419

by Will Ferguson

  "Do you see the photograph, by your elbow? That's Bishop Akinola. We know him."

  Laura turned, admired the photo. Wasn't sure what to say.

  "We're members of the Anglican Church, you see. And yourself? Anglican? Episcopalian?"

  "Um, no."

  "Catholic, then? Anglicans and Catholics are not so far apart as it might seem."

  "Not Catholic, no."

  "Surely not Baptist!" Both parents laughed.

  "No, we're—Well, I think my grandparents were Methodist, but then we became United. I'm really not sure, exactly. It wasn't a big part of our house, growing up."

  This baffled them. How could God not be a big part of any house?

  Laura sipped her berry bitters. Marital status, now religion.

  Had she entered into marriage negotiations without realizing it?

  "This," said the mother, "is Winston as a child." A photo album had somehow materialized.

  "Mama, don't. You're embarrassing our guest. We have to go."

  Laura turned a page. Winston in grade school. Winston missing a tooth. "Look at you. You're adorable." Laura smiled at him, as sweet as any sugary cake. He's thinking: I will have to kill her now. I have no choice, she knows far too much about me.

  "And your papa?" Winston's father asked. "Is he too in the export business?"

  "He was, in a way. He exported his savings—to Nigeria."

  "Pardon?"

  "You've heard of 419?" she asked.

  "Everyone knows 419. A terrible plague on our nation."

  Laura looked across at Winston, and this time she wasn't smiling. "You don't realize how fortunate you are, Winston. Both your parents, still alive." Then, turning back to Winston's father:

  "My dad died because of 419. He was killed by Nigerians."

  "Oh no."

  "Oh yes. I'm afraid it's true. It's why I'm here. I don't work in exports. I'm working with—" She had intended to say the police, but she now went one better. She fished out Inspector Ribadu's card, slid it across to the father. "The EFCC. In fact, I met with them when I arrived at the airport. My father had his savings stolen, he lost his home, his life. My mother is living in my brother's basement now. And the man who was responsible for this needs to know. He needs to know what he has done, he needs to make amends. I have come to Nigeria to find him. And Winston's been a big, big help with this."

  "How will you manage it?"

  "I've traced the emails, the money transfers."

  "Well," said Winston's father. "I hope you find the miscreant."

  "I already have. I found him before I even arrived. Among all the millions of people in Lagos, I have located my father's killer.

  And I have something to show him. Would you like to know what it is?" She turned back to Winston, met his gaze. In his eyes: panic, fear, bottled rage. It was the look of a man being driven off an embankment, a man falling through darkness. "Winston," she said, "would you be so kind as to pass me my bag?"

  And there, between the glossy pages of an in-flight magazine: police photographs of an accident scene. Her father's pulped features, face smeared, a mouth filled with blood, soft flesh ruptured, an arm dangling, barely attached.

  Winston's mother gasped, but she couldn't look away. Nor could her husband. No one ever can.

  "Winston," Laura said, her voice softer now. "I think you need to look at this, so you will understand why I have come all this way."

  When he spoke, his throat was dry. "We should go."

  "Yes," said Laura. "I suppose we should."

  "We are so, so sorry about your father." Winston's mother had tears in her eyes.

  "I hope you catch the yan daba behind this," her husband said.

  "I hope they send him to prison a long while."

  "I'm sure they will." Laura slid the photo back between the pages of the magazine, collected Inspector Ribadu's card, returned it to her pocket. "I hate to end on such a sad note," she said. "You have been very kind to me. I would like to send you something from Canada, a small gift when I get back. Maybe some maple syrup or some cookies."

  "Oh no," they protested. "No need. It was truly a gift just to meet you."

  "Well, at least a postcard." She got out a pen. "Maybe you'll come to Canada someday and visit me."

  "We would love to. Winston has had some visa problems. He was supposed to go to London last summer, but there was a mix-up with him getting out of the country, red tape and such."

  Laura smiled. "Well, I'm sure I could vouch for him, if he came."

  She passed her pen over to Winston's mother. "May I have your address? And your phone number? And Winston's too, of course."

  "Of course. We are on Keefi Street. Winston is just off Awolowo.

  Here, I'll write them out for you."

  Winston watched it unfold as though from a great distance: his mother carefully writing out both her address and his, passing it to the oyibo, the oyibo entering the information into her cellphone, hitting SEND.

  "There," said Laura. "I've sent the addresses and phone numbers to myself, and cc'ed my office. It went through, so everyone now knows where I've been tonight—if they need to find me. Isn't that something? All that information, instantly sitting in peoples hard drives on the other side of the world. And look, my cellphone takes pictures as well." She snapped one of his parents, then turned, said "Cheese!" and caught a frame of Winston glaring at her. She emailed those off as well. "As a memory of my visit," she explained.

