by Malla Nunn
‘Come, Sergeant.’ Shabalala stood up and headed across the sandy bank in the direction of the departing oxen. ‘The water is dropping fast. In one hour we will be able to cross the stream to the car.’
‘Ja,’ Emmanuel said reluctantly. He was in no hurry to tell Philani’s mother that her son was in pieces on a rock ledge.
The churn of wagon wheels and oxen hooves turned the farmyard into mud. Johannes and Petros, Sampie’s boys, rolled the full water barrels across the stoep and rested them against the rear wall of the house.
Emmanuel and Shabalala crossed the muck, their shoes and trouser bottoms caked with river sand and now more mud. Smoke from the kitchen fire made a long grey finger against the sky. A male figure sprinted from the stand of pomegranate trees and closed the distance to them in a blink.
‘That was quick,’ Emmanuel said.
Cyrus the runner was back at Covenant, dripping sweat and sucking air into his mouth. His shirt, already shabby and eaten with holes before the run, was now ripped and hanging loose from one shoulder. Cyrus must have cut through thorn bush to travel the quickest route to Little Flint Farm.
‘For you.’ The runner presented the split stick with a shaky hand. ‘From the little madam at the English farm.’
Emmanuel dug in his pocket and exchanged a handful of coins for the message. ‘Thank you, Cyrus. And sorry about the shirt,’ he said and unfolded the note. Six words were written across the page in blue ink: No answer at the police station. Ella’s signature looped under the reply. He gave the paper to Shabalala.
The Zulu detective read it and handed the note back to Emmanuel. ‘We are still on our own,’ he said. A tribe was nothing if all the factions did not pull together in times of trouble. The police force demanded the same kind of allegiance.
‘It’s just you, me and Zweigman again,’ Emmanuel said.
‘Yebo,’ Shabalala said. ‘But we know well how to work that way.’
Emmanuel laughed and remembered that yes, they had worked well together – it was just the trouble they had got into on those other cases that bothered him. He wondered if nosy police detectives and Jewish doctors had as many lives as cats.
Karin crossed the yard with a confident stride. ‘Cyrus brought bad news?’ she said. She hooked her thumbs into the belt loop of her dirty jeans and waited.
‘No answer at the police station,’ Emmanuel replied. Removing the body without Bagley’s help would be a challenge.
‘Pa says your boy can eat lunch with the workers at the kaffir hut.’ Karin pointed beyond the milking shed to a whitewashed hut with a grass roof, adding to Shabalala, ‘Come back to the big house when I call, okay?’
Shabalala tipped his hat and walked off.
Emmanuel had the honour of joining the whites-only table in the homestead. Sampie, Karin and Emmanuel ate springbok stew with potatoes in almost complete silence. Occasionally Sampie grunted requests, and Karin obeyed. For dessert she served peeled oranges accompanied by a nip of peach brandy poured into old jam jars. Emmanuel had only eaten half his serving of stew and was about to request second helpings of the brandy when a shout came from the yard.
‘What’s that?’ Sampie jumped up and cocked his head to the right, listening. More shouts and the slap of gumboots on dirt. Karin stood and reached for the rifle stored in the corner of the kitchen.
The dogs pawed the ground at the back door of the homestead, their unclipped nails digging into the dirt floor. Sampie pushed them out of the way and turned the handle. ‘Go!’ he growled and the boerboels sprinted into the yard, howling. Father, daughter and Emmanuel followed the pack of dogs outside, Karin slinging the rifle over her shoulder like a seasoned army sniper. The air was cool after the kitchen, the sun past its zenith.
‘By the coop,’ Sampie said. ‘That’s where they are. Go, Karin.’
The dogs were already running along the perimeter of the wire fence surrounding the poultry yard. Sampie and Karin closed in. If anyone was still inside the henhouse, there’d be no escaping now.
‘Thieves,’ Shabalala said when Emmanuel moved in the direction of the fracas. Workmen scattered among the farm buildings, shouting. The dogs barked. Guinea fowl in the woods raised their own alarm. ‘Stand and be quiet, Sergeant.’
The growls of the boerboels overwhelmed the crow of a rooster and the clucking of chickens. Emmanuel stood in the yard, straining to listen through all the sounds of panic.
‘Did you hear?’ Shabalala whispered.
