The Soldier who Said No (39 page)

‘Very well, Mrs Tan is Korean,’ he said. ‘And she’s a solicitor in private practice, specialising in immigration matters.’

He continued. ‘On my right is Mr Sione Hotene of the Immigration Service. He’s also Maori. And on the far right is Mr Adolf Guttenbeil, who is Samoan. Mr Guttenbeil is a security consultant to the Defence Department.’

Hotene was a very big man with a double chin under an elaborate hairdo that was more African than kiwi. Guttenbeil, on the other hand, was a darker version of De Villiers, a tall and lean but muscular man who looked supremely fit. He was completely bald.

Mason interrupted De Villiers’s silent assessment of the panel with a short, ‘You know the charges. How do you plead?’

‘Not guilty,’ De Villiers said.

Mason nodded and sat back with folded arms. ‘You may deal with the charges as you please.’

De Villiers glanced in the direction of the table where Henderson and Kupenga were seated. Kupenga appeared to be sending a text message on his cellphone.

‘I admit calling DS Kupenga a cannibal,’ De Villiers said, ‘but I did it in retaliation and in a whisper in his ear after he had called me a japie, for the whole squad room to hear, and that after I had previously told him not to call me that.’

Mason pounced immediately. ‘So you admit to racial abuse of DS Kupenga?’

De Villiers could hear Kupenga’s cellphone snapping shut.

‘No,’ he said emphatically. ‘It was an immediate response, like for like, to abuse by him.’

‘No, it can’t be like for like,’ Mason postulated. ‘You called him a cannibal.’

‘I whispered it in his ear. I didn’t shout it for the whole squad room to hear.’

De Villiers let his statement hang in the air until Mason was forced to ask, ‘How’s that like for like?’

De Villiers read from his notes. ‘Japie is a racial epithet applicable only to white, Afrikaans-speaking South Africans. It means a coarse, uncouth, unsophisticated and illiterate kind of person, like a hillbilly, a backward simpleton.’

Smith interrupted. ‘I thought that Japie was a common name amongst South African men, like Bruce for an Australian man …’

‘And Sheila for an Australian woman,’ De Villiers completed the sentence for him.

‘You know what I mean,’ Smith smiled.

‘I do, but this is different. My name is not Japie, just as yours isn’t Bruce. There
is
an innocent meaning to Bruce and even to Japie, when it is actually someone’s name, but when it is used to stereotype people, it’s no longer innocent. It has become a racial stereotype. And that is my objection.’

‘How is it different?’ Smith enquired.

De Villiers explained slowly, alternating eye contact with Mrs Tan and the smiling Adolf Guttenbeil. ‘Japie is the diminutive for a common Afrikaans name of Dutch origin, Jacobus. As such it has an innocent meaning, as I’ve said. But the word has acquired a sinister secondary meaning, a racist meaning which stereotypes white Afrikaans-speaking South Africans as poor whites and as simpletons.’

‘I don’t follow this,’ Mason said. ‘I’ve been calling South Africans japies for years.’

De Villiers paused for emphasis. ‘I have two degrees, a bachelor’s and an honours degree. I’ve passed the physical, academic and character tests of two police forces, that of the United Kingdom and New Zealand, and you call me backward, unsophisticated, a simpleton? How can that be justified?’

He glanced at the table from where Henderson and Kupenga were watching the proceedings. ‘And that’s what DS Kupenga did to me.’

There was a knock at the door and the constable let the caterers in with their tea trolley. ‘Let’s break for the weekend,’ the chairman announced, leaving the question unanswered. ‘There has been a lot of new information and I think we all need a breather to consider it. The enquiry will reconvene on Monday at ten.’

De Villiers took the ferry home and continued to work on his dossier.

It was a foul Saturday with heavy weather sweeping in from the Antarctic and covering the whole country in patches of alternating snow, sleet, hail and curtains of heavy rain. Strong south-westerly winds drove the clouds. There was a large rally in East Auckland where most of the immigrants lived. Men, women and children braved the weather and marched in the rain with their placards calling for protection from criminals and for more severe punishment. They accused the government and the police of neglecting them, of not caring about crime when its targets were immigrants. Traffic in Pakuranga Drive came to a standstill as police struggled unsuccessfully to divert the protesters down the side streets. With the elections less than five months off, the Member of Parliament for Pakuranga put in an appearance to receive a petition. He solemnly promised to ensure that a special unit be tasked to investigate the spate of crimes against the Chinese community.

