His smile turned sad. "It's always about the money, madam."
The young man sounded resigned to what was going to happen.
He'd sat in the darkness long enough for the nervousness and fears to dissipate. All that was left was this: he and her, and a task that needed doing.
When Laura spoke, her voice wavered. "Did Winston send you?"
He sounded puzzled. "Who is Winston?"
"He's... a business associate."
"No, that is not why I am here. Please, madam." He gestured to the chair across from him. "I wish to tell you a story."
CHAPTER 109
Palm wine and moonlight. Sleepy children and a tale wrapped within a larger story.
Nnamdi's father was lulling the young ones into slumber:
"Once there was a hunter who had many friends. Everyone enjoyed the hunter's company. They enjoyed his drinks, his dancing, his food. But most of all, they enjoyed this: the hunter always paid. He paid for everyone. He paid for the palm wine and the pepper stew, he paid for the drummers, he paid for the music, paid for the sweets. He always kept the dancing going when the others had begun to tire. Everyone liked him, and the hunter carried on in such a manner until, sad to say, one day his money was all gone. So he asked his friend,
‘Please give me twenty kobo so I can buy some corn. '
But his friend said,
‘Not give, lend. '
And this friend demanded the hunter's gun as a guarantee.
‘When you pay me back, I will return your gun.' Now
the hunter, he needed his gun to hunt the animals to sell in the market to make the money to pay back the twenty kobo to his friend. But his friend was firm on this.
He took the gun and he warned the hunter, '
I will be at your home tomorrow morning to collect payment. If you do not have it, I will keep the gun as mine.'
So the hunter went to see his friend the leopard, and he said,
'Please, I need twenty kobo to pay my debt.
'The leopard agreed to lend the hunter the money but warned him, '
I will be at your home tomorrow. If you do not have the money, I will take what I want.
' The hunter hurried now to his friend the goat and asked for money to pay the leopard. The goat lent the money, but he too said, '
I will be at your house tomorrow to collect.
' So now this hunter, he went to the bush cat to get money to pay the goat to pay the leopard to pay the friend. '
I will be at your house tomorrow morning,'
the bush cat said.
‘And. if you are not there
,
I will take what I wish. '
So the hunter asked the village rooster for money to pay the bush cat to pay the goat to pay the leopard to pay the friend, to get his gun back. The rooster gave him the money, but warned as well: '
I will come at first light, and if you do not have my money, I will take what I wish.'
The hunter agreed to this. But the next morning, he woke before everyone else and scattered the last of his corn on the ground outside his house. Then he hid behind a tree and waited. Soon after arrived the rooster, crowing for payment. Finding the hunter was not at home, the rooster said
‘Fine, I will eat his corn then.
' As the rooster was pecking at the corn, the bush cat arrived and, seeing the hunter gone, decided to take the rooster as payment. The bush cat was eating the rooster when the goat arrived. Angry that the hunter was not there to pay him, the goat charged the bush cat, knocking him into the forest to die. The goat began to call for his money.
But the leopard was now on his way. He heard the goat's bleatings and he followed the sound all the way to the hunter's home. When he found the hunter gone, the leopard pounced, taking the goat as payment. As the leopard was eating the goat, the hunter's friend appeared, carrying the gun. Seeing the leopard, he quickly took aim and—
pa-dang!
—he shot the leopard dead. At which point, the hunter jumped out, angry and shouting.
‘You have killed my friend the leopard! You will be punished!'
The other man was startled, and he begged the hunter for forgiveness. '
I did not know the leopard was your friend! Here, have back your gun. Your debt is paid. Let me go.
' After the other man had gone, the hunter skinned the leopard, cooked the meat, and sold the skin in the market. And that was the end of that."
CHAPTER 110
"Miss," said Nnamdi. "Don't you think it would have been better for everyone if the hunter's friend had let him keep his gun? Had not demanded repayment so fervently?"
When Laura spoke, her voice was so faint it almost dissolved into the air between them. "I've done nothing wrong," she said.
"Why are you here, madam, causing such mischief?"
"My father."
"Your father sent you?"
"No, my father died."
"I'm sorry to hear this. My father also died. How did yours?"
"He fell."
"Mine drowned."
"He didn't fall," she said. "He was pushed."
"Mine too."
For the first time, she recognized the beauty of the boy's smile.
Saw in it a sliver of opportunity. If she could establish a human connection with him... "I'm sorry about your father," she said.
"We've both suffered, it seems."
But this only puzzled him more. "My father—he suffered. I was very sad. But it was my father who died, not me. Soon, my wife will give birth, and I will become a papa myself. Do you have any children?"
She shook her head.
"That is a shame, madam. Because then you would understand what is going to happen. My father said the test of a parent is to ask,
Would you die for your child?
Until you can answer yes to that question, you are not ready to become one. But, madam, I think the greater test is,
Would you kill for your child?"
"Don't," she said. "There's no need."
"Every day," he said, "I see children picking through mountains of rubbish.
Mountains,
madam. My child will not crawl through rubbish. I think that is every parent's wish, don't you? That their children do not have to climb through rubbish."
"Wait, no, don't. Listen—here. I have..." She dug out the bill she had in her pocket. She unfolded it now for the first time, hands shaking, and offered it to him. "A hundred dollars. Take it, please, as a gift. I'm—I'm not going to the police, I'm not going to the EFCC, the only place I'm going is home. Please, just let me go home."
"A gift?"
"A gift."
One, two, in and out, let it bleed and walk away. Ransack the room, make it look like a robbery, opening drawers, flinging belongings this way and that. But just make sure she dies.
"Don't," she said when she saw his expression change. "You can't. I'm—I'm pregnant." It was the only card left to play.
