by Tony Park
‘So where did the boots that he was wearing come from?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe a gift?’
‘What about his cousin?’
Anna’s face soured. ‘He was always coming around to our house, showing off his new clothes, his new phone, talking about the parties he went to, the women . . . I always wondered where his money came from.’
‘How did he compare in size to your son?’ Sannie tried to recall the bodies she had seen at the crime scene.
‘They were similar. My sister and I would share clothes, sometimes, when the boys were growing up. They did have the same size feet, if that is what you are asking.’
‘Yes,’ Sannie said, ‘that’s what I was thinking. Anna, I need you to think, carefully, please. Do you ever remember Shadrack coming home with a new pair of boots, different from the ones he normally wore?’
Anna frowned. ‘I can’t remember, no, even though I know it is important. You linked my son to a crime he did not commit by the pattern on the sole of the boots he was wearing on the day he was killed. I would love to tell you that he was not wearing those boots until that morning, but the truth is I do not know. I was working late the day he was killed; he came home before me. He could have found or been given some different boots that day, but I don’t know where or by whom. He never stole a single thing is his life.’
Sannie nodded. ‘Thank you for your honesty. I will have some people, our forensic scientists, take a look at those boots that your son was wearing, and these ones, if you don’t mind, to see what they can tell us.’
Anna held out the boots and Sannie took them, but the other woman held tight a moment longer, not wanting to let them go. ‘Please do not be offended, but I do not know if I can trust the police. I was hurt, a long time ago, because I protested.’
Sannie put her free hand on Anna’s. ‘Please, you can trust me. I have two sons. I know the pain you must feel. I will see what the scientists can tell us about these shoes and the ones he was wearing. Perhaps there is an answer there.’
‘All right.’ Anna relinquished this last link to her son.
‘Do you think it’s possible Shadrack’s cousin could have given him the boots he was wearing on the day he was killed?’
Anna closed her eyes, then slowly nodded. ‘I did wonder if that might have happened.’
‘You can see why?’
Anna opened her eyes. ‘Yes. If his cousin killed that woman, the others, then he could make it look like my son was the one who did it. I don’t wish to speak ill of my sister’s son, but as well as being a show-off he was . . .’
‘You can tell me.’
‘He was bad. I knew it. I didn’t ask where his money came from, but there were rumours. If he kidnapped Shadrack, and was later going to set him up somehow then the police, you, would think Shadrack was the one.’
‘Yes, that is possible. The evidence is just what we call circumstantial. But both men are dead and we don’t have a lot more to go on with.’
Anna was silent, and tears began to well in her eyes.
‘Let me get a plastic bag for the boots so I don’t get my fingerprints all over them,’ said Sannie gently. ‘We have to protect what’s called the chain of evidence.’
Sannie went into the kitchen, to the cloth bag hanging on the back door where she stored all her old plastic shopping bags for future use. Plastic bags, South Africa’s ‘native flower’, were a blight on the landscape, and she couldn’t countenance the thought of them going into the ground as landfill.
The boots safely in a bag, she came back to the lounge room where Anna waited patiently. Sannie noticed that Anna’s eyes kept going to the family picture of Tom, Sannie, Christo, Ilana and Tommy.
‘You have a beautiful family.’
‘Thank you. Your daughter, Clarissa, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘She’s at varsity?’
‘Yes,’ Anna said, her eyes sad.
‘You must be very proud of her,’ Sannie said.
‘I am proud of all my children, all of them.’ Anna looked to the clock on the wall. ‘It is late. I need to go.’
Sannie put the bag containing the shoes down. ‘Let me drive you.’
‘Thank you. That way I won’t miss the bus back to Huntington.’
Sannie fetched the keys for her Fortuner and escorted Anna outside. She closed the house door and set the alarm; though in this part of South Africa she was more concerned about baboons or monkeys getting into the house than human intruders.
Anna sat quietly in the front passenger seat as Sannie negotiated the estate’s narrow, winding gravel roads to the entrance gate. It was four in the afternoon and there was a queue of people, staff and the employees of building and other contractors waiting to leave.
