Blood Rose

twenty-two

Clare sat at her desk, trying to think of what to say to Riedwaan as she waited for her computer to boot up. She checked her mail: chit-chat from her sister Julia, one from Rita Mkhize saying Fritz was absolutely fine, two from Riedwaan. Clare opened the first e-mail. It was full of official attachments written in incomprehensible bureaucratese. She filed them to read later. The second e-mail had nothing in the subject line. Clare opened it, her mouth suddenly dry.

Clare, it read. I fucked up. Talk to me. R.

She smiled. She couldn’t help it. The message was so like the man. Direct. For Riedwaan, emotion meant action. He had wanted her, needed her, when they first met. So he’d taken her, simple as that. And she had acquiesced, intrigued by the novelty of having her emotional defences so easily breached, and charmed by the simplicity of Riedwaan’s desire for her.

That moment of curiosity had set her adrift in treacherous waters, and now here she was: snagged on the reef of her own vulnerability, with only herself to blame.

She took a deep breath and with one sure stroke deleted Riedwaan’s message. Then she e-mailed a terse case update, copying in Phiri to neutralise any intimacy Riedwaan might have read into her ‘best wishes’ at the end.

By nine-thirty, she was walking fast down 2nd Avenue, ignoring the thin, chained dogs barking in each sandy yard. Number 53 had its back to the red dunes, and although the façade was ravaged, the paint blistered and the gutters sagged, the windows were clear. Clare rang the doorbell and waited.

‘Darlene Ruyters?’ The woman framed in the doorway was fortyish and too thin. The exposed ankles and neck too fragile. She pulled her fraying cardigan tight around her body. ‘I’m Clare Hart.’

‘How can I help you?’ asked Darlene. She opened the door, feeling in her pocket for her cigarettes.

‘I wanted to ask you about the murdered boy in the playground,’ said Clare.

Darlene held the door open and Clare stepped into the dim hallway. A pot plant wilted over a pile of post on the small entrance table.

‘Kaiser Apollis.’ Darlene walked through to the kitchen, her gait uneven. ‘Tea?’

‘Please,’ said Clare, looking around the tidy room. A pair of trainers stood at the back door, a box of brushes and shoe polish open next to them.

Darlene put on the kettle, and set out cups and sugar on a tray.

‘Are you from Windhoek?’ asked Darlene. She picked up the tray.

‘Cape Town,’ said Clare.

‘My home town. I miss it. All that green.’ Darlene led the way to a meticulously neat lounge and gestured for Clare to sit.

‘What brought you to Walvis Bay?’

‘The army,’ said Darlene. ‘My husband was posted here. He was a major in a special operations unit.’

‘And now?’ Clare looked at the floral-print sofas and porcelain ornaments.

‘Oh, that was a long time ago,’ Darlene said. ‘He was handsome then. Forty. I was twenty-two and in love. What did I know? I followed him. Ten years later when Nelson Mandela gave Walvis Bay back to Namibia, he left me with nothing. I’ve been alone ever since.’

‘You stayed?’

‘I was used to it by then. My marriage was over. I’d started teaching. I liked it, liked the kids. So I took back my maiden name and started a new life.’

‘That’s how you knew Kaiser Apollis?’

‘This is a small town.’

‘You taught him?’

‘A long time ago. Grade 1. He was such a sweet little boy. Desperate for affection.’

‘Tell me about him,’ asked Clare.

‘Usual things. His father lost his job. Then he disappeared. Kaiser came to school dirty, then there were the bruises. His mother drank and worked the sailors’ clubs.’

‘What happened to her?’

‘She died. Aids, I suppose. Although here it’s just called a short illness.’

‘When did you see him last, Darlene?’

Darlene swirled the tea leaves in her cup, as if hoping they would give her the right answer. ‘He came to school. Last Wednesday.’

‘What for?’ asked Clare.

‘I don’t know. I hadn’t seen him for months. He looked so’ – she shook her head – ‘alone. So I asked him if he wanted to come and help me.’

‘Was he there to see you?’

‘I didn’t ask him. I assumed he was. He used to help me get ready for my art classes on Thursday. He loved doing that. He had talent too. Real talent. Maybe if he had been born into a different life, who knows?’ She trailed off, as if exhausted by her speculation.

‘What did he do for you?’

‘He helped me with the desks, got the paint ready. I’m doing a recycling project with my Grade 1s. Kaiser helped me cut things up. Prepare. He ate a sandwich I gave him.’

‘Did he talk to you?’

‘No, not really. He just liked to be busy.’

‘How long was he with you?’

‘An hour I suppose. Maybe more. He mixed the paints, then he said he was going to go. I gave him some money and he left.’

‘He didn’t say where he was going?’

‘No. And I didn’t ask.’

