Free Trackers by Deon Meyer

don't
know if I was ever in love with him. Maybe I'm lying to myself... I was drunk that night. It was
Rag Week. Everyone was drunk. That's no excuse, I would have slept with him
some time or other, I was ready for it, I wanted to know what it felt like ...
     
    13
September 2009. Sunday.
    It was after ten before Milla woke from her drunken slumber.
    Fragments of the previous evening milled in her head.
Jessica's sensual, drink-befuddled voice: We are all rejects. You're the runaway housewife.
You've slept with one man? Never lived dangerously?
    Lord, had she really taken part in that conversation? She
had, and more. She had told her story, late in the night, the whole truth, in
drunken melancholy, and Jessica had held her hand and wept along with her. It
was all coming back, and mortification descended on her in waves.
    And the worry: how on earth had she got home? She couldn't
remember.
    She jumped up and looked out of the window and saw her
Renault Clio parked there, a small relief, because suddenly the headache began
to pound. She climbed back into bed, pulled the covers over her head. She had
driven home in her drunken state, she could have caused an accident... She
could have been locked up, how Christo would have enjoyed that. How could she
do that to her son? 'Was that your drunken
mother in the newspaper? The one who ran away?' She couldn't do that sort of
thing.
    She lay there feeling guilty until she could stand it no
longer, got up gingerly, put on her dressing gown and slippers, and shuffled
off to the kitchen to get the coffee machine going.
    And
then thought, well, last night she had lived a little. Of all that she had
lost, she had regained at least a little piece.
    Transcription: Audio surveillance, J.L. Shabangu (aka 'Inkunzi') and A.
    Hendricks,
telephone conversation
    Date and Time: 13 September 2009.
20.32
    S :
I have a message for Inkabi.
    H: What is the message?
    S :
The export deal...
    H: Yes.
    S: The guy who wants to buy the goods, you know? He is in Cape Town. He is an Inkosi...
    H: I don't understand Inkosi.
    S: Inkosi is a big man. A chief. You know . . . of a . . . company. How can I say?
We are in the same business, this buyer and I. . . But his business is in Cape Town...
    H: OK.
    S: We have heard that his name is Tweety the Bird.
    H: Tweety the Bird.
    S: That is what we have heard. So we think you can help to find him.
    H: OK.
    S: And we think the goods are going to travel at the end of the month. Any time
from the 24th.
    H: Do you know more about the transport and the route?
    S: We think it will be by truck, but the route is not certain. That is why you
must find this Tweety the Bird. He will know the route. You must make him tell
us.
    H: OK.
    S: I will give you a number. The number will change next Sunday, and then I will
call you again. H: What is the number?

14
    14 September 2009. Monday.
    At 6.46 when Quinn was having breakfast
with his wife and two teenage sons in their house in Nansen Street, Claremont,
he received an SMS. He glanced at the screen of his cellphone, excused himself
from the kitchen table, went into the bedroom and phoned Advocate Tau Masilo.
    'Osman is at the airport, on his way to Walvis Bay,' he said
when Masilo answered.
    'What time does his flight leave?' 'Probably within the
hour.'
    'Then we better get cracking.'
    'We only have one operator in Namibia. In Windhoek. I will
phone him now and hear how soon he can be in Walvis Bay.'
    'Thanks Quinn.. .Walvis Bay? What would the Supreme Committee
do in Walvis Bay?'
     
    'Why Walvis Bay?' Janina Mentz asked at 8.41 at the round
table in her office.
    'Import harbour. For the weapons.' Tau Masilo said.
    'You're speculating.'
    Masilo has prepared. 'Occam's Law. The simplest explanation
is usually the right one. After the Ismail Mohammed debacle, the Supreme
Committee will want minimum attention drawn to the Cape, they are warier than
ever. They know it will be hard to land the weapons here, and if things go
wrong, the focus