by Deon Meyer
‘In Wild en Jag. Game and Hunting. It is a magazine. They advertise.’
‘All of them?’
‘I don’t know. But I think all of them.’
Mbali opened her massive handbag, took out her notebook and pen, and wrote in it. ‘So I just go to these people and ask them to build me a suppressor?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is it expensive?’
‘Not very.’
‘How much?’
‘Depends on the type of suppressor. About one thousand eight hundred, or two thousand rand. For the … how you say … screw-on.’
‘How many types are there?’
‘Basies, uh, basically two. The screw-on, that’s the one for hunters. And the sleeved, the one that sleeves back halfway over the rifle. It is the type military snipers use. Because it does not make the rifle that much longer. It is easier to … how you say … manoeuvre it.’
‘And these gunsmiths build both types?’
‘You will have to ask them. Some do both.’
‘Why would a hunter want a suppressor?’
De Villiers’ peculiar eyes never stopped blinking.
‘Game farms. They have tourists, and they have hunters at the same time. So they don’t want to have noise from the hunters’ shots. And the hunters want to shoot more bucks. If you hunt springbuck in the Karoo, and they hear the shoot, they all ran away. If you use a suppressor, they stand longer. And you can shoot more.’
‘I don’t like the killing of animals,’ said Mbali dubiously.
Giel de Villiers shrugged.
‘Are there any of these gunsmiths in Cape Town?’
‘No. There is one in Villiersdorp.’
‘Do you have his contact details?’
‘It is in Wild en Jag.’
‘Do you have it?’
‘Yes, in my office. I will give you all the numbers.’
‘Thank you. You said suppressors can be imported from Finland?’
‘Yes.’
‘And some hunters do that?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Will there be some sort of record?’
‘Yes. At Customs. Anything … geklassifiseer … how you say … classified as firearm things must be inspected. That is why it is too much trouble.’
‘Do you need a permit to have a suppressor built over here?’
‘No.’
She wrote, then asked, ‘Just how much of the noise is suppressed?’
‘Depends on the rifle.’
‘How quiet? If I shoot a rifle from a car in a street, how far can the shot be heard?’
‘A good suppressor can make it very quiet.’ He unfolded his arms, clapped his hands together, hard. ‘About like that. Eighty-five per cent more quiet.’
Mbali nodded. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Can you get me the contact details?’
De Villiers began walking to the door. Then he stopped and looked at her. His eyes closed as if he was having deep thoughts. ‘You can also build your own suppressor.’
‘Oh?’
‘You just need to make a space for the gasses to … How you say?’ He gave up: ‘You need a pipe, some rubber … disks, and washers. And other things. You can buy it all from a hardware store. There are plans on the Internet … You can even just use a PVC pipe and a sponge, if you want to …’
‘Hayi,’ sighed Mbali.
De Villiers opened his eyes.
Alexa and he drove in silence to the Grand West Casino in Goodwood.
Griessel thought he understood Sloet better now. Gabby Villette had described her as an ‘excluder’ who deliberately distanced herself from the personal assistants. Then Alexa’s story of the narcissistic singer who ignored people if she felt they were her inferior.
Both of them had talked about ambition, of a woman who would do anything for prestige and promotion.
And Anni de Waal, ‘This child had a boob job, and was very pleased with it. With the way it made her feel and look.’
It all meant that the photos were meaningless, they weren’t relevant to her murder. She was just a self-satisfied woman who wanted to show off her assets. ‘A monument,’ Alexa had called it. De Waal had referred to ‘something tangible’.
It meant the communist thing was all they had.
And that was a mess.
Nothing was ever simple.
He pulled the cellphone out of his pocket, called Cupido. ‘Vaughn, I’m going to be late. And I will have to see the colonel first. Can you let Roch know we will be there closer to half past ten?’
‘Did you find something?’
‘Trouble,’ he said. ‘Only trouble.’
He ended the call.
‘You have never talked about your work,’ said Alexa.
