by Tim Willocks
They were now well into the desert, the tracks still clear with no end in sight.
‘We should concentrate on watching,’ said Dirk. ‘He couldn’t have got this far without water. He must be out here somewhere.’
Imi had to ask the question she so far hadn’t dared. ‘Do you remember the accident?’
Dirk didn’t take his eyes off the landscape below.
‘I wish I did,’ said Dirk. ‘The defining event of my life and I was too fucking pissed to even know it had happened. It’s humiliating. And it’s no defence. I’m guilty. I won’t fight it. I believe Jason. If he’d taken those keys, Hennie would’ve broken his arm.’ He took his eyes off the trail to look at her. ‘And I would never have left that girl if I’d known she’d been injured. Never, drunk or not.’
‘I know that.’
The desert swept by beneath them. She could see the far curvature of the earth. Between the horizon and her eyes, there was nothing.
‘Do you see any footprints?’ said Dirk.
‘No.’
‘Probably too faint to see from up here. The cars weigh two tons. I can’t believe we’ve missed him. Wait – there. Out on the salt pan.’
The surface beneath them changed. It became flat and smooth, denuded of even primitive scrub and without the plates of rock, the numberless stones. Ochre sand blotched with enormous streaks of pure white. The wheel tracks were deeper and unbroken. Now she thought she could see what might be footprints, but she wasn’t sure. Out on the pristine pan flashes of sunlight bounced from a shiny black mass.
‘Turner’s Land Cruiser,’ she said.
‘I would chance a landing here, if he’s down there.’
They closed in. The car came into sharp focus. Another shape, irregular, a dark blot, shifted against the ground nearby. Closer. Lower. The shape broke apart and in a sudden explosion of sinister grace half a dozen Cape vultures soared flapping into the air on enormous beige and grey wings. Their departure revealed three black holes in the salt pan and the gutted hulk of a man in ragged blue pants.
‘That’s a police uniform,’ said Dirk.
‘Rudy?’ said Imi.
‘Jesus Christ. He cut his head off.’
What the vultures left behind them seemed like the aftermath of some monstrous pagan ritual. Imi was sickened with horror and guilt. She had a terrible premonition that she had acted too late, that the violence unleashed here would not be contained, that the ritual was not over and would not be completed without more bloodshed.
39
As soon as Turner heard the plane he stumbled away from the track, bending over as far as he could without falling. Six, seven metres. He reached a patch of scrub, half a dozen stunted bushes sparsely scattered. He squatted to put his left hand on the ground and thrust his legs back to lie on his belly. The movement usually took him a fraction of a second. Today it took five and his arm almost gave way. He rolled onto his back, his face screened by dead, grey branches. He bent his arms and legs flat against the ground to make his shape as irregular as possible. His face was caked in dust and salt. So were his olive shirt and his khaki pants.
Who was the only local outfit who might own a light aircraft? Le Roux. Who wanted him dead? Le Roux. They were looking to finish what they had started. But whatever calculations they had made regarding his actions, they would expect him to be much deeper in the desert. The two and a half litres of water he shouldn’t have been able to drink must have won him at least fifteen kilometres, maybe far more. They wouldn’t be looking for him here. One man in the plane would be enough. Simon or Hennie. The sound of the engine closed in. He tried to think.
Forty kilometres to the salt pan. The pilot would be cruising slowly, 160 or less. Fifteen minutes to the pan. He’d see the solar stills, then head back faster. Ten minutes. Turner had a twenty-five-minute window. To do what? Reach the road, flag a car? Bury himself in dust? The plane would be out of range of a phone signal for most of that time. He couldn’t land here. So call in the muscle in the 4×4s. Or maybe they were already on their way. That was the most logical: spot from the air; close in by land.
He was going to have to shoot it out. Good. What opponent was more dangerous than a man already dead? Today that was him.
The plane whined overhead. Fixed high wings. A Cessna. White with red trimmings. It passed right over him. He watched it soar onwards. It didn’t circle. The pilot had missed him. Turner clambered back to his feet. He drew and checked his Glock; holstered it. The bastards would still be reluctant to shoot him. They still wanted a parched dead tourist not a cop full of bullet holes. They’d be expecting to find a shambling human wreck with a walnut brain. About that they’d be right. They’d be expecting the easiest kill they’d ever made. About that, they’d be wrong.
