“Darko, stop!” she begged in between paroxysms.
“Okay, okay,” he said, grinning and letting her relax against him again.
“You know what I’m thinking?” she said.
“What?”
“I get the feeling this might be some kind of sacred grounds and that we’re trespassing.”
“Then they should put a sign up that says so.”
“The gods expect you to automatically know certain things.”
“Oh, really?” he asked innocently.
“Yes, Dark. Which is why you probably shouldn’t have your hand in my blouse.”
She gave his right hand a firm but playful slap and he withdrew. “All right,” he said with a sigh. “I’ll be good-even though it’s going to kill me.”
She laughed and relaxed against him. “You can handle it.”
“Barely.”
She was quiet for a moment, then, “I hope the kids are all right.”
“Abe is taking care of them,” Dawson murmured. “For once, don’t think about the boys. We hardly ever get to spend time together alone, you and I, so let’s enjoy this moment.”
“Okay,” she said softly.
He wrapped his arms around her and inhaled the sweetness of her skin. They were silent, enjoying each other and the sound of the gentle breeze stirring through the trees of the forest.
ON SUNDAY MORNING, CHRISTINE, Hosiah, Akosua, and Abraham went to church while Dawson stayed behind with Sly, who was Muslim. They walked over to Chikata at the Stellar. Dawson switched the TV channel from the action adventure he had been watching to something more child-suitable, and Sly settled down on the bed to watch while the two men sat at a table on the balcony to talk about the case. They hadn’t had time to discuss Chikata’s outing with Baah in detail, but Dawson knew that the trip had turned up little to nothing.
“We went to a priestess in New Amanful,” Chikata told him now, leaning back and stretching his legs. “When I asked her about human sacrifice, she got offended and said, ‘I don’t involve myself with the spilling of human blood.’ She seemed very serious about that. Then we found fetish shrines in Kwesimintsim and Anaji-those are some other sections of Takoradi. The priests and healers we saw there wouldn’t talk. They mostly shook their heads and gave me evasive answers. They didn’t want to reveal any tricks of their trade.”
Dawson nodded. “Much of traditional medicine is jealously guarded. It’s like companies who don’t want to reveal their manufacturing process.”
“One possible lead, though,” Chikata continued. “The New Amanful priestess told me I should get in touch with a well-known fetish priest called Kweku Bonsa. She said if anyone knows about something like that, it’s Bonsa. He works in Kojokrom, a little way out from Takoradi. We didn’t have enough time, but maybe I can track him down tomorrow.”
