Name: Sambalikagwa Mvona
PenName: Sambalikagwa Mvona
Genre: Fiction
Location: Blantyre, Malawi
THE LEATHER JACKET
The two warring men lay on the fresh graveyard mound, facing each other. The slightly taller one, built like a gorilla and spotting a goatee had already died. The other one with square shoulders, his legs almost broken and his thick lips pulped lay groaning, his wrecked body showing some life with one battered eye still gazing distantly.
Mun’ndo, for that was his name, felt bitter, for despite his great strides to reach this far in his bloody chase, he too was poised to follow the same way. He was not going to enjoy the fruits of his sweat. An inveterate gambler, he too knew he was going to die. Die a hard way.
He tried to take a new grip on the machete, but the killer metal slipped from his hand and dropped down soundlessly. Yes, the writing was on the wall, his eye stared at the half dug mound and he felt his throat dry.
Was it not the rescue part known only by the name of Community Policing which saved Hankoni from the ruffians and opium consumers of Kaputa Forest? How about Komwa, Kalipinde and Njoya who were at one time or another saved by the rescue party? But was Mun’ndo in the line of such sympathisers? Who would sympathise with a man who was to be found on a new and half dug graveyard that had left so many broken hearts in Kaponda village?
Mun’ndo’s eye flickered as he realised that soon it would be daylight and the deceased’s relatives and friends would soon visit the graveyard to inspect if there had been any foul play on the new grave.
In the distance, he could see the Nampoto hills and the tree tops of the Pajombo ground. His battered body shivered. And as if answering to his worries in the nearby Nkhazi trees some leaves stirred. Two huge owls with dark beautiful feathers hooted: “Hii! Hii! Hii!”
With that they flew away to announce another death elsewhere.
Mun’ndo trembled.
He twisted his weak arm to get hold of the machete once again. It would be better if he would finish himself off before the angry mob of Kaponda village tied him on a tree and let their arms labour in throwing killer stones at his already battered body. But the arm was just too weak to handle such an iron weapon.
“Nasuwema!” he called wearily. But there was no Nasuwema. Everything was wrong.
Suddenly his mind projected back to the day when all this happened.
It had been one of those packed market days at Mbayani. Those who did not make it early had to spread their wares along the road in order to catch ready customers from the adjacent bus terminus. Being a central place where assorted second hand clothes were sold, the market had attracted people from all parts of the country which included gamblers, gangsters and pick-pockets.
Mun’ndo, one of the thriving vendors at the market had just bought two bales of second hand clothes – one containing assorted clothes and another stacked with leather jackets.
There was a deafening noise that one had to shout in order to be heard. Voice answered voice in tumult swells as every vendor talked on top of his or her voice to advertise his or her wares.
“Bwerani mudzaone! Bwerani mudzaone! Phwii wogonjetsa mphepo!” (Come and see! Come and see! New wind breakers sold here!)
Confused with the vendors’ outbursts, people moved this way and that way like tuned machines, touched this clothing and that without making up their mind. Competing with this noise on the Zalewa road were jovial cyclists, who piled bundles of well-set pyramid-like firewood, clicking their bells with exaggeration, warning drunkards and absent-minded shoppers to give way, waving with their thumbs to no-one in particular as they cycled proudly in troops towards their selling places.
“Pi! Piii!” hooted one minibus driver, missing one cyclist by a hair’s breadth. A conductor who perched himself between the passenger door and the front seat pulled out his head like an angry mamba and touted: “Limbe! Limbe! Limbe! K50 yokha ku Limbe! (To Limbe at K50 only)
Several minibuses painted with different colours rumbled stylishly as they swarmed like cockroaches, vomiting and swallowing in passengers as they raced towards the city centre.
Porters, whose tired necks swore with fatigue staggered with full loads of wooden boxes shouting “Magazi” (Take care!) as they squeezed themselves through the languid crowds.
The first assorted bale of Mun’ndo’s clothes was over and he had now just opened one that contained leather jackets. With the cold Mwera winds that were accompanied by cold drizzles on that particular day, he was sure to finish his lot before sunset.
It was a well-paying business, far much better than his previous rackets. Besides making double profits, Mun’ndo, with his fine tongue had managed to make more friends, more especially married women who usually sneaked out from their bored and tired husbands to seek a new lease of life with willing lovely bastards like Mun’ndo. It was a risky life, but Mun’ndo had managed to survive and pull through such thick huddles.
