‘Hey wena Vutha! Didn’t I say you must follow me?’
‘I am coming, mama. I’ll find you at the tap.’
But Vutha didn’t come. Instead he went to the marshlands to catch frogs and punish them for being frogs by punching holes in their bodies with a safety pin. There he found a friend from the neighbourhood, an eight-year-old boy who did not like going to school. He had left home pretending he was going to school, but had gone to fish in the marshlands instead.
While they were playing together, three men approached them. They tried to run away, but the men were too fast. They caught them, and asked them who they were. They wanted to know the names of their parents, and where they lived. The children knew immediately that these men were hostel dwellers. They screamed and begged for mercy.
‘Don’t cry, my children. We are not going to do anything to you. Come with us.’
They dragged them screaming and kicking their legs across the marshlands to the hostels. Here they took them into one of the hostel dormitories, where there were men sitting on cement beds. Some were joking and laughing, while others were playing their guitars, singing of faraway valleys and beautiful maidens, and cattle that were dying because of drought. Others were cooking on primus stoves, and the smell of meat filled the room. The men took the children to their own corner of the dormitory. There they fed them quantities of meat and steamed bread. They gave them the fermented maize drink known as mageu to wash down the food. The children had never feasted so much in their lives. After a banquet fit for a king, the men told them to go home.
‘You see, we are not as bad as you squatters make us out to be. You can come for more meat tomorrow. You’ll find us here. But don’t tell your parents about this. They won’t allow you to come if they know.’
The children went back to the settlement with their secret. The older boy did not trust Vutha. He thought that he would burst out and boast to his friends about his illicit adventure. The friends would in turn tell their parents, and that would be the end of their feasting on meat.
‘Hey wena The Second, if ever you tell anyone about this, I will beat you up, and cut off your ears, and feed them to my dog.’
When Vutha got home, Noria was very angry. She demanded to know where he had gone when he had promised to follow her to the tap.
‘I went to play in the marshlands, mama.’
Noria threatened to give him a thorough hiding. He cried and asked for mercy. Noria decided not to punish him. At least he had not gone there with Danisa. She did not want to answer to ’Malehlohonolo if the children drowned, or if anything terrible happened to them. Things of that nature spoilt friendships.
That afternoon, Vutha went to the usual political meetings. His marshlands friend was there. So was Danisa. After the lessons, the children participated in the usual democratic forum where the older Young Tigers discussed strategies for self-defence. There was going to be a rally of the followers of the tribal chief at the big central stadium the following Saturday afternoon. Buses were going to transport his followers there from all over the country, since it was essential that the rally should be a very big one. This would show the hostile media that the tribal chief had a lot of support. The Young Tigers’ plan was to ambush one of the buses from the hostel at a particular spot on its way to the rally, and to mow down all the passengers with semi-automatic rifles. This would be a fitting vengeance for the massacre.
The next day ’Malehlohonolo brought Danisa to Noria’s shack, and left for the city. Noria carried on with her chores while the children played their usual games. They tagged along when she went to the dumping ground, and to draw water for the brewers, But after some time Noria noticed that only Danisa was tagging along. Vutha was not there.
‘What happened to Vutha, Danisa?’
‘A big boy came and took him away. I think they went to the marshlands.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me, Danisa?’
‘The Second said he was going to beat me up if I told.’
Vutha and his friend had meanwhile gone to their hostel friends, who gave them plenty of meat and pap. They also stuffed their pockets with sweets. Then they asked them about the meetings. They wanted to know what the Young Tigers were planning. At first the children were reluctant to talk. But the men assured them that no one would ever know that they had divulged any information to them.
‘And we are going to give you some more meat, and sweets too.’
The older boy started blurting out the information about the planned ambush. He was vague about the details, since strategies of warfare are not easy for children to grasp. However, the information was enough to give the hostel dwellers an indication that something was being planned by the Young Tigers, and roughly what form it would take. They sent the children home with promises of more sweets and meat if they continued to visit them, and brought them any more information that they might have at their disposal.
Unfortunately when they left the hostel, school was out, and a lot of the settlement children were already playing in the marshlands. They were seen and questioned about what they were doing at the hostel. At first, they denied that they were ever there, but the older boys pressed them, and said that they were going to tell when they got back home. Vutha and his friend shared their sweets with them, in a futile attempt to buy their silence. When these children got home, they told their parents that Vutha and his friend had been at the hostel, and were given sweets by the hostel inmates. Some of the older residents said that maybe the hostel dwellers were trying to sue for peace with the settlement by bribing their children with sweets.
The Young Tigers, however, took a different view. They questioned the children sternly about their activities at the hostel.
‘The hostel dwellers are not your uncles. They cannot just give you sweets for nothing. What did you promise them? What did you tell them?’
The children had to confess that they told the hostel inmates about the planned ambush. The leaders of the Young Tigers were very angry. They called all the children to come and see what happened to sell-outs. They put a tyre around Vutha’s small neck, and around his friend’s. They filled both tyres with petrol. Then they gave boxes of matches to Danisa and to a boy of roughly the same age.
‘Please forgive us! We’ll never do it again. We are very sorry for what we did.’
‘Oh, mother! Where is my mother!’
‘Shut up, you sell-outs! Now, all of you children who have gathered here, watch and see what happens to sell-outs. Know that if you ever become a sell-out, this is what will happen to you as well. Now you two, light the matches, and throw them at the tyres.’
Danisa and the child who had been given the honour of carrying out the execution struck their matches, and threw them at the tyres. Danisa’s match fell into Vutha’s tyre. It suddenly burst into flames. His screams were swallowed by the raging flames, the crackle of burning flesh, and the blowing wind. He tried to run, but the weight of the tyre pulled him to the ground, and he fell down. The eight-year-old was able to stagger for some distance, but he also fell down in a ball of fire that rolled for a while and then stopped. Soon the air was filled with the stench of burning flesh. The children watched for a while, then ran away to their mothers.
Danisa also ran to her home. ’Malehlohonolo was not back from the city yet. So she ran to Noria’s.
‘Auntie Noria, I burnt The Second because he is a sell-out.’