“Oh, no, Osewa,” Isaac said, dismayed. “That’s not the way it was.”
“She had stolen my womb. Isaac got it back, and now Beatrice wanted to steal him. How dare she? What gave her the right to take so much away from me?”
Dawson’s bottom lip was quivering. “Auntie, how did you kill Mama?”
“You already know,” she said, suddenly weary. “You held the weapon in your own hands.”
Dawson felt sick.
“Yes, Darko. It was the rope we make from elephant grass, the same kind I made for you when you were a boy.” Tears streamed down her face. “I planned it. I knew I couldn’t do it with my bare hands. Your mother was too strong.”
“And when it came time for Mama to return to Accra,” Dawson said softly, “you walked with her toward the tro-tro stop, but you never got there, did you? You led her to the grove-just like you were to do with Gladys twenty-three years later-and you killed her there. You told everyone the lie that you had seen Mama board the tro-tro, but this last time, when I was having dinner with you and you were telling us about it, you made another mistake. It’s always in the lying that a mistake is made.”
“What mistake?”
“Mama would never have sat near the front seat, even if it was the last tro-tro on earth.”
“Oh,” Osewa said dispiritedly. “I didn’t even know that.”
Dawson took her gently and held her close.
“Detective Sergeant Chikata is going to arrest you now, Auntie, and then he will be taking you away. Okay?”
“I love you, little Darko. I will always love you.”
48
IT WASN’T A FETISH priest who had built the juju pyramid at the plantain grove. It had been Osewa’s creation. Maybe it would indeed serve to keep evil spirits away, but its main purpose was to hide what was underneath.
With Constable Gyamfi’s help, Dawson removed the rocks one by one from the pile. He felt a certain closeness to the constable. With Inspector Fiti and Constable Bubo suspended pending the investigation into alleged police brutality, Dawson had offered to stay in Ketanu and help at the station until a replacement inspector could be sent in.
All the rocks were down now, and the soil was exposed. Gyamfi had brought a shovel, and Dawson thrust it into the ground. Even though the soil was soft from the recent rain, it was hard work digging. Dawson had insisted on doing it without any help. When he got three feet down, he stopped and wiped the sweat streaming from his brow.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to take over for a while?” Gyamfi asked.
“I’m sure.”
As he continued, the shovel struck something hard, and he stopped and knelt down. Gyamfi moved closer to see. It was about the size of a thumb. It looked light in color but stained by the dark earth. Dawson used his bare hands to clear more soil away. It became clear that they were looking at a human bone.
Thirty minutes later, Dawson had the full leg and part of a pelvis. He freed the other leg and the feet, then moved up the spine. The body had been laid at a slight incline, so again he had to use the shovel carefully until he reached another level of bone.
He freed the arms. The skeleton was mostly intact. Around the bones of the neck, Dawson removed the soil in careful, thin layers until he found something again. It was coated with mud and the chain had been broken, but it was there-the gold necklace with its butterfly pendant.
“Mama,” he whispered.
When her head was exposed, Dawson gently touched her skull.
Gyamfi turned away and retreated quietly. Dawson brushed soil out of his mother’s head and eyes. In his mind, he didn’t see her skull, he saw her face and her smile and felt her skin.
“I’ll give you the burial you deserve, Mama,” he said, “and Christine and Hosiah will be there. At last you’ll see them and be proud. And then, Mama, you can finally rest.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you is a sufficient expression when someone holds a door open for you, but it is inadequate to express the depth of gratitude I feel for those who have in various ways helped me to write this book.
No one deserves the crown more than Marly Rusoff, my agent. When I first presented this novel to her, it was so roughly hewn I wonder how on earth she saw any potential shape in it. Marly not only has keen perception, she brings warmth and humanity along with it. She is a tenacious advocate for her authors. My tremendous thanks also go to Michael Radulescu and Jacqueline LeDonne in Marly’s office, who worked magic with foreign sales of this novel.
I would never have come upon Marly Rusoff had it not been for Beverly Martin at Agent Research and Evaluation. An accomplished writer herself, she searched tirelessly for agents who might take me on, and she was really the first person to teach me how to write a good query letter. I am very grateful to her.
I was fortunate to meet yet another wonderful person in this process: Judy Sternlight, my editor at Random House. She infused me with excitement from the very start. She has an amazing grasp of character and story, seeing many things that did not even occur to me as the author. I consider myself privileged to have worked with someone of her caliber and brilliance. My thanks also go to production editor Vincent La Scala, sharp-eyed copy editor Susan M. S. Brown, and the marketing and promotion personnel.
I must not forget the first readers of the manuscript-Julie Mosow, in Marly Rusoff’s office, and Mary Logue, both of whom gave me such invaluable guidance that I would not have been able to produce the second and third drafts without them.
Many thanks to Ken Yeboah, assistant commissioner of police and deputy director general at the Central Investigations Department in Accra. He was extremely helpful and patient with me in response to the scores of questions I had for him about police procedure in Ghana. Likewise, I would like to thank Edmond Vanderpuye and Patience Vormawor at International Needs in Accra for being so accommodating. I also thank Kofitse Ahadzi of Afrikania Mission; Moses Sowah, M.D., for getting me in touch with detectives and officers at CID; the incomparable and unflappable John Nkrumah Mills, M.D., at the Volta River Authority Hospital in Akosombo; Adukwei Hesse, M.B., Ch.B.; and Nii Otu Nartey, M.D. Many thanks to the always brainy Audrey Quaye for helping me make contacts in Ghana. I am very grateful also to Kwasi Asiedu, attorney at law, for his terrific assistance with tricky legal questions, and to David Asem for expert assistance with English-Ewe translation.
I cannot leave out my late father, K. A. B. Jones-Quartey, who taught me by example about the doggedness needed to write a book; my mother, Pearl; and my brothers, Kwatei, Nii Ofrang, and Kwatelai, to whom I’m grateful for their encouragement and support; as well as Joseph Adinolf, my physical trainer, who can always tell from my workouts if I’ve been doing a little too much writing for my own good.
Finally, thanks to Stephanie Cabot, who long ago suggested the story be set in real-life Ghana rather than a fictitious “Ghana-like” African nation, and to Marjorie Miller, who propelled me on my writing career in those early days. I will never forget Miss Mensah, my primary school English teacher, who inspired me to excel.