Clubhouse Impi and the great heist by Allister Marran

Chapter 1 – Load Shedding Capers

A loud metal clunk, and then silence. The four boys were used to it by now. Every day, four hours in the morning, four hours in the afternoon, and two hours late at night.

It was the familiar routine of Load shedding.

Last year, when they had started their club, the substation would constantly buzz in that sub-base “zzz” or maybe “mmm” that only electricity can make, an almost impossibly low sound that would win a car subwoofer competition if somehow you could register electricity on the entry form.

The silence was crisp and refreshing; a hypersensitivity making every background noise over-amplified like when your ears have been blocked up for a while, and suddenly re-open.

A bird chirped close by, a child shouted and then laughed in the distance. A car hooted and another one hooted angrily back. It is funny how easy it is to tell friendly car banter from a heated road rage incident just by listening to the hoot’s length and frequency.

There were other strange and welcome benefits to the scourge of rolling blackouts. For the four teens, it meant longer, lazier late afternoons and early evenings sitting in the clubhouse, just hanging out, being serious about doing nothing.

In the before time, when Eish-kom was able to sell their only product for a reasonable price, 5.30pm on weekdays was always home time. But there wasn’t much point to returning to a dark house, and the boys had managed to convince their parents with a few choicely Googled documents that doing homework by torchlight or candlelight was catastrophically bad to a growing boys eyes. Their curfew was often extended until bath time, or until hunger overcame the boys.

Bhutana stood arms aloft in the middle of the clubhouse, a newspaper article cut-out and dangling from his right hand as he gesticulated animatedly and excitedly at the text.

David, sitting a way away and unable to make out any of the small writing said, “Settle down Boetie,” in a slightly agitated manner and then, “What’s the story?”

In a high pitched almost screechy voice, Bhutana turned the article to face him and started reading aloud, “Mandela City – Five suspects were arrested last night in Eden Road, Mandela City after a massive manhunt which lasted for several hours. Armed police were called to the scene of a cash-in-transit vehicle heist in Joubert Street at 09.30AM on Thursday morning, to find the suspects had gained entry to the armoured car using explosives, and had tide up the guards next to the vehicle. On arrival of law enforcement, the suspects fled on foot with a large amount of cash and bond notes. Later in the day, the suspects were spotted near Mbeki Avenue, and after a short chase they were arrested at the Shell Garage in Eden Road. Two suspects, considered very dangerous, are still at large, and so far no money or other stolen items were recovered. Nobody was injured during the incident…”.

“So what?”, said David, cutting Bhutana short before the end of the article.

“Let me finish!” Bhutana said, almost bursting with enthusiasm now, “ … and police are asking for anybody with knowledge of the incident to call 10111. Do not try to apprehend the suspect. There is a R10000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the suspect and the recovery of the stolen items.”

“So WHAT?”, said David again, this time in an even more exasperated tone of voice, as if listening to Bhutana speak had somehow removed precious seconds from his life, or kept him from doing something more important.

“So”, said Bhutana, now trying to mimic David’s indignant tone as best he could, “Where is Eden Road?”

“Who cares?” said David, agitated that Bhutana kept using his own sarcastic tone of voice now.

“Okay,” Bhutana continued, still in a mildly mocking manner, and a little slower than before, “Eden Road is here”.

In one brisk movement  he whipped out a map he had been expertly hiding in his back pocket and pointed to Eden Road, “And Joubert is here”, he slid his finger to a mark he had previously made in obvious preparation for this big reveal, “And Mbeki Street is here” smiling now and pointing to a third spot.

David didn’t get it and started to protest again, just to be cut off abruptly by a loud gasp from next to him.

“Oh I get it!” Hashim shouted loudly.

“Get what?” asked David, now sounding a little insecure that someone else knew something he didn’t.

“Look carefully here” said Bhutana. “The green. The green, its Africa Valley parklands. To get from Joubert, to Mbeki and then Eden they had to have passed through Africa Valley. The money, it must be there…”

David now had a huge grin on his face, as he shouted, “Treasure Hunt!”.

“Saturday?” asked Melvin.

And in unison, Bhutana, Melvin, David and Hashim all shouted, “Uhambo!”

Chapter 2 – The group areas act

It wasn’t far to go for the boys to return to their respective abodes. The clubhouse was actually built where their family houses’ boundary walls met, at the bottom corner of their properties.

The 6 foot high walls met in a sort of a cross, making it the ideal spot for the floor of the clubhouse to be placed on top of the wall, supported by the wall and a few extra timber beams.

Bhutana’s elder sister Sindiso was a qualified engineer, and had been consulted extensively when project “Awesome Treehouse” had been started a year ago.

As a result the fort was surprisingly steady, able to withstand the rigors of any of the harsh South African weather that it may be exposed to. It had already survived an incredibly hot summer, torrential rains from a cyclone system that had moved through a few months before, and an unseasonably blustering windy season.

