I went back to my desk and picked up that hand-delivered letter.
‘I think it’s time for Jessie to come back to work,’ I said.
‘I do wonder what’s going on with her,’ Hattie said.
‘She’s got a broken heart,’ I said. ‘But it can be fixed.’
I phoned the police station and asked for Reghardt but he wasn’t there and they wouldn’t give me his cell number.
‘Reghardt?’ said Hattie, raising her eyebrow. ‘I have his cell number. Is he the heart-breaker?’
‘He’s also got a broken heart,’ I said.
There was a knock on the door.
‘Cooo-eee,’ said Candice, stepping in.
She had leather sandals on so we had not heard her usual clip-clopping. She wore a cream dress that fitted her just right. She smelled of lemon blossoms and her lipstick and her toenails were a pearly-pink. She probably looked good in her sleep.
‘Maria?’ Candice said.
‘Sorry, I was just thinking,’ I said. ‘What did you say?’
‘The funeral’s all set for tomorrow. How’s it going with y’all? Can I help out any?’
‘That night you went out with Jessie and got drunk,’ I said. ‘Where did you sleep?’
Harriet frowned at me.
‘Would you like some tea, Candice?’ she asked.
‘Sure, thanks,’ Candy said. ‘I was too drunk to drive. That nice young fella, the policeman, he took me home. To the Sunshine B&B, where I’m staying.’
‘Reghardt?’
She nodded.
‘It’s important, Candy, that you tell me the truth,’ I said. ‘It will really help our investigation.’
‘Truly, that’s what happened. I wasn’t so pickled that I can’t remember. We made a bit of a racket getting in and the owner got up.’
‘So Reghardt went home with you?’
Candice laughed.
‘Oh, no! He just helped me to my room. I wasn’t walking so well. The owner, Mr Wessels, stood frowning at us and let Reghardt out himself.’
‘So nothing happened between you and Reghardt?’
‘Hell, no,’ she said. ‘He’s a sweet little guy, but not my type. And I’m not his. He’s got a girlfriend.’
‘He told you that?’
‘Yeah, he seemed real proud of her. Didn’t tell me her name.’
‘It’s Jessie,’ I said.
‘Oh, hell damn,’ said Candice, ‘does she think . . . ?’
I nodded. Candice sat down and Hattie handed her a cup of tea.
‘The poor thing,’ Candy said.
‘Could you give me that number, Hats?’ I said.
Reghardt answered on the first ring.
‘Jessie?’ he said.
‘It’s Tannie Maria,’ I said. ‘I got a letter from a young man. I’d like to help him. I was thinking maybe you could give me some advice about what to say . . . ’
Reghardt was quiet.
‘His girlfriend is ignoring him because she thinks he spent the night with another woman,’ I said.
‘But why would she think that?’
‘Because she heard about him leaving a bar with his arm around another woman.’
‘What?’
‘One who was beautiful and drunk.’
‘Oh, that. She was too drunk to drive.’
‘Ja.’
‘So I, I mean he, took her home.’
‘Ja, and . . . ?’
‘And? And nothing. Oh, no – she thinks— Ag, nee.’
‘She’s really upset. The man is someone special to her.’
‘He is?’
‘I don’t think he should give up on her.’
‘You don’t?’
‘What should I tell him to do?’
‘Maybe he can ask her friends to tell her the truth. Do you think they’d do that, Tannie?’
‘If she’s feeling really hurt, she might be ignoring her friends too. I think he must write her a letter telling her what happened and how he feels about her. And then he must go round to her himself. If she won’t see him, he can leave the letter.’
‘Ja, that’s good advice, Tannie. You should tell him that.’
‘It won’t do any harm to give her some koeksisters. She really likes koeksisters.’
Just as I put the phone down it rang again and I picked up. It was Sister Mostert from the hospital.
‘They’ve gone,’ she told me. ‘Anna and Dirk. Just now they were eating breakfast and, next thing, they’ve disappeared.’
‘What about the police guards?’
‘You won’t believe this, but they made friends with each other. Dirk and Anna. Stopped fighting. So the police went.’
‘And Dirk and Anna weren’t discharged?’
‘No. And another thing. An ambulance, it’s been stolen.’
‘You think they took it?’
‘Who would drive? Her leg is in a plaster cast. His arm is in a sling . . . I can’t understand it. I phoned the police. But I also thought I should tell you.’
‘What is it?’ asked Candice as I hung up.
‘It’s Dirk and Anna. Disappeared. And so has an ambulance.’
‘In their condition . . . ’ said Hattie.
‘They’ve got one good pair of arms and legs between them,’ I said. ‘If they worked together, they’d be a whole person. But could they steal an ambulance?’
Hattie laughed.
‘Honestly. Those two, working together?’ she said.
‘Sister Mostert says they made up. They’re friends now.’
‘Where would they go?’ said Candice.
‘Looking for revenge,’ I said. ‘And I think it’s my fault. They listened to me for a change . . . Candice, can we take your car? It’s faster. Let’s go to John’s farm.’
‘You think they blame him for Martine’s murder?’ said Hattie.
I nodded and asked Candy: ‘Have you got a cell phone?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Hattie, we’ll call you when we get there, but phone the police in the meanwhile. Tell Kannemeyer the story and ask him to send a van out to John’s.’
The top was up, so we didn’t have that wild wind, but the car was going fast. Very fast. But it was okay – Candy was a good driver. As we shot out of town, I looked at the yellow and purple flowers that were coming up all over the veld. Candy saw them too.
‘Beautiful,’ she said.
‘It’s the rain,’ I said. ‘They come out after the rain.’
‘Beautiful,’ she said again.
‘Are you just born with beauty?’ I asked, looking at her smooth peach skin and golden hair. ‘Or can it grow on you like flowers? How do you do it?’
She smiled.
‘Beauty is my career.’
‘I couldn’t wear your kind of clothes,’ I said.
‘No. You’d have to find the right clothes for you. That show off your best bits.’
‘Hah. I’ve got no best bits.’
‘Nonsense. Your face, your hips and breasts are in a perfect ratio. Excellent curves. And your hands and ankles are real cute. I know just the style for you. If you like I’ll get my shop to send up something. What are you, a thirty-eight? And shoes. Four?’
I nodded and looked down at my brown dress and khaki veldskoene. They were very practical, but even I could tell they weren’t the best style for me. My dress size used to be thirty-four, before I married, then a thirty-six, and now it’s thirty-eight.
‘I can’t wear those fancy New York clothes,’ I said.
‘It’s on the house.’
‘It won’t help . . . ’
‘Oh, rubbish. You’re lovely. And you’ve got good skin, even though it’s so hot and dry here. What do you use?’
‘Olive oil.’
‘And as we get older we’ve got to watch the exercise and diet a bit more.’
‘Is that your secret?’
‘Secret? I’ve got no secrets.’
We were passing a grove of bright green spekboom trees.
‘I guess there is one secret I’ve learned,’ she said. ‘Clothes, skin, makeup, can all help. But if a woman thinks she looks good, she glows with her own special beauty.’
‘Ja, maybe, but even if she’s thinking and glowing and all, will a man see her beauty?’
‘Men aren’t as dumb as they seem, Maria.’
‘Look,’ I said, ‘a bokkie.’
‘What?’
‘A little buck, there, in the shadow of the spekboom. By those big rocks. A steenbokkie.’
But she couldn’t see it. It’s easy to see bright flowers, but you need the right kind of eyes to see a brown animal in the shade.
Maybe I would find a man with the right kind of eyes.