  "So. I have pictures of you, I have your names, your addresses, waiting for me in my inbox when I get home. Isn't it amazing, what technology can do?" She looked at Winston, smiled. Kill me now, Sony boy. Let's see you try.

  Mr. and Mrs. Balogun agreed that technology was wonderful these days, magical, miraculous, even. They offered Laura wine and chocolates. And she took another sip, had another bite.

  "What a lovely young lady," said Winston's mother.

  CHAPTER 102

  She'd come in by the back door, but was leaving through the front.

  Winston's parents stood waving on the doorstep as he and Laura walked down the street toward the sedan that was waiting under a street lamp.

  As soon as they were out of sight, Winston turned on her.

  "What is the meaning of this?" he demanded, more fear than anger in his eyes.

  In Laura's experience, when people asked what the meaning of something was, they usually already knew.

  "The meaning of this? You need reminding?" She dug into her carry-on bag and pushed the photo of her dead father into his face, forcing him to step back to get away from it. "Give me back my father, and we'll call it even."

  Winston pulled ahead, walking faster, leaving her behind.

  "Crazy woman. I have nothing to say to you! Find your own way home."

  She called after him. "The EFCC will be knocking down your parents' door with a battering ram first thing tomorrow morning."

  He spun on this, came back, stabbed a finger at her. "Do not dare!"

  "You're a thief and a murderer."

  "Hold your tongue, or I will cut it from your mouth. I am not a thief, nor a murderer. I am an entrepreneur!" He all but shouted that last phrase out. "And you are no longer welcome in my country.

  Go home, madam. We are done."

  "Done? We haven't even started."

  He stomped on, with Laura in harrying pursuit. "Give me back my father, you thief."

  He turned again, livid. "Is this what you want? Reparations?

  From Africa? Justice—from Africa? Nigeria is not your playground, madam. Africa is not some sort of—of metaphor. Go now and be gone, madam. Go home, before something terrible befalls you."

  "Give me back my father, give me back his house, give me back his sweater."

  "Your father died from terminal greed, madam. There's no medicine for that."

  She stepped in closer, not giving an inch, surprising even herself with the ferocity of her anger. "My father," she shouted, "was not a metaphor! G
ive him back to me!"

  "You're crazy." He turned, continued walking.

  "Your parents have a giant-screen plasma TV."

  He stopped. "So?"

  "I don't have a giant-screen plasma TV."

  "Oh, so because my parents are African, they are not entitled to such comforts?"

  "Not because they're African. Because you're a crook."

  "And the crooks in your country? They don't own giant-screen TVs?"

  "Give me back my father!" She was screaming now, was weeping. Her rage spilled out, hot against her face. The stucco bungalow, the modest savings, that sad little tally sheet that was her father's life, gone. "Give me back what you've taken, give me back what you've stolen!"

  They had arrived at the sedan. Winston opened the door. "Get in," he ordered, and then, to the driver, something in Yoruba, something about Ironsi-Egobia.

  Laura ran.

  Ran through the humid night. Ran, crying. Not from fear or anger, but from the crushing weight of what had been lost. She hadn't cried at her father's funeral, but she was crying now as she ran, aiming for a brightly lit street corner with Winston in pursuit.

  "Wait!" he shouted, dress shoes and flowing robes slowing him down. "Stop now, and nothing bad will happen."

  Some okada boys were purring their motors outside a cafe, waiting for fares. They heard the frantic footsteps, saw the weeping

  oyibo woman running toward them, bag bouncing, an angry man in full robes chasing her.

  She ran up to them, gulped air. "I need—I need to get back to my hotel."

  Winston stopped, saw the circle of hostile faces staring back at him. He said, between gasps, "Miss Scarlet, please. Come now. We will talk about this."

  But the okada boys narrowed their gaze, squared off, putting themselves between Winston and the woman.

  "Mistah bruddah," they warned Winston. "You go take your

  babban-riga, disappear. Lady here be fine wit' us."

  "I wish, just to speak with her a moment."

  "Speakin' time is done, mistah babban-riga. You go disappear."

  One of the drivers turned to Laura, spoke in an accent so thick she could scarcely follow what he was saying. "Is no need cryin'-oh. I get you home—safe as."

  And so he did.

  CHAPTER 103

  The phone in her hotel room was ringing.

  She had arrived on okada wings, the driver angling in and out of traffic as she clung to his shoulders, eyes clenched shut, carry-on bag wedged between her belly and the boy's back. She'd paid him all the naira she had on her, not knowing if she'd shortchanged him or grossly overpaid. She supposed the latter, but it didn't matter, just that she was here. Safe.

