Of Cops & Robbers (17 page)

Samson and Daphne Appollis sit opposite Fish on a couch. The couch has heavy wooden arms, ball and claw feet. Cushions patterned in brown and orange.

On every surface in the room are family photographs. Self-standing, silver-framed. The three of them: in this room, at a wedding, on the Sea Point promenade. Twosome combinations: Fortune and his dad fishing; Fortune and his ma at a school function; Fortune in his school uniform, badges on his blazer. A lot of pictures of Fortune by himself: studio portraits. One stands on the glass-topped coffee table staring at Fish.

Fish’s been through the sympathy spiel, heard about their good son. He’s told them he’s working for their lawyers. He’s told Mrs Appollis he likes her shortbread biscuits. There’s a plate of them next to the photograph of Fortune on the coffee table. The room smells of home-baked biscuits.

Mr and Mrs Appollis sit uneasy on the couch. They’re perched more than sitting. They’re not eating biscuits, they’re holding their teacups. Occasionally the teacups tinkle on their saucers.

Fish’s got to how glad they must be that Fortune’s in a private hospital now.

‘Oh yes, Mr Pescado,’ says Mrs Appollis, ‘thank the Lord.’ Her teacup tinkles. ‘Has Mr Pescado ever been into a government hospital?’

Fish nods. ‘Bit rough.’

‘You can die in a government hospital. They forget about you, Mr Pescado. They don’t care, not so, Pa?’

‘They were good to Forty, Ma,’ says her husband.

‘My friend’s mother died in hospital, Mr Pescado. They didn’t feed her. They didn’t wash her. It’s terrible. She got an infection. In the days when the whites were the government, the hospitals
were clean. Not like now.’

‘Ma …’

‘It’s true, Pa,’ she says to her husband, ‘blacks can’t run a country. Look at what’s going on. All the scandals. The young people can’t get jobs. This is not our country anymore.’

She stands up, rushes from the room.

‘Ma …’ Samson Appollis looks at Fish. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ he says, getting to his feet. ‘I must … We are very upset, Mr Fish.’ he says.

‘That’s okay,’ says Fish, watching Mr Appollis head after his wife. ‘Take your time.’ He can hear them in the kitchen, Daphne Appollis sniffling, her husband comforting her. He sits drinking his tea, eating biscuits.

Five minutes they’re back, apologising, perched again on the edge of the couch.

‘Don’t worry,’ says Fish, ‘I understand.’ He lets that settle. Then tries. ‘You sure you can afford the private hospital? It’s expensive. My firm can help you. Tide you over until the court case.’

‘There’s going to be a court case, Mr Pescado?’ says Daphne Appollis, looking from Fish to her husband. ‘Pa, I thought …’

Samson Appollis puts his arm round his wife. ‘Alright, Ma. It’s fixed up.’ He looks at Fish. ‘It’s alright, Mr Fish, we don’t want a court case.’

‘Has to be a court case,’ says Fish. ‘Your boy was injured. Badly injured.’ About to mention their son’s still in a coma but doesn’t. ‘That’s why I’m on the case, to find out who did it.’

‘Pa?’

‘What we want’s our son to get better,’ says Samson
Appollis
. ‘Mr Fish, that’s all we want. No court cases. We want our son …’ He rocks his wife. ‘It’s okay, Ma.’

Fish shifts forward on his chair. ‘I know what you’re saying. But you see, the law’s been broken. Your son was watching an illegal car race. The cops have to investigate what’s happened. They’ve got to find out who did it. Otherwise somebody else could get hurt. Maybe next time somebody dies.’ He looks at
them, neither of them looking at him. ‘Mr Appollis, Mrs Appollis we need your help. The police will need your help.’

Nothing from the couple, Samson and Daphne Appollis
sitting
there in their unhappiness.

Fish tries other bait. ‘What’s fixed up?’ he says. ‘You said something was fixed up.’

‘The hospital,’ says Samson Appollis. ‘We’ve got what-you-call-it … a policy.’

‘Insurance?’

‘Ja, insurance.’

‘Like a hospital plan?’ says Fish.

Samson Appollis nods. ‘That’s what they call it, ja. We don’t have to pay.’

‘That’s lucky,’ says Fish. ‘That’s why Fortune was moved?’

