by Deon Meyer
Emma was carrying a small leather bag. She sat down again, unzipped it and took out a pair of scissors. Picking up one of the white facecloths, she began to cut.
‘Someone put that snake in my room, Lemmer,’ she said in a matter-of-fact tone.
I just looked at the scissors and facecloth.
‘That’s what woke me. The window … when it slammed shut. Or something. I just went to have a look. The window is shut, but not latched.’
Deftly she cut a long spiral out of the cloth. ‘Give me your foot.’ I put it on her lap again. She took off the bloodstained paper and inspected the cut, which had stopped bleeding. She took the facecloth bandage and began to wind it around the ball of my foot. ‘Someone must have unlatched the window from inside last night. While we were at dinner. It’s the only way, you can’t open the window from outside.’
I said nothing. She wouldn’t want to know how improbable her theory was. How would you handle a reptile like that? How do you slip it through the slot of a half-open window?
How would ‘they’ know we were staying here? How would they have got here from the main road in the night with a three-metre venomous snake and known exactly which window was Emma’s?
Emma took a tiny silver safety pin from the leather bag and pinned the bandage securely. She tapped her palm on my toes. ‘There you go,’ she said, satisfied with her handiwork. I took my foot off her lap. We both got up. At the bathroom door she stopped and turned to me with a solemn expression on her face.
‘Lemmer, thanks. I don’t know what I would have done without you.’
I had nothing to say. I waited for her to leave.
‘How do you do it, Lemmer? Do you run?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘There’s not an ounce of fat on you.’
‘Oh.’ I was caught off guard. ‘Yes … I run. That… sort of thing …’
‘You must tell me about “that sort of thing”, some time,’ and she left with a little smile on her lips.
As I lay on my bed in the dark again and waited for elusive sleep, I pondered the way she viewed the alleged conspiracy with such calm assurance. To her it was completely real, an accomplished fact, an unfortunate reality that she had to live with. It didn’t make her hysterical, merely pragmatic. Someone wants to kill me 1 hire a bodyguard. Problem solved.
It was somehow flattering, her childish trust, her belief in my abilities. But I gained no satisfaction from it, coming as it did from the same woman who was entangled in imaginary plots. Whereas I had initially guessed she was lying, now I suspected her of fantasy, illusions born out of yearning.
I lay in the darkness for a long time listening to the noises of the bush, the nocturnal birds, a hyena. Once I imagined I heard a lion roar. Just as I began to descend into sleep there was another sound: the soft tread of Emma’s bare feet through the sitting room, past me to the other single bed beside mine. There was the rustle of linen and then all was quiet.
I heard Emma breathe out slowly, a sigh of comfort. Or relief.
9
Greg. Hospitality manager. He had thin blond hair and his red complexion did not respond well to the sun. His olive-and-khaki uniform was a little tight around the waist. ‘My most sincere apologies, this is totally unacceptable, we will move you, of course, and there will be no charge for your accommodation.’ He looked down at the lifeless snake.
It was very early and the veranda was packed. Beside the dead reptile stood Dick. Senior Game Ranger.
‘It’s a black mamba, awesome animal,’ Dick said to Emma, as if the snake belonged to him. He was her type and he knew it – a thirty-something Orlando Bloom clone, tanned, a big conversationalist. Once he realised that Emma had been alone in the double bed behind lock and key when the incident with the snake had occurred, he focused all his attention on her.
The black ranger (Sello. Game Ranger) and I looked at the dead animal. The morning was hot already. I hadn’t slept much. I didn’t like Dick.
‘You don’t have to move us,’ Emma said to Greg.
‘Most feared snake in Africa, neurotoxic venom, lung failure within eight hours if you don’t get the anti-venom. Very active, especially this time of year before the rains. Very aggressive when confronted, the best thing is to step back …’ motormouth Dick said to Emma.
The best thing is to step back. What did he think we’d done? Invite it to dance?
‘Then we will have the place sorted out. As good as new by lunchtime. I’m very sorry,’ said Greg.
For the first time Dick looked at me. ‘You should have called us, dude.’
I just looked at him.
‘I don’t think that was an option,’ said Emma.
Greg gave Dick a stern look. ‘Of course it wasn’t.’
Dick tried to regain lost ground. ‘Just a pity it had to be killed, such an awesome animal. They are very territorial, you know, and they usually avoid contact with humans, unless they’re cornered. Hunts by day, mostly. Far out, man, real far out, never happened before. How the hell did it get in? They’re so damn agile, can get through the smallest of holes or gaps or pipes, who knows? Sello, do you remember that one we found in the anthill last month? Huge female, maybe four metres, one minute she was there, the next she was gone, just slipped away somewhere.’
‘We’ll have to go for breakfast,’ said Emma.
‘And that will be on the house too,’ said Greg. ‘Please, if there’s anything …’
‘Mamba in the bedroom,’ said Dick, shaking his head. ‘It’s a first for us, but hey, it’s the bush, right. Africa is not for sissies … I suppose it had to happen some time or other. Radical. Just such a pity …’
Inspector Jack Phatudi was a block behind the desk, a bodybuilder who resisted the urge to boast, since his snow-white shirt fitted loosely. He had a permanent frown on his broad forehead, unfriendly grooves that broke the glossy sheen of his shaven head. His skin was the darkest shade of brown, just short of black, like exotic polished African wood. In the pressure cooker of an office he was the only one not perspiring.
