Tayo sat in his armchair with his eyes closed and feet resting on his leather pouffe as he listened to Coltrane’s Love Supreme. He looked forward to Sunday mornings when the house was quiet and he could reflect in peace. He stood up and walked to the bookshelf in search of an exemplary text. Last week his publishers had phoned to congratulate him on his manuscript. They were planning a sizeable print run of his history of Nigeria, the largest, they said, of any third-world history book, and naturally he felt pleased. All that remained to be written was the preface, but what did one say in a preface? He flipped through several books and then traced his finger along the mahogany bookshelf in search of one of his favourites, and there it was: The Open Society and its Enemies. He wondered how often a preface was overlooked in a reader’s eagerness to hurry on and read the rest of the book. And here was Popper’s preface, two in fact. Tayo nodded to himself, dwelling for a moment on the line that spoke of the need to break from the customary deference shown to great men. He reached for pen and paper and carried the books to his desk.

For years now, Tayo had been writing about Nigeria’s problems. He believed that greed and mismanagement were the root causes of oil corruption and a broken civil service. He also believed that the West, through the World Bank in particular, exacerbated his country’s problems, but he was cautious with this argument knowing its potential to detract from what could be done at home. He was also determined never to treat Nigeria’s problems as insurmountable and in 1984, when others were saying that the country’s many cultures and ethnic groups were never meant to co-exist, Tayo disagreed. He had no patience for the afro-pessimists, whom he saw as lending credence to the many racist historians of Africa. Instead, he maintained that in spite of his country’s numerous coups and despots, events could still change for the better. History, as Popper argued, was not deterministic. Tayo decided to acknowledge him in his preface, alongside colleagues and friends, not forgetting family of course.

The book would be dedicated to Vanessa, and to his father. To his father, for being a tireless civil servant in pursuit of a better Nigeria. Tayo shifted in his chair, sensing that something had fallen from his trouser pocket. He reached down, expecting to retrieve pound notes, but instead found a sheet of paper in his wife’s handwriting. It was yesterday’s shopping list, scribbled on medical paper advertising an unpronounceable medication. ‘Wretched pharmaceutical companies,’ he muttered to himself. Wouldn’t it be better if companies handed out free medicines instead of useless bits of paper promoting fancy, experimental drugs? This was yet another of Nigeria’s problems — the questionable role of multinationals. He read the list:

Not many husbands helped with domestic chores, but Tayo felt it only fair. After all, his wife worked out of the home just as much as he did, more if you counted her night shifts. Like most professionals, they employed a house servant and gardener, but some things they preferred to take care of themselves. Most Saturday mornings, she gave him a list and he did the shopping at Kingsway, while she haggled with the traders selling fresh fruit and vegetables in the car park outside. She enjoyed bargaining and was good at it; he was not — hence his relegation to Kingsway.

Usually, after the food shopping, his wife would stop at Challenge Christian bookshop and he would use this time to browse arts and crafts displayed in the stalls across the street. She didn’t like him buying from these traders, whom she claimed inflated their prices for tourists, but occasionally he chose something small, some glass beads or a leather bag, for his daughter. He knew the prices were high, but they were still far cheaper than the imported trinkets sold in Kingsway’s household section. He never made a fuss about this to his wife, but he didn’t like it when Nigerians shunned local products, preferring to import all manner of things like Quaker oats and golden syrup bearing the royal stamp of approval: By Appointment to Her Majesty the Queen. Tayo shook his head at the hypocrisy of it all, wishing his wife could see things his way, yet he knew he was being unfair, petty even, to criticise her. If she wanted her few overseas luxuries, so be it. She worked hard for them.

Tayo stretched his arms out in front of him, interlaced his fingers, and pushed them out further to loosen his muscles. Yesterday, after shopping, he had gone with Kwame and David to the abattoir to buy half a cow. Kwame White and David Wiseman were neighbours who, like them, lived in the new university homes on the Bauchi road — identical four-bedroom bungalows with sizeable back gardens. They’d spent a pleasant afternoon at Kwame’s house cutting the meat and portioning it into plastic bags for the women to freeze, but today Tayo was feeling the after-effects of their work. Every arm muscle ached, which made him doubly glad for the day of rest.

