Still. There were a lot of diamonds and she assumed they were worth a lot of money, but enough to kill for? Especially in their rough form?
Caz’s hand trembled when she picked up the figurine again. She turned it round and round. Horizontally, vertically, diagonally. Finally she fetched a strong flashlight and shone the beam into every nook and cranny.
She found the first sign of a seam in a groove just above the buttocks. It was so fine that she would have missed it if hadn’t been for a slight discoloration of the glue. At closer inspection she noticed that the seam went between the legs, around the protruding belly, between the breasts, over the head and around the back.
From her tool kit she retrieved the small screwdriver she used for repairing her spectacles and began prodding at the seam. The glue was old and the top layer turned to powder under the onslaught. After that it grew harder.
When it began to get dark, she switched on the lights, sat back down and proceeded with caution.
Just after nine, the two halves of the figurine that slotted together like a three-dimensional puzzle separated. Cautiously she wiggled them apart. The wood, about a centimeter thick, had been carefully hollowed out to accommodate six clay balls. She dislodged one from the buttock of the figurine. Another one from the other buttock. More from the breasts, the head and finally the pregnant belly. The hollows in which they rested had been smoothly finished.
The smallest sphere was the size of a smallish chicken egg, the largest one bigger than a tennis ball.
Her mouth felt like sawdust and she remembered she hadn’t had a thing to eat or drink since the parcel arrived.
She poured herself a glass of wine, took two big gulps, found a steak knife and sat back down.
She chose the largest of the clay balls because it was the easiest to grip. At first the serrated blade glanced off the hard clay but once she had made a nick in it, it was easier.
It took ages to remove most of the unbaked clay. The last bit she washed off under running water.
The object in her hand was not as round as it had appeared in its clay shell. It was narrower on one side, though not exactly oval. The surface was multifaceted, with varying gradients. Deep in the heart of the stone was a shimmer of lilac.
Caz gulped. It was the kind of stone people would kill for. If she wasn’t mistaken, the reason why Ammie’s father had been murdered was lying in front of her. Her grandfather. Lilah’s great-grandfather.
And there were five more stones. Smaller, but still bloody humongous for diamonds. Because that’s what the stones had to be. It was the only thing that made sense. Besides, there was an aura around the stones. A kind of palpable energy. However silly that might sound.
Ammie
Leuven
It was the eyes that haunted her. Cassandra’s eyes. Lilah’s eyes. Elijah’s. César’s.
Kembo’s eyes.
Doel. That photograph. She had pleaded with them not to publish it, to give her the negative. The photographer said the paper would choose. He had taken several. There was only a slim chance that the one on which she appeared would be published. But it was. Thankfully without a name. It was the only ray of light in the darkness, yet she knew she had to leave.
She nearly made it, but you don’t pack up the home you had lived in for fifteen years in a matter of days. The day the removal van was due to arrive ...
2001
Ammie
Doel
The knock on the back door made her blood freeze in her veins.
Ammie peered through the kitchen window, through the geraniums on the windowsill. She couldn’t really see from that angle, but her first reaction was relief. It wasn’t César. The man was too tall. The posture too young. But it wasn’t one of the Doel residents either.
The cap was low over his eyes, covered by the hood of his jacket. His hands were in his pockets. His clothing was too scant for the chilly autumn weather.
When he looked up, she noticed his brown complexion. He was in his forties, she guessed. Despite the overcast weather, his eyes were hidden behind dark glasses. The smile on his lips told her he had spotted her. He approached the window.
“Good morning, ma’am. May I come in? I bring a message from a distant place.” She had forgotten how different Congolese French sounded from Wallonian French.
She shook her head. Backed away.
The squeal of brakes in the street outside startled her, until she realized it had to be the movers. She rushed to the front door and opened it just as the driver was raising his hand to knock.
While the movers were carrying out her possessions, she returned to the back door. He was still there. He raised his hand. Smiled.
One of the movers entered the kitchen and picked up a box.
“Could you wait a moment?” she asked. “Stay here?”
He gave her a strange look, but put down the box and folded his arms.
Ammie opened the back door, but remained in the doorway.
The caramel-skinned man took a step closer.
“I have a message from Tabia.”
The name shook her.
“She’s ill. She won’t live long. She asks for the nkísi. To protect her the way they protected you.”
“I don’t have them any more.” Behind her she heard the mover shuffling his feet impatiently.
“Where are they?”
“I don’t know.”
He took off his dark glasses. The scorn in the blue gaze was unmistakable. “You’re lying.”
“Ma’am, will this take long?” the man behind her asked.
“Just another moment, please,” she said over her shoulder before she turned back to the dark skinned man with the blue eyes. “Who are you?”
“They say my father was a good man. Until he got mixed up with a white woman. They tell me it’s because of her that my father died when I was a child. They tell me she is my mother. I tell them a mother is the one who cares for you. Who raises you. Not a woman who throws you away. You know who I am.”
