CHAPTER ELEVEN

Zion Gospel Hall was a grey demountable thrown down between a scrapyard and a tuckshop with chicken wire over the windows. The first verse of the hymn 'Arise, My Soul, Arise' drifted out of the open church door. Emmanuel looked in. Many of the congregation had their arms in the air and swayed from side to side as if caught in a strong cross-current. Black and white limbs, skinny and malformed by poverty, reached like saplings towards the ceiling.

Three more verses to go, Emmanuel thought. He knew the song by heart. Five years of mandatory prayer meetings and weekly services at boarding school had left an imprint.

He backtracked along the length of the chain-link fence separating the scrapyard from the Gospel Hall and absently pulled up a chunk of kaffirweed on the way. The bitter scent lingered on his hands and brought back memories of endless Saturdays spent weeding the gardens alongside the Ndebele labourers; standard punishment for being unruly and wild at Ligfontein Kosskool: the Fountain of Light boarding school. His offer to weed the gardens on Sundays as well was refused. He reached the street and turned back to the Gospel Hall. The dying notes of the hymn drifted out followed by a loud chorus of 'Amen'. The congregation filed out of the demountable and gathered around the front entrance; black, brown and white all mixed together. They looked at Emmanuel, curious about the stranger loitering in their yard. A grey-haired white woman approached with squared shoulders. She wore no jewellery, no make-up, no stockings and no adornments in her plaited hair. Emmanuel couldn't imagine a way to improve her.

'Can I help you?' Wary blue eyes matched her Scandinavian accent.

'I'm Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper,' he said. 'I've got a few questions about Jolly Marks if you don't mind.'

'You weren't with the other detectives at the morgue. I've never seen you before.'

'Transfer from Johannesburg. It's my first week.'

'All the same, I'll be seeing some identification first,' she said. 'Then we'll take the next step.'

'Of course.' Emmanuel withdrew the brand-new ID from his pocket and handed it over. The plastic cover was pristine and the ink fresh. He wondered if the woman would notice.

'Never met a policeman that looked the way you do.' She gave the ID back after reading it and made a point of studying the dark silk tie and the pale citrus-coloured suit with the delicate mother-of-pearl buttons hand-sewn down the front of the jacket.

'Never met a woman preacher before,' Emmanuel said. 'So that makes us even.'

'Miss Bergis Morgensen.' She introduced herself with a nod. 'I've got to get back to my family and give them a parting blessing. Wait here. I'll answer your questions when everyone has gone. Jolly's passing has shaken people's faith so we'll keep this quiet, if that's all right.'

Emmanuel was happy to step back. He wanted to stay on the right side of Miss Morgensen, but more than that, he wanted to keep a safe distance from the broken members of the missionary woman's congregation.

They passed him on their way out of the churchyard in a parade of human frailty. A stumpy leg, a mouth with more gaps than teeth, a dark hollow where once had been an eye. Most disturbing of all was the combination of black skin and a physical impediment, which amounted to double punishment under the National Party laws that squeezed natives out of skilled labour and secondary schools.

Emmanuel waited for Miss Morgensen to bless the last member of her flock, a malnourished Afrikaner girl with cropped brown hair and a snub nose. The preacher held her hands, palms face down, over the girl's bowed head. 'You are a holy temple. May the Lord provide you shelter from the storm.'

'Amen.' The girl received the prayer and hurried to the street with her bony arms swinging by her side. She appeared to be running from church into the arms of the devil, which was the pattern Emmanuel had followed during his years of religious instruction.

'This way.' Miss Morgensen unlocked the door to a small shed nailed onto the back wall of the church. The storeroom shelves held a paltry collection of commodities that Old Mother Hubbard would have turned her nose up at. 'I pack and distribute charity boxes on Sunday afternoon. We can talk while I work.'

She took a small wooden crate from a shelf and started to fill it from an assortment of dented cans and bulky paper bags stacked on a round table. Her movements were brisk and strong for a woman who must be in her seventies.

Emmanuel shrugged off Gerard's jacket and hung it over the back of a chair. Silk seemed a vanity in the spartan room. He lifted a box from the shelf and placed it on the table. Bergis Morgensen did not like talking to the police and, perversely, he liked her more for it.

'One of each item?' he said.

