A Beautiful Place to Die Part 4

3.

THE FRONT OFFICE of the Jacob's Rest police station consisted of one large room with two wooden desks, five chairs, and a metal filing cabinet pushed against the back wall. Gray lines worn into the polished concrete floor made a map of each policeman's daily journey from door to desk to cabinet. A doorway at one side led to the cells and another in the back wall to a separate office. Shabalala was nowhere to be seen. of the Jacob's Rest police station consisted of one large room with two wooden desks, five chairs, and a metal filing cabinet pushed against the back wall. Gray lines worn into the polished concrete floor made a map of each policeman's daily journey from door to desk to cabinet. A doorway at one side led to the cells and another in the back wall to a separate office. Shabalala was nowhere to be seen.

Emmanuel entered the back office. Captain Pretorius's desk was larger and neater than the others and had a black telephone in one corner. He picked up the receiver and dialed district headquarters.

"Congratulations." Major van Niekerk's cultured voice crackled down the line after the operator's third attempt to connect them.

"What for, sir?"

"Uniting the country. Once the story gets out, the native, English and Afrikaans press will finally have something to agree on-that the Detective Branch is understaffed, ill informed and losing the battle against crime. One detective to cover the murder of a white police officer-the newspapers will have to run extra editions."

Emmanuel felt a jolt. "You know about the case, sir?"

"Just got a call from the National Party boys." The statement was overlaid with a casual indifference that didn't ring true. "The Security Branch, no less. They think Pretorius's murder may be political."

"The Security Branch?" Emmanuel tensed. "How did they get to hear about it so fast?"

"They didn't get the information from me, Cooper. Someone at your end must have tipped them off."

There was no way Hansie Hepple or Shabalala were hooked up to such heavyweights. The Security Branch wasn't a regional body monitoring rainfall and crop production. They were entrusted with matters of national security and had the power to pull the rug from under anyone-including Major van Niekerk and the whole Detective Branch. Did the Pretorius brothers have those kinds of connections?

"What do they mean by 'political'?" Emmanuel asked.

"The defiance campaign's got them spooked. They think the murder may be the beginning of Communist-style revolt by the natives."

"How did they come up with that?" The revolution idea would be funny if anyone but the Security Branch had flagged it. "The defiance campaign protesters prefer burning their ID pa.s.ses and marching to the town hall after curfew. They want the National Party segregation laws repealed. Killing policemen isn't their style."

"Maybe the Security Branch knows something we don't. Either way, they made sure I knew they were taking an interest in the case and they expect to be informed of any developments as they occur."

"Is taking an interest as far as it goes?" Even members of the foot section of the police knew "taking an interest" was code for taking control.

There was a long pause. "My guess is, if the defiance campaign dies down, they'll step back. If it doesn't, there's no telling what they'll do. We're in different times now, Cooper."

Emmanuel didn't think the defiance campaign showed any sign of dying down. Prime Minister Malan and the National Party had begun to enact their plan as soon as they'd taken office. The new segregation laws divided people into race groups, told them where they could live and told them where they could work. The Immorality Act went so far as to tell people whom they could sleep with and love. The growth of the defiance campaign meant that the Security Branch, or Special Branch as it was tagged on the street, would walk right into Emmanuel's investigation and call the shots.

"When can you get more men onto the case, sir?"

"Twenty-four hours," van Niekerk said. "Everyone here is focused on a body found by the railway line. She's white, thank G.o.d. That means the press will keep running with the story. I'll get a day to pull some men from headquarters and load them onto your case on the quiet."

Major van Niekerk, the product of a highbred English mother and a rich Dutch father, liked to keep a clear line of sight between himself and his ultimate prize: commissioner of police. His present rank of major wasn't high enough for him. His motto was simple: What's good for me is good for South Africa. Sending out a single detective on a crank call that turned out to be an actual homicide wasn't something he was keen to make public.

"And the Security Branch?" Emmanuel asked.

"I'll handle them." Van Niekerk made it sound easy, but it was going to be more like taking a knife from a Gypsy. "Meanwhile, you've got a chance to treat this like an ordinary murder, not a test case for the soundness of the new racial segregation laws. Consider yourself-"

Static swallowed up the rest of the sentence and left an industrial hiss breathing down the line.

