Payback - A Cape Town thriller (38 page)

‘I didn’t,’ said Mace. ‘I had nothing to do with it.’

‘She told you about buying the pieces?’

‘She could’ve. Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t. I can’t remember.’

‘But this is another little secret from Oumou. Now we have
Isabella’s
money to pay for the house. We must say thank you Isabella because the bank is happy.’

‘She bought your work,’ said Mace. ‘She didn’t dish out charity.’

‘From Isabella it is blood money.’

‘It is money you earned from your pottery,’ said Mace. ‘Full stop. Without it we’d be selling our house. We’d be on the street. That money kept us here.’ He watched her waver, hesitant about her argument, the weight it carried.

‘I had nothing going with Isabella,’ he said. ‘She liked your work and she came across it and she bought it. That’s all. It’s not blood money or anything like that. What’s at the bottom of this is your work. The pots you made here have kept us in this house.’

He could see he’d convinced her, that she wasn’t going to argue anymore. Went over to her where she sat on her stool and stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders, kneading. She leant back until her head rested against him and he felt the tension go out of her. He’d been working hard on her over the month: telling her everything that happened in his day. Every smallest detail. Almost. They’d been to the bank together, paid in the money from her exhibition that’d brought their bond payments back in line. He still noticed her looking at him sometimes, frowning. He’d come up on her then, do something unexpected: give her a kiss, hug her, maybe work her towards the bedroom. What he never told her about though were the diamonds. Or that he’d gone against the broker’s advice and kept them. To Mace’s way of thinking, the diamonds were a fall-back and easier to hide than an investment account, no matter where in the world you put it.

What did faze him were the emails: how someone had got the photograph; known about Isabella buying up Oumou’s exhibition. He was stone-walled here.

On the afternoon Mace notched up brownie points, he took Oumou and Christa to the five o’clock showing of Lord of The Rings at the V&A. Christa’s choice which was fine by him, plenty of action to stir the blood. Afterwards, Oumou said why didn’t they go downstairs to the Fish Market for calamari, Christa’s favourite and a restaurant easy to get the wheelchair in and out of. The Fish Market another fine choice, Mace thought, this time saying it out loud. And that all the on-screen fighting had made him thirsty for a long Windhoek.

They got inside no problem, the restaurant not too busy this early in the evening. Ordered a Coke for Christa, white wine for Oumou and the draught, the waiter then going into his spiel about the fresh fish on special that could be grilled and served with baby potatoes or pan-fried with butter, without butter, with garlic, without garlic, served with a baked potato or chips. French pommes frites-type chips. They ordered calamari and onion rings and baked potatoes with sour cream dressing all-round.

When the drinks arrived Mace said, ‘What’ll we toast to?’

And Christa answered, ‘Frodo.’

Oumou laughed. ‘Frodo, ma puce! With the hairy feet.’

‘I liked him,’ she said, ‘for wanting to get rid of the ring. That was cool.’

‘Yeah,’ said Mace. ‘It was an evil thing.’

‘But pretty, oui?’ Oumou fingering some of the amber beads in her necklace.

‘Just shows how people fight over pretty things.’ Mace took a long pull at the beer. It left a moustache on his upper lip that made Christa laugh and he used the back of his hand to wipe it off.

‘Men,’ said Oumou. ‘Men fight, no.’

‘This’s true,’ said Mace. ‘But there’s always a woman in it somewhere.’

‘Cate Blanchett’s my favourite,’ said Christa.

‘See,’ said Mace. ‘That’s what I mean.’

‘But if there wasn’t a ring, Papa,’ said Christa, ‘the fighting wouldn’t have happened. She didn’t make them fight.’

Mace reached across and brushed her cheek with the fingers of his right hand. ‘You win, C, I give up.’ Looking at his daughter sitting there, her legs hanging down. Glanced too at his wife and saw the flight of hurt cross her face. Still, the swimming was bringing a little movement back into Christa’s legs. He could see it. A bit of strength too. Not enough yet to stand, but enough that he could feel resistance if he held her up, her feet pressed against the floor.

‘Maybe some things can be corrected,’ the surgeon had said. ‘I’m not going to tell you she will walk again.’

