by Mike Nicol
42
Vicki swung round at the door banging open, banging closed. Fish stood there holding up Linda Nchaba, a battered, bloodied Linda Nchaba. Her first thoughts: What the fuck’d happened to Linda? Where the fuck’d Fish come from?
Saw Linda raise her head, her face mashed.
Jesus!
Heard Zama shout, ‘Who’re you? What’re you doing here?’
That grin Fish had in times of trouble. His comeback, ‘I’m the white knight, dude.’
Said, ‘What happened to her, Zama? What the hell’ve you done to her?’ Moving round the couch, seeing Zama pull a gun from under his jacket. Shouted, ‘No, no.’
Saw Linda stagger away from Fish, a gun in her hand, waving wildly. Her first shot going wide of Zama into the wall. The second punching through the leather couch.
Vicki smelt cordite. Saw Fish charge Zama. Bloody surfer boy had to always be in on the action. Reached for the .32 at her ankle. Came up with the Guardian as Zama fired: the blood-splatter from a hollowpoint writ across the wall.
Linda went down, Vicki catching the movement out the corner of her eye.
Saw Zama focus on Fish.
Fired.
43
Prosper kept to the centre of the crowd, let the president come to him. Was bumped, elbowed, pushed by happy partygoers. Felt a coldness wet his back. A young voice shout in his ear, ‘Sorry, Baba, sorry, hey. I spilt on you.’ Ignored her.
About him women ululating. Everyone jiving: become a great beast in motion.
Could see between the bobbing heads the tall Major Vula, beside him the shorter president’s dome, gleaming like peeled garlic. Worked the pistol free, held it low beneath his jacket. Needed the target to move closer. Gripped the cellphone in his other hand.
Slowly through the jostle forced a way to the major’s right, thinking to come on the target from the side or back. No problem with rear shots on them both. The mission here to make the kill.
In the mill and bunch met the eyes of Kaiser Vula across the heads. The man seeing him, recognising him. Prosper ducked down, squeezed between people at a crouch. Heard the shots in the palace.
Felt the crowd stiffen.
Brought the pistol up, thrust his way towards the president. Stared at the face of his target, the man looking back at him, frowning. Watched the president lurch forward, vomit a black spray on the feet of a howling woman. Did two things: pressed speed dial on his cellphone, went for a body shot. Bring the man down, finish him on the ground. Saw the impact low in the president’s gut. Adjusted his aim, fired again.
Major Kaiser Vula leapt forward, took Prosper Mtethu’s second shot in the chest. Staggered him back, didn’t drop him. His hand grabbing for the gun in his shoulder holster. Took the third shot in the stomach. Went down with that, the pain shutting out his vision. He blinked, pulled the gun free.
About them the chaos of screaming people. People fleeing, trampling over him. The sound of glass breaking, more gunshots from the palace. Through it all the clear pitch of Nandi’s howl. He couldn’t see her or the president. Looked down at the spread of blood across his chest, the rose blooming over his stomach.
The pistol a weight in his hand. Too heavy to raise. He squeezed the trigger, shredded the ankle of the man who stood over him.
Prosper Mtethu dropped. Did not hear the explosion. Felt the first of the kicks to his kidneys, his stomach, his crotch. Felt a boot stamped hard on his gun hand shatter his finger bones. Surrendered, as he’d known he would have to. Was beaten to death there amid the broken bottles, the discarded shoes, the remains of the canapés, by men in black suits.
44
Vicki saw the spit of flame from Zama’s gun. Heard Fish cry out, collapse behind the couch. Squeezed the trigger, felt the tug of the .32 in her hand, saw the bullet open a hole in Zama’s cheek. Fired again. The bullet smacking higher at the soft bone of the eye socket. Zama dropped, a finger snagged in the trigger ricocheting a wild round off the walls.
From outside gunshots, the screams of terrified people. One thought: Fish.
Found him writhing on the floor, his hand to his head, blood flowing between his fingers. Vicki bent over him.
‘Let me look. Take your hand away. Heaven’s sake, Fish, I need to see the wound.’
The wound a shallow furrow through his blond hair above the ear. The blood leaking out fast as head wounds did. Vicki tore a strip of lining from her jacket, tied it round his head.
‘You’ll live.’ Pushed back a quick desire to kiss his lips. Instead gripped his hand, helped him up. ‘Come’n, we’ve got to go. Chop-chop.’