“K1, 200! K1, 200! No one here can beat this price! No scratch! No taint! If detected please return and you will get a full refund,” he barked as scores of buyers invaded his hawker.
A powerfully-built young man with a scar cut across his left cheek, his blood-shot eyes darting at Mun’ndo and then at the leather jackets, planted himself a few metres from the stall, scratching his drum stomach. He screwed up his eyes and peered closely at the leather jacket Mun’ndo was holding.
“Make it K1, 000 and you will claim ownership of this beautiful leather jacket!” Mun’ndo roared at the giant man, admiring his ‘care-free’ manner.
The boyish look winced, hesitated.
“Don’t shout,” he said with authority, touching the leather jacket for the first time. “Do you want the whole town to know that Bongo has run short and is now buying kaunjika?”
Groping carefully through his hip pockets, he produced two warn-out five hundred notes and threw them to Mun’ndo.
Mun’ndo briefly studied the man and somehow ashamed, quickly dusted off the leather jacket with planks of his stall and handed it over to him. He was still dazed with the man’s behavior when a piece of paper jumped from one pocket of the leather jacket and dropped on Mun’ndo’s feet.
Mun’ndo picked up the paper quickly, unfolded it and carefully read the contents word by word, his face blank. Not understanding what it meant, he read the note for the second time, then the third. It read:
“Comrade Africa,
I have sinned against the Lord. I have killed a lot of black women with my HIV/AIDS virus. Now is the payback time. In this leather jacket, tied right inside the rear pocket is a whooping US$50,000. I believe the granting of this money to you, Comrade Afrika will clear out my own conscience, will cleanse away my sins as I fall by my sword”.
And when he looked up, the giant youth with the leather jacket had already disappeared.
Confused, he kicked through a forest of shoppers’ feet with the aim of catching up with the man, but Mbayani being such a chaotic meeting place, no one paid him any attention. He was – to be frank – swallowed by trooping legs, walking arms and liquorious blood-shot eyes.
BABA’s Hole was a tiny drinking joint in downtown Mbayani that hosted the cream of the city’s prostitutes. What attracted fun-seekers more to this pub was the sophisticated sound of the musical equipment, the selection of music itself and the huge abundance of young, half-naked nocturnal girls who regarded Baba’s hole as their ideal paradise for their daily livelihood. Only the carefree visited this 24-hour busy bee hive. To those who craved permanent partners, Baba’s hole was not their place. It only suited the hit-and-run lovers, for there at Baba’s Hole, old friendships failed to survive and new ones were always born.
It therefore did not take time for Mun’ndo to discover that Baba’s Hole was an ideal trap nest for his client. After he had lost his trail, he had tried to make enquiries of a tall thick-set man wearing a black leather jacket with a buckle at the back. They all said they had seen several fat men wearing black leather jackets. Just what was special with this man wearing a ‘funny’ leather jacket? Was he a ghost from the moon? Being such a golden secret that had to be jealously guarded, the trail had ended there. But Mun’ndo could not just give up. He wanted to use the US$50,000. He imagined how he would paint the whole town white. He would buy a car. He would build a decent house in the heart of Mbayani. He would buy a piece of land and farm tobacco. He would divorce his old-styled wife, Asuwema and instead marry a teenager. Well, the list was endless. But was he going to find the buster?
As he was recalling the afternoon incident, it dawned on him that the man he was looking for could not be very far if only if only he had studied his habits. The blood-shot eyes, the drum stomach, the boring gaze, all told a full story of a man who loved a bitter liquid in a bottle. Being a man hunter for the better part of his life handling dangerous odd jobs for big shots in the city, he was sure to find a man who had bought his leather jacket stacked in gold. And when Mun’ndo and a colleague visited Baba’s Hole that same evening, his client was there, clad in his black leather jacket!
The high-pitched equipment, the thumping of dancing feet and the decibel level of cheerful conversation was such that nobody cared about anybody.
Both men ordered their drinks as they gazed at their target idly, deep in thought. Will their mission be successful? They both seemed to cogitate. They knew if Bongo would be rounded up and probably killed, they would end up being local millionaires. How they would do it, they had no idea but they were so sure not to miss their target this time around. Mun’ndo looked the crowd over and knew soon; just soon they would call him ‘Sir Mun’ndo’, a title he cherished to die with. For if converted, US$50,000 would translate to K43 million! Mun’ndo stared at the man once again and wondered if he would just pull him out of the stool and strip the jacket out of his massive body. But that would attract a fight for all and Mun’ndo thought, that way, he would lose completely. He was therefore against the idea.