The boys had recently christened her Clubhouse Impi, the Zulu word for warrior after she had bravely stood against the elements for an entire calendar year.

Impi and indeed the boys’ friendship had a lot to do with the history of the country, and the ignominious Group Areas Act of 1966. The land had originally been a mixed area, where blacks, whites, coloureds and Indians had all lived in relative harmony.

But the NP government of the time had moved in, and with ruthless efficiency they bulldozed the houses, shops, Churches, schools and Mosques.

They divided the district into four and had replaced them with a princely white area with beautifully tarred roads, running water and electricity, a far less endowed but wholly separate coloured and Indian area, and a ramshackle black township devoid of amenities of any description.

Initially each of the four areas had developed far apart, with a massive iron bar fence segregating each community from the others. But over time, the suburbs grew and grew, until they all touched, back to back at the point where Impi stood now.

And with the abolition of the group areas act, and after the first democratic elections in 1994, the fence had been removed, and the homeowners had replaced it with 6 foot high Vibracrete walls, ensconcing the now non-politically mandated separation for another 20 years.

That was until that fateful day in 2017.

David had been playing with his dog in the backyard, throwing a tennis ball, only for Goliath to fetch and bring it back, the mutt never getting bored or tired of the game before David did.

Suddenly, a soccer ball came whizzing over the wall, struck with the kind of deadly force that would have made Messi proud. It just missed David’s head before dipping and striking the window of a garden shed, shattering it with a loud clang before bouncing off into a small rose garden to the left.

David and Goliath froze, knowing Dad and Estelle would go ballistic later that night when he tried to explain the smashed glass and the destroyed rose bed.

And then a dull thud, and another one, as two people hit the ground in the bottom corner of the garden.

A coloured and a black kid, about David’s age but much smaller in frame, had come looking for their ball. They had hopped the wall with surprising ease, but they had not noticed David and Goliath the giant bull terrier standing near to the shed, quiet and motionless.

They knew the general direction the ball had travelled in, and in short order they were scurrying around the rose garden, trampling even more of Estelle’s prized bushes in search of their scuffed kick toy.

“Thula,” whispered Melvin as Bhutana mistakenly kicked a small gardening fork lying on the ground near the shed, making a small scraping noise. “Just find the ball and lets go”.

Bhutana saw Goliath first and froze dead in his tracks, not able to speak or move an inch. Melvin carried on searching oblivious to Bhutana’s predicament, but he jumped about 5 feet high as Goliath, now standing about two feet away from Melvin, let out an almighty deep pitched bark, before moving forward to sniff Bhutana’s butt.

Both boys rooted to the spot, David finally sprung into action and called Goliath over, who had become bored with sniffing the new company and wanted to play fetch again.

Bhutana asked shakily,”Will he bite us?”

“Well he may lick you to death, but that’s about all. He is a big Teddy bear” said David, laughing loudly now at the obvious fear on the other boys faces.

“We just came to get the ball” said Melvin, a lot more relaxed now that he knew the dog wasn’t about to have him for an early dinner.

“Estelle is going to be cross” David said nonchalantly, not really caring about the gravity of the situation.

The boys stood surveying the broken window and the now almost totally ruined rose bed.

David said, “I will take the heat, but only if you let me join your soccer game. My name is David”.

“I am Bhutana, from behind, and this is Melvin, he lives across.” said Bhutana, pointing in a sort of up and over gesture with his arm towards their respective houses.

“You can’t play soccer with 3 people.” said Melvin.

“I will be goal keeper and you two can be strikers!” said David, trying to make sure they would still include him in their game.

“No that’s boring” said Melvin.

“Actually I know a guy,” said David. He hurried off to the other boundary wall, climbed up using a lot of effort to hoist his considerable bulk, and disappeared over the other side, leaving Goliath alone with his two once again nervous new acquaintances.

Two minutes and a lot of butt sniffing later, he reappeared at the wall, another boy appearing just behind him. The two boys jogged up to Bhutana and Melvin, doing a faux warm up kind of thing like the subs do on TV before taking to the football pitch.

“Meet Hashim. He’s a Man United fan, but don’t hold that against him…”

The four boys, separated even before they were born by the Group Areas Act of ’66, were now sharing a boundary wall, and a friendship that would be a lasting one.

Chapter 3 – Girl Power

Preparations for the big day hadn’t gone too well.

Modern day South Africa isn’t the kind of place that young teens just get to go off on their own, un-noticed and un-missed.

As such, they came up with an ingenious plan. David would say he was at Hashim’s house. Hashim would say he was at Melvin’s house, Melvin would say he was at Bhutana’s house. Bhutana told his little brother Fezile that he would give him 10 bucks if he was able to convince anyone that asked that they had all gone to the school fields to play some 5 a side soccer with a few guys in their class.

