By Lawrence Kadzitche
My shop is aptly named Osauka Satopa, literally translated as ‘the poor never gets tired’. I’m poor and true to my motto, I work very hard. Everyday I close the shop at six in the evening and as I’m about to close on that day, I spy my shop assistant slinking towards the door.
“John, if you want to keep your self-respect just return what you’ve stolen without being searched,” I warn him in a deadly flat voice.
The shop assistant turns, a feigned bewildered look on his fleshy face. “What I’ve stolen? What’ve I stolen?”
“That’s asking if the sun shines,” I return. “Do you think I don’t know that you steal money from this shop?’
John laughs, amused. “Sir, you don’t allow anyone except yourself to receive money in this shop. Even if I wanted to steal, how would I do it?”
A very good try that I almost laugh at his simulated innocence. I know he steals from me. When I was employing him he was as thin as a reed. So how come he’s now as fat as pig if he wasn’t stealing?
“I won’t fire you if you give me back without searching you,” I play good cop and immediately switch to bad cop. “But if I search you and find something, you’ll spend the night in a police cell.”
The shop assistant laughs again while shaking his head. “You always demand that I put on a pocket less T-shirt and tight fitting shorts; so where can I hide what you think I’ve stolen?”
He continues without waiting for me to reply. “You know what, Sir? The newly formed Stingy Men Association of Malawi has made a good choice in installing you it’s Emperor. You fit the bill!”
I’ve heard some people lately call me emperor. Before I can ask John why I’ve been given that moniker, he winks at me and dashes towards the door. My eyes follow him checking for any bulge on his body until he’s out of the shop. I see none. Still, that doesn’t give me any comfort. My dear departed father, who had once worked in the mines of South Africa, always said a good thief always finds a way to steal. The fat thief could still have hidden something on his huge body, very likely between his cheeks. I’ve a mind to search there but I know that would be going too far. “The youth of today; you cannot trust them,” I murmur sadly to myself while closing the shop’s doors.
“Now it’s time for my date with my dearest cash, my darling money, my sweet, my honey,” I say contentedly sliding behind the counter to tally that day’s money.
When I’ve finished counting the dosh, I carefully put it into a bag. Then I move the chair I was sitting on. Where the chair had stood, is a large rug. Moving the rug reveals a square wooden trapdoor. I open the trapdoor and a big hole appears. After kissing my darling money bag goodbye, I lovingly put it into the hole which is full of other similar money bags, close the trapdoor and return both the rug and chair in their original places.
I lock the shop’s only door with six strong padlocks and then venture into the biting cold wind. My threadbare shirt does nothing to protect me from the cold so I throw my hands into my pockets and hunch my shoulders against the wind. I don’t go towards my house which is just behind the shop. Instead I head towards Ngongolani’s house. Although it’s not yet dark, I can see lights being switched on here and there in in the location.
“Today, I don’t want to hear any more lame excuses,” I scream at Ngongolani’s wife without any opening pleasantries. “Give me back my loved one.”
“Alamu, where can my husband get the money to repay you while he is very sick?” complains Ngongolani’s wife. “In any case, can you be demanding your money while your friend is dangerously ill?”
“Yes, this is the best time to do so,” I reply. “If he dies, how is he going to repay me?”
“How can you say that? Ngongolani is your best friend!”
“My father always said that where issues of money are concerned, one must not have best friends,” I retort carelessly. “In any case, why did he get sick when he knew he’d my money? Now, tell him this; if he dares die before giving me back my hard earned money, I’ll sell his corpse to witch doctors to use his body parts for juju.”
Sure that the woman had got the message, I leave happily for home. I arrive home trembling from the cold.
“Father to Belita, you should buy a jacket otherwise the cold is going to kill you. If we’d some sugar, I’d make you a cup of tea,” my wife says as I settle on wooden chair.
She’s a big woman by any standards and my size is exactly opposite hers. I’m thin and short and sometimes wonder that maybe I descended from a line of dwarfs. But it is her big size that attracted me to her. I love her that way. My only regret is that the food never lasts in the house. And the children have taken after her in terms of size.
“A glass of hot water will do, Nabetha” I reply, doing my best to play down my chattering teeth. “If I’d money, I would buy a second hand jacket at the market.”
“If you’d money! Are you not the richest man in this location?”
“Make Belita, don’t mock me. Would I be suffering like this if I’d money?” I reprimand her. “Look at the poverty in this house. I’ve to sit on this hard chair instead of a sofa. Our children dress in tattered clothes. Sometimes they’re sent back from school because we fail to pay their school fees…”
Nabetha raises her hand. “Father to Belita…”
“Just look at yourself. Have you ever worn a new dress? If there’re poor people in this location it is us,” I continue in a voice charged with self-pity. “I think I should just close the shop. What’s the use of running a business that is not bringing in any money?”
