Icarus

by Deon Meyer

  There was a note.

  I am glad you are dry again. xxx

  86

  They walked together out of the lift of Huguenot Chambers in Queen Victoria Street, and Advocate Susan Peires said to Francois du Toit, ‘You said your mother is small of stature.’

  He stopped and looked at her. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘And she’s sixty-one now?’

  ‘Yes . . .’

  ‘She wouldn’t have been able to do it alone, would she?’

  ‘I . . . I also . . . You think so many things when you’re stressed, when you wonder . . . The labourers would do anything for her. She is like a mother to them. If she went and talked to one or two of them, told them that . . . I don’t know, maybe if she said their future and their children’s futures were on the line . . .’

  Peires took that in, and nodded. ‘Let’s go. Where are you parked?’

  He pointed. ‘Just down here . . .’

  ‘I’m in a red Jaguar. Wait until I come, then I’ll drive behind you.’

  ‘Okay.’ He turned and walked away, took out his cellphone and turned it back on, for the first time since that morning.

  Peires walked to the stairs to get to the basement where her car was. She was already thinking about the mother and the labourers, suddenly quite sceptical about it all, about his story.

  She was already down the first flight of stairs when she heard him call. ‘Advocate!’ his urgent voice falling strangely on her ear. She stopped and called: ‘Here!’

  He appeared at the top of the steps, holding up his cellphone. ‘I think you need to see this . . .’

  87

  On the 24th of December the ship of the Ernst Richter investigation sailed out of the doldrums.

  The first brisk breeze in the sails was the deciphering of the Chinese bank statements – thanks to Babalwa Boshigo’s aromatherapy massage, and her husband’s knowledge.

  But the sudden squall that made all the difference was the desire for drink that overwhelmed Benny Griessel.

  Bones phoned Cupido just before eight, with the news that the four payments from the Qin Trading account were made to a person or a company at the Stellenbosch branch of First National Bank, with the indecipherable abbreviation DTFT. The bank would give him full details, if he could produce a warrant, of course.

  So Cupido headed first to the Bellville magistrate’s court to get the warrant, and then raced through to Stellenbosch to be at the door of the bank when it opened.

  This morning Griessel was – thanks to the holiday city traffic – a few minutes too late to go with Cupido. Now he was sitting and waiting impatiently in his office. With the two miniature Jack Daniel’s bottles haunting him. Idleness and the Demon Drink were now dancing together. He had to get rid of the bottles. He couldn’t just toss them in his waste paper basket; he would have to make another plan.

  At ten past nine he made up his mind. He would discard them in the garbage bins behind the DPCI office.

  He closed his door, opened the drawer, scooped up the bottles, felt the cool glass in his palm. He shoved one each into his jacket pockets to stop them clinking, in case he ran into Major Kaleni in the passage.

  He opened the door, went out. The passage was empty. He walked quickly towards the stairs.

  His cellphone rang.

  Fok.

  He stopped, took out his phone, saw that it was Vaughn calling.

  ‘Vaughn?’ he answered.

  ‘Benna, we’ve got him. The account belongs to the Du Toit Family Trust, and the Du Toit Family Trust belongs to, lo and behold, a wine farmer, Francois du Toit. Klein Zegen is the name of the estate, it’s just here, other side the town.’

  The name Klein Zegen rang a bell. Griessel searched for its echo in his memory banks. He knew he’d heard the name when he’d already knocked back a few, but he would find it. Cellphone at the ear, in the middle of the passage, he mouthed the words. ‘Klein Zegen, Klein Zegen . . .’ he repeated to jog his memory.

  ‘Jis, I think what we must do . . .’

  ‘There was a bottle . . . No, I think more than one bottle of Klein Zegen wine in Richter’s drinks cabinet.’

