Deon Meyer (23 page)

 

 

* * *

He dozed shallowly, fitfully crossing the border of sleep, dreams and reality mixing. He was riding the GS down infinite roads, feeling the faint vibration of the bike in his legs, talking to Pakamile, hearing the rain on the roof of the cottage and then the sucking sound of tires in the mud, an engine at low revs, but he only really woke up to the bang of a car door. He rolled off the mattress, continued rolling up to the wall beneath the window.

 

 

Anonymous from Mitchell’s Plain, go ahead, you are on the air.

 

 

Hello, John, can you hear me?

 

 

You are on the air, go ahead.

 

 

I’m on the air?

 

 

Yes, Anonymous, the whole country can hear you.

 

 

Oh. Well. I just wanted to say this Mpayipheli is not the hero you make him out to be.

 

 

We are not making him into a hero. We are letting the facts speak. What have you got for us?

 

 

I don’t know if it is the same guy, but there was a Thobela Mpayipheli working for a drug dealer in Mitchell’s Plain. Big black man. Mean as a junkyard dog. And they were saying he was ex-MK. They used to call him “Tiny.”

 

 

Working for a drug gang?

 

 

Yes, John. He was what we call an “enforcer.”

 

 

“We,” Anonymous? Who are “we”?

 

 

I used to be a drug dealer in the Cape Flats.

 

 

You were a drug dealer?

 

 

Yes.

 

 

In Mitchell’s Plain?

 

 

No. I worked from the southern suburbs.

 

 

Sounds like a franchise business. And what does an “enforcer” do, Anonymous?

 

 

He makes sure the dealers pay the supplier. By beating them up or shooting them. Or their families.

 

 

And Mpayipheli worked as an enforcer for a supplier?

 

 

He worked for the biggest supplier in the Peninsula at the time. That was before the Nigerian Mafia came to town. These days, they run the show.

 

 

The Nigerian Mafia? We must have you back for a radio show all of your own, Anonymous. So what made you quit dealing?

 

 

I did time. I’m rehabilitated now.

 

 

There you have it. Strange but true.

 

 

This is a strange country, John, believe me.

 

 

Amen, brother.

 

 

He lay on the floor, breathing the dust. Footsteps sounded as if they were circling the motorbike. Then a voice called.

 

 

“Helloooo …”

 

 

Instinctively he looked around for a weapon, cursing himself for not keeping the soldier’s assault rifle. He could break a leg off the table. He stopped one stride away. No more violence, no more fighting. Implications ran through his mind. Did this mean the journey was over, could he go home? It meant Johnny Kleintjes was fucked; he stood in limbo between instinct and desire.

 

 

“Hello, the house …” A man’s voice. Afrikaans. Was it the farmer?

 

 

His hands hung by his sides but were clenching open and shut.

 

 

“Thobela?” he heard the voice say his name. “Thobela Mpayipheli?”

 

 

Soldiers,
he thought, adrenaline flowing through his veins. One step to the table, he grabbed one wooden leg in his hands and pressed his foot against the tabletop.
No,
said his mind,
no, let it

 

 

be over.

 

 

Go ahead, Elise, what is your take on this unfolding drama?

 

 

Two things, John. First, I don’t believe this drug business at all. Why is it that people always want to drag someone down the moment they hit the limelight? Second, I am the secretary of the Pretoria BMW Motorcycle Club, and I just want to say we don’t need the Hell’s Angels to act on our behalf. Mr. Mpayipheli is riding a BMW, and if anybody helps him, it will be the BMW motorcycle fraternity. I don’t know how the Hell’s Angels with their Harleys are going to travel on the gravel roads of the Northern Cape.

 

 

So the fugitive is a member of a BMW club?

 

 

No, John, but he rides a BMW.

 

 

And that gives you ownership.

 

 

We don’t own him, John. But neither do the Hell’s Angels.

 

 

What’s this about gravel roads?

