somebody he wanted to show them to.
Burn lay in his sleeping wife’s arms. His son slept beside him. He couldn’t remember when last he’d felt this good. Tomorrow he would go down to the real estate agents and rent an apartment. Whatever it cost, they would be out of this house by tomorrow night.
Then he would spend time on the Internet, researching New Zealand. He vaguely recalled there were two islands, North and South. The South was meant to be wilder, more remote, less people. High mountains and unspoiled beaches.
It was with these images in mind that Burn fell asleep.
When he awoke, sun streamed into the room. He was alone. He heard water bubbling in the plunge pool beneath the bedroom window. The African shouts and jibes of the builders next door drifted across to him.
He yawned, rubbing a hand across his stubble.
He heard Susan’s voice, from inside the house. She sounded like she was in the kitchen. Probably talking to Matt while she fixed breakfast. The idea pleased him.
Then he heard another voice. A man’s voice. A voice he couldn’t quite place.
Reflex moved Burn from the bed. He pulled on shorts and a T-shirt. Before he knew it, he’d opened the closet and the Colt was in his hand.
Moving silently in his bare feet, he went toward the kitchen. Susan was saying something he couldn’t catch. It sounded like a question. The man responded. Now Burn recognized the voice.
The fat cop was in the kitchen with Susan.
CHAPTER 11
Burn stepped into the kitchen.
Susan and the fat cop watched him. Susan looked scared. “Jack, I was about to call you.”
The cop leaned his massive gut against the kitchen counter. Susan was on the other side of the counter, keeping her distance.
“How can we help you, Inspector?”
Burn tried to stay cool, relaxed. He didn’t want to give anything away. Just aaw-abiding guy surprised to see a cop in his kitchen first thing in the morning.
“I just want you and your wife to look at a couple of photographs.” Barnard held a large yellow envelope at his side. He lay it down on the counter and slid out two glossy prints.
He handed them to Susan. She took them, one in each hand, and stared at them. Then she closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, she stared at Burn. Her face was bled of color.
Barnard had not taken his gaze off her. “Do you recognize either of these men?”
She shook her head and put the photographs down on the counter as if they were toxic.
Burn stepped closer and saw the faces of the men he had killed. Jesus, they had been found. So soon. They looked bloated, mottled. Decomposition already doing its work. He forced himself to stay calm, not allowing his face to tell anything.
He didn’t touch the photographs.
Barnard was looking at Burn. “How about you, sir?”
“Never seen them before.”
Then Burn was in behind Susan. She was trembling. He eased her onto a stool.
“Look, what’s this all about? My wife isn’t in any condition to be upset like this.”
Barnard slid the photographs back into the envelope. “You know that car that was outside? The red BMW?” Burn nodded. “I think these two men drove it here. To your street.”
“I’ve told you already. We know nothing about the car. Or these two men.”
Barnard was heaving his gut off the counter. “Well, I’m glad about that. They weren’t nice people.” He leered at Susan, yellow teeth like bone fragments in an open wound. “I’m sorry if I upset you, Mrs. Hill.”
Susan said nothing, stared at him blankly.
Burn’s hands tried to soothe his wife. Her shoulders were tight with tension. She shrugged him off. The cop noticed. Matt came into the kitchen. He looked at the fat cop, then gave him a wide berth and went to the fridge.
“This your boy?” The cop watched Matt help himself to juice.
Instinctively, Burn put himself between his son and the cop. “Is there anything else, Inspector?”
Barnard shook his massive head. “I’ll be in touch if there is.”
He was hauling himself to the front door. Burn went after him to buzz him out and make sure he left.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Susan exit the kitchen. He heard the bedroom door slam.
Berenice September was at the satellite police station at seven in the morning. There was no sign of the cop. The sun beat down on the commuters on their way to work. A group of kids in school uniform walked past, shouting out at one another.
Her son Ronnie hadn’t ce home. Every parent on the Cape Flats lived in fear of this moment. Scores of children went missing every year. Most of them turned up in the veld, raped, sodomized, murdered.
By seven fifteen Berenice was fretting. She was already late for work. She wouldn’t be able to pay her bills at the end of the month if they docked her pay. Then she saw the cop, strolling up from the taxi rank like he was with his girlfriend at the Waterfront. Berenice waved at him. This did nothing to speed his pace.
She walked toward him, pushing through a bunch of commuters shoehorning themselves into a taxi. “You remember me? From yesterday?”
It took a moment before the cop nodded. He carried on walking, and Berenice fell in beside him. “I haven’t seen my son since I left him by you.”
The cop shrugged. They had reached the container, and he fished in his pocket for a set of keys. “I haven’t seen him.”
“What happened last night, after I left?”
He unlocked the door to the container and pulled it open. The hinges screamed for oil. “Nothing happened.”
The cop stepped inside and Berenice followed him. It was like walking into a wall of heat. She was already perspiring, from the sun and from the tension. She felt faint and stepped back out, getting her breath. The cop looked at her with blank disinterest.
She tried again. “Last night, you said somebody was coming. I left my boy, Ronnie, here so he could speak to them.”
“Ja. But he fucked off. The kid. Before they got here. He waited for you to go; then he ran.”
She was staring at him. “Ran where?”
“How must I know? He’s your bloody son.” The cop set out the occurrence book and a pen.
Berenice shook her head. She turned and walked back home. She was going to phone in sick. They could dock her pay. She had to find her son.
“That cop knows something, Jack.” Susan paced the bedroom, anger flaming her cheeks.
“How could he?” Burn stayed still, deliberately, to counterbalance her motion.
“Then what was he doing here?” she asked, demanding that he make sense of this mess.
“He probably went to every house in the street. It’s just routine.” In fact, Burn had seen the fat cop get in his car and drive away, but he didn’t tell her this.
“Where did you put them? Those men?”
“In an open field. Behind the airport. Miles from anywhere.”
“Apparently not. Jesus, Jack.” She stopped, put a hand to her stomach, caught her breath.
He moved toward her. “Look, calm down. Sit down on the bed.”
“Just get the fuck away from me!” The words stopped Burn as if he’d been struck. Susan never spoke like this.
“Susan…”
“Okay, Jack, here’s the thing. I, we, Matt and… and her”-she pointed at her belly-“had to carry the can for the
