The Extinction of Menai

by Chuma Nwokolo

  I phoned Humphrey Chow. All his numbers rang on and on, tripping over to voicemail. I disconnected and reflected for a moment, then I rose. I followed the dispatch trail up to Accounts and found Humphrey’s requisition on Smith’s desk. The youngster was busy outputting the final accounts. I settled for a photocopy.

  I took the lift upstairs to the chairman’s suite. Every quarter, Malcolm told the agency conference that his office was open to everyone who needed a one-on-one. Today I had the opportunity to test the boast. In my first agency, an associate could walk into a black-tie meeting and whisper into the senior partner’s ear. Frisbee had a bank of personal assistants to preempt that exigency, and the earliest appointment I could secure was the chief’s walk-to-the-car-park-chat, that evening.

  I had an hour before the last courier deliveries of the day left IMX.

  I slipped into the toilet. Withholding my number, I called the IMX switchboard on my mobile. I asked for the chairman’s office.

  ‘Malcolm Frisbee’s office,’ said June. ‘How can I help you?’

  ‘I am John Grisham’s private secretary,’ I lied breathlessly, pressing my nose bridge to nasalise my voice. ‘Can I speak with Mr. Frisbee?’

  ‘He’s in a meeting. Could I call you back in—’

  ‘Don’t bother, John Grisham will not be free to be called back. Tell him it’s sorted . . .’

  ‘One minute, please . . .’

  Within thirty seconds, I was speaking one-on-one with my chairman for only the third occasion that year. ‘Hello,’ he boomed. ‘John Grisham?’

  ‘Jane,’ I said. ‘This is Jane Grisham of the Guardian. Would you have the name of Humphrey Chow’s new agency? We’d like comments on the breaking news of his major national award.’

  ‘You are speaking to his agency.’

  I allowed myself to sound confused. ‘My sources said you had ended—’

  ‘Not true,’ snapped Malcolm Frisbee categorically.

  ‘Perhaps we’ll wait for your press release . . .’

  ‘Within the hour,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll monitor your website,’ I said and hung up.

  I paused in our open-air lounge and smoked a well-deserved cigarette. Instead of pinching it dead at the halfway point, I smoked the day’s ration straight. Then, with the last drag, I blew a perfect smoke ring: a halo for Guardian Angel Lynn. Then I gave myself the treat of taking an unnecessary file into Grace’s office to discuss, just to be there to see her face when the memo came down.

  ESTELLE BAPTISTE

  Abuja | 20th April, 2005

  After this latest nightmare began, I had read everything I could find about Badu. I could not believe this was my husband. I was both afraid and excited.

  I hated big countries.

  In Abuja, there were people everywhere I turned. The airport was like a bus station; the bus station, a marketplace. And when I got to the tribunal on that first day, I had never seen that many people in my life; and they were all chanting, ‘Badu! Badu!’

  I made my way through the crowd to the car park, and there I found my lawyer waiting, as we agreed. He was not looking very happy with me.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘There’s a problem.’ He took me through the police cordon. We walked down a wide corridor and through a library. Finally we stood in front of another lawyer and a short woman in a jean skirt, who had been waiting impatiently for us.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ I asked again.

  ‘We have an issue with representation,’ said the other lawyer.

  ‘Look, I don’t speak law-English, what does that mean?’

  ‘What it means,’ explained my own lawyer, ‘is that you ladies have employed two different law firms to represent Badu in your capacity as spouses. Now, you told me clearly that you are Badu’s wife—and I believe you. And all I need is for you to prove to these . . .’

  He saw my face and stopped. His voice softened, and he seemed to realise that he wasn’t yet in court. ‘Sorry, madam, but do you have your marriage certificate . . . ?’ He trailed off.

  ‘Do Nigerian women carry their marriage certificates around in their purses?’

  ‘Listen . . .’ began the other woman, but I’d had enough. This new wife was too young to be Grace Meadows. It seemed Izak had a wife for every country, and I had left my jurisdiction.

  Mishael would never let me forget this. ‘Just shut up,’ I said and walked away.

  They could have the bastard, sickness and all.