Their calamari came and Mace said that perhaps in the school holidays he should take time off and they could get away somewhere, like to a game reserve.

‘The Kruger Park?’ said Christa, her eyes on her father, Mace saying through a mouthful that yes, Kruger was an option.

‘I will see,’ said Oumou, ‘where we can get bookings.’

Mace believed, watching mother and daughter making plans, that if he sold one or two of the smaller stones it should cover costs with money to spare. What a pleasure!

* * *

‘But how do we have the money for this holiday?’ Oumou wanted to know when they sat side by side on the couch in their lounge, a fire in the grate, Mace nursing a Johnny Walker black that he wished was blue, Dr Kiambu’s whisky tasting having given him a liking for finer things.

‘We can afford it,’ he said. ‘In the summer we’ve got so many clients signed we won’t be sleeping, either Pylon or me. Nor’s Kruger Italy where Pylon wants to go. That’s expensive. He’s talking airfares for the three of them that’d equal our holiday.’

Oumou reached for his whisky, took a sip.

Mace said, ‘I can get you one?’

‘Non.’ Oumou shaking her head, pulled a face at the taste.

He took back the glass. ‘Something else?’

She curled against him. ‘I can think of it.’

Mace could too. Sometimes, you acted on the spur of the moment you could score all down the line. Tomorrow, on the way to fetch Ducky Donald from the hospital, he’d stop at the broker’s, get the fellow to make an arrangement. Now he ran a hand under Oumou’s jersey, his fingers touching the scars across her stomach, sliding towards her breasts.

‘Hey,’ he said, ‘no bra!’

Ten days after the killing of Mo Siq, the city crouched, drenched and shivering under a low sky. The sort of day that was a copy of the last one Mo Siq lived.

On this morning, Sheemina February, opening the front door of the house she was selling, said to Mikey Rheeder, ‘Mikey, let me tell you something about this house.’

‘That you used to live here,’ said Mikey Rheeder. ‘You’ve told me.’

‘Mikey’ - she stepped into the hall, the heels of her boots hard on the floorboards, echoing through the empty house - ‘shut up and listen.’

He came inside and closed the door. They stood in the hall, Sheemina February staring down the passage to the kitchen, Mikey looking up the stairs at the landing.

‘What for?’ he said. ‘I can’t hear anything.’

‘Shh,’ said Sheemina February. ‘Hear how this house creaks and groans.’

‘Houses do that. What’s the big deal?’

‘Like someone’s in the house, walking about.’

Mikey Rheeder listened and said, ‘Hey, that’s weird. That’s really weird. Who’s it up there? A ghost?’

‘No one. Just the house.’

He squeezed past her into the lounge, looked around at the marks on the fitted carpet where furniture had stood. ‘You wouldn’t catch me living in a place like this.’

‘Scared are you, Mikey? Scared of strange noises?’

‘There’re ghosts,’ he said. ‘I’ve been on this tour this guy runs in Cape Town. You go to all the houses where there’s ghosts. Some rooms in the Castle, that spook house on the bend there in Rondebosch, the one with the turrets, other places he said people were murdered. ‘Strues, I got this really cold sensation in my blood. Like someone’s stroking down my arm very lightly, raising my hairs. That’s spooky stuff.’

‘I lived here three years, I never saw a ghost.’ Sheemina February opened the door beneath the staircase, switched on a light.

‘Still cleared out though.’

‘I move around, Mikey. Different parts of the city, depending on my mood.’

‘What’s down there?’ He stepped back into the hall to peer down the stairwell, a short flight of wooden stairs ending at a door.

‘A cellar. That’s what I wanted to tell you about. Come, let me show you.’

She went down first, bending to enter the low doorway, taking the stairs carefully, one gloved hand steadying herself against the wall. Unlocked the rough plank door, switched on a neon light that hummed and popped as it lit up inside the cellar. The cold was physical, like walking into a fridge.

Mikey dug his hands into the pockets of his jacket. ‘This’s grim. ‘N’ it smells.’

‘I found out,’ said Sheemina February, ‘that this was the cellar of the first house built here, probably a one-roomed farmhouse.’

‘I’m supposed to be impressed?’ said Mikey.

