The Down Days

by Ilze Hugo

  “And you.” She turned to Piper. “We will discuss this again at a later stage. Next time you come by for a delivery. With Major. On appointment.”

  The caretaker held the door open. Piper could smell his breath on her neck as he escorted her down the chilly passage. She shivered, pulled her sleeves down over her itching arms, and scowled from behind her mask at a sweet-faced sister hurrying along with a tray.

  - 48 - MAJOR

  Major woke up to a racket at the gate. He’d fallen asleep on the couch again last night. Through the window the sun was already sailing high on day juice. Bang, bang, bang went the gate, playing bongos on his pounding brain. His eyes were thick with drink—he’d been at that new therapy bar in Bree Street until the clock rewound last night. He rubbed at his eyes and headed towards the fuss.

  The banger was a pert little skirt with arms you could ring with your fingers, a body so skinny it could snap in the breeze. But step closer, zoom in, and you noticed the muscle there beneath the skin. And the guts in the eyes. Like she was readying to bite.

  “We’re closed,” said Major and cleared his throat. “Donations open at twelve on Thursdays. And I’m not sure you qualify, any case. Your hair’s a bit blue, isn’t it?”

  “I’m not here for that,” the skirt snapped and pushed something through a gap in the bars. A card. F. SEPTEMBER. TRUTHOLOGIST.

  “Truthologist? What the hell is that?”

  “It’s, uh, kind of a fancy word for PI.”

  Shit, thought Major, the sisters aren’t going to like this one bit. He squeezed his heavy eyes together, stretched them open again, and steeled himself. “Oh, right. I can never keep up with all these new politically correct terms. But you’ve got the wrong address, honey. No cases to be solved here.”

  “No honeys, either. But never mind that. I’m here about some hair. A boy’s. I need it for a case I’m working on. The kid donated here a few months ago.”

  “Sorry. No can do. No takebacks. If you give it to us, it goes with God, and you can’t steal from the Big Guy. Company policy.”

  “This is important. Kid’s missing. Looks like a kidnapping. His sister believes he was snatched by a woman at the museum market last week. Name’s Elliot. He’s only two years old. His sister, his only living kin, is a wreck about it. We need some DNA evidence to follow a lead and she says you have some. So please. Cut me some slack.”

  The skirt was playing the sympathy card. Good move. He’d have to counter well. “That’s a real tragedy. I’m sorry. But I don’t think there’s anything we can do to help. How are we supposed to know which locks are his? Do you have any idea how much hair we cut in a week? You can cover the whole blasted Island in it.”

  “See, I’ve done my research, brother. Turns out, to qualify for NGO status, you guys have to be approved by the Genetic Registry Service. This means perfect records of each strand donated, including serial numbers, the works.”

  Oh, heck. What now? Idiot card. Yes. He’d play that. “Oh, well. See, I just work here, miss. Sweep the floors. Pluck the weeds. Don’t know anything about that GMC mumbo jumbo. You’ll have to wait until my boss gets in, then. Don’t know when that will be, though. Might be hours. Hell, it could be days. I can take your number and call you when she comes in? Or you can make an appointment.”

  “No. I’ll wait.”

  Thought so. Little spitfire. Typical skirt. Charging into other people’s mornings, ruining a perfectly good hangover. “That’s fine, miss. I would let you wait inside, but my boss has the key, see.”

  “She just locks you in here at night?”

  “Yes, well.”

  “Never mind. I get the picture.”

  The skirt folded her arms into a koeksister and performed a quick pirouette. Then she draped her back against the bars of the gate. Major headed inside, feeling like a puppy that had just been newspapered.

  - 49 - FAITH

  Faith was getting restless. She’d been standing on the same spot for what felt like forever, but was probably closer to fifteen minutes, watching the butterflies playing tag in the overgrown garden behind the gate. Now and then a blue-turbaned sister would pass through the open courtyard in the distance. In one corner of the garden, underneath an old lemon tree, was a statue of the Virgin Mary. The Holy Mother cut a sorry figure, standing there all alone, eyes cast downwards, palms open at her sides, face disfigured by moss. Tiny blue flowers—Faith had no idea what kind—grew in clumps at her feet. Tall green stalks of something—weeds, probably—crept up against the cement folds of her skirt.

