By

Thabo Mooke

Author Thabo Mooke

She was abused at birth. Nobody knew who she was. Less than two months after her birth, her mother wrapped the baby in a black plastic bag and left it on a footpath in the veld.
There was a bright sun across the horizon. The withering thorn tree leaves swayed in the cool autumn breeze. A sad sound came from the bristle golden grass. Mma-Dlamini had walked across the open veld to her church for as long as she could remember. She wore her usual white top, sky-blue skirt, and white cap. Her thick waist was rounded by blue and white woollen ropes, her church uniform.
She stopped dead in her tracks. Her eyes opened wide in astonishment, and she gazed to the side where she thought she heard the joyful sounds of a child after it had suckled its mother’s breast. The hair on her nape stood up and hesitant, she strode towards the sound.
The giggles continued. Gee… gee… gee…
She gazed at the black bag, peeled it back, and glared at the newborn. It lay on the back and kicked the tiny legs in playfulness. Naked, it was a girl. The child remained unperturbed as it continued to kick her legs in the air as if seeking realisation.
Their eyes locked, and an innocent, pleasant smile stretched the baby’s face. It was a blameless smile oblivious to the hurts of life. But Ma-Dlamini did not reciprocate the baby’s pleasantness. Her eyes opened wide in shock and disbelief.
The universal instincts of a typical woman did not kick into Ma-Dlamini. She was detached, as if she were looking at something else.
But, in her dispassion and ice-coldness, she acknowledged, that the baby’s size was a sign of robust health. A precious bundle of joy, its face glowed from the joyfulness. And she guessed the baby had never cried and slept all night since its mother left the hospital with her.
Ma-Dlamini picked up the baby. She held her away from her white top, not to stain it, and hurried across the veld towards her church.
She and the other congregants stood outside the corrugated zinc church. She gazed at the priest. “Mfundisi, I’m taking her home to bathe clothe and feed her”.
“That’s very kind of you, Ma-Dlamini. Inkosi e ku busise, may God bless you,” said Mfundisi Khumalo.
Ma-Dlamini turned to walk away. “Mfazi, woman, u zo mbiza bani le ngani, who are you going to name the child?” asked one woman.
“Thokozani”, said another woman.
Ma-Dlamini was a large woman with squat legs and hands. A dark chocolate face, her glowing round eyes radiated with warmth. Hard work and economic hardships had consumed her beauty. Yet Ma-Dlamini still oozed humanity.
‘Nana… nana, lala sana lam… go to sleep my child’. She sang a lullaby as she tugged the baby into bed after bathing and feeding her.
Ma-Dlamini, a widow, her husband, had died in a mining accident in Virginia in the Free State and she did not have children of her own. She earned a meagre salary doing laundry, mostly for government servants in the township. A skilled brewer of a concoction of traditional beer, segonya matlho. She traded in the brew to augment her small earnings. Men converged on her yard in summer or sat in a backyard room consuming their favourite drink.
Over the years, Thokozani had grown into a beautiful young woman. Tall, full-bodied, with shapely long legs. Envious girls of her age thought she looked far more mature for her age. She was of glowing light skin, a heart-shaped face, a luscious wide mouth, oval enormous eyes, and big breasts.
Thokozani did not match Ma-Dlamini’s brewing skills, but she was delighted to serve the old woman’s customers. The men gathered at Ma-Dlamini’s home every afternoon when they arrived home from work. Thokozani also served the men on weekends when Ma-Dlamini had gone to her church’s night vigils in various areas around the country.
Some men, old enough to be Thokozani’s grandfather, perverts who lusted after young girls, took delight in being served by the girl. Their covetous eyes would undress the girl. Their imagination ran wild as they felt their manhood erect. Among them was Uzanempi Zondo. He was in a polygamous marriage, two of his wives lived in Kwa-Zulu-Natal, and he lived with his younger wife in Mamelodi.
Ma-Dlamini had frequently warned Zondo not to refer to Thokozani as mfazi wam omcane, my young wife. But the warning fell on deaf ears. Zondo’s reference to Thokozani persisted, and Ma-Dlamini’s warning waned. Thokozani also became accustomed to Zondo’s reference, and it stopped bothering her.
