Chapter 3
Dambuza got in his
Corolla and shut the door. The unhealthy metallic clang shook the entire car.
Like most things in Dambuza’s life, his car was hanging on by a very thin,
precarious thread. He pulled some tissue from the roll of toilet paper on the
passenger sheet and wiped the ubiquitous white dust off the dashboard. Already
he and Maun were not friends and this dust was not helping the situation. He’d
only been in the place for four days, but he’d come with a bad attitude to
start with which the town had done nothing to change.
He grew up in
Francistown, he knew the place, he liked the place. He was made for the city,
not the edge of the bush where wild animals waited to pounce. He liked concrete
not sand- and more sand- under his
feet. The transfer to Maun was a not so hidden demotion. His life had gone a
bit haywire and it had spilled over to work, giving the impression that he was
incompetent. His boss agreed with what he saw and thought a change of scenery
might help Dambuza get sorted. Now Dambuza would spend his days searching for
pick-pocketers having fun at the tourists’ expense, ticketing speeders, and
looking for people with bits of illegal elephant tusk. That was no job for an
investigator, and this was no place for a city boy.
He’d left his wife
and kids in Francistown which was a mixed blessing. He missed his kids already,
but his wife Bontle was another story. Their relationship was problematic and
neither one of them was willing to make the move to fix it or put it out of its
endless misery. The transfer gave him an
out. He was free of her, at least in distance. No more complaining about his
drinking and late nights out. No more lists of how he had let her down. No more
shouting matches that had the kids up and crying in the middle of the night. No
more tantrums thrown at the police station. No, Maun did have its upside.
Dambuza pulled
onto what served in Maun as its main road and suddenly the air pulsed with the
wail of a hooter being seriously overused and he quickly pulled back onto the
gravel. A flash of white combi zipped around him and sped off. Dambuza watched
the combi-driver-with-an-attitude disappear down the road. Across its back
window in solid black writing was written: DEAD END. Dambuza considered this.
Dead-end. That was about where he felt he was. Career wise, relationship wise,
life wise: Maun was his dead-end.
He checked his
watch-7:15, he’d soon be late for his first day on the job. He looked behind
him, and carefully inched onto the road. Just as he switched into fourth gear,
he saw something up ahead. There were two people shouting at each other. It
looked like a fight, he slowed down when he was nearer, pulled over, and jumped
out for the car.
When he was closer,
he could see it was a middle-aged white woman and a twenty something black man.
They were indeed fighting. In the mix was a huge dog, the biggest Dambuza had
ever seen. The dog was barking and licking at both the woman and the young man.
“You better stop
it right now, Bob!” the woman said.
Dambuza got up to
the two and shouted, “I’m a police officer. Move away from the woman, Bob.”
The woman looked
up and smiled while she flipped the young man around and, before Dambuza knew
what was happening, the man was sitting on the ground, his legs kicked out from
under him, with his arms tied behind his back with a piece of rusty wire.
“There! Now sit
still!” The woman turned to Dambuza. “So officer, this young man seemed to
think while I was out on my morning walk that I’d like to hand over my
cellphone to him. I thought otherwise.”
“So you know him
then?” Dambuza asked.
“Nope. Never saw
him a day in my life.”
“So why’d you call
him Bob?” Dambuza asked.
The woman threw
her head back, her long blond hair braided into two long plaits flew back and
she laughed a loud, raucous laugh, her weathered face folded along well used
lines in response. “Bob’s the dog!” she squeezed out.
As soon as the dog
heard his name he was on his feet wagging his tail. Friendly, he was, but
winning any dog beauty pageants was not going to be part of Bob’s future.
Besides being the biggest dog Dambuza had ever seen, Bob also might be the
ugliest. His head showed he had boerbull, it was as big as a roasted ham, but
he was obviously a Tswana mix. His body was long and lanky and covered in dark
brown stripes. Where he got his long haired white tail was anyone’s guess. He moved as if his head was too heavy and his
legs too long. Bob’s redeeming factor was his personality. As they spoke, he
lay down next to the thief and put his big ham head on the thief’s lap.
“So you want me to
take this guy in?” Dambuza asked.
“That would help.
I’d like to finish my walk undisturbed if possible.” The tall, muscular woman
looked Dambuza over. “Are you new? I know a lot of the police here in Maun,
most actually.”
“Yeah, I’m new,
first day on the job. I’m transferred from Francistown. Detective Dambuza
Chakalisa” He held out his hand and the woman took it up in a firm hold, firmer
than he expected.
“I’m Delly, Delly
Woods. I own Delta Tours about 3 kms down the road from here. Listen, if you
let me finish what I started, I’ll come by the police station in about an hour
and fill in the paperwork.”
