Once Upon a Time in Lagos: Episode 14

 

As he spoke I noticed that he blinks his eyes as he said each word. I felt the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. In a flash the phrase of Michael Reddington’s came back to me, when he described the man he most dreaded in the world. He had said that the man was an elderly soldier who always blinks his eyes each time he speaks. I was then that I realized that I had walked right into my enemies’ headquarters. My first thought was to push the punk aside and head for the door to the open air. He seemed to have read my mind, for he smiled and nodded to the door behind me. I turned, and saw two men in green uniforms. Both of them were holding what looked like a .22 Ruger Mark IV semi-automatic pistols and they pointed it at me.

I told myself that I may still have a chance. Yes, he knew my name, and yes, he had me cornered. But the truth is that he had never seen me before. So all it will take was my ability to convince him that I wasn’t the Jideofor Okorie he was looking for. If I can do that, then I will be out of here before I knew it.

“You lost me,” I said, point at the two men. “What’s all these for? And who are you calling Jideofor Okorie anyway? I’m Jonathan!”

“Well,” he said. “I’m sure you must be using other names, so we won’t argue over a name, okay?”

I shrugged and pretended not to care about whatever he said or might do, convinced that his mind was still doubting if I was really Jideofor Okorie.

“So, are you going to give me up?” I said, pretending to be just a car thief. “My God! What a bad luck I had! I wish I had never seen that cursed Deji’s Benz. Okay, here’s the money I took from him. Please take it and just let me go,” and I flung  three twenty naira notes on the table.

At that time, twenty naira was a large sum of money. I was just trying to give him the impression that I was not Jideofor Okorie, that I was only a car thief and robber who just hit some bad luck.

His eyes widened a little.

“No need to worry, Mr. Okorie,” he said. “I’m not giving you up – not to them. However, I have some friends and we want to have a sit-down with you, that’s all. We think you know too much.”

I was studying his face as he speak and I was convinced that, though he seemed to be very sure of himself, I could still see the dawning of a doubt in his mind. So I decided to make another attempt.

“Oh, for the love of Christ!,” I cried. “Be serious, sir. Tell you the truth, I have been an unlucky guy throughout this year. I lost my job and was kicked out by my landlord for owing three months of rent. Yes, I stole Deji’s car and money. So what? I was hungry and had no choice. And for that, I have been hunted by these assholes over those hills for almost too days. You know what? I’m sick of it all! You go ahead and do what you like! Jonathan Ibe’s got no fight left in him.”

He frowned his face and I could see that he’s becoming more confused.

“Do you mind telling me what exactly happened between you and them?” he said.

“I’m too tired to tell a story, sir,” I said. “I have not eaten for two days  now. Just give me something to eat and you will have the whole story.”

I must have shown my hunger in my face, for he told one of the two men in green uniforms to get me some food and told me to sit down. A plate of jolloff rice containing a fried chicken thigh and a cup of water was placed in front of me. I devoured the food in a few minutes like a hungry dog – or rather, like Jonathan Ibe, for I was keeping up my character. In the middle of my meal he suddenly spoke to me in Yoruba language, but I looked at him with a face as blank as stone wall.

Then I quickly made up a story to deceive him – that I was a car thief and that I live in Lagos. That I was forced to into this lifestyle by poverty and joblessness. That what I  do was to steal cars from villages in the Sagamu area and then take them to Lagos, where I have a special deal with a mechanic who help in moving the cars to Cotonou to sell them. How I had made a mistake by stealing the Mercedes Benz belonging to Deji Kolawole, the son of Lagos Police Commissioner. When I realized who he was, I had decided to give back the car but I took the three twenty naira notes lying on his back seat. And how he had called the villagers and the police on me.

“You can have the money,” I said. “But please let me go. I promise: this is the end of it. I will never rob cars again.”

“I just won’t believe you,” he said. “I think you are a good liar, Jideofor.”

“What are you talking about!,” I snarled, pretending to be very angry. “Stop playing around! I told you my name’s Jonathan, and I don’t know anyone called Jideofor. You know what? I think I will be better off being with the police than with you, with your Jideofors and your damned gunmen.”

“This is the thank I get, after hiding you from those jackals and giving you a good meal?” he asked.

“I’m sorry, sir,” I said. “I take that back. Thanks a lot for your generosity, but can I go now that the coast is clear?”

I was looking at him when I said that, and I can see very clearly that he was confused. The simple truth was that he had never seen me before. Even if he had got my photographs, my appearance must have changed considerably anyway. I looked very sharp and well-dressed in Lagos, and now I looked like a regular laborer.

