Apostle Lodge

Book 4: Col Vaughn de Vries

by Paul Mendelson

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

From the author of the acclaimed The First Rule of Survival, praised by Lee Child as 'excellent and uncompromising', comes Paul Mendelson's explosive latest thriller. Apostle Lodge looks out over the ocean, an award-winning mansion built by a renowned architect. Stark and minimal, its black opaque windows hide a terrible secret. As Colonel Vaughn de Vries investigates the depraved crime committed within its walls, he believes there may be more than one killer on the loose, all with connections to a charismatic man who, as a child, drowned his sister and shattered his family. And his work is not over yet. 'A jaw-droppingly brilliant crime thriller. Imagine The Killing moved to Cape Town and into the landscape of the hot and dusty African veld' Philip Glenister 'Mendelson plots so smoothly and writes so powerfully' The Guardian

Release date: October 5, 2017

Publisher: Constable

Print pages: 384

Sample

 

 

She descends the steep Bo Kaap cobbled street cautiously, glancing to her left between terraced cottages at the sparkling silver water beyond the glass skyscrapers, dazzled by the intensity of the light. She pauses in a pool of shade, pushes her veil a little forward so that it is low over her eyebrows, wishes that she had water. Even now, before nine in the morning, the heat is settling heavily in the City Bowl, buildings and pavements still exuding warmth from months of unrelenting, unprecedented heat. Even the wind, the theoretically cooling Cape Doctor, is hot and breath-stealing. She leans against a white-painted wall under bright scarlet bougainvillaea, looks at the topographical arms embracing the city: Devil’s Peak ahead of her, Signal Hill behind,Table Mountain itself, sharply defined, free from cloud, augmented only by the revolving cable car, refracting the sun like a jewel as it approaches the summit.

She adjusts her backpack, her shoulders stiff, wipes sticky hands on the coarse black material, steps out down the hill.

She crosses Buitengracht Street, congested with cars, engines turning over fast to power air-conditioning, pumping fumes into the low smog, which forms earlier as each week goes by. She finds little respite in the shady narrow confines of Shortmarket Street: a line of cars is backed up, hawkers and porters weaving between them with carts and trolleys. She studies each of them as they approach her, registers their fatigue, the narrowing of eyes as they take in her veil and heavy black robes. She is panting now, the exertion wearing on tired limbs. She looks up to find that she is almost at Long Street, one of Cape Town’s central avenues, a Mecca for tourists and locals alike, fronted by bars and restaurants, hotels and backpackers’ lodges, African artefact emporia and independent clothing stores. Commuters and visitors jam the pavements. She turns at the sensation of ice-cold air seeping from the opening door of a fluorescent-tube-lit tattoo parlour. Ahead, she sees the building that was described to her. She stops, composes herself, checks her backpack.

The small white truck drifts up the right-hand side of Long Street, pulling out around double-parked cars without warning, ahead of the slow-moving traffic. It accelerates past two youngsters on scooters, picking up speed. The driver sees the traffic lights ahead change to red, registers the Metro police car to his right, brakes hard.

From two hundred metres up the hill, she hears the brakes squeal, turns into a thunderous blast, glimpses the first second of the vast explosion, tongues of fire, like the arms of an anemone, human mouths wide, screaming silently, arms raised, lifted from their feet away from the invisible core of the detonation. She finds herself jolted backwards, head hitting the pavement hard, eyes scalded, vision gone, a siren in her ears, consciousness seeping away, her last coherent thought for what would be forty hours: her long-sought, hard-fought interview appointment missed.

 

 

 

 

The hall at the Inns of Court in the centre of Cape Town is grandly proportioned, ceiling high and elaborate, tall leaded windows running its length overlooking dusk descending on the Company’s gardens. On the opposite wall hang huge oils, dark portraits of white men who carry their gravitas heavily.

At the lectern, Dr Grace Bellingham says:

‘The belief in Manichaeism is that the battle between good and evil – God and Satan – was not external to the human race, but intrinsically located within us. The human was the battleground in which these powers fought: the soul defined the person. Nothing about us was assumed good or evil, but rather that we possessed both light and dark, that the battle was ongoing and never-ending through the reign of humanity.’

Colonel Vaughn de Vries of the South African Police Service opens one of the heavy wooden doors, slides inside, glances down at his cheap, tarnished shoes against the shiny parquet floor, eases his way to the back row of seats, slips into a chair on the centre aisle. He glances around, sees the sides and backs of heads he senses belong to the distinguished – a larger gathering than he had expected – inclined slightly upwards to face, in the dusty funnel of light, the raised lectern at the far end of the room.

