Foreign Gods, Inc.

by Okey Ndibe

  Usman asked, “Sounds like you’re about to make some good money?”

  “Serious money, yes.”

  Usman laughed. Infected, Ike laughed, too.

  “Doing what, exactly?” Usman asked. “Gambling?”

  Ike chortled and then collected himself. “A trade secret! If I tell you, I have to kill you.”

  “Don’t get into drugs, my friend.” Usman’s tone was devoid of joviality. “These American chaps have no mercy in their dictionary. They can throw your ass in the slammer—and let you rot there.”

  “I won’t touch drugs, am I crazy?” Ike protested.

  “You got me scared for a moment.”

  “No, my deal is clean. It’s the main reason I’m making this trip, even though it’s costing me lots of money I don’t have.”

  “You’re the first African cabdriver I know to ever complain about lack of cash. The others roll in lots of cash.”

  “They didn’t marry Queen Bee!”

  They succumbed to long, hard laughter. Then Usman spoke with his characteristic humor.

  “Listen, I have a little bit of cash lying around. I can put two thousand dollars in your pocket. Half of it is a gift; let’s call it my contribution to your post-Bee survival fund. The other half is a loan.”

  “Are you sure?” Ike asked, stunned.

  “No,” Usman said. Then, feigning a child’s voice, he added, “Let me go and ask my mommy.”

  Ike said he’d repay the full amount. Usman insisted on giving him half as a gift. He said he would drop off the cash at Ike’s apartment the next day, around seven in the evening.

  CHAPTER SIX

  It was in August 2005 that Ike Uzondu first read about Mark Gruels in an edition of New York magazine. His friend, Jonathan Falla, had filched the magazine from a dentist’s office and mailed it to him. By the end of December, Ike had made up his mind to travel to Nigeria, snatch the war deity his people called Ngene, and sell it to Gruels’s gallery.

  He had come to that decision after weeks of agonized indecisiveness. He’d been disgusted the first time he read Gruels’s story. The idea of a few wealthy individuals buying up so-called Foreign Gods and sacred objects just didn’t sit well with him. The sport struck him as the height of arrogance. If you had loads of cash, you could purchase deities torn away from their shrines in remote corners of the world. You could install these displaced, forlorn gods in your expensive city apartments or country mansions. And then you could invite friends and relatives over to gaze, in astonishment, admiration, or awe, at your odd acquisitions. What did it all prove? It was sheer decadence. When Ike read in the magazine that anybody who acquired a deity was known as the god’s “parent,” he paused and suppressed a rueful laugh.

  The New York magazine piece reminded Ike of that derisive name Nigerians had for anybody with too much money and too little sense: money-miss-road. He remembered the classic case of a vain, wealthy man. As the man neared death, he had gathered his family to give instructions for his burial and funeral. He instructed that a huge, wide grave be dug when he died, enough to swallow a wide car. “I have driven a Rolls-Royce for much of my life,” the man said. “Death should not end my splendor. When I die, I must continue to drive the same car in the spirit-world. I order you to lower a Rolls-Royce inside my grave, right next to my casket. I should not be mistaken for a wretched man when I arrive in the land of the dead.”

  Those who collected high-priced deities shared something with that Nigerian money-miss-road. In a fit of outrage, Ike had flung the magazine across the room.

  The next day, he dialed Jonathan Falla.

  “You got it, right?” Jonathan said in accustomed ebullience. “Didn’t the story blow your mind?”

  “There are too many crazy people with too much money around here,” Ike replied.

  “I agree! That’s why you need to go get that god of war from your village.”

  Ike, shocked, asked, “Why, exactly?”

  “Why, you ask? We need a revolution around here.”

  “You’re always talking revolution, but you’re a child of privilege. You’re part of the enemy.”

  “Nope, I already committed class suicide, my man. I’m ready for the revolution.”

  Ike laughed. He’d known Jonathan for many years, and yet it was impossible to know when his friend was speaking in jest.

  “So your revolution requires that I steal my people’s old deity and sell it to some rich fool?”

  “You’ve got a goddamn war god, don’t you? And it’s sitting pretty in your village, not fighting any wars. What use is it to your people? Nil! But you bring it over here, it’ll enter the oppressive system and fight the power. Lead the revolution from the inside.”