He held the twenty-year-old photograph of Jacobus le Roux between his thick, strong fingers and said, ‘This is not him.’ He irritably pushed the photo back across the surface of the government-issue table.
‘Are you absolutely sure?’ asked Emma. We were sitting opposite Phatudi. She left the photo lying on the table.
‘You cannot ask me that. Who can say they are absolutely sure? I do not know what he looked like twenty years ago.’
‘Of course, Inspector, I …’
‘How will this help me?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘The suspect has killed four people last week. Now he is gone. Nobody knows where he is. You bring me this photograph from twenty years ago. How will it help me find this man?’
She was momentarily halted, yielding to his onslaught. ‘Well, Inspector, I don’t know,’ she said pleasantly. ‘Perhaps it won’t help you. And I don’t want to waste your time. I have too much respect for the role of the police. I was just hoping that you might be able to help me.’
‘How?’
‘I saw the picture of the man on television for just a few seconds. Would it be at all possible to see it again, to put it next to this one …’
‘No. I cannot do that. It is a murder docket.’
‘I understand.’
‘That is good.’
‘May I ask you one or two questions?’
‘You can ask.’
‘The television news said the man, Jacobus de Villiers, worked at an animal hospital …’
‘The TV people, they don’t listen. It is not a hospital, it is a rehabilitation centre.’
‘May I ask what the name of the centre is?’
He was reluctant to name it. He adjusted his bright yellow tie, rolling the huge shoulders under the white shirt. ‘Mogale. Now you will go show your photograph there?’
‘If it’s OK with you.’
‘You will mak
e trouble.’
‘Inspector, I assure you …’
‘You do not understand. You think I do not want to help you. You think this policeman is difficult …’
‘No, Inspector …’
He held up a hand. ‘I know you think that. But you do not know the problems. There are big problems here. Between your people and the black people.’
‘My people?’
‘Whites.’
‘But I don’t know anybody here.’
‘It does not matter. There are big problems. The people, they fight all the time. There is much tension. The black people, they say the whites are hiding this Cobie de Villiers. They say the whites, they care only for the animals. These men who died, they have families. These families are very angry. The animals are wild animals. They belong to the people. They are not the animals of the whites.’
‘I understand …’
‘So when you go and ask questions, you will just make trouble.’
‘Inspector, I give you my word that I will not make trouble. I am not here about the killings. I am truly sorry for the families of those men. I have lost my whole family too. I just need to talk to the people who worked with this man. I will show them the photograph, and if they say it isn’t the person I am looking for, I will go home, and I will never bother you again.’
He scowled at her. It was an intense look, as if he could turn her from her course by willpower. Emma looked back at him with ingenuous sincerity.
Phatudi gave in first. He sighed deeply, pulled the file towards him, flipped it open and took out a photograph that he shoved angrily across to the one Emma had brought. The two pictures lay neatly side by side.
Emma leaned over to study the photographs. The inspector watched her. I sweated and studied the poster on the wall. It advised people not to commit crime.
They sat like that for a minute or two, the tiny Emma and the rock of a detective, in dead silence.
‘It is Jacobus,’ said Emma, but to herself.
Phatudi sighed.
Emma picked up both photos and held them out to me. ‘What do you think, Lemmer?’
Me?
The photo of Jacobus le Roux was in black and white, a young soldier in a bush hat smiling at the camera. The same high cheekbones as Emma, the same slightly prominent eye teeth. There was an intensity, an urgency, he wanted to get the photo session over with because there was a world out there waiting. An easy self-confidence, liking the camera and what it was capturing. My father is rich and life awaits me like a ripe pomegranate.
In Phatudi’s photo Cobie de Villiers was in colour, but colourless – an enlargement of what could only be an identity-book photograph. De Villiers seemed weary of life. No smile, just an expressionless face and dull eyes, a forty-year-old man without prospects. The only possible similarity was in the cheekbones, but it was vague, necessitating a leap of faith, or hope.
‘Ek kan nie sê nie.’
‘Dis reg,’ said Inspector Jack Phatudi, also in Afrikaans, ‘’n Mens kan nie sê. You can’t say.’
Emma looked at him in surprise. ‘And all the time we’ve been speaking English,’ she said.
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I speak sePedi, Tshivenda and isiZulu too. You came in here speaking English.’
Emma put the photos down on the table, turned around so that Phatudi could view them. ‘Look at the eyes, Inspector. And the shape of the face. Take this one and add twenty years. It is Jacobus … it could possibly be Jacobus.’
He shook his head. ‘What kind of word is “possibly”? Do you know what my job is, Mrs Le Roux? I have to make a case against this man.’ He tapped the picture of the hapless Cobie de Villiers. ‘I have to find him and I have to take him to court and my case must prove that he is guilty beyond reasonable doubt. Reasonable doubt. Those judges, they shout at you. They will shout at me if I talk about possibly. Do you understand that?’
