by Tim Willocks
‘He dropped me and Dirk right in it,’ said Hennie. ‘Bang to rights. What a cunt.’
‘Jason went inside the house,’ said Simon. ‘He’s come back out with the SPAS-12.’
They listened to the final exchange. Until it ended with a burst of gunfire.
‘Beautiful,’ said Simon. ‘Hard core. Turner gave him the first move. Do you want to see it, Hennie?’
‘Jason?’ said Rudy. His head came up from his chest. He was ignored.
‘No. Scrub it,’ said Hennie. He seemed offended that Simon was impressed. ‘That’s the last copy, isn’t it?’
‘The original’s travelling through my gut,’ said Simon, tapping and scrolling at the screen. ‘If you want that one you’ll have to find it yourself.’
‘Jason!’ raved Rudy.
Turner saw the pickaxe memorial pass by. Hennie slowed and swung off the road onto the scrublands. The ground was even but it wasn’t tarmac and the Land Cruiser bounced gently. Rudy groaned like a cow giving birth.
‘Jesus Christ, Rudy,’ said Hennie, ‘you almost gave me a coronary.’
‘Get me to hospital.’
‘We’ll see you’re taken care of, don’t you worry. Just sit still and take deep breaths.’
Rudy tried a deep breath. He stopped halfway with another terrible groan. His body stiffened. His shoulders trembled.
‘Fuck me. What did you do to him, Turner?’
‘I wanted to ask, too,’ said Simon. ‘What style is that? Some kind of Chinese internal system, right? Something like Hsing I?’
Turner wasn’t inclined to indulge them. He didn’t answer. Rudy moaned again and grabbed onto the dashboard with both hands to brace himself. His fingertips clawed the plastic. His whole body shuddered with pain.
‘Where are your gloves?’ said Hennie. ‘You’re leaving prints all over the car. Keep your fucking hands to yourself.’
A vision sprang to life, fully formed, in Turner’s mind’s eye.
Rudy’s prints.
The vision was atrocious. The mythical reasonable man inside him recoiled; but only for a moment. In extreme circumstances, even he could justify extreme measures.
‘T’ai chi,’ said Turner.
‘I thought that was old people and hippies, yoga teachers, vegans,’ said Hennie.
‘I’ll tell you, Hennie,’ said Simon, ‘I’ve been punched and kicked by the best of them. KO’d, choked out, broken nose, ribs. I took two rounds in the chest at Bangui. But I never felt pain like that before. I was paralysed. It was like someone had injected snake poison into my spinal cord.’
‘I’m not doubting you,’ said Hennie. ‘I’ve worked in the Far East. Manila. Bangkok. Hong Kong before we gave the bloody thing away. Different laws of physics out there. Sort of related to acupuncture and all that, isn’t it?’
‘Sort of,’ said Turner.
‘So where did you learn this Chinese malarkey?’
‘From a Chinaman.’
‘Come on, man,’ said Simon. ‘I’m interested.’
Rudy entered another groaning cycle. He broke wind at great volume.
‘Fucking hell,’ said Hennie. ‘Can’t you do some acupuncture on Rudy?’
‘What he needs is a good surgeon and intensive care,’ said Turner.
‘Now, now, don’t upset him any more than he already is,’ said Hennie.
‘You bastards,’ gasped Rudy.
‘Go on,’ said Simon. ‘I want to know.’
‘I hit him in the Dan Tian, point number 4 on the Conception Vessel meridian. If it had been number 7, he’d be dead, but he had that covered with his arms.’
‘But how does it work?’ asked Simon.
‘That’s like asking how to play a violin concerto,’ said Turner. ‘It doesn’t matter that all the notes are written down, or that you can read them, or even that you’re a good violinist. You have to reach a place where you’re not thinking about what you’re doing any more, you’re just doing it. Even the Chinese can’t explain it in words; it’s all metaphor, symbols. You can’t learn what you call the internal style directly, that takes you down the vegan route, good for your health but no threat to anyone else’s. You have start with an external style – Hsing I, you were right. Then you slowly strip away the bits you don’t need as you move into combat t’ai chi. You replace strength with energy. Something like that. All that matters is that it’s real.’
‘Handy for a police,’ said Simon. ‘No bruises.’