 

 

Mr. Mpayipheli slipped through the roadblocks by traveling on gravel roads. He’s on a GS, you know.

 

 

And what is a GS?

 

 

It’s an on road/off road motorcycle.

 

 

Like a scrambler?

 

 

No. Yes, I suppose you could call it a scrambler with a thyroid condition.

 

 

Ha. Now there’s the quote of the day. How do you know he slipped through a roadblock?

 

 

It is all on our website, John.

 

 

Your website?

 

 

Yes. www.bmwmotorrad.co.za. We have inside information.

 

 

And just how is your website getting inside information?

 

 

Oh, policemen ride BMWs, too, you know.

 

 

“I’m coming inside, Thobela, don’t shoot. I’m your friend.”
Don’t shoot.
They still thought he was armed.

 

 

“I’m on my own, Thobela, be nice.” The door opened. “I’m on your side, my brother.”

 

 

He waited the space of a single heartbeat and dropped his shoulder in readiness.

 

 

* * *

“I can’t get it,” said Rahjev Rajkumar. The web browser showed an error message:
The page cannot be displayed. The page you are looking for is currently unavailable. The website might be experiencing technical difficulties, or you may need to adjust your browser settings.

 

 

“Motorrad has two
rs,”
said Vincent Radebe softly.

 

 

“How do you know?” said Rajkumar nastily.

 

 

“It’s German for ‘motorcycle.’ ”

 

 

He typed in the new address. This time the website loaded. At the top, under the page title were the words FOLLOW THE GS FUGITIVE— AN INSIDE STORY.

 

 

* * *

He stood with his feet apart, shoulder lowered, the internal battle raging, knowing it was his moment of truth, knowing this was where he would win or lose— on so many levels.

 

 

The door swung slowly wider. The voice was soft and soothing. “I am a man of peace.”

 

 

A colored man, dressed in tattered suit, anonymous gray shirt, and a bow tie that could have been red in a previous era. His eyes were wide and he held his hands up in front protectively.

 

 

“Who are you?”

 

 

“I am Koos Kok,” he said very carefully. “You won’t kill me now, hey?”

 

 

“How do you know my name?”

 

 

“Just one look at that big motorbike. You are all over the radio. The ‘big, bad Xhosa biker.’ ”

 

 

“What?”

 

 

“Everyone is very excitable about you.”

 

 

“What are you doing here?” Mpayipheli straightened up.

 

 

“I was lonely for my winter house,” he said, motioning at the cottage. “I came to keep myself warm.”

 

 

* * *

“ ‘They had a roadblock at Three Sisters, manned by an army unit, some SAP and traffic authorities, and a big helicopter. They also had some Rooivalk attack helicopters at Beaufort West who tried to follow the GS, but the rain forced them back,’ ” Rajkumar read aloud from the website, and he wondered why fate had singled him out to be the bearer of bad news.

 

 

“Shit,” said Quinn.

 

 

“Go on,” said Janina.

 

 

“Apparently the GS took a side road, presumably the Sneeukraal turnoff, and went through a two-soldier roadblock, hurting one badly. Then he disappeared. That is all I have at the moment.

 

 

“ ‘The only way we can help this guy is if all BMW owners in the country unite. We must all gather at Three Sisters and try to find him. That way, we can help him get through to wherever he is going.’ ”

 

 

“They want to help him,” said Quinn.

 

 

“Who wrote that?” asked Janina.

 

 

“ ‘An Insider.’ That is all they say.”

 

 

“Fucking policeman,” said Quinn, and saw Janina’s disapproving eye. “I beg your pardon, ma’am.”

 

 

“Is there any more?” she asked Rajkumar.

 

 

“There are a few messages from guys who say they are going to help.”

 

 

“How many?”

 

 

He counted. “Eleven. Twelve.”

 

 

“Not many,” said Quinn.

 

 

“Too many,” said Janina. “They’ll get in the way.”

 

 

“Ma’am,” said Vincent Radebe.

 

 

“Yes?”

