The veins in Longdon’s bulky neck swelled as he lost his temper. “Did you hear what I said?” he shouted. “The cases are going to Regional. Again you challenge me? Get out of my office! Get out!”
Dawson’s eyes narrowed. This man is crazy. As he rose from his seat, Dawson locked his gaze with Longdon’s. I am not afraid of you, Commander.
That night, Dawson dreamt he had fallen into a mining pit full of blue water. Each time he tried to surface, Commander Longdon, standing above on a bridge crossing, shoved Dawson back into the water with a long bamboo pole sharpened at the tip. Akua Helmsley came running along the bridge to fight Longdon off, but as she got closer, he turned and drove the pointed end of the pole through her neck, almost decapitating her.
Dawson sat up in bed with a gasp. Sweat had soaked his T-shirt. He looked at his phone. The time was 4:20. He also saw that Akua Helmsley had sent him a link the day before via Whatsapp. He tapped it and it took him to The Guardian’s website, where she had a new post. ghanaian authorities show force: but challenges still lie ahead.
She had written about the raid and the shooting. She even had a picture of the deserted mining camp with the incinerating excavators. Without qualification, Dawson admired Helmsley for her work. She was on the ball, and now he dismissed any doubts he had entertained about the veracity of her story that she had confronted Tommy Thompson at PMMC. The question was now, why was he lying?
He saw that she had texted him again about forty-five minutes later, asking him to call her. In the dark, Dawson admitted to himself that he had deliberately avoided contact with her ever since Christine had thrown out that hint of jealousy. He didn’t feel good about avoiding Akua, but he didn’t want marital problems either, especially over nothing. His personal and professional worlds had collided somewhat.
Why was he now filled with a foreboding that something awful had happened? It must have been the nightmare. Dawson rose to remove his damp T-shirt. Trying to sleep anymore was fruitless, so he took his shower and got dressed quietly while Christine slept blissfully with a light snore. Overnight, she had gradually hogged most of the bed, as usual. Wish I could sleep like my wife, he thought, peeping into the boys’ bedroom, or my children, for that matter.
Dawson went outside to think in the cool of predawn, taking a seat on the cheap plastic chair under the avocado tree for a moment. But he felt restless and uncomfortable, so he rose and went outside the front gate to watch Kumasi stirring awake.
His phone rang and his stomach dropped when he saw it was Commander Longdon. A call this early could only mean trouble.
“Good morning, sir.”
“Morning, Dawson. You need to travel to Pakyi as soon as possible. I’m on the way there myself. There has been a fatal shooting. This one is high profile.”
Dawson swallowed and closed his eyes tight. He felt faint. “Who is it, sir?”
“The journalist. Akua Helmsley.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Dawson needed a tougher vehicle than the Corolla to go out into the bush, so he called Uncle Joe, who sent one of his drivers over with a jeep that Dawson could have for the day. He drove fast, reaching the turnoff just before Pakyi in under forty-five minutes. The directions were simple: just keep going into the deep bush, and then keep going some more. The unpaved, dusty road was barely wide enough for two vehicles side by side. It was rough in some sections and waterlogged in others, but the jeep, which had four-wheel drive, handled all of it without a problem.
After thirty minutes of travel, Dawson saw the vehicles in a cluster ahead: two black police Tatas off to the side, and a silver-gray Toyota Prado in the middle that Dawson recognized as Akua’s. He pulled over and jumped out, his heart beating hard and heavy at what he was about to see. Commander Longdon was with two uniformed low-ranked officers.
Longdon turned as Dawson came up. “It must have been an ambush,” he said. “It looks like both of them were forced out of the vehicle at gunpoint and then shot.”
The Prado was facing them. The door on the passenger side was ajar, and just below it, Akua lay on the ground crumpled like a broken doll. She had a single wound in front of her right ear, dried blood fanning out from it like a river delta. It was a professional job.
Stunned, Dawson recoiled. Oh. God. He felt numb, with a sense of utter defeat.
“The man’s body is here,” Longdon said, moving to the driver’s side of the Prado. But Dawson barely heard him, and he stayed where he was, staring at Akua’s body.
“Dawson?” Longdon was looking at him with the expression that said, Are you okay?
“Yes,” Dawson said, coming around the left-hand side, feeling as if he were floating in an unreal world. He couldn’t feel his feet touching the ground.
“His identification says he’s Joshua Samuels,” Longdon said.
Two biblical names, Dawson thought irrelevantly. “That’s Helmsley’s cameraman.”
“Oh, you know him?” Longdon asked in some surprise.
“I met him and Helmsley at Bao Liu’s mining area the day he was found dead. They were trespassing and I warned them off. She asked me if she could keep in touch in order to get updates on the investigation.”
“Ah, I see,” the commander said. He introduced Dawson to the two officers, a corporal and lance corporal and from the Pakyi station.
For the moment, Dawson put away any antipathy he had felt for Longdon. There was time for that, and it wasn’t now. “Who found them, sir?” he asked.
“Some hunters,” Longdon said. “Around three o’clock this morning. But they weren’t able to report it until about six, when they reached Pakyi. It’s a long walk back. ” He put his hands on his hips and shook his head slowly. “Cold-blooded brutality. It’s a terrible shame.”
“But what could be the motive for such an attack?” Dawson asked, bewildered.
“If I had to guess,” the commander said, “I would say it was a robbery gone bad.”
But why had Akua and Samuels been in such a remote area in the first place? Dawson frowned as he noticed something that had not struck him till now, and he turned to the commander. “This is the direction the Prado was facing when it was found?”
“Yes, of course,” London replied. “Why?”
“It’s pointed toward the main road,” Dawson said. “So she was coming back from somewhere.”
“I should say so, yes,” Longdon agreed.
Dawson thought of something and took out his phone, going straight to Whatsapp. “Akua Helmsley texted me at three seventeen yesterday afternoon,” he said.
“Oh,” the commander said with interest. “Texted you about what?”
“She wanted me to call her back,” Dawson said, “but she didn’t say more than that. I didn’t call.”
“Ah,” Longdon said. “That’s useful information. So, we know she was killed sometime between yesterday midafternoon and early this morning.”
Dawson was imagining the worst. What if Akua had wanted advice about what she was investigating, or to let Dawson know where she was going next? Perhaps she had waited for his return call as long as possible, and then started out on her mission. If Dawson had phoned her, could he have stopped her from going on a dangerous expedition and getting killed?
What have I done? Dawson felt sick. “Do you have CSU coming, sir?” The more businesslike he was, the less emotional he felt.
“Yes,” the commander said. “I want the entire unit here so this is handled correctly.”
CSU arrived near ten. The sky was gray, and thick clouds were moving in, promising rain in the afternoon. It was mercifully rainy-season cool, which would help retard decomposition of the dead bodies, but certainly wouldn’t stop it.