Thirteen Hours

Chapter 29

Alexa Barnard became aware of someone beside her bed.

She opened heavy eyelids and felt the dull ache in her forearm, the weight of her body and the peculiar odour of the hospital ward. On the right of her bed she saw large eyes behind thick spectacles. She tried to focus, but closed her eyes again.

'My name is Victor Barkhuizen, and I am an alcoholic,' said a voice very quietly and sympathetically.

She opened her eyes again. He was an old guy.

'Benny Griessel asked me to look in on you. The detective. I am his AA sponsor. I just want you to know you are not alone.'

Her mouth was very dry. She wondered if it was the medication, the stuff that made her sleep.

'The doctor?' she asked, but her tongue stuck to her palate, her lips were stiff and the words wouldn't form.

'You don't have to speak. I'm just going to sit here with you a while and I will leave my number with the ward sister. I will come again tonight.'

She turned her head towards him with effort and managed to open her eyes. He was short and stooped, bald and bespectacled, and the hair that he still had around his head hung down his back in a long plait. She slowly put out her right hand. He took it and held it tight.

'You're the doctor,' she tried to say.

'For my sins.'

'I smoke,' she said.

'And you don't even have a fever.'

She didn't know if the smile registered on her face. 'Thank you,' she said and closed her eyes again.

'No problem.'

Then she remembered, somewhere through the haze she had had a thought, a message. Without opening her eyes she said: 'The detective ...'

'Benny Griessel.'

'Yes. I need to tell him something.'

'I can send him a message.'

'Tell him to come. About Adam ...'

'I'll tell him.'

She wanted to add something, something that evaded her now, like silver fish slipping from her grasp into dark water. She sighed and felt Victor Barkhuizen's hand and pressed it slowly to make sure it was still there.

'I'd like to call my dad. I'll pay, of course,' said Rachel Anderson as she helped him carry the plates to the sink, in spite of his protests.

'No need for that,' he said. 'The phone is on the table, where I work.'

Then he laughed. 'If you can find it. Go, I will clear the dishes.'

'No,' she said. 'The least I can do is to wash up.'

'Under no circumstances.'

'Please, I insist. I love washing up.'

'You lie with such grace, my dear.'

'It's true! At home I do it all the time.'

'Then we'll do it together,' he said as he squirted dish-washing liquid over the plates and opened the taps. 'You do the washing, I'll dry and put them away. Do you still live with your parents?'

'Oh, yes, I just finished high school last year. This is supposed to be a gap year, before I go to college.'

'Here, you can wear these gloves .. . And where would you go for your studies?'

'Purdue. My parents work there.'

'They're academics?'

'My dad has tenure at English Lit. My mom's at the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, on the Astrodynamics and Space Applications research team.' 'Good grief.'

'She's a real scientist, the most scatterbrained person I know. I love her to death, she's brilliant, she does spacecraft dynamics, orbit mechanics, it's about satellite control, how their orbits decay, how they re-enter the earth's atmosphere, and it's like a rhyme, I can say it, but I don't understand anything she does, I think I take after my dad, and I'm talking too much, right now.'

He put a hand on her upper arm. 'And I'm enjoying every minute, so talk all you like.'

'I miss them very much.'

'I'm sure you do.'

'No, it's more like ... I left home almost two months ago, I've been away from them for so long, it makes you ... I didn't know how dreadful I was, such a teenager ...'

'We all were. It's the way life works.'

'I know, but it took a really bad thing ...' Her hands stopped moving, her head drooped onto her chest and she stood still.

He said nothing at first, just watched her with immense compassion. He saw the tears rolling silently down her face. 'Would you like to talk about it?'

She shook her head, fighting for control. It came slowly. 'I can't. I shouldn't...'

'You're almost done. Go and call your father.'

'Thank you.' She hesitated. 'You've been so very kind ... I...'

'I have done very little.'

'Would it be rude if I...?'

'I don't think you have a rude bone in your body, my dear. Please, just ask.'

'I'm dying for a bath, I don't think I've ever been this dirty, I'll be quick, I promise ...'

'Good heavens, of course, and take all the time you need. Would you like a bubble bath? The grandchildren gave me some for my birthday, but I never use it...'

There was no parking in Castle Street. Griessel had to park a block away from the Van Hunks club in Long Street, and the parking attendant descended on him like a vulture. He paid for two hours and walked hastily towards the nightclub, surprised to find Vusi waiting at the front door.

'I thought you were still on your way?'

'Those Table View guys are crazy. Sirens all the way. This door is locked. We have to go round the back.'

'I sent for the eyewitness from Carlucci's, Vusi. And Oliver Sands from the hostel,' Griessel said as they walked side by side.

'OK, Benny.'

They turned into the service alley. Griessel's cell phone rang: the screen said MAT JOUBERT.

'Hey,' said Benny, answering.

'Is that Captain Benny Griessel?' Joubert asked.

'Can you fucking believe it?'

'Congratulations, Benny. It's high time. Where are you?'

'Nightclub in Castle Street. Van Hunks.'

'I'm just around the corner. Would you like some Steers?'

'Jissis, that would be great.' He had last eaten the previous night. 'A Dagwood burger, chips and Coke; I'll pay you back.' His belly rumbled in expectation. 'Wait, let me ask Vusi if he wants something too ...'

