Of Cops & Robbers (14 page)

Fish, wearing jeans and a black T-shirt under a blue hoody, leans in for a quick smooch with Vicki, her naughty tongue in his mouth. His hand goes over hers, pinning it to the table.

He likes the tongue bit.

Vicki pulls back, jerks her hand out from under his. ‘You’re frozen.’

‘Yeah,’ says Fish, sitting down, ‘it’s chilly out there.’ He leers at her. ‘This’s early. Why’d you go back? You could’ve stayed.’

‘This’s not what you’re thinking.’

‘What’s it I’m thinking?’

‘You’re thinking a quickie.’

Fish shakes his head. ‘Uh uh. Not a quickie.’

Vicki stays with a wry face. ‘Trouble with you, Bartolomeu Pescado, you’ve got a one-track mind.’

Fish swipes a slice of toast through egg yolk, forks it into his mouth, ‘You haven’t?’

‘I compartmentalise. My life’s ordered, sorted.’

‘Is that so?’

‘It is. That’s the way it is.’

‘Miss Lawyer.’ He grins at her, goes head down back to his food. ‘Sorry: Ms Lawyer.’

Vicki finishes her cappuccino, dabs with the paper serviette at her top lip, says, ‘Fish, serious. For a moment.’

‘I’m dead serious. Always.’ Fish wolfing the last mouthfuls. ‘I could do that again.’ Signalling to the waitress for another, slurping at his cappuccino.

‘Listen to me first.’ Vicki tapping her laptop screen with a black fingernail. ‘Please.’

‘Yes ma’am.’

‘We’ve got a client we’re taking on pro bono.’

‘Wow, Vics, Cliffie’s being very generous.’

‘Fish.’

Fish eyeing her over his cup, getting off on the light in her eyes, her straight face. Scheming, come on, Vics, what’s the real vibe here? Thinking, God she’s stunning. Those cheekbones. Those brown eyes. That latte skin. He reaches over, runs the back of his hand down Vicki’s cheek. Lovely. Silky.

‘Fish.’

‘Vicki.’

‘Will you listen to me?’

‘All ears.’

‘We’ve got this client, Fortune Appollis. Twenty. Nice ordinary Cape Flats family. Dad’s in the printing trade, mom’s a shelf-packer. Fortune’s at tech, graphic design.’

‘Cape Flats: Mitchell’s Plain? Cape Flats: Delft, Belhar, Bonteheuwel?’

‘It makes a difference?’

‘You’re the Athlone girl, you don’t come from the wild parts, you’d know.’

Fish loving the frown Vicki’s giving him.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I’m teasing.’ Reaching for her hand.

‘You leave Athlone out of it.’

‘Athlone’s major. All those larney lawyers.’

Vicki putting the no-kidding look on him. Fish getting a kick at the beauty of this woman.

‘Are you going to listen to me?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then do so.’

Fish leans back, opens his arms, expansive. ‘All yours.’

‘Good. Now focus. My client …’

‘… Fortune Appollis …’

‘… Fortune Appollis is into cars. Urban racing, specifically. Not doing it, he’s not got the money, but following it. Like the drivers have got fan clubs. Even on Facebook. You know, these
kids. Post goes up on Facebook, or they get a Mxit SMS about where it’s happening, when it’s happening, and they drift over to watch. For the thrill of it.’

‘The cops pitched up, Fortune got arrested.’

Vicki shakes her head. ‘Fortune got injured. Badly. A driver lost control, ploughed into the bystanders. Well, into a bystander.’

‘Fortune Appollis.’

‘Exactly.’

‘And now the driver’s disappeared. His car’s disappeared. Nobody knows anything. And the Appollis family’s facing medical bills.’

‘Big time.’

‘And he might die.’

‘Exactly.’

The waitress slides in Fish’s second breakfast. He squints at her. ‘Can I get a coffee? Americano instead?’

‘You don’t want the cappuccino?’

‘Too much foam.’

She shrugs. ‘First time I’ve heard that one.’

‘Special favour,’ says Fish, giving her his boy-grin.

When she’s gone Vicki says, ‘Stop it.’

Fish chews down on a large bite of toast and egg and bacon. ‘What?’

‘You know what. Now listen. He’s in ICU. Unconscious. He’s bad. Probably not going to make it.’

‘The cops?’

‘Opened a culpable homicide charge. So what?’

‘They’ll find him, the racer.’

‘Maybe. More likely maybe not.’

‘You think I can?’

‘Sure. It’s why I’m asking.’

‘You haven’t.’

‘Not in so many words.’ Fish catches her glance. ‘It’s a job. You need the work.’ She sets up an index card against his cup.

On it, Fish reads two addresses. ‘What’s that?’

‘All we’ve got. First one’s the Appollis’ contact details.
Second’s
where the accident happened.’

‘That’s it? No witnesses.’