 

 

He held out the phone to her. “The director.”

 

 

She took the receiver. “Sir?”

 

 

“The minister wants to see us, Janina.”

 

 

“In her office?”

 

 

“Yes.”

 

 

“Shall I meet you there, sir?”

 

 

* * *

We have time for one more call. Burt from the Hell’s Angels, you back again?

 

 

Yes, John. Two things. We don’t ride Harleys. Well, a few members do, but only a few. And this thing that the black guy belongs to the BMW people is bullshit.

 

 

Let’s watch the language, Burt. This is a family show.

 

 

I’m sorry, but they’re nothing but a bunch of fair-weather, breakfast-run weekend wannabe bikers.

 

 

What happened to the great brotherhood of motorcycle riders, Burt?

 

 

Real bikers, John. Not these Beemer sissies. That Mpheli… Mpayi… that guy out there is a real biker. A war veteran, a warrior of the road. Like us.

 

 

And you can’t even pronounce his name.

 

 

 

20.

T
hey got two ministers for the price of one. The minister of intelligence was a woman, lean, as fitted her office, a forty-three-year-old Tswana from the North West Province. The minister of water affairs and forestry sat in the corner, a gray-haired white man, an icon of the Struggle. He said not a word. Janina Mentz did not know why he was there.

 

 

The director and she sat down in front of the desk. Janina glanced briefly at the director before she began to speak. He indicated with a minimal nod that she must hold nothing back. She filled in the background first: the Ismail Mohammed interview, the counterintelligence operation, and the things that had gone wrong.

 

 

“Have you seen the TV news?” asked the intelligence minister coldly.

 

 

“Yes, Minister.” Resignedly. Not for the first time did Janina wonder why politicians were more sensitive about TV than about newspapers.

 

 

“Every half hour there is something new over the radio. And the more they talk, the more he becomes a hero. And we look like the Gestapo.” A dainty fist emphasized her words on the wood of the desktop, her voice rose half an octave. “This cannot continue. I want solutions. We have a public relations crisis. What do I tell the president when he calls? And he will call. What do I say?”

 

 

“Minister … ,” said Janina.

 

 

“Two agents at the airport. Two Rooivalk helicopters and a whole brigade at Three Sisters and you don’t even know where he is.”

 

 

Janina had no answer.

 

 

And everyone wonders why the rand falls and the world laughs. At Africa. At bungling, backward Africa. I am tired of that attitude. Sick to death of it. This cabinet”— the minister stood up, too angry to sit, her hands bracketing her words—“labors night and day, battling the odds, and what support do we get from the civil service? Bungling. Lame excuses. Is that good enough?”

 

 

Janina stared at the carpet. The minister drew a deep breath, collected herself, and sat down again.

 

 

“Minister,” said the director in his soft, diplomatic tones, “while we are speaking frankly, may I place a few points on the record. This is the first well-planned counterintelligence operation we have attempted, and may I say it is high time. It is not only necessary but also ingenious. Creative. Nothing that has happened has jeopardized the purpose of the mission. On the contrary, the longer this develops, the more genuine it will look to the CIA. Granted, things haven’t unfolded as planned, but that is the way life goes.”

 

 

“Is that what I must say to the president, Mr. Director? That is the way life goes?” Her tone was sarcastic and cold.

 

 

The director’s tone echoed hers: “Minister, you know shifting blame is not my style, but if the members of the police service were loyal to the collective state, the media would not be having a field day. Perhaps we should place the blame where it belongs: at the door of the minister of safety and security. It is high time he sorted this out.”

 

 

“This operation is my responsibility. My portfolio.” She had calmed down, but the mood was fragile.

 

 

“But the behavior of another department is jeopardizing the operation. Undermining it. We don’t shirk taking our punishment, but it must be deserved. The circumstances at the airport were such that we wanted to avoid an incident. Our people acted with circumspection. As for the weather: our influence does not stretch that far.” Janina had never heard the director speak with such passion.