Of course, Fezile had to be paid another 10 bucks upfront when he realised that he now had leverage over Bhutana and his friends, knowing that they were up to something secretive. He asked to go along with them, not wanting to actually go with at all, but graciously accepted payment to stay at home.

That boy was going to make an excellent politician or lawyer if he chose either of those professions.

The boys gathered as planned at 9AM on Saturday in the clubhouse, hastily going through their gear check, making sure they had all the essentials covered.

Each one had a backpack, and inside each backpack was a pocket knife, a torch, a map, a waterproof rain jacket, and some padkos, the snacks that would make the journey that much more comfortable.

In fact David had stuffed his pack to bursting point with food. He seemed to have packed enough food to survive the much vaunted Zombie Apocalypse, should it happen when they were on their upcoming adventure.

“Why would you need to take 3 packets of two minute noodles?” asked Bhutana incredulously as they spilled out of David’s bag while he was rummaging around for a pre-trip bag of peanuts he had regrettably packed first at the bottom of the sack.

“Where will he get boiling water to cook it anyways?” continued Bhutana to anyone who would listen, but nobody was.

Instead the boys were all staring towards the hole in the floor they used as the entrance to the fort, as a head had popped through and had been watching the boys intently as they had checked their gear. It was Gina.

Another head popped up now, it was Gina’s best friend Siya.

No girl had ever before lacked the gravitas and broken the sacred code of Impi by simply climbing the ladder and entering uninvited into the boys’ safe place.

Siya and Gina both lived in the neighbourhood, but went to an all-girls school. They were also grade ahead of the four boys, and so never had much time to chat when they did see the boys together.

Siya was also the most popular girl at school, being head Drum Majorette, school dux and first team in practically every sport the school offered. She even started the chess club.

Gina on the other hand was Just Gina. She didn’t play any sports. She prided herself on being “the middle”, she was the middle child in her family, she always scored the class average in every test, and she stood in the middle of every line, just to prove her point. Her school uniform was as uniform as could be.

This was diametrically opposed to her fashion sense. Outside of school Gina she stood out. She wore black Doc Marten boots, black jeans, black shirts, black jewellery and black makeup. She was teen angst in a world of colour.

Siya and Gina were worlds apart, but the best of friends. And the least likely place this odd couple would ever show up was in the boys clubhouse, at this time on this day.

The sight of the girls gave David a fright and he dropped his peanuts. He cursed loudly; spoiling good food should have been the biggest no-no in the Ten Commandments.

Hashim reacted first with a meek, “Hi.”

But Melvin was having none of it. Something was amiss and so he interrogated them with a lot more venom than the other boys, “What are you girls doing here?”

Siya replied, “We want to join you.”

“Join what?” cried Bhutana, realizing suddenly that the day may have been ruined before it had even begun.

Gina responded with her usual monotone voice, “We know what you are up to. We want to come.”

“How?” asked David, peanut shards falling out of his mouth as he tried to chew and talk at the same time.

Siya explained,” We saw Fezile at the shop, he had 20 bucks. We asked where he got it and he said he would tell us if we gave him 10 bucks. He spilled the whole story. We want to come. Or else…”.

The threat was thinly veiled, all the boys knew that the jig was up if the girls didn’t come.

Now there were six.

Chapter 4 – Africa Valley

The 30 minute walk to the outskirts of Africa Valley was a strange mix of awkward silence with regular interjections of protest from Melvin, who would start of loudly and trail off under his breath as he wanted everyone to know that the girls weren’t welcome. He had all but given up by the time they reached the gravelly pathway that lead down the steep valley side.

“They must have entered here,” said Bhutana, “By my calculations, they would have entered here, spent a few hours in the valley where they buried their loot, and then scurried out the other side where they got caught in Eden Road,” trying to sound like a seasoned investigator that had made a Sherlock Holmes style deduction. He hadn’t actually calculated anything, but rather drawn a straight line between the heist and where they had been arrested, which went straight through the valley.

“Elementary my dear Watson”, said Siya in an over-acted humorous manner.

“Who is Watson now? Who the heck else did you invite? A reward can only be split so many ways…” said David, not getting the joke.

One-by-one they half-walked, half-slid down the valley wall as the trail wound down towards the river bed.

The Sisulu River flows lazily from the mountains about 60km inland, through the farmlands just outside of town to the north and meanders left and right through Africa Valley, almost cutting the city in half, before exiting the municipal area to the south east. It was more of a trickle these days, as the farmers upstream had erected several dams to utilize the water for their crops and cattle.

In certain spots when there had been no rain for some time, you could actually cross the river by hopping from exposed rock to rock, which is exactly what Bhutana had planned on doing.

As they approached waters’ edge Hashim, who’s older brother Ahmed had forced him to watch too many older war movies, took point and suddenly stopped, holding up his arm in an L shape and a closed fist.

David walked straight into the back of him, causing them both to fall over.

