THUGLIT Issue Twenty

by Justin Bendell

  "I can't fucking smell gas."

  "That's the most dangerous kind."

  Martin moved into the living room. The briefcase was on a chair in the corner. He crossed over and picked it up.

  "Fucking put that down. You're not from the fucking gas."

  "Don't you recognize me? From the train station? This is my briefcase."

  Gorton produced a knife and lunged at Martin.

  "You want this?"

  Martin threw the briefcase in Gorton's face. The distraction gave him time to grab Gorton's wrist and twist it round. The knife clattered onto the floor.

  Gorton aimed a punch at Martin with his free hand. Martin blocked the blow. He got his foot behind Gorton's leg and tripped him off his feet. Gorton grabbed Martin's arm and they both toppled over like a pair of felled trees. Gorton's head smashed into the metal radiator beneath the window.

  Martin struggled to get his breath back. Gorton remained where he was—still, lifeless. He wasn't breathing. Martin shook his opponent's shoulder, no response. He felt for a pulse. Nothing. Dead.

  "Come on, you little piece of shit. Wake up!" He slapped Gorton's face…no response. He slapped again and again and again. The head rocked back and forth like a bowling ball on a stick. Gorton's face wore a strange lopsided grin. The skin was pale, the lips tinged blue.

  Time stopped. Martin felt like he was looking at the scene from a long way away. He was snapped back to reality by a phone ringing. It wasn't his ringtone. He searched Gorton's body and located his phone. He stared in disbelief at the name on the caller display…

  Loz.

  Martin rejected the call.

  He slipped the phone into his pocket. Martin slowly got to his feet. He couldn't take his eyes off the corpse, half-expecting it to spring back into life. It remained inert. He'd have to get rid of it.

  Once he checked to see that the hallway of the flats was clear, he returned to collect Gorton.

  He dragged the body up off the floor. It was heavier than he expected. If anyone saw him, hopefully they'd think that he was simply helping to get a very drunk friend home.

  He struggled with the outside door to the flats and lost his grip on the body. Gorton's corpse slumped to the ground. "I told you not to drink that stuff," Martin said for the benefit of any curtain-twitchers watching. "Come on mate, let's get back home." He got the keys to car ready in his hand and hauled the body off the ground. He looked over at the car. Not far, but not easy with about 180 lbs of dead weight to carry. He nearly dropped him again as he struggled to get the back door of the car open. He lifted up the blanket and let the body fall along the seat, then covered it with the blanket. "There you are, you sleep it off, mate."

  He shut the door and locked the car.

  He returned to Gorton's flat and picked up the briefcase. His heart leaped at the sound of a door opening on the upper landing as he emerged from the flat. His breath caught in his throat as he listened to footsteps descending the stairs, and a moment later, the bang of the outer door closing. He let out a sigh of relief.

  Back in the car, it took a good ten minutes before his hands stopped shaking and he was able to think clearly enough to get the car started.

  He headed north. Once the initial shock at the night's events began to wear off, the full enormity of the situation began to sink in. There is a dead body on the seat behind me. The body of a person, I've killed, thought Martin.

  He tensed as he saw a police patrol car in the rearview mirror. He could barely breathe as the patrol car drew level, then pulled ahead. He expected it to stop ahead of him and for the officer to get out and wave him to the curb. Instead, the patrol car carried on along the road and eventually disappeared into the night. Fuck, that was close. Martin started breathing again.

  The monotony of the empty road made him feel drowsy. Thoughts and memories slipped in and out of his mind. He'd been a fool to think that the money he'd salted away would last. The money had vanished like raindrops on parched earth. Then the boss and Laszlo had entered his life. "Laszlo, this is all your fault. Damn you!" he thumped the steering wheel, almost losing control of the car.

  The landscape around him was in near pitch darkness. The car had long since left the road and now bumped along an uneven dirt track. He'd reached his destination. He stopped the car.

  This was the spot where ten years ago he'd said goodbye to Max Jardine. Appropriate.

  Gorton's phone rang again. He plucked it from his pocket and noticed the caller ID. Laz again.