But despite such an in-fight barbed war, Bongo, the man they were pursuing looked as calm as ever. He drank at his own pace. Never in a hurry. Never shaken. He talked to no one. He shared his beers with no one. He just sat there calmly, as if he had all the time in the world.
Such kind of behavior displayed by their client disturbed Mun’ndo immensely. Was this man the kind that surrendered easily?
“Have you murdered someone?” asked one drunkard, pointing an accusing finger at Mun’ndo.
“Why eeii ee mee?” Mun’ndo stuttered, his mind coming back from the long cold stare.
“Yes I mean you, comrade!” The drunk continued his story, attracting more laughter from the patrons.
Two hefty women in tight red pair of trousers appeared from the rare door, dragging each other towards the main entrance, their drowsy faces showing how much they had drunk. The one wearing a huge toupee that almost buried her ears screwed up her blood-shot eyes and shouted: “To hell with men who imitate men! You are nothing but paper lions!”
Faces exchanged glances. And as their precarious journey continued, one of them upset the glass of beer belonging to the man wearing the black leather jacket. Startled and thinking it was a deliberate move, Bongo stood up instantly and slapped the girl’s face with the back of his left palm. As the girl cried hysterically, someone somewhere threw a bottle that went straight onto Bongo’s forehead, dislodging him from the rungs of the stool, throwing him right to the hard cement floor. There was a violent crash.
As anarchy ensued, two tough bartenders appeared and carried the victim to the waiting ambulance which immediately sped off to the central hospital.
Mun’ndo and his colleague could not just wait and watch while things were happening. They fought their way out; quickly hired a cab and followed the ambulance.
But on reaching the hospital, the man was pronounced dead.
Mun’ndo and his friend received the sad story with shock. But they could not just give up. They had to fight on till they got back the leather jacket.
Amid wailing, hysteria and endless cursing during the funeral ceremony, no-one noticed the two strange faces that sat like two ghost statues, not believing what they were witnessing. The leather jacket was to be buried together with the deceased! And to think that inside that jacket was a cool US$50,000, Mun’ndo wanted to stand up and narrate the long story to the angry mourners. But his colleague suppressed him; it would be against their tradition and culture. And besides, it would be suicide. What if they accused them of murdering their son? Would they not face the wrath of the mourners at the funeral?
And so when everyone was asleep, right at midnight, they decided to visit the graveyard to exhume the deceased and remove the leather jacket so that they get the money. The money was good and they had to risk their lives, even if it meant being buried alive.
But just as they were about to finish the job, a quarrel erupted. As a hired hand, his colleague wanted to know how much he would be paid for the job. His demands were unrealistic. How could he demand half the cut as if he was there when Mun’ndo was discovering the fortune? No, Mun’ndo could not agree, arguing that the money originated from his business. It was him who got the letter from the poor American. It was his personal discovery. This resulted in a hot argument and then a fierce fight. The bawl continued till dawn when his colleague dropped dead.
But even though Mun’ndo was showing some signs of life, he knew he would not be able to make it by the time the deceased’s relatives visited the graveyard. He had lost a lot of blood. He too was going to die without seeing any single American dollar landing on his hands.
In the far distance, he heard the two owls hooting once again, far and away.
“Hii! Hii! Hiiii!”
Mun’ndo crawled back to the mound in fear. Fear of the unknown. He knew that he had now reached the very end of his rope.
True, he had lived almost half of his life a hunted man. Doing odd jobs that brought him no comfort. That pleased the few crooked in society and bread so many enemies. But where had all that got him?
“Nasuwema!” he wailed, wearily. But there was no Nasuwema.
In the distant, he could see his son, Domi stretching his hand to rescue him from further drowning. But he had missed the rescue hand once again. “You are drowning,” he heard someone saying. The words came out softly like those of an angel.
He tried to open his eyes to see who was talking, but the eyes could agree.
“Touch me,” it now came like a whisper, far and away.
In his long sleep, Mun’ndo could see the leather jacket hanging on the panks of his stall, flayed to and from with the whispering Mwera winds.
“Touch me.”
And that was the last he heard.
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