City of Blood

by Martie de Villiers

‘We will hit the house Monday at eleven,’ he said. ‘Do you have a phone?’

  I nodded, wondering what he would say if I told him that Letswe had given me a phone.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘You go there on Monday, do what you want to, but let us know if Abaju is there, phone Adrian. Don’t go back on your word now. You understand me, Siphiwe Modise?’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Sharp.’

  He turned his back on me and disappeared into the night: a small man made of steel. It was a pity Adrian was friends with this man. It was a pity that he could not see what I saw when I looked into his eyes. Grace had been right. This was not a good man. I sighed. But perhaps it was men like him who stood between us and the tsotsi’s in this country. Perhaps we needed these hard men to stand and fight and do whatever they had to do to win. Or perhaps it was because of them that all the trouble had started in the first place. Grace waited for me at the kitchen door.

  ‘I shall put the kettle on,’ I said, and then I told her about Lucky.

  ‘Ai, Siphiwe,’ Grace said to me after I told her how Lucky was killed. ‘This city is not a good place for you. You cannot keep yourself away from trouble.’

  ‘I know,’ I said.

  ‘Will you tell the police where the Nigerian lives?’

  ‘I have told the Zulu just now.’

  ‘And that will be your revenge for your friend’s death? To have them arrested?’

  ‘That’s all I can do.’

  She said nothing.

  ‘Grace?’

  ‘Tomorrow I shall phone your uncle and tell him that you are coming to visit him. You should stay there for a while, Siphiwe. If the Nigerians find out that you told the police they will be very angry.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’m worried too.’

  ‘So you will go?’

  ‘Yes, but I want to take Msizi with me. The Nigerians know about him. They have seen us together.’

  I knew Grace was angry with me but no harsh words came. Instead she said, ‘I shall look after him, Siphiwe. He may have to go to another shelter for a while, where he will be safe.’

  ‘He’s like a brother to me, Grace. His heart will be broken if I leave without him. He won’t want to go to another shelter. This is his home.’

  ‘You cannot take care of him, Siphiwe. You’re not old enough to be responsible for a little boy.’

  ‘I shall be twenty next year,’ I said.

  Grace shook her head. ‘Msizi cannot miss school. If you go to your uncle for a month or two then you can come back quietly. I am looking to find you a sponsor for further studies. These days, matric will not get you a good job.’

  It was the first I’d heard about this. It would be hard to find a sponsor. I wished Grace had not told me.

  All night I lay awake thinking about what I had let myself in for. There might be a lot of trouble on Monday and I could find myself in the middle of it. It was too late to pull out. The Zulu wouldn’t let me. I could hope that none of the Nigerians would remember that I had walked past their house several times in the last few weeks and think that I had something to do with the police showing up and taking their money and drugs. I could hope so. I assumed Lucky had done the same. He had hoped they wouldn’t find him. But he had made a mistake. Grace was right. I’d have to leave Johannesburg. If I chose to stay, I’d be looking over my shoulder every time I went out in the streets. I would have to find myself a shack in a cemetery to hide.

  The next day, early morning, I walked to Jeppe and as usual Msizi caught up with me when I was a few blocks away from the shelter.

  ‘Go home,’ I said. He pretended not to hear me. ‘Msizi!’

  ‘OK,’ he said, and turned round. I should have known that it was too easy. Halfway to Jeppe, he joined me again.

  ‘Are you going to steal the money, Siphiwe?’

  ‘No, Msizi.’ At times it was hard not to lose my patience with this boy.

  ‘I’ll be lookout. Then we share the money, half and half.’

  ‘I’m not going to steal the money. I’m not crazy and I don’t want to die. Stop talking about that, OK?’

  ‘OK,’ he said. Soon he was chattering in his usual way and all his talk made me smile. As usual, I was amazed how much a little boy who once refused to speak could talk when he was well fed and had a home and people who loved him.

  We approached the house from the back. Twice I had to tell Msizi to shut up. His talking now only made me nervous. Coldness spread inside me and when I looked around I saw nothing to reassure me. The streets were deserted and the wind had a bite to it, which was uncommon for this time of year.

