A Beautiful Place to Die Read online

  At the open shed door, Emmanuel risked a quick look in. Hansie, Louis and two freckle-nosed teenagers sat on an oil-stained blanket and passed the half-empty whiskey bottle among them. The second bottle of amber was placed in the middle of the circle with its top off in readiness.

  “Hey, Hansie.” A boy with a train-tunnel-sized gap between his front teeth took a swig. “Louis here says that Botha’s daughter isn’t the prettiest girl in the district. Says he’s seen better.”

  “Who?” Hansie was flabbergasted. “Who could be better than her? No one.”

  “I’ve got different tastes from you.” Louis pushed his messy blond hair from his forehead. “Just remember that no matter how modest women are in their appearance, no matter how shy and clean, they are the reason Adam fell into sin.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m hoping for, man!” Hansie replied.

  The policeman’s answer set off a round of laughter that continued even as Emmanuel slipped away into the veldt. He didn’t have to stay longer to know how the evening would unravel. There’d be talk of girls, imagined and real, then someone, most likely Hansie, would lie about having lost his virginity. There’d be more talk of girls and cars and the next big social dance. And during all this, Louis the sleeping lion of God, and Louis the juvenile delinquent, would jostle for supremacy.

  15

  EMMANUEL CALLED IN at the Grace of God Hospital early the next morning and found Sister Bernadette and Sister Angelina supervising a breakfast of cold porridge without milk for the twenty or so orphans collected on the open veranda. He waited until they’d dished up the last bowl, then approached them. He had no idea how to ask for what he wanted.

  “Sisters…” He cleared his throat and started again. “Sisters, I’d like you to witness a likeness of Captain Pretorius for me.”

  “Of course,” Sister Bernadette said. The tiny white nun wiped her pale hands on her apron. “Do you have a pen, Detective?”

  “Yes, I do…it’s just that…I…” He trailed off.

  “Yes?” Sister Angelina prompted.

  “I should warn you that it’s a…a provocative image. One that might upset or shock you.”

  “Oh…” Sister Bernadette’s smile was strained. “In that case we should get it over and done with as quickly as possible.”

  God bless the pragmatic Catholic sisters, Emmanuel thought, and pulled the second of the two envelopes from the leather satchel. In fifteen minutes the photographs were due on an express bus to Jo’burg with Miss Byrd’s cousin, Delores Bunton.

  Sister Angelina motioned him over to the far end of the veranda to an old gurney covered by a sheet. They were out of sight and earshot of the children. Emmanuel hesitated, then pulled the image free.

  “Look at the photo,” he said, “then turn it over and write ‘I swear that this is a true image of Captain Willem Pretorius.’ Sign your names underneath and date it, please.”

  He put the image faceup on the trolley and felt the heat of a blush in his cheeks.

  “Oh, my,” Sister Bernadette gasped.

  “Gracious.” Sister Angelina crossed herself and blinked hard.

  “This is a surprise,” the little Irish nun muttered. “I had no idea.”

  “Yebo.” The black nun pursed her lips. “Who knew the captain had such a big smile.”

  “Yes.” Sister Bernadette pushed an imaginary strand of hair into her head covering. “I don’t recall seeing him this happy before.”

  The sisters stood motionless and stared at the photograph. Emmanuel turned the image over and heard a sigh from the nuns. He handed over the pen and watched them sign and date the photo. He placed it back in the envelope.

  “Thank you, Sisters,” he said. “If anyone from the Special Branch or the Pretorius family asks about this photograph, deny ever having seen it. It’s the safest way.”

  Poppies General Store was quiet. The normal hum of sewing machines was replaced by the soft scrape of Zweigman’s shoes as he unpacked cans of sardines from a box and stacked them on a shelf.

  “Detective.” The shopkeeper greeted him with a nod. His hair, normally chaotic, was now positively Medusa-like with warring white strands fighting each other in an epic battle for control.

  Emmanuel motioned in the direction of the silent back room. “Nobody home?”

  “My wife is unwell,” Zweigman said. “She has given the ladies a day off.”

