“And you were paid for the job?” Dawson asked.
“Yes, please. I got my share of the cash.”
Dawson could deduce what had happened over the last few hours. “Early this afternoon, Commander Longdon called you to say he had an emergency job?”
“Yes, please. He told me two people would be traveling in a jeep and that I should shoot to kill, but he didn’t tell me who would be in the vehicle. When I saw it was you, I couldn’t do it. I just fired the shotgun and hoped it would scare you away.” Obeng looked at Dawson. “You don’t know how much the commander hates and fears you.”
The “fear” part surprised Dawson at first, but what Obeng really meant was Longdon feared that the truth would be found out.
“One more question, Obeng,” Dawson said. “Was it you who told some of the Chinese miners when a raid was coming?”
“Yes, sir,” he said.
“Did the commander tell you to do it?”
“No,” Obeng said, head down. “I did it for the money. The Chinese people gave me a small dash for the information. This is Ghana. You do whatever you can to get money.”
How very true that is, Dawson reflected.
KUMASI
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Dawson sipped his Malta while Daniel Armah had beer on a late Saturday afternoon as they sat on the back porch and reminisced. The older man had about five stories for every one of Dawson’s. They came around to the topic of Commander Longdon.
“Tell me again how you took him into custody,” Armah said, settling comfortably back in his chair. “I never get tired of hearing about it.”
“This is how it went,” Dawson began. “When we went to the commander’s house, he was in the sitting room having drinks with friends. He was surprised to see us. ‘What are you doing here?’ I went up to him and touched him on the shoulder. I told him he was under arrest as an accessory to murder, armed robbery, and all the rest of it.”
“His reaction?” Armah asked.
“Surprisingly calm. He told me that as a junior officer, I could not arrest him and that I should get out. And at that point, in walks DCOP Manu, who says coolly, ‘I am your senior officer, so I’ll do the arresting.’ Commander looked confused, as if he didn’t really know what was happening to him. DCOP Manu cautioned him, and told him, ‘Come along, it’s time to go.’ And the best part is she turned to his guests and said, “‘Excuse the interruption. Please carry on.’”
Armah laughed. “What a wonderful woman she is.”
“She will oversee the Obuasi Division until they find Commander Longdon’s replacement,” Dawson said.
“She will do more than a capable job,” Armah said. “But listen, there’s one other person I’m curious about. The American guy-Chuck Granger? How does he fit in, if at all?”
“I think he’s in the clear,” Dawson replied. “He has an alibi provided by Tommy Thompson, and even though Thompson could have cooperated with him to provide a fake one-meaning Granger really came back to Kumasi from Accra earlier than he said he did-I don’t think Granger had the slightest interest in Bao Liu.”
“I see. Well done, Darko.”
“Thank you, Daniel,” Dawson said warmly. He hesitated before speaking again.
“I sense something is bothering you, isn’t it?” Armah said, smiling gently.
Dawson sighed and leaned forward, rubbing his forehead as if it hurt. “I’m just not one hundred percent sure that Yaw Okoh really killed Bao Liu. I lose sleep over it every night.”
Armah nodded. “That little voice of intuition of yours always speaks the truth. If this is bothering you, you must go back again over the same territory and look for something you missed.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
In Sunday’s sweltering noon heat, Dawson found Mr. and Mrs. Okoh working on their cassava farm. Both were hoeing and turning the dry soil, but she had the additional burden of carrying a small child on her back.
“Ayekoo!” Dawson called out, recognizing their hard work.
They responded in kind, mopping their brows of sweat as he came up to them, and, exchanged greetings. They invited him over to the shade at the edge of the plot, and they sat on a fallen log.
“How are you?” Dawson asked them.
Mr. Okoh turned the corners of his mouth down and turned his palms up briefly. “By His Grace, we are managing.”
Dawson nodded. “And who is this little one?” he asked, gently passing his fingers over the soft hair of the infant strapped to Mrs. Okoh’s back.
“That is Ama,” she said with a smile, glancing over her shoulder. “Amos’s child.”
“She is sweet.” Dawson said. He looked up at them. “Have you seen Yaw?”
“Yes, please,” Okoh said, looking sad. “We went to visit him last week at Kumasi Central Prison. All the life has left his body.”
“I’m sorry,” Dawson said.
Mrs. Okoh cast her eyes down. “He is suffering,” she said. “He won’t eat. He has become very thin.”
Dawson couldn’t imagine a thin Yaw. “Mr. and Mrs. Okoh, deep in my heart, I no longer feel your son killed the Chinese man,” he said. “He wanted to save his father from going to prison.”
“Yes, please.” Okoh said, and his wife murmured agreement. “God bless you, Owura Dawson.”
Dawson sat a little forward. “Is there nobody else that you know who might have wanted to kill the Chinese man?”
Okoh looked at him with weary eyes. “Please, I can accuse someone just to get my son out of prison, but that won’t bring me any peace either, will it?”
Dawson didn’t need to answer that. “I will do my best to free your son.” And he added, importantly, “By His Grace.”
In the evening, while Christine and the boys played a noisy board game, Dawson sat at the table in the sitting room and went back over his notes page by page. This is exactly why he jotted things down. Once something was said, done, or observed, it was over forever. One might think one has a good memory, but the mind always distorts, regardless.
Dawson read through Wei Liu’s interrogation after the man had almost assaulted Kobby. He could understand why the Chinese man, in his distraught state, had done that, but it was absolutely not an acceptable excuse. Again, he wondered how these Chinese illegals viewed Ghanaians. With disdain?
Some of Dawson’s notes were short-like those about his chat with Danquah at Ofin Trading. Not that they weren’t important, just that Dawson didn’t think their content was as crucial as that of others. He read over what he had quickly written down after he had visited Wei at his home.
misses Bao
grief stricken, if only heard alarm and Bao trying to call
denies he knew about police raids b4hand
Dawson went back to his interview with Wei at the police station and frowned. He skipped forward again. And then back.
Discrepancy. His heart began to thump in his chest. Was he mistaken? He looked again. No, there was a discrepancy. He leaned back and for several minutes watched Christine, Hosiah, and Sly as they moved pieces and counted out spaces on their board game. Christine groaned as she was returned right back to the start. “Oh, goodness,” she said. “Why can’t I ever win this silly game?”
Dawson got up and went to the bedroom to lie down for a while and stare at the ceiling as he tried to tie everything up. He must have dozed off for a while, because the next thing he knew it was 10:25. The boys were already asleep, and Christine was watching the news in the sitting room. Dawson came around to her and kissed her on the cheek. “I have to go out,” he told her. “Something has come up in the case, and I might not be home tonight.”