“I have no intention of letting you go at the moment,” he said. “If you are who you say you are, you will soon be out of here after I make my verification. But if you are who I believe you are, then you are finished. You will never see the light of the day much longer.”

He rang an old brass school bell sitting on the table. A third man in green uniform appeared from the veranda.

“I want the Volkswagen Beetle in five minutes,” he said. “Also, prepare lunch for three people. I am expecting some friends.”

Then he looked steadily at me and my heart skipped a beat. There was something cold and dangerous in those eyes. They reminded me of the eyes of a rattle snake. In spite of that, I managed to maintain my composure and even to grin.

“Well,” I said. “I guess I can’t convince you so please yourself.”

“Omololu,” he spoke in Yoruba to one of the men with guns. “Lock this man up in the storeroom till I return. Make sure he doesn’t escape. I will fry your balls if he escapes from your custody, understand?”

“Yes sir!,” the man called Omololu said.

I was matched out of the room with a .22 Ruger Mark IV semi-automatic pistol at each ear.

The storeroom was dark and damp, and it had no carpet or a chair to sit down on. The windows were heavily shuttered and, because of the darkness, I could hardly see my surroundings. As my eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, I made out by groping that the walls were lined with boxes, barrels and sacks of some heavy materials that I could not describe. The whole place has a unique smell of mold and disuse.  The two men with guns turned the key in the door, and while in there I could hear them moving around as they stood on guard outside.

I sat down in the chilly darkness and kept cursing the day I stepped my foot into Nigeria. The elderly gentleman had gone off in the Volkswagen to get the other two punks who spoke to me yesterday. Now, they had seen me as the construction worker and I’m sure they would remember me, for those men were really smart. What was a road construction worker they saw yesterday doing twenty miles from his job site, pursued by the police and the villagers? They will simply put two and two together and conclude that I am indeed the guy they had been searching for. Probably they had seen Mr. Emmanuel Obaseki, probably Deji too; most likely they could link me up with Chief Tunde, and then the whole thing would be crystal clear.

I began to wish I was with the police and the villagers who, I believe, are now all over the hills looking for me. At least they will be more lenient with me than these savages who, I’m sure, will kill and bury me as soon as they found out who I am. The elderly gentleman had not taken long to get rid of them. I thought he had probably had some connection to the establishment – the kind of connection that gives one power to get anything they want in this country. Unfortunately, that the way things work in Nigeria.

The three men would be back for lunch, so time is not on my side. I must do something really fast to get out of this mess. If they get back here and confirm my true identity, I will kiss this life goodbye. I wished I had Michael Reddington’s courage, for I am free to confess that I don’t feel as heroic as he was. The only thing that kept me going was anger: I was furious to think of those three punks getting me cornered like this. Given the chance, I would quickly get rid of the three of them and their gunmen right here and end this madness.

The more I thought of it the angrier I grew, and by the time I knew it I was up and moving about the room. I tried the shutters but I couldn’t open them. I wasn’t surprised though, because they were the kind that lock with a key. From the outside came the sound of African bald eagles and the clucking of hens in the warm sun. I started to look for something that would help me to escape from this room, and in the process of doing that, I groped among the sacks and boxes. I couldn’t open the latter, and the sacks seemed to be full of all kinds of dry foods such as beans, rice, garri (cassava flour) and things like that. As I was searching the room, I found a handle in the wall which seemed worth investigating.

It was the door of a wall cupboard, which is very popular in Nigeria at the time. I shook it, and it seemed rather like something that would open if I apply some pressure. For want of something to do I put out all my strength on that door and, like I presumed it gave with a crash which I thought would bring in the men with the guns to inquire. So, I waited for a while, and then started to go through the contents of the cupboard’s shelves.

There were a lot of things in there. I saw a little stock of battery torches on one of the shelves. Picking one of them up, I switched it on and found that it was in working order. With the torch to help me I continued my search. There were bottles and cases of stuffs with pungent odors, chemicals which I believe were for experiments, and coils of wires, including copper wires. What are they doing with all these? Then I stiffened when I saw a box of detonators and a lot of cord for fuses.

These people were building some type of bomb here.

What do they need bombs for? I  investigated further and soon found yanks and yanks of thin oiled silk. I also found a stout brown cardboard box with a wooden case inside. When I forced the wooden case open I discovered that it contained half a dozen little yellow bricks. I took up one and examined it carefully. Then I smelled it and noticed that it is odorless. By now my heart was beating furiously. I sat down to think. I hadn’t been a science major for nothing, and I knew trinitrotoluene(TNT) when I saw it.

