Danger Woman (3 page)

Chapter Five

As he feared, the discovery of a human skull and other remains, which Sanderson had deposited with the forensics people had attracted the notice of the authorities in Gaborone. An e-mail announcing the imminent arrival of someone from DIS sent the local constabulary scurrying. Superintendent Mwambe sent out for a snack.

“Do they think I am not up to the task?” he asked Derek between bites of chicken sandwich. Derek shrugged. As he owed his position with the local police more to his uncle's beneficence than to his own competence, he was in no position to say. He did know from experience that the people to be sent from Gaborone were far more likely to solve the growing problems in the Chobe than his uncle. Even if the superintendent were the famous Sherlock Holmes himself, this rash of disappearing bad men and body parts turning up in the park was well beyond any one man's capabilities. And his uncle was for sure not Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

“I have been a policeman for thirty years and the superintendent of this district for more than a decade. I never had a…There has never been a single time when I had to have help in doing my job, Derek. Not until this game ranger stuck her woman's nose in. That Sanderson, she is the problem. She is telling them in Gaborone that there is trouble here and they listen to her.”

“Um, Uncle, it was the people in forensics who notified the capital. They wanted to have a DNA test done on the bones and the billfold analyzed and we—”

“It was the woman, Derek. That is the fact of the situation. You may believe what you will about who made a call. If you investigate, you will discover it was Sanderson who did this to me.”

Mwambe paced the floor, his fists clenched behind his back, a dab of sauce on his upper lip. Somewhere in the distance he heard laughter. Were his men sharing a joke? It made him frown even though he felt sure they were not laughing at him. Or perhaps they were. Had the news reached the ready room and were his officers being amused at his expense? Something had to be done.

“Derek, I am putting you on special assignment.”

Derek snapped to attention, or as much as he could manage while sitting down. “Sir?” He wondered what new sort of new trouble his uncle had in store for him now.

“I am assigning you to permanent duty with the game rangers. They will find bodies and so on…Well, that is police business, is it not? I want you to be there and keep a watch, to be a monitor. Find out what this woman is up to and tell me if she has plans.”

***

Botswana is a country about the size of France. Gaborone, its capital, is as far from the Chobe as Calais is from Marseilles. To be stationed in Gaborone and sent north would be considered a major disruption of one's life. Or at least Joseph Ikanya thought so. He stepped out of the director's office. He seemed anxious. No, more than that, distressed. “Old Reliable,” as he was called after a rough English translation of his surname from Setswana, was anything but. He had arrived at the level of Inspector due to his time in service. His assignment to the diplomatic sector of the capital had meant he had little need of any particular skill in solving crimes. His job involved traffic control, security patrols, and police escorts. But his name went on the roster with everyone else, and if something special came up he was as likely to draw the assignment as anyone. Today he'd drawn one such—the source of his distress.

What has happened, Joseph?” Kgabo Modise had been called to the director's office as well and sat in the anteroom waiting to be called.

“I am to go all the way up to the Chobe on temporary duty?” Ikanya said. “My wife is due any day now and it is her first. My mother-in-law is not so fond of me, you know, and this will not be wonderful news in my house.”

“I am sorry, for you, Joseph. I, personally, am very fond of trips to the Chobe.”

“Really? But there is nothing of interest up there except tourists and animals.”

“It is a beautiful place, Joseph, I assure you. I would go myself if I could. I take my time off there, you know.”

“I didn't know. Perhaps you would ask the director if you could take my place.”

“He has called me for a meeting just now. I will see what it is he wishes. Why don't you hang around a bit and see?”

The director's door swung open and the director's secretary waved Modise in. The door closed behind Modise, leaving him alone with the director.

“Modise, have a seat,” the director said without looking up or taking his eyes from the slim file on the desk in front of him. Modise sat. He knew better than to speak. The director would tell him why he'd been summoned soon enough. His chair was not close enough to the desk for him to make out what the file concerned, but he thought he caught the name Sanderson in the middle of a sentence. So, what had the lovely game ranger gotten into now? The director spun the folder around and motioned for Modise to pull his chair up and look. There was not much to see. Sanderson had found some body parts in the Chobe National Park. Nothing new there. She had found a skull and, as usual, refused to leave it at that. Instead, she had taken it on herself to scour the rest of the park for more evidence of mayhem and murder. Modise smiled. He knew this woman and realized she had not changed much in spite of his constant urging to stay with her job and leave policing to the police. “Stay in your lane,” he'd said the last time they'd spoken.

