‘Yes. Her case will be tried this morning.’
When Sango got to the magistrate’s court, the magistrate had not arrived. A number of men and women sat inside and outside the court, waiting. Some of them had waited six months for their cases to be heard. And yet Aina’s case was being heard so very soon.
Sango saw the Black Maria standing under the mango tree. It was empty. Looking upstairs he saw a window with stout iron bars. A dangerous-looking man with a grizzled beard tried to bend the bars. What if he did? Could he survive a fifty-foot fall to the traffic below? Sango looked at the next window and saw only women. An overwhelming flood of shame swept over him. Aina would be with them. But why did he feel ashamed? What was different about her case? He had often come here to this same court and it had meant nothing to him. He went back into the court and sat in the wooden chair and looked at the magistrate. This was Dirisu, a man feared for his cold-blooded strictness. Around the table a handful of police inspectors, plain-clothes detectives of the C.I.D., shuffled papers. They looked important, with that power to grant or remove personal freedom.
The prisoners began to trickle in, but Sango was looking for a particular one. Suddenly there was a hum. Aina was led into the court. Amusa felt a lump rise in his throat. He should have done something to save her, but hadn’t. As it was, she stood alone against a city determined to show her no mercy. She would never win. Sango could hardly bear to look at her face, grey and drawn with suffering, the sheepishly straining eyes, one of which appeared to be swollen.
From the witness box she was repeating after the policeman: ‘I promise to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.’
It all looked so formal with a constable standing behind her in the witness box. ‘On 26 March at 0430 hours you, Aina, did enter and break into the residence of Madam Rabiyatu Foleye of 19A Molomo Street and at the said time did remove, without her prior knowledge or consent, one wearing apparel, valued at £30. Do you plead guilty or not guilty?’
‘Guilty!’ came the faint voice. This must have been what the young policeman told her the night before. Do not say ‘not guilty’ because that will complicate things and annoy the magistrate. Plead guilty and he will be lenient. You will be fined, that’s all. A few pounds at the most. Her voice came up again. ‘I – I stole the cloth. I am guilty.’
‘You are guilty?’ There was a sneer on the magistrate’s face.
‘Yes, your worship.’
A moment’s silence as heavy as the entire twenty years of Aina’s life. What would happen now? Sango wanted to disappear immediately.
‘Three months!’ The magistrate’s voice was like a whiplash. ‘Next case!’
And immediately an old woman at the back of the court broke out in a wail. Two policemen seized Aina. She fought violently, kicking their shins, clawing, biting. ‘O, my mother! My mother, come and save me. O Lord, I am dead – O!’
But the stalwart men had been hand-picked and she might just as well have saved her breath. ‘Ha,’ they laughed. ‘Your mother did not follow you on that day! Ha!’
Amusa sat cowed. His limbs were heavy and inactive, his throat parched. He needed a drink. He got up ponderously; walked out of the court. Under the mango tree, the Black Maria was leaving. He caught a glimpse of the policeman with the rifle at the back door, Aina’s slim waving hand through the bars. She still clung to him even when condemned.
An old woman shuffled beside Sango. She stopped, and said: ‘Thank you for all you did, and may God bless you.’
He did not need to look at her, could not bear it. He heard her footsteps as she walked up to the mango tree, mumbling in her dejection; and then he was alone.
3
When Sango got to the Sensation office, McMaster, editorial adviser, had not yet arrived. Amusa talked to the art subeditor about the poor quality of the sports pictures that had appeared in recent issues of the paper. He saw the night editor, Mr. Layeni, shuffling towards them with sleepy eyes. Sango looked at him, said good morning, and continued talking to the art sub-ed.
Layeni stopped. He was one of the old school of Africans who believe that the younger generation were getting too cute. They were rude, did not bow to their elders as of old. They called it ‘education’, but he had another word for it. They lacked ‘home-training’. He would show them. He always showed them.
‘Why didn’t you greet me?’ he demanded of the art sub-ed. ‘That’s how you younger people disregard your seniors. I don’t profess to be very educated, but I’m your senior in age.’
‘But I said good morning; Sango, did you not hear me?’ The art sub-editor stared helplessly round the office. Protesting and apologizing voices were raised from all tables. The art sub-ed was told to say good morning again, which he did, but Layeni continued to harass him at the top of his thin voice. He was now in the position of a man who has started a row for which no one has any use. He was merely talking to keep face. No one listened to him. He had become a nuisance.
All of a sudden his manner changed. He stopped near the stairs, looking down. Sango followed his gaze. The man coming upstairs wore a gilt-edged velvet fez with golden tassels. He was smoking a cigar, and smoking it as only a big man knows how. His robes radiated wealth.
‘That’s Lajide coming,’ Sango said.
‘Perhaps he wants to insert an advert in the Sensation.’
Lajide waved his cigar. ‘Hello! How is everybody?’ His voice was warm and friendly.
Everybody was all right. Everybody waited to know the source of this sudden display of goodwill. Lajide joked. He laughed at the inconvenience of leaving one’s home at night to work for somebody. But people had to do it. It was the same in all countries. If people did not work at night, things would not go on. Layeni laughed, but Sango could see that he was nervous about something.
‘Well,’ Layeni stammered. ‘I – I must be going now.’ He looked about him, smiling uneasily.
Lajide blocked his way. ‘It’s you I’ve come to see. That’s why I’m up so early.’
‘Me?’ said Layeni.
‘I’ve come to collect my money.’