  There was nobody in the alley behind the Nigerian’s house, and although the sound of traffic came from both streets that ran parallel to the alley, here it was silent. People knew to stay away from this place. The wind stirred the leaves of the tree on the other side of the wall, just inside the property. I studied the branches hanging over the wall. A plane drew a thin white line across the sky above us. Under my feet the pavement was cracked and dirty. I noticed a small black beetle scuttling in behind the garbage bags.

  ‘Keep lookout,’ I said to Msizi.

  I had to jump to reach the lowest branch. I pulled myself up and tried to see over the wall, but only got a glimpse of the house through the branches and leaves: two upper-floor windows facing me. Thick burglar bars. Red corrugated-iron roof with a satellite dish. The little window on the second floor. I let go of the branch and dropped back into the street. I had seen enough. The window was small and far too high. The broken glass on top of the wall, too sharp.

  ‘Are you looking at the window?’ Msizi stared at me with large eyes.

  ‘No.’ It was impossible to get onto the roof, the branches wouldn’t hold my weight, and even if I could get on the roof, I wouldn’t fit through the window.

  ‘Let me have a look,’ Msizi said. ‘I can climb into the tree.’

  ‘It is too high,’ I said to Msizi. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘It’s not too high. I can climb into the tree,’ Msizi said. ‘Then I can climb onto the wall.’

  ‘There is glass on the wall. You will cut yourself.’

  ‘No, I’ll go along that branch, over there at the corner, and then climb on the roof and climb down the pipe and into the window.’

  He was referring to the drainpipe. ‘The window is too small,’ I said. ‘And you are not going to do it. Don’t be stupid.’

  ‘It’s not too small. I can get in and get the key from under the carpet. Then I will open the safe and take the money and throw it down to you through the window.’

  Once he got an idea in his head, he would not let go, and it was no good blaming Lucky for putting the idea into his head. I was to blame. I shouldn’t have brought him with me.

  ‘They will kill you, Msizi. You will not succeed.’

  ‘I am not scared.’

  ‘Yes, that is the problem. You don’t know when you should be scared. Inside that house are the people who killed Lucky. They killed many others as well. They will kill anyone who crosses them.’

  I heard a man’s voice on the other side of the wall, speaking loudly in a language I didn’t recognise. I grabbed Msizi’s arm and pulled him with me as I ran down the street. We crossed the road at the corner and I kept dragging Msizi along. I checked to be sure no one was following us.

  ‘On Monday the police will raid that house,’ I said. ‘They will take the drugs and the money and they will arrest the Nigerians, then it will be all over.’

  ‘Haw,’ he said. ‘But we can use the money.’

  I gave him a light slap on the back of his head. ‘It is over, Msizi. We are not going near this house again.’ I could see he was disappointed. ‘We don’t need money, Msizi. We have everything we need. We have Grace giving us food at the shelter. I have a good job. You go to school and you are bright. When you grow up, you’ll find a job too. Grace will make sure of that. The money in that house is bad money.’

 
; I should have noticed then that he wasn’t listening to me, but I didn’t pay any attention. I watched the street for danger and thought about Adrian and the police who would have to charge that house on Monday. People would die, I was sure of it.

  36

  MONDAY CAME. I had not slept all night. Fear had settled in my stomach and I couldn’t eat my porridge. I watched Msizi clean his plate. For him it was just another day. I finished my coffee and went outside. For me, this was the day everything would change. Today the police would raid the drug house and I would have to leave the shelter. I was angry at myself for telling them about that house. I should have kept quiet, then I could have stayed here with Grace and the children.

  There were still shadows in the garden, in the corner the sun had not reached. Dewdrops clung to the grass. Msizi came running out of the kitchen and stood by my side. He looked even smaller than usual in his school clothes, the grey shorts and white shirt, the grey socks that had already dropped to his ankles.

  ‘I have tummy ache,’ he said.

  ‘No you don’t. You just ate all that porridge without complaining.’ He often tried something on Monday mornings, hoping Grace would let him stay at home, but she never fell for his tricks.

