by Deon Meyer
How far from me were the balaclavas at that stage? The motion of the train had taken us farther from them – a hundred, two hundred metres? Was it more? The sniper was the reference point. It must have been more than three hundred metres. When I saw them next, they were closing in. How long had they stood still?
‘I really don’t know,’ I said. ‘Maybe two minutes before I reached her. Though it might have been more.’
‘When you reached her, was she unconscious?’
‘I think so. Why?’
‘There is a general rule for coma patients – the shorter the time between trauma and coma, the more serious the condition.’
‘So, it’s bad news.’
‘Yes, Lemmer, it’s bad news.’
She would not allow me to see Emma. I had to wait until the next day. Her husband wanted to see me before he went home. She called him. Dr Koos came in and kissed his wife on the forehead.
‘I know what you’re thinking, pal,’ he said to me. ‘You are wondering how an ou like me could get such a sexy creature for a wife.’
‘No, Doc …’
‘Does he call you “doc” too?’ he asked his wife.
‘All the time.’
‘I’ll inject him till he stops.’
‘Thank you, darling.’
‘We have names. She’s Eleanor and I am Koos. Repeat after me …’
‘How did an ugly ou like you get a wife like that, Koos?’
‘That’s more like it. And the answer is: I have no idea. How are you feeling? Your eyes are not quite so manic, at least.’
‘He listens to me when I talk. That’s why I married him,’ she said.
‘Naaa, it’s because I’m so good at kissing, et cetera.’
‘Never mind the “et cetera”. There’s a patient present.’
‘OK, pal, you must be feeling really sore.’
‘I’ll survive.’
‘Oh, tough guy? It doesn’t work on women.’
‘Sometimes,’ she said.
‘But not as good as a perfectly performed French kiss …’
‘Koos!’
He grinned and took a plastic container of pills out of the pocket of his white coat. He put it on the table in front of me. ‘Take two tonight before you go to sleep and one after every meal from tomorrow on. It will ease the pain and help you sleep well. But no more than three per day. When you don’t hurt any more, throw the rest away.’
‘OK, Doc’
‘There we go again. He’s tough, but he’s no rocket scientist. Maybe because he’s in love. It screws up your head.’
‘You think he’s in love?’
‘Definitely.’
‘You sound better,’ said Jeanette Louw over the phone. I could hear she had a Gauloise between her lips.
‘They injected me with something. I slept for six hours.’
‘I know. I told them they’d better do something. You should have heard yourself. How is she, Lemmer?’ I told her.
‘Doesn’t sound good.’
‘I know.’
‘It’s not your fault.’
‘I’m not so sure of that.’
‘Stop shitting me. What could you have done?’
‘I should have taken the threat seriously. I should have believed her.’
‘What would you have done differently?’
I didn’t know. I didn’t want to think about it. ‘There are things I need.’
‘What?’
‘Two invisibles. A car. Money. And a firearm.’
It didn’t take her long to put two and two together. ‘You’re going after them.’
‘Yes.’
Another pause. I heard her draw on the cigarette and blow out the smoke, two thousand kilometres away.
‘Will ten thousand do?’
PART TWO
23
I didn’t recognise the police guards at the door of the intensive care unit. The two youngsters looked wet behind the ears. Phatudi’s clods must be on day shift, but these boys didn’t look any better. They sat staring at me with their pistols safely clipped in their holsters until I reached them. One stood up then.
‘No entry.’ His eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep.
‘My name is on the list.’
‘Who are you?’
‘Lemmer.’
He took a folded sheet of paper from his breast pocket and opened it out.
‘Martin Fitzroy?’
Fucking Phatudi. ‘Yes.’
‘Wait here.’
The balaclavas could have eliminated them in about four seconds.
I waited. At a quarter past seven Dr Eleanor Taljaard came out of Emma’s ward. She looked tired. I wondered when she had last slept. She said there were ‘positive signs’. ‘She’s still in the coma, but is responding more strongly to external stimuli. Her Glasgow index is eight now.’
