The Serpentine Road (13 page)

‘And was she going to?’

Again, Bhekifa re-adjusts his position, frowns. De Vries smiles to himself; it is impossible to be comfortable in that chair. The legs on one side have been shortened so that the seat is at a slight angle and within minutes the back of the suspect begins to ache; the chair is too low for an adult.

‘Yes. A few weeks ago, we decided that the DRP could benefit from a strong funding base. She was prepared to be our first major financial supporter, to play a role in policy formation, concentrate on areas she was an expert in.’

‘Did she make a payment?’

‘No. She told me that funds would have to be released, that she would investigate how soon this could be done. There were also other matters she wished to consider but, in principle, she wanted to support us.’

De Vries nods.

‘At any point in the last weeks, did Miss Holt express any concern about her safety?’

‘Not really . . . She told me that her exhibition was causing some problems, that some small-minded locals had objected and were calling her, meeting with her, sending her threatening letters, but she said that it was because they did not understand the art.’

‘What did you think of it?’

‘I did not see the letters.’

‘I meant the art.’

‘Oh, that . . . I only saw two or three paintings when they were in her house. They were powerful. They represented what Taryn was about. They were great art, and they conveyed a message.’

‘You didn’t visit her gallery?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘I am sure that I would have, but I am busy too. I have my businesses as well as the work I do for the DRP.’

‘Last week, when did you see Miss Holt?’

‘We spoke a lot.’ He looks De Vries in the face. ‘You will know that if you have seen records of our calls to each other. I did not think that I would see her, but on Wednesday I wanted to be with her. She was upset by the demonstration and the attack on the gallery, so I drove into town, told her I would be at her home and, when she came back, I kept her company that night.’

‘What time did you arrive?’

Bhekifa shrugs.

‘I don’t know. Ten thirty perhaps?’

‘And you left the next day, when?’

‘Maybe 7.30 a.m. Taryn wanted to return to the gallery, to sort out the damage. She starts every day early.’

‘And that was the last time you saw her?’

‘No.’ He leans forward. ‘I saw her just for an hour on Thursday night.’

‘What time?’

‘Again, I don’t know exactly. I was in Cape Town meeting a client. We had a late meeting, a drink together and then, on my way back, I called in on Taryn. Maybe 9.30 p.m. I don’t know.’

‘Did you call her before going to her house?’

‘No. I wanted to surprise her. To show her that I was concerned about her.’

‘How long did you stay?’

‘I said, about an hour.’

‘And where did you go from there?’

‘Home. I was tired. I had been working all day and then had this meeting in Cape Town in the evening.’

‘Can anybody vouch for when you arrived home?’

‘Maybe. I live in my own development of six apartments. I don’t know if the security guard was at the desk, but there are cameras. I might be on them . . . Taryn was killed that night?’

‘Yes.’

‘When? What happened?’

‘We think someone broke in and shot Miss Holt.’

‘A robbery?’

‘Probably not.’

De Vries sees pain etched on his face, is uncertain whether the expression matches what he reads in the man’s eyes. There is not grief, but concern.

‘I need to ask you some more questions.’

‘Yes, okay . . .’

‘Miss Holt had an alarm system at her home. Were you familiar with it?’

‘I suppose so. She had a remote for it in her bedroom. I had not seen one of those before.’

‘Did she activate the alarm after you had left?’

Trevor Bhekifa pauses.

‘I don’t know. Probably.’

‘You didn’t hear anything as you left? The sound of the alarm arming?’

‘No.’

‘Where was Miss Holt when you left?’

‘In the house. She came to the door with me. She said good-bye; said that she was going to have a bath.’

‘And you drove straight home?’

‘Yes.’

Something in Bhekifa’s tone makes De Vries say: ‘Yes?’

‘Yes . . . I sat in my car for a while after I had left her.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I was not sure about how I felt. I think she wanted me to stay with her, but I had meetings early the next day . . . I was deciding if I should go back to her. I needed to be home. If I had stayed with her, she would not be dead now.’

De Vries stares at him, says: ‘You might both be dead.’

