Деон Мейер - Cobra

Never trust a whitey. Now Uncle Solly’s warning thundered through him. Never trust a whitey, you steal from them, but never do business there, because when the chips are down, we coloureds are the first ones they sell out.

But he didn’t have a choice, he hadn’t had time. He looked at the clock on the cellphone. 14.51.

It would only take that guy four or five minutes to find parking in Durban Road. Another three minutes to walk to the end of Kruskal.

He had seven minutes to track down Bobby van der Walt. And the memory card. Because it was in the pocket of Bobby’s faded, dirty blue overall jacket.

34

Don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic.

But he panicked anyway, because he didn’t know what else to do. If he ran, it was nearly three hundred metres from here to where the Tienie Meyer Bypass dropped down to Modderdam and you got access to the M11. It was the shortcut route that he had made Bobby take – but you had to also climb over two high wire fences. Not difficult, but it took time. Which he did not have. It would take him at least four minutes to the Modderdam crossing, where he would have a view over the highway. If he didn’t see Bobby then, he was fucked, six ways till Sunday. Because then he would not have enough time to get back and stand here again.

And the memory card was in Bobby’s pocket.

Jirre .

He dithered, this way and that, he tried to control his breathing and the lameness in his knees, he knew he must keep the panic off his face, because that damned security guard with the red beret was lurking around, getting kickbacks from every counterfeit-selling stall owner to keep the suspicious and the overly curious away.

He had got Nadia into this mess. Now he had better get her out.

14.54.

He would just have to stand here and wait, there was no other choice.

If the guy phoned, he would have to play for time.

But that’s going to wreck the schedule, because the next train to Cape Town from Bellville D was only at 15.35, platform 11, and the trains were running late, and that meant twenty to, or quarter to four, and that gave that guy twenty minutes to find him and Nadia at the station and take them out with that silenced gun. If he could walk in at the Waterfront and shoot people left, right and centre, he wouldn’t be scared of Bellville Station.

The blur of a lorry raced over the flyover, but Bobby was missing in action. Had the idiot stood too close to the road, and got run over, the memory card now in its glory?

14.55.

The cellphone in his hand rang.

Deep breath.

‘Yes?’

‘I have parked.’

‘OK. Find Wilshammer Street, you should be close to it. Then walk down Wilshammer Street . . .’ He had to think hard about compass directions, the sun came up on that side: ‘. . . towards the east, to the corner with Kruskal.’

‘The corner of what?’

‘Kruskal.’ He spelled it in English, slowly and clearly.

‘OK.’

Again he wanted to ask if Nadia was there, if she was safe, but he didn’t. He wanted the guy to think he could see them.

‘Call me when you get there. But not from Nadia’s phone. You give her phone back to her, and you use your own phone from now on.’

And he rang off.

After two flights of stairs Griessel knocked on the door of 21 West Side. There was glass set into the apartment door. He kept an eye on it, but saw no movement, heard no sound from inside.

Perhaps she was on campus. Safe.

He knocked again, but he knew there was no one home.

He turned away, looked out over Stellenbosch. The place that Vaughn Cupido called ‘Volvoville’. With the usual tirade: ‘Volvos, Benna? Why Volvos? Daai is the most boring cars in automotive history. And ugly. But the rich whiteys of Stellenbosch all drive Volvos. Explain that to me. Just goes to show, money can’t buy you style.’

That Cupido, really. He didn’t drink – instead he spewed out insults. That was his safety valve. Maybe Griessel should try it too.

He heard footsteps on the stairs to his right. A young man appeared, walking up. Big and athletic, broad shoulders in a fashionably weathered leather jacket. Griessel’s hand dropped to his service pistol. The young man looked at him, curious.

‘ Middag ,’ said Griessel.

‘ Goeie middag .’ The Afrikaans greeting made Griessel relax. Black hair, dark brown, smiling eyes. Carla’s age. Must be a student.

‘Do you live on this floor?’

‘Twenty-three,’ he said and walked past Griessel.

‘I’m looking for Nadia Kleinbooi.’ Griessel nodded towards the door of number twenty-one.

The student stopped. ‘Oh.’ He looked at the flat, then back at Griessel. A frown appeared.

‘I’m from the police,’ said Griessel. ‘Do you know her?’

‘The police?’ It was as though something fell into place. ‘Why are you looking for Nadia?’

‘Do you know her?’

The student came closer. The frown had disappeared, but now there was a different anxiety on his face. ‘Is it about the kidnapping?’

‘What kidnapping?’

‘On campus. The whole varsity knows about it.’ His voice became anxious. ‘ Was it Nadia?’

‘I’m not aware of any kidnapping,’ said Griessel.

The man’s eyes narrowed. ‘Are you genuinely from the police?’

Just wing it, thought Tyrone, there was no other choice now. His eyes were glued to the M11 bridge, in the dwindling hope that Bobby van der Walt would appear. Just wing it. It makes no sense. Didn’t the bum know he was throwing away a hundred bucks? That’s what you get when you do business with dagga smokers.

Tyrone stood on tiptoe to see if he could spot the Waterfront shooter and Nadia on over by the stalls.

Nothing.

Out of the corner of his eye a movement, someone rushing up to him from his right. He leaped in alarm.

It was Bobby, he realised – eyes wide, gasping for breath, mouth agape. ‘Sorry, brother, sorry. Fokken traffic cop stopping there . . .’ a grubby finger pointed in the direction of the fl yover ‘. . . and asked me if I was planning to jump. And I said: “Do I look like a jumper?” and the doos said: “Yes” . . .’ Bobby stood bent over with his hands on his knees, wheezing long breaths back into his lungs. ‘Can you believe it?’

Tyrone wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. ‘Where’s the memory card?’ he asked.

Bobby slapped the pocket of his overall jacket. ‘Right here.’

‘OK,’ said Tyrone, and he stood thinking.

‘Can you believe it?’ asked Bobby, starting to catch his breath. ‘That cop stood there and he says to me: “You look a lot like a jumper to me.” And I say: “ Nooit , I’m just admiring the view.” And he says he doesn’t want to argue with me, and he doesn’t want a traffic jam. If I want to jump, I’d better jump, just don’t fall anyone moer toe down below. So I just ran. Sorry brother, what do we do now?’

Tyrone didn’t hear him. His brain was working overtime. His plan had been that Bobby would wait on the flyover for his signal, and when the guy let Nadia go, then he would throw down the memory card. And the guy would have caught it. He might have believed that it was Tyrone up on the highway, he would have known he couldn’t get at him up there. His attention split between the flyover and Nadia. Bobby would have been out of harm’s way. Nadia would be free, he would have grabbed her arm just before the Sport Station, they would have run for the train . . .

What the hell was he to do now?

His cellphone rang.

Bobby stood waiting, his eyes wide and impossibly blue.

Tyrone looked at the phone. It wasn’t Nadia’s number, but it was a familiar one. His own. His phone that had been in the rucksack, at the Waterfront.