It was unusually hot for April, and Joy had walked four blocks from the main road where the minibus taxi had dropped her. Then there had been the boisterous greeting from Ilia—a double greeting since Kubu was not available to receive his share. The bed had to be made, dishes put away, laundry loaded into the washer. At last she could relax before she thought about supper with Pleasant.
Joy poured herself a glass of chilled orange juice, more refreshing than anything alcoholic. Even a steelworks seemed unattractive with Kubu stuck for another day in Maun. Suddenly Ilia barked. From the window, Joy saw two smartly dressed men coming up the driveway. Who was visiting at six in the evening? Probably from the Zion Church, she thought with irritation. Why couldn’t they leave you alone? After all, she had her own church, and she didn’t try to convert them. She was tempted not to answer the door, and let Ilia see them off. Not very charitable, she thought with a sigh. Kubu would have dealt with them easily. They never thought it worth annoying a policeman.
The doorbell rang, and Ilia barked even more furiously. Strange, she was usually quite friendly. Joy hesitated, but then opened the door halfway. “Yes?” she said. She made no attempt to call off Ilia.
“Mrs. Bengu? I hope we’re not disturbing you. We just need a couple of minutes of your time.” The man was smooth, polite, and had an astringent-sweet aftershave. He spoke English, but his accent marked him as foreign, probably Zimbabwean. Joy decided she didn’t like him. Ilia had stopped barking, but was still growling.
“I’m sorry, it’s not convenient. I’m busy making dinner for my husband and two of his colleagues from the Criminal Investigation Department.” That should do the trick, she thought.
The man leaned forward as if he were going to tell her something confidential. But suddenly he shouldered the door, shoving her into the hallway. The second man followed, and Ilia went ballistic. He tried to kick her, but she kept out of reach. Joy saw that the first man was now holding a pistol.
“Call off the dog. We won’t hurt you if your husband cooperates. He knows what we want. He’ll give it to us.”
“Ilia!” she snapped. The dog was momentarily quiet. “He’s not here. He’ll be back shortly. With colleagues from the police as I told you.”
The man smiled. “We know where your husband is, Mrs. Bengu. We’ll meet him later. Now we want you to come with us. Quietly. No one gets hurt.” The second man had taken something from his pocket, a dishtowel wrapped around a small bottle. The sickly sweet smell Joy had mistaken for aftershave became stronger. She screamed.
At once Ilia rushed for the man and bit his leg through his trousers. He yelled, dropped the bottle, and tried to knock her off with his fist. She let go of his leg long enough to bite his hand before returning her teeth to the fleshy part of his calf. Trying to kick her off, he nearly fell over. The man with the gun was distracted, and Joy saw her chance. Still screaming, she rushed him and kneed him in the crotch as hard as she could. Doubled over in pain, he hardly realized that she had grabbed the gun and backed to the far wall. The other man had freed himself from Ilia, but she circled him snarling, looking for an opening.
They regrouped and weren’t smiling anymore.
“If you come any closer, I’ll shoot you both!” she gasped. They ignored that, but stopped when she competently worked the action to ensure a bullet was in the chamber and released the safely catch.
“Put up your hands and stand against the wall. I’m a good shot. It’ll give me pleasure to shoot you both!” She was bluffing, and they could tell, but they did not push their luck. Slowly they raised their hands to shoulder level. Then the one she had kneed started backing to the door.
“You’re not going to shoot me, Mrs. Bengu. You don’t want to do that. We’ll just leave now.” The second man joined him. It was clear that they saw this as a temporary setback, not a defeat. Joy’s self-defense lessons had paid off, but her hands were shaking. She let them go.
But Ilia had the last word. She tore down the driveway barking furiously and ripped off a piece of trouser leg. She brought it back proudly, and Joy was immensely pleased with her.
“Good girl! Your father will want that for evidence. We showed them, didn’t we, Ilia?” Then suddenly she felt faint and nauseous. She locked the front door, checked the back door and windows. Then, still tightly gripping the gun, she ran to the toilet and threw up. After a few minutes, she felt better and phoned the CID.