“Freeze. It means freeze”, said Hashim as he dusted himself off and got up, staring coldly at David who was more confused as ever.

“Next time just say stop or freeze.” said David, “we are not in one of your Boet’s war movies here”.

Hashim wasn’t listening as he had already moved off to investigate what had caught his attention in the first place, a bush that had clearly been disturbed recently next to the river. Melvin had also seen it and had beaten him there.

Sticking his hand in, he withdrew an empty bag that had the name of the armoured car security company stamped brightly on the side. Then he took out another. And then another.

He laid the bags on the ground, all of them completely empty, and they all stared at the discovery in silent disbelief.

Nobody had really thought their adventure would lead to anything real. They had gone on fake treasure hunts before, but it was just a boys’ game in the backyard, like playing cops and robbers or pretending to go on a dragon slaying quest.

The discovery of the bags meant this was a genuine, bona-fide treasure hunt.

And they were one step ahead of the police, who hadn’t thought to check the valley.

It was game-on, there was now an electrifying atmosphere that had affected the entire group as everyone started to chatter loudly over each other. The noise became louder and louder until nobody could hear anyone else, until Gina uncharacteristically shouted “Quiet! Let’s think!”

Chapter 5 – The cave entrance

“Guys, we need to go to the cops”, said David first after everyone had gone silent. “Now that we know they came through here, we need to report it. We have evidence; I think we can go to jail if we don’t go tell them”.

“I agree” said Siya.

“Me too” said Hashim.

“No ways,” shouted Melvin, “We came here to treasure hunt. We haven’t found the treasure, we found our first clue, and now we want to stop? I say we go all the way. This is our chance to have our greatest adventure ever. We go back now, we lose out on the most exciting day ever, and the reward. Let’s vote on it. Who votes to continue on?”

His short speech had been so mesmerising, so passionate and heartfelt that immediately they all lifted their hands in unison, convinced that greatness lay ahead.

Without another word, Siya deftly hopped over the rocks, the river flowing slowly below her, and made it easily to the other side.

“Let’s go” she said and disappeared down the path on the other side.

The rest of them followed quickly, making the river crossing without any problem, all except David.

As David got to the rock in the middle, his foot touched a slimy patch on the rock and he almost did a backwards somersault straight into the waist high water.

Soaked, he waded across the remaining section of river to the far bank, and clambered up onto the other side, upset not at the fact that he was soaked and had almost hit his head, but that his snacks that weren’t sealed in water tight bags were now spoiled.

With David muttering under his breath, Melvin had walked back laughing hysterically before asking him to go back and do it again so that he could get it on camera. David wasn’t amused.

The warm African sun had already started to dry David’s clothes by the time they had continued down the pathway. They were now following seven sets of quite clear footprints that had been made recently on the sandy path, almost certainly that of the armoured car robbers. This route across the valley was fairly far often the beaten track, and as such very few people used it. They had to be close now.

About a kilometre later, the tracks suddenly veered off into a dense thicket of bushes. The boys and girls followed, but it was hard work pushing through the dense bush and tress, and to top it off some of the bushes had long thorns that scratched and poked and cut them as they leaned into the green wall of foliage.

After about fifty metres of bundu-bashing, they came out in a natural clearing that was covered by a canopy tree top, which would have been all but invisible not only from the pathway but also from the air. No helicopter scouring the valley would ever have found it. It was clearly a camp site as there was a man-made fire pit made out of rocks, stones and sand which had been used recently.

There was no sign of the treasure here.

Bhutana walked around the clearing, trying to find new tracks to show where they had left the area. To the one side, a section of rocks rose up, and a few branches lay at the foot of the outcrop. He kicked the branches away, and saw a small opening that lead into a small cave.

“Here guys, I have found something,” said Bhutana.

They all came running and stood in a half circle around the tiny cave entrance, everybody knowing what needed to happen next but nobody daring to say it in case it was seen as a sign that they wanted to volunteer to go first.

Hashim piped in, making a nervous joke that he couldn’t let David go on ahead in case he got stuck in the entrance Winnie the Pooh style after eating Rabbits’ honey. David didn’t object to the joke about his weight as he normally might, as he really didn’t want to be in the lead.

As David reiterated for the tenth time that he wasn’t afraid, “but, you know, I’m allergic to spiders, scorpions and snakes…”, Melvin got to his hands and knees and disappeared into the hole.

A few seconds passed, then a few more. Then a minute became two.

Just as the group started to become concerned that the creepy crawlies that David had alluded to had finished Melvin off, his head popped out of the hole and he cried excitedly, “You guys have got to see this!”.

One by one they scurried into the cave, even David made it through the narrow opening without much trouble or incident.

The cave entrance opened up to a fairly large room that had been decked out with all the amenities to sustain a group of people. There was a set of car type batteries in the corner that powered a single LED light in the room that Melvin had switched on with a pull rope when he had first entered. There were small fold out deck chairs, cooking utensils in a makeshift kitchen, a small TV, and even an enclosed toilet stall in the other corner.