‘If it is true, as many studies suggest, that every one of us has, at some point, considered an act of extreme violence, including murder, what but our own brain can possibly be considered in our search for the source of an evil that allows us to commit such a crime? And whether our actions induce remorse or we remain unmoved is surely only determined by our own moral barometer, and how it might have been set.’

De Vries ducks his head, clears his throat, looks back up. Only the monotonous insistence of SAPS bureaucracy has made him late. He is embarrassed, though he has little interest in the subject matter, dreads the socializing with his fellow audience members.

Her voice is clear and deep. He stares at her face, smiles, remembering their late-night conferences, their faces close, lips almost touching. The intensity between them not from the deadlines of a murder investigation but their own physical attraction, her smell, her touch. In three years of working together, he can remember every expression that crossed her face, but not one word that was discussed.

‘There is, naturally, one other consideration: influence, and the hypothesis of learned or inherited behaviour. Can our innate, inbred control mechanisms be manipulated, or are they truly set within us?’ She looks out across her audience as if applying her question to each member. ‘We might, I suppose, be grateful to Charles Whitman. In 1966, at the age of twenty-five, the former marine killed seventeen and wounded thirty-two in a mass shooting at the University of Texas. That morning, he had murdered his wife and mother. At this first crime scene, he left a suicide note.’ She looks down at the lectern and reads, ‘“I do not really understand myself these days. I am supposed to be an average, reasonable and intelligent young man. However, lately (I cannot recall when it started) I have been a victim of many unusual and irrational thoughts. Pay off my debts and donate the rest anonymously to a mental-health foundation. Maybe research can prevent further tragedies of this type.”’

She looks up at her audience. De Vries is suddenly aware that there is silence. He has been meditating on how their life together might have been and how, now, both have two children, both have left their spouse, both are alone in the city they call home.

‘Did Whitman sense that evil had infested his brain, disoriented his previously balanced moral compass? Is the concept of evil nothing more than a distortion of our brain function? And, if that is so, can evil – as a human concept – actually be said to exist at all?’

She bows minutely, takes a step back from the lectern. The applause sounds strident in the cavernous room. The audience begin to shuffle and chatter, rise from their seats, greeting one another with noncommittal smiles, firm handshakes. Double doors between portraits open and slowly people move towards the tables laid with glasses of Champagne, sweating canapés, sad tumblers of orange juice.

‘Vaughn . . .’

De Vries turns to see the director of his Special Crimes Unit, Henrik du Toit, in full uniform.

‘Sir.’

‘I had no idea you were attending this evening.’

‘I have some interest in the cerebral, sir. When time allows . . .’

‘After the events in Long Street last week, to contemplate such questions must be considered timely . . .’

‘Is it just the quantity, do you think?’

‘Quantity?’

‘Of victims,’ De Vries says, ‘that make it headline news. That many die every day around Cape Town. Every newsman loves a bomb, or a plane crash.’

Du Toit leans towards him. ‘They were tourists and professionals.’

De Vries snorts. ‘Does the differentiation of victims lack humanity?’

He feels Du Toit’s hand in the small of his back, permits the gentle pressure to rotate him, finds a photographer, knees bent, lens pointing. The man snaps, turns away.

‘Now I see why you’re here, sir.’

Du Toit is media friendly. At least he protects De Vries from them, allows him to work.

‘The entire city is afraid. Eleven dead. What is it? Forty-something injured?’ He lowers his voice. ‘Nobody knows who these people were, what they hope to achieve. We can’t even identify the driver. No one’s claimed responsibility.’

Another photographer attracts their attention. Du Toit stands to attention. De Vries turns away, walks towards alcohol, takes a glass, moves to a corner by the doors. In his pocket, his cellphone vibrates. He reads the message, smiles. He drains his glass, takes a final glance at the self-congratulatory gathering, slips out between the doors into the cool of the stone stairwell, descends, strides into the street.

Mlungisi Solarin walks through the tall bronzed doors of the anonymous SAPS building into the hot Pretoria air, across the pavement, into the waiting people-carrier. His small bag is loaded into the boot. The driver slams the door, gets into his seat, starts the engine. Solarin glances back at the austere, castle-like structure, still in awe that this is his workplace. He turns to the man beside him.

‘Good to be getting out of the city.’

‘Hot down south too, my friend.’

