Present Darkness: A Novel
By Malla Nunn
4/5
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About this ebook
Five days before Christmas, Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper sits at his desk at the Johannesburg major crimes squad, ready for his holiday in Mozambique. A call comes in: a respectable white couple has been assaulted and left for dead in their bedroom. The couple’s teenage daughter identifies the attacker as Aaron Shabalala— the youngest son of Zulu Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala—Cooper’s best friend and a man to whom he owes his life.
The Detective Branch isn’t interested in evidence that might contradict their star witness’s story, especially so close to the holidays. Determined to ensure justice for Aaron, Cooper, Shabalala, and their trusted friend Dr. Daniel Zweigman hunt for the truth. Their investigation uncovers a violent world of Sophiatown gangs, thieves, and corrupt government officials who will do anything to keep their dark world intact.
Malla Nunn
Malla Nunn was born in Swaziland, southern Africa, but moved to Australia in the 1970s. She studied theatre in America, where she met her husband and began writing and directing short films, three of which – Fade to White, Sweetbreeze and Servant of the Ancestors – won numerous awards and have been shown at international festivals from Zanzibar to New York City. Her first novel, A Beautiful Place to Die (2009), was published internationally and won the Sisters in Crime Davitt Award for Best Adult Crime Novel by an Australian female author. It was also shortlisted in the prestigious US Edgar Awards for Best Novel. Let the Dead Lie was highly commended in the Ellis Peters Historical Crime Awards. Malla and her husband live in Sydney with their two children.
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Reviews for Present Darkness
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What our readers think
Readers find this title to be a good read with well developed characters and a captivating plot. It is a critical portrayal of South African life under apartheid, providing a chilling portrait of life under arbitrary laws. The novel also explores themes of hatred, despair, and the struggle for power. While some readers felt that the portrayal of white men was too sympathetic, overall, the book is tightly written and entertaining, serving as a cautionary tale of absolute power.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5There is a lot of hatred and despair that sets the background for this novel. However, although I understand that the author wished to portray the women in a stronger light, and the white men as a more sympathetic player in the country's politics, it felt as if the whites and men enjoyed and relished the attention that they received for their status
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Good read with well developed characters and captivating plot.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Having read several biographies written by African authors, as well as the novels of Nadine Gordimer, this novel is a critical portrayal of South African life under apartheid. Tightly written and entertaining, the book is a chilling portrait of life under arbitrary laws and a cautionary tale of absolute power..
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Present Darkness is Malla Nunn’s fourth entry in the Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper series and is an excellent continuation of the series.
It’s the 1950’s in South Africa and Apartheid has taken its vicious hold. Detective Sergeant Cooper has managed a temporary transfer from Durban to Johannesburg for personal reasons. The price he must pay is reporting to the angry, religiously fanatic Lieutenant Mason who applies the Apartheid rules with a vengeance.
Cooper is called to assist in the investigation of the savage beating of a well-to-do white couple. The couple’s teenage daughter identifies Aaron Shabalala as their attacker. Aaron is the son of black Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala, Cooper’s friend, and a man who has once saved his life.
Cooper’s superiors are satisfied that they have the guilty party and break off any further investigation. However, Cooper believes the evidence doesn’t support the daughter’s story. He’s determined to uncover the facts and free his friend’s son, even though the young man won’t speak up for himself. Cooper, Shabalala and their friend, Dr. Daniel Zwiegman set out to discover the truth and their search takes them into the underbelly of Johannesburg and the worst it has to offer: drugs, gangs, prostitution and abject poverty.
Malla Nunn’s previous Cooper books were stark portrayals of the darkness of Apartheid and its dehumanizing effects. In Present Darkness she succeeds again in wringing drama from that terrible scourge.
Money and power allow some to flout the laws, while applying them with a heavy hand when they choose. To combat these people, Cooper and his friends must occasionally go outside those same laws, and rely on unsavory types to gain an advantage or discover information. Nunn does an outstanding job illustrating how Cooper and his friends serve justice by delving into these areas and living with the consequences of their actions.