  ‘Benna, it all makes sense. The payments, the forensic detail about pesticides, and the baling twine and the plastic and the vine leaves – all that says wine estate to me. We must just find that jacaranda tree. I have a theory, but I’ll tell you when you get here. Can you organise a search warrant for us? I went to magistrate Cynthia Davids this morning for the bank warrant; she already has the details, you can just fill in the new info. And then I scheme, Benna, we hit this guy with the full force of the Hawks, scare the bejaysus out of him. Hear from Mbali if Uncle Frankie and them are still on the Kraaifontein case, get everyone you can. Vusi is the great jacaranda expert, if he can come too. I’ll phone Forensics so long, so they can send people. But call me, Benna, I want to orchestrate it so that we all arrive at the same time, if you get my drift.’

  Cupido waited for the procession at the same Engen garage where they had bought food during the search of Richter’s house.

  He addressed them all first, in full JOC leader mode, a man with a new mission. Vusi, Mooiwillem, Griessel and Frank Fillander were there, along with four other Hawks, and Lithpel Davids, for the technology – the cellphones and computers. Thick and Thin from Forensics in their little white bus. Cupido said he had a theory. The wine farmer had imported something from China. Machinery, or harvesters or distillers or whatever shit wine farmers use. And inside those harvesters or barrels or whatever, were drugs. Richter was the middleman, he made contacts in South East Asia, dagga smoker that he is, and then he looked for a partner, someone who imports big machines or whatever from China. And then the wine farmer got his two million, and Richter got something like double that. But Richter’s money ran out, and he tried a shakedown with Du Toit, just like he tried with all the others.

  And that’s what got him killed. Under the jacaranda tree.

  ‘Under the Jacaranda Tree,’ said Arnold, the short fat one from Forensics. ‘That could be the name, if they make a film about Ernst Richter one day.’

  Cupido looked sternly at Arnold. ‘This is serious stuff. We are looking for evidence of the drugs. You swab and test all you have to swab and test. It’s eighteen months since the big smuggling operation, but you never know.’ Then to the detectives: ‘We’re looking for the papers from the imports, we’re looking for the plastic and the baling twine and the jacaranda tree.’

  ‘And the fungicide,’ said Jimmy, the tall, skinny forensic investigator.

  ‘Right,’ said Cupido. Then to Lithpel: ‘And all the cellphones and laptops and all that jazz.’

  They drove in convoy, Cupido in front, because he had the directions, on the Blaauwklippen road. Just beyond the Dornier estate they turned left, and Cupido turned on his siren and flashing blue lights. The road narrowed, up the valley, the mountains brooding and beautiful to the left. The sky was a bright clear blue.

  High up on the slopes of the mountain, through a gate, with a sign that said: Klein Zegen. Wines. Restaurant La Bonne Chère. Traditional French Cuisine.

  The farmyard was beautiful, well-tended, with green lawns and flower beds and shrubs and the elegant Cape Dutch homestead at its centre, the restaurant and outbuildings alongside. Below, towards the river, was a newer structure, large, like a cellar, but carefully designed to blend in with the historic.

  A few cars were parked in front of the restaurant. They stopped, Cupido turned the siren off and they all leapt out, except for Thick and Thin from Forensics, who waited to see if there would be shooting.

  A woman walked out of the front door of the homestead. Small, frail, somewhere past fifty, maybe sixty, but still attractive, with a thick bush of grey hair. She held a wailing baby in her arms and gave them a look of stern reproach.

  Cupido walked
up to her, feisty, determined, the warrant in his hand, and opened his mouth to speak.

  ‘Ag no, man, why did you have to make such a racket?’ asked the woman. ‘Now you’ve gone and woken little Guillaume.’

  An anti-climax. Francois du Toit wasn’t home, though his wife was. She was very pretty, dressed in her white chef’s apron. Not yet thirty. She introduced herself as San, her eyes frightened.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she asked.

  Cupido said they were here about the murder of Ernst Richter. They wanted her husband for questioning, and they had a search warrant that covered the whole farm. Where was her husband?

  She was confused. Ernst Richter? Francois? But why? Ernst Richter, the one who had been all over the news?

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘But we don’t even know him.’