"Major?"

The singsong beep, beep, beep beep, beep, beep signaled a disconnected line. Emmanuel hung up. Lucky? Was that the major's last word? Consider yourself lucky? signaled a disconnected line. Emmanuel hung up. Lucky? Was that the major's last word? Consider yourself lucky?

Emmanuel tipped the contents of the captain's drawer onto the desktop and began sorting through it. Booking forms, paper clips, pencils, and rubber bands got placed to one side. That left a small box of ammunition and a week-old newspaper. The box revealed rows of gold bullets. The newspaper stories he'd read last Wednesday. No luck there.

"Detective Sergeant?"

Shabalala stood in the doorway, a steaming mug of tea in hand. For such a large man, he moved with alarming quiet. He'd stripped down to his undershirt, and his trousers were damp from where he'd washed the material in an attempt to clean it. The black location, five miles to the north of town, was too far to ride his bicycle for the sake of a change of clothes.

"Thank you, Constable." Emmanuel took the tea, aware of the crisp lines of the shirt he'd changed into half an hour earlier. The Protea Guesthouse, the boardinghouse where he'd thrown down his bag, then washed and changed, was in the heart of town, surrounded by other white-owned homes. Shabalala would have to wait for nighttime to wash the smell of the dead captain from his skin.

"Where's your desk?" The front office, like the one at district headquarters, was reserved for European policemen.

"In here." Shabalala stepped back and allowed him entry through the side door to a room that included two jail cells and a narrow s.p.a.ce with a desk and chair. A row of hooks above the desk held the keys to the cells and a whip made of rhino hide called a shambok, the deadly South African version of an English bobby's truncheon. A window looked out to the backyard, and underneath it sat a small table with a box of rooibos tea, a teapot, and some mismatched porcelain mugs. Tin plates, mugs and spoons for the native policeman rested on a separate shelf.

"What's out there?"

Shabalala swung the back door open and politely motioned him out first. Emmanuel picked the black man's tea up off the table and handed the tin mug to him. The police station yard was a dusty patch of land. A huge avocado tree dominated the far end and cast a skirt of shade around its trunk. Closer in, a small fire glowed in a circle of stones. Shabalala's coat and jacket, wiped down from filthy to dirty by a wet cloth, hung over some chairs crowded around the outdoor hearth. A small sniff of the air and it was possible to imagine the smell of the police station's Friday-night braai and fresh jugs of beer.

"Did you know the captain a long time?" Emmanuel's tea was milky and sweet, the way he guessed Pretorius must have liked it.

The black man shifted uncomfortably. "Since before."

Emmanuel switched to Zulu. "You grew up together?"

"Yebo."

Silence breathed between them as they stood drinking tea. Emmanuel noted the tension in Shabalala's neck and shoulders. There was something on the black man's mind. He let Shabalala make the first move.

"The captain..." Shabalala stared across the yard. "He was not like the other Dutchmen..."

Emmanuel made a sound of understanding but didn't say anything. He was afraid of breaking the fragile bond he felt between himself and the native constable.

"He was..."

Emmanuel waited. Nothing came. Shabalala's face wore the curious blank look he'd noticed at the crime scene. It was as if the Zulu-Shangaan man had flicked a switch somewhere deep inside himself and unplugged the power. The connection was broken. Whatever Shabalala had on his mind, he'd decided to keep it there under lock and key.

Emmanuel, however, needed to know why the Security Branch was sniffing around this homicide.

"What clubs did the captain belong to?" he asked Shabalala.

"He went always to the Dutch people's church on Sunday, and also the Sports Club where he and his sons played games."

If the captain had been a member of a secret Boer organization like the Broederbond, Shabalala would be the last to know. He had to find a simpler way to track down the Security Branch connection.

"Is there another phone in town besides the one here at the station?"

"The hospital, the old Jew, the garage and the hotel have phones," Shabalala said. "The post office has a machine for telegrams."

Emmanuel swallowed the remainder of his tea. Two phone calls that he knew of had gone out regarding the murder. One to van Niekerk, who'd sooner eat horse s.h.i.t than call in the Security Branch, the other to Paul Pretorius of army intelligence. It was time to go direct to the source, the family home, and find out what information it yielded.