Nunn writes with a sure hand. Her portrayal of Apartheid, the insidious way it turned people against one another, and the manner in which some found kindness in spite of it is entirely authentic. Her characters are multi-dimensional and complex, and even angry Mason reveals some humanity. Present Darkness flows smoothly with plenty of drama and culminates in a satisfying climax. It should leave Nunn’s fans watching excitedly for the next Cooper novel.
Rating: A- - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5It is not possible to say anything negative about this book: it is gripping, credible, well-written, has excellent character portrayal and comes to a resounding conclusion. South Africa of the 1950s is apparent on every page: the people, the dust, the appalling racism, the manners, the language. Reading about something as infuriating as apartheid can be difficult, but I was immediately hooked on the exceptional story. This was my first Malla Nunn. I hope there are many more. My five star rating is completely warranted.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A young native boy is accused of the brutal murder of a white schoolteacher but won't defend himself against the charges. And while there is something off about the witness statement implicating the boy, Detective Emmanuel Cooper is discouraged by his boss from investigating further. This mysteries series set in South Africa in the 1950s, explores the dangerous moral and ethical dilemmas faced by Cooper as he relentlessly pursues the truth in this racially charged environment. Highly recommended.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Present Darkness is the fourth superb instalment in Malla Nunn's Detective Emmanuel Cooper series. This unique crime series, set during the 1950's in apartheid ruled South Africa, has become one of my favourites, and Present Darkness is Nunn's best yet.It is a few days before Christmas, 1953 and Cooper is fast losing patience with his colleagues in the Johannesburg major crimes squad. While the temporary transfer from Durban allows him to see Davida and their baby daughter Rebekah every day, he is wary of his boss, Lieutenant Walter Mason who seems far to interested in what Cooper does in his off time. Called to a vicious beating of a white couple, a high school principal and a secretary at the office of land management, Cooper is surprised when their teenage daughter blames Aaron Shabalala, the youngest son of his best friend and Zulu Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala, for the brutal attack. From the first things don't seem to add up, but Mason isn't interested in Cooper's doubts and insists the girls identification closes the case. Cooper, who owes Shabalala his life, can't let it rest though and with the help of Dr. Daniel Zweigman, he begins an investigation of his own.Cooper's inquiry leads him from the violent slum in which he was raised to a dusty farm on the outskirts of Pretoria. He encounters thieves, corrupt cops, pimps, murderers and an abducted prostitute in his drive to prove Aaron Shabalala's innocence. Full of twists and turns, complicated by Cooper's need to avoid alerting Mason to his unsanctioned investigation and his desire to protect his family, the plot is fast-paced and tension filled. Cooper, as always, follows the evidence wherever it leads him, no matter the threat or danger, ably assisted by Shabalala and Zweigman.As I've written before, the cultural framework of the novel is what really sets this series apart from other crime fiction I have read. Apartheid affects every facet of life for South Africans, and Nunn doesn't shy away from exposing the appalling inequalities of the period. Having experienced life on both sides of the colour line, Cooper is more aware of the arbitrary injustice based on skin colour than most and refuses to let apartheid compromise his job or his personal life. In 1953, Cooper's relationship with Davida, a mixed race woman, is illegal and he is conscious that she, and their daughter, is a vulnerability his enemies could easily exploit.As with Nunn's last book, Silent Valley (published in the US as Blessed Are the Dead), I read Present Darkness in single sitting. Skilfully crafted with an intriguing plot and superb characterisation, Malla Nunn's Detective Emmanuel Cooper series should be on everybody's reading list.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Australian author Malla Nunn continues to write very credible stories in the Emmanuel Cooper series, full of atmosphere. A white school principal and his wife who invite coloured students to their home for meals are attacked one night after dinner. Their shocked daughter identifies the two students who were at dinner that night as the culprits. One has an unshakeable alibi but the other one, the son of Cooper's best friend, refuses to say where he was.Parallel with this investigation is Cooper's uncomfortable relationship with the sergeant at the Johannesburg Detective Branch. Running in the background, chapter by chapter, is also the story of a prostitute who has been taken prisoner and is being held on a remote farm.Cooper's own relationship with Davida, the mixed race mother of his baby daughter Rebekah, reflects the knife edge that is South African apartheid. Exposure would mean the loss of his job and probably imprisonment. An excellent read.
