Riotous Assembly

by Tom Sharpe

  Weighing up the various debts he owed to Konstabel Els and the ugly possibilities that faced his career, the Kommandant came to a rapid decision.

  ‘Els,’ he said quietly, seating himself behind the desk, ‘I want you to think carefully before you answer the next question. Very carefully indeed.’

  Konstabel Els looked up nervously. He didn’t like the tone of the Kommandant’s voice.

  ‘What time was it when you deserted your post at the gate yesterday afternoon?’ the Kommandant continued.

  ‘I didn’t desert my post, sir,’ said Els.

  The Kommandant shivered. This was worse than he expected. The idiot was going to claim he stayed there all afternoon.

  ‘I think you did desert your post, Els,’ he said. ‘In fact, I know you did. At half past three to be precise.’

  ‘No, sir,’ said Els, ‘I was relieved.’

  ‘Relieved?’

  ‘Yes, sir, by a large black-haired konstabel who had left his revolver at the station.’

  ‘By a large black-haired konstabel who had left his revolver at the station?’ the Kommandant repeated slowly, wondering where the trap was.

  ‘That’s right. That’s what he told me, sir. That he had left his revolver at the station. He asked to borrow mine.’

  ‘He asked to borrow yours?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Kommandant van Heerden mulled this statement over in his mind before going on. He had to admit that it had the ring of utility about it.

  ‘Would you be able to identify this large black-haired konstabel again if you saw him?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh yes, sir,’ Els said. ‘He’s sitting in the cellar.’

  ‘Sitting in the cellar, is he?’ Kommandant van Heerden glanced out of the window and pondered. Outside Sergeant de Kock was patrolling up and down on the path. Looking out at the Sergeant, the Kommandant began to think he might have a use for him after all. He went to the window and shouted.

  ‘Sergeant de Kock,’ he ordered, ‘I want you in here at the double.’

  A moment later the Sergeant was standing in front of the Judge’s desk and regretting that he had ever mistaken the Kommandant for a transvestite.

  ‘How many times have I told you, Sergeant,’ the Kommandant said sternly, ‘that I will not have my men walking about in untidy uniforms. You’re supposed to set an example too. Look at your uniform, man. It’s disgusting. You’re a disgrace to the South African Police.’

  ‘Got dirty in the line of duty, sir,’ said the Sergeant. ‘Flipping vulture died on me, sir.’

  ‘Birds of a feather, Sergeant de Kock, stick together,’ said the Kommandant.

  ‘Very funny, I’m sure, sir,’ said the Sergeant unpleasantly.

  ‘Hm,’ said the Kommandant. ‘Well, as far as I’m concerned, it’s inexcusable.’

  ‘I didn’t choose to be there.’

  ‘Don’t make excuses. I didn’t choose to be where I was just now, and I didn’t notice any consideration on your part for my state, so you needn’t expect any from me. Get out of that filthy uniform at once. Konstabel Els, fetch the prisoner.’

  As the Sergeant undressed, the Kommandant continued to lecture him, and by the time he was out of his uniform, he had learnt a great deal about himself that he would have preferred to have remained ignorant about.

  ‘And what do you think I’m going to wear back to the barracks?’ he asked.

  Kommandant van Heerden tossed him the rubber nightdress. ‘Try this for size,’ he snarled.

  ‘You don’t expect me to go down into town wearing this?’ Sergeant de Kock asked incredulously. The Kommandant nodded.

  ‘What’s good for the goose …’ he said smugly.

  ‘I’m not going to be made the laughing-stock of the barracks,’ the Sergeant insisted.

  ‘Nobody will know who you are. You’ll be wearing this as well.’ and the Kommandant gave him the hood.

  Sergeant de Kock hesitated miserably. ‘I don’t know …’ he said.

  ‘I bloody well do,’ yelled the Kommandant. ‘Get into those clothes. That’s an order,’ and as the Sergeant, bowing before his wrath, squeezed himself into the revolting garments and wondered how he would explain his presence in them to his wife, the Kommandant continued, ‘You’re incognito now, Sergeant, and provided you keep your trap shut, you’ll stay that way.’

