Playing Solitaire
Copyright© 2026 by Jody Daniel
Chapter 19
Boschendal farm.
We played on for a while longer, splashing about like a couple of teenagers who had temporarily forgotten that adults were supposed to behave with some degree of dignity. Naomi was every bit as mischievous as Megan was, and between the two of them, I was beginning to suspect that my peaceful afternoon beside the pool had been nothing more than a cruel deception.
Eventually, though, my fingertips began to resemble the skin of a very old prune.
I held up my hands for inspection.
“Well, that’s enough of that,” I announced. “My fingers are beginning to look like they belong to someone twice my age.”
Megan glanced at her own hands and burst out laughing.
“Perhaps it’s an improvement?”
“Careful, girlfriend. I might remember that remark the next time you want a kiss.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t dare!”
The challenge in her eyes suggested that she was perfectly willing to test that theory.
I decided not to push my luck. I had already spent enough time in the pool for one afternoon, and I suspected that my dignity might not survive another round of whatever Megan had in mind.
I made my way towards the steps and climbed out, water streaming from my swimming trunks and running down my legs. The warm afternoon air wrapped around me, and a light breeze carried the scent of freshly cut grass from the garden. Somewhere beyond the house, a bird called from the trees, apparently unconcerned with the ongoing warfare beside the pool.
Megan followed a moment later.
Being the gentleman my mother had raised me to be, I turned and extended a hand to help her up the steps.
She looked at my outstretched hand.
Then she looked at me.
Then that familiar, wicked little smile crept across her face.
“I don’t trust you,” she giggled. “Just now you drop me back into the water.”
I put on my most innocent expression.
“I will never do that...” I replied.
She placed one hand on the pool edge and considered my offer as though I were a suspicious character trying to sell her a second-hand car with no papers.
“Still, once bitten twice shy...” she replied.
I kept my hand extended, but my attention had shifted to her eyes. There was a particular glint in them that I was beginning to recognise. It was the look Megan wore when she had thought of something that amused her enormously but hadn’t yet decided whether to share it with the rest of the world.
Experience had taught me that this was usually the moment when I should start worrying.
I was a trained investigator. I had spent years reading people, assessing threats and recognising trouble before it arrived.
And yet, standing beside my own swimming pool, I found myself completely unable to predict what my girlfriend was planning.
Something told me I was about to get wet again.
Megan either forgot about her revenge plans or decided that discretion was the better part of mischief. Whatever was going on behind those green eyes, she finally accepted my outstretched hand.
I closed my fingers around hers and helped her up the pool steps. She came out dripping, the orange bikini clinging to her as water streamed from her arms and legs onto the paving. The afternoon sun caught the droplets on her skin, turning them into tiny sparks of light.
I did my best to concentrate on being a gentleman.
It wasn’t easy.
“Towels,” I announced, before my brain could find something less sensible to do.
I turned towards the deckchairs, where a neat stack of folded towels waited for us. I grabbed one and handed it to Megan, then took another for Naomi as she joined us.
“Thanks, Tim,” Naomi said.
She ran her fingers over the towel, feeling its texture and the folded edges before giving it a practised flick to open it. Then she began drying herself, working methodically from her hair down to her arms and shoulders.
Watching her, you would never have guessed she was blind.
There was no hesitation, no fumbling, no searching movements. Naomi knew where she was, where her towel was, and exactly what she needed to do. Her movements were as natural as anyone else’s.
I had grown so accustomed to it that I sometimes forgot how remarkable it was.
“Will it spoil your supper if I suggest some coffee or tea and some cookies, Megan?” Naomi asked as she dried her hair.
“It sounds great,” Megan replied. “I can do with a stomach liner after all that action in the pool.”
Naomi laughed softly.
“Then come, let’s go inside.”
She draped the towel around her shoulders and set off towards the side door of the house, walking with the same easy confidence she had shown in the kitchen earlier.
Megan watched her go.
For a moment, she seemed lost in thought. Then she turned to me, holding her towel around herself.
“If I look at how Naomi gets along, I would never have guessed she’s blind.”
I nodded, following Naomi with my eyes as she reached the door without breaking stride.
“Yes, Megs, Naomi is fearsomely independent about moving around the house.”
Megan glanced back towards the house.
“How does she do it?”
“Well, practice, mostly. She knows the layout of the house so well that she can move around without having to think about every step. There was a time or two when she bumped into stuff, of course. Door frames and furniture don’t always move out of the way just because you know they’re there.”
I smiled at the memory of Naomi’s stubborn determination.
“But she still refuses to use a long white cane as a mobility tool. She has one, but I think it’s folded up and sitting on the top shelf of her bedroom wardrobe.”