Book preview
Present Darkness - Malla Nunn
PROLOGUE
JOHANNESBURG, DECEMBER 1953
Friday night. A dirt lane on the outskirts of Yeoville, where cars came out of the city, then disappeared in the direction of the four-way intersection that led to the suburbs. The girl paced out the number of steps between the mouth of the alley and the vacant lot at the far end. Some men liked to lay her down in the open field. Most preferred to position her against the wall of the dark lane itself. After the urgency left them, they got into their cars and disappeared back into the flat sprawl of Johannesburg’s suburbs: nice places, with names like Sandton, Bedfordview and Edenvale. She liked to feel the money in her hands for a moment before she took it to the darkest part of the alley, pulled out the loose brick she knew was there and shoved the bills behind it.
Between men, she stood halfway down the alley—in the shadows, but easy to see if one knew where to look. Squeezed between high brick walls and strewn with crushed kaffir weeds, the lane’s location was ideal for clients with ten minutes to spare between knocking off work and heading home.
The sweep of car headlights lit the walls of the narrow way at intermittent intervals. The moonlight was faint and partially blocked by the roof line of the adjacent building. She didn’t mind the gloom. It softened the hard line of her jaw and smoothed the acne scars on her right cheek. She liked the darkness. In the dark she was perfect.
The sound of a foot crunching the dirt broke the quiet, and the girl looked up. Car lights swept past, briefly illuminating the strip. A white man stood at the end of the alley, just emerged from the vacant lot. He was tall, big across the shoulders and still. He wasn’t so much standing in the alley as blocking one end of it. A chill traveled up her legs and into her belly.
Sorry, hey. Bad timing.
Fear sharpened her performance and she sounded every inch a slum-born English prostitute working for cheap. I’m just finished for the night.
He moved toward her: big and getting bigger. Sure-footed. In no hurry. The girl backed away, worn heels scraping the dirt. Cars passed on the main road.
Okay, wait.
She glanced over her shoulder and calculated twenty steps to the safety of traffic and people, maybe twenty-two. Wait. Let’s talk. We can work something out. What is it you want?
Everything,
he said.
On another night and with another client she might have joked, All right. But it will cost you.
Not this time. She turned and sprinted for the alley exit. Images of a roadside trench and the cold weight of the earth covering her naked body one shovel load at a time flashed through her mind. Every drop of street cunning accumulated over the hard years told her that the big man would take her blood and her bones. But he’d pay nothing for what he took.
Seventeen, sixteen steps more to the main road. In truth, she lost count. It didn’t matter. The traffic was louder, the headlights brighter. She risked a look over her shoulder. The man sauntered the dirt lane with his hands thrust deep into his pockets. He couldn’t catch her at that pace. She was almost safe. Home now, quickly. Turn the handle, slip inside and lock the door.
She turned back and slammed hard into a wiry body. The impact knocked her off balance and breath rushed from her lungs. Her shoulder smacked the ground. She looked up, dazed. A second man crouched down and cupped a hand over her mouth. His palms smelled of raw sugar, such a sweet scent amid the stench of urine and kaffir weed in the laneway. Then realization came quickly. There were two men in the alley, and together, they’d netted her like a bird.
The one holding her down said, Make sure she’s white. He’s strict about that kind of thing.
The man who’d blocked the exit to the vacant lot slotted a cigarette into the corner of his mouth. The flare of a match briefly lit his face, which was clean-cut and handsome with black hair combed back from his forehead. A dream client. He squatted and held the flame inches from her face. Heat licked her pockmarked cheeks.
White and ugly,
he said, and leaned closer. Do you want to ride home with me tonight, sweetheart?
The wiry one still blocked her mouth with his hand. She shook her head no. Twin funnels of smoke snaked from the handsome man’s nostrils and he smiled.