  ‘I sure as hell won’t,’ said the Sergeant. ‘I’ll be out of the fucking things as quick as I can. I don’t know how the hell you expect me to keep discipline when you make me look bloody ridiculous.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ said the Kommandant. ‘That hood is a perfect disguise. You ought to know that. And another thing, you keep quiet about what you’ve seen and I’ll keep my mouth shut about you. Right?’

  ‘I suppose it will have to be.’

  In the next few minutes Sergeant de Kock learnt that he had never so much as seen a vulture and that he hadn’t visited Jacaranda Park. He had, it seemed, been away on compassionate leave visiting his sick mother. The fact that his mother had died ten years before didn’t seem worth mentioning. With the knowledge that he would be known for the rest of his life as Rubber Cock unless he did what he was told, the Sergeant didn’t feel he was in any position to argue with the Kommandant.

  The Bishop of Barotseland had reached much the same conclusion. The whole thing was a mistake, and the police would soon discover their error, he told himself as Konstabel Els frogmarched him up to the study. He was delighted to find the Kommandant in a much friendlier state of mind than he had been earlier in the day.

  ‘You can take the handcuffs off him, Els,’ said the Kommandant. ‘Now then, Mr Hazelstone,’ he continued when this had been done. ‘We just want to make a little experiment. It concerns this uniform.’ He held Sergeant de Kock’s blood-stained tunic up. ‘We have reason to believe that the man responsible for the murders yesterday was wearing this uniform. I just want you to try it on for size. If it doesn’t fit you, and I don’t for one moment suppose that it will, you will be free to leave here.’

  The Bishop looked at the uniform doubtfully. It was clearly several sizes too small for him.

  ‘I don’t suppose I could get into it,’ he said.

  ‘Well, just put it on and we’ll see,’ said the Kommandant encouragingly and the Bishop climbed into the uniform. In the corner a grim figure in a nightdress and hood smiled to itself. Sergeant de Kock had begun to see daylight.

  Finally, the Bishop was ready to prove his innocence. The trousers were too short by a foot. The fly wouldn’t do up and the arms of the tunic just covered his elbows. It was obvious that he had never worn the uniform before. He could hardly move in the thing.

  He turned cheerfully to the Kommandant. ‘There you are,’ he said. ‘I told you it wouldn’t fit.’

  Kommandant van Heerden put the Sergeant’s cap on his head where it perched precariously. Then he stood back and regarded him appreciatively.

  ‘Just one more thing,’ he said. ‘We’ll have to have an identity parade.’

  Five minutes later the Bishop was standing in a row of twenty policemen while Konstabel Els walked slowly down the line. For the sake of verisimilitude, Els chose to hesitate in front of several other men before finally halting before the Bishop.

  ‘This is the man who relieved me, sir,’ he said emphatically. ‘I’d know him anywhere. I never forget a face.’

  ‘You’re quite sure about it?’ the Kommandant asked.

  ‘Positive, sir,’ said Els.

  ‘Just as I thought,’ said the Kommandant. ‘Put the handcuffs on the swine.’

  Before he knew what was happening the Bishop was manacled once more and being bundled into the back of a police car. Beside him, hooded and hot, sat the grim figure from the study.

  ‘It’s a lie. It’s a mistake,’ the Bishop shouted as the car began to move off. ‘I’ve been framed.’

  ‘You can say that again,’ murmured the figure in the hood. The Bishop looked at it. ‘Who are you?�
�� he asked.

  ‘I’m the executioner,’ said the hooded man and chuckled. In the back of the police car the Bishop of Barotseland fainted.

  On the front steps of Jacaranda House, Kommandant van Heerden was giving his orders. They were quite explicit. Find, restrain and transfer Miss Hazelstone to Fort Rapier Lunatic Asylum. Find, collect and transfer every lethal weapon in Jacaranda House to the police armoury. Find, collect and transfer every piece of rubber including bathmats and raincoats to the Piemburg Police Station. In short, collect every piece of evidence and get the hell out. No, the Bubonic Plague and Rabies notice-boards could be left up. They were relevant, and if anything understated the dangers Jacaranda Park held for visitors. From now on Kommandant van Heerden was going to conduct the case from a more secure base. His headquarters would be in Piemburg Prison itself where Jonathan Hazelstone couldn’t get out and, more important, his sister couldn’t get in. And get that damned hypodermic syringe out of his sight. He’d seen enough hypodermics to last a lifetime.

