He woke up at noon. Sunday in Africa. Deafening silence. Mercilessly blue sky. What did he have to do with it?
First and foremost he had to get hold of Lisa van Rensburg, give her a copy of his short-list and tell her to extract the photographs of these men. Those photographs could lead him straight to Heinrich Muller.
Second: he had to talk to Johan Lombard again. Get as much information on modern-day South African Nazis as he could. Find a way of asking him if he had any theories about Heinrich Muller, or whether he knew any old Nazis called Strauss. Compare information with his short-list.
Three: decide how the hell he was going to get to each Strauss on his short-list. He’d had a few ideas, but probably the best method was posing as a policeman. Everybody opens the door for a policeman. But how do you get hold of a police uniform?
Four: find out what help he could get when he found Heinrich Muller. He would need tough, reliable guys to help him make the snatch, since Muller was very likely to have some impressive muscle of his own.
And five: get those dents knocked out of the Landrover tomorrow. If Dupreez found the Toyota he could match up its damage with the Landrover’s.
He swung out of bed.
Ten minutes later he emerged from the shower feeling very hungry. He pulled the curtain back an inch. There was nobody to be seen. Only the dam sparkling in the noonday sun.
He drove into the pretty village, thinking about Lisa van Rensburg. He found a café and ordered steak, eggs and chips, wolfed them down, then sat considering his options.
Seeing Lisa was his top priority. First he had to establish whether she was home today. Telephone her and if Lisa answers, get round there.
He didn’t like this but it had to be done. He got up and went to the public telephone outside the café. A woman answered. ‘Ja?’
McQuade said, ‘Lisa?’
The woman said in Afrikaans, ‘No, Lisa has gone away on holiday, I’m looking after her place.’
‘Gone away? For how long?’
‘Three months.’
‘Three months! Where to?’
‘Well, she had all this leave accumulated and she decided to go overseas.’
‘Overseas?’
‘Can I take a message for when she comes back?’
‘No,’ McQuade said, ‘I’m just a friend of a friend. Thank you. Goodbye.’
He hung up. No photographs for three months! Those photos would have made it very easy for him! Damn!
And he felt very bad about Lisa. That kid hadn’t suddenly decided to take a holiday – she had fled. He thought of her wasting her money, sobbing her heart out in some London bed-sitter, and he felt a shit.
Well, maybe he could make it up to her when he was a millionaire. He sighed, and dialled Johan Lombard’s home.
‘Why certainly, dear boy, pop around anytime.’
Johan’s house was in Waterkloof, the select suburb of Pretoria, whose leafy avenues are lined with well-kept gardens and gracious houses. But Johan’s garden was overgrown, the swimming pool awash with leaves, the hedges ragged. Johan was someone whose idea of creature comforts stopped at an adequate supply of whisky, a reliable, long-suffering wife and books. Groaning bookcases lined every wall, makeshift bookcases filled any gaps, an overflowing bookcase stood in the middle of the living-room awaiting a permanent place somewhere. McQuade could see nowhere it could possibly go, except the kitchen, provided the refrigerator and oven went out into the backyard. His study was a dangerous-looking place, towers of books threatening to crush the unwary. Johan sat in his armchair, wreathed in cigar smoke, clutching his glass of whisky.
‘Oh yes, dear boy – this country has plenty of Nazis. They held a big demonstration here a few years ago for the release of Rudolf Hess, Hitler’s deputy, who’s been in Spandau prison in Berlin for the last forty years. And when a well-known local Nazi called Dr Heusler died some years ago there was a grand Nazi funeral, swastikas, the works. The Nazi Party’s been banned since before the war, but it’s a happy hunting ground for them here, isn’t it, with all our racialism? There’re more Nazis around Pretoria than Namibia, dear boy. They call themselves the South African Nationalist Socialist Party. Not a registered political party, of course, but they flourish all right. Their Führer – that’s what he’s called – lives between here and Johannesburg, surrounded by barbed-wire and armed guards. I happen to know that they’ve even got a holy-of-holies in there, a sort of shrine to Hitler, with great Nazi flags and whatnot, plus their own archives. The Nazi brass gathers there regularly to have an emotional orgasm over Hitler. They’re in constant touch with right-wing movements world-wide – in Germany, of course, where the Nazi underground movement is very strong again – no German or Austrian politician dare antagonize the Nazis voters, you know – and with Le Pen in France and Sir Oswald Mosley’s bunch in England, and President Stroessner in Paraguay.’
McQuade was making notes. ‘This local Führer, how old is he?’
