Michael Ridpath - See No Evil

‘Did he say why?’

‘Todd asked him. Cornelius said it would just bring back all the distress surrounding Martha’s death and it was better to leave it. Todd and Cornelius had a major row about it, and Todd threatened to go down to South Africa himself to talk to the Commission, but in the end Cornelius persuaded him not to. Given Cornelius’s position, Todd’s testimony would cause a major stir in the press and Cornelius felt that would be unfair on those members of the family who wanted to keep their privacy. Besides which, Todd himself had very little to say without the support of Cornelius. So, reluctantly, he let it drop.

‘Then last Easter Todd’s grandmother died. His grandfather had died shortly after Martha. He had had cancer and her death hadn’t helped him fight it. Martha’s brother had been killed in a car accident when he was in his twenties, so Todd and his sister Caroline were the only heirs. Todd was sorting through his grandmother’s papers when he came across the letter we were telling you about, from Martha to her mother. And that’s when he started asking questions again.’

‘Can I see it?’

‘Hang on. I’ll go and fetch it.’ Kim left Calder to go out to the entrance hall and rummage in her suitcase. She was back a minute later clutching a small leather photo frame and an airmail envelope. She handed the frame to Calder.

‘Todd always takes this with him wherever we go. I thought you’d like to see what she looked like.’

The photograph was of a woman sitting on some steps in a garden, clutching an ancient yellow Labrador. She was slender with frank blue eyes and long blonde hair that rested on her collarbones. She was wearing faded jeans and a simple blue T-shirt, she wore no make-up and she was smiling at the photographer, a warm, relaxed smile.

‘She was gorgeous,’ Calder said.

‘That was taken a couple of years before she died. She must have been over forty.’

‘Huh.’

‘Her family were originally from Norway, I think. Her maiden name was Olson.’

‘You can tell.’ Calder studied the photograph more closely. ‘Can I see the letter?’

She handed over the envelope and Calder carefully removed a couple of sheets of well-thumbed air-mail paper, covered with small, closely spaced, spiky writing.

‘Todd said his mother’s writing wasn’t usually that bad. He thinks it’s a sign of how panicked she felt.’

Calder began to read:

Hondehoek

August 25, I988

Dear Mom,

I know this letter is going to freak you out, and I apologize for writing it. When you get it, read it and keep it somewhere safe. When we next talk on the phone, we shouldn’t discuss it. I’ll tell you more next time I come over to America, which I hope will be in September.

You know that things are not going well between Cornelius and me at the moment. I told you that he is planning to sell his South African papers and to close down the Cape Daily Mail, and how upset this has made me. Well, I have discovered some stuff about all that that worries me. It worries me a lot.

If anything should happen to me... I hate writing those words and I know how much they will worry you, and I’m sure nothing happen, but just in case it does, then there are some things I would like you to know. You should get in touch with a friend of mine, Benton Davis. He works for Bloomfield Weiss, which is the investment bank advising Zyl News, in their New York office. I trust him, and he will be able to tell you what I’ve found out.

There’s also some stuff in my diary, at the back, on pages marked “Laagerbond” and “Operation Drommedaris.” You can read the rest of the diary if you like, just don’t show any of it to Cornelius. I keep it hidden in my desk at Hondehoek. It’s a black moleskin notebook and it’s stuffed in a box marked “US tax records 1980–85” which is at the back of the bottom drawer. It seemed to me the kind of box no one would open. But if something does happen to me, please come down here as soon as you can and find it.

When you’ve found it and read it, and when you’ve spoken to Benton, talk to Dad and decide what to do. I trust you two, of all people, to do the right thing.

It is impossible to put into words how much I love you and Dad. You have taught me so much and given me so much love. If I can be half as good a parent to Todd and Caroline as you were to me, then I will be very happy. I know I have done some things that you thought were wrong, I know you forgave me when that was hard to do, and I thank you for that.

With all my love,

‘Wow,’ said Calder, handing the letter back to Kim. ‘I can see why you want to talk to Benton.’

‘He obviously knows something .’

‘You said Todd tried to get in touch with him?’

‘Yes. Todd called him from America before we left for England, but he couldn’t get past Davis’s PA. When we got to England we went to Bloomfield Weiss’s offices in person, but once again we were told Mr Davis was unavailable. We tried to talk our way in, but the security guards were absolute pigs and wouldn’t listen. We didn’t know what he looked like, so we couldn’t just wait for him. Cornelius refused to help. That’s when I thought we could try you.’

‘After what Martha says about him here, it is strange he didn’t want to talk to you. But then this isn’t the Benton Davis I know.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him. But I suppose people change. After twenty years at Bloomfield Weiss, even the most trustworthy people might lose some of their integrity. Which is why I got out.’

‘What’s he like?’

‘Well, for a start, he’s black. Which is something in his favour. I would guess he joined Bloomfield Weiss in the early eighties, which was quite an achievement for a black person back then. He must have been pretty smart; there weren’t that many black investment bankers on Wall Street.’

‘You don’t think he’s that smart now?’

‘No. I always thought he was a bit superficial. Talks a lot about opera, name-drops like crazy, that kind of thing. But he might just be burned out. Once you get to fifty there are all kinds of younger men and women snapping at your heels trying to force you out of the hierarchy. He has a lot of charisma, though. He’s a big guy, quite athletic, impressive voice, you listen to him.’

‘Somehow or other he became a friend of Martha’s.’

‘Did Todd ask his father about him?’

‘Yes. Apparently Cornelius still does business with him. He said that Benton Davis and Martha met when Bloomfield Weiss were working on the deal to buy the Herald, right before Martha died. But Cornelius wasn’t willing to talk to him about Martha’s letter.’

‘Why not?’

‘He’s adamant that he doesn’t want to reopen any discussion of Martha’s death. Which is all very well for him to say, but Todd has a right to know and Cornelius should recognize that.’

‘Does he have any idea what Martha had discovered?’

‘No. Or at least he wasn’t saying.’

‘And the diary?’

‘Never saw it. Didn’t even know she was writing one. He said he couldn’t remember the specific box she mentions, but he is pretty sure that it would have been thrown away unopened when they sold Hondehoek.’

‘What about this “Laagerbond”?’

‘Never heard of that either.’

‘Presumably it has nothing to do with beer?’

‘Two “a”s, you idiot. Actually, no one seems to know what it is. Laager is the Afrikaans word for a circle of wagons around a camp. It’s an image from the Boers’ great trek away from the Cape to the interior of the country and it symbolizes a kind of defensive mindset that the Afrikaners have in the face of change. Bond just means “band” or “group”. Todd has asked around and no one has heard of this particular group. He did find one reference to it on the internet. It was from testimony by a spy to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997 who said that his handler in the security police was a member. But he only mentioned the word once, and the Commission didn’t follow up on it.’