Blood Rose

forty-eight

One kick would have ripped the newly installed chain out of the door, but Riedwaan rang the doorbell.

‘Yes?’ Darlene Ruyters opened the door a crack.

‘Captain Faizal. Police.’ Riedwaan always felt stupid holding up his badge like an American movie cop, but he did it anyway. People watched so much television these days they expected it. Darlene put out a hand for the badge before sliding back the chain and letting him in. Riedwaan stepped into the gloomy hallway. The smell of a thousand houses he had visited: the combination of yesterday’s cooking and fear.

‘Where is he, Darlene?’

Darlene’s eyes widened. ‘There’s nobody here.’ She crossed her arms. She wasn’t wearing a bra.

Pushing past her, Riedwaan went down the passage. He opened the first door, Darlene’s bedroom. Peach nylon lace and pale-green walls. A worn, shaggy carpet and a pile of teddy bears on the bed. He opened the next door: a bed, a table, a chair, a lamp. Not a thing out of place, but the windows closed, and the smell of a man in the stale air.

‘Where’s he gone?’ Riedwaan demanded.

Darlene was right behind him, her dark hair framing her pale, once-beautiful face. ‘You can see. There’s no one,’ she said, turning away, but Riedwaan caught her arm and swung her around again, light as a bird against his arm. The bruises on her wrists had faded to shadows. Riedwaan nudged her collar away from her neck. There was a livid contusion on her clavicle. He felt the back of her head. She winced. The skin there was broken.

‘Tell me where he is,’ said Riedwaan. ‘Your house guest, who left such a charming thank-you gift.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Darlene whispered. Riedwaan let her go. She swayed on her bare feet.

‘The guy who hired the car. Centaur Consulting,’ said Riedwaan. He pulled the car-hire forms out of his pocket and showed them to her. ‘Fifty-three 2nd Avenue. Your address. He hasn’t returned the car yet. Your ex-husband.’

‘Malan.’ The name twisted Darlene’s mouth as if it were poison. She slid down the wall until she was folded, small as a child, on the floor.

Riedwaan was unmoved. ‘When did he leave?’

Darlene stopped resisting, a drowning woman too tired to fight any more. ‘The day before yesterday,’ she whispered.

‘Where did he go?’ Riedwaan knelt down in front of her. He lifted her chin so that she had to look at him.

‘To cash in his pension.’ Darlene laughed, her bitterness corrosive.

‘What’re you talking about?’ said Riedwaan. ‘I’m out of time.’

‘What are you going to do? Hit me too?’ She looked him up and down. ‘I’m an expert in that area and you,’ she spat, ‘haven’t got it in you.’

‘Why did Malan come here to you?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘I don’t know. He didn’t explain. He wanted somewhere to stay. Somewhere where he wouldn’t be seen. I don’t know.’ Darlene got up slowly, the pain of movement making her wince.

‘You didn’t refuse?’

‘This is what I got without arguing.’ Darlene unbuttoned her blouse. Her delicate body was black and blue to the waist. ‘I thought, it can’t last forever. And it didn’t. He left.’

Riedwaan put out his hands and gently buttoned up her blouse again. ‘Where will I find him?’ he asked.

‘If he’s not out in the desert then I hope to God he’s gone.’

‘The desert?’

‘The sand on his boots. He made me clean them for old times’ sake. They were full of the golden dust you find further in. Fool’s gold.’

‘Why would he be back? Think, Darlene.’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. But if I know them at all, I can guess.’

‘Them?’ Riedwaan took her by the shoulders. She winced again.

‘Malan. Hofmeyr.’ She waved her hand dismissively. ‘Except he’s dead now.’

‘Janus Renko?’ Riedwaan tested.

A shadow passed over Darlene’s face. ‘I haven’t heard that name in a long time.’

‘You haven’t seen him?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘Not since the South African army left, and please, God, I won’t see him again. He made my husband and Hofmeyr look like Sunday school teachers.’

Darlene took a packet out of her back pocket and fingered out a cigarette. Riedwaan held out his lighter for her.

‘What was this pension?’ he asked.

Darlene shook her head again. ‘Guess then, Darlene.

Guess.’ Riedwaan kept the urgency out of his voice. It was like coaxing a wild bird to take food from his hand.

‘I’d say it’s something to do with the weapons they worked on during the war.’

‘What?’

‘You saw all that stuff, guerrilla fighters drugged and dropped from planes. People bleeding to death after being detained. Drugs that made your heart stop. Where do you think they practised?’

‘Where did they do this?’ asked Riedwaan.

‘First at Vastrap, then they had a place out in the Namib, in the Kuiseb Delta somewhere. I never went there.’

‘Would they have taken anyone else out there?’ asked Riedwaan. ‘Boys, maybe?’