That evening, Ma-Dlamini was dressed in her blue skirt and white top church uniform, a shawl on her shoulders. She stopped in the kitchen and glanced at Thokozani, washing the dishes at the zinc.
“Thokozani, lock the doors, do not open for anyone after 7 pm, and don’t sell liquor to anyone. You understand?”
This was a routine warning whenever Ma-Dlamini went away to her church’s night vigils. It had become like a scratched record to the girl.
Thokozani’s brow furrowed with annoyance, and her voice tight. “Yes, Ma, I know that”.
“Well, stay safe, I’ll see you in the morning”, she strode out. Months later, Ma-Dlamini would loathe that Saturday evening.
Long after Ma-Dlamini had left, the doors locked as instructed by her mother, Thokozani sat in the living room watching TV. A knock sounded at the door, and another hard one followed. She hurried to the kitchen door.
“Who’s that?”
“Mfaz’wam, vula himi, open it’s me.”
Thokozani drew a long breath, as her stomach knotted in shock. Zondo, like all of Ma-Dlamini’s customers, knew that she had barred them from coming to buy liquor after 7 pm. The old woman never relented on this rule, and her customers abided by it.
“What do you want?” There was a tremor in Thokozani’s voice. “You know you’re not supposed to come here this late.”
“I know. I won’t be long, please open the door.”
Hesitantly, Thokozani unlocked the door, opened and stared at Zondo her eyes brightened with curiosity. “What do you want? You’re not supposed to come at night”.
Zondo sandwiched himself between the door frame and Thokozani and waltzed into the kitchen. “Pour me a drink, make it quick. I’ll gulp it and go away”.
Standing before him at the table, she twaddles the fingers of her shaking hands. “But I can’t…”
Zondo allowed a lazy smile on his face, his lustrous eyes fixed on Thokozani’s large breast. “You can’t or you don’t want to?” He fished out a R10 note from his pocket and made out his hand towards her. “Listen, I’ll guzzle, finish before you could even think I was here”.
“Kodwa, but, Baba Zondo, eish…” Her voice trailed. She walked away without taking the note.
She bent at a plastic container next to the kitchen dresser to pour the drink into a plastic jar. Thokozani’s dress lifted, revealing the back of her smooth and elegant thighs. A lump moved up and down Zondo’s throat, almost choking him. He felt his manhood erect. Thokozani placed the jug on the table and their eyes locked.
As she reached for the R10 note on the table, he grabbed her hand and held it tight. “Come and sit next to me, we need to talk”.
“What are you doing? There’s nothing to talk about, please drink your liquor and leave.” Thokozani pulled out her hand and flung Zondo’s hand sideways.
He rose from the chair like his backside had been stung by hot needles. Thokozani’s mouth sagged and her eyes shone with terror as Zondo moved across the table. She dashed to the living room. In quick strides; he followed her. Her mouth opened wide, but the scream trapped at the back of her throat, Zondo cupped her mouth.
He dragged her to the ground, legs kicking wildly, he placed his knee on her chest, and with his free hand, he pulled down her panties, and raped her.
Not convinced her mother would believe her, and too scared to tell Ma-Dlamini about the rape, Thokozani kept the ordeal secret.
Elderly women, in Black society in particular, are endowed to notice a teenage girl’s pregnancy at its very early stages. And they are always spot on. They observed that the girl’s breasts grew bigger. Their eyes sparkle and the tone of their skin becomes smoother and radiant, they would be convinced there was a bun in the oven.
“No, Ma, how could you even think I’m pregnant?”
“My child,” said Ma-Dlamini, “I’m long in this world to know these things. You can’t fool me.”
Ma-Dlamini never brought up the subject again with her daughter. But she would get the shock of her life one morning, a day after Thokozani had written the last paper of her matric examination. An early person, Ma-Dlamini was sweeping the yard when she heard a shrieking scream coming from her daughter’s bedroom. She stopped dead in her tracks and could not breathe as she saw blood dripping down Thokozani’s legs. Ma-Dlamini rushed out, and in her bedroom, she dialled an emergency number for an ambulance.