‘Oh, about forty. It suits their purpose to have an Afrikaner as Führer – they want to keep a lowish profile and let the right-wing Afrikaners – the AWB – do their dirty work for them. The Nazis have cells in every city and village. Under local gauleiters, or district leaders.’
‘But what would happen if somebody showed up at the Führer’s gate when the top brass were arriving and took photographs?’
‘You’d be politely told to piss off. And your film rather damaged. I’ve tried it. Impossible, even with a telephoto lens.’
McQuade sighed in frustration. ‘Why doesn’t the government send the police in to raid the place?’
‘The outcry, dear boy! The AWB would be up in arms against “government suppression” of their allies. And remember that a big percentage of the police are secret AWB members. Or sympathisers.’ He waved his hand. ‘Anyway the Government knows who most of the Nazis are. The NIS - National Intelligence Service – knows everything. They know that you’re visiting me right now.’
McQuade frowned. ‘How?’
Johan waved a finger at the telephone. ‘You phoned me All journalists’ telephones are tapped, dear boy.’
McQuade thought of his Landrover parked outside with the dents that Toyota made. If Dupreez had found that Toyota and alerted the Pretoria police to look for his vehicle … He decided to hurry up and get to the point: ‘Do you know of any Nazi war-criminals in South Africa?’
Johan said: ‘There’re alleged to be a lot. But I don’t know who they are, or I’d tell the Israelis to come and get ’em.’
McQuade decided to chance it. ‘By the way, do you happen to know an elderly man called Heinrich Strauss? Or maybe he’s called Hendrik.’
‘I know a few Strausses but no Heinrich. Why?’
McQuade waved his hand. ‘No, just somebody a friend of mine told me to look up, a German old-timer.’ He went on ‘But what’s the Nazis’ overall strategy? What do they want?
Johan sat forward.
‘They want,’ he said, ‘what Hitler wanted. But for starters they want the AWB – which is neo-Nazi – to take over South Africa. And then, they want the whole of Africa.’
McQuade looked at him, excitement rising. What Professor Jansen refused to speculate about. Hitler’s blueprint. That submarine was loaded … ‘But the world wouldn’t let them invade across the Limpopo …’
‘The world didn’t make a very good job of stopping Hitler invade Poland, did it? Or France, or Holland, or Russia. The only reason Hitler failed was because he bit off more than he could chew at one time.’ He shook his head. ‘The modern Nazis here wouldn’t make the same mistake – though they wouldn’t let world opinion stop them either. But they believe they won’t have to do much military strong-arm stuff to get the rest of Africa – they’ll get it by default. The rest of Africa is a defenceless, corrupt, inefficient, poverty-stricken mess – any fool can see that. And now Nature is going to finish off the job: AIDS is rife in the Congo, West Africa, Kenya, Tanzania. The estimates are that in ten years sixty million blacks will perish from AIDS. What would Hitler have said? “Good, this is Nature’s cleansing process.” Sauberung – as they called their actions against the Jews. And who is going to occupy the vast territories left largely uninhabited by AIDS? The Nazis and their Aryans. What excuse will they give the world? To stop the Chinese occupying the territories. And to bring the dreaded AIDS epidemic under control they’ll doubtless put the diseased into concentration camps to die. Doubtless with a little help from malnutrition to jolly them along.’ He shrugged. ‘That is the “official” South African Nazi Party policy.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘And from there they take over the rest of Africa.’
McQuade was rapt. ‘But how realistic is all that?’
‘That, dear fellow,’ Johan said, ‘is a most realistic scenario. AIDS is going to wipe out most of the blacks. No ifs about it. Only whens. And who is going to fill the vacuum left behind? Fill the “Lebensraum” which Hitler demanded?’
McQuade sat back. ‘And,’ he said, ‘if they succeed, what is life going to be like under the South African Nazis?’
Johan said flatly: ‘Like Nazi Germany, but adapted to Africa’s needs. Most major industries nationalized – particularly the mines. All political opposition will be liquidated.’
‘And the blacks?’
Johan shook his head. ‘One needs labour, doesn’t one? Who’s going to build the roads and work the mines and factories until the Aryans have gone forth and multiplied sufficiently? So one needs slave labour for a decade or two. One would even have to pay them for a while to keep the economy going – it’s no good nationalizing a garment factory if there’re no blacks to buy pants, is it? And Zulus would make good soldiers to knock the living shit out of troublesome tribes to the north who had impudently survived the fortuitous AIDS epidemic.’ He waved a hand. ‘Oh, blacks will be needed for some time, dear fellow, to build the autobahns, the railways, the ports, work the farms and mines.’ Johan smiled at him cherubically. ‘You think this far-fetched?’
