The Wall

68

Warrant Officer Henrik Bezuidenhout was standing at the entrance to The Pines as the bakkie with the K9 unit finally drove up. Perhaps the problem would be resolved shortly. It couldn’t be all that difficult to catch a young fugitive inside a well-secured and supervised gated community and to hand him over to the law. In other words, to him. At the moment, he was the highest-ranking cop on site.

The vehicle was waved through and came to a stop. Jay-Jay Dlomo stepped out.

“Nkosi’s the best,” he said. “He’ll catch the guy in no time at all.”

The dog leaped out of the cage in the small Chevy. Bezuidenhout watched as Dlomo ran his hand across the German shepherd’s head. The dog panted, stretching his long tongue into the sunshine. Dlomo had been the first black dog handler in East London. A good man. Two generations of tsotsis had fled panic-stricken in front of his dogs. Sure, they had shot a couple of his dogs. But in order to flee from such a beast, you had to be fairly cold-blooded to not only pull but fire a pistol. And hit your mark.

“Where all has the guy been?” Dlomo asked.

“What he’s mainly done is run from everyone.”

“And always gotten away?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Amateurs! That won’t happen to us, will it?” Dlomo patted the dog.

“We heard that he’s been inside at least two homes. One of them was empty, but he grabbed some stuff there. And at the other… a woman was at home. She was asleep when the guy suddenly materialized beside her bed. He then tried to rape her. When she screamed, he ran off. Wait a second.” Bezuidenhout studied a piece of paper. “I think the woman ran over to a friend’s house to calm down. The other house is probably the easiest to start with. Someone’s there now. An old man.”

“How long was he in there?”

“Long enough to find the valuables and pocket them.”

“Ah, that’ll be enough for us. Right, my boy?” Dlomo looked down at his dog.

“I have the address here. Want to follow me?” Bezuidenhout asked.