by Peter Church
“Can’t the polo neck boy sort it out?”
“Deacon? No. Not in his league. I need you there. Tomorrow.”
“Right. What are the orders?”
“Nose around. Low profile. Check out Deacon’s crew. One in particular might need special attention.”
“And who’s that?”
“Name’s Johnny.”
The backup was completed. Carlos unplugged the drive and placed it under the desk. Later he’d hide it beneath his bed. It was the safest place.
“Check your phone. I’ll send details.”
Alistair leaned against the bar counter of the Verge Inn and sucked on a Peroni. A seething mass of flesh and color bobbed, arms reaching out, the gangsta beat of Dr. Dre ricocheting off the drab grey walls. He’d shot back to his room, changed into a pair of cotton chinos, blue cord shirt and raced back to the ball, found a safe spot in the Belsen bar.
He’d rehearsed his lines.
“Terri. What a surprise!”
If she asked about his earlier entrance in the baggies?
“Oh. I was taking my laundry down.”
And if she asked about him licking the nurse’s belly?
No, he didn’t need an answer for that. She’d never ask.
But there was no sign of her.
Next to him stood Colin Macintosh, Green 215, useless wingman, snorting over a game of “Freckles” he’d played with two fellow Zimbos the night before. A solitary, stocky girl perched on a stool, hanging on their laughter.
She was trying to uncork her woes on Alistair, relating a horror story from the night before when she was urinated on at the annual Zimbabwe Society gathering.
“It was disgusting. I was cross-legged on the grass listening to the speaker…”
“What do they say at those meetings, anyway?” Alistair interrupted, absent mindedly.
“Generally it’s about Bob, you know. How bad he is. The economy. How the country has gone to shit.”
“Why doesn’t someone just knock him off?”
“Have you seen his security? They shoot anyone who drives near his place.”
“That never stopped anyone before.”
“What’s your point exactly?”
She was a tough little thing, Alistair thought. No wonder she’d been pissed on.
“You’ve seen it, haven’t you?” she said.
“Seen what?”
“The video.”
Alistair”s heart almost stopped. The nurse! What had she done?
“Of me—being pissed on. On Watchit.”
“Oh. That.” Alistair relaxed. “They filmed it? Disgraceful. The things that people do for entertainment these days…”
“Hello Alistair.”
He turned to find Terri at his side, a lifeguard in a red one piece swimsuit and blue jeans. Her hair was full and loose, her face shone, the patchy skin of her visit to his room gone, replaced by an airbrushed beauty.
“Terri,” he turned, blocking the Zimbabwean girl. “What a surprise to see you here.”
“I came with Katie. She says I need to get out.”
He scrutinized her face, a thin streak of eyeshadow accentuating the blue, pale pink lipstick, no base. The first time he’d seen her wear makeup.
“You’re looking…so much better.”
She smiled at him. “Thank you.”
“Are you Baywatch?”
“Trying,” she replied.
He kept his gaze at eye level. “Funny, I almost did a similar thing.” He scanned about, checking to see if Henri was around.
An awkward silence.
“I’m just trying to get a drink,” said Terri eventually.
“Oh!” Alistair swivelled around. “Let me help you.” He whistled at the barman.
She touched his arm lightly. “Don’t worry. I’m fine.”
The Belsen barman arrived. He looked at Alistair and then at Terri. “What’ll it be?”
“Two spritzers.”
The barman, new on the job, looked at Alistair. “Half wine, half soda,” he explained.
Alistair turned back to Terri and smiled.
“And what are you?” she asked.
He examined his clothing. “I don’t do dress up.”
“Could have fooled me.” She smiled and walked away with her drinks.
“What did that mean?” said Alistair aloud, shifting to one side. “Could have fooled me?”
“I couldn’t hear. Your ass was in my face,” said the Zimbabwean girl.
“Your face is his ass,” Macintosh chaffed her and the other Zimbos roared with laughter.
Devon and Richard worked shoulder to shoulder behind the computer screens in the lounge at Gorillas.
“Can I get you another cup of coffee, Dev?” said Richard, removing his spectacles and placing them above the unused fireplace.
“I’ll be awake all night. How about some wine?”
“A good idea. I’ll open that nice Rosé.”
“Rosé? That’s terrible. I put a bottle of Chardonnay in the freezer.”
“And what if I want Rosé?”
Devon smiled and waved him away.
They’d spent the evening working with a new video editing package. Given a selection of clips, images and music, the software automatically created a professional video. They experimented, interchanging images of famous people and settings pulled from the internet with photographs of themselves and surroundings. Richard had superimposed Desperate Dan into Johnny’s blue Cressida.
“Alistair asked me about the Camps Bay murder,” he said to Richard when he returned, Rosé in hand.
“Really? How did he know?”
“Read the article in the newspaper.”
“Alistair reading?” said Richard bitchily.
“He’s a law student,” reminded Devon.
“I rest my case. Why didn’t you tell him?”
“For what purpose?”
Devon picked up the bottle of Rosé, sighed, and filled his glass.
“I have to hand it to Carlos. He’s in touch. A client doesn’t contact him, he checks up. He knew about the murder before we did.”