‘Footsteps,’ Emmanuel said. The sound was only just discernible. ‘Where from?’
A string of filthy Afrikaans curses issued from the direction of the chicken coop. Both Karin and Sampie were calling down a plague on the thief, who must have slipped the net.
A thud came from inside the Paulus homestead. Emmanuel and Shabalala ran to the front door, left open by the maid who now huddled against the wall in fear. The house was dark after the sunlight outside. Rusted metal clicked against rusted metal.
‘Back door lock,’ Emmanuel said and ran the obstacle course of rickety chairs and piles of yellowed newspaper in the passage. Something heavy fell from the top of the family organ and hit the floor. A gasp of breath was heard and then the creak of an opening door.
Emmanuel and Shabalala entered the kitchen together. A slim male figure bolted across the stoep and sprinted for the treeline. Alert to a new front of attack, the boerboels streaked around the corner of the lean-to. The figure melted into the brush, the dogs following him.
‘Did you see that?’ Emmanuel said after the dogs had disappeared.
‘Yebo,’ Shabalala said. ‘My eyes saw it too. A white boy in a school uniform.’
TEN
Sampie Paulus’s face dripped sweat and his pale eyes glittered in the dim light. He tapped the bottom of a jam jar on the kitchen table and Karin poured more peach brandy into it. The dogs had come back from the hunt and were now asleep in front of the wood stove.
‘It was that Reed bastard,’ Sampie said. ‘For sure.’
‘Of course,’ Karin agreed. ‘Who else?’
‘From Little Flint?’ Emmanuel was still trying to make sense of a white thief in a public-school uniform stealing from people living below the poverty line. What did they have that he could possibly want?
‘Ja.’ Sampie downed half the contents of the jar. ‘He steals from all the farms around here. Been doing it for years, but what does that shithead Bagley do about it? Nothing. Filing a police report is a waste of time. The whole business is a fokken disgrace.’
Emmanuel glanced at Karin, who stood back in the shadows and said nothing. Shabalala kept to an unlit corner and also remained silent.
‘I met Thomas, Ella and the parents this morning,’ Emmanuel said. ‘Who is the boy?’
‘The younger son,’ Karin answered. ‘The beffoked one.’
‘What makes him crazy?’
Emmanuel almost felt her shrug in the gloom. ‘He’s just not right in the head. Never has been.’
‘Give me an example,’ Emmanuel said. By some standards he’d be considered befok himself.
‘Well.’ The word came out short and exasperated. ‘He runs away from school every term. He lives in the woods and steals from all the farmers, even from his own people. The shops in town have banned him because he steals from them, too.’
‘Easter holidays he beat one of the farmhands at Little Flint and the doctor had to come from Roselet,’ said Sampie. ‘The constable kept that quiet.’
‘What’s his name?’ Emmanuel asked. A disturbed, violent young man at Little Flint could have killed Amahle, he thought.
‘Gabriel,’ Karin said. ‘And he speaks funny, doesn’t he, Pa?’
‘Like a skipping gramophone record. All here and there.’ Sampie swallowed half the remaining brandy and tears welled up when the alcohol hit. ‘What did he take this time?’
‘The honey.’ Karin was annoyed. ‘I only got it this morning. Plus the grey and yellow blanket from my bed.’
<
br /> There was a long pause before Sampie said, ‘Funny, he normally takes eggs from the chicken coop or sardines from the pantry. Sometimes jam. First time he’s ever taken anything that wasn’t food.’
‘Befok. Like I said.’
Emmanuel considered the new information. Every family had outcasts: embezzling uncles, aunts pickled in gin, kerb-crawling sons or promiscuous daughters. The Reeds weren’t special in that regard. ‘Gabriel might have taken the blanket because he was cold,’ he said. ‘The temperature drops at night, especially out on the hillside.’
‘Ja, but not so much in spring,’ Sampie said. ‘And he knows how to build a fire. Karin found one of his hideaways last Easter, didn’t you, girl? A rock tunnel behind a tree.’
Emmanuel heard Karin shift her weight from one foot to the other, the way a boxer might before dodging a blow. ‘Do you know all the caves in the mountains around the farm, Karin?’ he asked.