‘That’s it.’ She purses her mouth. ‘When the medics got there, the bystanders took off.’

‘This’s not a lot to work on.’

‘Sorry. But it’s money. The stuff you don’t have much of.’ Vicki closes down her laptop, gathers keys, iPhone, handbag. ‘Got to rush.’ Kisses him on the cheek. ‘Later. After work, my place?’

Fish chews, swallows. ‘What about a proper kiss?’

Vicki’s refreshing her lipstick. ‘Oh no, not that egg mouth.’ She beeps open her MiTo, gives Fish an air kiss. ‘Don’t worry about the bill, I’ve paid.’

‘I love lawyers on expense accounts.’

She pulls a face.

Mellanie’s there, BlackBerry to her ear, pacing the floor, talking loudly. Mart Velaze would rather Mellanie pissed off, but that doesn’t look likely to happen any time soon. He’s facing Jacob Mkezi from the far end of the man’s ten-seater dining room table. Jacob Mkezi at the head eating segments from a halved grapefruit with a silver spoon. Telling Mart Velaze over and over about this cave of rhino horns like it was some mystical experience.

He breaks off. ‘Why’re you here? You said you couldn’t make it.’

‘It’s Lord,’ says Mart Velaze, glancing at Mellanie. She’s engrossed, not part of their talk.

Jacob Mkezi doesn’t look up, keeps at his grapefruit. ‘Lord’s in trouble? He’s totalled the car already?’

‘Something like that.’

‘How’d I guess? Give the boy anything, he wrecks it. When?’

‘Last night.’

‘He phoned you?’

‘Ja.’ Mart Velaze shifts on his chair. ‘Ja. Must have been after one, almost two o’clock.’

‘He doesn’t phone me. He phones you?’

‘He knows I fix things. For you.’

‘He knows you fix things. He doesn’t think his father fixes things.’

Mart Velaze’s is about to speak. Jacob Mkezi holds up the grapefruit spoon. ‘Stop. Leave it. Lord is what Lord is. My son but not my son.’ He pushes away the eaten fruit, dabs at his lips. ‘Thank you, Mart. I appreciate what you do for both of us.’ Lifts a silver warming lid from an English breakfast, sniffs the aroma. ‘One thing useful the English gave us: bacon and eggs.’ He starts in. Through a mouthful says, ‘How bad?’

‘A spectator was knocked down.’

‘Dead?’

‘In a coma.’

‘And the car?’

‘Dented. Scraped. Will need some panel work. It’s not too bad.’

Jacob Mkezi chews through a couple of forkfuls. ‘Which hospital?’ Mart Velaze tells him.

‘I can’t have this coming back.’

‘It won’t.’

‘Nothing. Not a word. Nothing in the press, no whispers. You keep it dead quiet.’

‘I will.’

‘I’m not joking. This thing must go away. Whatever you have to do. Make it vanish’ – Jacob Mkezi blows a puff of air – ‘Poof.’ Looks down the table at Mart Velaze. ‘You’ll sort it?’

Mart Velaze nods.

‘Whatever you think best. Do it. I don’t care. Just no comeback.’ He forks a mushroom. ‘One other thing, you know someone called Vusi Bopape?’

‘No.’

‘Not national intelligence? Some other spookery?’

‘Never heard of him. You want me to check him out?’

‘You could. Why not? Might be useful to know.’

Mellanie sits down, pulls a grapefruit towards her. ‘What’s that I heard about Lord?’

Jacob Mkezi laughs. ‘You were on the phone, talking.’

‘So? What’d I miss?’

‘Lord had an accident.’

‘Typical,’ says Mellanie. ‘Buggered up his new car, no doubt. What’d I tell you would happen?’

Fish, at Knead, finishes his breakfast, his coffee. Leans back, watching two chicks suiting up. Both wearing black Speedos. Probably better than them standing there naked, he reckons, imagining the hidden boobies, taking in the tummy swell, the hips. Costume cut high like that meant bikini wax, gives Fish gooseflesh. The thought of hot wax, the tear of hair ripped out. The way Vicki prefers it. Almost a Brazilian.

‘Why’d you do that?’ he asked her once.

She shrugged. ‘Body art. It’s what we do with our hair.’ She pointed at his groin. ‘Not much you can do with that tangle.’

Which got Fish flushing, Vicki riding his embarrassment. The way she did, teasing him.

But he’s cool with that. Vicki’s not angling to move in. Not throwing a hissy fit that he doesn’t love her, that he’s selfish, that he doesn’t talk, that she feels locked out. Vicki doesn’t do any of that stuff. Vicki Kahn gets that little smile on her lips says, ‘I’ve got to go, dude.’ Gets in her fiery Alfa MiTo, zips off.

Lets him chill with Shawn, Jesse Sykes, Alison, the new local he’s discovered, Laurie Levine.

