Allegiance (13 page)

‘That’s the one. Took her for a few drinks last night, we’re getting quite friendly, she trusts me, I don’t know why. I’ve got the slips for you somewhere.’

‘No problem, I’ll pay.’ If there was a hint of annoyance in Durant’s voice, Splinters wouldn’t have noticed it.

‘Anyway at about one o’clock this morning I take her back and she’s very happy and talkative and mentions her brother’s name, you know, the guy we think’s an
ATM
bomber.’ Splinters licked his fingers, but smeared a blob of tomato source on his chin while he did so. ‘Calls him Nathi. Says he’s a problem child blah-blah. I just agree with everything she says. So I leave her downstairs and when I get to my flat I see I’ve got her cellphone in my hand.’ Splinters paused and smiled. ‘Now how did that happen, Kev?’

Durant raised his eyebrows and then smiled. ‘You stole her phone.’

Splinters raised a hand. ‘No, I didn’t steal it; I appropriated it for the purposes of investigation. My motive wasn’t greed, Kev, you know me. I’d still have it if I wanted it, wouldn’t I?’ Durant expected the blob of tomato sauce on Splinters’s chin to slide off, but it hung on persistently. It was annoying.

‘So you gave it back?’

‘As any gentleman would do, Kevin. But any gentleman spy would of course first go through the phonebook and take some numbers down, right?’

Durant couldn’t stand it. He took a serviette and blotted Splinters’s chin. ‘So you’ve got Nathi’s number?’ He said it matter-of-factly.

‘You don’t seem that impressed, Kev,’ Splinters said, wiping his hands on his pants and pulling a piece of paper from his jacket pocket.

Durant realised his mind was drifting. He had to stay focused. ‘No, Splinters, I’m very impressed, a well-executed operational initiative.’

He handed Durant the slip of paper. Durant looked at it, puzzled. ‘Too many numbers, sure you took it down right?’

Splinters frowned, looked at the paper, cursed, thrust a hand into his other pocket and pulled out another crumpled piece of paper. ‘That’s the lottery numbers, sorry, Kev. Try this one.’

‘Thanks, excellent. Stay close to Tamara – if you need money for entertainment, I can get for you, it’s good access, nicely done. Meanwhile, I’m going to work up this Nathi fellow and see what we can get on him.’

‘What would you do without me, hey, Kev? I know everything, everywhere, all the time, brother.’

‘Can’t deny that, buddy. I hope your lottery numbers are right. Actually, I don’t, because if you win you won’t need me any more.’

Ruslan parked the sheikh’s Mercedes in the lock-up at the complex and made his way on foot to the mosque for evening prayers. At seven he left the mosque and hitched a lift with Faizel Mohammed, a student who was travelling down to Durban. He didn’t like Mohammed much. He seemed too intense. And he could almost sense pent-up aggression. Especially after Maghrib. Mohammed stuttered, especially when he got excited. Ruslan didn’t feel like dealing with either of these handicaps. Little was said as Mohammed swung the Toyota onto the N2 and they headed south towards Gateway. When they reached the mall, Ruslan asked him how the studies were going and the younger man said they were progressing nicely. Ruslan knew exactly what he meant. Mohammed looked the type who put his heart and soul into anything he did.

The Toyota stopped in a loading zone and Ruslan said masalaama – goodbye – and walked towards the outdoor eating area, a large paved square with restaurants on two sides and the entrance to the mall on the far side. Water poured two storeys from tilted pots into a central canal and trickled past the tables where patrons indulged their appetites for good food. It didn’t take him long to find a halaal restaurant and order a shwarma from the waitron. His mind wandered for an instant to a place far away, a desert place where the dwellings were tents and everyone knew their neighbours. Durban was home, but he didn’t belong here. It was hostile, impersonal. He felt like a stranger in a familiar place, and at times like this, he longed for the desert and he missed his father. No. Such things were sentimental and unhelpful. He had a job to do – it was work for the Almighty. His father was long dead and the desert was as distant as his past life. He looked around and that woman was back. He’d seen her before. Only once, but in a different place, the Islamic bookshop in town. It’s not that he had an extraordinary talent in remembering faces, but this woman had struck him as not belonging in the bookstore. While the sheikh browsed for books, Ruslan had spent the time observing the woman. Her interest wasn’t in the books, he could see. She was more interested in the sheikh, trying to catch a glimpse at what books he was browsing. Interesting. And there she was again, just settling at a table across from him, sitting in such a way that she could observe him without it looking too obvious. Yet . . .