He didn’t know what to say. She wouldn’t understand, that was how he kept the evil away from the people close to him. Doc Barkhuizen was always on his case: ‘Don’t keep internalising it, Benny, talk about it.’ He didn’t want to. He needed to keep the two worlds separate – he needed a place that was unspoiled.
‘I won’t drink today,’ she said. ‘But you must come and tell me tonight. About … how you’re getting on.’
‘Alexa, it’s hard. It’s …’
‘Harder than not drinking?’
‘No,’ he said.
When they drove through the gate of the Grand West Casino, Alexa phoned Ella. ‘We’re here. It’s best if you come and fetch me from the car, otherwise my detective will think I’m going to escape.’
Griessel saw her hand shaking. Her battle of the day was intensifying.
She indicated where he should go, where he should stop.
A young woman came jogging out of the building. He recognised her. It was the pretty one who had confused him with Paul Eilers on Saturday evening. Before he made a complete fool of himself.
She came around to his side, and he wound the window down. ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘so you’re the detective.’
He shook her hand. ‘I am.’
‘No need to worry, Paul Eilers, I’ll handle this,’ she said with great self-confidence.
‘You’ve got my number?’
I’m a tough cookie,’ she said. ‘It won’t be necessary.’
‘Hey, I’m here too, you know,’ said Alexa.
21
Colonel Zola ‘Giraffe’ Nyathi looked at the seven names on the list of directors of Ingcebo Resources Limited. His face grew sombre, then he rose and said, ‘I think we should talk to the brig.’
Griessel followed him to the office of Musad Manie. The brigadier was in a meeting with four group heads. Nyathi said, ‘Apologies, but we need to talk to you.’
‘Gentlemen, if you don’t mind,’ said Manie to the senior officers. They stood up, walked to the door, looking curiously at Griessel.
Nyathi and Griessel sat down. The colonel waited until the door closed and slid Benny’s notebook over to Manie. ‘The deal Hanneke Sloet was working on. It’s BEE.’
‘I see,’ said Manie, the foreboding of trouble in his voice.
‘This is the list of company directors. There is a former ANC cabinet minister, and two were provincial premiers. These three I’m not sure about … But director number seven could be our problem.’
‘A. T. Masondo,’ Manie read. ‘I don’t know him.’
‘He was on the Central Committee of the Communist Party, late nineties.’
A shadow crossed Manie’s granite face when he put two and two together. ‘Our communist.’
‘Yes. He was also in Mbeki’s second cabinet. Deputy Minister of Mining, I think.’
Griessel saw the look the two senior officers exchanged. He had a strong suspicion why. ‘Brigadier,’ he said, ‘the problem is that Sloet’s boss said there was nothing funny about the transaction. It was all in the newspapers, there is nothing to hide. And Sloet hardly knew these people at all.’
‘Hardly at all?’
‘She met them briefly. Her boss said he doubts she had any further contact with them.’
‘We will have to make sure.’
Griessel nodded. ‘Brigadier, the whole transaction … It’s people borrowing money to buy fifteen per cent of a company, but without risk … I don’t really understand it … I will have to get Bones in.’
‘Yes,’ said Manie. ‘All right.’ He looked at the colonel. ‘Will you talk to Bones?’
‘Shall I get him in now?’
‘I have to go to Stellenbosch first, Brigadier,’ said Griessel. ‘To talk to Sloet’s ex …’
‘I’ll get Bones on standby.’
‘Zola, please, you know Bones. Make absolutely sure he understands: this is completely confidential.’
‘I will.’
‘Let him read the file,’ said Manie. ‘I swear, I will fire his butt if he talks. This thing is a minefield.’
‘I’ll make sure he understands,’ said Nyathi patiently.
‘Benny, please. Only the four of us know. Let’s keep it that way.’ Very earnest.
‘Yes, Brigadier. But there is something else …’
‘Yes?’
‘The gunman not mentioning the communist to the media. It doesn’t make sense. He’s looking for attention, he’s looking for publicity. He wants the papers to go after us. The whole time he’s been saying: “You’re taking money from the communist, you are in cahoots with the communist.” But when he writes to the press, there’s nothing about communists, just “the SAPS know who it is”.’