He brings his mind back, refocuses on the women chatting, students probably, zipping one another’s wetsuits, lovely as impala bokkies. Picking up their boards, heading for the water.

A short spliff. That’d make this a perfect day, Fish believes. But he’s not one to smoke in public. He pulls off his hood, feels the winter sun warm on his head.

Not a bad start: a surf, a breakfast, a job. A paying job.

The waitress with the pixie smile, says, ‘That all?’

‘Sure,’ says Fish. ‘I’m good’ – patting his stomach, standing.

‘She paid,’ says the waitress, ‘your girlfriend.’

Fish grins at her. ‘What I call WEE,’ he says. ‘Women’s
economic
empowerment.’

Next thing on this lovely morning, he’s got the professor calling. Fish’s sitting in his inherited Isuzu, tapping his fingers on Fortune Appollis’s card, staring at the sea. Still wondering if he shouldn’t do another surf before starting the day. Considering how a trip to see a guy in a coma in ICU is hardly a wow activity.

Jim Neversink’s on his CD player: ‘Skinny Girls are
Trouble
’. Fish hearing Jim’s lament. Thinking the skinny girl could be Vicki. No it couldn’t.

His cell rings. ‘Prof Summers’ on the screen.

Thumbs him on, doesn’t even say a word, the professor’s up and away, ‘Fish. Two baggies. There any likelihood you can provide?’

‘No reason why not,’ says Fish, thinking, the prof must’ve smoked up all weekend.

The prof says, ‘I know what you’re thinking. It’s not like that. I lost what you brought me.’

‘I’m not thinking anything, prof,’ says Fish. ‘When’re you in?’

‘Today?’

‘Maybe,’ says Fish. ‘Certainly tomorrow.’

The prof saying, ‘Who’s that playing?’

Fish watches the two young women hit by a hard break go into the wash. Sucks in his breath. ‘Jim Neversink.’

‘Interesting. Not Mozart but interesting.’

‘I’ll make you a copy.’

The professor laughing as Fish thumbs him off. His phone rings, like someone saw him end the conversation. His mother, Estelle.

Fish hesitates, just for a second, but he hesitates. He could press her to voicemail. He looks at the ocean, at the horizon stretched across the bay connecting Hangklip to the peninsula, at the waves so perfect. Takes a deep breath. Keys her on.

‘It’s eight thirty-five in London, Bartolomeu, nine thirty-five your time. I thought I’d save you the cost of the phone call. Tell me you’ve got what I want. That you’re about to email your
report.’

‘It’s not that easy,’ says Fish.

He hears his mother sigh. Imagines her in some Victorian rental, in the kitchen at a little table with her laptop open to her Gmail account. She’d have a cup and saucer to the right, a pot of green tea under a cosy on the nearest counter. There’d be a notepad and a pencil. She was probably tapping the pencil on the pad.

‘What’s not so easy? Explain it to me.’

‘Where are you, Mom?’ he says.

‘I’m here, Bartolomeu, in London waiting for some information from you.’

‘Where in London?’

‘What d’you mean where in London.’

‘I don’t know where you stay when you’re there. You’ve never told me.’

‘You’ve never asked.’

‘I’m asking.’ Fish watches a surfer shredding a wave. The sheer exhilaration of it. Doing that would be way better than sitting here with Estelle on his case.

‘You can call me Estelle now,’ Estelle said to him when he turned thirty. ‘Calling me Mom at your age is silly.’

But he couldn’t call her Estelle, not in person. That didn’t work for Fish. He wasn’t getting on first name terms with his own mother.

‘I don’t think so,’ he said.

She shrugged, ‘Suit yourself.’

But he calls her Estelle in his head.

‘I’m in Bayswater this time,’ she says. ‘A very nice flat, very comfortable in a leafy mews. Thank you for asking. Now what’s your problem?’

‘I need more time,’ says Fish.

‘You’ve had all weekend. All you had to do was make some phone calls.’

‘I’ve left messages,’ Fish lies. Stares out the windscreen at the
high tide running up the beach, licking the bathing boxes.

‘Bartolomeu, this is important to me. These Chinese
investors
have come to me. The company I work for. I can’t let them down. We have to show that we want foreign investment. That we’re not about to nationalise our major assets.’

‘Find them another mine.’

Again he hears his mother sigh. ‘They want this one. For whatever inscrutable Chinese reason they have, they want this one. But I need to know what I’m dealing with, Barto. I must know what Prospect Deep’s about before I make the approach. I don’t want anybody taken for a ride. Not us or the Chinese.’

Maybe they want it because of who owns it, Fish thinks. Says, ‘I’ll get back to you. Soon. Promise.’

‘When? This afternoon?’

‘If I can. Tomorrow—’

Is about to say, Tomorrow would be better. But she’s gone, leaving Fish with a bad feeling.