Wervey looked at Scheepers.
“We cannot know exactly what van Heerden was keeping the president informed about,” he said pensively.
Georg Scheepers nodded. He understood.
“I have picked you as the man to keep President de Klerk informed,” he said. “From now on you will drop all other matters and concentrate exclusively on the investigation into the circumstances surrounding van Heerden’s death. Is that understood?”
Georg Scheepers nodded. He was still trying to grasp the full implications of what Wervey had just said.
“You will be summoned regularly to the president,” he said. “You will keep no minutes of those meetings, only a few brief notes that you will later burn. You will speak only with the president and me. If anybody in your section wonders what you’re doing, the official explanation is that I’ve asked you to look into the recruitment requirements regarding prosecutors over the next ten-year period. Is that clear?”
“Yes,” said Georg Scheepers.
Wervey stood up, took a plastic wallet from his desk, and handed it to Scheepers.
“Here is what little investigative material the police have so far,” he said. “Van Heerden has been dead for only twelve hours. The hunt for the assassin is being led by an inspector called Borstlap. I suggest you go to Brenthurst Clinic and speak with him.”
That concluded the business.
“Do a good job,” said Wervey. “I’ve chosen you because you have proved to be a good prosecutor. I don’t like to be disappointed.”
Georg Scheepers went back to his office and tried to come to terms with what was actually required of him. Then he thought he should buy himself a new suit. None of the clothes he possessed would be suitable for meeting the president.
Now he was in the dimly lit antechamber, wearing a dark blue suit that had been very expensive. His wife wondered why he had bought it. He said he was to take part in an inquiry chaired by the Minister of Justice. She accepted this explanation without any further questions.
It was twenty minutes to one before the discreet security guard opened the door and told him the president was now ready to receive him. Georg Scheepers jumped up from his chair, aware of how nervous he felt. He followed the guard who marched up to a high double door, knocked, and opened it for him.
Sitting at a desk, illuminated by a single lamp, was the balding man he was destined to meet. Scheepers remained standing hesitantly in the doorway until the man at the desk beckoned him to approach and gestured towards a visitor’s chair.
President de Klerk looked weary. Georg Scheepers noticed he had large bags under his eyes.
The president came straight to the point. His voice had a note of impatience about it, as if he was always having to talk with people who did not understand anything.
“I am convinced the death of Pieter van Heerden had nothing to do with robbery,” said de Klerk. “It’s your job to insure the police investigators are properly aware of the fact that it’s his intelligence work that lies behind the murder. I want all his computer files investigated, all his index files and documents, everything he’s worked on over the last year. Is that understood?”
“Yes,” said Georg Scheepers.
De Klerk leaned forward so that the desk lamp lit up his face and gave it an almost ghost-like appearance.
“Van Heerden told me he suspected there was a conspiracy afoot that was a serious threat to South Africa as a whole,” he said. “A plot that could result in complete chaos. His death must be seen in this context. Nothing else.”
Georg Scheepers nodded.
“You don’t need to know any more than that,” said de Klerk, leaning back in his chair again. “Chief Prosecutor Wervey selected you to keep me informed because he considers you to be completely reliable and loyal to the government authorities. But I want to stress the confidential nature of this assignment. Revealing what I have just told you would be high treason. As you are a prosecutor, I don’t need to tell you what the punishment is for that particular crime.”
“Of course not,” said Georg Scheepers, shifting uncomfortably on his chair.
“You will report directly to me whenever you have anything to say,” de Klerk went on. “Talk to one of my secretaries, and they will make an appointment. Thank you for coming.”
The audience was over. De Klerk turned back to his papers.
Georg Scheepers stood up, bowed, and walked over the thick carpet back to the double doors.
The security guard accompanied him down the stairs. An armed guard escorted him as far as the parking lot, where he had left his car. His hands were sweaty as he slid behind the wheel.
A conspiracy, he thought. A plot? Which could threaten the whole country and lead to chaos? Aren’t we there already? Can things get any more chaotic than they already are?
He left the question unanswered and started the engine. Then he opened the glove pocket, where he kept a pistol. He loaded a magazine, released the safety catch, and placed it on the seat beside him.
Georg Scheepers did not like driving at night. It was too unsafe, too dangerous. Armed robbery and assault took place all the time, and the level of brutality was getting worse.
Then he drove home through the South African night. Pretoria was asleep.
He had a lot to think about.
Chapter Eighteen
Days and nights had merged to form a vague whole from which he was no longer able to pick out the parts. Victor Mabasha did not know how long it was since he left the dead body of Konovalenko behind in the remote house set in muddy fields. The man who had suddenly come back to life and shot at him in the disco filled with tear gas. That was a shock for him. He was convinced he had killed Konovalenko with the bottle. But despite the smarting in his eyes, he had seen Konovalenko through the clouds of smoke. Victor Mabasha escaped from the premises via a back staircase full of screaming, kicking people in a panic, trying to flee the smoke. For a brief moment, he thought he was back in South Africa, where tear gas attacks on black townships were not uncommon. But he was in Stockholm and Konovalenko had risen from the dead and was now chasing him in order to kill him.
He had reached town at dawn and spent hours driving around the streets, not knowing what to do. He was very tired, so weary he did not really dare trust his own judgment. That made him scared. Before, he had always felt that his judgment, his ability to think himself out of difficult situations with a clear head, was his ultimate life insurance. He wondered whether to take a room in a hotel somewhere. But he had no passport, no documents at all to establish his identity. He was a nobody among all these people, an armed man without a name, that was all.
The pain in his hand kept returning at irregular intervals. Soon he would have to see a doctor. The black blood had seeped through the bandages, and he could not afford to succumb to infections and fever. That would make him completely defenseless. But the bloody stump hardly affected him. His finger might never have existed. In his thoughts he had transformed it into a dream. He was born without an index finger on his left hand.
He slept in a cemetery in a sleeping bag he bought. He was cold in spite of it. In his dreams he was pursued by the singing hounds. As he lay awake watching the stars, he thought how he might never return to his homeland. The dry, red, swirling soil would never again be touched by the soles of his feet. The thought filled him with sudden sorrow, so intense he could not remember feeling anything like it since the death of his father. It also occurred to him that in South Africa, a country founded upon an all-embracing lie, there was seldom room for simple untruths. He thought about the lie that formed the very backbone of his own life.