He made brief eye contact with her. This was actually becoming a game he was enjoying. They both looked away simultaneously. No question. He was her focus of attention. Not the sheikh. Him. She seemed to fiddle uncomfortably with her glass. She was dressed quite formally in a neat two-piece suit, but her shoes were casual, comfortable. Her order arrived, a Coke. She waved away the offer for food. So obvious. She thought she might have to leave in a hurry.

He tapped his fingers on the table, his stomach reminding him that lunch was a long time ago. The shwarma would be good. The encounter even better. Should he confront her and demand to know why she was following him? Might scare her off. More subtlety needed. He couldn’t make it too easy, but he also had to make sure. If this was an approach – and he was pretty sure it was – then he had to make sure he was talking to the right people. It was important that information he shared went to the people who could really use it. For a terrifying second, a thought occurred to him. What if the sheikh was testing his loyalty? What if he’d misinterpreted this whole scenario and was only seeing and believing what he wanted to see and believe? Just as quickly, the thought left him. He knew the sheikh. Devious thinking wasn’t a characteristic he’d displayed. He trusted everyone. That was his problem. No, this girl was there for him. She made three calls on her cellphone in quick succession and each time she made a call, she looked at him briefly. He finished his shwarma – tasty, spicy and generously portioned – and realised he’d probably eaten it too fast. But he couldn’t wait for this final part of the uncomfortable relationship he had with his braid-haired tail. She looked at him and this time he smiled at her and flipped a pen from his pocket. He scribbled a few words on a serviette and slowly, dramatically folded it and placed it on the table. A minute later, the waitron, Ryan, took his cash – money well spent – and a generous tip, and the folded note that Ruslan asked him to kindly pass to the lovely woman with the braids at table 14. And he did.

The next morning, Durant entered Shabalala’s office on the third floor and sat in the chair facing his desk.

‘What’s this?’ he asked, picking up a large hourglass and turning it.

‘Leave that, Kevin, it’s a very delicate instrument.’

‘I know, it’s an hourglass, but what does it do?’

‘Please put it down,’ and Shabalala gingerly took it from Durant’s hands, wiped it with a handkerchief and lovingly placed it back on his desk. ‘It doesn’t do anything, it’s a thing of beauty, you admire it.’

‘Where’d you get it? It’s quite nice.’

‘It’s “need to know”, and you don’t need to know. Kevin, last night the surveillance unit had a stroke of luck.’

‘What, they didn’t lose their subject?’

‘Funny. I’ve targeted a guy called Ruslan at the
IAC
. The sheikh’s personal driver. He’s the guy closest to the sheikh and should have the best access. I looked at his background and he seems clean.’

‘Well done. Sounds good.’ Durant slapped Shabalala softly on the shoulder to reinforce how impressed he was. ‘When are you making the pitch?’

‘That’s meant to be a long way away because of the risks involved. Whether he’d work for us or not, I don’t know, so I’ve had surveillance on him for a few days to see what he’s up to.’

‘Anything interesting?’

‘Ruslan went to a take-away place at one of the malls and sat at a table. Hlengiwe saw him write something on a serviette and he sent her a note with the waiter.’

‘And?’

Shabalala slipped the folded paper serviette across to Durant. ‘“Let’s talk,”’ he read.

Durant frowned and read it again. ‘What does it mean? He knows he’s under surveillance?’

Shabalala turned his palms up and shrugged. ‘It must. But then that message is for us. He wants to talk to us.’

‘And if we approach him and the message wasn’t for us? What then?’

‘Hlengiwe says he looked her straight in the eye,’ Shabalala paused, recalling exactly what the surveillance officer had told him, ‘and then wrote the message. It was definitely for us.’

Durant sighed from frustration. This was hard to call. And the wrong call would mean disaster. ‘Maybe it was for her. Maybe he wants to just talk to
her
. Isn’t that possible?’

‘That’s fine. Then we let her talk to him and see what he wants. We’ll just back her up.’

Durant rubbed the back of his neck and then absently reached for the hourglass, turned it upside down and watched the sand slowly flow through the centre. ‘Time. It’s one thing we don’t really have on our side. If we can recruit Ruslan, I mean, that’s about as close to the sheikh as we can ever hope to get. What does his profile say?’

