A Carrion Death & The 2nd Death of Goodluck Tinubu

by Michael Stanley

  They went in convoy, leaving the curious glitterati to their late-night entertainments. As they drove, Edison reported to Mabaku what had happened. The director was furious. It seemed that his celebration had been premature.

  “Yes, go ahead,” he said sourly. “But they’ll have left as soon as the cell phone call cut off. You won’t find them.”

  And they did not. They found Leonard drunk and happy with two hundred pula in his pocket. But the two Zimbabweans were gone. They had left by minibus taxi to the border at Tlokweng. Just minutes before Mabaku alerted the border officials, they slipped across the border into South Africa. From there they would make their careful way back to Zimbabwe.

  Part Five

  RUNG BY RUNG

  We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung…

  —RUDYARD KIPLING,

  “GENTLEMEN-RANKERS”

  Chapter 43

  Mabaku assembled his core team. He had told them to meet by 7:30 a.m., and no one dared be late. Kubu was slouched at one end, brooding over a cup of coffee, with a fatcake for comfort. He had already spoken to his father about the kidnapping because he knew it would be all over the press and TV, and they would hear about it from neighbors. He had assured Wilmon that both Joy and Pleasant were fine. He would tell them all the details at their next visit. They had been upset, but he had calmed them down.

  Edison was sitting next to Kubu, morosely sipping black tea. Ian was cheerful as always, but wishing he was painting, sleeping, or even examining an interesting cadaver, rather than being at this glum early-morning meeting. Zanele Dlamini was there representing Forensics, although the only thing her group had done was check Tinubu’s briefcase for drugs. The rest of the forensic work had been done in Kasane and Maun. But she provided beauty and brains, and the men were glad for both. Joshua Bembo, the South African Police liaison, had settled for a glass of water and was fidgeting with his pen. The last to arrive, looking tired, was Tatwa who had flown from Maun the day before. He was dressed formally with a jacket and tie; his St. Louis cap rested on the table.

  Mabaku was already on his second cup of strong black coffee. His stomach had hoped for something more substantial for breakfast, and he felt a twinge of heartburn. But the bile was in his voice. He was angry.

  “Last night’s operation was a disaster! In fact this whole case is a total mess.” No one said anything. “Kubu was completely out of it yesterday.” He winced from the indigestion, and then added more kindly, “That was understandable, of course. How are Joy and Pleasant this morning?”

  Kubu pulled himself up in his chair. “They’re okay. Treating it as a big adventure and telling all their friends. It’ll hit them later. They’re both at my house, and Constable Mashu is keeping an eye on them. Both insisted I make the meeting this morning. But I admit I’m worried about them.”

  Mabaku nodded. His anger, frustrated by sympathy for Kubu’s family worries, turned on Edison. “Edison, have you never run an undercover operation before? How in God’s name did you let the Zimbabweans get away? What tipped them off?”

  Edison had slept badly knowing this was coming. “Director, we don’t know what tipped them off, but there was some confusion. We had a lot of men around Ganzi Street and the Gaborone Sun. But we didn’t cover the roads in between. That’s where they disappeared. We needed some extra police around the hotel. The dispatcher told them it was urgent, but didn’t say it was undercover. So they arrived at the Sun with their sirens going.”

  “Some confusion? Total confusion is more like it.” Mabaku pounded the table, rattling the cups on their saucers.

  “We think they caught wind of us and decided to wait. Perhaps also they tried to call the bearded character at the Ganzi Street house and couldn’t get through. Then they came up with the plan involving the pickpocket. And we fell for it.” Edison shrugged. Early promotion looked out of the question.

  “What’ve you done about catching them?”

  Edison shrugged again. “The usual. We’ve distributed Identikit drawings from Joy and Pleasant throughout the southern African countries. All the border posts are alerted, but the men may be in South Africa already; one of the Tlokweng immigration officials thinks he recognizes them from the Identikit pictures. But we’ve got prints, we’ve got Beardy, we can follow up with the car and the pickpockets. We’ll get them.” Edison wished he felt half as confident as he tried to sound.

  Joshua came to life. “Of course, you can count on the full cooperation of the South African Police.”

