Detective Kubu 01; A Carrion Death

by Michael Stanley

  Mabaku waited. The meeting had taken an unexpected turn, and he was anything but happy about that.

  “On Monday evening when I left work, a man was waiting out of sight next to my car. As soon as I unlocked it, he jumped in. He had a gun. I thought he was after money, and I had a few hundred pula with me. I was terrified.” Mabaku was grinding his teeth. He wanted to ask questions, but decided to let Cecil get through the whole story first.

  “But that wasn’t it at all. He thought I was somebody called Daniel. Or rather, he knew who I really was, but thought Daniel was an alias. He claimed that Daniel was behind a plot to murder Angus and that he had come to collect his share of the money. I thought it all nonsense, that the man was insane. Angus had been killed by a shark. There was no plot. There was no Daniel. I told him he had the wrong man, that I wasn’t involved in any of this, and that I didn’t know what he was talking about. He became angry and hit me in the face. He demanded two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. For God’s sake! As if I have that sort of money to dish out! He threatened to kill me. I told him that there was nothing I could do about that. Then he said he’d kill Dianna unless I came up with the money. I told him I would, if he’d let me go and not harm Dianna. He took all the money I had, and he made me drop him at a minibus taxi rank near the central bus station.”

  “What happened after that?” Mabaku asked, deceptively calm.

  “I never heard from him again.”

  “And you didn’t report this to the police?”

  “I was sure the man was mad! He just wanted to shake me down for what cash I had. Why take this lunatic seriously?”

  Mabaku fought to control his own temper and swallowed his mineral water before he spoke again. Cecil refilled his Scotch and walked back to the window. He always does that when he’s lying to me, Mabaku thought. He thinks I’ll read it in his face.

  “Cecil, an armed man gets into your car and threatens your life and your niece’s life. He takes your money. That’s a very serious crime. It doesn’t matter a damn whether his story was true or not. Didn’t you think he might try the same trick again? How did he get into your parking lot? We should have been after him ten minutes after you dropped him at the taxi stand!”

  Cecil hesitated. Then he said to the window, “He threatened to kill me if I went to the police. He said he had already proved how easy it was to get to me. I’m not proud of it, but I suppose I was a coward. And dragging all his nonsense up would hurt Pamela. I didn’t think it was worth it. I thought he was after a few hundred pula.” He turned to face Mabaku. “Look, I may have been right. I don’t know. But now I am worried. What if he ran Dianna over? Murdered her? He might be a homicidal maniac. I might be next.”

  “Cecil, you lied to me about the letter. For no reason as far as we can see. Now you expect me to believe that an armed man hijacks you at work, and you shrug it off? It didn’t occur to you that the man might come after you again if you gave in to him? What are you not telling me? You always hold something back. I’m warning you, this time you could find yourself an accessory to a murder. Maybe two murders. Maybe more than two.”

  Strangely, Cecil’s taut shoulders relaxed, and his voice regained some of its normal authority. “I’ve told you the whole story, Mabaku. There was some other stuff. I just agreed to everything the man said. I wanted to stay alive. Now I feel I may be in serious danger. I expect you to do something to protect me and to catch this maniac.”

  Mabaku sighed. “We’ll arrange a twenty-four-hour guard until we catch him. Can you describe him?”

  “He was wearing a hat and had a scarf wrapped around his face. But he was a white man, heavy-set, with a tanned face. About a metre eighty tall, I’d guess.”

  “Did he have a beard?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. Quite a bushy ginger beard. And he had an accent. Could have been Spanish or Portuguese.”

  Mabaku finally lost his temper. “Cecil,” he shouted, “the man who was in your car is wanted for at least three murders! He almost certainly was involved in the murders of your friend Kobedi and your geologist Aron. It sounds as though he murdered Angus too. Very likely Dianna as well! But you didn’t think it important enough to inform the police that he was in your car holding you at gunpoint! Do you detect a common thread in all this, Cecil? Your enemies and family rivals end up dead. But Red Beard tamely lets you go for bus fare! Forget the twenty-four-hour protection. I think you’ll be safest in a police cell.”