The room at the cave entrance opened up to an even bigger cave behind, where whoever had set this up obviously slept. Seven hammock type bunks had been strung up from wall to wall.

Next to one of the makeshift beds was a lamp, and under the lamp was a thick A5 diary come day-planner.

The leader of the gang had meticulously planned out the entire heist over the last few months and written it down. This was evidence, and they knew it. Hashim put the book into his backpack.

They had found the hideout.

Chapter 6 – David

David stood staring down a long narrow tunnel that lead out from the back of the second cave. It wasn’t as tight as the entrance they had come through, but you still had to crawl on hands and knees or waddle on your haunches to get anywhere. As they made their way down to who knows where, he felt a small pinch of panic as he imagined it narrowing until claustrophobia got the better of him. He needed to be brave, as it just went on and on and on.

David was decidedly a product of privilege, but his life had never been easy.

Mum and Dad were both from Jewish descent, with their parents’ parents having emigrated from Europe during the war. Safely in South Africa and away from the tragedy of the war that was sweeping over Europe, great granny and grandpa had met, fallen in love, started a successful business supplying miners’ safety equipment and clothing, and later on inventing and holding patents to some innovative mining machinery.

Dad had taken over the family business at a young age. Dad’s father had passed away when Dad was only 22. There was a tragic car accident in Johannesburg, and even though Dad and his dad had been close, Dad didn’t talk about him much with David.

A few years later he met and married Mum.

Mum had tried for almost three years to have a baby but was told that it would never happen, and so David had been adopted. He was delivered to the loving and expectant parents at the tender age of 11 days old.

Mum and Dad loved him dearly, and he felt loved. After a shaky start to life he had been gifted a home and as much love as he could accept, and he can always only remember being happy.

And then at the age of four years old tragedy struck. Mum was diagnosed with cancer, and whilst she put on a brave fight, she had passed away in less than a year.

Dad put on a brave face and never cried in front of David, but David knew he always cried when his door closed at night. It took a toll as dad had thrown himself into work to try and get over his mum, and for a long time, the only real companionship he had at home was the live-in housekeeper Phumi, and the live-in gardener, Christopher.

Both had a home tongue of Xhosa and as such, David had learned to speak Xhosa more fluently than English in his early primary school years.

About two years ago dad had met Estelle.

Estelle was less than half Dad’s age, but she made Dad happy, which made David happy. She wasn’t interested in being a mom, and she was never going to try to replace Mum, which was fine with David. And anyways, since she had been in Dad’s life Dad was around a lot more, leaving work aside and generally being less of a stick in the mud since she had moved in.

David had always struggled with his weight. He was a big baby, a big toddler and a big child. Everyone said it was baby fat and he would lose it as he got older, but now he was a big teenager. He was hoping that puberty, if it ever came, would help him lose a few pounds.

David’s friends had filled a big empty gap in his life

After shuffling forward for a few minutes, torches in hand to ensure that pitch darkness of the cave didn’t stall them on their quest, they suddenly came to a three pronged fork in the tunnel.

Hashim and Melvin immediately said, “Lets split up” with the exact timing of creepy twins from a horror movie.

David was scared, he knew how those movies ended. The aliens-slash-monsters-slash-bad guys would wait till the group divided into smaller bite sized teams, and then attack. Furthermore, David’s lack of self-esteem and self-confidence made him feel like a side character, a bit part or extra without a surname. Characters without surnames are hardly ever the hero, expendable to early plot twists and gruesome death scenes.

Before David could even start to protest, Melvin said, ”David you go with Siya, I will go with Gina, and Bhutana and Hashim can take the middle tunnel.”

“I don’t want to go with a girl” David said to himself as the other two teams had already proceeded down their respective tunnels well out of earshot, and Siya had taken the lead down theirs.

They moved along in almost complete silence.

David despised girls. It wasn’t his fault, he was a pre-pubescent boy who had grown up to think that you could get “girl-disease” just by chatting to someone of the opposite sex. And nobody had ever really corrected him.

But there was a huge problem. For some reason he could not explain, he had a huge crush on Siya. This was going to be a very awkward afternoon.

Chapter 7 – Making new girl friends

David and Siya were deep under the mountain now. The passage had lead more than 50 metres down from where the guys had split up, and it was becoming very rocky and technical at times. Siya led the way, bravely sweeping aside the cobwebs with her torch as David followed silently behind.

Every time he wanted to say something to her, it felt as if a heavy balloon would blow up in his throat and his jaw would become tight. Nothing would come out.

The terrain became much steeper all of a sudden, and as they walked forward, hunched over, they were forced to use their hands on the walls and roof to keep from falling.

Eventually he gathered all his strength and said, “How are you”.

Except what came out was a loud cross between a grunt and a squeal of a pig whose trotter had been jammed in a door.

