Desmond Bagley - Windfall

Time hung heavily on his hands and he sought for something to do. He was normally a mentally and physically active man and not for him the lounging on the beach at Clifton or Durban broiling his brains under the sun. His thoughts went back to his grandmother whom he dimly remembered – and to his grandfather who was thought to have been killed in the Red Revolt of Johannesburg in 1922. But there had been no body and Hendriks wondered. Using the techniques he had been taught and the authority he had acquired he began an investigation, an intelligence man's way of passing the time and searching the family tree. It paid off. He found from old port records that Jan-Willem Hendrykxx had sailed from Cape Town for San Francisco on March 25, 1922, a week after the revolt had been crushed by General Smuts. And that was as far as he got by the end of his leave.

He did not go back to Rhodesia but, instead, was posted to England. 'Go to the Embassy once,' he was told. "You'd be expected to do that. But don't go near it again. They'll give you instructions on cut-outs and so on."

So Hendriks went to London where his main task was to keep track of the movements of those exiled members of the African National Congress then living in England, and to record whom they met and talked with. He also kept a check on certain members of the staffs of other Embassies in London as and when he was told.

Intelligence outfits have their own way of doing things. The governments of two countries may be publicly cold towards each other while their respective intelligence agencies can be quite fraternal. So it was with South Africa and the United States – BOSS and the CIA. One day Hendriks passed a message through his cut-out; Could someone, as a favour, find out what happened to Jan-Willem Hendrykxx who had arrived in San Francisco in 1922? A personal matter, so no hurry.

Two months later he had an answer which surprised him. Apparently his grandfather could out-grandfather the Mafia. He had been deported from the United States in 1940. Hendriks, out of curiosity, took a week's holiday which he spent in Brussels. Discreet enquiries found his grandfather hale and well. Hendriks went nowhere near the old man, but he did go to the South African Embassy in Brussels where he had a chat with a man. Three months later he wrote a very detailed report which he sent to Pretoria and was promptly pulled back to South Africa.

Hendriks's immediate superior was a Colonel Malan, a heavily built Afrikaner with a square face and cold eyes. He opened a file on his desk and took out Hendriks's report. 'This is an odd suggestion you've come up with.' The report plopped on the desk. 'How good is your evidence on this Belgian, Hendrykxx?'

'Solid. He's the head of a heroin-smuggling ring operating from Antwerp, and we have enough on him to send him to jail for the rest of his life. On the other hand, if he comes in with us he lives the rest of his life in luxury.' Hendriks smiled. 'What would you do, sir?'

'I'm not your grandfather,' growled Malan. He leafed through the report. 'You come from an interesting family. Now, you want us to give the old man a hell of a lot of money tied up in a way he can't touch it, and he makes out a will so that the money goes where we want it when he dies. Is that it?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Where would you send the money?'

'Kenya,' said Hendriks unhesitatingly. 'We need strengthening in East Africa.'

'Yes,' said Malan reflectively. 'Kenyatta has been crucifying us in the United Nations lately.' He leaned back in his chair. 'And we have an interesting proposition put to us by Frans Potgeiter but we're running into trouble on the funding. Do you- know Potgeiter?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Could you work with him?'

'Yes, sir.'

Malan leaned forward and tapped the report. 'Your grandfather is old, but not dead old. He could live another twenty years and we can't have that."

'I doubt if he will.' Hendriks took an envelope from his breast pocket and pushed it across the desk. 'Hendrykxx's medical report. I got hold of it the day before I left London. He has a bad heart.'

'And how did you get hold of it?'

Hendriks smiled. 'It seems that someone burgled the offices of Hendrykxx's doctor. Looking for drugs, the Belgian police say. They did a lot of vandalism; you know how burglars are when they're hopped up, sir.'

Malan grunted, his head down as he scanned the medical documents. He tossed them aside. 'Looks all right, but I'll have a doctor go over them. The Brussels Embassy wasn't involved, I hope.'

'No, sir.'

'This will have to be gone into carefully, Hendriks. The Department of Finance will have to come into it, of course. And the will – that must be carefully drawn. We have a barrister in London who can help us there. I rather think I'd like to move Hendrykxx out of reach of his friends and where we can keep an eye on him. That is, if this goes through. I can't authorize it, so it will have to go upstairs.' He smiled genially. 'You're a slim kerel, Hendriks,' he said approvingly.

'Thank you, sir.' Hendriks hesitated. 'If Hendrykxx doesn't die in time he could always… er… be helped.'

Malan's eyes went flinty. 'What kind of a man are you?' he whispered. 'What kind of man would suggest the killing of his own grandfather? We'll have no more of that kind of talk.'

The operation was approved at top level and that was in the days when the South African intelligence and propaganda agencies were riding high. There was money available, and more if needed. Hendrykxx had his arm duly twisted and caved in when offered the choice. He was removed from Belgium and installed in a house in Jersey under the supervision of Mr and Mrs Adams, his warders in a most luxurious jail. Jersey had been chosen because of its lack of death duties and the general low tax rate; not that much tax was paid -when a government goes into the tax avoidance business it takes the advice of the real experts. 15M was injected into the scheme which, at the time of Hendrykxx's death, had magically turned into 40M. It is surprising what compound interest can do to a sum which has proper management and is left to increase and multiply.

Frans Potgeiter went under cover and surfaced as Brice, the liberal Rhodesian, the real Brice having conveniently been killed in a motor accident while trying to do the Johannesburg-Durban run in under five hours. He went to England to establish a reputation, and then moved to Kenya to manage the Ol Njorowa Foundation. Hendriks returned to his undercover post in London.

All was going well when came the debacle of Muldergate in 1978 and gone were the days of unlimited funds. One by one the stories leaked out; the setting up of the newspaper, The Citizen, with government funds, the attempted purchase of an American newspaper, the bribery of American politicians, the activities of the Group of Ten. All the peccadilloes were revealed.

In 1979 Connie Mulder, the Minister of Information, was forced to resign from the Cabinet, then from Parliament, then from the party itself. Dr Eschel Rhoodie, the Information Secretary, took refuge in Switzerland, and appeared on television threatening to blow the gaff. Mulder did blow the gaff – he named Vorster, once Prime Minister and then President of the Republic of South Africa, as being privy to the illegal shenanigans. Vorster denied it.

The Erasmus Judicial Commission of Enquiry sat, considered the evidence, and issued its report. It condemned Vorster as 'having full knowledge of the irregularities.' John Balthazar Vorster resigned from the State Presidency. It was a mess.

Hendriks, in London, read the daily newspaper reports with horrified eyes, expecting any day that the Hendrykxx affair and the Ol Njorowa Foundation would be blown. But someone in Pretoria must have done some fast and fancy footwork, scurrying to seal the leaks. It was not Colonel Malan because he was swept away in the general torrent of accusations and resigned his commission.