For the time being, Robert was stuck. He could not go back to his father’s office and the mayor was in the police cells. But he still had the passwords, and when the dust settled he would see what he could salvage.
His car was parked at a boutique hotel outside town. They would go to his father’s house but there was nothing of value there. He had the cash from his father’s bedroom and the money from selling the plots at the river, which came to more than he thought. And then there were the identity books of those who couldn’t pay. He would be back. Debt was debt and it had to be collected.
Liedjie and her dreadful mother came to mind. When his father said there were occupiers, Robert had put his mind to getting rid of them without unwanted attention. Move into their world and learn what they were thinking, that was always the easiest. Singling out Liedjie had been a piece of cake. All he had to do was go to her ridiculous church, make friends, win her trust. She had been more closed than he expected. Even in his bed, he knew he did not have all of her. And her mother. What a stubborn old cow. She had honestly thought she could take them on without consequences. She should have known better than to step in the way of a plan that was running so well. Like clockwork, until people like her came along and thought they could score something for nothing.
The fog of slapping and shouting that was the memory of his own mother came to mind. When he dreamed, it was always of her walking away with her suitcase, vanishing down the road. He had been eight when his father came home from work, shouting for food before he was even in the house, but she was gone. It had been better without her. His father was calmer and they carried on alone. Then there were other women and, when the shouting started, he slept on the stoep.
It had been off-putting watching his father trying to throttle the woman. The killing he didn’t mind but watching someone sweating and heaving over it was dreadful.
That night, he knew they would kill his father. The boys had gone for the older man and he had used the distraction to slip away. He had walked off, through the circling mob, and instead of going back to his father’s car, he kept going, crossing the main road and climbing the ridge above the rubbish dump to watch the fire.
When he knew it was all over and his father was dead, he walked back to the house, where he packed what he needed, pulled out his car, using his spare key, and drove to the hotel where he paid with cash. The lost car key was worrying him and he cursed his carelessness the night he had killed the old bitch’s husband. It had been unexpected and unplanned, which he didn’t like. So much of what happened with his father was like that, not thought through.
Robert stood across the road from the municipal offices, tapping his fingers on his forearm. He should leave town, but the key was a link to him and he wanted it back.