That house on the plot is a pigsty. You should clean it up, you know.’
Wolf looked away, grumbling unintelligibly.
Montgomery leaned forward in his chair and drew deeply on his cigar. ‘To answer your question: Phan Can Dung reassures me his successor will be easy to bribe. He’ll start priming him in Hanoi. It’s just as important to him as it is to us that we have cooperation from inside the consulate. He earns a shithouse in commissions. He’s not going to want to strangle the goose that lays the golden egg.’
‘And do we have a replacement in mind for Barnie Wolhuter?’ West asked.
Montgomery smiled. ‘No, but I thought you could probably just take over that little job for us.’
‘Me?’ West’s Adam’s apple jumped up and down as he swallowed.
‘Yes, you, Graeme,’ said Montgomery. ‘I’m not going to risk bringing in another outsider. I never, ever want to be blackmailed by an ex-employee again.’
Wolf shook his head. ‘Still can’t work out how Barnie found out about the horns.’
‘We slacked off. That’s how,’ said Montgomery, looking at West, who dropped his gaze. ‘He must have seen the horns in the crates. Because it’s just so much bloody effort to keep the lids on them, right? What was he doing wandering around there anyway? Ah, yes, Graeme forgot to lock the store.’
‘I’m sorry, Montgomery … I …’
‘What’s done is done,’ Montgomery snapped. He wasn’t in the mood to listen to West’s pathetic apologies again.
He inhaled deeply and blew the smoke out. ‘Theodore tells me he has a shit-ton of masks, some shields, pots and hundreds of strings of beads. Nichols is fetching all of it today. Graeme, you need to make sure that thirty percent of the stuff is distributed equally between the Waterfront and Cavendish shops. Canal Walk still has enough stock. The rest is for export. The curio shop in Taipei ordered twenty masks.’
West nodded. ‘Will do, Montgomery,’ he said, clearly relieved not to be in the line of fire any more.
‘Do we have a new sales assistant for the Waterfront shop yet?’
‘I’m doing interviews tomorrow with the four people on the shortlist.’
‘You need to get your ass in gear, Graeme. Old Tallie’s complaining that he can’t run the shop on his own.’
‘I’m doing my best. I …’
Montgomery cut him short. ‘Go.’ He waved his fingers at the door to shoo them out.
As Wolf was about to leave, Montgomery called him back. Breede turned around in slow motion, his arms dangling by his sides like a monkey’s. The ridiculous little glasses rendered him even more moronic than usual. Way too small for his big face.
‘Make sure the water’s the right temperature for the fish. And for God’s sake, remember to switch the circulation pump on every four hours.’ Montgomery smiled. ‘Hope you’ve replenished their food stocks. Eighty kilos of meat’s not going to last forever.’
Wolf nodded without expression and then slowly grinned as Montgomery’s allusion dawned on him.
* * *
Obote’s government was ousted during a coup d’état on 25 January 1971. Idi Amin became the new leader of Uganda.
And with that, our plans were laid waste. Uganda’s nightmare began. In spite of his suspicion that the British government had supported the coup in order to get rid of the communist-inclined Obote, Smiley’s father had enough vision to realise that life in Uganda was about to change radically, for whites as well. Amin was, according to him, a nutcase.
Smiley and I once met him at the Kampala rugby club. Apart from having been a formidable player in his youth, he’d also been Uganda’s light heavyweight boxing champion for a few years. Amin was there that night as head of the army to hand over the league cup to Kampala’s first team. He was most entertaining with his performance of British songs and his accordion playing, but this jolly front was a smokescreen for a twisted psyche.
The executions began soon after he came into power and he’d bedecked himself, to the scorn of the world, with every possible hero’s medal and newly invented rank one could imagine. In the final tally, there were more murders and political executions in Uganda than in the rest of Africa altogether during the same period.
Some sources guess that up to half a million people died under Amin’s rule.
Smiley’s father would soon be one of them. He smelled the smoke long before we saw the fires and quickly put a plan in place for his son to have a bright future in South Africa, in spite of Smiley’s hefty protest. I was part of the plan. Smiley’s father treated me like a son, knowing my mother wouldn’t be able to provide for me in England.
He was sending both of us to study in South Africa and he was paying my way too.
A friend of his from Cape Town recommended the University of Stellenbosch. ‘They’re going to struggle with the Afrikaans, but you don’t want to send your kid to one of these liberal English universities where they’re going to get indoctrinated with lefty communist crap,’ he’d said.
We were sent off to South Africa forthwith, and just in time to enrol as first-year students. The environment, the language and the culture were a shock to both of us. Smiley soon fitted in. It was much harder for me.
10
The vagrants under the bridge checked Kassie and Rooi out with some suspicion. Kassie took out his SAPS identity card and showed it to them. ‘We’re from the police. We want to talk to you about Barnie Wolhuter.’
A man eating baked beans out of a tin with a teaspoon shrugged his shoulders. ‘You must talk to Boepie. The rest of us know fuck-all about Barnie.’
‘Is Boepie here?’ Rooi asked.
‘I think so. Probably still sleeping.’
The man got up with a groan, walked a few paces until he was out from under the bridge, then took another spoonful of beans. He shouted towards the bushes: ‘Boepie! Bad news and good news! Bad news is: cops are here for you. Good news: they just want to talk about Barnie.’
First nothing, then a rustle. A man emerged, tall and wiry, wearing dirty jeans and a worn-out T-shirt across which was emblazoned I don’t need Google – my wife knows everything. The hard, round little belly which had clearly earned him his nickname seemed to belong to someone else. His feet were bare. His weathered red face showed all the hallmarks of an excess of sun, wind and booze.
He pointed to a pine tree where they could talk away from the others.
‘One of you generals perhaps have a cigarette for me?’ he asked.
Kassie gave him one of his Lucky Strikes. Boepie fished a box of matches out of his pocket and lit the cigarette. ‘What can I do for the generals this morning?’
‘We understand from Barnie’s wife that you and Barnie were friends?’
Boepie nodded, inhaled and looked at the burning end of the Lucky Strike. ‘We were, yes.’
‘When last did you see him?’ Rooi asked.
‘Almost a month now. I told his wife. But after she left I remembered something I didn’t tell her.’ Boepie slowly lowered himself onto his haunches and looked around him bleary-eyed. ‘Barnie told me a while ago that he had a scheme. And if the scheme worked out, he was going to be rolling in it. Millions, he said.’
He laughed. One of his front teeth was missing. ‘Told me he’d share with Maarman and me. Enough to buy a house and a car. I didn’t take him seriously. He was high. Tik.’
‘Did he say anything else about his scheme?’
‘Just that