Gosh! George said to himself while hiding in an aardvark hole waiting for Khalid to accompany him. He slowly slipped his body further down the hole desperately trying to hide from the warden.
Sirens could be heard in the distance, blue lights flashing. Police vehicles and an ambulance arrived on scene. The smell of death and blood hung in the air, bellowing deep into George’s nostrils. The smell of fresh blood plucked his nerves. Khalid had been shot dead. It’s not long before a pathologist vehicle arrives on scene and places Khalid’s lifeless body in a white body bag before loading him into the vehicle and speeding off with him into the buzzing traffic to the state morgue.
Later the warden would explain to the police of what happened.
“The pursuit happened after I noticed Mr. Assam walking beside the road. He made a run for it down here,” he said while showing the officer, making notes, to where Khalid had ran. “I ordered him to stop but without any success he did not. I fired three shots. The shooting took place in this sixty acre conservational park,” he continued out of breath, wiping the sweat from his face.
After the police had left the scene roughly three hours later, George nervously crept from out the aardvark hole, shook the sand off his body looking anxiously around him for any movement. No one was in sight. He runs deeper into the park to the back fence, climbs over and heads for the road.
I need to get home. I need answers. I need to investigate, he mumbles to himself while running down the road. After walking and running for nearly two kilometres, George stops a passing taxi with a young black child hanging out the window shouting Brackenfell – normal thing for taxi drivers and their crew to do in Cape Town. George quickly runs towards the taxi, places two fingers in his mouth making the taxi come to an abrupt stand still, half stopped on the pavement. His whistle was nearly ear-deafening.
“Kunjani, baba,” George greets the taxi driver. “Can you please take me to 111 Alexis drive? I will pay you as soon as we arrive. How much?” he asks with the taxi driver staring at him.
He looks George up and down and shifts the match stick to the left corner of his lips. “It’s twenty-two rand, mlungu. Get in,” the driver says and places the white venture taxi with its still old yellow CT number plates, into first gear and leaves for George’s home with thick, puffy clouds of exhaust fumes hugging the taxi.
George’s face is sallow. This is a huge risk. Anything can happen. Anything can go wrong, he thinks to himself.
After a quite bumpy ride, the driver stops outside of George’s house. George looks through the taxi’s side window. The grass has dried, the wind is howling. No one is in sight. If Anna were here, the flowers would have been blooming and the grass green. The thought leaves tears in his eyes. With his eyes still sparkling, he climbs out of the taxi and tells the driver he would be right back and heads towards the front door. He tries pushing and banging up against the locked door hoping it would be open, seeing that the locks are not too shabby. Failing once, twice, he heads for the back door which is closed. He opens the door and slowly and cautiously enters the house. He suddenly stops. He hears voices. He reaches for the drawer where the knives were always stored and grabs a sharp Jamie Oliver steak knife.
Cautiously George walks to where the voices are coming from. The voices get closer, louder. He heads upstairs, peaks around the corner looking into the study room. George spots his domestic worker, Lindiwe, and a tall black man with a dark blue balaclava rolled up onto his head, talking to each other. A gun is holstered on his hip. George carefully listens to what they are discussing in an English slang.
“Eish, we need to get rid of George. He is going to complicate things. The boss will not allow it. Jirre man, that whitey is just trouble, T,” Lindiwe tells the tall man. Possibly a code name, T looks at her.
“He is in Pollsmoor. He can’t do anything. He is awaiting trial,” T informs her.
Lindiwe laughs.
“He is a whitey. He has the money to make something go away. The boss wants him held accountable for the murders. Call Khalid, his cell is next to the whitey’s. I gave him a phone just last week when I visited. Tell him to make the whitey disappear,” she says while searching through papers lying on George’s desk.
George silently makes his way down to the basement and bolts the door shut behind him. He imagines the smell of Anna still hanging in the air but soon crosses over to other thoughts. They wanted Khalid to kill me. It was all an inside job? He would’ve done it, that’s for sure. Were they all working together? Would he have genuinely killed me while we were deep in the woods? All of this runs through George’s head like a veldt fire.
The sound of things falling and furniture being shifted around could be heard from the basement.
T slipped black leather gloves onto his hands and started searching through Anna’s desk – searching for any traces of their boss. T inserts a USB stick to the computer and removes all malware placed on the computer by their boss. Orders had been given to get rid of any evidence before the police return for further investigations. The house is, after all, on lock down by the police. The officer who was supposed to be guarding the scene is sitting in the garden shed with a bullet lodged in his head.
George unbolts the basement door and peaks out by the door looking if anyone is still in the house. After a few minutes of looking and listening for anyone who might still be in the house, he heads to the bedroom, grabs a small duffle bag and packs a few pieces of clothing and a loose lying R100 before heading for the back door through the kitchen.
George leaves the house, pays the taxi driver his twenty-two rand with the blue R100 note, who is unbelievably still standing outside but just next door under a tree.
“Can you please take me to Durbanville? You can drop me off at the Spar,” George tells the driver and climbs in.
The driver stares at him and holds his hand out.
“Thirty rand,” he says in a husky voice, still chewing on the match stick.
