Chapter 5

Chapter 5 - Histories

'He said you’ve got something they want. What could it be?'
'I don’t know. I don’t have much things.'
'Tell me again why you - '
'I tell you - I was desperate and I did not think. I just come from crawling underground and … at that moment, I was only' – he bit his lips in the effort to explain – ' following an instinct for survival.'
'You needed money?'
'Sure. It’s money which make the world go round, innit. – Hey, why you laughing?'
'Innit.'
'Your accent is pretty funny too.'
'How did you learn English?'
'Everybody speaks English in Nigeria. But not like me. I pick up the language of music and film and literature, like what's it called, the bird that steals -'
'A magpie'.
'That's it: silver earring here, safety pin there. I gotta shine for shiny things, and some words got a kind of glitter, don’t you think?'
'So do you think they want you for your poetry?'
Ransome stirring another sugar into his cappuccino, thinking, is this real, him sitting at a table drinking from a neat little cup with Englishwoman? Barman’s eyes scoured them both, but not unfriendly, just curious. Now he must behave well as he can, not break the spell, and maybe she’ll offer him money.
'What do you have?'
He indicated his clothes.
'Do you have family here?'
'No. My family’s back in Nigeria. Just I came.'
'Why?'
Sucking in of breath. Long story and he doesn't like it, but Ransome tells her the whole tale: the English talentscout spotting him, talking up big the French team he work for and how he got a lot of potential – the English scout says puffing cigar on hotel veranda: ‘Ransome you are such a nippy bugger on the wing, I can see it now, your nickname’ll be the Gazelle. The fans’ll be chanting your name. Just sign here.’ So Ransome he sign and the family help him pay half of flight to London. He get there and like they say other scout waiting at Heathrow holding up a card. Next day they give him a suit of clothes and train ticket to South France on Eurostar no less. At station he phone number he got given and this guy turn up after long wait – they put his trunk in the back of a car and drive long time. Finally they come to a small town, he let off at big apartment block and told third floor room so and so. There he find four other Brothers sleeping on mattresses. Two from Congo, one Sierra Leone, one Gabon, they explain him how it works, you fight for place, if you good enough they pay you, otherwise forget it, if you’re lucky they’ll send you on another club to try again. Now Ransome he fine player in Rivers State league, but first training he see other brothas they nippy also and coach don’t pick him for top squad. Then reserve coach he real sonofabitch tell Ransome he not strong enough and send him to weights gym every day alone while others work with ball. This gym real old-fashioned place not hi-tech like you expect in Ee-You. Rusty ‘quipment, smelly sweat stains everywhere, the feel of loneliness with metal sound of de weights clangin’ hollowly. But Ransome he say, come on boy, you fight harder than you ever done before, you can do this – only second day, just him in there, he liftin’ bar multistacked up with kilograms- but his palms so slippery they can’t hold and it fall on his back. He trapped under it, callin’ out, but nobody hear him for a longtime. Club doctor when he see it says, this boy’ll not play again for…actual fact, he ain’t played since that day.

Via Roma: Two men get out of an alpha, both wearing expensive coats in sober shades. On the driver’s side, a smooth, tanned face, salt and pepper hair, opens the gate and shows the other man in –
In the garden the woman is sitting at a table alone. Her opaque wraparound sunglasses give her face an insectoid quality. She’s sipping coffee. A newspaper is open on the table before her.
They greet each other. Salt and pepper introduces the guest. They speak Italian, not dialect. The two men sit down at the table and the woman shouts in through the modern French windows for more coffee.
The guest speaks first, admiring the cornices above the windows of the villa.
‘This is one of the original Bourbon villas. It was built in the eighteenth century.’
‘It’s beautiful. Very beautiful.’ Limited expression range of the foreigner.
‘Thank you. I have had the pleasure of visiting your city. I stayed in…’ she listed a number of top hotels and the guest listened attentively, making comments every so often. The conversation had the feel of an interview granted - an audience with a reclusive poetess perhaps. A question on the importance of form over content wouldn’t have seemed out of place. But salt and pepper interrupted:
‘The negro got away.’
