Vendetta, page 3
‘Say, if Luiz isn’t well I could always take a look at him,’ Melanie said.
‘Thanks, Melanie,’ Mia said. ‘That’s really kind of you, especially as you’re on holiday, but I’m sure the lodge manager will get him to the local doctor in Askham if he’s quite ill.’
Luiz Siboa was Mia’s San tracker and Mia had made up a story about him not feeling well to cover the fact that he had not reported for work prior to the early-morning game drive at Dune Lodge. Mia was worried but was trying not to show it. In all the time she’d been at the lodge, Luiz had never missed a scheduled drive. There had been no sign of him in his room in the staff quarters, either, when Mia had checked in the pre-dawn darkness as she readied for the morning safari.
They watched the lion for a few minutes more, listening to him call. After the big cat had padded across the sand to sit down in the shade of a lone thorn tree, the Canons and the Nikons ceased fire.
‘Are we all good?’ Mia asked, running a hand through her short dark hair.
‘Sure thing.’ Bill had a habit of speaking for the group. Mia did a quick scan of faces and they all nodded. They’d stayed out a little later than normal; it was nearly eleven am and Mia knew that as keen as the Americans would be, they would be getting hungry and starting to cook themselves in the open-topped vehicle.
She started her engine and radioed camp to let them know that they were fifteen minutes out. The manager, Shirley Hennessy, would make sure there was a staff member waiting with cold towels and an icy mocktail, or chilled champagne, to welcome the guests back to the lodge.
The guests were buoyed after the lion sighting, which had been the highlight of their morning. It was as though the unspoken pressure on Mia to deliver amazing game sightings had been lifted and the group could relax.
‘So,’ Joe said, leaning forward in his seat so Mia could hear him over the engine noise as she drove through a patch of thick sand, ‘how long have you been at Dune Lodge?’
‘Three months.’ Mia changed gear. ‘I was working as head guide at Julianne Clyde-Smith’s other lodge, Khaya Ngala, for the last couple of years.’
‘That’s where we’re headed next,’ Melanie chimed in.
‘You’ll love it,’ Mia said. ‘The Sabi Sand Game Reserve, where Khaya Ngala’s located, is very different from the Kalahari. Lots of thick bush and big trees – good leopard country, but you won’t see big black-maned lions the size of the guy we just had.’
‘But no pangolins or aardvarks, right?’ said Judy, with a note of triumphalism.
‘Let’s just say that in my five years at Khaya Ngala I saw pangolin five times and aardvark maybe nine or ten – here in the desert, we drive past the aardvarks to get to the pangolin.’ It was true – Mia had found the sightings of these two safari bucket list creatures amazingly plentiful on the equally surprisingly chilly nights at her new lodge.
‘Why did you move here, Mia?’ Joe asked as they bounced along the undulating road.
‘Julianne encourages movement between her lodges for professional development, not just here in South Africa, but also part-time exchanges with staff from properties in Zimbabwe and Tanzania. I’ve got a master tracker’s qualification, but the San people, like Luiz, take tracking to a whole new level and I wanted to improve my knowledge and skills. I’ve learned so much here.’ There was also another reason Julianne had wanted Mia to move to Dune Lodge, but that was commercial-in-confidence and her guests didn’t need to know.
‘Are the San, like, the Bushmen of the Kalahari?’ Judy asked.
They passed a magnificent male gemsbok, better known to the tourists as oryx, but whereas the striking grey antelope with its black-and-white face and long, pointed horns had been a fascinating photographic subject for the tourists on their first day, now Mia knew better than to stop. ‘That’s their old name, which isn’t used anymore,’ Mia said. ‘It’s considered disrespectful.’
‘What kind of a name is Luiz, for a San man?’ Melanie asked.
Where to start? Mia glanced over her shoulder. ‘It’s Portuguese.’
Bill raised his eyebrows. ‘He’s from Portugal?’