I could blow this house to smithereens with one of these bricks. I earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and I had known that  trinitrotoluene(TNT) is used chiefly as an explosive. In fact, my dormitory room mate and I almost got expelled for stealing trinitrotoluene(TNT) from the chemistry lab and exploding at the college football stadium after reading a book on how to build home-made bombs. So I have used the stuff before, but my problem now is that I had forgotten the proper charge and the right way of preparing it. I also wasn’t sure about the timing.

I told myself I had to take this chance and blow the house. Otherwise, there’s no other way for me to escape from these very dangerous people. It was a mighty risk, but against it was absolute certainty that my captors will execute me. I knew that the odds that I could blow myself to pieces is very high, but I would still be dead anyway if I didn’t. My captors won’t have any problem or remorse for burying me in a six-foot hole behind this house by the evening if I chose not to take this chance. So, for me, the prospect was pretty dark either way, which means that I hadn’t much to lose if I took this chance.

The remembrance of Mr. Reddington decided me. It was indeed the worst moments of my life; a moment that tested my soul. At this point, my mind was in the type of crises that would have made me to shrink from following this very risky choice. But I knew that if I stand by my decision now, I would never regret it, and I will enjoy the love of both my country and Nigerian people for exposing these jackals. So I managed to choke back the horrid doubts that flooded in on me, and started to think very hard to remember what my former room-mate and I did the night we detonated trinitrotoluene(TNT)  at our college’s football field. Soon the blueprint of our experiment that night came in a flash into my mind, and I began to work. To shut off the fear and anxiety that was torturing my mind at the time, I pretended I was doing a simple experiment in a chemistry lab. 

First, I started work on the detonator and finally attached it to a couple of feet of fuse. Next, I took a quarter of a trinitrotoluene brick and buried it near the door below a crack by the cupboard, fixing the detonator in it. I told myself that because the cupboard have so many explosives there would be a big upward journey for me and the men in green uniforms if I go ahead with my plan to blow up the place. But, at this point, it doesn’t really make sense for me to dwell on these negativities. Yes, the odds were horrible, but I don’t have a choice.

I went near a window in the room and lay face down. My heart was ponding so hard that I thought I was having a heart attack. “Jideofor Okorie,” I said to myself, “it’s time. You’d better do this now or never.” I then closed my eyes and lit the fuse. While waiting for the explosion, I started praying to God, and to recite Psalm 23. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me….”  There was dead silence – only a shuffle of heavy boots in the passage, and the chattering of the African eagles from the warm out-of-doors. I started thinking of where I would be in a few seconds. Perhaps in the arms of the Almighty…

The explosion was very deafening. Lots of things dropped on me, and then I think I became unconscious. I recovered within a few seconds and managed to struggle out of the debris to my feet. The good news was that I wasn’t that hurt and that, though I felt very sick and ill, I could move my limbs. I managed to get out of the wreckage and staggered blindly forward away from the house.

A huge anthill was a few feet away from  the back of the house. I ran to it and into a section of it I fell. One thing about African forests is that they often have ant-hills that are so huge that they look almost like a house build with clay. In my current predicament, the anthill became a good hideout for me. I lay behind the anthill, with all my body aching. From my position I was able to look behind me, being careful enough to expose my hideout. I saw a fog still hanging over the house and smoke escaping from the upper window. While I felt guilty for setting the place on fire I told myself that they gave me no choice. I could hear the confused cries coming from the house and that was how I knew that I had bought myself enough time to think about my next move.

Because this anthill was obviously a bad hideout for me, I told myself that I had limited time to make my next move. Anyone looking for me would naturally think of the anthill, which is not too far from the house. And I am very sure the search would begin as soon as they discover that my body is missing in the storeroom. From my location behind the anthill saw that a little further down stood another anthill, which was hidden behind  a collection of shrubs. On those shrubs were large number of bird’s nests. The cover provided by the shrubs and the nests were so good that if one doesn’t look hard enough they won’t know there was an anthill there. If I could get there without leaving tracks I might have a good chance of escaping from these animals. I was convinced that my enemies, if they thought I could move, would conclude I had made for the thick forests behind their house, and would go looking for me on the moor. There’s a chance that they might discover this anthill which was hidden behind  a collection of shrubs and bird’s nest but, at the moment, that is the best handout I have.

So I started moving towards it, scattering drive leaves and grass to hide my footsteps. When I reached the anthill and hide behind it I peeped out and saw that I didn’t leave any footmarks  behind. I laid down there and prayed silently. I was still praying when I suddenly dozed off.

