I Do Not Come to You by Chance - By Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani Page 0,63

to work again and just be collecting free money. They’ll even give you a house.’

I was not pacified. He must have seen it on my face.

‘OK,’ he continued. ‘You, you went to school. Did they not teach you about slave trade?’

‘They did.’

‘Who were the people behind it? And all the things they stole from Africa, have they paid us back?’

‘But Cash Daddy, can you imagine what will happen when her . . . ,’ I knew about husbands and boyfriends and sugar daddies, but the word ‘partner’ was alien to my vocabulary, ‘. . . when her man finds out? At least let’s leave her with the one we’ve eaten so far and try and—’

‘Kings, sometimes I get very worried about you. Your attitude is not money-friendly at all. If you continue talking like this, soon, whenever money sees you coming into a room, it will just jump out through the window.’

He had glared for a while, then shrugged, as if finally willing to concede.

‘OK. Since you don’t appreciate this opportunity God has given you to abolish poverty from your family once and for all, continue worrying about one oyibo woman in America. Be there worrying about her and leave off your own sister and your mother.’

Cash Daddy was right. Not being able to take care of my family was the real sin. Gradually, I had learnt to take my mind off the mugus and focus on the things that really mattered. Thanks to me, my family was now as safe as a tortoise under its shell. My mother could finally stop picking pennies from her shop and start enjoying the rest of her life. My brothers and sister could focus completely on their studies without worrying about fees.

Mirabelle had her problems, I had mine.

Suddenly, I heard a mouth-watering sound. My head snapped up from the computer screen. In this business, the ringing of a phone - whether cellular or land - was the sound of music. It was also a call for order. Buchi, who was sitting at the desk with the five phones and the fax machines, removed chewing gum from her mouth, pasted it onto her wrist with her tongue, then clapped her hands quickly to catch everybody’s attention.

‘Shhhhhhh!’ she shouted.

All talking ceased.

There were five of us who shared this room that Cash Daddy had called the Central Intelligence Agency. The receptionist, the menial staff, the dark-suited otimkpu whose main duty was to herald the arrival of their master and to make sure his presence was well-noticed, all stayed in the outer office. Buchi received all incoming calls before passing them on. At different points in time, depending on who was calling, she could say she was speaking from the Federal Ministry of Finance, the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation, the Central Bank of Nigeria . . . Now, after ensuring that the noise in the office had reduced to a more conducive level, she cleared her throat and lifted the receiver.

‘Good morning. May I help you?’ she asked in a clear, professional voice.

Buchi was a graduate of Mass Communication from the Abia State University, Uturu.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes,’ she said again.

While listening, she nodded and scribbled diligently in a jotter. Buchi took her job quite seriously.

‘All right if you could just hold on for one second, please, I’ll pass you on to the person in charge of that department.’

She pressed the mute button and extended the appliance in my direction.

‘Kings,’ she whispered as an extra precaution, ‘it’s Ben’s Port Harcourt Refinery mugu.’

Ben was one of our office cleaners. As well as those of us in the CIA, everybody else - the otimkpu, gatemen, drivers, cleaners, cook, receptionist, the boys who lived in Cash Daddy’s house - was entitled to compose their own letters and blast them out to whomever they pleased. Like Cash Daddy always said, there were more than enough mugus to go round. But as soon as contact was established and it looked like money was on the way, whoever had initiated the correspondence was supposed to let me know. Only I and Protocol Officer had keys to the cabinet where we stored the letterheaded sheets, death certificates, bank statements, call-to-bar certificates, proof of funds, money orders, cheques, and any other documents that might be required to prove the authenticity of a transaction. Only I and Protocol Officer could make the phone call to authorise our Western Union official to look the other way.

Some weeks ago, Ben had sent out letters claiming that he was