Deon Meyer - Dead at Daybreak

Mornings between eight and ten were safe. He never phoned before ten, and it became her library time, and when he gave her money it was her bookshop time, the secondhand bookshops of Voortrekker Street – her book exchange circuit, she called it – and she cooked with distaste, gardened with enthusiasm, and wrote stories by hand, the manuscripts stacked high in her wardrobe. I asked her why she didn’t send them to someone and she merely shook her head and said it was fantasy, not literature, and I asked her if there was a difference, and she laughed.

That second night we succumbed to our urges. On that second night I – we – completed the betrayal, not like illicit, guilt-stricken lovers, but like released prisoners, with joy and humor and an unbearable lightness of being.

That second night and every night after that until Nagel returned.

∨ Dead at Daybreak ∧

49

You know I have great respect for you, Van Heerden,” said Mat Joubert.

He didn’t reply, knowing what was coming.

“As far as I’m concerned you’re one of us. One of the best.” He sat on the edge of a living-room chair in Van Heerden’s house, spoke seriously. “But this morning, things changed. Now there are civilians in the firing line.”

Van Heerden nodded.

“We’ll have to take control, Van Heerden.”

He simply nodded. “Control” was a relative concept.

“We don’t want to exclude you. It’s Nougat’s case. You’ll work with him. Share all your information.”

“You already know everything.”

“Are you sure?” O’Grady’s voice was suspicious.

“Yes.” Except the call that was coming at two o’clock and the wallet in his pocket.

“This woman, Carolina de Jager. She was the mother?”

“Yes.”

“I’d like to talk to her.”

“I’ll take you to her.”

“And I’ll need those photographs.”

“Yes.”

O’Grady looked sharply at him, as if gauging his sincerity.

“I’m sorry, Van Heerden,” said Joubert, as if perceiving his disappointment.

“I understand,” he said.

“How do we play the media?”

Van Heerden thought for a moment. Minutes ago he had wanted to use the newspapers and television to break Brits, to use the natural aggression of the media as his battering ram to gain information about the whole cover-up. But now, after seeing the man’s struggle, he was no longer so certain.

“Say we’re cooperating. Everyone, the Defence Force as well. Say the investigation is at a sensitive stage and we must keep back certain information. But a breakthrough is imminent. Keep them hungry.”

Joubert gave a little smile. “You should come back, Van Heerden.” He rose. “Let’s go and feed the monster.”

They walked out, stood outside. The Murder and Robbery detectives led the way to the media lines, the press suddenly moving in anticipation. Then, behind it all, Van Heerden saw a new row of cars moving along the driveway. Right in front, in a white Mercedes-Benz, was Orlando Arendse.

“I wanted to warn you,” said Tiny Mpayipheli behind him. “The boss phoned to say he’s on his way.”

♦

There was something surreal about the scene. While he was briefing the repairmen, he looked out over the smallholding. In front of his mother’s house stood Orlando Arendse’s “soldiers,” all their weapons concealed under their clothing, self-conscious and uncomfortable about the proximity of the squadron of blue police uniforms that had formed a line close to his house – and on the other side stood the cream of the SANDF, the pick of the Urban Anti-Terrorist Unit. The fourth group, the soldiers of the media, was now depleted – only the patient crime reporters who had made the connection between art and Joan van Heerden remained.

Opposite, in his house, Nougat O’Grady was questioning Carolina de Jager. Behind him, in his mother’s living room, one of the main bosses of organized crime in the Western Cape was talking to Joan van Heerden about the merits of postmodern art in South Africa while in another room a doctor was treating Wilna van As for shock.

He shook his head.

This thing.

He needed silence now, thinking time. He wanted to read the letters again, comb them for information about Venter and Vergottini. He wanted everyone to go on their way. But he would have to wait.

Orlando had come back from the hospital, said Billy was in intensive care and it didn’t look good.

Tiny Mpayipheli shaking his head and saying it was just like the Anglo-Boer War: the people of color who had nothing to do with the fight were in the middle. They were the ones who died.

“Billy is a fighter. He’ll make it,” said Orlando.

He had phoned Hope before Joubert and the others had commandeered his living room. Told her the SAPS had officially taken over the case. But they didn’t know about the 14:00 call. She must take it. And contact him on Tiny’s cell phone.

“Good,” she’d said. Their conspiracy.

He had told her the one who phoned might be Venter or Vergottini.

The others were dead.

Six out of eight.

She was quiet at the other end of the line. And then she said she would phone.

What had happened, two decades ago, to make Death so frequent a visitor now?

Brigadier Walter Redelinghuys arrived, went over to Bester Brits. They talked for a long time, then walked toward him. He went to meet them, heard someone behind him. It was Orlando Arendse.

“I have a stake in this. Don’t look at me like that.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

Joubert, O’Grady, and Petersen came out of his house, saw the new grouping, also came over. The detectives’ eyes widened when they saw the crime baron.

“Orlando,” said Mat Joubert without warmth.

“Bull,” Orlando said in acknowledgment, using the nickname Joubert had earned on the Cape Flats.

“What is he doing here?” Joubert asked.

“It’s my man who’s in hospital.”

“Who are you?” Walter Redelinghuys wanted to know.

“Your worst nightmare,” said Orlando.

Mat Joubert frowned deeply. “What are you doing, Van Heerden?”

“I’m doing what I have to do.”

“I want to know how we’re going to cooperate,” said Walter Redelinghuys.

“I won’t work with him,” said Joubert, nodding in Arendse’s direction.

“Just as well, I have a reputation to uphold.”

“Orlando and his men made a valuable contribution to the investigation,” Van Heerden said uncomfortably.

“You’re one of us, Van Heerden. If you needed cover fire, we would’ve helped.”

“Without asking questions?”

And they all stood there.

“We’ve just taken over the case with Van Heerden’s support, Brigadier.”

“Nonsense,” said Redelinghuys.

Joubert ignored him. “I’ll leave ten uniforms here,” he said to Van Heerden. “You don’t need Orlando.”

He did. Because of the dollars. But he couldn’t say that.

“I want Tiny Mpayipheli.”

“He also Orlando’s?”

Van Heerden nodded.

Walter Redelinghuys: “Bester is also in.”

“No,” said Van Heerden.

“Why not?” Heavily.

“He creeps around this thing like a thief in the night. He tried to get me off the investigation, he lied like a trouper, he withholds information, putting people’s lives in danger. He contributes nothing and he bugs my phone calls. Bester is out. We’ve kept you out of the media but more than that I bloody well won’t do. He can carry on creeping if he wants to, but up to now all he’s done is cause trouble.”

“I contributed what I could.”

“Have you told Murder and Robbery about the body in Hout Bay, Brits?”

“Which body, Brits?”