  "Laszlo! You Bulgarian piece of shit!"

  "Wayne?" The puzzled voice on the other end of the line didn't sound like Laszlo.

  "Laszlo, where's Laszlo?"

  "Who is this?"

  "Stop fucking about and get Laszlo on this phone. Now! I've got a message for him."

  "Who?"

  "Stop with the bullshit, I want to speak to Laszlo, now."

  "Who are you?"

  "Laszlo will know."

  "You're mad." The line went dead. After a few seconds the phone rang again, Martin answered it, it was the same voice, "What are you doing with Wayne's phone? I checked, this is his number, this is his phone. Where is he?"

  "Get Laszlo on this phone" demanded Martin.

  "What's with this Laszlo crap, you weirdo?"

  "It's what came up on the screen, L-a-z."

  "My name's Loz—short for Lawrence. Lawrence Clarke. Wayne's my mate, if you've nicked his phone, you're in dead trouble."

  Martin looked at the screen: Loz—he could have sworn it had said Laz earlier.

  Loz was shouting something, but Martin wasn't listening, he turned the phone off.

  He should've known Laszlo didn't have the brains to plan the theft of the painting.

  He'd have realized that earlier if he hadn't let the Bulgarian bonehead get under his skin.

  There was no set-up. Gorton hadn't been working for Laszlo; he was just a thieving piece of shit, out to steal anything he could. He'd had no idea about the painting, or how much it was worth. He just got lucky. Or unlucky.

  If only Gorton had picked somebody else to steal from, if only the stupid prick hadn't pulled a knife.

  Two simple words. How many times had Martin left the card table thinking, if only?

  Fickle Dame Fortune always had the last laugh.

  "You should have let me have the case back, it wasn't worth losing your life for," Martin said to the wind. As a wave of anger broke over him, he threw the phone into the night.

  Martin stared into void, aware only of the sound of the sea crashing against the invisible rocks far below.

  What did he do now?

  He could start a new life, again. Sell the painting and live in exile. And spend the rest of my life waiting for a knock at the door, he thought, either from Laszlo, ready to carry out punishment on the boss's behalf, or a British police officer with an arrest warrant and a ticket back to England.

  Could he really start all over again, like he had ten years ago?

  Except that ten years ago, he hadn't been a killer trying to escape a possible murder charge. How much evidence had he left behind? The shop assistant he'd talked to, the garage he hired the car from, fingerprints, traces of DNA, the other Laszlo he'd spoken to on the phone? A curtain- twitcher who may have spotted him waiting in the car? Perhaps someone had heard the fight, or seen him carry the body to the car. So many breadcrumbs of information for the police to follow, all leading to Martin Johnson AKA Max Jardine.

  How long before the police contacted the ports and airports with his description and instructions to detain him for questioning?

  He could hand himself in, claim self-defense, throw himself on the mercy of the law. But they'd want to know about the painting, and that would be difficult to do without mentioning the boss—and the boss wouldn't take too kindly to Martin dragging him into a murder inquiry.

  Barely thirty-six hours ago he'd been sitting at a bar, dreaming of a rainy English summer. So much for his return home. H
e'd made a complete fucking mess of it.

  The minutes ticked by.

  He thought he heard the distant sound of a police siren.

  Martin took a couple of long, deep breaths. He gathered his jumbled thoughts and made his choice. There was really only one he could make under the circumstances.

  He returned to the car.

  That's another difference from ten years ago, he thought.

  This time when the car goes over the cliff, it won't be empty.

  The Best of All Possible Worlds

  by T.L. Huchu

  Sunday morning was the best time to visit Khumalo Hair and Beauty Treatment Salon because, with most people at church, business was slow and the hairdressers were liable to take more care. Detective Munatsi walked past the rusty metal sign with an arrow pointing to the establishment. She held hands with a small five-year-old child with ribbons in her hair who was eating an ice-cream cone. The girl was her flatmate's daughter, and the visit to the salon was a treat for them both.

