A Sailor's Honour (24 page)

‘Yes, Major. Loud and clear.'

De Villiers drove to the doctor's rooms and collected the referral letters. There were three, addressed to Drs McKerron, Zaug and MacDonald. He drove home slowly.

‘Have they found Zoë yet?' Emma asked. It was always the first question.

The answer was the same as before. ‘Not yet. But they will.'

Two days after their meeting in his chambers, James Mazibuko turned up at Weber's house in The Gardens. Unannounced, uninvited, unrepentant.

The Gardens was a small security complex in La Lucia. The houses – all built to a uniform style – rose against the sides of a north-south valley partly protected on the eastern side from the humid sea breeze that blows constantly from the northeast. Weber was lying under his car. He was shirtless and barefoot, wearing just a pair of baggies he had found in his son's wardrobe. The Porsche had been built long before the coach-builders had thought of galvanising the chassis and the body panels to prevent the car from rusting. Rust was the classic car's greatest enemy, spreading like a cancer once it had taken hold and never completely defeated. At The Gardens, so near the warm water of the Indian Ocean, the cancer had a willing ally in the salty air.

Working on the car, taking parts off for refurbishing and cleaning, rustproofing the components one by one before reinstalling them, was Weber's escape from the stresses and strains of his profession. It gave him time to think in an unstructured way that allowed his mind to wander and find its own solutions while his hands were engaged.

He was half under the car, outwardly calm and unconcerned, but inside he was in turmoil; had been the whole week. His helplessness and the uncertainties of the situation exacerbated his anger. In his practice, he maintained control over each case by meticulous preparation of the facts and the law to the point of scripting each trial and each argument as if it were a Shakespearian sonnet with every word and line in place. So much so that the last stanza was, as it had to be, irresistible in its logic and attraction, elegant even, if that could be achieved.

But there was no logic here, nor elegance. The situation was a brutal one. He was helpless in the face of the unknown. That Pierre de Villiers was convinced that Liesl would be returned to him unharmed was no consolation. Pierre had had problems of his own for years, as everyone in the family knew, and Weber was unwilling to rely too heavily on his judgment.

His leg went dead and he realised he had been lying under the car without doing anything for a long while. He was stretching for a spanner when a brown brogue blocked his reach.

‘How did you get in?' he asked as he slid out from under the car. He turned over onto his side and sat up, a cumbersome process when you're over sixty and have to start from prone on your back on a car trolley with multidirectional wheels.

‘Come on, don't just stand there. Help me up,' he said.

James Mazibuko extended his right hand and pulled Weber to his feet, then held his greasy hand out as if it offended him. Weber's leg tingled as the blood started circulating again.

‘How did you get in?' Weber asked a second time. He didn't bother to ask how Mazibuko had found out where he lived. The Webers' home phone number was ex-directory – at Liesl Weber's insistence – so that they would not have to deal with attorneys phoning in the evening or over the weekend. But a man of Mazibuko's talents and contacts would find them quickly if he wanted to.

‘I told the guards I was your client and I needed to see you urgently,' Mazibuko said. That would not have worked, Weber knew. Some money must have changed hands.

He directed Mazibuko towards the guest bathroom and limped through the open-plan lounge area to the patio. Does this mean that Mazibuko has accepted the assignment, Weber asked himself. If so, Weber would become the client and Mazibuko would be in charge. It would be difficult to cede control, especially to someone he hardly knew.

‘Your security is useless,' Mazibuko said when he came out onto the patio. He was dressed casually but expensively – the same brown brogues he had worn at their first meeting, navy blue Aigner slacks, light-blue shirt from the same designer displaying the logo above the pocket, brown belt to match the shoes, khaki dust coat folded neatly and carried over the arm.

‘Take a seat,' Weber offered. ‘What can I get you to drink? A beer? Something soft?'

‘I don't drink alcohol, but I'll have some tea if that's going around.'

