?. . . and his tools are still inside.?
Griessel grabbed his radio: ?Stop him! Stop the swimming-pool man, everybody!? He rushed down the stairs, phone in one hand and radio in the other. Ruby said ?Excuse me?? faintly over the phone as he screamed into the radio: ?Fielies, turn your car around and stop the swimming-pool man!?
?Are you there, sir??
?I?m on my way, Benny.?
He nearly fell as he turned the corner on the last set of stairs and the thought crossed his mind that the world was a fucking funny place. For years you don?t climb stairs and then all of a sudden you are faced with more stairs than your fucking legs can manage. ?Hello?? said Ruby over the cell phone. ?He?s around the corner!? shouted Fielies over the radio.
?Go, Fielies, drive, man!?
Griessel sprinted across the street to Carlos?s house. He heard feet slapping behind him, and half turning he saw Cupido and two constables running across the tar.
?Sir, are you there??
The postman on his bicycle was in front of him, wide-eyed and mouth agape. Griessel sidestepped and for a second he thought they were going to collide.
?Hello??
His knee bumped the rear tire of the bicycle and he thought if he fell now the cell phone and the radio would be buggered. He regained his balance. He shoved the door open and ran in and saw the Colombian lying by the swimming pool, blood everywhere. He reached him, he lay on his face and Benny turned him over and saw he was stone dead, a huge hole in his chest. He said: ?Fuck, fuck, fuck,? and Ruby said: ?That?s it!? and the cell phone made three beeps and the three policemen behind him skidded to a halt and then everything went quiet.
On the corner of Shanklin and Eldon, Detective Constable Malcolm Fielies wondered whether the swimming- pool man had turned left or right. He turned left, guessing, and ahead saw the panel van turning right and he put his foot flat on the accelerator and the tires screeched.
He turned right down Cranberry after the man and he saw on the sign that it was a crescent and he thought, got you, motherfucker, let?s see you get out of this one! But the road ran straight as an arrow and he saw the brake lights go on ahead and the van turned left and Fielies cursed and shouted into the radio: ?I?m after him!? but he knew they only worked over short distances and he didn?t know whether they heard him.
He threw the radio down on the seat beside him and turned left. Geneva Drive. He suspected it was the street leading up to Camps Bay Drive, the one leading into the city, and he changed the Golf down to a lower gear and listened to the engine scream as he drove.
He was catching up, slowly but surely he was catching the motherfucker, although this motherfucker could drive.
He grabbed the microphone of the police radio off its hook and called Control and said he needed back-up, but then Geneva curved sharply to the right, so fucking unexpectedly, and he felt the back of the Golf go and he grabbed the steering wheel with both hands. The tires screeched and he saw he was going to hit the curb. Look
the turn, that was what they were taught. He looked
the fucking turn. Too fast. There went the back end and he spun, 36
degrees, and the engine stalled on him. He said ?motherfucker? very loudly. He turned the key and it whined and whined and then it took and the Golf and Detective Constable Malcolm Fielies pulled away with screaming tires. At the T-junction with Camps Bay Drive he stopped and looked left and right and left again, but there was no sign of the panel van.
The swimming-pool floor of the house was filled with policemen and forensic people. Griessel sat to one side with his cell phone in his hands. He felt he had robbed Christine van Rooyen of her last chance to know her daughter?s fate. He thought, if the child was still alive somewhere, they would never find her now.
He knew that Senior Superintendent Esau Mtimkulu and Matt Joubert, first and second in command of SVC, and Commissioner John Afrika, the provincial head of Investigation, were arguing about his future down there beside the pool. If they sent him down the tubes, it was only right, because he had continued to believe the assegai man was white, even after he had had good evidence to the contrary. That was why he had been so slow to react to the swimming-pool van. That was why he had phoned first.
His fault. Too much fucking faith in his instinct, too cocky, too self-assured?and now he would pay for it.
The phone rang.
?Griessel.?
?Inspector, the helicopter has found the swimming-pool company?s van on Signal Hill Road. We are sending a patrol vehicle.?
?And the suspect??
?He?s gone. It?s just the vehicle.?
?Explain to me where it is.?
?It?s the road that turns off Kloof Nek Road to the lookout points on Signal Hill, Inspector. About half a kilometer in there is a clump of trees on the right-hand side.?
?No one goes near the vehicle, please. They must just secure the area.? He was on his feet and walking over to Cupido. ?Vaughn, they found the van on Signal Hill. I want you to think carefully?was he wearing gloves??
?No fucking way. I checked him out thoroughly.?
?So you?re sure??
?I?m sure.?
