And, what was worse, he was now aware that I knew about Flash Funerals, if they really existed – and if, in fact, they had something to do with the killing. If Thabo Mchunu had anything at all to do with Phineas Ndzoyiya’s death, I had alerted him to what I had found out and put him on his guard. If he had something to do with the attempted break-in at Paul’s house and the threatening phone call, I could now have put both myself and Paul at risk. Nervously, I pinched the leathery green needles of a rosemary bush between my fingers, releasing the lingering, pungent scent that for a moment seemed to fill the air. Rosemary for remembrance, said Shakespeare. Would I look back on this day with regret? I told myself not to be ridiculous, and, completely unpersuaded, made my way back into the house, wondering what on earth I should do now.
22
LUNCH WITH MY PARENTS the next day should have been a return to normality after a difficult couple of weeks. Mum is a good cook, and in honour of my birthday she had cooked a fillet, along with chips (a nod to Mike there) and a salad of rocket and asparagus. For pudding, there was a perfect tarte tatin, something I know how to make, but have never been confident enough to tackle. Life with Simon taught me that culinary flops cannot be written off to experimentation – they are a sign of incompetence, and I have never really got my head round trying again since he left.
But escape from the murder could not be for long: what I had said to Thabo Mchunu hammered away in my mind and, inevitably I suppose, Mum and Dad wanted to know more about Daniel. I repeated what I had told them the day before, and confessed that I had been in contact with the dead man’s son in an effort to get to the bottom of what his father had been doing, whether he had enemies. My parents looked unenthusiastic as I explained, but I could see Mike thinking it was all quite cool. He, of course, hadn’t seen the corpse.
I mentioned the apparent quarrel between Phineas Ndzoyiya and Thabo Mchunu, though I didn’t say anything about my telephone conversation with the latter. I said I was wondering whether their argument could have had something to do with Ndzoyiya’s death. I left out the threats to Paul, and the odd phone calls: there had been another one that morning – also from a “Private number”. Of course, they could have been wrong numbers, or anything, but they could also have been someone trying to frighten me – and succeeding. Mike interrupted to ask about the Mendi. He had heard of it, but anything more than the name seemed to have passed him by. History was not one of his matric subjects.
My father, something of an amateur military historian, was immediately in his element, and began to explain the whole story: how the Mendi had been carrying members of the South African Native Labour Corps to France from Cape Town. After calling in at Plymouth, the ship had sailed for France where the men were due to join the war as support troops, digging trenches and the like.
“In the fog, she was struck by a merchant ship, and sank very quickly,” explained my father. “More than 600 of the soldiers, as well as several of the crew, were drowned. Most of the troops had come from the Pondoland area, on the Wild Coast, and most of them couldn’t swim. Not that it would have helped much. It was winter, and the water would have been very cold. The story goes that the chaplain to the troops gathered the men around him on the ship as she was sinking and calmed them, telling them to ‘drill the death drill’.” Dad got up from the table and went off to find a reference book, coming back and reading to Mike what it was Reverend Isaac Dyobha was supposed to have said.
“‘Be quiet and calm, my countrymen. What is happening now is what you came to do … you are going to die, but that is what you came to do. Brothers, we are drilling the death drill. I, a Xhosa, say you are my brothers … Swazis, Pondos, Basotho … so let us die like brothers. We are the sons of Africa. Raise your war cries, brothers, for though they made us leave our assegais in the kraal, our voices are left with our bodies’.”
Mike looked suitably impressed. It is a moving speech, and one that deserves to be remembered, though perhaps more as an example of the utter futility of war than anything else. Dad went on to explain how the captain of the merchant ship didn’t stop to pick up survivors. “Maybe he was frightened, though some people have said he didn’t stop because the majority of the victims were black. So, like so much else, it’s a political football as well as a human tragedy.”