‘I'll be back in a minute,' Weber said. He went back inside and put the kettle on. He scrubbed his hands and arms up to the elbows in the sink outside the back door of the kitchen. When he returned to the kitchen, Mazibuko was reaching up for the cups and saucers from the top shelf. It struck Weber that Mazibuko knew exactly where to find them.

‘You've been here before,' he stated as a fact rather than a question.

‘I like to know who I'm working for,' Mazibuko said.

‘You could have asked me and I would have told you,' Weber said.

‘It's not the same,' Mazibuko said. ‘Isn't there a theory that says everything in nature changes simply by being observed?'

Weber cocked his head to one side. He tried to calculate the odds of someone like James Mazibuko knowing the laws of physics. Or to be more precise, some obscure theory pertaining to scientific experimentation.

‘I need to know more about you too,' he said. He carried the tray out to the patio and watched to see if Mazibuko would follow. ‘But I'll ask you directly, not break into your house,' he said over his shoulder.

Mazibuko laughed out loud, a deep baritone. ‘You wouldn't get past the gate. If the dogs don't get you, my bodyguards will. I get pictures from my
CCTV
to my cellphone.' Mazibuko poured tea for both of them. ‘Look, if you want me to do this job, you are going to have to trust me. And the less you know about me, the better. I need to know everything about you, and you need to know nothing about me. At least, not more than a lawyer would normally know about his client.'

Weber knew it was wise to keep the incriminating evidence to a minimum.

‘Tell me where your problem started,' Mazibuko said. ‘It couldn't have come out of the blue. No one kidnaps another man's wife unless it's personal.' Weber started a denial, but Mazibuko cut him short. ‘I need to know everything, including why you keep fingering that lion's claw you wear around your neck. It is a lion's claw, isn't it?'

Weber nodded. ‘So you've decided to—' he started to say, but was interrupted a second time in as many seconds.

‘Start at the beginning. I'll decide after I've heard all of it,' Mazibuko said. He grinned. ‘Isn't that what you lawyers do? You want to hear the whole story first before you agree to take the case.'

‘Not advocates,' Weber defended his profession. ‘We are obliged to take every case that comes our way.'

It took two hours and another round of tea for Weber to tell Mazibuko everything he knew from the beginning.

‘I think it is clear,' he concluded, ‘that they were taken by people who know what they are doing, both here and in New Zealand.'

‘I agree. That's the good news. If they are professionals, they won't hurt them. The bad news is that it's not going to be easy to find them.' Mazibuko stood up and stretched. He had listened in near complete silence as the story unfolded.

They walked out through the garage. Mazibuko ran his fingers over the Carrera's paintwork. ‘1964 Carrera 356
C
, the last year they made them.' He walked around the car as he spoke. ‘And a cabriolet to boot. Very rare. Special two-litre four-cam racing engine pushing out 130 horse power. Black-on-red interior, very popular combination, left-hand drive, which means I can sell it in the US for more than $300,000, maybe as much as $450,000, seeing it is in such good condition and entirely original.'

Mazibuko knew how to impress. And he certainly knew which buttons to press.

‘I have more good news,' Mazibuko said with a smile. ‘If they can't hide their money from me, how do you think they are going to hide your wife from me?'

Weber shrugged. He was unsure how to deal with Mazibuko. The man appeared to be quite jovial, but underneath his banter, there seemed to be a layer of steel.

‘They'll make contact again,' Mazibuko said. ‘And when they do, I want to know exactly what they said. I want the whole truth, remember? And nothing but the truth. No secrets, no parallel schemes. I'm not going to risk my life, or worse, my freedom, because of some cockeyed parallel operation to find your wife. Understand?'

Weber had to nod.

‘I want to hear you say it,' Mazibuko insisted. ‘The whole truth and nothing but the truth.'

‘The whole truth and nothing but the truth,' Weber promised.

