Деон Мейер - Cobra

It was a depressing process. He had tried to fight against it, rationalise and suppress it. Later he realised that it was partly out of fear of the greater, inevitable disillusionment: if they were fallible, so was he.

And so was the system.

He remembered having a moment of insight, after a few years with Murder and Robbery, when his drinking was still under control and he still spent time pondering such things: life is one long process of disillusionment, to cure you of the myths and fictions of your youth.

Mbali was going through that now, and there was not much he could do.

But she would handle it better than he did. Women were stronger. That was another lesson he had learned over the years. And Mbali was one of the strongest of them all.

Cupido knocked on the door of Room 303 of the Protea Hotel Fire & Ice! Not loudly, not urgently; he wanted it to sound like room service.

In case Lillian Alvarez was there. Which he very much doubted.

They stood and waited in silence. He kept an eye on the peephole for a movement, a shadow.

Nothing.

Cupido raised his hand to knock again, perhaps a little harder. Then something moved in front of the peephole, and it went dark. A voice, female and frightened, said, ‘Who is it?’

‘Miss Alvarez?’ asked Cupido.

‘Yes?’

‘I’m Captain Vaughn Cupido of the Hawks. We would like to talk to you, please.’

‘Of the who?’

‘The Hawks. The elite investigative unit of the South African Police Service.’

The peephole went light again. Bones and Cupido looked at each other. Cupido thought, it’s the third floor, and the way he pictured it, there were no balconies or places to climb down, surely she wouldn’t . . .

The door opened.

There she was, the woman from the Facebook photo and the Waterfront video. She was in her late twenties, sultry and beautiful, far more striking face to face.

She looked at them with big, dark eyes, from the lean marathon athlete to the tall, broad-shouldered Cupido. Emotion marred the beauty – her generous mouth twisted, her eyes red and tearful.

‘Please tell me you really are from the police.’

‘We are,’ said Bones.

‘Why are you here?’

‘Because of David Adair, and what happened at the Waterfront this morning.’

‘Is he OK? Please tell me he is OK.’

‘We are trying to find him, ma’am. That’s why we’re here. We hope you can help us.’

‘Oh God,’ she said. And then her face crumpled and she began to cry. When Bones put his hand out to touch her shoulder in sympathy, she moved instinctively forward so he could hold her.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

‘Don’t be sorry. It must have been a rough day,’ Bones comforted her and gave Cupido a meaningful look.

‘I’m so glad you came,’ she said, and began to sob.

Cupido thought, fuck, why wasn’t he the one who’d put his hand on her shoulder?

The Sunwind restaurant was small. Griessel didn’t know what the name had to do with a hospital, or with food. It was probably meant to refer to the Cape. But not this sunless winter.

They studied the menu at the self-service counter. Decided on the Grilled Beef or Chicken Burger, for only thirty rand. He chose the beef, Mbali asked for the chicken, ‘But no rocket, please, and the chips must be hot.’ But with less authority than usual.

While they waited for the food, he said, ‘I want to test my theory on you.’

‘Please, Benny.’

He said he thought she was correct: Lillian Alvarez had brought something from England that the Cobras wanted from David Adair. She would have handed it over to them at the Waterfront, but Tyrone Kleinbooi stole it. They knew the Cobras had been at the Schotsche Kloof house. Perhaps they had followed the pickpocket there, but then he managed to get away, with the stolen article still in his possession.

Mbali nodded. She was still in agreement.

He said there was a university account in Tyrone’s room with Nadia’s address on it. But the Cobras did not kidnap her at her fl at, it had happened on campus. That didn’t make sense. The only thing he could think of was that the Waterfront gunman left with Tyrone’s rucksack. Something in that rucksack allowed them to identify Nadia, and to track her down on campus.

‘It’s possible,’ said Mbali.

‘And once they had Nadia, they knew how to contact Tyrone. To set up a meeting and an exchange: the article for his sister. That happened at the Bellville train station. And in the process, she was shot.’

‘Yes.’

‘It means they now have what they want, Mbali. They have no further need of Adair.’

Again she nodded, despondent. Then she said, ‘We have the name on the passport for one of them. If he keeps travelling with that passport, we might be able to apprehend him at an airport.’

‘Perhaps we should let the SSA know. They probably have better systems for tracking travellers.’

‘No, Benny, don’t do that,’ said Mbali quietly, as their burgers arrived.

42

Cupido asked Lillian Alvarez to accompany them to the hotel lounge, knowing that an average hotel room was not designed to seat three people comfortably.

She asked them to excuse her for a moment, disappeared into the bathroom and closed the door.

They waited patiently.

‘She’s very beautiful,’ whispered Bones.

‘Yes,’ said Cupido. ‘But you’re a married man.’

‘And she smells nice.’ Teasing, because he was the one she had embraced, and he had seen what an impression that had made on his colleague.

‘You paid a big lobola to your wife’s parents, pappie. Don’t make me phone her,’ said Cupido.

‘But I’m allowed to look, nè . And allow myself to be hugged.’

‘Strange accent,’ said Bones. ‘She’s not English.’

‘She looks like a South American.’

‘Latin American,’ Bones corrected him in his schoolteacher voice. ‘When I was studying in the States . . .’

‘Here we go again,’ said Cupido, teasing, because Bones was known for being eager to talk about his time there – he was very proud of the B degree in Economics from Boston University’s Metropolitan College.

Bones grinned. ‘ Ja , ja . But seriously, in Boston there were lots of Latin American chicks. They were all stunning. And I wasn’t married then . . .’

The bathroom door opened. Alvarez appeared. Her hair was brushed, her make-up and her self-confidence were restored. She was even more breathtaking now.

‘Let me just get my bag. And my phone,’ she said with a small, self-conscious smile when she became aware of their undisguised admiration.

‘In case Professor Adair calls,’ she said when she returned, putting her phone away in the brown leather handbag.

In the lift she asked, ‘How did you find me? I mean . . .’

‘We’ll explain everything in a minute.’

‘God, it’s nice to get out of that room.’ Her earlier emotions had subsided, and her relief was palpable.

‘You’ve been in your room all day?’ asked Cupido sympathetically.

‘Yes. I didn’t know if David – Professor Adair – would call . . .’

‘Shame,’ said Cupido, resting his hand gently on her shoulder.

She just smiled gratefully at him.

While Mbali ate, Griessel’s burger and chips grew cold. Because his sense of duty made him call Nyathi – he knew he could not postpone it any longer.

He brought the colonel up to speed with the afternoon’s events. The Giraffe clicked his tongue when he heard about Nadia Kleinbooi, and he said he would personally phone the commanding officers of the Stellenbosch and Bellville stations to ask them to keep the engravings on the cartridges quiet.