“Wha …? Babe … are you crazy?”

“We are leaving right now, Spha!” said Linda.

“Why?”

“We can’t just relax like this. We have to be constantly on the move because you are a suspect in a robbery!”

She pointed to a pair of jeans and a T-shirt she had laid out on the bed where Owethu had slept.

“Get dressed, Spha!” she said. “Just do as I say for once!”

“Babe, what’s wrong?”

“Get dressed, Spha! We are leaving right now!”

Linda paced left and right in front of me. I stood up and held her to my chest.

“Babe, what’s wrong? It’s two in the morning!” I said.

She laid her head on my shoulder and let it all out.

“Spha, we have to find another hotel right now!” She broke free from my embrace. “What if Mpilo is working with a corrupt cop to track you so he can come here to kill you himself?”

“Babe, calm down. You were the one who said we should call him. So I called Mpilo. I explained everything to him and he understood,” I said.

“I woke up from visions of Mpilo and his brothers kidnapping us! They threatened to harm us if you didn’t hand over all the money. They cut my baby into pieces, Spha. I saw it in a dream! They killed Owethu!”

“Babe, please calm down. We are fine. Owethu is right here with us. Look at her, she is fine.”

Owethu was buckled into the pram and sound asleep, but Linda’s nightmare set off visions of distress in my own head. I was swallowed into her paranoia. Now I too saw us being kidnapped, my baby murdered and cut into pieces.

I got dressed. Just then the buzz of the cellphone stopped us in our tracks. There was a message from an unknown number. It was a video.

In the video a house was aflame. The area looked familiar – the container at the right edge of the screen, the slope of the land. It was our neighbourhood in Umlazi.

“No!” we both cried out when we realized it was our RDP house that was on fire.

A voice accompanied the video. It was definitely Musa, our neighbour who lived a few houses down.

“Ey, Spha, my friend,” said Musa. “They just set your house on fire. Mdu’s brothers set your house on fire. They want you dead, my brother. I’d never come back here if I were you.”

I dialled the number used to send the video. I switched the phone to loudspeaker mode as it rang.

“Musa!” We said simultaneously.

“Spha, Linda! Things are bad here!” said Musa.

“Who did this?” I shouted into the cellphone.

“Mdu’s brothers,” said Musa.

“The younger ones?” Linda inquired.

“Yes. But they were directed by the oldest one. The taxi boss,” said Musa.

“Mpilo?”

“Yes, Mpilo, the one who drives a black S Class Benz. I saw him with my own eyes directing others to burn your house.”

“But I spoke to him earlier. We straightened everything out,” I said.

“He was the one in charge. He threatened people in the neighbourhood. He was asking about Linda’s whereabouts.”

“When did this happen?” I said.

“Just now, Spha.”

Linda and I looked at each other in stunned confusion.

“Spha are you still there?” asked Musa.

“Yes, I’m here.”

“Listen, my friend. Never come back here. These guys want you and your whole family dead. I’ve got to go. Delete this video on your side. I’m deleting it on my side. These people will kill you, Spha. They don’t play.”

Tell us: Do you think Spha was silly to think he had ‘…straightened everything out’? Do gangsters play by rules of honesty and honour, like that?