Children of the Street (21 page)

38

Akosua Prempeh was a child
on
the street, not
of
the street. She had a home to go to, but her new stepfather, who had beaten her up three days ago, had told her to stay away unless she could bring back money.

“Useless girl,” he had called her as he threw her out. “Kwasea.”

The little bit of money she had made today was gone. Not because she had spent it, but because it had been stolen from her. Two men had roughed her up, searched her, and taken her money. On top of that, they tried to rape her. Another man who had been coming along raised the alarm and Akosua escaped.

Now she was wandering around Nkrumah Circle unsure what to do. It looked as if she would have to stay out tonight and get some kind of job in the morning. Had Musa been alive, she could have gone to him. They had killed the boy she loved with all her heart. Musa had once said to her, “Never,
never
sell your body.” She had promised him it was something she would never do.

But that was then.

Right now, it was a different story. She was hungry and tired. She wanted to sleep in her own bed, even if it was just a folded-over cloth. She was lonesome. The bustle of people around her didn’t make her feel any better. Tears pricked her eyes, but she pulled herself together. For a while, she sat and watched the goings-on at the circle.

Accra was a late-night city in only a few places. The Vienna City nightclub was the hub that kept Nkrumah Circle alive and crowded well into the early morning. Powerful music from inside the club spilled out to the sidewalk café, where people-watching patrons sat sipping cocktails. Just south of the circle, Nkrumah Avenue was jammed with shiny sedans and SUVs, their drivers looking for sex and drugs. “Enjoyment people,” Akosua called them. Prostitutes worked the club both inside and out. Taxis lined either side of the street waiting for passengers returning home or ashawos leaving with their customers. The taxis would take them to nearby lodges with names like California Inn and Beverly Hills Hotel. They accepted prostitutes and their clientele and made good money off them.

Akosua got up, walking past a tro-tro driver’s mate calling out his destination in a monotonous singsong. Mobile Fan Milk vendors were selling hot chocolate and coffee from the insulated containers attached to the fronts of their bicycles. In the midst of all this noise, a truck pusher slept peacefully on his cart next to a wall marked
POST NO BILL
.

A group of ashawos hung out at the corner of Nkrumah Avenue and Kente Street. They wore blouses and skirts that barely contained their big breasts and buttocks. They had bright makeup, wigs, false eyelashes, and heavy mascara. Akosua felt shabby in comparison. Three ashawos were having a squabble about something with a tall, slender male prostitute in a black see-through shirt, but the rest of them were flagging down cars and negotiating prices with drivers who had pulled over.

Akosua went on to a smaller street called Kente Link. She was faintly aware of the crunch of tires on gravel not too far away from her. At first she paid no attention. A horn sounded. Not impatiently—just a quick
pim-pim
to get her to look.

The man in the car waved. Akosua pointed questioningly at herself to be sure he really wanted her. He nodded and beckoned to her.
Come
.

What did he want? She wasn’t dressed anything like an ashawo.

For safety, she stayed on the passenger side.

He spoke to her in Ga, checking first that she understood.

“What’s wrong?” he said. “Are you sad?”

She shook her head.

“Yes, you are.” He smiled sympathetically. “I can tell.”

There was almost no street lighting, but she thought she saw a scar on the man’s forehead.

“You have no money,” he said. “You are hungry.”

She nodded.

“I can help you with some money if you help me too.” He took out a five-cedi bill and waved it.

Akosua swallowed hard. The temptation was powerful.

He smiled. There was something about his smile Akosua didn’t like. It gave her goose bumps. She backed away. He watched her like a thirsty man. She turned and walked off. Seconds later, she heard the tires spinning as they tried to gain traction in the dirt. For a panicky moment, she thought he might be coming after her, but when she whirled around to look, she saw the man driving away in a furious cloud of dust.

Relieved, Akosua walked farther along Kente Link. Many people slept at the storefronts along this street, some in pairs or groups. All ages, from babies to grown men and women. Akosua chose a spot and sat down with her back against a wall. She would half sleep, half stay awake. She was scared that if she lay down and went into deep slumber, she might be attacked and raped.