  Mabaku gave him a dirty look, muttered that more cooperation earlier would have been helpful, and changed the subject.

  “What have we learned from the bearded character?”

  “We think he’s a hired thug. He hasn’t said much yet. But he will.”

  Mabaku snorted. “Okay, I want to review the whole case. Set a few parameters. We’ve got lots of pieces, let’s fit some of them together.” He paused. “First, I want to make something clear. This is Kubu’s case, but now he’s too close to it personally. We don’t want some sleazy lawyer going after him later. So formally I’m running the show, but it’s Kubu’s case. That clear?”

  Everyone nodded. Kubu thought gratefully how well Mabaku had handled a sticky situation. The day before the director had said he would take charge. Now he had passed the baton back, albeit under a watchful eye.

  “Okay. Let’s see what we have. Kubu, lead the way.”

  Kubu straightened in his chair, tea and fatcake finished. It was time to get to work.

  “Let’s start in Zeerust. Joshua, why don’t you fill us in?”

  Joshua looked bashful. “Yes, of course. Thank you, Assistant Superintendent. Good morning, everyone. One of our undercover guys—Sergeant Sipho Langa—was following a person with a number of aliases. We believe his real name is Sithole. But it doesn’t matter. He’s a middle man, launders money, drugs, precious metals, diamonds, you name it. But he’s careful, and his principals are always well hidden. It’s the principals we want. Sergeant Langa was tailing him. He followed Sithole to Zeerust and observed a meeting with a man completely new to us. Sithole gave the man a briefcase, which we suspect contained a lot of money. We now know that man was Goodluck Tinubu. Langa decided to follow Tinubu and asked for someone else to tail Sithole. Regrettably Langa followed Tinubu into the Republic of Botswana without authorization.”

  He faced the director. “We greatly regret this. And then we lost Sithole, who’s now dropped out of sight. Not our best day.”

  Kubu thought this an understatement. As Joshua seemed to be finished, he took up the story.

  “We know Langa followed Tinubu through the border to his house. We decoded his cryptic notes giving directions. He watched him overnight, and then followed him toward Kasane. Tinubu’s car broke down, and Langa gave him a lift to Kasane and then on to Jackalberry Camp. He reported in once, saying he thought Tinubu was involved in something big. The breakdown seems to have been fortuitous, and Langa was a resourceful chap and took the opportunity offered. Then they met the mysterious Zondo at Jackalberry.”

  Much of this was new to Zanele, and she was trying to keep up. “He was the criminal from Zimbabwe? A hired assassin?”

  Mabaku shook his head. “That idea came from Du Pisanie—the camp manager. The Zimbabwe police said they’d never heard of him. Then they discovered his real name was Peter Jabulani and said he was a dissident. Recently they told us that he’s a desperate criminal and murderer. They’ve started extradition proceedings—as if we had the man in custody! Either they want him very badly, or they have him and want to misdirect us. They’ve even made a fuss about their president’s upcoming visit to the African Union meeting! Saying Botswana’s not safe if we harbor criminals and assassins. Rich, coming from them!”

  Ian piped up, “Are they being straight with us now?”

  “They’d better be!” said Mabaku. “How can he disappear with half of southern Africa looking for him? And we’ve got nothing. Not a hint of
a trail. We can’t even trace the pilot who fetched him from Jackalberry.”

  Ian sat back and filled his pipe. He would suck contentedly on the unlit pipe for the rest of the meeting. “Tinubu was originally from Zimbabwe. Was there anything in his background connecting him with Zondo?”

  It was Edison who replied. “Not as far as we know. In fact he seemed to have had very little contact with Zimbabwe since he came to Botswana years ago. We found out that he volunteered some of his time at a Zimbabwe support group. Kubu found some of its literature in his house.” Edison pouted. He had seen the pamphlets but ignored them. Kubu hadn’t been complimentary about that either. “He usually helped illegal immigrants deal with the system here. I also traced a regular payment from his bank to an individual who lives near Bulawayo. That was all. No letters at his home, no phone calls, nothing.”

  “Regular payments? Could it be blackmail? Have we followed up on this guy?” Mabaku asked.

