LEAVE THE BABY ALONE

Jogging in the early morning breeze, Dansi suddenly got trapped in a blizzard sweeping across the village from the Chang’ondo Dam. The cold winds ripped through his vest and shorts even though hot sweat covered his whole body. And not long his skin developed goose pimples to look like a sweet potato field.

To prevent freezing to death, he sought a place to hide until the horror winds died down. And where would that be but where a throng of people was streaming into a supermarket, also escaping the horrible weather outside. The shop was owned by a man named Doricma, his sworn enemy. That was the only safe place.

He hesitated going there for longer than ten minutes. What is the wisdom of seeing refuge in a shop owned by his deadly foe? But those ten minutes were enough to worsen his condition; he was now shivering and sneezing convulsively. Mucus and saliva raced out his nose and mouth like tilapia fish escaping saltwater. When the next wave of cold rain-soaked winds washed over; he surprised no one by rushing headlong into his enemy’s shop without second thoughts. But by now tears were pouring out as if fed relentlessly by the Kariba Dam, and his teeth clattered like the wheels of a goods train.

Once inside the shop, he elbowed his way to the deepest end, hoping to warm himself by the fire.

Doricma, seated at the counter, had seen him struggling to gain space, looking at him with disdain. Enemies have a way of sensing the other’s presence even with eyes closed. Dansi saw the eyes staring at him with undisguisable contempt, like someone welcoming a mad dog into his house. In more civilized situations; he would have left the shop to seek shelter or even just endure the inclement weather. But entering the howling winds now would mean instant death. He had to accept the humiliation of bending a neck to a sworn enemy for a bowl of soup after all disasters don’t give someone the luxury of choosing where help will come from.

“Good morning, Doricma,” he tried some peacemaking. His whole body was trembling, making his lips pronounce words like a baby learning how to talk.

Doricma didn’t answer, as if he had not heard the greeting. Instead, he called to Tailoka who was way behind, buried in a corner; “Tailoka, bring those carton boxes here.”

Tailoka lifted two carton boxes, one in each hand, and brought them to the front as commanded. Then to everyone’s shock, Doricma opened the carton boxes and started giving out biscuits to everyone inside the supermarket, free of charge.

“I don’t like this weather,” he was saying in a small voice and laughing uproariously “it is like the breath of devils. Please, let your humble brother do something to ease the discomfort.”

The whole shop exploded with “Doricma! Doricma! Indeed, this is a real Christian, a man of the people.”

Delighted with himself, Doricma went the extra mile; “if anyone is feeling cold, get a plastic cup and draw some hot coffee from that tap near the door, I will pay.”

Who wouldn’t feel cold when there is free coffee nearby? Everybody suddenly started feeling very cold and some even went through the motions of trembling like soaked chicks, walking slowly after taping the coffee. People know how to encourage sympathy.

 Dansi was horrified that his enemy was making great progress. Pretending he hadn’t heard the offer, he buried himself in a woman’s shoal next to the fire. Unfortunately, he fell into a deep sleep. When he woke up, the blizzard had long gone and so were all the people. There was nothing he could do now, but to simply walk out of the shop quietly. His shame was great, reaching the sky.

Luckily enough for him, Doricma was not at the counter. He had left a small girl to be selling for him.

“Thank God, I can leave without being insulted,” Dansi whispered to himself. He hurriedly walked to the door, but the young girl saw him before he could reach it. She raised surprised eyebrows wondering where he had been, maybe also to see whether he was carrying any items. But on seeing that he had nothing, she cursed under her breath and dropped her gaze to continue reading a text message.

Dansi felt bad. The girl’s eyes could tell that she considered him second class. He almost went back to pick something, anything just to change the girl’s feelings about him when; “whooaaaaaa! Eeeee--eeeee whooaaaaaa!” a child’s cry broke the silence.

Surprised, he almost jumped in alarm; what, a child crying here alone, without a mom? His bulging eyes took some resemblance to small tennis balls, his chest started exploding with fear. Was that a child crying or a vampire? His cerebral computers went berserk trying to decipher what exactly was happening here. The place was rife with stories about shop-owners using humans for rituals, to make people buy items in great numbers for more profit.

