Many Lies and a Truth

But for the case that had fallen into his lap, Professor Adetokunbo Oludare would have considered this a splendid evening.

In his old age, he’d come to develop a special appreciation for sunsets, especially ones as radiant as today’s. The sky above extends like an infinite canvas, with broad strokes of orange spilling out of warm grey clouds. It’s peaceful, serene, like a good dream.

He’d always found it a bit ironic how the bliss of sunset ushers in the darkness of night and the many terrors that follow it. That notion weighs heavily on his mind today. It is the way of things, beauty precedes chaos, like lightning precedes thunder.

The calm is broken by the sharp engine noise of a 2004 Toyota Camry way past its prime pulling up on the road right across Oludare’s residence.

Oludare gives a disgruntled groan. His earliest guest is finally here, no less than an hour late. He makes no move to get out of his rickety armchair. With arthritis and Parkinson’s ravaging his body, the old detective does not enjoy the luxury of the easy mobility of his youth. He lets his guest come over to him instead, hoping the young man will take no offense.

Efe slams the door of his Camry shut with more force than is necessary. Oludare winces from where he sits and patiently waits as Efe makes his way across. The young man is impeccably dressed, decked out in all white style of patterned clothing that Nigerians refer to as ‘native wear’.

Efe takes off his shades when he approaches Oludare. “Sorry, I’m late,” he says, offering his apologies in an overly formal tone. “I was held back at church.”

“I told you this case is important,” Oludare berates, his old voice betraying the toll of time on his body, but still retaining a cutting firmness to it. “I do not appreciate your late coming. That said, you’re actually the first to arrive.”

“First to arrive?” Efe is taken by surprise. “You’re waiting for others?”

“Of course,” Oludare responds like Efe should have known that, though the old man had intentionally failed to mention it in his phone call to Efe mere hours ago. “Three more in fact.”

Efe is struck even harder by the revelation. “What kind of case requires not one, but four detectives?”

“Five,” Oludare corrects. “Don’t forget, I’m a detective myself.”

Efe nods in a dismissive manner. He believes at Oludare’s age, the old man is as much a detective as he is an Olympic swimmer. Maybe once he was great, renown and respected. But a man way past his heyday should no longer be making such claims.

“You can barely get around by yourself. That’s why you need me — or apparently, us — isn’t it?” There’s a bruise on the old man’s wrists with a fresh plaster over it. Efe rolls his eyes as he notices the injury. The poor old man probably got it trying to get up from bed. That’s the man who still considers himself a prime detective.

Oludare does not get a chance to respond as two of his other guests arrive. One on a motorcycle and the other getting rather unceremoniously dropped off by a taxi.

The agitated uber driver goes off on a rant at his customer because when she ordered the ride, she’d indicated she would pay in cash, but now the lady is trying to pay her fare with a bank transfer, and the bank app is refusing to work.

“You too bear with me,” she pleads with the driver. “You know Naira notes are currently scarce.”

“Which is precisely why I was happy you were going to pay with cash but look.”

“Sorry now,” the woman apologises again. “I just forgot to change the payment method from cash to transfer. Abeg no vex.”

Some moments later, the transfer successfully goes through and Amaka heaves a sigh of relief.

“Sorry ehn. Bye. Thank you,” she says in flurry as the driver begrudgingly drives away after getting his money. “God!” Amaka breathes as she shrugs her shoulders, gathering herself. “Such drama. This country sef.”

“Amaka?” The man who arrived on the motorcycle calls. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here. You people will not let someone do his PI work in peace in this Lagos.”

“Ahn ahn, Bolaji.” Amaka claps her hands three times in the manner older Nigerians do when they encounter a rather unpleasant surprise. Bolaji scoffs at Amaka’s reaction to his presence.

“I don tell you say make you no dey do like old woman. Na young lady you be o.” “What are you even doing here?” Bolaji says, switching from pidgin to English. “I thought you only took cases that women hire you for.”

“I should assume the old man has briefed you on the case. The victim is a woman so because of that I took it.”

The duo’s attention is captured by loud sirens blaring in the distance. Shortly, a police van arrives, along with a retinue of pot-bellied policemen. A particularly short man with balding hair gets down the vehicle. The others salute him, then he waves for them to get back into the vehicle and drive away.

