Thirteen Hours (15 page)

'The
Josh Geyser?' asked Cloete.

'Who?' asked Griessel.

'The gospel guy. Barnard pumped his wife yesterday in his
office and she went and confessed the whole thing.'

'Barnard's wife?' asked Griessel.

'No. Geyser's.' 'Melinda?' asked Cloete urgently.

'That's right.'

'No!' Cloete was shocked.

'Hang on ...' said Griessel.

'I've got all their CDs,' said Cloete. 'I can't fucking
believe it. Is that what Mouton is going around saying?'

'Are you a gospel fan?' Dekker asked.

Cloete nodded only fleetingly and flicked his cigarette butt
in an arc down the street. 'He's lying, I'm telling you. Melinda is a sweet
thing. And besides, she and Josh are born-again - she would never do a thing
like that.'

'Born-again or not, that's what Mouton says.'

'Fransman, wait. Explain this to me,' said Griessel.

'Apparently, yesterday Barnard fucked Melinda Geyser in his
office. So her husband, Josh, pitches up yesterday afternoon saying he knows
all about it and he's going to beat Barnard to death, but Barnard wasn't
there.'

'Can't be,' said Cloete, but as a policeman he knew people
were capable of anything and he was already considering whether it might be
true. Then his face fell. 'Oh man, the press ...'

'Ja,' said Griessel.

'Benny!' All three turned when they heard Vusi Ndabeni's
voice. The black detective came jogging down the pavement and reached them, out
of breath. 'Where is the Commissioner?'

As one, all three pointed accusing fingers through the glass
doors where a doctor had now joined the Mouton conference.

'The other girl - she's still alive, Benny. But they're
hunting her down, somewhere in this city. The Commissioner will have to
organise more people.'

Without haste, she walked down Marmion Road in the direction
of the city. There was an absence in her, an acceptance of her fate. Ahead she
saw a car reversing out of a driveway, a small black Peugeot. The driver was a
woman. Rachel did not increase her pace, continued to walk towards her,
unthreatening. The woman drove to the edge of the street and stopped. She looked
left for traffic, then right. She saw Rachel and for an instant made eye
contact, then looked away.

'Hi,' said Rachel calmly, but the woman didn't hear her. She
stepped forward and softly knocked on the window with the knuckle of her middle
finger. The woman turned her head, irritably. Her mouth had a peculiar shape,
the corners pulled down strongly. She turned the window down a few centimetres.

'May I use your telephone, please,' said Rachel, without
emotion, as though she knew what the answer would be.

The woman looked her up and down, saw the dirty clothes, the
grazed chin, hands and knees. 'There's a public telephone at Carlucci's. On
Montrose.'

'I'm in real trouble.'

'It's just around the corner,' and the woman looked again for
traffic in Marmion Road. 'Just turn right at the next street, and walk two
blocks.'

She wound up the window and reversed. As she turned left to
drive away she looked once more at Rachel, suspicion and aversion in her face.

Barry studied the map on the hood of the vehicle and said
over his phone: 'Look, she could have gone left into Chesterfield, or she could
have taken Marmion, but I can't see her. The angle's not good from here.'

'Which one goes down into the city?' The voice was out of
breath.

'Marmion.'

'Then keep your focus on Marmion. We're two minutes from the
Landy, but you will have to tell us where she is. It's going to take ten
minutes to get the cops there. And by then she could be anywhere ...'

Barry took the binoculars and held them to his eyes again.
'Hang on ...'

He followed Strathcona to where it led into Marmion, which
was thickly lined with trees. The binoculars stripped the image of perspective,
there were too many double storeys and it was too overgrown; only here and
there could he see the western pavement and parts of the street surface. He
followed the trajectory north towards the city, glanced swiftly at the map.
Marmion ended in
...
Montrose. She ought to turn left there, if she wanted
to reach the city.

Binoculars again. He found Montrose, broad and more visible
from here. He followed it west. Nothing. Would she have turned right? East?

'Barry?'

'Yeah?'

'We're at the Landy. We're going to Marmion.'

'OK,' he said, still looking through the binoculars.

He saw her, far and tiny in the lenses, but unmistakable. She
crossed the intersection.

'I have her. She's in Montrose ...' He looked down at the
map. 'She just crossed Forest, heading east.'

'OK. We're in Glencoe. Now just don't lose her.'

John Afrika walked out of the glass doors of casualty alone.
Apparently, Willie Mouton and the sombre lawyer, Regardt Groenewald, had gone
into the hospital. 'Good news,
kerels
,' said
John Afrika as he took his place in the circle. 'Alexa Barnard is out of
danger. The damage is not so bad, she's just lost a lot of blood, they're
keeping her... Oh, Vusi, morning, what are you doing here?'

'I'm sorry, sir, I know you're busy, but I thought I should
come and ask for help ...'

'Don't apologise, Vusi. What can I do?'

'The American girl at the church ... there were two of them,
we know that now ...' Vusi Ndabeni took out his notebook from the pocket of his
neat jacket, stood up straight and said, 'The victim is Miss Erin Russel. Her
friend is Miss Rachel Anderson. They came in with a tour group yesterday. Miss
Anderson was seen on Signal Hill at approximately six o'clock this morning,
pursued by assailants. Sir, she's an eyewitness, and she's in great danger. We
need to find her.'

'Damn,' said John Afrika, but the English expletive seemed
ineffective in his mouth.

'Pursued by assailants? What assailants?'

'Apparently five or six young men, some white, some black,
the witness says.'

'And who is this witness?'

