The De Zalze Murders by Julian Jansen

Author:Julian Jansen
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780624082156
Publisher: Tafelberg
Published: 2017-11-10T06:56:06+00:00

***

It is the second December holiday since the De Zalze axe murders. In some respects, life has gone on: Henri and Marli’s parental home in the security estate outside Stellenbosch has new owners, and according to family acquaintances Marli is visiting friends in Australia. The lively blonde teenager was in Grade 11 for the past year, but whether she wrote the final exams, and if so, passed them, is not known.

11

The criminal case begins

‘THE BASTARD CARRIES on with his life as if nothing has happened. We haven’t seen anything of him. He doesn’t visit me and André.’

For most of the morning, Bailey van Breda has been in a cheerful mood. His harsh words come out of the blue. He hardly ever mentions the name of the murder accused: it is ‘that one’ or just ‘he’. This morning it sounds as if the dam wall has burst, and his emotions explode over the round table top.

It is late February 2017. The popular coffee shop Melissa’s in Dorp Street, Stellenbosch, is redolent with the aromas of strong coffee and freshly baked pastries. The 63-year-old Van Breda called me early that morning and invited me to join him for coffee.

He and his wife Ida are having breakfast: a tossed salad for her, an omelette for him. The couple travelled from their home in Mbombela (Nelspruit) the week before to visit their daughter Ilicia, a student at Stellenbosch University.

The jovial Van Breda has a wide circle of friends. His emotions have been seesawing lately, they say. For more than two years the couple has had to cope with the events surrounding the murders and Van Breda’s own battle against liver cancer.

A stone’s throw from the coffee shop, his brother, his sister-in-law and their elder son were hacked to death with an axe. The younger son is due to appear in court shortly on charges of murder as well as attempted murder and defeating the ends of justice. At times Van Breda’s hands clench into fists on the table top. He seems to be struggling to stop his thoughts and our conversation from going back to that summer night on the De Zalze estate.

Occasionally he becomes forgetful, with Ida completing his sentences. His hairy upper arms are covered in a red rash. It’s the chemo, he says. Frequently, he rubs his hand over his arms and bald head, and sighs deeply. Once a week they drive 320 kilometres to Pretoria on the N4 for his chemotherapy. Ida takes the wheel on their return journey because her husband is too exhausted and sometimes sleeps the whole way home.

‘We have a problem,’ Van Breda says suddenly. ‘There’s no money in the trust [the Rudell Holdings Trust]. Most of it’s in Abacus, the Australian trust.’ The latter is managed by Nic Oosthuizen, a pharmacist in Perth and a long-standing friend of Martin van Breda. Another trustee is Marguerite de Wet, a lawyer in Perth. The murdered couple’s house in Buderim, Queensland, is part of this trust. According to Australian estate agents, the value of the imposing residence is about R25 million.

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