Amaka was one of three guests at the small bar area of Bogobiri House that also served as the lobby and the restaurant. She had a bowl of fruit salad and a mug of coffee and was sitting facing the door so she saw Gabriel when he walked in. It was 7.45am. He must have driven fast. He had on a pair of worn, rumpled, khaki shorts and a light blue polo shirt that also needed ironing. Even with his bathroom slippers, his stubble, and his curly, greying hair, he still drew looks from the other women knife-and-forking their way through their continental breakfasts. Amaka was used to the effect that his light, mixed-race skin had on women. He often joked that she was only ‘immune to his juju’ because they’d known each other since when they used to run around in diapers.
He sat opposite Amaka and placed a brown envelope on the table. ‘Are you going to tell me what the fuck is going on?’ he said.
She sipped her coffee and looked at him above the rim. ‘Good morning to you too,’ she said.
‘Amaka, you almost drove me mad with worry. You say someone threatened you, then end the call, and when I try to call you back your phone is off. I called the Commissioner of Police, you know?’
‘Yeah. Really. I was worried. He called me back five minutes later. You were at a police inspector’s house?’
‘He told you that?’
‘Yes. He said you tried to stop a lynching at Oshodi. What were you thinking? They could have killed you too, Amaka. He said the inspector rescued you. Inspector…’
‘Ibrahim. And he did not rescue me.’
‘Yeah, Ibrahim. I called the chap. I spoke to him.’
‘You did?’
‘Yeah. He said you left his place in the middle of the night. Amaka, what the hell is going on?’
‘Is that the money?’
‘Yes.’ He slid the envelope over to her. ‘What are you up to, Amaka?’
‘Just taking care of stuff I should have taken care of sooner.’
‘You are scaring me. Why is this Malik looking for you? Why were you looking for him in the first place? And who the hell is he, anyway?’
‘It’s nothing I can’t handle. I need a favour.’
‘No more favours till you tell me what’s going on.’
‘I need you to get me a meeting with someone,’
‘Didn’t you hear what I just said?’
She stared at him as she took a sip from her mug.
‘Who?’ he asked.
‘Chief Ambrose Adepoju.’
‘Prince. Not Chief. And why?’
‘I need his help with something. Get me the meeting and I’ll explain everything.’
It was a long walk from where Amaka parked and paid a young boy to watch her car to Oshodi market where she stopped and stood on the side of the road, amongst pedestrians and passengers waiting for buses in the congested traffic. There, between the passing cars, she could make out where the asphalt was stained from the fire. The air smelled of exhaust and fumes from burning refuse, but in it she could smell burning flesh. For the rest of her life she would smell burning flesh in smoke of any type.
The market was human chaos as usual; thousands of people cramped into one stretch of road, ramshackle stalls next to umbrella canopies and awnings caked in dirt, goods on mats on bare ground. A moving, heaving, noisy gathering of sellers and clients, pickpockets and kids paid to carry other people’s shopping, white-robed prophets ringing bells and shouting their sermons, opportunists and traders, and among them also killers. The market was the subject of painters, many of whom captured the colourful madness from the narrow footbridge above. The market was due to be demolished, but in the mean-time it was business as usual and people even said the state government wouldn’t dare carry out the threat. Oshodi was a dangerous place, they said, a place where riots start and spread through the state. A place where you could buy anything including human body parts was not a place to mess with.
Cars were passing over the spot where a body had been burning the day before and people were walking past it, trying to give each other space but still brushing against one another. It was as if it never happened - as if Amaka herself had not almost ended up consumed in the flames of their orgy of violence.
Women behind a stretch of baskets spilling over with tomatoes were standing closest to the spot. Amaka hadn’t seen them yesterday – she couldn’t have seen them through the thickness of the killer mob – but they must have been there, and the day before, and the month before. Now, sat on low stools behind their baskets, they called out to Amaka, each trying to convince her that their tomatoes were ‘finer’, ‘sweeter’, ‘would make soup that your husband would love.’ Amaka picked an old woman in mismatched Ankara iro and buba. She had not spoken the loudest or employed the most convincing embellishments, but the other women close to her looked like they were in their twenties while she looked like she was old enough to have children their age.
