Stealth Giblets

By Travis Lyle a.k.a DJ Hedmekanik


We’re bored, bored, bored, to the last man, every one of us in this muggy little room at Impendle Police Station….or – what is it they call them these days? – ‘Community Service Centres’. The windows are misted up and some have been smoking, funking the room with the reek of it. We’ve been up an hour since 4:30, and listening to our polony-eating Inspector for half of that. It’s warm in here, but all the same, we’d all rather be out in the cold, the lot of us.

‘And that is why every single one of them – every single one – is a suspect…’ van Huysteen added the emphasis, little flecks of spit flying out onto his crisp shirt. He’s standing only two metres or so from me, and I swear I can see a teeny pink spot of polony in one of his errant spitballs. God help us.
Nevertheless, at risk of being sprayed with the remnants of his breakfast, it pays to sit near the front when Haardegat van Huysteen is giving one of his pre-ops motivationals. Projects eagerness. At least, he thinks so. For us up front it means cushier jobs later in the day.
Haardegat was on a roll:
‘…so don’t drop your god!’ he continued, clipping vowels as always, ‘Mothers, children – they even use the babies’ dia…dia…deksels…nappies! This type of people, they have no skaam, they are calculating and sly, like the snake!’
‘Sir?’ Wandi has his hand up, giving me a sly side-wink, ‘Sir?’ with his hand up, like in school.
‘Khumalo! Yes!’ Never really lost his drill-sergeant manner; Haardegat; he’s paraat in that old-school way, an old dog in a tricky new world.
‘I was jus’ wanderin’, sir. What ‘bout animals?’
‘Animals, Khumalo? What kind of animals? Snakes, maybe?’ A titter runs through the back row, where I’d much rather be. Then again, suffering a spit bath down the front here will pay dividends later. Haardegat ignores the dissent, eyeballing Wandi. Doesn’t smaak him. No surprises there, then.
‘Ah…no, Inspector. Dogs, sir. Cats. Birds. That kind.’
‘Are you trying to be funny, Khumalo? I think you’ll find that while Barry Hilton is still going strong, you’ve got no chance!’ Titter again, this time from one Christiaan Scheepers, resident teacher’s pet.
‘Ah, no sir, not trying…it’s just, I’ve heard they…ah…how do I put this…they put it inside the animal. Sometime. Sir.’
Haardegat ruminated on this for a moment.
‘Ja! They do. Sometime.’ He concurred, giving Wandi a little linguistic jab. ‘They have been known to put it inside a dog. But if you have read the brief, Khumalo, you would realise that this festivals doesn’t allow for dogs inside. So it is cars, mos, and the occupant of this cars, that you will be concentrating on. Now, let me tell you manne…this is the twelfth roadblock of this festival I am commanding officer, and I have seen all sorts of things, on this road…even the one time it was in a chicken – so Khumalo, you are not so far wrong talking about birds – but this was dagga in a frozen chicken! They take the dagga and they puts it in da giblets! And then they freezes this chicken! Maybe they think that the dogs isn’t going to sniff it, but they are wrong, ‘cos I have taken a suspect in with just such a chicken!’
Haardegat harrumphed, stuck his jaw out and blinked, allowing the gravity of such despicable abuse of poultry to sink in.
‘Now! From tomorrow morning, there will be be a heavy Easter holiday traffic on the R103. There will be thousands of vehicles, and maybe some of this people is not suspects, and maybe they are not for this festival. So you must use your brains, manne. Last year one member of the service actually tried to apprehend an officer of the Service for resisting arrest! Yes, Daniels – that was a stupid thing to do, but you screwed up on the side of caution, and for that nobody can blame you. It’s just a pity it was Detective Inspector Owen you pulled over!’
Sitting in the back row, Zane Daniels shrank into his chest. That had been a fuck-up of magnificent proportions. Haardegat, glaring at him, rolled on…
‘So don’t be stupid! But don’t fall for any tricks! Every one of this people is a suspect. Every single one of them. Now - your operational assignments: Thompson – reports, Adderly – reports, Scheepers – handler, Thompson – handler, Khumalo and Rogers, undercover…’

Festival mania, here we come.
 

2 comments so far.

  1. Anonymous July 3, 2008 at 11:43 AM
    "Stealth Giblets"... now there's a cool name for a band.
  2. Travis Lyle a.k.a DJ Hedmekanik July 3, 2008 at 2:36 PM
    Thigh Breast and the Stealth Giblets...got a nice ring to it...

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