The gun fired again and Jed rolled further away from the edge, letting go of the intruder. The man saw his chance. He stood up and kicked viciously at Jed’s kidneys. Jed arched his back and rolled on his side, watching in agony as the man lowered himself over the edge. The tyres protested as the car took off. Jed crawled to the roof’s edge and saw the vehicle racing through the half-empty car park. It was a sedan, white. Maybe a Mercedes. It was already too far away for him to read the licence plate.
Peering over the lip of the roof he could see the man had shimmied down a drainpipe.
A small crowd of people had spilled from the restaurant and bar inside the hotel to see what all the noise was about. A couple of young males, one white and one black, had pistols drawn. He had heard that many people carried guns in South Africa for personal protection because of the high crime rate.
He stepped back from the edge of the roof – he didn’t want to provide target practice for a civilian with an itchy trigger finger.
Jed brushed himself off and started back towards his hotel room. He felt his body, assessing his injuries. He could tell he would be badly bruised, but none of his ribs were cracked. He touched the inside of his lip with his tongue and tasted blood.
In his room, things looked as he had left them, apart from the missing lamp. His suit bag was zipped shut and his Alice pack still buckled closed. He must have arrived just after the man had entered his room, and before he’d had time to steal anything. He picked up the telephone and dialled reception. ‘Send your security man up here now and call the police. There’s been a break-in.’
‘The police are already on their way, Mister Banks. There have been gunshots outside.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘Forget it. Put me through to the bar, please.’
The receptionist connected him and a deep-voiced man answered.
Jed wiped more blood from his lip with the back of his hand. ‘I’d like to speak to the woman serving behind the bar.’
‘She’s left. Family emergency Who’s calling, please?’
‘I think I left something in the bar,’ he lied. ‘When is her next shift?’
‘She’s a casual. Only comes in here now and again. Can I help you? What did you lose?’
Jed hung up. He’d leave the girl to the police. He unzipped his suit bag and reached inside for his toiletries bag, but couldn’t see it. He had been carrying his airline tickets, passport and all his money in his pocket. There was really nothing else of great value in either his bag or pack. He rummaged through his clothes and, finally, located his wash bag and took it into the bathroom. He stripped and turned on the shower. The water stung a cut on his face, but the hot jets soothed the ache in his side.
As he turned off the water there was a knock at the door.
He pulled on a white bathrobe and tied it around his waist. ‘Who is it?’
‘Police, sir.’
Jed opened the door. ‘Come in, please. Excuse my appearance,’ he said to the two officers. Both wore dark-blue fatigue trousers, shirts of a lighter hue and military-style boots. They removed their peaked baseball caps as they entered the room.
‘Good evening, sir,’ said the taller of the two, who looked more Indian than African. ‘I am Sergeant Vincent Sakoor and this is Corporal Tshabalala. We hear you’ve been robbed.’
Jed ran a hand through his wet hair. ‘My room was broken into, but I don’t think anything is missing.’
‘You disturbed the man in the act?’ Sergeant Sakoor asked.
‘I did. He put up a fight, but he got away’ Jed told his story, describing the suspicious behaviour of the barmaid, the scuffle and the man’s escape in the getaway car.
‘Ah, these people are professionals, I think. You say the man was white?’
‘Yes. I was surprised by …’
‘You are surprised we have white criminals? You think only black or coloured people commit crimes in this country?’
‘No, Officer. I was about to say I was surprised by the apparent level of organisation behind a simple break and enter.’
‘As I said, it looks like the work of professionals. If it is whites, it’s probably drug-related.
Addiction to hard drugs knows no racial boundaries, Mr Banks.’
Jed nodded, but the intruder was no strung-out heroin addict. He was clean-cut and, now that he thought about it, had a military look about him.
‘Can you give me a description of the car?’ Sergeant Sakoor asked.
‘White sedan. Mercedes, I think.’
The two policemen looked at each other and Tshabalala consulted his notebook. ‘There’s a Mercedes on fire a couple of blocks from here. The licence plates match one that was stolen earlier this evening.’
