Cobra

by Deon Meyer

  How are you going to explain that to your sister,Ty, don’t be stupid.

  Not impossible. He could just say he got this moerse paint contract . . .

  Batman said something.

  ‘Sorry?’ said Ty.

  ‘It’s not necessary, jy wiet.’

  ‘Ek versta’ jou nie, my bru.’ I don’t understand.

  ‘You don’t need to go to the hospital.’

  Did he just say ‘to the hospital’ by mistake? Hadn’t he told him Bellville?

  ‘We’ve just caught the guy from the Waterfront. A bunch of Hawks are now on the way to the hospital, just to make sure. Your sister is safe. If I were you, I would just stay on the train.’

  Tyrone grew ice cold.

  ‘Who are you?’ He moved his hand back to his pistol.

  ‘My name is Vaughn Cupido. I’m a captain in the Directorate of Priority Crime Investigations of the Es A Pee Es. They call us the Hawks, pappie. We’re the hot shit, the top cops, the main men. And if you have a weapon there under your jacket, my best advice is, forget it. They don’t call me Crackshot McKenneth, the Pride of the Prairies, for nothing. I am Quick Draw McGraw, faster than a speeding bullet . . .’

  ‘OK,’ said Tyrone. ‘I get the point.’

  ‘So just relax.’

  ‘I am relaxed.’

  ‘Have you got a gun?’ Cupido’s voice was very calm, as if he were asking what he had had for breakfast.

  It took a long time before Tyrone could get it out: ‘Ja.’

  ‘Hand it over. Slowly. We really don’t want anyone to get hurt.’

  Tyrone sat frozen. The thought that he was going to lose everything, that it had all been for nothing, all the blood, the running, the terror, the worry, it made him feel paralysed.

  Cupido looked at his watch. ‘Time is running out. Just hand it over, everything will be OK.’

  Tyrone lifted his hand slowly to his hip, pulled out the pistol reluctantly.

  ‘Hold it like that so the Hase can’t see it.’

  ‘The Hase?’

  ‘It’s police-speak for the public. Slow and easy now.’

  Tyrone passed the pistol over, low and unobtrusively. The cop dude took it.

  ‘That’s better,Tyrone. Tell me, where did you grow up?’

  ‘Mitchells Plain.’

  ‘Me too. What street?’

  ‘Begonia.’

  ‘I know Begonia. Hard times, da’.’

  ‘’S true.’What did the motherfucker want?

  ‘I grew up in Blackbury Street. It’s just other side Eisleben.’

  ‘I know Blackbury.’

  ‘How long have you been a pickpocket?’

  Jirre. He knew everything. ‘Since I was twelve.’

  ‘Who taught you?’

  ‘Uncle Solly. From Begonia Street.’

  ‘Was he your real uncle?’

  What kind of conversation was this? ‘No. My foster father.’

  ‘You and Nadia were orphans?’

  ‘Ja. Daddy and Mommy died when I was three and she was one.’

  ‘Daai’s sad, my bru.’

  ‘Uncle Solly was a good man.’

  ‘But a pickpocket.’

  ‘Damn fine pickpocket. And he had morals.’

  ‘How much money is in the rucksack?’

  That was a surprise. Such an ugly surprise that his body jerked with the shock of it.

  He wanted to ask, ‘How do you know about the money?’

  But something else suddenly dawned on him: the Batman cop wanted a cut. Of course he wanted a cut. Or all of it. Everyone knew the cops were corrupt.

  ‘What money?’

  ‘The money in the photo that they sent to you. Did they hand it over?’

  He kept quiet.

  ‘Did they?’ Cupido asked again.

  ‘Ja.’

  ‘How much?’

  What did it help to lie. ‘Two point four.’

  ‘Million?’

  ‘Ja.’

  Cupido whistled softly. ‘And it’s all there?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘That’s a lot of money.’

  ‘How much do you want?’

  Cupido laughed. ‘If it wasn’t such a lekker day, my bru, I would have bitchslapped you.’

  Tyrone dared to look at the cop for the first time.