When I woke up my head was hurting as hell and the sun was glaring in my face. For a long time I lay motionless. I was completely disoriented by those horrible fumes from the explosion. I could hear the faint voices of the men in the house as well as the idling sound of a car engine. I peeped again from a little hole on the side of the anthill. I saw figures came out – one of the two men in green uniforms with his head bound up in a bloody bandage, and then a younger man in blue agbada – a traditional Yoruba long shirt.  They were looking for something and moved towards the anthill. How lucky I was! It was indeed a smart move to move further down here. Before they reached the anthill there was a loud cry from the house and they both ran back towards it. I noticed that both of them had guns on their hands.

Soon they came outside again, but this time there were three of them. I could see the figure of my captor – the elderly gentleman. I could also hear the sound of things being moved around from inside the house. The three men were arguing fiercely as they started moving towards the anthill again. Then, for some reason I could not fathom at the time, they changed their mind and went back to the house.

I spent the rest of the hot afternoon lying down behind the anthill hidden by a collection of shrubs and  baking in the sun. Thirst was my biggest problem now. My tongue felt as dry as a desert, and to make it worse I could hear the cool drip of water from a stream further down the forest. I would have given a thousand dollars to run down there and plunge my face into the stream. But I was able to control myself, for that move could be too risky for me. Up till now I could not explain why my former captors didn’t come this far to look for me. Perhaps it’s because of my prayers – or simply because Providence is on my side.

From where I was located, I have a clear view of the house. I also had a very good view of the forests behind the anthill hidden by a collection of shrubs, up to the point where the forest changed into a more dotted in many places by wild shrubs. I saw the Volkswagen Beetle speed away with two occupants, and a man on a bicycle riding east. By now I was very sure they were looking for me, and I told myself that this is another episode of my ordeal.

After they left, I had enough time to observe my surroundings. It was then that I discovered something very interesting about the house. My current location behind the anthill hidden by a collection of shrubs I was almost at the summit of the place. It was almost as if I had a bird’s view of the whole place, and could see what lay beyond. I observed that the forest was not solid, but only a ring surrounding the big compound where the house was located. On the left side of the house was an oval green grass lawn, which looked like a big football field. It didn’t take me long to put two and two together and guess what it was. It was a secret private airport. My enemies, the five majors, were smart enough to choose this location. Because the house was on top of a rise in the midst of a hill, anyone watching an aeroplane descending here would think it has passed out of view behind the hill. Only somebody standing in my location, or an observer with a telescope in one of the higher hills on the other side of this location might realize that the aeroplane had not gone over but had merely descended in the midst of the forests here.  But then this is a Nigerian village, and nobody in the village has a telescope or a spy-glass. When I looked around me from my current location I could see far away a blue line which I knew was a large river, I thought could be the Shagamu River.

Then I became concerned that if that if that Supermarine Spitfire airplane that I saw earlier ever came back the chances were ten to one that I would be discovered. The only power I had at this point was prayers, and through the afternoon I lay and prayed for darkness to come early. I was so glad when the sun finally went down the big village hills and the twilight haze crept over the forest and its surrounding moor. The Supermarine Spitfire airplane was late. When it landed  in the field, I saw a lot of coming and going from it to the house. But then its lights were soon turned off and everywhere became dark and silent.

I was so grateful to Providence that it was a black night. The moon seemed to be in a bad mood  today and I predicted that it would not rise till late in the night. By desire to taste fresh water, or any drink that would quench my thirst was too great to allow me to continue to stay here. So at around nine o’clock, as far as I could guess, I decided it’s time for me to move on. It wasn’t easy for me to get up, but I did got up and swayed a little bit before steadying myself by holding the side of the anthill. As I was about to make my first step I heard the back door of the house open and saw the gleam of a lantern against the wall of the anthill hidden by a collection of shrubs. For an agonizing minutes I froze and remained as steady as a rock. I continued to pray that whoever it was would not come round by the anthill hidden by a collection of shrubs where I was hiding. Then the light disappeared, I started moving stealthily towards in the dark, heading towards the house.

Fearing that I might be discovered if I continued in an upright position, I began crawling on my belly till I reached the fringe of trees which surrounded the house. I would have tried to put the Supermarine Spitfire airplane out of action if I had known how to do it. I, however, realized that any attempt to do that would probably be a waste of time. These animals are not stupid, and I was very sure that they would have some kind of security or defense round the house. So I crawled through the trees on hands and knees, feeling carefully every inch before me and making sure I did not touch anything that can make noise and alert my enemies. It was a smart thing that I followed this method, because soon enough I came on a wire about two feet above the ground. If I wasn’t this careful I would have tripped over that wire, and it would doubtless have set off an alarm in the house and I would have been captured.

Avoiding the wire carefully, I continued moving and, about eighty yards farther on, I found another wire carelessly placed on a small pond. Beyond that lay the other part of the forest and its surrounding moor. I reached there within ten minutes and soon was at a small stream that was hidden from sight by the forest and its surrounding moor. I became the happiest man when my face was in the stream , and I was soaking down pints of fresh water. As soon as my body became satisfied with the fresh water, I resumed running. I didn’t stop until I had put lots of miles between me and my enemies’ house in the forest.

