Doing Dangerously Well

by Carole Enahoro

  If he succumbed at this early stage, the Kolo name would not live on. He wondered what had happened to his three assassins. Three months had passed. They had not succeeded in killing Jegede nor even reported on the TransAqua bus bombing. He had never expected them to stick to schedule, but neither had he imagined that they would disappear altogether. Against a background of orchestral soft rock, he wondered whether Jegede’s group had killed them first.

  Easing himself up, he leaned over for the phone, intending to call the Inspector General of Police, a man whose life grew ever shorter with each blunder. Suddenly, his hand stiffened, hovering over the handset. Water. He heard it spurting somewhere above him, trickling down the walls.

  Noises to his left made him jump: jets and sprays of water on the other side of the door threatening to blow it apart. He pulled the covers over his face so that only his eyes were visible. Gathering his courage, he staggered to the window, lurching in a zigzag pattern so that enemies would be unable to follow the motion. Cautiously, he peered out from behind heavy brocade curtains and squinted at the ground. He could not jump from such a height.

  As he scanned the perimeters of the governmental complex, the splashing noises abated. It was unusual weather: the sun shone with a white intensity. The temperatures soared to push human endurance to its upward limit. The sky grew increasingly fanatical, in a capricious shift from the humid season’s blazing merriment of yellow and blue to the dry season’s white glint and back again, like the flash of a gunshot. Its explosion of radiance attacked the eyes, making it difficult for a man to hit a target at any distance.

  The walls looked secure. The guards seemed calm. Still, enemies might have paid off the sentries.

  He turned back to his room and froze. He heard a noise. A gushing sound. He looked at the ceiling. They must be trying to flood him out. He called his guard.

  “Caretaker. Now.”

  The guard left and within five minutes opened the door to an old man in blue overalls. Kolo waved the guard away.

  “Yes, sir?” The caretaker bowed.

  “You see that?” Kolo pointed to the soundproofed ceiling.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Take it out tomorrow. I want cement. And no water pipes anywhere.”

  “Cement?” The old man looked up at the ceiling. “Yes, sir.” He scratched under his arm.

  “And call the guard.”

  The old man hobbled off and soon the guard returned, his ornamental epaulettes flashing with golden arabesques, his eyes hidden behind sunglasses.

  “Bring.” Kolo pointed to a few prized possessions, including his medications. He wrapped himself up in his duvet and waddled out of the room.

  Kolo led the guard through corridors and down stairs. The thunderous cadences grew fainter, until they could no longer be heard. They finally came to the garage, where Innocent was polishing the Mercedes. The guard lowered his sunglasses on his nose so he could see better.

  “Bring sheets!” Kolo ordered. The guard flinched, betraying his surprise. Kolo clicked his fingers. “Now!”

  The guard, assuming his sunglasses hid his disbelief, put the medications down on the Mercedes’ hood. Innocent opened the trunk as the guard left to retrieve the bed linen from the presidential bedroom. When the guard returned, Kolo instructed him to place the bedding inside the trunk, as taut as possible. He had already commissioned a specialist to adapt the bulletproof trunk for flotation, with at least three days’ supply of oxygen.

  “That’ll fool them,” Kolo said to himself with a giggle.

  Mary sat in great pain, her irritable bowel syndrome radiating out from her abdomen. Despite the discomfort, she descended into deep thought. She clicked back on to Drop of Life’s website, but could endure only a few moments of Barbara’s lecherous leer. After all that Mary had engineered in Banff, Barbara had obstinately maintained her tenure with this makeshift crew. Mary could think of no threat great enough to budge her. She had to deal with the situation before Sinclair stumbled, or rather slipped, onto the information.

  Death always worked.

  Perhaps a bit radical. Still, the promise of death might prise Barbara away.

  She picked up the phone, stood up and looked out over TransAqua’s fountains to the thirsty desert.

  “Hello, Daddy. How are you?”

  “On the mend, my dear. Still recovering. Watching the old tick … It’s Mary!” he screamed. “No, your daughter. No, Mary, dear.” He turned back to the phone. “Mother sends her regards. Heard from you-know-who?”