Megan’s eyebrows rose.
“Oh my ... What about a guide dog?”
That earned a chuckle from me.
“Ah, now that’s a different story. We eventually convinced her that a guide dog might be a good idea. She fought us on it for a while, naturally. Naomi doesn’t take kindly to anyone suggesting she needs help.”
“Sounds familiar,” Megan remarked, giving me a pointed look.
“I’m choosing to ignore that.”
“Wise decision.”
I shook my head, smiling.
“Anyway, she’ll be collecting Rover soon from the guide dog association. She’s already met him, and the two of them bonded almost immediately. Apparently, he decided she was his person, and that was that.”
Megan’s expression softened.
“Rover?”
“That’s his name. I haven’t met him yet, but I’ve been assured he’s a good sort. Now it’s just a matter of getting him here with her.”
I glanced towards the open doorway. Naomi had disappeared inside, leaving her towel hanging over one shoulder.
I could already imagine the scene when Rover arrived. Naomi would insist that she had everything under control, Rover would probably decide otherwise, and the rest of us would stand back and watch the negotiations.
Knowing my sister, she would claim to be training the dog.
Knowing dogs, Rover would have his own ideas about who was training whom.
Megan gave my hand a gentle squeeze.
“I think she’s amazing, Tim.”
I looked down at her. There was no pity in her expression, only genuine admiration.
“That’s Naomi,” I said. “Stubborn as a mule, independent as a wildcat, and twice as difficult to argue with.”
“Runs in the family, does it?”
“I’m beginning to suspect so.”
She laughed, and I leaned over to kiss her forehead.
“Come on, Megs. Let’s get inside before Naomi drinks all the coffee and eats all the cookies.”
“Does she do that?”
“Not usually.”
I paused.
“But if she thinks I’m getting more than my fair share, all bets are off.”
Megan slipped her hand into mine, and together we headed for the side door, leaving the sunlit pool behind us.
As we stepped through the side door into the cool shade of the house, the aroma of freshly ground coffee and warm baked cinnamon was already drifting down the hallway.
Naomi didn’t head for the kettle. Instead, she paused by the kitchen counter, where a tall, poised woman in her early thirties was expertly arranging a tray with mugs, a porcelain teapot, and a plate of freshly baked rusks and shortbread cookies.
This was Tumi Mothibi.
She had joined the Boschendal household six months ago after the local community clinic in town closed down due to municipal budget cuts. A fully qualified professional nurse with an easy demeanour and sharp eyes, Tumi had initially been hired to assist Naomi and keep an eye on her health whenever the rest of us were out in the fields. But because Tumi also had a driver’s license and a knack for seamless organisation, her role had expanded rapidly.
Within weeks, she had become Naomi’s driver, companion, and unofficial household manager. More than that, she was Naomi’s eyes when it came to running the estate’s domestic engine—a presence so natural and unobtrusive that none of us could imagine the house without her.
Tumi looked up as we walked in, her dark eyes sweeping over Megan and me with quiet, humorous appraisal.
“I see the survivors of the great pool war have returned,” Tumi said, her voice smooth, warm, and carrying a soft Setswana cadence. She handed Naomi a clean dish towel to wipe her hands. “I was about to send out a search party, but I figured if Mister Tim hadn’t got drowned yet, he was probably holding his own.”
Naomi grinned, accepting the towel without looking. “He barely survived, Tumi. Megan had him on the run.”
“I was showing gentlemanly restraint,” I corrected, grabbing a hand towel from the rack. “There’s a difference.”
Tumi offered Megan a warm, welcoming smile, extending a hand. “You must be Megan. I’m Tumi. It’s wonderful to finally put a face to the name—Naomi told me Mister Tim would be bringing a guest over.”
“It’s great to meet you, Tumi,” Megan said, shaking her hand with genuine warmth. Her eyes flicked briefly to the fluid, synchronised way Tumi and Naomi moved around the kitchen counter together—Tumi subtly positioning the milk jug right where Naomi’s hand would naturally reach for it, without a word being exchanged.
“Coffee is fresh, tea is steeping,” Tumi announced, lifting the tray with practised ease. “And before you ask, Tim, yes, I saved the chocolate chip shortbread for you before Naomi could hide them.”
“Tumi, you are an angel sent from above,” I said, reaching for a rusk.
Tumi deftly nudged my hand away with her elbow. “Dry off and put a shirt on first, Mister Tim. Angels have standards.”
Megan burst out laughing, and even Naomi couldn’t hide her smirk. I reached out and reeled Megan in for a hug.
