They will march down to Sontik State okay, but they will join up at double salary. Not one shot will be fired. There’ll be no war.’
Obu released his generous weight, and the two front legs of his chair slammed onto the veranda with a thud. His eyes were hooded with derision, and Penaka knew he had overplayed his hand.
* * *
WHEN PENAKA Lee left shortly afterwards, the rain was coming down in steady sheets and the gardener had given up. A steward followed Penaka down the long pathway to the car park holding a large umbrella, but it didn’t stop him getting wet.
He slipped into the back of his limousine, allowing his PA to pass the steward a crisp note through the crack between the window and the door-frame. He dried the rain from his face and hands with a handkerchief before pulling out his phone. He opened the air conditioner vents, but his hands were wet again, this time with sweat, as he dialled his intelligence contact in Abuja.
There was a short pause as Belinja’s security loop kicked in. ‘Hello?’
‘He’s not biting,’ said Penaka.
There was silence.
‘He’s scared,’ suggested Belinja. ‘Maybe next week.’
‘He’ll never be ready. He’s a coward. He doesn’t believe I can deliver Nigerian battalions to the Sontik Republic.’
‘Maybe I should have a word with his security adviser . . .’
‘Lamikan? Well, that’s a thought.’ Penaka sighed. ‘Leave it with me.’
‘What do you have in mind?’ asked Belinja, sounding apprehensive but somewhat expectant as well.
A month earlier, when Penaka had promised to put an American destroyer in the Gulf of Benin to establish his bona fides with Obu, Belinja had been quietly derisive. Two weeks afterwards, a training exercise originally scheduled for the Indian Ocean was rezoned at the last minute, and Belinja’s unwillingness to take the other man on faith had evaporated.
‘I’ll set up a couple of meetings with some friends,’ said Penaka absently, ‘organise a little escalation. Do you have a newspaper publisher on your books?’
‘I have all of them.’
‘I want a paper with a decent circulation.’
‘How about Patrick Suenu’s Palaver?’
Penaka was indifferent. He did not read Nigerian newspapers, ‘That should do. I have a story to plant. Could you . . .’
‘I’ll arrange it.’
‘Thanks, Belinja.’
The phone went dead, and Penaka massaged his cheek muscles. He did not like ditherers. He would be fifty-five in April. He did not have all the time in the world. It was a big country; it needed big decisions. Big decision makers. And if it burned, there were fifty other countries on the continent. He lowered the partition window between him and his staff. ‘Go,’ he said to his chauffeur. ‘Confirm our flights for Kinshasa,’ he told his PA.
He had been caught on the wrong side of a Nigerian crisis before.
It was not an experience to be repeated.
SLEEPCATASTROPHES
Kreektown | January/February, 1999
Oga Somuzo
Saint John
Allotua Allegi
Renata Torila
Jani Agams
Ariz Agams
Eddi Fadamu
Births
Ogazi Kroma-Alanta
Extant Menai population: 430 (NPC estimates)
LYNN CHRISTIE
London | 16th March, 2005
‘I am worried for you, Humphrey Chow,’ I said.
We had the Chinatown restaurant all to ourselves. Every five minutes, a surly waiter tacked by to see whether we wanted something more. He wore an accusing frown, as though our refusal to order extra dishes was responsible for the imminent closure of his cold restaurant. My wintry blue overcoat was buttoned to my neck. But for my black boots, I might as well not have changed out of my nightdress, for all the good my clothing did me. Humphrey risked another bite of his tacos. We had managed to find a Mexican restaurant in Chinatown, and their tacos tasted more like wafers from a Chinese menu. Still, I was carrying a couple of extra kilos, so any excuse to abandon a meal after a spoonful was welcome.
‘I can’t think why,’ he said. ‘I finally write something you like and you’re worried for me?’ He’d dressed with his usual absentmindedness, wearing a green scarf on top of his blue flannel shirt.
I caught myself spinning my wedding band. ‘Where’s the suicide bomber?’
He looked up. ‘It’s fiction, Lynn, remember: I don’t do autobiography. Anymore.’
‘Why use real names? Why set the story in your holiday home?’
He shrugged. ‘I’ll change the names around. It just helped me visualise, you know. It was a literary device.’
‘I don’t want to sell it, Humphrey Chow. I don’t want to show it to a publisher.’
He stopped chewing. Now he looked worried. ‘You said you liked it. You said it trumps Blank.’
‘It’s the strongest stuff you’ve written yet—speaking as your agent. But speaking as your friend, it’s also the most disturbing tale I’ve ever read.’
‘Since when did the status of agent and friend become incompatible?’
‘I was looking to send it to Maximus. What if he reads it and writes you a twelve-month contract to deliver a collection? What then?’
He looked away. I could tell he did not relish the pressure either. It had taken him a year to follow up on his last story, and even though he claimed to be flowing now, there was still a huge jump from making the boast to putting fifty thousand saleable words on a ream of A4 paper. My ring was spinning fifty metres an hour and rising, though that was just everyday-grade worry. ‘Humphrey Chow, I’ll shop your tale around . . . but keep writing!’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ He grinned.
‘And stay fit.’ I left my worry ring and nudged his greasy plate away from him. ‘I want you in good shape when Grace is done with you.’ I patted his hand and pulled on my gloves.
Humphrey blew a kiss. For the past