He explained that, post 1994, the previously forgotten, or at least ignored, story of the Mendi had come back into the public eye. Dad looked over the top of his reading glasses at Mike, who nodded. He was very fond of his grandfather, and enjoyed Dad’s moments of didacticism. As a teenager, I had objected to them, moaning about being bored when Dad took us to places of what he considered educational value. But as a small child, and now as an adult, I actually rather liked it. It struck me that if I tried to tell Mike the story, he would have fidgeted and his eyes would have glazed over. Grandparents can get away with a lot.
But as my father was talking, I found myself becoming more and more convinced that this tale, almost a century old, had nothing whatsoever to do with the death of Phineas Ndzoyiya. There had to be more to it than that. He had quarrelled about it with Thabo Mchunu, sure, and after his reaction to my stupid remark to Mchunu yesterday, I was beginning to think he really was involved in some way: otherwise, why react to the name of Flash Funerals by hanging up on me? But the Mendi must surely be a red herring?
When we got home, Mike went off with his mates, presumably for the previous evening’s postponed activities. Beyond a passing admonition to be careful of his stitches, I said nothing. Following lunch with Mum and Dad, I was feeling full and lazy, and the idea of passing out on the sofa, allowing myself to sink into its sagging, oblivion-inducing comfort, was irresistible. Telling Grumpy, and my conscience, that I would kip for just 20 minutes and then head out for some exercise, I collapsed in a heap.
My 20 minutes turned out to be an hour and a half, and I only woke because Grumpy, his patience wearing thin, pushed his large, clammy nose into my ear. I rolled over, and penitently foregoing my longed-for cup of tea, pulled on my trainers, picked up the dog lead and headed up the road. We took the path past the spot where the body had been. I knew that, unless I was going to risk losing all pleasure in what bloody Sergeant Dhlomo had called my amenities, I was going to have to get used to it. And once it was behind us, I made a concerted effort to put the murder and all its ramifications out of my mind. I walked fast: I needed to shake Mum’s lunch off, and I owed Grumpy a decent outing before it got dark.
The shadows of the trees were long and solid across the road by the time I got home and, even though the walk had been brisk, the air was fresh enough to make me wish I had picked up a jersey on the way out. I fed the dog before I turned the kettle on and, from the kitchen, heard a car pulling up. One of Mike’s friends had recently passed his driving test and, aware that I couldn’t reasonably forbid my son to travel with anyone under the age of 40, I had reluctantly agreed that Stephen could drive him, at least in the hours of daylight. Stephen had obviously borrowed his father’s car to bring Mike home, and I strolled out to meet them, trying not to look too relieved to see them in one piece.
“Was someone here, Ma?” Mike asked. “There was a car parked just outside, but it pulled off when we arrived.”
Anxiety came sweeping back, like clouds obscuring the light. “No, no one. What sort of car?”
“Oh, just a bakkie. Isuzu, I think. I didn’t really notice,” said Stephen.
In an attempt to distract myself and avoid answering Mike’s question, I offered the boys tea and chocolate cake. My appetite, even for the tea, had vanished. The two of them fooled around in the kitchen for a while, and then went off to look at something on Mike’s computer. I told myself there could be a thousand and one reasons why a car was parked in the street. If it was behind the wall, I couldn’t have seen it unless I walked out to the gate: it was where Dan had parked his Golf that day. There was no reason to assume it was anything to do with the murder, or that someone was spying on me. The
road along the front of the house was busy enough, with a filling station and a couple of small shops less than a hundred metres away.
I shook myself: I was getting paranoid. The police were investigating. I had merely asked Mr Mchunu about his dealings with Dan and Mr Ndzoyiya, presenting myself, genuinely, as a concerned friend of Dan’s. Surely no one would come and park outside my house for that? And, anyway, didn’t Mchunu live in Gauteng? It struck me that I didn’t really know where he was based.
If it had been Mchunu, and if he had wanted to confront me, what better opportunity than when I was walking my dog in the plantations? No. The bakkie outside the house had to be a coincidence. I almost succeeded in convincing myself. Almost. My stupid Flash Funerals remark hammered away at my feebly constructed comfort.