But after a few seconds, he calmed his nerves, slightly, and walked towards the baby. He regained composure miraculously fast when he saw another human being coming nearby.

“Maybe she was left by one of those women…,” the girl at the counter tried to explain the unexpected development. She had come down from the counter and was now looking into Dansi’s eyes like someone seeking guidance.

“Hhhh-nthuu!” Dansi cleared his throat and spat thick yellow-orange phlegm on the shining carpet, making an ugly blot. It was clear the girl’s explanation didn’t satisfy him at all. No, he was satisfied all right, but he wanted some reason to twist the situation for his own benefit. It would be beautiful to have payback time-nice payback time for Doricma’s earlier sins.

“Aaaaahaaaaa!” he started, “this is very serious.”

“Uncle Dansi,” the girl was now frantic, “Don’t you know the mother to this child?”Her trembling mouth made her look funny, like a hornbill proposing love. Her mockery was completely gone.

Dansi looked at the girl, his eyes darkened by a sudden eruption of delight. Like an oversized vulture tearing a carcass, he walked away slowly, to start examining the baby.

“Selina!” he called, placing an emphasis on the last two letters. “How many demons has Doricma put in this shop so far?”

“Uncle!” Selina called out, now trembling in fear. “That is a child, not a demon.”

“Don’t think I am stupid?” Dansi asked. “Where is Doricma? Didn’t I see him when I came into your shop?”

“He has gone to the…..” Dansi cut her off; his eyes were now glittering with excitement, like a murder judge sentencing a habitual criminal.

“Gone, leaving a mermaid behind for you to feed, right?” he said while filming the howling child using an android phone. But there was no blood to justify the vampire story.

Secretly, he went behind the child and hacked off her finger. The child cried, even more, attracting a lot of people back into the shop.

By now Selina was frantic, flagging her empty hands like a parrot attempting to fly when its legs are tied up. Dansi, in complete control of the situation, was now pounding the floor like a flamingo scratching the ground for termites. The video was sent by WhatsApp to the Inspector General.

 Selina realized the situation was racing beyond her control. Hurriedly she went behind the counter and started screaming into the phone; it was a call to Doricma- “dad, please come here now,” she shouted hysterically.

“What is it, Seli?” Doricma asked on the other side.

“I found a ba…,” someone hacked the phone from her hand.

“Bring that! Stupid girl,” Dansi had grabbed the phone from Selina and was already yelling to Doricma with a tone noted for its venom. “Doricma! This is Dansi, you come to the shop now, the police want to know where the innocent children you are killing are hidden,” he said and hurriedly smashed the phone down, into a thousand pieces.

Then he addressed the people; “You can see for yourselves what Doricma uses to prosper, juju. This is not an ordinary child. It is a vampire that woos customers away from other shops into this one.”

“Oh shame,” someone suggested, “let us burn his shop.”

The whole mob now was angry; they followed Dansi who had started eating biscuits form the shelves.

Just then a woman entered the shop and covered the baby in a shoal. It was Bana Castro. News had traveled very fast and the whole village was abuzz.

“Stop that!”Dansi shouted, But when he realized who she was, he changed the tone, “oh sissy, what a dirt man we have here….”

“Who is the dirt man Dansi?” Bana Castro asked quietly.

“Can’t you see Doricma’s vampire that is what makes ….”

“Dansi, you are mad. What vampire?” that was Bana Castro; she turned her nose in disgust.

Dansi looked at Bana Castro warily, “Here it is. Probably Doricma hoped to drink its blood but it escaped,” Dansi started his speculations, “look at how she is bleeding.”

“There is nothing like that, Dansi?” Bana Castro asked with anger building up in her heart. “You still h…”

 “Get out stupid woman..,” the mob was angered by Bana Castro, and it started shouting, interrupting her speech.

“You people listen, I don’t think…...” again Bana Castro could not finish talking; she was rudely interrupted by the sound of a powerful engine booming loudly in the parking lot. Everyone turned round to see who could create that kind of noise. Most fled out of the shop when they noticed that it was the police.

But Dansi rushed forward, his hands spread out to welcome them with a big smile. “How happy we are to see you, our lords!” he howled like a sick dog pleading for a bone.

“Who is Dansi?” sergeant Bwalya asked, his eyes were red like pepper and the mouth curled sardonically like a porcupine doing a solo song. “He called us here.”