  “Anything to do with my visit?”

  “The damage was done long before you appeared.” The German stacked the last can of sardines on the shelf. “You have come for your checkup, yes?”

  “That and use of the phone if I may.” He had to let van Niekerk know that the satchel of photographs was already on its way to the address he’d telegraphed through two days ago.

  “Of course.” Zweigman picked up the phone from the counter and shuffled into the back room, where the rows of sewing machines stood with their night covers still on. Poppies felt deserted without the ladies bent over patterns and pins under the watchful eye of Lilliana.

  “I will be in the front unpacking.” Zweigman put the phone on the tea table. “Call me when you are ready for your examination.”

  Emmanuel sat down and dialed the operator. He wanted to be at the Jacob’s Rest police station within the half hour to see if the Security Branch raid had netted a big Red fish during the night.

  He got through to headquarters without any trouble and was given a new number to call. Van Niekerk knew how to fly under the Security Branch radar.

  “I’ve sent you something,” Emmanuel said once the major picked up.

  “Is it useful?” Van Niekerk was in high spirits for a powerful man forced to dirty his hands in a public call box. Like a prized bloodhound, he sniffed something on the wind.

  “Extremely useful,” Emmanuel said.

  “Smut? Dirty money? Political?”

  “Smut.”

  “Can it be tied to our departed friend or a member of his family?”

  “Let’s just say the captain was as good behind the camera as he was in front of it.”

  “My God! Are you absolutely sure it’s him?”

  “One hundred percent,” Emmanuel said. “I had the image signed and verified by two people who knew him.”

  He felt guilty using Sister Bernadette and Sister Angelina, but nuns were hard witnesses to push around on the stand. It was uncharitable to attack a bride of Christ.

  “Good man,” the major said. “I knew you’d come up with the goods. You always do.”

  Giving the information to van Niekerk didn’t feel as rewarding as Emmanuel thought it would. Willem Pretorius’s homicide was still unsolved and that was the only reason he’d come to Jacob’s Rest. The pornographic pictures were of value only if they helped catch the killer.

  “The packet will be hand-delivered this evening to the address on the telegram.” He was suddenly impatient with van Niekerk. Catching the killer was secondary to the power that possession of the photos gave the major over the Security Branch and factions of the National Party. “I have to go and check out what the Security Branch dragged in,” Emmanuel added. He wasn’t leaving Jacob’s Rest until he found out who’d killed Willem Pretorius and why.

  “They got him,” van Niekerk stated bluntly. “Your man from Fort Bennington College.”

  “How do you know?”

  Van Niekerk laughed, as if the question itself was too stupid to answer.

  “I just do, Cooper.”

  “Anything else you can tell me?” Emmanuel asked. There was no way Piet or Dickie would let him in on the questioning.

  “He was at the crossing on the night the captain was killed,” the major said. “That’s a solid fact. The miner Duma from the location was his contact. You may want to start entertaining the possibility that the Security Branch is on the right track.”

  “I’ll do that, sir,” Emmanuel said before signing off. He knew in his bones that the Communist agent wasn’t a fit for the murder. Why
was the body dragged to the water when it could have been left on the sand? And Shabalala was sure the killer had swum back to Mozambique. Maybe the Security Branch had some answers.

  He went to the front of the store, where Zweigman was busy cleaning the shelves with an ostrich feather duster.

  “I’ll come back for my examination this afternoon,” he told the shopkeeper, and set the phone back on the counter. “I have to check in at the police station.”

  “Of course. I will be here until approximately five-thirty.”

  Emmanuel stepped onto the pitted dirt sidewalk fronting Poppies and the liquor store. It was time to hammer on Shabalala’s door until the black man told him everything he knew about Willem Pretorius’s secret life.

  Four Chevrolet sedans were parked in front of the police station, the shiny chrome trim of each car flecked with dust and the dried bodies of crushed insects collected on the night drive. A handful of plainclothes officers in creased suits mingled on the porch, smoking and talking to a plump man with a camera slung around his neck. Press, Emmanuel guessed. The reporter would be in the employ of one of the toady Afrikaner newspapers that ran with the official National Party line no matter what the real story was.