‘Carjacked?’
‘No,’ Sakoor said. ‘Hot wired from outside a restaurant in Sandton. An area inhabited mainly by wealthy
whites
. A European man trying to break into a Mercedes would probably be assisted by a passer-by, someone who thought it was the owner who had locked himself out. A black man caught in the act of car theft would probably be shot by vigilantes.’
Sakoor sat down at the table and gestured for Jed to take the other chair. He took down a statement in longhand.
When they had finished, Jed said, ‘I take it you’re not overly optimistic about catching these guys.’
‘Consider yourself lucky, Mr Banks. And keep your balcony door locked next time.’
That night, when Jed finally fell into a fitful sleep, he dreamed he was chasing the black-clad man out of the room again. When they got to the edge of the roof, the criminal’s body hanging in space, Jed again ripped off the ski mask. This time the face that stared back at him was Miranda’s, her blonde hair cascading free in the breeze. He recoiled in shock and lost his grip on her. She fell, arms windmilling, her mouth opening as if she was trying to tell him something. But he could not hear her.
Jed woke in a cold sweat. The glowing red numerals on the bedside clock told him it was a little after four in the morning. He was sore from the fight and his head throbbed from the combination of too much alcohol and not enough sleep. To top it all he was jetlagged and couldn’t get back to sleep.
He rose, showered, then smoked a cigarette while he shaved around the reappearing stubble.
He wiped his face and replaced the razor and shaving cream in his wash bag. As he zipped the bag closed, a shiver ran down his spine.
The wash bag.
When he had reached into his suit bag last night it had taken him a few moments to find his toiletries. He was a disciplined soldier, a creature of habit, and, like it or not, a slave to order, precision and routine. He always placed his wash bag in last, on the top right of his bag. It had not been in its usual spot after the intruder had left.
Jed unpacked his suit bag and then turned it upside down. He sorted through his underclothes, his shirts and spare pair of trousers. He upended each of his combat boots and his running shoes, but nothing fell out. He checked the zippered pockets of the bag and then ran his hands over the lining, feeling for any irregularities. He took his camera out of its case and examined it. He hadn’t loaded it with film and it was still empty. As he shifted one of his running shoes the camera case dropped from the bed onto the carpeted floor. It landed with an audible thud.
Jed was surprised by the noise. He picked up the empty case; it was heavier than usual. He took a closer look inside and found a removable divider in the bottom of the pouch, fastened to the interior with strips of Velcro. He took out the padded piece of material and turned the case upside down. A black pistol magazine filled with snub-nosed bullets slid into his hand. He examined the mag and thumbed the rounds onto the unmade bed. There were thirteen of them. The magazine was made of metal and bore no markings, but he recognised it instantly as belonging to a Browning nine-millimetre pistol.
‘Bastard,’ he said.
He scooped up the rounds and reloaded the magazine. He searched his gear again and then emptied his Alice pack on the floor. He checked and rechecked every piece of kit and every item of clothing.
Then he re-examined both the pack and the travel bag to make sure there was nothing else in there that didn’t belong to him.
The magazine was small enough to be easily concealed but there was no way it would not be discovered by an airport metal detector. It was in his carry-on bag, as well. The intruder had not planted a pistol, just the ammunition.
Jed had been set up. He would have been stopped by airport security on his way to check in for his flight to Zimbabwe, and probably taken away for questioning. The security men would have discovered from the identification card he carried that he was US Army. The fact that there was no pistol in his possession would eventually be discovered, after they had searched both his bags and his person. He could imagine the process taking a long time, maybe hours. Would he have been charged with a criminal offence? Possibly: he didn’t know. Would he have missed his flight? Definitely.
And who was the intruder? If not a thief, who did he work for? Jed had been clearly visible over the roofline when the man’s accomplice had opened fire. He had been shot at with a pistol – not an accurate weapon over any great distance, but even so the rounds had sailed harmlessly high over his head. Had the man pulling the trigger simply been trying to scare him off?
Jed had carried his passport and tickets with him down to the bar. Still, the intruder had somehow known that he would be catching another flight the next day Then there was the mysterious woman who had been asking about him. It was all too weird for words.
