by Layton Green
White tablecloths sprinkled a pleasantly spaced, candlelit seating area. Soft notes of jazz floated on the air, and the smell of roasting venison filled the room.
“What is this.” Nya turned to the man who had let them in. “Take us to Lucky immediately.”
“I’ll bring him at once-”
“We’re going with you. Down that hallway.”
The man’s face transformed into a paragon of confused innocence. “As you wish, Madame.”
A bubbling fury built inside Grey at the knowledge that someone had tipped Lucky off. Pasurai surveyed the room, mouth set and arms folded.
They entered the hallway and Nya stopped their guide. “Open this door.” The man went to the nearest of the closed doors in the hallway, and everyone crowded around. The room was empty.
“Business has been very good,” he said. “We’re in the process of expanding.”
“Is that why no one’s eating in the dining room?”
“It is early, Madame. We are more of a… late-night establishment.” He looked right at Nya as he said this, and she struggled to maintain her composure. She made him open another door before they reached the end of the hallway. It mirrored the first.
“Nya-” Pasurai began.
“Wait.”
The doorman reached the end of the hallway. He swept the curtain aside and motioned. “Please.”
No waifish girl stood attentively behind the bar, no cigar smoke polluted the air. Lucky and three other suited men, none of whom Grey recognized, set down their highballs and rose from one of the tables, smiles slapped onto their faces.
“Ms. Mashumba and Mr. Grey,” Lucky said, the syllables of his Nigerian English pouring richly forth. “What a pleasant surprise. My investment partners and I were just discussing a new restaurant in Avondale. What do you think? Would we be a success there as well?”
Nya couldn’t speak. Pasurai glowered at her, and the policemen shifted from foot to foot.
Grey stepped forward. “Where’s your other doorman, Lucky? The one who assaulted Ms. Mashumba and me last night.”
Lucky’s face morphed into a mask of worry. “Assaulted? I trust you are both relatively uninjured—I do notice you favor your right hand.”
Grey stilled, and Nya laid a hand on his arm.
“I must say,” Lucky said, “I am not terribly surprised. It was brought to my attention yesterday morning that this employee has a criminal record. It is a shame I had to let him go.”
Grey snorted. “Where’s the rest of your staff?”
“They will be arriving shortly,” Lucky said. “If you wish to wait we can-”
“That won’t be necessary,” Pasurai interrupted. “I’ve heard enough. We apologize for any inconvenience.
“You realize harboring a criminal is a serious crime,” Grey said.
“And are you familiar with the rest of the laws of this country?” Lucky said. “Including the ones concerning the harassment of innocent civilians?”
“What about the ones concerning strip clubs, child prostitution, kidnapping and attempted murder?”
Crimson blossomed on Pasurai’s face. “Mr. Grey, you don’t even have permission to speak here. Your Embassy will be hearing about this.”
“They won’t be surprised.”
Nya took Pasurai aside. She spoke low enough for only Grey and Pasurai to hear. “This is worthless,” she said. “He’s not going to give us anything unless we take him in for questioning.”
“Questioning?” Pasurai said. “About what? Expanding into Avondale?”
“I told you, this is a brothel. This man is a criminal. Someone on the inside has clearly given him advance warning. Or are you going to take his word over mine?”
“Be careful, Nya. This man has powerful friends. You’re aware of the rules.”
Lucky spread his hands. “Is there something I should know about? Has someone manufactured lies of my involvement in this alleged matter?”
Everyone looked to Nya. She looked away and said nothing, her face bunched in anger.
Grey admired her character. She could have lied. It may not have convinced Pasurai, but it would have saved face.
Pasurai wheeled to face Nya. “It’s time for us to go.”
“No,” Grey said, and all eyes rested on him. “There’s one more place we’re going to look.” He moved towards the hallway. Pasurai put a hand on his elbow to stop him, but Grey shrugged him off. He went into the hallway and turned left, and the whole entourage followed: Nya, Pasurai and the officers, Lucky and his men. Grey strode to the door at the end of the hallway, the door that had been locked the last time.
