Payback - A Cape Town thriller (20 page)

Francisco looked at Ludo. The eyeballing returned, Ludo glancing away first, being the employee.

‘Paulo, he’s family,’ said Francisco, pulling his right earlobe, not deflecting his gaze. ‘Also a prick. Of this I’ve been made aware. Over the years.’

Ludo kept his opinions to himself. Lit a cigarette.

‘Isabella treats him like shit. Lines him up for this opportunity. I’m missing something you think?’

Ludo sucked smoke.

Francisco stood up, walked round the desk to the telescope.

‘Where he’s good is clubs. Sure. He can work clubs. Ten K a night I’ve heard he can do. That’s like two hundred sale points. That’s working. Doesn’t stop the punk being a prick.’

Francisco put his eye to the telescope, watched a truck coming out of Ground Zero.

‘We’re going to go down on this one?’ said Ludo, exhaling smoke.

‘I don’t think so.’ Francisco moved the scope to follow the truck. ‘It would seem Isabella’s one-time screw has come to the party. Fella called Mace Bishop. The sort of name you’ve gotta wonder about. Still, he’s done the wonders on the one side. Question is, can he do the wonders on the front-line? Isabella’s not stressing.’

‘Isabella says so,’ said Ludo, ‘she knows the score.’

Francisco grinned, came round behind Ludo, put his hands on his shoulders, squeezed. Ludo was hard as wood.

‘You got a number for her?’

Ludo’s shoulders rose and fell in a shrug beneath his hands.

‘It’s alright, I understand. She wasn’t my sister I’d have a number for her too.’ He went back to his chair. ‘You think Paulo can actually move that shit?’

‘Sure, your Rough Guide says lotsa clubs. It’s big holiday time. No reason why not.’

‘You keep an eye on him. Any way to scam it, he will. I’ll send you a present.’

‘Sure,’ said Ludo, crushing the butt in Francisco’s clean ashtray.

Francisco rang the receptionist to have the dirty ashtray removed. While the receptionist was doing this, took a file from his desk, shifted it across to Ludo. Ludo yet again amazed Francisco let people smoke if he hated cigarette butts that much.

‘That’s the paperwork,’ said Francisco. ‘You go to the port, find Customs. Find a Vusi something. Give him ten thousand local, one per kilo is how they work it, he’ll give you the merchandise. All you need’s in the paperwork.’ He tapped the file.

Ludo took it, stood up.

‘Have a good flight,’ said Francisco.

‘Yeah,’ said Ludo, thinking New York to London, five hours. Change in London wait two hours. Flight to Cape Town eleven hours. Sixteen hours flying time in economy. Also no chance of a cigarette. Some good flight.

‘Ludovico,’ he said to the woman who answered the door. Coloured woman about fiftyish in a blue housecoat. Steel-grey hair, glaring at him over frameless glasses. ‘This is the house we’re renting.’ Not a question but a statement. Paulo getting out of the Grand
Cherokee
stretching, exclaiming, the woman staring at them, seeming bewildered.

‘You speak English?’ asked Ludo.

She nodded.

‘Good. Like I said, my name’s Ludovico. L-u-d-o-v-i-c-o.’ He pulled an email out of his jacket pocket. ‘It says here this is the place we rented.’ He looked at the view: beach below, surfers pulling moves on the waves, sea for a hundred miles, sky forever.

The coloured woman stepped aside to let him in. He and Paulo squeezed past. Inside the place shone. The woman must have been cleaning all night.

‘Spotless,’ said Ludo. ‘We can eat off the floor.’

‘We have plates for you,’ said the woman.

Paulo whistled. ‘Nice one.’

Huge picture windows straight on to the exterior picture. Rim-flow off the patio. Maybe even better than California. Interior: white
softpile
carpets. Leather suite. Open-plan lounge and dining room. Ten-seater table. He went to the kitchen through a door, big black dude in there dressed all in white, even the shoes, beaming at him.

The dude said, ‘I am Sibusiso. How are you?’

‘Doing well,’ said Paulo, stretching out a hand. They shook. ‘How do you spell that?’

Sibusiso spelled it, ‘S-i-b-u-s-i-s-o.’

‘That Italian?’

‘Zulu,’ he was told. ‘I am the cook.’

Paulo called out to Ludo, ‘We order a cook?’

‘Seems,’ said Ludo. In the meantime he’d talked to the woman, found out her name was Mrs September, housekeeper. She’d told him she and the cook had premises off to the back. Hadn’t smiled once during the exchange.

‘Right, Mrs September,’ he said, ‘here’s the plan. One breakfast at seven. One breakfast at eleven. You clean the rooms eleven to noon. We have lunch say three o’clock. You do any other cleaning you need to anytime you can, mostly when we’re out. Five you’re gone. Same with Mr Cook. We want you to do dinner we’ll make advance arrangements.’ He smiled at her, she didn’t return it. ‘How’s that sound?’

‘Suitable,’ she said.

