Dharma Sutra

by David Pugh

  ‘The Darkness’ plan is to create more depravity within a depraved universe. The Chosen Ones are here to keep the light shining onto this darkness, to tell everyone what it is, simply the truth that we are all struggling against an almost inevitable return to a state of what seems pointlessness, a place of despair. So in this primordial hell soup the cosmic power we call God was cooked up and now you know that it is also the Devil. Peter reached into this pre-cosmic powerhouse to blast Ananias and Sapphira, he sent the couple into the Void before time, where they still dwell in self-indulgence, planning their revenge on the world. The fucking idiot created two monsters that day, the rock of the Church my arse, the man was built on sand and the Church that grew from those murders still holds sway today.

  ’Peter really saw himself as being in charge of this new charitable fund and recruited James, my brother, to give him credibility. He was furious when Paul turned up in Jerusalem with his own Gospel and three years evangelising behind him. They spent two weeks arguing doctrine; Paul had never met Jesus and claimed his power came directly from Yahweh. The truth is Paul had no real power; he was just a man with an eye for posterity and the guru business, quite inspired but not a Chosen One. From that meeting on the Christian Church went haywire, and everyone seems to have forgotten or never listened to my divine twin’s message.

  ‘“Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios”.’

  I smiled with a new respect for John Prine’s song Sam Stone,

  ‘You mean that The Church spread its message on a “broken radio”, very clever.’

  Issa then sang the whole song to me and the waiters gathered round in appreciation.

  ‘I think you have some new disciples, Issa,’ I laughed.

  ‘Jeffrey, you are forgetting, “I” never had any disciples.’

  Issa looked into each of the waiters’ faces, each one turned away from us with a glow on his face but he called our waiter back, indicating two more beers.

  ‘This Issa you see before you is a loner, very much like you, truth be told, Jeff,’ he paused long enough for the Kingfisher Strong to be poured.

  ‘I enjoy the occasional company of people but I can’t say I have any friends. Brothers in the blood of the knowledge yes, but friends is going too far. People are very lucky to have true friends, you had to create your own, your son is probably the person who knows you better than yourself, and I know you miss him. Sylvia was a friend, you got on really well, you never lied to each other, and you can’t know how important that is but I think you both knew that you got the most out of your relationship. I’m not 100 percent sure, but I’m afraid that you are really going to need a friend and more of my counselling in the next week or so.’

  ‘Damn it, Issa,’ I looked straight into his eyes, as if I could read his thoughts, ‘tell me what you think you know, I’m feeling scared, is anything going to happen to Edgar, Evangeline or Sylvia?’

  ‘Calm yourself, my friend, qe sera sera,’ Issa smiled, ‘and note the word, friend!’

  Chapter 63: The Power Behind the Throne

  Molefi’s Diary, The 4H Main House

  ‘We are agreed then; we cannot just break into his house and shoot Bob the Bastard.’

  This was Bouba Dibba addressing us conspirators in the new main house at the Happy Hippo Hostel Hotel. Somehow I seemed to have sided with those I shall call the Good Guys. Admittedly, the line between what I’d call Good and Bad wavers considerably, depending on my mood and circumstances. I can execute people with no qualms, but I feel no need for concepts like revenge and certainly I do not want to see people suffer. As a confirmed atheist I believe in dispatching people from this world as painlessly as possible, at the same time doing them the favour of shedding their mortal coil. For most people life is and always will be a continual strife, a battle for survival which they are destined to lose.

  ‘Let’s just kill the fucker!’ Amdou interjected.

  ‘We can’t do that; he has too many friends in high places who depend on what he provides them with, they’d want revenge,’

  Sylvia was right there, but he also had made enemies of these so-called friends, he knew their secrets and my guess would be that they’d be glad to see an end to him. The rich and powerful can always find a supplier for their perversions, but Bob was exceptionally professional and discreet in his dealings with them.

  ‘No, we must lure him here,’ Sylvia continued, ‘then we’d have the right to defend ourselves.’

  ‘He is too careful to do that,’ Bouba added, ‘otherwise, he would have moved in on the 4H a long time ago, he needs to be seen as the good Gambian, wronged by a Toubab.’

  ‘Which is why we must use his mother to draw him out and to make a mistake,’ Sylvia’s been giving this war a lot of thought since it started.

  ‘How to do you plan to do that, Sylvia?’ I asked.

  ‘I think I know something about him that is a secret to everyone, which he would not want anyone to know,’ she smiled.

  ‘If you mean his two-inch cock, that’s no secret,’ Amdou sniggered, ‘everybody knows but they are too afraid of him to mention it in public.’

  ‘It is more than that,’ she stated, ‘this is even a secret from him!’

