Payback - A Cape Town thriller

by Mike Nicol

  ‘Until it’s dark,’ said Mace. ‘They don’t make a move before then we’ll walk away.’

  ‘Yeah. And leave all this stuff. No chance, mate. No way in hell.’

  Pylon turned to Mace. ‘Take a look, they’re just standing up there on the deck.’ He waved, and one of the figures brought up his gun and unleashed a clip, the bullets zinging and clanging against the container. They waited for the silence. ‘Stalemate.’ Pylon pointed at the crates. ‘Somewhere in this lot has to be a rifle we can use to slot them.’

  Mace’s cellphone rang. He thumbed it on. ‘This is New York,’ the voice said. ‘Am I talking to Mace Bishop?’ Saying before Mace could answer, ‘This is Francisco Medicis calling to find out what’s happening.’

  ‘It’s not a good time,’ said Mace.

  Francisco talking over him. ‘I’m getting voicemail every connection I make to Isabella’s phone, and Mr Ludovico was breaking up last time we spoke. Since then only his voicemail. What I need to know’re the circumstances, Mr Bishop. Like where you’re at geographically speaking.’

  Mace said, ‘Luanda. Your man John Webster’s right here.’

  ‘That right,’ said Francisco, ‘this deal is going down?’

  ‘Not how we expected,’ said Mace.

  ‘Again,’ said Francisco. ‘I’m getting interference.’

  Mace said, ‘What’s happening here is we have the weapons. We have the buyer. We have not seen the diamonds. We are being shot at.’

  ‘Say again. You’re dropping, Mr Bishop.’

  Mace shouted, ‘This is a heist situation’ - the connection broke and Mace thumbed it off. ‘Christ!’ To Webster. ‘That was the man who put this together.’

  Webster came off the crates, ground the butt into the container’s wooden floor. ‘Like I give a damn.’ He drew out a .38 from beneath the loose hang of his shirt, put it on Mace and Pylon. ‘Back there. With the good doctor.’

  ‘John!’ exclaimed Kiambu. ‘What is this?’

  ‘It’s what he said,’ said Webster, pushing the cabinet minister against the crates until he sat down. ‘The only thing our friend here’s got right all afternoon. This’s a heist. Come gents, come.’ He levelled the gun on Mace and Pylon. ‘Oblige me. Sit down here beside our little politician.’ He dug in his jeans pocket for his cellphone and pressed digits, half an eye on his captives. ‘Excuse me one moment.’

  Mace nudged Pylon but Webster caught the movement and smiled. ‘Be good. Don’t try it on, yeah. You’ll be a frigging dead smart-arse.’ He brought up the phone, spoke in Portuguese. When he thumbed it off, said, ‘Any last minute calls you guys want to make?’

  ‘John… Who is that?’

  ‘Some friends, doctor. People you’re gonna spend some time with. Nothing to stress about.’ He turned to Mace and Pylon. ‘How about you, what’s your name, Pylon? Hey, what’s with you guys? Mace and Pylon? Like a comedy act. Pylon. What sort of frigging name’s Pylon? You have pylons running past your village, that was the first thing your mother saw after you wriggled out? So cute, you darkies, calling your babies all these weird names.’

  Pylon stared at him blank-eyed.

  ‘And Mace. Macey-boy. Someone had a sense of humour here? So who’s out there, boys? Gotta have some chicks somewhere. Two blokes like you two. Macho types. Gun dealers. Men of the world. What d’you say Pylon? No girlfriend, wife, mother to say goodbye to?’

  Pylon held out his hand for the phone.

  ‘Who’s it to be mate? Your wife? She sitting there in the shack with all the piccanins waiting for her hubby to bring home the kill like a good Zulu.’

  ‘Xhosa,’ said Pylon.

  ‘There’s a difference?’

  Pylon didn’t answer.

  In the distance Mace could hear a truck grinding in low gear, saw Webster focused on Pylon, heard the lorry change up to second, and closer someone calling Webster’s name. Webster yelling at Pylon, ‘Zulu, Xhosa, Zulu, Xhosa’ getting close to Pylon, putting the gun right in his face. Webster screaming, ‘You frigging golliwog.’

  Mace heard the click of the misfire. Even in the fracas, loud as a gunshot. He pulled the Taurus from his belt, wracked it, gut shot Webster, saw Pylon wrench the pistol from the guy’s hand, heard men shouting, running, the truck closer now. Webster bent double and Mace grabbed him about the neck, walked him step by step to the door, the gun at the diamond man’s head.

  ‘What you have to do,’ he said to Webster, ‘is tell your frigging chinas to go home.’