The vehicle sets off; the air-conditioning accelerates. He sits back, digesting the three-hour briefing they have just been given on the explosion in Long Street, Cape Town. In the seats ahead of him, two officers speak quietly; the man next to him rests his head against the frame of the vehicle, his eyes closed. This is his first assignment outside Gauteng, his opportunity to be part of a taskforce, to travel his country. This is why he studied, worked weekends through university, excelled in the ranks of the SAPS, aced his promotion exams. So that he could be sitting here, en route to Wonderboom National Airport, Pretoria, on the flight down to Cape Town, no longer to be merely the child of an illegal Nigerian immigrant and a South African mother. No longer Mlungisi. He is, he reflects, as he sees his face in the copper-hued window, Lieutenant Mike Solarin of the Major Crimes Unit Taskforce.

De Vries stands as she reaches the table.

‘You won’t be missed?’

Grace Bellingham embraces him, kisses both cheeks, allows the waiter to place her to De Vries’s left.

‘The speeches I can give, the glad-handing defeats me.’ Her voice is husky from years of smoking; her posture is confident; her eyes are wary – perhaps, he thinks, afraid.

She surveys the ornate dining room, part of a grand former banking hall now the Taj Hotel at the top of Wale Street.

‘I can’t imagine this is your local?’

‘You said you wanted Indian food. This is, I’m told, the best. And, no, I have never been here before.’ He looks curiously at the waiter who is spreading his napkin across his lap. ‘There’s a good takeaway just around the corner from my house.’

‘We could have gone there.’

‘This place has air-con.’

They order drinks, balance heavy menus on their laps.

She says: ‘Did you hate everything I said? I can almost imagine you rolling your eyes . . .’

‘I was late, as you know.’

‘Were you?’

‘You saw me slip in.’

‘Did I?’

‘I know you, so I know you did. Why are you trying to trap me?’

She smiles at him. ‘Because this is the game we play.’

He nods. ‘I’ve missed it.’

They eat ornate, refined Indian food, converse happily. De Vries stares at her, hair untied, eyes no longer occluded by dark spectacles, still wearing barely any make-up. He thinks that she still exudes the beauty of the precociously intelligent woman he met over twenty years ago, after he had joined the SAPS. Over those years, their paths have crossed sporadically, including 2003 to 2005 when she worked with his previous Major Crimes Department, building profiles of rapists and murderers. A six-month placement with the FBI in Quantico,Virginia, has propelled her to the forefront of criminal profilers in South Africa, an author and private consultant in the States.

He watches her eat, lay down her cutlery, speak; there is a delicacy to her hand movements, her posture, a style that he, and his circle of friends, wholly lack. She always had control over him: his awe made him her puppet, his lust juvenilized him. He wonders why she has contacted him now.

‘I’m coming home. For good this time, I think.’

‘To do what?’

She sits back, sighs. ‘Little, I hope. Write, probably teach. Maybe sit on a sunny stoep. Semi-retirement.’

‘Brace yourself. It’s been the hottest summer on record. The dams are dry. No sign of respite.’

‘You’re as bad as the Brits. I couldn’t believe them. Obsessed by the weather.’

‘In case you’ve forgotten, we have much more weather than the Brits.’

‘As if you care . . .’

‘You’ve been away from Cape Town for too long.’

She picks up her glass, toasts him. ‘And now I’m back.’

‘Leading a discourse on the nature of evil. You’ve picked an apposite moment. Everyone is jittery.’

‘No word on the bombing, who, or why?’

‘The powers that be are characteristically tight-lipped.’

‘They don’t know?’

‘So I’m told.’

‘Terrorists like to claim responsibility, so I’m surprised.’ She eats a couple of mouthfuls, lays down her cutlery. ‘And the lecture, it’s just publicity for the book, a way to announce my return, to the select few.’

‘You’ll be in demand.’

‘A demand I may not meet. I’m tired, Vaughn. You should know: dealing with the people we do, you can rationalize all you like, but there’s a tangible cost. It reroutes your brain. They have destroyed all joy in me.’

‘They’re welcome to whatever I have left. Go to waste otherwise.’

‘Those who use us think that we study them to learn and that we remain untouched, but the truth is that they eat away at us, they feed on us.’

He pats his stomach. ‘I have flesh to spare.’

She doesn’t smile. ‘Be careful,’ she says. ‘Before you know it – before I knew it – you live only in their world. You lose yourself entirely.’