She dozed off but started awake again after a while, she wasn’t sure how long. A car was parked at the end of the street, lights on, engine running. It was one of those really beautiful cars she saw when she sold water to drivers on Liberation Road, silver and shiny. Through the partly open door of the driver’s side, Akosua caught sight of the dashboard lights twinkling like different colored stars.

But there was no one in the car. Akosua’s gaze moved to the sidewalk not far away. Underneath a storefront canopy, a man was kneeling beside a street boy, talking softly to him. She couldn’t hear what they were saying. It was too dark to make them out clearly, but after a few minutes, they both got up to go to the car. The boy was maybe fourteen or fifteen. The man opened the passenger door for him, and then he came back around to the driver’s side, got in, and shut the door. The car pulled smoothly and silently away.

Akosua reflected on it.
Hmm, so this is Ghana now
. Nothing was a surprise anymore. The driver of the car must have a liking for boys. But not nice, clean boys with fine clothes. He liked raw, dirty boys fresh from the street.

39

Five-thirty the next morning, Sunday, Dawson woke with a start, swung his legs out of bed, and got to his feet.

Something’s happened
.

Another nightmare—Armah trying in vain to drive away vultures pecking at Comfort’s corpse awash in blood. Dawson’s heart was pounding as if it was banging its way out of his chest. But there was something else too—not just the nightmare.
What’s happened?
He looked at the phone on the night-stand. It rang.

Chikata.

“Morning, Dawson. I’m sorry to—”

Dawson cut him short. “Where’s the body?”

“Novotel Lorry Park.”

O
n the way out, Dawson called Dr. Biney and asked if he would come to the crime scene.

“Of course,” Biney said. “I’ll be there as soon as possible.”

The lorry park had borrowed its name from the Novotel Hotel a couple hundred meters away on the other side of Independence Avenue. The place was already bustling by the time Dawson arrived at six-thirty. Passengers were lining up for transportation to different parts of the city and country. Hanging off the sides of tro-tros departing in plumes of dust, drivers’ mates made last calls for one more passenger to squeeze into a space that did not really exist. Carrier boys and kayaye made mad dashes after every arriving tro-tro or bus, hoping to get a job.

Where there was transportation, there was commerce. Vendors, both mobile and stationary, traded inside the park and out. Dawson dodged two truck pushers and their cart as he made his way to the Independence Avenue side of the park.

He found Chikata with Bright and his crew in front of the public latrine, which was painted brown and yellow underneath the dust that coated it.
TOILET 20P
was scrawled on the side in fading letters. It was the pit latrine type, the very lowest in the hierarchy of public toilets and supposedly banned by the Accra Metropolitan Assembly.

“Where’s the body?” Dawson asked, looking around.

“In there,” Chikata said, making a face. “Young male.”

“
Inside
the latrine?”

“Yessah.”

“Ewurade,” Dawson said.

“Bright went in,” Chikata said, “but he couldn’t take it for very long. It really stinks in there.”

“Who found the body?”

“Early morning, someone went inside to do his business, and when he got to the last stall, he saw the body,” Chikata said. “Came running out, shouting.”

“What about the latrine custodian?” Dawson asked.

“Gone. We heard he went inside to look, turned right around, and left without saying one word.”

Dawson shook his head in disbelief. “The very man in charge of taking care of the place has abandoned it. Jesus.”

They had an audience—a few who had been wanting to use the facilities but had been turned away, to their annoyance, others who had heard a rumor about a dead person in the latrine, and the rest who had nothing better to do than hang around. But in general, Novotel Lorry Park was a busy place with people who had things to do and places to go.

“How were you notified?” Dawson asked Chikata.

“Someone made an anonymous call to the Kinbu Police Station early this morning that there was a dead person in the latrine. A sergeant took the call, and I suppose he couldn’t be bothered, so he tells one of the constables to come and look around the alleged area. The constable gets here, sees the body and calls the sergeant, who tells the station inspector, who tells the sergeant to handle it; the sergeant tells the constable to make a report and have the body taken to the mortuary. Constable wasn’t sure what to do, so he called CID, and they called me.”