“Come, let’s go get dressed before we face the wrath of the titans,” I said.
Later that night, after supper, I withdrew to my study to put the finishing touches to my report. The house had settled into that comfortable evening quiet, with the occasional sound drifting in from the rest of the farm. I switched on the desk lamp, settled into my chair, and brought the report up on my computer.
It had taken a great deal of work to get to this point. The wreckage examination, the flight data, the weather records, the recovered instruments, the reconstruction, and the painstaking work of the team had all contributed to the final picture. Now it was my responsibility to bring those separate pieces of evidence together and make sure the conclusions followed the facts, not the other way around.
There were twenty-one headings in the report, beginning with the Executive Summary, Flight Crew and Qualifications, History of the Flight, Accident Site and Wreckage Examination, Weather Conditions, and Navigation and Flight Instrument Analysis. From there, the report worked through the technical findings and supporting evidence before reaching the Conclusion.
I wasn’t about to bore the reader by reciting all twenty-one headings. What mattered was that every significant aspect of the accident had been examined, documented, and cross-checked. Where the evidence supported a finding, I stated it. Where there were uncertainties, I acknowledged them. An investigation report wasn’t the place for guesswork dressed up as professional certainty.
The King Air 350i was not equipped with flight data recorders or cockpit voice recorders. Therefore, we, the investigation team, had no evidence in that regard but only the data points that the instruments recorded for the last ten kilometres of the flight. I stated that in the report under the headings of “Flight Data Recordings”, and “Cockpit Voice Recording.”
I paid particular attention to the Analysis of Contributing Factors, the Probable Cause, and the Safety Recommendations. Those were the sections people would remember, and the ones most likely to influence what happened after the report was published. The purpose wasn’t merely to explain why an aircraft had come down. It was to establish what had happened, how the chain of events had developed, and what could be done to prevent another crew from finding themselves in the same situation.
The aviation community has little patience for an investigation that casually blames a pilot. Pilot error is a convenient phrase, but it can also be a lazy one. I’ve seen how easily it can become a catch-all explanation when an investigator fails to dig deeply enough into the evidence or lacks the technical knowledge to understand the systems involved.
It’s particularly easy to point a finger at a pilot who didn’t survive to defend his decisions.
A dead pilot cannot challenge an investigator’s assumptions, explain what he saw in the cockpit, or describe the information available to him in those final moments. That makes it all the more important to examine the evidence objectively. The absence of a surviving witness doesn’t give an investigator licence to fill the gaps with speculation.
That wasn’t how I worked.
My job wasn’t to find someone to blame. It was to establish the facts, understand the sequence of events, and identify the circumstances that had led to the accident. If a pilot’s actions had contributed, the evidence had to demonstrate it. If an aircraft system had failed to provide the information the crew needed, that had to be established too. And if weather, equipment, procedures, and human factors had combined to create the conditions for disaster, then the report had to reflect that complexity.
In this case, the evidence pointed to a Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFIT) in which adverse weather conditions had affected the aircraft’s systems without adequately alerting the pilots to the danger.
I read the wording again, checking that it said precisely what the investigation had established and no more.
The conclusion read:
“Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFIT) due to adverse weather conditions that influenced the aircraft systems without the instruments alerting the pilots.”
There it was. No convenient scapegoat. No unsupported accusation against a crew that could no longer speak for itself. The finding was based on the evidence we had recovered, examined, and analysed, not on an assumption that the people at the controls must have done something wrong simply because the aircraft had crashed.
I wasn’t suggesting that pilots never made mistakes. We all make mistakes. But a credible investigation has to establish whether an error occurred, what contributed to it, and whether the circumstances could have been prevented. Simply writing “Pilot Error” at the bottom of a report doesn’t answer any of those questions.
Before closing the document, I returned to the section acknowledging the investigation team. I had been fortunate to work with people who understood that thoroughness wasn’t optional. Each member had contributed something essential, whether through the wreckage examination, technical analysis, data recovery, photographic documentation, weather assessment, or the painstaking task of fitting individual pieces of evidence into the larger picture.
I made sure every team member was credited for his or her contribution. A report might carry one investigator’s name on the cover, but that didn’t mean the work belonged to one person.
I saved the document and leaned back in my chair, rubbing the tiredness from my eyes.
The report was finished. At least, my part of it was.
Tomorrow, there would be the final checks, the formalities, and the inevitable questions from people who might not like what the evidence said. That was part of the job too. Conclusions weren’t supposed to please anyone. They were supposed to withstand scrutiny.
I glanced at the title on the screen one last time, then shut down the computer.
