Wife of the Gods (4 page)

“Maybe we would if you actually did some work.”

Chikata ignored the jab. “Can’t we get some confessions by
beating up one or two suspects – like you did to that rapist when
you were detective sergeant?”

Dawson swiveled in his chair. “Look, that’s not what happened,
Chikata.”

“Sorry. Then tell me.”

“I caught the guy red-handed. He confessed. After I cuffed him,
he said all little girls deserved to have his
bulla
up their
totos
, so I punched him in the face. That’s all.”

“Oh, I see. How many times did you punch him?”

Dawson shrugged. “I don’t remember exactly. Two, three
times.”

“Three times at
least
, from what I heard. No disrespect,
but I think your temper is too hot, Dawson. Why waste energy on a
bleddyfool like that?”

“I’m not like you. Doesn’t anything ever upset you?”

“Oh, yah. Not getting enough sleep.”

“You would get some if you would go to bed by yourself every
once in a while.”

Chikata began to laugh so hard he capsized his chair, at which
point Dawson could not help himself and broke into laughter
himself. Chikata recovered and restored the furniture.

“Anyway, you’d better solve something before my uncle transfers
you to some bush village somewhere,” he said, only half
jokingly.

“I’d like to see him try,” Dawson said.

♦

Perhaps he should not have spoken with so much bluster. That
afternoon Chief Superintendent Theophilus Lartey called Dawson to
his office. Lartey, around fifty-two, was a surprisingly tiny man
for the amount of power he wielded. His soft leather armchair and
expansive desk dwarfed his proportions, as did the room, which
could have held at least three offices the size of Dawson’s. It was
luxuriously cool in here, with a powerful air conditioner purring
from high up on the wall. The room was completely quiet, insulated
from the hum and bustle of the outside world, where the weather was
hot and stifling.

“Sit down, Dawson,” Lartey said.

Dawson did so, feeling as he always did – like a pupil in the
headmaster’s office. One never went there unless there was
trouble.

“You know Ketanu in the Volta Region?” Lartey asked.

“Yes, I’ve been there before.”

“And you speak Ewe?”

“Yes. My mother is Ewe.” He could not refer to her in the past
tense. “Why, sir?”

“There’s a situation up there,” Lartey said. “A young woman was
found dead in the forest day before yesterday. Suspicious
circumstances for sure, so the local police called in a CID
detective from Ho.”

Ho was a minuscule city compared with Accra, but as the capital
of the Volta Region, it was where small-town Ketanu would look for
help in police or other matters.

“All right,” Dawson said. “So CID Ho is investigating – ”

“And where do we come in?” Lartey interjected. “The young lady,
Gladys Mensah, was in her third year of medical school and was
volunteering with the GHS under the Ministry of Health. The
minister called me this morning. He insists someone here in
headquarters take the case.”

“What’s wrong with the Ho detective?”

“Look, Dawson,” Lartey said irritably, “don’t ask me these
questions. I have no idea why the minister doesn’t want the Ho man
to take the case. I’m sure it’s something political, but what
difference does it make? The bottom line is that I have to send
someone there, and that someone is you.”

“Why me, sir?”

“Use your head, Dawson. You’re the only detective here who
speaks Ewe and that’s what they speak in the Volta Region, so you
have a big advantage. What’s that stupid look on your face?”

“This is a little unexpected, sir – ”

“Life is full of surprises.”

“When am I supposed to go, sir?”

“Tomorrow morning. You can take one of the CID cars. The MoH
will make the arrangements for a place to stay in Ketanu, but your
first port of call will be the Volta River Authority Hospital. The
postmortem is being done there tomorrow, and I want you to attend
it.”

∨
Wife of the Gods
∧

D
arko Dawson’s first
visit to Ketanu had been twenty-five years ago. He was ten and his
brother, Cairo, was thirteen when their mother, Beatrice, took them
there to visit Auntie Osewa and Uncle Kweku. Papa couldn’t go with
them because he couldn’t get any time off from work. That’s what he
said, but Darko didn’t believe him. For some reason, Papa wasn’t
fond of Mama’s side of the family.

