Peter Abel’s colleague murdered, severed ears sent to wife

25 Apr Peter Abel’s colleague murdered, severed ears sent to wife

Peter Abel stared down at the two bloody severed ears. The last time he had seen them, they were on either side of Tunde Picketts’ head. Now they were sealed in a plastic evidence bag, held casually by a stocky policeman. Abel had no difficulty recognizing the ears as Tunde’s. Each sprouted distinctive wiry hairs. He often wondered if Tunde’s pretty wife noticed them and if she cared that Tunde never bothered to groom them.

As he continued to stare, they reminded him of the imported dried apricots he bought in the marketplace on special occasions. Abel was embarrassed by the idea. What on earth was he thinking?  Thank God he hadn’t said it out loud. He looked sheepishly at the policeman who had introduced himself as Sergeant Fakorede.

“What happened?”

“Mr. Picketts’ wife received a parcel this afternoon. She opened it and found these. She recognized them as her husband’s. She called us. She thinks it is a kidnapping with a ransom note to follow.”

“Jesus is Lord!” Abel whispered. Suddenly, he felt his legs begin to give way under him and leaned against the wall. “When my publisher told me to come over here, he only said this was something about an accident.”

“Tunde Picketts is your colleague, yes?”

“Yes. We are both on the paper.”

“You are the investigative journalist?”

Abel nodded.

“A dangerous profession these days.”

Abel looked back at the evidence bag and wondered what Tunde was working on that could have prompted such a response. Ears. The message was clear. Hear no evil. And if you do, don’t write about it.

*********************

Only an hour before, Peter Abel had been standing on the third floor balcony of the Zodiac Newspapers headquarters in downtown Lagos. The five-storey marble edifice with a luxurious penthouse for its publisher, Chief Alade Benson, reflected the paper’s overwhelming success. The same hard work and sweat that financed the building made The Zodiac Nigeria’s most respected newspaper.

Abel was in Ikeja, a suburb, on the northern end of the boisterous city of Lagos, which defies a clear-cut description. It used to be an agricultural centre in the 19^th century. No more. Over the years it transformed rapidly into the residential and industrial hub of Lagos City. In the mid-1960s an industrial estate was established there, a precursor to its emergence in 1975 as the capital of the newly formed Lagos state. The political face of the suburb made it a choice residential area of the high and mighty in politics, which was quickly followed by an influx of other people. Abel stood there, amazed at the suburb that had become an intricate mix of commerce, industry and politics.

As Abel watched, Lagos was thrown into a damp partial darkness by angry rain-bearing clouds. He knew the city’s collapsed drainage system, chronically in need of repair, would soon turn major streets into streams and rivulets, snarling traffic in the evening rush hour.

All along Awolowo Road, hawkers and stall owners abandoned their stations and scampered for shelter from the mounting assault of large raindrops. Abel amused himself with the sight of impatient drivers cutting each other off, honking horns and shouting abuse. The familiar chaos created by these sudden storms brought him comfort. It was all so predictable.

Standing here, as he often did, Abel felt above the fray, an observer for his own amusement instead of a requirement for his work. Abel didn’t know it then, but he was himself about to enter the storm.  Soon he would find himself drenched and frustrated, sitting in the “go slow” traffic jam he now watched like a detached deity.

His publisher’s call couldn’t have come at a worse time. Unknown among his friends on the newspaper, Abel was about to give up journalism. Tonight he was to meet with an investor who would help him establish a think-tank. Abel was eager to get to the meeting. He had even planned his route home so there would be no delay. He would take the out-of-the-way third mainland bridge to his Ikoyi home, adding kilometres but avoiding snail traffic.

As the rain picked up, Abel ducked away to cover, protecting his expensive clothes. He had picked his outfit carefully for the think-tank meeting that evening. He was all in black: black pin-striped suit, a shiny black silk shirt and black shoes. Creeping age had produced a receding hairline, so he had scraped his head clean and shiny. It gave him an unintentionally yuppie appearance and took 10 years off his chronological 48.  He hoped he projected a confident self-assurance.

As Abel stood on the balcony watching the city, a raindrop splashed onto his polished shoes and he retreated toward the doorway. As he turned, his cell phone sang Bob Marley’s Natural Mystics. A glance at the phone’s digital readout indicated it was his publisher. How ironic. Abel had been hiding his decision to leave journalism from Benson. It made him wonder if Benson had gotten wind of his plan. Was this why he was calling?