Fish complaining, ‘Hey, slow down.’ Holding onto her arm. ‘Gimme a break. I’m dizzy. I could’ve been dead.’ Stopping her. ‘You shot him. Killed him.’
‘Yes,’ said Vicki, surprising herself. No feeling for what she’d done. ‘He won’t be missed.’
When the bomb exploded somewhere downstairs, the reverberation thrumming in Vicki’s ears. The lights flickered, went out. Sirens starting in the building, an overhead sprinkler system raining down a fine mist.
‘Great, like we need this.’ Used her cellphone as a light to lead them to the door.
‘The dude was serious,’ said Fish. ‘About whacking the prez. Didn’t think he had much chance.’
‘Who? Which guy?’ Vicki coming round on him. Recanting. ‘Doesn’t matter. Later.’ Paused over the body of Linda Nchaba. Laid a gentle hand on the dead woman’s head. Too jigged now for remorse. Or sorrow.
‘She was strong,’ said Fish. Retrieved his weapon, prying it from the slack fingers. ‘Never thought she’d pull that one.’
Vicki didn’t respond. Opened the door onto a dark passageway. The stench of smoke. Voices shouting. The high wail of a woman in agony.
‘Here’s the plan,’ she said. ‘We’re going to the main gate. Give me your security tags. You don’t say a word. Okay?’ Squeezed Fish’s arm. ‘Okay?’
‘Yes ma’am, okay,’ said Fish, handing her the lanyard with its security card.
She held up the light to his face. His hair damp. The makeshift bandage soaked. Runnels of watery blood on the side of his head. Fish grinned.
Vicki thought, long time since she’d seen that grin. Had missed it. Said, ‘You’re bloody crazy.’
Fish coming back, ‘And you’re not?’
She let it go, kept her smile to herself.
They edged along the corridor, the smoke thickening. Down the staircase into the wrecked reception: the cloakroom on fire, flames licking at the panelling. Two men, beating at the burn with their jackets. Went through the shattered glass doors onto the entrance steps. Before them, a chaos of toppled tables, discarded clothing, spilt braziers, their coals scattered, glowing. About the patio people sat, heads in hands, stunned. Men in shock, women crying. Security personnel picking themselves up. Two bodies on the slasto paving. Men in black on their radios, others carrying a figure between them.
Vicki took it in, pointed down the stairs to their left. ‘Let’s go. That way.’
They hurried on. Fish complaining his head hurt, he was dizzy, he wanted to puke.
‘Don’t be a wuss,’ said Vicki. ‘The quicker we’re outta here the better.’ Gripped hold of Fish’s arm like she was medevacing a damaged man. Emergency services coming past them now. A nurse in a blue jumpsuit asking, ‘He okay? You need help? He’s bleeding bad.’ Vicki going, ‘I’m okay.’ Waving an arm back the way they’d come. ‘There’s more. More wounded. There’s been gunshots. A bomb.’ The nurse nodding, shouting, ‘There’s ambulances coming.’ Not for my walking wounded, thought Vicki.
Got Fish to the gate, flashed her security pass. The guard taking one look at Fish’s bloody head, waving them through.
‘I’ve got a hire car here,’ said Fish.
‘Yeah, sure,’ said Vicki. ‘Like you’re okay to drive?’
‘My bag’s in the quarters.’
‘You want to go back’n fetch it? Don’t think so, babe.’ The babe
coming out before she could stop it. Catching the look in Fish’s eyes. His cheesy grin. Said, ‘Oh, what the …’ Beeped open the Cruze. ‘Just get in and shut up, okay. Let me think.’
‘There’s a couple of other things,’ said Fish, fastening the seat belt. ‘My mother’s inside somewhere. You shot the president’s son.’
‘You could phone her,’ said Vicki. ‘There’s always that option. The president’s son I wouldn’t worry about too much. Not troubling my conscience.’ She switched on the ignition, headed down the road towards Trekkersburg.
Half-heard Fish phone his mother, her thoughts on the girls. Like how to find them. She didn’t, they’d die. Starve to death wherever Zama’d been holding them. That’d be on her conscience. That she’d failed them. Had failed Linda, come to that. Didn’t want to think too much about Linda. Linda was going to be one of the question marks. One of the ghosts that’d rise in her life from time to time: had she got what she deserved? Or had she deserved redemption? To be remembered for trying to right her wrongs? Enough.