‘How much will that improve her chances?’
‘Ask me again after we’ve done the CAT scan tonight.’
‘More or less?’
‘Lemmer, it’s guesswork.’
‘I know that.’
‘Well, I’d say more than fifty per cent.’
‘That’s an improvement on yesterday’s thirty-four per cent.’
‘It is. Let’s not get too excited about it. There’s a still a lot of work to do. You can be of help.’
‘Really?’
‘She needs stimulation, Lemmer. Your voice is the only one she knows. I want you to talk to her.’
‘Me? Talk to her?’
‘Yes.’ With great patience. ‘I want you to sit in the chair beside her bed and talk to her.’
‘For how long?’
‘As long as possible. You have all day.’
‘All day!’
‘Of course, you can eat and drink when you need to, but the more time you spend talking to her, the better.’
‘What do I say?’
‘Whatever you like. Keep your voice level and speak only loud enough for her to hear you. Talk to her.’
Life is not fair.
Eleanor saw exactly how keen I was.
‘Come on, Lemmer, she won’t know what you’re saying. Get a book and read to her. Or tell her the story of a film you’ve seen. Anything. She needs you.’
She seemed lifeless and fragile, pale and forlorn. They had shaved off her hair. There were bandages around her head and chest, wires connected to her, a drip in her arm, monitors and machines making soft electronic noises. Her left hand lay on top of the bedlinen, very still. I wanted to reach out and touch it.
I sat beside her on the bed. I didn’t want to look at her. I looked through the glass on the other side of her. Eleanor Taljaard stood out there watching me. She nodded at me. I nodded back. I looked at Emma.
‘I’m sorry,’ but it was too quiet, she wouldn’t be able to hear me. I cleared my throat. ‘Emma, I’m so sorry.’
Only the electronics of her life functions answered me.
What should I say to her?
‘I, urn, the doctor said you can hear me.’
The whole day? Impossible. Where could I get a book? A magazine? A woman’s magazine might be the solution.
‘They say you are a little better this morning. They say there’s a good chance you will recover. You must vasbyt …’
Vasbyt. What kind of fucking word was that? How could I tell someone in a coma to hang in there? I’m a moron.
‘Emma, they said I must talk to you because you know my voice.’
Tell her what you need to say.
‘It was my fault, Emma. I should have believed you. That was the mistake I made. I’m so sorry. I thought I was smart. Thought I knew people, thought I knew you. I was wrong.’
She just lay there.
‘I’ll fix it. I promise I’ll fix it.’
How? How was I going to fix it?
‘I don’t know how yet, but I will.’
Then I sat back and was quiet.
I looked up at the glass window.
Dr Taljaard was gone. Emma and I were alone. I could see the slow movement of her chest, breathing in and out.
I gathered my thoughts slowly and carefully and said, ‘I have to keep talking. You know I’m not good at this. The thing is, I don’t know what else to say to you. They didn’t give me any time to think. I hope you understand. I’ll go and buy a magazine in a while. What do you read? I wonder. There’s such a choice nowadays … It rained again this morning. Not thunderstorms like the other night, only soft rain. I was outside just now. The first time since we … It’s not so hot now.’
Could I go out to buy a magazine?
‘Dr Eleanor Taljaard seems to know what she’s doing. She’s about fifty. Her husband also works here. His name is Koos. They are an interesting couple. He’s shorter than she is. They seem to get along very well.’
Say something.
‘I will tell Jeanette Louw to refund you your money.’
Don’t talk about the injury.
What do women like?
‘Remember when I said I was a builder? There at Wolhuter’s place? I was trying to be clever, but it wasn’t a complete lie. I’m busy doing up my own house. At Loxton.’
This was the right topic.
