Dead at Daybreak

∨ Dead at Daybreak ∧

57

He was aware that he was alive long before he regained consciousness, floating between dream and hallucination. His father, lunch box in his hand, walking with him through Stilfontein, long conversations, his father’s voice low and sympathetic, his father’s smile indescribably happy. Hand in hand with his father until he drifted away again to a blackness without awareness, and out on the other side only to experience the blood and the death of Nagel and Brits and Steven Mzimkhulu and Tiny Mpayipheli and Hope Beneke, the shock and the horror, every time he hurled himself into the hail of bullets, every time it passed through him, every time he screamed uselessly, his cries disappearing into the mists. And then Wendy was there, Wendy and her two children and her husband – “Oh, Zet, you’re missing so much” – and his mother, he knew his mother was there, around him, with him. He heard her voice, heard her singing, it was like being in the womb again, and then he was awake and the sun shone and it was late afternoon and his mother was with him. She held his hand and the tears ran down his cheeks.

“Ma,” he said, but he could barely hear his own voice.

“I knew you were there somewhere,” she said.

And then he was gone again, to dark, peaceful depths. His mother was there, his mother was there, and then he came back slowly, up, up, up, a nurse bending over him, shifting the hanging drip. He smelled her faint perfume, saw the roundness of her breasts under the white uniform, and then he was there, awake, his chest hurting, his body heavy.

“Hallo,” said the nurse.

He made a noise that didn’t quite work.

“Welcome back. Your mother went to have breakfast. She’ll be back in a moment.”

He just looked at her, at the pretty lines of her hands, the fine blond hairs on her supple arms. He was alive, looking at the sunlight through the window.

“We were worried about you,” the nurse said. “But now you’re going to be okay.”

Be okay.

“Do you have any pain?”

He nodded slightly, his head heavy.

“I’ll get you something for it,” she said, and he closed his eyes and opened them and his mother was there again.

“My child,” she said, and he saw tears in her eyes. “Rest, everything is fine. All you have to do is rest.” And then he slept again.

♦

Wilna van As stood next to his mother. “I just want to say thank you. The doctor said I’m only allowed a few minutes – I only want to say thank you very much.” He could see she was uncomfortable, self-conscious. He tried to smile at her, hoped his face was cooperating, and then she repeated, “Thank you,” turned, took a step, turned back, came to the bed, and kissed him on the cheek and walked out quickly and there were uncontrollable tears in his eyes.

“I bought this for you,” his mother said softly. She had a portable CD player in her hands. “I know you’ll need it.”

“Thanks, Ma.”

He had to stop crying. Hell, what was it with all the crying?

“Never mind,” his mother said, “never mind.”

He wanted to raise his hand to wipe away the tears, but it was anchored somewhere under drip needles and blankets.

“And the CDs.” She had a handful. “I just grabbed some from your cupboard. I didn’t know what you’d want to listen to.”

“Agnus Dei,” he said.

She looked through the CDs, found the right one, slid it in, put the small earphones in his ears, and pressed the PLAY button. The music filled his ears, his head, his soul. He looked at his mother. “Thank you,” he mouthed, saw her reply, “It’s a pleasure,” and then she kissed his forehead and sat down and stared out of the window and he closed his eyes and drank in the music, every note, every single blessed note.

♦

In the late afternoon he woke again.

“There’s someone to see you,” his mother said.

He nodded. She walked to the door, spoke to someone there, then came in followed by Tiny Mpayipheli. A bandage round his head covered one entire ear and he walked somewhat stiffly in his dressing gown and hospital pajamas. Relief flowed through him when he saw that the big man was alive, but the bandage around his head, which looked like a turban set awry, as if he was doing an Arab parody, made him want to laugh. There was something about Tiny – an awareness that he looked absurd, a self-consciousness that deepened the humor – and the laughter welled up. He shook, the pain of his wounds sharp and urgent, but he couldn’t stop himself or the sounds emerging from his mouth. Mpayipheli stood there grinning in a sheepish way and then he laughed as well, holding his ribs where they hurt. They looked at each other, wounded and pathetic, and Joan van Heerden, standing at the door, was laughing, too.

“You don’t look so great yourself,” Tiny said.

The laughter stopped. “I dreamed you were dead.”

The black man sat down on a chair next to the bed, slowly, like an old man. “It was pretty close.”

“What happened yesterday?”

“Yesterday?”

“Yes.”

“Yesterday you slept as you did on each of the previous six days. And I lay and felt sorry for myself and moaned at the nurses about the fact that this hospital’s affirmative action is so far behind schedule that there are only thin white nurses on duty with unpinchably flat bottoms.”

“Six days?”

“Today’s Thursday. You’ve been here a week.”

Amazement.

“What happened?”

