Allegiance (38 page)

‘No. A member.’

‘So Ruslan’s your asset? Well, we can clear this up pretty quickly, because we’re liaising with
SAPS
right now to have him taken in for questioning.’

‘Allow me a phone call, ma’am.’

Masondo called Shabalala and spoke softly in isiZulu. He finished the call and placed his phone on the table.

‘My member spoke to Ruslan at around 20:15. He asked him if everything was quiet around the ship, to which Ruslan responded it was. The member asked him to try to make contact with the sheikh and find out the status of the event, if all was quiet.’

‘So your member phoned Ruslan at 20:15. At about 20:29 Ruslan phoned the sheikh and at 20:30, the sheikh phoned a cellphone which detonated the bomb.’ Berkeley twirled a pen between her fingers. ‘What are you reading into this?’

‘Are you implying my member is involved?’

‘Not at all, Mr Masondo, sorry if I implied that. It explains why Ruslan called the sheikh, though, on your member’s instruction. Did Ruslan give the sheikh information? What did he write down?’

‘I saw him write something down. I assumed it was a number.’

‘Then didn’t Ruslan give the number of the detonating phone to the sheikh, who then dialled that number?’

Masondo raised his eyebrows. ‘It’s two o’clock now. Give me a few hours before you take Ruslan in. We don’t want to lose his trust. Let me send my guy to talk to him. Maybe there’s a reasonable explanation.’

‘This thing is slowing me down,’ Masondo said, using Nandi’s arm to support himself until he could manoeuvre himself out of the wheelchair and collapse onto the couch. ‘I’m better off without it.’

‘Dad, you need to rest that leg of yours, otherwise it’ll never get better. Don’t be stubborn.’ Nandi tried not to sound disrespectful, but knew she had to be firm with her father. He was an old soldier and soldiers were their most heroic – and foolish – when wounded.

‘Stop thinking like a doctor, my girl. Think what’s in the best interest of your father.’

‘I am. You’ve got nerve damage to that leg. If you don’t look after it, you’ll be in that wheelchair forever.’

His daughter, however, underestimated the resolve of a struggle veteran. Obstacles and setbacks didn’t break morale, they fed it. While Nandi started to replace the dressing on his leg, Masondo reached for his cellphone and paged through his directory. He looked at his watch and did a quick calculation. It was late afternoon in Moscow and General Ivanov would still be at his office. Whether he’d be sober or not was the question.

‘Sergei, privet. Long time.’ Masondo had last spoken to the general when he’d attended the funeral of an mk commander in Lusaka two years previously. Masondo was in his twenties when his organisation sent him to Russia for military training. The then Captain Ivanov had struck him as efficient, dedicated, discreet. The camaraderie had stood the test of time. At the cemetery, Ivanov had embraced him like a brother. The general was the chief of personnel in the Western Strategic Command and highly respected, but assured Masondo that comrades were inseparable over time and distance and he could always be counted upon. Masondo was counting on him now.

‘Comrade Alfred, greetings from Mother Russia.’ He laughed, and it was as raucous as Masondo remembered the time he’d walked into the Leningrad barracks where the ragged crew of
ANC
exiles first met him. ‘You need me to find the terrorists who did this in your country?’

‘A favour, comrade. An urgent favour and you’re not far from the truth. Maybe you can help me with that.’

‘I am so sorry, comrade, to read of the disaster. Your beautiful country has been blemished.’

‘And I need you to help me fix it, comrade.’

‘I toast your resolve. Of course.’

‘I want to give you a name and a date and city of birth. Do you have friends in Chechnya?’

‘Comrade, you know I have friends everywhere. Especially Chechnya.’

‘How long will it take you to get me details of this fellow?’

‘A few hours, comrade, and a few vodkas.’

‘Can you make it a few minutes, and much vodka? You can send me the bill.’

‘Comrade Alfred, as always you are rushed. It is too warm there; you need to be frozen to slow you down a little.’

The area surrounding Arshad Tanveer’s building lacked lighting and smelt of sewage. Amina felt uncomfortable bringing Siraj to the flat at night, but she’d do it for Mariam. Siraj was wrapped up in a blanket and she held him close to her, even though it wasn’t cold at all. His little sleeping body gave her a measure of comfort. Arshad had allowed her to keep Siraj for three days and it was hard for her to bring him back to that squalid place, but he’d phoned earlier and indicated he was ready to take his son back for a while. She’d parked her car as close as she could to the entrance of the flats, but there was still a ten-metre walk along a narrow alley, a journey up a flight of broken steps and then onto a landing where a rusted steel gate served no purpose other than to disfigure the building even more.