When Edison and Mabaku arrived ten minutes later in a cacophony of sirens, they found Joy surrounded by women trying to comfort her. Joy’s neighbors had heard Ilia’s frenzied barking and had come to investigate. One had her arm around her; another rubbed her back. A third was making tea.
It was only after Edison had shooed the women out of the house that Joy’s control finally broke, and she started to sob. Edison put his arms around her, but she desperately wished it was Kubu holding her against his comforting bulk.
Kubu drove through the night and arrived home the next morning just after dawn. All night Edison and Constable Mashu had alternated sleeping on the couch and patrolling the house. Ignoring them, Kubu rushed to Joy, even finessing Ilia’s welcome. Later Ilia would get plenty of attention and rewards for her bravery. Once he was convinced that Joy was safe and had suffered no obvious ill effects, Kubu settled down and officially relieved the other policemen. Edison headed for home, and Mashu went back to CID headquarters.
Kubu spent the day at home, unable to come to terms with whether Joy was his charge, wife, or even patient. In desperation, Joy fed him a large lunch with a generous glass of red wine, and was relieved when he settled down in the bedroom with her and fell asleep. With a sigh, she left him there and went to clear up. He’s feeling guilty about the whole episode, she thought. But whether it was because he hadn’t been there, or for some other reason, was unclear.
Chapter 34
Built in the Chobe Forest Reserve, Kachikau is a charming helter-skelter of small houses climbing the slope overlooking the Chobe River flood plain. The Kachikau Saturday market is a popular event. People come from as far away as Satau and Kavimba, and everyone has something to buy or something to sell. And it’s a good excuse for a chat and to meet for tea and, later, maize beer.
Moremi had grown up in Kachikau and loved the market. He had managed to get a day off, and a ride with Enoch who was driving in to Kasane and dropped him off at the town, roughly halfway. Moremi and Kweh were now browsing the stalls, which were nothing more than camp tables or a patch of ground, tended by a merchant seated on a log. Sometimes he found interesting local herbs that added a special flavor to his intriguing stews. Local ingredients always appealed to the guests at Jackalberry, although once there had been a problem with an herb used mostly for medicinal purposes. Several of the guests had stayed at the camp the next day, not daring to venture far from the toilets.
Several people stopped to chat to Moremi and to greet Kweh, who had become something of a local mascot. The gray go-away-bird sat on Moremi’s right shoulder, balancing himself with his long tail as his owner bent to examine the wares. Moremi had discovered Kweh as a fledgling that had left the nest too soon and found himself on the ground unable to get back to the safety of the trees. Moremi had taken him back to the camp and fed him scraps of fruit. Everyone had told him that the big, noisy, clumsy birds couldn’t be tamed. In Moremi’s experience, when everyone agreed on something with no evidence, it was usually false, and this was no exception. Kweh had become more than a pet; he was Moremi’s friend and confidant.
Moremi tried and rejected the feel of a carved walking stick, and looked around the scatter of stalls in search of the fresh curry powder he wanted. He spotted a fat, overdressed woman trying on a hat. “Look at that lady, Kweh,” he said nodding surreptitiously toward her. “She looks ridiculous!” The hat had a large and rather wilted ostrich feather as its centerpiece. Kweh raised the neat crest on his head, as if in competition. Moremi wandered on, keeping an eye out for interesting hats to entertain
Kweh. Suddenly he stopped, shocked.
“That’s Rra Zondo,” he told Kweh. “That’s his hat. You see the felt hat with the guineafowl feathers on the side?” The man was in a crowd around a drinks seller.
“Rra Zondo!” he called out and would have moved through the crowd toward him, but something more interesting had caught Kweh’s attention. He took off with a flapping of ash wings and landed heavily on a rough wooden table. Its owner, who was selling marula fruit at ten for a pula according to a handwritten sign, was a stout lady sitting on a wooden stool hardly adequate to support her. She knocked it over in fright and began complaining and flapping at Kweh with a brown paper bag grabbed from a small stack on the table. Kweh was selecting a fruit, but jerked back to avoid the flapping bag, and voiced a loud alarmed, “Go away! Go away!” Nevertheless, he grabbed the closest fruit and flew to the safety of Moremi’s shoulder. Balancing on one claw dug deeply into the shoulder, he held the marula in the other while he ate. Juice dribbled down Moremi’s neck.
