I was woken up by hushed voices in the sitting room. I went straight to the door and listened carefully. “Why take the radio? It is too heavy,” someone said. We lived in a big house but my room was the closest to the sitting room. Consequently, I might have been the only one who heard the strange noises. My heart was pounding madly in the rib cage, my mouth was dry and I was confused.
I slowly opened the door and tip toed to the sitting room door.
The two burglars could be heard clearly. That is when I remembered we had an alarm but I could not activate it without attracting their attention. My parents were dead asleep. Dad was a heavy sleeper and mom usually wore earplugs. Suddenly I heard footsteps coming towards the sitting room door then the movement stopped and I heard one say, ‘Where are you going? Let’s take what we came for.’ I could tell they were only two. Suddenly, my eavesdropping was smashed by a harsh blow to the back of my head.
When I woke up, I realized I had been unconscious for about half an hour.
I had been tied firmly to a chair, I heard people talking but my mouth had been taped. The two men continued ransacking the sitting room at minimum noise. I did not know what they were looking for but they seemed very determined to find it.
My being tied up to the chair must have put my brain to work as I suddenly connected Kamaa, our houseboy, to the scheme unfolding in front of my eyes. I had suspicions about him from the first time he started working for us. His stern look, his late night outings and suspicious cell phone calls at ungodly hours always made me wonder.
“How could Kamaa be related to all this? How could he do something like this? Aha! It must be the watch!” My father had an old watch given to him a long time ago by an American tourist when he worked as a tour guide. He kept it as a souvenir. I was the only one who knew its value. My father never wore it for he was never one to like jewellery. He said that jewellery made him look artificial. He sometimes put it in the cupboard near the theatre system. The watch had a golden coating but that was a secret known only to me. Its market value was worth a fortune.
‘Kamaa must have found out!’ I thought. I had closed my eyes to follow my train of thought only to open them and find a pair of familiar gumboots planted in front of me. After a few seconds of shock, I looked up to meet the characteristic stern gaze of Kamaa. He didn’t say a word. He just stood vigil like a statue as his two accomplices ransacked the drawers of the wall unit.
Their frantic search was unceremoniously interrupted by sirens of police jeeps.
My father kicked the door open and swung into the house like a commando on special assignment. He firmly held a pistol in his outstretched hands. The police had simultaneously sneaked in through the back door and one could count six barrels of cold steel arrogantly pointed at the cornered thugs. Realizing that they stood no chance, they surrendered peacefully. The cold barrels of steel reluctantly went back to their holsters. As police peeled off the layers of ropes that had been used to harness me, it was ironical to see mom emerging from the bedroom wondering what the commotion was all about. Meanwhile, I anxiously waited for a moment with dad for I wanted to know how he had sneaked out and more important, where he learnt combat manoeuvres.
GEORGE KAMURE
TWO EAST
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