The sun started to set and dropped below his line of sight. Street lights flashed on above his car. A green Toyota Tazz drove past, and Nico ducked down onto the passenger seat. The Toyota kept driving. Nico sat up straight again in his seat once the Toyota’s headlights had disappeared around the corner. The temperature dropped, and the wind picked up. He watched another car come round the corner into Hartley Street and turn left into De Bruyn Street on its way home. He wished that he was on his way home but, still had a long night ahead of him. His cell phone rang and vibrated against his thigh. He lifted up his left hip so he could get his hand into the trouser pocket. He recognised Janet’s number and realised he was going to be in trouble.
“Where are you?” she said the moment he answered. He could hear that she was trying to sound calm but worry, tinged with anger, crept into her voice.
“I’m sitting in my car outside a victim’s house.”
“What do you mean sitting in your car? You were supposed to be here over an hour ago.” She used her angry voice, with only a slight hint of worry.
“I’m sorry, sweetie, I’ve got to work tonight.”
“Why didn’t you call me? Or is that asking too much?”
Now he knew he was in big trouble. A storm front was definitely on the rise. Headlights headed in his direction. He ducked. Janet’s voice shouted at him from the cell phone. The headlights didn’t drive past or turn into any other street. He peered over his steering wheel to see where the car had stopped. His heart pounded in his chest, and the adrenaline pumped through his veins. The car stopped right outside Marietta Gouws’s home.
He couldn’t believe his luck. The killer was either incredibly stupid or desperate or both. The headlights were switched off, and the same blond head from the Entabeni flats emerged from the car. It was the same white Golf.
“Nico, are you still there?” Janet’s voice interrupted his excitement.
“Have to go,” he said and hit the disconnect button before she could say anything.
Nico waited for his suspect to open the gate and walk to the front door. This time there wasn’t anywhere for him to run. Nico knew he finally had the bastard. The feeling of triumph started to rise in the pit of his stomach. But the nagging feeling this was all too easy tugged at the back of his mind.
He watched his suspect open the front door and made a mental note to find out how the suspect had obtained a set of keys for the house. Nico waited for him to go inside and then got out of his car. Closing the car door softly behind him, he removed his 9mm service pistol from his hip holster. Crouching, he ran across the road, his gun at the ready and jumped over the wire fence. Good thing it was only waist high, he thought, as he landed in the garden. All the other fences and walls in the neighbourhood were well over six feet high and sported razor wire on top. He sprinted across the garden and crouched against the wall at the front door. He decided this was as good a place as any to wait for his suspect to come out. It was dark, and the walls of the house cast a dark shadow over him.
He was down on his haunches with his pistol gripped firmly in front of him when he heard his suspect opening the front door. With heart pounding and hands sweating, he waited for his suspect to walk past him before he made his move.
“Police!” Nico shouted as he came out of the crouch. “Stop right there!”
His suspect stopped mid-stride. Nico felt as though time was standing still. The suspect hesitated and then broke into a sprint. Nico took aim and fired. The man stopped running, the warning shot had landed at his feet.
“There’s nowhere to run. You might as well cooperate, or the next bullet won’t end up in the ground.” The suspect nodded his head, and his body slumped in surrender.
“Put your hands up, slowly, above your head.” He did as he was told, a silver candlestick in need of polish in his hand. Nico strolled towards him, ready to fire his pistol if the man moved a muscle. Nico stood behind him and removed his pistol from his hip holster and then patted him down for more weapons and found a second, non-issue, revolver strapped to his ankle and removed it. Putting the nuzzle of his pistol at the base of the suspect’s skull, Nico pulled out his handcuffs and placed them in the man's hands
“Put them on,” Nico instructed.
“Can I move my hands?” the suspect asked, his voice sounded young, too young to belong to a serial killer, but age wasn't a determining factor for a monster.
“Don't try to be funny. Just put them on,” Nico said as he applied more pressure with the barrel of his pistol. He heard the handcuffs click into place.
“Now turn around. No sudden movements.”
As his suspect turned around slowly, Nico recognised the man he had been hunting. He had been under his nose the whole time. It was the bored young constable who had pissed him off at all the murder scenes.
“According to section thirty-five of the Constitution you’re under arrest, Constable, for the murders of Michelle Venter, Amanda Du Plessis, Theresa van Wyk, Erica Steenkamp ...”
“Hey! Wait a moment, I didn’t do that. I didn’t kill anybody, Captain.” The young constable looked frightened and confused.
“I suggest you shut your trap and talk to a lawyer. Now, where was I? Oh yes ... furthermore, I arrest you for the murders of Tanya McKenzie and Marietta Gouws. You have the right to remain silent.” He made sure that the handcuffs were tight enough. “You have the right to legal representation. If you cannot afford legal representation, someone will be appointed to you by the State. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. Do you understand these rights as I have read them to you?” Nico said while he marched the constable over to his car.