  ‘Ek sê, it’s a lot of money. A lot of responsibility.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Not many get such a chance. An ou who can put his sister through university. And make something of himself. Get out of Begonia Street.’

  ‘’S true.’

  The cop put his hand in his coat pocket. Tyrone watched the movement. The hand emerged, holding a card.

  ‘This is my business card. Take it.’

  Tyrone took it.

  ‘I’m getting off in Bellville just now. You are going to stay on the train. You are going to go all the way to Stellenbosch. Go and stay in your sister’s flat, until you get your own place. Don’t go back to that room in Schotsche Kloof. There’s still people who might try to find you, for a week or two. So, lie low. If you have any trouble, call me. If you want to make absolutely sure the whole thing is over, call me.’

  Tyrone nodded, dumbfounded.

  ‘But no more pickpocketing. I am going to check the system. If you ever get arrested, if I see you on a CCTV camera, if you jaywalk, my bru, then I will come and bliksem you, and I will put you away, versta’ jy?’

  Tyrone nodded again.

  ‘Make a life,Tyrone. Few people get the chance.’

  ‘I will.’

  Cupido put out a hand and squeezed Tyrone’s shoulder. ‘You’re a brave ou. Very brave. Your sister is lucky to have you.’

  And then the motherfucker stood up, smiled at him, and walked to the door of the railway carriage.

  The train slowed. It stopped at Bellville. Tyrone watched Cupido walk away in his long swanky coat. The dude didn’t look back, just stepped out when the doors opened. He followed Batman with his eyes, he watched the cocky walk, until he disappeared completely from view.

  Tyrone sat there, staring, until the doors closed again, and the train left the station.

  Then he shuddered, and began to cry.

  He cried all the way to Muldersvlei, his tall, skinny, sore, tired body shaking uncontrollably.

  60

  They were questioning Joaquim Curado in a small office of the DPCI building in Bellville, away from the suspicious eyes of Criminal Intelligence, when Benny Griessel walked in.

  There was blood on Griessel’s jacket. His hair was even more dishevelled than usual, he was harried and stressed, but his eyes burned clear and full of fire.

  ‘He won’t say a word.’ Cupido pointed at Curado, who sat like a sphinx at the table, still handcuffed.

  ‘He doesn’t have to talk,’ said Griessel, ‘but tell me first, who is with Nadia?’

  ‘I’ve convinced the Bellville SC to send eight more people. They have every entrance covered,’ said Zola Nyathi.

  ‘OK. Thank you, sir.’

  ‘How come he doesn’t have to talk?’ asked Cupido.

  ‘Dave Fiedler has tracked the Cobra phone,’ said Griessel. ‘We have four other phone numbers. Two are registered with Orange France, and Dave can’t do anything with them. The other two are Cell C, they must have bought them here. Dave has been plotting their location over the last twenty-four hours. I think David Adair is on a farm by the name of Hercules Pillar, near the R304.’

  Griessel was watching Joaquim Curado closely. When he said the words ‘Hercules Pillar’, there was an infinitesimal movement of his head and eyes, and he knew that he was right.

  ‘Dave said the place is advertised on the Internet: Rent a farmhouse, privacy and solitude, just twenty minutes from Cape Town. Here is the Internet address . . .’

  They walked to Cupido’s office, where they could look up the Hercules Pillar website.

  ‘It’s perfect,’ said Mbali, because the old farmhouse, beautifu
lly renovated and whitewashed, was situated on a hill. You would be able to see any intruders coming a kilometre away.

  ‘We’ll have to go in with speed and superior firepower,’ said Nyathi. ‘That is the only option.’

  There were eight of them: Griessel and Cupido, Nyathi and Mbali, Radebe and Vusi Ndabeni, Frankie Fillander and Mooiwillem Liebenberg. Quietly, in pairs, each collected an assault rifle in the Hawks’ weapon safe, then crept though the corridors to the car park.

  They drove off in four cars.

  On the N1, in the leading car, the Giraffe asked Mbali, ‘What happened to the memory card?’

  She tapped a chubby hand on her big black handbag.

  ‘What are you going to do with it?’

