Harold making money while the curfew bites

Last week, the court of uphill, which rests on its lofty perch atop Gitegi Hill and watches over Harold’s land indignantly, toppled an appeal that we had launched for the Prayer Payment Initiative (PPI).

This was a disappointment on many fronts and now leaves yours truly in an uncertain position. I was just about successful in lobbying to be the minister for agriculture, with my manifesto to ban avocados, also professionally known as the forbidden fruit, from the diet in Gitegi, and “to bring peas among our a-maize-ing human beans, ensure Harold carrot be im-peach-ed and dis-apple opposition”, I wrote, trying to prove I had agricultural witticism.

Now, without funding, there are no seats available for people like myself, as Harold will not have enough money to allow him toss scraps at us. After I introduced a system where the villagers pay high amounts for watching elite English clubs (with a proposition that Arsenal fans actually get paid by Harold) I realised that he was taking all the money to Sue.

We are now desperate for money and are using any tactics that can earn us something before Sue wreaks havoc.

Last Sunday, I was shocked to hear Harold announce that he would be offering security services to people walking at night during curfew hours as the government had dispatched a secret group to monitor and maintain law and order.

If they came and attacked you, said he, they would leave you battered and unable to visit Sue (at the bar) or Harold (at the church), and it would be a bad thing being distanced from the two most important people in the village.

So you need him to be your escort in those ungodly hours, he concluded.

Drunkards would have to pay to have their security guaranteed. Alcohol makes sense only if imbibed at night, a research by Harold, in which he interviewed himself, shows. As such, Sue’s visitors would spare a coin or two to drop into Harold’s waiting palm so that by the time they need to stagger home, singing their favourite hymns and speaking ‘big English’ at silhouettes, they would be protected.

Petty thieves would also need to pay him so they could ferry their loot home in peace.

True to his word, a mysterious group of law enforcers appeared on Sunday night, clobbering two men who were heading home a little past midnight. The same thing happened on Monday and by Tuesday, even aspiring night-runners were remitting his fees.

I was worried that he was dumping his earnings at Sue’s, again. When I confronted him he denied the allegations.

Every evening since, he has been going to the pub, wearing his raincoat, and collecting money from patrons. He then roams about meeting practicing muggers and collecting money from them as well.

After ten in the night, he starts escorting them home, in groups. Those unlucky not to be alongside the whoosh-whoosh of his raincoat get blows rained on them by the mysterious law enforcers.

But then some people copied his style and started walking about in raincoats, and the group, allegedly made of young men, did not know who to beat up after 10 at night.

The group of law enforcers were soon to understand Harold’s walking style and continued to mete violence on everyone wearing a raincoat but with a different bounce in his step.

Rumour had it that the group still stole from their victims, and that the money eventually went to Harold.

Friday night, things did not go as planned.

Harold had one too many at Sue’s and when he came out, his step faltered. The group of law enforcers, hiding in the night, descended on him with a wrath born out of frustration; the other drunkards had even mastered his walking style!

Harold making money while the curfew bites

Peter Theuri