Heard Fish say, ‘You’ll be alright. I’m …’ Had to smile at the guy’s backtracking, excuses. Remembered it was ever thus with Fish and Estelle. The mothering he got. Glanced at him in the dark, glad to have him beside her. Fish disconnected the call.
Said, ‘She’s okay then?’
‘In her element.’
The two of them laughing. Fish saying, ‘Where’ve you been, Vics? What happened?’
Vicki came back quickly. ‘Not now. Okay, not now. Now we’ve got to find the girls.’
‘The girls?’
‘The girls Zama was trafficking. It’s why I’m here.’ Then pulled a spook-trick, changed tack. ‘Tell me about the hitman.’
Fish did. In ten minutes laid out chapter and verse. The loyalty of Prosper Mtethu. Also the Agency agreement, the Kolingba kill, the CAR connection, the communist conspiracy. And Mart Velaze.
Mart Velaze. Vicki kept both hands on the wheel, eyes on the blaze of road in the headlights. That name again. ‘Talk to me about Mart Velaze. Who’s he?’
‘Not much I can tell you I haven’t already. He’s one of yours.’
‘He came to you?’
‘You could say.’
‘Jesus, Fish, do I have to dig it out?’
‘He sent me some photographs.’
‘Of what?’
‘Hey, hang on. I’m getting there, alright? Hell, Vicki, gimme a break. You got water in here?’
Vicki told him on the back seat. Fish found a bottle, took a guzzle.
Said, ‘One was of Prosper at the Kolingba hit. The other of him in a hospital. Turned out to be the hospital that had Kolingba as a patient.’
‘So why’d Velaze give you …?’
‘Dunno, Vicki. You spooks have insane reasons.’
Vicki held a hand out for the water bottle. Drank. ‘You were talking how to Velaze?’ Drank again. Gave the bottle back to Fish.
‘On the phone.’
‘You didn’t meet?’
‘Not that time. The first time, ja, at the Athens wreck car park, the second time he phoned me. To tell me to warn you. Nice of the guy, don’t you think?’
‘What’d he say?’
‘Ah, heck, how’m I supposed to remember? Hell, Vics, it was something like to tell my mate she was in deep shit. Quote unquote.’
Vicki let the my mate slide. ‘That’s all he said? Didn’t tell you anything more?’
‘That’s all I know.’
‘More than me.’
‘Which is why you’ve gotta talk to me about us.’
‘You reckon?’
‘I do. What’s happened to us, Vics, since you got back from that Berlin trip?’ Fish reaching out his hand, his fingers going through her hair to massage the nape of her neck.
She wanted to push back against his fingers, tell him, don’t stop. Said, ‘Fish, please.’
‘You used to like it.’
‘I’m driving. There’s things we’ve got to do.’
‘Like talk.’
Vicki didn’t answer, let the kilometres pass in silence. Her thoughts on what she’d never know: the true story of her aunt Amina for one thing. She’d reached the end of that history. No one left to say yes or no to an old man’s letter. An old man she probably couldn’t trust anyhow. Whatever’d happened to Amina in Botswana, whatever it was she’d found out about stolen bullion or nuclear trades or armament kickbacks, the secrets’d died with her in that Metro station in Paris. Same with Zama, if he’d had secrets to tell, which she doubted. Zama was rubbish. His life a legend concocted by the grand spymaster, his father. The truth long ago forgotten, brushed under the palace’s Persian carpets. No ways she could see him as blood family. No resemblance for starters. Just one of the president’s peccadillo kiddies. End of that game.
At Trekkersburg phoned Henry Davidson. Said, ‘You know what’s happened?’
Was told, ‘We’re getting some reports.’
‘You’re getting some reports? That’s all? Jesus, Henry, there was shooting. A bomb. It’s the presidential palace. What about the president?’
‘The situation’s unclear at this time.’ A pause. ‘You’re not still there, obviously.’
‘Trekkersburg,’ said Vicki.
‘Good,’ said Henry Davidson. ‘Good. Drive home. Don’t take the flight. There’ll be too many complications at check-in. Police, that sort of thing. Drive home. Better if you’re what they call in the wind for a while.’
‘What’re you saying, Henry? What’s going on?’
‘Internecine, my dear. Sharp knives and stealthy killers. We hit everything within reach whether we can see it or not, to misquote Tweedledum. You get my meaning?’
‘And the girls?’
‘Let the saps find them. They’re looking already. I’ve told them.’
‘The cops? What use have the cops ever been?’
