?I don'?t know. ??
?Unless, of course, it is you.?
?That?s true. Unless I am the one.?
?And that couldn'?t be, Janina.?
?Sir, let me speak frankly. I feel our relationship has altered.?
The coffee arrived, and her words hung in the air until the waitress left.
?Earlier today when we met Powell, after that,? she said.
He took his time, tore open the sugar packet, and stirred the sugar into his coffee. He looked up at her. ?I don'?t know whom to trust anymore, Janina.?
?Why, sir? What has changed??
He brought the cup to his lips, testing the heat carefully, sipped and replaced the porcelain cup carefully back in the saucer. ?I don'?t have an empirical answer to that. I can?t set out the points one by one. It is a feeling, Janina, and I am sorry that you felt it includes you, too, because that is not necessarily the case.?
?A feeling??
?That I am being led down the garden path.?
When Thobela dismounted from the R1150 GS before the Livingstone Hotel in Gaborone, he could barely stand. At first he held on to the saddle with a thousand stars swimming in his vision, bending over it until balance and sight returned.
When he moved around the bike, he saw the damage for the first time.
The 9 mm bullets had struck the right-hand luggage case, two small neat holes in the black polyvinyl. The sports bag was in there.
He unclipped the case and took out the bag. Two holes, perfectly round.
He locked everything and crossed the pavement and entered the door.
The night porter sat sleeping in his chair. Thobela had to ding the bell with his palm before the man stood up groggily and pushed the register over the desk. He filled in his particulars.
?Will you take South African rand??
?Yes.?
?Can I still get something to eat??
?Ring room service. Nine one. Passport, please.?
He passed it over. The man?s bloodshot eyes barely looked at it, just checking the number against the one he had written down. Then he pulled a key out of the lock-up cupboard behind him and passed it over.
Before the rattling elevator had reached the ground floor and opened for Umzingeli, the man was asleep again.
The room was large, the bed heavenly under its multicolored spread and the pillows billowy and tempting.
First, a shower. Redress the wound. Eat, drink.
And then sleep? dear God, how he would sleep.
He zipped open the sports bag. Time to review the damage. He shook the contents onto the double bed. Nothing to mention, even his toilet bag was whole. Then he picked up the hard drive and held it in his hands and saw that it was destroyed. The Heckler & Koch rounds had hit the middle of the almost square box, where metal and plastic and integrated circuits came together. The data was lost forever.
No wonder the bang had been so loud.
Heads together, voices low, Janina Mentz and the director looked like lovers in the Long Street Cafe. She said the hard drive was the wrong focus, containing nothing of importance, old stale intelligence locked up in a safe by an old man who wanted to feel he still had a part in the game, suddenly dug up when he was in trouble. Thobela Mpayipheli was no longer important; he had become a marginal figure, an irritation at worst. Let him go, the action was in Lusaka, the answers lay waiting there.
?We already have four operatI'ves there. We are going to send another twelve, the best we have. We want to know who is holding Johnny Kleintjes hostage and we want to know how they knew of this operation. I considered sending the RU to Lusaka, but we don'?t want an incident; we need a low profile, to work subtly. We need silent numbers, not fireworks.?
?And what about the leak??
?I am only involving four people here? myself, you, sir, Quinn, and Rajkumar. We keep it small, we keep it intimate, and we get the answers.?
?Does Tiger know??
?Tiger knows only that priorities have changed. Anyway, he is on a mission of his own. Apparently, he is going to stop Mpayipheli. In Botswana.?
?And you let him go??
She thought this over before answering carefully. ?Tiger has earned his chance, sir. He is alone.?
The director shook his head. ?Tiger has the wrong motives, Janina.?