1
DETECTIVE SERGEANT, EMMANUEL COOPER crossed the ramshackle garden, jacket unbuttoned in the nighttime heat. A fat moon tangled in the branches of a jacaranda tree and the air carried the smell of fresh-cut grass and the tree’s shameless purple flowers. It was a perfect Friday night to sit with his daughter Rebekah’s chunky brown arms laced around his neck while Davida sat barefoot on the stairs. Instead he was at a crime scene in Parkview, in the flashing lights of a street cruiser.
Blue police barricades encircled a brick house with weeds growing from the gutters. The barriers made a physical reminder that the inhabitants had passed through the veil of the everyday and into a darker world of blood and broken things. Emmanuel crossed the crime-scene perimeter and left ordinary behind.
Detective. Sir.
A gangly white policeman reeking of sweat and vomit moved off the house stairs. He’d been inside, Emmanuel guessed, and seen something he wouldn’t forget. Lieutenant Mason said to go straight in, Detective. Sir.
A cluster of young uniformed constables stood on the porch. Two more of them guarded the front door. Middle-class, European victims always brought the force out in force.
Sergeant Cooper, Marshall Square,
Emmanuel said to the police on door duty. They stepped aside. He stepped in.
Smashed furniture littered the entrance and ripped telephone wires snaked across the oak floorboards. Glass from a broken hall stand reflected a mosaic of light onto the ceiling. Emmanuel took a deep breath. A single phone call he’d received minutes before the end of the shift had made the difference between being with Davida and Rebekah and being here, in chaos.
What a mess, hey?
Detective Constable Dryer, a big-boned Afrikaner with thinning brown hair combed over a bald spot, stood in a doorway to the right of the wreckage. Dryer’s most useful character trait was his ability to state the completely fucking obvious.
Uh-huh.
Emmanuel made the right noises. The white and yellow telephone wires interested him. The actual telephone lay farther into the hallway, the receiver torn clean from the cord attaching it to the base. Stripping the wires from the wall might be a sign of extreme caution or violent rage. No way to tell which yet. An ambulance siren wailed in the distance.
Animals. Who else would do this so close to Christmas?
Dryer hooked his broad thumbs into his belt, which gave his beer gut room to move. You wait and see, Cooper. The police commissioner will work us like dogs till this case is closed. No leave. No overtime. We can kiss our holidays good-bye.
Bad timing,
Emmanuel said. Dryer liked to complain. If he’d worked for the postal service, the mailbags would be too heavy. Emmanuel let him gripe. The fleshy Afrikaner was background noise and part of what Emmanuel had agreed to endure in order to secure a short-term transfer from the coastal city of Durban to the flat sprawl of Johannesburg. He’d worked his boss, Colonel van Niekerk, hard for the transfer and knew that the favor would have to be repaid in the future—with interest. Seeing Davida and Rebekah every day, however, was worth the heavier workload, and Dryer was no worse than most of the detectives he’d worked with in other places.
Broken glass crunched underfoot and a tall man with a thin, humorless mouth stepped out of a room farther down the corridor. Detectives,
he said. Black hair, black shoes and an unwrinkled black suit gave Lieutenant Walter Mason a grim, funereal appearance.
Cooper.
Mason crooked a finger. In here with me.
Emmanuel kept to the left of the corridor, careful to avoid disturbing the debris. A living room with a lime-green carpet, a brown corduroy sofa and a tinsel-laden Christmas tree appeared untouched. Four silver photo frames were arranged in a straight line on the mantel. Sounds of quiet sobbing came from deeper in the house.
There’s no time for delicacy, Cooper,
Mason said. The ambulance officers have to get through. Dryer, clear a path.
But . . .
The Afrikaner started to complain. Mason’s icy expression killed the words in his mouth. Right away, sir.
Emmanuel approached the doorway where the lieutenant stood. Oak floorboards creaked underfoot. The air smelled of rusting copper after the rain. Emmanuel knew the odor well. It was the hot, wet funk of blood: a scent burned deep into his memory. He’d smelled too much of it on the battlefields of France during the war.
Go on.
Mason motioned into a bedroom bathed in bright electric light. The metal smell intensified and burned Emmanuel’s throat. A shirtless white man lay on the cream-colored carpet, pale arms and legs splayed at bizarre angles. Pulped and swollen to twice its natural size, the man’s face resembled a grapefruit left to rot in the field. Stained teeth showed through a split bottom lip. He had been horribly beaten. He might live to midnight.