  ‘I don’t like school,’ he said.

  ‘Nobody likes school when they are nine years old,’ I said. ‘You must go, and be good, OK?’

  ‘Msizi, let’s go,’ Simon shouted.

  ‘Wait.’ I knelt next to him to tie his shoelace.

  Msizi swung his bag over his shoulder.

  ‘Pull up your socks, Msizi,’ I called after him. He stopped at the corner of the house and looked at me as if he wanted to say something.

  ‘I shall see you this afternoon, Msizi.’

  He waved.

  I went back inside to get another mug of coffee, and stayed in the kitchen to talk to Grace. It made me sad, thinking that I would have to leave. I wished I could stay.

  It was half past eight when the phone rang. Grace went to get it and I went out to look at my vegetable garden, to say goodbye. I fetched the watering can. As I stepped out of the shed, I froze. There in the corner, where the beans were coming on so nicely, lay a large coffee tin. Someone must have thrown it over the wall.

  I walked over to pick it up. It was the same type Grace used for our coffee, a yellow Ricoffee tin with newspaper pushed inside. My heart thumped inside my chest. I didn’t want to believe what I saw. I wanted to think someone had thrown this over the wall, a tin that looked just like the one I had buried in the back garden, with newspaper wrapped around Lucky Mosweu’s gun. But one look at the soil showed that someone had been digging there and had not done a good job of covering the hole up again. I dropped to my knees and forced my fingers through the cold soil. Nothing. I dug deeper. The gun was not there.

  I grabbed the tin lying in the corner, pulled the newspaper out. It was my tin, there on the paper was that same advertisement I had seen the day I had buried the gun, the one about the salsa dancing. Someone had taken the gun. Who? Who could have known? I slowly came to my feet and walked towards the tap, where I washed the dirt off my hands under ice-cold water.

  ‘Who?’ I asked aloud and suddenly felt as if all that cold water had washed through my veins.

  ‘Msizi has not gone to school.’

  I flew up. Grace stood behind me.

  ‘He has not showed up,’ she said. ‘The principal just phoned me.’

  ‘But he went with Simon and the others. He had his school bag . . .’

  She shook her head. ‘He slipped away. I told you,’ she said. ‘Plotting mischief.’

  ‘I’ll go look for him.’ I walked to the gate. I walked, although a voice inside me screamed at me to run. That morning I’d buried the gun, Msizi was up early. He must have seen me. I thought of the house in Jeppe. I didn’t want to think the worst. I wanted to think that Msizi had not taken the gun and I wanted to believe that he would never go to the Nigerian’s house by himself. But I knew Msizi too well.

  When I reached the corner, I started running and I ran until my lungs were burning, but I kept going. If Msizi had gone to that house, it would be for one reason: to steal the money. I tried to think it through while I ran. School started at half past seven. It was now a quarter to nine. He would be there already. I could not run any faster.

  The last two blocks, I had to walk, not only because I was out of breath, but also because I had to keep an eye out for trouble. I slipped into the alley, pausing to see if I was being followed. I couldn’t be sure. I had to go on.

  The alley behind the house was deserted. More garbage bags had been put out into the street – I could smell them. The wall around the house seemed higher than before. How would Msizi get up there? Perhaps I’d made a mistake. But where else could he have gone?

  I found them under the tree, in a plastic bag: a pair of black school shoes, size 3, boy’s shoes, with the socks pushed inside. I was right to think he came here and now I didn’t know what to do. I jumped for the lowest branch and pulled myself up. I could not see anything. If anyone spotted my legs hanging from this tree, they would shoot me.

  I let go and landed hard on the pavement. I stepped back until I could see over the wall. And there he was, clinging to the roof tiles, in his school shorts and white shirt, his school bag on his back. He was so small, Msizi. His arms and legs as thin as sticks, but he could climb like a monkey. He must have used the tree. He must have climbed across on the branch that forked over the roof. I eyed the branch. It would never hold my weight, and if I called out, the people in the house would hear me.