  The weather was turning. The wind was brewing up a storm and the whole garden was beginning to dance to its beat. The branches of the tree were shedding their twirling leaves this way and that. Faith’s arms were bare and the creeping cold was beginning to get to her. She shucked off the straps of her backpack and bent down towards the pavement. Undid the clasp and took out her coat. She put it on, did the buttons up. Tried to smooth out the wrinkles with her palms.

  More minutes passed. Finally, footsteps. But it wasn’t the man with the one lazy eye, the one she’d talked with before. A woman was walking towards her through the garden. Head tilted down, eyeing her feet as she walked. She didn’t look like a nun. And judging by her long, bottle-red hair, she wasn’t a donor, either. The woman was wearing scuffed pumps, a bloodred cardigan to match her hair, and a white wrinkled shift dress pocked with an army of tiny black grinning cats. Dark circles ringed her eyes and there was a bleeding scab on her cheek. One hand kept pulling at the sleeve of her cardigan as she walked.

  “Hi,” said Faith, as the woman reached the gate.

  The woman didn’t look up. Just mumbled something and squeezed past Faith into the street. The gate swung homeward with a drawn-out squeak. Faith slipped her hand in the shrinking gap, and pushed it open again. Slipped in.

  “Hey, what the hell!” It was Lazy Eye, making his way down the path.

  “That other woman, with the red hair, she let me in.”

  The man cleared his throat. “Damn junkies,” he muttered to himself. Then to Faith, “Mother will see you now. But make it quick, please. She’s a busy lady, you know.”

  She followed him up the garden path, through the courtyard, and down a long open corridor, lined with arches on the one side and rows and rows of doors on the other. All closed. Except for a set of arched double doors, a crack open. Faith could just make out the dim hall inside and caught a glimpse of candles and glass jars (“as big as a rugby field”). Tomorrow was counting on her.

  No one other than the two of them seemed to be around and their footsteps echoed on the cement floor. Lazy Eye turned a corner, and came to a stop. He knocked on the wooden door in front of him. “Come in,” called a voice from inside.

  “Go on,” he said. His arms were flecked with a string of tiny tattooed stars, woven together with bugs, webs, crowns, and a drawing of Casper the Friendly Ghost. “Go on,” he said again. “I’ll wait here.”

  Mother was a plump woman in her fifties with red splotches on her nose, forehead, and dimpled cheeks, as if someone had left her in a handbag with a leaking pen. Fierce black glasses hugged her uppity nose. She was staring up at Faith from behind a desk so big it almost filled the room. “Sit,” she said, without bothering to introduce herself. She motioned to the only other chair in the room. “Major said something about you needing some hair?”

  “Yes.”

  “Please explain.”

  “Well, I’m a private detective of sorts and I’m working on a case involving a missing boy. I need a DNA sample of him in order to follow a lead.”

  “Of sorts?”

  “Yes.”

  “You do know I can’t give you that without permission from next of kin?”

  “I have a letter signed by his sister. Both parents are deceased.”

  “I see. Well, there are other issues, too. Each ponytail offered is not only an offering but also a form of confession and it would be highly unorthodox to share a confe
ssion with a third party.”

  “Surely this can be waived if the donor’s safety is a concern? Especially in this particular case, where the donor is a minor and I have permission from his legal guardian?”

  “That is debatable, Mrs.—”

  “Miss. It’s Miss. September.”

  “That is debatable, Miss September. But there is also the issue of numbers. Do you have any idea how many donations we receive every month? Hundreds. How do you expect us to keep track? The holy hall is filled with strands going back at least five years. How do you expect us to sift through all those jars and find the locks of one little boy?”

  “I’ve done my research, ma’am. I know the law. It says you have to keep records in order to qualify for NGO status. You need to be GMC compliant. So the issue of records shouldn’t be a problem. Provided everything you’re doing here is aboveboard, of course.”

