The Second Death of Goodluck Tinubu (11 page)

For Kubu, the arrival of the tea tray was a welcome sight.
Miriam poured two cups and offered Kubu a biscuit. He took three
and arranged them strategically around his saucer, thus preempting
the need to reach for more. For a moment, Kubu was lulled into
thinking that he and Mabaku were friends. But the moment was
brief.

“I want you to go to Mochudi this afternoon,” Mabaku said as
soon as his cup was empty. “See if you can add to what Banda’s
discovered about Tinubu. Who were his friends? Did he have any
enemies? Anything suspicious about his finances? The usual. Report
back to me tomorrow at two.” He paused, then continued, “When
you’ve finished at the school, stop in at your parents. I’m sure
they’ll want to see you.”

He waved a dismissive hand and pressed the intercom button.
“Miriam, please phone Director Van der Walle in Johannesburg. Tell
them it’s urgent. I want to speak to him now.”

Walking out, still holding the last biscuit, Kubu wondered what
was going on between Mabaku and the South African police.

∨
The Second Death of Goodluck Tinubu
∧

K
ubu was hungry. The
summons to see the director immediately after landing nearly four
hours after leaving Jackalberry Camp meant he could not stop for
food en route to the office.

Now he needed to get to Mochudi for a 4:00 a.m. appointment with
the deputy headmaster, leaving insufficient time to debrief Edison
and also have a decent lunch. The only solution was to eat at the
fast-food Wimpy hamburger joint with Edison. Fortunately for Kubu,
since he was not fond of their hamburgers, the Wimpy offered its
steak-and-eggs breakfast throughout the day. As he ate, he
questioned Edison about Mochudi.

“I found very little,” Edison replied between mouthfuls. “We
searched Tinubu’s house. Very modest place right next to the
school. Bare minimum of creature comforts. Only a few old
black-and-white photos on the wall. They looked like school class
photos. And one of what must be a young Tinubu and two friends. Not
even a television. No personal letters. No sign of a girlfriend.
I’ve asked for all his telephone records for the past year. Should
have them tomorrow morning. We can see if there’s been anything
unusual lately.”

“What about his bank records?”

“I’ve got them. Nothing unusual. Certainly no big amounts of
money ever went in or out. There’s a monthly stop order for a
hundred pula. I’m waiting for the bank to let me know where that
goes. Teachers aren’t the best paid people in the world. There was
very little money in his account.”

“What was the reaction at the school when you told them he was
dead?”

“I spoke to the deputy headmaster, a man called Madi. He was
clearly shocked. No acting there. He said Goodluck Tinubu was the
kindest person he had ever met. I also spoke briefly to an
assistant and one teacher who happened to be at the school. It’s
school holidays, you know. They both had the same response. Shock
and sadness. They both said the school would never be the
same.”

Kubu finished his steak. He had better get going. “How do I get
to the school?”

“On the way into Mochudi, turn left at Rasesa Street. The school
is on the left just past the Welcome Bar Part 1. Strange name!
Where’s Part 2?”

“Oh, that’ll be at the high school,” said Kubu, leaving Edison
to work out if he was serious. Most of the way out of Gaborone he
needed to steer the vehicle through the apparently random behavior
of traffic, pedestrians, and animals, even though the road was a
modern highway. The greatest threat came from taxis. Their drivers
obviously thought that having the word TAXI hand-painted on their
vehicle bestowed unlimited privileges, including exemption from all
the rules of the road.

After about fifteen minutes, the traffic thinned and moved more
quickly, giving Kubu a chance to call his parents for the third
time since leaving the director’s office. Every morning Kubu’s
father, Wilmon, turned on the cell phone Kubu had given him,
convinced it would waste money to leave it on overnight. And every
Saturday night he charged it with due ceremony, but he had never
used it to make a call. He was proud of the phone and showed it to
his friends. “A present from my son, David,” he would say, chest
puffed out. “My son is an important man in the police.”

Kubu was concerned. Wilmon’s phone always waited in eager
expectation. But Wilmon was nearly seventy. Had he forgotten to
turn it on? Had it malfunctioned? Or could the power outages in the
Mochudi area the previous weekend be to blame? It would not occur
to Wilmon to charge it on a weekday.

