KARMA

K A R M A

“Come on in”,Oyenna replied cheerfully to the knock on the door. On hearing it open, he glanced up with a smile which froze in place as he realized that the masked entrant hadn’t been the visitor he was expecting. ‘Who are you and how did you get in here?’, he asked it in obvious fright as he jumped off his bed.

‘Trust me, you know who I am. You are just trying to pretend like you don’t remember’,the stranger retorted, producing a gun from its shoulder bag.

‘I don’t understand what you mean. I can’t even tell if you’re male or female’, Oyenna said in despair. ‘How then do you claim that I know you?’

‘Well, I must say that I am a bit surprised at your reaction. I’m sure you never considered gender differences while you perpetuated your atrocities with the innocent teenagers left in your care for years so this shouldn’t be an issue for you! Anyway, my face is going to be the last you’ll ever see, so …’, the stranger lifted the mask and Oyenna gasped with obvious recognition.

 He couldn’t have forgotten so easily a face as this one; one he used to know by some other name, but who now preferred to be called ‘Karma’.

‘So let’s get down to business, I have a few more stops to make. Let’s go get a glass of drink from the kitchen; time is no longer on our side.’

After all was set, Karma went to the phone, dialed 911 and in a muffled voice whispered,’I think I just witnessed a suicide.’

•           *             *             *                *

With the phone ringing so loud I could no longer shut it out of my head, I jumped out of bed and was informed by my table clock that I had only been in bed a little over two hours, uniform and all.

‘Lieutenant Tobe’, I answered, speaking groggily into the phone.

‘There’s a situation at the station.’, Captain Shola’s voice echoed through, sending me out of drowsiness spontaneously. ‘I need you to come downtown and get involved immediately.’

‘Yes Sir!’ In three minutes, I was on my way to Central Police Station, Amawbia Division.

*          *          *          *          *

‘What’s the situation?’, I asked my young partner Zane, who was clearly unappreciative of the fact that his day had just barely ended before it began again. It was 2:15am.

‘Well, the service operator said someone just called and all he or she(the voice could not be identified) said was ‘I think I just witnessed a suicide.’ then the line went dead. No address, nothing else but the call has been traced to 56b Parklane Avenue, Amansea.’

‘56b Parklane Ave… why does that address sound familiar?’, I wondered aloud and then it hit me, just before Zane answered. That was Sexton Oyenna’s residence- the very man we were to bring in this morning for questioning concerning the recurrent teenage sexual abuse in his area especially in the past few months. ‘We need to leave now!’ I shouted, racing towards the police van.

•         *          *          *         *

The moment we walked into the condo, I caught sense of a familiar smell that I could identify from a very far distance; the one smell that I could never mistake for any other in the world - the smell of death.

‘Police!’ I shouted, following due process as I pushed open the door to the living room. Another unmistakable smell sliced through the air -a smell of the stale mixture of clogged blood and barf. I looked in bafflement at my partner and he shrugged. Getting into the house and closer to the living room while he went off to check the other rooms, I saw him hunched behind the settee at one end of the room with his hands to his stomach as if in deep pain. Upon a closer look, I confirmed the dead man to be Sexton Oyenna.

‘Zane! Over here! I found him.’ Zane came into the living room just as I was about to call for an ambulance. My first thought would have been - why exactly would the highly respected Sexton Oyenna Philips, the Vice-principal of Glorious High School do such a thing to himself?, but just then I caught sight of the centre table on which there was a bottle of beer, an almost empty glass and two empty sachets of Arsenic Oxide. Picking up a note beside these,I read out its contents which written in S. Oyenna’s own writing and signature, was a confession to and apology for the numerous sexual abuse suspicions of Andrew, Rachel, Ekene, and at least five other names I hadn’t come across in the course of this investigation. He also confessed to looting some of the school funds that had been in his care some years ago and claimed he could no longer put up with the guilt following it. The letter finished with his decision to end it all, but to do the right thing by first clearing the air concerning it. ‘What a smart way to evade justice’, Zane smirked as he walked out of the living room. I would have thought so too, but something was amiss; I wasn’t sure what yet but I intended to find out.

‘Zane!’, I called back. ‘We have a killer to catch.’