This took him aback. "You are with child?"
"Yes, I found out just today. If you kill me, you'd be killing my child, too."
Nnamdi smiled. "I would wish you a heartfelt congratulations, madam."
"Thank you."
"But we both know you are not with child. It is a ruse, madam.
You are simply trying to 419 me. We both know this."
CHAPTER 111
Amina was waiting in the stairwell with a change of clothes for Nnamdi. But when he appeared, there was no blood. A clean kill?
Or no kill at all?
If we go down, we will go down, swords raised.
"Here," he said, palming the bill into Amina's hand. "One hundred dollars. That's a midwife and swaddling, that's an electric fan, a cradle."
"The
oyibo
woman?"
"Gone."
"Gone, dead?"
"Gone soon. She will be leaving first thing in the morning and will be making no more mischief. She promised on her papa's soul."
He was out of breath.
"But guyman will be asking—"
"Only just you and me knowin'. We tell guyman faddah she never showed. Tell him she was already gone away home. Now, hide the money quick, so it can't be found."
He ran down the stairs, two at a time, feet clattering echoes all the way. He'd answered his own question. He might die for his child. But he wouldn't kill.
Nnamdi tossed the ice pick down a stairwell laundry chute as he ran, heard it bounce metallic against the sides as it fell. It would be discovered in among the hotel bedding that night, when the laundry was dumped into the washing bins, but by then it wouldn't matter.
They were waiting for Nnamdi when he reached the lobby.
As the door clicked shut behind the young man, Laura had scrambled to shove the chain into the slot. She'd turned the deadbolt, hands palsied with fear.
She was having trouble breathing, felt the panic come in waves.
Hands still trembling, she'd called down to the front desk, had said,
"I've just been robbed. He's on his way. Hurry. You might catch him."
And they did.
CHAPTER 112
"Sit down there." A shove.
His face was badly swollen, with one eye puffed shut. But he felt thankful nonetheless; he'd been plucked free of police custody just moments before they were going to start breaking bones.
Hotel security had yelled one question at Nnamdi, again and again. "Who let you into the room?" They wanted to know if he'd been working alone or in tandem with others.
"Door was unlocked, sir," Nnamdi said through a mouth full of blood. "I let myself in, alone, sir." It was the truth. And even after he was carted off by the police, and no matter how hard they hit him, he never wavered.
The door was open. I let myself in.
Surveillance tapes from the hotel showed Nnamdi slipping in, and this was enough for the police to convict him in advance of any trial. Had they rewound the tape further, to several hours earlier, they would have seen a cleaning girl enter the room with extra rolls of toilet paper, might have noticed the door not quite close as she left, might have noticed it held open—ever so slightly—by a deadbolt, half-turned. But it would never come to that. As abruptly as Nnamdi had been arrested, he was released. The officers tossed his belongings back at him, not even bothering to steal the few kobo in coins he had before dumping him out the back door.
A car was waiting for him.
And now he was here, in a crumbling courtyard that smelled of petrol. High walls, no windows.
A familiar cough. "Gently, gently. There is no call for any roughhousing. Fetch the boy some water."
Nnamdi squinted at the figure moving toward him. "Cousin guyman?"
CHAPTER 113
She wouldn't leave her room, so they came to her: investigators with the Nigerian police, speaking in hushed, almost hallowed tones, offering her the tea and scones and sympathy that the concierge had sent up.
"We've caught the rascal," the officer in charge assured her.
"We will question him over the weekend, assess his story, probe for accomplices. You will need to come down to the Ikeja police station on Monday morning, make a formal statement, identify the culprit."
"Monday? I can't."
"I'm sorry, madam, but you must. Bring your passport."
"I can't. I have a flight to catch. I'm heading home tomorrow."
"Oh, madam, I'm afraid that is out of the question."
They're not going to let me leave. I'm never getting out of Lagos.
"Did the boy mention any accomplices?" they asked.
After the investigators had left, she locked herself in again, dug out Inspector Ribadu's card. And if I do call him? They may very well find out about the money I transferred home. May even accuse me of 419. But if I don't call him...
She paced the room, secure for now behind her deadbolt and chain. When she had outpaced the worst of her anxiety, exhaustion set in, and she lay down on the bed. This had been no random robbery, she knew—the story about the leopard and the hunter, the warning to go home and cause no further mischief. The boy hadn't known who Winston was, though; his puzzled look seemed genuine. But who knew what alias Winston was using? She should have said "Chief Ogun," and she berated herself over that.
I should have said Ogun.
Laura ate her dinner from the minibar fridge—cashews and chocolate bars and screw-top wine—and watched the searchlights on the airport towers turning. Just when she'd resolved to call the EFCC and come clean, the phone rang. It was the police officer who had interviewed her earlier.
"Madam, you are free. You may go home. I just require your flight times and information, in case of last-minute complications."
"I don't have to come to the station, identify the boy who robbed me?"
"There is no need, madam. He died in custody."
CHAPTER 114
Ironsi-Egobia dragged a chair across the cement floor of the crumbling courtyard. Aluminum legs, vinyl seat: he turned it backward, sat across from Nnamdi, his heavy arms folded on the chair's back.
"Can you read?"
"Yes."
"Did you read the newspapers yesterday?"
"No, sir."
"The United Nations has reported that the average life expectancy in Nigeria is 46.6 years. As of today, I am 46.7 years." A smile surfaced, wide and magnanimous, like an invitation to an embrace.
"You see? I have already bested the odds." His low belly laugh turned into a bronchial cough, and then into blood. He wiped his mouth, continued to laugh.
Ironsi-Egobia's men shifted uncomfortably behind him. They were not used to hearing him laugh.
Slowly, Ironsi-Egobia's expression changed.
