side interest. ‘The one body lying there belongs to a brother I know, Popo Dlamini. The other body lying there belongs to the wife of someone I don’t know, man called Obed Chocho.’

  ‘Politician or something?’ said Gonsalves. ‘Done for fraud or theft?’

  ‘That’s the wonderful man. High-up type. Can talk to the president.’

  ‘So what’re you telling me? It’s a hit?’

  ‘Chocho’s still in prison, has to be. Not only that. We’re talking a pro. Uses a .22 probably silenced. You can’t hear that gun if you’re not listening for it. This is neat. Efficient. This shooter doesn’t want back-splatter over the curtains. He fires a head shot the bullet stays in the brain. Nice and contained. Except for the lovely Lindi. Her face is a bit mucked up. And I couldn’t see but there’s probably a body shot.’

  ‘You’re saying what? She jumped him.’

  ‘Probably closer than she should’ve been. I don’t know. You’re the expert.’

  ‘This is outta my area,’ said Gonsalves. ‘What you expect meto do?’

  Pylon could hear he was chewing. No doubt had the phone tucked under his chin while he peeled a cigarette and balled the tobacco in the palm of his hand.

  ‘Keep a watching brief. Let me know from time to time what’s going on.’

  ‘You reckon Chocho did them?’

  ‘Wouldn’t you?’

  A pause filled with the suck and sluck of Gonsalves working a tobacco plug round his mouth.


  ‘What’re we talking here?’

  ‘I can make a contribution. Say five hundred bucks.’

  ‘That’s cheap. Double it.’

  ‘Hell no. To just tell what happens? You’re crazy. Six tops.’

  ‘Seven-fifty.’

  Pylon sighed. ‘You’re a hard man Captain Gonsalves.’

  ‘You think I like it that my retirement package’s gonna have me being night-time desk security in some office block? After forty-two years on the force. Hey, you think I enjoy that?’

  ‘The service,’ said Pylon. ‘There’s no force in it anymore.’

  ‘Bloody right,’ said Gonsalves. ‘Another thing, tell the Bishop fella he can relax. The court case isn’t gonna happen. Seems Paulo got on the wrong side of his prison pals, they cut his head off. Vittoria she tried to escape in transit, got shot for her troubles.’ He disconnected.

  The cops insisted Pylon made a statement there and then. He sat on the patio dictating to a sergeant why he’d come to see Popo Dlamini in the first place, stating the nature of their business association as property investment, leaving out that he knew the name of the dead woman. They’d find out soon enough. No doubt then come asking more questions or they wouldn’t depending on what story they decided best dovetailed the facts.

  Nor did he mention the iPod. Had no reason for this except instinct. Cause the iPod could be anybody’s: Popo Dlamini’s, Lindi Chocho’s, some kid from the estate. Didn’t have to’ve been dropped by the killer on his way out. What sort of killer would go in dangling accessories? Anyhow, Pylon argued to himself, his prints were all over it. Probably if forensics did the work right they’d find a print on it that wasn’t his. Only thing, Pylon was convinced they wouldn’t do the work right but he knew somebody who would. The print info could always be slipped back into the system via Gonsalves should the process of justice get so far as arresting somebody.

  Which Pylon doubted it would. Professional contract hits had a low arrest rate. You hired someone at a taxi rank, you all got nailed soon enough. A careful man with a .22 might die a natural death. Even if he dropped the odd iPod.

  The other reason Pylon stayed quiet was curiosity about the tunes. Those he’d recognised put the iPod’s owner in a different category. A category not far from his own. They’d be out in familiar territory.

  It was going two before Pylon got away but he wasn’t fazed by that. Given him a chance to see that some top brass were called out for this one. Popo Dlamini pulled connections Pylon hadn’t expected. Among them a man with a smile who read Pylon’s statement and asked him what he thought was going on here?

  Pylon put the smiler down as national intelligence. Two surprises: the pinkness of the guy’s skin. And his being an Afrikaner. With a smile like that he had to have a load of dirt on someone to still be hanging in there.

  Pylon told him the truth, that what he thought was going on was a hit.

  Smiler said, ‘Interesting observation. From someone in the business.’ The smile broadening lopsided into his right cheek. ‘Next question’s, why?’

  Pylon matched smiler’s smile. ‘One thing I learnt in the business, all the shit comes from here’ – he tapped his chest. ‘Affairs of the heart.’

  ‘Strues,’ said smiler. ‘We should have a beer sometime, talk about it.’

  ‘You got my details,’ said Pylon, pointing at the statement. ‘Now I have to go. I’ve got a wife who’s not taking this well. An hour I told her and back for lunch.’

  Smiler added a nod to his smile. When Pylon turned the corner of the house, he glanced back to see the agency’s man still watching him. One of those types who didn’t smile with their eyes.

  21

  Obed Chocho was maudlin. Unexpectedly down. Stricken when he should’ve been mighty fine.

  After the call from Sheemina February he’d known a grief that kept him awake, tossing. Had him up drinking the better half of a bottle of Glenmorangie. The sort of whisky that should celebrate the good, not dull the bad.

  At the end of the fourth double it was Lindiwe’s fault. For disrespecting him. Disregarding him. Opening her legs to Popo Dlamini, thinking nothing of it. Straight afterwards, opening her legs for him, letting him, her husband, slide in among her lover’s sperm. The bitch.

  He’d warned her. Clearly in so many words: ‘You talk to him. You phone him. You send him any message I’m going to know. You do not want that to happen.’

