Blood Rose

forty-three

Riedwaan’s cellphone beeped as he parked his bike outside the police station. Call me, read the text. He dialled, smiling.

‘Februarie, you cheap bastard.’ Riedwaan could hear maudlin country music playing in the background.

‘You still interested in that murder in McGregor?’ Februarie grunted.

‘You had an outbreak of altruism or what?’ Riedwaan closed the door to the office. Neither Karamata nor Van Wyk was in. Tamar’s door was closed.

‘You wouldn’t know altruism if it gave you a blow job,’ said Februarie.

‘What then?’ said Riedwaan. ‘You think I’m phoning you back because I like the sound of your voice? Just like I came to see you because of your pretty face.’

‘As charming as ever, Faizal. No wonder you’re such a onehit wonder with women.’

‘What have you got?’

‘Some more background on your Major Hofmeyr. Seems he started in Pretoria with some obscure unit doing research. He was from the wrong side of the tracks with no links in the Afrikaner establishment. But he was a bright boy and he did well. Soon he had a beautiful wife from one of the oldest Cape families, nice house, fancy car, and trips overseas. Then he was transferred to another unit and sent to some hellhole in the Kalahari where-’

‘Vastrap,’ Riedwaan interrupted. ‘His wife’s already told us. She was less clear about what he did there.’

‘That’s the odd thing,’ said Februarie. ‘It looks like it was a promotion. More trips overseas. More money. He didn’t do the party circuit like some of the others, but he had what he wanted in terms of research and travel. I can’t find much, but it looks like it was weapons development and testing.’

‘What kind of weapons?’

‘Possibly nuclear. It looks like it was part of Operation Total Onslaught, PW Botha’s baby. Born in 1972, baptised with the Soweto riots in 1976. The best minds; the best facilities; unlimited funding. It makes sense that it would be nuclear.’

‘And then?’

‘He was sent to Namibia in the eighties, where you could do what you liked, pretty much. Play God, and no one would ever know. And if they found out, what would they do about it?’

‘Why was he shunted sideways?’

‘Can’t say if he was really. It was all classified. And shredded in the early nineties before Mandela could say amandla. De Klerk sold them down the river by decommissioning unilaterally in 1990.’

‘What else have you got?’

‘Well, I had another look at that TRC stuff. Like I said, Hofmeyr’s name came up in a few of the hearings. The usual things: torture, a few extra-judicial killings, assaults. Him and two others, all from the same unit in Namibia, but it didn’t look like he was going to apply for amnesty. And because nobody said anything, it just went away.’ Februarie paused. ‘Never happened for me,’ he added.

‘You fucked up in the wrong direction, Februarie. You went after the guys with money to buy enough politicians to make their own parliament.’

‘That’s my problem with altruism,’ said Februarie.

‘It’s terminal,’ said Riedwaan. ‘You’re born with it. This therapy session is costing me five bucks a minute. I’m sure you can get it cheaper down there. Tell me what happened.’

‘Extra-judicial killings,’ Februarie mused. ‘A good concept that – always makes me wonder what a judicial killing is.’

‘No philosophy either, Februarie. What else? How is this connected to Hofmeyr’s murder?’ Riedwaan tried not to sound impatient; withholding information was Februarie’s favourite game.

‘Ja, well, Hofmeyr had a change of heart. He approached someone to make a full disclosure about what they’d been doing up there in Walvis Bay. Him and his friends.’

‘He must’ve stood out like a parade ground corporal in a ballet tutu,’ said Riedwaan.

‘Funny, you mention Tutu. The only person who looked like he might be happy about it was the Arch. Hofmeyr wanted forgiveness, I suppose. The major was dying of cancer, so I guess he was afraid of that final court date. His offer was shoved from one desk to another, and then he was murdered. So it all went away overnight.’

‘Until you started looking,’ said Riedwaan.

‘I was shafted,’ said Februarie. ‘Apparently my paperwork was bad.’

‘Was it?’

‘Of course it was. My paperwork’s fucking terrible. But it always was before I got into any of this.’

‘Why then?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘I found out that he had visitors before he died,’ said Februarie, after a pause.

‘Who told you?’