“Are you concerned?” asked Richard, picking at his skin, his forehead oily and red.
Devon shrugged. “I’m curious.”
Richard turned and looked at Devon. “Thank you for sharing things with me,” he said softly.
Devon pointed at the screen, “Let’s work out the code for this application.”
Richard isolated the object code and dragged it into a disassembly program.
“When did you speak to Alistair?” asked Richard, fingers rubbing and scratching at his face.
Devon raised his eyebrows. “Stop picking your skin!”
Richard, told off, pulled his hands away from his face and turned his attention back to the screen.
“When did he ask you about Camps Bay?” Richard tried again, as he scribbled down the list of compatible file types that would operate with the software.
“Yesterday afternoon.”
“What was the occasion?”
“He’d come to fetch his cash.”
“Did you talk for long?” Richard kicked off another background process and a list of subroutine calls flashed across the screen.
“No. I’m getting tired of this.” Devon pushed his chair back and stretched his arms in the air.
“Of what?” Richard let go of the cursor and faced him.
“No, I mean of this work. Even if we disassemble the code, what’s the point?”
“We can use the subroutines in our own programs.”
Devon yawned. “Have you heard anything about Alistair?” he asked, changing the topic.
“What sort of things?”
“Him seeing Terri Phillips.”
Richard shook his head.
“I wonder if he has?”
“Don’t worry so much about him, Devon. You’re always on about him. Alistair this. Alistair that. You’d think…”
; “What?” Devon interrupted, his voice sharp.
Richard raised his hands in the air and pushed his chair back.
“What? Richard! Think what?”
Richard got up, hands still in the air as he walked toward the door.
“Richard! Answer me!”
“I can’t talk to you when you get like this, Devon.”
He walked to his room and locked the door.
A MATTER OF SHARKS
“My ass looks like the Japanese flag,” Silverman moaned from within a cubicle in the communal ablution area on Green Second.
Alistair leant against the door of the cubicle. “What ails, Silverman?”
“I have a grass burn in my crevice.”
“Ouch.”
The remnants of Silverman’s green underpants lay on the concrete floor; they looked as if they’d made a journey too many through Mrs. Hamilton’s washing machine.
“Look, Silverman. I want you to understand something. I never made a video.”
“Liar!”
“Seriously, I didn’t.”
“Why was your video camera open on your desk?”
“I was cleaning it.”
“Why was there a plastic DVD wrapper in your waste paper basket?”
Alistair thought hard. “I downloaded a video online and cut a copy on my laptop.”
“Have you retained the evidence for this court?”
“Yes.”
“Why was your room reeking of perfume and sex?”
The cross examination had taken a bad turn. Alistair floundered. “It wasn’t.”
“We have witnesses who’ll say it did.”
“But are they credible?”
“I want to see the video, Morgan. I won’t rest until the truth emerges. I’ll call the princess to the witness stand.”
Silverman yelped again.
“OK. The truth,” announced Alistair.
“Nothing but.”
“I did make a video.”
“Whoopee. State’s evidence. Please present.”
“But not of Terri.”
“Pray continue.”
“I met a girl at the pool. She came up to my room later.”
“You didn’t know her. Before?”
“No. I think I’d seen her around.”
“Seen her around? Filthy girl! Name, please?”
Alistair hit a blank. “She’s a nurse.”
“OK. I’ll cut you some slack. Present the video and we’ll examine the evidence.”
The toilet flushed and Silverman appeared.
“I have a bit of a problem with that,” explained Alistair. “She’s got the video.”
Campus, lunch time. Alistair received a text:
Rwanda. 1600. NB
He idled at the Leslie, sipping on coffee, scouting talent on the move, noting the different speeds and intensities. The conscientious girls skipped, bums taut, books clutched, intent obvious. The flirty girls dawdled, wiggled ass, dropped pencil cases, flicked hair.
He examined the message, from Devon, an important meeting at Gorillas at four.
Alistair stood up, still sipping on his coffee. He spotted two girls waving. He smiled a shy, cheeky smile and waved back as if he knew them. Not bad, he thought: definite maybe.
He attended class after lunch, slipped a text to Terri:
U on campus? Keen 4 a coffee at leslie?
He had time to kill before four. No answer, though.
The gang sprawled across the lounge furniture. Johnny in a pair of shorts, scratching his chest, Richard flicking through muted DSTV channels. Alistair sat in the chair next to Johnny watching Devon, who paced restlessly back and forth. Devon sucked in his breath purposefully and heaved out an artificial laugh. The speakers resonated with obscure electronica, a German band Richard had found, the tune lost in excessive bass.
“This is outrageous,” said Devon. “But authentic, a one hundred percent for real request from Dark Video.”
Richard continued to flick the remote, Johnny rubbed his hands on his pants and looked up, a hungry wolf anticipating his dinner. He removed a crumpled packet of cigarettes from his top pocket, banged the pack to unseat a unit, saw Devon’s disapproving expression, fed the cigarette back and replaced the packet.