  “Mabaku,” Cecil stammered, “as God is my witness, I never saw or spoke to this man before last Monday. I swear it. If he wasn’t behind Angus’s murder himself—and he seemed to think that it was this Daniel character—then I don’t know who was. I had absolutely nothing to do with it. Nothing. I swear that too. Yes, I was wrong not to go to the police, but I was scared and shocked. I intended to contact you if I ever heard from him again. I just wanted it all to go away. If you want to arrest me, I’ll come with you now. May I tell my solicitor what charge I’ll be facing?”

  “We could start with concealing evidence to defeat the ends of justice, and accessory to the murder of Dianna Hofmeyr. More will come to mind as we go along.” But then Mabaku sighed and slumped in his chair. “I’m not arresting you, Cecil. I want you to go to Pamela Hofmeyr right now and break the news to her. Then I want you to come down to the station and make a full and complete statement of what happened, with nothing left out or glossed over. Do you understand?” Cecil nodded. “I’ll leave that job to Superintendent Bengu. I’m sure he will be happy to do it. And we’ll need to fingerprint your car.” He stopped at Cecil’s headshake.

  “He wore latex gloves, like a dentist.”

  “Well prepared, your petty hoodlum, wasn’t he?” Mabaku said sarcastically. “We’ll also want the name of the guard who was on the gate that day. I want to find out how Red Beard got into the parking lot.” He didn’t add that he wanted to check that when Cecil left, there actually had been a man with him in the car. “I’ll wait for you outside. We’ll drive to the Grand Palm together. For the moment, I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  PART TEN

  A Villain’s Mind

  “I like not fair terms and a villain’s mind.”

  Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act I, Scene 3

  APRIL 2006

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  CHAPTER 72

  The bus sputtered and coughed and then roared unevenly into diesel life. That it still ran at all was testimony to the skill of the bush mechanics who did their work cut off from replacement parts by Zimbabwe’s financial crisis. The bus looked tired. It was tired. It was battered and bruised by bad roads, altercations with other vehicles, overloading and over-age. Its roof rack was piled high with tatty suitcases and boxes stuffed with goods unavailable across the border ten kilometres away.

  The bus kicked up gravel as it pulled out of the dirt parking lot at Kasane, Botswana’s most northerly town. A passenger who had been chatting to friends scrambled on at the last minute to much laughter from his comrades. The bus was nearly full on this homeward trip, but it was always packed on the trip into Botswana, a differential that had not escaped the attention of the Botswana authorities.

  The passengers talked loudly, happy to be under way, not more than half an hour behind schedule. Surrounded by packages and carrier bags, some were digging something to eat out of these, sharing with their neighbours. Four American backpackers were enjoying the local colour and chatting with the friendly group around them.

  Towards the back of the bus a white man sat alone, his folded denim jacket firmly occupying the seat next to him. He wore a rumpled brown T·shirt, which could have been cleaner, and dusty jeans. His arms were heavy and darkly tanned, his face closed and unwelcoming. His stained canvas holdall was stuffed into the luggage rack above his head.

  Halfway to the border they came to an army roadblock. No one took much notice. Such checkpoints were common around
cities and near national borders. The bus slowed, but a soldier casually carrying a submachine gun over his shoulder waved them through. The bus driver called out something cheerful in Setswana. The soldier just scowled and waved them on in a more peremptory fashion. There was little love lost between the Batswana of northern Botswana and the Ndebele of western Zimbabwe. The driver shrugged and concentrated on getting the bus back to its top speed. He started singing cheerfully to himself. His shift would be over once he got the bus to Victoria Falls.

  Two kilometres farther they pulled up at the border post of Kazungula. It was midday, and hot. Animals and people crowded into whatever shade could be found. The driver dug out the wad of papers he would need and waited for his passengers to disembark. They all knew the drill. No difficulty on the Botswana side, but customs on the Zimbabwe side could be a problem. He hoped that in lieu of time-consuming searches and customs levies, they would accept a share of the substantial and informal cash fee that he charged passengers for bulky merchandise. The white man at the back of the bus was one of the last to get off. He carefully jammed his bag more tightly into the rack and put on his jacket. Then he followed the others, adding himself to the group of American backpackers.