Siya got such a fright that she over-balanced on the steep downhill tunnel floor and slipped, sliding downwards out of control.

The cave had been carved out of limestone by underground rivers hundreds of years ago, and whilst the water had subsided a long time ago and it was now dry, there were deep holes in the ground where the liquid had drained after the water table had dropped.

So far the holes had been small and they had simply stepped over them.

With terror David realised that Siya was falling uncontrollably towards the edge of a massive chasm in the ground, which could be hundreds of metres deep.

He lunged forward and stretched out his arm, grabbing her hand just as she disappeared over the edge.

“Hold on” he shouted as he strained to cling on to her with his sweaty fingers, “I will get you out”.

Siya started laughing.

He kept holding on but peered over the rim of the giant girl-swallowing bottomless pit, only to see that Siya was actually standing up straight and it was only actually about 6 foot deep.

She laughed again as his face reddened. He felt foolish.

“You can let go of my hand now,” said Siya. “unless you don’t want too?”

David snatched his hand away and jumped down into the pit, quickly scrambling up the other side trying to hide his embarrassment.

Siya, being the more athletic of the two, quickly caught up to him and passed, pausing briefly enough to say,” Thanks, I think that was sweet” before giving David a little kiss on the cheek.

Red enough to light the cave without a torch, David waited until Siya was far enough ahead to not see him flashing a giant grin and an exaggerated fist pump in the darkness of tunnel.

Chapter 8 – The puzzle

About 20 metres later the tunnels all converged again. All of a sudden all 6 of them where standing in a room about the size of a single garage. In the middle of the room was a large safe with a keypad.

The boys went to the safe and tried to move it, but it literally weighed a ton. There was no way they could ever get it back out the cave.

Gina suddenly said,” They must have used a hydraulic jack on wheels to get the safe in here”.

She would have known, her dad worked at a company that sold fork lifts and other moving equipment.

“You will never get that out without the right equipment” Gina added in a disappointed tone of voice.

A sudden rustling of pages, and they all turned to face Hashim, who had gone into his backpack and retrieved the diary he had found in the sleeping quarters earlier. On the inside back cover of the diary was a strange hand written riddle which went as follows:

The number has four digits (eg.1234 or 9876). All the digits are different. It begins and ends with an odd number and has two even numbers in the middle. 19 and 519 go into it exactly.

“It’s a clue to the combination of the safe” shouted Melvin, who loved puzzles. “We can do this”.

David walked to the safe and entered “1111#” after which the safe gave a loud and alarming beep-beep-beep before not opening.

“Wait! My dad has that same type of safe in his office at work” said Hashim. “It locks for 24 hours if you put in the code incorrectly 3 times in a row. We need to be sure”

All of them except Siya glared disapprovingly at David, who slunk slowly away from the safe knowing he had cost them one of their three precious attempts at unlocking the safe.

There was almost complete silence bar a few calculations being muttered under their breath as they all tried to work out what number it would be.

Suddenly Hashim said, “I have it!” and typed in 1823.

Another three beeps.

“It starts and ends with an odd number and the two middle numbers are even.” he said.

“But 19 and 519 don’t go into it” said Siya, clearly far more frustrated with Hashim’s fairly considered attempt than David’s clearly more inept try earlier.

“How was I supposed to know, I am not a calculator” replied Hashim, more upset by the fact that he had been given more grief than David about his attempt than about failing.

“Last chance. We all need to agree on the next number, it’s a team effort. We don’t try it until we are sure.” said Bhutana.

They all stood, some motionless, others pacing, trying to figure it out.

“I have it!” shouted Melvin. “It’s a bit of a trick question. Just multiply 19 by 519. The answer is 9861. The first and last numbers are odd. The Middle numbers are even. It must be the combination?”

With no other options on the table, they all gathered around the safe, and Melvin carefully pressed the buttons. 9…. 8…. 6……. 1………. And then with a deep breath #.

Click, the door swung slowly open.

Inside were piles of money and some printed certificates. They had found the money.

Chapter 9 – The Little Square Red Door

There was a lot of money in the safe. Every nook and cranny was full.

Bhutana ordered everyone to empty their backpacks of their food, water and other equipment, and fill them with the neatly wrapped piles of money in the safe. There was no other way to carry it out of the cave.

David objected wildly. Any food wasted was a major sin in his opinion, but he quickly agreed when Siya walked over, put her arm around his shoulders and asked him nicely.

Backpacks filled, they started back towards the tunnel they had come in on, but just as they were about to head out, something caught Gina’s eye and she stopped abruptly, backing everyone up.

Hidden cleverly in the corner of the room was a curtain, the same colour as the rock walls, very effectively camouflaging way lay behind.

Gina walked up to the curtain and swept it back, revealing a neatly installed bright red door, measuring approximately one metre by one metre.

Why was it here? Who would take all the time to install a door deep inside a cave? What other treasures might lay beyond?