  Edison shook his head. “It was one hundred pula each month. Far too little for blackmail. I’ve got the man’s name—Paulus Mbedi—and address through the bank, but we haven’t followed it up. I’m not sure we want to get the Zimbabwe police on this person’s case. He’s probably just a friend or relative. Completely unrelated to the case or to Zondo.”

  “Let’s get to the night of the murders,” Kubu said. “Over to you, Tatwa.”

  Tatwa was nervous in this gathering and felt he should stand. Everyone near him was forced to lean back to look up at his face.

  “On the Sunday night everyone at the camp had dinner together. It was pleasant, everyone was relaxed, but no one was particularly friendly. They all went to bed early. Tinubu was murdered in the early hours of the morning. The most obvious suspect is Zondo. That night he changed his plans and arranged to leave at dawn. We think he cleaned out whatever was in Tinubu’s briefcase, because it was empty when we found it. Then he disappeared.”

  Zanele chipped in. “We found nothing of interest in the briefcase. You asked us to check for drugs, but we found no traces at all. Even sealed bags leave a detectable residue.”

  “The clues are confusing,” Tatwa continued. “We think something like a wrench was used to knock Tinubu out and kill Langa, but it hasn’t been found. All the ones we took from the camp tested clean. Also, there were two water glasses in Tinubu’s tent, one with his fingerprints and one with Zondo’s. So it seems they had a drink together, presumably after dinner. That’s interesting because they apparently didn’t know each other.” He sat down abruptly.

  Zanele interjected. “Were there any other Zondo prints in Tinubu’s tent? Anything else that linked them?” Tatwa shook his head, and Zanele continued, “Well, it could be a setup. Maybe someone planted the glass there, taking it from Zondo’s tent.”

  Kubu digested that. “That’s an interesting idea. Let’s keep it in mind.” He paused. “Another strange feature was the position of the body. Ian, over to you.”

  Ian took his pipe out of his mouth, holding it by the bowl. “Tinubu was obviously in bed asleep at that time of the night. He was hit on the side of the head, probably hard enough to knock him unconscious. There was blood on his pillow, and he had a head wound. Then he was dragged off the bed, stabbed through the heart with a spike of some sort, and his throat was cut. Overkill you might say.”

  Zanele was frowning. “Why pull him off the bed? Surely the murderer could stab him there?”

  Ian pointed the pipe stem at her. “Good point. I also wondered about that. And cutting the throat? It must have been obvious that Tinubu was dead. Then the murderer mutilated the body. A message? A warning? Or more misdirection?”

  “What about Langa?” asked Mabaku.

  Ian replied. “Sergeant Langa had his head smashed in, probably by the same blunt instrument used to knock out Tinubu. Then he was tossed down a slope into a small gully. No fancy killing methods or mutilations there.”

  Kubu took over. “We think it was the briefcase that linked the two murders. Certainly Sergeant Langa was focused on the briefcase. First, the handover in Zeerust and then a possible exchange at Jackalberry. And when he was killed, he was prepared for a night of watching—jacket, binoculars, and so on.

  “Let’s suppose Zondo was the murderer. He kills Tinubu, takes the contents of the briefcase, and goes back to his tent. He doesn’t realize that he’s being followed by Langa.”

  “Surely the sergeant would’ve raised the alarm when Tinubu was murdered?” Joshua interjected.

  “But he probably wouldn’t have known,” Kubu replied. “He couldn’t get close enough to see into the tent. And the goings on there would’ve been quiet. No shots or screams.” Joshua nodded doubtfully.

  “Now suppose that near Zondo’s tent, Langa made a mistake,” Kubu continued, “and somehow gave himself away. Zondo kills Langa and gets out at first light the next morning as planned.” Kubu rubbed his jowls with both hands, wishing he’d had a longer night’s sleep. He clearly had more to say, so the others waited.

  “There’s another possibility I’ve thought about. The thread Tatwa and I found up at the lookout niggled at me. It came from Tinubu’s jacket and was in thicker bush—as though he’d suddenly needed to hide from a watcher. Who would that have been? Not Zondo, his supposed compatriot. And why hide from anyone else at the camp? He had every right to be there. It could only have been Sipho Langa. Goodluck must’ve been suspicious. Suppose he went to Zondo’s tent—probably to exchange money for drugs or whatever—and realized Langa was onto them. Perhaps Langa even confronted them? They would’ve had to get rid of him. Exit Sergeant Langa.

