The Satanic Mechanic. Sally Andrew

Slimkat is okay?’ I said.

      ‘Yes, I went to his book launch; so did an army of plainclothes police.’ She leant forward so our heads were closer together. ‘Someone tried to kill Slimkat yesterday.’

      ‘Goodness gracious,’ said Hattie. ‘What happened?’

      ‘No one will tell me the details,’ she said. ‘Reghardt won’t talk, and Slimkat’s cousin pulled him away before he could answer all my questions. But Slimkat told me they’d tried to kill him. And he agreed to another interview with me; we’re meeting here this evening.’

      ‘Well, I’m jolly glad they’ve got Slimkat well guarded,’ said Hattie.

      ‘Ja, well, the Oudtshoorn police want to make sure nothing messy happens at the KKNK. They’ve roped in lots of help. Once the festival’s over, they’ll leave him to his fate.’ She handed us each a festival programme. ‘There are a few events in English, Hattie. And of course there’s art and music.’

      ‘I do understand some Afrikaans, you know,’ said Hattie.

      ‘And some nice food events, Tannie M,’ said Jessie. ‘I must run.’

      ‘Now do be careful, Jessie,’ said Hattie. ‘You’re a journalist, not a policewoman. Leave the police to investigate this attempted-murder business.’

      ‘I’m an investigative journalist,’ said Jessie, flicking her ponytail as she hurried off. ‘See you later.’

      Hattie looked at the programme and said, ‘Ooh, there’s a talk on the art of Pierneef. If I hurry, I might catch it.’ She jumped up. ‘Do come along, but do you mind if I go ahead? I’d hate to miss the beginning.’

      She could see I wasn’t going to jump up and rush anywhere. I watched her leave the tent, trot across the grass and out of sight. I glanced at the programme; I would study it in a moment. First I had an appointment with a kudu sosatie.

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      The sosaties were fantastic. The kudu wasn’t cut in the usual cubes but in small thin pieces, seared over hot coals. There were sweet sosaties made with pineapple and dried apricots. And savoury sosaties made with mushrooms and baby marrow. They were served with a choice of honey-mustard sauce or tomato-chilli sauce. I had a savoury sosatie with honey sauce followed by the sweet one with chilli sauce.

      The chilli sauce was in a red plastic squeeze-bottle, like a tomato-sauce bottle, and the honey-mustard in a yellow one. But they tasted nothing like the usual stuff you get with hotdogs. They were both delicious homemade sauces, full of flavour.

      And the kudu was tender, with that smoky fire taste. Kudu meat is quite subtle, not full of kick like springbuck.

      The sosaties weren’t very big, and I still felt hungry, and I got to wondering what the sweet one would taste like with the honey-mustard sauce and the savoury one with the chilli sauce. As a food writer, it was my duty to research this properly. I am glad I did, because it was the last sosatie I ate that had the best combination: The honey-mustard sauce with the sweet apricot sosatie.

      I went up to the Kudu Stall and asked the young blonde girl who was serving if she would give me the recipe for the sauces.

      ‘Ag, sorry, Tannie,’ she said, brushing some hair from her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘I already checked with my boss because another tannie also asked me, but he said, no, he won’t share them.’

      I was sorry about that. Recipes were made to be shared. I cheered up when I saw Hattie walking towards me.

      ‘There you are,’ she said. ‘I do wish you’d carry a cell phone. The Pierneef talk was fabulous. There are some super little art galleries and second-hand bookstores. I can’t resist a good bookstore. How was your afternoon? What did you get up to?’

      ‘Research,’ I said. I wiped my mouth with a napkin, and threw it into a big green bin.

      ‘I could do with something to eat,’ said Hattie. ‘I forgot to have breakfast. And lunch.’

      I shook my head. How could someone do that?

      ‘Come with me to the Ostrich Club dinner,’ I said.

      ‘Super,’ she said, and we walked together out of the beer tent.

      The sun was setting, and the pale-blue sky was smudged with red. A little tractor drove past us, pulling small carriages filled with children. As we strolled along the walkway between the stalls, the sounds around us got louder. Music from the Ferris wheel. A band starting up in the beer tent.

      ‘I wonder who is playing tonight,’ said Hattie. She paused in the light of a buttermilk-pancake stall and looked at the programme. ‘It’s Kurt Darren. That should be lively.’

      We walked on to the Ostrich Supper Club. The stall was now decorated with big pink ostrich feathers, and a stove and pots were laid out on the trestle table where a man and a woman were chopping vegetables. He was roundish with a rough beard, and she was a skinny tannie with tight grey curls and a blue apron. Behind them, inside the stall with its canvas walls, was a dining table with a white cloth and candles. There were about six others standing and sitting here. They were dressed quite smartly, and I felt a bit shy in my veldskoene.

      The woman with the little curls looked up at me and smiled. ‘We’ll be having a cooking demonstration now-now,’ she said. ‘We’re making a sort of cottage pie with ostrich mince and sweet-potato topping. There are some ostrich recipe booklets here. They are free.’

      Hattie and I each picked up one. It was a little black-and-white stapled booklet. On the back was a list of the sponsors, which included a few wine and ostrich farmers.

      ‘Look, here’s a recipe of yours, Maria,’ said Hattie, pointing to my name on the page. It was the cottage pie recipe.

      ‘Are you Tannie Maria?’ asked the woman.

      ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘and this is my friend Hattie.’

      ‘Ag, you came. That is so nice.’ She called over her shoulder: ‘Annemarie, our guest of honour is here.’

      ‘Guest of honour?’ said Hattie to me.

      ‘Ja, well, I sort of helped, with my letters, to introduce them to each other.’

      ‘Tannie Maria?’ said a woman with shoulder-length brown hair and a pink dress that matched the feathers.

      She was looking from me to Hattie. She had never seen a picture of me, and I had not seen her. Though I would have recognised her because she’d mentioned the scars. Her face was lined with white scars like the way mud cracks when there is a long drought.

      Hattie pointed at me, and I offered her my hand, saying, ‘Annemarie.’

      She did not shake my hand but took it in both of hers and pulled me to her and gave me a hug.

      ‘Thank you so much for coming,’ she said.

      ‘This is Hattie,’ I said, ‘the editor of the Gazette.’

      She held Hattie’s hand.

      ‘Come inside, come inside,’ she said. ‘Let me introduce you.’

      Ag, those people were so warm and friendly to me, they felt like the big family that I’d never had. What with no brothers and sisters, and my father gone so much, it was only when we visited with my cousins in the Free State that I really had a lekker nice big family like that. That little canvas stall was full of warm good food, delicious red wine, and talk and laughter. Annemarie was holding the hand of the round man with the beard, Stefaan, and sometimes I caught them looking at each other, and there was such happiness in their eyes.

      There was just one man at the table who did not look happy. He sat very quietly, his hair and eyes shiny and dark, his face unshaven. He was long and thin, and his clothes were an olive-grey. He reminded me of a black mamba. He didn’t eat