‘No, Angola, originally. That was once a Portuguese colony. Luiz was born there – sometime in the mid- to late 1950s – he told me once he’s not a hundred per cent sure of his age, but he thinks he’s sixty-six. In his younger years he lived a totally traditional life as a San hunter-gatherer in the bush. When he was about seventeen, he joined the Portuguese army to fight against the forces trying to liberate Angola during the 1960s and early seventies.’
‘Against his own people?’ Judy said.
Mia knew she’d opened a can of worms, but the guests were asking questions, which meant they were engaged, and that meant they were happy. ‘Not really. The San have been marginalised throughout their history. They were the original inhabitants of much of southern Africa, but migration by more numerous African tribes started to displace them from their hunting grounds, and the arrival of colonial armies and settlers just made things worse. They were enemies of some of the other tribes.’
‘So they fought on the side of the whites, the Portuguese?’ Joe said.
Mia nodded. ‘Yes. Luiz’s family were pro-Portuguese. I’m not exactly sure of his family’s history – he’s a very reserved guy – but I do know he had a stepsister who was half-Portuguese. She was the mother of Shirley, our lodge manager, who is Luiz’s niece.’
‘OK,’ said Melanie. ‘I was wondering about Shirley’s surname, Hennessy. I’ve got distant cousins with the same name, and they’re Irish Americans. Is she married?’
‘No,’ Mia said. ‘I don’t know the ins and outs of her family, but Shirley did tell me once that her late father actually was an Irishman living in South Africa. Anyway, when Portugal pulled out of all its African and other colonies after a coup in Lisbon in the 1970s, the white South African army took on Luiz and hundreds of other San soldiers and employed them in their fight against the new Angolan government, and against other nationalists, fighting for independence in Namibia.’
‘Boy, Africa is complicated, with all these different tribes and so forth,’ Bill said.
Mia held her tongue. So too was the American Civil War, she wanted to say.
‘What was this war over?’ Judy asked.
Mia took a deep breath. ‘In South Africa we called it the Border War. In the seventies and eighties the apartheid-era government was under threat from within, with the rise of Nelson Mandela’s ANC – the African National Congress. Angola provided a safe haven for the ANC, and for an organisation called SWAPO, the South West Africa People’s Organisation.’
‘South West Africa was the old name for Namibia, right?’ Bill interjected.
‘Exactly, Bill,’ Mia said. ‘And their military wing, PLAN, the People’s Liberation Army of Namibia, was launching raids across the border into what we know as Namibia, which back then was considered almost part of South Africa. The South African government was fiercely anti-communist and they were concerned about the election of a left-wing government in Angola, which was backed by Cuba and Russia. The South African Defence Force waged war in Angola, propping up a guy called Jonas Savimbi and his party, UNITA.’
‘And Uncle Sam played a role,’ Bill said. ‘The CIA was backing Savimbi, and I read a novel that said Savimbi financed his war effort with elephant ivory, rhino horn and blood diamonds that the US and South Africa helped him sell abroad.’
‘Correct again, Bill, on all counts. White South African men, including my father, were conscripted to fight and sent to the border with Angola. There were some big battles inside Angola, and fighting in South West Africa. It all ended in a kind of draw in 1990 when Namibia was proclaimed as an independent country.’
‘How did someone like Luiz end up here,’ Melanie asked, ‘so far from home and his traditional life?’
Mia liked Melanie. She was compassionate and caring, which Mia guessed made her a good doctor. ‘At the end of the war in Angola, Luiz and hundreds of San soldiers and their families were moved to South Africa, to a military base near the diamond-mining town of Kimberley; they would have been persecuted if they’d tried to return to Angola. Nelson Mandela granted them land and a permanent home close by, in a township called Platfontein, when he took power in South Africa.’
‘That was good of him,’ Melanie said.
Mia didn’t want to disagree, but she’d learned, through Luiz and Shirley that life was hard for the San refugees from the war. ‘Sure,’ Mia said. ‘But they ended up in basic housing in an arid area far from their homelands, with nowhere to hunt and very few prospects for jobs. After the democratic elections here in South Africa, many people still saw them as enemies.’
