A Beautiful Place to Die (9 page)

“What’s up?” Emmanuel asked.

“Captain Pretorius sold the old family farm to King a year or so ago. They think King cheated the captain on the price.”

“Did he?”

Anton shrugged. “Captain never complained about the money, only the sons.”

“Anything come of it?”

“Just a lot of hot air. Silly talk from the brothers about King being a swindler, but King is too big for them to mess with. The Pretorius boys don’t like it when they don’t get their way.”

“You know what it’s like to be on the wrong side of them?”

“Everyone in Jacob’s Rest has had a taste. I’m no different.”

Emmanuel was about to ask for more details when two newcomers to the family group caught his attention. The men, crewcut commando types, were squeezed into the cheap cotton suits worn for court appearances and interrogation cell duties. Both were drawn from the “rough justice” section of the training manual. Neither appeared capable of playing the soft man, versed in worming confessions out of prisoners using empathy and skill. They were the Security Branch.

“Friends of yours?” Anton asked.

Emmanuel jumped off the mudguard and pulled Anton down after him. The crowd washed around them like a black sea, momentarily blotting out the presence of sharks in the water. Emmanuel took a deep breath. Two days. Just long enough to select personnel for the assignment, brief them, and arrange transport. The Security Branch had no intention of taking a backseat. They were in on the investigation from the start. “Taking an interest” was just the bullshit they’d thrown van Niekerk’s way to keep things calm while they marshaled their forces.

“Don’t know them,” Emmanuel replied. “But I’ve got a feeling they’ll introduce themselves to all of us soon enough.”

Anton swallowed. “Should I be worried, Detective?”

“Are you a political man? Do you belong to the Communist Party or a union that disagrees with the National Party laws?”

“No,” the coloured man replied quickly. “Can’t say I like what’s going on, but I’ve never done anything about it.”

“Are all your identification papers in order?”

“Far as I know.”

“Then keep it that way,” Emmanuel said. “The Security Branch is here to look for political activists, and whatever the Security Branch looks for they find.”

“So I’ve heard,” Anton answered quietly. If the Security Branch had the power to spook a white detective, what chance did a coloured man have?

“You know how to play the game, Anton. Just keep playing it.”

“You a strange man,” Anton said lightly. “What do you know about the game, anyway?”

“I was born here. Everyone in SA has to know their place. Some of us are pawns and some of us”—he stopped and motioned in the direction of Elliot King, who was walking toward a canvas-topped Land Rover parked on the street—“are kings. I’ll see you later.”

Emmanuel pressed through a gathering of white farmers and drew parallel with the dapper peacock of a man just as he reached his car. The door to the Land Rover was held open by an older native in a green game ranger’s outfit with the words “Bayete Lodge” embroidered over the breast pocket.

“Mr. King.” Emmanuel stepped into the space in front of the door and held his hand out in greeting. “I’m Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper. Could I have a moment of your time?”

“Certainly, Detective Sergeant.” The smile was cool, the handshake brief and firm. “How can I help?”

In the churchyard, the Security Branch goons were deep in conversation with Paul Pretorius. They’d be down at the police station this afternoon, pissing in all the corners to make sure everyone knew the investigation was theirs.

“I’d like to ask you a few questions about Captain Pretorius. Would it suit you to talk at your house? Town is crowded, and I think it would be better if we had some privacy.”

“Am I a suspect, Detective Sergeant?”

“It’s just an informal chat,” Emmanuel said, aware of the thinning crowd and the risk of exposing his leads to the National Party musclemen. “A favor to the investigation.”

“In that case I’ll be happy to see you at my farm in an hour or so.” King slid into the Land Rover. “As you’re coming out my way, do go to the old Jew’s place and pick up my housekeeper and her daughter, there’s a good fellow. It will save Matthew here a trip back into town. They’ll be ready to come out to the farm in about an hour.”

The door slammed shut before Emmanuel had a chance to reply. His reflection blurred in the dusty car window. Elliot King had given an order and he expected it to be obeyed.

Emmanuel gave a mock salute and the car pulled away from the curb and headed out to the main road. He’d met every form of arrogant Englishman on the battlefield, but at least this one, in his tailored khaki suit and new Land Rover, didn’t have the power to order him over a hill littered with land mines. He’d play the lackey for as long as it took him to figure out why Elliot King’s name had been given to him as a clue in the dead of night.