  Emmanuel climbed the stairs, ready for the brush-off. The Security Branch machine had a stranglehold now on the police station and he wasn’t on their list of invited guests. One of the new Security Branch officers stepped forward.

  “This is a restricted area,” said the moonfaced man in the badly cut suit. “No entry without Lieutenant Lapping’s say-so.”

  Emmanuel stepped back. He was unlikely to get pockmarked Piet’s nod of approval in this lifetime.

  “I was looking for the regular police. Constable Shabalala, Lieutenant Uys and Constable Hepple. I’m working a local investigation.”

  “Check out the back.” Moonface smiled, then said, “Hey, you caught the pervert yet, Detective Sergeant?”

  Emmanuel walked away without answering. Lieutenant Lapping had isolated him from the murder investigation and made him a figure of fun into the bargain. He’d eat humble pie for as long as it took to find Shabalala and until he’d finished sifting through Willem Pretorius’s dirty laundry.

  He opened the side gate to the police station’s backyard. Paul Pretorius and the diminutive Lieutenant Uys were sitting in the shade of the avocado tree with three men he didn’t recognize. Was there anyone left at the Security Branch offices?

  Paul Pretorius stood up and closed the gap between them with his slow swagger. “So.” The hulking soldier smiled at him for the first time in their acquaintance. It was an unpleasant sight. “How does it feel to be at the arse end of the investigation, Detective Sergeant?”

  “You’ve got a confession from the suspect?” Emmanuel said.

  “Another hour or two and it’ll be done,” Paul said, stroking the bristles on his chin to emphasize how long a night it had been for those at the center of power. “I tell you what, those boys inside know what they’re doing.”

  “They’re sure he’s the one?”

  “Absolutely. And you thought Pa’s killer was some degenerate white man. Looks like you’ll have to run back to Jo’burg with empty pockets. Shame, hey?”

  Emmanuel knew just the thing to wipe the smile off Paul Pretorius’s face: a single image of the respected white police captain nursing a giant hard-on in a coloured woman’s bed. That would do the trick. It was just as well the packet of pornographic photographs was on its way to van Niekerk and well out of his reach.

  “The constables aren’t here?” He continued with the conversation as if the arrogant Pretorius son hadn’t taken the whip to him. Paul was destined to find out the truth about his father one day, and Emmanuel hoped he’d be there to witness the moment.

  “Hansie’s out with his girl, and Shabalala I haven’t seen.” Paul Pretorius strolled back toward the group of men seated in the shade with a shrug that implied he had more important things to do now that he was finished baiting a detective with no power and no credibility.

  Emmanuel moved onto the kaffir path. He had to find Shabalala and explain to him that protecting Willem Pretorius’s memory was a waste of time. With enough pressure he might even be able to find out the identity of the mystery woman in the photos.

  At the juncture of the kaffir path and the main street he spotted Constable Hepple nestling close to a hugely betitted brunette with milkmaid’s arms. It was the girl from the churchyard: the one Hansie had targeted after the captain’s funeral. The lovebirds didn’t notice him until he was almost on them.

  “Detective Sergeant.” Hansie sprang back and straightened his jacket over his slim boy hips. “I…I didn’t see you.”

  “You were busy,” Emmanuel replied, and the girl made a hasty attempt to straighten the neckline of her dress. “Do you know where Constable Shabalala is?”

  “The location.” Hansie’s breath was short and his color high. “Lieutenant Lapping said for him to come back tomorrow.”

  “Lieutenant said Hansie could have the day off as well.” The girl’s work-worn hands fluttered up over her enormous breasts to stroke the diamond center of her necklace. “We were going for a walk.”

  Emmanuel pointed to the necklace nestled in the girl’s cleavage. “That’s an unusual design. Can I take a closer look?”

  “Of course.” The milkmaid flushed with self-importance and lifted her chin to allow a better view. “It’s real gold and diamonds.”