  She looked out of the window. She said, ‘I’ll keep it as a safeguard.’

  ‘Against what?’

  ‘Against people who want to harm our democracy, and the spirit of my father’s struggle.’

  Nyathi just nodded. He couldn’t think of a better guardian for it.

  In their car, second in the convoy, Griessel asked, ‘What happened to Tyrone?’

  ‘Canny coloured daai. He gave me the slip,’ said Cupido.

  ‘Yes,’ said Griessel. ‘We old dogs don’t have the speed to keep up any more.’

  Cupido’s laugh was a little forced.

  And Benny realised what must have really happened.

  Their plan was simply to race up to the farmhouse on the hill: there was nowhere to hide, no room for surprise.

  They would drive up to the farmhouse, park the four vehicles around it. Then they would give the Cobras a chance to come out before they stormed the house and began shooting.

  The plan worked, up to a point.

  When all the cars had come to a halt, when they had jumped out and found shelter, assault rifles cocked and aimed at the windows and doors behind the wide veranda of the big house, there was only silence. Just the cooing of a few doves, and a cow mooing somewhere.

  Nyathi called out over the megaphone, ‘You are surrounded. Please put down your weapons, and come out with your hands on your heads.’

  They waited, the adrenaline pumping, fingers on triggers, heads shielded behind the safety of the vehicles’ metal bodies.

  No reaction. Only the afternoon hush, and the shadow of a fat white cloud that came and went.

  Griessel looked at the bare ground outside the front door. There were the tracks of other vehicle tyres in the mud of last night’s rain. The Cobras had parked in front of the door, with at least two vehicles. Maybe three.

  Nyathi repeated the message, even louder.

  Nothing happened.

  ‘Sir, let me run to the door,’ Cupido said.

  ‘Wait,’ said Nyathi.

  They waited. The minutes crept by.

  ‘OK, let’s cover Vaughn,’ said Nyathi. ‘Wait for my signal.’

  They stood up, lifted the barrels of the rifles over the roofs and bonnets of the cars, pointed them at the door and windows, where there was still no sign of life.

  ‘Go!’ yelled Nyathi.

  Cupido, in his long, elegant coat, ran across the open yard to the front door, slightly crouched, as if that would somehow help. The automatic rifle in his hand made him look like a character from a 1930’s film.

  Only his footsteps were audible on the saturated ground.

  He was safely at the door.

  Silence.

  ‘I hear something,’ said Cupido. He knelt down in front of the door.

  They waited, dead quiet.

  ‘Yes, there’s somebody in there.’

  He shifted closer to the door.

  ‘Someone is shouting for help,’ he said. ‘I think we should go in.’

  They found David Patrick Adair in the master bedroom of the house. He was stretched out and tied to the bed, with cable ties and rope. He was unshaven, dirty, and smelly, but unharmed. His first words when Cupido walked in were, ‘Are you the cavalry, or a different kind of trouble?’

  ‘We are the Hawks,’ said Cupido.

  ‘I’m not sure that answers my question . . .’

  Shouts from the other team members, as they declared the house safe, room by room.

  ‘We are the South African Police Service,’ said Cupido.

  Nyathi and Mbali walked in, then Griessel and Fillander.

  ‘And what a splendid representation of the Rainbow Nation you are,’ said Adair, his nonchalant tone trying unsuccessfully to disguise his immense relief. ‘You wouldn’t happen to know if my student, the lovely Lillian Alvarez, is safe, would you?’

  Adair politely requested a chance to shower. ‘And, please God, let me brush my teeth.’

  He was a tall, elegant man. Griessel saw that he wanted to preserve his dignity at all cost, but the trauma of the past days lay close to the surface.

  They waited on the veranda to make sure the Cobras didn’t make a surprise appearance. When Adair came out of the bathroom, Nyathi, Griessel, Mbali, and Cupido questioned him in the sitting room.

  He said there were three of them during the abduction in Franschhoek. ‘They were so terribly efficient. So utterly businesslike.’

  They knew about Lillian Alvarez. That was how they found out precisely where he was, because they had tapped Alvarez’s cellphone. And like a fool, he had phoned Alvarez last Friday night from the Franschhoek guesthouse.