  “Nope. She’s still at Drop of Life.” She felt sick just thinking of it. “Daddy, can’t you persuade her to leave Ottawa? Please?”

  “Far be it for me to interfere in her life,” he sighed in a singsong voice. “I’m only her father, after all. That carries very little weight with some people. What can I do? An apparently corrupt engineer like me, too incompetent, by the way, to build one of Africa’s most famous dams.”

  “But, Dad, I’ve just talked to the Nigerian president. They have a contract out on her life.”

  “No more mention of her name, please. It’ll upset your mother.”

  “Dad! She may be killed.” Mary twirled a rubber band around her index finger.

  “Well, she got herself into this mess; she can get herself out of it. Your mother’s health is very fragile.”

  The phone clicked. “What about my health?” her mother shouted.

  “It’s very fragile, dear.”

  “What?” Mother’s voice cracked with alarm. “What is it? Cancer? Is it cancer?”

  “He’s sending out his hit men,” Mary continued, flicking the rubber band off one index finger and onto the other. “She needs to get back to the US.”

  “Who’s sending hit men? Who needs to get back to the States?”

  “The Nigerian president. Barbara.”

  “No more mention of her name in this house. It’ll upset your father. She’s persona non grata,” Mother said, the tail end of her sentence wobbling with emotion.

  “But her life’s in danger.” Mary flicked the rubber band even higher.

  “She’s made her bed. She’ll have to lie in it,” Mother said in her most clipped tones. “We have to think of your father’s health. He may not have long to live.”

  “What?” he yelled. “I don’t?”

  “If,” Mother continued, “we continue to harbour terrorists, as Mary is proposing.”

  “What’s the doctor told you?” Father shouted. “I demand to know! It’s my life, after—”

  “But, Mom,” Mary whined, “I might lose my job if she keeps working with terrorists.”

  “What? Oh my God! They’ve fired you?”

  “No. I was just saying they will when they hear Barbara is with Drop of Life.”

  “Not both of you!” Mother sounded as if she were about to faint.

  “Mom, I haven’t been fired. Is there any way you can persuade Barbara to leave Ottawa?”

  “When has she ever listened to us?” Mother asked, a sob breaking through her fainting spell. “She hardly knows we’re alive.”

  “You can tell her she’s been disinherited,” Father veered off topic, “and that includes any monies from the Inga Dam work. Since it’s so ethically offensive to her.”

  Mary suddenly hit on a solution. “Tell her you’re dying, Dad. That’ll work!”

  Silence.

  “I’m not saying you are dying,” Mary explained. “You’re both in good health.”

  “I wish that were the case,” Father said, a plaintive note in his voice.

  “Her antics have almost killed us,” Mother whispered.

  “Call her up, Dad. Tell her you’re dying. She’ll come home. Please!”

  “But, Mary—”

  “She’ll get them to stop the Inga Dam investigation if she thinks it’s caused you health problems. Anyway, I need to keep my job. Do you want the neighbours to hear you have two unemployed daughters?”

  “Ernie.” Mother’s
firm tone suggested she had now recovered. “Do as she tells you.” Yelling. “Mary needs her job back.”

  “Okay, love. Anything for our Mary. Give us the number to Life Drop.”

  After they got off the phone, Father tried Barbara’s numbers in Ottawa, only to receive no answer.

  There was a smell of indifference, of competence, of formality, and it was this scent that first pierced Barbara’s consciousness. She opened her eyes. Through the fog of her bleary vision, she could see insipid green all around her. She looked down. As she concentrated, bandages slowly came into focus. Her wrists. Bandages on her wrists. Around her, a grubby white curtain set on a rusting aluminum rod. She began to weep, weary, defeated. She had survived.

  She would have to try again.

  Someone dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief. She turned her head to the side, her neck stiff. Behind the sedating daze, there was Astro, with a crooked, encouraging smile.

  “Hey!” she said in a croak. Her throat was sore, her eyes puffed.

  “Hey, Babu!” He leaned over and kissed her softly on the forehead. “Finally, you’re awake!” Two teardrops landed on her nose. “At last, man. What have you done to yourself?”

