“Where do you want to go?” asked Viljoen.
“When old farmer Marais died, he must have left a will,” mused Preston. “And that would have to be executed, and that means a lawyer. Can we find out if there is a lawyer in Duiwelskloof, and if he is available on a Saturday morning?”
Viljoen drew up to Kirstens Garage and pointed across the road at the Imp Inn. “Go and have a coffee and order one for me. I’ll fill the tank and ask around.”
He rejoined Preston in the hotel lounge five minutes later.
“There’s one lawyer,” he said as he sipped his coffee. “He’s an Anglo, name of Benson. His office is right there across the street, two doors from the garage, and he’ll probably be in this morning. Let’s go.”
Mr. Benson was in, and when Viljoen flashed a card in a plastic wallet at Benson’s secretary, the effect was immediate. She spoke in Afrikaans into an intercom and they were shown without delay into the office of Benson, a friendly and rubicund man in a tan suit. He greeted them both in Afrikaans. Viljoen replied in his heavily accented English.
“This is Mr. John Preston. He has come from London, England. He wishes to ask you some questions.”
Benson bade them be seated and resumed his chair behind the desk. “Please,” he said, “anything I can do.”
“Can you tell me how old you are?” asked Preston.
Benson gazed at him in amazement. “All the way from London to ask how old I am? As a matter of fact, I’m fifty-three.”
“So in 1946 you would have been twelve?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me, please, who was the lawyer here in Duiwelskloof in that year?”
“Certainly. My father, Cedric Benson.”
“Is he alive?”
“Yes. He’s over eighty and he handed the business over to me fifteen years ago. But he’s pretty spry.”
“Would it be possible to talk to him?”
For answer Benson reached for a telephone and dialed a number. His father must have answered, for the son explained there were visitors, one from London, who would like to talk to him. He replaced the receiver.
“He lives about six miles away, but he still drives, to the terror of all other road users. He says he’ll be here directly.”
“In the interim,” asked Preston, “could you consult your files for the year 1946 and see if you, or rather your father, executed the will of a local farmer, one Laurens Marais, who died in January of that year?”
“I’ll try,” said Benson Junior. “Of course, this Mr. Marais may have been with a lawyer from Pietersburg. But local people tended to stay local in those days. The 1946 box must be around somewhere. Excuse me.”
He left the office. The secretary served coffee. Ten minutes later there were voices in the outer office. The two Bensons entered together, the son carrying a dusty cardboard box. The old man had a fuzz of white hair and looked as alert as a young kestrel. After the introductions Preston explained his problem.
Without a word the older Benson took the chair behind the desk, forcing his son to draw up another one. Old Benson placed glasses on his nose and gazed at the visitors over them. “I remember Laurens Marais,” he said. “And yes, we did handle his will when he died. I did so myself.”
The son passed him a dusty and faded document tied in pink ribbon. The old man blew the dust off it, untied the ribbon, and spread it out. He began to read it silently.
“Ah yes, I remember it now. He was a widower. Lived alone. Had one son, Jan. A tragic case. The boy had just come back from the Second World War. Laurens Marais was going down to Cape Town to visit him when he died. Tragic.”
“Can you tell me about the bequests?” asked Preston.
“Everything to the son,” said Benson simply. “Farm, house, equipment, contents of house. Oh, the usual small bequests in money to the native farmworkers, the foreman—that sort of thing.”
“Any other bequests—anything of a personal nature?” persisted Preston.
“Humph. One here. ‘And to my old and good friend Joop Van Rensberg my ivory chess set in memory of the many contented evenings we spent playing together at the farm.’ That’s all.”
“Was the son back home in South Africa when the father died?” asked Preston.