Trackers (75 page)

Then he spat in contempt, on
October's hand.

They regrouped, sent for coffee, sat
in the room next to the interview room, analysing their strategy. In the
background the sounds of a prison at night, now and then the dull clang of a
metal door slamming, a stern order over the loudspeaker, the voices of inmates,
like night animals calling to each other in the dark.

Between the three of them, there was
more than eight decades of law enforcement, and the shared knowledge that
patience was the only way. Their most effective weapon was time.

'Blind loyalty,' said Butshingi.

October: 'That's the way they are.
Unto death.'

'And he's not scared to die.'

'Sometimes I wonder if they want to
die, my friend. Seems like they're looking for it.'

Joubert sat with his elbows on the
table, head bent, working through the information.

'Johnny, what were they doing on that
road. Near Atlantis?'

'That's the question, Sup.'

'Is that traditionally part of the
Ravens' territory?'

'You know how it's been the past ten
years, Sup. After PAGAD and POCA. The leaders live in the white areas, recruit
members in the coloured townships. And sell
Tik
there.
Tweetybird used to live in Rondebosch, Terror and Moegamat Perkins live in
Rosebank, they never showed their faces at a place like Atlantis.'

'And yet he was there.'

'With someone in the boot of his car
...'

'On his way back from Atlantis?'

'Maybe not. Maybe they were just
looking for a place to get rid of the body. Far away from where they live. Or
maybe they were going to shoot someone. At a place where gunshots wouldn't
attract attention.'

'Which shooting range are we talking
about?' asked Joubert.

'The army has a shooting range out
there,' said October. 'It's massive. They might have been looking for it,
turned back. The bus driver said the sign board isn't there any more.' 'And
that's a sandy area,' said Joubert. 'Easy to dig a hole. Quick.'

'Could be, Sup. But it's just as easy
anywhere on the Flats. Sand everywhere ...'

'So they go looking for a place far
from the traditional hunting grounds to dispose of a body. Terror Baadjies, his
strongman, KD Snyders, and a driver. They don't know the area very well, want
to turn off somewhere away from the main road ...'

'That's why they were driving so
slowly. All three were looking out for a spot, they didn't realise the bus was
on their tail. They missed the shooting range turn-off. Someone says "we
should have turned off there". The driver hits the brakes.'

'Bang! The bus rams into them.'

'They get rid of the bus, go on and
do their thing.'

A long silence while they pondered.

Joubert scratched his head:
'Twenty-ninth of September. Flint only opened his bank account on the fifteenth
of October. Let's say he took a week or two to get hold of Terror's phone
number, and to call him personally. "I've got you on video, out at
Atlantis. I know what you were doing." Lies a bit, but vaguely, just
enough to let Terror know the evidence is damning.'

'And they pay up.'

'But not straight away. They take
their time. Nearly a week.'

'While they try to find him?'

'But why did they pay?' Johnny
October asked. 'Like Fizile said, get rid of the forensic evidence in the
Mercedes, make up a story. Then you don't have to worry about the police ...'

Silence, more thinking.

Butshingi wiped his hand over his
face. Then raised it slowly. 'Maybe ...'

The other two looked at him.

'Maybe,' Butshingi repeated, 'that's
it. Maybe they were not worried about the police.'

'What do you mean, my friend?'
October asked.

'When did this faction fight start?'

October rubbed his moustache. 'Our
intelligence says it began last year in August already, late August. That's
when
Die Burger
wrote about the plans of the
Democratic Alliance to appoint a special prosecutor to try and get Tweetybird
de la Cruz on tax evasion charges. That's just about the only thing they
can
prove. Then
Tweetybird sent for The Accountant, Moegamat Perkins, and Perkins said this is
trouble, because the Tax Man is a bulldog, where he bites, he won't let go. No
matter how they cooked the books, Revenue Services would clearly see there was
something fishy.'

'So that's when it started?'

'The story goes, that's when they
decided Tweetybird should leave the country And Terror Baadjies blamed Perkins,
because he's the one who does the books. Tweetybird tried to keep the peace,
but if your people know you're soon leaving for Uruguay, you don't have much
authority. Why do you ask?'

'Terror Baadjies. If he wasn't
worried about the police, if he could cover up. Why did he pay? Maybe because
he was worried about his own people finding out.'

'Aah,' said Johnny October.

'I'm not sure I understand,' said
Joubert.

'Sup, where's that timeline of
yours?' October was suddenly invigorated, Butshingi shifted closer.

Joubert opened his notebook and
thumbed through to the right place.

'We focus on everything
after
the incident
with the bus. We think this thing began on the twenty-ninth of September,' said
October. 'But Terror Baadjies already knew at the end of August that trouble
was brewing. There would be an opportunity to become leader of the Ravens.'

'Yes,' said Butshingi. 'So he started
planning his coup.'