Sannie always felt mildly annoyed at the fact that even Hippo Rock’s most loyal and long-serving staff had to subject themselves and their bags to a search by the estate’s security guards every day, in case they had stolen something from one of the houses.
‘Thank you,’ Anna said as she got out of the car. ‘If there is anything else I can do to help in your investigation, please let me know.’
Sannie nodded, and as she sat in the Toyota for a minute longer, watching the people patiently wait while their meagre belongings were searched, she had an idea.
Chapter 25
Hudson Brand nursed a beer at the bar of the lodge. The bleeding sun was being devoured by Lake Tanganyika. Tema, in a white shift dress, was sitting at a table for two on the sandy beach talking to Sonja.
James Paterson walked in, wearing chinos and a blue Oxford shirt. Hudson had gone for a swim in the afternoon, after making love to Sonja, and wore shorts, sandals and a Hawaiian print shirt that Sonja said didn’t suit him.
‘Aloha,’ Paterson said.
‘This shirt gets all sorts of comments.’
‘Gin and tonic,’ Paterson said to the barman. Hudson covered his glass.
Hudson took a sip of beer. ‘I had a call from Sannie van Rensburg, the cop investigating the shootings in the Sabi Sand and Hazyview.’
Paterson took his drink. ‘I’ve seen her around. She and her husband moved to Hippo Rock a while ago.’
‘Yes. She’s following a new lead that one of the killings by your people – by Sonja and Tema in fact – might not have been justifiable.’
‘Really?’
‘She thinks that kid Shadrack, who worked on our estate, might have been framed by his cousin, the one driving the Isuzu bakkie.’
‘So that it looked like Shadrack killed the member of Sonja’s team of Leopards who ran from the contact?’
‘Yes. It’s one thing to go down for rhino poaching, or rather attempted poaching, as they didn’t get anything that night, but it’s another thing to go away for murdering a female anti-poaching unit operator. The cops were closing in on him and Sannie thinks that maybe he gave his boots – distinctive ones with a slit across the tread – and his AK to his intellectually challenged cousin so that if they got caught he’d be the lead suspect.’
‘Stupid, but feasible, I suppose.’ Paterson looked up at the ceiling, as if recalling something. ‘Boots with a split, you say?’
‘Yes.’
‘Hudson, I need to call van Rensburg. I’ll do so this evening; please give me her number.’
‘Sure, I’ve got it here. But what do you need to call her for?’
Sonja and Tema were walking their way, across the sand to the bar and dining area.
‘I know whose boots Shadrack was wearing.’
‘Whose?’ Hudson asked.
‘Mine.’
Hudson raised his eyebrows.
‘I’d noticed that I’d damaged the sole of one of them – a silly accident with a chainsaw while splitting wood; I was lucky I didn’t lose my bloody foot. Shadra
ck was at my house raking and sweeping and I asked him if he wanted them. Compared to his boots they were damn good quality and he couldn’t thank me enough; he thought Christmas had come early. It was a day or two before the Leopards Anti-Poaching Unit was ambushed.’
Hudson nodded. ‘Yep, you do need to tell Sannie all of that. It doesn’t help Shadrack, though.’
‘No, I’m afraid not. Rather it puts him more squarely in the picture. Here comes Sonja.’
Hudson turned and watched her enter. He thought of her naked, in the shower, teasing him.
‘Hello, we meet again,’ James said to Sonja, pretending, for the barman’s sake, that they had only met that morning. Tema followed her into the bar.
‘Maybe we should adjourn to the lounge area,’ Hudson said.
‘Sure, fine by me, honey.’ Sonja took his arm.
Hudson got a kick out of hearing Sonja address him that way, even if it was an act. They all sat around a carved wooden coffee table and ordered fresh drinks from the barman to get him out of the way.
Paterson addressed Tema. ‘How’s it going between you and Nikola?’
‘He’s taking me out on his boat tomorrow. We’re going to Mahale National Park. He says he has a surprise planned for me.’