“When’s my backup getting here, sir?” Emmanuel asked. He’d reached Major van Niekerk at home: a redbrick Victorian mansion nestled on vast grounds in the posh northern suburbs of Johannesburg. “I can’t run this investigation on my own.”

“No backup,” van Niekerk replied over the sound of a whistling kettle. “The commissioner has told me to step away. The Security Branch is in control now.”

“Where does that leave me?”

“Alone,” the major replied. “The Security Branch wants you replaced but I’ve convinced the commissioner to keep you on. That means you’ll be a very unpopular addition to the team.”

“Why not replace me?” Emmanuel asked.

“You’re not a Security Branch stooge,” van Niekerk informed him. “You’ll make sure the right person hangs for the crime.”

Despite what he said, van Niekerk wasn’t big on the pure justice element of policing. The ambitious major was making sure that a detective loyal to him was on the ground to represent his best interests. Van Niekerk wasn’t going to hand over the headline-making murder of a white police captain to the Security Branch without a fight. Fine, Emmanuel thought, except for the fact that van Niekerk was in Jo’burg sipping tea while he was about to go toe-to-toe with the hard men of law enforcement.

“What are they like?” van Niekerk asked with mild curiosity.

“They look like they can beat a confession out of a can of paint.”

“Good. That means you can turn the whole thing around on them.”

“How do I do that?” Emmanuel asked drily.

“Find the killer,” van Niekerk said. “Find him before they do.”

Outside the captain’s office, the Security Branch officers rifled through the contents of the police station’s file cabinet. Their faces made two sides of an ugly coin. They turned to him and Emmanuel felt their hostility radiate outward. “Unpopular addition to the team”? Major van Niekerk had a talent for understatement.

“We can relax, Dickie,” the older, leaner officer instructed his hefty colleague, his smile a bare stretch of his lips over yellowing teeth. “God is with us. Finally.”

“You must be the smart one,” Emmanuel said, and threw his hat onto Sarel Uys’s vacant desk. He waited for the second salvo. The Security Branch boys were going to give him a kicking just to let him know who was in charge.

“God?” Dickie’s brain was straining to keep up.

“Emmanuel,” the senior officer said. “That’s what his name means. God is with us. According to Major van Niekerk, Detective Sergeant Cooper here can walk on water. He’s a real miracle worker.”

Emmanuel let the comment ride. If the Security Branch wanted a fight, they’d have to land a few more solid punches.

“Where are you off to, Cooper?”

“I report to Major van Niekerk,” Emmanuel said. “No one else.”

“That was yesterday. From today you report to me, Lieutenant Piet Lapping of the Security Branch. Your major was informed of that fact by my colonel.” He paused to let the full weight of the information sink in. “Now, where are you off to, Cooper?”

“A farm,” Emmanuel said.

“You sure you want to do that?” Lapping asked. “Farms are dirty places. You might get cow shit on your shoes.”

Dickie, the muscle of the outfit, rested his beer-fed rump against the edge of Hansie’s desk. “That’s what we heard, hey, Lieutenant? That Manny here likes to keep himself neat and tidy. Always with the ironed shirts and polished shoes.”

Piet lit a cigarette and threw the packet over to his sergeant. “That’s probably why his friend Major van Niekerk promoted him so quickly. Neat bachelors like to stick together.”

“Truly?” Dickie asked conversationally.

“Ja.” Piet blew a cloud of smoke out from between bulbous lips. “They meet in secret and starch each other’s underpants till they’re good and stiff.”

Emmanuel ignored the urge to shove Piet, headfirst, into the rubbish bin. Security Branch intelligence was becoming legendary, but pockmarked Piet and his partner had only a few days’ worth of it to draw on. They knew he’d been promoted quickly: too quickly for some senior detectives’ liking. His personal hygiene habits and the ugly liaison rumor came from deep inside the district Detective Branch. Somebody had talked.

“Where does a man learn such unnatural things?” Dickie’s hippo-sized head tilted to one side as they continued their routine.

“The British army,” Piet replied. “That’s probably why Manny here did so well during the war. Foot soldier to major in a few years, plus all those shiny medals to pin onto his pretty uniform.”