“Father to Belita, let me put it plainly. The business is flourishing. The problem is that you’re a miser,” explains Nabetha with marked insolence. “That’s why you’re now drinking hot water instead of tea.”
“Mother to Belita, why are you affronting me?”
“I’m not insulting you. The truth is that you’ve money, lots of it. Every day you make a great deal of money,” insists Nabetha. “You’re not a womaniser. You don’t drink or smoke. You don’t gamble. You’re not a wizard. So where does your money go?”
“Are you implying that I hide money somewhere?” I ask, looking at her closely. Does she know about my stash in the shop? I conclude that she doesn’t.
“Don’t you?” Nabetha answers with a question.
I flinch as if pierced with a needle. Holy Mary, she doesn’t know how close to the truth she’s. I must take such thoughts out of her mind once and for all. “Mother to my children, if you still want to be my wife, this should be the last time you bring up a conversation of this type in this house or anywhere. You want people to kill me thinking I’m made of money?”
“People are right to crown you Emperor!”
“That’s the second time today I’ve heard of that title,” I acknowledge, annoyed. “Where’s it coming from?”
Nabetha laughs. “Don’t you know? People have crowned you Emperor of the Stingy Men’s Association because you’re the stingiest person in the world. You’re all over Facebook and WhatsApp statuses. Baba, you’re trending!”
I don’t have a smart phone so I’m not on Facebook or WhatsApp. I consider being on internet a waste of money. I’m able to make calls and received text messages on my cheap phone so why should I squander my hard earned money buying an expensive phone? The vice president’s speech on mindset change should also have touched on this, the stupidity of spending money on trivia like smart phones when a ‘mose’ can do.
“Anyway, your food is ready on the table,” that’s all she says returning to her chores.
I’m not put down by her attitude. My father always said never let a woman’s nagging change the way you spend your money. So I proudly sniff in the air like a dog. A mouth watering aroma of cooked mice floats to my nostrils.
“Ha! Ha! Ha! Today there is chewing of nsima,” I say, swallowing like a hungry dog that has been offered a bone. “That’s why I love you Nabetha. You know how to cook.”
I waltz towards the dining table. I frown. Is this a dream or what? What is the big woman trying to do? Kill me with shock?
“Nabetha!” I bellow. “Come here on the double.”
She comes in. I hold my anger.
“When I was buying this mouse I didn’t know it had only two legs,” I exclaim, looking astonished.
“What do you mean?” she asks. “Can’t you see I cut off the legs?”
I let my anger come to the surface. “From whose mouse did you chop off the two legs?”
Nabetha licks her lips that have suddenly gone dry. “I didn’t eat the legs. The children…”
“…the children were crying for them,” I finish for her harshly. “What did I say about eating of meat in this house?”
“What would I’ve done?” she tries to justify her actions. “There was no other relish apart from chisoso and you know how the children hate…”
“I do not work for the children,” I tell her as I’ve told her countless times before, cutting off her gibberish. “The children will eat food of their choice when they grow up but not now!”
“But…”
“No buts, woman,” I snarl. “I’m the head of this family and my rules are what everyone follows? Clear?”
She nods her head in agreement. This woman seems determined to challenge my authority. I know she calls me a miser, a tightwad just because I try to make sure that she does not use things wastefully.
But that does not bother me. I’m the head of the family. It’s my duty to determine how the family should be run. It’s a pity she doesn’t know how lucky she is to have a loving person like me for a husband. It’s her duty to take care of housekeeping but for no fee at all, I’ve volunteered to assist her in running of the house. I’m the one who makes sure lights are on only in rooms that are occupied. I’m the one who ensures that the toilet is flushed only once per day so that water is not wasted. If that’s not love, I do not know what else is.
We only have three children. I’ve told her not to give them tea. They should eat porridge without sugar. From the little education I’ve, there’re no real nutritional values in tea and I don’t want the sugar damaging their teeth. Yet my wife says I do this because I’m close-fisted.
I also want them to grow up as vegetarians. Strictly no meat. My wife has the effrontery to ask why I still eat meat if it is bad for health. Do I really have to explain to her that it’s just because some bad habits are difficult to break?
And when I go to have my tea at the tea room or eat meat at the restaurant, she accuses me of being a miser. How many times do I’ve to explain to her that it’s not good to let the children see me indulge in bad habits?
My rules are simple. Meat is for me only unless I say otherwise. Kids are to eat porridge without sugar. When visitors come, they should not be given any food. After all they come to chat and not to eat.
I’ve devised ways to make sure I know should my wife try to break any of my rules. All the same, I’ve recently had a feeling that she has been tricking me. Although I measure the salt, sugar and flour, they somehow end a bit more quickly than planned. But I can’t do anything unless I’ve proof. Proof is all I need.