Masondo dialled Shabalala’s number while Nandi changed the dressings on his leg. ‘Cedric, go and see Ruslan. I want you to get back to me after you’ve met him and you need to reassure me he’s not involved in this thing. Where’s Durant? He’s not answering his phone.’

‘I’m driving behind him. We’re on our way to Tanveer’s flat. He wants to ask him some questions, I’m backing him up.’

‘Thank you, Mr Shabalala, turn around and go to Ruslan. Durant is old enough to look after himself. I can’t waste the talents of my two best men doing the same thing. Call Ruslan, meet him somewhere. I want to know exactly what he asked the sheikh and whether he gave the sheikh something he would have written down.’

Durant saw Shabalala flash his car lights and peel away. His cellphone lay lifeless on the passenger seat beside him and he assumed his colleague would have tried to phone and say that he had needed to abort the convoy role. No problem, Durant thought, he could handle Tanveer. It was approaching 7 p.m. and he was desperate to get home.

Masondo took Nandi’s hand. ‘I don’t want you to think I’m trying to run your life. I’m sorry if I seem overprotective, but since Mom died, you’re all I’ve got.’

‘Don’t be silly, Dad, you’re not going to lose me; don’t worry so much.’

‘I’ve thought about a lot of things lately – a near-death experience has a way of focusing a person – I don’t want you to begrudge me one day and say I didn’t give you every opportunity possible to flourish.’

‘You have, Dad. It’s because of you I’m a doctor, without you I probably wouldn’t be anything in life. You’ve given me every opportunity I could possibly hope for.’

‘I don’t want you to think I have an issue with Cedric Shabalala. He’s a good man.’

Nandi wrung her hands. ‘I’m sure he is, Dad.’

‘And I know he’s considering courting you. I know he’s not exactly Prince Charming and you probably wouldn’t be interested, but don’t hurt his feelings. Be open to it perhaps, if you feel you want to.’

Nandi smiled. ‘What if we fall in love?’

Masondo winced and jerked his leg.

‘Sorry, Daddy, did I hurt you?’

‘No, no it’s just that you mustn’t rush into anything. Cedric is a very complicated person.’

‘Dad, I—’

‘Excuse me, darling.’ Masondo raised his cellphone to his ear. ‘Good evening, comrade, you’re working late tonight.’

‘I am sending you an email, comrade. The information you requested is in my hands, and I have a man I owe a big favour to. I will send my banking details. And drink to your success.’

It was after seven and Shabalala realised he hadn’t eaten yet. He had five minutes to kill before Ruslan came, so parked his car outside an
ATM
at the Plaza to draw money. He would buy something after his meeting. He heard the distinctive sound of the sheikh’s Mercedes behind him as he walked away from the cash machine. Ruslan motioned for him to come over to the car.

‘Climb in, Reno, let me take you for a drive.’

Shabalala hesitated at the car window. ‘Um, I left my phone in my car. Don’t you want to come with me rather?’

‘How often do you get a chance to drive in a car like this? I have something important to show you and we don’t have a lot of time.’

Shabalala shoved the cash into his small rucksack and climbed into the passenger seat. ‘Sorry to drag you out this time of the night, but I needed to see you.’

‘I was about to phone you because something came up, so I’m pleased we were able to meet. You wanted to ask me something?’

‘I’m sure they’ve already asked you a whole lot of questions,’ Shabalala said.

Ruslan gunned the motor and turned onto the beach road. ‘The police spoke to me at the centre.’

‘You were close to the sheikh, so they assume you know a lot about him.’

‘Yes, I’ve been harassed a lot. The police have interviewed me and they’ve searched my room. There is one thing I haven’t told them; I wanted to tell you first.’ A cane truck loomed closer in the single-lane road and Ruslan slowed the Mercedes down. ‘So dangerous, these trucks. Look at this, so easy just to drive into the back of it. And it happens a lot.’

‘I’m listening. Do I need to write something down?’

‘No, just listen. You asked me to phone the sheikh during the function, do you remember?’

