am Superintendent Webber.”
“I shot him. I had to. I did it for Carli. And for myself. I had to. I had to.”
He walks over to the telephone, rings the forensic division, arranges for a female constable to be sent to the top office.
“Who did you shoot?”
“Danie du Toit. I had to, Superintendent, believe me, I had to.”
“Where did you shoot him?”
She looks at him uncomprehendingly.
“In his leg, arm – where?”
“In his head. I had to.”
He looks up with relief when the door opens. It’s Constable Naudé.
“See that she is formally arrested. And I want all her clothes. Also look for trace under her nails, forensics is waiting.”
The woman with red hair leads me down the passage, past the toilet, down the steps to an untidy office where a desk is piled high with files. The constable with the soft eyes who found me in the bathroom is also there. He smiles encouragingly at me, but I am not able to smile back.
The woman leaves me standing, does not offer me a chair. I feel as if I’m about to collapse with exhaustion.
“Anna Bruwer, you have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney . . .”
I shut my ears, keep my eyes open, I do not want to hear. Not that, not those words. The right to remain silent. The right? Sometimes it’s all that you can do. Shush. Don’t talk. Don’t say anything. Shush. Anna who remains silent, mute.
The redhead opens a book, looks up at me without interest. “Name, date of birth, height, weight, eye colour, allergies, medication, doctor?” she rattles off the list.
I answer slowly, because I have to consider each word before I can allow it to pass my lips.
“Any distinguishing features?”
When I do not respond, she asks impatiently: “Tattoo? Birthmark?”
“Tattoo.”
“Where, what?”
“A dolphin, on my right shoulder.”
I had first considered angel wings. So that I could look into the mirror every day and know that I have goodness in me too, not only badness. But that would have taken too long, and I did not like the idea of having a stranger’s hands on my body. The dolphin was small, quick. The elegant curve of its leap out of the water represented freedom to me. Because I still thought then that I was free of the past.
She makes a note. “Handbag?”
“No.”
“Any personal items on you?”
My dignity? My pride? My clothes? The car keys in the pocket of my jeans? My cellphone?
I reach for my pockets, but her hands shoot out in a flash. “No, I’ll do that.”
What on earth is the woman thinking? That I’m going to yank out a pistol and start shooting?
Naturally they would think that. Murder is a sin. And sins cleave to a person. Like a stain that you cannot remove, but that grows every time you try to. They see it, this murderous stain on my skin. This woman, the man with the soft eyes, the superintendent with the booming voice. They all see it. Why can’t I see it?
Because the thing that I did was right.
My pockets are emptied. Car keys, cellphone and peppermints are placed on the table in front of the redhead. “Where’s your purse?”
“In my car.”
“I’ll fetch it,” says the constable with the soft eyes.
“No,” says the redhead, “you’re already in deep shit. Let forensics fetch it. But you can drive to her house and fetch clothes for her. Her clothes need to be bagged, she’ll have to have something to put on.”
“I live in Knysna,” I say.
“But surely you brought some clothes with you?”
“No.”
“You drove all the way from Knysna without any extra clothes? Fuck! This is not some kind of spa, you know! What are we going to do now?”
“I can fetch some from my wife,” the constable suggests.
“No, that will take too long, and Supe is already mad as hell.” The redhead sighs, takes some keys from her bag. “There’s a gym bag in my car.”
She draws an ink pad closer, places a sheet of paper with blocks on it in front of her. “Come here.” Finger on the pad, then on a block on the sheet of paper. All the fingers, palm, thumb, sides of hands. She turns round, takes a black koki from the desk and reaches for a small whiteboard. Writes on it with her back to me, turns to face me and hangs the board round my neck.
She picks up a camera. “Look to the front.” Click. “Turn to the side.” Click.
I look down at the board, read the words upside down: Case Number 232/2004, Anna Bruwer. Murder.
So that’s it, I think. Murder. This is what it looks like. This is what it feels like.
“Uncover your shoulder so that I can take a photograph of the tattoo.”
I do so.
The constable comes in and puts a gym bag and my purse on the table.
The redhead opens the bag. “You’re lucky that I was planning to go to the gym, otherwise you’d be sitting in the cells stark-bloody-naked,” she says without looking at me. She takes out tracksuit pants, T-shirt, panties and socks. “I’m certainly not giving you my tackies.”
She opens my purse, takes out everything and puts it on the desk, writes down each item in the book, looks up at me. “Everything has been written down, so that you can’t say later that we stole anything from you. Check and sign.”
I don’t even look at the list, just sign shakily where she points. She tears the page out neatly along the perforated line and holds it out to me.
She removes the board from around my neck. “Come.”
We walk down the passage again, turn left this time and go into a bathroom. It’s cold inside, a window is ajar and I can hear the wind whistling outside. Two men are standing there, waiting.
I stop abruptly, but the redhead shoves me forward. “They don’t bite.”
“Hold out your hands,” one of the men says, not unfriendly.
I hold out my hands, note that they are still shaking slightly. He scrapes under the nails of my left hand;