We hadn’t brought the aircraft home, and we couldn’t return the crew to their families. But we had done our best to establish what had happened, and we had given their families something more useful than a convenient answer.
We had given them the truth as far as the evidence allowed us to establish it.
And I could live with that.
I looked at my wall clock. It was past midnight. Time for a shower and some shut-eye.
The desk phone rang early the following morning, breaking the quiet of my study just as I was printing the final signature pages for the report.
The printer whirred beside the desk, feeding out one sheet at a time. Beyond the window, the Boschendal fields were emerging from the cool morning haze, the first sunlight spilling across the grass and catching the tops of the trees. It was a beautiful morning, the sort that made you want to leave your paperwork behind, pour a mug of coffee, and spend a few hours outside.
Unfortunately, paperwork had other ideas.
I glanced at the phone, wondering who would be calling at that hour. Most of the people I dealt with knew better than to interrupt me when I was trying to finish a report, unless they had something important to say.
The telephone rang again.
I picked up the receiver on the third ring.
“Tim.”
“Colonel Duncan, my man. It’s Piet.” Captain Piet’s voice came through crisp and loud over the line, with the unmistakable background noise of a busy SAPS Serious and Organised Crime office. I could hear telephones ringing, people talking, and what sounded suspiciously like somebody arguing over a photocopier. “I hope I’m not interrupting the sunrise.”
I smiled and leaned back in my chair.
“Not at all, Piet. Just wrapping up the report. What’s the news?”
“Good news across the board,” he said, and there was a note of grim satisfaction in his voice. “I figured you’d want to know where the dust is settling before you hand in your final file.”
I pulled the notepad closer and found a pen. Old habits died hard. Even when a colleague called with good news, I preferred to make a note of anything that might become relevant later.
“I’m all ears.”
“First up, Steinhoff.”
I could almost picture Piet settling into his chair, tapping a pen against the desk while he arranged the facts in his head. He had the knack of delivering information in the right order, building towards the point he most wanted me to hear.
“The NPA formally served the indictment an hour ago. We’ve got him dead to rights. He’s facing charges relating to his involvement in financial crime, racketeering, and money laundering. His high-priced lawyer buddies are already scrambling, but the paper trail you and the team uncovered is solid. Very solid. He’s not walking away from this one without a fight, but for once, he’s going to have to fight the evidence instead of relying on his reputation.”
I made a note beside Steinhoff’s name.
The man had spent so long believing that money, influence, and an expensive legal team could insulate him from consequences that I suspected the indictment would come as a personal insult. In his world, rules were things other people had to obey.
“That’s a major win, Piet.”
“It certainly is. And depending on how the proceedings unfold, the professional consequences could be just as serious. If the evidence establishes the necessary misconduct, he could even face being struck off the roll of advocates.”
I nodded, although Piet couldn’t see me.
Steinhoff had been a persistent thorn in our side, using his position and connections to obstruct the investigation while helping people who had very good reasons to keep their activities hidden. Seeing him answer for it wouldn’t undo the damage, but it was a start.
“It gets better,” Piet continued.
I stopped writing and gave him my full attention.
“Our tactical teams executed coordinated takedowns late last night, in Gordon’s Bay and down in KZN. Clean sweep. We hit three safehouses, seized their communications equipment, and arrested the core of the operational cell. The teams worked off the intelligence we collected, and from what we’ve established so far, the syndicate’s local operation has effectively been dismantled.”
I let out a slow breath.
Three safehouses. Communications equipment. The operational cell.
Those were more than encouraging headlines. They were tangible results, the kind that came from intelligence being followed up properly and teams working together instead of treating every discovery as an isolated event.
The network had been operating behind legitimate businesses, concealed communications, and people who thought they were clever enough to stay ahead of the law. We had spent weeks pulling at loose threads, often without knowing what would emerge when we reached the other end.
Now, those threads were beginning to lead somewhere definite.
I looked down at my notes.
“And Chen?”
There was a brief pause.
Piet knew that was the question I really wanted answered.
“That’s the cherry on top,” he said, his voice dropping a little. “We received word from our international liaison in Beijing late last night. Once the financial trail was exposed and the South African operation collapsed, things apparently went south for our friend in Shanghai.”
I waited.
“His board of directors held an emergency meeting. They stripped him of his executive powers and terminated his appointment with immediate effect. It seems they were rather less sentimental about his position than he expected.”
I leaned back, the pen resting between my fingers.
For a man who had built his life around control, that must have been a brutal blow. Chen had used money, influence, and intermediaries to keep himself at a distance from the consequences of his actions. He had expected the people beneath him to absorb the risks while he enjoyed the rewards.