"I'll go and pay my respects to the widow," Emmanuel said. "Is the captain's house far from here?"

"No." Shabalala opened the back door and allowed him to enter first. "You must walk to the petrol station and then go right onto van Riebeeck Street. It is the white house with many flowers."

Emmanuel pictured a fence made from wagon wheels and a wrought-iron gate decorated with migrating springbok. The house itself probably had a name like Die Groot Trek, the Great Trek, spelled out above the doorway. True Boers didn't need good taste; they had G.o.d on their side.

The late-afternoon sun began to wane and blue shadows fell across the flat strip of the main street. The handful of shops sustained themselves with a trickle of holidaymakers on their way to the beaches of Mozambique and the wilds of the Kruger National Park. There was OK Bazaar for floral dresses, plain shirts and school uniforms, all in sensible cotton. Donny's All Goods, for everything from single cigarettes to Lady Fair sewing patterns. Kloppers for Bata shoes and farm boots. Moira's Hairstyles, closed for the day. Then, on the corner, stood Pretorius Farm Supply behind a wire fence.

A handwritten sign was tied to the mesh: "Closed due to unforeseen circ.u.mstances." Unforeseen. That was probably the simplest way to get a handle on the murder of your father. Inside the compound a black watchman paced the front of the large supply warehouse while an Alsatian dog, chained to a spike in the ground, ran restless circles of its territory.

Across a small side street was the garage Shabalala had told him about. The sign above the three petrol pumps read "Pretorius Petrol and Garage." It was open, manned by an old coloured man in grease-covered overalls probably called in at short notice to supervise the black teenagers operating the pumps. Why wasn't the town called Pretoriusburg? The family owned a big enough slice of it.

Emmanuel turned right onto van Riebeeck Street. The neat country houses with manicured beds of aloe and flowering protea had a deserted air. Garden boys, now usually finishing up for the day, were nowhere in sight. Dried laundry flapped on backyard lines. No maids. No "missus" or "baas," either.

The news was out, he guessed. A quick glance down van Riebeeck confirmed it. A group of the captain's neighbors was gathered in front of a house at the end of the street. Housemaids and garden boys, many of them gray haired despite the t.i.tle, stood in a group two dwellings down: close enough to look on yet far enough to show respect.

A woman's sob floated out into the afternoon. Emmanuel approached a wide gravel driveway choked with cars. An elegant Cape Dutchstyle house nestled in an established garden. A dark thatched roof perched over graceful gables and gleaming whitewashed walls. Wooden shutters, the exact shade of the thatch, were shut against the world. A long veranda, decorated with flowerpots, ran the length of the house. There wasn't a wagon wheel in sight.

Like the captain's hand-tooled watch, the house was a surprise. Where was the bleached antelope skull he expected to find nailed over the doorway? He stepped past the front b.u.mper of a dusty Mercedes and into the garden.

"Hey! Who you?" A hand settled on his shoulder and stayed there. A skinny white man with watery blue eyes stared him down. The crowd turned to examine the interloper.

"I'm Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper." He flicked his ID open and held it uncomfortably close to the man's face. "I'm the investigating officer in this case. Are you a family member?"

The hand dropped. "No. Just making sure we all act decent toward Captain Pretorius and his family."

Emmanuel returned his ID to his pocket and smiled to show there were no hard feelings.

"He's okay, Athol. Let him by." Hansie stood on the veranda in his filthy uniform, cheeks glowing an eggsh.e.l.l pink. Exercising his authority in public agreed with him.

"This way, Detective Sergeant." Hansie waved him across the garden flushed with early spring color, and up the stairs that led to the imposing front door. Emmanuel took off his hat.

"I've come to pay my respects to Mrs. Pretorius. The family all here?"

"Everyone except Paul." Hansie opened the front door and ushered him in. "Mrs. Pretorius and her daughters-in-law are seeing to the captain. The rest are out on the back veranda."

They entered a small receiving area that led farther along to a series of closed doors, most likely the bedrooms. Hansie walked left into a large room dominated by heavy wooden furniture, the kind built to withstand generations of pounding by unruly boys and leather-skinned men. The polished tile floor was smooth as snakeskin under the yellow light of the gla.s.s-faced lanterns. An enormous sideboard covered in trophies and framed photos ran along one side of the room.

