by Deon Meyer
Ouma Hettie only issued the great ultimatum twice in her life. The first time was that day. She told her husband, either he paid the university fees or she took her children and left.
Jean shouted and swore and threatened, but she stood her ground, calm and unshakeable.
Hettie sent Guillaume to register the following year, and brought the account to Jean. She sat in the office and waited until he had written out the cheque. He did it with great reluctance and misgiving, but he did it. He knew only too well that if his wife left, everything would fall apart. But he paid the bare minimum, forcing Hettie to scrimp and save, to wangle a bit here and there in order to give Guillaume some pocket money.
Jean made his son pay in other ways too. He communicated even less with him, and refused to attend his graduation. (Eleven years later, when Guillaume married Helena Cronjé, Francois du Toit’s mother, Jean tried to boycott that too. That was the second time that Ouma Hettie issued the big ultimatum.)
Oupa Jean’s final revenge was that he lived up to his promise: He clung to the farm, for another twenty years.
22
Desiree Coetzee said Ernst Richter came and went as he pleased.
‘He wanted to know the precise state of everything. He kept his eyes on the figures, but he often said he didn’t want to be caught up in the office grind. He said that was how he lost perspective. So he mostly kept his calendar open. Sometimes he would come in in the morning, and then he would sit down in client services and answer the telephone himself when the alibi requests came in. Then he would tell the client, “this is the managing director,” and he would process the whole alibi himself. Or he would just sit and listen to how they talked to the clients, and he would give advice. Or he would come in late, around ten or so, and he would have some new idea, and he would go and talk to the relevant department. But his big thing was the graphic design team; he devoted most of his time to them. He was big on the acquisitions people. Often he would come in and tell them he had a new trick . . .’
‘Who are the acquisitions people?’ Cupido asked.
‘There are four at Graphic Design who have to search out genuine documents all the time. Let’s say a client’s alibi is that he stayed over in the Hilton Hotel in Sandton. He has to have a receipt that looks like the real thing. In that case, what the acquisition people do is to phone the Sandton Hilton, and ask to talk to room so-and-so, until they get someone on the line. Then they tell the one who answers, they will pay him a hundred rand if he will take a photo of his receipt and email the picture to them. They were also constantly busy on the Internet, acquiring logos and the right fonts and stuff. Ernst took great pride in the work, and the quality of the alibis. He would often spend many hours with the designers, making a master document that was exactly right. He was very good at it. They all said, he’s the Photoshop king.’
‘Who is his secretary?’
‘He doesn’t have one any more. There was a secretary, for about three months in the beginning. But when we had to downsize the first time, he let her go. He said he answered his own email and phone in any case.’
‘So who would know best what was going on in his life?’
She thought about it. ‘That would probably be me.’
Cupido nodded. She was comfortable now. It was time for the big questions.
‘Thanks, Miss Coetzee, we understand better now. But now we have to ask a few hard questions.’
‘It’s fine. Ask.’
‘Are there people in this company who were angry with Ernst Richter?’
‘You mean, as in . . . wanted him dead?’
‘We have to examine all the possibilities, Miss.’
‘No. Never.’
‘You sound very sure.’
‘I am.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they liked him. And he was Alibi. Without him . . . I don’t know what is going to happen to us.’
‘He was the sole proprietor?’
‘No, he had a 51 per cent share, but he was the driving force. And the brain.’
‘Who owns the other 49 per cent?’
‘I can’t say. There’s a non-disclosure agreement.’
‘Miss Coetzee, with all due respect. This is a murder investigation. You will have to answer.’
‘I will have to talk to our lawyers first.’
‘Can you phone them now?’
She hesitated only for a moment. Then she reached for the phone.
Benny Griessel wondered why she was so calm and in control, under the circumstances.
Sergeant Reginald ‘Lithpel’ Davids was the resident genius of the Hawks Information Management Centre, or IMC. He was skinny and slight of build, with the face of a schoolboy, and a massive Afro hairstyle.
‘Cappie, you’re crowding my space,’ he said as he scrabbled around in a box of cables.
Captain Frankie Fillander, who was leaning anxiously over Davids’ worktop, took a small step back.
‘Where are the days, Lithpel . . .’
‘Cappie?’
‘Back when we couldn’t understand you. I’m telling you, one of these days they’re going to write you up for insubordination.’ Davids had had a serious speech impediment until about three months ago. But thanks to reconstructive jaw surgery at Tygerberg hospital, he now spoke normally, without the old lisp. His nickname, however, had survived.
‘They won’t, Cappie. You need me too much.’
‘And windgatgeit,’ said Frank Fillander. ‘And I’ll lock you up myself for being so cocky.’
Davids just laughed. He was going to try to resurrect the iPhone 5 that Forensics had dug out of the sand beside Ernst Richter’s body.
‘Your iPhone 5s is not nearly as watertight as your iPhone 6 or your Samsung S4 or 5, but sand is a great dehumidifier, Cappie. Did you know, if you drop your phone in the water, that you should put it in rice?’
‘In rice?’
