James McClure - The Caterpillar Cop

Mindful of how headmasters felt about these things, he did his swearing in the car before going round to the office. The secretary there, a proper old bag in a black dress, was taking her spinsterhood out on the typewriter. She totally ignored him until, out of the corner of a downcast eye, she noticed the intruder wore long trousers.

“Yes?” she said. “Have you come about the smell?”

“Not exactly,” Kramer replied. “I’m from the CID. I want to see the principal.”

“What about?”

“Can I see him?”

“Mr. Marais is down at the Education Department this morning. The deputy’s got chicken pox.”

“I see. Well, I want to have a word with one of the pupils-Hennie Vermaak. It won’t take long.”

“Break is just over.”

“Fine. It’d be better alone.”

“Do the parents…?”

Kramer seemed to nod.

“Has Hennie…?”

He shrugged.

Her imagination took over and the result seemed to delight her in a predictably unpleasant sort of way. She slit open a smile.

“What was the name again?”

“Vermaak, Hennie. He’s twelve.”

She waddled over to the door.

“I’ll get Miss Louw; she teaches the twelves. Please take a seat.”

Kramer sat down in her chair and read the letter she had been working on. From it he learned that all the school’s attempts to get an English teacher had now failed. Then he looked through the desk drawers.

“Damn.”

There was no correspondence whatsoever concerning Boetie Swanepoel, not even in the file marked STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL.

Footfalls had him at the window admiring the featureless playing field. A dozen or so Bantu prisoners knelt weeding it under the supervision of a warder armed with spear and club. They wore the regulation white shorts and red-and-white-striped jerseys and looked like a soccer team who had lost the ball.

Christ, his mind was all over the place.

On the other hand, every part of Miss Louw was precisely where nature had intended. It made her one of those young women who always pause in a doorway because a doorway has a frame and a frame sets off a pretty picture. One rendered prettier still in this instance by strong sunlight shining through the light summer frock from behind to define the long legs in gentle silhouette. The glare from the quadrangle also gilded a rim around the bounce of blond curls, and cast a shadow that crossed the floor to smooth itself up against Kramer. If only it had reached high enough to shade his eyes, he might have been able to see the face properly.

“Hello,” she said.

“Miss Louw? I’m Lieutenant Kramer of-”

“The secretary told me and we’ve discussed it,” she cut in. “I don’t really see why not. So I’ve put Hennie in the remedial classroom because it isn’t being used today. Third door down as you go out of here. Sorry, I must get back to my class.”

“But-”

Kramer was caught off guard. For a moment he considered chasing after her, and then vetoed the motion on the grounds that she had already made him feel old and enfeebled. Miss Louw was young in a way that hurt.

So he got back to business and tracked down Hennie Vermaak.

The boy was short for his age and not very bright by appearances. His hair had been cut so close he was almost bald, he had a snub nose, and under the small brown eyes, teeth like maize pips. He also bit his nails.

“Catching up on your reading, Hennie?”

The boy dropped the placard with dog printed on it.

“Who are you?” he asked gruffly.

“Just a policeman.”

Hennie edged away but Kramer moved with him, placing an arm around his shoulders.

“What’s the matter, then? Don’t you like cops?”

“Yes.”

“Hey?”

“Yes, I do. They keep the communists away.”

“That’s what pa told you.”

Hennie inclined his head.

“Good boy. So it’s all right if I ask you a few questions?”

“What about?”

“Your mate Boetie Swanepoel.”

The small shoulder blades squeezed together.

“He isn’t at school today.”

“I know. He isn’t at home either.”

Hennie looked up warily.

“Where is he, then?”

“They say you’re his best friend. But do you know if he has any other friends he might go and visit? Special friends, like you.”

“Everyone’s at school.”

“Grown-up friends maybe?”

“Huh?”

“Tell me, what did you blokes do together yesterday afternoon?”

“We went shooting birds with our air guns.”

“Up near the country club?”

Hennie scowled.

“We never go there! It’s too far. Besides, you’re not allowed.”

“How many did you get?”

“An Indian myna.”

“Not bad! They’re a smart lot. And did you have any plans for today? Were you going shooting again after school?”

“No, it’s swimming. We’ve got to practice for the gala. Boetie and me-”

“Yes?”

“Nothing. We’re in the interhouse relay.”

“Is that what you talked about last night before he went home?”

“Maybe. I don’t remember.”

“Try hard, please.”

“He just said he’d better be going a bit early before it got dark because his tire was flat.”

“But he lives close by, doesn’t he?”

“It was something like that.”

“What time was this?”

“Sort of six o’clock.”

“You’re lying to me, Hennie! Want to know why?”

The boy ducked and ran for the door. Kramer grabbed him.

“Shall I tell you? Because Boetie’s air gun is there in his bedroom, but he didn’t go home last night. Not at all! ”

Hennie’s top lip trembled like the lid of a saucepan brought to the boil. Any minute he would spill over.

“Now take it easy, son! Just tell me how it was that you and Boetie were shooting when-”

“His gun’s broke.”

“And so?”

“He borrowed my big brother’s.”

Kramer’s hands fell to his sides.

“Oh, Jesus,” he sighed. This line of inquiry was getting him bloody nowhere fast, it really was. Maybe he should get back to the sick men with dirty fingernails, no sense in upsetting everyone, including innocent kids. But he had one thing left to do: flash his trump.

“Hennie, I’ve got some bad news. Boetie isn’t going to be in the gala.”

“Why?”

“Are you asking me?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll tell your ma and pa that you asked me this question-straight out?”

“Yes.”

“Boetie is dead.”

Adults collapse, children can only gape.

“He was murdered, Hennie, killed by a very wicked man.”

The convicts outside began a low chant, singing of their cattle and their wives and their children back in the reserves; it helped them bear the weight of a grass roller they were unloading from a truck. A window opened and a nasal voice screeched for silence. It went deathly quiet.

Kramer stared at Hennie incredulously. He had expected the boy to register shock but not fear. Not fear so great it smelled worse than the puddle of urine expanding on the classroom floor.

Beauty Makatini, as Zondi now knew her to be, was preparing lunch in the Swanepoels’ kitchen. She opened two tins of pilchards in sauce, sliced six tomatoes, washed a lettuce, and grated some carrots. For dessert, she halved two pawpaws and squeezed lemon over them.

“Too much,” murmured Zondi from his seat on the bread bin. “You heard the priest say the boss and the missus were sleeping.”

“This morning I make porridge and eggs for four people, Detective Zondi. Bonita and the priest eat it all and I have to find toast for them, too. They are very hungry, I think.”

He chuckled. For a while he had suspected she was up to the old trick of making sure there would be leftovers to supplement her own meal of boiled beans. But you could not get away with that one in every household and, from what he had heard about Mrs. Swanepoel, hers was no exception.