  “What am I doing here?”

  “The people at work found you. A woman called Krystal phoned. You’d put me …” He sniffed bravely. “You’d put me as next of kin.” He squeezed her hand, his bottom lip trembling. “Babu—don’t ever do this again, okay?” He began to weep.

  “So don’t leave me, okay?” Tears fell to each side of her face. She did not know why he would stay—she had betrayed his immeasurable faith in her. But if he stayed, here was the branch she could hold on to through the current of her despair.

  As Barbara succumbed to sleep, she heard a match being struck. The comforting scent of Astro’s ylang-ylang incense accompanied her into slumber.

  “Could you turn that announcement down, please?” Astro frowned. “My patient here is in a very fragile condition.”

  “I’m afraid we can’t. It’s the safety instructions,” the flight attendant whispered as she demonstrated the inflation of a life jacket, miming these actions as softly as she could.

  Following Astro’s grave prognosis, the airline had upgraded Barbara and her stern, tawny-haired attendant to first class, so great was their concern over her health. As per Astro’s proscription, all noise in the cabin was stifled. Few of their cabin-mates dared to tinkle the ice in their drinks in the face of Astro’s disapproval.

  In Washington DC, on entering his apartment, Astro led Barbara to a deck chair. “Just sit down here, Babble,” he said, helping her into the chair as if she had an ambulatory disability. “There you go. Now,” he squatted beside her, speaking softly and clearly, but with the authority of a medical professional, “I’m just going to get a blankie, okay, bud?” He searched her eyes for signs of comprehension.

  She blinked.

  Satisfied, he hurried off and returned a moment later. “Here we go. One blanket coming up. Now, I’m just gonna put it around you, okay, bud? That’s right, just lean forward a bit. Good work! Now, lean back.” He wrapped her like a hot dog. “Great. Now, would you like some tea?” He hovered over her with concern.

  She looked up at him through her bundle of blankets, feeling like an idiot. “Astro, I’m …”

  “Yes?” He crouched forward a bit, turning an expectant ear towards her mouth.

  She looked at his ear, annoyed. Realizing her attendant had no clue as to the difference between depression and a deep coma, she huffed out, “Sure, thanks.”

  “Okey-dokey. I’ll go to the kitchen,” he pointed to the kitchen as if she had no idea of its location, “which is just around that corner.” He enunciated his words clearly, taking time over each vowel, each consonant, as if she had also forgotten the rudiments of the English language. “I won’t be long. If there’s anything you want, just holler. So …” he looked down, “… where am I going?”

  “To the kitchen.”

  “That’s right. And I’ll be back … ?”

  “In a moment.”

  “Good job!” He tucked a wayward edge of blanket under Barbara’s legs. He stood back and surveyed his work. Satisfied, he widened his eyes to speak to her again. “Okay, if you want something … ?”

  “Just holler.”

  He looked down at her, pride fanning across his face. “Atta girl!” he whispered, suppressing a crooked smile of congratulation. He hesitated, then made a decisive swivel kitchenwards.

  Barbara heard him take the mugs out of the kitchen cabinet and fill the kettle with water, explaining every move, as if hosting a cookery program. She knew he thought it would help her: constant chatter is considered beneficial to comatose patients. “Okay, first warm the pot with hot water …”

  Barbara unravelled herself from her winding sheet and tiptoed through his apartment, looking for signs of his girlfriend. She entered his bedroom, embraced by walls of crimson and scarlet, feeling that she had ventured back to the origin of all mystery. She neared the scattered cushions that represented his bed and gasped. A furry massage glove was wedged between his pillows—not a sexual toy she remembered having purchased. She stared at it, trying to extract its meaning. She wondered what his new girlfriend looked like. She imagined a tall woman with long fingernails, meowing through Astro’s intercom. She pictured her purring in ecstasy, back arching as Astro stroked her with the fur glove.

  She burst into tears and flung herself onto the bed, burying her head under a cushion to cover her sobbing.