She considered the possibility. ‘Not likely,’ she said, holding out her bruised hands. ‘It’s women he likes to see grovel and beg. He’s very old South Africa, so if he had boys out there it’s because there was hard labour to be done.’

‘Where would they go,’ said Riedwaan, ‘if they’ve come back? Tell me, Darlene. If they’ve come back for some of their old toys and you say nothing, you’ll have way more than a couple of homeless kids on your conscience.’

Darlene’s resistance crumbled. ‘There’s one place. I’ll show you.’ Riedwaan followed her as she walked down the passage. ‘Here.’ She pointed to an old survey map taped to the wall. ‘It’s a map of the Kuiseb before the big flood a few years ago. This was an old army site, before the river changed course after the flood.’ She pointed to a marking next to the old Kuiseb River. ‘It’s this area around the old railway line that caused all the trouble between the Topnaars and the army; it was full of!nara plants. Now it’s giving Goagab headaches. Maybe that’s where they tried to go. Some kind of sick reunion.’

‘Can I take this?’ Riedwaan asked.

Darlene nodded and Riedwaan rolled up the map.

He closed the front door behind him and heard the chain rattle as Darlene locked herself in. She must have slid down the wall and crouched there, because he did not hear her footsteps recede.

Riedwaan’s bike surged to life. He made the short trip back to the station in record time. He closed the special ops room door and called Phiri, pleading with his acid-sounding secretary that she get him out of his weekly planning meeting. While he waited for Phiri to call back, he looked at Clare’s map of where the dead boys had been found. Two, three, five, the first one with nothing. He plotted possible trajectories, trying to figure out where they had been killed from where they had been dumped. Two of them in the east; two in the west. No-man’s-land in the middle.

‘Faizal?’ Phiri called back in five minutes.

‘Sir, I’m glad you-’

‘I had a call from someone called Van Wyk,’ Phiri cut him short. ‘He tells me that Captain Damases is off the case and that he’s in command and, thanks, but no thanks for the assistance. I then had a call from Town Councillor Goagab saying that, apart from apprehending the suspected serial killer, who seems to be some kind of desert bogeyman, the show’s over. What’ve you done this time?’

‘I’ve done my job,’ said Riedwaan.

‘That’s what I was afraid of,’ said Phiri.

‘Goagab and Van Wyk would like to see it as solved,’ said Riedwaan.

‘You and Clare don’t?’

‘No,’ said Riedwaan.

‘Despite the fact that the luminal showed positive for blood on the cart?’ Phiri asked.

‘The Topnaar could’ve moved the bodies when the boys were already dead,’ Riedwaan explained. ‘But I don’t think he killed them. You dump a body out here, and no one will find it. Vultures, predators, heat. All you’ll have is bleached bones in a couple of weeks. I’d put money on that Topnaar moving these boys to draw attention to their murders.’

‘What for?’ asked Phiri, puzzled.

‘There’s a weapons test site that a special ops unit used to use,’ said Riedwaan. ‘Bang in the middle of the Topnaar land. I want to check it out.’

‘That’s it?’ said Phiri.

‘That, and the fact that a couple of old soldiers who used to be involved in covert stuff seem to have been around.’

‘That lot are finished, Faizal. They are all practising their golf swings in Wilderness.’

‘If your intelligence is correct, this little game is not about ideology,’ said Riedwaan. ‘This is about money.’

There was a long pause. Riedwaan waited it out. ‘What sort of weapons?’ asked Phiri. ‘What sort of money?’

‘The records are all gone,’ said Riedwaan, ‘but I’d say biochemical.’

‘I have one card left to keep you there,’ Phiri said reluctantly. ‘And that’s a bluff. You’ve got twenty-four hours.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ said Riedwaan, breathing a silent sigh.

‘This had better be good,’ warned Phiri. ‘If it’s not, there’s a post in Pofadder that needs filling.’

‘I’m sorry, sir,’ Riedwaan cut in, ‘but I have a call waiting.’ He saw with relief that it was Clare.

‘What’ve you got?’ he asked as he switched calls.

‘Nothing yet,’ said Clare. ‘Myburgh hasn’t pitched.’

‘Wait for him,’ said Riedwaan. ‘I’m going to check out an old military site. If Karamata’s around, I’ll get him to take me.’

‘Good plan,’ said Clare. ‘Elias knows the area well. What did Darlene tell you?’

‘That her ex-husband’s been back.’

‘Surprise, surprise,’ said Clare. ‘With those bruises, who else? You think he’s been killing these boys?’

‘Why come all the way to Walvis Bay to kill street children?’ said Riedwaan. ‘There are enough in Cape Town.’

‘Another coincidence?’ Clare asked.

‘That’s what’s bugging me. We’ll discuss it over dinner.’