  Webster spat blood, groaned something that sounded to Mace like no human words. Mace shook the guy, getting the pain of the gut wound to make Webster buckle in his grip. He pulled him up, feeling the stickiness of blood underfoot. Webster as heavy as deadweight.

  Pylon pushed past to open the container door. Outside stood two men with AKs pointing at them.

  ‘Stage’s all yours,’ said Mace, digging the gun into Webster’s ear. ‘Talk to them.’ At the same time felt his phone vibrating in his pocket, the ringing lasting for seven counts until the call went to voicemail.

  39

  Captain Gonsalves heard the voicemail click in and cursed, left a message, ‘Call me, Bishop. ASAP.’ He disconnected, walked away, stripping the cigarette he’d cadged. The site busy as a shopping mall. Bloody Sunday afternoon everyone dragged away from their braais and their families, his wife not even looking up from her crochet work when he took the call-out. Just a ‘See you later.’ He sighed, headed up the sand dune to get some perspective. The climb winded him, the sand hot and loose and filling his shoes. Halfway up Gonsalves rested, sat down to consider the scene.

  He could see over the dunes to the road, busy now at this time of the afternoon with people coming back from their West Coast getaways. The farm gate visible too, a couple of cops in a marked car sitting there to secure the area. Below, the technicians did their work, combing through the dune grass, sifting the sand. He didn’t reckon they were going to find much. Or anything at all.

  Gonsalves rolled the tobacco between his palms, popped the pellet into his mouth.

  He watched the medics strap the bodies onto stretchers. Funny way they’d fallen: the one on top of the other. Strange scuffle markings in the sand like after the male had been shot he recovered enough to try and pick up the woman, before he collapsed again. The end of it beyond that. His cellphone dropped as he fell. Why would you bring somebody out here and let them keep their cellphone? Let them keep their wallet. Minus cash and credit cards admittedly. Only clue a photo of the dead women in the wallet holder. But no ID. And nothing on the woman. Then she’d have had everything in a handbag. Which was easy to dump. Still didn’t explain the cellphone? Like it was an up-yours gesture. Deliberate. Like whoever this was telling you they weren’t planning to be around long. First clue: all the numbers in the cellphone were American. Mostly New York.

  Gonsalves sucked at the tobacco plug.

  Yankees. Tourists. Jesus. He unlaced his shoes, emptied out the sand. Tied the laces in neat bows again.

  What this shooting reminded him of was the homo killing, the one queer shot smack in the centre of the forehead. Just like the woman here: right between the eyes. A major difference: both of them brought out to be done on the spot, the doc guessing anything up to fifteen hours separating the shootings. The man taking it in the chest, a lung hit, which was why he’d come back to life temporarily. Which might mean there’d been two killers. Because why not go for the same shot again, if you were the shooter? Also, if you were the shooter and going for the heart, you’d hit the heart. Not put a stray one through the lungs.

  Still, cocky bastards not even trying to hide the bodies. Believing that outta the way in the thick dune grass no one was gonna stumble on them in a month of Sundays. And probably a fair assumption. If it wasn’t for quad bikers tearing up the dunes, almost ramping right over the corpses. Might have been a couple of weeks otherwise. Instead of four or five hours.

  At the base of the dune, the medics loaded
the bodies into the ambulance and closed the doors, the doctor waving up at Gonsalves. The captain got up slowly, his right knee cracking. He flexed his leg muscles, working the joint. What was puzzling was Mace Bishop’s cellphone number in the phone. Chances were the guy wasn’t one of Bishop’s clients. Although the woman could’ve been. She was expensive. But not the man, too chain store in his clothing. Gonsalves spat out the tobacco and started down the dune, the sand cramming his shoes with each step.

  40

  The men with the AKs shouted in Portuguese. Pylon yelling back they should shut up or Mr Webster would take another bullet. The men highly agitated, dancing about like the ground was hot.

  Behind them Mace could see the truck stopped other side of the Mercs, its engine running, the driver watching the stand-off. Mace shook Webster. ‘Talk to your buddies. Let them hear you.’

  Webster groaned, his head flopping forward, Mace thinking, Christ, the frigger’s dead meat, and tightened his grip to keep Webster from dropping. Wasn’t any way Webster would be talking to his buddies.

  Shouted at Pylon, ‘He’s bloody dead.’

  Pylon gesticulating at the two men with the nine mil in one hand, Webster’s dud thirty-eight in the other, telling them they would die beyond the count of three if they didn’t get their arses in the truck and vanish, catching the movement of Mace tossing Webster’s body aside and behind him Dr Kiambu. The politician appearing with an R34 assault rifle in his hands like this was nothing new.

