Last Train to Retreat Read online

  ‘Hanno, they asked me about Gatiep again,’ Curly whispered. ‘Everyone knows we were choms. They’re going to ask today. We gotta say something.’

  ‘I’ve thought about it, okay, I always think about things. I’m going to tell them Gatiep’s gone away on business for a while … to Durban. For me and Sasman, sussing out opportunities, ha, ha, get it?’

  ‘Serious?’

  ‘Serious. That’s what we’ll say, okay? And not a word to Gatiep’s toppie, Sollie, is that clear? Listen, I’ve got to go, we’ll finish this later. Curly, you know what I think? I think you’re paaping …’

  ‘Me scared? Come on, what of?’ Curly said indignantly. ‘I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me for nearly ten years, haven’t I? I’ve killed, haven’t I?’

  ‘Ek sê, my bra, just checking …’ Hannibal’s eyes were dead and unblinking. ‘By soeking trouble on the train you and Gatiep started other things … like one thing leads to another, you understand, like dominoes?’

  Guilt with a hint of panic drifted into Curly’s eyes. Hannibal suddenly got up and punched the air viciously. ‘She either came looking for you, Curly, or she happened to be there. If it’s the first, you’re a target – why, I have no idea. If it’s the second, it means she must be from around here. Either way she’s revealed herself … better than you seeing nothing for two weeks at Wynberg station, eh, Curly?’ His fingers formed a zero. ‘When a route is blocked to the fox it finds another … I’ll get them.’

  •

  Two days later Hannibal called Curly. ‘Aweh, jy, hoesit! Listen, why don’t we go fishing in the morning?’

  ‘What! Tomorrow’s Wednesday, Hanno, haven’t we got things to do at the tik house?’

  ‘A lot of aggro we’ve had, too much I say … and it’s gonna be a lekka day.’

  Hannibal could hear Curly thinking. They used to fish off the beaches of False Bay, from Gordon’s Bay in the east to Cape Point in the south, especially when there was a yellowtail or snoek run. Hannibal added, ‘It’s not your casting arm that’s hurt, Curly … just put an extra bandage around it. What are we waiting for, my bra, I’m the boss, let’s klap the fish!’

  ‘You mean just you and me?’ Curly sounded relieved and pleased. He’d been giving everyone dark looks since the Sunday braai at Hannibal’s as if the world was coming to an end.

  ‘Ja, bra, keep it to yourself … the others might get jealous.’ Hannibal laughed. ‘I’ll pick you up at sparrows, at five, okay? I’ll get cold chicken, cream crackers and cheese, and koeksisters, and I’ll bring the brandy and Coke. All you need is your tackle …’

  ‘I’ll bring a flask of coffee to start with!’ Curly’s troubles seemed to melt away like spookasem leaving behind only the sweet thought of a whole day with Hannibal. ‘Where we going, Boss?

  ‘To Rooikrans, Curly … I just feel for the fish tomorrow. I’ll bring braai stuff. Jesus, a Roman or yellowtail would be good on the fire, or a couple of Hottentots, huh? Ha, ha, Hottentots eating Hottentots! Get it, Curly?’

  •

  Hannibal packed his Honda Civic 1.8 VXi – pre-owned, not second-hand, crystal black pearl, not just black. It had cool six-inch, five-spoke alloy wheels, twin exhausts, tinted windows all round, and a spoiler in the shape of angel wings. To this day the people of Lavender Hill waved at him in his car, remembering the good he did for the community when he first took on the gangs in the name of the Lord. As Hannibal packed he made a mental note to do some more good in the next few weeks, perhaps pay the two Warrant Officers, Kuscus and Fritz, a little bonus – keep everyone on his side, build up credit while Rottweiler woman and Bruce Lee man were on the loose and the Gnome’s deadline loomed. But first things first, he told himself – doing things the wrong way round could trip you up.

  Hannibal fetched Curly at five from his house where he lived alone. Above the brooding bulk of the Hottentots Holland Mountains on the Stellenbosch side of the Flats the early light was beginning to fracture the night. It was still half-an-hour to sunrise and they wore sweat-tops with hoods, cheap tracksuit pants, and Nikes. Having blown away the clouds the wind had subsided, leaving a promise of T-shirts and baggies later in the day. The streets of Lavender Hill looked almost peaceful as they made their way west, turned left into Main Road and headed south towards Muizenberg. Curly was a person whose energy irritatingly spiked in the early morning causing him to talk a lot.