David wasn’t having any of it, “Come on guys, we got what we came for, let’s go.”

Just above the door handle was a small keyhole, and above that, written in permanent black sharpie marker, “DO NOT OPEN” which seemed to be scrawled in an evil font, as if handwriting could have an unscrupulous motive.

It gave David the hibbie-jibbies, the hair on the back of his neck stood tall and his skin crawled. All of a sudden he didn’t want to be here, and the walls felt like they were closing in on him again. He was sweating.

“We have to open it,” squealed the far more brash and overtly confident Hashim, “what if it contains more treasure?”

Hashim and Melvin scrambled back to the large safe in the middle of the room, looking intently underneath any scraps of paper left behind to see if they had overlooked any keys in their excitement to pack the bundles of money a few minutes earlier. There was no sign of it, so they started searching around the safe in concentric circles, until they had covered most of the cave floor.

“What if its booby trapped?” said David hesitantly; hoping it would make a difference, but nobody was paying him any attention anymore. Everyone had joined the hunt.

“I reckon if it’s super important then the bad guys would keep it with them.” said Siya. “We may be wasting our time here”.

“Maybe we can just force it open, that lock looks really flimsy.” said Bhutana as they started to gather again slowly around the door having failed to find any key in the cave.

Without getting anyone’s approval he grabbed the handle and pulled, softly at first, and then harder, until he was straining with all his might, without the door budging an inch.

“It’s tougher than it looks,” cried Bhutana panting loudly now from all the strain he had put in, “Let David try, he can put more heft in”.

“No ways,” answered David with a resolute tone of voice and a swing of the arms, “If it is a trap I don’t want to find out. Just use a loose rock and bash it in. We are in a cave after all, there are rocks everywh….”.

His sentence wasn’t finished, as it was drowned out by a loud crash as a rock hit the door, Melvin and Hashim not needing any further invitation to use brute force to knock the door down. They had found the largest rock and were smashing it into the door over and over again, the noise was absolutely deafening and reverberated through the cave and far beyond.

Ten strikes, then twenty more, but still the door did not give. It was sturdy and put up an awesome fight.

All of a sudden Siya and Gina, who were standing off to the side watching the boys do what boys do best, noticed a fine mist gather before their eyes in the air. Every time the boys smashed the rock into the door the mist grew a little thicker, the room beginning to cloud up with dust.

Then without warning, a few gravelly stones landed on Gina’s shoulder. With the next wallop a few more landed on Siya’s head.

“STOP” shouted Gina and Siya at the top of their lungs, but at the exact moment another clang of rock on door rang out, resulting in them not being heard at all.

A large chunk of stone fell and missed Gina by an inch, her eyes now wide and panic stricken.

“STOP, STOP” this time shouted in a period of silence, but it was too late. The cave was starting to crumble and come down before their eyes.

Chapter 10 – The Chase

The silence was deafening as the echo’s faded away into the distance, but a new disturbance had started to catch their attention. Every few seconds there was a crack as a rock dislodged from the ceiling and a crash as the rock struck the floor and broke into smaller pieces.

They needed to go. They needed to go fast.

Gina suddenly put her hands to her lips and quietly but firmly shushed them all.

In the distance they could hear men’s voices, talking loudly and aggressively. They could not make out what they were saying, but they didn’t want to find out either.

There was no doubt the men knew they were here, they must have heard the bashing and crashing of rock on door, and would not be surprised to see the young treasure hunters when they got to the cave with the safe.

They felt trapped, the robbers were ahead, and the cave was collapsing behind. Their situation was dire and the options were perilous, but staying here was not one of them.

Bhutana sprang to action first and took control, whispering out orders, “Turn off the flashlights. We need to wait until they are close enough to know which tunnel they are in, and we will take another one and try to sneak past them.”

David whimpered a bit as a paralysing fear crept over him. This time they were in real trouble, as the robbers coming towards them were undoubtedly dangerous and potentially armed, but in the nick of time a surge of adrenalin kicked in and snapped him back into motion, his wits keeping him alert and quiet.

After what felt like an hour, but was probably only a minute or two, they heard the voices approach from the left tunnel. 

Silently they all went in single file to the right, into the pitch black darkness as fast as they could without risking a twisted ankle or a fall. A large boulder fell in the cave just behind them, and struck the safe with the bullseye accuracy of a champion darts player, demolishing it more effectively than dynamite ever could.

Half way out they suddenly heard a loud commotion behind them. The thugs had obviously found the destroyed safe and had immediately sprung into angry action, leaving the collapsing room and stalking their prey with lightning speed through the caverns.

There was no point in going dark or silent anymore, the robbers would have known that there were only two possible routes the guys could have taken and split up to cover both options.

Torches burning and personal safety no longer a big priority, they scampered out of the tunnel and into the smaller sleeping cavern, and then into the larger main cavern before getting their first glimpse of the two criminals who were pursuing them.