‘My wife lives happily in Jo’burg with some media type, my girls have finished university, starting work. It’s just me and my house. I live for the work. Nothing else does it for me.’

‘Nothing?’

He smiles, remembering their history, a meal together in more modest surroundings than this, a flirtation that nearly evolved. ‘That was then. I was just married, faithful. You were taken. I used to see you with your kids, your husband, wonder what it was we had . . .’

‘Or didn’t have . . .’

‘We had something, Grace. I was never sure what.’

‘We’re both older,Vaughn.’ She looks up at him. ‘Just because a girl loves a puppy doesn’t mean she wants a dog.’

He shunts piles of rice with the back of his fork, pushes them into thick, sweet sauce. He senses she is watching him.

‘What do you want, Grace?’

She shrugs; a half-smile creates a dimple in her right cheek.

‘I don’t know . . . Company, a familiar face, something to ground me back into my life here . . . Love, sex, friendship.’

‘Apparently I was only ever good at one of those.’

‘And have you considered,’ she says, head tilted, ‘perhaps, now, you aren’t my type?’

He does not raise his eyes. ‘Women often say that before they sleep with me.’

She does not laugh, even smile. ‘You’re very sure of yourself, aren’t you?’

He looks up. ‘I don’t care any more. When I was young, being rejected was the end of everything, so I was nervous, but now . . .’

‘Now you’re used to it?’

They stare at one another, each keeping a straight face, until he laughs first. ‘It never happens.’

The bright dark sky reveals the stars blurred through the almost viscous warm wind. They battle uphill, tired and intoxicated. No one sits outside. Smokers press themselves against the walls of restaurants and bars, watch sparks fly as they flick tips. They climb the stairs to 15 On Orange Hotel, amid up-lit white right-angled pillars, the lobby level illuminated brightly beneath a hazy glow from the upper storeys of the tinted-glass rectangle.

Arm in arm, they cross the lobby to the lifts.

‘Three nights,’ she says, ‘courtesy of my publisher. I need to find an apartment.’

The lift doors part. She steps in ahead of him. His cellphone rings. He snatches it from his pocket, squints at the screen.

‘I have to take this.’

She cups the edge of the lift door, preventing its closure, watches him listen, his eyes close.

‘I have to go.’

She sighs. A philosophical smile forms beneath fallen eyes.

‘You know there are some things I can’t ignore. I’m really, really sorry, Grace.’

She lets the doors close, says: ‘So am I.’

Sweat forms over his entire body. He feels feverish and disoriented from the downhill jog back to his car. His back hurts, neck aches. He battles the car aggressively across town, honking and flashing at the slow and weaving populace, crawling on wheels or foot. He joins Kloof Nek Road, runs through the gears of his underpowered car to climb the steep gradient towards the cable-car station, crests the humpback mountain pass, follows the main road down above Camps Bay.

Twenty-five years ago, this area was still considered wretchedly windblown and sun-bleached; properties were ramshackle, the vertiginous land cheap. Now, the view down to the blue bay, the white-sand beach fringed with palm trees, overcomes concerns about inhospitable terrain and the blistering wind. Every portion of land that can be built on has been. The seafront has morphed from traditional town thoroughfare to neon-lit strip of high-priced cafés and restaurants, boutique hotels and a promenade for the rich to cruise in their imported supercars, to lunch and dine and club the night away. He rarely comes here now.

From high above, the crescent of beach is dimly lit by the multicoloured beams of light projecting from the bars and cafés, the sky and sea battleship grey, the water crowned by the startlingly white crests of the waves being blown back on themselves into sheets of spray. To his left, the Twelve Apostles – the peaks at the back of Table Mountain, running almost as far as Hout Bay – are deep purple, fringed with translucent, elongated wisps of cloud.

He brakes hard at the first sharp corner in the road, fighting the adverse camber, strains to see the black on white signposts indicating side-streets. He free-wheels down the hill, tapping the foot-brake, finds Plumbago Lane, notices that it runs on both sides of Camps Bay Drive. He instinctively turns left, sees flashing lights at the end of the narrow street, his choice vindicated. He slows before he reaches them, takes out a cigarette, lights it, inhales deeply. Within the chaos, the tragedy and fear, he must focus only on what he can see and feel about the crime scene. To him, the politics, the regimen, are unimportant. He drifts down the slight incline, noting that the substantial properties at either side of the road are built on wide plots. There are no cars parked on the street, save for the SAPS vehicles.