  ‘They also used her to convince me to hand over the data. They said they would kill her. And that I had to call her, to bring the memory card.’

  ‘What was on the card?’ asked Nyathi.

  ‘A lot of data,’ said Adair.

  ‘What kind of data?’

  ‘The monetary evil that men do.’

  ‘Can you be more specific?’

  ‘How much time do we have?’

  ‘All the time we need.’

  ‘Well, there is the data on possible terrorists. And possible spies. And possible organised crime money laundering. By organised crime, and by the banks. Damning evidence of dirty banking hands. Not murky little banks in banana republics. Continental, international banking colossi. And then there’s the quite impressive and intimidatingly long list of corrupt government officials . . .’

  ‘South African government officials?’ asked Mbali.

  ‘I’m afraid so. But let me hasten to add that the data also includes government officials from thirty-nine other countries. My own included. And the evidence is quite conclusive.’

  ‘Can you tell us which South African government officials?’

  ‘Quite a few. MPs. Ministers. Your president, I’m sorry to add.’

  Mbali made a small despairing sound.

  ‘That’s how they got the SSA and CI involved,’ said Nyathi.

  ‘Who?’ asked Adair.

  ‘Your MI6 got our State Security Agency and Crime Intelligence Unit involved in the investigation, in the quest to find you.’

  ‘I see. No stone unturned. How comforting. But yes, you might be right. I did mention the corrupt politicians list to my friends at MI6.’

  ‘Who do the Cobras work for?’ asked Griessel.

  ‘The who?’

  ‘The people who kidnapped you. Do they work for the CIA?’ asked

  Cupido. ‘

  Good heavens, no. They are working for the banks.’

  61

  They didn’t believe him.

  David Adair explained. He said he knew he would only get one chance to go fishing for all manner of evil in the SWIFT system with his extensive new protocol, because he had always been very open about his political and ethical standards. There were so many factions watching him, all waiting to see what he wanted to do with the system – and suspecting that he might be looking for ammunition for his crusades.

  So he wrote the programming in such a way that he could slip in a digital Trojan horse afterwards, when everyone was satisfied that the protocol would not be damaging to them.

  And the end result, when the data began coming in, was
mind-boggling. There were the spying details, the corruption of politicians, the massive extent of large, well-respected international banks looking the other way and cooperating in the laundering of billions for organised crime. But what took him completely by surprise, was a conglomerate of international banks manipulating the financial system: to evade taxation, to fix rates, to tamper illegally with share prices and exchange rates, and to continue to trade in derivative instruments – indecipherable and complex derivatives, despite the huge risk it posed to the world economy.

  Executives of banks and financial institutions enriched themselves on a massive scale, at the expense of common people. He was totally unprepared for the greed, the sheer extent of the machinations.

  ‘The problem is, what does one do with such information? To make it public is an act of potential financial sabotage. The system, still very fragile after the meltdown, might well collapse. Or at least trigger a new international recession. The big losers won’t be the banking fat cats, but the very people I had hoped to protect. The public. So, just after my dialogue with MI6, I made the mistake of calling the CEO of a very big international bank. Just to tell him that it might be a good idea to start winding down all the illegal and dangerous activities. Or run the risk of being exposed. Yes, it was blackmail, but the cause was good and just, I thought. Soon after, I became aware of a series of strange occurrences. I thought I was being followed, I was pretty sure someone had been in my office and my house. Perhaps to plant bugs? So I took a few precautions. I flew to Marseilles to get myself a false passport, and I put a considerable sum of money away in a new account under the false name—’

  ‘Where would a university professor get a considerable sum of money from?’ asked Cupido.

  ‘The European Union has been rather generous in remunerating me for my work.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘I packed a suitcase, just in case. And when I got home from Lillian’s place last Monday night, and I saw that my home had been ransacked, I knew. And I ran.’

  ‘But how do you know it was the banks?’

  ‘I speak French,’ said Adair. ‘I understood what one of my abductors was saying over the phone to the people who hired them. There is only one conclusion.’