  “A flower,” Emmanuel said, and examined the gold petals set with a sparkling diamond stamen. It was the necklace worn by the brown-skinned woman in the captain’s flesh extravaganza. Hansie shuffled closer, intent on protecting his girl from the big-city detective’s attentions. Emmanuel ignored him. The farm girl’s mammaries were important only because their eye-popping size ruled her out as the model in the photos.

  Emmanuel’s brain leapt from one bizarre scenario to the next in an attempt to explain the appearance of the gold flower around the neck of an Afrikaner brunette. Did Captain Pretorius have a multicolored harem of women he rewarded with identical gold flower necklaces?

  “Where did you get the necklace?” he asked.

  “Hansie.” The girl beamed at her idiot boyfriend. “He gave it to me just now.”

  That explained the sweaty clinch. It wasn’t every day a farm girl was given an expensive piece of jewelry to flash around.

  “You’ve got good taste, Constable.” Emmanuel placed his hand on Hansie’s shoulder and moved him farther onto the kaffir path. “Where did you get the necklace?”

  The boy tensed at the serious tone and scraped the toe of his boot into the sandy path.

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Tell me.”

  “I…I found it.”

  “Where?”

  The constable’s cornflower-blue eyes filled with tears just as they had when the Pretorius brothers made a move to beat the daylights out of him at the crime scene.

  “By the river. On the path leading to the veldt.”

  Emmanuel regretted not letting the Pretorius boys give Hansie a solid pounding. It was more than the imbecile policeman deserved.

  “You’re talking about the riverbank where the captain was found?”

  “Ja.” Tears rolled down the constable’s face and dripped onto his starched uniform. His mother was going to have to spot clean the fabric this evening.

  “The necklace was on the path the boys used to get back to the location?” Emmanuel clarified the facts and struggled to stop his fingers digging into the flesh of Hansie’s shoulder. Surely the National Party government realized that giving a uniform to a boy like this was the same as giving it to a monkey?

  “Ja, on that path.”

  “Why didn’t you call me to look at this unusual thing?”

  Hansie chewed on his thumbnail and gave the question his best efforts. It was an excruciating exercise to watch. “Well…A woman’s necklace has nothing to do with the captain dying. I me
an…it would be like a woman was there with him…and…there wasn’t a woman with him, so…because…Captain wasn’t like that.”

  “Hepple.” Emmanuel dropped his hand from the young man’s shoulder and rifled in his jacket pocket for the car keys. “That necklace is evidence. You have until this afternoon to get it back from your girlfriend and give it to me. You understand?”

  “But…she…she really likes it.”

  “This afternoon,” Emmanuel said, and made for the Packard. He had an idea now of what Shabalala was hiding and why the Zulu policeman was covering up for his boyhood friend, Willem Pretorius.

  He ran through the unplanned maze of dilapidated dwellings, on the lookout for the pink door that he was told marked the Zulu constable’s house. He found it and pounded twice. The door swung open and Shabalala stepped back in surprise.

  “A woman was with him,” Emmanuel said. “There was a woman with Captain Pretorius at the riverbank on the night he was shot.”

  “It rained and many of the marks—”

  “Don’t give me that rubbish, I’m not buying it today. You’re a tracker. You knew Pretorius wasn’t alone that night.”

  The Zulu-Shangaan made an effort to speak and when that failed, he reached into the pocket of his overalls and pulled out a blank-faced envelope, which he handed over without saying a word.

  “What’s this?”

  “Read it, please, nkosana.”

  Emmanuel tore the envelope open and extracted a folded piece of paper with two lines of text written on the lined face. He read the words out loud. “‘The captain had a little wife. This wife was with him at the river when he died.’”

  “You were the one who sent me to King’s farm,” Emmanuel said. He recognized the hand. It made sense now. The person who’d left the note ran like no one he’d ever seen, ran with a relentless stride that had left him gasping for breath out on the veldt. Captain Pretorius and Shabalala stirred the hearts of the old people as they crossed the length and breadth of the Pretorius farm without stopping, without drinking. Like so many white men, Emmanuel thought, I was beaten by a warrior of the Zulu impi.