  Deadly serious he’d been when he said it. This was no joking matter, no funny business. This was about loyalty. Honour. Reputation. He was her husband. So it was over with Popo Dlamini. Stay away, he’d told her. You are making me out a moegoe.

  Still she doesn’t listen. Still she goes running to the bastard last night. Mighty fine, the bitch, she had it coming.

  But it wasn’t that easy. After four doubles Obed Chocho was in tears, weeping for his dead wife. He finished the last whisky, hurled the glass at the wall, the shattering like a gunshot in the quiet of the prison hospital. No one came to check.

  Obed Chocho threw himself face down on his bed, smothered his head in the pillow to stop his howls. Great sobs racking his body, misery heaving and gasping in his chest. He gave himself to this: let the shuddering quieten itself and fell into exhausted sleep whispering no more Lindiwe. No more taking one of her long nipples between his teeth.

  When the prison commander knocked on Obed Chocho’s door at two o’clock on Sunday afternoon, the prisoner was sharp and waiting. Trademark suit, white shirt unbuttoned to show chest and a gold chain.

  Obed Chocho checked his watch. ‘It’s two.’

  The prison commander nodded.

  ‘At two I should be through the gates, my brother. Not waiting here to be taken down.’ He picked up his cellphone from the bed. ‘This is my time we’re on now.’

  ‘It’s your lawyer’s come to fetch you.’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Obed Chocho. ‘Business before pleasure.’

  The prison commander blocked the doorway. ‘The regulation is five o’clock, you’re back. I’m giving you till six. You come back later I’m the one in the shit.’

  Obed Chocho grunted, waving the man out of the door way. ‘Mighty fine. That’s mighty fine, no one’s going to be in the shit.’

  The prison commander stepped aside and followed the prisoner down to the visitors’ reception room. Watched Obed Chocho shake hands with Sheemina February, the lawyer almost as stunning as the man’s wife. Only the lawyer had something else about her: a ruthlessness the prison commander thought. Because of the black glove on her left hand, the flash in her eyes that saw and dismissed him in the instant. The briskness of her exit. So abrupt she left a presence behind, a lingering malevolence.

  In Sheemina February’s high-riding X5, Obed Chocho said, ‘Are they found yet?’

  The lawyer fired the ignition, slipped the gear into reverse. ‘Yes. A little earlier than I’d thought but what can you do? Sometimes there’re wild cards in the hand. Anyhow, earlier, later doesn’t make much difference in the end.’

  Obed Chocho thought of the medics lifting Lindiwe’s body onto a stretcher, carrying it out covered by a sheet out to the ambulance. He wondered where she’d taken the bullet. In the head was Spitz-the-Trigger’s style. She wouldn’t have known fear. Would’ve gone from this world to the next without a pause.

  ‘How’d you intended it?’

  Sheemina February pulled the SUV round in a U to face the gates. ‘I thought putting the broken-hearted hubby on the scene would’ve been good. Would’ve stirred the press.’ She glanced at him. ‘Are you broken hearted?’

  Obed Chocho kept his head turned away from her, facing the road. ‘I was. I’m dealing with it, okay, leave it.’

  She left it, steering slowly out of the prison and turning towards the highway.

  Obed Chocho settled himself on the seat, easing down the backrest. ‘How long to the Smits’ place?’

  ‘You’re going to sleep?’

  ‘Why not? It’s a
way isn’t it?

  ‘Forty-five minutes.’

  ‘Mighty fine. Get us there.’

  He was finished with talking but Sheemina February wasn’t.

  ‘Obed, there’s another matter: Spitz.’

  ‘What’s his problem?’

  ‘Money. He wants more of it.’

  ‘To hell with him.’

  ‘That’s not so easy.’

  ‘So what’s his case?’

  Obed Chocho brought the seat up. He needed a drink. Whisky would be preferable but he’d settle for something long and cold. ‘Tell me there’s a six-pack of beer in the back.’

  Without a flicker of a smile, no hint of humour in her voice, Sheemina February said, ‘Behind your seat is a cooler box. Help yourself.’

  Obed Chocho slapped her thigh. ‘That’s mighty fine, my sister, mighty fine. A woman who knows my preferences.’ He reached back and broke free a Black Label can, tore the ring-pull, putting his mouth over the opening to draw up the foam.

  Sheemina February waited until he’d wiped the back of his hand across his mouth before she said, ‘Don’t do that again. I’m you’re lawyer. That’s how we keep it. That’s how I know your preferences.’

  Obed Chocho took another hit of beer. ‘What’re you saying?’ He looked at her: her profile sharp and outlined against the side window. Her jaw tight, her mouth closed. Her lips bright as the flesh of plums. Her eyes secret behind the designer shades. Very elegant. His sort of woman. Not the sort of woman he wanted lip from. ‘What’re you saying?’

  She didn’t answer. Let a minute pass. Let him drink another mouthful.

  He broke her silence. ‘Lighten up, lady, okay? I’m mighty fine. Everything’s mighty fine.’

  ‘What I’m saying,’ said Sheemina February, ‘is the beer’s not free. On my invoice under incidentals you’ll see there one six-pack listed.’

  ‘Hey,’ said Obed Chocho, ‘you’re on a good number with me. Keep it in mind.’

  Sheemina February smiled but the sight of it didn’t fill Obed Chocho’s heart with joy. Nor her words: ‘Oh I do, Mr Chocho, all the time.’