 

 

END OF EPISODE 14

P.S. To read the rest of the story in “Once Upon a Time in Lagos,” I encourage you to get a copy of the book.  Both the paperback and e-book versions of “Once Upon a Time in Lagos” will be published in January, 2021 – just 2 months from now. Stay tuned. Please feel free to critique what you’ve read about the story.

Once Upon a Time in Lagos: Episode 13

 

That night, I slept on the trunk a fallen tree at the foot of the hillside. I was lucky I was in an African country, where the weather is very friendly and warm throughout the year. I would have frozen to death if I had  tried  this in America. I had earlier left Mr. Reddington’s little black book, my watch and my packet of cigarette at Emmanuel Obaseki’s house. The only thing I have with me is my money and about a pound of bread which I managed to squeeze into my trousers pocket.

For my dinner, I ate a half of the bread and I folded my arms across my chest to keep myself warm while I slept.  I was feeling really happy with myself, for I was beginning to enjoy this hide-and-sick game with the police and my enemies. So far I had been very lucky. The newspaper vendor, Mr. Akin, Chief Tunde, Mr. Emmanuel Obaseki, and the stupid Deji, were indeed all pieces of  good fortune. The fact that I have been a success with all of them gave me a feeling that I was going to pull through this thing.

My immediate problem now was that I was very hungry. As I lay down on the trunk of the fallen tree, I had kept turning around, for the little bread I ate earlier merely emphasized the aching void, with the memory of all the delicious Nigerian meals I had thought so little of in Lagos. There were Adeyemi’s deep fried bean cakes called akara. He often made them in the mornings using peeled brown beans, ground and blended with onions and spices, and then fried them in vegetable oils – how I often  enjoyed eating them  with bread! There were the skewers of intricately spiced and grilled meat called suya they serve every evening at the Lagos Colonial Sports Club, for which my mouth lusted. My thoughts hovered over all varieties of Nigerian foods, and finally settled on the thin, very spicy broth called pepper soup. Nigerians prepare it with a chock-full of assorted cuts of meat or fish and spice it more with a local scented vegetable called uziza. It is very delicious, and while longing hopelessly for these Nigerian meals, I fell asleep. 

When I woke up about an hour after dawn, I was feeling both cold and stiff, for the early morning times are usually chilly in Nigeria. It took me a while to remember where I was. My sleep was indeed a deep one. I, however became very alert after I saw a big shoulder of hill and my boots placed beside a nearby shrub. I immediately jumped up and looked down into the valley, and that one look was enough to make me start putting on my boots in hurry. The reason was that I saw some men below, not more than a quarter of a mile off, and they were spaced out on the hillside. I had no doubt in my mind that they were looking for me. I wasn’t surprised that Deji had not been slow in looking for his revenge.

Leaving the fallen tree, I followed a shallow trench which slanted up the hill face. This led me into a narrow gully by way of which I walked to the top of the ridge. When I reached there I looked back and saw that I was not yet visible to my pursuers. They were patiently looking all over the hillside while gradually moving upwards.

I ran for maybe half a mile, making sure that I kept behind the skyline. I continued running till I reached above the topmost part  of the hill. Then I showed myself to my pursuers. I immediately heard loud voices coming up from below as my pursuers changed the direction of their line of search. Using myself as a decoy, I pretended to retreat over the skyline, but immediately changed course and went back the way I had come. Within a few minutes I was standing behind the ridge overlooking my sleeping place, the fallen tree trunk. From my location, I could see my pursuers streaming up the hill at the top of the narrow valley, convinced that they were heading towards my direction.

I knew then that I had to act fast. So I chose a ridge that cut through the one that I was on, and in a couple of minutes I had put a narrow valley between me and my pursuers. All these maneuvers was a good exercise for me and I could feel my blood getting warm. Not only that, I began to enjoy myself again, and felt confident enough to stop briefly and finish the remnants of my bread.

Because I don’t know this area at all, I had no idea what to do. I had trusted the strength of my legs, but I was well aware that my pursuers have a very big advantage over me: this is their village and they are very familiar with the lie of this forest. So, even though I had the strength of my youth, the fact that I’m not from this area would be a big setback for me. In front of me was a collection of small hills, rising very high towards the south. I looked northwards and saw that it was mainly broad ridges covered with shrubs and light vegetation. I followed that direction and the ridges seemed to sink after a mile or two to a moor. I continued walking and soon I saw the heads of my pursuers. When they saw me, they started shouting again, and their voice even became more louder when I waved my hand. I didn’t know why I did that, but then I had no good explanation for a lot of things I have done lately. The truth is that, because I was still winning , the whole thing feels like a game that we play in my high school days.