Ludo was wondering why she hadn’t mentioned anything about a delivery of packages. Didn’t want to ask, because he didn’t want her to know he knew. Wanted it to seem like a surprise. Maybe best to let it unfold in its own time, he reckoned. This Mrs September was pure clam. The sort of reserve he liked. Twenty minutes later she came out with two gift-wrapped bottles of wine, gave one to each, also a box for Ludo.

How Francisco had organised this was amazing. Fedex’d over the greeting cards, got a local wine boutique to do the rest. The message to Paulo clearer than if he’d written it: I can do things everywhere.

‘Nice one,’ said Paulo, thinking, Jesus the guy never lets up.

Ludo fancied the rim-flow. Fancied everything about drifting round the pool looking at the ocean. Liked Sibusiso and Mrs September, especially Sibusiso bringing him coffee, Illy espresso through a Saeco wonder of wonders, the moment he sat down. All told a better deal than he could have imagined and he’d had high hopes to begin with.

La bella casa. He gazed up at it from the pool. Nice house. His room on the upper floor with the best views. Off the patio a TV lounge with a bigger flat-screen than he’d ever seen in New York. All wired up for DVD. Best of all a good sound system for his blues CDs. If there was a downside, no summer ballet season. What sort of city was this for Chrissakes? No ballet. He swam over to the side, lit a cigarette. Smoked it, supporting himself on the rim tiles, his body in the water. As he relaxed there, saw Paulo come out all smarted up, wearing wrap-around shades.

‘You coming?’ he wanted to know.

‘Chill it,’ said Ludo leaving the pool. Emerged ten minutes later jacket over his arm. Paulo looked like he was going to give him lip but didn’t.

They took the Quattro. Paulo driving, well orientated to the left-hand side of the road. Both of them smoking. When they stopped at a traffic light a blue haze of smoke flowed from the windows.

‘You know where we’re going?’ said Ludo.

‘No problem,’ said Paulo, ‘until we get to the small stuff. That’s why you’ve got the map.’

Ludo let this go. The only other words spoken before they got to Customs was Ludo giving directions down a street that crossed car parks, went under an elevated freeway through a gate into a fenced yard. Paulo parked.

‘This’s it?’

‘Smells like it,’ said Ludo. ‘Docks smell of fish ‘n oil.
Everywhere
in the world they smell like this.’

Turned out their man at Customs, Vusi Themba, had an office of his own, three floors up, good side of the building with a view of the docks. Other side of the building, third floor was level with a motorway.

Vusi Themba was easy-going. Big friendly face, coffee-coloured, nose looked like it’d been squashed onto his face. Gold Rolex weighing down his left wrist. He greeted them, shaking hands. Invited them in, shut the office door, sat them down, poured coffee from a filter machine, asked how they liked the city?

Paulo told him it was a great place.

Ludo asked if he minded people smoking.

Vusi brought out a pack and offered it round. Lit their cigarettes with a Zippo. Then wanted to know if they were going to visit a shebeen, spend a night in one of the township B&Bs, like an experience of a lifetime, man. Not to be missed. They wanted partying, then a township shebeen was the place for it. Okay, the city clubs were good. The type of clubs you found anywhere in the world though. You wanted something different, you hit a shebeen.

What’s he saying here? Paulo thought. Paulo wanted clubs like you found anywhere in the world. On the other hand maybe this fella was dropping hints. Laying out a business plan. Opening up a new market. Maybe he wasn’t so much Customs as Trade and Industry, Paulo thought.

Ludo thought, suave. Very suave. Ludo also thought, What’s he saying here? Ten thousand isn’t enough? Decided to give him the envelope with twelve grand. For the advice.

Vusi grinned at them both, stubbed his cigarette, scooted his chair across to a wall safe. Keyed in a code, not even trying to hide it. Ludo noted the numbers out of habit. Vusi reached in, brought out a cardboard box wrapped in brown paper tied up with string, the knots sealed with red wax. A battered
cardboard
box.

Jesus, thought Ludo, wasn’t that the most obvious package you’d ever seen? No two ways about what was in there.

‘Here’s your coffee,’ said Vusi, whisking it onto the desk. Ten kilos no effort in the arms of a big guy like him.

‘Much obliged,’ said Paulo. Judging by the state of the box they were lucky it hadn’t broken.

Ludo opened his leather shoulder bag, flipped through the paperwork to one of the envelopes he’d prefilled, offered it to Vusi.

‘Thanks,’ said Vusi, searching round his desk for a paperknife, finding a silver one with the handle a naked woman. Very tasteful.

‘Nice paperknife,’ said Paulo.

‘Carrol Boyes,’ said Vusi. ‘Local artist. Advance Christmas
present
from an importer. Jewish guy, brings in fashion accessories.’

Vusi counted through the notes while they watched. Stashed the envelope in the safe, closed it.

‘So, gents,’ he said. ‘Have a good time’ - taking them through the drill of a brother’s handshake on the way out.