by Mike Nicol
‘I’ve got a letter for you from Detlef,’ he was saying. Pointed at an outside table, towards the back. ‘That should do nicely.’ No early breakfasters anyhow. ‘We can keep an eye on our friend. And even if he has some listening device, we’re going to be out of range, I would imagine.’
Vicki about to say, Detlef Schroeder’s dead. I saw his body, remember. Instead ordered a double espresso. Henry a latte.
‘Yes, Detlef’s letter. It came a few days ago. Not sure why it has taken so long, but it has. Sorry, I should have given it to you earlier, I should have. Slipped my mind what with the goings-on.’
Like hell, thought Vicki. You wanted the right time to put it into play.
‘It came to you? For me?’
‘Yes. Nothing mysterious in that. An old network of Detlef’s that we used now and again, in the dangerous times. I don’t know. This occasion you cannot say it was very efficient, took a while. Rusty cogs in the old machinery.’
‘Well? Where is it? I want to read it.’
‘Not that simple, Vicki.’ He dug in his trouser pocket, took out a key. ‘This is for a post-office box. At the central post office. A facility I have had for years, for documents I would rather no one else knew about.’
She held out her hand, closed the key into her palm.
‘Look, another thing you need to know is this.’ Henry Davidson patted his hair, cleared his throat. ‘Confession time. Mea culpa. Actually, I was not only working for the NIS. I had other, shall we call them, irons in some fires.’
Vicki laughed. ‘Wouldn’t have doubted it for a moment.’ Then got serious: ‘What sort of irons? Which fires?’
‘Sealed lips. Cannot spill the beans,’ said Henry Davidson. Pursed his lips, put a finger to them. ‘Top secret. Fifty-year embargo.’
Vicki shook her head. ‘Jesus, Henry, just stop giving me half the story.’ Sat back, feeling the plastic chair hard against her shoulder blades. ‘I mean what have you told me? You were in Paris when my aunt was killed. Why, I don’t know. You might have been a double agent, for whom, I don’t know. You and Detlef Schroeder had a secret network, why, I don’t know. It doesn’t faze you that I’m under surveillance, probably by our own people. But you’re not going to tell me who. Or why.’
‘Ah.’ Henry Davidson wagged a finger. ‘I did not say I would not tell you who.’
‘Who then?’
‘Coffee first.’ Beamed at the waitress. ‘How kind. You wouldn’t have a currant bun you could butter for me, would you?’
The waitress bit her lower lip. ‘No, sir. Sorries.’
‘Pity. There was something satisfying about a currant bun in the middle of the morning.’
‘We have the cupcakes. Vanilla. Chocolate. Strawberry.’ The waitress smiled hopefully.
‘Too sweet. Much, much, much too sweet.’ Henry Davidson pointed at the coffees. ‘This will do. Thank you.’ Waiting while she backed away. ‘Such a shame about the demise of the currant bun. Nobody appreciates those sorts of buns anymore, I have to say. Where can you get a currant bun in a café these days? You have to wait until Easter. For the rest of the year there are only these damned sweet things. No wonder we wobble around like a nation of blobs.’
Vicki tasted the coffee. Not French roast but you could drink it. ‘You going to tell me now?’
‘I am. First another confession. In Schiphol, those SMSes to Linda Nchaba’s cellphone, that was me.’
‘You? You bastard!’
‘Wanting to hurry things along, Vicki. Make things easier for you. Looking after your welfare, you know. Anyhow, as things go, not a big intervention. Nothing like taking her away on a stretcher. That was not my doing.’
‘Whose then?’
‘I have an idea, as I was told soon enough where she was.’
‘Well who told you?’
‘Above your pay grade for the moment.’
Vicki holding hard to her temper, feeling an anger flushing heat through her body. Heard him saying, ‘Probably a chap called Kaiser Vula behind our bergie. Major Kaiser Vula to give him his rank. From our very own Agency, indeed. Formerly military intelligence. Which is another story all of its own.’
‘Probably? You don’t know for sure?’
‘Nothing is for sure in this business, Vicki. I’m assuming he is watching me. If that is so, then he is also watching you to see what I might be up to.’
‘Why? Why’s he watching you?’
