by Deon Meyer
The eyes mesmerized him. Were they his? They reflected no light, as if they were empty and dead inside.
From the late afternoon he lay on his hotel bed, arms behind his head, motionless.
He remembered: Pakamile in the shed above the house milking a cow for the first time, all thumbs, in too much of a hurry. Frustrated that the teats would not respond to the manipulation of his small fingers. And then, at last, the thin white stream shooting off at an angle to spray the shed floor and the triumphant cry from the boy: “Thobela! Look!”
The small figure in school uniform that waited every afternoon for him, socks at half-mast, shirt-tails hanging, the backpack disproportionately big. The joy every day when he drew up. If he came on the motorbike, Pakamile would first look around to see which of his friends was witness to this exotic event, this unique machine that only he had the right to ride home on.
Sometimes his friends slept over; four, five, six boys tailing Pakamile around the farmyard. “My father and I planted all these vegetables.” “This is my father’s motorbike and this is mine.” “My father planted all this lucerne himself, hey.” A Friday night . . . everyone in a Christmas bed in the sitting room, jammed in like sardines in a flat tin. The house had vibrated with life. The house was full. Full.
The emptiness of the room overwhelmed him. The silence, the contrast. A part of him asked the question: what now? He tried to banish it with memories, but still it echoed. He thought long about it, but he knew in an unformulated way that Miriam and Pakamile had been his life. And now there was nothing.
He got up once to relieve himself and drink water and went back to lie down. The air conditioner hissed and blew under the window. He stared at the ceiling, waited for the night to pass so the trial could begin.
The accused sat alongside each other: Khoza and Ramphele. They looked him in the eyes. Beside them the advocate for the defense stood up: an Indian, tall and athletically lean, flamboyant in a smart black suit and purple tie.
“Mr. Mpayipheli, when the state prosecutor asked you what your profession was, you said you were a farmer.”
He did not answer, because it was not a question.
“Is that correct?” The Indian had a soothing voice, as intimate as if they were old friends.
“It is.”
“But that is not the whole truth, is it?”
“I don’t know what . . .”
“How long have you been a so-called farmer, Mr. Mpayipheli?”
“Two years.”
“And what was your profession before you began farming?”
The state prosecutor, the serious woman with the gold-rimmed spectacles, stood up. “Objection, Your Honor. Mr. Mpayipheli’s work history is irrelevant to the case before the court.”
“Your Honor, the background of the witness is not only relevant to his reliability as a witness, but also to his behavior at the filling station. The defense has serious doubts about Mr. Mpayipheli’s version of the events.”
“I shall allow you to continue,” said the judge, a middle-aged white man with a double chin and a red complexion. “Answer the question, Mr. Mpayipheli.”
“What was your profession before you went farming?” repeated the advocate.
“I was a gofer at a motorbike retailer.”
“For how long?”
“Two years.”
“And before that?”
His heart began to race. He knew he must not hesitate, nor look unsure.
“I was a bodyguard.”
“A bodyguard.”
“Yes.”
“Let us go one step further back, Mr. Mpayipheli, before we return to your answer. What did you do before you, as you say, became a bodyguard?”
Where had the man obtained this information? “I was a soldier.”
“A soldier.”
He did not answer. He felt hot in his suit and tie. He felt sweat trickle down his back.
The Indian shuffled documents on the table before him and came up with a few sheets of paper. He walked to the state prosecutor and gave her a copy. He repeated the process with the judge and placed one before Thobela.
“Mr. Mpayipheli, would it be accurate to say you tend towards euphemism?”
“Objection, Your Honor, the defense is intimidating the witness and the direction of questioning is irrelevant.” She had glanced at the document and began to look uncomfortable. Her voice had reached a higher note.
“Overruled. Proceed.”
“Mr. Mpayipheli, you and I can play evasion games all day but I have too much respect for this court to allow that. Let me help you. I have here a newspaper report” — he waved the document in the air — “that states, and I quote: ‘Mpayipheli, a former Umkhonto We Sizwe soldier who received specialist training in Russia and the former East Germany, was connected until recently to a drugs syndicate on the Cape Flats . . .’ End of quote. The article refers to a certain Thobela Mpayipheli who was wanted by the authorities two years ago in connection with the disappearance of, and I quote once more, ‘government intelligence of a sensitive nature.’”
Just before the prosecutor leapt up, she glanced fiercely at Thobela, as if he had betrayed her. “Your Honor, I must protest. The witness is not on trial here . . .”
“Mr. Singh, are you going somewhere with this argument?”
“Absolutely, Your Honor. I ask for just a moment of the court’s patience.”
“Proceed.”
“Is that what this newspaper article is referring to, Mr. Mpayipheli?”
“Yes.”
“Excuse me, I can’t hear you.”
“Yes.” Louder.
“Mr. Mpayipheli, I put it to you that your version of the events at the filling station is just as evasive and euphemistic as your description of your background.”