  “Jay, you still come up with these crazy ideas!”

  “Crazy to you, but it’s strategic thinking.”

  “Well, I’m not touching Ngene.”

  “Okay, be on the side of the oppressors!” Jonathan quaked with laughter.

  Ike seemed to forget the magazine where he tossed it. One fateful night, two or three weeks later, it crossed his mind again. He had just taken a long shower to shake off the languor of hours spent in traffic. As he sat moping at the TV and sipping from a mug of Guinness, he suddenly began to wonder where he had seen one of the actors before. Then it dawned on him: the man strongly resembled Mark Gruels. He sat up and searched for the magazine, already lightly coated with dust. Back on the sofa, he read the story again. To his amazement, the initial disgust had disappeared.

  Over the next few weeks, he read it again and again. Sometimes he read slowly and closely, pausing to reflect on one sentence or another. Other times, he read fast, skipping sentences or even whole paragraphs. He’d become obsessed. In some curious way, the story transported him, kept him spellbound. It became an eerie reminder of the sense of wonder he felt as a history student in secondary school, when he first learned about some of Africa’s ancient kingdoms—Mali, Songhai, Ghana, and Kanem Bornu—and encountered their great heroes and warriors, names like Mansa Musa, Askia the Great, Osei Tutu, Queen Amina of Zaria. Each new reading of the magazine drew him ever closer, fearfully, to the edge of fascination and temptation.

  There came a weekend when he could neither work nor escape to a casino to gamble. An ice-tinged snowstorm had come on the heels of a blitz of powdery flakes that left banks and banks of snow.

  Trapped in his apartment during those wintry doldrums, Ike had eaten little food. He mostly nibbled on potato chips, cookies, and buttered bread. But he drank swill after swill of Guinness. With little else to occupy him, he used some of his empty time to reread the New York magazine. And then he spent long hours in agonized self-examination. The major question he considered was this: Did he have the guts to snatch the statue of Ngene and sell it?

  At first, his mind seesawed, leaned this way, then that. The torturous exercise racked his nerves and left him fatigued and mentally exhausted. Yet, he ultimately decided that the answer was—yes! The date was December 29, 2005.

  Having reached that decision, he realized that it would be best to make an urgent job of it. He wanted to set an early date for his trip. He had close to three thousand dollars on hand, but the sum was far from enough to pay his rent and other bills and buy a flight ticket. By acting quick, he would reduce the emotional cost to himself. Already, he felt an ache in his heart. It came from a nagging sense that he was about to betray his uncle Osuakwu—his father’s only brother and the chief priest of Ngene. There was no satisfactory way around the shame and guilt. In the end, Ike settled for Mark Gruels’s argument in the magazine. It was this: that, in a postmodern world, even gods and sacred objects must travel or lose their vitality; any deity that remained stuck in its place and original purpose would soon become moribund. Deep down, Ike felt it was a lot of mumbo jumbo, fanciful but meaningless. No, he was not himself convinced of its soundness. Still, he made it serve.

  Ike realized the advantage of moving fast. He considered asking Jona
than for a loan but decided against it. Instead, the following weekend, he took off on a gambling junket, not to Atlantic City, this time, but to Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut. He couldn’t resist the casino’s special offer of double-bed rooms for twenty-three dollars (plus tax), complimentary drinks thrown in. After a weekend of binged gambling, he left the casino in sour spirits, dazed, and broke.

  He ceased reading the magazine, which he tossed underneath his bed. Ike’s plans to transplant and sell Ngene might have stayed on hold had he not received an e-mail from his sister that jolted him. Part of the e-mail read: God has told Pastor Uka that it is time to destroy Ngene. God revealed that the deity is demonic. It is the cause of barrenness in our married women. It’s the reason sickness and disease have entered Utonki. Its shrine is the headquarters of witchcraft in our area. God gave the pastor a special message for you. You’re divinely favored to be a millionaire, but Osuakwu and Ngene have been closing your doors. Osuakwu and Ngene caused you never to get married. God told Pastor Uka that you must send 1,000 dollars immediately. The money is to help the pastor to destroy Ngene. Once you send it, God will unleash blessings in your life. You will find a wife and millions of dollars will find you. God told the pastor that Ngene must be destroyed in the month of May. The statue will be thrown into a huge fire. Mother asked me to tell you not to joke with this message. You must act immediately.