She shrugged. ‘Some people are. It’s history. I found out that house was burned down in seventeen eighty-one. Set alight by a mob. Inside was the owner, an English doctor. The reason the mob burned it down was because they thought he was a paedophile. Afterwards, no one could find his corpse.’

‘You better tell this to the man who runs the ghost tours.’

Sheemina February sat down on the bed, on the new foam mattress, smoothing the creases from her skirt. She picked up a chain that was fastened to an iron wall-pin at one end and to a pair of handcuffs at the other. ‘I’m telling you, Mikey.’

‘What’s that?’ said Mikey. ‘Hey, what’s that shit?’

‘Let me finish. I said I’m telling you because underneath this floor we’re standing on is earth. You lift up these flagstones, that’s what’s below. No concrete foundation, nothing but earth.’

‘So?’ Mikey cocked his head.

‘So you’ve got some unfinished business, and I’ve got some unfinished business. Both with the same man.’

Mikey frowned. ‘Who’s this?’

Sheemina February sighed. ‘How about Mace Bishop?’

‘Yeah,’ said Mikey, ‘that’s true, yeah’ - taking his hands out of his pocket. His left hand buckled and bent, shaping his right into a gun, going ‘Pow, pow’- grinning.

‘What I’m getting to,’ said Sheemina February, smiling at Mikey slowly coming up to speed, ‘is that before I sell, maybe it would be better to throw a concrete floor in here.’ She held out the house keys and he took them. ‘The house is on the market, but the market’s quiet. Also the agent’s taking a holiday out of the country. Nobody’s got any business here for ten days, two weeks. Neighbours see a bunch of building boys mixing cement, they’re going to think I’m doing minor repairs to meet a sale. Nothing out of the ordinary.’

‘Alright,’ said Mikey, jangling the bunch of keys. ‘I see where you’re going. I can see uses for that chain.’

‘Good,’ said Sheemina February. ‘Problems solved then.’ She got up and headed for the cellar door. ‘Let’s get out of this freezing cold.’ She paused. ‘Tomorrow. Nothing dramatic, Mikey, you understand me. Keep it toned down.’

Mikey switched the light off, locked the door, following her up the stairs, his eyes on her larney boots rising into her long coat. ‘Same deal as with the other one?’

‘That’s fine.’ She waited for him on the stoep, the outside warmer than the inside of the house. Which had been one of the drawbacks to living there, that the place was an ice-chest in winter.

Mikey came out. ‘You suppose the English doctor’s down there?’

‘Wouldn’t you?’

He laughed. ‘It’s gonna get crowded then.’

Sheemina February, driving away from the house, thought it didn’t matter how Mikey Rheeder played this one, or Mace Bishop for that matter either, the outcome was going to be satisfactory. As a gesture, though, she bought a single deep purple long-stemmed rose in a box from a florist on Kloof. Had it delivered to Mace Bishop’s office.

Mikey Rheeder, standing on the driveway looking up at the house, thought he could have some fun here. Keep the guy in the cellar for a while, smash some of his fingers to show him what it’s like. Mace Bishop could scream his lungs out down there, wasn’t going to be anybody who’d hear him.

Then other thoughts occurred: that he’d heard about Mace Bishop doing a diamond deal, also that maybe there was a way to get Sheemina meshed in. People he knew would pay for that.

Mikey Rheeder said aloud, ‘Hey, who’s a clever dude?’

On this wild morning, either Mace or Pylon was to collect Ducky Donald Hartnell for a site visit.

To Mace, the newspaper spread across his desk, a mug of coffee at hand, the heater warming his feet, the thought of chauffeuring Ducky Donald Hartnell to a site meeting never had been a must-do and was becoming moment by moment less so. He listened to the fall of rain on the corrugated-iron roof and said, ‘I’ll flip you best of three.’

To Pylon on the couch, a newspaper across his lap, a mug of coffee at hand, the thought of chauffeuring Ducky Donald Hartnell to a site meeting was a non-starter. He listened to the drum of the rain and said, ‘D’you think the cops are doing anything?’

‘About what?’ said Mace, searching for a five-rand coin in a jar of change he kept for car-guard tips.

‘About Mo’s killing.’