“That is . . .”
“You are a highly trained military man, schooled in the military arts, urban terrorism and guerrilla warfare . . .”
“I object, Your Honor — that is not a question.”
“Overruled. Let the man finish, madam.”
She sat down, shaking her head, with a deep frown behind the gold-rimmed spectacles. “As it pleases the court,” she said, but her tone said otherwise.
“And a ‘bodyguard’ for the drug syndicate in the Cape for two years. A bodyguard. That is not what the newspapers say . . .”
The state prosecutor stood up, but the judge pre-empted her: “Mr. Singh, you are testing the patience of the court. If you wish to lead evidence, please await your turn.”
“My sincere apologies, Your Honor, but it is an affront to the principles of justice for a witness under oath to fabricate a story —”
“Mr. Singh, spare me. What is your question?”
“As it pleases the court, Your Honor. Mr. Mpayipheli, what was the specific purpose of your military training?”
“That was twenty years ago.”
“Answer the question, please.”
“I was trained in counter-espionage activities.”
“Did this include the use of firearms and explosives?”
“Yes.”
“Hand-to-hand combat?”
“Yes.”
“The handling of high-pressure situations?”
“Yes.”
“Elimination and escape.”
“Yes.”
“And at the filling station you say, and I quote: ‘I ducked behind the petrol pump,’ when you heard the shots?”
“The war was over ten years ago. I was not there to fight, I was there to fill up . . .”
“The war was not over for you ten years ago, Mr. Mpayipheli. You took the war to the Cape Flats with your training in death and injury. Let us discuss your role as bodyguard . . .”
The prosecutor’s voice was high and plaintive. “Your Honor, I object in the strongest —”
At that moment Thobela saw the faces of the accused; they were laughing at him.
“Objection sustained. Mr. Singh, that is
enough. You have made your point. Do you have any specific questions about the events at the filling station?”
Singh’s shoulders sagged, as if wounded. “As it pleases the court, Your Honor, I have.”
“Then get on with it.”
“Mr. Mpayipheli, did you forget that it was you who attacked the accused when they left the filling station?”
“I did not.”
“You did not forget?”
“Your Honor, the defense . . .”
“Mr. Singh!”
“Your Honor, the accused . . . excuse me, the witness is evading the question.”
“No, Mr. Singh, it is you who are leading the witness.”
“Very well. Mr. Mpayipheli, you say you did not charge at the accused in a threatening manner?”
“I did not.”
“You did not have a wheel spanner or some tool . . .”
“I object, Your Honor, the witness has already answered the question.”
“Mr. Singh . . .”
“I have no further questions for this liar, Your Honor . . .”
4.
I think he believed he could make things right. Anything,” she said in the twilit room. The sun had dropped behind the hills of the town and the light entering the room was softer. It made the telling easier, she thought, and wondered why.
“That is the thing that I admired most. That somebody stood up and did something that the rest of us were too afraid to do, even if we wanted to. I never had the guts. I was too scared to fight back. And then I read about him in the papers and I began to wonder: maybe I could also . . .”
She hesitated a fraction and then asked with bated breath: “Do you know about Artemis, Reverend?”
He did not react at first, sitting motionless, tipped slightly forward, engrossed in the story she was telling. Then he blinked, his attention refocused.
“Artemis? Er, yes . . .” he said tentatively.
“The one the papers wrote about.”
“The papers . . .” He seemed embarrassed. “Some things pass me by. Something new every week. I don’t always keep up.”
She was relieved about that. There was an imperceptible shift in their roles — he the small-town minister, she the worldly-wise one, the one in the know. She slipped her foot out of its sandal and folded it under her, shifting to a more comfortable position in the chair. “Let me tell you,” she said with more self-assurance.
He nodded.
“I was in trouble when I read about him for the first time. I was in the Cape. I was . . .” For a fraction of a second she hesitated and wondered if it would upset him. “I was a call girl.”
At half-past eleven that night he was still awake on his hotel bed when someone knocked softly on his door, apologetically.
It was the public prosecutor, her eyes magnified behind the spectacles.
“Sorry,” she said, but she just looked tired.
“Come in.”
She hesitated a moment and he knew why: he was just in his shorts, his body glistening with perspiration. He turned around and picked up his T-shirt, motioning her to take the single armchair. He perched on the end of the bed.
She sat primly on the chair; her hands folded the dark material of her skirt over her plump legs. She had an officious air, as if she had come to speak of weighty things.
“What happened today in court?” he asked.
She shrugged.
“He wanted to blame me. The Indian.”
“He was doing his job. That’s all.”
“His job?”
“He has to defend them.”
“With lies?”
“In law there are no lies, Mr. Mpayipheli. Just different versions of the truth.”
He shook his head. “There is only one truth.”
“You think so? And what one truth is there about you? The one where you are a farmer? A father? A freedom fighter? Or a drug dealer? A fugitive from the state?”