  ‘This is jits, awesome!’ he enthused, leaning back, cap sideways, arm hanging slap from the window feeling the air.

  ‘Ja, a shitty day away from the Flats, fishing,’ Hannibal grinned, ‘while others have to graft.’ He listened with half an ear while Curly jumped from one subject to another like a horny bullfrog.

  They were now on the False Bay coastal road that would take them to Fish Hoek, Simon’s Town, Miller’s Point, and finally Cape Point. Curly had gone quiet. Suddenly he said, ‘Ek sê, my bra, don’t you think of the days when we were warriors – of God, not Sasman?’ His words hung awkwardly in the car like bats in a stale cave.

  ‘God has no guns and no money, Curly. Didn’t we get this straight long ago, huh?’ Hannibal opened his window and sucked in fresh Atlantic air.

  ‘I know, but I mean, we felt so good then! Remember the Mongrels, Jester Kids, Ghetto Kids, Americans, and the Laughing Boys killing each other and everybody who got in the way – over the shebeens, drugs, and taxi routes? The schools had to close, the army trucks came in – Lotus River it was, and Parkwood Estate, Grassy Park, Ottery, Hanover Park, all over the Flats. And you, you were so otherwise, starting the Evangelicals, getting us guns and knives and T-shirts with “divine justice” and “righteous violence” on them, and warning the gangs. We had to kill twice, remember, only twice? Glasoog and Pac Man, the main manne – shit, how bad they were. We cut off their heads and stuck them on the doors of their houses to look like big hairy knockers! Ha, ha! Locks for knockers! We cleared Lavender Hill in a day, the police looked the other way, the dominees said fokol, the people loved us, and even the papers noticed us – “gruesome justice” they called it. Hey, those were the days!’

  Hannibal had changed the pale, meek Christian God he had been brought up with for the masculine, muscular God of the American evangelist writer, John Eldredge. He had used Eldredge’s book, Wild at Heart, as his bible, read from it to his members and to anybody who would listen. His favourite part was where Eldredge quotes Isaiah 63 which describes God wearing blood-stained clothes, spattered as though He has been treading a wine press, and Eldredge going on to say, ‘Talk about Braveheart. This is one fierce, wild, and passionate guy. I have never heard anyone in Church talk like that, either. But this is the God of heaven and earth.’

  As if he could read Hannibal’s thoughts, Curly said, ‘Remember how you told us God was a warrior, like William Wallace the braveheart, and Maximus the gladiator – wild and free, a man of action, ready to fight, not turn the other cheek?’

  ‘Those days are over, Curly, okay? You can’t fight and win without bullets and money.’

  ‘Ja, bra, we got those now, and the drugs and the girls, but not the thing that made us different, the God thing. Everybody loved us and we liked ourselves, Hanno. Remember our sign at the entrances to Lavender Hill: “No criminals allowed, by order, The Evangelicals”? It was like an order from God Himself. ‘

  ‘You’re running scared, paaping again, bra.’ Hannibal accelerated through the quiet streets, slowing down at the last minute for bends.

  ‘I’m just saying all that’s left are those angel wings on your car and our tattoos – we’re God warriors only on the outside, Hanno.’

  ‘Kryp in jou moer, man! What’s with you, Curly? You’re in my ears like a mosquito! Are you gonna fuckin’-well fish or philosophise? You’re thinking of how you nearly got killed on the train then in the gents, not so? Thinking of death, that’s why you’re talking about God?’

  But like mist rolling over Table Mountain Curly’s words were enveloping Hannibal. It brou
ght back the time when he had left school and couldn’t find a job, a prisoner at home dependent on his heist-driving father, who worked in a paint factory, and on his mother, a home-carer, for his food and a place to sleep. He might as well have crawled back into his mother’s womb his jobless existence had been so dull. But he had found something he excelled at: Mixed Martial Arts fighting in wire cages, a step up from schoolyard fighting – bigger crowds, recognition, and a little money. At school he could never relate to the compassionate, humble, forgiving God of the New Testament. That God was too tame for the Flats. He was for people accepting of their fate, not for fighters. People Against Gangsterism And Drugs – known as PAGAD – and its militant wing, G-Force, weren’t an option for Hannibal. He had no stomach for an organisation wanting to transform the country into an Islamic theocracy based on the Iranian revolution of 1979 and planting bombs in public places. But like PAGAD, Hannibal rejected community police forums as toothless and ineffectual. That’s when he discovered the Braveheart God of John Eldredge. He had also read about a Mexican gang called La Familia whose leader, Nazario Moreno, aka El Más Loco (the Craziest One), saw himself as an Old Testament warrior on a mission from God to protect his patch, using the severed heads of enemies as calling cards. The fact that La Familia became involved in drug trafficking was final vindication to Hannibal. He had found his God and his mentors.