“You must pay for the marula,” screeched the woman. “Your bird has stolen one.”
“I will, Mma,” said Moremi. “I just need to find Rra Zondo, then I’ll come right back.”
“No!” said the fruit seller firmly. “You pay now!”
Moremi was looking around. He could no longer see the felt hat with the feathers. Quickly he fished ten thebe from his pocket, but the woman shook her head. “Twenty-five thebe,” she said. Moremi wanted to go after Zondo, but felt cheated.
“It’s too expensive! I can pick these from the trees by the road for nothing! It’s ten for a pula, so each one is ten thebe.” He held out the coin.
The woman shook her head again. “Special price. You have to buy ten.”
Moremi looked around. He thought he saw Zondo crossing the road some way off, but wasn’t sure. The man was wearing a felt hat, but was too far away for Moremi to tell if it had feathers on the side.
“All right. Quickly. Give me ten. But the ripe ones, not the green ones hidden underneath. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Again the woman refused, insisting he pay at once. Irritated, Moremi ignored her and started to walk away. “I’ll scream that you are robbing me and stealing my fruit!” cried the woman. Angrily, Moremi pulled out a pula and pushed it at her. She accepted it and started filling a bag. Moremi watched to see that he was not cheated. As he accepted the bag with the nine fruits inside, the bird let out another raucous “go away!” startling them both, and flew down to the table to grab another marula. The woman started to scream again and flap with her paper bags. Quickly Moremi pulled a fruit from his bag, dropped it on the table, and moved hastily away. Kweh landed elegantly on his moving shoulder with his new prize in his bill. The woman’s loud complaints that the bird had fouled her table followed them, but Moremi was hurrying across the road looking for Zondo.
But the felt hat with three guineafowl feathers was nowhere to be seen.
Moremi and Kweh went to the house of Constable Shoopara. Moremi felt it was his duty to report the matter to the police. And, in Kachikau, Constable Shoopara was the police. Because it was market day, he was off duty—although always on call—and he was not feeling particularly friendly.
“You can’t bring that bird in here,” he said firmly.
“Kweh does no harm. If I can’t bring him in, we must talk outside on the veranda. Or I’ll go away if you like.”
Shoopara looked at Moremi. He had known the cook for many years and, like most of the villagers, regarded Moremi as strange, unusual, but not mad. In fact he thought Moremi smart, but not in ways that made sense in rural Botswana.
“No, it’s all right, he can stay,” he relented. “Now what’s the problem?”
“We saw Rra Zondo—didn’t we, Kweh?—the man who was at Jackalberry Camp, the man you’re all looking for!” Moremi finished triumphantly.
The goings-on at Jackalberry Camp were well known throughout the area. People here did not rely on newspapers, it was word of mouth. The excitement of the attack on Dupie and Salome had been described variously as another attempted murder and an armed invasion of Botswana from Zimbabwe. But Shoopara knew the true story, and he knew about Zondo.
“Are you sure it was him? Did you see him close? Did you talk to him? Where did this happen?”
“Yes. Not very. No. At the market.” Shoopara had to replay his questions to decode the answer. “Let’s go and look,” he said. “How did you know it was Rra Zondo, if he wasn’t close?”
Moremi explained while they walked, and Shoopara lost some of his enthusiasm. “Perhaps there are many such hats,” he said doubtfully. “Did you see his face?” Moremi admitted that he had not. Nevertheless they searched the area around the market and questioned the sellers who were now busy packing up their unsold goods. No one remembered a man wearing a felt hat with guineafowl feathers. Shoopara showed them the picture of Zondo, albeit a poor faxed copy, but no one recognized the man. Worse, no one even remembered a stranger unable to speak good Setswana.
Shoopara gave up on the wild goose. “I think you were mistaken,” he said firmly. “You had better hurry or you’ll miss your ride. Keep well, Moremi.” And he stalked off to resume his interrupted nap.
