by Frank Lamour
One-eye sat in the parking bay, without saying a word for what felt like a good full minute before starting up the car and taking off.
Turning out the parking lot, still heading in a roughly Southerly direction. They drove in silence for some time.
Lesley was tempted to add something, say a few more words, but his gut (now lighter) told him to keep schtum. The dude was mulling it over. Give it time. Don’t make himself appear lightweight by yapping too much. He’d already sort of screwed that up a bit with the toilet thing, but that had been unavoidable. He needed to make up for it now by just bathing in the silence.
After what’d seemed like an age, One-eye finally spoke. “How much?” he said, then tapping the pocket holding five thousand, added, “I’ve already spent this.”
The hook was in.
Lesley had been thinking this over. He had to do this right. “It’s a big job,” he said. “And I need it done today. That’s important.” He paused, hoping to let that bit of information sink in. “This character’s expecting me in a couple of hours. I need you to go with me to his house and we take him out. He’s got security so the more ou’s we can get, the better.” Lesley sat back. “I not gonna lie, it’s dangerous job, but it’s only going to take like an hour. And for that I can pay you four hundred K.” It was pretty much all the fucking liquid cash he had, but if this wasn’t a rainy day, he didn’t know what was.
“You must really want this friend of yours dead?” One-eye said.
“It’s him or me,” Lesley said
“Who is he?”
“He’s a drug dealer,” Lesley said, choosing to leave it at that.
The car moved on slowly South, seeming to be heading in a circuitous route, passing increasingly rundown houses.
One-eye fumbled for something in his pocket, pulled out an iPhone and handed it to Hipster, saying something that Lesley didn’t catch. Hipster dialled and handed the phone back. One-eye then conducted about a minute-long conversation. It was in the vernacular and Lesley didn’t follow. The only word he got was, “Chinese.”
One-eye hung up and stuffed the phone back in his pocket. “Okay, okay. We gonna take a drive,” he said and turned the car around.
Chapter 56
Don sat on the dirty concrete floor, in a room at the back of some dude’s—possibly this Pinchas character’s—garage. To his left, Ricky, who somehow still had his wallet as well as cat bag with him, and was now holding the baggie up to the light and carefully inspecting the contents. To Ricky’s left, in the corner, Beppe, was laid on his side, looking unpleasantly green around the gills and clutching his ruined knee.
The room had no windows, and was lit by a sickly tube fluorescent. The walls and door all appeared to be crudely covered with discoloured rhino board and Don could see in areas where the board had chipped away, some kind of Think Pink insulation. There was a big steel cupboard against one wall (locked—Don had tried) and a heavy workbench with a vice clamped on, next to it. The other notable object in the room was what now—and since he’d entered—held his attention.
In the middle of the floor sat what looked something like an old-fashioned wooden gym horse. It had four sturdy wooden legs, the body of the horse though being a sharp-edged prism—one edge facing up. Bolted into the ceiling directly above the horse was a chunky eye-hook from which dangled a pulley. On either side of the horse, where stirrups might usually be, were loose hanging Velcro straps with little net things attached. Underneath the device—perhaps most disturbingly—a large sheet of plastic.
After Beppe had been shot it had not been too long before the Jeep had returned. The three of them, now without recourse to a weapon, had been bundled into the vehicle without too much fanfare.
The camo guy with the silenced shotgun had retrieved the maize bag and Street Sweeper from the pavement cover, and then squeezed into the boot of the Jeep opposite Beppe—taking a seat on what Don thought—craning his neck—looked a lot like— folded into the small space—a body wrapped in plastic.
The Jeep had then gone back up to pick up the suited guy who’d met them at the HoV driveway. He had climbed in the backseat with Don and Ricky, the front door still not able to open, and immediately started bitching to the driver, a tall, gangly surfer type, about blood on the upholstery and the KFC bag that was stuffed under the driver’s seat.
