Читать книгу Piranha - Rudie van Rensburg - Страница 11

The news had thrown Kassie completely. On the way from Maria’s house to his flat in Goodwood, his cellphone rang. It was his pal Trevor Hansen, chairperson of the Philatelic Society of South Africa. He was calling from Perth, where he was attending the world stamp exhibition.

‘You did it, Kassie!’ he shouted excitedly.

‘Did what?’

‘Your collection! The Cape of Good Hope triangles. You’ve won the Grand Prix!’

Kassie had pulled over to the side of the road. It was an enormous surprise. He knew his collection was unique, but never in his wildest dreams did he imagine it could win the highest prize. It was like the Olympic gold medal … for a stamp collector.

Now, sitting at his computer in his study and watching the messages of congratulations flooding in from collectors all over the world, he was feeling almost light-headed with happiness. His hand shook as he picked up a glass of Creme Soda. He took a long swig. Not even the sounds of the accordion polka from the kitchen could calm him as it usually did.

He got up from the desk and walked to the bedroom carrying his drink. He kicked off his shoes, shrugged off his windbreaker, took off his work clothes, and pulled on a pair of turquoise sweatpants and his sheepskin slippers. In the bathroom he took two drops of Rescue Remedy. He looked at himself in the mirror and did a fist pump. This called for pizza before he went back to the computer to answer the emails and respond to all the messages on Facebook. He called Mr Delivery and ordered an extra-large Four Seasons with extra cheese.

He shambled to the kitchen and put away the wholewheat sandwich that was meant to be his supper. He took his cholesterol pills out of the cupboard and drank them down with some Creme Soda, then put his favourite CD – Ollie Viljoen – into the player and turned the volume up high, and collapsed on the couch in the living room. He lit a Lucky Strike and puffed away at it, feeling entirely at peace with the world.

His exuberance soon hit a speed bump. He’d completely forgotten about Maria’s dilemma. He was certain she was overreacting, but he’d promised to go to the bridge in the next day or two to talk to the homeless who lived there. Barnie would turn up eventually, he’d reassured her, because drug addicts – especially tik addicts – seldom acted rationally.

Barnie and Maria slipped out of his head again.

He lay back and shook his head in disbelief. A Grand Prix. A Grand-fucking-Prix!

* * *

Theodore sat on his camping chair and watched the last rays of the sun turn the tops of the bushveld trees orange. As though they’d been waiting for this signal, the crickets and other insects began their dusk chorus. In the distance, on one of the adjacent game farms, a lion roared.

The heat was unbearable. His torso was drenched in sweat. With winter feeling like this, he had no idea how he was going to survive another summer. He got up and took off his T-shirt, throwing it on the chair. He walked to the big acacia next to his tent. It was the only place around here he could get reasonably good reception. It was here that he usually waited for a call from Freedom when the team was out on a poaching operation.

He called his sister. She was excited to hear his voice, though she crapped him out for a minute because she hadn’t heard it in such a long time. Then she excitedly told him about her new place and how wonderful it was to be away from their parents. She outlined her freelance gig for a major media company and how she was allowed to work from home.

He smiled. It didn’t look like he was going to get a word in edgewise this evening. His sister was in the grip of a talking fever.

The smile faded when he saw a flash of lights from a vehicle bumping over the veld path towards his camp. Soon he heard the car’s engine. He never had visitors at this time of night. Could it be Freedom?

‘I’ll call you back, Sis. Someone’s just arrived.’ He rang off.

An unfamiliar red Ford bakkie stopped in front of his tent and Carina Vosloo got out. What the hell was she doing here? He’d seen her the day before yesterday about the masks. And Nichols was fetching them from her tomorrow afternoon.

‘I hope this doesn’t mean there was a break-in at the store?’ was his opening salvo. He felt uncomfortable being shirtless in front of her.

She laughed. ‘Nope. I came to tell you I got hold of a jewel today. You might want to add it to your purchase. I brought it for you to look at.’

Her outfit was a surprise. A halterneck top. A tight pair of shorts clinging to her hips and shapely thighs.

Not bad for her age, he thought. He estimated she was in her mid-forties. He’d never seen her like this before. She’d always seemed quite plain when he visited the warehouse.

She leaned over towards the passenger seat and brought forth a mask. She cocked her head towards the tent. ‘I expect you have better light in there. You’re going to need to see this in all its glory.’

He grabbed his T-shirt off the chair. ‘Okay. Let me make myself decent.’

She put a hand on his arm. ‘This heat is unbearable. You really don’t have to get dressed for my sake.’

He laughed and threw the shirt back on the chair. He’d noticed her flirting with him before, but she was really turning on the charm this evening.

‘Okay. Let’s take a look.’

He followed her swinging hips into the tent. No visible panty line under those tight pants. Was she going commando?

She put the mask down on the chair next to his desk so that the lamplight fell directly on it, and then stood back.

It was oval-shaped, not particularly big, but it had a strange golden hue to it. The eyes seemed unhappy and the corners of the mouth were turned down.

‘This guy looks sad,’ he said.

She nodded. ‘It’s a burial mask from the Congo. Very, very rare. I’ve never seen one.’

He went down on his haunches to inspect it more closely. Nothing special, but he was going to have to feign interest considering she’d driven ten kilometres into the bush to show it to him. He turned the mask over and sensed her moving away from the desk, deeper into the tent.

‘This place is big,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘Looks comfortable, I must say.’

He nodded. ‘I’ve been here nine years. I’ve had to make it comfortable.’

He tapped the mask. ‘I’ll take it. How much?’

‘How about we discuss it over a cold beer?’

He stood up with a smile. ‘Luckily, I have a few of those in my fridge.’

When he turned around, she stood two metres away from him, hands on her hips. Her clothes lay in a tiny little pile on the floor. She stepped towards him.

‘Maybe the beer can wait.’

* * *

Ugandan independence in 1962 never really had any negative impact on the white community. The white farmers were full of confidence that things would continue as they had when the country was a British protectorate.

For the rest of that decade there were no outward signs that they were wrong. There was, however, a slight flutter in the white pigeon cage when Milton Obote, the new prime minister, ousted the president and ‘appointed’ himself as the executive president. This move made him the sole ruler and turned Uganda into a one-party state.

Smiley’s father, the most authoritative white man in the south-west, wasn’t in the least concerned about it. Obote and he were friends. The president had been on the farm a number of times. According to Smiley’s father, Obote’s plans to implement radical socialism was mere talk to pacify his more militant colleagues.

Because of his father’s confidence, Smiley and I saw our future as being in Uganda. We were comfortable there and there were all kinds of business opportunities for budding entrepreneurs. During our final year of school in 1970, we started making all sorts of plans. A piece of unused land on Smiley’s father’s farm was going to become our vegetable farm. He approved and we started plotting things in the finest detail. We’d begin small, buy trucks as we expanded, and then we’d sell our vegetables outside the borders of Uganda.

My father’s death from a heart attack in my matric year did nothing to stop our plans. My mother returned to England but agreed to my staying behind. There wasn’t money for university and there weren’t many job opportunities in Manchester.

We had no idea our dreams would be shattered early in 1971.