As Moremi waited for his ride back to the main road, he hummed and puzzled. “We did see him, didn’t we, Kweh? I’m sure, aren’t you?” Kweh had a russet eye fixed on the brown paper bag Moremi was carrying. He chortled, but whether he was agreeing or begging for the food was hard for Moremi to decide. Absentmindedly, he passed the bird another marula fruit.
Chapter 35
Tatwa spent Saturday morning following up the remnants of clues and loose ends. He was relieved to know that Joy was fine. He had met her once or twice with Kubu during his time in Gaborone and liked her. More important, Kubu had been good to him and supported him. He was very fond of the big detective.
He had been shocked to see him so haggard the day before, taking off alone on the long journey home. He had offered to help drive, but Kubu had waved this aside. “I’ll be fine. You have to talk to Mrs. Boardman tomorrow. I’ll call you when I’m home.” Then he was gone.
So in the afternoon Tatwa called on Amanda Boardman at the Maun Safari Lodge. He found her calm, focusing on the details of a death in a foreign land rather than its enormity.
“It’s been a nightmare with the plane. You’d think it’s the first time they’ve been asked to transport a body,” she told him. “The undertaker is an idiot. And the police haven’t been helpful either.” She glared at the mild-mannered detective as though the fault were his.
“Mrs. Boardman, I’m terribly sorry for your loss. I only met your husband once, but I thought he was a fine man. I wish there was something I could do.” Amanda seemed surprised and touched by his short speech. “Thank you, Detective. Well, you can tell me what the police have done to catch his killer.”
“I’m hoping you can help me with that. We—Assistant Superintendent Bengu and myself—don’t think this was just a robbery. We believe it was somehow connected with the murders at Jackalberry Camp.”
“Yes, of course. I said as much to Assistant Superintendent Notu, but he couldn’t see it. A vicious, brutal murder for a few pula? That would be believable in South Africa, detective, but not in Maun.”
Tatwa was intrigued. “So you agree your husband was somehow…” He stumbled, not wanting to say “involved.” “Somehow connected with what happened at Jackalberry?”
“I think there may’ve been something he knew or guessed about what happened. He seemed almost pleased about it—not about the murders, but in the way you can be pleased when you know a useful secret. He didn’t tell me what it was, though. William kept things to himself, business and such, even though we worked together. He’d wait until the deal was closed, then he’d let me know. Almost as though he thought saying it out loud would tempt fate. I know it sounds silly, but he was like that.”
“Why did you think that in this case?”
/> “There was something about him after the interview with you and the Superintendent. Almost as though something important had been confirmed. Something he’d find valuable in the future. That’s the impression I had at the time. But then it was gone, and he was back to normal. I knew better than to quiz him about it.”
Tatwa felt a stir of excitement. Was it possible that Boardman had somehow stumbled on Gomwe’s involvement? Perhaps seen him that night when looking for an owl? If that were true, and he’d tried to use it in some way such as blackmail, then Gomwe might have a motive for staging a violent and deliberately fatal attack.
“Mrs. Boardman, did your husband say anything about what he was doing here on Monday? Particularly Monday night?”
“Well, of course, he was here to buy stock for our shop. He’d done pretty well, judging by his full trailer. But I know he was meeting someone. He usually calls me every day when he’s on a trip. He phoned about six, but I was out, so he left a message on the answering machine. He was meeting someone for drinks after dinner that evening. He thought he might be late, so he’d phone the next morning. So, you see, he was definitely expecting someone.”
Tatwa hesitated, then asked, “Could it have been a woman?”
Amanda laughed. “You’re not married, are you, Detective?” Tatwa shook his head. “Well, if you were having an affair, would you call your wife and tell her you were expecting to have drinks with an unnamed person?” Tatwa admitted that seemed unlikely.
“Very unlikely, I’d say. I’m sure William was looking forward to telling me another of his secret successes in the morning. But the morning never came, did it?” She stared at the ceiling, forced to focus on that gruesome night. Her voice dropped. “That’s all I can tell you, detective. Perhaps you would leave me now?”
Tatwa nodded, muttered his thanks, and rose to go. “We’ll catch this man, Mrs. Boardman, I promise that.”
A Carrion Death & The 2nd Death of Goodluck Tinubu Page 60