‘Trevor Bhekifa is the last person we know who saw Taryn Holt alive. He claims he left her house at approximately 10.30 p.m. That puts him within thirty minutes of the earliest estimate of the time of death. There may be corroborative evidence at his place of residence if the video cameras recorded his return. I have already dispatched officers to investigate that.’

‘So, he remains a suspect?’

‘Yes, sir.’

De Vries is aware that most of the squad-room are stealing glances at General Thulani in his office. He is rarely seen on any of the operations floors; many of the elite unit team have never met him.

‘What can I tell his father?’

‘Whatever you choose, sir. His son has admitted to having a relationship with the victim, that he was interested in involving her in his political party, the . . . Democratic Reform Party. He wanted her to become a donor to the party.’

Thulani shakes his head slowly. De Vries wonders whether he rues Trevor Bhekifa’s political actions – in direct opposition to his illustrious father – or whether it is the mingling of races in the bedroom which disturbs him. He knows little about the Assistant Deputy Provincial Commissioner beyond the fact that he has vied with De Vries’s own boss, Henrik du Toit, for most of their careers, and has been overt in his desire to see Du Toit, De Vries and any other white officers he considers tainted by their service during the Apartheid era shunted into the background.

‘If she was to donate to his party, what motive, then, would he have to murder her?’

‘Nothing obvious,’ De Vries says. ‘If it was him, there could have been relationship problems. She was not monogamous and certainly had at least one other boyfriend at this time. Men and women become jealous; a disagreement can easily turn violent. It is still early in the investigation.’

Thulani feels under his shirt collar.

‘Tread very carefully, Colonel. You are dealing with important, influential people here. Men who have connections to the highest levels of government, to the very top.’

‘I am aware of that, sir.’

‘Your performance will reflect on all of us.’

‘I must go where the evidence takes me. But, I hear what you say.’

He sees Thulani glance at him; his is not an expression of confidence.

‘You impressed on everyone the importance of keeping all elements of the investigation private, away from the press?’

‘I did.’

‘You do not have a reputation, Colonel, for discretion or diplomacy. This is your opportunity to impress me.’

De Vries resists a parting comment, watches Thulani strut heavily across the squad-room to the elevators.

On his return from Stellenbosch, Don February travels straight to Sergeant Joey Morten, the department’s technology consultant. Attached to the Crime Scene Unit based in the building, he sits in a small office surrounded by computer screens. Don hands him the memory stick and, within moments, on screen he can see the foyer to Bhekifa’s luxurious apartment building.

Above the security desk, which is located opposite the elevators, are four analogue clocks indicating the time in Cape Town, New York, London and Tokyo. In the bottom right hand corner of the screen, displayed digitally, is the date and time. Don looks around as the door to Morten’s office opens and De Vries’s head appears.

‘I have it here,’ Don tells him.

‘What time did you say he got back?’

‘About 12.30 a.m., but there are timing issues.’

‘Meaning?’

Don indicates towards the screen.

‘We are just looking at it now.’

‘Where does this start and end, Don?’ Morten asks.

‘The security guard called the company who installed the equipment. I talked to the owner. He said that this system records digitally for a period of twenty-eight days before the records are deleted. The recording is sent electronically immediately to the company offices in central Stellenbosch. That is where I went. There was no problem in obtaining a copy. I requested the period from 9 p.m. on Thursday, second April to 6 a.m. on Friday, third.’

‘What do you mean “timing issues”?’ De Vries asks.

On the screen, the picture is now running at normal speed.

‘Look at the clocks above the desk, sir,’ Morten says. ‘You can see that they all say that it is twenty-five minutes past the hour.’

‘
Ja
.’

‘Now look down here . . .’ He points to the digital time reading on the recording. It reads thirty-seven minutes past the hour. ‘It’s twelve minutes out.’

De Vries says: ‘Which is the correct time?’

‘I did not know there was a difference until just now.’ Don says.

‘Just call the building,’ De Vries says impatiently. ‘Ask the security guard what the time is on the clocks and compare it to the correct time.’

Don nods, ducks out of the office.

‘Now, just get me the moment when Trevor Bhekifa appears, Sergeant. We’ll solve this time matter in due course.’