The older he got, the more he looked forward to the peace and quiet of Sunday mornings. Did he miss going to church? Not really. He still believed in God, or at least in the existence of a supernatural being, but he’d grown disenchanted with organised religion. He disliked the newer services and found it embarrassing to watch people crying and confessing their so-called sins in public. He viewed the speaking in tongues with great suspicion and did not care much for St. Mark’s congregation. It seemed church members worried more about displaying the latest fashions and the newest German cars than in humbly worshipping God. His family had taken issue with him: he hardly attended services so how could he know what congregations were like? So Tayo had learnt to keep his views to himself and while his wife and daughter worshipped at church, he played his records and read the papers. These days he listened less to Highlife and the jazz of his youth and more to the jazz of artists like Coltrane, whose music he was listening to now as he scanned the local papers. He bought Punch and New Nigerian out of habit and always with the hope of finding something worthwhile in between the excess of advertisements, obituaries, memorials and other social announcements. The more serious international paper, The Weekly Guardian, he saved for last. It kept him abreast of international news with a selection of articles sourced from Le Monde, The Guardian, and The Washington Post.

Tayo realised that he must have drifted off to sleep. The papers had slipped from his lap and the family was back. Kemi waved her Sunday school colouring in front of his face.

‘Do you like it, Daddy?’

‘It’s beautiful.’ He smiled, preparing to add it to his already large collection of fishermen, shepherds, and babies in mangers.

‘Not the colouring! My autograph.’ Kemi pointed to her name scribbled in joined-up letters. ‘I’m going to save it,’ she announced, whisking the paper from Tayo’s hands and skipping off to her room.

‘Miriam?’ Tayo called, wondering where she’d gone.

He stood up and went to the bedroom where he found her changing out of her Sunday clothes into a looser fitting dress. He slipped his arms around her waist, hoping for a few moments of intimacy, but Miriam wriggled free, intent on getting dressed. Tayo sighed, wondering why he bothered. There’d been a time when she would lean back in his arms and be affectionate and playful. He thought of those days as he went to look for a jacket.

It was a tradition in the Ajayi household to have lunch at Yelwa Club one Sunday a month. It was one of the few surviving country clubs established by the British in colonial times and was located on the outskirts of Bukuru, a thirty-minute drive from the Ajayi home. Tayo frequently took younger lecturers, and sometimes students, to the club for a peaceful drink or a stroll around the grounds. He liked to play squash there too, but Sundays at Yelwa were always reserved for the family and today they would be meeting the Abubakars. On their drive to the club, Tayo had hoped to listen to the news, but he was out-voted. He never won when Miriam and Kemi were both in the car.

‘Lets play the Wombles music,’ Kemi clamoured from the back seat. ‘Please Daddy! Please Mummy! Pleeeeeease!’

So they listened to the Wombles for a while until Tayo could stand it no longer and Miriam changed the cassette to one of her American gospel tapes. Tayo didn’t mind gospel, but found the musical arrangement irritating when it hopped haphazardly from slow to fast tracks. Albums should either be fast or slow, he mused as he swung the wheel to avoid a pothole. They had taken the Jos-Miango road, passing the Nasco biscuit factory and the Coca-Cola bottling plant. Most of these factories were closed at the weekend, but a few factory chimneys still spewed their dirty gases, staining the sky brown.

‘Are you okay, Miriam?’ Tayo asked, knowing that the factory emissions made her nauseous. She’d wound up her window and was caressing her stomach.

‘I’m fine,’ she replied, resting a hand on his knee.

He squeezed the hand and massaged her fingers. Miraculously, after all these years, Miriam’s belly was full again with a child. So many miscarriages and now this. He gave her hand another squeeze. When people asked him if he wanted a baby girl or a baby boy, he would always say that he hoped simply for a healthy child, but truthfully, he wished for a boy. With a son he could play football and build model ships. His boy would be studious like his daughter, but also a sportsman. He had already thought of names: Adeniyi Oluwakayode Pele. Adeniyi after his father and Pele, of course, after Pele. He’d even thought of adding Segun to the names in honour of his own country’s footballer, Segun Odegbami. And wasn’t that the beauty of giving many names to one’s child? But of course, they could not all revolve around sports.

When they arrived at the Club, Tayo parked the car in the shade of the frangipanis. It was the coolest spot and close to where they would eat.