“Sure no
problem.” Dambuza bent down and pulled
the young man, who was not more than a boy really, to his feet with little
effort. “Come on. I think you chose the wrong woman to mess with this morning.”
“Go nntse jalo,” he said shaking his head
while he climbed in the passenger seat of the Corolla.
***
Dambuza took the
last puff of his cigarette and crushed it out in the gravel of the parking lot.
He helped his passenger out of the car. “Here we are. You should be happy, your
morning mischief has made me late for work on my first day.”
Dambuza pushed the
thief through the door. Inside there was a long wooden bench. “Sit there,” he
ordered him, and then he went to the counter where a tall, very dark constable
waited to be of assistance.
“Dumela Rre, can I
help you?” he asked. The new customer service initiatives had been taken to
heart by this young man. Dambuza smiled.
“Yes, I’m
Detective Dambuza on transfer from Francistown.”
The constable
looked at Dambuza’s charge sitting on the bench. “Oh yes I was told to keep an
eye out for you. They call me Blue. So did you come with your own criminals
from Francistown then?”
“No, I picked this
one up on the way to the station. He was trying to get a cellphone from a local
woman, Delly Woods.”
The constable
laughed into his hand. He called to the back room. “Zero! Hey Zero-we tlaa kwano!”
A short, round,
baby-faced constable came around the corner. “Our new detective brought you a
customer. Take this fool to lockup. The idiot tried to rob Delly.”
They both laughed.
Constable Zero was still shaking his head when he pulled the thief to his feet.
“You new around here?” he asked the young man. The thief nodded.
“Thought as much.
Lucky for you the detective was around. Delly usually deals with people like
you in her own way. You’ll prefer the beating you’re going to get at the kgotla
to the punishment Delly would have handed down.”
Dambuza watched
Zero lead the thief away. Blue said, “So Detective Dambuza, the boss was
looking around for you this morning. You better go through and let him know
what you’ve been up to.”
Dambuza walked
down the dark hallway to the end. He knocked softly on the door. “Tsena!”
The man behind the
desk didn’t look up. He wore a uniform with pleats so straight and sharp
Dambuza wondered if they would cut a finger drawn along them. His desk was tidy
and he clicked away on a laptop finishing what he was doing while indicating
Dambuza should take a seat at one of the wooden chairs in front of his desk. A
few minutes passed while he finished then he looked up. “Yes, what can I do for
you?”
“I’m Detective
Dambuza from Francistown.”
He saw the boss’
eyes pass over the clock on the wall. “Trouble finding us this morning?”
“No, I ran into
something on the way. A man trying to rob a woman of her cellphone. I brought
the culprit in.”
The boss stood up
and held out his hand. “Sorry… we get all kinds as I’m sure you know. I’m
Assistant Superintendent Tito Barulaganye. Most around here just call me Tito.”
He reached for a file on top of his in tray. “Looks like you’ve been having
some problems in Francistown.”
Dambuza wondered
how much was in that file. “Yes, sir. But I think I’ve sorted most of the
problems out now.”
“Is it?” Tito
asked sceptically. “I’ll be honest. I don’t like chasing after my staff. They
should do what the government has hired them to do. You don’t trouble me, I
won’t trouble you. From your file I can see you get the job done, impressively
in fact. You seem to do it in an unconventional way, but I don’t care about
that. What I want is a clean, quiet town. My officers make sure I get what I
want. Do we understand each other?”
“I think we do,
sir.” Dambuza already liked this man.
“Okay. As for your
personal life, well that’s it-it’s yours- and it’s personal. I don’t care
unless it keeps you from doing the job up to my specifications.”
“I understand,
sir.” Dambuza was beginning to see that the file contained everything and he
thought as much. His past boss was a crazy, born-again Christian with a
pathological hatred for alcohol. He’d do raids on bars that were operating
legally just to give the customers a fright and send them to their homes. He
hated Dambuza the moment they met. He was happy his current boss seemed not to
be weighed down by so much baggage.
“Okay, so this
thief you collected this morning, is the victim with you too?” Tito asked.
“No, she said
she’d come in later. She says she knows you, her name’s Delly Woods.”
Tito smiled and
shook his head. Dambuza was beginning to wonder about this woman all the police
knew. “Okay, no problem. Tell Blue at the desk to show you your office. Ah…I’m
a bit short staffed today. I wonder if you could do me a favour.”
“Sure, what is
it?”