Morten fast-forwards through the recording until it reaches 12.32 on Friday, 3 April. At that moment, the camera picks up Bhekifa walking slowly into shot from behind the camera. He moves straight to the elevators. He presses a button between the two doors, the right-hand doors open and he steps inside.

‘You’re sure he doesn’t arrive earlier and go out again?’

Morten reverses the action, running at twelve times normal speed, watching for any movement in the foyer. He stops the recording at 11.47 when a couple enter, summon an elevator and walk into the left-hand lift. He continues travelling back in time, but no one else appears. Throughout that time, no security guard appears at the desk. De Vries wonders whether this could have any significance, or whether, more likely, the guard was snoozing somewhere off camera in the building.

Don February comes back into the room.

‘According to the guard on duty, the clocks were showing thirteen minutes to the hour. On my watch, it was exactly ten minutes to four, so they are three minutes slow.’

Morten says: ‘If they are three minutes slow, then the surveillance system time code is nine minutes fast. Bhekifa arrived home at 12.23 on Friday morning.’

‘That is almost two hours after he claimed he left Taryn Holt’s house,’ De Vries says. ‘At that time of night, how long would it take to drive from Oranjezicht to Stellenbosch? Forty-five minutes, an hour if he drives slowly. That means he could have left Holt’s house at 11.30, even 11.40 p.m. That puts him right in the time-frame.’

‘We get him back in?’ Don says.

‘Of course . . . But maybe not just yet.’ He turns to Morten.

‘How solid is this timing evidence for court, if it comes to that?’

Morten contemplates for a moment.

‘We should obtain a copy of the recording from the present time back to the time-frame covered here. The officer should check the time against an accurate source. We can check that neither the clocks on the wall of the foyer, nor the digital display, have been altered. Then, the timing is rock solid.’

‘Good. Sergeant, not one word of this goes anywhere. You understand?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I mean anywhere.’

Morten looks up at De Vries, meets his eye, nods.

They sit in silence at the back of the car. De Vries looks out of the window at the view of the Southern Suburbs anew, as a passenger now rather than as a driver watching the road; Thulani stares straight ahead. The interior of the car is cold; De Vries notes that the police driver is wearing a coat yet, outside, it is still warm. The car turns off the freeway into Bishopscourt; the peaceful, leafy streets are deserted, the plots of land extending to several hundred metres wide, most of the houses hidden from view. The car turns into a driveway, stops at a security gate. A uniformed guard appears, salutes the occupants, raises the barrier. The car drifts down a wide lane lined with olive trees under-planted with agapanthus, and pulls up under a covered porch by the front door. Another security guard opens the car door for Thulani, and De Vries’s door is opened by the driver. He walks around the car and up the steps to the house, a few paces behind Thulani. Once inside the grand hallway, a suited man greets them, leads them to the back of the house and into a formal sitting room, overlooking an expansive garden and, beyond, the breathtaking vista of the forested southern slopes of the mountainside. In a square armchair, a small, elderly man sits writing in a leather-bound folder. He wears a tweed check three-piece suit, gold cufflinks on thin wrists. As they approach him, he looks up, smiles at Thulani, leans forward in the chair and half rises. Thulani approaches, bends down to him, shakes his hand warmly.

‘This is one of my senior officers, Colonel de Vries.’

Vaughn moves forward, shakes Bheka Bhekifa’s hand gently. It is as if he is being granted an audience with royalty. The old man holds onto his hand, looks up at him.

‘You have been with the SAPS a long time, Colonel?’

‘Twenty-seven years, sir.’

‘Yes . . . You have that look about you.’

Bhekifa releases his hand, nods, shifts back in his chair until he is propped up in its crook.

‘Sit down, both of you.’ He turns to Thulani. ‘You tell me that there is news which I must hear only personally from you. This concerns me. Do not keep me waiting any longer.’

De Vries is surprised by the man’s frailty, his slow delivery which reminds him of Mandela after his release, yet Bhekifa must have been at least twenty years Mandela’s junior when the great man died, and is perhaps now in his early seventies. Behind the shaky words, De Vries sees bright, small eyes, and thinks that this man’s brain must still be sharp amid a failing body.