48

When Ade returned from the bathroom, he asked if I was enjoying my time in Nigeria. Had he not heard anything I’d said? Had he become so used to the madness in this country that he had become immune to it? He checked the time.

‘Do you have to be somewhere?’

‘No.’

‘She has gone to his house.’ Did he miss that bit about the guy possibly being a killer?

‘What does she expect to find at this Chief Amadi’s house?’

‘I don’t know. I’ve been doing some research into ritual murder in Africa but I haven’t found any solid information. What exactly do they do with the organs they take from their victims?’

‘All sorts of charms, I guess.’

‘Money rituals? I read about that too. Exactly how does it work?’

‘I really wouldn’t know, Guy.’

‘They seem to have a preference for human heads but I also read that they sometimes take eyes and tongues and breasts?’

‘Yes,’ he said and sighed. ‘That is what the papers report. They take virtually every organ in the body: heart, lungs, livers, kidneys, even testicles.’

‘So, you do know something about it?’

‘Well, I’m a journalist. I’ve come across several similar cases. What is reported in the papers is not always what actually happened. I once saw a corpse that had its liver removed. It had been lying in the bush for some time and animals, maybe birds, had eaten its eyes. I read in the papers the next day that the man had been killed only for his eyes.’

A member of hotel staff walked up to us. ‘Mr Collins?’

‘Yes?’ I vaguely remembered the chap from my first day at the hotel.

‘You have a call at the lobby, sir. Miss Amaka.’

‘Oh.’ She’d asked me to stay in the room and I’d forgotten. Ade followed as I went to take the call.

‘Do you have a pen?’ she said. She was whispering.

I got a pen and a writing pad from a receptionist behind the counter.

‘Where are you?’

‘I’m in his room. Listen, I think I found something. It looks like a code. Take down these numbers.’

‘Where is he?’

‘Downstairs. Guy, I have to be quick. It’s in a diary he hid under his bed. See if you can figure it out.’

She began to read out the numbers. ‘Amaka? Amaka?’

The line was dead. The phone showed the caller ID and I dialled the number. It rang but she didn’t answer.

‘What happened?’ Ade said.

‘She’s in his room. She found some numbers in a diary. She thinks it’s some kind of code. She wants me to try to figure it out.’

‘Let me see.’ He took the pad I’d been writing in.

I went over the conversation I’d just had with her, trying to remember if I heard any sounds or anyone else when she ended the call. I tried her again. The receptionist eyed me as if I should have asked before making a call.

‘These are flight numbers,’ Ade said. ‘Virgin Atlantic international flight numbers. See this? This is the date of the flight, and this part, this is the flight number. He has written them all together without spaces. That’s why it appears like a code.’

‘Flight numbers?’

‘Yes. They normally start with V S but he has left out the letters and the dashes between the dates. Maybe the man is only into drug trafficking. This could be the flight numbers and arrival dates of his couriers.’

‘Drugs? No.’

Since I’d been researching the killings, a thought had been forming at the back of my mind. I’d not been able to pin it down but it had stayed with me, tugging at my consciousness. It all came together.

‘I knew this juju thing didn’t make sense.’ I said.

‘What?’

Livers, kidneys, hearts, and now flight numbers. It all suddenly made sense.

‘Don’t you see? They are selling body parts. Think about it. You said they take livers, kidneys, hearts. Back in the UK, people spend years on waiting lists for an organ transplant. Why wait to die when you can get a bent surgeon to find you the organ you need on the black market? In Nigeria. I bet you, if we cross-check the medical records of people on those flights with these so-called ritual killings we would discover a strong tie. They are killing people for transplants.’

He cocked his head to one side as he looked at me.

‘That’s all it is, Ade, we’ve cracked it. They are selling organs to rich foreigners.’

‘Guy?’

‘Yes?’

‘I need to use the toilet.’

The receptionist had moved the phone away. I ignored her eyes and pulled it back to me. I wanted to tell Amaka what I’d discovered. I wanted to tell her that she could leave his house now.

I was still waiting for her to answer the call when Ade returned.

‘What’s wrong?’ he said.

‘I think she was sneaking around his stuff when she called. I think he might have caught her.’

‘So, what do you want to do about it?’

‘I have to go there. Do you have a car?’

‘Yes.’