Ketanu was about 160 kilometers away, the farthest Darko had
ever traveled, and he was excited about the trip. They boarded a
tro-tro at the Nkrumah Circle lorry park, a whirling dust bowl of
people coming and going. Darko thought the tro-tro was packed
enough to begin with, but the driver made two more stops in the
city and the tro-tro conductor, or mate, squeezed in a few more
passengers. Darko and Cairo had wanted to sit somewhere up in
front, but Mama would not allow it.

“No, no,” she said, shaking her head firmly. “If there’s an
accident, I don’t want you flying through the windscreen. Nor me.
We sit in the back.”

Mama was very nervous about traveling in tro-tros. Darko noticed
how tense she became, gripping the seat in front of her whenever
the vehicle had to brake sharply.

Several cramped and bone-rattling hours later – the ride seemed
endless to Darko – they arrived at a transit town called Atimpoku,
on the Volta River, where they were to change tro-tros. The
Atimpoku stop was a bustling trading place. Market women with trays
of merchandise balanced effortlessly on their heads swarmed around
arriving vehicles in aggressive attempts at selling sugar-bread and
the popular “one-man-thousand,” plastic bags packed tight with tiny
crispy-fried fish.

Mama waved the traders off and firmly led Darko and Cairo away
from the mayhem. They had a little time before the next tro-tro to
Ketanu was to arrive.

“Come, boys,” she said. “Let’s stretch our legs. I’m going to
take you to a secret place.”

Darko loved exploring. “Where, Mama?”

“You’ll see. It’s a bit of a walk, so get your legs strong and
ready.”

“I
have
strong legs,” Darko said.

“They’re skinny,” Cairo said. “Just like a girl’s.”

“They’re
not
.” Darko hit his brother on the arm, and
Cairo struck back and almost knocked him over.

“Boys, if you don’t stop, I’m not going to take you there at
all,” Mama said sternly.

They managed to behave themselves as she led them away from the
depot across the Adomi Bridge spanning the Volta River. The bridge
bounced noticeably up and down with passing traffic.

“Why does it do that?” Darko asked.

“Because it’s a suspension bridge,” Mama said.

“What’s a suspension bridge?”

“What we’re walking on,” Cairo said obviously.

“Look up, Darko,” Mama said more kindly. “See all those cables
that go up to the top? That’s what’s holding the bridge up –
suspending it.”

He gazed upward. “Oh. I see.” After walking a little more, Darko
declared, “I
like
this bridge.”

“It’s the only suspension bridge in Ghana,” Cairo informed them.
He knew a lot of things.

They stopped for a moment to look out on the expanse of the
Volta, with its lush banks and islands of palm and mango trees. The
sun reflected off its surface, silhouetting fishermen in their
canoes gliding silently and smoothly over the water like
spirits.

“Come along,” Mama said.

At the other side of the bridge they went off the road and were
soon going up an incline thick with vegetation. Birds sang, and
bees and butterflies flitted from plant to plant.

“Just a little longer,” Mama said over her shoulder.

“I’m thirsty,” Darko said.

“Me too,” Cairo said. “This hill is steep.”

“Here we are,” Mama said, breathing heavily. “We can stop
here.”

“Oh, look!” Cairo said. “You can see the whole river even better
than on the bridge.”

Darko stood on tiptoes while holding on to his brother.

“Come on, shorty pants,” Cairo said, stooping down. “Get on my
shoulders.”

Cairo lifted him up for the full view.

“The Akosombo Dam is up that way,” Mama said, pointing
north.

“We learned about it in school,” Darko said. “I’m sure I could
swim across the river.”

“No, you couldn’t,” Cairo said.

“Yes, I could!”

“No.”

“I’ll throw you both down this hill in a minute if you don’t
shut up,” Mama said crisply.

Darko and Cairo collapsed in the bushes and laughed till their
sides hurt.

♦

It was getting late in the day when they alighted at Ketanu’s
small bus terminal off the main road and took a footpath in the
direction of Auntie Osewa’s house.

“Mama?”

“Yes, Darko.”

“Do Auntie Osewa and Uncle Kweku have any children?”

“No, they have no children.”

“Why?”

“Don’t you know?” Cairo said brightly “She’s barren.”

“Cairo!” Mama said sharply. “Who told you that?”