  Pylon yelling at him to stay back.

  Mace going, ‘What the fuck?’

  The attackers with the AKs hesitating at the appearance of the short man in the jacket and tie. In that hesitation losing the moment as Kiambu sprayed half a clip into them, their bodies jiggling at the impacts, spinning to fall face down.

  Mace felt shells bouncing off him, his head booming with the automatic fire, thinking, with some men you just couldn’t tell. They looked the talking type, the last sort you’d expect to know about guns, let alone killing. Then when it came down to the nail they pulled a stunt. You had to give it to him.

  Kiambu handed the rifle to Pylon. ‘A dangerous weapon, I think. Perhaps it is of more use to you.’ He pointed at the truck. ‘That transport would be useful, I believe.’

  The driver saw this scenario too, in his haste to reverse at the sight of Pylon running towards him stalled the engine.

  Pylon came up with a grin, said in pidgin, ‘Don’t cause any shit.’ The man shook his head, climbed out of the cab and stood peeing his pants. ‘Ah, save me Jesus.’ Pylon rolled his eyes to the heavens. ‘There’s no need for that.’ The driver was a short way off tears too. Pylon prodded him in the ribs with the rifle barrel, pushed him backwards. ‘Go. Deixar. Piss off’ - indicating the road into the warehouses. The man looked at him. ‘Ciao! Goodbye,’ said Pylon, ‘go’- and the man took off, running, glancing back, about a hundred metres away bringing up a pistol from somewhere in his trousers. He fired twice on the run, his aim high. Pylon watched him, thinking, why bro, why’re you doing that? Wondering, should he take down the brother? Decided, no, what was the point?

  ‘In politics,’ said Dr Kiambu ‘there are always enemies. Some of these will want to kill you. Myself I believe in the case of dictators this is a good thing. The killing. This is what should happen in Zimbabwe, yes? Many years ago they should have shot Mugabe.’

  He lined up a range of single malts on the counter top: Glenmorangie. Speyburn. Ben Nevis. Laphroaig.

  Laphroaig, the only one Mace recognised.

  ‘You would agree, about Mugabe? Such a good leader in the beginning. But he gets money, he gets power, a new young wife, what is to stop a man when he has these things?’ Kiambu held up between his thumb and index finger an AK47 round. ‘This. This is the friend of the ordinary citizen. You would agree? When the man becomes a monster then pow, finished, the saint kills the dragon.’ He stood the bullet next to a photograph of a woman and two teenage girls. ‘Who was that saint?’

  ‘Saint George,’ said Pylon.

  ‘I should not forget.’ Kiambu set a row of four glasses before Mace and four in front of Pylon. ‘It is important you try each one to choose what you want to drink. Myself I drink Ben Nevis.’ He poured a tot for Mace and Pylon, a triple for himself. ‘For me it is the vanilla and orange. Por favor, please, taste it.’

  They did. Mace thinking if there was vanilla and orange in there it was hidden. Good smooth Scotch, though. You could settle in with this for a winter’s night. Not quite the drink in thirty degrees and high humidity. A beer would’ve been better, but the doctor was on a victory roll.

  Kiambu picked up the Glenmorangie. ‘This is my second choice. My colleagues will not drink anything else. But some of them are bush monkeys so this is no recommendation. Try for yourself. Also you will taste the vanilla.’ He poured. ‘Bom.’

  Pylon said, ‘That’s it, doctor. That’s the one.’

  Kiambu smiled. ‘You would have friends in our cabinet.’

  Mace couldn’t tell the difference. Why bother, it was hellish good anyhow.

  ‘What I have difficulty with understanding,’ said Kiambu, uncapping the Speyburn, ‘is that there are people that want to kill me. Why I do not know. I mean why I have this difficulty with understanding it. All my life people have been shooting at me to kill me. This is what happens in war. But then the war stops but the people do not want to stop shooting at me.’ He poured a shot into their glasses. ‘This one you will notice is more sweeter. Like honey. Also very very good, but not for my palate.’

  Mace could taste the sweetness, decided this suited him better than any of the others although he sipped the Laphroaig out of politeness.

  ‘Please, gentlemen. Let me guess which one you prefer. Mr Buso I have no doubt is a Glenmorangie man. Yes?’ Pylon nodded. ‘Mr Bishop I would say is Speyburn.’

  Mace grinned. ‘How’d you guess?’

