The Perils of Skinny-Dipping (17 page)

Chapter Eighteen

The pungent smell from the garbage that had being lying untouched for days lingered in the air. Dried fish hung on a wire spanned across the rough ground outside the apartment block. Loud music thumped out of a cassette player, surrounded by a group of young men drinking the local beer. Richard had arrived in the capital after hitching his way down from Kasane. His bank account had soon dried up, due to the fact that the women here wanted more than a promise of a good reference for their services.

In an attempt replenish his income, he had tried calling at some of the private schools, only to be told the same tale over and over again - there were more teachers currently looking for jobs than there were positions. Finally, he had gone to the Teaching Service Management offices and registered as a teacher for the state schools. As yet, his services had not been required.

Richard had managed to rent a room in a flat near Tlokweng. It wasn’t far from the South African border and was one of the poorer areas of town, with rows of concrete apartment blocks. Children and stray dogs roamed the street by day and night. He growled at the children whenever they put out their hands, begging for a few pulas. The clouds of flies made him feel nauseas, as he watched them crawl over the waste that had escaped from the small, corrugated iron shacks, which were used as outside toilets, on patches on waste ground.

At night, he drank in the local shebeens, spending what little hard cash he had left. He was careful not to carry anything of importance, as muggings and stabbings were quite common as people (especially drunk, white people who represented the wealth of the west) made their way home.

He sat at the bar, unshaven and unwashed, pushing away the women trying to force themselves onto his lap in the hope of earning some money. How had he let this happen? How could that bitch have got the better of him? He thought Mr Permelo had said it wouldn’t be a problem, and that it was all in hand. He had assured him that Abbey and Phil’s future in Botswana was about to come to an abrupt end. The next thing, he had been forced out of his job and out of town under the fear of arrest for fraud. He wouldn’t put it past that bitch to turn him in and make even more trouble. He didn’t care what happened to her now, as long as it was bad enough to satisfy his revenge.

It was the not knowing that was making him more frustrated. He left the bar, looked around for possible assailants and, sensing it was safe, made his way to the phone box in the next street.

‘Ja, Richard. Howz it?’ asked Mr Permelo, as if there was nothing wrong.

‘It’s not,’ growled Richard. ‘What the hell’s going on up there? You said you would get rid of both of them so I could come back.’

‘Ja, I know that, but these things take planning and time, you know this. Is it so bad down there?’

‘Just tell me what you intend to do and when I can get back up.’

‘As you know, part of the plan has already been executed and the other part will be put into place in the next week or two. You’re just going to have to be patient with me here, man. I’ve got my back to watch as well. Don’t call me on this number again, unless it’s urgent.’

‘This
is
urgent,’ spat Richard into the mouth piece. ‘In fact, it’s more than urgent.’

The line clicked dead. Richard, dissatisfied with what he’d heard, pulled up his collar and walked as quickly as he could back to his room.

Not long after their return from Gaborone, Darren left to re-join his team to check on how the new drill was performing. The subject of Anna Halley had not come up, and Abbey was still feeling uncomfortable at the way this woman blatantly flirted with her husband. No matter how hard she tried to reassure herself, a nagging doubt that there was something she didn’t know just wouldn’t go away.

Darren was going to be away all week, which gave Abbey time to get up to date with the paperwork that had built up. Boitachello had managed the office very efficiently and Abbey had a pile of phone messages on her desk. The morning flew by as she updated the volunteer rosters and ordered new supplies of saplings.

At lunch time, she decided to walk down to the President’s Lodge for a bar snack instead of staying at the office. She ordered her toasties and sat at the same table she and Phil had sat at after their infamous team-building day.

Her gaze wandered across the river and then over to the doorway at the hotel reception. Mr Permelo walked out with another gentleman she did not recognise. He did a double take when he saw her, and stared for a few seconds before taking his companion’s arm and walking towards the car park. Abbey gave it no more thought and finished her lunch, relieved that he was on his way out and putting some distance between them. No evidence had ever been found as to the cause of the fire and the police had conveniently closed the file.

That evening, she locked up the AVP plot and walked home, taking her usual route. As she approached the bungalow, she noticed a man in his early twenties standing by the gate, looking towards the front door.

‘Dumela Rra,’ she called, walking towards him. ‘Can I help you? Are you looking for Mr Scott?’

The man did not reply. He half turned to face her, put his hands together as if he was praying, bowed his head and walked away down the hill. Abbey raised her eyebrows at his strange behaviour and thought she would mention it to Boitachello tomorrow to see if she could shed any light as to who he was.

Abbey spent the evening reading a selection of magazines and playing with Moxy, Phil’s cat, who had decided not to run away and had made herself quite at home. Apart from terrorising the bird population in the garden, she had been a welcome addition to the house, killing insects and chasing spiders.

Abbey decided to try and call Darren to see how he was, but also because she was missing his company. The automated voice clicked in to tell her the number was unavailable and to try later.
Damn
, she thought,
that means no signal, which means I won’t be able to reach him all week
.

She replaced the phone onto its cradle. As she did so, something by the bedroom door caught her eye. She walked over and switched on the light. Nothing seemed touched or out of place. She made her way back to the lounge and saw another shadow, this time at the kitchen door. She leaned into the kitchen, stretching her hand onto the wall and flicked the light switch. On first inspection she couldn’t see anything unusual. As she turned to go back into the lounge, she saw the shadow again. She walked over to the vegetable basket in the corner of the kitchen. Protruding out from the bottom rack was the unmistakable tail of a snake.

Abbey felt her stomach turn over. She had been in Chobe long enough to know not to make any sudden movements or noise. She also knew that snakes usually only came into houses to find a warm place to sleep when the nights were growing colder, not to attack the inhabitants. She opened the kitchen door to provide an escape route for both her and the snake; then, carefully holding the broom handle, she pulled the vegetable basket away from the wall.