A week later, Ma-Dlamini held the whooping baby girl in her arms, seated at the table across from Thokozani. Though the baby wasn’t crying, she rocked the bundle of joy with all the care she could amass.
“You still don’t want to tell me who the father is, Thokozani?”
She glanced at her mother, eyes pleaded, and shook her head. “Let’s leave it at that Ma. I promise I’ll not abandon Mbali like my mother did.”
Ma-Dlamini was delighted to take care of Mbali while Thokozani looked for employment.
Thokozani also spent most of her free time at the gym to get back her body shape and keep fit. A local karate instructor, Sansei Koko, encouraged her to join his club for karate lessons. But Thokozani was reluctant.
“You’ll surely like it. Women today need skills to defend themselves,” said Koko.
Pondering the prospect, her eyes blurred as she recalled the incident of her rape. ‘Women today need skills to defend themselves. Koko’s words echoed in her head. She considered she could not defend herself on the night Zondo raped her. She did not have the skill to do so.
She later joined Sensei Koko’s club. In less than a year, Thokozani was awarded a black belt.
Age had caught up with Ma-Dlamini, her strength waned, and she had stopped brewing beer at her home. Employed as a clerk at the Mamelodi Day Care Hospital, Thokozani could now support her family. She was content that the family lived comfortably on her salary.
Mbali, a replica of her mother, had grown into a beautiful woman. Shapely tall legs, slim, and a dark chocolate face, her peers always encouraged her to enter the Miss Mamelodi Beauty pageant. But she vehemently refused to heed the encouragement, apprehensive this would distract her studies.
A double tragedy struck two days after Mbali turned 17. Ma-Dlamini died after a brief illness from diabetic complications. And at about 6:30 pm that evening, as she arrived home from a school trip, Mbali was attacked and raped outside the gate of her home. The occurrence left Thokozani devastated, blaming herself for having failed to protect her daughter. She refused to listen to counsel that it was not her fault, but a societal issue. Men who were supposed to protect the vulnerable members of their society have turned into indescribable monsters.
But Thokozani’s solace that the scumbag that had raped her daughter had been arrested would turn into a nightmare. The man’s parents paid for the services of a well-known Pretoria criminal lawyer to defend their son. The culprit was acquitted on a technicality. The state had failed to provide credible evidence that the man had committed the crime.
From that day onwards, Thokozani developed an intense loathing for criminal lawyers. She despised them for being insensitive, selfish, and a greedy lot. The cared only for money.
Like a pack of hungry hyenas, reporters surrounded the acquitted man, his parents, and his lawyer. The man, a beaming face with a triumphant smile, fielded questions from the reporters.
Mbali had not come to court, as she was not feeling well. Thokozani stood further from the crowd, watching the spectacle. She glowered at the man, his family, and the lawyer.
“Oh… I’m so happy; I’m delighted I’ve been vindicated.” The man turned to look at his lawyer and they exchanged glances. “And it’s all thanks to my lawyer and my parents who always believed in my innocence.”
Thokozani lay in bed tossing and turning, unable to find sleepiness. She vowed to avenge her daughter’s torment at all costs. That morning, she walked into her manager’s office. Her hands trembling, she took out a white envelope from her handbag and tossed it on his table.
The man looked up at her, eyes opened wide in a startle. What’s this?”
“Open it”, she said, her voice trembling with fury.
The man tore the envelope and read the letter. There was a heavy silence after the manager had read the letter. He put it on the desk and their eyes locked.
“Are you crazy, Thokozani? You’ve just lost your mother, and who do you think will take care of your daughter?”
“I guess I’m crazy”. She pushed back the chair and walked out.
Thokozani was adamant, even though the man was acquitted because his parents had employed a good damn lawyer for him, he remained a rapist. Seated at the table, with a pair of scissors. She cut the two photographs of the acquitted man, his family, and his lawyer from newspapers. The story of the man’s acquittal had appeared on the front page of a national newspaper. She rose from the chair, went outside, and tossed the newspapers into the rubbish bin.