  “But now Zondo is one step ahead of Tinubu. He realizes that once Langa is found, the game will be up. So he decides to make this last trade the most profitable ever. Later that night he kills Tinubu and takes the contents of the briefcase.” Kubu rubbed his jowls again and shook his head slightly.

  “You don’t buy it?” asked Mabaku.

  “Well, if they used a wrench, where did it come from? No one at the camp reported one missing. And the ones we tested were all clean. Whichever way I look at it, it seems premeditated. More important, the whole thing doesn’t ring true with Tinubu’s character. I can’t reconcile his work at the school in Mochudi over all those years with what happened. Tinubu, a murderer? Drug smuggler?” Kubu shook his head. “It was something else. I think Goodluck was a victim.”

  Mabaku looked grim. “Well, I have some information to contribute. The Munro sisters actually came out to Botswana to follow the lives of some people involved in the Rhodesian war. One of those people was Salome McGlashan and another was a George Tinubu—the name Goodluck used when he lived in Rhodesia.” He filled the group in on his meeting with the Munro sisters. “Kubu needs to follow up with them. We haven’t had the opportunity with all this other business. The point is that there’s now a real chance that Tinubu and Salome knew each other. Maybe they didn’t recognize each other and maybe they did. But it’s a connection; before we had strangers. It raises the possibility of other motives.”

  “Revenge is a powerful motivation,” said Ian. “Could Salome have been the murderer?”

  Kubu shook his head. “Based on my assessment of her, I doubt it. And what about Langa?”

  “Maybe he caught her in the act while keeping an eye on Tinubu as you suggested,” Ian responded.

  “Why kill him at the other end of the camp? Hardly likely she’d be able to do that if she’d lost the element of surprise anyway. And how was she going to explain the bodies in the morning?”

  “She could blame the murders on Zondo!” said Zanele excitedly. “Exactly what happened!”

  “According to Dupie and Enoch, she didn’t know Zondo was leaving early. And how would she know he was going to disappear?”

  Zanele was unconvinced. She seemed to like Salome in the role of vengeful fury. “What if she had help from Du Pisanie? Or one of the other camp staff?”

  “Well, Dupie certainly had no love to waste on black Zimba
bweans—especially the ones running the country there now. He still refers to them all as terrorists. But to commit murder on the spur of the moment in front of a camp full of people for revenge when the truth was sure to come out? He knew where Tinubu lived and could have chosen his moment.” Kubu shook his head again. “It doesn’t add up. But we do need to dig deeper into this issue with the Munros.”

  Mabaku looked pensive, but he could not fault Kubu’s reasoning.

  “Does that mean that it had to be Zondo? Because he was the only one who knew about the briefcase and so had a motive?”

  Tatwa broke in excitedly. “That’s what we thought. But it’s not right. Tinubu lost his keys at one point and was very upset about it. They turned up, but could easily have been lifted and used to search the stuff in his tent in the meantime. One of them could have been a key to the briefcase. So someone not involved in the smuggling could’ve known about the contents of the briefcase. Mind you, there wasn’t a briefcase key on the ring we found in his tent, but that could be because the murderer needed it to open the briefcase.”

  Kubu joined in. “So anyone who was nosy could’ve discovered a briefcase full of money, and then would have a motive. The only thing is, he would have to be suspicious to make him look in the first place. Someone who had an inkling of what was going on. And that brings us to Boy Gomwe.” Kubu looked at Joshua Bembo, inviting him to share what the South African police had discovered. Joshua obliged by filling in the background and their suspicions of Gomwe’s drug-running activities, lamenting that Gomwe always seemed to be one step ahead.

  “That makes Gomwe a suspect. What was he doing at the camp? And he would’ve guessed or suspected what was in the briefcase. Enough motivation to steal the keys and take a look. And then…” Tatwa trailed off leaving the rest to their imaginations.

  Kubu was no longer concentrating. The fatcake was long gone, and he was thinking about breakfast. There was a real danger the meeting would go on all morning. He would have to think of something; he doubted he could hold out until lunch.