  As the men dispersed to carry out his orders, the Kommandant called Konstabel Els back.

  ‘Very good, Els,’ he said charitably. ‘There was only one little mistake you made.’

  ‘Mistake? What was that?’

  The Kommandant smiled. ‘It wasn’t a konstabel who took over from you at the gate, it was a sergeant.’

  ‘Oh yes, so it was. I remember now. A sergeant.’

  13

  The prison in Piemburg is situated on the edge of town. It is old and looks from the outside not altogether unattractive. An air of faded severity lingers about its stuccoed walls. Above the huge iron doorway are printed the words ‘Piemburg Tronk and Gaol’, and the door itself is painted a cheerful black. On either side the barred windows of the administrative block break the monotony of the walls whose heights are delicately topped with cast-iron cacti which give the whole building a faintly horticultural air. The visitor to Piemburg who passes the great rectangle of masonry might well imagine that he was in the neighbourhood of some enormous kitchen garden were it not for the frequent and persistent screams that float up over the ornamental ironwork and suggest that something more voracious than a Venus Flytrap has closed upon a victim.

  Inside the impression is less deceptive. Opened by Sir Theophilus in 1897, the Viceroy had complimented the architect in his speech at the unveiling of the flogging post for ‘creating in this building a sense of security it is hard to find in the world today’, a remark which, coming as it did from a man in whom a sense of insecurity was so manifest, spoke for itself. Sir Theophilus’ enthusiasm was not shared by most of the people who entered Piemburg Prison. Notorious throughout South Africa for the severity of its warden, Governor Schnapps, it had the reputation for being escape-proof and having the fewest recidivists.

  If the prison was escape-proof, the Maximum Security Block was doubly so. Set near the execution shed which was appropriately nicknamed Top, the Security block huddling half underground was known as Bottom.

  The Bishop could find no fault with the name. ‘I can see it’s the bottom,’ he said to the warder who pushed him into his tiny cell. ‘I don’t have to be told.’

  ‘I could tell you a few other things,’ said the warder through the grille.

  ‘I’m sure you could,’ said the Bishop hastily. His experience with the hooded man in the car had taught him not to ask unnecessary questions.

  ‘I have always kept this cell for murderers,’ the warder continued. ‘It’s convenient for the door, you see.’

  ‘I should have thought that was a disadvantage with prisoners who have such strong motives to escape,’ the Bishop said, reconciling himself to the thought that he was a captive audience.

  ‘Oh, no. They didn’t escape. It made it easy to take them across to Top. We rushed them along the passage and up the steps and they were gone before they knew it.’

  The Bishop was relieved to hear this. ‘I am glad you put so much emphasis on the past,’ he said. ‘I gather there hasn’t been a hanging for some time.’

  ‘Not for twenty years. Not in Piemburg, that is. They hang them all in Pretoria these days. Taken all the fun out of life.’

  The Bishop was just considering the dreariness of a life that found hangings fun when the warder went on, ‘Mind you, it will be different in your case. You’re a Hazelstone and you’re privileged,’ the warder said enviously.

  For once in his life the Bishop was thankful to be a Hazelstone. ‘Why’s that?’ he asked hopefully.

  ‘You’ve got the right to be hanged in Piemburg. It’s something to do with your grandfather. Don’t know what, but I’ll see if I can find out for you,’ and he went down the passage and left the Bishop cursing himself for asking yet another silly question. As he paced his cell he heard the sound of vehicles outside and peering out through the tiny barred window saw that the Kommandant had arrived.

  The Kommandant had taken the precaution of driving down from Jacaranda House in an armoured car and was busy explaining to Governor Schnapps that he was taking over his office.