  The e-mail was sent on April 2, 2006. Ike wasn’t sure whether Pastor Uka was bluffing, but he couldn’t afford to wait and see. Suddenly, he had a new impetus to save Ngene, even if he didn’t have to sell it. The thought of the statue smoldering in a fire was too jarring to imagine.

  Ike’s financial state was dismal. He had less than thirteen hundred dollars saved. His March rent of fifteen hundred dollars was long overdue, the April rent was due. Yet, none of that mattered. He had to move, and fast. His rent and other bills, he decided, must wait until he returned from the trip. Then, with the windfall reaped from the sale of the deity, he would clear all his debts. And he would have lots of cash to start any life he wished.

  Four days after reading the e-mail, he had set a date for the trip. And then he drove to a travel agency on Hoyt Street in Brooklyn and charged the fare of $1,583 on a Visa card activated that same day. The card had arrived in the mail a month ago. He’d seen that it carried a usurious interest rate of 28.9 percent and had meant to cut it up. It was only his habitual hesitancy that stood in the way. He had inserted the card in his wallet and forgotten about it—until now.

  Having settled the matter of a ticket, Ike had to think about cash for expenses. There would be expenses, a lot of them, once he arrived in Nigeria. He would make a stopover in Lagos for a night or two. He’d need a place to stay in the city. He’d need money for eating, for moving about. Then there was the domestic flight from Lagos to Enugu. There was the cost of hiring a taxi from the Enugu Airport to his hometown. Once he grabbed the deity, he could not afford the risk of a customs officer prying into his bag. It would take doling out a handsome bribe to persuade customs officers to—as Nigerians said—go blind small. The thought unsettled him, but he knew that his mother and sister would expect some cash.

  Ike had two or three good friends who lived in Lagos. He had only to ask, and they would graciously pick him up or drop him off at the airport. He could easily ask any of them to host him in their homes. But he had decided not to make contact, for the nature of his trip required that he operate with extreme caution and tact. The company of friends, he feared, might stimulate nervousness. He was better off isolating himself as much as possible. He would be the master of his own fate: see to his own accommodations and care in Lagos and make arrangements for his movements once he touched down in Nigeria.

  Ike’s credit card came with a cash limit of twenty-five hundred dollars. He withdrew it all, unperturbed by the high interest rate. He had a beloved deity to rescue. And he stood to make a great fortune doing it.

  The trouble was that twenty-five hundred dollars was not enough for the expenses that Ike envisaged. He had worried himself sick about where to get some more cash. If he had had time, he might have been tempted to make a quick dash to Atlantic City or Foxwoods. The more he thought back on all his gambling losses, the more convinced he was that luck lurked around the corner, finally ready for him.

  And then Usman stepped out of the shadows with his largesse.

  Ike glanced up at the clock hung above the framed black-and-white photograph of his family and saw that the time was 11:53 P.M. Then he lowered his eyes and stared at the picture. He looked lingeringly on his parents. They sat side by side. His mother seemed somewhat uneasy. Hands folded on her lap, she stared straight, as if suspicious of the camera. His father was noticeably more relaxed. He leaned back in his chair, left hand thrown over the back of the chair, fingers clasping his wife’s shoulder. Ike and his sister stood behind their parents. At the time, Ike was still slightly shorter than Nkiru. His head of bushy hair was cocked right, away from his sister, his lips parted in a hesitant muttering of cheese. His sister Nkiru’s eyes were already branded by that appetite for rebellion and adventure that, at nineteen, would leave her carrying a baby for a police sergeant.

  Looking at the photo, he wondered if he had not betrayed his mother and sister—and, in some vague way, his late father. Once he came back from his trip, he would have enough money to do a better job of taking care of his mother and sister. Guilt, grief, and penitence spun in a whorl inside of him. He turned away from the photo, but thoughts of his father, mother, and sister stayed with him.