At worst, they wouldn’t get their tourist.
Wait or walk? Play dead? What if he was wrong? What if they weren’t coming yet? That would leave him here frying in the sun. Better to move on, make for the road, flag that car.
Turner walked. Keep it slow. Steady. He detected a faint stirring of adrenaline. He hadn’t thought he had any left. It felt good. Relatively speaking. His head ached badly, a pang each time his foot hit the ground. Apply some qigong. He rubbed his skull all over, briskly, with his fingertips. He pushed his fingertips into the Dan Tian, above his navel, and held them there for thirty seconds. He pressed his thumbs into the hollows on either side of the base of his skull, Gall Bladder 20. Thirty seconds. He pushed his right thumb into the central hollow at the base of his skull, Governing Vessel 16, and with his left thumb and index finger he pressed the upper ridge of his eye sockets, just below the inner tips of his eyebrows, Bladder 2. Thirty seconds. He used the index and middle fingers of both hands to press up gently beneath his cheekbones, directly below the pupils of his eyes, Stomach 3.
His head still ached but his mind felt refreshed, clearer. He slid his clip holster to the small of his back and drew the Glock and carried it down alongside his thigh. He flexed his fingers around the butt, the trigger. He rolled his shoulders. His neck. Just as he thought that he was as ready as he was going to be, with amazing suddenness the big red Range Rover appeared in the distance.
Amazing, in part, because Turner realised he was no more than five hundred metres from the road. He now recognised the cairn that marked the spot where Iminathi’s father had died. The car slowed and swung off the road and rolled towards him, the same car that had killed the girl.
Turner marked a low, dusty shrub and stopped beside it. He raised his left arm and waved at the car, as if in blind desperation. As he did so he sank to his knees, as if overwhelmed by exhaustion. Neither gesture required any great performance. He hoped these distractions would mask his right hand as he laid the Glock on the ground by his ankle, concealed by the bush. He waved with both arms.
The Range Rover hurtled towards him, bouncing on the uneven ground. For a moment he thought it might run over him. Then Hennie braked hard and the car smoked to a halt five or six metres short. A black man in a pale grey uniform, same as the spotters had worn yesterday, jumped from the rear door and levelled a slung H&K UMP9 at Turner’s chest. Turner slumped back to sit on his heels, his arms falling to hang by his sides in a gesture of defeat. The tips of his right-hand fingers touched the butt of his gun.
Hennie got out from behind the wheel. He carried the Benelli shotgun by its pistol grip, the bore pointed at the ground. A third man sat in the passenger seat without moving. The glare on the tinted screen hid his identity. Hennie smiled and shook his head in admiration.
‘You’re fucking beautiful, Turner. I have never regretted killing a man in my life, but I will regret killing you. How did you do it?’
Turner gave him a blank, stunned stare. He opened his cracked lips and let his jaw droop. He swayed a little at the hips, as if close to collapse, and raised his left hand in a drinking gesture.
Hennie shook his head. ‘Sorry, mate.’
The guard circled round, st
ill aiming the sub-machine gun.
‘Khosi,’ said Hennie, ‘sling the gun and put the cuffs on him, from behind. And be careful, he’s a kung fu expert. Aren’t you, Turner?’
Khosi hauled on the sling and slid the H&K behind his back.
Turner scooped up the Glock and lined up the sights.
Hennie jerked up the shotgun.
Bam, bam, bam. Turner put three through Hennie’s gut.
Blood gouts erupted from his back as Hennie groaned horribly and staggered back. He fired the Benelli into the ground and dust fountained at his feet.
As Khosi struggled with the sling Turner shot him twice in the centre of the chest. Crimson ropes of blood flew.
The shotgun barrel tangled in Hennie’s legs. He toppled over.
Both men hit the cap rock at the same time.
Khosi was stone dead.
Hennie’s sunglasses fell from his face and he lay panting and bleeding, his breath catching in his throat as pride tried to stifle the sounds of his pain.
Turner covered the windscreen of the Range Rover with the Glock, but saw no movement from the man inside.