‘It is what we do. We are in opposing camps, so to speak. From what I hear the good major is as tight as a remora with the president and the president’s number-one son, Zama. The son without a mother. I drop that in as a titbit. Probably the major is the mastermind behind the botched assassination of Colonel Kolingba of the Central African Republic. Whose wife, Cynthia Kolingba is now, to all intents and purposes, as we speak, running that vicious little country. Where, another titbit, the president has considerable mining interests. Where our soldiers are playing war games to keep his mining interests safe. The pieces all fitting together now, ummm?’
Everywhere the Zama connections. Vicki finished off her espresso in a mouthful. Tasted burnt. The kickback harsh. Said, ‘You were going to tell me this?’
‘Naturally. Of course. But until now it has not exactly been necessary.’
‘Like it hasn’t exactly been necessary to show me the rest of the videos on the flash drive.’
‘You should not even have seen the ones you did.’
‘But I did. With Linda in Amsterdam. She showed me. There’re important people involved, aren’t there? Important European people. Politicians I recognised. Probably also businessmen. The cosseted rich. And what else’s on the other clips? More about the trafficking?’
‘Again, need-to-know rule. Sorry about that. No, not sorry. You do not want to know any more than you do. Believe me. You do not want to know what certain people are getting up to. Fingers in pies. As Alice noticed, “Every single thing’s crooked.”’ Henry Davidson giving a mirthless grin. ‘Back to the situation in hand: Linda. Linda is still our little secret.’
‘We’ve got to get her out this weekend.’
‘That is the plan, is it not? Just got to fly with it until the right moment. Timing, Vicki. Timing is everything.’
Vicki let that settle. Could come back to it. Went with: ‘Why were you in Paris?’
‘Excellent question. Flick back to confuse the interviewee.’ A forced grin. ‘Following up on our, on my, intelligence.’
‘Much good it did.’
‘That was the surprising thing, Vicki. There I am on the banks of the Seine on this beautiful day with a French secret-service fellow lighting a cigarette not half a dozen paces away, when, voila, he disappears. Like the Cheshire cat leaving only his smile. Well, metaphorically speaking, you understand. I have no clear idea what happened. Maybe he had a pager. If he did I do not believe I heard it go off, did not see him look at it. Thing is right then and there, a couple of moments after I had spotted him, he walked away. Disappeared among the Sunday strollers. Never saw him again. Never had anybody following me afterwards. Couple of hours later I heard about your aunt being killed in the Metro. I worked out that it must have happened while I was walking beside the river. Once it was done no one needed to follow me anymore. That is why my French companion took off. Could now go to the park for a game of boules.’ Henry Davidson raised his eyebrows, took a sip at the latte.
Vicki looked off over the foliage. No sign of the bergie. Said, ‘I’m confused. You’re telling me you knew she was to be killed, that the French were in on it. You didn’t think to warn her?’
‘We had no confirmed intelligence. Nothing was certain. That was the thing, you see. It could have been our very own dogs or some township special from uMkhonto we Sizwe or a French poodle even. Or maybe it was all bow-wow, the intelligence that we had.’
‘But it wasn’t.’
‘No, in the end, it was not, unfortunately. Your aunt was a target. It seems she knew too much th
at was disturbing to too many people. If you wanted me to guess who did it, I would say the French. But I could be wrong.’ Henry Davidson drank half his latte. ‘Never put quite enough coffee in these things, do they?’ Patted his lips with a paper serviette. ‘History, Vicki, history. Nothing we can do about history.’
‘Except it haunts us.’
‘It does. In strange and unexpected ways.’ He reached across, patted her arm.
Avuncular Henry. The wise man about the world. Sometimes, Vicki thought, he could be such a prick.
‘Enough of that matter, shall we leave it until you have read Detlef’s letter? Alright? Let us move on. Let us consider now, as they say, our options. Tell me what is new on the Linda front. Or in the modern idiom, talk to me about Linda.’
‘Zama’s been in touch.’
Henry Davidson leant back, his toupee shifting with the sudden movement. ‘But that is marvellous. Exactly what we wanted. Exactly what we expected would happen.’ Smoothed a hand over his hair.
‘He’s after taking her for lunch.’
‘Charming. Nothing wrong with that. Lovers trying to rekindle old flames. Very touching.’