  Ike opened the last bottle of Red Stripe and emptied its contents into a large tumbler. He upended the tumbler, drained the beer, and licked his lips. He lay down on the couch, curled up in the fetal position. As his head snuggled on the armrest, his nostrils caught the scent of Queen Bee’s hair spray. It turned his alcohol-filled stomach. He sat up, upset, but also astonished to find himself aroused. He thought: She left a whiff of herself on the couch, and then left the couch behind to torment me. He shut his eyes, not in submission to the lure of sleep, but to expel the thoughts of her.

  It was 1:14 A.M. when he opened his eyes. Insomnia made him crave alcohol, but he had run out of beer. His only option was a bottle of Jack Daniel’s whiskey he had hidden under the bed. Queen Bee had bought it—in all likelihood, Cadilla had given it to her. For months, the bottle had sat on the kitchen counter. After the divorce, she left without taking it. Ike had been tempted to throw it away or to hand it to some homeless man. But a deep fear of Queen Bee kept him from either action. He wouldn’t put it past her to show up one day and demand that bottle of whiskey. He had rolled it underneath the bed to keep it out of sight.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Ike swept his hand under the bed until his fingers felt the bottle of whiskey. He used his shirt to wipe off its film of dust and then twisted off its cap. Its rich scent hit his nostrils and made his stomach heave slightly. He had never liked the smell of whiskey. If he could help it, he never drank it. When he did, he first killed the smell with a liberal spray of Coca-Cola. Nor did he care for its taste, unless it was mottled in chunks of ice and lemon juice.

  Tonight, he was prepared to drink the whiskey straight, braving its reek and its strong, burning taste. He was having one of those desperate nights when sleep fled from his eyes.

  He poured the drink into a glass, alert not to exceed the halfway mark. He brought the glass to his nostrils, testing out his abhorrence against his desperation. He flinched, surprised by the ease with which repulsion weakened his will. From the refrigerator he fetched three cubes of ice and a can of ginger ale. After throwing in the cubes and two dabs of ginger ale, he swilled the whiskey. It was far from a smooth affair, but neither was it as hard to swallow as he feared. The liquid slipped, scalding and cold, through the circuit of his belly. He felt a sharp pain in his guts, hunger flaring up. He immediately lifted the glass again to his lip. Another jet of liquid coursed down his throat.

  H
e continued sipping until his tongue became accustomed to the taste. Then he once again found and opened the May 1, 2005, edition of the New York magazine.

  He sat down and twisted the knob of a standing lamp. The bulb blinked, steadied itself, and bathed the room with a bright glare. He set the glass of whiskey on the floor. Then he spread the magazine on his lap. Having met Mark Gruels hours before, he studied the photo that dominated the first page of the profile. A beaming Gruels was dressed in a twilled blue T-shirt and a pair of black pants. In the crook of his left hand was a joss, in the other hand a statue of the Ewe god of rain. In bold red letters that grazed the hair of the smiling entrepreneur was the headline: “The Man Who Sells Gods.”

  An hour and six minutes later, he woke up to the pulse of a terrible pain in his neck. The couch was soaked with his sweat and reeked of whiskey. For a while he lay still, bedraggled. Eyes half shut, right hand cramped, his mind seemed vacant, unable to remember the last thing he did before he was swept off by sleep. He had slept deeply, dreamlessly, aroused finally by the throb of pain in his neck.

  Eyes fully opened, Ike surveyed the room with the curiosity of a man transported in a dream to a strange room. Gradually, the shafts of light from the slatted window restored his sense of bearing. With his left hand he pulled out the cramped right hand from underneath his head. The rescued hand felt numb. He clenched and unclenched it to regain some sensation. Then, shifting his body, he felt the crinkle of paper.

  He lifted himself and pulled out the wrinkled copy of the magazine. The slight movement gave him a feeling of nausea and made his headache flare up. He was familiar with the drinker’s credo pertaining to a hangover: Kill the pain with more of the same. His fingers swept the floor until they touched the glass that held the remnant of whiskey. He took a sip and burped, convinced that the hangover was assuaged, even if slightly.

  He lowered his legs to the floor, leaned his reeling head on the couch, and began to read, freeing himself to be absorbed.