‘Good evening, ma,’ Amaka said.
The other market women shifted their attention to potential new clientele. The woman used a newspaper folded in two to stop flies landing on her tomatoes.
‘Five for two hundred for you, my daughter,’ the woman said.
Amaka stopped by her basket. ‘Mama, I’m not buying today. Were you here yesterday?’
‘Yesterday? I was here. I’m always here.’
‘Did you see what happened here?’
‘What is that?’
‘The man they killed.’
The woman sighed heavily. ‘We saw, my daughter. We all saw. May God forgive his sins.’
‘Mama, there was a girl. They were going to do something to her as well. Did you see? Do you know what happened to her?’
‘The girl? Who did you say you are again?’
‘I was also here. I was trying to help the girl. They hit me on the head with something. Some women protected me from them until the police came.’
‘Police? Are you a policewoman?’
‘No, I’m not with the police. My name is Amaka. I am an ordinary civilian like you. I just want to know what happened to the girl.’
‘The girl? Who is she to you?’
Amaka became aware of people standing around her. The other traders had come over, and with them stood men in blood-stained clothes. Amaka stood up.
A stout man in his fifties, wearing a pair of khaki shorts and a faded blue polo top, both pieces of clothing stained with brown smears of red, and holding a machete in one hand, asked the woman, ‘Mama, kíni ó bi yín?’ The lady explained that she was asking about the thief killed there yesterday.
The man said he hoped she hadn’t told her anything. The woman shook her head and answered that she hadn’t.
The man looked at Amaka while still speaking to the woman. He said Amaka was probably an undercover police detective or a journalist.
The woman raised her palms and reiterated that she hadn’t said anything.
‘Who are you? Wetin you find come?’ the man asked Amaka.
More men pushed through to the middle of the arc that had now formed around Amaka and the old lady. Most of them were shirtless, their lean, hard muscles glistening under their sweat-oiled skin. A lot of them held machetes.
‘Orukọ mi ni Amaka,’ Amaka said.
‘Ah, ó 
Yorùbá o,’ someone exclaimed.
‘Why are you disturbing this woman?’ the stout man asked.
‘I have explained to mama that I was here yesterday when it happened. I want to know what happened to the girl. She was almost killed along with the thief.’
‘There was no girl. We did not see any girl. The police have already questioned us and we told them what I’m telling you, that we had nothing to do with it at all.’
More young men joined the crowd. Amaka and the old woman were enclosed.
‘You did not have anything to do with what happened to the girl?’
‘This is how you educated people behave, assuming that because we did not read as much as you, we have no sense in our heads. Why are you trying to put words into my mouth? Or, are you a lawyer? Did I mention any girl? I said we did not have anything to do with the area boys who set fire to the unfortunate boy.’
‘You are right, I’m a lawyer, but I am not trying to put words into your mouth. I just want to find the girl.’
‘Who are you to her?’
‘I do not know her. I only want to know what happened to her. Like I told mama, I was here and I was trying to save her from the area boys when they descended upon me as well. I also want to find the people who helped me, who shielded and saved me from them.’
A young boy standing next to the man had been studying Amaka’s face.
‘She’s the one that was struggling with the area boys,’ he said.
One by one other people began to recognise her.
The stout man studied Amaka’s face. ‘It is you?’ he asked, pointing with his machete.
‘Yes. I was trying to save the girl,’ Amaka said, staring past his machete into his eyes.
‘Follow me,’ he said.
The younger men got behind Amaka.
‘Where are we going?’ Amaka asked.
Someone pushed her from behind. ‘Just follow us,’ the young boy said when Amaka turned to look at him. His machete was in his hand by his side.
‘What is happening? Where are you taking me?’
No one answered.