  ‘Ma’am, where is your husband?’

  ‘He went to town. Ernst Richter? We have nothing to do with Ernst Richter.’

  But they could see she was worried that perhaps there was something she didn’t know.

  The older woman with the baby came and took San du Toit by the arm. ‘Come in, my child,’ she said calmly. ‘It’s a mistake, they will realise later, it won’t help to talk to these people now.’

  ‘When will your husband be back?’ asked Cupido.

  ‘He’ll be back soon,’ she said, her voice shaking and let the older woman lead her away.

  ‘Then we will begin our search so long. I ask you to choose one room in the house and stay there. Don’t touch anything. And we want someone to show us all the jacaranda trees.’

  The older woman stopped. ‘Jacaranda trees?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Cupido.

  She pointed to the side of the house. ‘There,’ she said. ‘That’s the only one.’

  All the detectives’ heads turned. The tree stood at the corner of the house. Beneath it was a lush green lawn.

  Thick and Thin from Forensics walked quickly through the outbuildings, stores and the cellar and then phoned Plattekloof for reinforcements, because there was much more work than anyone had anticipated. They began with the cellar, and did their tests while they speculated which Hollywood actors would star in the film Under the Jacaranda Tree – and who would play which detective. Mooiwillem was easy: George Clooney. Fillander was definitely Morgan Freeman. Vusi was Denzel Washington. Cupido’s casting led to heated debate, until they settled on Chris Rock. They themselves – non-negotiable – were represented by Brad Pitt (Jimmy) and Bradley Cooper (Arnold) respectively, however Jimmy said Zach Galifianakis was his stout colleague to a T. But they kept scratching their heads over Benny Griessel.

  Chris Rock and Lithpel Davids set to work on Du Toit’s office.

  Morgan Freeman and George Clooney searched the house, because they could ‘handle angry women the best’.

  Griessel was grateful that he could be on the team that walked across the farm looking for the other jacarandas, because none of them believed the aunty with the hair, as Cupido had christened her.

  He still had two 50 ml bottles of Jack Daniel’s, one in each jacket pocket. In the heat of the moment, when Vaughn phoned him, Griessel had forgotten about his mission to dispose of them and only remembered the whisky when they were already on the road.

  Now he could throw them away somewhere between the vines.

  But on Klein Zegen the stars never lined up quite the way you planned.

  88

  He walked down a dirt road, a hand in each jacket pocket, clutching the bottles while his eyes searched for the purple-blue flowers that Vusi had described. ‘But it’s late in the season, so the flowers may be over, but the blossoms would still be lying under the trees. So look for this shape.’ He showed them a photo of a tree on his phone.

  Young grapes on the vines, rows and rows of them. The mountains looming behind. The silence: just the birdsong and the buzz of insects. Peaceful. He had been in places like this before – idyllic, breathtaking, you wouldn’t believe a murder had been committed here. You couldn’t believe that someone’s final death scream had gone up from this place.

  Don’t mess with that stuff now. Follow the shrink’s advice.

  He turned his attention back to the possible jacaranda trees.

  His phone rang sudden and shrill in his pocket, making him jump.

  That was the thing with the drying-out process and the medication and poor sleep and the tension of the job and Alexa and all: it put him on edge.

  He took out his phone. Recognised the number. Answered.

  ‘Griessel.’

  ‘Captain Benny Griessel? From the Hawks?’ A man’s voice that he didn’t recognise.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’m phoning from the Son, Captain. The newspaper.’ He spoke the words in a rush, as if he were afraid Griessel would interrupt him. ‘I just want to confirm with you where you were last Wednesday night, around six o’clock.’

  Benny’s heart missed a beat.

  What did they know? Why now? Jissis, why now that he was dry? He had to stay calm; he mustn’t let the journalist hear what a fright he’d got.

  ‘Where did you get this number?’

  ‘From a contact, Captain. Can you confirm where you were last Wednesday evening?’