The director drummed his fingers on the desk. He lit a cigarette, stared at it in disgust, and then snuffed it out. “You have worked with this Sanderson person in the past. Am I correct in thinking this?” The director fixed Modise with his laser look. It meant that Modise would be wasting his time skirting questions of any sort from this point forward.

“Yes, sir.”

“More than just work with her, I am told.”

“She is a…friend, sir.”

“A friend? Yes. Well, that is good. My spies tell me she also oversteps her duties and sometimes anticipates the Superintendent of Police in Kasane.”

“Anticipates? Ah yes, perhaps so. She has a curious nature, sir.” He could not be certain but Modise thought he saw a smile flit across the director's face. It did not last long enough for him to estimate its significance.

“A curious nature. Very well put, Modise. Well, to the point. I am sending Ikanya up there to liaise with this Mwambe person.”

“Sir, I…”

“Yes?”

“Sorry, nothing. You were saying Joseph is to go to Kasane and work with Superintendent Mwambe.”

“Precisely. My reading on both of them is that they are not the quickest baboons in the congress, if you follow. I want Ikanya to spend his time diverting the superintendent while you sort out this business in the park. The news services have not yet tumbled to the fact that the park has become a graveyard for our less than noble citizens and it is important that they never do. We depend on a thriving tourist business up there in the Okavango Delta and in the Chobe.”

“Yes, sir. Ah, you were aware Ikanya's wife is due to have their first baby soon. I think he worries he will not be available to—”

“Is that what he told you? The woman is in her seventh month. She will not surprise him anytime soon and I need his inept presence in the Chobe. Now, you also know we have suborned a Russian national into our service?”

“Yuri Greshenko, yes.”

“You will run him. The deal we have with Mr. Greshenko is, he works for us and he doesn't get deported to Russia. His choices are not good and he will not be happy, but he knows we have him.”

“Then you believe the Russian Bratva is, in fact, making a play into the Chobe?”

“We are sure of it. This man Lenka has sent his scouts. They have begun to recruit—negatively and positively, you could say. We need to shut him down before he firms up his foothold.”

“Yes, sir. Where should I start?”

“With Ranger Sanderson. Work with her. She, it seems, has a better grasp of the park and the area than anyone and…there is one more thing you should know.”

“Sir?”

“We sent Bahiti Ditlalelo up there undercover. We didn't hear from him for nearly two weeks. Then Ranger Sanderson found his wallet in the park near some bones. Modise, they know we're on to them so, be very careful.”

Chapter Six

Kgabo Modise had attained the position he now held as much by his work ethic as his intelligence. He was bright, no doubt about that; in a developing country, sometimes that is enough. But Modise also worked hard at his job. His brief, very brief, time with law enforcement agencies in the United States had convinced him that the profession he'd chosen required diligence and patience. The States, he'd discovered, took for granted that people understood the parameters of productivity, and to be unproductive required a conscious decision and effort to be so. New, raw countries, like his, freed from paternalistic overlords, had to learn the how of it. Modise had. And now he realized that he would need to apply those lessons to the case at hand. Law breakers did not reveal themselves; they were to be ferreted out and pursued.

After he left the director's office, carefully avoiding Joseph Ikanya, he returned to his cubicle and rummaged through the stack of documents piled on one of the desk corners. Never throwing anything away had become an important part of his routine. He'd made that mistake once and it had nearly cost him his life. On the other hand, it had resulted in a famously cluttered work area. He extracted a moderately recent file and began to read. He wanted to be sure he had not forgotten anything.

Olegushka Zhoravitch Lenka:
currently a resident of Cape Town, South Africa.

Lenka has moved between various locales, Sharjah, Antwerp, and Rio de Janeiro. Like his contemporaries, including the presently incarcerated and disgraced Victor Bout
,
he is a native of the old and the new Russia, the U.S.S.R. as it had been, and the state that now operates in its place. Born in Novograd, educated in St. Petersburg, he emerged as a senior Bratva figure in the late nineties. His group now operates through multiple fronts including Nexus Aviation which is currently one of the larger commercial air carriers linking Africa, Latin America, Middle East, and Asia. And it has a significant air service infrastructure at O.R. Tambo airport in Johannesburg. Lenka's network linked these services operating out of East Africa, specifically to Uganda and Rwanda, where they apparently are involved in a variety of enterprises in and out of the Democratic Republic of Congo: Specifically guns, spares, drugs, as well as legitimate and quasi-legitimate cargoes such as coltan and, occasionally, conflict diamonds.

