Taduno's Song by Odafe Atogun

Author:Odafe Atogun
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canongate Books

FIFTEEN

They brought him before the President on a Sunday morning. He had lost count of the days, but they told him it was a Sunday. They said the President sees troublesome prisoners only on Sundays, and decides their fate on Mondays. If the prisoner is lucky he gets a reprieve on Tuesday. If he is not, he goes to the gulag on Wednesday.

‘Your fate is no longer in your own hands,’ a soldier told him, as they drove him to the President’s office. ‘In fact, your fate is no longer in the hands of man. It is now in the hands of a mighty man. All you can do now is pray.’

Taduno nodded and said: ‘Thank you.’

‘I said you should pray, I didn’t say you should say thank you.’

‘Thank you,’ he repeated.

The soldier sighed. The fate of this prisoner is already sealed, he thought to himself.

*

He had more waiting to do when they got to the President’s office. After a long chain of rigorous security checks and counterchecks, they brought him into a sprawling, tastefully furnished room. A handful of men dressed in flowing gowns sat on comfortable leather settees at one end of the room. He sat at the other end, with a single soldier by his side; and he could tell that he was the only prisoner in that room. All the others were potbellied VIPs.

He sighed and caressed his guitar.

*

He waited and waited.

The soldier guarding him warned him not to play his guitar when he was before the President.

‘Why?’ he asked innocently. ‘Music is good.’

‘Mr President does not like music,’ the soldier said quietly. ‘Music has caused too much trouble for his government.’

‘I see,’ he replied.

They fell silent again.

An hour or so later, the soldier began to snore quietly. Taduno turned to watch him sleep for a moment. Then he shook his head in pity, knowing the poor guy was exhausted.

He continued to caress his guitar, resisting the strong urge to play his music to the VIPs. None of them paid him any attention. They just kept whispering nervously amongst themselves, strategising ahead of their meeting with the President. He wondered if they were powerful politicians, or businessmen, or both. Judging by their potbellies and the smell of money about them, he assumed they must be both.

He waited for hours before he was ushered in to see the President, ahead of the potbellied men who had been waiting for much longer. The men looked at him as they took him in, wondering who he was and why he carried the guitar that seemed so disturbingly alive.

*

A female secretary showed him into the President’s office and retreated silently, closing the sturdy door after her. At first, he felt lost in the vast office, and he wasn’t sure whether to walk towards the huge mahogany desk at the far end of the room where a man was seated, or whether to remain still until he was summoned. He became even more confused when it occurred to him that he was alone with the man at the far desk whose face was buried in a thick file.

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