  Mother’s throat made a sound. Somewhere between a snort and a sigh. “It seems you’ve thought of everything. I’ll have a look through our files. It might take some time. Can you come back next week?”

  “Sorry, but no. This is urgent, ma’am. A young boy’s life may depend on this information.”

  The nun reached across the desk for a pen and a Post-it Note. “Do you have a phone number where I can reach you?”

  As the woman fiddled with the pen, Faith noticed a pile of books on the corner of the desk. Cryptography for Beginners, by M. L. Steiner, was on the top.

  “Interesting read?” she said to the nun, indicating the book with her chin.

  “What? Oh, this.” The woman wasn’t wearing gloves. She stroked the cover of the book with one naked forefinger, picked it up casually, then set it down in front of her. Faith studied her cartographic hands with curiosity, then glanced back at the pile. Vaccines, Sixth Edition was the title of the next book. The nun saw her looking and she picked that one up, too, but this one she stowed away in a drawer underneath her desk. “Your contact number, Miss September?” The pen was poised above the Post-it Note.

  The digits rolled off Faith’s tongue and the nun caught them, one by one, with her pen. She pushed her sliding glasses back in place and looked up at Faith. “Thank you, Miss September. I will be in touch. Major will show you out now.”

  Outside in the corridor, the man called Major was standing a few meters to her left. He had his back to her and hadn’t heard her come out. He was talking to a tall sister with piercing blue eyes in the same shade as her turban. Faith slipped away to the right, and made her way down to the far end of the corridor. Towards the arched double doors she’d noticed when she came in. The doors were still open a crack. Faith glanced up and down the corridor to check if anyone was looking and squeezed through the gap.

  An ocean of glass jars glinted in the candlelight. Swaying votive flames glowed like star-struck fireflies. Stacks and stacks of bottles and candles wallpapered the room all the way to the ceiling or curved along the floor to form an intricate labyrinth of narrow pathways.

  She stood there for a moment, in the dark, surrounded by all that hair. So many bottles. How was she supposed to find Elliot’s hair in here? It would take a miracle.

  Kneeling, she picked up the bottle closest to her. Held the little glass vial in front of her face to see it better in the gloom, inspecting the lock of brown hair inside. Turned the tiny bottle on its head. On the bottom, the letters KL and a four-digit number were written in permanent marker. She picked up another jar, which also had two letters and a number written on the bottom.

  A sound. A shock. A voice against her neck, so close she could feel its owner breathing. “Found what you’re looking for?” Her body twitched electric. The bottle almost dropped.

  “Break one of those and they say you will condemn the donor’s spirit for all eternity.”

  “I’m sorry. I—”

  “I know, I know. You just couldn’t help yourself. Nosy types like you never can,” said the man with the lazy eye.

  “Hey. That’s not—”

  “I think it’s about time you left now, miss. Best not to overstay your welcome, don’t you think?”

  He led her to the gate, through the courtyard, where the sisters were starting to gather for lunchtime donations with their baskets and their shavers in hand. Down the garden path and past the frozen Madonna, who seemed even more demoralized when seen up close.

  Faith stepped through the gate. The man shut it behind her without ceremony. It creaked on its hinges. Needed some oil. She was about to point this fact out to the caretaker but one look at his good eye told her not to.

  - 50 - MAJOR

  The sound of the rusty gate screeching on its hinges didn’t do his throbbing hangover any good, and the episode with that nosy visitor hadn’t helped. He headed down the path rubbing his temples, wishing he could dig his fingers into his brain and pull the hurt right out. The self-righteous little skirt had upset the balance of his morning. He might not be brain surgeon material, but he was no idiot when it came to reading people, either. He could see the judgment burning in the skirt’s eyes, smell it on her skin. He knew her type, the lucky type who’d never had to get her hands dirty, and now she went around judging other people’s stained fingers like she knew what was right. Acting as if Mother were some kind of supervillain in a comic book where everything was black-and-white and she was there to save the day. The type who didn’t understand a thing about real life.