‘Of course. And you did phone him.’

‘I did. When I phoned him, he asked me for the number of a contact of his called Walid. I never met this man, but a week ago he gave me Walid’s number. I forgot about it. When I phoned him on the ship, he said I must look up the number of Walid on my phone and read it to him. I did that.’

‘Was it the number that detonated the bomb?’

‘It must have been. Because the police are saying after I called the sheikh, the next call he made was to the cellphone bomb.’

‘So Walid didn’t exist. Maybe he just didn’t want to have the number on him or in his own phone directory.’

‘That’s what I thought. But it makes me look guilty. I don’t know what to do.’

‘We’ll have to tell the authorities. Because that means the sheikh acted alone – it was a suicide bombing. He must have set the whole thing up himself.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Whew, I think everyone was getting worried. Even I was wondering about that call to the sheikh.’

‘I still feel I let everyone down. I was used. Right at the end, he still used me for his own selfish purpose.’ Ruslan was momentarily distracted by the low-fuel warning light.

‘You see it as selfish? Won’t some see him as a martyr?’

‘He would probably want to be remembered as one. Killing is a small matter if it exalts Allah.’ Ruslan tapped the accelerator and the s600 glided past the truck effortlessly.

Masondo touched the screen of his BlackBerry and smiled. The old Russian had come through for him. There were four attachments, all scanned documents, all official-looking and all but one in what Masondo assumed was Russian. He sent the documents to his printer and asked Nandi to bring them over to him. The first, a birth certificate, giving details of the nursing home the subject was born in and the birth weight. The second was a document which appeared to be a discharge letter from the army. Masondo put it aside and looked at the third, which was a copy of a passport showing a man in his late thirties with a deep scar running the length of his face. He didn’t remember Shabalala ever mentioning Ruslan having a scar. The final document was a letter written in English and addressed to the Minister of Home Affairs in South Africa, in which a commissar called Vladimir Makarov certified that Ruslan was a qualified marine engineer who had been offered a job at a shipping company in Durban. ‘General,’ Masondo said into his phone, ‘the second document you sent me, I can’t understand what it says.’

‘Your friend was wounded in the Soviet-Afghanistan conflict. He was a tank commander, honourably discharged in 1991. It seems he lost a leg.’

Amina touched the door to Tanveer’s flat and was surprised to see it was open. She pushed it a little more and called his name, cautiously looking into the dark apartment. Siraj was getting heavy in her arms and she awkwardly slipped her cellphone from her jeans pocket. She dialled Tanveer’s cellphone number. After a few seconds she heard the phone ringing inside softly until it stopped and she heard it go to voicemail. She called his name again and hesitantly stepped inside, feeling the wall for a light switch, but not finding one. A subdued light still came through the window from outside and she could see that the lounge area was vacant. Dirty dishes lay in the sink. She walked towards the bedroom, her foot kicking a plastic juice bottle. A set of keys lay on the floor next to an advertising supplement from a newspaper. She laid Siraj down on his bed and called Tanveer’s name again. She tried Durant’s number, but his phone was off. The door to the other bedroom was slightly ajar and Amina used the toe of her takkie to push it open. ‘Hello?’ Then she gasped and felt cold. Tanveer lay on the floor, awkwardly, his left arm lying under his body and his head cocked to the side. His knees were pulled up to his chest and his back was slightly arched. ‘Arshad?’ Amina said softly, feeling his wrist for a pulse. She felt a shock go through her body from her fingers that touched him, a jolt that made her mouth go dry and her heart rate accelerate all in a matter of a second. Tanveer was dead. Horror gave way to a momentary spark of realisation: Siraj would be her child. No, she had to force that thought from her mind for now. What had happened? She wondered how long the process of adoption would take. No, again, no. She was disgusted with the thoughts that flooded her mind, selfish thoughts while Siraj’s father lay dead at her feet. There was no sign of a struggle. What had killed him? It was as if he had just fallen down, right where he was. She had to get Siraj out of there. She backed out of the room into the lounge and in the near-darkness felt herself touch another human being who had walked into the flat. The person grabbed her awkwardly and she screamed and he shouted and only then she realised it was Durant and she clutched onto him, her body jerking now as tears came to her eyes.

‘What happened?’ Durant asked, urgency in his voice. ‘The door was wide open.’