The pursuit continued, and very soon it doesn’t fill like a game anymore. When I looked behind it seemed as if the whole village were looking for my head. I saw that only six men were following me directly. I concluded that, perhaps, the others are forming a circle to cut me off. If there had been a cover it would have been very easy to lose them. My hope of winning this chase is to find a way to get quickly reach the moor, and to do that, I had to run really fast. Before my pursuers appeared on the skyline behind me I had already gotten off the ridges and down into the moor. Soon I reached a dirt road and, I kept running with no idea where I was going.

As I continued to run, I saw another dirt road on my left side which had well-kept hedges on both sides. The road led to a house, and I began to wonder the type of person that might live in this lonely place. Usually, Nigerians seldom live in isolated places like this. They generally live in towns or villages where houses and compounds are closed together, often clustered around a central point. But this house is all by itself, with nothing around it but trees and forests.

I did a quick thinking. My luck have be good so far, and this lonely house may be a good hideout that might extend my luck. The fact that there were trees around it meant there’s a cover for me. Yet I have to be very careful, I said to myself. I did not follow the dirt road directly. Instead, I carefully  walked behind the hedges and trees that flanked it on the right so that I could have a good cover. It was a good move and soon I reached lawn surrounding the house. I looked back and concluded that I was out of sight of the pursuit, which made me feel better.

As I continued to walk towards the house, a flock of birds rose at my approach. The house before me was a simple bungalow that long veranda. Sitting in the veranda watching me was an elderly gentleman who appeared to be reading a newspaper. When I entered the veranda I saw that he had other books around him. He was as bald as a glass bottle and had glasses with thick lenses stuck on the end of his nose. He neither moved nor say anything when I arrived. He simply raised his eyebrows and waited on me to speak. Following the tradition of Nigerians, which requires young people to greet the elderly first before making any request, I said, “Good morning, sir.”

I knew then that it won’t be an easy job to convince this stranger who I was and what I had wanted. It will even be a tougher job to gain his trust. The funny things is that I had only a few minutes to do that.

“Morning, son,” he said. “You seem to be in a hurry.”

I wanted to go ahead and explain to him my situation, but there was something about his eyes that made me pause. I tried to speak, but I could not find a word. I simply stared at him and mumbled something that I myself could not hear.

“What is the problem, son?” he said again.

I pointed towards the window. Through it one could see across the moor through a gap in the trees flanking the house. Following my direction, he saw figures of my pursuers about half miles away.

“Oh, I see,” he said. He picked up what looked like a binoculars and patiently observed the figures.

He turned to me and said, “So you are running away from justice. We will talk about the details later. I will help you. Go into my study and you will see a door that leads to a room at the back of my house. Go into that room and close the door. I won’t let these villagers or the police to invade my privacy. You will be perfectly safe here.”

After he said that, he continued reading again.

I followed his instructions, and soon found myself in a dark room which smelt of chemicals. The only source of light in the room was a tiny window high up in the wall. As soon as I entered the room, the door behind me closed with a click – you know, a click like the door of a safe. I have, once again, been given another safe haven. But, for some reasons, I wasn’t comfortable. There was something about this elderly gentleman that made me nervous. He had been too ready and willing  to hide me, almost as if he was expecting me. And, I don’t trust what I saw when I looked in his eyes. I could not explain why, but his eyes set off an alarm bell in my mind.

The room remained quiet and, for all I knew, my pursuers might be searching the house. So I had no choice to forget how hungry I was and remain silent. But I started thinking. Yes, the elderly gentleman’s  eyes were scary, and yes, I don’t trust him. But he could scarcely refuse me a meal. I also started thinking about the kind of meal he might have here. He’s probably a widow, for what kind of wife would want to live in this lonely place where there’s no other ladies to gossip with. If I’m right, the type of meals he might have here would be rice-and-beans, bread, beverages, yam porridge and other meals that can be easily and quickly prepared by men. While all these were going on in my mind, I heard a click and the door stood open.

I came into the sunlight and saw the elderly gentleman sitting in the couch  in the room he called his study. While looking at me, he said, “You need not worry again. They have gone.”

I was very surprised.

“Gone where?” I asked.

“Who knows?” he replied. “All I can tell you is that I convinced them that you have crossed the hill.”

“Wow!” I said. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am. I will…”

“Not important,” he said, raising his hand. “I wouldn’t let the police or anybody come between me and an important man like you. This is indeed a lucky morning for you, Mr. Jideofor Okorie.”