‘Ranka dede,’ Ibrahim called out in greeting as they entered the lounge.

‘Sanu,’ Tayo replied, smiling at the waiter’s exuberance.

‘Make I go get drink sah?’ Ibrahim asked.

‘Yes, the usual.’ That meant a Dubonnet for him, Fanta for Miriam and a Sprite for Kemi.

In Tayo’s seven years of coming to Yelwa Club, little had changed. The sweet and spicy aroma of curry always hung in the air, accompanied by the clatter of pots and pans from the kitchens in the back. There was also the put-put sound from people playing pool in an adjoining room and the steady whirr from overhead steel fans that blew a gentle breeze. The décor too remained the same — velvet settees, leather-topped side tables, withering cacti and African violets in clay pots. There were also two oversized pictures hanging from the wall: one of Her Majesty the Queen, the other of President Shagari. Through the open doors Tayo could hear the faint sounds of excited children playing by the pool. Miriam and Kemi stood up to go outside while he waited for the drinks. He watched them leave and then gazed for a moment at the President’s picture. Others had preceded this President behind the same glass frame, and Tayo hoped that sooner rather than later, this one too would be replaced. While he had celebrated Nigeria’s return to civilian rule, Tayo now believed that the only way to bring his country back to its senses was to install the military — not forever, but for a short while to restore law and order.

‘Professor Ajayi, my honourable good friend,’ Yusuf’s voice rang out across the lounge.

‘My honourable good friend,’ Tayo answered, standing up to greet Yusuf, whose stomach was what greeted people first these days — a decidedly large and unorthodox beer belly.

People joked that Yusuf’s size came with the good life. He had recently been appointed District Manager for NEPA, while his wife held a senior position at NTA. However, life for the Abubakars was not as easy as it looked from the outside. They had lost their first two children to sickle cell anemia, and for a long time didn’t know whether the youngest two would suffer the same fate. Thankfully, Isaac and Dari were healthy. Yusuf embraced Tayo in his dashiki, and then moved on to greet others whom he recognised in the lounge.

Tayo marvelled at Yusuf’s temperament — always jovial, and seemingly at ease in any setting. By the time Yusuf had dispensed all his greetings, the whole room smelt of his cologne. He’d made his mark. Yusuf knew everyone in Jos: from the Lebanese to the Indians, the British and most of the Nigerians. One minute he could be heard speaking Pidgin, then Hausa or English (with the Yorkshire accent he’d never lost), and even some Yoruba these days, depending on who happened to be around. And it wasn’t just linguistics that Yusuf juggled so smoothly, but everything, it seemed to Tayo, right down to the clothes he wore. Today it was a dashiki, but he might just as easily have donned a safari jacket or a three-piece suit.

Yusuf had the sort of personality that Tayo associated with those best attuned to life in Nigeria, that seamless ability for social metamorphosis, which Tayo often envied. Cultural juggling did not come naturally to Tayo, and Miriam was always reminding him of that fact, saying that he was far too English in the way he dressed, in the music he listened to, and in his preference for speaking English rather than Yoruba. He took it as teasing even though it sometimes felt like a series of rebukes. And it wasn’t just Miriam, but his brothers and sisters (even Bisi) who told him he had too much oyinbo mentality for his own good. Yet for all his so-called Western thinking, he refused to leave Nigeria to live abroad. Nigeria was home for his soul, if not entirely home for his mind. His friends and family maintained that in the past he’d been more carefree, but he disagreed. Except for his approach to religion, he remained the same. It was society, he told them, not he, which had changed.

‘Look at you, my dear, you’re looking splendid,’ Joy complimented Miriam, spotting her as she returned with Kemi through the back doors.

‘Is that so? But I’m tired sha,’ Miriam replied, grasping the sides of her abdomen.

Her stomach was big like a watermelon, and it made Tayo anxious. He worried, as he had done when she was carrying Kemi, that her slender frame would not withstand the pregnancy.

‘How many months is it now?’ Joy asked.

‘Five,’ Kemi answered for Miriam, before dashing back outside to play with her friends.

Tayo remembered how Miriam had at first wanted to keep it a secret from Kemi until the pregnancy became visible. He did not hold strongly to these cultural beliefs but played along for Miriam’s sake; although in the end there was little they could hide from their curious six-year-old.

