30
Clare was up early. She came back from her run refreshed, prepared for the day. She’d scheduled a meeting for that morning, to work through the details of the profile and to strategise the next moves. Chief-Superintendent Phiri had the press breathing down his neck and the Minister for Community Safety about to break his balls. He was desperate for some meat to throw at them at the press conference scheduled for two o’clock. But Clare did not want the profile she was assembling to be released. She hoped that none of the forensic evidence would be passed anonymously to a journalist. That had happened once before, and a child murderer had walked free because of it.
Clare was sure the killer would be watching the press. He was an exhibitionist, the daring display of his corpses left no doubt of that, and he would delight in taunting the police. She switched her phone back on. There was only one message – from Riedwaan. He had been married so long that the intimate habits of obligation came easier to him than to her. It was her own weakness that had taken her to him on Saturday night. This had opened up the hurt for both of them again. Clare hoped that it was not going to derail theIr work on the case.
‘I’d better listen to it now, and then phone and apologise. Again!’ she said to Fritz who was rubbing herself against Clare’s legs, hoping for breakfast. Clare listened to the message. Riedwaan’s voice was filled with an icy, impotent rage. ‘Where the fuck are you? It’s Sunday morning. There’s another girl missing. Her name is India King. Our man is just getting into his swing and you’re playing games with me. I hope you’ve got something very smart for me. Call me back. I’ll have my phone on.’
Clare’s legs went numb. She slid to the floor with her back to the wall and called Riedwaan – but there was no answer. She left a message that she would meet him as soon as he called. Then she called the station. Joe Zulu told her that Riedwaan wasn’t there, but he gave her what meagre information there was about India King.
Clare showered and dressed in five minutes. She took her coffee to her desk to wait for Riedwaan to call her back. Her notes about the murders were strewn across her desk. She arranged them neatly before putting them to one side, so that her thoughts could sink down into the dark space where the killer lurked.
She sensed him, his implacable rage all the more frightening because he seemed to have plenty of resources. Firstly, a car – how else would he get the bodies where he left them? He had money too, or access to it. The clothes he decked his pathetic corpses in were absurdly expensive. He had control, too: the bound hands told her that. Or did they? Clare stared out of her window at the reddening sky. She picked up a pen and jotted some more notes:
He needs to exert control. Why?
The control he exercises over the girls is displaced – there must be some other place where he periodically loses control.
Sexual fetish.
No assault.
Money?
Murders: not cheap.
A text message pulled her back into the present. It was from Riedwaan. ‘Meet me at the station. Eight-thirty.’ Clare gathered her papers, finished her coffee and walked to the police station. Being outside calmed her enough to face what was coming. She opened the door of the caravan where their investigation was housed. Riedwaan had cleared a wall for India. All that was there were her name and a photograph. Her brown eyes sparkled at Clare across the room. Riedwaan’s greeting was cold. He did not thank her for the file she handed him. Clare went out to get some more coffee, leaving him to read the profile she had written.
Soon afterwards, Clare went with Joe and Riedwaan to retrace India’s movements before she’d disappeared. Nothing. Her friend had said goodbye after the rehearsal. India had said she was meeting someone.
‘No,’ said Gemma, her friend. She didn’t know who or where. But she had been distracted so she hadn’t really paid attention. ‘Yes,’ she said, they often split up, went their own way.
By the end of the day that was all they had: that India had gone to the Little Theatre on Long Street. That she had left at about nine-thirty – perhaps to meet someone, perhaps not – and that she had vanished. She had not been seen again. Not by a car guard or any of the sleepy bouncers Riedwaan had woken. She had simply vanished.
‘Girls like her don’t just vanish like that,’ said Joe, shaking his head.
‘Not unless she slipped into a car,’ said Riedwaan. ‘Well-dressed girl getting into an expensive car. Who would notice?’
Rita Mkhize sauntered in. ‘Hey, Riedwaan. Your fax from ballistics.’ She handed him the two pages. He skimmed them quickly.
‘Confirmation that it was a scalpel. But not a type widely used here any more. More like the kind of blade widely used thirty years ago. Still deadly, though.’ He read on.
‘Now here’s something interesting,’ he said. ‘The keys are duplicates. Both girls had their hands tied around copies of the same original.’ He handed the fax back to her. ‘Rita, won’t you check out all the key duplicating places from Sea Point to Woodstock. Find out which have this particular mastering system.’ He pointed out the section she needed. ‘You and Joe might want to pay them a visit.’
‘Okay,’ said Rita. She turned to Joe. ‘I’m going back to my office to put that list together.’
‘Don’t you like our palace?’ asked Joe. Rita laughed as she made her way down the caravan’s rickety steps. Joe watched her disappear into the main building.
‘Those keys you can buy anywhere,’ said Joe. ‘It’s a long shot.’
‘What would you suggest, Joe? You got any aces up that designer sleeve of yours?’
‘Cool it, Riedwaan,’ said Joe. ‘I’m just thinking about where we’re putting our time.’
‘There’s another girl missing, Joe. Should I just sit here on my
‘Well, we’re not going to catch anything if we fight,’ said Clare. ‘Let’s go over those statements again and see if there’s something we’ve missed. Phiri needs something for the press this afternoon.’
Riedwaan turned back to the growing pile of folders on his desk, tension knotting his neck. ‘Okay, let’s get going.’ He opened India’s file – it was the slimmest one, just a missing-person report – as if it would suddenly reveal the truth. It didn’t. They worked through lunch, ordering pizza to keep them going.
Phiri came by just before two. He skimmed through Clare’s report.
‘I’m cancelling the press conference,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing new here. These guys are after my blood and your profile.’
‘What will you do, sir?’ asked Riedwaan. ‘The press won’t be happy.’
‘I’m going to issue a statement about India King’s disappearance. I will advise young women to stay indoors or move with an escort.’
‘That will make you very popular,’ said Riedwaan.
‘Thank you, Captain Faizal, your concern is noted.’ Phiri slammed the caravan door.
‘Sir,’ Riedwaan called after Phiri through the small window, ‘ask anyone who has been approached in a threatening way to come forward.’
Phiri nodded curtly and slipped in the back entrance, avoiding the gaggle of journalists at the front.
‘That will go down like a ton of bricks,’ said Clare.
‘I’m going to join Rita and Joe. I want to see how they’re getting on with those keys.’ Riedwaan picked up his keys. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow?’
‘Yes,’ said Clare. ‘I’m going to go through these old cases – see if I pick up anything similar to this.’ She reached her hand towards him. He took it, and bent down and kissed her cheek.
‘How do you get away with it?’ he asked.
‘See you,’ Clare smiled as she turned back to the heap of unsolved cases in front of her. ‘Get some rest.’
She worked till six. She had invited Marcus and Julie for a belated birthday dinner, and dashed home to wash away the long hours she’d spent with Riedwaan and the rest of the team, glad that she hadn’t cancelled. Clare set the table just inside the balcony doors and put the graceful arum lilies she had bought into a vase. She had ordered an elaborate array of sashimi from her favourite Japanese restaurant, which was delivered just as Marcus and Julie