‘No red flags. Nothing that makes me suspect anything. Hasn’t travelled out of South Africa since he arrived. No family here; did checks on the databases and he’s clean. There’s nothing on him. Converted to Islam, so probably trying to earn points by driving the sheikh.’

‘Well, he’s gonna lose a couple of points when he starts talking to us. Let’s give it a shot, Ced.’

Tanveer loved the Pentax. A great second-hand buy from a local pawn shop. A few scratches and dents but it still took superb pictures and the 300 mm performed well, even in low light. He was in position, a good angle from the vehicle. Now he just had to wait. The pickup was always in the same place, so he had no doubt he would see the Volvo turn into Anton Lembede Street, or Smith Street as most other Durbanites still called it, and stop outside the bank. Mariam was already waiting. He looked through the viewfinder and lightly touched the shutter release, snapping the image into focus. She wore the black strappy top he never wanted her to buy – far too revealing – and tight jeans which only a prostitute would have felt comfortable in. Yet she was a prostitute, selling herself to this American slime in the white Volvo. Tanveer sighed. That made him a pimp then. He’d set it up, allowed it to happen, even given it his blessing. A job was a job, he’d told her. Nobody liked their jobs. As long as the money came in. Just for a while. And she didn’t have to sleep with him. If she did, it didn’t really matter anyway. A white car flashed into view. Khalid’s Volvo. The Pentax beeped as the focus locked and Tanveer hit the shutter release again and again.

It was 4 p.m. and storm clouds were gathering in the west as Ruslan turned the sheikh’s Mercedes into the car wash parking area and paid the attendant the fee. He bought a newspaper and sat on a bench under a small thatched gazebo. He’d barely sat down when a well-dressed woman with braided hair walked up to him, smiled and sat down.

‘Let’s talk,’ Hlengiwe said, her voice calm, perhaps even flirtatious.

‘I’ve been expecting you,’ Ruslan said quietly, contemplating the young woman’s face. She looked innocent, out of her depth.

‘I know. I got your note. What do you want to talk about?’

‘You’re following me. Why?’

‘You’re dreaming. Who’d want to follow you?’

‘Apparently you. You’re everywhere. You’re even here, now.’

‘You wanted to talk, so talk. Otherwise I’m going.’

Shabalala strained his eyes from across the road. ‘Damn. She’s getting up. It’s not working. Wait. Okay, she’s sitting down again. Eish, Kevin, this is gut-wrenching, man.’

‘Are you ready to move? ’Cos everything’s gonna happen quickly from here on.’ Durant involuntarily clenched the Land Rover’s steering wheel.

Ruslan lowered his voice almost to a whisper, even though there was no one close by. Hlengiwe had to lean forward to hear him. ‘I’ll talk. Bring me someone who wants to hear about the sheikh.’

Hlengiwe looked at her watch and then stood up.

‘That’s your first signal, Ced, go!’ Durant said, his voice racing.

Shabalala walked across the road and as Hlengiwe walked past him, she gave a small nod, which was the second signal. Shabalala proceeded to the gazebo and sat down on the bench Hlengiwe had vacated.

‘Mind if I join you, Ruslan?’ Shabalala was uncomfortable and nervous, but there was no evidence of it.

Ruslan shook his head. ‘Please.’

‘Name’s Reno. I got your note.’

‘Pleasure to meet you, Reno.’ Ruslan sounded calm.

‘I’m the person who wants to hear what you have to say.’

‘Okay. Are you in the police?’ Ruslan’s eyes met Shabalala’s gaze.

‘No.’ Shabalala held his gaze.

‘Intelligence?’

‘I’m not here to answer your questions, Ruslan. I’m here to listen to what you have to say.’ Shabalala felt the muscles in his shoulders relax slightly. Ruslan seemed harmless, calm, in control.

‘If you were a man who was gathering intelligence, then I would assume you’d be interested in the sheikh?’ Ruslan’s command of the English language impressed Shabalala.

‘If you were a man who was close to the sheik, would you be willing to share information on him?’

Ruslan smiled, he liked Reno’s approach.

‘If I was an intelligence officer, I would worry about asking a complete stranger to spy on his boss, especially one in such a religiously sensitive position as mine.’

Shabalala leaned towards Ruslan. ‘That’s why an intelligence officer would have to be sure of his subject’s loyalty first, before committing himself to such a request.’

Ruslan nodded. ‘Reno, you’re a smart man. I like your cautious nature. Look, I drive the sheikh everywhere, and I know a lot of things you might be interested in.’