If he hadn’t been suspended, De Villiers, like every other member of the police who lived in the district, would have been called up to don his uniform and assist with crowd control.

Instead he was able to spend the day indoors to finalise his report. Emma and Zoë went on their usual Saturday morning excursions, ballet class first and shopping to follow, while De Villiers sat hunched over the computer.

After an hour of mulling over the facts, he called Henderson.

‘I need to make an identification, Sir, and I think it will be best if you were present,’ he explained.

Henderson wanted to know more. ‘I’m not giving my weekend away for nothing,’ he said.

‘It’s about the Prime Minister’s arrow, Sir,’ De Villiers said. ‘I think I know who has the bow and the quiver and arrows to complete the set.’

‘Why should I believe you?’ Henderson demanded. ‘And moreover, why should I help you?’

‘Because you know that I am not the man who shot at the Prime Minister, Sir, and because I think I know who did.’

There was a long silence before Henderson answered. ‘I’ll meet you at your house.’

‘This had better be good,’ Henderson said a quarter of an hour later as he fastened his seatbelt in De Villiers’s car.

They passed the fifteen-minute drive in silence. De Villiers stopped in the parking lot in front of an East Tamaki archery store. A white minibus with blackened windows stood in front of the archery store. At the other end was a similar minibus but black. The rest of the parking lot was empty.

‘Now tell me what’s going on,’ Henderson said.

De Villiers turned to face his superior. ‘I think I know the man who owns this store, and if I’m right, then I think we’ll find a link between him and that arrow you showed me.’ He shifted uneasily in his seat. ‘I need you to pretend to be a customer while I hang around in the background. If it’s the right man, I’ll leave and you can follow me when you’re ready.’

De Villiers opened the glove box and put on a pair of Emma’s sunglasses. They covered the upper half of his face. A cap pulled low over his eyebrows completed a rudimentary disguise. Henderson nodded and they alighted. Henderson turned his back to the wind to light a cigarette. He marched deliberately towards the shop. De Villiers followed a step behind.

They stopped at the door. The shop window displayed various bows and a range of archery equipment. Prices were marked down by 33%. It was an impressive display of bows and arrows and other accessories of pig-hunting and archery. Henderson flicked his cigarette butt into the gutter and entered. A bell at the door alerted the storekeeper that he had customers.

De Villiers followed Henderson inside and pretended to study for-sale items in a waist-high glass cabinet. He listened as Henderson introduced himself to the man at the counter. ‘Good day, I wonder if you can help me. I’m thinking of taking up archery, but I’m completely ignorant about it.’

De Villiers half turned to hear the shopkeeper’s voice. ‘I’m sure we can find something for you,’ the voice boomed. ‘Tjaart Erasmus, pleased to meet you.’

De Villiers watched from under the peak of his cap as the two shook hands.

He left the shop immediately when his suspicions were confirmed. When he got to the car, he sensed movement behind him. He tensed and the hair on his arms rose. He opened the driver’s door and slowly turned around. There were only three cars in the parking lot, his, and the two minibuses. There was something odd about the black minibus. It had a second antenna and seemed to be rocking slightly on its springs, but De Villiers couldn’t see through the blackened windows. He stared at it for some time before he got back into his car and waited for Henderson.

When Henderson eventually came out of the archery store, he had a handful of brochures and a quotation for a full kit for a bow-hunter. A complimentary cap sat skew on his head.

‘What’s that about?’ De Villiers asked as he pulled out into the road.

‘I got his fingerprints on the brochure and his handwriting on the quote,’ Henderson smiled. ‘Now tell me what you know.’

‘I know him from way back,’ De Villiers started.

A police car first overtook them at speed and then slowed down in front of them. The black minibus stopped behind them.

De Villiers looked at Henderson with disappointment. ‘What now?’

‘I’m stuffed if I know,’ Henderson proclaimed. ‘Let’s see.’

A constable alighted from the police car and came around to the driver’s window. ‘I need to take down your full particulars,’ he said, leaning down to be at eye level with De Villiers. ‘Full names, please.’

De Villiers wanted to argue, but Henderson took over. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Henderson, head of the International Crime Unit, and this is Detective Constable de Villiers of my unit. We are on an official investigation. What’s this about, sonny?’