‘Not all,’ she said defensively. ‘I don’t know where that boy is hiding. His pa and brother normally get one of their Zulus to track him down and then they drive him back to school, crying like a baby.’
The Zulu man Thomas Reed had dressed down in the cattle yard might well have been a tracker. ‘Do you know how long Gabriel’s been on the run this time?’ Emmanuel asked.
‘No idea.’ Sampie rolled the jam jar between his palms, considering a top-up. ‘First we know about the little bastard being out in the woods is when he gets into the henhouse or the pantry.’
‘Today was the first time in a while, then?’
‘Ja. He must have ditched school two or three days ago. That’s how long it takes him to run down the valley and back home.’ Sampie pushed the jar across the table. ‘I’ll give him his due: he outfoxes my dogs every time.’
‘The devil knows the darkness, Pa,’ Karin said, and Sampie nodded in agreement.
Emmanuel drew the threads of the story together. If what Sampie and Karin said was true then the Reed boy was a habitual runaway and thief, sheltered from the consequences of his actions by Constable Bagley’s wilful blindness. Emmanuel knew how this story could play out. It was easy to go from breaking minor laws to breaking major ones. In fact, if the perpetrator remained unpunished it was almost inevitable. Some of Emmanuel’s childhood friends had graduated from school to running the streets and then to prison before they reached twenty years old. He’d felt the insistent pull of the shadowy, dangerous corners of Sophiatown himself. In one of life’s ironies, joining the army had saved him and perhaps ruined him at the same time.
‘So, Gabriel could have been in the hills for days without anyone knowing about it,’ Emmanuel said. Depending on when the boy had absconded from school, he might have been in the area on the night Amahle was murdered.
‘That’s the Reeds’ business, not mine. You’ll have to check with them. And while you’re there, Sergeant Cooper, ask them when they’re going to buy me a new blanket and replace the jar of honey.’ Sampie pushed back from the table. ‘We’ll check the river level in half an hour, see how we stand.’
Karin removed the jam jars from the table while Sampie shuffled out of the kitchen and back to work.
‘Have you seen Gabriel in the last few days?’ Emmanuel asked Karin. A schoolboy could have made the prints around Amahle’s body.
‘No.’ She stared at the alcohol swirling at the bottom of the jar she held in her hand. ‘Haven’t caught sight of him.’ She made eye contact with Emmanuel and swallowed the brandy in one shot. ‘I have to get back to work,’ she said and walked away.
She was almost through the passage doorway when Emmanuel stopped her. ‘Wait. Your pa said that Gabriel Reed hit one of the farmworkers at Little Flint Farm.’
‘Ja. The doctor came out from town to fix things up.’ She rubbed a fingertip along a seam in the mud-brick wall.
‘Must have been bad.’
‘Doctor couldn’t come out here when Pa had the flu last winter but she travels to help a kaffir. What do you make of that?’
‘I think someone got hurt badly,’ Emmanuel said. The family had been forced to send for proper medical help instead of using the first aid box or calling on a local nun with a supply of novocaine. ‘Do you know what led to the beating?’
A smile curved Karin’s mouth and she appeared soft and pliant in the half-light. ‘I can’t say for sure. It might have had something to do with a workman laying a hand on one of the Reeds’ special kaffirs . . .’
‘Amahle?’ Emmanuel asked.
‘I don’t know. That’s English business.’ She left the kitchen.
‘Well, that was either a hint about Amahle being the cause of the problem, or spite,’ Emmanuel said to Shabalala. ‘Karin doesn’t like the Reeds or the way they treated Amahle when she was alive, that much I do know.’
‘The kitchen gardener with the broken face must have been the one beaten by the little Reed baas.’ Shabalala made the connection. ‘He will never talk. We must ask the constable and the doctor about the fight.’
‘Bagley is nowhere, so let’s ask Dr Daglish when we get back to Roselet. If the workman’s injuries were serious she would have visited Little Flint a few times.’ Emmanuel swallowed a mouthful of brandy and offered the bottle to Shabalala, who declined. ‘Daglish knew Amahle, after all,’ he said. ‘Why would she lie about a thing like that?’
*
The creek had receded and the main road to Roselet was two stepping stones away. Shabalala cleared the water first and Emmanuel followed. By now keeping dry didn’t matter. They both looked as ragged as hobos in stolen suits.