  John Pule was the immigration officer who dealt with the American group. They told him they loved Botswana. They had been to Chobe National Park, to the Okavango Delta, and into the Kalahari. They would love to come back and would tell all their friends. He nodded and smiled, checked each face against the photograph in the passport, banged the stamp on a blank page, and wished the youngsters a good time in Zimbabwe. He checked his watch. It was nearly time for his lunch. Fortunately, they had dealt with most of the bus passengers.

  He looked up at the next person in the queue, another white man but darkly tanned. Something about his face struck Pule as odd. The man offered his passport and exit form. It was a travel-worn Angolan passport in the name of Antonio de Vasconcelos. Pule glanced at the picture and then flipped through the pages. There were stamps from Namibia and Zambia as well as Botswana and Zimbabwe. The man’s home address was given in Luanda.

  “Where have you been in Botswana?” he asked.

  The man shrugged. “Kasane,” he said.

  “Anywhere else?” The man had been in Botswana for over a month.

  “Come from Luanda,” the man said, apparently not understanding the question.

  “What do you do?” Pule suspected the man of working without a work permit.

  “Holiday.”

  “What do you do for work?”

  “Seaman. In Luanda. Work docks.”

  Well, it was unlikely that he’d been doing that in Botswana. The closest Botswana came to the sea was the Bushman painting of a whale in the Tsodillo Hills. Pules intuition told him that something was wrong, but it was nearly lunchtime. Let Zimbabwe have the problem. He reached for his rubber stamp, trying to find a blank page for the imprint. The passport eluded his one-handed attempt and flipped to the front page. Pule looked at the picture again, his stamp poised for action. Of course, that was it. In the black-and-white passport photo Vasconcelos had a heavy beard; now he was clean-shaven. That was what looked wrong about his face; his cheeks and neck were much lighter than the rest of it. The beard had come off very recently.

  “Beard?” he asked the man casually, touching his own cheeks.

  Vasconcelos laughed. “Hot!” he said. He pretended to cut it off, with two fingers of his right hand playing scissors. Pule wasn’t amused. He had noticed the ginger hair on the man’s arm. The midday stubble looked ginger too. The top of his head was smooth and brown—bald, not shaven.

  He got up and directed the man towards a side door. “This way, please. Just a short routine check.”

  Vasconcelos looked alarmed. “Bus! Me on bus!” He pointed in the direction of the parking lot.

  “Don’t worry. Bus will wait. Just five minutes.” Pule held up five fingers to confirm this. Reluctantly the man followed him into the supervisor’s office.

  Speaking quietly in Setswana, Pule told his supervisor about his suspicions. “And the police in Gaborone are looking for a heavy-set bald man with a red beard from Angola. He fits the physical description too.”

  “What would he be doing up here? It’s two days’ drive to Gaborone.”

  Pule shrugged. “He doesn’t speak much English.”

  “Go and get Rosa. Her family came from Angola. She speaks Portuguese.”

  Pule nodded and left to fetch her.

  “Sit down,” the supervisor told Vasconcelos. He waved to the chair when there was no response. Vasconcelos looked very agitated. “Miss bus,” he said loudly. “Victoria Falls. Miss bus.” He approached the immigration officer as he said this and suddenly pointed to the door and shouted, “Bus!” as if it was about to join them in the office. Despite himself, the officer looked over his shoulder. And in that moment of inattention, Red Beard hit him.

  Having quickly retrieved his passport, Red Beard left the office and walked casually out of Immigration as though his formalities were complete. He cursed himself for leaving his vehicle in Kasane. He had been sure he would have no trouble getting across the border on the bus to Zimbabwe. Now he was in trouble. He had only a few minutes at best before the immigration officer returned with Rosa. There was nowhere to hide in this tiny town. Somehow he had to get back to Kasane.