“Let Blue and Zero
take care of Delly’s case. I’m supposed to go to some official opening thing
today and I have a monthly stats report due in Gaborone. They expect us to
attend all of these community meetings, if I’m not at the kgotla I’m at the
airport greeting some actor from America. How they think I can do my job I
don’t know. So maybe you could attend this official opening thing. I’m supposed
to be there at eleven.”
“No problem, what
is it?”
“We have a new
AIDS laboratory opened here in Maun. Quite important actually. They’re employing about 200 people down
there. They’ve been open for about a year now but the official opening is
today.” He dug around in his drawer. “Go with this. Say you’re standing in for
me. The President is coming up and the Minister of Health. It’s a big deal. And
like most big deals, it will take the whole day. You’ll be doing me a huge
favour.”
Dambuza took the
invite and went looking for Blue who led him to an office opposite the hallway
leading to the jail cells. It was small and painted army green, but it had a
big window looking out on the main street. Furniture included a scratched
wooden desk that looked like it weighed at least 200 kg, a rickety secretary’s
chair with one wheel missing and two metal chairs that when moved made a noise
much bigger than they should. “This looks great, thanks.”
Dambuza collected
a box of office things from the Corolla. He was at his desk putting pens in
holders and files in draws when he looked up to see Blue again. “You have a
visitor Detective Chakalisa.”
“Call me
Dambuza.” Blue smiled and moved aside to
let the visitor in.
Dambuza looked at
the man with Blue and knew without a second glance he was a lawyer. It was a
combination of the pin-striped suit and the arrogant sneer. For some reason
lawyers saw themselves at the top of the food chain and were oblivious to the
fact that everyone else saw them significantly lower down.
“How can I help
you?” Dambuza asked.
Dambuza’s mind trawled
through all the possible people that might be sending a lawyer after him in
Maun. A few unpaid debts, the owner of the ancient BMW he knocked one night
when trying to make his way home from the bar, he remembered one guy
threatening to sue him for libel after a verbal fight they’d had at the Marang.
The list was long, but still he was surprised when he opened the summons. It
was from Bontle, his wife, and she was filing for divorce.
“Sign here.” The
lawyer’s face was skewed up as if he didn’t like the smell of Dambuza’s new
office. He disappeared as soon as he had the papers back in their envelope.
Dambuza signed
mechanically and fell back in his chair which jerked onto its three wheels
making him reach out for the desk before he toppled over. Divorce? He knew their
marriage was in problems. It had been for a long time. He was never quite good
enough for Bontle. They fought. He drank. She shouted. He left. She followed
him. Francistown knew about the fights they had in public and likely some they
had in private too. They were legendary. But even with all of that, she was his
wife. For eighteen years she was his wife, he was her husband. The fighting was
their way. But divorce? He couldn’t believe she had the nerve to do it.
He thought the
transfer would help them. He’d get home when he could, and they’d be together
for short period of times where they might find a way to talk and get through
some of their problems. He thought being apart would give them both a bit of
air. He thought it was the beginning of a new chapter. Apparently, Bontle saw it
in a different way, a chance to finally be free of him.
If that’s how she
wanted it fine. He reached in his box and pulled out a thermos. Found his “Greatest
Dad in the World” mug and filled it a quarter with the gin from the thermos.
Downed it in one gulp. Fine divorce it will be. Cheers!
He popped a mint
in his mouth, and just as he was putting the lid on the thermos bottle, Blue’s
face appeared in the doorframe. “Dambuza, the driver’s here to take you to Hope
Institute.”
Chapter 4
Dambuza was shown
his seat in the one step down from the VIP section. He sat with heads of
departments and some of the local business leaders. They were waiting for the President and the
Health Minister to arrive. Dambuza looked around.
This was some
place. Three blocks of two story face brick buildings made up the Institute.
The grounds were immaculate with lawns of green grass and flower beds sprinkled
with all of the colours of the rainbow. So unlike the rest of Maun that
operated on shades of grey and brown most of the year. The employees had
uniforms in various styles, all in the turquoise corporate colours of the
Institute. They sat in a big group under
the wide tent opposite to where Dambuza was sitting.
Dambuza paged
through the booklet he’d been given by the usher. Hope Institute was started by
an American named Dr. Hamilton Ride. He’d worked at Brown University and was
part of setting up the Lifespan/Tuft Brown Center for AIDS Research, “one of
the leaders in HIV/AIDS research” according to the promotional material. From
there he came to Botswana, a country hard hit by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and set
up the Hope Institute. Their goal was to produce products that stopped the
spread of the disease and helped those already infected lead a normal healthy
life. Their first product they came up with was a viricide called Total
Protection. According to the book, there is a spray form for men and a
suppository of women. It could be applied 48 hours before sex and kills all
human immunodeficiency viruses on contact. It allows people to go back to
having sex without condoms according to the booklet. Dambuza was impressed.
