He didn’t want to die.
He needed to be more careful.
Back on all fours. That alone was humiliating. And back in the other direction. The first house. Then the next. The girl’s face was no longer in sight. Cautiously. There were probably people at home. They probably knew what was going on in the neighborhood and were now more diligent than usual.
Moses peered around the corner of the house at the street on which the nanny had just been playing ball with the little boy. He couldn’t see them anywhere. Or hear them. So keep going. Running the few meters to the wall behind which he had hidden several minutes ago, he threw himself back down in the grass. The dead bird was still being disemboweled by the ants. He lifted his head and looked in both directions, but couldn’t see either the nanny or the child.
Lowered, then lifted his head again. For thoroughness’ sake. Who else might help him? A guard appeared at the next corner. Moses immediately ducked back down.
Wait. Let him pass. Disappear. Then look for the Kaizer Chiefs’ house. The footsteps slowly grew closer. Rubber-soled boots, not loud but audible. Only a few meters away. Moses wished he was as tiny as the ants close to him.
For a long second, Moses heard no noise at all. Each noise seemed to have vanished, to have been swallowed up like under a bell. There were also no smells. And his attempt to feel was just as futile as his attempt to hear. The blood had drained from his fingers and toes. No circulation.
Stasis. Complete. Practically dead.
Tried to quietly breathe in. And back out. In. Back out. Where was the guy?
The blow from the club almost deafened him. It landed on the wall, not on his body, but Moses jerked so hard he almost pissed himself.
“I got him!” the guard yelled, grabbing Moses’ feet at the same moment.
It took an eternity for Moses to recover from the shock. Might have been a half or full second. At first, he thrashed about helplessly, then with more determination. He was able to pull up his knees, which destabilized the guard. He then stretched his legs back out. As fast as he could. He hit the guard in his support leg and heard something crack. It was so loud and clear that it seemed like it wanted to make up for the seconds of total silence.
Very close by, he could hear the siren of a police car.
58
Sandi was standing in her room. She was convinced at least twenty minutes had passed. Maybe more. The phone was still in her hand. Sweat trickled down her back.
The room was small. Bed and wardrobe and kitchenette in less than twenty square meters. Toilet and shower in an old supply closet. She wasn’t complaining. Some of her friends had it even worse. Communal kitchens were shit. Communal bathrooms were shit, in the literal sense. Above all, when the boys used them. She gazed at the small photo of her and Moses that she’d pinned up over her bed.
What had Moses gotten himself into now?
Wrong question. She shook her head. Disloyal. A betrayal to their relationship.
Once more from the top. What had actually happened to Moses? The car, his phone, the gated community—why would anyone want to live in such a hell hole—the two white men, and then the break-in.
What could I do? she wondered. Nothing came to her. Just like a few minutes ago, and the time before, and the time before that. But there was always something you could do. Right?
So once again. Sandi sat down on the bed and pulled her shoes on. It gave her the feeling of doing something. Go stand at the entrance to that gated community, she thought. But how? With whom? With what?
With guns.
Ridiculous. She didn’t know anyone who had any. Except for her uncle in Mthatha. Just go in. Search. Take Moses by the arm. Walk out.
Sandi rummaged around under her bed. Pulled out a shoebox. Opened the lid. Pulled out a few maps. Flipped through them. Zimbabwe. Lesotho. Durban.
She left her room and knocked on her neighbor’s door. Laura opened right away.
“You have a city map, don’t you?” Laura had moved from Zambia three months ago. And had her own car. How else would she find her way around?
“Sure.”
“May I borrow it?”
Two minutes later, the map was stretched out on the bed in Sandi’s room. She was kneeling beside it. Here was Abbotsford, situated at a highway intersection. Mostly small single-family homes and a few newer gated communities. And there was Dorchester Heights, larger homes, a subdivision stretched along the Nahoon River. Suburbia lifted out of a dictionary, and not even a single shop where you could just buy a loaf of bread. The map didn’t show her where The Pines was located. But there couldn’t be all that many possibilities. The river was here, Dorchester Heights was there, just as it was printed on the map.
There weren’t many other open spaces. She could envision quite precisely where Moses was. What she couldn’t envision was how she was going to actually help him.
59
The security guy instantly released his hold on Moses. From his mouth emerged a sound of surprise, more than of pain.
Stand up, quickly look around. Nobody else was nearby. Back around the house. His ears were still throbbing from the blow that hadn’t even struck him. Had he been seen from inside this time? No time to worry about that. Quickly into the next yard. Pause at the wall where he had earlier eavesdropped on the white guy with the club and the other voice. They would shoot him. He had to escape, but he also needed to be careful.
The street was empty. No face in a window, as far as he could see. The two white men had headed to the left. He took off to the right. That was the wrong direction. Away from the exit. Once again. Then again, if this was about survival, he thought, there actually wasn’t a wrong direction.
Moses sprinted down the street and saw the small hill off to his right. So, he was heading toward the river. That was the direction he’d taken at the beginning. A T-intersection in front of him, twenty or thirty meters off. He’d cover the distance rapidly. But which way after he did? Right or left? Make up your mind, Moses chided himself.
To the right of the intersection, three people materialized. Moses slowed down slightly.
Two old women and an old man. The man with a stick, both women with dogs. A senior citizens’ patrol.
“There he is!” the man cried.
One of the two women screamed. One of the dogs began to yap. The other followed suit. The group had now reached the middle of the intersection. The man spread out his arms, using his stick as a barrier. Don’t do that, Moses thought. And: Hopefully, they aren’t armed. He started to run faster.
The other woman yelled: “Here! Help! Help!”
Past them into the T-crossing and down the next street. Moses could still hear one last “Hellllp!” with a very long L.
Dogs, Moses thought fleetingly. Real dogs. They weren’t here yet. Keep running. Forward and to the right toward the river. Straight ahead and slightly downhill toward… Toward where? There were no directions. Everything here was offlimits, everything was cut off by an endless wall. Make up your mind.
Somewhere behind him, he heard the short yelp of a police siren. A guard appeared in front of him. So to the right it was. Free until the next T-intersection. Very close to the river. Then see from there. Run.
Moses couldn’t see the guard who had hidden behind one of the walls. He was mid-stride with both feet off the ground when the body check came. Stumbled to the side, couldn’t regain his balance, landed with his chest against a trash can that fell over. He somersaulted over the large plastic container and landed in the filth that was now spilling out of the can. The other man fell on top of him and kept rolling due to his momentum. The guard crashed into the wall of the next house with his shoulder and yelled loudly with pain.