“I swear, Captain, I didn’t kill those women. I just had a few debts to pay so I pinched some things so that I could flog them. I’m not a killer. I’m just a thief.”
“Save it for your lawyer, fuck nut. I really don’t want to hear it,” Nico said and pushed him into the back seat of the car. Nico slid into the front seat and radioed into the station that he was bringing in a suspect for the Bathroom Strangler case. He was in for a long night of paperwork and Janet was going to put him on dry rations for at least a month for standing her up. Not to mention what she would do to him for hanging up on her.
IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT when Nico buzzed Louis’s and Natalie’s flat in Sunnyside. He could have waited until morning and given Louis a decent night’s sleep: but there was still something about Louis and the whole case which bothered him. He hoped surprising him in the middle of the night would catch him off his guard.
The paperwork and interviewing the constable had taken a few hours and taken their toll on Nico. He was exhausted. He had delegated someone to check on the cop’s alibis for all the murders. It was something he would have preferred doing himself, but he needed to confront his suspicions about Louis so he could move on with the case. He only hoped everybody at the station had respected his request and not yet informed Louis of his mother’s death. He wanted to see the expression on Louis’s face as he gave him the news.
Louis’s sleep-filled voice answered the buzzer.
“This had better be good!”
“It’s Nico.”
“What are you doing here? Do you have any idea what time it is?”
“I'm sorry, but it’s important.”
There was a buzzing sound, and the gate clicked open. This was usually the part of his job he hated the most. The dead bodies and the criminals he could handle. Telling a person that someone they loved was never coming home was a whole other story. But this time, it felt like a game of cat and mouse.
Louis was standing in the corridor outside his flat when Nico stepped out of the lift. The light above the door was bright, and Nico could see that Louis was still trying to adjust his drowsy eyes to the light. Louis only had his pyjama pants on, and gooseflesh had started to crawl across his chest.
“Let’s go inside,” Nico said to a confused-looking Louis.
Louis turned withou
t saying a word and led the way back into the flat. Natalie was in the kitchen wearing a white terry-towelling gown greying with age and big, fluffy animal slippers on her feet. She yawned while filling the kettle with water.
“I thought a cup of coffee might be a good idea,” she said when they walked into the kitchen.
“So, what’s so important that you had to get us out of bed at this time of night?” Louis asked him, stifling a yawn.
“I’m sorry to do this to you, and I don’t know how to tell you this to be quite honest,” Nico said, combing his fingers through his thinning hair.
“Well, you’ve woken us up now, so you might as well just spill it,” Louis said.
Somewhere car brakes screeched to a halt and hooters blared. There was a period of silence that seemed to last forever as Nico tried to think about the best way to do this. The speech he had been preparing on his way up evaporated the instant he walked through the door. The kettle boiled and Natalie poured the boiling water into three mugs and put the mugs on the kitchen table in front of them. She sat down next to Louis and sipped her coffee in silence. Her actions were slow and deliberate, almost calculated.
“I’ve got some bad news for you and umm ... ag, shit ... the thing is ... well, it’s your mother.”
Natalie's eyebrow twitched.
“What about her?” Louis said and then took a sip of his coffee. Nico wasn’t sure how to read the expression on his face. Something flashed across his eyes, but Nico wondered if he was just looking for something that wasn't there.
“I’m sorry to have to be the one to tell you this ... but she was found dead yesterday.”
There was a long silence. He could hear cars driving past in the busy streets outside. The one thing about Sunnyside was that it never slept. There was always something going down in this part of the city. Someone was probably being murdered or robbed just a few blocks away. The murder and robbery unit were trying their hardest to crack down on the area and were, surprisingly, making headway. They had made some large drug busts in the last few months that had made front-page news. It had been excellent PR for the service.
The look on Natalie’s face surprised Nico. She just stared at Louis. There were no tears. She didn’t ask how it happened. There was no denial. Neither one of them, for that matter, said that it was impossible. Neither one displayed the first stages of grief. She just sat there and stared at Louis, dumbfounded, with a strange glint in her eyes. It was almost as if she'd expected it. He would have to ask Janet about Natalie’s history with Louis’s mother. He doubted that Louis would ever tell him what Natalie’s story was and he had a feeling that it was a fascinating one. After what seemed an inordinately long silence, Louis collected himself and cleared his throat. Nico pulled his attention away from Natalie and focused on Louis.
“So ... um ... what exactly happened?” Louis’s voice croaked.
“She was killed on Sunday night by the Bathroom Strangler. We do have a suspect in custody. I know that’s not much consolation, but at least you have the satisfaction of knowing that the bastard is behind bars.”
“You’re right; it isn’t any consolation. I can’t believe it. I saw her on Sunday night.”
“Yes, I know. One of her neighbours saw you go in.”
Louis stood up, pushing his chair back as he stood and started pacing the length of the small kitchen.
“I’m ... sorry ... it’s just that ... my mother and I had an argument that night. I just stormed out of there ... and now ... If only I had stayed a little longer ... she might still be alive.”
