Salim didn't stay for another explanation.
He left Bwana Tunu's room, went down the stairs, and stopped beneath the shade of a stationery shop. His heart was beating fast, not because he was frightened, but because the sentence from the man in the inner room was still in his head.
**You said this was the final step.**
Tunu's voice wasn't unique to him.
His words weren't unique to him.
Salim pulled out his phone and called Kassim.
“Are you at the shop?”
“Yes.”
“Don't leave.”
“Why?”
“I want to see your receipts.”
Kassim went silent.
“What receipts?”
“Tunu's.”
“Salim—”
“You said you paid three times. If you still have them, bring them.”
He ended the call before Kassim could answer.
When he returned to the arcade, Kassim was standing in front of his printer with his hands in his pockets.
“I thought you were only going to listen,” he said.
“I listened.”
“To what?”
“There was another man inside. He said he'd paid twice and had been told this was the final step.”
Kassim lowered his voice. “You heard him clearly?”
“Perfectly.”
Kassim glanced down the corridor as if Tunu might have followed him.
“My receipts are at home.”
“Messages?”
Kassim slowly took out his phone.
“Some.”
They sat inside Salim's kiosk.
Kassim opened WhatsApp and searched for a contact he'd saved as **BT**.
“Why BT?” Salim asked.
“I didn't want my wife asking questions.”
Salim said nothing.
Kassim scrolled back several months.
The first message was ordinary.
**Come and we'll talk. The first session has the fee we agreed. There is no obligation to continue.**
Salim felt cold in his hands.
“Wait.”
He opened his own conversation with Tunu.
The message from his first day wasn't identical word for word, but it was close.
**The first session is what Kassim told you. Nothing more.**
Kassim kept scrolling.
After the first payment came another message:
**There is movement, but don't make the mistake of stopping the work halfway because of the first sign.**
Salim took Kassim's phone.
“Read that again.”
Kassim did.
Salim opened his own message.
**Something has begun to open, but don't make the mistake of stopping the work halfway because of the first sign.**
Both men sat in silence.
“Two words are different,” Kassim said.
“And the business name.”
Kassim moved forward.
Another message:
**Pressure may increase before the path settles. Don't treat that as failure.**
Salim searched his own.
**If the pressure has increased, don't confuse the final sign with failure.**
Kassim exhaled.
“I thought he knew what was happening to me.”
“So did I.”
“But this…”
“It's a template.”
Kassim didn't like the word.
“Maybe he has a system for talking to people.”
“Yes. A system for telling us the same thing.”
Kassim locked his phone.
“I want you to see the receipts yourself.”
“Let's go.”
“The shop?”
Salim called over a young accessories seller nearby and asked him to watch the kiosk for twenty minutes. Kassim shut down his printer.
Kassim's home wasn't far. His wife wasn't there. Kassim pulled an envelope from beneath clothes in a drawer.
“I hid them here,” he said.
“Why didn't you throw them away?”
“I don't know.”
There were three receipts inside.
Salim arranged them on the table.
The first had a small fee.
The second was nearly twice as much.
The third was larger again.
The descriptions were brief: **Consultation**, **Follow-up**, **Completion stage**.
Salim opened photos of his own two receipts on his phone.
The first: **Consultation**.
The second: **Follow-up**.
Kassim put his finger on the line.
“This is the same.”
“Yes.”
“And now he's told you completion stage?”
“Final step.”
Kassim sat on the bed.
“So even the names…”
“Follow the same order.”
“But the fees aren't exactly the same.”
“They don't have to be. The pattern is the same.”
Kassim picked up the third receipt.
“I paid this while my son's school balance was still outstanding.”
Salim didn't know what to say.
Kassim continued. “Three days after I paid, the tuition centre called about the contract. I took that as proof.”
“When did you submit the quotation?”
“Two weeks earlier.”
“Had they contacted you before?”
“They'd asked about my capacity.”
“So the contract was already in process.”
“I know that now.”
Kassim bent the receipt slightly, then flattened it again.
“But at the time, I needed something badly enough that I wanted it to mean something.”
Salim thought about Juma.
Juma had received his own payment. Then he had paid his debt. Salim had taken that event and turned it into an answer to something he couldn't prove.
“Take pictures,” Kassim said.
“Of what?”
“All the receipts.”
Salim photographed the third one beside his own two.
“And the messages,” Kassim said.
They took screenshots of the similar phrases.
When they returned to the arcade, Salim didn't feel victorious. He felt like a man who had seen his own cost written in someone else's handwriting.
That afternoon, the second supplier sent confirmation that one model had been canceled. The refund would take two days.
Salim recorded it in the ledger without counting it as money he already had.
Nuru called.
“The trip has been paid. I saw the receipt.”
“Yes.”
“Alya is happy.”
“Good.”
“What's wrong? Your voice sounds far away.”
Salim looked at the screenshots.
“I found something about Tunu.”
“What?”
“I'll show you at home.”
“Don't go back alone.”
“I already did.”
Nuru went quiet.
“Did you pay him?”
“No.”
“Promise anything?”
“No.”
“Then bring the whole truth home tonight.”
“I will.”
After the call, Kassim arrived with two printed pages.
“I printed the screenshots,” he said.
Salim laughed. “You really are a printer man.”
“Phones can disappear.”
The first page showed Kassim's messages. The second showed Salim's.
Side by side, the similarity was harder to ignore.
**The first sign.**
**Pressure before things settle.**
**Stopping halfway.**
**The final step.**
Kassim said, “This isn't enough to say everything he did was a lie.”
“I know.”
“But it's enough to say he wasn't reading my situation the way I thought he was.”
“Yes.”
“And yours.”
“Yes.”
A man who cut keys in the corridor passed, looked at the papers, and joked, “Are you opening a court case?”
Kassim covered them.
“Accounting.”
The man kept walking.
Salim said, “We need the man I heard today.”
“How will you find him?”
“I don't know.”
“Don't go back and wait outside. That will create trouble.”
“Then what do we do?”
Kassim thought.
“I knew someone who took me to Tunu before I took you.”
Salim stared at him.
“You never said there was someone else.”
“There are many things I didn't say.”
“Who?”
“Moses. He used to distribute bottled water to offices.”
“Do you still talk?”
“Sometimes.”
“Call him.”
Kassim hesitated.
“Kassim.”
“I'll call.”
He put the phone on speaker.
Moses answered after four rings.
“Kassim! You remembered me because your printers refused to work?”
Kassim forced a laugh.
“Brother, I have an old question.”
“Ask.”
“Do you remember Bwana Tunu?”
The other end went quiet.
“Kassim,” Moses said, his voice changing, “why are you asking me about that man?”
“I have a friend who went to him.”
“Has he paid?”
Kassim looked at Salim.
“Twice.”
Moses made a short, pained sound.
“Then tell him not to pay the third.”
Salim moved closer to the phone.
“Why?”
Moses asked, “Is that the friend?”
“Yes. My name is Salim.”
“Salim, have you been told there's a final step?”
Salim and Kassim looked at each other.
“Yes.”
“And that the pressure has increased because the process is entering its final stage?”
The hairs on Salim's arms rose.
“Something very close to that.”
---