Could change the whole scenario, he thought. These people were doing some
important things.
He looked up and
everyone was standing. The President was arriving. Straight away Dambuza
recognised the boss of the place, Dr Hamilton Ride. He looked just like his
photo in the brochure. He was walking with the President. Behind them was the
Minister of Health, Dr Lesang Morapedi, who was walking with a woman Dambuza
could not stop looking at. She wore a suit trimmed in the turquoise of Hope
Institute, so obviously worked for them. She said something to the Minister and
they both laughed and for a moment Dambuza was sure the world shook. He’d never
in his life seen such a beautiful woman, he was sure of it.
As the VIP guests
moved to their seats at the front, Dambuza could not pull his eyes away from
the woman. She had curly brown, shoulder length hair, tossed as if without
effort but looking fabulous. She was
tall and strong looking, taller than the Minister who was a tall Kalanga woman,
even taller than the President. Her skin was a glowing caramel colour. Dambuza
couldn’t decide if she was Indian, or coloured, or Arabic. He could pay
attention to nothing else. He was so
fascinated with the woman that he didn’t notice someone sitting down next to
him.
“So we meet
again.”
Dambuza turned,
finally cut from his hypnotic state. He turned to see the woman from the
morning, the victim of the cellphone robbery, Delly Woods. “Well Mrs. Woods, I
didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Ms. – I’ve been
divorced, much, much longer than I was married. Doesn’t seem right hanging on
to the Mrs.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be.
Sometimes divorce is the best thing for a couple. He’s still a good friend,
just a complete mess of a husband.”
Dambuza certainly
understood that. He looked back to the front where Dr. Hamilton Ride was at the
podium speaking about the assistance the Hope Institute had received from the
government. Besides generous tax breaks, the government was a 40% shareholder
in the project.
Hamilton Ride
spoke with a practiced voice, deep and full. He had everyone’s attention.
“We’re very thankful that the government has been able to partner with us to
produce Total Protection. We are already exporting to the entire world. So it
is a product that is creating jobs in Botswana where unemployment is so high as
well as helping curb the escalating HIV infection rate that your country and so
many others has been struggling with for years.”
The crowd
applauded. “I’d like to introduce my other partner in the project -Portia Delany.”
A thin, blonde woman sitting at the end of the front row stood up. She waved at
the crowd, smiling with a face that was not used to such movements. She was not
an ugly woman, but she was unattractive because of her hard face. She looked at
the audience with her forced smiled, but it changed when she looked back at her
partner, Hamilton Ride. It softened, Dambuza expected there was something more
than business between to the two.
“Ms Delany is a
world renowned expert on viruses and bacteria. She’s actually the owner of the
patent for Total Protection, she did the research on it. She’s quite a hero if
you ask me.”
The crowd
applauded. “Again,” Dr. Ride continued, “Thank you for coming and please enjoy
the day. Feel free to move around and take a look at our lovely facility. You
are indeed welcome!”
A traditional
dance troupe moved to the stage and Dr. Ride took his seat back next to the
President.
“Slick one that
guy,” Delly whispered.
“Who? That guy?” Dambuza said. “You mean Hamilton
Ride?”
“Sure, look at
him. I don’t trust a guy who looks like that. Too polished, must be hiding
something.”
Dr. Hamilton Ride
was indeed a handsome man. His suit, if Dambuza knew anything about makes and
costs of suits, would have likely impressed him. Dr Ride had thick, dark hair
with just enough strands of grey to give him an air of respect, but not enough
to tone down his sexiness factor which was through the roof. While Dambuza and
likely most of the men in the crowd were captivated by the woman with the Health
Minster, the women were likely equally drawn to Dr Ride. All the women except
Delly Woods, but already having known Delly Woods for less than a handful of
hours, Dambuza had come to the conclusion that she was not like any other
woman.
Dambuza’s eyes
drifted back to the woman at the front he couldn’t stop watching. She had
beautiful hands. Long fingers, manicured nails. He searched everywhere for
something that was not perfect on her. She had to have something. Maybe her
feet smelled. Or she had a terrible, high-pitched voice. He hoped so. As soon
as he thought that he looked at Delly Woods, hadn’t she said almost the same
thing about Hamilton Ride?
He was looking at
the woman he now thought of in his mind, no matter how crazy the thought might be,
as “his woman”, and for a moment he thought she smiled at him. He looked
around. Did anyone else see that? Dambuza was realistic. At 49, he knew enough
about himself to know that this woman was miles out of his league. Her league
was so far away he’d need another lifetime just to walk to the edge of it. But
she did smile at him? Right? That was something. Or was he delusional?