After a short drive, Don’s suspicions about the bulk the camo guy was sitting on was pretty much confirmed when the 4x4 had made a detour into Charlotte Maxeke Academic. The Jeep had circled down into one of the hospital’s dark and spooky parking lots and here Suit and Shotgun had transferred the weighty package from the boot onto a gurney attended by a bloodshot-eyed character in scrubs.
The man in scrubs, quickly covering the form with a sheet, had been handed a stack of bills by Suit and then they’d been out of there, as easy as that.
Don wondered if it was Kratom in the package? He felt both some sadness as well as guilt (having been the catalyst of this whole situation) as he imagined the young man becoming shortly nothing but black smoke wafting over the Johannesburg skyline.
After leaving the hospital it had been another relatively short trip in silence. Their final destination was a formidable villa-style estate on Westcliff Ridge—not too far from Lesley’s actually—where the SUV had turned in and headed up the steep drive, pulling into one of bays in the big garage. From here Don and his two companions had been roughly directed, or in Owen’s case, carried, through to the potential torture chamber in which they now found themselves.
The suit had done a brief bandage job on Beppe’s leg, wrapping the wound but Don suspected it needed a proper clean and the kid maybe at least given some antibiotics.
After they’d been left alone Don had tried the steel cupboard, tested the room door and generally looked for some way out, without any luck, before returning to his spot on the floor.
Don turned again to check how Beppe was holding up. “Should’ve taken the fucking money,” the bowl-cut kid murmured.
Don wanted to mull things over but now, above the intense anxiety, felt tired, cloudy headed. The cat was surely wearing off.
“I’m going to try take a nap,” Don said, shifting down to lie on his back on the carpet, hands behind his head. The announcement did not seem of much interest his two companions.
Don closed his eyes.
It felt like he’d just finally been drifting into a nice sleep, when he was woken by the sound of voices, keys, a lock turning. The door opened and Suit (carrying two heavy looking Sportman’s Warehouse bags), Camo and the gangly driver entered. They were followed by a tiny man, with a weird balding pattern, carbon-fibre calipers on his legs and supporting himself heavily with an ivory-handled cane. Pinchas?
Don was too wiped out to bother sitting up and continued lying his back, hands behind his head.
Pinchas now took stock of the three them on the floor.
“So you Lesley’s guys?” Pinchas said.
The three on the floor remained silent.
“Times must be tough,” Pinchas said.
Don propped up a bit on his elbows. “I’m not his guy.”
“I’m not his guy either,” Beppe put in weakly from the corner.
Pinchas wasn’t listening. “Which one’s Dan?”
The man in the suit pointed at Don.
“Who these other two?
Suit shrugged.
Pinchas now turned his attention on Don. “Dan, what do you think of the Cheval de Bois?” he said walking over to the gym horse thing.
Don shrugged.
“I’m working my way through a list of interrogation devices I find more puzzling. This one the subject straddles the body of the horse, more weight is added to the legs, then the subject, in this case you, is left there as the pain builds and his legs stretch longer. It’s like, for me, a sort of extreme study of ergonomics. I always found that interesting, ergonomics I mean. My experiences with orthotics—that might as well have been medi
eval—nurturing it maybe? Who knows? But I even tried for a Product Design degree, when I was around your age… but, as well as just not being cut out for it, there’s just no money in it. Remember that, Dan. People with specialised skills just hit a ceiling. The more amorphous and vague your job title, the more you get paid.”
Don had didn’t know what Pinchas was on about, but the man did come across one-hundred percent serious about it all.
“We haven’t tried this one yet,” Pinchas continued. “You’ll be the first to ride. Then your friends. Well, let’s see how it goes.”
“What do you want?” Don said, finally. “You got your money back.”
“It was late,” Pinchas said, now even more all business.
“But… but… I’m just a pawn!” Don pleaded. He pointed at Ricky. “He doesn’t even have a job. He’s Lesley’s cat-sitter. Why can’t you just put the fat man in there?”