The photographs covered several generations of the Pretorius clan. There was a girl in ponytails playing in the snow, then a dour-faced clergyman surrounded by an army of equally humorless children. The next photo showed a young Captain Pretorius and a pretty woman in her twenties seated on a park bench. Then an image stopped Emmanuel in his tracks. The Pretorius boys, ranging in age from five to fifteen, stood shoulder to shoulder in their Voortrekker Scout uniforms. It was night and their faces and uniforms gleamed in the light of the flaming torches held high in their hands. Their eyes stared out at him, hard with Afrikaner pride. Emmanuel thought of Nuremberg: all those rosy-cheeked German boys marching toward defeat.

"The Great Trek celebration," Hansie said. "Captain and Mrs. Pretorius took us Voortrekker Scouts on a trip to Pretoria for the ceremony. We got to throw the torches into a huge fire."

Emmanuel remembered his own trip to the same celebration well. He remembered the heat of the flames breathing onto his face and the uncomfortable feeling that he was outside the circle of those selected by G.o.d to be pure.

"I read about it in the papers," he said, and moved on to the next photo. Paul, as big and thick necked as his brothers, in army uniform, then a Pretorius family portrait no more than a year or two old. He focused on the youngest son, who was finer boned than his brothers, with a sensitive mouth and messy blond hair that fell over his forehead. The captain and his wife had run out of brawn by the time it came to making Louis.

"An Englishman came through town with his camera and charged one pound to take a photo. We have one in our house showing me with my ma and sisters."

They moved through to the kitchen, where two black maids laid cold meat and slabs of bread onto a giant platter. A third maid, white haired and ancient, sat at the small table and sobbed in quiet bursts.

"That's Aggie," Hansie whispered. "She's been with the family since Henrick was a baby. She's not so good anymore, but the captain wouldn't let her go."

They pa.s.sed a dining room dominated by a wooden table and chairs that carried a whiff of the Bavarian forest. Large windows looked out onto the vine-covered back veranda where a group of older men, rough farmers in khaki, stood together in a tight bunch.

"The fathers-in-law," Hansie explained. They stepped out of the house and onto the veranda. Six children, from knee to shoulder height, played with a wooden spinning top that wobbled and bounced between them. A young black girl rocked a fat white baby on her knee. The Pretorius brothers held their own council out on the garden lawn. All except Louis.

Emmanuel approached them. Erich started straight in.

"Hansie here says it was the old Jew who looked Pa over. How's that?"

"Checked his papers myself. Everything was in order. He was qualified to conduct the examination."

He waited for angry denials, but none came. The brothers stared back at him, expressions unchanged.

"Pa was right." Henrick's speech was a beat too slow, thanks to an afternoon of steady drinking. "He always said the old Jew had something to hide."

"Shifty," Erich threw in. "Who else but the old Jew would lie about something like that, hey? Probably doesn't know how to tell the truth. No practice."

The Pretorius brothers were halfway to being wrecked, and in no hurry to slow the ride.

"Did your father and the old Jew have a disagreement lately?"

"Not for a while," Henrick said. "Pa went to see him a couple of times this past year just to talk to him about how things work here in Jacob's Rest. Give him guidelines, like. To keep him clear of trouble."

"Good of him," Emmanuel said mildly, recalling Zweigman's comment about the captain dropping in for a "friendly chat." "You think the old Jew resented your father's help?"

Henrick shrugged. "Maybe."

"Enough to kill him over?" Emmanuel plowed ahead, exploiting the brothers' relaxed state of mind. Sober, it was hard to find a wedge into them.

Erich snorted. "Him, kill my pa?"

"The old Jew's scared of guns," Henrick explained. "Won't touch them. Won't even sell bullets from his shop."

"He couldn't strangle a chicken without help," Johannes said.

"Couldn't p.i.s.s on a fire without his wife aiming it for him," Erich added with a mean-spirited giggle that set the brothers laughing.

Emmanuel let the laughter subside. In a few hours, when the whiskey bravado had worn off, they'd feel the full weight of their father's murder, and remember that the killer still walked free among them.