'A lady by the name of ... Sybil Gravett. She was walking her
dog along Signal Hill when Miss Anderson came up to her and asked her for help.
She then ran in the direction of Camps Bay after she asked Mrs Gravett to call
the police. A few minutes later the young men came running past.'

The Commissioner checked his watch. 'Fuck it, Vusi, that was
more than three hours ago ...'

'I know. That's why I need more people, sir.'

'Bliksem
.' Afrika rubbed a hand over his jaw. 'I don't have more
people. We'll have to get the stations involved.'

'I've already asked the stations, sir. But Caledon Square has
to police a union march to Parliament, and Camps Bay has only two vehicles in
operation. The SC says they lost one patrol van to theft on New Year's Eve and
the other one was crashed ...'

'Neeo
bliksem,'
Afrika swore
before Vusi could finish.

'I've put out another bulletin, sir, but I thought if we
could get the chopper, and put some pressure on the SCs ...'

Afrika took out his cell phone. 'Let me see what I can do ...
Who the hell is chasing her?'

'I don't know, sir. But they were at a nightclub last night.
Van Hunks ...'

'Jissis
,' said John Afrika and called a number. 'When are we going
to clean out those dens?'

Rachel Anderson walked in through the front door of Carlucci's
Quality Food Store, straight up to the counter where a young man in a white
apron was busy taking change out of small plastic bags.

'Is there a telephone I can use?' Her voice was
expressionless.

'Over there, next to the ATM,' he said and then he looked up.
He saw the stains on her clothes, the dried blood on her face and knees. 'Hi...
Are you OK?'

'No, I'm not. I need to make an urgent call, please.'

'It's not a card phone. Would you like some change?'

Rachel took the rucksack off her back. 'I've got some.' She
went in the direction he had indicated.

He noticed her beauty, despite the state she was in. 'Can I
help you with something?' She didn't answer. He watched her with concern.

'Jesus Christ,' Barry said over the cell phone. 'She's just
gone into a fucking restaurant or something.' 'Shit. Which one?'

'It's on the corner of Montrose and ... I think it's Upper
Orange .. .Yes that's it.'

'We'll be there in two minutes. Just keep looking ...'

'I'm not taking my eyes off the place.'

The ringing of the phone woke Bill Anderson in his house in
West Lafayette, Indiana. With his first attempt he knocked off the receiver, so
he had to sit up and swing his feet off the bed to reach it.

'What is it?' his wife asked beside him, confused.

'Daddy?' he heard as he picked up the receiver. He lifted it
to his ear.

'Baby?'

'Daddy!' said his daughter, Rachel, thirty thousand
kilometres away, and she began to cry.

Bill Anderson's guts contracted; suddenly he was wide awake.
'Honey, what's wrong?'

'Erin is dead, Daddy.'

'Oh, my God, baby, what happened?'

'Daddy, you have to help me. They want to kill me too.'

To her left was a large window looking out on Montrose
Avenue; in front of her was the deli counter, where three coloured people exchanged
looks when they heard her words.

'Honey, are you sure?' her father asked, his voice so
terribly near.

'They cut her throat last night, Daddy. I saw it ...' Her
voice caught.

'Oh, my God,' said Bill Anderson. 'Where are you?'

'I don't have much time, Daddy. I'm in Cape Town . . . the
police, I can't even go to the police ...' She heard the screech of tyres on
the road outside. She looked up and out. A new white Land Rover Defender
stopped outside. She knew the occupants.

'They're here, Daddy, please help me ...'

'Who's there? Who killed Erin?' her father asked urgently,
but she had seen the two men leap out of the Land Rover and run to the main
door of the shop. She threw the receiver down and fled through the shop, past
the dumbstruck women behind the deli counter, to a white wooden door at the
back. She shoved it violently open. As she ran out she heard the man in the
apron shout: 'Hey!' She was in a long narrow passage between the building and a
high white wall. Along the top of the wall was a long row of broken glass. The
only way out was at the end of the passage to the right - another wooden door.
She sprinted, the awful terror upon her again.

If that door was locked ...

The soles of her running shoes slapped loudly in the narrow
space. She pulled at the door. It wouldn't open. Behind her she heard the deli
door open. She looked back. They saw her. She focused on the door in front of
her. There was a Yale lock. She turned it. A small, anxious sound exploded from
her lips. She jerked the door open. They were too close. She went out and
slammed it shut behind her. She saw the street before her, realised the door
had a bolt on this side, turned and her fingers worked in haste, it wouldn't
budge, she heard them at the lock on the other side. She banged the bolt with
the palm of her hand; pain shot up her arm. The bolt slid and the door was
barred. They jerked at it from the other side.

'Bitch!' one of them shouted.

She raced down four concrete steps. She was in the street,
kept running, left, down the long slope of Upper Orange Street, her eyes
searching for a way out, because they were too close, even if they went back
through the shop, they were as close as they had been last night, just before
they caught Erin.

Bill Anderson rushed down the stairs of his house to his
study, with his wife, Jess, at his heels.

'They killed Erin?' she asked. Her voice heavy with fear and
worry.

'Honey, we have to stay calm.'

'I am calm, but you have to tell me what's going on.'

Anderson stopped at the bottom where the stairs led into the
hallway. He turned and put his hands on his wife's shoulders. 'I don't know
what's going on,' he said slowly and calmly. 'Rachel says Erin was killed. She
says she's still in Cape Town ... and that she's in danger ...'

'Oh, my God ...'

'If we want to help her at all, we have to stay calm.'

'But what can we do?'

The young man in the apron saw the two men who had chased the
girl coming back through Carlucci's Quality Food Store. He shouted again: 'Hey!'
and blocked the way to the front door. 'Stop!'