The Hunter (40 page)

35

B
ryce, with his safari guide’s eyes, was pointing out animals faster than the balloon pilot could, but it wasn’t the wildlife that amazed me, it was the incredible sense of peace and freedom I felt. It was, I think, a feeling I’d never truly known.

It was the way the sun burnished Bryce’s cheeks a beautiful red-gold, and the way the zebra herds made swirling psychedelic patterns in the grass below. It was the complete absence of sound as we floated above the Masai Mara’s endless plains, and the warmth of the burners on my back when the pilot fired them up. All of it produced a feeling of being in a weightless cocoon, made all the more comforting when Bryce put his arm around me and squeezed me, as he did every few seconds.

I had wanted to see Anna before she left, to make one last attempt at beginning the healing process, and I wanted to thank Hudson Brand and Andrew Miles, but when I got to Anna’s tent in the pre-dawn blackness after Bryce and I had dressed for the balloon flight, I’d found her gone. Andrew, I knew, was flying them back to Nairobi, from where Hudson and Anna would fly back to Zimbabwe. From there, Anna would return to Britain.

Bryce kissed me, just before the pilot gave us the command to sit down and brace ourselves for landing. I remembered his touch from the few short hours we’d spent together earlier: tender, caring, yet strong and passionate. We didn’t chat much with the other passengers over the champagne breakfast on the plain. Instead, we spent a lot of time staring into each other’s eyes.

I was feeling pleasantly mellow when we returned to camp, and I was looking forward to peeling off my safari clothes and getting into a bath with Bryce. When I entered my tent I saw an envelope on the freshly made bed.

‘I need to use the loo,’ Bryce said.

I picked up the envelope, which had my name on it, and opened it. It was hand-written and my eyes went straight to the bottom. It was signed, Hudson Brand. I began to read it.

Dear Kate, by the time you get this we will be in Nairobi, and there is something I must tell you. It won’t be easy for you to hear . . .

‘Hey,’ Bryce called over the noise of the toilet flushing as I read on quickly. ‘Is this yours? I just found it on the floor in the bathroom.’

I looked up from the letter, my vision swimming and my heart pounding. Bryce was holding up a folding hunting knife with a wicked-looking blade that glinted in the morning light streaming in through the open tent window.

*

Andrew taxied the Beechcraft to a hangar at Wilson Airport. ‘Here’s our ride,’ he said into the intercom.

Brand looked out and saw the black car with tinted windows. He undid his seatbelt and opened the door. Anna, who’d been quiet during the flight, got up. Brand led the way down the stairs as soon as Andrew had cut the engines. The car drove up to meet them.

‘Quite the royal reception,’ Anna said as the car door opened.

Brand moved behind Anna as Sannie van Rensburg got out of the car and introduced herself by rank, name and service. ‘Anna Cliff, you’re under arrest for the murders of Nandi Mnisi and Juliette February in the Republic of South Africa, and Melanie Afrika in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. You’ll also be questioned about the murder of police Warrant Officer Mavis Sibongile.’ As Sannie began to read Anna her rights, Anna tried to talk over the top of her.

‘This is outrageous. I’ve done nothing . . . my husband, my late husband, Peter, he’s the one you need to –’

‘Mrs Cliff,’ Sannie said, brooking no further interruption, ‘we searched the lodgings of Patrick de Villiers yesterday afternoon and found a number of emails between you and him in which you discuss the planning and execution of these murders – and rapes – in graphic detail, along with your desire to kill your husband’s lovers and to set him up at some point in the future. We found some long strands of hair at the scene of Warrant Officer Sibongile’s murder which look very much like they came from you. I believe you were with De Villiers when Sibongile shot him, and that you killed her. You also discussed with De Villiers a plan to frame this man, Hudson Brand.’

Anna looked at him, and around her, but two uniformed Kenyan police officers emerged briskly from the hangar. Tom Furey, Sannie’s husband, had also got out of the black car and was standing by to restrain Anna. However, she looked nonplussed now as Sannie put the handcuffs on her.

Anna turned to Brand. ‘You knew.’

‘Captain Van Rensburg called me yesterday. My phone was flat and I only got power and signal when we got back to camp. I came to find you as soon as I heard.’