  The scent of jacaranda trees in full bloom filled the air. Pebbles on the driveway crunched under their feet as they walked past the main house, a green bungalow, to the salon, which was situated in the old servant's quarters. Vimbai, the hairdresser, waited at the entrance beaming an ingratiating smile.

  "Good morning, Detective Munatsi," she said, stepping aside to let them pass. "Are you finally going to let me do your hair today?"

  "Just the usual trim for me, you can have Tata," Munatsi replied.

  "I have a nice Brazilian weave, one hundred percent natural human hair. It'll make you a new woman," Vimbai said.

  "Is Charlie Boy in?" Munatsi said, ignoring the hairdresser.

  "Always here to serve ZRP's finest!" Charlie Boy called out from the corner where his barber's chair was located. "Come sit down."

  Faded posters of black Americans lined the walls of the salon advertising dated hairstyles. The smell of chemicals, relaxers, and dyes filled the room. The hi-fi in the corner played loud rumba music from the Congo. It was hot and the small windows provided little ventilation.

  "I'm going to make Tata look like a little madam, a real white woman," Vimbai said, taking charge of the little girl.

  "Don't use any of that stuff on her, she's too young. Use a hot comb or just plait her hair, keep it natural," Munatsi replied. She was used to Vimbai's hard sales pitch—anything that would bring the salon an extra buck or two.

  No sooner had she sat down in the chair and Charlie Boy had thrown a towel around her neck did her mobile start ringing. She held up a finger to stop Charlie Boy as she answered her call.

  "Detective, there's been a murder. Come to the Kines right in the town centre."

  "It's my day off."

  "Superintendent Chiweshe said it's your case. Call him if you have a problem with that." The person on the other end hung up.

  Munatsi removed the towel and stood up again with a sigh. She apologized that she couldn't stay, and paid for Tata's hair. Then she left Vimbai with Tata's mum's phone number so she could be collected later. Munatsi kissed the little girl and walked back out into the sunshine.

  She went on to Colquhoun Street, through the tree-lined road, past the fortified American Embassy whose concrete balustrades annexed the pavement and a single lane's worth of sovereign Zimbabwean territory. From there it was a short walk through the Gardens into the city centre and onto the Kines.

  There were uniformed policemen in khakis standing at the entrance of the cinema. A small crowd had formed around the perimeter, blocking the pavements, so Detective Munatsi had to negotiate and budge her way through. The khakis let her into the building without checking her I.D. It was impossible not know her, she stood head and shoulders taller than most male officers in the force.

  "Right this way, Detective," said a constable waiting in the foyer who led her past the box office and the turnstiles into screen number 1.

  Some of the lights in the auditorium were broken and it took a while for her eyes to adjust to the dimness. On the stage was a man in an expensive Italian suit lying on the ground with a bullet hole between his eyes. A fine spray of red covered the curtains behind the man, and a pool formed around the body.

  The forensic scientist kneeling next to the body stood up. "Have you been paid?" he said to her.

  "Nope," she replied.

  "Has anyone been paid this month?" he asked the cops in the room, most of whom were sitting in the cinema chairs as if watching a grotesque show. One of them was even eating some popcorn. He turned to Munatsi, raised his hands and said, "Same old nonsense."

  The scientist was Billy Mungate, an old friend. He wore plastic shopping bags tied to his hands and feet because the department hadn't bought him gloves or any of the consumables on his supply sheet. It was the least of Munatsi's worries—the government hadn't paid her salary two months in a row. Yet, she still came to work. Somehow they all did. Beat cops and the traffic section earned their pay through bribes and extortion, her CID colleagues supplemented theirs through catch-and-release fishing.

  "Are there any witnesses?" she asked. For her, forensics didn't matter half as much as human intelligence, the right person at the right time.

  "The manager and projectionist both heard the shot, but they saw nothing," Billy replied.

  "What was the projectionist doing here on a Sunday?" The cinema made more profit hiring the venue out to charismatic churches than showing movies that day.

  "He doubles as the sound engineer for the church to earn an extra buck," Sgt. Moyo called out through a mouthful of popcorn.