  I heard my lawyer calling me, urgently. I supposed he would not want me to give in without a fight, with all those fees and television appearances at stake. I heard footsteps coming after me, and I ran. He could keep my deposit; no one would ever be able to say that they saw Estelle crying over Izak again. I ran all the way to the guest house where I had spent the night. When I stopped at the reception, she caught up with me. We stared at each other until my key arrived, but we were panting too heavily to attempt a conversation without looking silly.

  I did not know how I looked, myself—after running like a witch overtaken by dawn through the streets of Abuja—but looking at this third wife, all I could think was that Izak was both mad and blind. I could not believe I had sold my business to pay the legal fees for this serial philanderer with such poor taste in women. I took my key without a word and walked upstairs. Why she followed me, I did not know. I had left Izak for her. If these Nigerian girls were willing to fight to the death over a penniless terrorist, I wondered what they would do over a tycoon.

  My bed was unmade, as usual. The TV was on. The coverage was still on Badu. We sat on opposite sides of the bed, panting for several minutes. I was the first to recover. Or maybe I was simply the angrier one. ‘Shouldn’t you be at your husband’s trial?’ I snapped.

  ‘We’re not married.’

  ‘Then at your boyfriend’s trial! Or your lover’s trial! Or . . .’

  ‘That’s what I was trying to tell you. I didn’t realise he was married. Nothing’s happened between us, okay? He was my friend and I did what friends do.’

  I looked at her suspiciously. ‘What do friends do?’

  ‘I mean getting him a lawyer. But since you’re his wife, and you’re here, of course my lawyer will withdraw. I apologise for the mix-up.’

  There was a tense silence in the hotel room. I was looking at every angle of every word. These Nigerians were dangerous. Of all the countries in Africa, why did Bamou’s sister have to live in Nigeria?

  ‘Your English sounds . . . French?’ she asked.

  ‘Ivorien.’

  ‘When did you get married?’

  ‘2002 . . .’ Was this just idle conversation? Was she trying to deflect me? ‘Are you saying there’s nothing between you and him?’

  ‘Nothing at all,’ she said, but she was looking at an irrelevant picture high up on the wall. ‘Absolutely nothing at all.’ She stood up quickly. ‘Now, I will go and tell my lawyer to withdraw.’

  She walked quickly to the door—almost as quickly as I had run away from them at the tribunal. And I was not a child. I could swear that my husband had been deceiving this woman, the way he deceived Grace. But, suddenly, she was not walking quickly any more. She was standing, staring at the television, mumbling, ‘Is that a yellow shirt?’ She approached the television slowly. On TV, Izak was coming down from a Black Maria. He wore chains on his legs and wrists—and a yellow shirt and jeans. ‘Is that a yellow shirt?’ she asked again, louder this time. There was something in her eyes and voice that worried me. Izak was definitely not wearing a black blouse, and I was not sure why the colour of his shirt had suddenly become an issue. I found myself hoping she had not locked us in. I stood up and moved slowly towards the door myself. It was too late. She turned from the television and stared at me with crazed eyes. With a sinking heart, I realised that whatever madness was affecting Izak was infectious after all. After our hour of passion yesterday, only God knew when I would lose my own senses!

  �
�What’s your husband’s name?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘What do you call him? What’s his name?’

  ‘Izak.’

  She stared blankly.

  ‘He also calls himself Humphrey Chow,’ I added.

  She smiled, and her face changed. She became a different person, and I saw how it was possible for a man to actually lose his head over her. She crossed the room in a leap. I raised my hands in self-defence, but she was only trying to embrace me. ‘Did you know that Humphrey Chow has an identical twin brother?’

  It was my turn to stare. She pointed at the TV. ‘Do you recognise that tattoo on his neck?’

  ‘That’s my name.’

  She nodded. ‘That’s your husband, no question. My boyfriend is his identical twin, Badu.’

  ‘Boyfriend? I thought you said . . .’

  She grinned mischievously. ‘If you ever tell him I said “boyfriend,” I’ll kill you. Where’s your stuff, Dee? You’re family. You’re moving out of here now.’