‘I suppose. Why not?’

‘In five days not a mention in the newspapers. Not a cop on our doorstep. This’s how they investigate?’

‘Must be a long list of people to see,’ said Mace emptying the jar on his newspaper, spreading the coins across the print. ‘Our names aren’t a high priority.’ He found a coin. ‘Heads or tails?’

‘I’m not doing that,’ said Pylon. ‘This’s got your name on it.’

‘Forget it. Not in this weather. Come on, fair’s fair.’

‘Also, you’d think the newspapers would be worrying at it. Writing those reports where the cops say they’re at a sensitive stage. Except they aren’t. Writing them I mean.’

‘Probably the cops aren’t at a sensitive stage either. Heads or tails?’

‘How about you offering for once?’

‘You mean like you do?’

‘It’s been known.’

‘Uh uh, china, not today.’

Pylon said, ‘Shit, who came up with this idea anyway?’

‘The way I recall it,’ said Mace, ‘you did. All those years ago. Heads or tails?’

‘Tails.’

Mace flipped: tails. Pylon called tails again. Mace flipped: tails.

‘Want to see if you’ll win the third one?’ Pylon said.

Mace flipped, caught the coin in his palm, slapped it down on the back of his hand and kept it covered. Pylon called heads. Mace took away his hand: heads.

‘If you flipped and I called I’d win,’ said Mace.

‘Sure,’ said Pylon ‘but I’m not going to.’ He cracked a page of his newspaper. ‘Look at it another way, bro, you’ve got a more exciting life.’

‘Isn’t it?’ said Mace.

He took the Spider parked at the curb, intending to use Ducky’s BMW for the downtown leg. If Ducky was going to get shot at again, Mace didn’t want bullet holes in his car, or blood splatter on the upholstery. Also, he had to admit, the BM was faster in a tight situation.

At the bottom of Barnet he noticed a grey Camry hard on his pipe. Followed him into Vrede, right into St John’s, down Plein to the traffic light. A lone driver, difficult to tell if it was a man or a woman. Not that he was concerned at this point.

The light went green, the Camry tracked him left into Spin, Adderley, Wale, up to Buitengracht, down to Strand. Another red traffic light, the Camry one car back. Mace’s interest aroused, but the situation far from critical.

On the green he took Strand to the robot at Chiappini, and a sudden right down the hill, only a block or two above Ducky Donald’s building site. The Camry followed. No longer a coincidence. Mace braked hard in the middle of the street, and leaped out, shouting. The Camry swerved and
accelerated
, jumped the red light into Somerset on squealing tyres. Hooters blared at this craziness, cars skidding about the
intersection
. Not a pleasant sight, but Mace got the number and phoned it through to Pylon for his contact at Traffic to do a quick scan. The rest of the way to Ducky wondered what advantage was to be had from harassing him? Although he’d been there before.

‘A site visit’s not a secret,’ said Ducky. ‘Architect, engineer, builder, project manager, building inspector, a couple of secretaries, have to be about seven people know of the meeting excluding the two of us. Someone in there’s keeping tabs on me, they’re gonna know about it. Stands to reason. Also have to know that I’ve engaged you. So they start the nonsense to put a cracker in your jocks even before you’ve got here.’ He laughed. ‘Seems to have worked, I’d say.’

Nor did Pylon come back with helpful news. The plates on the Camry belonged to a twenty-five-year-old Datsun registered to a woman on the Flats.

‘Not even worth checking out,’ he said.

‘Worth a phone call,’ Mace said.

Pylon groaned. ‘Ease up, bru. It’s going nowhere.’

Still, came back three minutes later that the Datsun in question was up on bricks in the woman’s backyard, had been like that for ten years and no it didn’t have number plates on it anymore. ‘Satisfied?’

Mace told him he was a great help.

On the drive from Ducky’s house to the site, Mace was pleased not a grey Camry to be seen. Didn’t seem to be any car following them.

At the site, despite the rain, about twenty, thirty people crowded the entrance, waving placards, singing songs they’d last sang at the barricades during the eighties. Some priests and imams stoking the emotions but no politicians that Mace could see. The cops had been called and kept the mob back from the gate. All the same, he reckoned, if someone in their midst pulled a gun, Ducky Donald was going to be very close to the action as he walked past.