Pinchas seemed to consider this, shook his head. “I understand what you’re saying but I’m happy with Lam where he is. I don’t need him dead or in hospital. He’s earning for me. I just want him to get a message. See what I did to your guys? You could be next. It’s just about stoking a bit of fear. It’s the price of business.” He turned to Don. “Look, Dan, I don’t think this one’s going to kill you. I don’t think,” he added the last more to himself, looking over at the device. “After a few months of rehabilitation it’ll be like nothing happened. Maybe you walk with a cane. You’ll still have it better than I did. And I did okay.” He turned to the man in the suit. “What do you think?”
Suit shrugged.
“You might even be a bit taller,” the gangly driver offered.
“Let’s just see what happens,” Pinchas said, not seeming to have appreciated the driver’s levity. “Go with the flow.”
“Uh…,” Don started, trying but failing, to think of further ways to plead his cause.
“Ok, we talked enough,” Pinchas said. “String him up.”
“Uh…”
Suit and Shotgun stepped forward and in one unceremonious motion yanked Don to his feet.
Don suddenly in the grip of panic, in the moment all concerns of embarrassment leaving him, started to scream unashamedly for help.
His cries were cut short by a meaty fist to his abdomen from Camo. Don, struggled for breath, almost seemed to black out for a second and would’ve dropped to his knees if not for still being held upright by the two men.
Well, he wasn’t going to die at least, he thought. Probably. Perhaps if he just screamed and wailed in an over the top manner once the torture started, they’d think they’d done enough and cut the experiment short. It was the best he could come up with.
Don now quietened as Pinchas’s men set about preparing the horse. He needed more contrast between his now normal self and in the grips of torture self.
The gangly driver went to the steel cupboard, removed a bunch of keys from his pocket, and unlocked it. From the cupboard he removed a couple of sturdy looking cable ties and some heavy rope.
The cable ties were then used to lock Dons wrists behind his back. The rope wrapped around his chest, looping under his armpits.
“You got a chair or something?” Suit asked the gangly driver. The driver left the room and returned a in a bit with a dining-table sort of chair.
Suit then asked him to send the other end of the rope around the pulley bolted into the ceiling, which, with help of the chair and his height, he did.
Pinchas then took the chair off to the side and positioned himself, crossing his legs, resting his cane against them and casually throwing an arm over the high back, now able to monitor the proceedings in comfort. “Maybe gag him before we get going,” he said.
The driver went over to the cupboard, scrounged about and found a roll of black duct-tape. Peeling up some the tape, he slapped it over the Don’s lips, then took the roll and sent it all the way around Don’s head, about one and a half times, taping up half of Don’s good ear—or whole ear—in the process.
“Shall I take the pants off?” Joel asked.
“Just the trousers. I don’t particularly wish to see his junk,” Pinchas said.
Don’s hemp trousers were removed to reveal a pair of worn, patterned briefs with a couple of holes in. Despite the gloominess of the situation, it seemed vanity had not completely left Don and he found himself wishing he’d made a better choice of undergarment before setting off.
His Converse still left on, Don was then lifted bodily up into the air by Suit and Camo and lowered down on to the back of the horse.
The pain was immediate and intense, the sharp edge of the horse wreaking havoc with all the mass of nerves in his pelvic floor. Don cried out through the tape, tears welling in his eyes. If this was only the start he didn’t think he was going to make it. The action going on around him now starting to seem increasingly distant.
Don thought he heard Suit say, “Use it to keep him from falling…,” as he felt the rope around him tighten. The pain as a result seemed to lessen a fraction, but only a fraction.
“Good, good,” a voice said. “Now start with the light weights.”
Straps now tightened around his ankles. And then suddenly the pull of weight on one leg and then the other.
The pain rocketed up twenty-fold. He was surely splitting in two. He would never walk again!
Don was now weeping and wailing through the tape, mucous flowing freely from his nose. He tried shifting to the side, to relieve some of the pressure, get the weight more on to the side of his buttock.