Ammie knew but she didn’t want to know.
“My name is Kembo Elijahsi. My father was Elijah, but I’m telling you you’re not my mother. Tabia was closest to a mother to me. I’m telling you Tabia saved your life. Save hers now.”
“I don’t have them any more. If I had them, I would give them to you. I left them behind.” The tears were warm on her cold cheeks.
“Where?” Kembo stepped even closer, a slightly menacing figure. “The city of purple blossoms?”
She nodded, her body racked by sobs.
“Ma’am?” The mover pushed past her. “What’s going on here? You’re upsetting the lady. I’m going to call the police. Scumbag!”
“Wait! Kembo!”
But Kembo had already vanished around the corner.
No! She didn’t want to remember. She didn’t want to think of the implications. She didn’t want to feel the growing doubt. Couldn’t she just be taken in her sleep?
Caz
Overberg
Midnight came and went. Caz lay in bed but sleep eluded her.
All she could think of was the objects that she had returned to the strongbox, which she had shoved under her bed with a huge effort.
Why did Tabia give those two objects and their contents to Ammie? Did she even know about the enormous diamonds Aron Matari had hidden in the nkísi? But why, if Tabia didn’t know about the stones, would he have given the diamonds to Ammie? Without telling her about them? She would certainly not have treated them so recklessly if she had known. She said she had them locked away because of their artistic value. Twenty-three years after she had left them behind in Africa, along with her child.
All these questions were academic. She was stuck with the consequences of whatever had happened.
Even if she threw away the nkísi, d
iamonds and all, as she felt like doing, Njiwa and Matari would still be on her tail. For the rest of her life. No matter where she went.
Should she give them the lot and beg them never to contact her again? Promise to tell no one that she knew now why they’d had no qualms about killing Tieneke when she had stood in their way?
No, even if she handed over the nkísi and the diamonds, they wouldn’t allow Caz Colijn to stay alive—whether they wanted the diamonds for personal gain or for more sinister reasons.
Chances were slim that anyone would believe the story, but surely there had to be someone who could help her?
The South African Police weren’t an option. She knew there were wonderful, honorable men and women among them. Captain Dlamini was probably one of them. They might even be the majority, but how the hell was she going to know who the honest ones were while so much corruption was going on? There was too much at stake. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what that pile of shiny stones was worth.
De Brabander? Even if he believed her when she told him that she had never offered Njiwa and Matari the diamonds as payment for services rendered, what could he do from Ghent to protect her? He would have to go through official channels and that brought her back to the South African authorities.
Who knows what would happen if she told them she was in possession of a pile of uncut diamonds. For all she knew, she would end up in prison herself, but even if it didn’t happen, it would be a time-consuming exercise. In the meantime Njiwa was out on bail.
Should she contact the De Beers company? She had no idea what they would do if she came to them bearing diamonds. Who would she go and see anyway? She didn’t know how this kind of thing worked. There was something called the Kimberley process, but what it entailed she didn’t know. If she wasn’t mistaken you need a licence for the possession of uncut diamonds. Where would she get one? Besides, the diamonds came from the Congo. She shuddered to think of the consequences it might have for Ammie. She was the one who had smuggled the stones out of the country, whether she knew about them or not.
Could someone in Antwerp, the diamond capital of the world, help her? She and Lilah had gazed in awe at thousands of diamonds of all sizes and colors on display in shop windows in the diamond district. They had also passed the entrance to the block where the world’s biggest diamond bourse can be found. Caz had stared at a number of hyperorthodox Jews in dark suits, hats, long beards and sidelocks.
Should she simply walk in at the nearest diamond trader, ask to see the boss and tell him: Here, take these diamonds, I don’t know what to do with them?
Not a bad option, but how the hell would she get the diamonds there without landing her arse in jail?
Somewhere in the future she would probably say she should have done this or that—if she survived, of course—but at the moment she had no idea how to take it from here.
She would have to think creatively. To be able to do that, her mind had to rest for a while for the panic to subside.
Caz wrapped both hands around the alarm remote. It was her talisman. If the panic button worked.
Njiwa was in Pretoria. Tomorrow he would check in at the police station in fulfilment of his bail conditions. She had to believe it. She also had to believe that he would keep doing so until he appeared in court. That he would go to prison. Even if it was only for a few months.
She needed time to make plans.
Preliminary plans as well as long-term ones.
Not that she had the foggiest what those plans could be.
Saturday, October 18
Luc
Damme
Maybe he had been a little overly optimistic, Luc thought as he cleaned a pump in the greenhouse.
The evening with Laura had been quite pleasant. He noticed that she had gone to trouble with the food. Flowers in a vase, candlelight. Everything exactly right. She had made an effort to look pretty too.
He truly appreciated her attempt to put things right between them. And she had succeeded. The initial tension between them had been allayed by the wine. They spoke about the university, the VGK, her proposed research tour.