‘Ja.’

‘Pa,’ says Daphne Appollis.

‘Not now, Ma,’ he says.

Samson Appollis keeps his eyes down. Daphne Appollis stares at her teacup.

Silence. Fish picking up on the thump of bass vibrating in the walls. Nice neighbours.

Fish thinking what’s the scene here? No ways they had a hospital plan. No ways they could afford a hospital plan.

‘Ah, listen,’ he says, ‘I’m just trying to help, okay?’

Now they both look at him. Quickly. Flashing glances like startled mongooses wanting to make a dash for it. The bad part of this job, thinks Fish, pushing where people don’t want to go.

‘Your son,’ he says, ‘did you … know about the car racing?’

‘Pa,’ says Daphne Appollis.

‘Forty didn’t drive,’ says Samson Appollis.

‘Pa.’

‘Wait, Ma,’ he says. ‘Let me tell Mr Fish …’

‘He’s a good boy, Mr Pescado,’ says Daphne Appollis. ‘A good son.’ She’s not far off letting the tears flow. ‘Tell him, Pa.’

Fish says nothing.

‘Mr Fish, we told him, his Ma and me, that the car racing was wrong. Please, we told him, don’t go to the races. The police say it is dangerous.’

‘But his friends like it,’ says Daphne Appollis. ‘They like the fast cars, not so, Pa?’

‘Ja, Ma,’ says Samson Appollis. ‘Forty liked them too. He told me.’

‘Do you know these friends?’ says Fish. ‘Their names? Where they live?’

The couple shake their heads.

‘The one boy was Willy. Big boy, very polite, not so, Pa? He came inside the house one time. He and his girlfriend. Also very nice. Quiet, a very soft voice, ja, Pa.’

Samson Appollis glances at Fish. His brows furrowed, his eyes scared.

‘Willy was the one with a new car,’ Daphne Appollis is saying. ‘They went to college with him.’

‘You got a phone number for Willy?’ says Fish. ‘Or the girl?’

Blank looks from the couple.

‘Fortune’s cellphone then? He must’ve had a cellphone?’

‘It wasn’t with his things,’ says Samson Appollis. ‘We asked the police but they don’t know. They never found a cellphone.’

‘Either of the friends phoned you, Willy or …’

‘No, Mr Fish. No one.’

‘Okay. Alright.’ Fish standing up. He fishes a card from his shirt pocket, sets it against the photograph of Fortune on the coffee table. ‘In case you need me.’

‘All fine, Mr Fish. We won’t need you will we, Ma?’

‘No, Pa,’ says Daphne Appollis. To Fish she says, ‘Does Mr Pescado have a map to get out of Mitchells Plain?’ Fish nods yes, she gives him directions to Baden Powell Drive anyhow.

Fish sits in the Perana outside the Appollis’s house in Beechcraft Street. The street quiet this time of the morning. The boom-boom music inaudible. A woman sweeping her stoep watching him, two doors down. End of the road a grease monkey peering into the
bonnet of his Nissan. In the rear-view mirror, Fish sees a black Golf GTI with tinted windows parked about a hundred metres back. The reflection’s bad but he reckons the driver’s behind the wheel. Nothing wrong with that. Except Fish thinks there is. He’s wondering, should he circle, should he leave it? Decides to leave it. Takes the reg number anyhow.

The last time they meet together is over a weekend at a beach cottage. The Commander, Rictus Grin, the Fisherman, Blondie. And a black dude who drops in for lunch. There’s a pic of them all, well, minus the Commander who’s taking the photograph: Rictus, the Fisherman, Blondie and the black dude. Happy pic, they’re all grinning. Holding bottles of beer, showing their teeth.

On the Sunday morning the Commander suggests a braai on the beach. The Fisherman’s already in the tideline, fishing. Rictus is knocking back a hair of the dog.

‘May as well,’ says Blondie, scratching mosquito bites on his neck, arms. He and the Commander haul a half-drum to the beach, collect a pile of driftwood.

When their collecting’s taken them off a way, the Commander says, ‘Some advice, after this job, disappear.’

Blondie stops. ‘What?’ He laughs. ‘What’s this? What’re you saying?’

‘I’m saying disappear. Drop out of sight. Leave. Scoot the country. Change your name. Vanish.’