Ian and Martha Brewer,
Mason said. A high school principal and a secretary at the office of land management. Not the usual victims of such a violent crime.
Emmanuel skirted the bed and found Martha Brewer. She was a tiny thing, a puppet with cut strings propped up against the mattress base. Blood clotted her dyed blond hair and stained the neckline of her pink cotton nightdress. A pulse point fluttered at the base of her neck, weak but steady. The ambulance siren howled from the front lawn and set the neighborhood dogs to barking.
Stay here, Cooper. I’ll see the medics in.
Yes, sir.
Emmanuel remained crouched and looked around. Middle-class ruin blighted every surface of the room. The wall behind the quilted bed head was sprayed with an arc of rust-colored splatter. Summer dresses and plain cotton shirts had spilled from broken dresser drawers. The wardrobe had also been rifled.
In here.
Mason directed two white men into the bedroom. Each carried a canvas-and-wood stretcher underarm and a medical kit in hand. See to the woman first.
Emmanuel stepped into the corridor, gave the ambulance crew room to work. They knelt on the stained carpet, stanching blood and bandaging wounds. Their hands were soon soaked, the knees of their trousers blotted red. Martha Brewer’s body made a small hollow in the canvas as they carried her to the ambulance, taking a path cleared through the hallway rubble by Dryer.
The husband is finished,
Mason said when the ambulance roared onto the asphalt road with sirens screaming and Ian and Martha Brewer strapped into the back. With God’s grace the wife will survive the night.
Yes, by the grace of God.
Emmanuel made more right noises. Some days it seemed that all he did was lie by omission.
I didn’t take you for a praying man, Cooper,
Mason said. The only real color in the lieutenant’s face was in his eyes: they were a bright blue. Ice cubes had more warmth.
I keep my hand in.
Emmanuel examined the telephone wires to avoid discussing religion with Mason, a born-again, praise-the-Lord Christian. For twelve years the lieutenant had worked undercover operations, all the while enjoying regular access to his two great loves: sourmash whiskey and free pussy. Then a gospel tent preacher saved him and now he served a joyless god who frowned on all forms of pleasure, even laughter.
So it’s true,
Mason said. There are no atheists in foxholes.
I never met any,
Emmanuel said. That his superior officer knew he’d been a combat soldier during the war and not part of the rear-echelon army was a detail to consider later.
All this for a box of jewelry and a stack of bills hidden behind the underwear drawer.
Mason gestured to the wrecked furniture. The love of money is truly the root of all evil.
The living room hasn’t been touched,
Emmanuel said. There’s a row of silver picture frames on the mantel. Why expend so much energy and leave those behind?
It wouldn’t be the first time a robbery became a murder.
True.
Burglars caught in the act killed dozens of people every year and maimed a few more besides. This level of violence seems excessive, almost personal in nature.
Sobbing came from the rear of the house.
That’s the daughter you hear.
Mason stalked the length of the corridor, crunching debris. Negus is babysitting her in the kitchen till one of the station typists arrives. She needs a female touch.
In police code, female touch translated to the witness is hysterical and won’t stop crying, even though we’ve told her to.
Emmanuel followed Mason and glanced into a room with an upended single bed, a ransacked wardrobe and walls papered in a yellow canary design: a teenager’s bedroom, presumably the girl’s.
The police typist is coming from out Benoni way. She won’t be here for another half an hour at the earliest.
The cold-eyed lieutenant paused outside a closed door and glanced at Emmanuel over his shoulder. I want you to get in there and try to calm things, Cooper. If I remember right, you’re good with women.
I’ll try,
Emmanuel said. Good with women? He couldn’t think where Mason’s comment came from.
Dryer sniggered, sure that Mason was referring to a party in Dryer’s imagination at which Emmanuel and the lieutenant had shared in a repast of whores lain on by an obliging madam. Dryer was an idiot.