  ‘It was simple. With the first two, there was a little tightening in your lips. Same with the Laphroaig. With the Speyburn, nothing. Am I right?’

  ‘Spot on.’

  ‘Then.’ Kiambu gave them triples of their choice.

  Mace said, ‘Some ice perhaps?’

  ‘Ah, Mr Bishop…’ He shook his head. ‘You are not a whisky drinker. Ice will stop the flavours from coming out.’

  Mace shrugged.

  ‘But you are a guest and this I will honour.’ He took a tray of ice blocks from the bar fridge. ‘Please, help yourself.’

  While Mace did, Kiambu brought out Montecristos in cellophane wrappers.

  ‘I suppose what it is difficult for me to understand after this afternoon is my friend John Webster. For ten years we have done business, I would even say he was a friend. We are both soccer fans. He has slept here in my house. He has invited me to his fine house in Scotland. Together we have visited the distilleries. We have had these lovely times, he and myself.’

  While the doctor spoke, Mace broke the wrapper, slipped out the cigar and slid it back and forth beneath his nose.

  ‘This afternoon at our lunch he asked why did I not come again this summer to catch trout in his streams? I said, yes, why not? I was pleased. I was happy about this possibility. But he was going to kill me. He could sit here and look at me and know I would be dead tonight. Pah! What sort of man is this, I ask you?’

  Dr Kiambu contemplated his cigar, cut the end off, passed the snippers to Pylon.

  ‘I find this behaviour beyond my belief.’ He shook his head. ‘What has he to gain? The guns. The diamonds. My ransom. What is this worth? A droplet. Over the years there would be much more. I was a good contact for him. Here in the country, but outside too. John Webster did not know everybody.’

  Kiambu clicked up a flame on a heavy gold lighter, sucked until the cigar burned. He blew out a stream of smoke. Waited while Pylon and Mace went through the ritual. ‘Shall we sit?’

  The chairs were leather, deep, would not have been out of place in the foyer of a five
-star hotel.

  ‘Sometimes I believe we know so little of what it is that is going on. We walk into someone else’s agenda and things happen that appear to be completely without meaning. For that someone it is all naturally logical, this game they are playing. For us it can be strange, it can be dangerous. It can be deadly.’ He sipped at his whisky. ‘Myself I would not have thought this of my friend John Webster.’

  He drew on the cigar, sending the smoke up at the chandelier.

  ‘And you two gentlemen. Strangers until this afternoon. I could say strangers even now because what do I know about how you have lived? But you have saved my life.’

  A silence settled. Mace smoked, then rolled the scotch around his mouth. He considered contacting Isabella. Wondered what she’d known of John Webster?

  Dr Kiambu broke into his thoughts. ‘Bom. Please, gentlemen. Perhaps we should call this the end of the night?’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Sim, yes. It is after ten o’clock. If you do not mind I will drive you to the hotel.’

  Mace took the rest of his whisky in a single swallow. Felt the weight of the diamonds against his hip. Hell, after the peri-peri crab, the French Chablis, the scotch, he could understand the man’s need to sleep.

  In his hotel room Mace spilled the stones from their pouch onto his bed, divided the heap in half.

  Said, ‘That’s your lot. Just in case.’

  ‘Just in case what?’

  ‘Kiambu sends heavies round to get them back.’

  ‘He won’t.’

  ‘You can be so sure?’

  Pylon said, ‘I think you’re being paranoid,’ - funnelling his share back into the pouch.

  ‘Not a bad thing to be in this country it would seem,’ said Mace. ‘A nightcap?’

  Pylon considered, shook his head. ‘Nah, I won’t. Enough excitement.’

  Alone, Mace uncapped a beer from the minibar and sat on the edge of the bed, suddenly exhausted. The sort of exhaustion that wasn’t tiredness but anger at John Webster. At why couldn’t he have let the deal happen without the duplicity? At why the goddamned hell he had to be a greedy bastard? Always there was someone out to score. Never content to take a cut, wanting it all. And when that happened the world turned nasty. He shuddered, recalling the click of the misfire. That could’ve been Pylon gone. For a heap of stones. Mace rolled the diamonds beneath his palm, thinking, he’d not thought about Pylon being killed before, or himself for that matter. A prospect that’d been a real possibility with each deal they’d floated in the old days. There were times they both could have taken a bullet. But he’d not stopped to think about it then. Not for an instant. Certainly not gone maudlin. He grabbed a handful of the stones, let them drop from his fist one by one. Pretty enough. Although in a heap of gravel you’d have to be a prospector to find them all. Blood diamonds. Three deaths written against their record in one afternoon, and how many before?