Silence. A sense of narrowing slits behind the shades.
‘You knew where he was squatting.’
‘He ran.’
‘Where?’
‘The scavi.’
‘And then?’
‘We don’t know. He dived.’
‘Dived?’
‘Into the waste channel. Don’t worry, we’ve got our own copy, remember. It is simply a case of finding out what he means.’
'It is the Lord’s will that we find out before anyone else.'
The guest, flashing a crocodile smile, interjected: 'It is a code. A fascinating puzzle to be honest.'
The woman glared at him.
'If it is so easy, why does no one have the answer?
'We have top scholars working on it, myself included.'
'Meanwhile another copy is loose on the streets.' It was salt and pepper's turn to feel the force of her disapproval.
'Come on! I hardly think an African is going to solve it first.'
Insect, and Salt and pepper looked at the guest, who was grinning broadly. He had been peering around the whole time they were talking, like someone on safari – over the woman’s shoulder into the shadowy rooms at the back of the house.
‘You must find it very interesting, living with all this history around you.’
'It’s fascinating', the woman replied. The only parts of her that moved were her thin, bloodless lips. The guest wondered what she enjoyed doing in her leisure time. No ideas immediately occurred to him. What a strange people they were. How serious, and how much they loved the misery of their way of life, so different from America’s clean opportunism. Something romantic about them. He guessed killing each other was what kept them going. It was as if they didn’t know life was there to be enjoyed. Enough money for a luxury yacht and they’d rather gild themselves in hideous mansions, in this hell of a place, not even travelling down the coast where at least you could get to the beaches. Crazy people – but he knew how to deal with them.

So how did you come to Napoli?
'T’aint much of a life wrapping sandwiches. You see them get sold four pounds a time for all hurrying people swinging laptop bags over there shoulders, take away to the office and eat at desks, pretty happy to be having healthy lunch. Maybe some folks they glean a satisfaction thinking me, I part of the drive for a healthy society, people eatin’ here what once would pack away bigmacs each day. Climb the old career ladder n’ that…but Ransome he got the formication thing…like ants in his pants- what he should think is- job London, shit pay but no matter, livin’ with a Brother who is assistant branch manager – his prospects could be lot lot worse after that weight crush his football dreams an’leave him with nothin’. Oh but no, he start goin’ to library man – is dangerous place that public library, an’ he starts readin’ books, gets out one book bout fall of the Roman Empire – ideas in there set to Ransome's head like a welding torch you see at roadworks, all hot and ready to melt the tar.'
'You mean Gibbon’s Decline and Fall -'
'That the one.'
'I had to read it for a course at University.'
'You gone to University?'
'Everyone with even half a brain does where I’m from. So you left the sandwich shop?'
'Half way through a chicken mayo wrap, some guy he asks me all sarky if I’m planning to finish it that week, so I tells him deadpan by end of that week I gonna put bomb on the tube which he take to work. That pretty much be the time when you gotta say a customer service job is not for you. Not to mention the boys in blue might pick me up and throw me in Guantanamo. So I walk out, pick up the money what I saved, and get buses all the way to Rome. Figures I, if all roads lead there bus is the way to go.'
'What did you think you’d do when you got there?'
'Little bit o’ sightseein’. Oh yeah, I did that. Even went in a few cafes like we are in now. Italians respect you no problem if you are well dressed an’ got money to pay yo’ bills. I hit a couple o’ clubs. Real dolchay veeta train I was riding for two days, but problems started when my suitcase got stolen from the hostel – suddenly you only got the clothes on your back and a wallet none too strong for thickness.'
He stopped. Telling his story was triggering such memories that he had to pause to let the images sift through his brain. She was impatient. There was still this mystery of something he had which she wanted to know about – .
'Maybe they just want to throw you out the country. Aren’t you -'
'Illegal' – he showed his white teeth in a short laugh – 'of course. Clandestino they call you here. Don’t know which I prefer.'