‘Huh! Come’n, man, I can’t do that.’

‘You can. This’s genuine. I’m genuine. Genuine advice: get lost. Like you say, it’s what Dr Gold told you: run.’

‘I can’t do that.’

‘You can.’

‘Look …’

‘No, you look. We’ve been through the heap. We know things. We can point where the bodies are.’ He laughs. ‘Some cases, literally. Big things are happening, okay. Changing. Things are not going our way. The blacks are coming in.’

Blondie wipes sweat out of his eyes. ‘What’re you talking about? What things? Come’n, talk sense. Plain English, what’s
going on?’

‘What I’m saying,’ says the Commander, ‘is you’ve got no connections. No wife. No family. No girlfriend even. If you disappear who’s gonna know?’

‘I can’t disappear.’

‘Why not? Who’s gonna know? Head office? Couple of colleagues. In our work it’s not strange for men to disappear. When last were we all together? Eighteen months ago, something like that? In between we stay out of touch. If one of us died we wouldn’t know, probably not for months.’

Blondie keeps focussed on the Commander, watching his mouth, his lips tight. The man’s not playing games.

‘We could’ve disappeared, been killed, for all you knew. Hear what I’m saying, you can go. No one’s gonna know for a long while. Even your surfer mates aren’t gonna worry. People’ll say they heard you’d gone to Durbs. Someone will say no maybe it was South West. Rumours. Nobody gives a damn. You can vanish. Poof, gone. Outta sight, outta mind.’

Blondie bends to pick up driftwood. They start walking back towards Rictus, dragging branches. Blondie twitches, scratches mozzie bites with his free hand. ‘You scheme, hey?’

‘I do. Work something out, okay, work something out.
Something
so that nobody knows where you are. Nobody can contact you. What I’m telling you’s serious.’ He jabs a finger against the other man’s head, once, twice.

Blondie steps away. ‘Chrissakes.’

‘That kinda serious. Bullet hole serious.’

They get back to Rictus, the Commander’s talking about taking a swim to cool down.

‘There’re sharks here,’ says Rictus. ‘Zambezis. Ragged-tooths. Hammerheads.’

‘You’re the expert?’

‘I went to the shark place in Durbs. They got pictures of what’s out there. Sometimes close in.’

‘You’re shit-scared.’ The Commander lets go of the wood
he’s carrying, angles towards Rictus. ‘You’re shit-scared, aren’t you?’ Turning to Blondie. ‘Come’n, let’s give him some therapy.’

Rictus grins, pulls a stiletto.

‘What’re you gonna do with that?’ says the Commander. ‘Stick your mates?’ He lunges. Rictus feints. ‘Come on.’ He lunges again. Rictus steps backwards, stumbles on the sand. And the Commander’s got him, knocked the knife out of his hand. Blondie’s into the mix too, grabs Rictus by the feet. He’s
kicking
, struggling, swearing. Laughing too. All of them laughing as they stagger towards the water. All of them collapsing in the waves, horsing around. Rugby tackling. Playing silly buggers. Stripping off T-shirts. Causes the Fisherman to put down his rod, join the melee. The four of them riding one another until they can’t stand up. Part laughing so hard, part winded. They lie in the shallows, the sea lapping warm over them. Lie there not talking, like four beached corpses.

Until the Fisherman sits up. ‘Okay, boykies, time for beer and boerewors.’

Blondie’s moving off into deeper water for a swim. Still hears the Fisherman say to the Commander, ‘Why’re we here? What’s the story?’ Blondie stops, he’s in waist-deep water. Lies beneath the surface, still as a crocodile.

The Commander’s rolled onto his stomach facing the
cottage
couple of hundred metres away across the sand and dune grass. ‘A big one,’ he says, rising to his knees, standing. ‘Makes everything else chickenfeed.’

‘So what’s it?’ Rictus getting in on the act. ‘Chrissakes. We gotta torture it out of you?’

‘Major communist,’ says the Commander. ‘Major terrorist. Major ANC bigshot.’ He stops, glances at the men. ‘Any guesses?’

They shake their heads, no.

‘Another away game. A London job.’ He stares at Rictus. ‘And nobody goes off-plan, okay?’

Rictus grins, salutes. ‘No, sir.’