‘You think it’s political, Benny? Is that it?’
‘Sir, I don’t know what it is. It’s just … strange.’
‘The whole damned thing is strange,’ said Manie. He tapped the list in Griessel’s notebook. ‘But we can’t afford to ignore it.’
‘No, Brigadier.’
‘And we don’t have anything else.’
‘No, Brigadier. We don’t have anything else.’
‘I’ll brief Bones,’ said Colonel Nyathi, the tension in him obvious now. He stood up.
They drove to Stellenbosch. Griessel was at the wheel. Cupido sat with the photos of Hanneke Sloet in his hands. ‘Jissis,’ he said. ‘What a fucking waste. Bloody majestic jugs.’
Griessel was angry with himself for forgetting the envelope on the back seat of the car. Cupido spotted the word Sloet in blue ink and homed in on it.
‘Where did you get this?’ Cupido asked.
‘In her bedroom. Bedside cupboard.’
‘Fokkit. Little porn star. How come she didn’t have a boyfriend, at the time of death? I mean, a chick like this, body to die for, and she flaunts it. I’m telling you, Tommy Nxesi missed something. That’s the problem with the new mannetjies, they don’t do footwork any more.’
‘Her cellphone records don’t show anything. There were no other men.’
‘That’s the problem. Cellphone is yesterday’s technology. I mean, did they check her Facebook account?’
‘Nxesi said he did …’
‘Did she have Gmail? Was she on Twitter?’
‘Twitter?’
‘Jissis, Benny, you’re so fokken old school, it’s scary …’ Cupido, ten years younger than Griessel, pulled out his cellphone. ‘This, my friend, is the HTC Desire HD, runs on Android. TweetDeck at the tap of an icon …’ He showed Benny. ‘That’s Twitter. You have to motor, Pops, to keep up, there’s a new tweet every second.’
Griessel was driving, he stole a quick glance at the screen of the smartphone. ‘A twiet?’
‘Tweeeet,’ Cupido stretched the vowel to correct the pronunciation. ‘It’s social media, Pops. You broadcast yourself.’
‘What for?’
‘It’s the new way. You tell the world what you’re doing.’
‘But why?’
‘For the fun of it, Benny. To say: Check me out, I am here.’
‘That’s what Sloet did. With the photos.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It was her way of saying: Check me out.’
‘But for who?’
‘For herself. That’s what the photographer said. It’s a woman thing.’
‘And you believe that shit?’ Cupido worked his phone again. ‘Let us see if Sloet had a Twitter account …’
‘Forensics report says Lithpel checked the computer.’
Reginald ‘Lithpel’ Davids was Forensics’ lisping computer whizz, small and frail, with the face of a boy, two missing front teeth and a big Afro hairstyle.
‘OK. Lithpel doesn’t miss much. Canny coloured, that bro’ … Nope. No account, not under her own name anyway. Big tits, no tweets … So what were you and the Giraffe and the Camel doing just now?’
The Hawks’ bush telegraph, lightning fast as usual. ‘Politics,’ said Griessel. ‘You don’t want to know.’
‘Fokken politics.’ Cupido picked up the photos again and stared at them. ‘What a waste. Majestic jugs …’
The Bonne Espérance estate was on the R310, just beyond the Helshoogte Pass. They drove through the white, gabled gate and the avenue of oaks to the visitor’s centre.
‘Tourist trap,’ said Cupido when they got out and he looked at the advertising signs. ‘Wine tasting, five-star dining, spa … Don’t they make enough money from the wine?’
Griessel went to ask reception where Egan Roch could be found. The young woman gave them directions: behind the cellar, in the cooper’s shop.
‘Another shop,’ said Cupido. ‘What do you sell there?’
She giggled. ‘Nothing. That’s where Egan and the guys make the barrels, sir.’
That shut Cupido up as they walked, past the gracious old homestead and the cellar, to the back, where crates were stacked beside tidy rows of viticulture implements. A farm labourer had to direct them again, until they found the entrance, a nondescript wooden door.
