they talk to you? What do they say?”
“They tell me stories . . .”
“Books are dusty, and dust gives me hayfever.”
Wisely he kept silent about book lice. “Nothing smells as good as the leather and vellum of my books.”
“My nose prefers good wine.”
“A rich guest at the Kempinski is going to take you away from me one day soon. I can see it coming.”
“I’m not looking for a man, rich or poor. Not yet.”
“And if he takes you, I’ll be all on my own. Listen, Sofie, I’ve told you about my friend Abel from South Africa. I want to take him out to dinner. I thought it would be nice if you could join us, meet him, help make him feel at home.”
“Fine, Dad, we can do that. What about your medication? Are you taking it regularly? Should we make another appointment with Dr Smeden?”
“No, no appointment – I’m taking my medication. I’ll phone you about our dinner date.” He put down the receiver feeling guilty about not, in fact, taking his medication. And he could feel it, the anxiety, at night. But he avoided Dr Smeden, who’d been treating him for nerves and depression since Jute’s death. After three stints in the St Raphael insititution in Antwerpen, he had decided: Never again.
11.
In his office at the Record Jake read an article titled “Countercorruption and Security” on the website of the Department of Home Affairs. Then he phoned the Johannesburg regional office and asked for Mr Heilbron. He didn’t identify himself as a journalist, and went on to break almost every rule of the press code.
“Mr Heilbron, a friend gave me your name, said you’d help me. He said if ever I’m in trouble, I should phone that nice Mr Heilbron at Home Affairs.”
“Yes?”
Jake switched on the digital recorder. “My friend said: ‘Don’t rub Mr Heilbron up the wrong way. Don’t expect him to do anything illegal. He’s an ethical man, follows the rules like the Gospel.’ But it’s the queues, you know, Mr Heilbron. You stand in line all day and when you eventually reach the counter the clerk says: ‘Where are your fingerprints?’ And you say: ‘No one said anything about fingerprints.’ And she says: ‘First you must have your fingerprints taken. Go to the back.’ And you wait in another line to have your fingerprints taken . . .”
“What’s your point, Mr . . .?”
“Diamond.” Damn! His real name. Slip of the tongue. He paused a beat. “All that red tape and queues, Mr Heilbron, and three months later Piet de Wet gets his ID book, with inside a photo of Bhekuyise Ninela, and Bhekuyise gets his ID with a photo of Gert van der Merwe, and so on, you know what I mean? My friend says Mr Heilbron can help . . .”
“Who’s your friend? Does he have a name?”
Jake had expected the question. He didn’t have any Pakistani friends, didn’t know any typical Pakistani names, but had remembered Imran Khan, Pakistan’s cricket captain. In 1992 his team won the World Cup final against England, Ian Botham dismissed for a duck by Wasim Akram.
“My friend? Oh, Wasim Khan. D’you remember him?” He hoped the name rang a bell, but not too loudly. Just enough to jolt Mr Heilbron’s memory.
“I help hundreds of clients. I can’t remember every one. Khan?”
“Khan, yes. My friend Wasim said: ‘If Mr Heilbron agrees to help you, don’t be tight-fisted, show your gratitude.’ That’s what Wasim said, not me. He used the word largesse. He likes big words.” He waited another second, to let the big word sink in. “I’m in trouble, Mr Heilbron. Can you help me? Could we discuss it, perhaps tomorrow over a nice lunch? It’s Friday, so no one will be hurrying us along. What’s your diary like? Is there room for lunch, and for largesse, if you can help me?”
12.
Majid’s personal assistant brought him the message in his office on the mezzanine floor. A glass wall afforded him a panoramic view of the vast interior of his supershop. The steel and corrugated-iron open-plan construction resembled an airplane hangar. Three storeys high, it could indeed accommodate a Boeing and an Airbus, with room to spare. The shelves were filled with wholesale groceries for the chain stores, spazas and street vendors of Soweto. Below him, if he looked almost straight down, he could see the never-ending queues of shoppers with laden trolleys at the row of paypoints – fourteen cashiers, all transactions in cash.
Majid reread the message his PA had put on his desk. It was from his uncle, who could have phoned him directly, but showed his respect by leaving a message with his PA: Mullah Burki says if you can spare the time he would appreciate a visit tonight, after Isha’a.
If he could spare the time. Mullah Burki was the patriarch of the family; if he left a message requesting a visit, you made time. But of course only after Isha’a, the fifth and final prayer of the day.
Majid was thoroughly aware of the responsibility on his young shoulders. He was the anointed, the crown prince of Johannesburg’s wealthy Burki family; at thirty, MD of the EasySave Cash & Carry empire, eleven wholesale outlets countrywide.
Majid, with his MBA from Wits, would have liked to study at Harvard. In fact, he had already been accepted when – without providing a reason – the American consulate in Johannesburg had turned down his application for a study visa. No reasons were given but he and his aggrieved family believed it had everything to do with race, faith and lineage. Majid was born in Lenasia, Johannesburg, but his parents had originally lived in Pageview. His father had owned a fabric store in Fietas’ 14th Street and prayed five times a day at the green-and-white mosque in 22nd Street, near the Braamfontein cemetery, where there was a section for Muslim graves, and a maza¯r, housing the remains of a Muslim saint.
One of the questions on his visa application had concerned his father’s place of birth. Majid’s father was born in Pakistan, not South Africa – in Kanigoram, South Waziristan. He had also been required to state the date of his father’s death. After the old government’s apartheid policy had robbed his father of his store in Fietas, he had decided to return to Pakistan in 1982 because he had felt it his duty to join in the struggle against the Soviets, who were laying claim to the ancient native land of the Pashtuns in Afghanistan. His father had died there, and now the Big Satan had tried it again.
Majid had resigned himself to the situation and enrolled at Wits. Having achieved his MBA degree, he had taken over the highly profitable cash and carry business that Mullah Burki had started after the bazaar in 14th Street had closed its doors.
* * *
“Majid,” said Mullah Burki that evening in his Lenasian house, the size of a boutique hotel, with enough bedrooms for three generations, “tell me where we stand.”
They spoke Pashto here, and Majid knew his uncle wasn’t referring to their retail empire. The business was doing