The missionary hesitated then thrust her chin in the direction of the meagre stockpile. 'Three of sardines, two of spam, a bag of flour and sugar, then hand the box over to me.'

Emmanuel sorted through the cans and found the sardines and the canned meat, all with the labels peeling away from the metal. The flour and sugar bags were light, perhaps five cups inside.

'Now.' Miss Morgensen received the first completed box and topped it up with half a bar of soap and a washcloth that had been cut down from a towel and resewn. 'What do you want to know about Jolly Marks?'

'You identified the body?'

'His mother asked me to, so I went to the morgue and signed the papers. The police have me in a few times a year, normally when they need to put a name to an unidentified body that's been found around the Point.' She shut the box and tied it off with string then wrote the name 'Ephraim Nakasa' along the side with a pencil attached to the table by a string. 'Jolly was the first child I've had to identify and I pray the Lord never gives me that errand again.'

Emmanuel took down another box and arranged the cans and bags so they at least covered the bottom. 'You knew Jolly and his family pretty well then?'

'His attendance at Zion wasn't regular but he came often enough to be called one of my flock.'

'Do you know anyone who could have hurt him?'

'Hard to say. The children in and around the docks live in a floating world. One day the tide brings in gold, the next day poison. Normal does not exist. Prostitution and violence are a part of everyday life.'

'What about his father?'

'In and out of jail. In and out of bars. Never in church. He's got seven more months to serve in Durban Central Prison for holding up the local milkman for a couple of bob. That tells you all you need to know about Jolly's father.'

'Is there someone else in his everyday life that made you suspicious? An odd relative or a man who makes a nuisance of himself around children in this area?'

'I've prayed on it. But God is stubborn and hasn't answered me yet.' Miss Morgensen tilted her head and frowned. 'How did a stranger get close enough to harm Jolly? That's the question on my mind.'

'You think Jolly knew his killer?'

'I believe he did.'

'What makes you think so?'

The crime scene was cold and impersonal. The knife wound clean and precise. Murders where the people knew each other were normally messy and driven by emotion.

'Jolly worked on the docks but he was careful,' she said. 'All his customers were regulars. He knew the rail yards and the quays better than the harbourmaster. It would have been hard for a stranger to surprise him.'

Emmanuel considered Miss Morgensen's theory but wasn't convinced. Out on the docks, a stranger with money was an instant friend. It was wishful thinking to believe that Jolly Marks worked exclusively for a select band of prostitutes and thieves. Emmanuel couldn't throw away any leads at this point, however.

'Nobody comes to mind?' he said and pushed a box of supplies across the table. If the Flying Dutchman wasn't at the passenger quay he'd need a new lead to pursue. Fast.

'Nothing so far but God and I are working on it, Detective Sergeant.' The missionary scribbled the name 'Brian Hardy' on the second charity box and 'Bettie Dlamini' on the third. 'He hears every prayer and He notices every death. "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from our father." Matthew 10:29.'

If a hundred years were as nothing to God then both he and Miss Morgensen might die awaiting a divine answer to the question of who killed Jolly Marks. Man's twenty-four hour clock was winding down and the suspect description was still 'a white man in a black suit' except that he could now add 'and possibly known to Jolly'.

'You don't believe,' Miss Morgensen said without rancour and began to pack the charity boxes into a wheelbarrow with a punctured tyre.

'I've seen forests of sparrows fall into trenches filled with bodies,' Emmanuel said. 'I'm a little thin on belief.'

'The war, eh? Infuriating, isn't it?' The missionary chuckled. 'How stubborn God is? I often wonder what he's up to with the famines and the wars and now with this poor country.'

She tied the last box with string and wrote the name 'Delia Flowers' along the side then placed it in the wheelbarrow. She retrieved an oak walking stick with a curved handle from the corner and laid it across the top of the charity supplies.

Flowers. Not a rare surname but not common either. The warren of decrepit cottages and cold-water flats served by Miss Morgensen's charity was the natural nesting ground for the people the major had called 'rootless whites'. Emmanuel was fresh out of leads and it was hours yet before he could search for the Flying Dutchman at the passenger quay. He stopped the missionary when she began to wheel her load to the door.

'I have a car,' he said. 'I'll take you on your deliveries if you like.'

'Are you sure, Detective Sergeant?'

'My good deed for the day.'