‘It’s an old house. No one is really sure when it was built. I think it must be between ninety and a hundred years old. It’s the last house on the left as you drive out to the town dam. The previous owner was a Muslim. He was the electrician in town for a year or two. The people nicknamed it the AI Qaeda house. You know, tongue in cheek. But there wasn’t enough work there and he left. Maybe he didn’t feel at home without his own people. Now they talk about Lemmer’s house. It’s kind of ironic because it is my first house. I had a flat in Seapoint before. Before that I always rented, because we were six months in Pretoria and six months in Cape Town when I worked for the minister.
‘In any case, I’m busy renovating my house. It wasn’t in a bad state. There were a few cracks in the walls and the garden was very neglected, because the Muslim had been away for two years when I moved in. But the layout is peculiar. All the old houses in Loxton are built with the kitchen and bathroom side by side at the back. When you want a bath you have to walk from the bedroom down the passage and through the kitchen. They didn’t build showers at all. I don’t know why, water is so scarce in the Karoo. The old folk only built baths.
‘At the moment I’m breaking down the wall between the bathroom and the kitchen. I’ve converted one of the smaller bedrooms into a bathroom. It was quite a job 1 had to move all the pipes and plumbing. It took me about a year between working jobs for Jeanette. I think the new bathroom looks good now. I’ve got ceramic tiles on the floor and a big shower and basin and a toilet behind a little wall that I built.
‘In? … I learned bricklaying previously. Perhaps I should tell …
‘Maybe later. Anyway, I rebuilt the wall three times before it was right.
‘When the new bathroom was ready, I started on the wall between the kitchen and the bathroom. I want to make one big room including the small bedroom beside the kitchen. A kind of big living space for eating and cooking and entertaining. Not that I can actually cook … Or do much entertaining. But in Loxton the people are different. They knock on your door and say, “We’ve come for coffee.” And then you chat.
‘There’s an old Aga stove in the kitchen. It’s lovely and warm in winter. When I have finished taking down the walls, it will be one big room with the stove in the centre.
‘There’s a coloured woman who is teaching me to cook. Her name is Agatha. She says the stove is in her name. She comes twice a week to clean and wash and iron clothes and then she shows me what to do with a leg of lamb or ribs in the oven. The meat that comes out of that Aga melts in your mouth and the delicious aroma fills the whole house. Sometimes she brings her grandson along. He’s three. His name is Ryno. She says he’s named after a character in 7de Loan, the Afrikaans soap opera. Do you ever watch it? I started watching it with Agatha. She gets personally involved in that soapie.
‘I must be boring you a lot.
‘When I worked for the government there was never time for TV. I have a satellite dish now. It was just for the rugby to start with. But you know how poor the rugby was …
‘Life is very boring in Loxton. But that’s what I want. That’s why I moved there. But that’s another story.
‘In any case, the old sitting room at the front is my bedroom now, with the new bathroom alongside. The house has a veranda facing the street. There are no houses across the street. Just the commonage. Karoo veld. Koppies. The commonage is ten thousand hectares. Can you believe that? Some people keep sheep on the commonage. Oom Joe van Wyk said I should get myself some sheep. He said I mustn’t worry about the slaughtering, there is a butcher in town again for the first time in seven years. And a restaurant and a coffee shop … the Rooi Granaat. You should taste the fig liqueur that Tannie Nita makes, Emma, it’s better than any wine.
‘I’ve got the garden going too. There is still irrigation by water furrow in Loxton. My turn is on Tuesdays at three o’clock. When I’m not there Agatha or Antjie Barnard leads the water from the water furrows. There’s an old pear tree in the garden. I pruned it back and it bears well. I planted a saltbush hedge all around the boundary fence, and three peach trees and an apricot. Agatha said I should plant a fig tree, because it’s best suited to the Karoo and she could make jam. I planted four close to the kitchen. The rest is lawn and a few flower beds.
‘I enjoy the gardening.’
I looked at my watch. A quarter to eight in the morning.
The whole day.