Vicki caught movement out the corner of her eye: the bergie being shooed off by the waitress. ‘She’s scared of him.’
‘Yes. Yes, I could see she would be. He has taken his time getting in touch with her. I was beginning to wonder …’ Henry Davidson smiled at the protesting bergie. ‘You would think he really was a vagrant, would you not? Good for him, getting into the act.’
‘Also he’s going to do the auction on Sunday. I think I should be there. When we get her out.’
His eyes flicking back to her, assessing her. Vicki held his gaze. ‘Do you now? You don’t say.’ A pause. He signalled the waitress for the bill. ‘Ummm. I wonder. Put you in the field again. I wonder.’ Then a sudden: ‘Alright. If that is what you want. Alright, then why not try it? But you do not get her out until I say so.’
‘What about my watchers?’
‘What about them? Poor chappies.’
‘Henry! Be serious.’
‘They are doing a job, Vicki. Let them be. Better to know where they are. So much easier to get rid of them when you really need to. Who knows, they might even come in useful.’ Smiled at her, that fleeting all-knowing irritating smile. Made Vicki grind her teeth.
17
Prosper Mtethu phoned Cynthia Kolingba. As arranged.
‘Every night you go off duty, you call me,’ she’d ordered. ‘If I don’t answer, you leave a message. I want to know his condition.’
Every evening, same time, Prosper Mtethu sat at a table in the hospital café, made the call.
‘Quickly, Prosper,’ she said.
Prosper heard engine noise, voices on a two-way radio.
‘He is fine.’ Said it every evening. He is fine.
‘No change?’
‘They say a stable condition.’
‘Good. How’s your lovely granddaughter?’ A question she’d asked every evening from the time he’d first told her about his home life. ‘You’re proud of her,’ she’d said then. ‘I like that, Prosper. You’re a good man.’
Every evening he would smile as he replied: ‘Fine. She is fine thank you.’
‘Look after her. She is lucky she has you, Tata.’ Using the colloquial. Then the polite goodbye.
Prosper wondered what she felt, half a continent away, fighting a bush war? Not an easy one. Her sons in a safehouse somewhere, her man a vegetable, her daughter dead. Because of what he Agent Prosper Mtethu had been ordered to do. A stain on his conscience. A stain he would wipe away.
Every evening Prosper ordered a toasted cheese sandwich, a can of iced rooibos tea. Sat at a back table eating.
This evening his thoughts on the blond man. Who was the guy? How’d he got the photographs? Why now? Took the photographs from the envelope. Day of the hit: fuzzy but good enough, Prosper Mtethu behind the wheel of the white Honda. This shot a zoom-in. You pulled back, you’d see the field men, the colonel going down, the little girl collapsing.
The other photograph more recent, six weeks ago, after he’d left the Agency. Someone keeping track.
Had to be SSA. Had to be expected. Question: Why leak it to some mlungu surfer-type?
The blondie’d said he worked for Cynthia Kolingba, knew of Joey Curtains. Prosper upended the envelope, out slid Fish Pescado’s business card. Time for another talk.
On his phone the blondie’s picture: straw hair, tanned skin. Prosper about to finish his toasted sandwich, he saw Major Kaiser Vula walk across the foyer to the lifts.
Prosper Mtethu put away the photographs, pocketed his phone, sat there with the last of his iced tea, waiting. Not a long wait. Four, five minutes, give or take. Reckoned the major must have gone to ICU, checked on the patient, come right back out again. Hadn’t happened in months. Why the sudden interest? Why the same day blondie comes round?
Prosper watched his former boss step from the lifts, leave the building. Decided wouldn’t be a bad idea to check on the colonel.
All well in ICU.
The nurses telling him, ‘Go home, Prosper. You got your men here. Relax. The colonel’s fine.’
He was: the monitors beeping; the IV lines feeding him.
Prosper Mtethu called it a day. Sat in his car, pondering. Took out Fish Pescado’s card, tapped it against the steering wheel. Decided, if you don’t phone, you don’t know shit.
When Fish Pescado answered, said, ‘We need to talk.’
Fish Pescado coming back, ‘Hallelujah, Joseph and Mary. Has to be Mr Muscle. Guess what? That’s why I came to see you.’