He told her about his new approach to his lectures and how it was being received by the students. And about his hydroponically grown vegetables. She was very interested. That might have been the reason why he had shared his witloof recipe with her.
He knew that if he had made the slightest move, he could have shared her bed. The temptation had been there. He had wondered whether he shouldn’t just succumb to what she so clearly wanted to happen and get it over with.
But he couldn’t. Not with the image of Caz Colijn that kept coming between himself and Laura. He didn’t understand it. He was furious with Caz. Every day Ammie remained in her cocoon, he grew angrier. And she hadn’t even asked after Ammie’s health. Not a single SMS since she left. Yet ...
Caz
Overberg
Caz woke up with a start and a scream that stuck in her throat when she felt the foot of the bed give way.
The meow told her it was only Catya who had jumped onto her bed, but her heart kept thumping in her chest.
It was a clear, sunny day. She had bloody well overslept.
Catya nestled against Caz and meowed more loudly. The poor cat was probably starving. So was she. She had forgotten to eat last night.
An hour later both their tummies were full and Caz had taken a shower.
She had to shake off last night’s panic and think rationally. First, make certain that the stones were indeed diamonds. She couldn’t just assume they were. She sat down at the computer.
Even a perfunctory search on the internet made her realize she was in possession of a few hundred carats’ worth of stones, whether they were diamonds or not. But the shape looked right. An eight-sided threedimensional object is an octahedron, she learned. If the stones turned out to be high-quality diamonds to boot, they’d be worth millions. But only an expert could tell.
A more refined search took her to a simple test to determine the density of a stone. You weigh it dry, then weigh it suspended in water, and divide the dry weight by the second number. The resultant “specific gravity” value will tell you what kind of stone you are dealing with.
Her kitchen scales were probably not perfectly accurate, but at least they were digital. The most difficult part was to fix a length of wire around the stone and suspend it in water without touching sides or bottom. She made her calculation and got a result of 3,5.
The value put it more or less on a level with malachite and titanite, she learned. But malachite was dark green and its crystal structure was different, whereas titanite was usually yellow and looked nothing like the stones in her possession. One after the other she eliminated stones with a density of around 3,5. Until only one remained. Diamond.
Caz closed her eyes. So be it.
Two hours later she was staring at a long list of notes she had made. Random thoughts and ideas.
She actually didn’t give a damn about the bloody diamonds, but there were two issues she couldn’t ignore.
In the first place, her life was less than worthless at the moment. Njiwa had killed once to get to the contents of the box. He wouldn’t hesitate to do so again.
Her second concern was almost worse. If the diamonds fell into the hands of a group set on reAfrikanizing and dewhitenizing Africa, the consequences could be far-reaching. She didn’t really know what the two terms entailed but it didn’t take a genius to guess what they were about. The secrecy surrounding the groups that used the terms was indication enough that a Sunday-school picnic wasn’t on the agenda.
It would be no use trying to hide or destroy the stones. She had to get rid of them in a way that would prove she no longer had them in her possession. Njiwa in particular had to be left in no doubt about it.
The diamonds were much too big to try to get rid of j
ust anywhere.
South Africa was out. She could trust no one here. Not with all the corruption, mutual distrust and flawed interpersonal communication in the country. Especially while words like reAfrikanization and dewhitenization were being bandied about.
Antwerp, on the other hand, was neutral and synonymous with diamonds. At one of the diamond bourses they would know what to do. Their reputation had to remain above reproach and it meant they would follow the right channels. Yes, it had to happen there. How, she didn’t know, but that she could figure out later.
De Brabander could possibly help her, but only once she was back in Belgium. The fewer the people who knew she was going to try to take a shitload of diamonds to Antwerp, the better. He would probably suspect her of all kinds of devious motives again, but she believed De Brabander had integrity. She believed she could trust him. More than anyone else, at least. Now she only had to work out how the hell she was going to get the diamonds out of the country without landing in prison.
Maybe she could take pottery classes and conceal the diamonds in new figurines. No, there wasn’t enough time. She could hardly take a lesson or two and expect to be a master ceramicist. Nor could she approach an experienced potter. What would she say? Excuse me, I have a few hundred carats’ worth of diamonds. Won’t you cover them in clay and fire them for me?
And what would happen to the diamonds if they spent hours in a kiln at an incredibly high temperature? She didn’t know and she wouldn’t want to take the risk anyway.
An hour later she was staring at a possible solution on the screen of her laptop. She was going to take a massive chance but it might just work.
She would need a week or two. In the meantime she’d have to beef up her own safety. But she couldn’t do it before Monday. If Njiwa stayed where he was, she might survive the weekend.
Caz called Dlamini. There was no reply. She called the police station and was sent from pillar to post before someone confirmed that David Verstraeten had checked in.
She had a day’s reprieve. If she was lucky.
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