I looked at her hand. The shape of the slender wrist and fingers.
‘Emma, I don’t know what else to tell you.’
Outside, behind the glass, a nurse walked past.
‘I want to start a herb garden too. And a vegetable garden. The soil is good. Oom Wessel van der Walt has a vegetable garden on both his plots and the plots in Loxton are big, seldom smaller than a thousand square metres. Oom Wessel bought two plots long ago. When he retired he built on one. A lot of people in town are retired, but more and more of them are from Cape Town or Johannesburg. To get away. From whatever. They came and opened guest houses and a restaurant. There’s a couple who do freelance writing for magazines and a guy who designs websites. And a few holiday houses.’
The door opened. A nurse came in, a young black woman. She smiled at me.
‘Good morning,’ she said, and came over to Emma.
‘Good morning,’ I said.
She took readings and noted them on a chart.
‘Just carry on,’ she said. ‘I’ll be finished soon.’
‘Do you think she understands what I say?’
‘No.’
‘Do you think she will remember anything?’
‘No.’ Then mischievously, she said: ‘So if you want to say anything important, you will have to wait until she wakes up.’
I wondered what Dr Koos had been telling the staff.
‘Can I go out to get a magazine? To read to her.’
‘You can, but do you know which one to buy?’
‘No, I’ll just get a woman’s magazine.’
‘But which one?’
‘An Afrikaans one.’
‘Which Afrikaans one?’
‘Does it matter?’
She looked at me sternly. ‘Of course it matters.’
‘Why?’
‘Shame,’ she said. ‘You’re not good with women, are you?’
24
‘If I tell you why I went to live in Loxton, I will have to tell you the whole story. Right from the beginning.’
When she wakes up and Phatudi talks to her she will find out who I really am anyway.
She doesn’t understand and she won’t remember either.
Tell her.
‘Emma, I was in jail.’
She just lay there.
‘I was in jail for four years.’
I leaned back in the chair and shut my eyes.
‘When I came out, I didn’t want to stay in the city. The city has turned into a place that brings out the worst in us. I’m not making excuses. I had choices and I made the wrong ones. But you have to know your weaknesses and you have to protect yourself from them. I went looking for a place that could protect me. I just drove. I took the back roads, from the Cape to Ceres. Then to Sutherland and Merweville and Fraserburg and Loxton.
‘Did you know there are mountain passes in the Karoo? Did you know there are places where you can stop and get out and see for a hundred kilometres? There are gravel roads that run through rivers that have water in them all year round. In the Karoo.
‘I didn’t know that.
‘In Loxton I was filling up at the Co-op and Oom Joe van Wyk came and talked to me. The pumps at the Co-op are at the back; you have to drive through the gates. I got out to stretch my legs and he approached me. Put out his hand and said he was Joe van Wyk and asked me how many kilos the Isuzu had, because he farmed only with Isuzus and his last one had lasted seven years and four hundred thousand kilometres. Now the children were farming and he and his wife lived in town and he still drove an Isuzu, but a Frontier, because there had to be room for the grandchildren. So who was I and where did I come from?
‘That’s how it should be. The other day you talked about people not hearing each other. I wanted to say I was different, I wanted to say I don’t want to be heard, I want to be left alone. I think hell is other people. The Jean-Paul Sartre way. But I would have been lying. I don’t really believe that.
‘What I should have said was that you were wrong. I don’t want to be heard, Emma, I want to be seen. On the one hand it scares me: to be seen. On the other hand it’s what I long for most. Because it never happened. The city is one reason. People don’t see each other in the city.
‘In Loxton, somebody saw me. But that’s not why I went to live there. Not the main reason. I wanted to be in a place where I was safe.
‘I’ve got a problem with my temper. That’s the trouble with me, Emma. I needed to find a place where I would not be provoked. ‘But there were other reasons too.
‘I believe everyone must belong somewhere. I think it’s in our blood.