‘Professor Ajayi is a very lucky man,’ Yusuf chuckled, grasping Tayo again by the shoulders. ‘You’re looking stunning, my dear Miriam.’

As does Joy, Tayo thought wistfully, finding Joy carefree and sensuous in the way that Miriam used to be.

The one o’clock gong sounded, and Tayo led both families to the long table where waiters in white suits and red cummerbunds were serving the guests white basmati rice and bright yellow curry. It was then self-service from a line of silver trays, each with its own condiment — shredded coconut, green pickles, purple onion rings, sultanas, tangerine segments, sliced banana, and tomato. Soft white rolls were brought to the table with shavings of butter floating in ice water to keep them from melting.

‘You know there’s going to be a coup soon,’ Yusuf announced when everyone was seated.

‘But until the BBC says so, it’s all rumour,’ Tayo asserted, smiling to himself at this unconscious borrowing from his father. He remembered Baba saying it on the weekend of Nigeria’s second military coup, and he had wondered then whether Baba really believed that the first accurate news would come from the BBC, or whether he’d made the announcement to distract the men from their anxieties.

‘We just need a strong ruler,’ Yusuf broke into Tayo’s thoughts. ‘Someone who can bring discipline to this country. Corruption. That’s the problem with this place — corruption. Wallahi!’ Yusuf pounded the table with his fist. ‘We need a dictator. Like Rawlings. Even Idi Amin,’ he added, shaking his arm to straighten the Rolex that hung loosely around his wrist.

‘How about Jimmy Carter?’ Kemi offered.

‘Please Yusuf, don’t exaggerate,’ Joy said, ignoring Kemi’s question.

The Abubakar children spoke only when spoken to, and Tayo worried that he and Miriam had spoilt Kemi. Baba would never have stood for so many interruptions, and yet Tayo knew he should not compare. He had never wanted to be as strict as his father.

‘No, I’m serious,’ Yusuf insisted. ‘I’m telling you that unless this country is ruled by force, we’re all doomed. Yes now, force! Just look at our property. Did we tell you, Tayo, what happened when we came back from Florida last year? We got to our place … you know, our place where we’re building our small-small palace, and found no cement, no bricks, no nothing! The workers were stealing it all and carrying it to their villages to build their menene. So I sacked them, all of them. Wallahi! Look, Nigerians are just too corrupt!’

‘It’s true,’ Tayo nodded. ‘This business of corruption is so bad; when I travel these days I’m even embarrassed to show my passport.’

‘Precisely,’ Yusuf stabbed the air with his fork. ‘You see, you watch everyone passing so smoothly through those immigration places in Europe until it comes to our Nigerian passport and then the way they look at you, it’s an insult. That’s why I got myself a British passport. Yes now! The end justifies the means, isn’t it so?’ Yusuf chuckled.

‘Was Jimmy Carter a dictator?’ Kemi persisted.

‘No, he was a democrat. But not a Naija democrat-o,’ Yusuf laughed.

‘And did you hear about that Professor of Economics?’ Tayo interjected.

‘No. Which one is that now?’ Yusuf laughed in anticipation.

‘Last month,’ Tayo began, ‘the university passed on a candidate to the committee stage, this fellow from Oxford, Innocent something-or-other. I wasn’t involved in the recruiting, mind you, but I just wanted to meet the applicant — a fellow Oxford chap and all that.’

‘Of course. We all know your reputation, Tayo,’ Joy smiled. ‘Always looking out for younger colleagues. Isn’t that so?’

‘Well,’ Tayo shrugged nonchalantly so as not to appear flattered.

‘Haba, Tayo, you’re too humble my friend,’ Yusuf insisted.

‘Anyway, I called Innocent to my office,’ Tayo continued, ‘and straight away I knew something was fishy about the chap. He was sort of shifty-looking and telling me he didn’t have much time to talk. And then I asked him which college he attended at Oxford. Do you know what he said?’

‘What did Mr. Innocent, innocently say?’ Yusuf asked, already laughing.

‘Oxford College!’

‘Why is that funny?’ Kemi shouted, frustrated at being left out.