‘That sounds encouraging,’ James said.
‘The surprise will be if I don’t get seasick.’ Tema rolled her eyes.
Paterson looked to Sonja and Hudson. ‘That gives you two a chance to case Nikola’s bungalow and plant some bugs. OK?’
They nodded.
‘The maid takes lunch from twelve thirty to one,’ Tema said. ‘There’s no one in the house then.’
‘Perfect,’ Sonja said.
Tema set down her drink on the table. ‘If someone does see you and reports it back to Nikola, you can tell them that I said you could come borrow a book I’m reading. I’ll leave it on the lounger out the front of the bungalow. Nikola never locks his suite. He says there are no criminals here.’
Paterson scoffed. ‘Apart from him.’
Hudson thought that was what they were there to try and prove. He saw Sonja look past him, to the entrance to the lodge, and when he turned Mario walked in.
‘Is this a private party, or can anyone get a drink?’
Hudson eyed him, then stood. He felt Sonja’s hand on his arm, but he shrugged it off. Hudson saw how the other man swayed a little. ‘You’re drunk.’
‘Yes, well, I’m off duty, and I’ve come here for a refill.’
‘Hudson,’ Sonja said, ‘leave it. Let him get his drink.’
‘Listen to your girlfriend,’ Mario slurred. ‘Remember, she’s the boss here. She’s the one who wears the pants. You like it like that, don’t you, Brand?’
Sonja got up off the lounge and moved around Hudson so that she was between him and Mario. ‘Stop this. Mario, get out of here before you cause a scene and compromise this operation.’
‘You owe Tema an apology,’ Hudson said.
Mario went to the bar. ‘Barman? Hey, where the fuck are you?’
Sonja put her hands on her hips. ‘Get out, Mario. I’ll have room service send you a bottle.’
‘No. You don’t tell me what to do any more.’
‘Apologise to Tema,’ Hudson said.
Sonja looked over her shoulder. ‘You’re goading him, Hudson.’
‘Fucking-A.’
‘Brand.’ Mario leaned back against the bar. ‘You fucking cowboy. Go back to America, or Angola, or wherever it is a bastard like you comes from. Tema?’
Tema stood as well. ‘Yes, Mario.’
‘I’m sorry for wanting to fuck you.’ He burped. ‘Maybe you prefer girls to guys.’
Sonja took a step closer to him. ‘Mario. Enough. You’ve been warned. Get out of here.’
He waved a finger at her. ‘Oh, you . . . Sonja. I know you’re not into girls. I know just what you like. I remember just how you like it, from behind, like the bitch in heat that you . . .’
Hudson let the rage overtake him, but before he could get to Mario Sonja had put him down with a hard, fast sucker punch straight to the nose. Mario yelled and started to slide down the bar. Blood ran through the fingers he held to his face. He growled, low and animalistic, then lunged at her.
Sonja weaved, easily out-manoeuvring the drunk, and by the time Mario had raised his closed fist to strike at her Hudson was ramming the barrel of his Colt .45 into the side of Mario’s temple. ‘Get up, you worthless piece of shit. Move it.’
Mario put his hands up. ‘All right, all right, I’m moving.’
Hudson grabbed him by the shirt collar and thrust him through the doors of the lounge, outside. Sonja and Tema followed them out.
‘Give me an excuse,’ Hudson said to Mario.
‘Ha, you’d like that.’
‘Go for your gun, if you’ve got one, if you’re man enough.’
‘Want a gunfight, eh, cowboy?’ Mario spat blood. ‘Want me to draw down on you?’
Hudson stood back. ‘Yes.’
‘No!’ Sonja came to him, but Hudson held out his left arm, stopping her from getting between them.
Mario stared at him. Slowly, he undid the lower two buttons of his safari shirt and used his right hand to uncover the holster clipped to his belt.
Hudson gripped his .45 tight.
‘You’re supposed to put your pistol back in your holster,’ Mario said, his voice distorted by his blood-clogged nose. ‘That’s a fair fight.’