Melanie nodded. ‘I see. I’d love to talk to Luiz, when he’s feeling better; or, like I say, if there’s anything I can do . . .’
‘Thank you, Melanie,’ Mia said, meaning it.
Mia returned her eyes to the road, but caught sight of a dark speck in the sky in her peripheral vision. She slowed and looked up.
‘Vultures,’ she said, seeing that there was more than one, coming in to land.
‘Where?’ Bill asked.
‘Ten o’clock high, buddy,’ Joe said. ‘You need some new glasses.’
Mia drove to the crest of the next dune to get a better look at what the vultures were interested in. She stopped and took out her Swarovski binoculars, a tip from some other clients from the United States; Americans could be incredibly generous and appreciative guests. She knew this spot well; the big camel thorn tree standing stark and picturesque against the sparse desert view was a favourite shady spot for Mia and the other guides to break their game drives for morning coffee or afternoon sundowners. She focused, then bit her lower lip.
‘Um, everyone, just sit still in the vehicle here for me. I’m going to take a look.’
‘Will you be safe?’ Judy asked.
‘For sure, just stay in the Land Rover.’ Mia took the long, green canvas bag from the racks on the Land Rover’s dashboard and unzipped it. She pulled out her .375 Brno rifle, got out of the vehicle, opened the bolt and loaded her weapon with five fat slugs from the hand-tooled leather cartridge belt around her waist. ‘Back in a minute, please sit tight.’
‘OK. You be careful, now,’ Melanie said.
Mia nodded and walked away from the game viewer. The red sand was loose, and she felt each step in her calves, but the thudding in her chest worried her more. She looked around. For kilometre after kilometre the desert stretched away like an empty sea of red waves. It was the nothingness she’d found hard to get used to, at first. She had longed to see the towering leadwood and jackalberry trees that lined even the dry watercourses of her homeland, let alone the flowing Sabie River, but in time she had come to appreciate the desolation. It made the impressive camel thorn she was heading towards an even more special landmark. Here, in the middle of nowhere where the reserve was situated, nearly one hundred kilometres from the nearest town, Askham, she felt a peace she hadn’t known since before the death of her father. What she hadn’t told her guests was that her dad, Frank, had killed himself, and that she was sure the war she’d spoken of, like a history teacher, had been part of the reason why he’d done it. The silence, at first eerie, almost scary, now calmed her.
A vulture took flight as she came closer and others hopped away from the carcass they were feasting on, close to the base of the tree. She could hear the thwap-thwap of massive wings cleaving the air as others hauled themselves skyward.
She was still some distance from the shade, and the sun overhead stung the back of her neck; perspiration beaded her upper lip. She gripped the rifle tighter, her palms slick. The lion the big male had been challenging could be close, in the lee of the next sandhill, resting in between eating. She did not think, however, that a lion, cheetah, or one of the secretive Kalahari leopards had made this kill.
Mia looked at the sand. Tracking in this place was maddeningly difficult; she tried to remember everything that Luiz had told and shown her in the last three months. Mia glanced over her shoulder. Her tourists were sitting still, at least, the two men watching her through binoculars.
She brought the butt of the Brno into her shoulder, ready, just in case. A movement to her right startled her, and she swung the barrel around. It was just another vulture, a late departure.
Her Rogue boots squeaked beneath her and she felt grains of sand being kicked up onto the backs of her legs. The kill was no more than twenty metres away now and she could confirm that her first instinct had been right.
Again, she scanned around her, 360 degrees, searching for danger. When she looked back to the place where the vultures had been, she saw the blood, and on the hot desert breeze, she smelled the first telltale odours of death. Mia closed her eyes, but a tear forced its way out and rolled down her cheek.
‘No,’ she whispered.
She stopped and saw what the vultures had begun feasting on. She didn’t need to go closer to confirm it was a human, a man dressed in the khaki shirt and green shorts of Dune Lodge.
Luiz.
Chapter 3
From Scottburgh, Sannie took the R102 and headed south. The old main road meandered along the country’s eastern coastline, all the way to Cape Town on the southern tip of the continent. The Indian Ocean sparkled on her left.