“Inspector Rufai,” Bolaji and Amaka greet the balding policeman in unison. The police inspector acknowledges them with a nod. “I didn’t know this was going to be a party.”

“Neither did we,” Amaka says. “I honestly thought I was the only one this man hired for this case.”

“Hmm,” Inspector Rufai grunts. “I wonder what that old professor is playing at.”

“We better go find out,” Bolaji says.

It is only when all four of his guests are gathered in front of him that Oludare attempts to get up. The pain in his joints force him back to his seat. With a frustrated groan, he reaches into the inner pocket of his washed-out blazer and retrieves a bottle of pills. He picks up the tiny flask beside his armchair, pours some water in his mouth, pops a pill, swallows and then flushes it down with more water from the flask.

Efe is still fuming that Oludare invited other detectives to work on this case. He eyes the other three with displeasure and scoffs. “Let me just say now that this was not my idea. I’m perfectly capable of solving this case myself.”

“Of course, we knew it couldn’t be your idea Efe,” Amaka says, “ideas are foreign to that thick brain of yours.”

“You see, you see,” Efe protests. “I knew this would happen. You just arrived and you’re already insulting me.”

“You started it!” She argues.

Oludare takes his walking stick and beats it against the ground. “I didn’t call you here to fight.” His voice immediately suspends the argument. “I called you here because this case is very important to me, and I believe five of us working together will be almost as effective as a younger me working alone would be.”

“Ah!” Inspector Rufai voices his disagreement. “I feel insulted. I’m a whole police inspector.”

“And yet, I have solved more cases in my career than your entire department has in the past decade.”

Oludare stills, exhaling to get his train of thought, interrupted by Rufai, back on track. “Like I was saying, this case is important to me. The young lady journalist who was murdered mere hours ago was dear to me. In fact, I imagine Aisha was dear to you four too, after all, she filled her weekly blog columns with stories of your solved cases. It is because of her work that Lagosians have come to know and appreciate the work that we all do.”

“First things first, we need to go over to the scene of the murder. Inspector Rufai, I believe your officers still have the place cordoned off.”

“Yes, that’s correct,” Rufai answers. “Great. It is only a ten-minute drive from here. Let’s take my minivan. Efe please go into my house, you’ll find my keys on the table.”

Efe grabs the key and gets behind the wheels of Oludare’s minivan, while the rest, together with Oludare himself, find somewhere to squeeze into behind him.

“Hey look, you forgot your flask,” Bolaji announces just as he’s about to slide the minivan door shut. Oludare sinks into his seat and sighs. In his struggle to get to the van, he’d left the flask behind. Bolaji could see the strain on the old man’s face at the thought of having to go back for the flask.

“Don’t worry, I’ll get it,” Inspector Rufai volunteers and jumps out of the van to go get the flask for Oludare. He passes the flask to Bolaji who in turn passes it to Oludare. Efe completes the drive in just a little over five minutes.

Two police vans are stationed at the entrance to victim’s apartment building, one of which Efe recognises as the van that had brought Rufai. If Oludare was going to bring them here, why didn’t he just tell Rufai to go ahead of them then? The old man’s ways of thinking can be quite strange at times.

The police officers there have a young lady in their custody. Immediately Oludare gets out of the minivan and spots the young lady sitting at the back of the police van with her head down, he turns to Inspector Rufai with a look of disapproval on his face.

“I thought we agreed that your officers would not bother this woman.”

“They’re not bothering her. She’s a person of interest,” Inspector Rufai counters.

“Who’s the lady?” Amaka asks, concerned.

“Aisha’s neighbour Adaeze. Poor girl called me this afternoon when she discovered Aisha’s body. I called the Inspector after that, then you three.”

Bolaji’s eyes narrow as he brings his attention to focus on Adaeze at the back of the police van. “You talk about her as if you’ve already decided she could not have been the one who committed the murder.”

“She’s not the one,” Oludare says shrewdly.

“And how do you know that? Or you think just because she looks like that she’s not strong enough to murder someone?”

“She’s not the killer,” Oludare insists.

