Part 1: My Castrol tin box

On March 23 someone broke into Jonathan Ancer’s underpants. During his search for answers Ancer discovers that the man who has breached his holy of holies is a scam artist who calls himself Joseph Williams.
Now, in this five-part series that documents an all too familiar South African story of crime and police and bank apathy, Ancer attempts to find Joseph Williams and bring him to justice

Joseph Williams flips the steaks. A feast of surf ’n turf sizzles on the braai – over-sized T-bones, juicy lazy-aged rumps, fatty lamb chops, chicken and dozens of large prawns. Joseph, who has covered himself with Lentheric’s Solo Original spray, puffs on a Peter Stuyvesant.
There’s cherry berry Cola for the abstainers and for the guests who like a tipple there’s JC le Roux le Domaine – “a delightful sparkling wine that comes alive on the palate”.
Joseph is delighted.
Two weeks before his braai – on March 23 – the phone rings. It’s Jean, my wife, who informs me that I have become a statistic. There’s been a break-in at our home. Sh*t. Sh*t. Sh*t. It feels like I’ve just been slapped in the face.
I recover from the sting only to feel the winded wheezing shock of being punched in the solar plexus. As long as my Castrol box hasn’t been stolen, I think as I rush home.
At noon – two hours before Jean’s call – Joseph forces open the window in our front room and into our lives.
It takes just a few brutal kicks to blast his way through the burglar bars. Fortunately, no one’s at home – a sentence we repeat ad nauseam afterwards.
Joseph switches off the mains at the electricity board. He goes into two-year-old Rachel’s room. He empties the contents of her cupboard on the floor. Nothing there |interests him so he moves to seven-year-old Khwezi’s room, which is in its usual state of chaos and, thinking that it has probably already been ransacked, he doesn’t even bother going in.
It’s in our study where Joseph hits the jackpot. He opens one of my gym bags and in goes our laptops (with “must keep” e-mails, holiday photos and three years’ worth of work, including two half-started books – no, I don’t have hard copies and I haven’t backed up).
He opens another bag and in goes my iPod, sunglasses, an engraved pocket watch Jean had given to me when we got married, a DVD player, a PS2, CDs, DVDs, tools and clothes.
Please, not my Castrol box! The box, made out of recycled yellow Castrol oil cans, is my mobile “safe”. 
It’s locked with a padlock and it’s under my underpants – because thieves never look under the underpants.
It contains things I’m trying not to lose: spare car key, chequebook. It also contains treasures like my father’s watch, my first published story, my half cent and my R5 coin collections, and my Stephen Fry autograph.
I was wandering about Cape Town Airport in 2007 when I spotted Fry, the British actor, novelist and sparkling wit. I became an autograph hunter. The autograph hunter wants a memento; something to show the world he’s had an audience with greatness; that even if it was just for a moment – he was the focus of the star’s attention.
I stalked him as he browsed the magazines at CNA and checked out the Juicy Lucy menu. I’ve read his books (The Liar, The Hippopotamus, The Stars’ Tennis Balls), watched his movies (Peter’s Friends and Wilde), and chuckled my way through his Blackadder characters… and suddenly he was walking towards me.
Here’s my chance, I thought. I took a deep breath. “Uhm, hi, I’m a Fry, Peter Fan, loved you in Stephen’s Friends. Er, that is to say, hi, I’m a Pan, Peter Fry, and I loved you with Stephen. Er, hi, I’m Peter Pan, loved you with fries.”
He smiled kindly. “How do you do?” he asked.
“Er, can I get your autograph? For my fan – he’s such a big son.”
The autograph has been locked away in my Castrol treasure chest ever since. Beneath it lies a yellowing City Press cutting from 1992 titled “Katlehong through white eyes” – my first newspaper story.
There are also 17 half cents in my Castrol box. In 1975, Chappies wasn’t a peak connecting Noordhoek with Hout Bay; Chappies was a piece of pink or blue or green or yellow sticky gum that had four Did You Knows? on its wrapper and cost half a cent.
I remember going into the corner café with 1c, buying a Chappie and pocketing my half cent change. Sometimes the café owner would tell me: “No change! Take Chappies.”
Half cents take me back to sunny skies, juicy mulberries, cops and robbers, Gerrie Coetzee versus Michael Dokes and The A-team. My half-cent collection isn’t worth anything in money terms. That’s not true. My 17 coins are worth eight and a half cents, which wouldn’t even buy a 10th of a Chappie now.
My other collection is worth a mint. Or to put it another way: if it’s gone Oprah owes me R25 000. About 10 years ago I watched the Queen of Talk TV interview a woman who had saved all her change and, as a result, had become a millionaire. A millionaire.
Who doesn’t want to be a millionaire, I thought. Well, besides a billionaire? Seeing as though I wasn’t a billionaire I decided to collect R5 coins.
Jean told me I was mad. Put your money in the bank, she said. You’ll get interest. She was right, but I couldn’t.
After a decade of compulsive collecting I had thousands of R5s. I once read that police raided a forger’s home and seized 2 000 R5 coins and wondered how I would explain my collection if police ever raided my home.
Today the police are at my home and I’m worried I may not be able to say the same thing about my R5s.
Two officers fill out a form, listing what has been stolen: DVD, laptops x 2, PS2… please, not my Castrol box, I think. I run to the study.
Clothes are strewn across the floor. I put my hand into my underpants drawer. Nothing. The Castrol box is gone. Sh*t. Gone are my 17 half cents, spare key, chequebook, my father’s watch, my first ever published article and Stephen Fry’s autograph.
It’s close to midnight on April 4 – the night after Joseph Williams’s braai.
Everything is quiet, but I’m restless. I listen to the night sounds and think of how our lives have changed since Joseph invaded our home and violated our space.
I now sleep with a panic button next to my bed and a cricket bat under my bed.
It’s the same bat that helped me achieve my highest score (a modest 17 not out) against the KES under-15 side in 1985, when the country was in a state of emergency and Chappies cost 5 cents. Joseph Williams has burst my bubble.
I think of how Khwezi triggered the alarm accidentally a few days earlier.
“The police are going to arrest me,” he sobbed. “They’ll think I’m a bad guy.”
A day later he built a Lego house. It had an alarm, CCTV monitors and guards.
That night Rachel wouldn’t go to sleep. “What’s the matter?” I asked.
“I’m scared of bad guys,” she said. “Daddy’s going to look after you,” I told her.
I hear a scratching sound. Just the wind, I think. I hear a shuffle. A creak. There’s no mistaking the sound of an intruder. Someone is in the house. I feel for the panic button but it’s not there. My hand trembles as I reach for my cricket bat.