Emmanuel sifted through the ranks of his detractors and came up with a name. Head Constable Oliver Sparks: a bitter twig of a man due to be pensioned off the force after twenty years of indifferent service. The homosexual liaison rumor was his doing, payback for van Niekerk’s refusal to offer up the high-profile cases.

“How is Head Constable Sparks?” Emmanuel asked. “Still planting evidence and drinking on the job?”

The porridge flesh on Piet’s face tensed noticeably and he took a long drag of his cigarette and exhaled. Emmanuel knew he’d scored a hit with Sparks’s name. The lieutenant’s pinprick eyes darkened.

“Whose farm are you going to?” Lapping continued the previous conversation and Emmanuel felt a rising uneasiness. Lieutenant Piet Lapping and his sidekick were not the “hard man/hard man” combination he’d picked them for at the funeral. Beneath the lumpy facial mask and the concrete-reinforced body, Piet had a brain that worked at above average capacity.

“Elliot King’s farm,” Emmanuel said. “I’m following up a rumor that King cheated Captain Pretorius on a financial transaction. There might have been bad blood between the two.”

“You’re chasing the personal angle?” Lapping made it sound like a fool’s errand.

“Is there another?” Emmanuel asked.

“None that I can discuss with you.” Lapping waved a hand toward the front door. “Go off to your farm visit and report to me immediately when you get back to town. I am in charge of all aspects of this case. Understand?”

Emmanuel got the feeling that the Security Branch was way ahead of him. They were searching for specific information. “The personal angle,” as the lieutenant put it, was at the bottom of their list of motives.

“Back again so soon, Detective?” Zweigman was wrapping a parcel in a length of brown paper. “Are you perhaps interested in our special on apricot jam? Top quality. You won’t find better. Not even in Jo’burg.”

“The funeral’s put you in a good mood,” Emmanuel said. “Planning a party for later?”

“Just a quiet drink with my wife,” came the deadpan reply.

“I though you never hit the bottle, Doctor.”

“Only on special occasions.” Zweigman tied the parcel up neatly and laid it with a pile of others on the counter. “Do you plan to join the funeral reception at the Standard Hotel, Detective? I hear Henrick Pretorius is serving up half-price drinks until sunset.”

Emmanuel imagined the Pretorius brothers and their Boer brethren singing Afrikaner folk songs late into the night. Someone might even pull out a squeezebox for good measure. His blood ran cold.

“Not my kind of gathering,” he said. “I’m supposed to give King’s housekeeper and her daughter a lift to his farm. He said they’d be here.”

Zweigman stilled. “Mr. King has a driver.”

“I know that, but as I’m going out to King’s farm, he thought I’d be a ‘good fellow’ and do him the favor of driving his staff back. ‘Saves Matthew making two trips.’”

“I see.” Zweigman busied himself picking pieces of string off the countertop.

“Well, are they here?”

“Of course.” The German shopkeeper collected himself. “I will go out to the back and inform them that you will be providing them with transport.”

“Thank you,” Emmanuel said, and strolled over to the window that fronted the street. A throng of white men passed across the corner of van Riebeeck on their way to the half-price drinks at the Standard Hotel. Groups of blacks drifted onto the kaffir paths that headed out to the location. The town was emptying.

He turned and found Zweigman at the counter with Davida, the shy brown mouse, and a graceful woman dressed in a black cotton dress teamed with a row of fake Indian shop pearls.

“This is Mrs. Ellis and her daughter, Davida, whom you have already met.” Zweigman performed the introductions as though the task itself was distasteful to him.

“Mrs. Ellis. Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper.”

“Detective.” King’s housekeeper gave a deferential bow, the kind reserved for white men in power. She was green eyed and brown skinned, her lips full enough to hold the weight of a weary man’s head. Davida stayed in the background with her head bowed like a novice about to take orders. The tiger had given birth to a lamb.

“Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Ellis,” Emmanuel said, and fished out the car keys. “I’m afraid we have to get going.”

“Of course.” Mrs. Ellis hurried to the counter and Zweigman shooed her away while he and the shy brown mouse divided the parcels between them.

Emmanuel stepped outside. A skinny mixed-race woman with coarse yellow hair walked a chubby toddler past the burned-out shell of Anton’s garage. The wreckage reminded him of any one of a thousand French towns flattened in the march toward peace.