Despite the fact
that he’d been sent to the edge of the world, to a town where police are called
out to chase elephants out of maize fields, where white dust covered
everything, a place where his career was going to come to a grinding halt, and
he’d been served with divorce papers only hours before, the most beautiful
woman in the entire world just smiled at him and he was feeling pretty
fantastic.
***
Long, white-clothed
tables had been set out for the VIPs and the not so VIPs in the dining hall of
Hope Institute. Dambuza sat down next to Delly with his plate of the
prerequisite diet for such affairs: seswaa, Tastic rice, butternut, beet roots,
and the one piece of leather-hard, overcooked chicken. The one saving grace was
wine on the tables. Dambuza was not normally a wine drinker, but when push came
to shove alcohol was alcohol.
Delly reached her
long arm out for the bottle of red in the middle before he could get a chance.
“Thank God for this.”
She filled
Dambuza’s glass to the top and then hers then set the bottle near to them in a proprietorial
way. They’d finish the bottle the two of them before they’d leave the place. It
was decided without speaking a word. Dambuza liked this woman.
“So you, are you
married?” Delly asked taking a bit of seswaa with her hands and popping it in
her mouth, Setswana style.
“Yeah.”
Technically that was still true.
“Kids?”
“Three, one girl,
two boys.”
“So where are
they?”
“With their
mother. She’s a nurse at Nyangabwe, supervisor.”
“You and your
husband ever have any kids?” Dambuza asked.
“No, I wasn’t
interested in kids by then, I was already 34 and I had my business to take care
of. No time for babies when you need to be carting foreigners around to look at
giraffes and lions.”
An old man in a
frayed suit jacket and a hat he’d likely bought in the 1950s came up to their
table. “Dumela, MmeDelly. O tsogile jang, ngwanaka?”
Delly stood up and
shook the old man’s hand, holding her right arm with her left in the
traditional Setswana way of showing respect. “Kgosi Mpho ke tsogile sentle, Ntate.”
Then they were off
on a long discussion about the rain, all in perfect Setswana. Delly introduced
Dambuza and the old man was on his way.
Delly sat back down and took a drink of her wine.
“So how long have
you been here?” Dambuza asked seeing yet another aspect of this odd, unexpected
woman.
“Long time. I arrived
here as a young girl of twenty in 1968.”
Dambuza did the math
in his head. That made her sixty-two. He couldn’t believe that. He thought they
were about the same age. She was weathered looking, but she was so active and
strong. Looked like life in the bush was good for the aging process, maybe Maun
deserved another notch in his book.
“What brought you
here?” Dambuza asked.
“Hmmm…now that’s a
long story. One day when we’ve drank a lot more than one bottle of wine I’ll
tell you.” Delly smiled thoughtfully
then nodded her head as if answering a question in her head.
Dambuza was checking
his watch. It was already four, he thought he better pass by the station before
Tito knocked off to give him a report. “I better get going.”
Delly held out her
hand to stop him. “No, wait, I want you to meet my daughter.”
“Your daughter? I
thought you said you didn’t have any kids.”
“No, you asked me
if I had kids with my husband. We didn’t have any kids together, but I do have
a daughter.”
Just then Dambuza
saw “his woman” heading their way. He sat back down. He had the excuse of
waiting around to meet Delly’s daughter so he didn’t feel awkward waiting for
the woman to get closer, which she seemed to be doing. If he was lucky he might
get a few minutes with “his woman”, maybe talk to her a bit. He was regretting
not looking for one of his ties in the back seat of the Corolla before
coming.
He tried not to
watch her as she walked their way. “So does your daughter work here?” Dambuza
asked, not very interested.
“Yeah, just
temporarily. She usually lives in UK, but needed to come home for awhile and is
working doing marketing for these folks.”
Dambuza tried his
hardest to pay attention to what Delly was saying, but “his woman” was coming
closer and closer and his nerves were getting the better of him. He looked her
direction and she smiled at him – again.
Damn. Was this really happening? He couldn’t believe it. He practiced what he
would say to her in his head.
“Marketing eh?” he
asked Delly, trying to appear engaged.
“Yeah, it’s not
really her passion but she does a lot of it for the theatres she works for in
London. Oh here she is.”
Delly stood and
Dambuza looked up from his plate where he’d been pushing a chicken bone around
with his fork trying his best not to stare at the “his woman”. Delly was
standing with her arms around someone. When she pulled back Dambuza couldn’t
believe his eyes- “his woman” was Delly’s daughter.
No comments:
Post a Comment