Bolaji inclines his head as several objections coalesce on his tongue, but then he holds back. Oludare is a stubborn old man. There’s no use arguing with him. If Adaeze is guilty, Bolaji will find the proof. That’s why he’s here.

“We need to see the body,” Efe says.

“Yes, and we need Adaeze to come with us so she can go over what she saw,” Amaka adds.

Inspector Rufai signals to his boys and they in turn order Adaeze to follow Oludare and his entourage.

“What were they asking you?” Professor Oludare asks Adaeze as they walk towards the apartment complex.

“They wanted to know what I saw. I told them I might have seen a person around the time of her murder, and they wanted to know if I’d be able to identify the person.”

The apartment block is a newly constructed two-storey building. It sticks out like a sore thumb out of the pile of houses that clog the street because of its slenderness. Lagos real-estate developers always try to minimize the space their buildings take up because the city is overcrowded, but for this building, it’s over done. The block resembles a shiny but tiny Lego brick the way it’s sandwiched between much fatter complexes.

The only access to the second floor is a narrow stairway by the side of the building. Efe, Bolaji, Amaka and Inspector Rufai ascend with ease, Oludare meanwhile, stalls at the foot of the stairway.

“Let me help you so you don’t fall again,” Adaeze says and offers Oludare a hand to assist him in climbing.

It’s a garish sight in Aisha’s apartment. The victim’s body is covered with a white sheet that is now soaked red with her blood.

“Oh God,” Amaka heaves at the bloody sight.

Bolaji goes over to the body and pulls back the sheet to inspect. “A stab wound to the chest. No marks around the neck, no bruises anywhere else.” He reaches into the victim’s pockets. “No wallet, no phones. I can’t see a laptop. A robbery perhaps?”

“I’m going to go check if anything else is missing,” Inspector Rufai says and heads off to the victim’s room.

While Bolaji concerns himself with the victim’s body, Efe scrutinises the door. “No signs of forced entry. That means she opened the door which makes it likely that she knew the killer.”

“I could have told you that,” Amaka says. “Most female victims are murdered by a close personal acquaintance, like an ex-boyfriend.”

Amaka turns to Adaeze. “You are her neighbour. Did Aisha have a boyfriend or an ex that might have wanted to hurt her?”

Adaeze shakes her head. “Not that I know of.”

“Really?” Amaka questions. “So all the while you’ve been living here, you’ve never seen Aisha hang out with a male acquaintance or anything of the sort?”

Adaeze’s only response is another timid shake of the head.

While the rest are busy asking questions and studying the scene for clues, Oludare goes off to the sofa and plops down, groaning in pain. From his sofa, he watches Efe, Amaka, Bolaji and Rufai with close attention as they investigate.

“Are you okay?” Adaeze asks Oludare, concern for his well-being evident in her voice.

“Yes, I’m okay. But that little trip up the stairs is killing my joints.” He reaches into his pocket for his pills and flask again. He opens the flask and takes a sip of water before realizing that the water remaining won’t be enough for him to use to take his pills.

“Shit,” Oludare curses. “My water is finished.”

“I’ll get you some from the kitchen.” Adaeze gets up and makes for the kitchen, only for her to be stopped in her tracks. Aisha’s body lies right at the entrance to the kitchen and Adaeze would have to step over Aisha’s body to get there. The young lady freezes, unable to move.

Amaka realizes what’s happening and quickly goes over to comfort the lady. “Hey…hey, it’s okay. Calm down.” She gently steers Adaeze away from the kitchen and back to the sofa.

Efe, seeing what’s happening, takes it upon himself to get water for Professor Oludare. He enters the kitchen, unfazed by the dead body in the way, gets a glass of water and then hands it to Amaka to give it to Oludare.

Oludare takes his medication with the glass of water then leans back and reclines into the sofa.

Without warning, Inspector Rufai reappears and breaks out in a loud voice. “Wait!” Pointing, he says to the professor, “Is that a blood stain on your shoe old man?”

Everybody looks down at the soles of Oludare’s feet, and indeed, there were blood stains under there. Stains it looked like someone had done a shabby job of cleaning. Inspector Rufai advances carefully towards Oludare, his suspicion climbing.