She looked at him, realising he had known about her and her crimes all night long. He’d had a job to do, making sure she didn’t harm herself or anyone else through the night, but he had learned of her childhood and her marriage and he felt something for her, though he wasn’t quite sure what. None of that excused the horrific crimes she and De Villiers had committed, but it told him he was dealing with a troubled, damaged soul. Brand had debated, in his own mind, telling Kate, but he figured she and Bryce needed a few hours of peace and happiness before she learned the truth about her sister. He’d opted for the letter instead. Also, if Sannie van Rensburg found Kate she’d do her best to extradite her to South Africa as well.

Van Rensburg and her husband had done well to organise the extradition and arrest warrant as well as passage on the overnight flight from Johannesburg to Kenya. It saved him having to deliver Anna to South Africa.

Tom and the Kenyan police ushered Anna into the back seat of the hired limousine, which would take them all to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport for a return flight to South Africa later that day. Sannie walked over to Brand and extended her hand.

‘Thank you for your help, Mr Brand. No hard feelings, I hope?’

‘No.’ He shook her hand.

‘I don’t suppose you can tell me where Linley Brown is?’

‘Linley Brown?’ Brand said. ‘I think you’ll find she passed away.’

Van Rensburg smiled. ‘Can I give you a lift to the airport?’

Andrew Miles was standing by his aircraft. ‘When is the owner collecting this crate?’ Brand asked.

‘Not for about a week,’ Andrew replied. ‘He said I can use it up here until he gets back.’

‘I kind of like the sound of Zanzibar,’ Brand said. ‘So, thanks for your kind offer, captain, but I think I’ll pass. I can pick up my Land Rover later.’

‘Zanzibar looks nice,’ Sannie said. ‘In fact, my husband and I were just planning a trip there on the flight last night. I hope you’re long gone before we get there.’

Brand smiled, ‘Me too.’

Van Rensburg got in the car and they drove away.

*

I read the rest of the letter out loud to Bryce. Brand explained the evidence against my sister, and the final sting he had planned with Van Rensburg, to arrest Anna in Nairobi. He apologised for leaving me in the dark last night, but I understood why he’d done it. I would need to find a way to communicate with Anna in prison, but that would take time. I also had to look after Lungile; she had kept my secret, even around her brother. I had told Bryce about her while we waited to board the balloon.

Brand said De Villiers’s computer and emails had revealed how he and my sister had acted as a devilish team. Anna had pretended to go on overseas trips to Thailand and Singapore while Peter was away, and had sent me postcards from the airports of these countries before catching connecting flights to South Africa. There, she and her safari guide lover, whom she had met in a sexually based internet chat room, had tailed Peter and stalked and murdered the women he had slept with. Anna, it appeared, was motivated by revenge and a grand plan that would eventually lead to Peter being blamed for the murders and imprisoned. De Villiers hated Brand and after the incident with the rhino poachers, when the Cliffs decided to engage him as their guide, Patrick and Anna hatched another plot to set up the American as a backup scapegoat, in case he found out the truth about Anna. De Villiers and Anna had also discussed the search for Linley or Kate, and Anna had bragged how she had set up a fake email account in Peter’s name and used it to send the reversed picture of Kate and her friend to Dani Russo. Anna had been tailing Peter and she had found out about our affair. They had thought they were clever, but Patrick de Villiers’s lack of computer security had undone them.

‘The knife,’ I said, looking at the wicked weapon Bryce still held. ‘I wonder if she came here last night planning to kill me, just as she killed the other women Peter slept with.’ Something else crossed my mind. ‘Our father was a monster, Bryce, and he made Anna what she is. He was stabbed to death and no one was ever charged with the crime; I wonder if it was her? She told me he deserved to die.’

‘Maybe if she gets some kind of treatment or therapy in prison it might come out; it might help her.’ Bryce put the knife down on the side table. ‘She would have had time to stab you before I arrived, so maybe she thought better of it.’

Dear Bryce
, I thought. He
would
think the best of Anna. If she had wanted to kill me then he had saved my life.

‘There’s something you don’t know about me,’ Bryce said.

I felt a moment of dread. I hoped there wasn’t a monster lurking beneath his gentle, loveable exterior. ‘Go on.’

‘My family’s loaded. I do want to find work here in Kenya, but we won’t starve, Kate. Also, seriously, if you need legal help for your friend Lungile I’ll find a way to help, likewise if your sister needs counselling or anything like that.’

I kissed him, then went back to reading the final paragraph of Hudson’s letter.