‘Fuck fair.’
‘Hudson, he’s not worth the effort,’ Sonja said.
Mario laughed and winced. ‘I’m not going to commit suicide. But you can shoot me if you want, Brand, if you have the balls. You know, if the situation were reversed, and you had fucked two of my women, I would have killed you by now.’
‘Sheesh, Mario, shut up or I’ll shoot you myself,’ Sonja weighed in.
Hudson looked down the barrel of his pistol, past the sights. He hated how the weapon was shaking in his hand, how Mario was making him feel.
‘Tell me . . .’
Mario kept his right hand just above his pistol. ‘About Sonja?’
Hudson gave the slightest nod of his head.
‘I was her revenge fuck, I think, in Zimbabwe. She thought you’d been with someone else. She was using me to get you out her system. She tasted great.’
‘Mario!’ Tema hissed.
Sonja drew her pistol and pointed it at Mario. ‘Get inside, Tema. Hudson, I did not sleep with Mario in Zimbabwe.’
Hudson clenched his jaw and put his finger through the trigger guard of the Colt.
‘I did her once before, in Afghanistan.’ He grinned at Sonja.
Hudson felt his heart lurch.
Mario continued: ‘She was like a leopardess, you know? You’re a safari guide, you’ve probably seen it for real, what that’s like. Far more brutal than the way lions do it. She was scratching, biting, and expected me to do the same, and when I was done she just wanted more of the same. It was different with Ines.’
Hudson’s eyesight started to swim. He felt the rage overtake him and closed the gap between them and pushed the tip of the barrel hard into the skin between Mario’s eyes.
‘Shut. Up.’
‘She cried, Brand. All the way through.’
Hudson took up the slack on the trigger, then started as he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked around and saw Sonja’s face.
‘Get your hand off me.’
‘Ha!’ said Mario.
Hudson drew back his hand and, still holding the gun to give the blow extra weight, smashed his fist into Mario’s shattered nose. Mario screamed in pain, staggered and dropped to his knees. He writhed and moaned for a few seconds then collapsed into the sand.
‘Hudson,’ Sonja said, ‘Please . . .’
He stuck the pistol in the waistband of his shorts and looked her in the eyes.
‘Was Mario lying, about tasting you?’
‘I can explain . . .’
‘So that’s a no,’ he said.
Hudson felt the rage building inside him, like hot lava ready to erupt from a volcano. His vision went blurry and he clenched his teeth to fight back the vitriol that threatened to spew forth from his mouth.
‘It was nothing. I regret it. I was stupid; and in any case when we were in Zimbabwe we were interrupted, so nothing really –’
‘Interrupted? So you fully intended to have sex with him.’ He took a deep breath. There was no point in him saying anything and there was nothing she could say to make this right. Of all the people she had to let touch her, why did it have to be that disgusting creature lying out cold on the sand? He drew his gun again. Sonja didn’t flinch, but he had no desire to shoot her. He swung his arm until he was pointing at the prone figure.
‘You can’t do that,’ she said.
His hand wavered. He thought, in his madness, that if he executed Mario he might excise the cancer that had grown between him and Sonja. He looked to her again. ‘How could you?’
Sonja was defiant. ‘I thought you had slept with Rosie. I thought it was over between us.’
‘You didn’t give me a chance to explain that nothing happened.’
Sonja looked down. ‘Well, nothing happened between Mario and me. I said I’m sorry.’
‘No, you said you regret it and you were interrupted.’
She looked up at him again. ‘Of course I’m sorry. I apologise, Hudson, from the bottom of my heart. Will you please forgive me?’
He breathed deep again. His shrink had told him that deep breathing would help him control his anger, when he was doing it tough, after Angola, after the things he had seen people like Mario do there. He’d thought that was all behind him, but all the evil, all the hatred, all the ugliness reared up again, as did the image of Ines, alive and beautiful, and dead and desecrated.
He put the gun away again. He was better than Mario on that front. As much as he wanted that man dead, he was not cowardly or criminal enough to shoot an unconscious man.