‘The maid. Who else?’

‘She see them?’

‘No. Hofmeyr told her not to come for a couple of days. But the woman who worked next door told her anyway. Two men. They argued on the second night. Then they left, and two days later, he was dead. Too many coincidences. The visitors while the wife was away. The convenient gangsters.’

‘You think it was the wife?’

‘You know what I think of wives,’ said Februarie. Riedwaan knew. The whole force knew. Februarie’s wife left him for her boss. Februarie had refused to take the fact that the boss was solvent, always sober and never violent as mitigating circumstances.

‘But no. Not her. It’s the visitors. I’ve been looking for them since I last saw you.’

‘And did you find them?’ Riedwaan felt his fingertips tingle in anticipation.

‘No. But I did get the names of the two friends Hofmeyr was going to implicate in his disclosure.’

‘Where did you get this from?’

‘It might be hard for you to swallow, Faizal, but I still have a few chips to call in.’

‘Who are they?’ Riedwaan asked. ‘Hofmeyr’s friends?’

‘Malan.’

‘Malan?’

‘Malan.’ Februarie was enjoying Riedwaan’s discomfort.

‘Now there’s a helpful name. There must be thousands of them.’

‘This one runs a security consulting business out of Good-wood in Cape Town.’

Riedwaan knew the area well, poor and working class, clinging to respectability despite the backyards filled with cars on bricks. ‘You got a number for him?’

‘Jesus, Faizal. You ever heard of a phone book? Phoenix Engineering. Look it up.’

‘Give it to me, Februarie. I know you’ve got it.’

‘Okay, I’m standing in front of the place right now,’ Februarie laughed.

‘I thought you were at the Royal,’ said Riedwaan. ‘That shit music I heard in the background.’

‘Don’t insult the Man in Black,’ said Februarie. ‘That was Johnny Cash on my new tape deck.’

‘Sorry, sorry,’ said Riedwaan. ‘Tell me what you see.’

Februarie was parked at the end of a littered cul-de-sac. ‘Spanish burglar bars on the front,’ he said. ‘A pile of mail at the front door. Nothing inside. Empty. Everyone gone.’

‘When would you say?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘The neighbours round here aren’t that chatty, but one old lady told me no one’s been here for a month.’

‘She know the people?’

‘No. Keeps her curtains shut. This isn’t the type of neighbour-hood where you pay too much attention to what your neighbours do. All she would say was that a man came here, used it for storage. Then he left and… nothing. I’ve done a company search. Not much, except some import/export permits to Pakistan.’

‘And the other one?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘The other who?’

‘Hofmeyr’s other friend?’

‘Oh him… Janus Renko.’

‘Russian. That must’ve caused him trouble in the army.’

‘From what I heard, he didn’t take any shit. Parents were immigrants.’

‘Do you know where he is?’

‘No sign of him for ten years. No parents, no siblings. No ex-wives like Malan. No children like Hofmeyr. Could be he changed his name. Maybe he bought another passport, moved elsewhere,’ said Februarie. ‘Could be dead, in which case you’ll be hunting a ghost.’

‘Where did your witness in McGregor see them?’ asked Riedwaan, lighting a cigarette and going over to look at Clare’s display.

‘She didn’t. All she saw was two extra sets of dirty sheets a couple of days before the major was shot. Made me wonder who Hofmeyr had had to stay.’

‘Thanks, Februarie. I’ll buy you a case of beer when I’m back.’

Riedwaan put down the phone and looked again at the places the boys had been found. A triangulation between Rooibank, the Kuiseb Delta and the ugly cinder-brick town. Pretty much the area where South Africa had camped thousands of miserable, sand-blasted conscripts in their decades-long war in Namibia. Why would any of these men come back? Walvis Bay had been about the worst army posting anyone could get.

Riedwaan looked closely at the pictures of Kaiser Apollis, Fritz Woestyn, Nicanor Jones and Lazarus Beukes. Why would anyone bother to shoot them? Scrawny little rejects, unlikely to live past their teens anyway.

He sat down at Clare’s desk and opened her neat folders, looking for her interview transcripts. Details. The devil gave himself away in the detail. Riedwaan opened the first interview and started to read again.