  SLEEPCATASTROPHES

  Kreektown | December, 2004

  Clama Mfala

  Daudi Mfala

  Netia Mfala

  Tima Amaga

  Kali Situme

  Apo Ulama

  Births

  Nil

  Extant Menai population: 87 (NPC estimates)

  ZANDA ATTURK

  Ubesia | 21st April, 2005

  The streets were still tense, with flying stones and eddying teargas. Her own courtiers were harried and nervous. Amana, though, exuded a calm, seemingly unfeigned composure. She seemed like someone born into the title and office. I felt achingly clumsy, uncomfortable. I smelled of palm oil from the barge that had smuggled me onto the jetty of the Nanga’s Residence. I had thought about this meeting over and over. None of my scenarios even came close. There was the formality of the first sight of her—when the very possibility that she could tarnish the stature of the office of Nanga by actually smiling at the sight of me, how much more rising to receive me, had become ridiculous in hindsight. Then there was the processing of her train into a private reception room and the coldness of her first words when we were finally alone. ‘Your brother was arrested in your place. What are you going to do about it?’

  It was as though nothing had happened. As though we hadn’t last seen ourselves some days earlier in the stairwell of a Putney apartment block; as though she hadn’t abandoned me in London and I hadn’t travelled six thousand circuitous kilometres to see her. There were many things I wanted to say, but I had difficulty with the imperial clothes. I had not thought I would, but I had difficulty with the imposing throne. She should have used a regular chair for this private audience, but she did not. She should have risen to greet me! I stood there, like any other Sontik subject . . .

  There were new truths about us that I’d discovered, on the plane flying into Lomé, on the barge chugging in through Era Creek. Yet, when I opened my mouth, I couldn’t help but respond to her curtness. ‘I could always turn myself in.’ She stared levelly at me until I snapped, ‘You aren’t suggesting that, are you?’

  ‘You couldn’t have planned this better, could you? It beats killing him yourself. He will be executed, and the real Badu will be in the clear, free to live his life the way he wants.’

  ‘You can’t blame me for this! I didn’t plan it!’

  She glared her judgment. Something gave way inside me, and I turned to go.

  ‘Zanda.’ Pride crackled like static in her voice. It was not the cry of a moderating lover in the middle of an escalating quarrel. It was the call of imperium—but I was a lover, not a subject. I stormed out. The doors were ten-foot-high ironwood as thick as a trunk and quite unslammable. Outside, the emptiness surged again, and I recognised a battle greater than any Badu had ever fought.

  I went back directly, glad for the crestfallen look I surprised on her face.

  Her office was the elephant in the room. It was such a stretch, a cavernous, impersonal hall, two metres of her father’s damask train on the floor between us. This boil would take some lancing. I walked across it. The ceremonial fan, the ceremonial spear, the ceremonial sword—I pushed them over. I could have skirted them, but it was important to lance that boil and I pushed them over . . . and then I was standing over her, her face now restored to imperial anger. Again, I was past caring. I had risked apprehension at the border posts, death on the streets; there was not much worse her courtiers could offer.

  I took her by the upper arms and lifted her roughly.

  ‘Are you crazy, Zanda?’ but she was whispering. She could have been shouting for the palace guards. I felt a surge of adrenaline.

  ‘Wrong question,’ I whispered in return. Something still held me back. Her headgear. With it on, her resemblance to her father became uncanny. I still felt I was holding the Nanga, not Amana. I seized and pulled it off.

  ‘You are crazy,’ she said anxiously, her eyes darted to the entrance to her private hall.

  ‘No, but I don’t do royalty either.’

  I kissed her then. She was rough at first, biting me quite hard, then I felt her giggle, and grip me, and I knew it was going to be all right then.

  A noise disturbed us, and we turned around at the same time to see the distraught servitor with a tray of refreshments for me. There was a look of horror on her face. She turned and fled, quartered oranges falling in her wake. We broke apart with alacrity, swiftly restoring the insignia and regalia of the Nanga as best as we could.

  * * *

  I TOOK a deep breath. ‘You could have told me before you left. I was sick with worry.’

  ‘I was on the chartered plane before I got over my fury with you, for keeping such a secret from me. He thought I hated him. I would have come before he died, known him as a dad . . . we could have planned it so much better. You never learn, do you?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I have, now.’

  She sighed and turned to more practical things. ‘Your brother, Zanda.’

  ‘You are the Nanga of the Sontik. What are you going to do about him?’