  Billy told Munatsi the victim was Pastor Milo Miracle of the Sweet Chariot of Fire Ministry. She'd seen him on TV a few times, charismatic, smooth voice, healing powers that brought a full house in every Sunday. Last she heard they were on a fundraising drive because the cinema was too small a venue and Pastor Miracle wanted to build a mega-church for his ministry. And now here he was, brains splattered everywhere, designer white shirt ruined.

  Sgt. Moyo descended the steps and stood next to Munatsi. His uniform was tight around his voluptuous pot-belly.

  "I think we have a cut-and-dried robbery here," the Sergeant volunteered, all the while chewing popcorn. "Thief comes in, trying to shake the pastor down for a bit of cash. Maybe the holy man resists, a scuffle ensues, gun goes off. Thief takes whatever he can and makes a dash for it."

  A grunt of approval came from the khakis watching the show. Detective Munatsi walked around the body. She squatted and took a closer look.

  "Billy, how much do you think those shoes are worth?" she asked.

  "A grand easy in US dollars. Zim dollars, no idea."

  "Did he have a wallet, phone, watch?"

  "Obviously the thief took those and ran. I'm telling you it was a robbery."

  Then she got up and walked over to the sergeant, reached out and undid his breast pocket. "Hey," he cried out. She reached in and extracted a wallet. She took out a wad of cash and handed it to him. Then she checked the I.D. and bank cards within. The sergeant was ash-grey pale. "I was holding that as evidence," he mumbled. Munatsi knocked his cap off with a flick of her finger and turned to the other cops as he scrambled on the floor to pick it up.

  "Someone is going to find the phone in the space under his seat and hand it over to me. I'll take the ring back for his wife, too. I don't care about the Rolex, whoever found that can keep it."

  For a moment, the room was still and quiet. Munatsi glared at the khakis.

  Slowly, two hands rose up, each holding the articles she had demanded.

  The manager heard a loud pop and the projectionist, who was nearer, heard a loud bang. They both confirmed that the shooting took place at 08:50. Apart from that, they weren't much use. They saw nothing else, and heard nothing else. Munatsi wrote down in her notebook that the pastor never screamed or cried out, so it was likely he knew the assailant.

  In the foyer, she met an elder of the church demanding to be let in. Beside him was a beauti
ful woman in a bright blue dress. Munatsi stepped past the constable holding them back and introduced herself.

  "I need to ask you a few questions," she said.

  "Is Pastor Miracle in there?" the elder asked.

  "He's dead. Someone murdered him."

  "Jehovah no!"

  The man and woman were in shock but Munatsi emphasised that time was of the essence and she needed their help. Elder Gumbo answered the questions because the woman, Sister Grace, was too overwhelmed.

  "The service starts at 10am sharp. Pastor Miracle is never late; he's not like those other African preachers. He gets here around 7:30, Sister Grace comes in around 8:00 to help get ready and I come in at 9:00 maybe, sometimes with the band."

  "You two are married?" Munatsi asked.

  "No, Sister Grace's husband is a backslider, he doesn't come to church anymore."

  Munatsi took their details and promised to get in touch. She told the constable to let them inside in order to formally identify the body. The crime scene was already contaminated and it would do no harm. A journalist from the Herald, Nigel Magaisa, accosted her. The other independent papers didn't even bother trying to ask her questions—she only spoke to the state-owned publication. She liked Nigel, a born-and-bred Hararian, who kept an Eversharp pen tucked in his Afro and a notebook in his back pocket. The journalist lived and breathed the city.

  "Have you got anything?" Nigel asked.

  "Not a lot. Keep your ears on the ground and see if you can pick anything up for me."

  "You know how it goes with these churches. Could be a money thing or maybe a disgruntled husband whose wife the pastor was giving a seeing-to."

  "Let me know if you scratch up anything."

  Half the congregation was kneeling down on the pavement, praying, when she went out into the bright morning sunshine. It was nearly 11am and the congregation was getting restless. Detective Munatsi scanned the area and pulled two junior officers to help her canvass the local shops and street vendors to ascertain if anyone had seen anything suspicious.