‘I understand that. But I don’t want to take anyone to court.’
He scooped up his photo and put it back.
‘Is there anything else?’
‘Inspector, what happened to the people that were killed?’
The scowl deepened. ‘No, Mrs Le Roux, that is sub judice. I can’t tell you.’
In the BMW Emma studied the map with great concentration. I aimed the air conditioner’s cold blast at my forehead. A great relief. Emma glanced up. ‘Can we stop at a garage? I want to find out where the Mogale rehabilitation centre is.’
I pulled away. ‘Right, Mrs Le Roux.’ I echoed Phatudi’s address without thinking and she laughed in astonishing clear musical notes.
‘The inspector is an interesting man,’ she said. When her laughter had subsided, as an afterthought, she added, ‘You are too.’
Categorised with the detective. I wasn’t sure that it was fair, but I wasn’t going to react.
‘Look, there’s an Engen filling station, let’s ask there …’
I put on the indicator and turned off.
10
The centre lay against the lower slopes of the Mariepskop. The mountain, with its forbidding mass of red rock cliffs, was a powerful figure of authority guarding the plains.
Mogale Rehabilitation Centre was displayed in fancy green lettering together with a logo of a raptor’s head and an invitation to enter. Plus a programme:
TIMES OF OUR REHAB TOURS
Mondays to Saturdays:
* 1st Tour starts at 09h30 *2nd Tour starts at 15h00
‘We’re just in time,’ said Emma as she got out to open the gate.
I drove through. Beyond the gate was another notice. Wild Animals. Please remain in your vehicle. Emma got in again. A kilometre further on she said, ‘Look’ and pointed out a swarm of vultures gathering at a carcass. ‘I wonder if they feed the birds here?’
The centre was spread out – cages, gardens, lawns and covered parking for vehicles. Visitors: Please park here. A young man in khaki and green, apparently the standard uniform of the Lowveld, waited impatiently at the gate. We got out.
‘We’re about to start the tour,’ he said, but not in any unfriendly way. He was a head taller than me, with broad shoulders and an athletic self-confidence. Emma’s type.
He led us to a thatched building that was a lecture hall. Several rows of tiered wooden benches descended towards a stage. The audience was already seated, people great and small, with cameras slung around necks and cool drink cans in hand. There was a wilderness scene painted on the wall behind the stage: raptors and vultures in the sky, a leopard, hyenas and buck in the long grass between the thorn trees. The young man positioned himself centre stage. ‘Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Mogale Rehabilitation Centre. My name is Donnie Branca, and I’ll be your guide this morning.’
He looked at us and said, ‘Vultures.’ For an uneasy moment, I thought he was referring to his audience.
‘They’re not cuddly, they’re not cute. As a matter of fact, we think of them as disgusting beasts – squabbling and squawking at a stinking carcass, fighting over decomposing meat. Carrion eaters with beady little eyes, scrawny necks and hooked beaks, often covered in blood and gore and guts up to their eyeballs. Pretty revolting. So most people don’t care much for vultures. Well, let me tell you, here at Mogale, we not only care for them, but we love them. With a passion.’
There was something about the tone and manner of Donnie Branca’s words that was vaguely familiar. He spoke smoothly and easily, with conviction and zeal.
He said vultures were the big game of the feathered kingdom, an indispensable link between mammals and birds in the broad spectrum of nature. They were an ecological necessity, the cleaners of the veld capable of consuming rotting carcasses from head to tail before diseases could incubate that would create havoc up and down the food chain. Vultures were part of the balance, he said, a perfect, delicate balance that had determined the cycle of life in Africa for a hundred thousand years.
‘Until we humans disturbed the balance.
’
Branca allowed his words to sink in before continuing. He explained that the problem with vultures was that public and private game reserves could not fence them in. Many birds patrolled areas that were four or five times greater than the Kruger National Park. And that was where the trouble began. They would nest in mountains and valleys, in trees and forests where their ancestors had brooded for thousands of years, but humans had taken over these areas. There was an incorrect perception that vultures preyed on the farmers’ small stock and poultry. So, they were shot.
‘And then there’s the belief among the local people that vultures have magic powers. They believe that vultures have supernatural eyesight that is not only able to find food over vast distances, but is so good that they can actually see tomorrow. In other words, see into the future. Since we started a National Lottery in South Africa, sangomas, as witch doctors prefer to be called, have been selling vulture heads for a small fortune to eager gamblers who believe that they are lucky charms that will enable them to see into the future, their talisman to predict the winning numbers.’
Beside me, Emma was listening with intense concentration.
‘The market for vulture parts has skyrocketed in the past few years. Take a guess what a vulture head is now selling for. Five hundred rand? A thousand bucks? Try ten thousand rand. But the sangomas buy the dead vultures from poachers for maybe two or three hundred rand a piece. And how do the poachers capture the vultures? They poison them. They set out a carcass laced with a deadly poison and they kill a hundred or two hundred birds at once, but they are on foot and they can only carry off ten or twenty, so the others are just left to rot.’