‘I mean it. No twak ’n nonsense this time. We stick to the
plan.’

Rictus scoops up water, douses his face. ‘It worked out alright.’

‘It mightn’t have. Off-plan’s when the crap happens.’

Rictus looks from the Fisherman to Blondie. ‘Two weeks
surveillance
. Nice little holiday drinking flat beer, I don’t think.’ He walks backwards out of the shallows, talking to them. Beckons to Blondie. ‘You want to hear this?’

Blondie hauls himself in, shaking water from his hair as he jogs out of the waves.

Still the Commander holds off with the name until the fire’s going, they’re standing round it in their damp clothes with long-tom Castles in their fists. Rictus’s chasing his beer with brandy nips. In a plastic bucket covered with Blondie’s shirt to keep off the flies, they’ve got two coils of sausage, about a metre’s length of meat, eight chops, two racks of ribs: their lunch.

The Commander smiles at them, keeping up the tension.

‘Chrissakes,’ says Rictus.

‘The head honcho.’ The Commander pokes at the fire with the tongs to spread the coals. ‘The veritable head honcho. One Mr Oliver Tambo, ANC president.’

Rictus splutters, goes into a coughing fit.

‘Piss off,’ says the Fisherman. ‘There’s no chance.’

Rictus wheezes out, ‘You’ve gotta be joking.’ His voice thin, raspy.

‘No way,’ says the Fisherman. ‘No way in hell.’

‘Suicide,’ says Rictus, slides rings up and down his fingers. ‘A kamikaze number.’ He takes a slug of brandy from the bottle. ‘We wouldn’t walk out of that.’

The Commander looks at Blondie. ‘Want to add your two cents?’

Blondie shrugs. ‘Nothing to add.’

‘Bloody surfer’s got water for brains,’ says Rictus.

‘Better than brandy.’ Blondie matching Rictus grin for grin.

Rictus checks him out through slit eyes. ‘Watch it, Blondie.’

‘Alright,’ says the Commander. ‘Anyone interested in the
plot ’n plan?’

‘Course not,’ says the Fisherman. ‘We’re here for the sausage.’

The Commander says, very funny, goes into CO mode. How the job’s got to be done chop-chop. How they fly to London separately. He’s flying in directly. Rictus to Paris, then by train. The Fisherman to Amsterdam for two days, then a ferry. Blondie to Frankfurt for a day, then a flight to Gatwick. How Blondie joins him in a Wimbledon house. How the Fisherman hooks up with Rictus in a Notting Hill pad. Bit rough, but rough’s a wise idea. Once there, the programme is a surveillance roster one by one until the timetable’s filled in. Then bingo bongo.

Which is about when they hear a car.

The Fisherman first, pulling a .38 from his tackle bag. ‘We got visitors.’

Rictus’s conjured his stiletto. Says to Blondie. ‘Want to get our guns, china? You’re the fittest.’

Blondie’s listening, reckons the car’s a Golf, something small, the engine whiny on the dirt track. He glances at the Commander, the Commander’s unfazed. He’s expecting this.

Rictus and the Fisherman are jabbering, going, hey, hey, hey, get the guns, split up, let’s move, Chrissakes, man, this is a problem.

The Commander holds up his hand. ‘Relax. The visitor’s expected.’

Rictus says, ‘Now you tell us. Now he says, don’t worry we’re expecting a lunch guest. Hell, man, hell.’

The Fisherman spits in the sand, says, ‘Ag, man, what a cock-up.’

‘What’s your case?’ says the Commander. ‘You got some sort of problem here?’

The Fisherman spits again, backs away.

‘Get rid of the hardware,’ says the Commander. ‘Relax, okay. Just relax.’

They listen to the car stop, the engine dies. A door opens, slams shut. Blondie counts off the paces. Takes about thirty
paces to go round the cottage, appear in the front near where they braaied the previous evening. He counts: one, two, three …

On twenty-two a black man, early thirties, appears at the corner of the cottage: colourful dude in his swimming shorts, bright Hawaiian shirt, flip-flops. Kicks off the flip-flops, starts barefoot over the vlei grass towards the beach. He lifts a hand in greeting. The Commander acknowledges.

As he reaches them the Commander says, ‘Right on time.’