As the cell phone repeated Marley’s musical phrase, demanding to be answered, he was tempted to ignore the call. But of course, he couldn’t. You didn’t ignore Chief Alade Benson.

“Yes, Sir”, he said into the cell phone, trying to keep annoyance out of his voice. The emotion grew from more than the potential disruption of his evening plans. It was borne out of the guilt he felt for leaving the paper.

Benson was on his mind when he dressed for work that morning. He had observed his image in the full-length mirror his late wife brought home one rainy day. It was one of her endless bargains. He loved teasing her about her inability to pass up a good price, even if they had no use for the object.

As he had regarded himself in his wife’s mirror, Abel saw a man slightly over six feet tall with an athletic build threatened by middle-aged fat in the tummy and cheeks. His skin was becoming sprinkled with light brown spots. The real attraction remained his face, his warm brown eyes, pointed nose and thin lips. The slight overbite to his teeth, an imperfection some people said made him look sexy, was still there.  He had nodded, satisfied.

That’s when he had remembered his boss’s description of him as having a sweet personality. It had made him playfully blow a kiss into the mirror.  He felt light hearted this morning. He had finally made the decision to leave journalism. He felt free of a burden he had been carrying around. Not the burden of his work, but the burden of uncertainty.

He had spent the past decade in what he thought of as “the valley of the shadow of death”, his special brand of James Bond-like investigative journalism. But he wasn’t young any more. With slower reflexes, creaking muscles, and the deep desire to remarry and raise a family, running a think-tank would be equally challenging but far less risky.

“Yes, Sir”, he said again to prod his boss who had gone into a long pause.

Abel began to suspect that Benson’s silence was an indication that he had in fact discovered Abel’s plans and was furious.  He imagined an apoplectic Benson, rendered speechless with anger.

But his fears were allayed in the next second when Benson finally broke the silence and spoke.

“Sorry, Abel. Please go immediately to Tunde Picketts’ home. The police just called. There must have been an accident.”

“Yes, Sir”, Abel said. Something in Chief Benson’s tone alarmed Abel. So much so that the disruption of his evening plans never entered his mind as he ran back to the office for his briefcase.

As he ran, he wondered why Chief Benson was sending him on this errand instead of the editors under whom Tunde worked.  As a features correspondent, Tunde reported to the Features Editor, who would have handled some routine problem. All the more reason to believe this problem wasn’t routine.

Peter Abel’s status on the paper freed him from dealing with the hum-drum issues that arose almost daily. Not only was he a star deep-undercover reporter, but he sat on the editorial board during his free periods. He was Chief Benson’s most trusted employee. It was the combination of Benson’s funds and managerial acumen, and Abel’s skills as the country’s number one news-breaking journalist that made The Zodiac Nigeria’s leading paper soon after it was established some 11 years back. Success did not blind Chief Benson to the magic of that combination. And, grateful, he had continued to treat Abel the way he would treat a favourite first-born son.

Which in Abel’s mind, made this unexpected errand that much more worrisome. He was being sent because of his personal connection with Tunde.  And this meant the situation was serious. Abel felt a pang of affection for Tunde. He had grown fond of his colleague during the time they had worked together on the paper. The younger man had been a kind of protégé. And they had become friends.

As Abel reached the garage of the Zodiac building, he pulled out his car keys. Looking at them, Abel was suddenly overcome by a wave of inertia. He couldn’t abide the idea of driving himself through the flooded Lagos streets. He was too unsettled to deal with snarled traffic and obnoxious boisterous drivers. So, he opted for one of the official unmarked Honda SUVs in the company’s fleet. As the paper’s star, he only had to wave his hand at the attendant to summon a car and driver.

The driver, a short and stoutly built man of about 40, arrived five minutes later, his wide frame crammed in behind the Honda’s steering wheel. He extracted himself from the car and held the door as Abel slipped into the back seat.

Abel recognized the man as one who had driven him before. He was glad to see a familiar face. The driver was a friendly sort, known for always having a bawdy joke he picked up in one of the beer and pepper soup drinking joints he frequented on paydays. But this evening, the driver wore a solemn look and licked his thick, black lips as he hit Awolowo road in a hail of heavy raindrops. The wipers fought a losing battle against the onslaught. As Abel anticipated, the road was flooded, and traffic flow reduced to a pace slower than that of the people who waded through the ankle-deep water.