McQuade was not quite sure. Not after the books Roger Wentland had lent him on German colonial history. Not after reading about Hitler’s blueprint for Africa. ‘But how serious is this Nazi threat to South Africa today?’
Johan threw an aggressive dash of whisky into his glass as if he had just noticed a troublesome new outbreak of bush-fire at his elbow. He took a swallow and marshalled his thoughts for the uninitiated.
‘The Nazi threat in South Africa today –’ he said slowly, ‘and by that I mean the AWB with the Nazis clustered behind them, and this Conservative Party whom the AWB supports – the Nazi threat in South Africa today is as serious … and almost as significant as the Nazi threat was in Germany in the 1920s, when Hitler was rising to power …’ He glared at McQuade, letting that sink in: then he elaborated slowly: ‘Unless we are very careful … and quick and lucky … South Africa will soon be ruled by Nazis! We will have an AWB dictatorship Within the next five to ten years. And that will mean a Nazi dictatorship …’
Johan stomped off into the living-room and started ransacking his bookshelves.
He came back with a fat box file. He snapped it open and pulled out a glossy booklet and tossed it to McQuade. It was entitled The Principles of the AWB and it had a big crest of the German eagle, wings out, its talons clutching the three-legged swastika. ‘What’s the difference between that and Hitler’s emblem?’ Johan demanded. ‘Read their official booklet and tell me the difference between their principles and Hitler’s. None! Hitler demanded Lebensraum, living space for his pure Aryan race – the AWB demands their Volkstaat, living space for the pure-white race. Hitler hated Jews: in those documents’ – he pointed – ‘you will find seven anti-Semitic statements. Parliamentary government is rejected fifteen times – as a demoralizing British-Jewish political system. Twelve times they demand an “authoritative system” instead, twelve times they speak of the “Herrenvolk”, the master race. Freedom of speech and freedom of the press is roundly rejected four times.’ He glared at him. ‘All exactly the same as Hitler. Read this whole file – newspaper clippings I’ve collected for ten years about the AWB! They show you their whole Hitlerian history. The footsteps of Hitler!’
McQuade stared at him. He started to ask a question but Johan went on. ‘Oh, dear fellow, I’m not talking about the rank and file membership, the good old Afrikaner farmers and housewives of Blikkiesdorp – they’re just simple God-fearing folk, hangovers from the voortrekker days who believe they’re God’s chosen people for this Promised Land, to whom God gave victory over the blacks at Blood River and at the 1948 elections – those people aren’t Nazis, they just believe the blacks are the sons of Ham whom God made hewers of wood and drawers of water.’ He leaned forward. ‘But the AWB leadership? They’re Nazis. The organizers in every city, town, village and rural area? The secret cells in every police station and government department? The secret cells in the Army, Navy, and Air Force?’ He paused to let McQuade think about all that power: then his eyes narrowed: ‘And never forget about the Youth!’ His finger shot up again. ‘Hitler said: “Give me the youth!” And he got them! Sweet little German girls with angelic faces and strapping Germans lads thinking what fun to be in uniform. And what did Hitler’s party machine do to them?’ He paused, then cried: ‘Turned them into little monsters! Who grew into big monsters! Who were prepared to commit the hideous crime of genocide!’ He frowned incredulously: ‘Genocide …? What more appalling … mind-blowing crime is there? Exterminating a whole race of people …?’ He waved his hand: ‘Brutally dragging them out of their homes, young and old, little old ladies and babes-in-arms, and herding them like cattle onto railway trucks for the gas chambers?’ He frowned in wonder: ‘What diabolical madness was that? A national orgy of insanity …’ He shook his head. ‘The Germans are perfectly decent people …’ He tapped his breast: ‘I am part German! The Queen of England herself is part German! And half the royal families of Europe! Half the people in America and Australia and New Zealand have German origins!’ He frowned at McQuade in wonder: ‘So why did these decent Germans tolerate the hideous international crime of genocide … ?’
McQuade waited. Johan leant further forward.