 

 

 

END OF EPISODE 13

P.S. Stay tuned for Episode 14, which  will be published here next Sunday.

Once Upon a Time in Lagos: Episode 12

 

I remembered an old scout in Baltimore, who had done many strange work in his day, once telling me that the secret of playing a part was to think yourself into it. You will never succeed in impersonating another person, he said, unless you could manage to convince yourself that you were that person. So, following his advise, I shut off all other thoughts and switched them on to the road-mending. I thought of Mr. Emmanuel’s house down the road as my home, I recalled the years I had spent running a store and a bar at Ewu-Oluwo, I made myself dwell lovingly on sleep in his bed and of a bottle of cheap gin. Still nothing appeared on that village road – not even a bicycle.

 

Sometimes I passed some villagers on my way to or from the pond. I also saw some teenagers washing clothes at the stream. Other than that, the neighborhood was quiet. After the teenagers left, I saw an African fish eagle flopped down to a pool in the pond and started the fish, ignoring my presence completely – to it I might as well be a milestone. On I went, moving my loads of fractured stone, sand and fine soil particles, with the heavy step of a professional construction worker. And since this is Nigeria, the weather was hot, though I didn’t feel it that much due to a low humidity. By this time the dust on my face changed into solid and abiding grit. I was already counting the hours till evening should put a limit to Mr. Emmanuel’s monotonous toil. Suddenly a sharp voice spoke from the road, and looking up I saw a red Volkswagen, and a young man in a dashiki.

 

“Are you Emmanuel Obaseki,” he asked. “I am the new road supervisor. You live here and have charge of the road section from here to Ogijo?”

I told him that he’s correct.

“Great!,” he said. “A fair bit of road, Emmanuel, and badly maintained. Well, it was a little bad about a mile off, and its edges need some work no doubt. You take care of those, and,  I visit you  another time.”

 

That was it! Clearly my responses and interaction was good enough for the dreaded road supervisor. I went on with my work, and as the morning began to change to noon I was cheered by a little traffic. A bread seller, who was carrying his wares in a box attached to the top of the front tires of his bicycle passed through the road and sold me a loaf of bread, which I placed beside the road, just in case I got hungry again. Then two young boys shepherding a small collection of goats passed, and startled me somewhat by asking loudly, “What had become of Googled Emma?”

 

“He went back to bed,” I replied.

“What, this early?” one of them said.

“Yes,” I again replied. “He was having a headache.”

 

They passed on with their herd of goats.  A few hours later, at around 12 noon, a red-colored Datsun Bluebird station wagon drove down the hill, glided past  and stopped about a hundred yards away from me. It had three men sitting inside and they came out as if to stretch their legs, and then started moving towards me. I immediately noticed that I had seen two of the men before from the window of the Village Breeze Guest House. I haven’t seen the third man before, but he had the look of villager, perhaps the village storekeeper. He was dressed in a washed out blue jean trouser and a white shirt.

 

“Good morning to you,” he said. “You are doing a good job.”

 

I didn’t look up as they approached me, and now that they started talking to me, I slowly and painfully straightened my back, just like the construction workers doing roadwork does.  I also spat frequently like they normally do and then looked at them for a while before replying. I was looking at three pairs of eyes that missed nothing.

 

Trying very hard to hide my foreign accent, I said to them in Pidgin English, “Thanks, but I hate the job. If I have the choice I’d rather have your type of job, driving around in a car. It’s you guys that mess up our roads with your cars.”

 

The man wearing the blue jean trouser and a white shirt was looking at the newspaper showing from Emmanuel’s plastic bag.

 

“You reading this?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied in Pidgin English. “It’s my good companion here.”

“May I?” he said, pointing at the paper.

“You go ahead,” I said.

 

He picked it up, glanced at it casually, and then put it down. One of the other two men whom I had earlier seen at the Village Breeze Guest House had been looking at my booths, and a word in Yoruba called their attention to them.

 

“For a construction worker I would say you have a good taste in boots,” the man in blue jean trouser and a white shirt said. “I’ve never seen this kind of boot around this area before.”

“It was a gift from a rich friend, sir,” I said.

Again one of the men I earlier saw at the Village Breeze Guest House spoke in Yoruba.

“Come on, guys,” he said. “Let’s move on. He’s not our man.”

Before they left, they asked one last question.

“Do you see any young man pass here early this morning? He might be on foot or he might be on a Phoenix bicycle?”

It was a trap, and I almost fell into it by making up a story about a cyclist hurrying past earlier in the morning. But I was smart enough to pretend to think very deeply.