Mazibuko's car was parked in the visitors' parking up the street. It was an Aston Martin, a convertible, light blue to match the Aigner shirt, with sand-coloured upholstery matching the khaki coat Mazibuko now casually draped ever the passenger seat. It was as if he had chosen his dress to match the car. Or vice versa. He spoke to Weber from the driver's seat. ‘Make sure to do a nice job on my car. I'll be coming to collect it soon.'

Despite himself, Weber found himself not only trusting, but liking this detail-oriented man. This was the first time Weber felt some hope that his wife would be returned to him safely. He watched the Aston Martin until it rounded the first bend. It was a beautiful car with almost feminine lines, but it didn't have the throaty roar of a Porsche.

He returned to his garage and crawled back under his car. The Carrera was already in near perfect condition, and truth be told, there was very little left to do. Liesl frequently told anyone who'd listen that to her husband, a car was not a car but a project and as soon as his beloved little Carrera was in perfect nick with no more work to be done on it, he would tire of it and sell it on, most probably to someone who would never appreciate just how special the car was. Weber had never been able to muster a defence to his wife's charge. Guilty on all counts.

He now lay under the car and considered James Mazibuko's assessment that they were up against men who were extremely well organised and professional. He dared hope that Mazibuko was right and that his wife would be released unharmed. That he was now working on a car that might soon belong to Mazibuko didn't strike Weber as unusual. But he couldn't imagine Mazibuko covered in grease up to his elbows, bending over the engine bay or reaching up from below the car to clean something. Nevertheless, he was sure to pay someone to look after it and that person would probably, judging by what Weber had been able to ascertain of Mazibuko's character, be professional too.

While Weber's advocate's hands were working, his mind was busy. Mazibuko was right: this was personal. Weber and De Villiers had already come to the same conclusion. His hands stopped their work. Could those long-past encounters about a ship be the link? He and De Villiers had made enemies and he wondered where the ship could be now. Not quite big enough to be called a ship, she had started out as a fishing boat, built of steel in Bremerhaven, later registered in Malta.

The
Alicia Mae.

It all comes down to her, he thought. A ship with a Swedish girl's name.

While Pierre de Villiers was in the air on his flight from Auckland, James Mazibuko was in Johannesburg, having dinner with the senior deputy director of the National Prosecuting Authority. He had enticed the man to dinner at the most exclusive restaurant in the business district of the wealthiest suburb in the country with a hint of evidence which could result in a coup for the prosecutor. The
NPA
had endured some serious criticism for overspending its budget while pursuing a hopeless, politically motivated case against the president. The national director was going to lose his post as soon as they decided on his compensation. The deputy director was in line for the top job. All he needed was a high-profile success.

Mazibuko had hinted at the right sort of break when he'd phoned. He arranged for his guest to be fetched in the Aston Martin, driven by a white-coated, gloved chauffeur. The wine was a red from Chile and a white from the South Island of New Zealand. There were no prices on the wine list. Their table had its own maître d' and chef. The two had spent some time explaining what the kitchen could produce for such distinguished guests. The setting, the menu, the attention lavished on the deputy director and the chauffeur-driven car were all reminders that there was now a new elite that revelled in being seen to be rich and powerful.

‘So James,' the deputy director said, talking with his mouth full and his glass in his hand, ‘what you're saying is that you have information that there is a major underground operation of the right-wing kind being planned, or already in the execution phase, is that right?'

‘For sure, AA,' Mazibuko said, calling the deputy by the initials with which he signed all his decisions to prosecute. ‘It's running, according to my source, and we expect some overt action in the next week.'

‘Your source thinks they are holed up somewhere in the northeastern parts?'

‘Yes, my informant couldn't be more precise. Or he wouldn't be. You know how it is with informants. They always hold something back for another payday.' Mazibuko shrugged his shoulders. ‘I know he's going to come to me with the exact location in the next day or two – his money never lasts beyond the next day at the races. Then I'll let you know what I've got.'

‘And in the meantime you want to know if we have anyone under surveillance in that part of the world, so that you don't step on our toes or perhaps ruin our operation by getting involved, unwittingly, so to speak?'