Grey tried the door, but it was still locked. “I know there’s something in here he doesn’t want us to see. What is it, Lucky? Did you stuff your little girls in there, or did you give them the night off? Or is it something to do with Juju?”
Lucky appeared worried for the first time. “You have no grounds to search my premises.”
Nya walked up to Lucky. “Open the door.”
Lucky balked, and Pasurai said, “I have yet to see evidence of anything that points to something other than the questionable investigative work of Ms. Mashumba. However, given her track record at the Ministry, I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt one last time.” He paused, enjoying the opportunity to assert his authority. “I wish to see behind that door.”
Lucky folded his massive arms, his neck muscles testing the limits of the fabric of his suit. “But of course,” he said softly.
He pulled out a key. Pasurai stood directly behind him, Nya hovering over Pasurai’s shoulder. Grey kept a wary eye on Lucky’s men in case the situation took a turn for the worse. There was no telling what they’d find behind that door.
The lock clicked, and Lucky eased the door open. Pasurai walked in first. As soon as Pasurai passed Lucky, Lucky looked back at Grey and winked.
Grey entered the room last. As soon as he did he swore.
The room contained a weight bench, a full-length mirror on one wall, and a calendar next to the mirror. A naked woman standing in front of a Christmas tree waved back at them from the opened calendar.
Pasurai’s face flushed deeper and deeper. “I assure you, you won’t be bothered again. Please accept the Ministry’s apology.”
“Lucky,” Grey said, then snarled and rushed straight at the larger man. Lucky threw Grey off him, into the nearest wall. Grey sprang to his feet, but Pasurai rushed over and grabbed him.
“Mr. Grey, if you don’t immediately accompany me off the premises, I will arrest you. Do you understand?”
Grey allowed himself to be led away, his eyes never leaving Lucky. Lucky regarded him with an amused expression just before he closed the door.
• • •
Not until they left the club did Pasurai let go of Grey’s arm. He turned to Nya, face rigid. “You falsely accused an innocent man, you allowed this insolent American to embarrass our government, and you kept me from my family tonight. I need not further explain the gravity of your error. You’ll be hearing from me in the morning.”
Pasurai spun and left. Nya watched him and his officers leave, then said to Grey, “Did you have to add insult to injury? I’m furious with this bastard myself, but you must control your temper.”
“I wasn’t trying to hurt Lucky. If I was we’d still be in there.”
“Then why?” Nya said wearily.
Grey pulled a black leather wallet out of his pocket. “I was stealing his wallet.”
Nya’s mouth upturned in a slow grin.
“Let’s get out of here before he figures it out,” Grey said.
They hurried to the Land Rover. Nya pulled away as Grey rifled through the wallet. “I had to salvage something. If nothing else it’ll return the inconvenience he caused us. I’m sorry about your superior.”
“He’s a rodent. My only concern is that I’ll be taken off the investigation. I’ll need to try and smooth this over tomorrow. What’s in there?”
“A few Euros, lots of American dollars, phone numbers, bank card, driver’s license, wait.”
“What?”
Grey held out a slip of paper with something scrawled on it.
“Tell me.”
“You remember the conversation I overheard in Lucky’s club the other night?”
“Yes.”
“Listen to some of these words: owo, oju, ese, blockus, ori, ifun. I think these are some of the words I heard that night. There’s an address in Belgravia below the words.”
Grey read it to her, and Nya gave him a sharp glance. “That’s Fangwa’s address.”
“Now we know for sure there’s a connection. Remember what the Professor said about Jujumen? That they have men, called headhunters, who work for them? I think Fangwa’s our guy. I think he’s the N’anga, and I think Lucky’s doing his dirty work.”
“Even if that’s true, Fangwa will be very hard to touch after tonight’s fiasco,” Nya said.
“You’d need evidence. Foolproof evidence.”