‘Depends,’ said Turner. ‘Rudy’s probably bleeding from the kidneys and small intestine. Maybe the spleen. His blood pressure is double what it should be. His heart is skipping beats, his intracranial arteries –’
‘Shut him up,’ said Rudy, his teeth gritted.
‘This ride isn’t doing him any good, either,’ added Turner.
Hennie was driving at a steady 80kph. Mark Lewis in the Land Rover Discovery was running parallel, clear of their dust. The Land Cruiser was eating the scrubland but the bumps and bounces were constant. The air con was doing its best but due to the missing window the car was stifling. On every side there was nothing to see but pale brown flatness baking in the mid-day sun.
‘Maybe you don’t want him to get back alive,’ said Turner.
‘What are you saying?’ said Rudy.
‘Whatever kind of chain they’re making here,’ said Turner, ‘you’re the weak link.’
Hennie looked at him in the rear-view mirror. He changed the angle of his head to look at Simon. Neither spoke. Rudy turned his head to glare at Turner with deep hatred.
‘They know that better than I do,’ said Turner. ‘As you said last night, you know where the bodies are buried.’
‘You black bastard.’ Rudy turned to Hennie. ‘I only said that to set him up for me and Jason.’
‘Take no notice of him,’ said Hennie. ‘He’s trying to divide and conquer. We’ll have you at the hospital in an hour.’
‘This is far enough,’ said Rudy. ‘He’ll never walk out of here.’
‘Another twenty clicks.’
‘Jessis.’
For several minutes the ground got rougher. Rudy moaned and manoeuvred in his seat, hoisting his right hip up so he could lay his head against the window.
Turner worked on the rest of his plan. The atrocity. Polishing the details in his mind’s eye. It was sound. He had nothing to lose. The Cruiser steadied and the wheels were suddenly running on smooth, perfectly level ground. Hennie picked up speed.
‘Salt pan,’ he said. ‘The bed of a dry lake. Now we’ll rack up some miles.’
The pan was a pale reddish brown. A fine spray of particles was sucked in through the open window and drifted back over Turner. In the distance he saw shimmering patches that were snow white. He didn’t know if they were pure salt crystals or some mirage effect. They drove on.
Every kilometre was another nail in his coffin. He was waiting for Rudy to make his move. He’d given him enough reason to. Rudy had cleared the way to reach his gun on his right hip. Whatever else he lacked he didn’t lack guts. He might try to shoot Turner but the muzzle would have to travel a long way at an awkward angle, and the pain would slow him down. Either Simon or Hennie would stop him well before it got there. Best give him another push. Turner’s arms were cramped and aching behind his back. He leaned forward as far as the seat belt would allow. It put his head closer to Rudy, making any angle of attack even more difficult.
‘How’s an hour from the hospital looking to you now?’ he said.
Rudy snatched out his Z-88 with a gasp. Hennie reacted fast. He reached out to grab Rudy’s arm but Rudy was ahead of him. He passed the gun to his left hand and aimed it across his body at Hennie. Simon shoved his gun against the back of Rudy’s head. Rudy ignored him.
‘I’ve fired a thousand rounds through this and the trigger’s squeezed as tight as it will go,’ said Rudy. ‘So make your mind up, Hennie. Either we stop here or you get a bullet. Or your boy shoots me in the head, and we both get on
e.’
‘All right, Rudy. Gently does it.’ Hennie took his foot off the accelerator. The car slowed. ‘Simon, put it away.’ Simon holstered his pistol. ‘Rudy, ease off that trigger, then I can brake. I told you, he’s playing us off against each other. That’s how he killed Jason. Don’t give him another win.’
Rudy relaxed his finger but didn’t withdraw it from the trigger guard. Hennie braked softly. He threw Turner a venomous look in the mirror. Mark Lewis drew alongside them in the Discovery. Hennie hit the horn twice. Both vehicles slowed to a halt. Hennie looked at Rudy.
‘You stay here. Ten minutes and we’ll help you over to Mark’s car. OK?’
Rudy nodded. Hennie reached under the dashboard and triggered the bonnet catch. Simon unlocked Turner’s seat belt. Hennie got out and opened the rear door and dragged him out. Turner stepped onto the pan. The air con had seemed ineffective but the heat now hit him with a force that almost made him stagger. In seconds he felt it rise through the soles of his boots.