One more thing. I’ve decided not to make a final report to the insurance company. They may pay you, but they’re notorious for finding ways not to pay claims and making that call, as you did, may have voided your policy. I figure that I’m done with hunting people after this case and by the time they work out the truth I’ll be on a beach somewhere out of contact. If you do get your money, I do hope you’re true to your word about giving something back to the people you stole from and making amends with them. If Bryce is reading this he’ll make sure you stay on the straight and narrow.

I looked across at Bryce and he grinned.

I wish you the best of luck, Kate. You’ve got a good guy and a good guide there in Bryce Duffy. He’ll show you the right way.

Acknowledgements

It was a conversation over a beer with a man in Zimbabwe, John Woodward, that gave me the premise for
The Hunter
. John, the managing director, special services, for the Safeguard Security Group, was telling me how he had investigated many cases of people faking their own deaths.

John, a former police officer and member of the World Association of Detectives and Association of British Investigators, later talked me through the intricacies of this particular crime, and agreed to read the manuscript that was born of that first discussion. I’d like to pass on my thanks to John here, and my apologies for any embellishments I’ve added or any slipshod work on the part of my fictional investigators.

Likewise, I’d like to thank former South African Police Service officer Sonnett Scholtz for kindly agreeing to read through my story, and for her input and corrections. Thanks also to Adrian Kitchin of Insurance Advisernet Australia for answering my questions about insurance claims.

I’m indebted, also, to a very helpful team of African experts who read the manuscript with an eye to cultural, linguistic and geographical errors. My deep thanks go to Annelien Oberholzer, Sue Fletcher, Hilary Hann and Ayesha Cantor.

In the course of writing this novel, as with my past books, I was lucky enough to visit some truly beautiful places and I’d like to thank the following people and places for their hospitality: Garth Jenman of Jenman Safaris and Elephant’s Eye lodge in Zimbabwe; Duncan Rodgers of Leopard Hills in the Sabi Sand Game Reserve (who also read the manuscript for me); Don and Nina Scott of Tanda Tula Safari Camp in the Timbavati Game Reserve; Chris Harvie of Rissington Inn in Hazyview; and Brett McDonald, Managing Director of Flame of Africa holidays and owner of the
Lady Jacqueline
houseboat on Lake Kariba

As with many of my previous novels, I’ve devolved the (often tricky) responsibility for thinking up character names to a number of deserving charities and NGOs. The following big-hearted people paid good money to their respective causes to have their names assigned to characters in
The Hunter
: Linley Brown, Peter Cliff, Vanessa Fleming (for Geoffrey Fleming) and Bev Poor (for Andrew Miles Poor) made donations to Painted Dog Conservation Inc, an Australian-based charity supporting in-situ wildlife conservation projects in Africa; Kate Munns, who works for the NGO Worldshare, made a generous personal donation to Heal Africa, which funds a hospital in the strife-torn Democratic Republic of Congo; and Kevin Gillett (for Daniela Russo), generously supported ZANE, Zimbabwe, a National Emergency. I hope you all enjoy your fictitious identities.

The character of Bryce Duffy is named after another real person, Captain Bryce Duffy, Royal Australian Artillery, who died in the service of his country in Afghanistan in 2011. Bryce, like his mother and father, Kerry and Kim, and his sisters, Cassie and Samantha, had been to Africa and had read some of my books. I became good friends with the Duffys when writing Bryce’s story for the book
Walking Wounded,
written by Brian Freeman and me. The Duffys have had much to do with supporting and helping other families who have lost loved ones in Afghanistan, and with soldiers suffering physical and psychological wounds from the war. I never knew Bryce, but wish I’d met him and it was my honour to name a character in his memory, on behalf of his family.

A number of other people have helped me and my wife, Nicola, in so many ways during our travels in Africa, and special thanks go to Dennis and Liz in Zimbabwe, for introducing me to John Woodward; our friends and neighbours in Hippo Rock (my fictitious name for the place Nicola and I now call home for much of our time in Africa); Greg and Tracey Meaker (not Mahoney); and Wayne Hamilton, of
swagmantours.com.au
who helps me explore new places and also organises safaris (escorted by me) for my readers.

If you have enjoyed this book then a large part of that is down to my devoted unpaid editors: Nicola, my mum, Kathy, and my mother-in-law, Sheila; and, at Pan Macmillan Australia, Publishing Director Cate Paterson, Editorial Manager Emma Rafferty and copy editor Brianne Collins.
Thanks, too, to my hard-working literary agent, Isobel Dixon.

Lastly, whoever you are, wherever you are, and no matter how you’re reading this story (as long as you haven’t illegally downloaded it), thank you: you’re the one who counts most.