  Stay calm, But his resistance was low. The implications of a news report about his drunkenness, about his fighting, hammered through him. Much worse, now that he had stopped drinking again and he could see the terrible outcome all the more clearly. Now, just when things with Vaughn were back to normal. When he still had a faint hope of Alexa returning.

  He took a deep breath. He didn’t want to wait too long before answering, that would suggest certain guilt. ‘I am busy with an investigation, sir. Please call Captain John Cloete of the DPCI. He handles the media. Goodbye.’

  He ended the call, but his heart kept racing.

  What did they know?

  He pushed the phone into his jacket pocket. It clinked against the Jack Daniel’s.

  His phone rang again.

  The same number.

  Again his fingers brushed against the Jack.

  He would drink one, just to calm his nerves.

  Not here. There were colleagues around. He clutched the bottle tightly as he walked blindly downhill, to the little stream below. Can you confirm where you were, last Wednesday evening? He had to think about the question when his nerves had settled, it was asked in a specific way. First he must just regain control.

  He walked fast, stumbled over a stone. Fok. There was a place to hide, down by the stream. He was nearly there, he thought, narrowly avoiding walking into a wire fence. He turned right along the fence; there was dense plant growth here. He stopped, looked around. Nobody could see him. Water babbled against the bank beside him. He pulled the bottle out, unscrewed the cap with one swift movement, raised it to his mouth, lifted his head.

  That’s when he saw the jacaranda tree, across the river. Here and there a pale purple flower still clinging to the branches.

  Griessel stood transfixed, bottle at his lips, his eyes on the tree barely ten metres from him. Something behind it. It looked like a shed: he saw a metal wall, corrugated iron.

  Nothing grew under the tree. Just brown dirt and rotting plant material and those purple-blue flowers.

  Secluded. Quiet. Far away from everything.

  He looked around him. On the opposite bank of the river a dirt track ran past the tree, towards the shed.

  He focused on the area under the tree. Drag a body there and you would get jacaranda flowers and sticks and vine leaves in the back pocket.

  He looked at the bottle in his hand.

  Can you confirm where you were, last Wednesday evening?

  Not ‘Were you at the Fireman’s Arms?’ or ‘Were you in the cells at Cape Town Central?’


  The journalist was fishing. Like he also did, when questioning a suspect. Clever. And he’d nearly fallen for it.

  He let out a long, slow breath. He turned the bottle over and let the alcohol pour out onto the ground at his feet, then threw the empty bottle into the water. Took out the other one, did the same.

  Then he walked upstream, looking for a bridge over the river.

  He walked at least sixty metres before he found it. He followed the dirt track on the other side of the river and walked downstream back to the jacaranda.

  The area under the tree was undisturbed. A month had passed; the possible drag marks would be long gone. But everything looked like it could fit.

  He judged that the shed was about ten metres away. He walked up to it. It was a metal structure, big. He walked around the corner of the building, saw the big sliding door, wide enough for a tractor. It was closed, but not locked. He pushed it open. The door groaned.

  There was a deep twilight inside. Only a few small windows on the northern side, beams of light falling onto the contents of the shed.

  He stepped in. It was hot and the air was filled with strange odours. A tractor, unusually small and narrow – he had seen them in the vineyards. A trailer with a big yellow tank on it. Another implement that he suspected was to remove weeds.

  He loosened his tie, uncomfortable in the heat, and waited for his eyes to adjust to the dim light. He saw the shelves against the walls, stacked full. Tins and drums and cans. Irrigation equipment.

  He went closer. Portable sprayers, spades and forks. On one shelf pruning shears lay in a neat row, fifty or more of them.

  Dark cylinders. He walked to them. Rolls of black plastic.

  And below, five big rolls of baling twine. Blood red.

  He touched the rolls to make sure, ran his hand across the plastic.

  He took a quick look at the drums on the shelf. He couldn’t read the labels. He took out his phone, used the torch function.

  He saw the words: Triazole.

  It was here that Richter had been bound and wrapped. The tree outside was the murder scene.