  ‘You can’t do that,’ the Governor protested.

  ‘Can and will,’ said the Kommandant. ‘Got Emergency Powers. Now then if you’ll be good enough to show me where your office is, I’ll have my camp bed moved in and we can get down to business.’

  And leaving the Governor to write a letter of complaint to Pretoria, the Kommandant installed himself in Schnapps’ office and sent for Konstabel Els.

  ‘Where’s Luitenant Verkramp?’ he asked. ‘That’s what I want to know.’

  For once Konstabel Els was better informed. ‘He’s in hospital,’ he said. ‘Got himself wounded up at the gate.’

  ‘That fellow shot him, did he? Deserves a medal.’

  Els was surprised. What he had seen of Luitenant Verkramp’s courage didn’t seem to him to warrant a medal.

  ‘Who? Verkramp?’ he asked.

  ‘No, of course not. The fellow who shot him.’

  ‘He didn’t get shot,’ said Els. ‘Threw himself into a ditch.’

  ‘Typical,’ said the Kommandant. ‘Anyway, I want you to go and fetch him from the hospital. Tell him he’s got to interrogate the prisoner. I want a full confession and quick.’

  Konstabel Els hesitated. He was not anxious to renew his acquaintance with the Luitenant.

  ‘He won’t take orders from me,’ he said. ‘Besides he may have hurt himself seriously falling into that ditch.’

  ‘I wish I had your optimism, Els,’ said the Kommandant, ‘but I doubt it. The swine’s malingering.’

  ‘Why not leave him where he is? I don’t mind getting a confession out of the prisoner.’

  The Kommandant shook his head. The case was too important to have Els botching it up with his dreadful methods.

  ‘It’s kind of you to offer,’ he said, ‘but I think we’ll leave it to Luitenant Verkramp.’

  ‘There’s gratitude for you,’ thought Els, as he went off to fetch Verkramp from the hospital.

  He found the Luitenant lying on his stomach taking nourishment through a straw. Verkramp’s back, it appeared, made it impossible to eat in any other position.

  ‘Well?’ he asked grumpily when Konstabel Els reported to him. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Came to see how you were,’ Els said tactfully.

  ‘You can see how I am,’ Verkramp answered, regarding Els’ dirty boots with disapproval. ‘I have been seriously wounded.’

  ‘I can see that,’ Els said, grateful that the Luitenant couldn’t study his face. He regretted having peered down into the moat now. ‘Got you in the back, did he?’

  ‘Came at me from behind,’ said the Luitenant who didn’t like the imputation that he had been trying to escape.

  ‘Nasty. Very nasty. Well, you’ll be glad to know we’ve got the bastard. The Kommandant wants you to start interrogating him straight away.’

  Verkramp choked on his straw. ‘He wants what?’ he shouted at the Konstabel’s boots.
<
br />   ‘He says you’re to come straight away.’

  ‘Well, he can say what he likes, but I’m not budging. Besides,’ he added, ‘the doctors wouldn’t let me.’

  ‘Would you like to tell him yourself?’ asked Els. ‘He won’t believe me.’

  In the end a telephone was brought to the Luitenant’s bedside and the Kommandant had a word with him. It was rather more than one word and in the end Luitenant Verkramp was persuaded to report for duty. Short of facing a court martial for cowardice, desertion in the face of the enemy, and incompetence in that he allowed twenty-one policemen under his command to be slaughtered, there didn’t seem much he could do to remain in hospital. Verkramp was in a very ugly mood and not altogether clearheaded when he arrived at the prison to question Jonathan Hazelstone.

  It was hardly less ugly than the mood Kommandant van Heerden was in. After a momentary spasm of optimism that the case was as good as closed now that the prisoner was in Bottom, the Kommandant had succumbed to a state of extreme pessimism on learning that Miss Hazelstone was still at large. Since leaving the Park she had not been seen. The police Land-Rover had been found abandoned but of Miss Hazelstone there was no trace, and while the Kommandant felt pretty sure she wouldn’t break into the prison to renew their acquaintance, he had no doubt that what she might do outside was just as likely to jeopardize his future.