“I think it’s been dropped behind the counter. Yes, here it is.”
“Extraordinary! If you will just come down to the strongroom, you can have it immediately. I lock up this sort of thing at night.”
Kramer followed him with a secret grin, elated by his corrective training and by the prospect of getting the ring. What a lead if the design was unusual.
“Here we are,” Mr Williams said, pointing into a shallow box holding an assortment of labelled articles.
Kramer reached out.
“No, not the ring.”
“Hey?”
“Number four-one-nine.”
“This?”
“No, officer, that very nice little locket.”
It was a nice little locket. A beautiful little locket. A little locket that sprang open to reveal two heart-shaped photographs. One portrait was of Miss Le Roux-and the other was not.
8
Zondi was having his problems. Ordinarily there was nothing to a surveillance job in Trichaard Street. The Group Areas Act had placed it within Trekkersburg’s sole non-white zone which meant it did the job of ten streets elsewhere in the town. So there were always plenty of people about from sunrise until curfew shortly before midnight, and plenty of them with nothing to do either except stand around. It was easy to remain unnoticed. You could submerge yourself in a jostling crowd around the game played with Coke bottle tops. Or you could sit on the kerb and shuffle your feet in the gutter with the others who never earned a glance from passers-by. You just took off your tie, turned your jacket inside out to show the satin lining like a farm boy, and went to work. It was a cinch, especially after twilight.
Unless it rained. It was now coming down all right. In torrents which sluiced the pavements clean of orange peel and turned the pot-holes into ponds. For two days a blazing sky had been sucking up every particle of moisture from the land to gorge its clouds until they had grown fat and heavy-it was as though an avenging claw had slashed their bellies open, for the drops were warm and as blinding as blood.
There was the sound of calico ripping and then a bolt of lightning caught Zondi, crouched in a shop front, in its flash. A curtain opened and closed like a shutter.
He started running. He hurdled the puddles. He slithered on the melon rind. He crashed through the door.
The thunderclap itself caught up with him as a tall Indian in a fez snatched up a knife and backed towards the cash register. His customer shrieked, tripping on her sari.
“Police!” Zondi barked.
The storekeeper recognised him and lowered his right hand.
“Shut up, Mary!”
Every Indian woman was Coolie Mary. She did.
“Who’s that in your room upstairs?” Zondi demanded, crossing the floor. “Don’t waste time, Gogol.”
“Moosa.”
“You’re telling me the truth?”
“You can go look.”
Then Gogol shrugged indifference, picked up a cabbage and began trimming its stalk. Zondi kicked the knife out of his grasp.
“Listen to me, churra, it had better be Moosa-you hear?”
“Come,” Gogol mumbled.
Zondi followed him out into the hallway cluttered with fruit crates where the smell of curry was like a cushion against the face. The stairs were uncarpeted. The landing had a square of linoleum worn badly one way but not the other. They walked across the brighter pattern.
“In here,” Gogol said, opening the door.
A middle-aged Indian rose as far as he could-without his special shoes he came up to Zondi’s shoulder. He was already in his pyjamas.
“Sergeant Zondi, what a pleasure,” he beamed.
“Sit, curry-guts-you, too.”
Always a man to oblige, Moosa sat. Gogol, his appointed patron, perched scowling on a shoe locker. The Muslims always looked after their own, unlike the Hindus who made up most of the Indian population, and you never saw a Muslim trader go down for good. Moosa had served six months for receiving stolen goods after a trial which had cost him every cent his general dealer’s store was worth. When he came out, Gogol brought him home, gave him a room, and waited for him to reinstate himself. This was beginning to take an unnecessarily long time. Gogol had put it around that Moosa was quite happy to lie and stare at his bleached pin-ups of Jane Russell and do nothing. The Muslim community was sympathetic but pointed out what a shock prison could be for a man of Moosa’s cultivation. It had, however, also agreed to share some of the expense even though Gogol was unmarried.
Lightning flashed again, this time the thunder was hard on its heels. Moosa flinched.
“What’s wrong? Are you frightened?”
“I’ve never liked violence, you know that, Sergeant.”
Zondi caught the allusion and smiled meanly.
“Still say those radios were planted, Moosa?”
“I do.”
Zondi looked into the cupboard, inspected the wall decorations.
“Who was it, you said? It’s a long time since I was in Housebreaking.”
“Gershwin Mkize.”
Zondi stared right through Miss Russell and went on staring until his eyes lost their focus. Then he snapped his fingers.
“Of course, I’d forgotten.”
“So you would have, Sergeant. All water under the bridge.”
“Not your bridge,” Gogol muttered.
“What was that?”
“Nothing, Sergeant, my landlord and provider can be a little sour at times, may Allah reward him.”
“The shop door is still open,” Gogol retorted. “I could be losing everything in the till while you jabber-jabber your nonsense.”
“You had a customer.”
“She’s gone a long time you bet, Zondi.”
“Please, Gogol! Remember who this African gentleman represents.”
“You get out,” Zondi said softly, “you go down and you lock up and you stay there.”
Gogol slunk out, his tail between his teeth.
“Yes, that’s enough of this rubbish talk, Moosa. I want to know who was in this room when the storm began.”
“Just me.”
“If you’re lying…”
“In the name of Allah-”
“I said no-”
“There was nobody but me here. I implore you.”
“What were you doing?”
“Listening to Springbok Radio.”
“In a storm? With lightning?”
