Piranha. Rudie van Rensburg

He told me he and Barnie were good friends, but he hasn’t seen him for three weeks. He found it strange, because Barnie’s been living there for five months. He showed me where Barnie slept under the bushes. I recognised the blanket I gave him a while back. And there was a brand-new toy car, still in its packaging. Boepie said Barnie’d bought it for his son’s birthday.’

      She wiped a hand over her tired face. ‘This afternoon I called the hospitals. And all the police stations in the Southern Suburbs. No trace of him.’

      She started crying, her shoulders shaking hard.

      ‘Fransie will be devastated if something’s happened to his father,’ she managed to get out between her sobs. ‘Please find him for me, Kassie. Please!’

      * * *

      That was the weekend my hatred for Smiley germinated. In time, it would grow into an all-consuming bitterness.

      He and Sophia were all over one another. I sat in my rondavel feeling sorry for myself. It felt as though my life had no purpose. I was a total failure. In the darkest hours of the night, my burning jealousy turned to thoughts of revenge. The master stroke in my plan for retribution was to tell Vicci about Smiley’s faithlessness on Monday morning.

      It boomeranged badly. Vicci and Sophia ended up pushing one another around at break and I landed in the principal’s office for ‘spreading malicious rumours about Smiley and Sophia’.

      Not long after, Sophia and her family moved back to England. Uganda was not for them, and Sophia wasn’t meant for either Smiley or me.

      Life went on. Vicci and Smiley stayed happily together, while I was left single, bitter and brooding.

      But Uganda was a lonely place without friends. Smiley went out of his way to win me back. He even apologised, which, as far as I know, was a first – and a last – for him.

      * * *

      The rangers weren’t gentle with the poacher. They jerked him to his feet and the leader slapped him hard.

      Natasha stepped in as one of them was about to hit him in the ribs with the butt of the gun. ‘I know we all want to see him bleed, but let’s just control ourselves.’

      She was frustrated that the other two poachers had got away so easily and she was shocked at the anti-poaching unit’s bungling.

      The leader spoke Sepedi to the poacher while he yanked him around by his collar. The poacher’s eyes were wide as he stammered his responses.

      ‘It’s a white man from Bela-Bela they were doing this job for,’ the leader interpreted for Natasha. ‘He says this would have been his first time killing rhinos.’

      ‘Who’s the white man?’

      The poacher got shoved around some more as the leader peppered him with questions. His answers were halting, and he kept pulling up his shoulders in a gesture that said ‘I don’t know’.

      The leader turned to Natasha. ‘He says the man’s name is Piet, but he doesn’t really know him. The man lives in Bela-Bela, but he’s not sure where, because he met them somewhere in the bush. He gave them the gun. They were each going to get ten thousand for the job.’

      ‘When were they going to get paid? And where?’

      Questions in Sepedi again.

      ‘He says they were told to phone him when they have the horns.’

      ‘Does he have his number?’

      He said he didn’t, that his leader had it. Natasha felt exasperated. She looked at Gert, who was looking around as though he was still expecting a lion to emerge from the bush. It was clear he wanted to get out of there as soon as possible.

      ‘This is a dead end here,’ she said. ‘We’re not going to get anything more out of him.’

      ‘Maybe the gun will reveal the white man’s identity?’

      She shook her head. ‘The chances are zero.’

      She took the gun from the ranger and examined it. ‘Look: serial number’s been filed off. You don’t give a poacher a gun that can be traced back to you.’

      She stared at the gun thoughtfully for a while. ‘I don’t think he’s lying about this being their first operation. No silencer on the gun, not even one of those ineffective homemade tin ones. They’re complete rookies.’

      She hoped the two who got away would be put off poaching for life. On the other hand, people were queuing up for poaching opportunities. Conscience is a luxury when you’re poor. And hunger can make you blind to danger. This Piet wouldn’t have any trouble finding new recruits.

      Sometimes the sheer scale of the poaching problem overwhelmed her so badly she felt like giving up. It wasn’t just the organised gangs, but the murderous little ad hoc groups regularly running amok among the rhinos and elephants.

      ‘You’re bleeding.’ Gert pointed to where she’d been gaffed by thorns. ‘We have to get back to camp.’

      She laughed. ‘That’s nothing. I’m a farm kid from Zim. We grew up pretty wild.’

      ‘That much was clear today,’ Gert grumbled.

      She looked at the leader of the anti-poaching unit. ‘Shouldn’t we try and follow the other two? We might still catch up to them in the Land Rovers.’

      Gert sighed. She ignored him.

      8

      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!