As he draws up behind a marked patrol car, he sees a small group who are residents, he assumes, craning their necks past a uniformed officer. He takes a final drag on his cigarette, pushes it hard into the ashtray, one among a hundred stompies, opens his door.

The wind, driven up the side of the Mountain, funnelled up ravines, squeezed between buildings, hits him. He holds his door as he stands straight, steps away, lets the wind slam it shut.

He looks behind him. The lane is dark, the small streetlights off. Gnarled trees, mostly leafless, lean back like limbo dancers; spiky hedges in front of electric fences mark boundaries. Lights glow dimly behind drawn curtains. As he turns back, he sees his warrant officer, Don February, walking towards him, his arms wrapping his oversized suit jacket around his small, slender frame.

‘Be careful, sir. I was almost blown over.’

De Vries smiles. ‘That’s because there’s nothing to you.’ De Vries pats his stomach. ‘Alcohol anchors me.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘We have one body?’

‘Yes, one.’

‘Old?’

‘The victim is not old. Nor is her body. But, sir, I do not know what you will think.’

‘Think of what?’

‘What you are about to see.’

They start to walk, past the gathering of neighbours, as far as what appear to be the final houses on each side of the lane. The sandy tarmac road opens up to form a turning circle, beyond which there is a thicket of contorted trees and long grasses leading to a rocky escarpment.

Don gestures ahead and to his right.

‘Down here, there is one further property. It is called Apostle Lodge.’

He walks ahead of De Vries, produces his torch, illuminates a turn down a steep incline, leading to large garage doors at the base of a cast-concrete structure, featureless and dark. To its right, the entrance hidden by an overgrown evergreen shrub, Don indicates a narrow raised walkway, which runs around and over the driveway. He gestures for De Vries to take the lead.

A coarse metallic screech startles him.

‘What the fuck’s that?’

Don points to the roof of the house. Against the dimly glowing sky, De Vries can just make out the angular form of the bird-shaped chimney cowl. It turns again in the wind, squealing mournfully.

De Vries exhales, looks down at the narrow walkway above the deep caldera of the garage area.

‘What is this place?’

‘All I could discover is that it was built by a young female architect in the 1970s, one of the first houses on the street. The windows are all black from the outside. You will see, sir. It is a very odd house.’

‘Who lives here?’

‘Nobody. It is for sale. I have contacted the real-estate agent, but I have received no reply. According to the neighbour, it has been on the market for many years.’

At the end of the walkway, a uniformed officer stands at the door under an opaque glass globe, its light grey and dim. Within, De Vries sees a whiter, colder glow. He steps into a hallway panelled in dark bare wood, lit by recessed fluorescent tubes above each wall. The light is cold and sickly. He is immediately aware of a minute rapid flickering, which makes him feel nauseous, of the pervasive chill, many degrees cooler than the hot night air from which he has come. He lets Don overtake him, lead the way through a Spartan kitchen – more concrete, dark wood – into a wide living room, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a garden and, in the distance, far below, the bay and the vast expanse of shadowy sea beyond. The angle to the ocean means that he can see no moon, no horizon.

The back of the room is also clad in wood, the same flickering lighting. There is an oversized silver free-standing lamp, with a wide, curving arm, ending in a chromed globe. It is not illuminated, hanging over nothing but the highly polished grey and black terrazzo floor. There is no furniture but for a narrow, almost Z-shaped, chrome and black leather chaise longue, facing out to the view, and a single dining chair. As he approaches, the smell of excrement and urea begins to intensify. He sees the back of Harry Kleinman, the department’s senior pathologist, bent over the couch.

‘Harry?’

Kleinman does not move. ‘Give me a moment.’

De Vries rarely sees Kleinman outside his lab, let alone the building itself. He turns to Don. ‘Why is Dr Kleinman here?’

‘I asked him to attend.’

‘Why?’

Don opens his mouth, closes it again. ‘I want you to see, sir.’

De Vries steps forward.

‘Sir, wait.’

He freezes. ‘What?’

‘Look down at your feet.’

On the floor, De Vries discerns movement. He squats, sees Don offering his torch, takes it, points it. A wavering line of ants, dark orange-brown against the almost black floor, meanders between his shoes.

‘Ants.’ He shrugs his shoulders. ‘So what?’

‘There are two other trails. One heading towards the corner of the building there.’ He points towards the far right-hand corner. ‘The other leads towards the door in the wall to the left.’

‘There’s a body. There are always bugs.’

