Zoo City

Zinzi goes to another recovery meeting, where she learns that the rapper Slinger is not really mashavi. On page 6 of the newspaper, she finds a report by Mandlakazi Mabuso about the murdered person—not a woman but intersex—who had the Sparrow. Because Serfontein was homeless, and because Zinzi saw a shopping trolley filled with plastic forks in her vision, Zinzi looks for homeless shelters that accept donated food. She shows one shelter’s administrator a photo of Patrick, but he doesn’t recognize the victim. They go to a park, where a homeless woman remembers Patrick had an Aardvark. Zinzi asks if they’ve noticed that any other homeless people have gone missing, and they respond that they wouldn’t notice: “Exactly what the killer is counting on” (306).

Zinzi meets Mandlakazi Mabuso and tries to convince her that these murders have to do with muti, explaining that she has received email messages from the victims. Zinzi believes the killer is targeting mashavi and stealing their animals; she tells Mandlakazi about the teen gangsters who’d cut off the Porcupine’s paw to sell it. Zinzi knows there’s already a market for harvested child body parts: “A hand buried under your shopfront door will bring you more customers” (309).

Zinzi, Mandlakazi, and Dave meet a young girl named Roberta at a mall coffee shop. The girl, who is a prostitute, insists on speaking only to Zinzi and says she is afraid to go home. She witnessed the murder of the woman with a Sparrow. She reports that while she saw the woman’s blood, she could not see the killer: the only thing visible was “gray. Like a shadow. Like a demon” (312).

Zinzi arrives home to find Vuyo sitting on her bed, with a gun. She receives a call from one of the iJusi crew (she has set up a ringtone to alert herself), but ignores it, offering Vuyo tea and trying to remain calm. As she opens her cutlery drawer, she finds a large knife and a china figurine of a kitten; she realizes these are pieces of evidence meant to link her to Mrs. Luditsky’s murder. Vuyo says the cash Zinzi gave him was fake, and he begins beating her up. Sloth attacks him, and Vuyo twists Sloth’s arm back at a terrible angle. Zinzi recovers and threatens to bash Vuyo’s skull in with her tea kettle. She knows he’s unwilling to risk bringing the Undertow and becoming animalled if he kills her.

Zinzi realizes that someone has called the police. She tells Vuyo that the same people who gave her fake bills planted evidence at her place. She also realizes that the murderers had already killed Mrs. Luditsky before Zinzi became involved, so they’re trying to link her to something else, too. Zinzi escapes the building and drops the planted knife and china cat into a storm drain. She escapes, thanks to the police being distracted by her neighbors’ fake passports. She makes it to her car, where she listens to a voicemail from Arno, which says that someone has invaded the home; she hears the sound of Arno being dragged away. When she heads to Mrs. Luthuli’s, her photo on a “Wanted” poster at the security station. The home is in flames.

Posing as a member of the press, Zinzi approaches the burning house. She sees charred bodies, including Arno’s, being dragged from the rubble. She senses a lost, tattered book with a golden tree on its cover; Amira is nearby. Zinzi escapes from the crowd and returns to her car.