23
MONDAY MORNING: FRESH BEGINNINGS. I would be sensible and leave Daniel’s predicament to the professionals: Robin and the police. If I pretended my call to Thabo Mchunu hadn’t happened, maybe it would go away. Chantal phoned during break: obviously the kind of efficient person who knows when to phone teachers. She asked if I had heard anything more about the bail appeal, or whether the police had been to see me again. I said no, but told her I would phone Robin and see how things were going.
She said Sergeant Dhlomo had visited them again, asking all kinds of questions about who could have known that Dan planned to visit me. All she and Verne knew was that when Dan arrived from Joburg he said he would be coming round, probably the next day, but had given them no specific time. And she couldn’t think who else he might have told – why would he?
She sounded accusatory, as if the sergeant bugging them was my fault and as if she thought she and Verne were suspected of something. I commiserated, and said it was one of the things that puzzled me too. If the bakkie I thought I had seen had been following Dan – unlikely though it seemed that anyone would follow someone with a corpse in the boot – then I couldn’t have seen it before Dan arrived. The whole thing made no sense. And unless Dan had fortuitously run into the murderer and told him what he was planning to do with his afternoon, how could he, or possibly she, have known where and when to dump the body? It was pure chance that Dan had been walking my dog. Nothing seemed to add up. Chantal and I agreed to keep in touch, and she rang off.
When I called Robin, he had little to tell me. He was “working on” getting Dan bailed, and following up various leads, but he was vague about specifics. I spoke to Chantal again and, forgetting that I had opted out of detection, told her I was hoping to see Dan this week if I could. She had some clean clothes for him, and asked if I would take them. So I did, visiting Dan during the official visiting hours at the holding cells. I again castigated myself for being a wimp as I cringed away from the grimy walls and the people I saw, but it was an experience my run-of-the-mill suburban life had not prepared me for, and I hated every minute of it.
Dan looked drawn, but insisted he was okay. He was still alone in his cell, and while he complained of being lonely, he knew that, as a Zimbabwean, at least that way he was safe from any xenophobic impulses of other prisoners, although not from the police. He was convinced the sergeant resented his status as a refugee, and said he had made a couple of disparaging remarks about freeloading Zimbabweans the last time he had been to question Dan. But at least he had kept it to remarks: there had been no overt violence or threats. I disliked Dhlomo, but it seemed he stayed within the boundaries. His presence, however, was threatening enough.
I handed over the clothes, and the sketchbook and pencils I had brought him. He seemed delighted, and offered to contribute a drawing of the interior of a prison cell to my exhibition. So at least he could still make a joke, albeit a rather feeble one.
My good intentions of Monday were wilting further in the reality of Daniel’s position. I asked if he could possibly have mentioned to anyone, apart from Verne and Chantal, that he was coming to see me. Unless whoever had dumped Phineas Ndzoyiya’s corpse had known Dan was going to be in the vicinity, why on earth would they have dumped him there? As far as I knew, the police had not yet worked out where he had been killed. He had left Paul’s house on the morning of the day of his death, ostensibly to visit the Archives, according to Paul. And had vanished into thin air – until he was found dead later in the afternoon at the top of my road. Paul had said the police told him his father had never arrived at the Archives. All researchers have to sign the register, and his name was not listed. Nor had anyone working there seen him.
“Think, Dan. On the day of the murder, did you tell anyone … anyone at all … where you were going that afternoon?”
Dan sank his head into his fists, elbows on the greasy table. For the first time I noticed a few wiry grey hairs among the black curls on his head. Finally he straightened his neck and looked wearily at me.
“The sergeant has already asked me, Laura, and I honestly don’t think so. I went up to the university in the morning to see a few people, and I had coffee with Verne at the cafeteria. I did say to him that I would probably go over to your place later, but he knew that anyway – and we can’t suspect Verne, surely? There were a few people around, but I didn’t know them. Though, wait a minute, one was that fellow Martin – Martin Shongwe, I think he is. He was on campus when I was a student, but he became SRC president at some stage and dropped a year. I didn’t know him well. He’s back there – I think he’s now doing some kind of postgrad work on curatorial policies.”