“That has nothing to do with Pakamile’s death,” he said, anger creeping into his words.
“The moment Singh brought it up in court, it became part of his death, Mr. Mpayipheli.”
Rage flooded over him, reliving the day of frustration: “All that Mister, Mister, so polite, and objections and playing little legal games . . . And those two sitting there and laughing.”
“That is why I have come,” she said. “To tell you: they have escaped.”
He did not know how long he sat there, just staring at her.
“One of them overpowered a policeman. In the cells, when he brought him food. He had a weapon, a knife.”
“Overpowered,” he said, as if tasting the word.
“The police . . . They are short of manpower. Not everyone turned up on shift.”
“They both got away.”
“There are roadblocks. The station commander said they won’t get far.”
The rage inside him took on another face that he did not wish her to see. “Where would they go?”
She shrugged once more, as if she was beyond caring. “Who knows?”
When he did not respond, she leaned forward in the chair. “I wanted to tell you. You have the right to know.”
She stood up. He waited for her to pass him, then stood up and followed her to the door.
There was doubt in the minister’s face. He had shifted his large body back and cocked his head sideways, as if waiting for her to qualify her statement, to complete the sentence with a punch line.
“You don’t believe me.”
“I find it . . . unlikely.”
Somewhere she felt emotion. Gratitude? Relief? She did not mean to show it but her voice betrayed her. “My professional name was Bibi.”
His voice was patient as he responded. “I believe you. But I look at you and I listen to you and I can’t help wondering why. Why was that necessary for you?”
This was the second time she had been asked that. Usually they asked “How?” For them she had a story to fit expectations. She wanted to use it now — it lay on her tongue, rehearsed, ready.
She drew a breath to steady herself. “I could tell you I was always a sex addict, a nymphomaniac,” she said with deliberation.
“But that is not the truth,” he said.
“No, Reverend, it is not.”
He nodded as if he approved of her answer. “It’s getting dark,” he said, standing up and switching on the standard lamp in the corner. “Can I offer you something to drink? Coffee? Tea?”
“Tea would be lovely, thank you.” Did he need time to recover, she wondered?
“Excuse me a moment,” he said, and opened the door diagonally behind her.
She remained behind, alone, wondering what was the worst thing he had heard in this study. What small-town scandals? Teenage pregnancies? Affairs? Friday night domestics?
What made someone like him stay here? Perhaps he liked the status, because doctors and ministers were important people in the rural areas, she knew. Or was he running away like she was? As he had run off just now; as if there was a certain level of reality that became too much for him.
He came back, shutting the door behind him. “My wife will bring the tea soon,” he said and sat down.
She did not know how to begin. “Did I upset you?”
He pondered a while before he answered, as if he had to gather the words together. “What upsets me is a world — a society — that allows someone like you to lose the way.”
“We all lose our way sometimes.”
“We don’t all become sex workers.” He motioned towards her in a broad gesture, to include everything. “Why was that necessary?”
“You are the second person to ask that in the past month or so.”
“Oh?”
“The other one was a detective in Cape Town.” She smiled as she recalled. “Griessel. He had tousled hair. And soft eyes, but they looked right through you.”
“Did you tell him the truth?”
“I almost did.”
“Was he a . . . what do you call it?”
“A client?” She smiled.
“Yes.”
“No. He was . . . just . . . I don’t know . . . lost?”
“I see,” said the minister.
There was a soft tap on the door and he had to get up to take the tea tray.
5.
Detective Inspector Benny Griessel opened his eyes to his wife standing before him, shaking his shoulder with one hand and urgently whispering, “Benny,” she said. “Benny, please.”
He was lying on the sitting-room couch, that much he knew. He must have fallen asleep here. He smelt coffee; his head was thick and throbbing. One arm squashed under him was numb, circulation cut off by the weight of his body.
“Benny, we have to talk.”
He groaned and struggled to sit up.
“I brought you some coffee.”
He looked at her, at the deep lines on her face. She was still stooped over him.
“What time is it?” His words battled to connect with his vocal chords.
“It’s five o’clock, Benny.” She sat next to him on the couch. “Drink the coffee.”
He had to take it with his left hand. The mug was hot against his palm.
“It’s early,” he said.
“I need to talk to you before the children wake up.”
The message borne on her tone penetrated his consciousness. He sat up straight and spilled the coffee on his clothes — he was still wearing yesterday’s. “What have I done?”
She pointed an index finger across the open-plan room. The bottle of Jack Daniel’s stood on the dining-room table beside his plate of untouched dinner. The ashtray was overflowing and a smashed glass lay in shards beside the overturned bar stools at the breakfast counter.
He took a gulp of coffee. It burned his mouth, but could not take the sick taste of the night away. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Sorry isn’t good enough anymore,” she said.
“Anna . . .”
“No, Benny, no more. I can’t do this anymore.” Her voice was without inflection.