Because the thing that I did was right.
My pockets are emptied. Car keys, cellphone and peppermints are placed on the table in front of the redhead. “Where’s your purse?”
“In my car.”
“I’ll fetch it,” says the constable with the soft eyes.
“No,” says the redhead, “you’re already in deep shit. Let forensics fetch it. But you can drive to her house and fetch clothes for her. Her clothes need to be bagged, she’ll have to have something to put on.”
“I live in Knysna,” I say.
“But surely you brought some clothes with you?”
“No.”
“You drove all the way from Knysna without any extra clothes? Fuck! This is not some kind of spa, you know! What are we going to do now?”
“I can fetch some from my wife,” the constable suggests.
“No, that will take too long, and Supe is already mad as hell.” The redhead sighs, takes some keys from her bag. “There’s a gym bag in my car.”
She draws an ink pad closer, places a sheet of paper with blocks on it in front of her. “Come here.” Finger on the pad, then on a block on the sheet of paper. All the fingers, palm, thumb, sides of hands. She turns round, takes a black koki from the desk and reaches for a small whiteboard. Writes on it with her back to me, turns to face me and hangs the board round my neck.
She picks up a camera. “Look to the front.” Click. “Turn to the side.” Click.
I look down at the board, read the words upside down: Case Number 232/2004, Anna Bruwer. Murder.
So that’s it, I think. Murder. This is what it looks like. This is what it feels like.
“Uncover your shoulder so that I can take a photograph of the tattoo.”
I do so.
The constable comes in and puts a gym bag and my purse on the table.
The redhead opens the bag. “You’re lucky that I was planning to go to the gym, otherwise you’d be sitting in the cells stark-bloody-naked,” she says without looking at me. She takes out tracksuit pants, T-shirt, panties and socks. “I’m certainly not giving you my tackies.”
She opens my purse, takes out everything and puts it on the desk, writes down each item in the book, looks up at me. “Everything has been written down, so that you can’t say later that we stole anything from you. Check and sign.”
I don’t even look at the list, just sign shakily where she points. She tears the page out neatly along the perforated line and holds it out to me.
She removes the board from around my neck. “Come.”
We walk down the passage again, turn left this time and go into a bathroom. It’s cold inside, a window is ajar and I can hear the wind whistling outside. Two men are standing there, waiting.
I stop abruptly, but the redhead shoves me forward. “They don’t bite.”
“Hold out your hands,” one of the men says, not unfriendly.
I hold out my hands, note that they are still shaking slightly. He scrapes under the nails of my left hand; the other man scrapes under the nails of my right hand. There’s still blood on my arm that I didn’t wash away, and they carefully scrape some of it off.
Once they leave, the redhead orders me: “Undress.”
I hesitate. I do not take off my clothes in front of other people.
“Get a move on, it’s late, I want to go home.”
She picks up my clothes from the floor, places them in a bag. My tackies too. Underwear. Gives everything to someone outside the door.
I’m standing naked in front of this strange woman, trying to cover my private parts as best I can.
She rolls her eyes. “Oh, please, do you really think I haven’t seen that before?”
I stare at the floor, hear the slap of the latex gloves as she slips them on. Struggle to hold back the tears of humiliation while the stranger’s cold hands probe me. In my mouth, my ears, my nose, my vagina, my anus.
“Get dressed,” the redhead says as she drops the gloves into a refuse bin.
I stand uncertainly with her panties in my hand.
“They’re clean.”
I nod. Nevertheless. “I’d prefer not to wear them, thanks,” I whisper.
She just shrugs. “Your loss.”
The tracksuit pants are hopelessly too long. T-shirt and socks, no shoes.
The redhead opens the door. “Do you want to phone your lawyer?” she asks in the passage.
I shake my head. I want to phone nobody.
“Come on, then. Supe Webber is waiting.”
He is in the same office as before, but not alone this time. Opposite him sits a man with dark hair whose dark eyes are fixed questioningly on me. I hesitate.
The stranger stands up. I have to look up at him.
“I am Joubert van Heerden. I am a lawyer.”
When I remain silent, he adds: “I am your lawyer.”
“I don’t want a lawyer.”
“Miss Bruwer,” the superintendent interrupts, “you need a lawyer.”
“No. I don’t want one. I have committed a murder, I admit guilt. I do not need a lawyer.”
The strange man nods. “Very well, Anna. May I then sit here while Superintendent Webber questions you?”
“Who are you?”
“Joubert van Heerden.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Uncle Retief Roodt phoned me.”
“Uncle Retief! How does he know . . . ?”
“Your mother told him.”
My mother.
I nod. He can stay.
He turns to the superintendent. “Could I have a few moments to consult with my client?”
Webber stands up, gestures towards the other chair in front of the desk. “I’ll wait outside.”
Joubert van Heerden leans over to me. “Anna, I’m here to help.”
I shake my head. “It’s too late for that. I don’t think anyone can help me any longer.”
He sighs. “But I can try. Allow me to try?”
His dark eyes are not friendly, also not hostile. His large frame projects a sense of calm. Uncle Retief sent him to me.
“Okay then.”
“Why did you shoot Danie du Toit?”
I look down at my hands. “Because he deserved it.”
“Tell me.”
I cover my face with my hands, shake my head.
He places a hand briefly on my shoulder. “We can talk about this some more later.”
He stands up and opens the door for the superintendent.
Bulldog takes the dictaphone from the top drawer of his desk. He deliberately does this very slowly, so that he has a