“I woke up late today,” I said. “The truth is that my daughter was married last night and, because of the celebration with family, in-laws and friends, I had went to bed very late. When I woke up this morning to begin my work, I have only seen two young boys shepherding a small collection of goats and you guys. This village is usually very quiet by this time of the year.”

One of them gave me a stick of cigarette. Thanking him, I stuck it in Emmanuel Obaseki’s small plastic bag. They got into their Datsun Bluebird station wagon and drove away.

After they left, I released a sigh of relief. And I continued working for about ten minutes, which was good for the car returned for some reason that I could not understand. It is very obvious that these men don’t leave nothing to chance. One of them waved at me as they finally drove away.

I finished Emmanuel Obaseki’s lunch, and I continued  working on the road. I was confused about what to do next. The truth was that I can’t be working on this road for a long time. I had to do something now, for time is not really on my side. I was glad that God had kept Mr. Emmanuel Obaseki asleep indoors, but if he appeared on the scene there would be trouble. I was very sure that the cordon was still tight around my surrounding areas, and that if I walked in any direction I might fall into my enemies’ trap. In spite of that, I knew that I must leave, now. I have never met any man whose nerves could stand more than a day of being spied on in all my life.

I decided to work for a little while before returning my tools to  Mr. Emmanuel Obaseki’s tools to his hours later on. By now it was almost 5 o’clock in the evening. I had planned to take my chance of getting over the forests and small hills in the darkness after returning the tools to him. But suddenly a new car came up the road. It was a black Mercedes Benz and it slowed down a yard or two from me. One man was sitting behind the wheel and he wanted to light a cigarette. I took a good look at him and couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It was Deji Kolawole! What the hell is he doing here? Perhaps this was his village, I thought. But then, that doesn’t matter now. Deji Kolawole was a bad news to any young woman, including the married women. I’ve met him in Lagos. He was a spoiled brat of Lagos Police Commissioner and they lived in my neighborhood in Victoria Island. And he generally do what a rich spoiled kid does, especially when their parents had the power and connections: he partied, made lots of friends, slept with almost all the young ladies in my neighborhoods, drove around in his father’s Mercedes and experimented with alcohol and marijuana. He was really having a blast at the time, and rumors had it that he was also sleeping with married women at the time. There were lots of young girls with broken hearts in Victoria Island because of Deji.

Anyway, there he was now, well dressed, in his father’s Mercedes Benz, obviously on his way to visit one of his girlfriends. I made a quick decision, and in a second I had opened his passenger’s door, jumped into his car and had him by the shoulder.

“Hello, Deji,” I said. “What a surprise to see you in this part of the country.”

He stiffened with fear and his chin dropped as he stared at me. “Who are you?” he said in a faint voice.

“My name’s Jideofor Okorie,” I said. “From Victoria Island, remember?”

“Oh my God!,” he shouted in Yoruba. “You are the murderer!”

“Well said,” I snarled. “And there will be another murder right now if you don’t follow my orders!”

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Excellent,” I replied. “I need your jacket and your hat. Hurry up!”

He did exactly what I said and within a minute the dusty construction worker was transformed into the neatest motorist in the village. I turned his car around and headed back to the road he had come. I knew that my pursuers, having seen his car before, would probably let it pass without any suspicion. Besides, Deji’s figure and appearance was in no way like mine.

“Now, listen very carefully my good friend,” I warned. “I have no beef with you. Just behave yourself and you won’t get hurt. I am only borrowing your car for a few hours, so don’t try to be a hero. If you open your mouth to alert anyone, or if you try to play any trick with me, I will break your neck. Understand?”

“Yes, boss!” he said.

Overall, I enjoyed my ride with him that evening. We drove about seven miles down the valley, through a village or two, and I actually saw some men loitering by the roadside. I was convinced that these were men who would have stopped me or alerted the police if they had seen me. But instead, they were admiring the car as we drove pass them, and one of them even waved at me in salute, and I waved back at him.

Soon it was getting dark, and I turned the car to a road that led into what I believed was an unfrequented corner of the hills. As I continued to drive, we left the villages and farms behind. We came to a large area that was covered with shrubs and a few trees, where the night was blackening the sunset gleam in a nearby stream. Here we stopped and I gave back the jacket, hat and the car to Deji.

“Thanks a lot, my good friend,” I said. “You are more useful than thought. Now, get lost before I lose my temper!”

I sat on the hillside and watched him drove away. As I was doing that, I pondered on the various crimes I had now committed. I am not a murderer, in spite of what the police might be saying about me. But I had become a stupid impostor, a liar, and a car thief. The thought of these made me even more worried about my life.

 

  

END OF EPISODE 12

P.S. Stay tuned for Episode 13, which  will be published here next Sunday.