“Papa.”

“What does
barren
mean?” Darko asked.

“Never mind,” Mama replied quickly.

Darko looked up at her walking beside him. Everything about her
gave him reassurance and comfort. He knew the touch of her hand and
the fresh smell of her skin. He loved to sit on her lap with his
head resting against her while he played with the gold necklace she
always wore and never removed. The pendant was a little butterfly,
because she loved butterflies.

The footpath took them past thatch-roofed huts and tin-roofed
houses. Goats, sheep, and stray dogs shared their route.

“Are people
staring
at us?” Darko whispered.

They had indeed attracted some attention from the locals, who
could tell they were from out of town, but it was out of interest
and not hostility. Mama called out “Good afternoon” here and there.
She had always said that politeness toward complete strangers was
the highest form of courteousness.

The dwellings began to thin out, and in turn the forest became
more evident.

“Look at that place over there,” Darko said, pointing in the
distance.

It looked particularly different from the other houses they had
been seeing. It sat within a grove of trees, a comparatively large
abode subdivided into three with a courtyard formed by an
encircling wall.

“I wonder what they do in there,” Darko said.

“They live there, of course,” Cairo said.

“Here we are,” Mama said, at length. “That’s Auntie’s house over
there.”

It had a rusted tin roof. The walls were marred with gashes and
trailing cracks. A crooked screen door hung open with ragged
mosquito netting curling off the frame.

Mama announced their arrival.
“Kawkaw-kaw!
”

Seconds later a woman came to the door. Darko could immediately
tell she was Auntie Osewa, just from her resemblance to Mama.

“Woizo, woizo!
” she cried in welcome.

She kissed Mama and then Darko and Cairo over and over again.
She was younger than Mama by a few years and not as tall. Both were
pretty, with heart-shaped faces and lovely skin. But to Darko, his
auntie was only a close second to his mother.
No
one was
prettier than Mama.

“How are you, Sis?” she said to Mama. “It’s been so long –
too
long.”

Darko felt the silken quality and the musical lilt of Auntie’s
voice. He had always had a peculiarly heightened sensitivity to
speech. Not only did he hear it but he often perceived it as if
physically touching it. He had on occasion told Cairo or Mama that
he could feel “bumps” in a person’s voice, or that it was prickly
or wet. They were mystified by this, but Darko could not explain it
any better than he could describe the process of sight or
smell.

“Come with me,” Auntie Osewa said. “Let’s go and fetch Uncle
Kweku. He went to the farm to get cassava.”

They followed her around the small house to the back. The “farm”
turned out to be a tiny plot of land. Uncle Kweku was bent over
using a hoe to dig up the soil around the cassava plants.

“Kweku!” Auntie called. “Come along, they’re here!”

He looked up, put down the hoe, and dusted off his hands as he
approached. He was average in build, but his right hand and forearm
were disproportionately large from years of wielding farm tools.
Close up, Uncle Kweku seemed to Darko quite a bit older than Auntie
Osewa, or maybe just more worn down. He was sweating profusely in
the heat.

“Woizo,” he said, his smile crinkling the corners of his eyes.
He gave Mama a hug and lightly patted the boys’ heads.

“How was everything? The journey was fine?” His voice was quiet,
the texture of a wet loofah sponge lathered with soap.

“It was very good, thank you,” Mama said, and Darko and Cairo
secretly exchanged amused smiles because she had failed to mention
how petrified she was of traveling in tro-tros.

“Come on,” Auntie Osewa said. “Let’s go inside now.”

The house had only two rooms, a table and a stool and chairs in
one, a bed in the other. It was hot and airless, and the two
windows let in very little sunlight.

They sat down to chat, but Mama and Auntie did most of the
talking. Uncle Kweku didn’t say much, merely nodding and smiling at
intervals.

Darko noticed a bundle of straw in the corner of the room.

“What’s that for, Auntie Osewa?”

“I’ll show you.” She took him by the hand. “Pick a straw out.
Any one, it doesn’t matter.”

He pulled one of the long filaments from the bundle.

“We get these off the tops of elephant grass,” Auntie Osewa
explained.

“Why’s it called elephant grass?”

“Because it can grow as tall as this house.”