‘That’s right. Cover it in rice. The rice absorbs the water. Now, sand does the same job. And this phone doesn’t look wet to me.’ Davids selected a charger cable, and pushed one end into the USB port of his laptop, and the other end into the back of the phone.
‘I see. Any luck?’
‘Patience, Cappie, patience . . .’
Fillander couldn’t help himself. He leaned forward again to see the screen of the phone.
It lit up suddenly, and the Apple icon appeared.
‘It’s working,’ said Frank Fillander.
‘Too soon to tell. It has to boot first . . .’
They stood waiting and watching in silence. The icon disappeared, and was replaced by a sign-in screen.
‘Hallelujah,’ said Fillander.
‘Thank you, Lithpel,’ said Davids, pointedly.
‘Thank you,’ said Fillander. ‘But all you did was plug in a cable.’
‘It’s not just plugging in the cable. You have to know which cable . . .’ He pointed at the screen lock and said, ‘We still have a problem. It’s still locked.’
‘Can you unlock it?’
‘It’s an iPhone 5s, and the owner used his fingerprint for the lock.’
‘His fingerprint?’
‘Apple’s touch ID. Very cool.’
‘So we need his finger?’
‘Cappie, you’re a genius.’
‘We have ten of his fingers in Salt River . . .’
‘You’re not making me go into that mortuary, Cappie. That totally freaks me out.’
‘Windgat, maar bang-gat, hey? You’re so full of it, but it’s all just hot air. Give me the phone, and tell me what I have to do.’
Desiree Coetzee put the phone down. ‘The other two shareholders are Marlin Investments, and Cape Capital, 24.5 each,’ she said.
‘Who are they?’ asked Cupido.
‘Venture cap
ital firms. They put up about half of the start-up capital for Alibi.’
‘And the other half?’
‘Ernst put it up.’
‘How much was it?’
‘The total start-up capital? I’m not sure, but it was around three million.’
Cupido’s phone beeped in his pocket. ‘Sorry,’ he said and took it out. He read the SMS. It was from Vusi Ndabeni. He wanted to know where Ernst Richter’s computer was.
‘Miss Coetzee, what computer did Richter use?’
‘His laptop. A MacBook Pro.’
‘And the Stellenbosch SAPS took it?’
‘Yes.’
‘When?’
‘When Ernst was reported missing: three weeks ago. They phoned later to ask if we knew what the password for the laptop is. We couldn’t help them.’
‘Okay . . .’ Cupido typed an SMS in response to Ndabeni.
While he was busy, Benny Griessel asked a question for the first time: ‘Miss, you said all the staff liked Ernst Richter.’
‘Yes. He was really nice to them.’
‘And you?’
‘Sure.’ But the answer was just a touch too light on enthusiasm, thought Griessel.
He kept his voice sympathetic: ‘It must be hard to keep it all together this morning.’
‘It is. The people are devastated. But the show must go on.’
‘You’re handling the shock very well.’
‘I have no choice. I am the only one who can . . .’ And then she stopped, and displeasure wrinkled the lovely smooth skin of her forehead. ‘What are you trying to say?’
Cupido lowered his phone and looked with fresh interest at Griessel, who merely shrugged. He knew he had said enough.
Coetzee crossed her arms, clearly affronted. ‘If you’re insinuating that I’m not . . .’ She shook her head, then leaned forward over the desk, her eyes angry, and focused on Griessel: ‘He was missing for three weeks. Just gone, like that. His car was found in Plankenbrug. Here, near the township. This is Stellenbosch. Do you know what the crime statistics are? Muggings at the university, the Balaclava Gang on the farms, the varsity prof murdered in the Strand. What would you have thought? How long before you put two and two together? I did my grieving a week after he disappeared, in the privacy of my home. That’s when I knew, something had happened. But I did not have the luxury of showing my sorrow in public because I had to go back to work, and manage sixty-seven people in very difficult circumstances. So please forgive me for not breaking down this morning, sir, and not living up to your high emotional standards.’
23
Transcript of interview: Advocate Susan Peires with Mr Francois du Toit
Wednesday, 24 December; 1604 Huguenot Chambers, 40 Queen Victoria Street, Cape Town
FdT: Ouma Hettie did some careful creative accounting with the farm books, while Pa was swotting, and the year that he did national military service. The day of his passing-out parade, Ouma Hettie gave him a gift – a plane ticket to Europe, along with some spending money . . .
I wish I had known Pa when he was young. Or just knew more about him . . .
In all the farm photo albums there is practically nothing from my father’s student years. He never talked about it; it was as if the student Guillaume du Toit had never existed, except for the graduation certificate that he eventually framed and hung in the cellar. When he was forty-four years old – two decades after he had graduated.
I wonder if Pa was a happy student. I wonder if he ever laughed or talked nonsense, if he partied, if he took girls out on dates, if he had fun. How much fun can a person have when your father hates and rejects you, if you know your mother had to make a terrible threat so that you could be at university? What sort of student life do you have when your passion is wine making, and you learn how to do it, but you might never get the chance, because your father is going to stubbornly cling to the farm until the day he dies?