‘Nice try,’ said Hennie. ‘But this is where the road ends.’
25
Hennie slammed the door of the Cruiser and walked to the cargo boot. Turner followed. Simon was already rummaging through Turner’s rucksack. The Benelli shotgun was propped against the rear wing.
‘Keep your distance,’ said Hennie. He pointed. ‘Over there.’
Turner retreated three steps and stopped and watched. Simon pulled out one of Turner’s spare shirts and removed it from the plastic and the wire hanger. He laid the shirt aside and shoved the bag and the hanger back into the rucksack. He slid Turner’s laptop into the rucksack and closed the buckles. Methodical as a bone surgeon. No emotion. No need to show off. Nothing a performance, just tasks to be accomplished as well as they could be done. Not a Hennie. A samurai mentality. Worth twice whatever Margot was paying him.
Mark Lewis walked over from the Discovery. He was young and sullen and afraid. The Discovery was a work vehicle rigged for the environment. Off-road tyres. A shovel strapped to the bonnet. Big plastic jerry cans, red and blue, spare diesel and water, in steel baskets welded to the rear wings. Lewis raised the bonnet of the Land Cruiser and propped it up. He stepped back from the engine heat, wafting his hand. He was wearing thin canvas work gloves. He did not look happy to be there and avoided looking at Turner, as if the less he knew the better.
Hennie hauled the pack of five two-litre bottles of water from the boot, still wrapped in plastic. He set them on the ground.
‘Hennie,’ said Mark Lewis, ‘I can use one of those.’
Hennie pulled a bottle free and tossed it to Lewis. Lewis caught it, opened it and emptied it over the engine bay. Steam billowed from under the hood. Hennie took a second bottle. He unscrewed the cap and smiled at Turner.
‘We’re forty kilometres from the road, give or take,’ he said. ‘To walk that far in these conditions a trained soldier needs to drink eight litres of water to stay on his feet – and that’s if something on wheels or four legs carries it for him. That’s the science. The military logistics of the Gulf War. You walk, you sweat, you breathe, you dehydrate. Your blood turns to a salty sludge, your brain shrinks to the size of a pickled walnut. Then you die.’
Hennie poured a long draught of water down his throat, his Adam’s apple bobbing. He gasped with satisfaction.
‘Hot enough to brew tea, but it still tastes good.’
He emptied the rest of the bottle over his head and shirt and shook the last drops out onto the sand. He threw the empty bottle at Turner’s feet.
‘That’s why urban types like you come to grief in places like this. You don’t think to carry enough water for an emergency.’
‘Hennie?’ Simon was shoving Turner’s plunder into his pockets. ‘He’s got the keys to two of our cars, two of our phones and one of our guns in a holster. From the lookouts we sent.’
‘What did you do to them?’ asked Hennie.
‘They had to take a sick day,’ said Turner.
‘There’s a trumpet in here,’ said Simon.
Hennie’s brows rose and fell. ‘A man of many talents, eh? I’ll pick it up tomorrow. It’ll make a nice souvenir.’
Simon went to the driver’s cab. He came back with the keys and opened the lock box and slid out the drawer. ‘I’ll lock up the long guns or he’ll shoot us while we’re driving away.’
‘OK, but we leave everything else exactly as it would be if he’d never met us,’ said Hennie. ‘We just take the water. We don’t want some clever bugger asking “why is this or that missing from his kit?” It’s a simple story. He went for a drive in the desert – tourists do it all the time. It was just his bad luck the most reliable motor ever made broke down on him.’
Simon packed the SPAS-12, the R5, the pepper spray and the Kevlar vest and locked the drawer.
‘You expect someone, somewhere, to believe I became a tourist in the middle of an investigation?’ said Turner. ‘Before I logged a report?’
Hennie shuffled on the spot. ‘It’ll do.’
‘It may have worked before to get rid of some local difficulty. It won’t work for a Cape Town detective on a case.’
‘What do you mean, “before”?’
Turner didn’t want to involve Iminathi any more than she already was; but he didn’t have to. ‘It’s obvious. Special Forces couldn’t invent this plan from scratch in the time you had. Four men and not one of you ask any questions on the way?’ Turner nodded at Lewis. ‘The mechanic cripples a car in the desert like it’s all in a day’s work? It’s a routine. The problem with your simple story is you’d have to be fucking simple to believe it.’