“Why do you have dried blood stains on your shoes Oludare. You haven’t been anywhere near that body since we came in, and when you called, you assured me you hadn’t been to the crime scene yet.”

All heads turn slowly towards Oludare. The old man can feel the weight of a thousand eyes baring down at him.

The old professor grits his teeth, then sighs. Turning to Adaeze, he says, “I guess the jig is up.” He draws in a long breath and exhales before he speaks again. “It’s time I come clean.”

Oludare raises his head and meets the eyes staring at him, pair by pair. “Efe, Bolaji, Amaka, Rufai, the truth is, I didn’t call the four of you because I needed help on this case. I called you for because I had reason to believe one of you…killed Aisha.”

All four are thrown into shock by Oludare’s confession.

Efe is the first to break out of his shock. He breaks into a weird laugh as the hints come together in his mind. “Of course,” he scoffs. “Only you could do something like this. I should have realized it when we were climbing the stairs and Adaeze said she didn’t want you getting injured again. That’s because you came up here this afternoon, before you called anyone.”

Oludare nods slowly and even adds a fake applause. “That’s right,” he says, “detective,” he adds with a sneer.

Bolaji hangs his head to the side. “Yeah, Efe is right. I knew it was unlike you to wait and not take action for hours after finding out about a case. The only reason you waited for us four to arrive is because you’d already done your investigation.”

Amaka steps forward, folding her arms over her chest. “I can tell from that grin on your face you’ve already narrowed it down to one person. You look so pleased with yourself right now, so why don’t you go ahead and spill it. If you believe one of us killed Aisha, drop a name.”

A world-stopping silence captures the room. The prospect of Oludare’s often accurate accusing finger pointing at any one of the detectives hangs in the air like a wrecking ball.

Oludare opens his mouth to speak and then suddenly seizes.

Adaeze is startled. “Oludare…Oludare…professor?”

The old man crashes to the floor and starts to convulse. Adaeze goes down after him, calling his name repeatedly and trying to hold him still. It’s of no use, in seconds, Oludare is dead.

Inspector Rufai’s attention turns to the glass cup on the table that Oludare had just drunk from moments ago. “Poison.” Rufai picks up the cup and inspects it. “It would seem one person here figured out Oludare’s game and took him out before he could name the murderer.”

Adaeze turns to face Amaka.

“No… no… no…” Amaka steps back. “Don’t look at me like that. Efe passed the cup to me. Everyone saw.”

Efe quickly protests his innocence. “I just took a cup and fetched water from the tap that’s all. I didn’t put anything in it.”

Bolaji’s eyes are wide with suspicion. “If that’s true, then how come Oludare’s dead?”

Efe can’t let everyone think he’s the one who killed Oludare and quickly thinks of a way to protest his innocence. Then it hits him.

“The flask! Oludare’s flask! He drank from it too.”

“So?” Inspector Rufai asks.

“You…” Efe points his accusing finger towards the inspector.

“Professor Oludare left that flask behind and you went to get it. Maybe you put something in the flask then.”

All eyes immediately shift to Rufai and just like that, he becomes the prime suspect.

“Wait…wait…wait,” he shakes his head in disbelief. How could a bunch of private detectives be accusing a whole inspector of murder. “I wasn’t the only one who touched the flask. I passed it to Bolaji.”

Now the attention is on Bolaji. “And so what?” He protests. “This is pointless. Let’s just search everyone and see if we can find poison on their body.”

“Good idea,” Efe agrees. “We do it this way. I check Bolaji, Bolaji checks the inspector, the inspector checks Amaka, and Amaka checks me. Fair?”

“No way I’m letting any man pat me down. I’m not letting the inspector touch me.”

“Adaeze can do it then?” Efe says, suggesting a reasonable compromise. Amaka agrees.

Efe begins, telling Bolaji to raise his hands and then patting him down thoroughly. He finds nothing on Bolaji. Bolaji moves to the inspector and pats him down thoroughly. He discovers nothing on the inspector. Next Adaeze checks Amaka and finds nothing. Finally, Amaka checks Efe and discovers no incriminating evidence.

“Well, that was pointless,” Amaka says after she’s done checking Efe. “That didn’t help at all.”

“Yes,” Inspector Rufai responds. “The killer must have disposed of the poison already.”

“Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way,” Amaka says. “Oludare clearly had it figured out. He knew who the murderer was. The question we should be asking ourselves is how he figured it out.”

“Amaka is right,” Bolaji concedes. Turning to Adaeze, he asks “When Oludare came to see you this afternoon, what exactly did you two talk about?”

Adaeze is scared to speak, but Efe assures her no harm will come to her. “You must speak freely,” he chides. “The only way this ends is if we figure out who did this, and we can’t do it without your help.”

Adaeze answers in a thin, shaky voice. “When the professor came by this afternoon, he mentioned that he wasn’t surprised Aisha’s murder and expressed regret that he’d done nothing to prevent it.”

“He wasn’t surprised by her murder?” Inspector Rufai asks, bewildered.

Adaeze confirms with repeated nods.

“Yes. The first thing the professor noticed when he came to investigate earlier was that Aisha’s laptop was missing. Aisha had mentioned to him last week that she was working a story that could bring down a private detective whose cases she’d written about many times before. However, Aisha didn’t give the professor a name. The missing laptop together with her statement led the professor to conclude that it had to be one of you three because she’d written most prominently about you guys.”

Inspector Rufai throws his hands in the air in relief. “That settles it then. I’m not a suspect in that case. I’m not a private investigator. Aisha has never written about me. I’ve never been a feature of one her stupid praise columns.”

Efe scoffs and sneers at Rufai. “Look at you, so quick to claim vindication.”

“You heard it from the lady’s mouth. Aisha told the professor she was writing a negative piece about a private detective that she’d written positively about before. That’s not me. That’s one of you. In fact, I’ve had it with this. I’m going to order my boys in here so we can continue this investigation at the station.”

Adaeze gulps and Amaka notices. There’s another detail Adaeze is leaving out of her story and Amaka can tell.

“There’s something else, isn’t there Adaeze? Something you’re not telling us.”

All eyes fall on Adaeze once more, and reluctantly, Adaeze nods. “The professor was confident he’d be able to figure out who committed the murder simply by observing you three. But he put a failsafe plan in place just in case. He planted a fake backup flash drive in Aisha’s room, hidden somewhere so obvious it couldn’t be missed. He was going to put the idea in your minds that a journalist like Aisha would definitely have a backup drive in her room. He suspected the murderer wouldn’t be able to resist trying to find it and hiding it on his person. Then at some point, I was supposed to go check if the flash drive had been taken. If it had, the professor would have come clean about his ruse. He would search you and anyone found to have the flash drive would be arrested.”

Amaka realizes why Adaeze had been so afraid of revealing this part of the plan. Only the inspector had gone into the room but when he came out, he said nothing about finding a flash drive. If the flash drive was so obviously hidden as Adaeze suggests, then the inspector must have seen it but refused to share the discovery for some reason.

Everyone turns to the inspector, who once again is forced to protest his innocence. “I didn’t find any flash drive.”

“Really?” Efe asks, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

“The professor placed the flash drive under Aisha’s pillow. It’s impossible to miss,” Adaeze says.

Amaka taps her chin as she speaks. “Then we’ll all just go check if it’s still there. If it is, then the inspector truly did not see it. But if it’s missing…”

“I’m telling you, I didn’t see any flash drive. Besides, Bolaji searched me and found nothing on me.”

“Still, I’d like to see for myself,” Amaka says and starts to walk towards the room. Efe follows closely behind her.

Amaka lifts the pillow from the bed, and sure enough, there’s no flash drive there.

Amaka, Efe and Adaeze all turn to look at the inspector who quickly protests his innocence again. “I’m telling you, I didn’t see anything. Besides, Bolaji searched me.”

“About that,” Efe says, “I would like to search you again. Maybe Bolaji just sucks at searching.”

“Or perhaps, he’s in on it too,” Amaka says, “and there are two murderers, not one.”

As Efe tries to search the inspector, Rufai jumps back. “Don’t you dare touch me. How dare you! I’m the inspector of police.”

Efe, young, fast and agile, forcefully reaches into the inspector’s pocket and pulls out a flash drive. “What do we have here inspector?”

Amaka glares up at Bolaji. “You want to tell me you didn’t feel that in the inspector’s pocket when you searched him?”