Abel leaned forward so he could speak to the driver. He wanted to ask what the man knew about Tunde. Drivers always heard things. They listened to radio calls and exchanged gossip with colleagues returning from runs.

“Have you heard anything about Tunde Picketts?” Abel said. He had to shout over the clattering noise of the raindrops assaulting the car’s roof.

“Yes, Oga, (meaning Boss). Word is that Tunde was attacked.”

Abel’s heart pounded. “How badly is he hurt?”

The driver shrugged. It was a piece of information he didn’t have.

“Do they know why he was attacked?”

“Most probably because of the story he wrote for today’s paper”, the driver said. “I just hope he is alive, Oga. He exposed too many people. Read for yourself.”

Abel saw tears well in the driver’s eyes as he handed him a copy of the day’s paper. Abel felt a chill. This is why Benson had wanted him on the scene.

He had seen Tunde’s story entitled, “Visa, the Serpent and God”, on the front page of the Metro Section, but he had not read it. He had been too busy preparing for his meeting on the think-tank. Abel held the paper up to the window so he could read the story in the murky light:

 It is a strange world indeed when a renowned racketeer turns to voodoo and religion to fulfil illegal contracts.  But oftentimes truth is stranger than fiction. And for racketeer Sunday Ola, a very strange truth entered his world.

The story broke through the discovery of a headless snake on Saturday on a suburban Lagos Road by a famished hunter, who rushed home with his saliva flowing for a snake soup. But to his dismay, the snake carried a dozen visa applications stuffed inside its belly. Visa applications!  Tracking the origin of these applications led to the aforementioned Sunday Ola.

The snake was an “Embassy” of sorts for some 15 visa hunters. The applicants had paid Sunday Ola a goodly sum of money to obtain illegal visas for them, visas they would use to travel to the US or the UK. 

But when Sunday could not make good on the visas and could not refund the money to his angry clients, the desperate criminal sought spiritual help.

He approached his pastor, a certain Pastor Majayi, seeking divine intervention to obtain the visas. In turn, Pastor Majayi consulted a local Prophet, practised in powerful voodoo arts.

The Prophet showed Pastor Majayi a plastic drum that contained a large snake and water. Pastor Majayi was reportedly shocked, but he said the Prophet assured him God works in mysterious ways.

At midnight, Pastor Majayi said the Prophet woke him up for a special prayer. As part of the voodoo ritual, the snake had been killed and its belly stuffed with passport photographs of the angry applicants. The two men spent the night in prayer over the dead snake. At dawn, the Prophet handed Pastor Majayi the long snake and ordered him to bury it down the road. Pastor Majayi was assured that Sunday’s clients would not be disappointed…”

Abel quickly scanned the rest of the story. When he finished, he swallowed hard. From his long experience in undercover reporting, he had learned caution. Never jump to conclusions. But the facts here seemed clear. Tunde had written about certain people who would not take his accusations lightly. He had paid a price for reporting this story. But what was that price? Abel prayed it wasn’t the ultimate one.

Shaken, Abel handed the paper back to the driver and said, “We will know what happened after an investigation”.

“Yes, the drivers all expected Chief Benson to send you, so you can get to the truth.”

Abel was even more eager now to reach Tunde’s home. He strained to look out the fogged window and was dismayed to see in 15 minutes they had covered less than 200 metres on Awolowo Road. Only the floodwater and commercial motorbikes, locally called Okada, were moving quickly. Okada meandered dangerously through the stream of cars, their riders drenched.

Normally cautious when it came to such things, Abel decided to risk hopping aboard an Okada. He ordered his driver to stop so he could flag one down.

“The fastest way for admission into an orthopaedic hospital with broken bones”, the driver warned.

Abel waved him off.

“Stop!” He ordered as he removed his jacket and tie, putting them on the seat. “It will be a short ride. Ogba is not far from here.”

Before the driver could protest further, Abel had opened the door. Seeing he couldn’t dissuade his passenger, the driver lifted a raincoat from the front seat. “Oga, take this. You will need it.”

Abel took the coat, exited the Honda hurriedly, and flagged down a young man riding an Okada.  The driver rolled down his window to watch as Abel climbed aboard the bike. Abel said something to the young man who nodded.

“Ride carefully, my friend”, the driver said, his voice filled with concern.

The bike squeezed into the small space between the two lines of traffic and sped away.  Abel tried to balance himself uncertainly, water from the street spraying up all around him.