LITMIR.BIZ

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      ‘I am Tannie Maria,’ I said. ‘Sit. Sit. I’ll make us coffee.’

      She sat on the edge of Jessie’s chair and frowned at me, like she didn’t like the way I was putting sugar in her coffee. But I carried on anyway, and added milk too.

      Then there was a sound like someone had stood on a puppy, and I got a fright. The woman’s face crumpled and the sound was her crying. Then she was tjanking, howling like a dog that’s been left alone. I put her coffee along with the tin of rusks on the table next to her, and pulled my chair closer to hers.

      ‘Heavens above,’ said Hattie and closed the door.

      But she needn’t have worried because the woman got much quieter. Tears ran down her face; you could see the lines because her cheeks were a bit dusty. They ran right into her mouth. She was tjanking softly now, and I could make out some words:

      ‘Tienie. My Tienie,’ she said. ‘I love her.’

      The tears kept streaming down. Ag, I felt sorry for her.

      Then there was a loud knocking, and Hattie went to open the door.

      ‘Police!’ barked a man’s voice. ‘I am Detective Lieutenant Kannemeyer. We are looking for Anna Pretorius. Her bakkie is outside.’

      Hattie said nothing and for the second time someone pushed past her. The policeman was big and tall with short hair and a thick handlebar moustache. It had a nice shape, like he took care of it. His moustache was a chestnut colour and his hair was a darker brown with silver streaks above his ears.

      The woman jumped up from her chair, knocking the tin, and spilling the rusks onto the floor.

      ‘Anna Pretorius,’ said the man, ‘you must come with me for fingerprinting.’

      Anna wiped her face with the back of her hand and then, with that same hand full of dust and tears, she made a fist and punched the policeman in his jaw. He jerked back and touched his fingers to his face. His eyes were a storm-cloud blue. He reached out his long arm. The long arm of the law they say, but I’d never seen it in person before, you know, reaching out like that. But she ducked under his long arm and darted for the door. He seemed to move slower than her, but somehow he caught her. She was jumping, and beating out with her fists, her face as red as a beetroot. But he just wrapped his arms around her, like a giant bear, and pinned her to him until she went still. There was sunlight shining on his arms and you could see that chestnut-coloured hair again.

      ‘Konstabel Piet Witbooi,’ he said.

      A little guy with the high cheekbones of a Bushman popped up beside the detective. His hair was like peppercorns and his skin was wrinkled and yellow-brown like a sultana. His hands moved quickly and quietly as he slipped handcuffs around Anna’s wrists. I thought she was still going to kick and bite, but when I saw her face I realised the fire had gone out of her. The tears were slipping down her cheeks again.

      ‘Why do you need fingerprints?’ I said to the policemen.

      They did not reply, but I knew the answer. Anna was a suspect in the murder of her friend.

      ‘You’ve got to help me,’ Anna said, looking at me with her wet brown eyes.

      I knew that I would try. But I also knew that I would never be able to help her with her biggest trouble. That huge eina loss of the one she loved.

      And then, it was funny, and I know it was a selfish thing to do, but I felt jealous of her, standing there looking so miserable, with the big policeman holding her. I envied her love. That deep love I had never had.

      Constable Witbooi and Detective Kannemeyer and Anna left Hattie and me standing there, looking down at the muesli buttermilk rusk crumbs, trampled all over the floor.

      I shook my head. What a sad story.

      CHAPTER THIRTEEN

      ‘You blerrie dyke bitch,’ said the pink-faced man in khaki shorts.

      Now that wasn’t how I expected to be greeted when I went into the Ladismith police station. I was there to tell the detective about the Gazette letters I’d got from the dead woman and her friend. I didn’t get a chance to talk to him earlier.

      The rude man was swearing at Anna: ‘Blerrie bitch.’

      Anna stood in front of a long wooden counter next to Constable Piet Witbooi. He turned and greeted me with a nod. Anna’s handcuffs were off and there was ink all over her fingers. The room was big, with pale yellow walls and small metal-framed windows, and an old humming air-conditioning unit. There was a corridor leading off this room, with doors to smaller offices. On the other side of the counter sat a young black policewoman at a wooden desk, busy with some paperwork.

      Anna glared at the rude man, her eyes bright and her nose twitching.

      ‘She hated you, you ugly warthog,’ she said. ‘Vlakvark.’

      He did look a bit like a warthog: stocky, his eyes small and his hair wiry. A big nose. And brown and grey scraggly whiskers on his jaws. Where had I seen him before?

      ‘You blerrie fat rat,’ he said.

      She was baring her teeth at him now, but not in smiling way. She didn’t look like a rat; more like a rock-rabbit, a dassie. With her soft fur and dark eyes. I wondered if the dassie was going to sink her teeth into the warthog.

      ‘She was mine,’ he said.

      Now I recognised him: Dirk van Schalkwyk – from Jessie’s photographs.

      The policewoman said something, but I could not hear, because at that moment the aircon unit made a loud rattling sound.

      ‘She hated you,’ Anna hissed.

      ‘I’ll blerrie kill you, you fat kakkerlak,’ he shouted.

      That was just silly. She looked nothing like a cockroach.

      ‘Hey!’ said Detective Kannemeyer, coming out of the office at the back. He stared down at us all. He really was a tall guy. ‘Stop that.’

      ‘Go ahead, warthog,’ said Anna, standing up straight, pushing her shoulders back. ‘Kill me, you murderer.’

      ‘You’re not gonna get away with it,’ said Dirk, pulling a gun out from under his shirt.

      I thought she would kick him or throw herself on the floor but she just lifted her chin a little higher. Maybe she was happy at the thought of joining her Tienie.

      Piet moved so quickly I hardly saw him. He knocked Dirk’s arm up into the air as a shot rang off. Boom! Bits of plaster and dust fell down from the ceiling.

      Detective Kannemeyer clamped Dirk’s wrist in his big hand, and took the gun from him.

      ‘Enough,’ said the detective.

      Kannemeyer twisted Dirk’s arm behind his back, and Dirk made a snorting noise. They both had ceiling dust on their hair.

      ‘You fat rat,’ Dirk mumbled as he was pushed past Anna, out of the room.

      I shook my head. Such rudeness. So unnecessary.

      Anna really was not at all fat. She had some padding, like any woman who ate three meals a day. But to call her fat was just wrong.

      Now the police station was full of people who’d popped in to see what the shouting and shooting was about.

      ‘Hello, Tannie Elna,’ I said to the woman who worked in the shoe shop next door.

      She was small and thin, hopping up and down like a meerkat to get a good view.

      ‘What’s going on?’ she said.

      ‘Would you say she is fat?’

      I pointed to Anna, who was being led away by a policewoman. Elna put her head to one side and scrunched up her mouth, then shook her head.

      ‘No,’

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