“I gave you one-hundred-moola, make small change,” George instructs the driver.
The taxi driver drops George off at the local Spar in Durbanville in the Northern suburbs of Cape Town. He gets the change, sticks it in his pocket, slings the duffle bag over his shoulders and walks in the direction of an open veldt. Waiting for the taxi to speed off into the traffic, George makes his way to his parents’ house. Their house is located on the outskirts of Durbanville - a private road with only three houses.
After quite a walk, George arrives at the house. Tired of walking, he stops in front and stares at the Victorian-like house while standing on the pavement. The house stands out like a just bloomed flower surrounded by green grass and a white picket fence. My parents are so corny. In South Africa we don’t have white picket fences. Thankfully there is no South African flag flying up high from the porch. This is not America, George says to himself with a grin on his face. He pulls himself together and walks across the grass to the front door. Upon opening the door, the smell of incense sticks welcomes him delightfully – frangipani and white rose - his favourite incense stick. Just when he thought his mother would come welcome him home with a kiss like when he was just a boy, he sees tiny droplets of blood on the white flowered Persian carpets lying throughout the passage. Following the blood trail, George goes to the master bedroom, the place where he felt safe after having endless nightmares as a little boy. The lifeless bodies of his elderly one-fingerless-father lies on the bed with a beaten face and turpentine cloth shoved in his mouth. His mother’s tortured body is shoved like a trunk underneath the bed with one foot sticking out. George falls onto his knees and shouts a devastating creed. The two people, other than Anna, who he loved the most, had been brutally killed for something that he did not even do. Why me? Why Anna? Why Max and Claire? Why my family? he asks himself over and over while sitting helpless on his knees with salty tears flowing from his eyes, damming up in his goatee.
George stands up with his eye catching a red note and white rose lying on th
e dresser where his mother had sat everyday doing her make-up. The burnt out frangipani and white rose incense sticks lay in an ashtray on top of the note and rose. George moves the ashtray out of the way and reads the note:
I’m sorry; well I hope I am, for all these killings. I tried my best to stop myself from killing but it’s something I just have to do. It’s like breathing. You have to breathe. I’m born to be this kind of person everyone calls a mass murderer or serial killer. But, George, I can’t take the blame for it. I too have a career. I too am a normal ordinary kind of guy with a family. I’m so sorry for the scare I’ve put in the community or, once again, I hope I am. I’ve caused a lot of pain and I know how horrible my acts are. I’m sorry, Georgie, but I know that this is far from over. If only Anna hadn’t fooled me. If only she didn’t use me to give the police information on my whereabouts. I could’ve been left alone then none of this would’ve happened. I knew you would’ve gotten out of prison, somehow. I also knew you would come here.
May their souls rest in peace? They didn’t put up a fight.
Till we meet, George,
Yours truly,
Barry
After reading the note and staring at the drawn smiley face in blue ink, George throws the letter on the floor. What must I do? he thinks to himself. Feeling weak, he falls to the ground with his head hitting the beds leg.
Chapter 13
The Letter
He sits behind his desk with his head in his hands. A lump sits tightly in his throat. Suddenly his office door flies open and a woman enters.
“Detective Williams, we have received a package with your name on it. According to the courier guy it was dispatched by an unknown female late yesterday afternoon,” the woman, who is a lieutenant, says.
Detective Williams freezes upon hearing what has been said.
“Please bring the package to my office,” he orders the lieutenant. She leaves the office and makes her way back to reception. A few moments later she arrives with the brown box in her arms followed by another police officer. Detective Williams catches sight of the package and a shiver tingles down his spine. The lieutenant places the package down on his desk and leaves the office with the police officer. Detective Williams carefully opens the package after grabbing for a pair of blue police gloves. Gently he slides a knife through the sealed tape. He freezes. Immediately he stretches his arm out for the telephone and calls reception.
“Get a cameraman down here now!” he orders the officer at reception. A crime scene officer arrives with his camera and silver crime scene suitcase.
“Look,” Detective Williams says.
The officer gently folds the box’s flaps open. He stares out of shock as what he is seeing. A red note, white rose and a woman’s ear decorated with a white pearl dangling from the lobe.
The heart and pulse rate of Detective Williams reaches sky limit. The murders seem to be far from over. The crime scene officer reaches for an evidence bag and places the ear in it marking it for evidence – Jane Doe: Ear.
Detective Williams reaches for the note and takes a deep sigh before unfolding it.
I looked in your eyes, they were so dark, warm and trusting, as though you had not a worry or care. The more guile the game the better potential to fill up those pools with your fear.
You may have been free, you loved loving your life, and fate had its own scheme, crushed like a bug you still die.
When the crime scene officer leaves the office, Detective Williams laughs and a smirk appears on his narrow face.
Crushed like a bug you still die were the seven words echoing through his head. Who will be next?
Chapter 14
The Newspaper Article
Gently, the rain falls onto the corrugated roof, trickling through the gutters leading onto the cobbled side path squaring the house. The smell of wet grass leaves a rich aroma hanging in the air.
George sits on the back patio with a double whiskey and water. He looks onto his wrist watch – 04:35, the digital watch’s flashing digits announce.
