He paused at the bedroom door. Chloe Fanshawe lay on the bed, resting on one elbow, the sheet twisted around her large body. She flung it aside.
‘Here you are at last,’ she said. ‘What kept you?’
‘Listen, Chloe,’ Morgan began haltingly. ‘I’ve been…giving things some thought, and I’m not so sure…’
♦
Outside the rain fell softly in the dark, the toads and crickets made their noises and all sorts of insects began to test and spread their wings in anticipation of the rain stopping. The riot was over, the piazza deserted, smoke wisps curled from the burnt-out cars. Elsewhere in the country units of the Kinjanjan army surrounded Government House, took over the radio and TV stations, and began arresting prominent political leaders. Innocence lay in the muddy compound of the servants’ quarters, and Murray lay on a marble slab in the Ademola morgue. The thunder passed on towards the coast and, somewhere, Shango, that mysterious and incomprehensible god, flashed and capered happily above the silent dripping jungle.
EOF