The traffic had been unusually light and, having time to spare,
Kubu decided to check on his parents on the way to Goodluck’s
school. He turned off the highway toward Mochudi and drove through
the higgledy-piggledy patchwork of houses on small plots along the
road. He drove down the main street and turned right into Kgafela
Drive, passing the Linchwe II Junior and the Molefe Senior
Secondary Schools. Just after the Hungry Tummies Take Away and the
Taliban Haircut and Car Wash, he turned right into his parents’
street.

Driving toward their small house, Kubu saw his parents sitting
on the veranda. Aha, he thought. There’s time for a quick cup of
tea. As he stopped in front of the house, his mother, Amantle,
stood up and waved. Wilmon took longer to stand. He did not wave,
but awaited Kubu’s arrival at the top of the steps. Kubu extended
his right hand, touching his right arm with his left hand in the
traditional, respectful way.

“Father,” he said. “You are looking well.”

“David, you are welcome at my house,” Wilmon greeted him in
Setswana. It was the same dignified greeting Wilmon always
used.

Kubu turned to Amantle and kissed her on the cheek. “Mother,” he
said. “You too look well.” He hesitated, then continued. “I can
only stay a few minutes and would love a cup of tea and, perhaps, a
biscuit. I’ve had a really busy day.”

While his mother bustled off to boil water, Kubu decided to
investigate the case of the unanswered cell phone.

“Father,” he said quietly, “I tried phoning you several times
today, but you didn’t answer. I was worried. Is the phone
okay?”

Wilmon shrugged. “I decided to leave it off. It uses
electricity, which is very expensive. And it is a lot of
trouble.”

“But, Father, it is useful to keep in touch.” Kubu did not
mention that he paid for the electricity in any case.

“We see you quite often. We do not need it,” Wilmon said
stubbornly.

Kubu knew his father, and how he treasured the phone. He thought
for a while, then said, “It’s broken, isn’t it?”

Wilmon was clearly embarrassed by the question and looked about
as if trying to find somewhere to hide on the small veranda. Kubu
sat silent, unrelenting. At last Wilmon grimaced and said, “You
know I always charge it on Saturday evenings.” Kubu nodded.

“Last Saturday, we were cleaning the floor, and at six o’clock
the sofa was in front of the plug – that is the time I charge the
phone. I decided to use the plug in the bathroom instead. I put the
phone on the windowsill above the toilet while I plugged the cord
into the wall.” He frowned. “Before I fixed the cord to the phone,
your mother asked me to help move a table. When I finished, I had
forgotten about the phone.” His embarrassment became acute, but he
sat taller in his chair and continued. “Your mother had need of the
bathroom and closed the curtains of the window. The curtains
knocked the phone into the toilet!”

Wilmon shook his head. “It was my fault. I took the phone out of
the water and dried it, but I was scared to plug it in again. You
cannot use electricity near water, you know.” He was not looking at
Kubu.

Kubu managed a straight face. “Father, you made the right
decision. It could’ve been very dangerous. I’ll look at it and
advise you.”

He stood up, leaving Wilmon to his discomfort.

A few minutes later he returned and said, “Father, you did a
very good job of drying the phone. I turned it on, and it still
works. I also plugged it in – very carefully – and it’s charging
now. Everything is fine.”

Wilmon broke out in a smile the likes of which Kubu rarely saw
from his father.

Twenty minutes later, Kubu had drained two cups of tea and
consumed several rusks that he had successfully dunked without
losing any into the tea. He briefly told them about the murders in
the north.

“Father,” Kubu said. “One of the victims is from Mochudi. A man
called Goodluck Tinubu.”

Wilmon’s normally impassive face registered shock. “Goodluck
dead? How can this be?”

“You know this man?” Kubu was astonished.

Wilmon snorted. “Everyone in Mochudi knows Goodluck. I am
surprised you do not. He came here many years ago from Rhodesia. He
is the headmaster of the Raserura Primary School. A good man, even
if he is a foreigner. But then his mother was a Motswana. She
married an Ndebele in Bulawayo,” Wilmon concluded with a touch of
disapproval. “But we all liked him. He cared about the
children.”