The snake stared at her, raising its head ready to attack. She was in no doubt it was a Mozambique Spitting Cobra, which were highly poisonous. She took a deep breath and, using the bristle end of the broom, gently pushed the snake towards the open door. The snake retaliated, spitting. Abbey stood back, knowing it would try and catch her eyes with its venom. After her second attempt, the snake sensed the night air and slid out of the back door. Abbey ran over and bolted it shut, her heart beating furiously inside her chest. After pouring herself a shot of Darren’s whiskey, she carefully checked the rest of the house, looking under chairs and behind cupboards, before retiring for the night.

As well as hiring Boitachello on a full-time basis, Abbey had also employed a labourer called Alfred. Alfred was in his mid twenties and had previously been a volunteer. He had impressed Abbey with his enthusiasm, turning up to help on a daily basis and carrying out instructions to the letter.

Boitachello had seized this opportunity to spend more time working in the office, which she clearly enjoyed much more than working outside, and had introduced some new office routines, which were to be rigorously stuck to. One of the new routines included the favourite national pastime of drinking bush tea. For half an hour every morning at ten o’clock, Abbey sat with her two assistants under the shading outside the office, drinking tea and eating cake. She had decided to buy cakes every morning on her way to work, as an alternative to the Mopani worms that Boitachello always seemed to have in great supply and which Abbey could still not bring herself to swallow, whether they were raw or fried.

At ten-thirty, it was back to work and Abbey smiled as she heard Boitachello exercising her authority over the newly employed Alfred, giving orders to tidy up the yard if she felt he had nothing to do. Alfred was also going to accompany Abbey on her weekly trip to the Crossroads. To her surprise, Alfred declined a seat in the cab of the bakkie, preferring to travel in the back in the open air.

After the trees were loaded, Abbey ate her burger and told Isaac about the snake.

‘
Did you leave the door open?’ asked Isaac.

‘
No, I don’t think so.’

‘
What about windows?’

‘
No, and anyway, all the windows have got fly screens on them.’

Isaac scowled. ‘That does not sound right to me, Miss Abbey. That snake had to get in your house somehow, and if there was nowhere open, I don’t understand.’

Abbey had not given any thought as to how the snake had got into the house. She immediately remembered the man standing outside the gate, the same afternoon, but decided not to mention it to avoid any conspiracy theories being created. Instead of feeling better, she now felt a sense of unease at Isaac’s suspicion that the snake had not wandered in of its own accord.

‘
Do you remember when Mr Phil had a snake in his house?’ laughed Isaac.

Abbey did remember. They had only been in Kasane two weeks when a snake had visited Phil in his lounge. He had panicked, ran out of the house screaming to his next-door neighbour who, rather worse for drink, had shot at the snake, missed it completely and blasted a kitchen cupboard apart instead. The snake had escaped through the open front door and promptly got run over by a bakkie, as it coiled itself across the road.

That afternoon when she arrived home, Abbey checked all the windows and doors were shut before giving the house a thorough search. The conversation with Isaac had unnerved her and the thought of a snake or baboon spider slithering beneath the duvet in the middle of the night made her feel quite sick. As soon as she was confident that the house was snake free, Abbey settled down to read her book.

She lay on the sofa, casually observing the cat who, in turn, was observing a gecko on the ceiling, which was stealthily creeping up on a mosquito, when the phone rang. Excited at the prospect of speaking to Darren, she ran over to answer.

‘
Hello.’

‘
Can I speak to Darren?’ came the cold voice of Anna Halley.

‘
Oh, hi Anna, how are you? Darren’s away at the moment, can I take a message?’ said Abbey, determined to sound unruffled.

‘
I’ll call him on his mobile,’ replied Anna, not returning any courtesies.

‘
I don’t think you’ll get him,’ said Abbey, ‘I’ve been trying all week and…’

‘
I think he will pick up for me,’ she said, cutting across Abbey once again.

‘
It’s not a case of him not picking up,’ said Abbey impatiently. ‘It’s a case that he won’t receive the call!’

The connection had already been severed before she could finish her sentence. ‘That damn woman,’ she sighed, as she slammed the phone down in annoyance.

A few days later, Abbey arrived at work to find both Boitachello and Alfred standing by the gate of the plot, both wearing very serious expressions.

‘
What’s all this about?’ asked Abbey as she took out her keys to open the office door. Neither of them spoke or followed her. Abbey turned around. ‘What
is
the matter with you two?’

Boitachello nervously pointed to a small, white package outside the door. Abbey bent over and inspected it before picking it up. As she did, Boitachello began to make a strange clicking noise in the back of her throat and Alfred took a few steps back from the gate.

Abbey removed the white paper to reveal a cardboard box. Inside the box was a small bone. It looked like a small, human finger bone, and Abbey immediately knew what it signified. Someone in the town was letting her know, under no uncertain terms, that her card had been marked, and she was now a target for trouble. She took the box and placed it on the ground outside the gate.

‘
I’ll deal with that in a moment,’ she said, motioning to Boitachello and Alfred to come into the plot. They walked forward, cautiously looking at the box as they went past.

Abbey had heard plenty of stories about witchcraft and the traditions that still went on, mainly in small rural communities. Witchcraft medicine, or ‘muti’ as it was known locally, came from weird and wonderful concoctions of herbs and animal parts. Occasionally, in more sinister cases, it resulted in the death of a child, as the bones and organs of children were deemed to be more powerful in providing a cure for any disease than those of adults or animals. There had been a publicised case in the last few years of a child disappearing in Mochudi, just outside Gaborone, which had been blamed on witchcraft. Unfortunately, no matter how incensed people had been, they were still too frightened to come forward and give evidence, and the case was never solved.