“Without a doubt.”
“Then let’s go get some,” he said.
“Hey?”
“Look, if we tip anyone off again, the same thing’s going to happen, if it hasn’t already. And time’s running out for Addison. We need to move now. Tonight. No one’ll expect us to act so soon. We need to get into Fangwa’s townhouse and find some evidence.”
She weighed his statement and gave a thoughtful nod. “We may not have another opportunity. But how?”
“I know a thing or two about breaking and entering.”
39
The city writhed during the restless evening hours, stumbled past midnight, and then finally slumbered. The only people left on the streets of downtown Harare were those poor few whom the city had dragged down into its depths, touched, and spit back out. They migrated, with the stultified shuffle of the homeless, from begging outposts to makeshift shelters, from street corner to abandoned building.
Grey and Nya watched the nocturnal drama from two chairs in the Meikles lobby, next to the window facing Third Street. They’d come to consult with Viktor, but he was nowhere to be found. They decided to wait in the lobby until it was late enough to sneak into Fangwa’s residence.
Except for the night receptionist, who got in the occasional sidelong glance, the staff had retired for the evening. Nya toyed with the empty teacup that had been sitting in front of her for more than two hours. “Where could Viktor be?”
“Who knows. He’s more mysterious than the N’anga.”
She stroked his arm. “Your Embassy hired him.”
“I’m glad he’s here, but he marches to his own drummer.”
Silence returned; both had been quiet and reflective for the majority of the evening. Grey let his eyes rove to Nya’s face. He caught her staring at him, and she blushed. He put his hand on top of hers, and she interlaced their fingers.
“Maybe when this is over,” she rubbed her index finger against his own, “maybe we can go somewhere for a while.”
“I’d like that. How about the Seychelles? If Harris is right, maybe we’ll find Addison working on his tan.”
She turned back to the window. “I don’t think he’s in the Seychelles.”
“Neither do I.”
“Grey, if something goes wrong tonight-”
“I know. I’ll be out of a job also.”
“It’s more than that.”
He squeezed her hand. “I’ll help you find your father’s murderer. I’ll help until someone forces me to leave the country.”
“I wasn’t asking you to do that. But thank you.”
“I know you weren’t asking.”
She took his other hand and gazed into his eyes. “It’s more than that as well.”
• • •
Viktor never showed. At three a.m. Grey and Nya left the hotel and drove to Belgravia. They parked a few streets away from Fangwa’s townhouse, and left the car in the parking lot of a dry cleaner.
They skulked through the slumbering neighborhood, stopping a few feet from the low wall surrounding Fangwa’s town home. The tunnel of jacarandas kept the ambient light to a minimum, and the street brooded in darkness.
“What now?” Nya whispered.
Grey put on a pair of transparent gloves he picked up at a pharmacy, and handed Nya a pair. “I pick the lock, we walk in the front door, and we hope no one’s awake.”
“What about an alarm system?”
“I didn’t see one when we were here before. They’re pretty obvious, unless they’re truly sophisticated, which I doubt is the case here. We haven’t seen any dogs, so unless someone’s awake we should be fine. If an alarm goes off, we run.”
“I think his security system is his reputation,” Nya said. “No one is daft enough to break into the house of a known Jujuman.”
“That’s my sense as well.”
“I want him. Get us inside.”
They scaled the wall and Grey set to work on the door. He pulled a short iron filing out of his pockets and hovered over the lock, fingers twitching. He soon had the door eased open. Nya squeezed his arm.
Grey closed and locked the door behind them. Leave everything as intact as possible.
A thick stillness blanketed the inside of the house. After a few minutes, the room adumbrated enough for Grey and Nya to make out the banistered stairwell and the vague outline of the slender hallway and its two doorways. Grey pointed, and they crept up the wooden stairs to the second story.
Grey tried the first door. A guest bathroom. He closed the door and tried the next. Empty.