“Bester Brits is alive – can you believe it? They say it’s a miracle. The bullet missed his brain stem and exited from the back of the neck, almost exactly like the bullet of twenty years ago. What do you think the chances are of that happening? And he’s going to make it. Only just, like you – evidently you whiteys are too soft.”

“And Hope?”

His mother replied: “She comes every day, twice, three times. She’ll probably come again a bit later.”

“She’s not…”

“She was very shocked. She spent a night here for observation.”

He digested the information.

“Vergottini?”

“In custody,” Tiny said. “And when Speckle Venter’s fractured skull and various other bits of bone have healed, he’ll be behind bars, too.”

He looked at Tiny, at the eyebrow ridges that were still swollen, at the lopsided bandage, at the unnaturally thick bundle under his arm. “And you?”

“Ear almost torn off, seven broken ribs, concussion,” Tiny said.

Van Heerden could only stare.

“He’s strong, that one. Strongest I’ve ever fought against. It was hell, I’ve got to hand it to him. Merciless, an animal, he has more hate than I have, he’s got murder in him. I was scared, I tell you. He had my head in a vise and he banged it against the wall and when I felt his strength and saw those crazy eyes I thought, This is how I’m going to die, but he’s slow, too many muscles, too many steroids, too little wind, but fuck, he’s strong,” and he touched the bandage round his head and looked round guiltily. “Sorry, ma’am.”

“You two talk,” she said smiling. “I’m going outside.” She closed the door softly behind her.

Mpayipheli looked at the door.

“And then?”

Tiny turned back, shifted something under the dressing gown, his mouth pursing with pain. “Strong. Held my head with one hand and with the other took hold of my ear and tore. God, Van Heerden, what kind of a human are you to want to tear off another’s ear? I kicked, because of the terrible fucking pain, I kicked him with my knee, with everything I had, and got loose somehow and knew that the only way to walk away alive was to stay clear of him. At some stage we went over the table and I grabbed one of the legs and I hit him against the head, hard enough to break the wood, and he bled like a pig and shook his whole body like a wet dog, and, when he came at me for more, I tell you, I was frightened because no one can keep standing after such a blow, but he wanted more, his hatred is so enormous, and then I had to dodge and hit and dodge and hit. I’ve never been so tired, Van Heerden, I tell you, he kept coming, his whole face a bloody mess. I hit him with everything I had and he would spit, teeth and red gob, and he would come…”

Mpayipheli got up slowly. “Need some of your water first.” He shuffled to the jug and the glass on the table, poured the liquid into the glass, ice cubes falling, water splashing on the table.

“Ah,” he said. “Fortunately they’ll think you’re the messy one.” He emptied the glass in one gulp, refilled it, and walked back to the chair.

“Want some?”

Van Heerden nodded. Tiny held the glass for him, helped him drink.

“I hope you’re allowed to drink. Might leak out of a hole somewhere.”

He swallowed the ice-cold water. It tasted sweet, fresh, delicious.

“He hit me a few more times, swinging blows that you could see coming a mile off, but I was too tired to duck. I know now what a tree feels like when you hit it with an axe: it goes right through you, you feel it here.” He put a fingertip on his forehead.

“He fell eventually, forward, like a blind man who doesn’t know where the floor is. I can’t tell you how pleased I was because I was finished, completely finished. I collapsed on my knees. I wanted to come and help you, but nothing wanted to work, it was like swimming in treacle, head not thinking, so I rested.”

He took a sip of water.

“I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t just walk through that door and say, Okay, boys, the boss is over and out and we’re taking charge. And then I thought, It can’t be that door. What about the other one, outside, the big one? and I went out to the car, slowly. Odd, my ear wasn’t so bad then. It was the ribs that were screaming, big black spots in front of my eyes. I don’t know how long it took me to the Benz, and then I knew there was no time and I took another firearm out of the back and I drove and I looked for the door and I couldn’t find it because everything was so confusing. So I made my own.”

Mpayipheli swallowed the last of the ice water, got up to fetch some more, and sat down again.

“And then you shot the lot. There was only one left for me and it was just as well because the first shots went completely wide.”

The door opened and the blond nurse came in.

“He must rest,” she said.

“And I must do all the talking,” said Tiny. “Nothing will ever change in this country.”

♦

Late afternoon. He was alone in the room. A thick brown envelope with his name on it lay next to the bed. Slowly he wriggled his left hand out from under the blankets. He saw that his forearm was red and swollen just below the puncture where the drip entered. He moved his right hand over slowly, touching the wounds in the chest and shoulder, a burning, sharp as fire, but he managed to reach the envelope. He lay back, let the pain subside slightly, and tore the envelope open with difficulty.

A note on top. “You owe me a honeymoon. And a huge favor for the document. Pleased that you’re recovering. Destroy when read. Please.”

