LITMIR.BIZ

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before his wife. The shouting and wailing drew the attention of the neighbours who rushed out of their rooms to rescue the situation. It took them time and persistence to stop the fight and separate the women. There had been slapping, biting and tearing of clothes – so much so that the two ladies were half naked. Soon afterwards, there was a serious exchange of unpleasant words. Pius Toktok’ wife did her best to crush her husband with words in the face of the crowd. Same treatment for Beatrice who felt really bad as the crowd was full of her university mates, who could not understand what Pius Toktok had seen in her modest looks to risk his marriage. It was an experience that marred her entire stay at the university, as each time she was seen around campus, fellow students would shout ‘husband snatcher international’, pointing insultingly in her direction. Many were surprised by the strength of character she displayed by not abandoning her studies after what happened rapidly became a life in hell for her. The relationship with Pius Toktok didn’t outlive the incident. Whatever has happened between Pius Toktok and his wounded wife, I have not succeeded in finding out, but it doesn’t seem he completed his studies at UM.”

      ***

      Lilly Loveless was pleased with the way Britney had conducted the interviews so far. They would provide some insights, she was sure. But she would have to tell her to be meatier in the data she collects, and to watch her personal views, in future interviews. It was better to have fewer and richer interviews, than many sketchy encounters. She thanked Britney, paid for the drinks and they separated, with Britney going off to conduct more interviews.

      Lilly Loveless on the other hand went to the Archives where Prince Anointed was waiting for her with files to photocopy. She collected the files – mostly newspaper reports on sexual scandals and rumoured affairs in official circles in colonial times and the immediate post-independence period. She gave him Mim$200,000 to help him out for the month, and was about to leave when a visibly touched Prince Anointed, tears in his eyes, held her hand and said:

      “An angel has made an appearance in hell.” He rubbed and caressed her hand with gratitude, graciousness, integrity and dignity. “I can’t begin to thank you enough for this,” he was now holding the money in both hands. “I haven’t seen anything like this for God knows how long.”

      “It’s my pleasure,” Lilly Loveless didn’t want him to make too much of the gesture. “Whatever one can do to help out now and again to keep hope alive one will do.”

      “What do I give you in return? Thank you is hardly enough…”

      “You’ve already done enough for me”, Lilly Loveless looked at the files she was carrying appreciatively.

      “Wait a minute.” Prince Anointed searched his trouser pockets. “I found this in my personal archives at home,” he said, handing her a piece of paper.

      “What is it?” she asked, opening the folded paper. She could see the age on the paper.

      “It’s something I wrote about money, when I was still a boy,” he told her. “I didn’t know I still had it. In fact, I had completely forgotten I ever wrote something like that.”

      “As a boy? Amazing!”

      “That’s the power of preserving documents.”

      “You are absolutely right. I hope there were many more like you.”

      “You can take the piece along. Photocopy it, so at least you have something by me, not simply something preserved by me.”

      “I certainly will.” Lilly Loveless thanked him for the gift and left, touched.

      Her curiosity couldn’t wait. As soon as she was out of the Archives, she read the piece:

      ‘Money, You’re impossible.

      ‘I’m always counting it and saving and wanting more of it, but it never seems to satisfy my needs. Every time I get it, it isn’t enough. I want more! More! More! Every time I do get it I don’t know what to do with it. Mom says save it for something you really want. Dad says save it for school. But I say, spend it. Now! Then just when I’ve decided what to buy I find something better. Money! You’re Impossible.

      ‘The little paper monster that everyone wants, that everyone likes, that everyone treasures. It crawls in people’s ears and up to their brains and then it does its disastrous work. It fills people with awful feelings of greed, disgust and jealousy. And then it leaves without fulfilling so many needs. Money! You’re Impossible.’

      How apt! And a relevant gift too! Lilly Loveless went back into the Archives to thank Prince Anointed once more, and to invite him for a drink at a place of his choice after work.

6

      The next day Bobinga Iroko appeared abruptly, and insisted Lilly Loveless should come along with him to Sakersbeach, where he had an appointment to interview a heavyweight politician for The Talking Drum. He promised to show her the lovely beach if she came. “Lots of opportunity to sunbathe,” he added, which was enough to persuade her. To Lilly Loveless, the beach was the most romantic place in the world. She couldn’t wait to kick off her shoes and bury her feet in the warm sand of the beach that she had heard so much about. There was another reason though. He would miss his appointment if he sat down to tell Lilly Loveless of developments. Better to do so in the car, on the way to Sakersbeach, was his idea.

      Lilly Loveless quickly assembled a towel, sun protection cream, her digital recorder and camera, her iPod, and other things she thought she would need in Sakersbeach.

      “I haven’t seen or heard from Dr Wiseman Lovemore for days. Is he OK?” she inquired, getting into the passenger seat of Bobinga Iroko’s secondhand double-cabin Toyota Hilux pickup. She noticed he was wearing a similar flowery well-embroidered shirt to the one he wore when they met the first time at Mountain Valley, which she told him she liked. If her mom was here, she would have jumped to conclusions, for she was used to saying in response to her childhood question on what love was: ‘Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it every day.’

      “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” said Bobinga Iroko, turning the ignition.

      “Is anything wrong?”

      “Lovemore is under detention…”

      “What for?”

      Bobinga Iroko told her the story. The night a week ago when Lovemore left abruptly following a phone call, was when he was picked up by the police. “The maid made the call under duress, forced to lie that Lovemore’s daughter, Pinklie, had suffered a critical malaria attack that needed urgent attention.” When Dr Wiseman Lovemore hurried home, two policemen greeted him with handcuffs. They took him to the police station where he was detained, charged with instigating rebellious students to vandalise the Reg’s car, and also for being one of the masterminds behind student unrest at UM. The police played back a recording of him making injurious statements against the VC and Reg in an argument he had with a colleague, Dr Nosewordy Boiboibambeh, about the strike.

      “When I went to see him upon learning of the detention, his spirits were not too low. ‘Being incarcerated and in pain proves I’m useful,’ he told me. But he was very disappointed that Dr Nosewordy Boiboibambeh, a colleague of his at the university with whom he quarrelled recently had secretly recorded their exchange and handed the tape to the university administration for whom he was spying. The police are now hanging onto every critical word he uttered in the tape as evidence that Lovemore is guilty.”

      Lilly Loveless remembered the passionate exchange between Dr Wiseman Lovemore and one of his colleagues. She was sure that was the Dr Nosewordy Boiboibambeh in question, for the man had left in fury and in a hurry. But how could a colleague, an intellectual and an academic do a thing like that? She was baffled.

      “What could he have said that was so injurious?” she asked.

      “The details are scant, but he is said to have gone beyond the limits of acceptable criticism. Dr Wiseman Lovemore is not one to be suffering from

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