“I didn’t,” Bolaji says defiantly.

“I find that hard to believe. And now that I think about it. Earlier, you said to the professor that he shouldn’t think an innocent looking girl like Adaeze wasn’t strong enough to commit murder. And this was before you found out that the victim was murdered by stabbing. You somehow knew there was physical violence involved. You didn’t think of poison or gunshot. The professor was careful not to give us details when he called us. It takes quite a bit of strength to stab someone to death. That statement you made gave you away.”

“This is just conjecture!” Bolaji argues.

“Actually, it’s not,” Professor Oludare says quietly from the floor where he was pretending to have died. He groans as he slowly picks himself from the ground to Efe’s, Bolaji’s, Amaka’s and Rufai’s utter amazement. Adaeze helps the professor back onto the sofa.

“Are you okay professor?” “I’m fine Adaeze. You played your part perfectly, but you can stop acting now.”

The professor turns to the others. “Apologies for my little drama,” he says, “but it was necessary I turn you all against one another if I was to be certain my assumptions. First, I must confess that Adaeze here is not Aisha’s neighbour. She doesn’t live in this building. She’s my assistant. Second, I was the one who discovered Aisha’s body, not Adaeze. On my painful, albeit necessary Sunday walks, I always make sure to stop by and say hi to Aisha. When I discovered her body this afternoon, I knew I had to act fast. I called Adaeze and we concocted a plan. I had assumed that the murderer had to be one of you three private detectives based on my previous discussions with Aisha before she passed. I called Aisha’s editor to ask which detective she was writing about. Her editor didn’t know, but he mentioned she was working a corruption expose that was directly connected to Rufai. And that’s when I knew I had to add him to the mix. I dangled Adaeze in front of the inspector knowing he wouldn’t be able to resist having his men question her. But in doing so, she was extracting information from your men about your entire operation. When we arrived and Bolaji immediately took an interest in trying to stress that Adaeze should be a suspect, I realized maybe in fact there were two people involved in this plot. I planted the flash drive, but to be honest, I had no idea it would work so well. If either Efe or Amaka had found it, they would have brought it up and I would know they were innocent. But when Rufai entered that room and came out without saying anything about it, I knew he had to be guilty. And when Bolaji searched Rufai without finding the flash drive, it confirmed my suspicion that the two were working together.”

Inspector Rufai continues to shake his head as if he’s listening to a raving mad man give a lecture about the dangers of insanity.

“This is ludicrous. The flash drive proves nothing.”

“It does,” Professor Oludare says, “but it is not the only evidence I have. The editor is a witness to the phone call Aisha made to you, asking you for comments on the upcoming article. You threatened her and cut the call, but not before vowing that the article would never see the light of day.”

The inspector tries to protest his innocence again but Bolaji shuts him up with a confession.

“You’re right,” Bolaji admits to the professor, “about everything. The inspector made me do it. He had his men follow Aisha for days, and when they discovered she was also writing an expose about me, about how most of my cases are total fabrications, they relayed the information to the inspector. Rufai sought me out and told me I had to take her down. He made me do his evil job for him.”

Rufai breaks into laughter upon hearing Bolaji’s confession. “It doesn’t matter. This is flimsy. I am the inspector of police. There’s nothing you can do to me. Whatever I say goes. I will make sure all of you disappear and nothing will happen.”

Professor Oludare is unfazed. “I thought you might say so. Well, now is probably a good time to tell you that my dear Adaeze is the daughter of a high-ranking military officer. A general, was it?”

“Major General,” Adaeze corrects.

“Major General,” Professor Oludare repeats, taking the correction. “And when did he say the soldiers would be coming again?”

Adaeze walks over to the window and peers out into the distance. It is dark now, but she can see the procession of military trucks arriving. “They are here already,” she says.

“Did you hear that? They’re here already,” Professor Oludare says to Inspector Rufai.

“My job here is done. I’ll let the soldiers take it from here.”

The old man makes for the exit, walking slowly as he steadies himself with his cane. He reaches the entrance, pauses, and then whirls around. “Oh and Efe, Amaka, I should commend you for your keen observations. Perhaps someday, we can work together for real.” And with that, the old man makes his way out.