  ‘I am only the Nanga here in the private residence. I am the dark horse candidate opposed by my own half sisters: the female, jailbird, illegitimate daughter candidate. All I have going for me is my father’s will. My main rival is already entrenched in the palace court. He’s the favourite of the governor-president, the favourite of the kingmakers—and they select tomorrow.’

  ‘When does your DNA result come in?’

  ‘There’s no chance of it coming in on time.’ She shrugged. ‘And even if Nanga Saul himself were still alive, what could he do for the most wanted prisoner in Nigeria? I guess the real question, Zanda, is what is Badu going to do?’

  I bit down on my retort and turned away. It was a question I asked myself also. Badu seemed a bottled spirit bled from the old Zanda, who had turned his back on his Menai roots. With Zanda out of denial, the ‘spirit’ of Badu had become diffused, like a laser beam spread out to light a room. Badu couldn’t cut it any longer.

  He couldn’t do crazy anymore.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I can do,’ she said. ‘What I have done. Come.’

  She swept off her cape, and we went deep into the lair of the Nanga. Away from the public rooms, the residence was more utilitarian, almost Spartan. She walked fast, and I followed, trying to come to terms with the eerie bows that were the automatic response of the courtiers and servitors we met. Her half sisters and the rest of the Sontik nation could wait for the kingmakers, but in here, where the last desire of Nanga Saul was law, she was unquestionably the Nanga. There was a half smile, an arch of the back, and a glide that was the Nanga. She was acting the part now, and I followed in her wake. We left the main house and crossed a lawn fringed with dwarf palms. I smelled the creek, heard the gulls of creek country cry. We approached a wooden chalet on two levels, with a spare, broad balcony running across the front of it. To the south, a jetty ran alongside the creek. We mounted to the first floor,
and she knocked quietly. I sensed her excitement as a key turned in the lock. The door stood open. Her smile broke her court facade as she entered a room with an ancient sofa and a garrulous television. Across the room, a corridor opened into an alcove with an unmade bed. All this I took in as my eyes returned to rest on the nervous woman by the door. She was staring at me with wide-open eyes. ‘Izak . . .’ she gasped, her voice heavily French-accented.

  ‘Zanda,’ Amana corrected, with a proprietorial grin. ‘Your husband’s twin.’

  I stared in some confusion. ‘Grace?’

  ‘No! You spend too much time on Google! This is Humphrey’s real wife, Dee!’

  I stared. Dee ran to me, ripped away my collar, and stared with horror at my neck. Then she backtracked with her hands cupped around her mouth. As she dissolved into tears she was moaning, ‘Izak . . . Izak . . .’ and I wondered who that was. Did Tobin have triplets after all? It didn’t seem quite the scene Amana had planned, and she held the woman close. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, glaring at me. ‘Humphrey will be out soon, Badu is here now.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said, confidently. ‘He’s Humphrey Chow. He was in England throughout. His alibi will be cast-iron—’

  ‘Have you read the papers?’ Amana asked with some exasperation. ‘He hasn’t said a word since he was picked up.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He’s ill,’ wept Dee, ‘and, as to alibi, sometimes he doesn’t even remember we’re married.’

  My fists tightened until my fingers began to ache. I turned away, avoiding Amana’s eyes. It was my first realisation that my brother might die for my deeds. When I heard her footsteps following, I raised my hand. They stopped and I passed alone out onto the broad balcony. I stood there, against a stone totem, staring into the mangroves of creek country. I could not put my sense of loss into words. What was it about me that was so invested in aloneness? I thought of Humphrey in his cell, Tobin in the desert . . . Tume in his grave . . .

  TUME ATTURK (ANCESTORMENAI)

  Kreektown | 16th April, 1980

  Night had fallen and Tume rose slowly, knee joints cracking from stiffness. He had lain motionless since early afternoon, passing a sleepless six hours with the resoluteness that had earned him the sobriquet ‘Gentlebones.’ When he could no longer see the Nomsoks’ kitchen from his doorway he sat up and pushed his feet into boots. He left the house through the back door. Since deciding on the robbery, he had avoided using the front room, under which his mother lay. That decision itself had surprised him, in the speed with which his previous idea of himself had caved in to a biological need.