She heard Henry Davidson mock gasp. ‘I’m shocked and horrified, Vicki. How could you say such a thing? They’re an integral part of our justice system. Now get out of Trekkersburg. Hole up in some small town for the night.’
45
Vicki drove north out of Trekkersburg, told Fish the gist of Davidson’s warning.
They talked then in the long dark hours on the road. Vicki staying away from the one subject she’d buried. The secret she couldn’t share.
‘I had things on my plate, Fish.’
‘What? That you couldn’t tell me?’
‘Yes. That I couldn’t tell you. It’s that sort of job.’
‘Then give it up. Please. Go back to law.’
‘I might,’ she said. There, had voiced it. The realisation that’d come with Linda’s shooting. This wasn’t her life. Nor the life she wanted, the secrets and lies. Didn’t want to work for a corrupt state. Didn’t want to be part of the looting, the civil war.
‘You might?’ Fish’s fingers at the back of her neck, massaging.
‘I might.’ Flashing him a smile in the dark. This time not telling him to stop. An ache in her body she’d long suppressed. Wanted the feel of Fish’s skin beneath her palms. Wanted to scream: Gimme skin, babes, give me skin.
Drove off the dark plains into a Free State town, stopped at a small hotel, the Delerey. The rush on Vicki now, like she was gambling. Playing a bluff hand to high stakes.
‘We’re stopping here?’ said Fish.
‘It’ll have a room, Fish, a bed, that’s all I want.’ Purposefully not looking at him, close to the point she’d drag him out of the car.
The hotel foyer smelt of mothballs. Prints on the walls of beach scenes. The only light a standing lamp on the reception desk. Its shade burnt brown near the globe.
‘You don’t have the baggage?’ asked the night porter. Had his knobkerrie on the counter. A blackwood stick with a beaded hilt. Stroked his grey beard, glancing from Vicki to Fish.
Vicki signing them in, shook her head, didn’t look up. ‘They were stolen.’ The lie coming easily. ‘They m
ugged my partner.’
The old man’s rheumy eyes on Fish. ‘Hoh! You are strong. You must fight. You must protect your woman. Your beautiful woman.’
‘Ja, indoda,’ said Fish, ‘it’s not easy, hey.’ Touched a quick hand to the bloody strip round his head.
Vicki put down the pen, picked up the room key. Took Fish’s arm, feeling the muscles flex beneath her fingers, responding to her touch. Put the buzz on her, the anticipation of the surfer’s body hard against her: skin on skin. Flicked her hair, said, ‘He does his best, Tata. What else can a man do?’
SATURDAY 12 APRIL
In the quiet night the girls heard a car stop outside the warehouse. They were hungry. Scared. The little ones cried. Lay on the mattresses, curled on themselves. In a corner, an older girl rocked on her haunches, keening. During the long hours since they’d last seen the woman, a few had banged on the metal door with their fists. Had shouted. Until their voices died, their fists hurt. After that all had ached for their homes. For the mothers who had washed them; for the fathers who had held their hands. Had woken with the smell of woodsmoke, woken to the sultry heat, the smell of the toilets, their hunger, the pain of longing.
Then they heard the car. Heard it stop, a door bang closed. The whisper of footsteps approaching. The click of the lock opening. They cowered at the back of the warehouse, bunched together. The door opened, a man stood silhouetted against the light. A man they had not seen before. He stepped towards them, stopped. With his finger counted them. Looked at each one for a long time. An older girl said, ‘Mister, mister.’ The only English words she knew. In Portuguese she said they were hungry.
The man spoke, his voice soft. Took a step towards them. The girls pulled back. Again he spoke, held up his hands. Then he turned, went back into the dark.
The man brought them sandwiches, cooldrinks, water. Apples, bananas, chocolates, packets of sweets. Left these on the concrete floor. Spoke to them again in his soft voice. The girls stayed together, holding one another. Watched him wave at them, step through the door. Watched him drive away. At first they waited. When the man did not come back, they rushed for the food. There was enough for them all. When they had eaten, an older girl approached the door. Looked out. She turned to them, said there was no one in the street. No cars. The high mast lights casting shadows. Three of the older girls left first. Took sandwiches, fruit, cans of Coke, walked into the hot night. The others watched them go, unsure. More left in the faint light of dawn. The youngest were the last to leave. They waited into the morning, dreaming of their other lives. Then ate again, and carried whatever they could into the day.