A sly fellow stunned his unsuspecting friends by taking advantage of their absence to commit a felony, a reminder that we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, writes SIMON MWALE

WHEN I was a student of journalism at Evelyn Hone College, I remember meeting two lively friends who were studying hotel management.
One of them was Gareth (not real name) and the other was Nixon (not real name).These two struck up a great friendship and they were always together. Both Gareth and Nixon are late. After sometime, Gareth and I also became friends after discovering that our fathers once worked for government way back in the early 60s in Chipata.
Gareth and Nixon were strikingly similar in some respects. They were both slim, light complexioned and both kept walrus moustaches.
Generally they were amiable fellows who got along with most people. By dint of my friendship with Gareth, I also came to know Nixon and he became my friend, since they say, a friend  of my friend is also your friend.
Nixon and Gareth were always trend setters when it came to dressing.
Always dapper dressed, they were smart and dashing and the envy of most students at the college. No wonder they were pursuing a career in hotel management where personal grooming is not only the essence but is the stock-in-trade of the profession.
When I finished my studies I joined this newspaper and worked for three years when I crossed over to the Indeco Group of companies to join its public relations department which was headed by Mr Augustine Seyuba who had himself hailed from the Times of Zambia before joining Indeco.
It was while at Indeco that I was privileged to travel a lot in the course of duty, especially between Lusaka and Ndola. But there were times the assignments took me to Livingstone where Livingstone Motor Assemblies, a subsidiary of Indeco, manufactured Fiat cars.
By this time, Gareth had completed his studies and had secured a job with Hotel Intercontinental, but I wasn’t sure where Nixon found employment, but he was living in Lusaka.
Each time I travelled to Livingstone I stayed at the Intercontinental, that is officially. But in reality, I would spend nights at Gareth’s flat and move to the hotel in the morning, having eaten wholesome
English breakfast from my hotelier friend who was trained in culinary delights.
What this meant was that whenever Gareth took leave and came to Lusaka, he had no choice but to come and stay with me at Mpezeni Flats in North mead. In 1986 or thereabouts he came over as usual when he was on holiday.
Nixon always knew that Gareth was in town and so one day he came to my flat to come see our friend Gareth. After 30 minutes or so, Nixon excused himself and said he had something to attend to in town. We let him go and expressed hope that we would meet him soon.
The following morning, after breakfast, Gareth and I left the flat, me going for work at Indeco House while Gareth had various places to touch. We agreed to meet in the evening. When evening came, we chose to have some drinks and watched television instead of going out.
The following day, after taking his bath, Gareth was preparing to dress up in readiness for the day’s business. He went into the wardrobe and tried to select a particular shirt to wear. Shocker!
He searched and searched and after turning the wardrobe upside-down, the shirt was nowhere to be seen. Then he asked me if I had seen the shirt, but I hadn’t. We then asked the maid whether she had seen the shirt, but she said she hadn’t either.
Where had the shirt gone? Was Gareth not mistaken-perhaps he had left the shirt in Livingstone? He stressed that there was no way he could have left it. After 10 minutes of agonised silence and puzzlement, we decided to quiz the maid over the missing shirt again.
“Are you sure you have not hidden the shirt somewhere?” “No, Sir. I can’t do a thing like that,” she said innocently.
But where had the shirt gone on its own? And then the girl dropped the bombshell!
“That man who came the other day, came again today when both of you left the house,” the maid said.
“He was here? Did he enter the bedroom?”
“Yes. When I opened the door for him, he went upstairs and he spent about 10 minutes and then he came down on his way out,” she said.
“How could you have allowed him to go to the bedroom?” that was me rapping the poor girl.
“I thought you are friends and there was nothing wrong in letting him go to the bedroom.”
There was no need to push this Spanish inquisition t of his line but certain information was still crucial.
“Did he carry anything?” that was me asking, sensing the unlocking of the mystery of the missing shirt.
“Yes, he was carrying a parcel wrapped in a newspaper.” There we had it.
“It’s Nixon who has stolen the shirt,” Gareth said as I nodded.
At that time, there were no mobile phones and we could not call our friend to verify our suspicion. The maid did not know where he had gone and we too could not guess.
But wait a minute? Soon after we learnt that our friend was the prime suspect in the theft, Gareth and I started checking for possible theft of other items. When a thief strikes, It’s rare that he will lift one item and as sure as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, we discovered that I too was a victim.
About two weeks back, I had arrived from Botswana where I was part of a Zambian delegation that had visited various trading and manufacturing industries in Botswana and Zimbabwe. The delegation was led by the then director general of Zambia Industrial Mining and Corporation (ZIMCO) Mr Evans Willima
The delegation also included the chief executives of Indeco the late Mr Mr Dixie Zulu and National Import and Export Corporation Mr Clement Mambwe.
Among the items I had bought in Botswana was a brown pair of shoes and a few shirts and jeans. When we did a search, I found that the shoes were gone, too! I couldn’t believe this and said to myself if our thief friend had helped himself to an old pair of shoes, I wouldn’t have minded. But a brand new pair of shoes worn only once to be stolen was unacceptable.
So what did we decide to do? Report our friend to the police? We agreed that this was not a good option. Nixon was our friend and the material things he had stolen to sell cheaply to raise money for a beer or two wouldn’t take him anywhere.
Nixon despite this dark side to his character was an amusing friend. He was gifted with psychology in tight situations. For instance, if he wanted to extract some money from a presentable person he knew at a bar, like Lotus Inn in those days, he would use this tactic.
He would say: “Baba, what are you doing here? Simalo banu aba (what are you doing here? this place is below your status) You should be drinking from Intercontinental, Ridgeway (now Southern Sun) and
Pamodzi. These are the places befitting your status.” And then, immediately the man felt flattered, Nixon would add, shamelessly,
“Baba, bwanji ka K20 for a drink? (How about a K20 for a drink)” He would let out a big extra-ordinary giggle.
One day, I was walking to collect my vehicle from a friend’s house where I used to park it (security was bad at the flats) when I met Nixon in Northmead. “Baba, mukuyenda ndi myendo. Kodi muli kalaliki? (why are you are walking? Are you a clerk?. Tengani taxi, baba! (hire a taxi).”
That was Nixon, a jolly good fellow who sprung a shocking surprise on us. Not all that glitters is gold.
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