The only place where he can be safe is at the place where he and his friend used to barbeque on Saturdays while the Springboks rugby team played on a plasma TV in the background of the enclosed entertainment room – Max’s house.
No one will look for me here, he thinks by himself.
The house once filled with laughter and a gentle giant who used to walk through the passage humming Stairway to Heaven, is now gone. Indeed in heaven - unannounced, untimely. The house is silent. It’s only George and the crickets serenading him with their spiritual chirping.
Just after sunrise, George heads down to a small Bangladeshi owned tuck shop situated on the corner.
He reaches for Die Beeld newspaper on the top shelf of the newspaper stand, feel-feeling for loose change in his back pocket.
He hands the dark skinned Bangladeshi with his Amla oiled hair, chewing on a piece of bubblegum, a ten rand note and leaves the tuck shop.
While walking home, George scans the front page of the newspaper. The huge capitalized bold heading instantly catches his attention: ‘WHITE ROSE KILLER’ STRIKES AGAIN: ELDERLY COUPLE BRUTALLY MURDERED
He sighs. A police vehicle passes by. George instinctively opens the newspaper and tries to cover his face and rapidly increasing his walking pace.
Arriving back at Max’s house, he makes his way to the kitchen, pulls a metal framed chair with its yellow padded cushion out from under the table. Immediately he opens the newspaper again and pages until he finds the full page front article on page three. George slowly reads the article aloud:
By Candice Blakely
The so-called ‘White Rose Serial Killer’ accused of five murders in Cape Town, strikes again.
The husband of the late well known estate agent, Anna Knox, who was found dead in their family home basement on Alexis Drives’ mother (64) and father (70) have been brutally found murdered in their Durbanville home.
Earlier this month a suspect was arrested for the murder of Anna Knox and the kidnapping of Claire Jewish, when the IP-address of the intruder, who allegedly hacked Mrs. Knox’s home computer, was traced to a local library. The suspect would later have been falsely apprehended after another murder had been committed whilst in police custody. Mrs. Jewish, up until this day, is still not found. Her husband, Max, was murdered shortly after her disappearance. The investigation of her whereabouts is ongoing.
‘The White Rose Serial Killer’ has left a number of five bodies of which the police are aware of.
George Knox handed himself over to police earlier this month. It is alleged that he had informed police that he is accountable for the murders.
The mystery as to who the ‘White Rose Serial Killer’ may be continues.
The investigation is ongoing and no further arrests have yet been made.
George gets a lump in his throat, struggles to keep the tears back from damming under his eyes.
Why! Why! he yells out with the salty tears breaking the dam bank and slowly flowing down his wrinkled cheeks. His parents were his only closure from everything which had happened. The package he had received with his father’s finger and ring digs back onto his memory. All the murders, the jail time, Lindiwe and T who wanted Khalid to kill him, explore his thoughts once again, leaving it nearly impossible to handle.
George stands up, walks to the refrigerator and unhooks the telephone hanging beside on the wall. He dials for Mary Olson, the psychiatrist. After just a few short rings a woman answers.
“Mary Olson, Cape Town Psychiatric Help. How can I help you?” her soft, friendly voice travels through the telephone’s speaker.
Silence breaks out.
“I need to talk to you,” George says.
Mary breathes loudly.
“Sure, come to my office and we will speak,” she replies friendly. The way she speaks reveals the sign of her smiling.
“Rather not. I would like to have a telephonically conversation. I’m on braking point. I ha
ve lost everything I’ve ever loved,” George says without going into too much detail.
Mary pauses for a while.
“Sir, I unfortunately cannot help you over the telephone. I need to see you in order for me to properly help you. A psychiatric evaluation needs to be done. This is a sensitive topic.”
George hangs up.
Bloody hell! he yells out, balling his fists, hitting the side of the refrigerator leaving a tiny, yet visible dent.
He takes a seat by the kitchen table and throws his head backwards over the chairs back with tiny droplets of nervous sweat droplets setting on his forehead. Waves of emotions penetrate his mind.
A woodpecker lands on the kitchen windowsill nibbling on a piece of an earthworm. George stares out the window and watches as the woodpecker freely flies away after swallowing his meal.
One day I too can be free. I too can flap my wings and start over again, he says to himself while clamping the side of the table with his right hand.
Chapter 15
The Harvesting
Vendors and hundreds of people making their way to work have crowded the local taxi rank. Drivers shouting their destinations and blaring kwaito music pierces George’s eardrums. The smell of pap and meat fills the morning sky with mouth-watering flavours and aromas loved by many. School children dodge the hundreds of people to reach a taxi to get to school in time; domestic workers are climbing off to get to work. George makes his way to a taxi decorated with the brightly yellow logo of MTN cellular phone network provider. With his mind on one thing – to spy on Lindiwe and her partner in crime, T. George sits on a single seat waiting for the taxi to be filled by other passengers.
“Hey, wena, where do you want to go?” a rather scrawny African driver dressed in a torn blue overall and brown leather sandals asks him.
“This is the Langa taxi, right?”
The driver nods yes with a frown upon his face.
Mystery of The White Rose Serial Killer Page 7