He stood up, slowly. He walked over to Hennie and stooped and picked up the shotgun. He saw no sidearm. Hennie watched him through slitted eyes.
Turner checked Khosi. He lay in an enormous pool of blood, already soaking into the dust, its surface skinning over in the rays of the sun.
Turner holstered his Glock and walked to the Range Rover and levelled the shotgun flat through the side window at Mark Lewis’s face.
Lewis stared at him through his shades, his features rigid with fear. Turner repeated the drinking gesture. Lewis scrabbled around and came up with a half-litre bottle. He lowered the electric window and handed it out. Turner felt a waft of cooled air. He pointed at the bottle cap and circled his finger. Lewis eagerly flipped up the cap and pulled the valve open and presented the bottle again. Turner reached past it and took Lewis’s shades from his nose with finger and thumb. Lewis blinked and cowered. Turner stepped back and beckoned him from the car.
The young mechanic seemed momentarily disappointed, as if he thought the bottle ought to buy him a ride home. Turner stared at him and Lewis’s terror intensified. He opened the door and scrambled out and extended his arm with the bottle. Turner donned the sunglasses. The relief was immediate. Again he ignored the bottle. He jabbed the shotgun at the glovebox and pointed two fingers at Lewis’s eyes. Lewis got it. He popped the glovebox and looked inside.
‘There’s a pistol in there,’ said Lewis.
Turner aimed the shotgun bore at Lewis’s gut and held out the palm of his hand. Lewis took the pistol by the barrel as if it were a block of uranium and placed the butt in Turner’s hand. It was a Steyr L9-A1, the same gun Simon Dube carried. Turner put it in his pocket. He took the bottle of water. He backed off again and directed Lewis towards Hennie.
They both walked over to Hennie and stopped and Turner looked at the bottle. Icelandic Glacial. Only the best. He knew he shouldn’t drink too much too quickly. He couldn’t remember why. His brain would swell; or was it shrink? He reckoned if he made this bottle last an hour, he’d be OK. He took a sip and held it in his mouth without swallowing. In seconds it was absorbed by his tongue and disappeared. A strange stinging sensation. He took another sip and another, without swallowing. He swallowed the fourth. It burned his raw throat. He didn’t feel any surge of delight. One more swallow. His stomach cramped at the shock, then relaxed but felt jumpy. Enough for now.
‘Get Hennie in the car,’ said Turner. His voice grated and crackled. He hadn’t counted on it working at all.
‘Fuck off,’ said Hennie. He was flat on his back, his shirt and pants drenched with gore. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’
Turner pointed the Benelli at his crotch. ‘Margot can bury you with your cock and balls, or without them. Your choice.’
Hennie grimaced with rage and pain. He nodded at Lewis. Lewis stooped and manhandled him into a sitting position, then he squatted behind him and threaded his arms around Hennie’s chest and hauled him to his feet. Hennie uttered a series of guttural moans but somehow took his own weight. He leaned across Lewis’s shoulder and shuffled to the passenger door. With another stifled groan he ducked into the seat and sat down. Lewis tucked his legs in. He shut the door on Hennie and opened the adjoining rear door for himself.
‘What are you doing?’ said Turner.
Lewis’s mouth opened and closed. His lips writhed. His shoulders shook. Turner pointed at the H&K slung around Khosi’s blood-soaked torso. A grin of panic-stricken relief broke out on Lewis’s face. Like a dog eager to please his master, he hurried to the corpse and worked the sling over its head and arm. His hands were covered with blood. He gathered the spare magazine. He carefully held the gun upright by its barrel. Turner indicated the back seat and Lewis stowed them inside.
‘Close the door,’ said Turner.
‘You motherfucker,’ said Hennie.
Lewis put his hand on the door but couldn’t bring himself to push it.
‘This was nothing to do with me,’ said Lewis. ‘I don’t even know what it’s all about.’
‘It’s about torturing a man to death.’
‘No, no, they just asked me for a favour with the car.’ In his terror, Lewis grinned like some deranged ventriloquist’s dummy. ‘Anyway, you’re alive, aren’t you?’
‘Imi’s father,’ said Turner.
He watched Lewis’s grin warp into a grimace, saw his mind struggle to deny the fact that his life was about to end, crushed by the visceral knowledge that here in the desert justice could settle for no less a penalty.