'Didn’t you get a Visa to come?'
'Fell for scouts trick, it was a tourist Visa, just one month. The French team if you do good they fix you up with necessary documents. One way I was lucky my injury come so quick. I got back to London with visa still ok – I just showed fake return to Lagos that the scout booked then cancelled.'
'But for Italy?'
'If I see any police I run.'
'Last night then. Wasn’t that why they were after you?'
'I don’t think so. Reason being, in my present abode I sure as certain ain’t the only one senza documenti. There is a six strong West Africa posse living in an old factory jus’ along by the sea there. Now, don’t you think it mighty curious they come only lookin’ for Ransome Ochikwe, askin’ the rest where Ransome is and not mindin’ that they are clutterin’ up Italy too and all hatchin’plans to bring their families over?'
'Could it be something to do with the terrorism threat? When you said you’d blow up the tube?'
'These were not English. English cops just shoot you, ask the questions after that. Oh he was the wrong man, oh well, never mind eh, we still basically gentlemen. No, these were real bad men, not Englishmen defending an empire in fine upstanding way.'
'Which takes us back to the question. What have you got that they would want?'
Ransome sighed, suddenly tired of all her questions.
'I told you, I don’t know.'
She had an idea.
'Let’s try something. Look, here’s some paper, and a pen' – she fished in her bag – 'now write down an inventory of all your possessions.'
He sucked the pen for a while and just gazed at the sheet. Had she assumed too much - that he could write just because he'd read Gibbon? Maybe he was embarrassed... but no, he was off - it didn't take long.
clothes
blanket
photo of my family
laptop computer
'You have a laptop?'
'Just kidding.' He put a lazy stroke though it.
'Blanket.'
'It's not even a flying one. I tried.'
'What about the photo?'
'You think the Italian mafia want a photo of Granma Ochikwe?'
'Well, are you sure that's all?'
'I have a phone card but no credit left. Can you believe they put a picture of bananas on jus' because it's for Africa?'
'One like this?' Mina pulled her wallet out and found the card she'd used before she bought an Italian mobile. 'It's not only Africa.'
'Well the guy in the shop didn't have to choose that one when I said Nigeria.'
'I think you're being paranoid.'
'Sorry, ok this is a very fair society.'
'How do you survive?'
He slapped his forehead. 'You're right, yeah. I still got plenty left in the bag.'
'Plenty what?'
'DVDs. I can sell 'em. Already shifted a few, enough for a decent feed two days straight.'
'Films?'
'Yeah, pirate copies. Some boy - what do you say - from the computer.'
'Burns them?'
'That's it. Then he sells us them - all African boys, Senegal most.... you get them in little plastic wallets with the cover printed from internet. You put your money in and you take a stack of fifty all held together with rubber band. fifty euro fifty cds. Sell them all for two each and you get fifty profit.'
'I paid three on Via Liberta for Blood Diamond.'
'Di Caprio, right. Then you got fleeced. But sometimes they slip in no-hope discs that you can't sell for shit. Like, I got an Easyjet flight attendant training dvd. Now who wants to buy that. You don't sell enough - you make a loss, not a profit.'
'How did you have enough money to buy them in the first place?'
'One of the brothers helped me out. I got to pay him back of course.'
'So the discs are back at your -'
'They searched the factory. But I hid them pretty good. Hey, do you think?'
'That's what I'm wondering. Who knows you're selling pirate dvd's?'
'Anyone who saw me. But the other boys do it too, that's what I don't get, why only Ransome they want to catch?'
'We need to have a look at those discs. There could be something there.'
'We?'
'You'll have to give me directions.'
'Who are you, Cagney or Lacey? Don't look at me surprsied, Nigeria gets TV you know, we ain't in the stone age.'
'Just the seventies. Is that where you learnt to talk like Shaft?
'No, that's my old man. He went to America in the seventies a short time. Came back with a silver tongue, gold jewellry and a bit of a liking for Columbian talcum powder.'