‘How much money did you give him?’

‘How much?’ Darlene asked. ‘I can’t remember. Maybe ten Nam dollars in small change.’

‘Is that why he came to see you?’

‘Maybe.’ Darlene shrugged. ‘Like I said, we didn’t talk much. He never begged. He hated it. He was a proud boy. I always gave him money for the odd jobs he did for me.’

‘Were you surprised that it was him on the swing?’

‘Herman Shipanga found him.’

‘Shipanga doesn’t wear high heels.’ Clare’s voice was uncompromising.

‘No, he doesn’t,’ Darlene whispered. Her hands twisted around each other of their own volition. It was so hard to keep the sequence of things straight. She had been walking through the kindergarten playground when she heard the creak of the weighted swing, set in motion by a gust of wind that skittered papers across her path.

‘Neither does Inspector Damases,’ said Clare. ‘There were holes in the sand leading up to the swings. I’m sure they would match the shoes you wore on Monday. The ones you cleaned.’

Darlene remembered walking towards the single occupied swing, transfixed, her ulcer stabbing. She had crouched down and thought about closing the lids of the accusing eyes staring at her. Her fingernail had trailed over the shoulder and the twinned curve of his buttocks beneath the stained shroud.

‘Not surprised. Shocked, yes. Horrified, yes. But not surprised.’ Darlene returned to the original question.

She did not know how long she had crouched there, but her legs had cramped. When she stood up, the fog had lifted, and there along the fence trotted a dark, blue-clad figure, so she had picked up her basket and gone down the passage to her empty classroom.

‘Why didn’t you call someone?’ Clare asked.

‘Herman Shipanga found him. I knew he would. He called the police. I knew he would. What did it matter that I saw him first?’ Darlene pulled a crumpled cigarette out of her pocket and fumbled about for a light.

‘Is this what you’re looking for?’ asked Clare, picking up a battered Zippo from the floor. It had a topless mermaid engraved on it. Darlene lit her cigarette, and put the incongruous lighter on the tea tray.

‘They don’t care if he’s dead or not, anyway. He was just street rubbish to them,’ she said.

‘Who doesn’t care?’ asked Clare.

‘The police. The municipality. You ask them. They don’t care about this dead boy or Nicanor Jones and Fritz Woestyn. They threw them into a grave to save themselves any trouble. There are so many orphans now that in their hearts people are glad when they’re eliminated. They just hope it’s the one who might’ve smashed their car window.’

‘You care.’ Clare’s voice was gentle.

‘That’s why they came to me, those boys. I didn’t judge them, or want anything from them. They were like my children. They wanted me when they needed something.’

‘What did Kaiser need?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Darlene. ‘I just don’t know. Maybe nothing. Maybe he just wanted some company. Maybe he wanted to tell me something but he was too shy. I don’t know.’

‘You said you were shocked to find him, but not surprised.’ Clare’s voice rose, questioning.

Darlene shrugged. ‘There was something about him when I saw him last. Like he had crossed some line. His sister tried to look after him when their mother died. How does that work, a child-headed household? Bullshit. There is no household. Those kids just sit there, waiting to be picked off.’ She took a deep, angry drag of her filterless cigarette. It made her cough. ‘Sorry,’ she said, waving the smoke away with her hand.

‘After it happened,’ Darlene continued. ‘When I found him, it seemed as if he’d come to say goodbye. As if he knew what was going to happen. He looked so at peace, even with the wound.’

‘That’s because he’d been dead a while,’ said Clare. ‘All the muscles relax. That irons the expression from the face. Hence the peaceful look.’

Darlene recoiled and Clare regretted being so blunt. She stood up. ‘You’ve been helpful.’

Darlene opened the front door and stepped onto the stoep. Clare was glad to escape the dank house. The fog had thinned, revealing the soft-swelling dunes.

‘It’s so beautiful, the desert,’ said Clare, captivated.

Darlene’s laugh was bitter. ‘A jumble of women’s tits. That’s how my husband described it. He said it turned him on, the way it just lay there, waiting to be taken.’

Darlene’s hands shook as she put another cigarette between her lips. The sleeve of her cardigan fell back. There was a bracelet of bruises around her wrist. Clare put out her hand and circled Darlene’s thin arm.

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘I’m just clumsy.’ Darlene snatched her hand back and pulled down her sleeve. She went back inside, closing the door behind her.

Clare expelled the stale, bitter air she had breathed in the house. She walked back, thinking about Darlene Ruyters and ignoring the cascade of twitching curtains that followed her progress. The learned cowering of a woman once battered runs deep and cold, habituating her to secrecy. It lasts long after bones knit and bruises fade. Those bruises, fingered around a resisting wrist, were fresh, a few days old.

On a woman who lived alone.