  They drove in silence through the narrow streets of Simonstown. Houses climbing the hill on their right were now bathed in the early light. Below them the massive sandstone breakwater stopped the ocean swell from reaching a couple of warships. Oh, yes, it had been too good to be true – the God of Eldredge and El Más Loco turning out to be not so hot after all. A Grassy Park gang leader had waited for Hannibal outside a shebeen, shot him in the chest, and driven away. For three days it was touch and go. Then they came for him again in the early hours of the morning, killing the guard at the hospital entrance and a nurse inside, going to the wrong ward and shooting a patient out of rage, fleeing as the cops arrived. From that time on Hannibal never slept in one place for too long. He had survived, but they had killed his God. What made him think that God, whether from the New or the Old Testament, had ever been to the Flats? Why should He have bothered, even after the brown people got dumped onto its wastes? The Flats could never have been in God’s mind as a promised land to anybody. Only the apartheid government saw it like that. Hannibal had realised with a shock that the Evangelicals were no more than God’s branded cattle in a dusty kraal, carrying His mark in the form of tattoos – all for nothing. If God couldn’t save Jesus how could He save Hannibal? The rest was history as they say. The Gnome had come along and Hannibal forged a new, unholy alliance. And when Hannibal declared to his men that God was dead, how could he realise it would kill his relationship with Chantal? The one thing that had exonerated him in her eyes was destroyed the second he shook Sasman’s hand. And of all people it had been her brother who had poisoned her against him – Zane, who desperately needed an excuse to leave the Evangelicals because he couldn’t pass Hannibal’s man-test.

  At the gate to the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve Hannibal paid the entrance fee for himself and for Curly. Hannibal cracked a small smile as he drove through. How would Curly ever know that fearless Hannibal thought about death too sometimes? His smile was fixed as the fishermen’s huts came into view on the slopes of Judas Peak rising steeply from the sea.

  •

  On this week day, at this hour, Hannibal’s vehicle was the only one in the Rooikrans car park not far from the Point. They had packed the minimum for the steep, stony descent to the ledges down below: three-piece rods held together with elastic bands, rucksacks containing the rest – fishing gear, drink and food, mobile phones and wallets. The only other thing Hannibal carried was a long gaff with a bamboo handle.

  Forty minutes later their silver spoons arced gracefully towards the deep blue, hitting the surface – tiny sprays in a vast expanse but enough to attract the big ones – only to be reeled in again to resemble small fish speeding erratically through the water. It was a ritual delicious in its anticipation of a large dark shape striking the spoon and the tip of the rod suddenly being pulled down.

  They were casting from a rock ledge. Massive red cliffs rose up behind them, and immediately below their ledge deep water swept towards False Bay. It felt as if they were standing in an amphitheatre with a spectacle about to take place. The sun warmly embraced them but had trouble putting a shine on Hannibal’s faded hair. Being there made Curly forget about death and God. He whooped as he cast, his voice bouncing off the cliffs, and he repeated his cries like a kid for the effect. They didn’t look at each other, only at their writhing spoons, waiting, praying for a school of yellowtail to come past. As a boy Hannibal remembered the men catching big tuna from the ledges, and though scarce today so close inshore, a tuna run at Rooikrans was the stuff fishermen’s dreams were made of.

  They fished for nearly three hours without catching a thing. They ate the cream crackers and cheese, the koeksisters, finished the flask of coffee, and Curly downed two double brandies and Coke. He placed his rod against a rock and mixed himself another drink, calling out, ‘Hey, my bra! Why not try for Hottentot and Stumpie? Put on redbait or mussel. I got ghost cotton. Jissis, it’ll be kwaai on the braai!’