Grey eased the third door open. It was a Spartan room, with only a white twin bed and matching dresser. Fangwa’s boy servant lay perfectly still in the bed. Grey moved forward, sensing Nya’s presence behind him.
For a moment Grey thought the boy was awake, and then he felt a tingling work its way through his body. The boy lay face-up, his arms at his sides, a single sheet drawn in a line across his bare upper chest. His open eyes stared at the ceiling. The boy reminded Grey of a corpse, folded and arranged, lying in an open coffin.
Grey saw his eyes blink, saw his chest rise and fall in the shallow breath of sleep. Grey expelled the breath he’d been holding. The boy was alive, if that was what it could be called.
They backed out of the room, Grey vowing to do something to help the boy when he had the chance.
They climbed to the top floor. The house so far was suspiciously clean and sterile, as if the owner were trying too hard to present a face of civility. Or as if the entire house were the antechamber, the area of purification before the ritual began.
The first room was another bathroom. They reentered the second room on the third floor, the one in which they’d met with Dr. Fangwa. Except for the absence of chairs in the middle of the room, it looked the same, just as Grey had suspected it would.
The third room proved more interesting. A simple metal desk backed against the far wall, strewn with papers, pamphlets, and other office paraphernalia. Grey closed the door and flicked the light on. Light flared into the room like a sunspot. They cringed at the illumination of their intrusion, even though no one below could possibly have noticed.
Except for the desk and a framed diploma from the College of Medicine at the University of Lagos hanging on the wall behind it, the room was empty. Interesting. Fangwa was a real doctor after all.
Grey and Nya rifled through the papers on top of the desk; mostly tourist information on Nigeria. The desk had four drawers on each side, and they silently pored through the folders stuffed into the drawers, conscious of every second that passed, praying no one below would be disturbed.
Grey grimaced in silent frustration. Nothing. Too clean, too normal. Nya moved to the long middle drawer. She pulled out a crisp black folder and tugged at Grey’s arm.
The first thing inside was a certificate affirming Fangwa’s attaché appointment. Grey watched as she flipped through the rest. There were various governme
nt papers, visas and diplomatic letters, all concerning Fangwa’s appointment.
Nya closed the folder, disappointed. Grey sank into the leather desk chair. He rested his chin on his fist and swiveled. Grey put a foot out, stopping the motion. He leaned down and rifled through a cylindrical trash can on the floor in front of the wall, pulling out and inspecting each balled up piece of paper. Halfway through the process he stopped and held up a crumpled fax.
“That’s a Nigerian number,” Nya said. “Lagos, I think.”
Grey checked the date: December 14th. Two days ago. A single line of type interrupted the field of white.
“Has it been found? Do not forget what is at stake.”
No signature. Grey looked at Nya; her confused eyes matched his own. Grey returned to the trash can and rummaged through the wads of paper until he found it: the copy page of the return fax, sent later in the evening on the 14th.
“I am close. It is almost time for my return. Rest assured I will never forget.“
This fax was signed, in elaborate script, Dr. Olatunji Fangwa. The signature seemed odd, incongruously prominent after the single line of type. The signature was making a statement.
“Almost time for what?” Nya said. “What’s this about?”
“No idea. Clearly Fangwa’s appointment is a front, as we suspected. Let’s discuss it later. We’re going to have to go downstairs.”
She took a deep breath. “I know.”
He pocketed the two pieces of paper. He ran through the rest of the trash, found nothing else of interest, and they rearranged the desk.
They padded to the bottom level. Nya stepped towards the first door, but Grey held her back. He took her hand and led her down the hallway, moving with exaggerated slowness past the two doors, right to the paneled wall where the hallway ended. He put his mouth next to her ear.
“Does anything about this hallway seem different to you?”
“Is it shorter? What’re you thinking?”
“The same. I’m also wondering why there aren’t three doors on this level, and where the kitchen is.” He probed the wall for a few long minutes. “If it’s false, the control must be somewhere else. I’m guessing it’s in one of these two rooms.”