Emmanuel tried and failed to come up with a source for Mason’s observation. They’d never worked together before or even had a beer at the local bar. The undercover operations squad was a tight unit. They believed in secrecy and money. Emmanuel had stayed far away from them his whole career—and especially since arriving back in Jo’burg.
In here.
Mason opened the door to a ruined kitchen. Silver cutlery and smashed containers littered the floor and counters. Piles of flour, rice, coffee and sugar were dumped onto the small pine table. A white girl in a cotton nightie sat in a chair with her face buried in her hands, weeping.
Name?
Emmanuel asked before going in.
Cassie. We got that from the neighbor who called in the disturbance. Nothing from her yet.
Negus, the detective on babysitting duty, was a solid, old-fashioned cop Emmanuel knew from the station. He would have come on duty with three things: a loaded gun, adrenaline and a hard-man face. Good cop or not, he was ill equipped to comfort a teenage girl whose parents might die tonight.
Thank Christ,
Negus mumbled when he reached the door. I need a piss and a smoke.
The girl, Cassie, sobbed and kept her fingers tightly closed. Eyes shut, face hidden, she was trying to block out the chaos. Emmanuel walked into the room: time for Cassie to put her hands down and open her eyes.
The local police found her in that corner.
Mason pointed to a spot near a four-burner gas stove. We’ve tried to get her out of here, but she won’t leave.
The kitchen, at least, smelled of cinnamon and caster sugar instead of blood. There was no blood in this room that Emmanuel could see. The headmaster and his wife had been beaten in the bedroom while the house was turned over: a job for two men, minimum. He found a kettle in the debris and filled it at the sink.
Do you want a cup of tea, Cassie?
he asked. Or cocoa, if I can find it?
Nothing,
she sniffed.
You’re sure?
Uh-huh.
She was talking. That was a start. Emmanuel left the water running and checked her for injuries. Blood running down her thighs or dripping from an elbow would have shown up in the flour sprinkled on the floor. The flour was still clean. Cassie’s freckled legs and pale arms were likewise unmarked by trauma, her yellow nightgown pristine.
Is that blood?
Emmanuel leaned closer, heart thumping. Red color smudged across the back of Cassie’s hand. Christ knows what injuries hid behind those shuttered palms.
What?
she hiccuped.
There.
He touched a gentle fingertip to the spot and noticed the red had a strange metallic shine.
Oh.
She dropped her hands to the table and rubbed at the smear with a fingertip. I don’t know where that came from.
Oh, yes you do, Emmanuel thought. It wasn’t blood Cassie scrubbed away at so hard. It was lipstick.
I’m Detective Sergeant Cooper,
he said, and shut off the water tap. Are you hurt anyplace that I can’t see?
No.
Cassie scraped the last trace of red away with a fingernail and looped a strand of frizzy ginger hair behind her right ear. She was about fifteen years old with bright hazel eyes and a wide mouth that belonged in a broader face. Freckles sprinkled her nose, neck and collarbones so her skin appeared browner than white. I’m all right. Really.
Emmanuel gave her his handkerchief and said, Can you tell me what happened, Cassie?
She blew her nose and frowned, thinking.
Take your time.
He lit the gas flame under the kettle. There’s no rush.
I . . . I was asleep in my bed and there was a . . . a big crash. Like there was someone in the house.
The frown deepened, cutting a trench into her forehead. It was dark. I couldn’t see.
Tell me what you did then.
Emmanuel sat at the table. After the noise.
I got a fright and I got out of bed.
Cassie twisted the corner of the handkerchief into a tight cylinder. Then I hid behind the wardrobe.
Your wardrobe?
The ripped doors and the scattered contents he’d seen from the corridor.
"Ja. That one."
Did you hear voices from there?
What?
The question seemed to startle her and the corners of her wide mouth twitched. I . . . I don’t know what you mean.
Emmanuel said, You were behind the wardrobe while the robbers were in your room. Did they say anything?
Cassie took a deep breath, looked away to the kitchen window. The moon now hung lower in the branches of the jacaranda outside. Two minutes ticked by in silence.
Zulu,
she said finally. They were speaking Zulu. I don’t know what they were saying.
