Lost But Satisfied - Episode 23

 

The moment she got out of the reach of any of the men, Grace sped on after shouting at Ademola to tighten his belt. The area was dark, peaceful and the road, smooth.

‘Jesus. Bidemi shall not die in Jesus name...' she kept on muttering.

‘Mummy, why did Daddy hold a gun?'

 ‘Because those men wanted to kill him. Ah! This chief will know me . He thinks he can do anything he likes'. She banged the wheel.

‘But Mummy-'

‘My friend will you shut up and let me concentrate...'

 She said as she swerved out of the rough road that linked from the street adjacent Chief’s street to the tarred road. Not looking either side, she drove into the road that led from the University of Greencity to Sango.

‘I will arrest him. Did he think he can use his wealth to overrule the world’? She said, driving roughly and not minding the other drivers yelling at her.

She picked her phone, called her Pastor, and told him to start praying for her husband. At first, her Pastor wondered what was wrong with her, asking her how she would ask him to pray for a dead person. However, she explained things to him shabbily, promising to report more, he understood her plight.

‘Stay in the car', she said to Ademola as she jumped out of the car and rushed into the police station at Sango bus-stop.

 The light of the bulb made the cream colour of the station looked cheap. When she entered, the heat was too much but she couldn’t fathom if it was the heat from her body or the heat of the bulb and she wasn't ready to know its source.

 ‘Officer, I want to arrest a criminal'.

‘Madam, chill

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. I dey come', the policeman said and went out to the back of the station, spending up to five minutes. He came back to meet Grace who was shaking angrily.

‘I said I want to arrest someone'.

‘Wetin he do?'

‘He took my husband away at gunpoint. I know where he stays'.

‘Oya. Chill. Tell me how everything happened.'

Grace explained what she could, sparing the police the details of the past. All she wanted at present was to get her husband.

‘Who is yelling there now?' A sergeant asked.

‘Shan sir!' the other policeman said, saluting the sergeant. And then, the policeman narrated what Grace told him to the sergeant, spicing up the story.

‘Madam, calm down. Where do you say this place is?'

‘Aderibigbe street'.

‘Oh!' The sergeant and the other policeman looked at each other.‘Please, you have to come with me to my office'.

‘Why? You need to save my husband now’

‘Come with me’.

 Grace stood still, staring at him as she gasped for breath. She allowed her shoulders drop as she followed him. When they entered the office, he offered her a seat, which she sat in reluctantly.

‘Madam, that place is no-go-area for the police. Please, try to understand me, someone like me…Me... I would love to nab this Chief but he's powerful and we wouldn’t even exit his house before I.G and top officials give us a call to liberate him. More so, he has dangerous assassins that I and one of my friends had been looking for a way to peg someone's death on. Yemi had tried and was almost near, but he was transferred to Lagos when he was seen as a threat'.

 ‘Do you mean officer Yemi, that short fair man?’ Grace said as she shifted to the edge of her seat. ‘I know him. He was the one that brought to me the news about my husband being alive’

‘Ehn ooo.... ‘

‘But why ...why are they doing this? I need my husband back. He must not die...' She said and burst into tears, shuddering as it dawned on her that she can’t legally save her husband. The sergeant came near her and put his hand on her shoulder.

‘Madam, don't shed tears. You should have noticed the trend. Anybody that tries to raise a motion against them had always been found dead'.

 Grace was dejected.

‘Is that how he would be left to himself'? I’ve to do something. I will go to newspapers and other Media’.

‘Then. be ready to relinquish your life. Ask Yemi he will recount the death of a woman who tried to talk about Chief on an online forum. They got to her and killed her, scattering her body around her abode, so disgusting.’

 Grace cried again.’ Abidemi o’.

 Suddenly, someone started shouting outside. The Sergeant excused himself to quell the noise that was coming from outside. And after a few minutes, the officer entered with a lady that was held down by two others at Chief’s house.

‘You have to arrest him tonight. He is an animal. I used to call him father but he’s dead to me’. The lady shouted and stared at Grace for a long time. 'Were you not the one Chief wanted to kill the other time?'

 Grace nodded as tears poured down her face. The right eye of the lady was red.

‘Officer, you can see what I was talking about? He almost killed Jerry’.