‘Who?’ tried Lewis.
‘The miner.’
Lewis’s throat convulsed, as if trying to suppress vomit.
‘Get it over with,’ called Hennie. ‘Shoot the spineless bastard.’
‘See what they’re like? I had no choice,’ said Lewis. ‘What could I do?’
Turner said, ‘Close the door.’
Lewis closed the door.
‘Do you have children?’
‘No.’ Lewis realised he had given the wrong answer. ‘I mean I plan to, I love kids.’
Turner raised the bottle to his mouth. As he drank he levelled the Benelli and shot Lewis through the solar plexus. Nine buckshot with zero spread, each equivalent to a. 38, cored a narrow cylinder through his stomach, aorta and spine. The blood loss was catastrophic and instantaneous. Lewis folded to the dirt.
‘Jesus,’ said Hennie.
Turner collapsed the stock of the Benelli. Yesterday he wouldn’t have executed Lewis for being a murderer and a coward. Today he carried a different law.
He walked round to the driver’s door and opened it. He laid the Benelli between the front seats, the barrel resting on the rear. He put the Steyr in the door pocket and rearranged his holstered Glock on his belt. He got in and sat the water bottle between his thighs. The keys were still in the ignition. He started the engine and closed the windows and turned up the air con.
‘Give me my phone,’ said Turner.
Hennie didn’t move but he was fully conscious, taking shallow breaths. A waxy pallor. The bullets appeared to have missed the major vessels. Multiple slow leaks of blood and intestinal fluids. Depending on how slow, he might last hours; or be dead within minutes.
‘You were going to leave it on my body,’ said Turner. ‘Give it to me.’
Hennie looked at him. Then he dug the phone out of his bloody pants and handed it over. Turner switched it on and entered his pin code. Forty per cent battery. He checked the log. Among various others were two missed calls from Iminathi and five from Mrs Dandala. Not a single call or message from Captain Venter.
Turner’s mind crawled towards the truth. Not because of the dehydration, the headache, the residue of madness, but because he didn’t want to get there and see it. He remembered his walking dream in the desert. The dust, the rhino whips, the blood. The bland, efficient face. The face he had fo
rgotten and whose blandness he had thirty years later come to trust. The dream that had been no dream but a lost memory, recovered on the verge of death.
‘Eric Venter.’
‘What?’ gasped Hennie.
‘Venter turned me in. At the bookie’s.’
‘Who the fuck else would it have been?’
Turner thought about it. The timing.
‘You couldn’t have got to him that quickly.’
‘He got to us,’ said Hennie. ‘Put you up for auction.’
‘How much?’
‘Two hundred krugerrands. Paid in advance. Three million rand.’
Solid gold coins. Paid in advance. Turner said, ‘He’s here in Langkopf ?’
‘While you were slogging through the sand, he was drinking prosecco with me and Margot.’
Turner put the phone in his shirt pocket. He pushed the gear-stick into drive and pulled clear of the corpses. He swung a U and headed for the road.
‘Where are we going?’ said Hennie.
Turner didn’t give him an answer. He didn’t have one. He had no plan. The shape he was in, he knew he couldn’t get far. His thoughts laboured to reach beyond each passing moment. Margot. Simon Dube. Venter. They had no reason to give up now. The best he could do was whatever came next, even if he didn’t know what that might be.
‘You won’t get into the compound,’ said Hennie. ‘Not with Simon holding the fort.’
‘If Simon’s holding the fort, who’s up in the plane?’
‘Dirk,’ said Hennie. ‘And Iminathi. On a mission of mercy. If I wasn’t leaking shit into my own guts, I’d laugh. They went to protect you from me.’
So Imi was the woman he’d hoped she was after all. He had misjudged her. But she hadn’t misjudged Dirk. The entire sequence of events unrolled in front of his mind, like a tapestry depicting an allegory of folly. One call, two nights ago, and only the nameless girl would be dead. They had all played their parts; the vain, the vicious, the stupid and the scared – he as much as any of them. Eight dead men on his back; Hennie would be the ninth. And it wasn’t over. He recalled something Hennie had said in the bookie’s.