Mace stopped the car a block away before anyone had seen them.

‘Not good, Ducky.’

They sat considering: staring at the demonstration through each pass of the wipers. Didn’t take a psychologist to see the people were worked up. Not even the wet and cold were going to send them home.

‘Maybe someone’s office would be a better idea?’

Ducky Donald drummed the armrest with the fingers of his good hand. ‘No ways. This lot have gotta know I’m not shit scared.’

He looked shit scared to Mace. Licking his lips, his voice coming from a dry mouth. ‘Last thing they’re gonna do is hit me out here. In front of the cops. It’s not their style. Their style’s your drive-by. Your pipebomb hurled through the bedroom window. Out here, on the street, they want publicity. Give the reporters something to write about. Don’t you think?’

Mace shrugged. ‘My advice is we drive away.’

‘Nah, Mace.’ He opened the door. ‘You’re going soft. That’s crap. What I’ve done’s been patient and understanding. I’m looking after their bones for heaven’s sake. My conscience’s clear. What I’m not gonna do is store their bones in my new building. That’s outta the question. Completely. Is that unreasonable? I ask you? Come’n tell me? All they gotta do is find somewhere to bury the bones, I’ll even pay to dig the hole. I’ve told them. Just not in my building.’ He got out of the car, leant back in. ‘Switch off. Let’s go. You’ve gotta be there to take the bullet for me.’ And pulled his hyena grin.

That was exactly the problem Mace could foresee: being in the line of something meant for Ducky Donald.

They weren’t halfway down the block when the horde realised the man in the long black raincoat, advancing with his hobble gait towards them, was none other than the hated developer. This gave them new vim and vigour. Unleashed some stones but nothing Mace and Ducky couldn’t dodge. The cops got active; even the mob’s leaders called for calm. Didn’t stop the chanting though.

Gathered at the entrance to the site were the people Ducky Donald was to meet. Not a happy crew. Clustered under golf umbrellas clutching their plans and files.

Among the enemy, a priest Mace recognised from television and a man he didn’t, started calling to Ducky, the police
restraining
them.

Ducky said, ‘What’s your problem reverend? We’ve got
channels
for this sorta stuff.’

‘See how angry people are,’ said the man in a soaked kurta. ‘You have desecrated a grave.’

Ducky waved him aside. ‘Yeah, yeah. We’ve been through this, Ahmed. We’ve gotta move on. Do me a favour, hey. Find
somewhere
new for your bones. Okay? Then we can talk.’ He turned away from them, started shaking hands with the people he’d come to meet.

Mace kept facing the horde, saw the half-brick lobbed from the back but was too late in pulling Ducky aside. It caught the developer on the shoulder, staggered him into the arms of his architect. Unleashed a roar of outrage. Ducky Donald swung round on the pack even as it surged forward, his wounded hand raised, shouting, ‘You bastards. What’s your bloody problem, you bastards?’ While Mace bunched a fist into his jacket and hauled him inside the site entrance.

‘Lemme go. Jesus damnit, Mace. Lemme go.’ Ducky found his feet. Straightened the clothing Mace had pulled awry. ‘The bastards. The bloody bastards.’

‘Alright,’ Mace said restraining him again. ‘Let the cops deal with it, okay. They’re breaking it up.’

‘They want war,’ he said. ‘They’ve got war.’

The second time Mace had heard him threaten this, but believed Ducky was probably a three-bells man.

He quietened down, the consultants grouped around shuffling nervously.

While they held their meeting on a platform suspended over the hole, Mace stood at the entrance, admiring the police efforts. No
hardline
tactics, a gentle pushing and shoving, moving the people up the street. Nor were the leaders putting up any resistance. Everyone went peacefully enough, still singing. Eventually only the priest was left, a wet figure at the top of the road holding a sodden newspaper over his head. He made a cellphone call during the time Mace watched but he couldn’t have said more than a dozen words before he disconnected. Nor did he move from that spot or change his stance until Ducky appeared. Then he was gone onto Somerset Road.

‘Who’s the priest?’ Mace asked Ducky in the car. ‘He looks familiar.’