Now the structure he’d built to protect himself was collapsing around him.
“Terminated as in fired, or terminated as in—”
“Fired first,” Piet interrupted. “Then, before the authorities could act on the information reaching them, Chen took matters into his own hands. According to the report we received, he jumped from his penthouse office in Shanghai this morning.”
The pen stopped moving.
“He’s dead, Tim.”
For a few seconds, I said nothing.
“The threat to you, your farm, and your family is officially over,” Piet added.
I sat back and stared at the papers on my desk. The final signature pages lay neatly stacked beside the printer, their corners aligned. A few minutes earlier, my biggest concern had been making sure the report was properly completed and ready for submission.
Now I was being told that the man who had threatened me and my family was dead.
Chen Wei-Liang had been a shadow hanging over the investigation for weeks. He was distant enough to seem almost unreal, a name attached to financial transactions, coded communications, and a network of people willing to do his bidding. Yet the threat had been very real. It had reached all the way from Shanghai to South Africa, into our investigation and, eventually, towards my own doorstep.
I had spent enough years in police work to know that the death of a suspect didn’t automatically resolve every question. There would still be records to examine, outstanding matters to settle, and people who might know more than they had admitted. A network could lose its leader without every strand disappearing overnight.
But Chen himself was gone.
And with him went the immediate threat that had been hanging over us.
I wasn’t sure what I felt. Relief, certainly. Perhaps a measure of satisfaction that he would no longer be able to reach across continents to interfere with our lives. But there was no triumph in it. His death wouldn’t bring back the people who had died in the aircraft, nor would it erase what his organisation had done.
It simply meant that one particular danger had come to an end.
“Tim? You still there?” Piet asked.
I realised I had been staring through the window without seeing anything.
“I’m here, Piet,” I replied. “Just taking it in.”
“Understandable, my friend. You’ve had a rough few weeks.”
That was one way of putting it.
“You earned a bit of breathing space,” he continued. “Wrap up that report and get some rest. We’ll take care of the court dates for Steinhoff and the rest of the legal process. You’ve done your part.”
I glanced at the report again.
There was something satisfying about hearing that from Piet. We’d both seen enough investigations become bogged down in paperwork, competing agendas, and people trying to protect their own interests. This time, the work had led somewhere.
“Thanks, Piet. For everything.”
“Lekker, Timmy.”
I chuckled at the nickname. It was difficult to maintain the dignity of a senior officer when your colleagues insisted on treating you like an old schoolmate.
“One last thing, Piet.”
“What’s that?”
I turned my attention to the heavy electronic safe where the green box was secured. Even from across the room, it had a way of occupying my thoughts. The device had been the prize everyone was chasing, the reason behind threats, deception, and an increasingly dangerous chain of events.
Now that Chen was dead and the local operation had been dismantled, it was time to deal with the thing properly.
“What do I do with the contents of the green box?”
“Have Amanda kill the software, and I will come fetch it as evidence,” Piet replied. “Just be certain that it will never function again. When the court case is over, I will request the judge to have you appointed as the officer to destroy the device.”
I considered that for a moment.
Amanda would know how to neutralise the software safely, and Piet could ensure the physical device entered the proper chain of custody. Whatever else happened, the green box couldn’t be allowed to remain a working tool for anyone who might get their hands on it.
“Good. I will enjoy doing that. Just a pity that Chen ain’t around to see it...”
Piet chuckled.
“Cheers, Colonel. Give my regards to that beautiful red headed doctor when you see her next and chat soon.”
“I will. In fact, we will be having breakfast shortly. Goodbye, Captain.”
I replaced the receiver and sat quietly for another moment, listening to the faint click as the line went dead.
The study seemed quieter than before.
Outside, the morning sun had climbed higher, washing the Boschendal fields in warm gold. Somewhere in the house, I heard Tumi calling that breakfast was ready. The ordinary sounds of home had resumed, entirely indifferent to the fact that a chapter of our lives had just closed.
I looked at the report one last time, then gathered the signature pages into a neat pile.
There was still work to do. The report had to be submitted, the green box had to be secured as evidence, and the legal process would take its own course. But for the first time in a long while, I could look towards the days ahead without wondering who might be watching the farm or whether another threat would arrive by telephone.
I pushed back my chair and stood.
Breakfast first. The rest could wait until I’d had coffee.
Breakfast was a lively affair, filled with the comforting aromas of Tumi’s scrambled eggs, crisp bacon, and fresh coffee. The kitchen had been warm and welcoming, the clatter of cutlery and the easy flow of conversation creating the sort of ordinary domestic bustle I’d come to appreciate more than I cared to admit.