Children of the Street (17 page)

30

Dawson and Chikata reported their progress to Chief Superintendent Lartey. Tedamm was ready for interview in the assistant superintendent’s room.

As they left Lartey’s office, Chikata said, “Dawson, at the lagoon today I was really scared.”

“Of what?”

“I thought you had killed Tedamm. That choke hold is dangerous.”

“I admit maybe I went a little too far,” Dawson said, “but look at what he was doing to that kid.” He paused for a moment. “Not that I’m recommending you ever use a choke hold on anyone.”

Chikata nodded. “Yes, I know.”

“Get a shirt for Tedamm before we begin.”

Chikata trotted downstairs, returning with a shirt from the so-called Lost and Found. It was really suspects’ abandoned clothing.

As they went in to talk to Tedamm, Dawson threw the shirt on the table at which Tedamm was sitting.

“Put this on,” Dawson said. “We don’t need to see your chest.”

Tedamm would have sneered, but a sneer was on his face already. He didn’t put the shirt on.

Dawson took the only other chair in the room. He set it down with a bang opposite Tedamm. Chikata stood between Tedamm and the door with a clipboard and paper.

Dawson dropped a folder on the table and sat down. “I said, put the shirt on.”

Tedamm picked it up and threw it over his head in one smooth motion. Not bad for a guy who rarely wore a shirt.

“How are you, Mr. Tedamm?” Dawson asked.

No answer. Tedamm kept his head angled downward, but his eyes were turned up at Dawson like nuggets of red-hot charcoal.

Dawson recited the standard police advisory statement. Nothing worse than an arrestee getting off on a technicality.

“What is your full name?” Dawson asked.

He waited a moment for Tedamm to speak. The man kept his clap shut. Dawson stood up abruptly, the legs of his chair squeaking on the floor.

“Lock him up,” he said to Chikata with a dismissive wave. “I don’t have time for this. We’ll come back sometime tomorrow and see if he’s ready to talk to us.”

He started toward the door.

“Kareem Tedamm.” It came out like the growl of a bush cat.

Dawson returned and sat down again. “Why were you beating that boy?”

“He was supposed to pay me, but he wouldn’t,” Tedamm said. His voice had lost the growl. Now it was surprisingly soft.

“Pay you for what?”

“I found him his job at Makola Market, so he has to pay me.”

“Every week?”

“Yes.”

“So everyone you find a job has to pay you like that?”

“Of course. That’s how it is.”

“So you make a lot of money.”

“Not as much as you.”

“And you also beat up a lot of people, not so?”

“Do you even know how the life is in the streets?” Tedamm challenged. “You have to fight to be on top, and when you get on top, you have to fight to stay there. People fear me—I
make
them fear me, you hear?”

“You’re a bully,” Dawson said. “That’s all you are. And behind every bully is a coward. If that boy dies from your kicking him in the head, you’ll be charged with murder.”

Tedamm’s eyes met Dawson’s unflinchingly.

“Ebenezer Sarpong,” Dawson said. “Did you know him?”

Tedamm shook his head.

“Yes, you did,” Dawson said. “You told him he would be sorry if he didn’t leave his shoeshine corner in Lartebiokorshie, but he didn’t do as you told him.”

“And so what?”

Dawson slid one of Ebenezer’s autopsy photographs from the folder to Tedamm’s side of the table. “And so this.”

Tedamm’s gaze flicked down for a moment, and then back up.

“Do you know something about that?” Dawson asked.

“I know he’s dead, that’s all.”

“Not just dead. Murdered.”

“So what are you asking me for?”

“Where were you on Monday night between nine o’clock and midnight?”

“With my friends in Agbogbloshie.”

“What are the names of your friends?”

“Antwi and Ofosu.”

The same names as the two people Issa had told Dawson always followed Tedamm around.

“What about after midnight?” Dawson asked.

“We slept at Agbogbloshie.”

“Did you see Ebenezer Sarpong at any time on Monday night?”

“No.” He blinked.

“You’re lying, Tedamm. I want to warn you about something. There’s a lie detector in this room. No, don’t look up at the wall. It’s not there. It’s right here.” Dawson V-pointed to his eyes. “And in here.” He pistol-pointed to his temple. “So, one more time. Did you see Ebenezer on Monday night?”

“I saw him when he was coming back to his base. I greeted him. That’s all.”

“Did you argue with him?”

“No. About what?”

“I’m asking you.”

“I don’t waste my time with small boys like Ebenezer. He’s dead, and so what? Sorry, but I’m not going to cry for him.”

Dawson brought out a photo of Comfort and put it in front of Tedamm. “Do you know her?”

Tedamm looked down for only a second. “No.”

“More lies. You’ve already forgotten what I said. We know you were with her last night. Someone saw you with her. You, Antwi, and Ofosu. All three of you were with her.”

Tedamm looked at Dawson dispassionately. “It’s a lie. I wasn’t with her.”

“Look at the picture carefully.” Dawson brought it closer to Tedamm’s face. He drew his head back. “Here’s another one. This is how they found her. Comfort Mahama was her name. Is this what you did to her? Threw her away like rubbish?”

Tedamm turned his head away.

“We know she was raped, Tedamm. Did you do that to her?”

“I didn’t do anything.”

A faint sheen of sweat showed at the top of his forehead like light drizzle on asphalt.

“Why can’t you look at it, Tedamm? You raped her, didn’t you? Your boys Antwi and Ofosu held her down while you did it. And then you killed her.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Didn’t what? Rape her or kill her?”

“None of them.” Tedamm’s voice strengthened. His eyes narrowed. “So, why don’t you beat me now, Mr. Inspector Man? I know about you. You caught one friend of mine two years ago. The one you said raped a girl. And you beat him well, remember?”