The constable straightened up and cast an anxious look at the black minibus. After a moment’s hesitation, he said, ‘Please wait here, Sir. I’ll be back in a minute.’ The door of the black minibus opened. A man in the minibus had one foot on the tarmac but remained hidden. A gloved hand came around the door frame and beckoned the constable over.

Henderson would have none of the delay and followed the constable to the driver’s side of the minibus. De Villiers watched in the rear-view mirror. He saw Henderson displaying his warrant card and smiled to himself. He probably outranks these men, he thought.

The constable came back to De Villiers. ‘Just stay where you are, please.’

De Villiers continued to watch the proceedings at the minibus in the rear-view mirror. He saw Henderson disappearing into the back of the minibus.

It must have been fifteen minutes before Henderson returned to the passenger door and got into the car. ‘Let’s go,’ he said as he fastened his seatbelt.

‘What was that about?’ De Villiers asked.

‘Is your car a no smoking zone?’ Henderson asked, and when De Villiers shook his head, added, ‘I think we’ve struck oil here. That was the Anti-Terror Unit. They’ve been watching the comings and goings at the archery store for some months now, something to do with that business in the Ureweras.’

De Villiers put the car in gear and pulled off. Henderson looked at his watch. ‘I’ve got to get home. There’s a rugby test on tonight and we’re having some guests over. My partner will kill me if I leave all the work to her. Now tell me, who’s this Tjaart …’

‘Erasmus,’ De Villiers completed the sentence.

‘Yes,’ Henderson said. He flicked the cigarette stub out of the window. ‘Explain.’

‘It’s him, Sir,’ De Villiers said. ‘I’m positive we can connect the arrow to him.’

‘I suspected that you might say something like that,’ Henderson said. ‘And I’ve asked the Anti-Terror Unit not to let him out of sight until our unit’s investigation has been completed.’

‘That sounds good, Sir.’

Henderson remembered his last visit to the Prime Minister’s house. ‘We don’t have time to waste,’ he said. ‘We need a full report by Monday morning.’

‘It’ll be ready, Sir.’

De Villiers stopped in Macleans Road behind Henderson’s car. The two men alighted and faced each other across the roof of the car.

‘You’ve been secretly investigating the case, haven’t you?’ Henderson said. He wagged a finger at De Villiers. ‘And you probably have a report all but ready.’

De Villiers nodded. ‘I’m a policeman, Sir, and that’s what we do.’

‘Monday, first thing,’ Henderson said. ‘Address it to the Commissioner and say that I detailed you to conduct this investigation outside the normal procedures due to the importance and sensitivity of the matter.’

Henderson reached across the roof of the car and they shook hands.

After the rugby test, De Villiers telephoned Johann Weber in Durban to commiserate with him.

‘I saw it coming,’ Weber said. ‘Wrong number 10, wrong number 8, wrong tactics, I would suggest.’ Like most rugby fans, he was long on opinions but short on knowledge.

‘I need more help with my enquiry,’ De Villiers said when they had exhausted their lay analysis of the rugby.

The conversation lasted half an hour, a twenty-dollar phone call, but it was time well spent.

De Villiers was ready to terminate the call when Weber changed the topic. ‘What happened in Pretoria, Pierre? The girl came back with a bottle of champagne and said you had been to a soccer match at Loftus.’

‘I left you a note,’ De Villiers explained. ‘It’s in the glove box. Didn’t Marissa tell you?’

‘No, she just gave me the champagne.’

‘There’s a note in the glove box. The note explains it,’ De Villiers said.

‘Is there anything else?’ Weber asked.

‘No.’

‘Well, one last thing then,’ Weber said. ‘The Boks are going to win in Dunedin next week.’

‘They’ve never won there and they won’t win this time either,’ De Villiers argued.

‘All it takes is a lucky bounce,’ Weber countered. ‘And it’s about time.’

That’s what
I
need, De Villiers thought, a lucky bounce.

Weber said goodbye and rang off.

De Villiers worked late into the night.

He had a pot of coffee at his elbow when the Sunday paper was delivered well before sunrise. By lunch time the weather had cleared a bit and at three in the afternoon the sky was clear. He settled on the couch in front of the television and with Zoë snuggling against his side, watched the replay of the ladies’ final at Wimbledon. He looked on in amazement when Venus Williams lost the first ten points to her younger sister, yet came back to win the match in two sets.