“Where is the constable?”

“I questioned him and sent him home. What he said was straightforward, but if you want to talk to him, I have his mobile number.”

“What about the station inspector and sergeant? Do you have their names? Both of them need to be reported.”

“Yes, I have their names. I’ll let you handle the reporting, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Of course. I’ll take care of it.” Dawson turned to Bright. “Do you have some gloves to spare, sir? I’m going in.”

Bright handed him a pair. “Mask?”

“No, thank you. I don’t think it would help much.”

The look on Bright’s face said something like
Best of luck
.

Dawson went in, switching on his flashlight. It was as dark as a dungeon. The six open stalls of about three-by-four feet had soiled, filthy walls that Dawson didn’t dare touch. The stench was thick and impenetrable. It had no boundary beyond which you could pull in a little fresh air. It made you reel as if you had been bludgeoned. It coated your skin and your mucous membranes, and clogged your windpipe.

Dawson clenched his teeth.
Good sanitation and clean toilets are human rights, surely
. He followed the beam of his flashlight. One, two, three, four, five stalls. And then, number six. The body sat upright against the back wall, legs splayed on either side of the squatting hole. For a second, Dawson’s mind reacted mildly, as if avoiding any emotion. The victim was a young teenage male, barefoot. He had on an orange T-shirt and jeans, which coincidentally was the same outfit Dawson remembered Ofosu had been wearing over two weeks ago.

Heart pounding, Dawson trained his flashlight beam on the victim’s face, that same beautiful, heart-shaped face and those finely sculptured cheekbones. His almond eyes were open and looking at Dawson. His mouth was open too, but his tongue was cut out.

Ofosu
.

Dawson turned his head to one side as he heard a strange noise—a strangled cry, a cough, and a violent choking, retching sound. He realized it was coming from his own throat.

He was about to vomit.

No, don’t throw up. Don’t
.

It passed. Dawson bent forward slightly, resting his hands on his knees. He felt dizzy. At first he thought he was only hyperventilating, but in fact he was weeping.

“Dawson?” It was Bright at the entrance of the latrine, shining his flashlight down. “Are you okay?”

He hastily straightened up. “I’m fine, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Dr. Biney has just arrived. He’ll be joining you shortly.”

Minutes later, gloved, masked, and gowned, Biney entered the latrine with his black forensics bag in one hand, flashlight in the other.

“I got here as soon as I could, Inspector,” he said as he came up.

“Thank you for coming, Doctor. I’m glad to see you.”

“What do we have?”

Dawson shined his flashlight.

“My God,” Biney whispered. “Good Lord.”

“I know him,” Dawson said. “His name is Ofosu; he’s a street boy I spoke to about two weeks ago.”

“And for talking to you his tongue was cut out? Is that what this is all about?”

Dawson didn’t have an answer.

Biney got closer to Ofosu, touching his head in his uniquely intimate way. He gently lifted the eyelids. He shined a flashlight into the mouth.

“The tongue was lifted and sliced right out. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite as cold-blooded.”

“But there’s not much bleeding from his mouth,” Dawson observed.

“Yes, good point. Likely done postmortem.”

Biney attempted to raise one of Ofosu’s arms from his side. It did not give an inch.

“Still very rigid,” he said. “Time of death, since I know you’ll ask, has to be a broad range, I’m afraid, Inspector. Taking into consideration warm temperatures and his lean body, I’d say within the last eight hours, most likely between midnight and three or four in the morning.”

He tugged at Ofosu and pulled him away from the wall. The body stayed eerily sitting up in exactly the same posture. Biney shined his flashlight down Ofosu’s back.

“This is a bad angle to look at it,” he said, “but he does have a stab wound on the right. Undoubtedly there’ll be internal hemorrhage at autopsy. Here, I’ll move out so you can take a look. There isn’t room for three.”

Biney and Dawson switched places.

“Same thing as the others,” Dawson said. “The killer’s back. He couldn’t stay quiet very long.”