  As we had no other plan we set about arranging our entry into Abibatu’s Palace, in the gated compound of the International Village, Brufut. Amdou had a friend who lived there, a semi-retired colonel, who sometimes acted as a host to visiting foreign dignitaries. Amdou had served for years under Colonel Kamara Ceesay, first as a platoon sergeant, then as a batman. Most importantly, Ceesay hated Bob, who had been blackmailing a close friend of his. Ceesay’s friend had been brought to the edge of ruin by Jatta and had shot himself. Colonel Ceesay let it be known at the International Village gate that he was expecting a visit from a high-ranking officer in the Botswana army. I always travelled with my major’s uniform; it was wonderful for gate-crashing diplomatic cocktail parties, to weasel out the current whereabouts of awkward political activists and the like. I told Sylvia to dress in her smartest office-wear and act as my P.A. Amdou still had his sergeant’s uniform, so he was to be the driver. Bouba is a good man, not satisfied with his work for a UK charity, he is a part-time special constable, a post I think he created for his home village, Bakary Sambouya. He designed his uniform himself, so no one would dispute that he was an important policeman and hence a suitable bodyguard for Major Bankaketse.

  Bouba had an impressive BMW, donated and delivered to him by a German friend. We cleaned and polished it up, stuck a Gambian flag on the bonnet, and we were through the International Village gates without a hitch. Instead of turning left towards the colonel’s house, we took a right onto Freedom Drive and Abibatu’s Palace. A security camera was blinking at us above the impressive front door.

  ‘Who are you? How did you get in here? And what do you want?’ a metallic woman’s voice questioned us.

  ‘We have an invitation from your son,’ Sylvia held up the gris-gris to the camera’s eye.

  ‘Where were you hiding that?’ I couldn’t help asking her.

  ‘A rather obvious place,’ she quietly replied, ‘up the big hippo’s arse, if I had blown it, there would have been an almighty fart.’

  I smiled at her but the metallic woman was barking, ‘How did you get that?’

  ‘You are not his Muslim woman, you look Chinese and you are far too old!’

  Sylvia looked puzzled.

  The door opened, I expected to see an old woman in a full black hijab. What I did see surprised me; yes, the woman was probably in her late sixties but she looked stunning, tall in a shimmering blue mermaid dress, popular in The Gambia. It’s tight fitting to just below the knees, a pencil line that then flares out to create the fish tail impression. She wore a complimentary heavy headdress, the musorr, locally known as a tiko. The tiko was adorned by a double row of pearls, held by a solid gold centrepiece; it was an amazingly expensive ornamentation.

  ‘Come in but be quick, I have a bi
rthing ceremony to go to,’ adding, ‘I am the guest of honour.’

  ‘I am afraid you may have to postpone the ceremony,’ Sylvia was clearly not as overwhelmed as I was by this intimidating woman.

  ‘You recognise this as your son’s gris-gris, which you made for him, so you will know what is in there,’ Sylvia dangled the Gregory before the woman.

  ‘Your son is an evil man and a bitter enemy of mine and hated by these two gentlemen with me,’ she indicated Bouba and Amdou.

  ‘How dare you, you bitch, Aboboulaye is a wonderful man, not to be judged by the likes of these two jigaboos!’ she stared malignly at the two brothers.

  ‘He has wealth, power and influence in this world, not just in some small African village!’ she spat on Bouba’s police uniform.

  ‘He also has a two-inch cock, which governs his thinking!’ Amdou spat back at her, ‘but our younger brother has no cock at all, thanks to your bastard son!’

  ‘I don’t care what your problem is, Aboboulaye has his own standards and principles that he lives by, and Allah, the Most Beneficent has blessed my boy with all the power and the glory this world has to offer.’

  ‘Madam,’ I interjected, ‘you have a very personal interpretation of Islam, then most people find that which suits them in whatever mumbo-jumbo they wish to believe in, but for now shut up, this lady has the stage!’

  ‘Mrs Jatta, your son believes that I have wronged him but I believe that you have wronged him far more.’

  Abibatu silenced Sylvia, ‘What the fuck are you talking about, and what do you think you know about me and my son, you Chinese Toubab?’

  Sylvia dangled the gris-gris close to her own face, ‘Your son has never seen inside this bag, has he? If he had he might wish to examine one little item very closely.’

  ‘I don’t know what you are talking about!’ Abibatu was trying to perfect the look of a wronged woman.

  ‘Really?’ Sylvia replied, ‘Then you won’t mind calling your son over here, to discuss this secret in the open?’

  Abibatu’s features had lost some confidence, ‘My son is a busy man, and I have a ceremony to go to!’

  ‘You are not going anywhere,’ Sylvia was clearly in charge, the woman was looking troubled, ‘Molefi, you have Bob’s number, tell him we are holding his mother hostage, until he shows up here alone.’

  Chapter 64: Mother Knows Best

  The Testament of Aboboulaye, Abibatu’s Palace, The Gambia

  ‘Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!’ What’s going down? That bastard Molefi phones me to say he, the Chinese cunt and two of Big Size’s brothers are inside my mother’s house! How the fuck did they get through the gate? I’ll make the International Village management pay for this, lousy, incompetent idiots!

  ‘Come alone,’ the Tswana says, ‘there are things that you wouldn’t want your goons to overhear.’