Hennie seethed in silence.
‘I can tell you a better one,’ said Turner.
Hennie stared at him through his shades. He struggled with the impulse to tell him to shut his mouth. But he knew he wouldn’t; and although Hennie’s vanity was excessive, he badly wanted to know what Turner had to say.
‘All right, let’s hear it.’
Turner retreated several more paces, out of earshot of the broken window. Hennie and Simon followed but still kept their distance.
‘You’ve still got your weak link,’ said Turner. ‘He’s only going to get weaker. Grief, guilt, bitterness. Resentment, envy. Whoever applies the pressure, Rudy’s ready to break like a dead twig. Even if he doesn’t, he’s going to want more status, more money. He’s a millstone hanging from your balls.’
‘I’m not hearing a story I don’t know,’ said Hennie.
‘Then you should know this too, but maybe you haven’t had time to think about it. Rudy tried to kill me this morning. You’ve still got four bodies to prove it – bodies you’ll have to make disappear, if your plan’s going to work. Somebody hired those corpses. Four local losers didn’t wake up today with the bright idea of killing an unknown cop – who’d only been in town twelve hours – all by themselves. That finger points at you, before it points at Rudy. Plus you have to keep their loved ones quiet, if they have any. That’s a tall pile of dirt, even for Mokoena. The only place to sweep it is under Margot’s carpet. Because Margot’s got the only carpet in half a day’s drive.’
Hennie flinched microscopically. ‘So what’s the improved version?’
‘Rudy went after me. Revenge for Jason’s death. I wiped out Rudy’s murder squad, just the way it happened, but they’re not dirt any more – because Rudy took me prisoner. Five against one, why not? Rudy didn’t shoot me on the spot because he had a plan, based on your old routine. Drive me out into the desert. No, make me drive, with a gun to my head. Out to the salt pans where the ground is soft not stony. Rudy needs my car to get back home so he can’t fake an accidental death, but he can get some payback if he wants to. Make me dig my own grave. Bury me alive, under the dry lake bed where no one will find me. All he needs is a shovel. Motive, opportunity, means, concealment. And Rudy’s prints are in the car. To a murder police, it’s the perfect case.’
Hennie stood thinking. He looked at Sim
on. Simon shrugged one brow: not bad.
‘What happens next?’ said Hennie.
‘That’s the twist. Rudy doesn’t get his payback. I put up a fight, kick him in the gut, maybe hit him with the shovel. We struggle for the gun and I shoot Rudy dead. But it’s not my day either. The most reliable motor ever made breaks down on me.’
Again, Hennie wordlessly consulted Simon.
‘He’s right about sweeping up the dirt,’ said Simon. ‘And the carpet. And clearing the case. All the dirt becomes evidence – against Rudy. It doesn’t need sweeping anywhere. For us it’s two birds. Six if you count the losers. Seven if you count Jason. It is better. It’s much better. It’s clean, it’s logical. He’s a cop, he knows how cops think. The dead Land Cruiser’s a stretch but it always was. That’s why I told Mark to come up with something clever.’
Hennie took his shades off and squinted at Turner. ‘Why do us this favour?’
‘If it wasn’t for Rudy, I wouldn’t be here. First he set me up. Then he cost me twenty minutes.’
‘Revenge. Didn’t Confucius say dig two graves?’
‘Mine’s already dug.’
‘You know,’ said Hennie, ‘it’s a pity you didn’t accept Winston’s offer to go on the payroll.’ He glanced at Simon, then back to Turner. ‘You might have put us both out of work.’
‘Is the job still open?’ said Turner.
Hennie laughed. He held out his hand to Simon and Simon gave him Turner’s Glock. Hennie checked the chamber and shoved it in the back of his belt. ‘Give me his phone, too.’ Hennie put Turner’s phone in his pocket.
Mark Lewis stepped around the engine bay. ‘Car keys?’
Simon tossed him the keys. Lewis slotted the key into the ignition. The starter motor turned over but the engine wouldn’t catch. He tried again with the same result. He left the keys in the car and looked at Hennie, again avoiding Turner.
‘That’s it,’ said Lewis. ‘I’ve shorted the EFI relay –’