“Tighten the rope, straighten him out!” someone said.
Please no!
Then from somewhere through the red haze of pain he thought he heard a singing. What the…? Many voices. Strings. Some heavenly choir? This was it, he supposed. He had split in two and was dying.
Chapter 57
The drive had been very roundabout. Heading roughly South West in what seemed a fairly circuitous route, One-eye spending a lot of that time what sounded like arguing into the phone. Lesley still wondered if the man wasn’t just going to cut his losses and dump him in a ditch somewhere.
They had eventually met up with the black 4x4 that he’d encountered back at his place, which was joined by another almost identical GLS (except for a nasty scratch along its side) at a KFC in an industrial area Lesley was unfamiliar with. After this they had turned and begun heading back roughly in the direction they’d come.
The three-car convoy now travelled through the former “coloured” township area, West of Melville. The neighbourhood was distinctive for its staggered blocks of state-built flats. Lesley roughly knew the neighbourhood, one of his dealers lived in and worked the area.
No formal introductions had yet been given and Lesley was okay with that. The hijackers had taken to calling him, ‘Big Man,’ which he wasn’t in love with, but it was at least better than ‘fatty.’ He didn’t intend this relationship, if all went to plan, to last much beyond the end of the day, and probably the less they all knew about each other the better.
He wasn’t crazy either about them knowing his address and thought if he did make it through the day, a future move might be something to consider.
The convoy continued on through the hood, passing the tumbledown buildings, dusty pavements and graffiti, before turning off the through-road and heading into an even more broken-down looking section. The streets were narrowing and there were lots of small old houses. The three-car convoy finally pulled up outside one of these. An unassuming, non-descript, rundown old place.
One-eye told Lesley to stay in the car, went inside, and after about fifteen minutes emerged with around a dozen of the scariest looking guys Lesley was sure he’d ever seen in his life.
All, like One-eye’s men, packing busted-up AK-47’s (Most likely the spoils of some cold war cache Lesley speculated. The reliability of the weapon’s design no doubt made the same guns still useful for many generations of aspiring carjackers to come). Many of the men al
so wore over their fashionable civvies in some cases very tried and tested looking bulletproof vests.
The additional force now loaded up into the two 4x4’s. The infernal machine had started rolling and Lesley was sure he now had little choice (unless of course he wanted to end up shoved into that ditch somewhere) but to see it through to the end.
The men now all squeezed in to the two Mercs and the three cars then continued on to Lesley’s.
Arriving back at his place, Lesley got out, rolled back his half-open gate and directed the vehicles into his yard. Closing the gate he couldn’t help but cast a quick glance up down his street, hoping none of his neighbours were watching.
Lesley then went inside and after another trip to the lav, removed all the cash he had in his safe as well as—after not being able to choose—both his Desert Eagle .50 cal and 6.5-inch barrel Taurus Raging Judge. Not having yet acquired holsters for the weapons he stuffed both in the waistband of his chinos.
He also took out his Astra .38 snub which he at least had an ankle holster for. He’d looked for his Armsel but just couldn’t find the fucking thing. He could’ve sworn he left it in the fucking cupboard, it not fitting in his safe. He strongly suspected Beppe or Don, but wasn’t going to worry about that now.
Lesley anyway, didn’t plan on getting involved in the action. He was going to stay as far back as he could, and let the cannon fodder do what he was fucking paying for. Maybe after, he thought, he might be willing to come in and do the mopping up.
Lesley also then went to collect his Rolex, wanting to keep an eye on the time. He then headed back outside and handed the cash, which he’d put in a Checkers plastic bag, to One-eye who went to sit in the passenger seat of the Corolla to begin counting. “You drive from here.” One-eye said.
Lesley now noted that what looked like balaclavas appeared to have been distributed amongst the troops. Some of the guys were trying them on. They were pretty much just made from old t-shirts, all differently coloured, loosely sewn, tied, eye holes roughly cut out.