Chikata’s head popped up like a jack-in-the-box.

Dawson was flabbergasted. Tedamm was absolutely correct. In a fit of temper that rarely troubled Dawson nowadays, he had repeatedly hit a rapist in the face after the man declared that his victims deserved what they had got.

“You broke his nose,” Tedamm continued. “You say behind every bully is a coward. So who is the coward here, apart from me?” Tedamm symbolically pointed his index finger to his right eye. “You see now?”

And Dawson did see something. Stains underneath Tedamm’s fingernails.

“Tell me about Comfort, Tedamm.”

“Tell me why you beat my friend when he didn’t do anything.”

“Just because the court didn’t find him guilty doesn’t mean he didn’t do it.”

“But why did you beat him? You made him bleed all over his face, Inspector Dawson. Why?”

A smile played at the corners of Tedamm’s lips as he locked eyes with Dawson. “When somebody says the word
rape
, you become like a madman.”

Dawson’s phone rang. He kept his gaze steady on Tedamm as he answered. “Hello?”

“Biney here.”

“Yes, Doc?”

“We have semen suitable for DNA testing.”

Outstanding
. “And we have a suspect,” Dawson said.

“Excellent. Get me swabs and a blood sample.”

“We will. Thank you, Doctor.”

Dawson pocketed his phone. Tedamm was looking amused, but something about Dawson’s face made his smile fade.

“You’re going back to your cell now. Cuff him, Chikata.”

Tedamm leapt up.
“I didn’t do anything!”

Chikata tackled him, thrusting him flat on the table, wrestling to get his wrists behind his back.

Dawson leaned on Tedamm’s shoulders to hold him still.

“Don’t fight. It’s two against one, and more outside the room.”

They guided their prisoner to a corner to face the wall. He stood breathing heavily, his torso heaving.

“Get someone here from Korle Bu to swab his cheek and his fingernails,” Dawson told Chikata. “We need blood too.”

He moved closer to Tedamm, speaking softly. “We’re going to find your friend Antwi. We’ll see if you were telling the truth.”

Tedamm shrugged his muscle-knotted shoulders.

“Oh, you don’t care, eh?” Dawson said. “When we find out whose sperm is inside Comfort and whose blood is under your fingernails, we’ll see if you still don’t care. And then we’ll see if you don’t care after you’ve been in prison so long you forget what the sky looks like.”

Tedamm turned his head and spat on the floor.

D
awson went back to Chief Superintendent Lartey’s office.

“We want to find this boy Antwi as soon as possible, sir. I need people.”

“How many?” Lartey asked, like a suspicious parent.

“At least six.”

“What, you think yours is the only case in town? We have other priorities besides your case, you know.”

“I understand, sir, and I don’t know what these other priorities are that you talk about, but—”

“Let me give you just one example,” Lartey interrupted, his voice sharp as a straight blade. “The VP of Ghana Petroleum was murdered early this morning in his house in Airport Residential. Shot execution style. Did you know about that?”

“Oh,” Dawson said. “No, I didn’t.”

“I’ve got an internationally connected oil executive dead, and you’ve got these nameless prostitutes and good-for-nothing street people. Who do you think wins?”

“It’s murder either way, sir,” Dawson said. “Prostitute or oil exec, dead is dead.”

Lartey closed his eyes for a long-suffering moment. “Four constables, Dawson. That’s all you get. And you’ll need to fill out an official request for them.”

31

Localized scleroderma. That was what Austin Ansah had. It caused the strange deformity called
en coup de sabre
that ran from his scalp into his forehead like an oblique lightning bolt. It could, and most probably would, become worse.

As he read through a paper written by researchers from UNICEF, he rubbed his fingertips across the irregular depression in his brow, an unconscious habit.

“I imagine you must be used to it by now,” a stupid woman had once said to him.

“So is an amputee,” Austin had retorted. “That doesn’t mean he wouldn’t like his leg back.”

He was thirty-eight. Women were not attracted to him. He knew that. In fact, they were repulsed. They looked away when they saw him. If they were in a group, they would whisper to one another,
What’s wrong with his forehead?
At wedding receptions, the single women wouldn’t dance with him even if he asked, which he no longer did. He had some male friends. They invited him places sometimes—whenever they felt sorry for him.

Austin had been working on his thesis, “Social Structures Among Migrant Groups of Accra,” for three years. He had begun to take notice of migrant girls the way an ornithologist realizes the beauty of the birds he studies. A year ago while he was in the field one night at the Nkrumah Circle, a street girl had walked up to him and propositioned
him
. Taken completely by surprise, Austin had stammered his refusal. The girl went away, but her image and her voice never left him. It was as if he had been given an analgesic for pain but not quite enough. He had tasted a tiny bit. He craved much more.

So he went back. That first time, he was shaking with excitement and fear. He didn’t find the girl who had originally set fire to his kindling, but the one he chose was just as young. Fifteen. When he had done the deed, he felt revolted. He threw up and vowed never to do it again. But it was like heroin. He was hooked. He went back again and again. Each time, he had the same reaction: disgust and loathing.

A
ustin looked around his cramped lodgings, a rented room in Ussher Town. Papers and books were piled wherever there was any space. He got up, paced a few steps, sat down again to make some desultory notes on his yellow pad. He rested his head on his desk for a moment, closing his eyes, gritting his teeth, trying to quench the urges. It was twelve-fifteen in the morning. Accra was silent, but that was when the city beckoned Austin most. The tumult of the daytime pushed him away, but at night, the city became seductive and sensual.

He stood up quickly, threw on a shirt, and left the room.

I promise. This will be the last time
.