His organization employs locals as “boots on the ground” in its markets. In Southern Africa this means the presence of ex-liberation-era combatants both white and black.

Boers, Modise translated. Boers and the riff-raff which flowed across the border from Zimbabwe, all the unhappy people who couldn't get their mind around the fact that Southern Africa was done with killing. He noted the red pencil note he'd added earlier: “How do you fight a gang that has its own air force?”

Next he opened the envelope that had been left for him: Bahiti Ditlalelo's transmissions from the Chobe District before he disappeared.

Lenka is a serious sociopath.

No news there.

He has no sense of basic morality. He will order a killing often simply to make a point and the victim might be chosen at random. He has his eyes on the casino on the Chobe, but that is not all. He believes he can be the Bugsy Siegel of Botswana and build his version of Las Vegas on the river. At this time, I do not see any major financing in place. No “Meyer Lansky” in the background anywhere.

Bahiti knew his American history, at least the criminal part, it seemed.

The best guess is he intends to steal or coerce the present owners of the several hotels and resorts to surrender their control. He is recruiting heavily in the area, with some success. The prosperity promised in the south has not found its way north and the influx of jobless from Zimbabwe makes for easy pickings.

The real threat, though, is the woman, Irena Davidova. She is, I think, the brains behind the operation. If Lenka is cold-hearted, this woman is solid ice.

There was nothing more. Apparently Bahiti had only sent this one piece back before he dropped off the grid. Still, it was useful as far as it went. He would contact Interpol and inquire about this dangerous woman, Irena Davidova.

Kgabo shuffled the sheets of paper and slid them back into his file. A knock on his door. Joseph Ikanya was not to be avoided after all.

“Modise, it is a terrible thing that is happening.”

“Joseph, how is this?”

“I must go to the Chobe district and supervise police work there.”

“The Chobe is very nice, Joseph. Be glad. The hotels are fine and the food most excellent. Well, you may not enjoy the hotels, I hear. The director is economizing but, in your free time—”

“But, Modise, my wife—”

“She will be fine. I am sure we will be back in Gabz in plenty of time for the new arrival. Is it to be a boy or a girl?”

“I don't know. My wife is superstitious that way. She refuses to discover the truth of this thing. Who is this Superintendent Mwambe I must interface with?”

“Ah. He is the Superintendent of Police in the area. He is old school. You two will get along well, for sure.”

“Old school? What does that mean?”

“It means, Joseph, that the two of you will be seeing eye to eye on many important issues. What is it the director wishes you to do?”

“This Mwambe is slow to react, the director says. I am to urge him forward. That does not strike me as a very important thing to be doing.”

“You would prefer to be in the field? The problem up there has to do with Russian gangsters fighting with the indigenous criminal element while holding off the Yakuza, the Nigerian gangs, and assorted other would-be successors to the late Rra Botlhokwa's territory.”

“But Botlhokwa is dead. He committed suicide they say.”

“Suicide by lion, it is reported, yes but…So, the field is wide open for someone else to assume the lead. Botlhokwa ran a loose organization specializing in pretty small stuff. Extortion, smuggling, things like that. If he had an interest in the hotels and that new casino, he hid it pretty well. He is gone and these international elements are moving in. They do not play fair, you could say. Too many bodies are turning up in the game park and that is not good. No, the field is not where a man waiting for his new baby needs to be. Joseph, these criminals must be pinched off in the bud or everything we have worked for as a country will be lost. That is why we need you in Kasane to help the old school policeman.”

“Oh, I see.” Joseph obviously did not see, but he was at least mollified sufficiently to put his objections aside. “Well, thank you, Modise. That had been most helpful.”

“We will fly north together, tomorrow.”

“Yes, of course. What will my poor wife be thinking?”

She will be thinking what a relief to get this old hen out of the coop for a while.
“She will be fine, Joseph, and proud that you have such important things to occupy you. You will see.”

When Joseph Ikanya had cleared the door sill, Kgabo turned his attention back to his own itinerary. He must contact the men and woman already in the field. Personnel that Mwambe did not know about. He would need to put this Russian Greshenko into motion. That could be a problem. How best to use him? How long would he stay alive as a double agent? Not very, he guessed. Too bad about that. Modise remembered him as a nice fellow, his criminal past notwithstanding. How would they know that what he did or said was the truth? The director had not been clear. Would this Russian prefer his own kind and to save his life, betray the police to Lenka's people? This operation is looking like a very risky business. And then there was Sanderson, the beautiful game ranger. What will become of that situation?

So much to do.