On the third floor of a recently restored office building in St George's Mall, the lift doors opened to release the fat woman.

She hitched the handbag over her shoulder, shifted the pistol on her belt and walked purposefully across the thick, light brown carpet to where a middle-aged coloured receptionist sat behind a dark wood desk. She took the SAPS identity card hanging around her neck between her thumb and forefinger and aimed it at the receptionist, looking up at the words Jack Fischer and Associates, which were displayed on a dark wooden panel, every letter cut from gleaming copper and individually mounted.

'Inspector Mbali Kaleni, SAPS. I need to talk to Jack Fischer.'

The coloured woman was unimpressed. 'I doubt he is available,' she said, putting a reluctant hand out to the telephone.

'Is he here?'

The receptionist ignored her. She typed in a four-figure number and said in an undertone: 'Marli, there is a woman from the police who wants to talk to Jack ...'

'Is Jack here?' Kaleni asked again.

'I see,' said the coloured woman into the telephone with an air of satisfaction. 'Thank you, Marli.' She replaced the phone and sniff-sniffed with a slight frown. 'What is that smell?'

'I asked you if Jack Fischer is here.'

'Mr Fischer's diary is full. He can only see you after six.'

'But he is here?'

The woman nodded unenthusiastically.

'Tell him it is in connection with the murder of his client, Adam Barnard. I want to talk to him within the next fifteen minutes.'

The receptionist opened her mouth to respond, but she saw Kaleni turn and waddle to one of the large easy chairs against the wall. She sat down and made herself comfortable, placed her handbag on her lap and took out a white plastic bag with the letters KFC and the logo of an old bearded, bespectacled man on it.

The receptionist's frown deepened as Kaleni put her chubby hand into the plastic bag and took out a little red and white carton and a tin of Fanta Grape. She watched the policewoman put her handbag on the ground and the Fanta on the table beside her, opening the carton with absolute concentration.

'You can't sit there and eat,' she said with more astonishment than authority.

Mbali Kaleni lifted a chicken drumstick out of the packet. 'I can,' she said, and took a bite.

The receptionist shook her head and made a little noise of disbelief and despair. She picked up the phone, without taking her eyes off the munching policewoman.

Galina Federova walked down the passage with Vusi and Griessel behind her. Benny smelled the alcohol even before they entered the big nightclub - that familiar, musty old smell of drinking holes where alcohol has been poured, drunk and spilt, the smell that for more than ten years had offered him a refuge. His stomach contracted in fear and anticipation. As he went through the door and the club opened out before him, his eyes sought out the shelves of bottles against the wall, long rows glinting like jewels side by side in the bright lights.

He heard the Russian woman say: 'This is the night shift,' but he continued staring at the liquor, his head full of memories. He felt a powerful wave of nostalgia for days and nights of drinking with forgotten booze buddies. And for the atmosphere of these twilight places, that feeling of total submission, clasping a glass with the knowledge that a refill was only a nod away.

The taste in his mouth now was not the brandy or Jack Daniels that he used to drink, but the gin that he had poured that morning for Alexa Barnard. He recalled her relief with disturbing clarity; he could see the effect of the alcohol on her so clearly, how it drove out all the demons. That was what he desired now: not the smell or the taste, but the calm, the equilibrium that had evaded him all day. He craved the effect of alcohol. He heard Vusi say his name once, twice, and then he dragged his face away from the bottles and concentrated fiercely on his colleague.

'These are the night-shift staff,' Vusi said.

'OK.' Griessel looked around the room, aware that his heart was beating too quickly, his palms sweating, knowing he must squeeze the longing out of himself by force. He looked at all the people. Some of the staff were seated at tables, others were busy arranging chairs and wiping down tables. For the first time he heard the music in the background, unfamiliar rock.

'Can you ask them to sit, please?' he said to Federova, thinking he must pull himself together pretty smartly; he had a young, lost and frightened girl to find.

The woman nodded and clapped her hands to get everyone's attention. 'Come. Sit.' Griessel noted that they were all young and good looking - mostly men, nine or ten of them; four women. None of them looked particularly impressed to be here.

'Can someone turn off the music?' Griessel asked, his patience worn thin by the general lack of interest, the liquor and the urgency inside him.

A young man got up and walked over to the sound system, pressed or turned something and it went suddenly quiet.

'They are from the police,' said Galina Federova in a businesslike voice, but her irritation came through. 'They want to ask questions about last night.' She looked at Griessel.

'Good afternoon,' he said. 'Last night, two American girls visited this club, young tourists. This morning, the body of one of them was found at the top of Long Street. Her throat was cut.'

He ignored the subdued sounds of dismay; at least he had their attention now. 'I'm going to pass around a photograph of the victim and her friend. We need your help urgently. If you remember them at all, put up your hand. We believe the other girl is still alive, and we have to find her.'

'Before it is too late,' said Vusi Ndabeni softly beside him.

'Yes,' said Griessel, and gave half of the photographs to Vusi, walked to the back table and began to hand them out, watching how they looked at the picture with the usual macabre interest.

He went and stood in front again, waiting for Vusi to give out the last photos.

Federova sat down at the bar and lit a cigarette. In front of him the young workers' heads were lowered, busy studying the photos.

Then two or three slowly looked up, warily, with that tentative expression that said they recognised the girls, but they didn't want to be first to raise a hand.