Deon Meyer - Thirteen Hours

ThirteenHours

DeonMeyer

Table of Contents

05:36: a girl runs up the steep slope of Lion's Head. Thesound of her running shoes urgent on the broad footpath's gravel.

At this moment, as the sun's rays pick her out like asearchlight against the mountain, she is the image of carefree grace. Seen frombehind, her dark plait bounces against the little rucksack. Her neck is deeplytanned against the powder blue of her T-shirt. There is energy in the rhythmicstride of her long legs in denim shorts. She personifies athletic youth -vigorous, healthy, focused.

Until she stops and looks back over her left shoulder. Thenthe illusion disintegrates. There is anxiety in her face. And utter exhaustion.

She does not see the impressive beauty of the city in therising sun's soft light. Her frightened eyes search wildly for movement in thetall fynbos shrubbery behind her. She knowsthey are there, but not how near. Her breath races - from exertion, shock andfear. It is adrenaline, the fearsome urge to live, that drives her to runagain, to keep going, despite her aching legs, the burning in her chest, thefatigue of a night without sleep and the disorientation of a strange city, a foreigncountry and an impenetrable continent.

Ahead of her the path forks. Instinct spurs her to the right,higher, closer to the Lion's rocky dome. She doesn't think, there is no plan.She runs blindly, her arms the pistons of a machine, driving her on.

Detective Inspector Benny Griessel was asleep.

He dreamed he was driving a huge tanker on a downhill stretchof the N1 between Parow and Plattekloof. Too fast and not quite in control.When his cell phone rang, the first shrill note was enough to draw him back toreality with a fleeting feeling of relief. He opened his eyes and checked theradio clock. It was 05:37.

He swung his feet off the single bed, dream forgotten. For aninstant he perched motionless on the edge, like a man hovering on a cliff. Thenhe stood up and stumbled to the door, down the wooden stairs to the living roombelow, to where he had left his phone last night. His hair was unkempt, toolong between trims. He wore only a pair of faded rugby shorts. His singlethought was that a call at this time of the morning could only be bad news.

He didn't recognise the number on the phone's small screen.

'Griessel,' his voice betrayed him, hoarse with the firstword of the day.

'Hey, Benny, it's Vusi. Sorry to wake you.'

He struggled to focus, his mind fuzzy. 'That's OK.'

'We've got a ... body.'

'Where?'

'St Martini, the Lutheran church up in Long Street.'

'In the church?'

'No, she's lying outside.'

'I'll be there now.'

He ended the call and ran a hand through his hair.

She, Inspector Vusumuzi Ndabeni had said.

Probably just a bergie. Another tramp who had drunk too much of something or other. He put the phonedown beside his brand new second-hand laptop.

He turned, still half asleep, and bashed his shin against thefront wheel of the bicycle leaning against his pawnshop sofa. He grabbed itbefore it toppled. Then he went back upstairs. The bicycle was a vague reminderof his financial difficulties, but he didn't want to dwell on that now.

In the bedroom he took off his shorts and the musky scent ofsex drifted up from his midriff.

Fuck.

The knowledge of good and evil suddenly weighed heavily onhim. Along with the events of the previous night, it squeezed the lastremaining drowsiness from his brain. Whatever had possessed him?

He tossed the shorts in an accusatory arc onto the bed andwalked through to the bathroom.

Griessel lifted the toilet lid angrily, aimed and peed.

Suddenly she was on the tar of Signal Hill Road and spottedthe woman and dog a hundred metres to the left. Her mouth shaped a cry, twowords, but her voice was lost in the rasping of her breath.

She ran towards the woman and her dog. It was big, aRidgeback. The woman looked about sixty, white, with a large pink sun hat, awalking stick and a small bag on her back.

The dog was unsettled now. Maybe it smelled her fear, sensedthe panic inside her. Her soles slapped on the tar as she slowed. She stoppedthree metres from them.

'Help me,' said the girl. Her accent was strong.

'What's wrong?' There was concern in the woman's eyes. Shestepped back. The dog growled and strained on the lead, to get closer to thegirl.

'They're going to kill me.'

The woman looked around in fear. 'But there's nobody.'

The girl looked over her shoulder. 'They're coming.'

Then she took the measure of the woman and dog and knew theywouldn't make any difference. Not here on the open slope of the mountain. Notagainst them. She would put them all in danger.

'Call the police. Please. Just call the police,' she said andran again, slowly at first, her body reluctant. The dog lunged forward andbarked once. The woman pulled back on the lead.

'But why?'

'Please,' she said and jogged, feet dragging, down the tarroad towards Table Mountain. 'Just call the police.'

She looked back once, about seventy paces on. The woman wasstill standing there bewildered, frozen to the spot.

Benny Griessel flushed the toilet and wondered why he hadn'tseen last night coming. He hadn't gone looking for it, it had just happened. Jissis, he shouldn't feel so guilty, he was onlyhuman after all.

But he was married.

If you could call it a marriage. Separate beds, separatetables and separate homes. Damn it all, Anna couldn't have everything. Shecouldn't throw him out of his own house and expect him to support two households,expect him to be sober for six fucking months, and celibate on top of that.

At least he was sober. One hundred and fifty-six days now.More than five months of struggling against the bottle, day after day, hourafter hour, till now.

God, Anna must never hear about last night. Not now. Lessthan a month before his term of exile was served, the punishment for hisdrinking. If Anna found out, he was fucked, all the struggle and suffering fornothing.

He sighed and stood in front of the mirrored cabinet to brushhis teeth. Had a good look at himself. Greying at the temples, wrinkles at thecorner of his eyes, the Slavic features. He had never been much of an oilpainting.

He opened the cabinet and took out toothbrush and toothpaste.

Whatever had she seen in him, that Bella? There had been amoment last night when he wondered if she was sleeping with him because shefelt sorry for him, but he had been too aroused, too bloody grateful for hersoft voice and big breasts and her mouth, jissis, that mouth, he had a thing about mouths, that's where the trouble had started.No. It had begun with Lize Beekman, but like Anna would believe that?

Jissis.

Benny Griessel brushed his teeth hurriedly and urgently. Thenhe jumped under the shower and opened the taps on full, so he could wash allthe accusing scents from his body.

It wasn't a bergie. Griessel's heart skipped a beat as he climbed over the spiked railings of thechurch wall and saw the girl lying there. The running shoes, khaki shorts,orange camisole and the shape of her arms and legs told him she was young. Shereminded him of his daughter.

He walked down the narrow tarmac path, past tall palms andpine trees and a yellow notice board: STRICTLY AUTHORISED. CARS ONLY. ATOWNER'S OWN RISK, to the spot just left of the pretty grey church where, on thesame tar, she lay stretched out.

He looked up at the perfect morning. Bright, with hardly anywind, just a faint breeze bearing fresh sea scents up the mountain. It was nota time to die.

Vusi stood beside her with Thick and Thin from Forensics, apolice photographer and three men in SAPS uniform. Behind Griessel's back onthe Long Street pavement there were more uniforms, at least four in the whiteshirts and black epaulettes of the Metro Police, all very self-important.Together with a group of bystanders they leaned their arms on the railings andstared at the motionless figure.