A deeper, more certain voice says: ‘They’re not interested in the body.’ De Vries turns towards Kleinman, who stands straight, arching his back slightly. ‘Flies, maggots, cockroaches, many other what you call bugs, but the ants, they have a different destination.’

‘Can we talk insects later? Let me see the victim.’

Kleinman smiles grimly, glances at Don. ‘Of course.’

He steps aside. De Vries finds himself staring into the black, bloody, empty eye sockets of a woman’s face, her mouth wide open, distorted, screaming. Dry rust-coloured blood stains her face, like tears. He feels a cold shiver pass down his back, a feeling like static electricity reacting with his damp skin. He takes a breath, tries to retain his dignity.

‘Shit.’

He forces himself to study the body. She is probably in her late thirties or early forties, dark hair curling around her face, bound to the chaise longue by her wrists and ankles. Her blouse is raised over her breasts, her bra still in place; her skirt is pushed high to her thighs. De Vries ascertains that she is wearing no underwear, looks away again, wishes she was covered, knows that this cannot happen until he has borne witness.

‘Where are her eyes?’

‘Follow the ants,Vaughn.’

De Vries looks up at Kleinman, back at the floor, sees the two trails converge on the dining chair. On the black leather seat cushion, two eyeballs sit apart, smothered in crawling ants, moving tentacles of insects stretched out behind them. One is nearly at the edge of the chair.

‘I imagine that they were placed next to one another,’ Kleinman says, ‘possibly lined up to give the impression that they are looking back at her. The ants are attempting to move this one.’ He points with a pencil at the eyeball near the edge of the chair.

De Vries exhales, wipes his face, feels both chilled and suffocated; wonders how Kleinman and Don February can seem so calm.

‘Her eyes: before or after she died?’

‘Afterwards.’ Kleinman studies him. ‘Are you all right,Vaughn?’

‘No. Why are you?’ He looks accusingly at both of them.

‘I should have warned you, sir.’

De Vries examines the room. The low ceiling, exposed concrete and dark panelling make the space seem barren and hard. He turns back to the scene, determined to study it dispassionately.

He works his way up from her bare feet, past the light summer dress. Her skin is lightly tanned, smooth, healthy.

‘Sexually assaulted?’

‘You don’t like speculating and neither do I,’ Kleinman says, ‘but, from a cursory examination, I would say yes. I’ve taken swabs already but, once you’re done, we’re going to transport her and the chair back to the lab – still attached.’

‘Time of death?’

Kleinman folds his arms. ‘There are so many factors at work here, I’m guessing. With that understood, I’ll say that life probably became extinct between twenty-four and forty-eight hours ago. When I examine her and calculate exactly, based on the readings provided, I can be more accurate . . . No obvious cause. Something frightening, agonizing – but that’s your department, isn’t it, Vaughn?’

‘Then why are you here?’

‘Because,’ Kleinman says firmly, ‘I was intrigued by Warrant February’s call to me, his description of, and his initial reaction to, the scene. It’s good that I’ve seen her in situ. I can tell you now: she is dehydrated, the wounds beneath her bindings old. I think she has been here a while. She was bound to this chair, raped, terrified and, over a period of perhaps several days, she was left to die.’

De Vries stands still, his back to Don February. It is his ritual to absorb the atmosphere of the scene, to study details, to commune with the victim, to devote himself to them. He wishes that he could be more objective, more disinterested, but that is not how he operates. The victim, helpless and unknowing, naked and exposed, has taken him into her confidence, and he vows never to betray it, never to give in.

He turns from the interior to the dark garden, the rising moon beginning to backlight the bent branches of the surrounding trees. After a couple of minutes, Don squats with his torch, produces an evidence bag and a folded piece of white paper. He scoops up several ants, tips the paper into the top of the evidence bag, seals it. He stands, puts the bag in his jacket pocket.

‘What do we know?’

‘We have not even begun house-to-house yet,’ Don says. ‘There are neighbours outside, but I have not spoken officially with any of them. We have a team ready.’

‘Who found her?’

‘All I have been told is that the neighbours’ children discovered the body and their father raised the alarm.’

‘They saw her from outside?’

‘No, sir. We can see out of the windows but, from the outside, you cannot see in. On the outside, the glass is black. There is a side door from the garden into a utility room, and another door into the house. Both these doors were open when officers arrived.’

‘They touch anything? The kids or the officers?’

‘The Camps Bay guys say no. I have not spoken to the children yet.?