“I believe he’s still abroad,” Seidu responded in a marvelous baritone. “I can email him to find out.”
Dawson’s phone vibrated, and he checked it.
“From Dr. Smith-Aidoo,” he told the other two. “She wants me to meet her at the Raybow Hotel. Where is that?”
“It’s not far from the Africana Roundabout in Takoradi,” Seidu said. “It’s not far from Shippers Circle.”
“Thank you, sir.” Dawson stood up. “I’ll go there now.”
“Okay,” Hammond said. “We’ll talk later, then.”
Seidu rose from his chair with conventional courtesy, but Hammond stayed right where he was. As Dawson walked back outside, he reflected that the superintendent seemed to be stuck in resentment thick as tar. He appeared to be taking the intervention of CID Headquarters as a personal insult. There’ll be little or no help from him, Dawson thought. In fact, he might be a hindrance. Dawson would have to be on his guard and ready for a fight. He was up to it, but he would prefer not to have to do it.
AS BAAH DROVE TO the Raybow Hotel, he showed Dawson more evidence that the oil industry was profoundly affecting Takoradi. The skeletal necks of building cranes dotted the skyline. The sprawling Best Western Atlantic Hotel with luxury chalets and hundreds of rooms had superseded the old military barracks on Officers’ Mess Road.
“What do you think of all this construction?” Dawson asked Baah. “Are the locals better off because of the oil?”
Baah sucked his teeth. “They say one day we will all see benefit, but I think they are telling us lies. Someone like me will never get any oil money. Only the oburonis, the white people, and those big businessmen and the ministers of parliament will get plenty money, buying Benzes and houses for their girlfriends. You watch. Just now when we get to the Raybow, you will see them-old men with young, young girls.”
Baah, who lived in a section of Takoradi called Kwesimintsim, said that although his own rent of twenty cedis a month had not gone up, he knew of people evicted after their landlords had suddenly doubled or tripled their rent as higher paying customers arrived from other parts of Ghana and neighboring Côte d’Ivoire.
They turned into the driveway of the Raybow, a three-story, ivory-colored hotel with arched columns and a bronze cembonit roof. Baah pulled up at the portico entrance, and a uniformed doorman stepped forward to open Dawson’s door.
“Morning, sir.”
The doorman directed Baah where to park and then held open the entrance door for Dawson. He went into the lobby, which had subtle lighting, gleaming wood floors, and a spiral staircase to the left. He stopped at the receptionist counter where a young man and woman greeted him.