  The Airport Ambassador Hotel & Suites. A voluminous lobby with walnut wood and superfluous lamps. As she checked in, the man at the front desk had said, voice as soft as lather, "We were worried about you, madam. Worried something might have happened. You hadn't checked in, and your flight landed many hours ago." The Airport Ambassador Hotel & Suites, on the other side of the overpass from the Sheraton.

  "I was—delayed."

  "And your luggage, madam?"

  "Only this," she said, keeping the carry-on close to her.

  The hotel was self-contained and hermetically sealed, with air-conditioned air wafting through and piano music trickling out from somewhere. A business centre, a conference room, shops that sold aspirin, a pool, a full-service bank offering foreign exchange and wire services, even tennis courts. Indoor, of course, to avoid the heat.

  The ding of elevators.

  Long hallways.

  Numbered doors counting down slowly to hers. The slide of a card and the click of a door unlocking. It was all so comforting, so secure.

  She entered a darkened space. Those first stumbling moments in a hotel room were always a scavenger hunt of light switches and dimmers, and as she groped her way through, she asked herself, Why must they always make hotel rooms so hard to illuminate?

  The phone was ringing.

  She fumbled with a reading lamp, stared at the telephone.

  The only people who knew where she was staying were Inspector Ribadu and the agents at Customs and Immigration. Had she let the name of the hotel slip when she was talking with Winston's parents? Her head was swimming, and she couldn't remember.

  The phone rang and rang.

  The motorcycle taxi boy. She'd told him where she was staying.

  Winston must have overheard.

  When she finally picked up—

  "You are dead! Do you understand, madam? Dead! You have written your own obituary."

  It was Winston.

  "We are mafia! We will ruin you, we will leave your life in tatters! You will die in Lagos!"

  "Tell your mom and dad I said hi."

  She hung up. Took a deep breath. The phone rang again almost immediately, and this time she was ready.

  "Winston. Listen. When you scream like that, it's hard to understand what you're saying. You seem upset."

  "Fuck you, madam! Fuck you! We will find you, and we will kill you!"

  "You've already found me. But—more to the point, Fve found you. I have the emails you sent my father, a record of the money transfers. I know who you are, Winston. I know where you live, I know your sister's name, I know where she goes to university. I know where your parents live. Fve got their phone number. I have everything I need. So. Shall I hang up and call the EFCC? They will destroy you, Winston. They will destroy your life, they will destroy your family. They will seize your assets, they will freeze your bank account, they will confiscate your passport. Your parents will probably lose their home. They will certainly lose their son. Are you listening now, Winston?"

  A long silence passed between them. When he spoke, his voice sounded distant, hollow. "Your father was not my fault."

  "My father was nothing but your fault."

  "What is it you want then?"

  "I want a bear with Rumpelstiltskin glasses. I want a stucco bungalow with wood panelling in the living room and orange shag carpets in the den. I want my father back. I want a snow globe Mountie and a ticket to the All-Seeing Oracle. I want a piggy bank shaped like a cowboy. I want postcards for my Nana." She was reaching back through time now, was wiping the smirk off the face of a teenage boy at the Stampede midway.

  "I don't under—I can't..."

  "Then give me back the money you stole. "

  "I don't have it."

  "Bullshit. Bring the money to the Ambassador Hotel tomorrow morning. The banks are open on Saturday. I checked. Do that, and I will leave. I will fly home, and you will never see me again. Do that, and I won't have you arrested. Your parents can keep their garden and their plasma TV, and they won't have to visit their son in prison."

  She dropped the receiver into its cradle, followed the cord back with her hand, unplugged it from the wall.

  The car tumbled through darkness, end over e n d . . .

  In the hum of a silent room, Laura Curtis stood at the window, looked out through her own reflection. Airplanes were landing and escaping, lights blinking. An air traffic control tower stood silhouetted against the night sky, the searchlight on top turning and turning.

  CHAPTER 104

  Winston waited for the coughing to stop. Begin with the assumption that he knows everything, that he already knows the answer to every question he asks. The coughing trailed off into rattling breaths, a final wheeze. At first, Winston had suspected that the constant hacking and facial sweat were more a manifestation of suppressed rage than an actual affliction, but blood on a handkerchief, the whites of the eyes gone jaundiced—could even rage do that?

  Ironsi-Egobia looked up at Winston. "And?" he asked.

  Fear was a worm in the heart, a tremor in the chest, a flutter in the bone. "There were... complications."

  "Complications? Is that what you're calling it?" Ironsi-Egobia leaned back from his desk, and as he did, his face fell into the umbra of shadow beyond the overhead lamp. He be
came a voice.