'And that's what Fizile is talking about,
Sup. Terror and KD Snyders and the Mercedes. We've been thinking all along they
were busy with their usual crime on the twenty-ninth of September. But maybe
they were busy with the coup. Maybe the one in the boot was a Raven, a member
of the rival faction ...'

A light went on in Joubert's head.
'That's why they drove all the way to Atlantis. To get out of the Ravens'
territory.'

'Exactly,' said Butshingi.

'And that's why they paid Flint. Not
because they were afraid of the police finding out...'

'But because they feared some of
their own people would find out. Maybe the other lieutenant... the money man
...'

'Moegamat Perkins.'

'That's right.'

'Or Tweetybird himself,' said Johnny
October. 'If Tweetybird found out before he left the country that Terror
Baadjies was planning to usurp his throne, he would have had Terror shot so
fast...'

'Because they expect blind loyalty.'

Joubert, with suddenly insight,
pressed his finger on the table. 'That is what we must use, Johnny.'

'Sup?'

'KD's loyalty. We have to turn it
around.'

'Now I'm not with you.'

'What would happen if the Ravens
found out that a month or so before Tweetybird fled, Terror had been murdering
his own gang members in order to seize power?'

'His own faction would turn against
him.'

'Exactly. And that's the secret KD
has to keep. Terror brought KD into the Ravens. Initiated him ...'

'That's right, Sup. Terror is like a
father to KD.'

'Exactly, Johnny. KD won't talk
because he is loyal to the death to
Terror.'

'Absolutely.'

'That's what we have to use. The one
thing that KD is afraid of, is rejection of his Ravens father.'

'Aah ...' said Johnny October.

'Devious,' said Fizile Butshingi. 'I
like it already.'

Joubert sat right next to KD Snyders,
October and Butshingi opposite them.

He leaned in close, so that his face
was only centimetres from Snyders. He bluffed in a big way. He said: 'We know
everything, KD. Everything that happened over there at Atlantis. We know how
Terror stabbed the Ravens in the back, we know what's lying under the sand.' He
listened very carefully to Snyders' breathing, he knew the disfigured face
would reveal nothing.

He heard the man's breath stop for
one second, as though his heart skipped a beat.

That gave him courage.

'We know about Flint and the video.
We know how you got rid of him. We don't know where you put him, yet, but we'll
get there. KD, your problem is that only we three know who betrayed you. No one
else. But I tell you what we're going to do: we're going to get up from here
and tell the warders you sang. You sold out. You gave Terror to us, you handed
us his head on a platter. Superintendent Johnny October is going to broadcast
that all over the Cape Flats, that it was you who helped us get Terror. You
betrayed your own blood, and Terror betrayed the Ravens ...'

He stopped and listened. The
breathing was shallow now. Rapid.

'You stabbed Terror in the back.
That's what he will believe. And he can forget about becoming the new boss ...'

The chains joining the hand and foot
shackles trembled slightly, tap-tapping against the metal edge of the steel
table.

'Then you will have nothing, KD.
Nothing and nobody.'

At last, the face twisted. Then KD
Snyders lunged at Mat Joubert with a bellow of rage and despair erupting from
the depths of his great body.

Joubert jerked back, out of reach.
But he knew. They
had
him.

Johnny October waited for KD to calm down. Then he said, with
his unshakeable courtesy. 'There's a way out KD. Terror doesn't ever have to
know. But you have to help us.'

In his hoarse voice and with the
speech defect that prevented the deformed lips from forming plosives, KD
Snyders reluctantly answered a few questions. Curtly, with the fewest words
possible, his eyes glistening with hatred and fury, his hands trembling slightly.

Johnny October asked him: 'Who was
the one driving the Mercedes when the bus bumped into you?'

'Mannas Vinck.'

'Terror's chauffeur.'

KD nodded.

'Now you must tell us where we have
to dig, KD.'

Snyders looked away.

'You have one chance, KD.'

'Montagu's Gift. In Philippi.'

'The farms? Next to Mitchell's
Plain?'

He received only a nod as answer.

'Where on the farm?'

'Next to the Olieboom dune. On the
Morgenster side.'

October nodded, as though he knew
where it was. 'And the body you buried near Atlantis?'

'At the gate of the shooting range.
In the corner. Behind the 900-metre.'

'The 900-metre?'

Another nod.

'What does that mean?'

Snyders signalled the limit of his
betrayal with a shake of the head. He would answer no more.

'Who's buried there, KD? At the
shooting range?'

Silence.

'What happened? How did you kill
Flint?'

The gangster turned his face away,
stared at the wall.

'Who left his car at Virgin Active?'

Nothing.

Until October said: 'I'll keep my
side of the bargain, KD. But if you're lying to us ...'

They stood up then. October phoned
his station, told them to get manpower, there was digging to be done. Mat
Joubert phoned his wife and told her not to stay up for him.