Prosper biting down on the sarcasm. ‘We can meet now.’
‘We can. Only supper time. But what the hell. What’s that in a life of action and derring-do? I can nuke a lasagne as well later as now.’
‘You know some place?’
‘I’m guessing you’re knocking off. Still at the hospital.’ A pause. Prosper waited it out. ‘How about the Toad on the Road?’
‘Fifteen minutes,’ said Prosper Mtethu. ‘You better be there.’
Phoned his granddaughter.
‘Khulu, I’m at home. Don’t worry.’ Her voice easing the tension in his shoulders. As she could do. The only woman who’d ever brought him comfort.
‘I will be late,’ he said.
‘That’s cool. No probs.’ Sounding more like a tv star than his Nolitha, the teenager he’d raised for ten years. Seen her through the grief of her parents’ deaths.
‘There’s food …’ he started to say.
‘Eaten already.’ Her chatter taking off into her school day, the results of a test, her tennis practice. Prosper listened as he always did to this world he couldn’t imagine. Her enthusiasm for it. Eventually broke in.
‘Don’t stay awake for me, sisi.’
‘You’ve got a date? Oh wow! What’s she like?’
Prosper laughed. ‘A blondie,’ he said.
18
Fish’s cellphone rang: the patch through to Vicki’s apartment. Vicki’s voice saying, ‘Linda, I’m flying in tomorrow. Yes, really.’
Linda? Fish thinking, Linda? Linda? Linda? Could be the Linda he’d tracked down those weeks ago. The model? Never had got to hear the rest of that story from Vicki. The only time he’d raised it, she’d ducked and dived. Then the curtains’d come down.
Fish paused, about to head out for the Toad. Prosper could wait a few minutes.
Flying in?
That Linda had been Durban-based.
Vicki saying, ‘What? The Walrus? That’s okay.’
The Walrus? Who, what was the Walrus?
‘You’re at lunch that’s fine. What’d he say? Mm-hmm. Mm. Play it cool. Don’t turn him off.’
Play the Walrus cool? Fish thinking, who else was hearing this? Mart Velaze’s warning coming to mind, ‘Your mate Vicki Kahn’s deep in the shit, like she doesn’t even know how deep.’ Case in point the bergie doing surveillance, had
to be one of the lurgies from the dark side. Vicki kept on talking to Linda most of the Agency would know her plans. Then the thought: Maybe that’s what she wanted? Keep everyone watching her happy.
‘I’m not going to get there till the afternoon, anyhow.’
Fish thought, me too, Vics. Gonna be your guardian angel on this one.
Vicki said, ‘I’m hiring a car. The drive up’s what? An hour, hour and a half?’
Fish reckoning, chances were he could get the first flight out, be ahead of her. Tag in behind as she left the hire-car zone. Hour and a half’s drive put the destination somewhere in the Midlands or up the North Coast.
Vicki now doing the rev. ‘It’s going to be alright, Linda. It’s going to be fine.’ Listening.
Fish thinking, the last thing it sounded like was alright. Sounded like a beach break. Fast, hollow, closed out with a bonecrusher.
‘No contact, okay. No contact. You don’t call me, I call you. Promise me. No, you got to promise me.’
Fish shut the back door, locked it. Walked quickly to the Isuzu.
‘Linda. Linda. Stop. We’re watching, okay. Just keep your phone on. We’ve got this covered.’
Got what covered? The Agency’d got it covered? The Agency couldn’t cover its arse at a baby shower.
Fish fired up the Isuzu.
‘This weekend it’ll be all over. That’s the idea. Just hang in there. I know, Linda, I know. The girls too, sure, of course.’
The girls?
Fish thinking, what sort of girls? Models? Had to be, in Linda’s line of work.
‘I’m going now, okay. I’m going to ring off.’
Fish heard the goodbyes, the last, ‘Yes, I’ll be at the party.’
The party?
Estelle had mentioned a party at the palace. Hour and a half from the airport you’d be somewhere near the palace. Could be. Could be.
Vicki heading for the Bambatha party as part of a spook brigade? Official SSA security. Made sense.
Fish thought, phone Estelle. Contract his services as a bodyguard. Businessmen like the Chinese had to have bodyguards.