“An argument? What was it about?” Nico asked, looking from Louis to Natalie.
“It was about Natalie.” Louis stopped pacing, looked down at Nico and crossed his arms. “We argued about her every time I went there. Why are you asking me about this?”
“I’m just trying to get a feel for everything that happened to your mother on Sunday. How often did you see her?” Nico took out his notepad and started taking notes.
“I visited her every Sunday.”
“Every Sunday?”
“Yes, every Sunday. Why do I feel like I’m being interrogated?”
Natalie was still sitting in her chair, dry-eyed and drinking her coffee in silence. Nico’s warning bells were clanging and drowned out any other thoughts. Something was very wrong with this picture. He tried to tell himself that maybe she just reacted to shock differently from most people. Perhaps he had been a cop for too long, and his overly-suspicious mind was playing tricks on him. Maybe Louis was sincere in his grief, and he just wasn’t seeing it. But those bells kept clanging. The fact that he visited his mother every Sunday just made those bells clang even louder.
His mother was the catalyst. She was the trigger.
“I’m sorry. This isn’t an interrogation. I’m just getting the facts. Now back to the argument you had. Why was it about Natalie?”
“They always have arguments about me. His mother hated me.” Natalie finally found her voice.
“I told my mother that I was going to ask Natalie to marry me, which I did when I got home,” Louis said, taking a few steps forward and standing behind Natalie’s chair. He put his hands on her shoulders and started rubbing them.
“Congratulations! I wish it were under better circumstances.”
“So do we,” Louis said, looking down at Natalie’s head.
“There are still a lot of questions that I have to ask, but that can wait till tomorrow,” Nico said, getting up and walking from the kitchen into the dark entrance hall of their flat. “I’ll give you a call later in the day to work out all the details.”
“Okay. I’ll chat with you then.”
“Once again, I’m sorry for your loss,” Nico said, stepping into the hallway outside their door.
Nico turned and walked away. He heard the door close behind him and wondered what was being said. He would find out tomorrow if the right man was spending the night in jail. But he had a sneaking suspicion that he'd arrested the wrong man for murder.
ONCE NICO HAD LEFT, and the door was closed behind him, Natalie turned on Louis.
“So is there something you should tell me?” she asked him, her arms wrapped around her chest.
“What the fuck are you on about now, you crazy woman?”
“Oh, I don’t know ... how about ... how you knew that she wouldn’t be a problem for us ever again? Huh ... How did you know that?”
“Natalie what are you trying to imply?” he asked as he took a few steps closer to her. He was close enough for her to smell his breath. There was still a hint of minty toothpaste on it.
“I’m not implying anything. I’m asking you straight out did you or did you not have something to do with this?”
His laughter was the last thing she had expected. It was deep and guttural. It stopped just as suddenly as it had started.
“So you think I’m the Bathroom Strangler, do you?” He arched his dark, thin eyebrows.
“I didn’t say that.” Her voice had lost its conviction and wasn’t much more than a whisper. “It’s just that I wouldn’t blame you if you had killed that horrible cow and made it look like the Bathroom Strangler did it.”
“Well, I wish I had, but you heard the man. They already have someone in custody.” He wrapped his right arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him. “Ding dong the witch is dead.” He kissed her hard, forcing her lips apart with his tongue.
11
Nico walked into his fishbowl a few hours later and threw his car keys and cell phone onto his desk. He pulled his jacket off, which felt a little tight around his shoulders and draped it over the back of his office chair. Either all his clothes had shrunk, or he needed to go on that diet Janet kept suggesting. Sitting down, he rested his elbows on his government-issue desk and rubbed his stubbly chin. A shit day lay ahead of him. There wasn't any proper evidence against the young constable sitting in the holding cells below; most of the evidence he had was circumstantial. Even though he was
guilty of theft and perverting the course of justice, he wasn't the killer.
He wasn’t looking forward to dealing with Louis. He needed to get all his thoughts down on paper; it was the only way he could sift through everything that was swirling around in his head. He took out a pen and was searching his drawers for paper when his boss, Colonel Molwedi, phoned him.
“Get your white arse into my office now, Van Staaden.” The phone was slammed down. His day was off to a very bad start.
It took him a few minutes to get to Molwedi's office. He knocked three times and was answered by “Get in here!”
“So let me guess ... I’m in the shit?” Nico said as he walked into the office and closed the door behind him.
“Whatever gave you that impression?” Molwedi said, his hands clutched in front of him on his cluttered desk. Moses Molwedi’s desk was also typical government issue, only bigger than Nico’s. Desk size was the best way to tell the difference in rank in any government department.
“Oh! I don't know ... maybe the ‘Get your white arse up here’ thing. So ... what terrible crime against humanity have I committed this time?”
“They are too numerous for me to mention all in one sitting.”
“Look, Boss, can we get this pithy shit out of the way so you can crap me out for whatever it is and then I can get back to work. How does that sound?”
Requiem in E Sharp Page 11