  Truth was, Mother was just doing what she needed to do to keep the convent safe. The old nun was a servant of God, yes, but she was more than that. She had responsibilities, a flock to protect. A sisterhood. Fifty girls, many of them with pasts that would make your palms sweat and your stomach do a flip just hearing about ’em. They needed someone to watch their backs. And to do that, you needed more than a leaking roof and a holy book. You had to have business sense. You had to have guts. And if your moral compass had a kink or two in it, well, let those who were so quick with the stone-throwing just try to manage half of what his boss had to do and see how far they got. They should take their outrage to Bree Street for some skop and donner, punch it the hell out. Leave Mother alone.

  There was a time when Mother had been more holier-than-thou, though. But they’d gone through a rough patch a few years ago, living day to day, meal to meal. Morale was so low some of the sisters lost their faith and left. And without any marketable skills or street savvy, the real world came as quite a shock. (Major knew of at least one sister who ended up walking the streets at night in a very short skirt.) A plan needed to be made.

  So the old nun sent Major to the city library and he took out all the business and marketing books he could get his hands on. For two weeks Mother did nothing but read, only to come to the conclusion that traditional religions just weren’t selling in the current market. To make things work, they needed to do some rebranding. So she read some more. Looked to other countries, other cultures, other religions for inspiration. Came up with the idea of hair as penance. And got one of the sisters, an ex–fashion designer, to redesign their habits. Give them a more exotic flavor.

  And it worked. Followers started streaming in. The convent had never seen so much traffic. But though the new changes were making the convent more popular, they still weren’t making enough money from the donations alone. So they branched out. Started a recycling drive. Recycling was a moral gray area, but Major did some smooth talking, convinced Mother that God didn’t deal in physical things. That the hair itself wasn’t what was important. It was the offering it up that counted. What happened afterwards was moot. And if selling the hair meant they could put food on the table, how could it not be the right thing to do? Besides, recycling was an eco-friendly practice. Sustainable. So they were saving the planet, too.

  Thanks to the recycling, the convent’s troubles did a one-eighty. But there was a ceiling to this kind of success. And they were reaching it fast. This was a small city, and there was only so much hair going around. Supply was running out. They needed
a backup plan.

  So the nun did some more reading. Phoned some experts. Started talking about Laughter cures, saying she was convinced this whole sickness had a spiritual root. Then last month she came back from some spiritual convention sounding very chipper, rambling on about amakhosi gangs, saying something about a conversation she overheard between a sangoma and a sociologist who were arguing over whether it was a spiritual or social phenomenon.

  Had he heard of them before? she’d asked. Amakhosi gangs?

  No, he’d said.

  Then she’d said something about a plan. It was too early to talk about it, she said, but it was good. Next thing he knew that junkie was borrowing Mother’s van and turning up on Monday nights.

  He still had no idea what the old bat was doing with the street rats. Not a clue. Except that it was all part of her new backup plan. Something promising, something that would change everything. So he left it at that. Major knew better than to pry too much. The whole reason he was still working here after all these years was because he was good at knowing when to keep his mouth shut. Take this journalist fellow, Lawyer somebody, from the Truth (the name didn’t ring a bell, but then he only read the sports section and the classifieds), who had come snooping around yesterday, asking all sorts of questions about the junkie, only he called her a medic, which was odd.

  Now this skirt was asking about lost boys. He wouldn’t lie, he was getting worried. Helluva worried. It was all getting to be a bit much. But who was he to say anything? He had a good gig here. A nice paycheck. So he’d keep mum. Just keep doing what he was doing. Living his life with his eyes on the ground. Not wondering, not asking, not sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. Keep mum.

  - 51 - SANS

  There was a queue in front of the Long Street Baths. It was bleach day. Members of the Sanitation Church were lining up for their weekly ritual dip. For a second Sans considered joining them. Maybe the bleach actually helped? It would wash away his sins like they said and he would be reborn anew, sparkly clean and feverless? But what if someone saw the sweat dripping down the arch of his back while he undressed? Nah, bad idea. He’d rather sit that one out.