She kept her eyes peeled for men jogging along the road but saw no one. Running in this heat would be murder; never had she been so grateful for the Fortuner’s air conditioning.
After Park Rynie she took the turnoff on the left to Rocky Bay and crossed the railway line. Passenger services had been discontinued on the line some years earlier, she had learned, and freight trains ran infrequently – and not at all since the huge floods that had ravaged the province. At Pennington she’d seen people walking and running along the line, hopping from sleeper to sleeper – maybe Adam Kruger had taken this route.
She could be wrong about her theory that Kruger had walked or run here, but as a detective she’d learned long ago to follow her instincts. As always, she was keeping an open mind about this case, but she was hoping she would be able to wrap it up quickly.
She’d only been in her new job for three weeks and now she was due to go on leave the following week. She was looking forward to the break to visit her good friend Mia Greenaway, though the Kalahari Desert and the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park would be just as hot as the south coast, if not more so.
Sannie nosed the Fortuner into a spot in the municipal car park overlooking the ocean. To her right was the rocky promontory that gave the bay its name, topped with a short concrete walkway with safety railings, perfect for fishermen. Two anglers had lines in the water. In front of her an older couple, maybe from the caravan park on the other side of the parking area, lay in the shade of a beach umbrella, reading. A family was sitting down to a picnic meal under a fold-out gazebo; three teenage boys laughed in the surf as waves broke over them.
Sannie got out and pulled her sunglasses down. To her left was the ski boat club, a rather small, two-storey brick building with a kitchen downstairs and a bar with a wooden deck above. She could see a couple sitting at wooden picnic tables upstairs.
She crossed the car park and went to the club. Inside, she took the stairs.
‘Morning, can I help?’ asked the blonde bartender who was wiping the counter. A heavy-set grey-haired man with a red face, a quart bottle of Castle Lite in a cooler in front of him, nodded hello.
‘Just looking for a friend,’ Sannie said.
‘Who?’ the bartender asked. ‘Chances are I’ll know him or her.’
‘Adam Kruger.’
The older man at the bar burped. ‘Sharky.’
‘Sorry?’ Sannie said.
The bartender set down her cloth and put her hands on her hips. Her eyes went to the pistol on Sannie’s hip – her shirt had ridden up, exposing the handgrip. ‘What do you want with Adam?’
Sannie took out her police ID, held it outstretched for the bartender to see, then hung the lanyard around her neck.
‘Here.’
Sannie turned at the sound of a male voice and the blonde woman looked over Sannie’s shoulder. A man’s head and shoulders appeared through an open window; he was shirtless and had been sitting at one of the outside picnic tables, though she hadn’t seen him from the car park. The face disappeared.
As Sannie walked onto the wooden deck, which was just wide enough to accommodate the table-and-bench combos, the couple who had been outside passed her and headed downstairs.
‘Adam Kruger?’
He looked her way and gave a small nod. He had short hair, dark speckled with grey, and was deeply tanned. His torso was virtually hairless, and his abdominal muscles were clearly etched, though she doubted he was the kind to wax or pay for a gym membership. Like the old guy propping up the bar inside, Kruger was also drinking from a quart – Black Label, this time. The cheapest beer in the bar.
As she walked to him, she noticed his eyes. They were the most striking shade of green, and even though he was looking at her it felt like she was invisible to him, like he was looking through her to some far horizon. Maybe he was drunk already, but in his body language she detected no sign of relaxation or inebriation; if anything, he seemed hypervigilant. He sat in the far corner, which is why she hadn’t seen him; his back was to the wall, the ocean to his left.
‘I’m Captain Susan van Rensburg, from the Hawks. I need to talk to you about the events at Scottburgh Mall this morning.’
He took a swig of beer out of the bottle. ‘How did you find me?’
‘It’s my job.’
He nodded, twice, slowly. ‘You’re good at it.’
She stood there, her right hand resting on the pistol grip of the Z88. ‘Why did you flee the scene of the robbery and shooting?’