He sat up. “Hang on, Laura. Curatorial policy. Heritage. I was probably talking to Verne about my ideas – I’ve been banging on to anyone who would listen about colonial wars and how to present a fair picture in artistic terms. We were in the cafeteria, so Martin, or anyone else, might have overheard us. Do you think Martin Shongwe might have told the killer? Or even been the killer?”
“I don’t know. I can’t imagine why he should be. I think I know who he is, though. Isn’t he that brash, tough-talking guy with dreads? Tall? I thought he had gone up to Joburg, but he must be back. But I can’t see what connection he could possibly have had with Phineas Ndzoyiya, or Thabo Mchunu for that matter.”
“Thabo Mchunu? Hold on – isn’t that the guy who gave me Phineas Ndzoyiya’s name, the man Rhoda Josephs introduced me to. Why him?”
I realised that Dan, stuck away in his cell, knew nothing about my getting Mchunu’s name from Rhoda, about his interactions with Phineas Ndzoyiya or about my much-regretted call to him. I gave Dan a brief rundown, playing down my concerns, but he looked worried.
“Laura, for God’s sake, don’t take risks. Whoever killed Phineas Ndzoyiya, or had him killed, is not someone to mess with. If you’re worried, go and talk to the Inspector. Anyway, I’ll tell him that I’ve remembered talking about my exhibition and saying I was off to see you while I was in the Fine Arts Department, and that Martin Shongwe was around. I honestly don’t think he could have anything to do with the murder, but for all we know he may be a friend of the murderer and may have mentioned something, however innocently. It’s the only thing I can think of. After I left campus, I went back to Verne and Chantal’s, had a sandwich, made a couple of phone calls and then came to see you.”
“One more thing, Dan. When you were at my place you parked outside, and when Sergeant Dhlomo and Adam Pillay asked me about it, I did wonder why. I mean, you usually bring the car in.” I felt awkward. It wasn’t that I suspected Dan of anything, but it was niggling me, and the happenings of the past few weeks had jolted me out of mindless acceptance of superficial appearances. My own recent past should have made me realise I am no great judge of character, and I was coming to see that most of us are chameleons, taking protective colour from our surroundings, making an effort to blend in and wanting to be as seen as just another leaf on the tree, nothing threatening, nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps I had previously been too willing to accept what I saw at face value.
Dan looked surprised. “I dunno. I hadn’t been there for a while. I know Rory has a car, and I didn’t
know if he was at home. I suppose I didn’t know if you were in, so I parked and then got out of the car and rang the bell. When you answered, I just came in. There was no reason to get back into the car and bring it in. Why do you ask?”
“I didn’t think about it until the cops raised the issue. And then it seemed … well, odd. Did they ask you about it?”
“I suppose they did. I didn’t really think about it.” Dan gave me a thoughtful look. On one hand, it was a relief. His explanation made sense. But on the other, I sensed him wondering. Didn’t I trust him? However, all he said was: “The sergeant says forensics found nothing in my car. It’s in the clear. Verne fetched it yesterday.”
I felt depressed as I left the cells, and it wasn’t just my surroundings. That sad, shattered body at the top of the road had set in motion a whole slew of events and emotions that I didn’t want in my life. But, with Dan in jail, I couldn’t just walk away. And my own actions had left me floundering in a quicksand of mistrust, unhappiness and potential danger.
24
I MADE A SPECIAL EFFORT that week, teaching my classes to the best of my ability, smiling in a manic fashion every time I passed Mrs Golightly in the corridor and cooking tasty and nutritious meals for Mike. He was beginning to show signs of working hard and I offered what support I could. His stitches were out: to his great disappointment, they had not been removed by the well-endowed Dr Naidoo, but by a battleaxe of a nurse who went about the procedure with brisk efficiency. As for the scar, for now at least it looked more like a shaving disaster on his sparsely haired chin than the sexy cicatrice he had, I’m sure, been secretly hoping for.
Just a Dead Man Page 12