*
Inside the crowded airport terminal Jed took the lift to the departures floor, and joined a queue of people waiting to put their bags onto the conveyor belt of a large X-ray scanning machine. The machine was big enough to take suitcases, and the departing passengers were being told to place all their luggage, not just their carry-on bags, onto the wide rubber belt for inspection.
As Jed approached the machine, a European man in jeans and a spray jacket walked over and stood beside the seated security officer. It was close to a hundred degrees outside and warm and sticky inside the terminal, despite the airconditioning. Jed guessed the man wore a jacket to conceal a shoulder holster. He peered intently at the screen as Jed dropped his suit bag and then his pack onto the conveyor. As he walked through the metal detector, the beeping alarm sounded.
The man in the civilian clothes looked up and stared at Jed as a second uniformed security officer, an African woman, ran a metal-detecting wand over his body. The wand made a buzzing noise as it passed over Jed’s pants pocket. The woman asked him to empty his pockets. Jed noticed out of the corner of his eye that the conveyor belt had stopped. The man was alternating his gaze between the machine’s monitor and Jed.
Jed reached into his pocket and pulled out his mobile phone. The female security guard made him walk through the detector again and, when the alarm did not go off, she handed him back his phone.
The conveyor belt started once more and Jed’s bags emerged. As he picked up his pack, the man in civilian clothes whispered something to the male security guard, who called a third colleague.
‘Please empty the contents of your bag on that table, sir,’ the standing security guard said.
‘Why?’ Jed asked.
‘We need to check something, sir. Now, if you don’t mind …’
‘What if I do mind? What are you looking for?’
‘We’re not sure until we inspect your bags, sir.’
‘Both bags?’
The security guard looked over at the man in civilian clothes, who nodded.
Jed emptied his pack and then his bag, keeping his eyes locked on the European man the whole time. The man held his gaze, but did not come closer or take part in the thorough examination of the bags’ contents.
Amongst his civilian clothes were a few items of military-issue gear he thought would come in handy in Africa. He had a web belt with a couple of water bottles in their carriers, an ammo pouch, his green mosquito net, and a pair of tan battle dress utility trousers and matching bush hat. His pack had originally been drab olive-green, but he had lightened the colouring with liberal splashes of sandcoloured paint for his time in Afghanistan.
‘You are in the military?’ the security guard asked.
‘No, I’m in real estate.’
The guard looked confused. He held up the fatigue pants. ‘Why do you have these then?’
‘Because it would be embarrassing walking around in my boxer shorts.’
‘And this hat?’
‘Prevents skin cancer.’
The security guard gave up. He turned to the man in civilian clothes and shrugged.
Jed repacked his bags, without any help from the guard. As he shouldered his pack he said, ‘Whatever you’re looking for, I don’t have it.’
The man took a mobile phone out of his jacket pocket, punched in a number and started speaking, his free hand covering his mouth. Jed picked up the suit bag and left.
He found a coffee shop on the departure side and ordered himself a cup of black coffee. He pulled out his wallet. In it was a picture of Miranda, taken during her summer vacation the year before. She was wearing a cropped green T-shirt and khaki walking shorts, her blonde hair tied back in a ponytail. She was smiling wide, hands on her hips. She had grown into a beautiful young woman and he had missed so much of her life.
The picture had been taken at a campsite on the Appalachian Trail. They had spent a week together, just the two of them, hiking a demanding stretch of the route through steep valleys and dense woods.
‘On nights like this I can see why you joined the Army,’ she had said the night after the picture was taken.
‘How do you mean?’
‘You must spend so many nights out under the stars, away from it all. The peace, the freedom, it must be such a blast.’
‘Sometimes more of a blast than you might think. It’s not all camping out, you know.’
‘Hey, I know it’s dangerous, but tell me you don’t love being out in the field, away from the rat race.’
‘I’d be lying if I said I didn’t,’ Jed admitted. ‘Though it sounds like you’ll get your fair share of nights under the stars in Africa.’