Her surveillance of Mahamba’s house did not yield any fruits on the first day. Nobody walked in or out of the house she was watching. She had gathered that the man acquitted of raping her daughter was the only son. He was known in his neighbourhood for his misdemeanours, assault, and for raping young women after spiking their drinks at shebeens.
A source had told Thokozani; “He’s a rotten, spoilt brat. His parents always come to his defence and bail him out every time he is arrested.”
It was now the third day since Thokozani had embarked on her mission. Thokozani sat on a rock in the scorching sun, holding an umbrella. Her back leaned against a church fence, she noticed two people walk out of the yard she was observing. A middle-aged male and female walked in the other direction.
A few moments later, her teeth clenched; “That’s him. The bastard”, she said to herself as she saw a man walk to the gate, and he walked back to the house.
Her heart thumping as it would pop out of her breast, and panting, she sprinted towards the house. As the man came out of the kitchen, his eyes opened wide in a startle.
“Oh… shit, you scared me”. He held his chest, his eyes shone with recognition, and his voice hostile. “What the hell are you doing here?” He moved towards Thokozani, leaving the door ajar.
A mocking smile parted Thokozani’s lips. “I’m looking for heavenly answers from you”.
“Look man, it’s all over, I’ve been acquitted, what the shit do you want from me? Just piss off.” He waved his hand in vigour at Thokozani.
In lightning speed, she grabbed his hand, twisted it to his back, and as the man grimaced with pain, with her free hand, she wrapped her fingers around his windpipe. She pushed him inside the kitchen and placed him on his back on the kitchen table.
Her voice was soft, but firm. “I want your lawyer’s address and telephone numbers. Is that too much to ask for?”
“You’re hurting me. Just piss off, I don’t have them.”
She increased the pressure on his windpipe. When Thokozani noticed the terror on the man’s face, she exerted more pressure. “Don’t be some smart Alec with me; you sure must have them, right”.
He nodded in brisk movements. She allowed a satisfactory smile to cross her face. Thokozani held the young man around his neck and lifted him. His hand still twisted at his back, she followed the man out of the kitchen. In his bedroom, he fumbled in the drawer of his dressing table and handed her the lawyer’s business card.
She conceded, that anybody facing potential injury or death, is unlikely to lie, she shoved the man onto the bed and walked out.
In the telephone directory, the lawyer’s residential address was listed, as No 8163 Mamelodi West, and his name was Anthony Mashamba.
Thokozani had smiled with satisfaction when research revealed that the socialite attorney, in his late 30s, was a bachelor and lived all by himself. On three occasions, after she observed Anthony Mashamba’s house, she was positive the man was a socialite. The whose-who of Mamelodi frequented his house, consuming large quantities of alcohol till the wee hours of the morning. She also observed that some women slept over. They would leave in the morning before Mahsamba left for work. He was also a womaniser, Thokozani told herself.
Clouds scudded across the horizon, it was dark, and only one streetlight at the far end illuminated Mashamba’s street. She cursed under her breath, she guessed there would not be any activity at Mashmamba’s that evening. Thokozani had walked up and down the street without seeing the usual activity at the lawyer’s house.
As she walked from the far end of the street, a car parked outside Mashamba’s gate. She fought back the temptation of sprinting towards the house, in case he would be disturbed by the footsteps.
At a safe distance, she noticed Mashamba unlocking the gate; he got into the car and drove inside.
As he struggled to open the garage door, Thokozani sneaked into the yard and hid behind the wall of the front. Hot blood rushed down her face. She was in a dilemma, not sure if she must confront him, whistle he was still outside the house, or wait for him to go inside. At that, Mashamba opened the kitchen door, and a moment later the living room lit up.
Thokozani believed socialites had a detrimental weakness. They welcomed people into their houses all the time, even those they did not expect.
She knocked at the back door, and on the second, she pushed the door open.
“Come in”, Mashamba’s voice came from the bedroom.
