PASTOR HANTAMBO REPENTS

    “We are sending Pastor Hantambo to deposit the tithe money into the bank, Amen church!” Elder Munaumba concluded the business meeting at the venerated Chazanga SDA church one afternoon.

   “Amen! Alleluia! Amen! Alleluia!” the church exploded in a standing ovation.

  Pastor Hantambo was thirty four years old, slightly short and completely brown in complexion. He did not waste time after the dramatic announcement by the elder. With bubbles of elation at being honored with such a delicate task, he asked elder Mundulo to rush him to the bank immediately.

    “I must reach the bank fast before they close,” he begged the elder.

    The elder ground his teeth in secret frustration .If he refused and then something happened to the tithe money wouldn’t the wrath of God definitely seek him out? But then just because one was an elder did the whole world expect him to offer free transport? Were questions buzzing his head.

  “Alright pastor, let’s go,” he reluctantly agreed, fearing the wrath of God more than anything else.

  He got into the blue Cressida and swung it round to join the main road. The time was thirteen fifty and the sun was shining brightly.He had to reach the bank before fourteen thirty. Traffic was minimal, there was no earthly reason why he could not beat the system and reach the bank as expected. But a strange curse also had its own ideas.

  “Licence please!”An officer at Matero roadblock shouted excitedly. He looked at the vehicle with envy because it looked completely new.

  “Here is the license Bwana,” Mundulo extended the document.

  The face of the officer fell down.

  “Are you sure this is your licence?”He howled like a drowning man.

  Being naive, Elder Mundulo failed to understand the rules guiding traffic police officers; he dipped his hand into the hip pocket to produce his NRC to back up his licence. Producing a licence, who told him that traffic officers eat or drink licenses?

   “Yes I knew it, why is the Mapanza on the licence and the one on the NRC different?”The officer shouted triumphantly. One Mapanza had no n as opposed to the other one.

   “What is the problem officer?”

 “Don’t even officer me, I am impounding the vehicle.”

“Why should you impound a vehicle for no reason?”

“This is a product from proceeds of crime.”

    He then arrested the occupants as probable perpetrators of the crimes of motor vehicle theft according to him until further notice.

   “You will agree with me that it is unusual for such critical details to miss unless one is forged,” he said while keeping Mundulo under close observation through the corner of his left eye.The fault was slight but traffic police regarded nothing small as long as a small payment was not made;what mattered was the payment not the crime.

     However at eighteen fifty hours, the grumpy officer released them with a stern warning never to drive around without licenses .The officer hid his eyes behind shades but it was clear he was greatly disappointed with Mundulo’s immaturity in dealing with the law. He watched them meekly like a sick dog seeing its master off as they entered the vehicle to drive off.

      However, they could not drive off at all. The fuel tank was completely empty.

     “How can fuel be stolen from a vehicle right under the nose of the police?” Mundulo complained bitterly as he looked for an empty container to rush to the filling station for more fuel.

   With a glint of mischief in his eyes, the officer became active ,his zeal resembling that of an avenging angel.

  “You think the boma can steal your fuel?” he shouted. “You will see what made the beak of the partridge red.” Quickly he rearrested Mundulo accusing him of defaming the police.

   Pastor Hantambo left the elder in police custody. Coming out of the police station and mistakenly finding himself near Bishop Imakando’s Blessing Centre he swung round into the notorious Devil’s Street. It was not long before he met the Devil himself with horns.

   Walking a few meters into the notorious street, he decided to enter a chemist to buy some medicine for the family. He did not even stay long inside the chemist, he immediately came out. But just at the door, on his way out, a young energetic woman bumped into him almost knocking him down.

   “What stupidity is this?”The pastor went into cursing vehemently much like us ordinary mortals are fond of doing when crossed.

   “I am terribly sorry for appearing blind sir,” the young woman knelt down briskly . She was wearing a short skirt which curved upwards revealing man-eating thighs screaming to be stroked. Kneeling down was just a girlish prank calculated to expose more leg space which she hoped would throw the pastor’s thinking process into disarray. It did.

   The pastor looked at the girl in anger. His eyes rolled down, attracted by the luscious thighs. The sight caused the fastest change in temperament recorded in history. It reengineered the pastor’s mood completely, no, not completely but irreversibly. The pastor’s hunger for blood was ousted by an overwhelming desire for peace at all costs with the girl. He became a born again, a changed man.

   Dropping the bible a bit more sacrilegiously on the dirty rail where it dropped into the sewage water, he stooped down to pick up the girl by the shoulder and to reassure her that all was well. With the alacrity of a cat the girl got to her feet right up to pastor Hantambo’s frame; head to head.

     “I am pastor Hantambo, terribly sorry about the ungentlemanly outburst,” the pastor was good at breaking barriers into people’s restricted emotional spaces.

  “Thank you pastor, God…” the girl said. “I am Angela…,”

   Even before Angela could finish the word, a violent explosion threw the whole area into total darkness.There was an electrical problem in the nearby shop which affected the whole area.

  “Mamma…...” Angela screamed as she threw herself into the pastor’s body shamelessly. She clung to him as if it was someone from some medieval village. Though she felt guilty of her intentions she consoled herself by saying; “I am not employed, to survive I just have to use what I have.”

    Pastor Hantambo’s earlier problems of vision paled in grimness compared to the new problem of body contact. He would later hypocritically preach that what we feel is more powerful than what we see, off course, from experience. The girl’s body grinding into his for protection caused significant combustion in the central heating system; a person ten yards away would feel the heat. His breathing rate raced to the sky while his erection cleared away any pretentions of being a man of God.

    “Angela, allow me just once, please!”

    “Just once what, papa?”Angela pretended she was totally green in such matters.

      “Can I sleep with you, please just once?”

     “No, I am a virgin,” Angela said dropping her gaze down drawing arcs with her toes like a real virgin.

    “Please I beg you…” the pastor was getting desperate as his right leg started lifting the girl’s skirt to poke for trouble between her legs.

      “Ha! You just here?”Angela protested. “Okay let’s go to that lodge, but just short time.”

     Pastor Hantambo almost lifted the girl on his shoulders for matters to happen a bit more quickly. They booked a room and spent two hours proving to each other why the street is called the Devil’s. At the end of the short service, Angela demanded for five thousand kwacha as payment.

    “Give me five, I want to go,” she said now with a hard face of a seasoned prostitute.

   “No problem here is five hundred as you say,” the pastor said.

   “Please be serious,” Angela fired back. “I said five thousand.”

    “I don’t have that kind of money…” before he could finish the sentence the door was thrown open by a violent push. Two thugs entered making Angela turn violent.

   “Give me my money idiot,” she screamed as she punched the pastor, breaking two front teeth.

   The pastor would pray ernestly about his moral weakness that had led him into the present disaster.The thugs went berserk clearing the twenty thousand kwacha church money from his pockets.

How will he to explain the loss of such a huge sum of money at church? Should he commit suicide? Should he change churches?

should he report to the police?