“It is me, officer,” Dansi was yapping hungrily like a newly married woman fawning on her In-laws. He expected some kind of appreciation for his timely service as he called it.

“Where are the murdered children?” sergeant Bwalya asked without wasting time.

“Come and see your honor,” Dansi eagerly said, almost pulling the officer by hand for more speed. “Only one escaped out, but if you search the shop, you will find hundreds, I know it.”He led them into the shop while chewing Doricma’s expensive biscuits. But a shock awaited him.

And just then Doricma arrived; he was cycling a bicycle furiously. Sweat pouring all over his dark face like dew spots on a leaf. He found the police interrogating Dansi.

“You called the Inspector General about murdered children,” Sergeant Bwalya rolled his eyes like a dying cat. “Where are they?”

“This is my shop,” Doricma shouted breathlessly, “I don’t keep murdered children here.”

“Doricma is lying. I saw them here, Bwana officer,” Dansi said with a low cry, “maybe he has hidden them.”

“Dansi is sick, sergeant, can’t you see?” Bana Castro blurted out, surprised, her eyes swept over the others who also nodded in agreement. “Doricma has just arrived, when did he hide the children, Dansi?”

“But there was a child here, I saw it.”

“Don’t change the report,” sergeant Bwalya yawned in frustration, “you told us hundreds of children, not one child, remember?”

“Sorry, ya, I don’t know officer,” Dansi was now breathing like someone in oxygen tubes. It started getting too hot in the shop. He also started fidgeting like a nun toying with a condom.

“The question is where they are?”

Seeing some space Dansi decided to run away before the police became violent. It was clear from the questions and the mood that violence was not very far. But someone anticipated his move. He was hacked down a few yards into the race. This time sergeant Bwalya exploded.

 “Kwaaaaa! Kwaaaaa!” his open palm spoke as it smacked Dansi’s exposed cheeks. Sergeant Bwalya had unleashed a couple of hard police slaps. “Why waste police time, dragging us down here for nothing?”

 Dansi’s problems increased exponentially. The biscuits he had been eating, at Doricma’s expense, also started their own game down there in their sacred residential quarters. “Kogroool! Kogroool!” his stomach rumbled, growling like an angry lion. It was clear diarrhea was not very far.

The next slap from the officer had more than one effect. Dansi opened up the mouth in angry yelps of pain, baring sharp teeth like an injured dog. Somewhere down also, the rectum didn’t feel like being outdone by other hardworking organs, it opened up a passage with a ratatatatat sound to eject a smelly trail of yellow-orange watery stool.

“Aaaaahaaaaa! Aaaaahaaaaa!”The women roared in laughter as they blocked their noses from the terrible stench.

Doricma rushed to the officer and tried to stop the battering, “officer please…..”

“Do you have the dead children here?” Sergeant Bwalya glared at him.

“No no bwana,” Doricma pleaded, “But you will injure this man…”

“It is not your problem,” Sergeant Bwalya answered Doricma as he clamped some handcuffs on Dansi. “The inspector general wants this idiot to show us the murdered children.”

“Search Doricma’s shop, why are you beating me?” Dansi cursed as he broke into crying, “Maweee! Maweee!”

“Sergeant, the baby Dansi is talking about is here,” that was Bana Castro putting down the baby on the floor. “There was a strong blizzard and many people entered this shop to escape the bad weather. She remained when the mother left the shop.”

“Is that true?” Sergeant Bwalya asked and after Tailoka confirmed with a nod, he continued, “But why is the finger bleeding?”

“It is Doricma,” Dansi screamed, “ask Doricma, he uses blood to woo customers.”

But Sergeant Bwalya was about to push his prisoner to the van when he saw blood on Dansi’s breast pocket.

“What is that blood on your pocket?”He asked.

“Ask Doricma, he put it there, there…” he wailed like a demented person.

Sergeant Bwalya exploded both as a police officer and a human when he pulled out the baby’s finger from Dansi’s pocket. By the time they loaded Dansi into the police van he was in a third coma.

A few weeks later, Dansi was charged with attempted murder.

Surprisingly, Doricma tried very hard to pay bail to get him out. Was he guilty somehow?