‘Bidemi’, Grace corrected.

‘Because he wanted to tell Jerry to build a car’.

‘A car?’ Grace and the sergeant said at the same time, they hurriedly shared glances and looked at the lady on red.

‘Yes… The idiot said he wanted to build a car that can be used with water’.

‘Oh my God….’ Grace said and hit her head with the edge of her palm.’ I should have known. God!’

‘What happened?’ The police asked.

‘He was building a car that runs on water before he suddenly left home one day and later appeared in Brown Valley’.

The lady on red and the sergeant looked at her as if she was a Christian preaching heresy.

‘What? Don’t you people know that people a lot of people want to build cars that run on water and all the people that did that successfully have immediately gone into extinction. Either the people openly declared it was a mistake or the press call their invention something else. The first man even died. And that was why I told Bidemi to stop till we can convince the petrol dealers that cars can run on water and wouldn’t affect them because the major problem came from them’

 The sergeant appeased the lady on red and gave her the same explanation he gave Grace to her. Afterwards, he saw them off to the gate, telling them that there was hope and that he would send for Yemi. Moreover, it was finally time to catch Chief, even if they had to do so illegally and break many codes of conduct.

While he was still at it, he received a call. The caller told him a bomb had been detonated at a car park in Emperor road.’ Impossible’ the sergeant shouted.

 Grace looked up, staring at him from her car.

‘Oh, God! Ladies, I’m sorry…I have to leave for Emperor road immediately… Bomb blast…’ the sergeant ran into the police station.

‘What… In the west? Impossible...’ Grace exclaimed. She thought of who she could call to cover the news and decided to call Itunu. When she called him, he said he was already near the event and the first on the scene.

‘Chief did this….’ The lady in red said, shaking her head in anger.’ That crazy man did it. God! What does he want?’

  As if in response to the lady’s question, an explosion rocked the police station. Throwing the lady at Grace’s car and jerking Grace forward. Grace hit her head on the steering and the last thing she heard was the cry of Ademola.

            ***

 When she opened her eyes, she was in a room painted green. She looked about in the room, touched the bed and tried to rise but a sharp pain in her head held her down. She moaned loudly and returned to her lying position into the bed, holding her breath as the smell of drugs filled the air. Then, her fuzzy head became clear as she remembered her son, Ademola.

‘Nurse’, Grace called,’ nurse’.

 A nurse hurried into the ward and told her to calm down while she began to check for one thing and the other, correcting something and releasing some other things.

 ‘Where is my son?’

‘Madam, calm down’, the nurse said as she began to pack her things. ‘The Doctor will come to attend to you now’.

 The nurse left the room, making Grace wonder if she had woken from her unconsciousness. She pinched herself to assure herself. She must see her son and must see him immediately. She rose from the bed with the hope of heading for the door but the pain in her head was unbearable. She pushed herself backwards and rested her back on the wall, knowing that she would soon be able to rise after resting a while.

‘Madam, please don’t injure yourself’, a plump man said as he entered the ward. ' Calm down… Stay calm… Everything is fine’.

‘Doctor, I’m fine’, she said. 'I need to see my son. I want to know if he is fine’.

‘We are putting things in place. You people were near the blast; the other lady lost a finger to it’.

‘God will heal her. I need to know the fate of my son.

Read " The Thorny Path to Europe " by the same author ( Akíntayo Akinjide )

. Can’t you tell me where he is? You can at least make me know if I still have someone to call a son’.

The man placed his hand on her shoulder.

‘Take your hand off my shoulder and talk to me like a man’, she shouted.’ Where is my son?’

‘The blast made him hit his head. You know he was still a small boy. The hit was too much for him to take. He was a strong boy… We did all we could but God has a purpose for every man’s life. He has kicked the bucket’.

‘No’, Grace screamed, forgetting her pain. She held on to the doctor’s cloth with excruciating pain surging through her body. It felt as if several native men were drilling a hole the pores of her skin. Her hand was shaking, yet firm, as tears flooded down her face.’ Ademola miii ooo’

 She cried, holding the doctor’s shirt for support. Pain crawled over her body and made it feel as though it were on fire. She couldn’t take the pain anymore. She fainted.