‘So then I thought, let me just have some fun with this Innocent chap,’ Tayo continued, ‘and I asked him, “Did you read Economics at Oxford?” Of course, as you know, there’s no Economics course at Oxford, only PPE. But this man just nodded saying, “yes, yes, yes”. And then …’ Tayo paused, trying not to laugh, but Yusuf and Joy were laughing so hard that it made it difficult not to do the same. ‘And then I said, “So was Marks one of your tutors?” “Of course,” the chap replied. “Yes, Karly Marx,” he added. So there I was even giving the foolish man the benefit of the doubt asking if he knew Daniel Marks, and the chap thinks I’m talking about Karl Marx.’ Tayo struggled to keep a serious face. ‘So then I ask him if he meant the one who died in 1883. And what did he say? “Karly Marx junior.” Can you imagine?’

Yusuf’s loud laughter, punctuated by fists pounding on the table, now had the whole room going.

‘Come on, Tayo,’ Yusuf spoke in fits and starts. ‘You exaggerate too much, but I like this story-o!’

‘We simply need a God-fearing man in power,’ Miriam remarked, her words landing like a fly swat against their merriment.

‘Well, we certainly need someone who is not corrupt.’ Tayo wiped his eyes. ‘That’s what we need. Someone like Awolowo.’

Tayo wished Miriam wouldn’t always insist on a God-fearing man. He had nothing against the suggestion itself, but the predictability of Miriam’s responses and her simplicity annoyed him even more than their daughter’s interruptions. Yet, when he’d first met Miriam it had been that very simplicity, her youth and her unwavering faith in God, that he’d liked. So why did these things now bother him? At least she hadn’t joined the Aladura church or any of the cults popping up like anthills all over the country. He would never dismiss religion or faith, but he wished she were more questioning, or could at least engage with other people’s ideas the way Joy did, for example. There was so much that he wanted to do, so much he wished to change in his country, yet Miriam showed very little interest. In the early years it hadn’t been like this: they had discussed things together. Miriam had read literature and taken an interest in the courses he taught, but now she confined her reading to the Bible and Christian pamphlets. He couldn’t help but wish she’d never fallen pregnant all those years ago and that way they also wouldn’t have gone through the trauma and heartbreak of losing the baby that had made things even worse. Doubly tragic. But no, he wasn’t being fair. This was life and they’d both decided to try to make it work and maybe it had worked, as well as could have been expected. Meanwhile, Yusuf was still talking and teasing Tayo about Awolowo.

‘I’m telling you, Awolowo is corrupt, no be so?’ Yusuf turned to Ibrahim, who had begun clearing their plates.

‘So oga, when you go be President?’ Ibrahim asked, looking in Tayo’s direction.

‘Me? You wan make I die? Neva!’ Tayo laughed. ‘Make you bring me some of dat your fruit salad.’

‘And do you have sherry trifle?’ Yusuf inquired.

‘Yes sah. We also have Bird Eye costad and ice cream.’

‘Eh-henh, then make you bring all of dem.’

‘Yes sah.’ Ibrahim dashed off to join the rest of the amused waiters, who stood idly in a line at the back of the room.

‘Ah-ah, look at this man, our Black American brother!’ Yusuf exclaimed, pointing to a new arrival. It was Kwame, who had come with some friends for lunch.

Tayo stood up and they chatted for a while.

‘So how do you know Kwame?’ Tayo asked, once the desserts arrived and Kwame had left.

‘We play tennis. The man’s an Arthur Ashe, you know.’

‘I didn’t realise he was that good.’

‘Shows how little you know about your university colleagues. He used to be a Black Panther too.’

‘Well of course I knew that,’ Tayo smiled.

‘He’s a good man, so dedicated to our country,’ Yusuf mused.

Tayo nodded. They were all close friends now, but he remembered when Kwame first arrived and how aloof he’d been. It was only when Tayo told Kwame about his admiration for Brother Malcolm and the fiery Oxford debate of 1964 that Kwame grew more relaxed in his presence. Perhaps, Tayo mused, Kwame, like Miriam, found him too English and not quite African enough.

The children had finished their ice cream and were eager to play in the pool, so the women took them away while Tayo and Yusuf stayed behind to drink tea and continue their conversation.

‘Karly Marx Junior and Professor Innocent,’ Yusuf repeated, shaking his head and laughing. ‘Did the man even know any economics?’

‘Who knows?’ Tayo laughed as they stood up. ‘But the man was smart enough at least to try bluffing his way into university.’