“They want a clip of a great white shark attacking…”
He paused as they digested the news. Alistair stared ahead, gaze directed at the poster of King Kong without conscious thought.
“Attacking what?” asked Richard, putting down the remote, eyes huge behind the lens of his glasses.
“A person.”
The music thumped in dull monotone.
“No way,” said Richard, pressing his face into a cushion. “No way!”
“Way,” replied Devon, his head scanning the room in a slow arc. “Big cash offered.”
“Can I just turn it down and leave right now?” Alistair sitting forward, addressed the amplifier.
“How much?” Johnny asked.
Alistair sat back again, the volume squeezed out of the room, a light wind flicking at the closed curtains in the lounge.
“Two fifty US.”
Johnny whistled. The math was easy: over two million rand.
Devon paused for effect. “An additional two fifty if it breaches.”
“What?” said Alistair. “Five hundred thousand dollars?”
“No way,” repeated Richard. He laughed nervously.
“Snuff,” said Alistair, shaking his head. “I’ll be leaving, I think…”
“Just wait a moment,” responded Devon. “Let’s just think this through slowly. We’ve got a lot of sharks right on our doorstep and there may well be a chance to take advantage of our location.”
Like most Capetonions, all four of them knew about the infamous shark population off the Cape coast to a greater or lesser degree: that the coastline was home to the largest population of great white sharks in the world; that False Bay, ringed with popular Cape Town beaches, was one of only a few known great white breeding grounds and harbor to the infamous Seal Island which, overrun by thousands of Cape fur seals, attracted the fearsome predators by the score. One thing they all knew for sure: it was the only spot in the world where great whites have been regularly filmed breaching as they race up from the murky depths in pursuit of their prey. Devon, Alistair, Johnny and Richard had all seen the National Geographic footage and images of gaping jaws clutching at flapping seals; muscular bodies thrashing in midair, filled their minds.
“But I’ve seen footage of shark attacks on people,” said Richard, breaking the silence.
“Coincidence,” said Johnny. “Those are right time, right place events. You can’t follow a shark around hoping it attacks someone.” He removed the pack of cigarettes again.
Alistair unlaced and retied his tackies. The repetitive beat of the music irritated him. “Devon, you’re not being serious are you?” he said.
“I’m serious that it’s a DV request. I’m serious about the cash offered.” A little smile appeared at the side of Devon’s mouth. “But I haven’t got a serious suggestion for how we go about getting the shot.”
“A shark cage outing, someone gets knocked overboard. We film it,” suggested Johnny.
Richard shook his head. “How’d they get knocked overboard? What are the odds?”
“Exactly,” agreed Alistair. “And we can’t exactly arrive on a chartered boat with tons of video equipment and then someone falls over? Come on!”
“Good point,” said Devon. “We’ll need an underwater camera and at least one on board. We’ll definitely need our own boat, which I can organize.”
“Easy, we stage it,” interrupted Johnny.
“We can’t do that,” said Devon. “It has to be real.”
“So let’s get this straight,” said Alistair. “Someone has to die.”
Devon nodded.
“And we’re still having this conversation? Have I gone crazy or something?”
“No way! No way ar
e we going to kill someone for bucks,” said Richard.
No one spoke, just the relentless bass. Then Devon: “What if the person wants to die?”
“What the hell does that mean?” said Alistair. He stared again at the picture of King Kong. He imagined being one of the people trapped on the branch. “Please can’t someone turn that flipping music off!”
Devon pointed the remote at the sound system. The volume diminished.
“It’s simple. Find someone who wants to die.”
Richard laughed hysterically. “What moron wants to be eaten alive by a great white? Have you watched freaking Jaws? I wet myself when I’m in a swimming pool sometimes.”
Johnny raised his hands to allow Devon to continue.
“Dark Video don’t care how we do it. Other agents will be prepared to cross the line, whatever the method. But we have a moral line we won’t cross.”
“Then how?” Johnny tapped the packet of Camels, took out a single cigarette.
“What if a person is dying anyway? Terminally ill, three months to live. No pension or reserves. Leaving behind destitution. We offer a million rand to be paid to the family on his death.”
Devon’s words turned the questions into imagination, into blue water thrashed by a savage black beast, gaping mouth, rows of serrated teeth, red blood spurting in the air, screams and frantic splashes. Would the victim resist or accept death gracefully? Would a primal instinct to survive engage and a desperate struggle ensue?
“Beers!” Devon broke the silence.
Johnny volunteered, disappeared to the kitchen, returned with four Black Labels and passed them around. Alistair placed his can on the table. Not his drink of choice.
“Now this is exciting!” said Johnny. “Cheers.”
Technically it was possible, Devon explained. He possessed a skipper’s license; his uncle owned a decent sized ski boat. He revealed a plan for an automated camera attached to a pole to focus on the action underwater, and on board cameras recording the breach and the action above—one of the big Canons mounted on a tripod, and a camcorder, just in case. He would acquire the waterproof casing required for the underwater camera, as well as a suitable telescoping pole, then work out an easy fitment and removal mechanism, and cabling to control the angle from above.
“Why not just get in the water and film it?” asked Johnny, gulping from the red and black beer can.