“Thank you, Prof. You have really helped.”
“You are most welcome, Inspector,” he said, smiling with his voice. “Please, do keep me posted.”
As he hung up, Dawson reflected on what Botswe had said: something terrible done to his family member or members. Is that where Jason Sarbah came in? Did he blame Charles and Fiona for Angela’s death and kill the couple for revenge?
Dead tired, Dawson took a cold shower, brushed his teeth, and fell into bed. In the morning, he would meet with Superintendent Hammond with a fresh mind.
DAWSON SAW THE neighborhood for the first time by the light of day as he emerged from the lodge. It had rained overnight, which surprised him because he hadn’t heard anything and rain usually woke him up. It proved how tired he must have been. He locked the front gate behind him. Across the street was Stellar Lodge, a white, two-story hotel with a brand new extension. Business must be good, Dawson thought, although he recalled that the place had had some adverse publicity about a year ago after a hotel guest had been apparently electrocuted in the shower. Dawson wondered how one could engineer a murder that way. Not as gruesome as his present case, but certainly not a pleasant way to die.
He observed several 4×4 SUVs parked in front of the hotel. One pulled out with its Ghanaian driver at the wheel and a white man in the rear-probably an oil engineer.
He decided to take a short walk before hailing a cab so that he could get a good sense of the neighborhood. Within a ball’s throw of the lodge, young soccer players were performing their early morning drills on a large green playing field that belonged to Hassacas, a local soccer team. He caught a slightly smoky scent to the air-someone cooking on firewood somewhere, but he couldn’t tell from which direction. He passed a petrol station to the left, and a little farther along, a strip mall with a clothing store, a jewelry boutique, and a barbershop.
The morning had started out cool but had warmed up considerably by the time he arrived at Shippers Circle, a neat roundabout that Malgam Oil had recently refurbished. Taxis were ubiquitous in Takoradi; Dawson got one in seconds with barely a gesture. The driver, a bone-lanky man whose name was Baah, looked like he was eighteen but he assured Dawson he was twenty-four.
“How long have you lived here?” Dawson asked him.
“Since I born,” Baah said, with a broad smile marred by crooked teeth. He added that he had only been out of Takoradi once in his life. His knowledge of the city and his love for it were obvious as he pointed out landmarks. Just beyond Paa Grant roundabout, he gestured to a thickly wooded area on their right.
