“Remember,” Moses said to himself. He walked a few meters to the left and stared down one of the streets, then in the other direction. Decided to start with the rightmost street, tackle things systematically. He’d remember when he saw the house.
How had they actually gotten here last year? Definitely not in his car since he hadn’t owned one at that point. He hadn’t saved up enough to buy the Toyota until a few months ago. Had they taken Ross’s car? Who else had been along? And why in the world was he asking himself these things in the first place?
Because the whole picture would help stimulate his memory. If he could recall the group, their faces, the car, then he’d more easily recognize the house they had visited. And the name would come back to him. Japie? The Boers have such strange names, Moses thought.
A symbolic stretch of wall along the street, a few meters of grass and garden, a half-cube with windows, attached garage. Trees that offered a little shade, but were only half-grown. An old Hyundai was sitting in the driveway, two flat tires. Nobody had driven it anywhere lately. The scent of grilled meat, from where? Laundry on a drying rack in the front yard. Who would be home at this hour? The domestic workers, of course. But who else would be inside these walls this time of day? Everyone around here had jobs. And was Japie at home? Or Janie? What had he even looked like? Moses stopped and concentrated. Tall. Thin. Arrogant. Hairline already receding. Talked a blue streak. Moses had taken an instant disliking to him. Oh well, he’d help him either way.
A woman in a smock stood at a window, ironing, her back turned to the window as her massive arms moved slowly across the ironing board. She reached for a piece of cloth and wiped it across her face. The heat. And she was ironing as well. As she finished with the cloth, she turned around and caught sight of Moses. Was startled to see him just standing there, looking in the window. He walked on without waving, rubbed his hand over his sweaty forehead. He glanced at his watch. Exactly one o’clock. The plan had been to be making out with Sandi by this point.
He approached a T-intersection, the end of the first street. As he walked along, he became increasingly certain that his classmate didn’t live in one of these one-storied houses. Veering off to the right, another street continued in the exact same curve. Everything still on one level. Moses picked up his pace. Another T. The next street was straight, forking this time slightly toward the left. Running between two-storied houses now. The lots weren’t all that large down this street either, the second floors extending over the two-car garages. Flowers were growing in the front yard of one of the houses on the left side of the street. A small bed, every color imaginable. Moses had no idea what kind of flowers these were, but the fact that they were blooming brightly under the brutal sun indicated the amount of work that was being invested in them. He looked around. Who took care of the gardens here? Was there a crew for the entire gated community? Or did each house hire its own gardener? He had no idea how these people lived.
Moses came to a stop a few minutes later and did a double take. There was the house. He remembered the mailbox mounted on a wooden post next to the front door. The box looked like a miniature house open on one side. The wooden roof that extended beyond the two walls protected the box’s opening from the rain. Moses took a few steps toward the house, hesitated. Looked more closely. Wrong. This couldn’t be it. A Kaizer Chiefs jersey was hanging in one of the upstairs windows. The Boers didn’t watch soccer. Ever.
And Japie or Janie or Danie was a typical Boer boy. Moses would have picked up on anything out of the ordinary. He shook his head. Kaizer Chiefs fan. Downright subversive. This wasn’t the house.
He paused again at the next T, glancing all around him. He had now covered most of the distance to the wall running along the river, almost the full length of The Pines. He took a couple of steps down the next street before realizing that something had caught his attention as he’d scanned the area. He looked back at the intersection and then up.
A small camera was mounted on one of the lamp posts.
5
Meli breathed in and out. He then inhaled the hot air one more time before turning on the lawn mower. The few blades of grass that were left for him to cut would make it hard for him to breathe for the rest of the day, but he really couldn’t complain. He was a gardener by profession. A good gardener, at that.
The exhaust from the old mower puffed up a Woolworth’s bag. It shot upward and hung for a second, suspended in the shimmering air. Meli put on the brake without cutting off the mower, as he tried to catch the empty bag. It deftly eluded his first attempt, but he then jumped up and grabbed it.
He caught sight of a figure at the end of the street who was looking in his direction. A little scruffy, but not completely. Good posture. Head up. An afro like some of the young people were wearing again these days. The figure gave a quick wave. Meli waved back.
Not like the two people he had seen a few minutes ago at the other end of the street. He had instantly registered that the two of them were up to no good. The one in a suit, the other in a smock. Just like in one of those sitcoms that were always playing on TV. But what was this to him? The people around here might not realize what was going on, but that was their own fault.
The figure had disappeared again.
“What is it, Meli?” Mrs. Viljoen. That voice. Even the question was an order. She managed to drown out the engine as well.
“Nothing, madam,” he said just as loudly and clearly.
“Then you should get back to work.”
“Right away, madam,” he said. He pulled his phone out of the pocket: 1:05. Still almost three hours to go until his day was over.
6
Thembinkosi quietly shut the door behind them.
“Everything okay with the lock?” Nozipho asked.
“Yep. Even if someone comes and unlocks it, they won’t notice anything.”
The two of them stood at a window and gazed out. Established practice. First, make sure that nobody has noticed you, then search the house. Usually, time was on their side.
A compact drove past outside.
“I don’t like these clothes,” Nozipho said.
“But they’re helpful.”
“You really don’t think anybody suspected?”
“Not at all.”
“I still don’t like the smock. I look like a cleaning lady.”
“That was the whole idea!”
“Uh-huh… Do you remember the time we hired that white man?” Nozipho asked. “With the two of us as his servants?”
“Yes, it was a good idea. Too bad the white guy didn’t fit the type.”
“We bought him those new clothes.”
“And he still managed to look like a homeless person.”
“He was a homeless person. But it was a good idea.”
“It was a fabulous idea.” Thembinkosi broke off. “But honestly, he didn’t really act like a white man.”
“Why do you think that was?”
“What do you know about class differences?”
“Come on. Don’t start in on…”
“I think that was our mistake. We hired a poor white man.”
“But a rich one wouldn’t have done it.”
“Exactly. We should have analyzed the situation better. Our mistake.”
“Should we go ahead and start?”
7
Were there more cameras? Moses glanced around. Not on this street. He retraced his steps a short way. Nothing. A little further. Back to the T. This was the boundary between the one- and two-storied houses. Still nothing. Had anyone seen him? Maybe at the entrance? In the other direction, he saw the back of a man in overalls. Someone working in a garden, out in this heat. The man was too far away to hear him. He was just turning on the mower. Noise. The exhaust blew a plastic bag toward the street. The man parked the mower without shutting off the motor, ran after the bag, and caught it as it spun in the air. His eyes then fell on Moses. The man froze for a second, bag in hand. Moses waved. The man waved back with his empty hand and turned back to the garden. As he himself turned back around, Moses caught sight of the next camera. Only a few meters away. It was small, attached to yet another streetlamp. And it was pointed right at him. This made it two.