“Do you know if he had any enemies?”

Wilmon shook his head. “Everyone liked him.”

When Kubu took his leave, his father’s final words to him were
“Why would anyone kill Goodluck Tinubu?”

♦

“Why indeed?” Kubu muttered as he searched for Raserura Primary
School. He missed Rasesa Street and had to ask the way. He turned
around, drove a short way, and turned left into a road without a
street sign. Kubu wondered whether other countries had street signs
that mysteriously disappeared.

Parking and leaving the car windows slightly open to let the
heat escape, he walked through the main entrance. Classrooms were
scattered around the property, each colorfully painted with a
variety of cartoon characters, as well as letters of the alphabet
and numerals. For an instant the buildings towered around him, the
perspective of the small boy who had made his way from Mochudi to
Maru a Pula school in Gaborone. How lucky he had been. His parents,
uneducated and poor, had dreamed of their son being the first in
the family to complete secondary school. Their priest, who liked
Kubu’s soprano hymn-singing and spotted his unusual intelligence,
persuaded the headmaster at the recently opened Maru a Pula school
to give the young Bengu a scholarship. No doubt Wilmon had
something to do with it too.

But the experience was not what he expected. It soon became
apparent that being fat was a hazard. He was teased unmercifully
and often bullied by older kids. Despite efforts by the teachers,
Kubu could not escape the taunting. Lying in bed at night, he hid
his tears, determined to make his parents proud. He would never
tell them.

As a consequence of his isolation, Kubu sought activities
avoided by the bullies. Although he did not have a great voice, it
was good enough for him to be in the school’s informal choir. This
bestowed respect and the start of friendships. In addition to the
African songs he already knew, he also learned songs from all over
the world. And then he discovered the soaring choruses from
monumental works called operas and oratorios. Some had translations
into English, but most were in languages he did not understand but
still had to sing. His soul was captured, never to be released.

The other benefit was that there were boys of all ages in the
choir, with interests beyond physical prowess. Kubu was soon making
friends with boys several years older than himself. He got on
better with them than with those of his own age. And they had
better things to do than tease him.

Kubu also loved books. By the end of his first year, he was two
grades ahead of his classmates in reading. The teachers allowed him
to progress rapidly and encouraged him to spend time in the
library. He read incessantly.

One day, he picked up a book entitled
Teddy Lester’s
Schooldays
. He loved it. But more important, he read about
cricket, a game he saw the older boys play on Wednesday afternoons,
but about which he knew nothing. The book’s descriptions captured
his imagination. And so started a love affair with a game he would
never play. From then, he absorbed everything he could get his
hands on and became a walking encyclopedia. He started watching the
school teams play and privately kept score. Then one day the
cricket coach walked over.

“Hello, Bengu.”

“Good afternoon, sir,” replied Kubu, standing up.

“I see you here every game. What are you doing?”

“I love cricket,” Kubu said sheepishly. “It’s wonderful. I try
to keep score, but I keep getting details wrong.”

The coach took Kubu’s scraps of paper. “You’re doing a fine job,
but you need some help. Let me show you.” They walked to the little
pavilion where the players sat waiting for their turn to bat. One
boy was keeping score in a large book. The coach showed Kubu how
each page was printed to make scoring easier. There was a place to
keep track of how many runs each batsman had scored, a place for
the total, and even a place where you could keep track of each ball
bowled. Kubu was fascinated.

“May I have one of those pages?” he asked eagerly. “It makes it
so much easier.”

“No, I don’t think so,” the coach replied. Kubu was crushed. His
hopes had been high. “After the game, take the whole book. Next
game I want you to score. You’ll be our official scorer.”

For the first time at school, Kubu was happy. Elated was a
better way to describe what he felt. The other boys slowly got to
know him and to appreciate his skills. He never became ‘one of the
boys,’ but he no longer bore the brunt of teasing. For the rest of
his time at Maru a Pula, Kubu was the scorer, eventually becoming
the scorer of the school’s First XI at a younger age than anyone
before.