  Then Msizi looked back at the street and saw me. He almost lost his balance in shock. Sickness swirled up in my throat. If he fell down that roof, he would break his arms and legs. The Nigerians would see him, or the dog would get him. He was quick to regain his balance. I waved at him to come to me, to come away from the house. Stupid boy, I wanted to shout. I wanted to go up there and grab him. I waved at him again.

  He clung to the roof and shook his head wildly. He pointed his finger down at the house. I showed him my fist. He shook his head. It was the worst moment of my life. It was as bad as the day my brother died. There he was, this little boy, on the roof of a tsotsi’s house, on his way to steal his money, and I could not stop him.

  But I had to do something. I moved to the other side of the street, away from the tree, so I could have a better view. I took Letswe’s phone from my pocket. The police would have to come now. And if they did? They would start shooting and Msizi would be caught up in it.

  Msizi scrambled down the roof, looking for the drainpipe. I waved both my fists at him. He ignored me. He was now above the pipe, lying flat on his stomach. He glanced at the ground and, without hesitation, turned round and swung his legs down the roof. I hoped that he would find it too difficult and turn back, but he seemed to have regained his confidence. He reminded me of the small green gecko that lived in my room. The gecko could hang upside down on the ceiling for hours. I was sure Msizi was half-gecko.

  I prayed without closing my eyes, ‘God, please protect that boy today.’

  Msizi’s bare feet were still dangling in the air and once more I expected him to fall, but he kept lowering himself until his feet met the wall. It was a brick wall and I could imagine his toes finding the gaps between the bricks like the toes of a gecko. He grabbed hold of the drainpipe and clung to it with both hands and feet and then, little by little, he edged down the pipe until he was alongside the window. He hung there for a moment, before reaching for the windowsill with one hand, then the other.

  It wasn’t long before his head disappeared into the small window, his body followed and then his kicking feet vanished as well. I couldn’t just stand there. I phoned Adrian. His phone said to leave a message. I couldn’t believe it. This was a policeman’s phone. Why didn’t he answer?

  My heart was beating fast. My throat was dry. At the top end of the alley, away from the Nigerian’s house, a man passed on
a bicycle. A motorbike roared in another street. With every breath my lungs filled with the stench of rotting garbage. I tried Adrian’s number again.

  ‘Eh, bru,’ he answered. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘You must come to the house now!’ A man turned into the top end of the alley. I dropped flat behind the garbage bags. ‘Wait,’ I said to Adrian. The man stood there looking down the alley. I held my breath. The man lit a cigarette before he walked off.

  ‘Adrian, you must raid the house now.’

  ‘The plan was for eleven,’ he said. ‘Why change it?’

  ‘Because he’s here, Abaju is here.’ I didn’t know if that was true, but I hoped that would get them to move faster.

  ‘OK,’ said Adrian. ‘We’ll move it on. Hang on.’ I heard him talking in the background. ‘Right, Siphiwe,’ he said. ‘We’ll be there in half an hour.’

  My shirt clung to my back and I could smell the sweat on me; it smelled of fear. I knew that smell only too well. I kept glancing at my watch. I could not just hide behind the rubbish for thirty minutes. I got up and jumped for the overhanging branch, pulled myself up. It was no good. I couldn’t see a thing. I crouched behind the rubbish bags again. Think, Siphiwe. Do something. What?

  Twenty minutes before the police arrived. Unless they were delayed. They could not be trusted to be on time.

  There was no way to help Msizi. No way into the house, unless I used the front door. Coward! I’d always been a coward. Now I’d lose another brother. Tears burned in my eyes. It was no good standing here crying. I had to act. Time to cause a diversion.

  I walked to the front of the house, openly, hoping that nobody would see how nervous I was. The guard at the gate was watching me. Two other men stood at the front door. A helicopter flew overhead. The guard at the gate looked up, then his eyes fixed on me again. From behind him, inside the house, I heard a woman’s laughter.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said to the guard, ‘is Mr Obembe here?’

  ‘Why?’ He spat a piece of chewing gum past me onto the pavement.

  ‘I want to speak to him about a job.’