‘Not just because of Hitler, dear fellow … Not just because one of the greatest natural leaders of all time had blossomed in their midst. Not just because of his staggering charisma, his shattering oratory …’ He shook his chubby cheeks. ‘No, my friend. It was because of the organization he built up! Hitler was proud of saying that Nazi Germany was built by seven men. (Exactly what Terreblanche of the AWB claims!) Who recruited his first group of bodyguards – the SS!’ He dropped his voice: ‘Who went around breaking up the political meetings of Hitler’s opponents, who escorted Hitler around with bully-boy fanfare – who gave a military, invincible stamp to everything he did …’ He ended: ‘Which bullied the ordinary German into submission. And all that’ – he jabbed a finger – ’is what the AWB is doing! They have bully-boys who dress up in uniform, carry arms, who’re stormtroopers to beat up anybody who heckles Terreblanche’s speeches, who break up opposition meetings – even the State President’s meetings! They have openly declared that no member of the government will be allowed to hold political meetings in their territory! Terreblanche has made a study of Hitler’s techniques. When Terreblanche speaks, he starts off hypnotically, slowly spinning a web of nationalistic emotion through his audience, playing on their heritage and then he works himself up into a crescendo, just like Hitler did. Oh boy, what an orator …!’ He shook his head. ‘Our Foreign Minister is holding a public meeting in Pietersburg next month and the AWB has openly vowed to break it up, and hold a rival meeting instead. You must come along with me and see the fun.’
‘But he’s only demanding a separate white state, a Volkstaat—’
Johan cried, ‘And what did Hitler demand? Lebensraum! Living space for his Herrenvolk! And the AWB is demanding the same! And Hitler created a one-party state, and that’s exactly what the AWB want! And Hitler nationalized industry to harness their power to his one-party state, and that’s exactly what the AWB say they’ll do! All our massive mining, our massive industry, all our commerce will be nationalized!’ He waved a hand. ‘What was Hitler’s first economic demand? The return of the industrial areas which Germany forfeited after the First World War. What do the AWB demand? The return of the gold mines which the Boer republics lost when they were incorporated into the Union of South Africa after the Boer War!’ He shook his head. ‘Officially, the AWB is only demanding their old republican territory back, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg, my dear fellow. History is repeating itself. For Nazi Europe read Nazi Africa.’
History repeating itself. ‘And what do the big guns of commerce think about this? And the Jews?’
Johan said wearily: ‘There is an overall tendency in this troubled land to think of the AWB as a “lunatic fringe”. We are so used to a strong diet of politics, so unaccustomed to change, that there is a certain complacency. A certain numbness. But I assure you the government itself takes the threat of the AWB very seriously indeed! But the Jews? My God, they take it seriously! They are very aware how close Hitler came to controlling South Africa. And they’re wide awake to the dangers of the AWB. As a result there is a heavy-duty Zionist movement called the Jewish Defence Organization. It is highly militarised and highly secret. Devoted to defending themselves – and the country – against the AWB and the revival of Nazism.
McQuade was thinking: Go to the Jewish Defence Organization and ask for some muscle? No, that was as tricky for the submarine as getting Simon Wiesenthal involved. ‘But would the AWB start another pogrom against the Jews? Or would they just drive them out and nationalize their property?’
Johan jabbed his finger. ‘Not the ordinary God-fearing Afrikaner – but the Hitler-type Youth that the AWB will spawn! The AWB is not yet in its mature form, it’s still on its way up, like Hitler in 1929. But it’s already the second-most powerful organization in the country! And’ – he jabbed his finger again – ‘remember that when the AWB comes to power their policies will meet with such resistance that they will have to be ruthless! Just as Hitler was.’ He glared, letting that sink in: ‘There will be civil war! The Jewish Defence Organization will leap into action, not to mention the left wing – not to mention the blacks, the ANC.’ He paused dramatically: ‘The AWB will have to be ruthless to enforce their policies, and that is where the jack-boot will come in – crushing all this opposition! All the Gestapo methods. Including …’ he leant forward, ‘the concentration camps.’ He fixed McQuade with his glare. ‘And once one’s got those concentration camps, dear boy, once one’s got all that barbed wire, what does one do with all these criminals?’
‘And how do we stop them?’
Johan smiled. ‘Aha – there’s the rub. The irony, the paradox. Because the only way to stop them, dear fellow, is by supporting this present distasteful government.’
That was hard for McQuade to swallow. ‘Not the Left?’