One guy was big. Really ,really big, with massive arms and biceps, looking more like a WWE wrestler than an armoured car robber.

David’s first impulse on seeing such an imposing hulk of a man was to stop get an autograph and ask for weight loss tips and a good training program, but for the fact that they were too busy fleeing for their lives.

The leader was much smaller but no less menacing. He was quicker than the other guy, and sprinted towards the boys and girls with alarming speed.

They managed to duck out of the cave and into the warm sunlight when the bad guys were about half way across the room, and like that the chase was on.

They had enough of a head start as they started crashing through the bushes towards the pathway to believe that they could make it all the way out of the valley before being caught, but as the crooks emerged from their hideout they made so much noise that you couldn’t really tell how close they were. It sounded like they were right on the kids’ heels, and getting closer all the time.

In a blind panic, they pushed harder and stronger, and emerged out of the thicket and onto the main path with torn clothing and dirty faces.

Turning to run back towards home, one of their pursuers suddenly crashed out of the bushes ahead of them, blocking their route to freedom. It was the big guy, and he was mad.

Melvin, in the lead, grabbed two bundles of money, tore the paper that held the bundle together and threw the money high into the air. The wind whipped the money this way and that, and the big guy gasped and made an attempt to catch the money drifting in the air which left a small gap just big enough for the kids to slip around as he was distracted.

They ran as fast as they could towards the river they had crossed earlier. David, the biggest and slowest of the group, fell behind quite quickly, and soon the entire group was out of sight ahead of him.

As they got to the river, they had to cross the rocks with much more haste and enthusiasm than before. Hashim first, then Gina, then Melvin, then Bhutana.

Siya was half way across when an arm reached out and grabbed her backpack. She stopped in her tracks, unable to move. The smaller man had caught up and seized her from behind, and she couldn’t get away.

Melvin shouted back from the safety of the far bank of the river, “Take off the backpack, let him have it!” in an attempt to free her from her captor.  

As she shrugged off the backpack which was being held firmly by the shorter villain, he made a grab for Siya’s arm in order to stop her from crossing the river.

Suddenly he was shoved forcefully sideways as David skipped across the rocks with astonishing speed for a kid of his size and rammed into the side of the gang leader, causing him to lose his balance and fall awkwardly into the same water David had been in an hour earlier.

Without looking back to see the fate of their nemesis, they scrambled across the river and up the side of Africa Valley, still in possession of five of the six backpacks of money that had been stolen.

A minute or two later they were in the main road and had flagged down a police car who was patrolling the area.

The adventure was almost over.

Chapter 11 – Friendship

An hour later they were standing back at the entrance to the caverns, this time surrounded by hundreds of police and reporters. Their parents were also there, bewildered and dishevelled as they were bombarded and regaled by tiny snippets of the adventure from all sides as the kids excitedly blurted out incoherent sentences that you really had to have been there to understand.

The big guy with muscles who had blocked their pathway had been arrested in the cave when the police arrived. He hadn’t put up much of a fight, instead looking rather crestfallen and pathetic as the police lead him away in handcuffs.

There had been no sign of the smaller gang leader or the single missing backpack of stolen money.

“I wonder who he is?” asked Bhutana’s dad with a genuine look of concern on his face, obviously wary that the man may return to wreak vengeance on the boys and girls who so cunningly thwarted his carefully laid plans.

“I think his name is Moriarty” laughed Melvin, tongue in cheek trying to continue with the Sherlock joke from earlier at David’s expense. David didn’t take the bait, as he seemed more interested in eaves-dropping into what Siya was telling her mom about the escapade, listening to hear if his name was been mentioned in a positive light.

The police had tried to search the caves, but hadn’t been able to find the cavern with the safe or a red door. The rock fall had blocked off everything behind the two main rooms in the front, and a local expert had said the area was too dangerous to go into as the ground had become too unstable.

That Red Door.

Would the mystery of the red door ever be solved?

One of the reporters stopped taking photos long enough to ask the kids what the worst part of the adventure was.

Melvin immediately replied, “The giant octopus was really scary”

‘Octopus?” enquired the reporter with a truly bewildered and confused look on his face.

“Um. Call me Data?” he said as he tried to drop the next subtle hint before giving up in frustration and blurting out, “Just, just Google it”, his pop culture reference to the Goonies flying well over the head of the newspaperman as he turned to answer another question in a purposefully mischievous and obtuse manner.

“So what was the best part?” asked another journalist, this one with a video camera.

Hashim, Melvin and Bhutana all shouted in perfect harmony, “The reward!” as if they had been rehearsing it forever.

But David didn’t say a word, he just glanced over at Siya and smiled.

“Who are you kids? Where are you all from?” asked another newsman.

“We are best friends” replied Bhutana, and then after a few seconds added, “Best friends from the Clubhouse Impi in the corner, where our worlds meet.”

The End