As a child I was still too dumb to really know my father. He was just what he was. My father. And in those days Pa worked at the KWV, office hours. He travelled a lot, so he was to a certain extent absent. It was hard to form a proper idea of his character back then. But after my teens, when he eventually got the farm, when as an adult I began to see him as a person for the first time . . . He was a quiet man. Responsible, fair, calm. Maybe too calm. But unknowably quiet. Not completely sombre, he had a certain dry sense of humour, but I don’t believe I ever heard my father laugh really spontaneously.
I often used to wonder, was he always like that? Was that his nature? Or was that how life had made him? I still believe it was life. When he smiled, there was a sort of . . . nostalgia, longing, almost as if at that moment he thought that things could have been different. He could have been different.
But life was cruel to Pa.
First there was Oupa Jean. And then there was his firstborn son. Paul.
24
Vaughn Cupido took a few minutes to realise that he and Benny Griessel had switched roles. For the first time since they had worked together, as far as he could remember.
Traditionally he had been the bad cop versus Benny’s good cop, and he had enjoyed it, because he was good at it. He knew how to get under the skin of the suspects, how to tip them off balance. How to make them cross, so that in their anger and agitation they would say the wrong thing, or go seeking protection from a sympathetic Griessel, who would then winkle the information out of them more easily.
But he could play the good cop. Especially with Desiree Coetzee. ‘Captain Griessel, that’s a bit harsh; Miss Coetzee has a lot to deal with this morning,’ he said and saw her glance gratefully at him.
‘But you didn’t like him as much as the others did,’ said Griessel.
She looked to Cupido for help.
He said: ‘It must be different when you work with someone in management.’
‘Yes,’ she said, and sank back slowly into her chair. ‘We had our differences. I wished he would be more hands-on. And I said so. There were times . . .’
They didn’t react, waited for her to elaborate. She shrugged again. ‘The department heads will tell you, Ernst and I sometimes disagreed strongly in the exec meetings. And it’s true. The trouble is, he wanted me to run the company, but then he made decisions that . . . He didn’t consult . . .’
She looked out of the window. She breathed in slowly and deeply, and then let the breath out suddenly, explosively, as if somehow that brought her relief and release. ‘He was like a child, sometimes. I mean no disrespect to the dead, honestly, but he . . . I think that it was more of a game to him. The whole thing – the company, the alibis, the fake documents – he was having a lot of fun. He wasn’t a businessman. No, he wasn’t a manager. When he sat with the staff, he made jokes, he wanted them to be his friends, to like him. You can’t do that if you are the managing director. When we had to do the lay-offs, six months ago, he didn’t want to. He was so afraid they would . . . not like him. That’s the problem, if you rub shoulders with the staff. Appearances were important to him. Everything had to look right . . .’
And then she fell silent.
‘But everything wasn’t right?’ Griessel asked.
‘No, everything wasn’t right.’
‘Where was the problem?’ asked Cupido.
‘Ernst was cooking the books.’
Lithpel Davids had given Captain Frank Fillander very detailed instructions: keep Richter’s iPhone plugged into the car charger on the way there, they didn’t want the battery to give up the ghost just at the crucial finger moment. Make sure the thumb on the right hand of the corpse was properly clean. ‘Phone me then, Cappie, and I’ll talk you through it.’
Now Fillander was standing in the State Mortuary in Salt River, where the remains of Ernst Richter lay on a table of gleaming stainless steel, ready for the forensic pathologist’s investigatio
n. The body was covered with a green sheet, only the right arm was exposed. The thumb had been cleaned with alcohol. The smell of decomposition was powerful.
Fillander had rubber gloves on both hands. He took out his own phone, called Lithpel’s number, and pinched the instrument between his chin and shoulder.
‘Cappie,’ Lithpel greeted him.
‘Okay, I’m ready,’ said Fillander.
‘Take a deep breath, Cappie.’
‘Don’t mess with me, Lithpel.’
Davids said he must activate the screen by pressing the button on the top right of Richter’s iPhone.
‘Done,’ said Fillander.
Davids told him to press the cushion of the right thumb lightly against the circular button below the screen of the phone.
Fillander bent down to see better, picked up Richter’s phone and followed Davids’s instructions.
Nothing happened.
‘Shit,’ said Fillander.
‘What now?’ asked Davids.
‘Didn’t work.’
‘Just stay cool,’ said Davids.
‘Why didn’t it work?’
‘Cappie, you pressed the thumb too lightly. Or on the wrong spot. But now you must work nicely, because it’s three strikes and out.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your iPhone works like this, if you give it the wrong fingerprint three times, then it asks for an access code, which we don’t have. You can switch it off, and on again, but then you only get one chance at the fingerprint before it asks for the access code again.’
‘Fok,’ said Fillander.
‘Just relax. Try it one more time. Make sure you have the meaty part of the finger, and press it a bit harder.’
‘Okay. Hang on . . .’ Fillander bent down further and the sickly-sweet odour threatened to overwhelm him. He had to swallow to suppress the urge to vomit.
He activated the screen again. He held Richter’s phone in his right hand, brought the phone closer. He aimed and then pressed, his head turned so that he could see what was happening on the screen.