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are the wrong colour. You have no experience, no CV, your
honours degree won't help, not at our age. You will be competing with hordes of
ambitious, highly qualified young people who are prepared to work for nothing.
They know Digital Media, Milla, they live in it. And the economy! The media is
fighting to survive! Have you any idea how many magazines they are shutting
down? Jobs frozen, cuts. You couldn't have picked a worse time. Tell Christo
you want to open a boutique. A coffee shop. Journalism? Forget it!'
    9
August 2009. Sunday.
    She sat in the sitting room on her new sofa. The Careers
section of the Sunday Times was on the coffee
table in front of her. Her eyes anxiously scanned the media adverts, companies
searching for an eCommerce Operations Manager, a WordPress/PHP Developer, Web
Developer and a Web Editor ( Internet/Mobile
experience ess).
    The anxiety was growing, the doubt, she wasn't going to make
it, wasn't going to survive. The Friend was right. On Friday afternoon an
employment agency consultant had told Milla the same, hidden behind political
correctness and corporate euphemism. She had no chance.
    She couldn't accept it. At first she had called the
magazines, directly, one after the other. She worked down her list of
preferences to the dailies, Afrikaans and English. After that, reluctantly, the
local, weekly tabloids, and finally, in desperation, tried to track down the
publishers of company magazines.
    Without success. The same message: No vacancies. But send
your CV.
    Right at the bottom of one of the inside pages she spotted a
small block advert:
     
    Journalist. Permanent
position in Cape Town. Relevant experience preferred. Excellent research and
writing skills required. Must relish team work. Tertiary qualification
essential. Market related salary. Please call Mrs Nkosi. Apply before 31/08/09.
     
    It was
the 'preferred' that gave her a modicum of courage, made her sit up straight,
fold the newspaper so that the ad was clearly visible, and pick up the cup of
rooibos tea.

5
    11 August 2009. Tuesday.
    At 12.55 the bergie tramp
pushed a shopping trolley down Coronation Street with his left hand, past the
row of cars in front of the mosque. He swayed drunkenly. In his right hand he
held a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag.
    The street was abandoned, the owners of the cars inside the
mosque for the Dhuhr prayers.
    Beside a white 1998 Hyundai Elantra the bergie stumbled and fell. He held the bottle
aloft, desperate to avoid breaking it. He lay a moment, dazed. He tried to get
up, but did not succeed. He shifted around, so that his head was under the car,
just beside the rear wheel, as if he were looking for shade. Then he pulled the
bottle under the car to take a drink, and his hands were no longer in sight. He
lay like that for a while, fiddling, before he slowly scuffled out again.
    He put the bottle down on the tarmac, put one hand on the
edge of the mudguard and tried to stand. He struggled, so that he had to take
hold of the vehicle again, then pulled himself upright with great effort.
    He
brushed imaginary dust off his ragged clothes, picked up his bottle and, still
unsteady on his feet, reached for the trolley and began meandering along again.
    In the electronics room of the Presidential Intelligence
Agency, Rahjev Rajkumar sat with a computer operator, while Quinn, the Chief of
    Staff: Operations, stood beside them. All three stared at the
computer screen that displayed a street map of Cape Town.
    Quinn glanced at his wristwatch and then back at the screen.
A sudden electronic blip broke the silence. A tiny red triangle appeared on the
screen. 'Zoom in,' Rajkumar said.
    The operator clicked on the magnifying glass icon, then on
the triangle, twice, three times, until the name of the street was clear:
Coronation.
    'I think we're in play,' said Rajkumar.
    'I'll wait for Terry's report,' said Quinn. 'But so far, so
good.'
     
    Quinn, Chief of Staff: Operations, reported directly to
Advocate Tau