  She sneezed. The sex toy moved. Barbara sprang back. A cat! Barbara sucked in a breath. This was worse than expected—the woman had moved in her pet, despite the fact that Astro was tending to an invalid severely reactive to dander.

  She heard Astro rattling the teapot, so she rushed back to her postpartum position on the beach chair.

  Astro came back, carrying a tray.

  “You’ve got a cat?” Barbara asked, tears streaming down her face, choking back the sobs.

  “You saw the cat?” He crouched down in front of her. “Don’t go near it, Babu. You have ‘allergies.’” He quote-marked the air. “Do you understand?”

  She blinked back tears and nodded.

  “Good.” He hunted around for a handkerchief. “Aw, man, I didn’t know your allergies were so bad.” He wiped her tears and held the handkerchief as she blew her nose.

  Once he had settled her down, he squared the edges of the tray so they lay parallel to the table, looked at the tray again and realigned it. It overflowed with leaves, mosses and flowers, at the centre of which lay her tea and cookies.

  “Whose cat is it?” she asked, tears springing to her eyes again.

  “My neighbour’s. You know—the guy downstairs. Remember when he took care of my apartment? Well, believe it or not, he stole my sax.”

  “So you stole his cat?”

  “No. To ‘steal,’” air quotes, “means to take property. A cat is a living being, not property.” He knelt to fuss again with her blanket.

  So he had kidnapped a cat. How could she have doubted him? He had only taunted a neighbour, not replaced her with a new girlfriend. She sighed. What a mystical spirit of nature!

  “I’m so sorry about the way I treated you, Astro. I saw such horrific things in Nigeria, and you were the only piece of innocence I had.” She stroked his hand with the back of her fingers.

  He kissed her fingers, pressing his lips against them. “I’m not as innocent as you think, Bobble,” he said into her fingers, “and you’re not that tough, either.”

  That night, having evicted the cat from the room, they lay in the enveloping warmth of his bed, Barbara listening contentedly to his breath: a wisp of an inhale, a hush of an exhale. These small sounds, which she had taken for granted, filled her with a sense of renewal. These sounds would provide her with the strength to finish what she had started. She turned to rest her head on his chest, so she could hear his heartbeat and return once again
to the amnesia of the womb.

  Within a month, Kolo’s garage decor had changed radically, with deep-pile carpets, pleasing ochre walls and fancy cornicing. An interior designer had selected the best antique furniture, above which hung giant paintings, honorary doctorates and photographs of Kolo with foreign dignitaries. In the middle of this grandeur, underneath a heavy chandelier, sat the white Mercedes-Benz. This bedroom had no windows, a bulletproof door through which the car entered, and numerous oxygen cylinders. Kolo had also installed a bathroom.

  The sound of dripping had increased slightly since he had moved to the garage, but nothing as loud as the unexpected surges of gushing water in his former bedroom. He felt safer. But if, by some terrible fate, his enemies sought to flood the garage in order to drown him, he only had to open its mighty door to reach the safety of open ground.

  “One of my best ideas. Apart from the security benefits, no one would think of finding me here,” he murmured to himself.

  From his pyjama pocket, he took out a key and opened the trunk, then hopped inside and nestled into the bedding for an afternoon nap. The Benz had been his own private joke. The former president, semi-illiterate as far as Kolo was concerned, had been interviewed during his short presidential campaign by a newscaster whose British accent struggled to integrate Nigerian inflections.

  “So, Minister, what motto will provide the direction for your presidency?”

  “Enh?” The candidate responded. “White Mercedes-Benz!”

  The studio went silent.

  While President Mu’azu had never been able to purchase his prized motor, Kolo paraded the fact that he would never have made such a basic error.

  He sniggered.

  Suddenly, the garage door opened.

  Kolo yelped and, with fumbling fingers, tried to close the trunk’s lid. The guard entered, flung off his sunglasses and cocked his revolver.

  “It’s okay, sir. Just Mechanic.” The guard kissed his teeth and addressed himself to the intruder. “Why can’t you come through my own door? You can’t just open garage door like personal toilet. Look at your miscreant self causing confusion. Ah-ah!”

  “I have to attend to car. Where am I supposed to enter-now?”