Signed by Mat Joubert.

He looked at the document, typewritten A4 pages, stapled together in the top left-hand corner.

Transcription of interrogation of Michael Venter, also known as Gerhardus Basson.

Sunday, July 16, 11:45, Groote Schuur Hospital.

Present: Superintendent Mat Joubert, Superintendent Leon Petersen.

He turned over the first page.

Q: Superintendents Mat Joubert and Leon Petersen in interrogation of suspect Michael Venter, also known as Gerhardus Basson, in the investigation of the murders of Rupert de Jager, aka Johannes Jacobus Smit, and John Arthur Schlebusch, aka Bushy Schlebusch, aka…er…Jonathan Archer, and attempted murder of Colonel Bester Brits of the South African Defence Force. The interrogation is being taped and the suspect has been so informed. Official permission from Dr. Laetitia Schultz has been obtained. The doctor has already certified that the suspect is not under the influence of any medicine or drug that could affect his comprehension or consciousness.

Q: Could you please give your full name and surname for the record?

A: Fuck you.

Q: Are you Michael Venter, who is also in possession of a forged South African identity document in the name of Gerhardus Basson?

A: Fuck you.

Q: The charges against you have already been read to you. Do you understand them?

A: Fuck you. I’m not saying another word.

Q: Your rights as a suspect in this investigation have already been read to you. Do you understand them?

A: (No reply.)

Q: Let the record show that the suspect did not respond to the question. You have the right to have a legal representative present during this interrogation.

A: (No reply.)

Q: Let the record show that the suspect did not respond to the question. You are aware of the fact that this interrogation is being taped and that anything you might say during it may be used as evidence in a court of law.

A: (No reply.)

Q: Let the record show that the suspect did not respond to the question. Mr. Venter, can you recall where you were on the night of September thirtieth last year?

A: (No reply.)

Q: Let the record show that the suspect did not respond to the question. Were you in, or near, the home of one Rupert de Jager, also known as Johannes Jacobus Smit, on Moreletta Street, Durbanville?

A: (No reply.)

Q: Let the record show that the suspect did not respond to the question. Were you…

Q: We’re wasting our time, Mat.

Q: I know.

A: Fucking right, you’re wasting your time. Fucking cunts.

Q: Will you answer further questions?

A: (No reply.)

The transcript of the first interrogation ended.

Transcription of interrogation of James Vergottini, also known as Peter Miller.

Sunday, July 16, 14:30, Interrogation Room, Murder and Robbery, Bellville South.

Present: Superintendent Mat Joubert, Superintendent Leon Petersen.

Q: Superintendents Mat Joubert and Leon Petersen in interrogation of suspect James Vergottini, also known as Peter Miller, in the investigation of the murder of Rupert de Jager, aka Johannes Jacobus Smit, and John Arthur Schlebusch, aka Bushy Schlebusch, aka Jonathan Archer, and attempted murder of Colonel Bester Brits of the South African Defence Force. The interrogation is being taped and the suspect has already been advised of this as well as of his rights.

Q: Could you please state your full name and surname for the record.

A: James Vergottini.

Q: You are also in possession of a forged South African identity document in the name of Peter Miller?

A: Yes.

Q: The charges against you have already been read to you. Do you understand them?

A: Yes, but I had nothing to do –

Q: We’ll get to that in a moment, Mr. Vergottini. Your rights as a suspect in this investigation have already been read to you. Do you understand them?

A: Yes.

Q: You have the right to have a legal representative present during this interrogation, but you have already waived that right.

A: Yes.

Q: You are aware that the interrogation is being taped and that anything you may say during it may be used as evidence in a court of law.

A: Yes.

Q: Mr. Vergottini, where were you on the evening of September thirtieth last year?

A: At home.

Q: And where is that?

A: 112 Mimi Coertse Drive, Centurion.

Q: Near Pretoria.

A: Yes.

Q: Can someone confirm that?

A: Listen, can’t I take this whole thing from the beginning?

Q: Mr. Vergottini, can anyone confirm that you were at home that evening?

A: My wife.

Q: You’re married?

A: Yes.

Q: Under which name?

A: Miller. Please, I’ll tell you everything I know. I had nothing to do with Rupert’s death. It’s a long story, but I swear it was Speckle and Bushy.

Q: Venter and Schlebusch?

A: Yes, but I hadn’t seen them in years. It was only when the picture appeared in Beeld –

Q: When last did you see them?

A: Last year.

Q: But you said you were with them in ’seventy-six?

A: That’s what I’m trying to tell you. You must understand the whole thing. The whole story.

Q: Tell us, Mr. Vergottini.

A: I don’t know what you know. Where shall I start?

Q: Assume that we know nothing.

A: It was in 1976. That’s where it all started…