She hurried and stopped in the middle of the door. Mashamba was unfastening his tie, he stopped, eyes dazzling with astonishment, and dropped his hands on the sides. Thokozani smiled at him, he looked pathetic like some stranger had caught him naked, his lawman’s dignity now stripped.
“Who’re you.”
She chose not to respond to his question. “Are you not having a party tonight, you and your friends?”
“Is this a kind of sick joke? Get out of my house”. He realised Thokozani had no intention of obeying his instructions. And now his voice pitched. “I said get out”.
He turned away from her; Thokozani sprinted towards him and stood behind. He opened the wardrobe and turned around with a gun in hand. She kneed him between his legs; he let out an excruciating groan and bent. Her hands clasped, Thokozani delivered a crushing blow at the back of his head, the gun fell out of his hand and he dropped to the floor.
She picked up the gun and pointed it at him. “Do you remember me?”
He shook his head. “Please, I’ll give you everything you want.”
Her body trembled with anger and fury.
She was disgusted by Mashamba’s lie that he did not know her; he had crossed examined her after she had given evidence to the prosecution about Mbali’s whereabouts on the evening she was raped.
“Lying bastard…”
Sitting on the floor, his back against the wall, his hands lifted, there was terror in Mashmamba’s eyes. “Listen, it’s my job, he was my client, and I had to defend him”.
“And now I’m here to defend my daughter. You and your scumbag client,” and now her voice pitched, “will never restore my daughter’s dignity and innocence.”
A shot rang out, and in quick succession, three others followed.
While the police combed the crime scene around Mashamba’s house, two detectives and a forensic team searched for evidence. “Damn it”, there’s no murder weapon”.
Somewhere in Mamelodi, a fight broke out in a shebeen over a bottle of beer. The man, who had been acquitted of Thokozani’s daughter’s rape, was stabbed several times in the chest and neck by an unknown man who fled the scene. The victim was declared dead on arrival at the hospital. Now the two detectives who had been at Mashamba’s house had a double murder on their hands.
In the morning, Thokozani found a young female constable idle behind the counter at the Mamelodi Police station. She drew some weird objects with her red pen on a piece of paper. That’s what they are paid for, after all, wasting the taxpayer’s money doing zilch.
“I’m here to report the murder of a Mashamba, said Thokozani.
The constable’s eyes flickered like she was watching a horror movie. “Wait, I’ll find the detective for you”, she disappeared along the corridor.
After a while, the constable emerged followed by a man with his belly sagging, Thokozani smiled in amusement, it looked like a cow udder.
“How can I help you”. There was a trace of hostility in the man’s tone.
“I’m here to help you, detective.”
“How so?’
“OK. Will you believe me if I say I know who killed Mashamba? The lawyer who was killed last night?”
The detective breathed in. Out. He gazed at the idle constable as if seeking answers from her. He turned to look at Thokozani. “All right, come this way to my office”.
The place was too small to be occupied by two people. There was a steel cabinet against the wall, two ancient desks cluttered with many government documents, and a telephone. A detective sat behind the desk, eyes bloodshot and non-sleep bags below his eyes.
The belly detective pulled a chair over and offered Thokozani to sit down. “Tell me, how do you think you can help me?” He glanced at his colleague. There was a mocking smile on his face. “She says she knows who killed Mashamba.”
The other detective moved out of his desk. He stood next to Thokozani. “Madame, are you sure you don’t need professional help?”
She ignored the detective standing next to her. She permitted a lazy smile on her face and her voice stern. “I said I’m here to help you solve this matter as quickly as possible. That bastard”, she reached into her handbag and placed the gun on the table. “He defended the man who raped my daughter. This is his gun”.
There was silence. The two detectives could not imagine that Mashamba’s murder and that of the man stabbed to death at a shebeen could be a coincidence.
“Wait a minute,” said the belly detective. “Do you also know the young man who was stabbed to death at the shebeen? He was killed almost at the same time Mashamba was shot to death.”
“Listen, detective,” there was a trace of irritation in her tone, “I had nothing to do with the scumbag who was killed at the shebeen. I shot the attorney. I did not kill the rapist. ”