Then Kramer had an inspiration: “Who says she had to be mixed up with kaffirs at all? These killers aren’t always in gangs-some work freelance. All you need is a contact and the right kind of money.”
It was not really an inspired thought-simply a repressed one, surfacing. Why his brain had sought to shield from it was obvious: it made him sick to the stomach.
“God in Heaven,” the Colonel whispered. “You mean some white fixed this one up?”
“I’m just guessing, but it makes better sense.”
“God in Heaven.”
They sat in silence. Kramer turned the idea over and over with a stick. It was ugly, it was revolting, it was unprecedented that a white murderer should get a black to do his dirty work. But it had a curious logic.
“Cost one hell of a packet,” the Colonel said at last. “If the killer came down from the Rand, you’d have to get him a forged pass or he might be picked up by the vans for vagrancy.”
Typically, he had chosen the point of least importance.
“Money’s nothing. Maybe he’s moved down here on his own and taken a job as a house boy. Things might have got too hot on the Rand, we’d better put through a Telex to Jo’burg and see if they have any leads.”
“I’ll see to that.”
“It’s the contact that is the trouble. A kaffir wouldn’t think of doing this job for a white unless he trusted him completely, knew him better than his own brother. But how? Where would they meet? Somebody would notice them together-the Special Branch are always on the look-out.”
“Maybe they could help us.”
“No, we’re not dealing with fools.”
“What about a middle man then? A black who fixes the deal independently?”
“The same goes for him. It could be a trap and he would be an accessory. Trust. Trust who?”
“What about this bloke Zondi says she was going to marry?”
“Oh, him. Yes, he’s our best bet so far-if he exists.”
“What do you mean?”
“Right now he’s just a medical theory, but I’ll look into it.”
“And Shoe Shoe?”
“Another theory, but it looks like we’ve moved out of his class. I’d better get round to the market square and call Zondi off.”
Kramer stood up and the Colonel accompanied him to the door.
On the way over, he said: “So you’ve found another excuse to have your Bantu pal along with you, hey?”
“It’s as much a Bantu case as white!” Kramer flared back.
“Easy, man, easy. I’m just pointing out that this trust you’re talking about can build up in certain situations, properly controlled of course.”
He should not have qualified his remark, now Kramer was no longer defensive but angry.
“Look, if you’re not happy with the way I work, then let’s go and sort this one out with the Brigadier.”
Beautifully done, a phantom toe-cap right in the old crone’s scrotum.
“Please, Lieutenant, there’s no need for that. Both of us know you-er, are best as a team. You missed my meaning.”
“So my work is all right?”
“Yes, yes, of course.”
“And I’m in charge of this case?”
“Completely in charge.”
“Right, then I don’t want any follow-ups in the Gazette, understand?”
“Should I tell them it was a false alarm?”
“Tell them if they print anything you’ll want to see the editor.”
“Fine, much better idea.”
“Also, I’m not writing a report on this case until it is finished and over.”
“You just get going, my boy, be your own boss. I’ve got a lot of interest in your success.”
“I bet you have,” said Kramer, closing the door behind him.
Shoe Shoe was still missing.
Zondi completed his ninth circuit of the City Hall and halted at the main entrance. The other beggars were about as usual, but he ignored them. He was going to ask his questions at the top.
So he crossed over De Wet Street and entered the courthouse gardens where the glimpse of a yellow Dodge drawing up at a side gate made him hasten towards a vantage point under A Court’s windows. But no one left the sedan as it was not yet one o’clock. Time to smoke a Texan.
At one the sun had passed its zenith and then the true afternoon began. As the shadow of the City Hall began to edge out over the pavement, the halt and maim left the civic portico and took up fresh positions. The spear of shade cast by the steepled clock tower switched sides and advanced on the other flank. At five it would slit into the General Post Office and people would pour out, cover the pavements, eddy into the gutters, and finally trickle away. But right now there was no rush. The heat was terrific.
And the yellow Dodge roared away down the Parade, leaving Gershwin Mkize to come lazily up the wide gravel path. The brown lawn on either side of him was so dry that the grasshoppers made tiny puffs of dust as they landed and took off. Their incessant movement contrasted strongly with the still forms of Bantu office messengers who lay sprawled during the lunch break with yesterday’s bread and yesterday’s papers. But it found an echo in the curious spring of Gershwin’s gait-which Kramer had once said was the result of going with a dirty woman. He certainly looked a type who would take on anything, with his thin lips, toffee-coloured skin and straightened hair.
Gershwin stopped and leaned against a palm tree. It was on a slight mound that enabled him to see over the traffic. The ringmaster had come to make his daily inspection.
Zondi remained where he was, about fifteen feet directly behind Gershwin, and smiled with satisfaction. It was always advisable to approach a man like Gershwin from the rear, whatever your motive. If it was hate, then, with his bodyguards waiting with the Dodge in the Market Square, your friends could lay odds. If it was just a few questions you wanted to ask, then men of his kind had no more sensitive area than the back-a slight touch there unsettled them, made them garrulous.
Gershwin began to show signs of irritation. His thumbnail worked on the bark of the palm tree, fidgeting the fibres away, and his two-tone shoe tapped smartly. Then out came the yellow handkerchief. He used it on his face like a powder puff before giving it a twist up each nostril. He snorted.
And snorted again, in surprise. Zondi had flicked the stub of his Texan so that it struck the sweat patch in the yellow suit between the shoulder blades. Before he could turn, Zondi was at his ear.
“What’s the trouble, is Arm Chop swallowing his pennies again?”
“Ah, Detective Sergeant Mickey Zondi,” said Gershwin without a sideways glance. “Arm Chop he a good boy now, spend short time in lavatories. My thoughts are for this new fellow by the phone box. He not look too damn happy.”
It was part of Gershwin’s vanity that he would rather speak bad English than Zulu, his mother tongue.
“Why not?” Zondi’s tone was light, bantering. “His first week in the big city? I bet when you spoke to him about it, the wax turned to honey in his ears. Look here, you said, you’re not useless after all. Your brothers cannot come in to find work because they have no passes, but the police will not mind if you don’t have one-they leave your kind alone. All you have to do is show your legs to the Europeans and they will give you money that you can send home to your mother-and your brothers.”
“Too true,” agreed Gershwin, supremely amiable.
Zondi switched to Zulu: “But now he knows. He wants his brothers to carry him away. But they have no passes.”
“Later he will get more for his families,” Gershwin said, sticking to English. “I’m telling you this one took much petrol to find, he stays far in the mountains. Much, much petrol-much money.”
“Have a Texan.”
Gershwin nipped one from the packet and dropped it in his eagerness to whip out a flashy gas lighter.
“Hell no, have another,” said Zondi in English again, catching him by the shoulder as he bent to retrieve it. Gershwin nodded-then, noticing a quick movement, used his heel to grind the tobacco into the ground. A black