They walked slowly across the courtyard, past the building where the annual horticultural show took place and where Scottish dancing was taught on Sunday evenings—the last vestiges of colonial days that seemed destined to linger.

‘Now Tayo, remind me again, when is the baby due?’

‘We’re told the last week in August.’

‘Inshallah. Good. Very good.’ Yusuf stared ponderously at his snakeskin slippers. ‘So, are you still considering that job at Birmingham University?’

‘Yes, still deciding.’ Tayo didn’t need Yusuf to remind him that it was an attractive offer. It was a chance to teach in the African Studies Centre while completing his own research towards a PhD, yet he was reluctant to accept. Life would be better in England, offering a more conducive academic environment, and greater financial security, but Tayo felt an obligation to remain in Nigeria if for no other reason than for his students.

‘And what does Miriam say?’

‘She thinks we should go.’

‘You know you owe it to your family. You must be very careful, Tayo, how you criticise the government these days.’

‘I take it Miriam told you to say that?’

‘Look, my friend, you think we don’t read your articles in the paper? You have to be careful Tayo, I’m telling you. These guys aren’t the small-small thugs we used to fight in Bradford. These ones have guns and armies, my friend.’

‘But you know as well as I do that this government is corrupt.’

‘Yes, and that’s why I say we need a dictator. I don’t want any of my friends losing their jobs for the sake of politics, and I’m not even going to mention losing your life.’

‘So what do you propose?’

‘Look, Tayo, you’re right to blame our leaders, but they don’t work alone. They dance with Western governments and oil multinationals, and each one of them is taking a slice of our national cake. I don’t need to tell you that.’

Tayo shook his head and sucked his teeth in irritation.

‘But Yusuf, change has always come from individuals and we first need to fix our problems at home before thinking of changing the World Bank and all those people. Remember Nehru and Gandhi, Martin Luther King.’

‘Tayo, you know I can’t talk books like you, but I can tell you one thing for sure — in this, our country, don’t make waves alone. Why don’t you go into business instead? Take a break from the teaching.’ Tayo glanced at his wife sitting with Joy by the side of the pool and sighed. He resented those that criticised the government but did nothing to change the status quo. Admittedly, Yusuf was not as bad as Ike, who had joined the government talking about the need for change from within while changing nothing. Yusuf wasn’t that bad, but the suggestion to go into business irritated Tayo. He’d heard the line too often. He was fed up with it and if anything were to drive him back to Europe, it would be this growing lack of respect for the pursuit of knowledge. He did sometimes wonder if he should have stayed in Europe in the first place, forging a serious career there many years earlier. And not just for his career. Other things might have been better too.

‘You have a good family,’ Yusuf repeated, as though he’d read Tayo’s thoughts and decided to challenge them.

‘As do you,’ Tayo muttered, watching his daughter dive under water and out again.

‘Look Daddy!’ Kemi squealed with delight, ‘I’m doing synchronised swimming like at the Olympics!’

‘I can see that,’ Tayo smiled. ‘Show me some more!’

Kemi trod water and raised her hands high in the air. ‘Does it look good, Daddy?’

‘Beautiful,’ Tayo smiled. Sometimes when he saw Kemi it seemed impossible that she’d grown so big. It felt like yesterday when he’d held her in the palm of his hands and now look at her — a potential Olympic swimmer. ‘Oh, I almost forgot. I brought you some papers,’ Tayo added, taking them from his briefcase so Yusuf could borrow them.

Yusuf thumbed approvingly through the Weekly Guardians. ‘And when you’ve finished, I’d like that article back.’ Tayo pointed to the one he’d circled.

Yusuf studied the paper and read the title aloud. ‘“African Authors Write Back”. Do you have a mention in this?’

Tayo nodded. His children’s stories were mentioned. They were gaining greater international acclaim these days, too, but that wasn’t why the article was important to him.

‘Hey, make you treat my papers properly! Don’t bend ‘am now!’ Tayo ordered, stopping Yusuf from rolling the paper into a tube.

‘Na just paper now,’ Yusuf protested.

‘It’s not just paper, my friend. It’s the person who wrote it.’

‘Vanessa Richardson,’ Yusuf read the name without recognition.

Tayo nodded, thinking for a moment that he would remind Yusuf of who she was, but the wives had returned and the moment had passed.