An idea hits me. I’ve found a way to catch the thieving woman. I buy a packet of sugar. I call her for a tete-a tete.
“I’ve bought this packet of sugar,” I tell her. “Did you or the children work for it?”
She doesn’t answer. I take that for a no and continue, “I worked alone sweating blood while you and the kids were greedily munching the legs of my mouse. So only I will use the sugar. I don’t want to hear the children blah blah. That will be end of this marriage.”
In locations, just like in villages, drinking tea is a symbol of status, that you’ve money. People travel long distances to tea rooms even on hot day just to have a cup of tea. I know my wife will be tempted to try stealing my hard earned sugar. So I hide the packet where I trust she cannot find it.
But somehow, I realize that she is stealing some of the sugar. How, I do not know.
“If you’re playing with my sugar, you should stop immediately,” I warn her, looking at her the way a dog eyes a person whom it has not yet determined whether is an enemy or friend. “But if you’re, stop immediately or you’ll rue it.”
But my warning falls on deaf ears. I still continue to note small changes in the levels of the sugar. The scheming woman is still stealing my sugar. I decide to show her that she is messing with the wrong person.
I should point out that my father was a genius. He always had ways of finding out when mother was breaking any of his rules. Borrowing one of his tricks, I put a fly in the packet of sugar and then tie it. Then I leave to see a friend. When I return in the afternoon, the first thing I do, is check the packet of sugar. It is tied exactly the way I left it. But horror of horrors; the fly is gone.
I immediately summon my wife. I’m dead calm just like a lull before a storm. “What were you doing in my packet?”
She opens her mouth. No word comes out.
“What were you doing with my sugar?”
“Nothing,” she responds when she finds her voice. “I don’t even know where you hide the packet.”
I let out a short horrible laugh. “If you didn’t touch the packet, then where is the fly that I left inside?”
The question hits her like a bomb blast. But what happens next is far from what I had, expected. She doesn’t fall on her knees and beg for forgiveness.
Instead anger descends on her like a bolt of lightening. “My mother was right! You’re a mean foolish man…”
That takes me aback. Me, a fool? “Nabetha, you’re way out of line!”
“Shut up! I don’t know how I’ve put up with your stupidity all these years…”
What stupidity, I want to ask. My father run his family the way I was doing and stayed in happy matrimony up to a ripe age. He never allowed us eat meat. Whenever meat was the relish he would throw in the soup pieces of rubber which we would chew until our teeth hurt. The man was a genius. “Nabetha…”
“I said shut up. This is not stinginess but a disease. Anyway, I’m through with your stupid rules. I’m going to see our marriage counselors so that everyone should know what a stingy man you’re.”
I laugh her threats off. She isn’t going to win. I’m not frugal. Would you call ensuring that money is being used properly parsimonious? The counsellors will obviously take my side, I conclude with satisfaction.
The following morning, I go to check my money like I do every morning before opening my shop. I find it all gone. My terrible cry of shock immediately attracts Nabetha who finds me on my knees weeping uncontrollably.
“Mother to Belita, what did I tell you? I’ve been killed, murdered. I’m dead,” I wail. “Send a message to the location headman that there’s a funeral here.”
“A funeral? Who has died?”
“Me. Don’t you see I’m dead?”
“You’re not dead? You’re alive.”
“How can I be alive when somebody has stolen my heart?” I mourn. “Someone must’ve been listening to our conversation last night. In the dead of the night, he came and stole my loved one.”
“Your loved one?”
“Yes. My darling money is gone!”
“Gone from where?”
“Here,” I reply pointing at the empty hole. “There was a lot of money in here. All of it is gone.”
Nabetha scratches her chin. “But that’s impossible. I thought you said you’d no money. How can someone steal money you didn’t have?”
My reaction is to continue mourning the loss of ‘my lost loved one’.
“You see our children were failing to go to school because of lack of school fees yet you’d a lot of money. Now what have you gained?”
“Mother to Belita, I’ve learned a lesson. If I was using the money, I wouldn’t have been in this mess.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes. Of what value is money if it is just hoarded? Now I’ll be using money for necessities.”
Nabetha disappears momentarily and returns carrying bags of money. “Here’s your money. I took it deliberately to show you that I knew you were keeping money even though we were suffering.”
I receive the bags of money and hugs them to my chest the way a mother does with a baby. I repeatedly kiss the bags, purring, “I’ve found you, my beloved. What would I’ve done without you, cherry? I love you, honey.”
As I’m about to put the bags back into the hole, my eyes stray to my wife who is eyeing me with interest. I take in her worn out dress and tattered chitenje. Suddenly I feel ashamed.
“Mother to my children, take the money,” I suddenly utter, handing the money bags back to her. “Use it to buy things we need at home.”
Nabetha hugs me and kisses me on the lips. For the first time, my wife and not money becomes my loved one.
End