‘No Mr Insurance Policy,’ Emmanuel said and crossed the grass verge to the Chevrolet. It was 2 p.m. and Zweigman’s examination of the body was probably finished by now. The results might yield some answers.
‘No-one has heard of him, Sergeant. He is not a Zulu from the valley.’
‘We’ll ask in town but it feels like that lead is going nowhere.’ He fished out the car keys and inserted them in the driver’s side door. The angle was wrong, the keyhole at a lower level than normal. He stepped back to look.
‘Little bastard.’ Emmanuel now knew just how Sampie Paulus felt when the Reed boy stole from the homestead and escaped without punishment. ‘The front tyre’s been slashed.’
‘Huh . . .’ Shabalala crouched down to examine the damage. ‘One cut with a small knife. The tyre must be changed.’
Another delay, Emmanuel thought. It was no wonder he hated the country. Dirt, flies, cow dung, and now a thieving schoolboy with a malicious streak and a knife. ‘I’ll check the spare.’ He opened the boot, praying the detective branch pool vehicle was up to standard. It was – this time at least. He removed the tool bag and lifted the spare from the well. Shabalala unpacked the jack and wrench and set to work. Despite not having the authority to drive a car, at some time the black man had learned how to change a flat.
ELEVEN
Town was quiet. A wrinkled white woman and her bulldozer of a black maid trundled past two farm trucks parked outside Dawson’s General Store. A spindly yellow dog trotted at the side of the road with its nose to the ground.
‘Three main stores,’ Emmanuel said. He’d filled Shabalala in on Amahle and her payday purchases. ‘The café is Europeans only so she didn’t go there. That leaves the farm supply store, the general store and the spaza shops hidden in the backstreets. A couple of hours’ work at best.’
‘I will ask at the spaza shops,’ Shabalala said. These hidden businesses operating out of back rooms and side windows were the lifeblood of the black community. Spaza shops traded without a licence and remained out of sight of the authorities. ‘Maybe the chief’s daughter bought a Fanta or some other small thing.’
‘Very possible.’ Emmanuel turned left and into the doctor’s driveway.
‘Sergeant . . .’ Shabalala’s fingers gripped the dashboard. ‘Look out.’
Zweigman and Daglish appeared out of nowhere, running full pelt towards the car like two escapees fro
m a demented physicians’ home. Emmanuel slammed on the brakes and the tyres kicked gravel into the air. The Chevrolet stopped inches from Zweigman’s outstretched hands.
‘Quickly.’ The German doctor was sweating heavily, a raised lump swelling at the centre of his forehead. ‘He’s still inside.’
‘Who?’ Emmanuel cleared the driver’s seat in seconds. Shabalala was one step ahead of him, surveying the garden and the side path for signs of danger.
‘We tried to call the police station from inside the house.’ Margaret Daglish’s cheeks were red, her words tumbling out. ‘There was no answer, so we ran.’
‘Tell me what happened,’ Emmanuel said.
‘Shhh . . .’ Shabalala raised a finger for quiet. He said, ‘Footsteps splashing in water.’
‘The creek,’ Margaret Daglish guessed. ‘Thank god for that. He’s running back to the valley.’
‘Hamba!’ Emmanuel said to Shabalala. ‘Let’s move.’
They hit the side path and broke out of the rear of the property in less than thirty seconds. Another thirty seconds brought them to the shallow stream crowded with stones. Across the water and too far in the distance to make a clean identification, a black speck sliced across the veldt at incredible speed.
‘Wait.’ Emmanuel placed a hand on Shabalala’s arm before the Zulu detective could jump the stream. ‘Reckon you can catch up?’
‘Yes,’ Shabalala said, then added, ‘Eventually.’
‘Let him go.’ That was the only option. It would take precious time to close the gap, with no guarantee of capture or an interview at the end. The speck melded into a rock outcrop and disappeared into the landscape. ‘Let’s find out what happened to Daglish and Zweigman.’
‘A moment, please.’ Shabalala crouched down at the edge of the stream and examined the faint indentations in the sand bank. Next he doubled back on the path leading to the cellar, stopping every few feet to examine the crushed grass and disturbed soil. Emmanuel held his breath. Shabalala only stopped when he thought he had something valuable.