Griessel pushed it open, smelled the smoke and the fire. It was a large space, with yellow lime-washed walls. It was hot inside. In one corner a big man stood with his back to them. He was working on a small vat. He was tap-tapping a metal hoop down over the pieces of wood, with smoke coiling through the opening of the barrel. His white T-shirt was wet with sweat.
‘Hello,’ said Cupido.
The man did not respond. Griessel noticed the earphones behind the thick black hair, the little wire down to an iPod on his belt. He went closer.
‘Benny,’ said Cupido and pointed at the wall.
Rows of tools hung there, odd hammers and axes, wood planes, files, and a series of long, thin metal staves. The points were very sharp.
22
Cupido tapped the broad shoulder. Roch looked around, smiled apologetically, put the adze down on a wooden workbench and took out the earphones. ‘Sorry,’ he said.
‘Egan Roch?’
‘That’s right, excuse the dirty hand,’ he said, and held it out to Cupido, his voice deep, his smile full of self-confidence.
Griessel recognised him from the photos in Sloet’s album. Roch in real life looked even more like a man who should be on TV, his face strong and symmetrical. Powerful arms, big hands, he was a head taller than Cupido.
‘Captain Vaughn Cupido, Hawks. And this is Captain Benny Griessel.’
‘Oh … OK, pleased to meet you. Do you … I have a little office …’
‘No, this is fine,’ said Cupido. ‘Tell me, where did Tommy Nxesi interview you?’
‘Who?’
‘The investigating officer. The one who took your statement.’
‘I went to see him. In Green Point. He asked … Why?’
‘Just routine. So, you make barrels.’
‘Vats.’
‘How does a guy learn to do that?’
‘You do an apprenticeship. Overseas. Are you sure you don’t want to sit down. Coffee? Tea?’
‘No thanks. What do you learn when you make barrels?’
‘Phew. It’s a long list. You first have to learn to select the right wood. French oak, the best comes from the forests of Tronçais and Jupilles …’
‘No, I mean what sort of
manual work. Woodwork? Metalwork?’
‘Oh, yes, of course, a bit of both, it’s very specialised …’
Griessel knew Cupido was also thinking of Prof Pagel’s pathology report, the ‘considerable force of the stabbing action’, the possibility of a home-made weapon. He knew his colleague would take over the interview, it was his way. But he was in too much of a hurry, his approach was too aggressive.
‘I wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee,’ said Benny.
‘Great, I could do with a cup myself. Please come through.’ Roch gestured at an interior door.
The ‘little office’ was a work of art. The desk was raw oak, the same fine grain as the vats, the chairs were antique ball-and-claw, upholstered in red, the floor was grey cement, polished to a shine, with a single Persian carpet over it. Against the wall was a painting of a cooper’s workshop from a bygone era, against the other a huge oil painting of a vineyard landscape in a foreign country.
Roch made a phone call to order the coffee, and came and sat down with the detectives in one of the old chairs, stretching his legs out in front of him in a relaxed way.
‘I heard on the radio that you have taken over the case. It’s rough, the guy shooting …’
‘We have to interview everyone again,’ said Griessel quickly, before Cupido could get going again.
‘Of course …’
‘According to your statement you and Hanneke broke up a year before her death.’
‘It wasn’t a whole year. Eleven months. February last year.’
‘She ended the relationship?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
Roch made a gesture with his hand that said: Who knows? ‘It was … You know how it is …’
‘How did you meet?’
‘At Moyo, the restaurant at Spier. One Sunday evening, December 2007.’
‘You remember well,’ Cupido said.
Roch smiled with nostalgia. ‘It was a night to remember. Hanneke was … There were five or six women at the table, and she stood out. In every way …’
‘So you introduced yourself?’
‘That’s right. I couldn’t resist the temptation. We … myself and two friends, we went and sat with them. And … the rest is history.’
‘Why did she end the relationship?’ Griessel asked again.