Footsteps shuffled in the doorway. Mason and Dryer moved closer to catch the rest of Cassie’s story. A few days shy of the Christmas holidays, the police commissioner would cancel all police leave pending an arrest. The headlines tomorrow would send a ripple of fear through the white neighborhoods: Zulu Gang Beats European Couple to Death in Their Bed.
It wasn’t Pedi or Shangaan that you heard?
Emmanuel asked. Johannesburg was the economic powerhouse of southern Africa, and it drew black Africans of every different tribal group to the city with the promise of work. The city was an industrial Babel, with dozens of languages spoken.
No. It was Zulu. Definitely. I . . .
Cassie buried her face in her hands and started to cry again.
Emmanuel placed a hand on her arm, hoping the warmth of human contact would calm her. It didn’t. Cassie’s sobs deepened. Only a little while ago, she had been alone in a corner, too terrified to move, while her parents bled out onto their carpet a few feet away.
Emmanuel stood up and put an arm around her shoulders. Her wet face pressed against his stomach. He made the right sounds yet felt no sorrow, pity or anger. He was detached, floating above the wrecked kitchen, wondering when his ability to lie had grown so deep and become so easy. Wiry hair crinkled against his shirt, curlier than his mixed-race daughter’s would ever be. He’d never hold his own girl Rebekah like this in public.
It’s okay.
He recited the given script. You’re safe now. You can talk to me. Tell me anything.
I recognized their voices.
Cassie’s face burrowed deeper against his tear-soaked shirt. I know who did it.
You know their names?
Emmanuel asked.
Mason moved into the kitchen and stood at the edge of the pine table. He watched Emmanuel’s ministrations with snake eyes. If I remember right, you’re good with women. Emmanuel had been meticulous with his lies these last five weeks, especially around Mason. Talking about his personal life would send him to jail for three to six years for immoral activity.
The beauty of Davida Ellis’s honey-brown skin against white cotton sheets and the sky gray of his daughter’s eyes would remain his secret.
It was boys from St. Bartholomew’s College,
Cassie said. Two of them.
Look at me, Cassie.
Emmanuel waited till she did. He had to be sure there’d been no mistake. You’re talking about St. Bartholomew’s College in Sophiatown?
She broke off eye contact and licked her dry lips. Yes.
The Anglican school and its well-known redbrick chapel were in Emmanuel’s old neighborhood. The school was an oasis in the tough streets of Sophiatown for black boys who wanted to become teachers and lawyers instead of gangsters. His good friend Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala’s son attended the prestigious school.
How did you come to meet students from a native school?
Sophiatown was less than thirty miles from the neat grid of suburban streets where Cassie lived, but it might as well be on another planet in a distant galaxy.
My father,
Cassie said. He runs an extracurricular program for natives. He takes them to the theater and also to music concerts. Once a term they come to the house for dinner.
To this house?
"Ja. He thought it would be good for them to see how Europeans lived."
Dryer snorted from the doorway. Emmanuel stepped away from Cassie’s burrowed face and squatted by her chair. She chewed her bottom lip.
Tell me their names,
Emmanuel said.
I . . . I don’t want to get anyone in trouble.
We’re just going to talk to them and clear things up. That’s all.
Emmanuel was surprised at having to coax the names of the culprits from Cassie. Christ Almighty. What did she care if two black boys from the townships got into trouble for beating her parents and wrecking her home?
Cassie pressed the handkerchief to her face. Kibelo Nkhato. I think that was his surname,
she said. And Aaron Shabalala.
Emmanuel slipped back into his body, heart thumping and panic taking hold like a virus. Shabalala was a common Zulu name. Throw a net out of a bus in Sophiatown and you’d land a dozen. But two boys named Aaron Shabalala attending the same Anglican-run boarding school was unlikely.
You’re sure about those names?
Emmanuel leaned in closer to establish eye contact with Cassie. The odds against there being a personal connection between him and this crime scene were astronomical.
Yes, of course. They were here tonight for the end-of-term dinner.
The handkerchief muffled the sharp edge of her voice. It was Aaron and Kibelo. Those two boys. I’m not making it up.
Okay.
Her gaze flickered away