Thirteen Hours

'You will never fucking believe where this phone was. Inside a black shoe, in a bag of stuff Metro picked up this morning in the streets around the churchyard murder scene.'

'A shoe? Did you see what size it was?'

Griessel picked up the shoe, looked inside but saw nothing. He turned it over. The numbers were worn down. 'It's a ten and a half.'

'Fucking unbelievable.'

'Where did they find it?'

'I don't know; you'll have to ask Jeremy Oerson at Metro. He's a Field Marshal or something there.'

'What's a Field Marshal?'

'I mean he's some or other fucking fancy rank. Wait, I'll give you his number ...' He began looking it up on his own cell phone.

'And you're a Captain now?' Griessel heard how Dekker tried to keep the envy out of his voice. Then he said: 'Can you look up his call history for me?'

'Hold on.' It took a while because he wasn't familiar with the make of phone.

'I think he called someone last night, just before ten,' said Dekker.

Eventually Griessel found the right icon. NO RECORDS, read the screen.

'There's nothing here,' he told Dekker.

While Barry answered his phone, his eyes were on the delivery vehicle parked on the corner in front of Carlucci's.

'Barry here.'

'Why haven't they gone in yet?' said the man with the grey beard.

'They can't. There's a delivery truck at the shop up the street, parked in Upper Orange, and the driver is looking right down the street.'

'How long?'

'Well, they've been unloading for a while now, so it shouldn't be long ...'

A moment of silence on the line. 'We're running out of time.'

It was the first time Barry had heard a tinge of concern in the man's voice. But then he was back in control: 'Call me when it's clear. I want to know exactly when they go in.'

'OK, Mr B.'

Chapter 32

His moustache was as big as his ego, thought Mbali Kaleni.

She was sitting with Jack Fischer at a round table in his luxurious office. On one side was the expansive dark wood desk, on the other a bookshelf covering the whole wall with what looked like legal reference books. On each of the two remaining walls was a single large oil painting, landscapes of the Bushveld and the Boland respectively. Behind the desk, deep red, heavy curtains hung at the window. On the floor was a Persian carpet, new and beautiful.

Fischer was approaching sixty with a full head of hair painstakingly combed into a side parting. Greying temples framed the weathered hawkish face, with the fine wrinkles of a lifelong smoker. And that wide, extravagant moustache. She suspected the dark-blue suit was tailor-made, the fit was too good.

She did not like him. His heartiness was false and slightly condescending, the kind of attitude towards black people that was typical of many Afrikaner men of a certain age. He had risen from his desk with a blue folder in one hand and asked her to take a seat at the round table. He opened the conversation with 'How can we help you?' We. And when she explained, he smiled beneath his moustache. 'I see.' And: 'I would offer you refreshments but I understand you brought your own.'

She did not react.

'You realise I am not obliged to release the information without a warrant.'

She settled herself in the expensive chair and nodded.

'Nonetheless, we are former members of the Force.'

It was the 'nonetheless' that spurred her to show him a thing or two about language.

'Nowadays we prefer to refer to the SAPS as 'the Service',' she told him. 'I was relying on the fact that former members would appreciate the significance and urgency of a murder investigation.'

Once more he deployed that superior smile under his moustache. 'We understand only too well. You will have my full cooperation.'

He opened the file. On the inside cover was the word 'AfriSound' and a code number. She wondered whether the record company's accountant had phoned him to let him know the police were on their way. That in itself would be interesting.

'We simply tracked the AfriSound payment of fifty thousand rand to the account of one Mr Daniel Lodewikus Vlok, and subsequently contacted a subcontractor in Bloemfontein to go and talk to Mr Vlok. The purpose of that conversation was merely to make sure Mr Vlok was aware of the payment and the circumstances leading thereto. We did not want to point out an innocent man to our client.'

'So the subcontractor assaulted him.' «

'Absolutely not.' Indignant.

She looked at him with an expression that said, she might be a woman in a man's world, but that didn't mean he should think she was stupid.

'Inspector Kaleni,' he said with that fake courtesy, 'we are the private investigation company with the fastest-growing turnover in the country - because we are ethical and effective. Why would I put our future in jeopardy by illegal activities?'

That was the moment she made the link between the ego and moustache. 'The name and contact details of the subcontractor?'

He was reluctant to supply them. At first he just gazed at one of his paintings, his body language expressing an inaudible sigh. Then slowly he stood up to take the address book out of one of the drawers of his giant desk.

Mat Joubert said he had to get going, because he could see they were busy. Griessel walked with him to the door. Once they were out of earshot of the others, the big detective said: 'Benny, I'm going to join Jack Fischer's company.'

'Jissis, Mat,' said Griessel.

Joubert shrugged his massive shoulders. 'I've thought about it for a long time, Benny. It was a difficult decision. You know: I'm a policeman.'

'Then why are you buggering off? For the money?' He was angry with Joubert, now he was practically the last white man left in the SAPS, and they had come a long way together.

'You know I wouldn't leave just for the money.'

Griessel looked away to where Vusi was sitting with Oliver Sands. He knew Joubert was telling the truth, because Mat's wife Margaret was financially very comfortable after a big inheritance. 'Why leave then?'

'Because I'm not enjoying it any more, Benny. With SVC I could contribute, but now ...'

Joubert had been commanding officer of the former Serious and Violent Crimes Unit and he was good, the best boss Griessel had ever worked for. So he nodded now with some understanding.

'I've been with the Provincial Task Force for four months now, and I still don't have a portfolio,' said Joubert. 'No people, no job description. They don't know what to do with me. John Afrika has told me I have to accept that I will not be promoted - that is simply the way it is now. That wouldn't bother me so much, but just sitting around ... I'm also getting too old for all the shit, Benny, the National Commissioner's monkey business, the disbanding of the Scorpions, the racial quotas that change every year; everything is politicised. And if Zuma becomes President, the Xhosas will be out and the Zulus will be in and everything will change again - a new hierarchy, new agenda, new troubles.'

And where does that leave me, Griessel wanted to ask, with growing apprehension, but he just kept looking