  ‘Naai duidelik, Curly. Do a trace for me, will you? Then you carry on spinning … just in case!’ Hannibal had changed into baggies and his legs were like sturdy oaks planted in the rock. His eyes sparked in the sun and his yellow hair stood out against his caramel skin.

  Curly made up a new trace, secured some slithery mussel on the hook with ghost cotton and passed it to Hannibal.

  ‘You go first, Curly, bring your rod and your drink. That looks like a good spot over there.’ Swells were coming in from the deep. They seemed to raise the entire ocean ten feet up against the rock without breaking, pulling back empty-handed with great angry, sucking sounds. Curly made his way carefully over the rocks – a little drunk, devoted as ever, his thick bandage causing his arm to stand out from his body. Hannibal stared at him. If Curly were a dog his tail would be wagging.

  ‘Ek sê, dis darem lekka saam by die see, Boss!’

  ‘Ja, Curly, it’s nice by the sea like this, together. Now go for it, bra, get that spoon in the water! A lucky strike’s waiting for you in the deep, I feel it. Ha, ha! Get it, bra, it’s what you used to smoke, Lucky Strike! A good sign if ever there was one, I believe in these things. Lemme hold your drink … now go for it … that’s it. Watch the spoon, okay, watch for dark shapes, remember they come from the right, and fast …’

  Curly tried not to blink as he concentrated on his spoon coming towards him like a small fish on the run. He was leaning slightly forward about to lift it from the water when Hannibal pushed him gently over the edge – two fingers were all it took. With a startled cry Curly plunged into an incoming swell. It lifted him up, up, higher than when he went in. He clutched his rod until it dawned on him it wouldn’t hold him up. He let go and turned towards Hannibal arms flailing. ‘Help, Hanno, help me!’

  Hannibal watched as the ocean pulled away from the rocks with a deep sigh, Curly in its grip, screaming, ‘Help, it’s got me! Jissis, Hanno, I’m going!’

  Hannibal walked to Curly’s rucksack, took out his phone, smashed it on the rocks and threw it into the sea where Curly and his rod had been a minute ago.

  Seventeen

  Zane had never seen the BAT pitch machine in action. He was in the boardroom watching the PowerPoint presentation to Good Hope Distillers, sitting with the agency team on one side of the long, gleaming yellowwood table. The client team sat on the other side. Everyone was dressed smart casual – suits were only for creative award functions, weddings, and funerals.

  The presentation was drawing to a close. Magnus Theron had presented the agency’s credentials in spite of GHD knowing perfectly well who they were. Appleby had followed with a market overview even though GHD knew t
heir business better than BAT did. Johan had reconfirmed media space and time already booked to catch Christmas and the New Year. The only new part was Justin’s creative presentation. Justin purposely avoided computer-generated ads that would have given a finished look, using rough scamps and storyboards instead to convey the big idea and how it could work above and below the line. He talked from flip charts – tearing off page after page and discarding them until he stood in a sea of paper and glossy cut-outs from Cosmopolitan, Dolce Vita, Kasanova, and Vanity Fair that illustrated the kind of people he’d use. Then he played a catchy soundtrack with the volume on high. He showed how the campaign could work on Facebook, Myspace, and MXit. Zane did not know what to make of the presentation. All he knew was that a Good Hope Distillers’ brand manager had let slip to Appleby that the competition had made ‘awesome’ pitches.

  ‘That’s it, ladies and gentlemen,’ Magnus said, his blue eyes reaching out to the row of impassive client faces. ‘We believe we have come up with a compelling campaign – the stars in the ads are the trendy, upwardly mobile young people having fun in exotic settings, with the product basking in this halo of chic and glamour. The campaign is unashamedly about extrinsics – the look, the sound, the mood. Intrinsics like the easy-to-hold bottle and funky new flavours are simply there as hard evidence for a campaign that’s clearly the coolest thing to hit this sector for a long time.’ He chuckled at his pun.

  Zane felt a stab of shame while Magnus talked. What did it say in Matthew about Judas selling Jesus to his enemies for thirty pieces of silver? Was this not like selling one’s soul? He reminded himself that it was for his family, in the same way that he had lied to the doctor to get medicine to save the girl. He craved the day when he’d have enough money not to have to compromise on what was right and wrong, to be his own man beholden to no one.