FORTY-FIVE

May 22, Atimpoku, Ghana

It had rained hard overnight, leaving the ground sodden. Fortunately, Emma had on her jeans and trainers. This was no time for a skirt. Besides the rain, something else came down heavily last night: her period, and she was cramping. She didn’t ever want to be a man, but every month around this time she had transitory fantasies of a menstrual-free life. She’d have to wait a few decades for that.

Having washed up with the few toiletries she had bought from a convenience store, Emma was ready at a little past six when Mr. Labram arrived in his four-wheel drive Toyota Prado, which he parked on the street.

“From here, we can walk down to the shore to speak with some of the fishermen,” he explained to Emma.

They crossed the road and descended toward the river, coming to a cluster of four thatched huts and a brick building a few meters from the water’s edge. Three traditional canoes and a modern dinghy with an outboard motor were pulled up on shore.

A kilometer or so northward, the graceful arc of the Adome Bridge spanned the Volta. Looking across to the other side, Emma marveled at the breadth of the river. It was at once magnificent and daunting. How in the world could they ever recover a body from these vast waters—if it was there at all? It could be anywhere along the river’s course.

A shirtless young man of about eighteen was leaning against one of the canoes as he repaired a fishing net.

“Good morning,” Labram greeted him in Ewe.

“Morning,” he replied.

Labram continued in Ewe, introducing himself and Emma and explaining their mission. The man, whose name was Solomon, looked puzzled.

“Please, wait one moment. I will call my father.”

Emma recognized Solomon’s speech was unusual—the pronunciation rather childlike, and she understood at once that Solomon might have a mild mental deficit. He went inside the brick house and returned a few minutes later with his father, Zacharia, a fortyish version of his son.

With the customary pleasantries, Labram told Zacharia what he did in the area, and after a complicated conversation involving names of people who had lived and worked where and when, it turned out that they were probably related. After much laughter and palm slapping between the two men, Labram got down to business.

“My brother, Madam Emma here, is a detective in Accra,” he said to Solomon, switching to Twi for Emma’s benefit.

“Oh, very fine, madam,” Zacharia said, looking at Emma. “You are welcome.”

“We need help finding someone,” Labram said.

“What is it about?” Zacharia asked with interest.

“At the end of March this year,” Emma began, “one gentleman from America came to stay at the Riverview Inn.”

“Ah, okay,” Zacharia said.

“He was supposed to leave on the third of April, but when his driver came to pick him up and take him back to Accra, he had disappeared.”

Zacharia frowned. “And up till now he is still missing?”

“Yes,” Emma said. “Now, around two in the morning of that day, third of April, one woman in Atimpoku saw an SUV on the Adome Bridge and two guys removing something from the back of the vehicle that looked like a sack with a human body inside. They took it and threw it over the side of the bridge into the river.”

“Oh!” Zacharia exclaimed, pulling back his head as if someone had jabbed him in the eyes with a garden fork. “Ah! These people, eh? How can they do this? Is it the American man they threw in the river?”

“We don’t know for sure,” Emma said, “but we need to find out, and if he’s been thrown in the river, we must find his body. His son has come all the way from the States to look for his father, and we are trying to help him.”

“God bless you, madam,” Zacharia said. “If the American was thrown into the river, then by all means the body will come to float on top of the water.”

“Even if they put rocks in the sack?” Emma asked.

“Yes,” Zacharia said with certainty. “It will float. Madam, you know one thing is that now the water is not as deep as in the old days, because of less rain every year. So, by all means, if the body is in the river, I think it will come to rest at a shallow area. But it can also get stuck on the riverbed or in some weeds, so that also might delay it small.”

“Okay,” Emma said. “Please, how long have you been a fisherman?”

Zacharia laughed. “Since I could walk. My father was a fisherman, and his father too.”

“Oh, nice,” Emma said.

“But the fishing life is not so good anymore, oo,” he said, turning regretful. “The river doesn’t flow as fast as before, so weeds get a chance to grow.” He pointed far out. “You can see where bush is growing in the middle of the river. Those are all weeds, and the fish hide inside the weeds. So, we can’t get them the way we used to.”

“I’m sorry,” Emma said. “It makes life hard for you.”

Zacharia was grim. “Even, my wife says we should go to live in Accra.”

Emma tilted her head side to side. “Well, Accra too . . . that’s another problem place altogether.”

The three of them laughed, but Emma noticed Solomon’s expression changed little if any.

“Mr. Zacharia,” she said, “we are asking if you can tell your fellow fishermen all about this. They should look out for something like what I described—a dead body, or a sack with something inside. Anything unusual.”

“By all means, madam,” Zacharia said, nodding vigorously. “I will start to look for something like that all around the weeds and the riverbanks near Adome Bridge. Please, give me your number in case I see or hear something. I will call you at once.”

Emma obliged, and Labram gave out his number as well. “Your boy is very quiet,” Emma said, smiling at Solomon.

“Yes,” Zacharia said soberly. “You know, he has some small problems. He finds it hard to communicate.”

“I understand.”

“But he fishes very well,” Zacharia said, brightening.

“Very good,” Emma said. She dug in her pocket and pulled out a couple bills, which she handed to Zacharia. At this rate, she was going to have nothing left. “Thank you, eh? We appreciate it very much if you can help us.”

“Not at all, madam,” he said. “I also thank you, and God bless you. If I find anything out, anything at all, I will call you or Mr. Labram for sure.”