‘Oh,’ he raised his bandaged hand dismissively. ‘Holy called Thomas Carney. Got a huge chip on his shoulder. Got huge chips on both shoulders actually. Does TV stuff.’

Mace eased into Prestwich Street, drove slowly past the building site. No action any longer, even the cops were gone.

‘All this bloody rain, how’re you supposed to get a bloody building built?’ Ducky stared at his fence of corrugated-iron sheeting surrounding the excavation. ‘You take a look down there at all the water?’

‘Uh huh.’

‘Like a swimming pool. Seeps up from underneath. Buckets down from the heavens.’

‘You wanted to be the developer.’ Mace turned into Chiappini, heading towards Somerset. There on the corner was the reverend. ‘Want to give your friend a lift?’

‘Of course, yes, why don’t we? Dump him to hell ‘n gone in the Karoo. Let him walk outta the desert like a prophet.’

Mace stopped at the traffic light. The priest came quickly at them, slapped his sodden newspaper on the bonnet of the car. Shouted, ‘Damn you to hell Mr Hartnell.’

Ducky lowered the side window. ‘Not very charitable, reverend.’ The man glared at him. ‘Can we give you a lift?’

‘Fuck you. Just fuck you.’ And the reverend hit the car again, taking off towards the city in long strides.

‘Crazy man,’ said Ducky bringing up the window. ‘A priest saying things like that. Jesus Christ!’

The light changed and Mace drove across to where he’d had the altercation with the grey Camry. Got stopped again at the intersection into High Level Road.

‘What sort of priest?’

‘Anglican. Church of England, whatever you call it. In the struggle days saw the insides of prisons more than the insides of churches. A righteous man. Starved himself when the Boers locked him up.’

‘He did?’

‘A hunger strike got him on the front page for ten days. I checked.’

‘Always hoping for an angle.’

Ducky chuckled. ‘Why not? You never know.’

Mace turned into High Level, accelerating up the hill.

‘He’s just a poor rev nobody can even bum money off. So when the bones come up he jumps to the frontline. Something to vent his spleen. Get him back in the news. Gives me crap all the time without let-up.’

When Mace next glanced in the rear-view mirror there was the blurred front end of a grey Camry, a lone driver.

‘We’re going for a little ride,’ he told Ducky, shifting forward to draw the Ruger from his belt. ‘Don’t look back. Let’s keep it calm.’

Ducky hit the dashboard, nonetheless. ‘I don’t bloody believe it.’

‘Mightn’t be anything but a little more aggro. To let you know they’re watching.’

‘Bugger them. This is war now Mace. Know what I’m saying? War.’

He kept rigid in the seat though, facing forward. All the way along High Level, down Fresnaye into Queen’s onto Victoria, slowly along the coastal curves through Clifton, through Camps Bay, the Camry keeping steadily behind them, not too close, until the road opened under the Apostles, then narrowing the distance. Mace let him come up, figuring not too many options in his hand.

The weather was black and raw here: breaking in squalls off a high sea. Spume and debris on the road. The wind tugging the wheels. Mace let the Camry move out to overtake, changed down, put foot.

‘Are you bloody mad?’ yelled Ducky, as they went into the first bend, the cars sliding on the wet, side by side. For any on-coming traffic the Camry was solid in their lane. Also he had the
drop-away
to the sea at his elbow. Mace edged closer, but the driver didn’t frighten, kept his speed until the Camry was door for door. Swept through a left curve, a right, a tight left, the Camry twinning his moves.

‘Goddamned maniac,’ Mace shouted.

Ducky going, ‘Jesus! Fuck! The bugger’s got a gun.’

Mace caught this out of the corner of his eye: the driver’s grin, the pistol and damaged hand raised in profile. A face he recognised. Glanced ahead, the road wide and rising on a straight.

The BM had power to spare, would outstrip the Camry in a few hundred metres. Instead Mace braked, stood hard on the pedal, the ABS kicking in, even on the wet the car not fishtailing. It got him a couple of seconds, the Camry braking too but sliding right, loose on the road. Mace jerked the handbrake, brought the car round in a tight left. Slapped down the gears and watched the needle climb.