  They are also threatening Mama with violence if I do not comply. What have they got on me; surely, Mama hasn’t told them what happened two nights ago? Fuck, I do not like this! I’m packing a Beretta, it’s a Px4, not your 007 stuff, it’s marketed as “with full-size shootability, in an ultra-concealable package”; sounds like my prick, doesn’t it? I’m not James Bond in this story, I am very much the villain and proud of it. I park my Jeep out of sight and let myself in with my backdoor key, gun in hand. I sneak up to the living room door; they are all looking very relaxed and casual.

  ‘Come in, Bob,’ the Chink says aloud, ‘did you forget your own security cameras?’

  They are watching the wall-size TV, split into eight camera views of the house.

  ‘You can keep the gun if it makes you feel better,’ Molefi announces, ‘Bouba and Amdou have your mother covered, in case you decide to try and take any of us out.’ Molefi adds, ‘Oh and your mother is wearing your Gregory around her neck and Mrs Dharma still holds her cute little remote detonator.’

  ‘By the way, Bob,’ Amdou adds, ‘if you were wondering if the detonator was a fake, I can assure you it is not; note the small cylinder attached behind your gris-gris, I fixed it myself and if it explodes, your mother will lose her jaw at the very least!’

  I have no time for this show of group bravado; I ask them what they want.

  Bouba answers, ‘Personally, I should like to watch you shoot yourself in your tiny prick, with that tiny gun.’

  ‘Then I’d like to kneecap you, shoot out your elbows, cut off your ears, nose and eyelids…’ I interrupt Amdou’s wish list and demand to know what the Chink wants.

  ‘All of the above, Mr Jatta,’ Sylvia replies, ‘but before I make my demands of you, I’d like your mother to carefully undo the stitches around your gris-gris, she is very good with a needle you know.’

  If Mama could look white she would be very pale right now, what does the Chink know about the contents?

  Sylvia explains, ‘I’ve already looked inside, you can see Mrs Jatta that is not your expert needlework.’

  Mama is trembling to undo the seam, the other three look perplexed, they are not in on the Chink’s game. Slowly, the new stitches are removed, the contents put on a silver tray that the Dharma woman hands her. Along with my mother’s hair lock is the bullet that killed my father, a symbol of mortality; the piece of caul, symbolising life; the glass eye to watch over me; and finally, my tiny foreskin cut from me inside the banyan tree by the Harraf, we called him in Wolof, to the Mandinka he is the Kankurang. Time now stops, I am back in that tree fighting back the pain but more the humiliation of having to expose myself to this man covered in jafoe, a red bark that is beaten to feel like wool. He whispers that I am a special one with powers other boys could not even dream of. He makes me drink a bitter potion and the day turns to night, as he takes me by the hand and we fly above my body, I still see it below inside the tree. I am feeling special, irresistible and impervious to the trials of the world and then the witches come. The Harraf carries two swords and he hands me one, together we kill these flying demons, their purple blood flows and I know that I can do great things. Yet, here I am seemingly at the mercy of these lesser beings; Amdou has picked up the foreskin.

  ‘Were you a baby when this was cut off?’ he sneers.

  ‘No, he was nearly thirteen,’ Sylvia replies, ‘I checked the village records, hand it to Bob, Amdou.’

  I take the little piece of soft leather in my hand.

  ‘Turn it over and look at the tip of it,’ the Chink orders, ‘note the little dots, can you see what they are?’

  They look like stitches, I look at my mother, she is crying, saying, ‘I thought it was for the best.’

  ‘Mama, you sewed up my foreskin as a baby?’ I am incredulous.

  ‘Not just stitched it but bound it tight too, just allowing enough space for a little boy to have a pee,’ the Chink adds.

  ‘You must understand it was for the best!’

  What is my mother saying, “For the best?”

  ‘Your father was ruled by his penis, he followed it from woman to woman, wasting his life chasing skirts. I wanted better for you, I wanted you to be a great man, I wanted you to be more than a walking soolde. Being built like a little boy made you become a real man, a self-made chief, respected and feared by all. It has made you what you are today…’

  ‘A monster!’ Bouba interjects.

  I shoot the bastard but only hit him in the shoulder, I cannot see through the tears.

  Amdou is aiming a gun at me, and Molefi has produced one from inside his revolver case, both cover me. I turn my gun on my mother, wavering unsteadily.

  ‘I just wanted to be a man,’ I cry, ‘Bouba is right, I am a monster, I should kill you for what you have done to me!’

  My view on the world has suddenly changed, so many have died and suffered through the one act of this woman. I believed in the creature she had created, saw him as all-powerful, a titan, unrivalled in his infamy. Now, deep down inside, I discover that I would have traded the empire of rust that I have created for the joy of making a woman smile. My father ha
d a true life, loved by many; all I have is the hatred of thousands. I could kill my mama for this, in my mind’s eye I see myself pulling the trigger, the bullet bursting her brain. But this woman is the only woman I have ever loved and the only woman who has loved me. I lower the gun and turn to the others assembled.