‘Forget the Left, dear fellow! They’ve been losers for forty years, ever since General Smuts got kicked out. Maybe they’ll re-organize themselves one day, but for now they’ve got no credible policy. And this is an Afrikaner country, dear fellow, the Afrikaner finally won it back after a hundred years of foreign domination and he’s here to stay as long as he has powder for his gun – so the only person to lead this country to reform must be an Afrikaner bringing the Afrikaner volk with him. And right now, in practical terms, the only party which can do that is the reigning Nationalist Party.’ He shook his head. ‘God knows, I hold no brief for this government, they’ve fucked us up psychologically and internationally with their unjust, stupid Apartheid, and they’ve bogged us down with their over-loaded Civil Service giving jobs for the boys to ensure Afrikaner perpetuity. But …’ he held up a finger: ‘the truth has finally dawned on them that Apartheid is a failure, international opinion and sanctions are finally biting and the border war with SWAPO and the jolly Cubans is costing an arm and a leg – and at least the government is reforming, dear fellow. Apartheid is patently crumbling. They have declared a brand-new attitude, that some form of power-sharing with the blacks must be instituted—’
McQuade interrupted, ‘Then why the hell don’t they have the courage of their so-called convictions and legally abolish Apartheid – strike it off the Statute Book?’
Johan sighed patiently. ‘Because of the AWB, dear fellow. And their surrogates, the Conservative Party, who are now the Official Opposition in parliament. The outcry there would be, the AWB and Conservative Party would literally be up in arms, and the government’s own rank and file membership would baulk. We Afrikaners have to be led into the twentieth century gently.’ He jabbed his finger. ‘And that’s the terrible danger of the AWB. Don’t you see? Even if the AWB don’t win the next election, they will nonetheless wax in strength. Because while the government gradually pushes its reforms through parliament and drags the country into the twentieth century, the AWB will rant and rave and whip up so much conservative Afrikaner emotion that they may well win the following election. And that, my friend, is where the real Greek tragedy of the AWB will come to its terrible fruition. Because …’ he shook his head, ‘this Afrikaner government, which has ruled us for forty years, will never surrender power … And that’ – he jabbed his finger – ‘is when the Civil War of South Africa begins. And the AWB will have legal right on their side because they won the election!’
McQuade was astonished. He had never thought of this. He echoed: ‘The government would not surrender power if the Conservative Party and the AWB won the next election?’
‘Absolutely no doubt about it! The Broederbond was formed after the First World War with the express purpose of bringing the Nationalist Party to power and never thereafter surrendering it!’ He shook his chubby cheeks. ‘Never! So if the AWB won the election, the President would declare a state of emergency, suspend parliament and rule by decree … And then,’ he raised his eyebrows, ‘the shit would really hit the fan. Then the AWB would really go on the warpath. Civil war. Afrikaner against Afrikaner. And all the stops would be pulled out by both sides.’ Johan glared at him. ‘That is the real tragedy of the AWB in our midst. Win or lose, they could destroy the country.’
McQuade stared at him, fascinated. ‘Where would the police and Army stand in that civil war?’
‘Aha!’ Johan said. ‘The million dollar question. About one third of our police are AWB sympathisers. But if the AWB had won the election the police would be legally obliged to enforce the law and give the AWB the reins of government, whether they were pro or anti. So most of the police would fight for the AWB. The Army? Most of the officer corps would stick with the President, legal or illegal. But the rank and file are mostly unsophisticated Afrikaner boys; at least half would defy their officers and go to the AWB.’ He sighed. ‘It would be an awful mess, dear fellow.’
‘And who is going to win?’
Johan smiled. ‘The Afrikaner is a tough customer. He has a very long tradition of fighting for his survival – against the British, and against the blacks. War after war.’ He waved a hand. ‘But, in our forthcoming civil war, it’ll be Afrikaner fighting Afrikaner – to the death. And although the President’s men will have superior fire-power, let me remind you, dear fellow, that the guerrilla is a very difficult man to defeat. Fidel Castro proved that. Mao Tse-tung proved that, and he was fighting not only Chang Kai-shek but the might of the USA. Even the Afghan rebels have given the Russians such a hard time that they’ve gone home. In Angola, Savimbi’s rebels have kept the Cubans tied up in battles for years. The IRA have kept Great Britain on the hop for decades, dear fellow …’ He shook his face: ‘And don’t imagine that the AWB haven’t got military strategists – don’t imagine that they aren’t prepared.’ He shrugged. ‘The punters would put money on the President’s men, I’m sure. Me, I’d put a dollar each way, on both.’
McQuade gave a sigh. ‘And how will the Nazis fit into this? After the dust has settled?’
Johan snorted. ‘The dust will take a long time settling, dear fellow. But, if the President’s men win, we will have a long period of a Franco-type dictatorship, as they had in Spain. While the President dismantles the fortress of Apartheid brick by brick so as not to cause too many draughts and gradually brings the blacks into some kind of power-sharing structure. But if the AWB wins …? Oh, boy …’ He looked at McQuade. ‘Then it won’t be just their Volkstaat they’ll end up with. It’ll be the start of the Fourth Reich.’