  He saw a small Toyota parked nearby. An elderly man was locking the drivers door. He seemed to be alone. Red Beard walked quickly up to him and pulled a knife from the inside pocket of his jacket.

  “Give me keys! No one gets hurt.” The man hesitated. “See that man over there?” Red Beard nodded towards a man dressed as a cleaner who was resting on a tree stump about twenty metres away. “He works with me. Give me keys, and you stay here quiet until he lets you go. Then you claim on insurance and get nice new Toyota. Otherwise you need funeral insurance.” He prodded the man’s ample stomach with the knife. The unfortunate man handed him the keys and started to back away. “But what about my luggage?” he asked plaintively. Red Beard laughed. He had already started the car.

  He did a U-turn and accelerated away. He didn’t race but kept just above the speed limit. He would be back in Kasane in fifteen minutes. Once at his vehicle, he would have several options. He laughed again. Wait until they started to interrogate that cleaner!

  However, as he rounded the bend towards Kasane, he saw soldiers spread out across the road. He had forgotten about the roadblock, but he had no alternative now. It couldn’t be more than five minutes since his escape from the immigration officer. Almost certainly they were still looking for him at Kazungula. He pulled up smoothly, rolled down the car window, and smiled. “Good afternoon,” he said. A couple of soldiers lounged behind their officer. They all looked relaxed.

  “Good afternoon, sir. Just a routine check. Please turn off your engine and show us what is in your car boot. It will only take a minute.”

  Red Beard turned off the engine and took out the keys. He might need them to open the boot. He hoped that the elderly little man wasn’t a smuggler. As soon as he got out of the car, the sergeant stepped back, and the two soldiers levelled their weapons at his chest. “Put your hands on your head and link the fingers together. If you move, my men will shoot you at once. Do you understand?” Red Beard nodded as he obeyed. He heard a two-way radio crackling in the background.

  Kubu was feeling better. After a relaxed weekend, he was more philosophical about the deaths of the Hofmeyr twins. Neither was his fault; perhaps neither was avoidable. But he wanted resolution. Perhaps even revenge. And Edison burst in offering both.

  “They’ve got him! They’ve got Red Beard!”

  Kubu sat up. “Who’s got him? Where is he?”

  “He’s in Kasane. In jail. Caught him trying to sneak out of Botswana at Kazungula. He got a bus from Kasane going to Vie Falls. Hoped to slip through as part of the crowd. One of the border guys remembered our alert and pulled him aside and started questio
ning him. He didn’t speak any English, or at least pretended not to. He went berserk. Punched the poor border guy. Knocked him cold. Then he made a run for it. Hijacked a vehicle parked at the border and headed back towards Kasane. The Immigration people radioed the police, and the army fortunately already had a roadblock in place. They picked him up just outside Kasane.”

  “It has to be the right guy,” Kubu said with elation. “Nobody would run like that unless he thought he was in serious trouble. Made it worse for him too. We can throw the book at him just for the crimes he committed making his escape.” He took a deep breath. “It looks as though we have our first real break!”

  “They got his bag off the UTC bus too. It had a pistol hidden in it. We shouldn’t be quite so critical of the border guys in the future,” Edison said. He displayed a wide array of perfect white teeth lighting up his dark face.

  “I wouldn’t go quite that far,” Kubu said, laughing. “Edison, I’m off to Kasane first thing tomorrow. I’ll bring back the pistol in the evening. I want it tested against the bullet in the big black guy’s head as soon as possible. I’ll bet there’s a match. I must say I’m looking forward to meeting Mr Red Beard. He’s got a lot to tell us.”

  ∨ A Carrion Death ∧

  CHAPTER 73

  Cecil spent the weekend locked in his house, petrified that Red Beard would come after him. He would want his payoff—a lot of money. Money that Cecil didn’t have. Although he had little confidence that the two constables Mabaku had positioned outside would stop Red Beard, he was thankful they were there. They would at least make a break-in more difficult.

  On Monday morning, Cecil had to get to work. He had an appointment with Tweedledee and Tweedledum. He sent one of the policemen to check the car and garage, and one of them accompanied him in the passenger seat.