Must Read: Paradox Of Abel - Season 1 - Episode 11

7 years ago

Must Read: Paradox Of Abel - Season 1 - Episode 11

The men cast a sudden simultaneous look at Daniel, as if the youngest man was a meteor rock which had just droppped from the sky.

Daniel found himslf grinning nervously, like a demented incipient. His heart was squinting blood through his arteries at a speed Sango couldn’t have matched with a bolt of lighning from his wand.
“Howdy?” Soyinka said, he had finally won in his battle with the gate which now stood ajar like like the entrance of a cemetery.
“Good morning, how may we help you?” Samson asked, the Nazirite was neither smiling nor scowling.I’ve not been shot yet?
Daniel continued smiling so ridiculously that both older men exchanged uncomfortable glances. He quickly spoke out before the men would conclude that he was an escapee from a mental institution. Besides, the impressive way he was clad didn’t give them the liberty to arrive at such a conclusion earlier. Daniel had learnt the art of dressing from one of the best, Richard Kish.
“Um-I-I work here. I train here.” Daniel assessed himself and decided that he wasn’t convincing enough. He added, “My name is Daniel Oliver Famous.”
“Okay. So, Daniel Famous, how may we help you?” Samson asked again.

He had racked his brain for thirty minutes without a definite explanation for his presence here. He decided that the only plausible explanation he could give was to come clean.

The worst they could do was buy him a straitjacket, or they could rush into the stadium, shut the gate in the process; hence locked him out. They could do worse than that, he reflected, they could shoot him.
“Will you answer the question or not?” said the laureate. His pupils behind the spectacles revealing the slightest degree of inquisition.
So, Daniel dropped the bombshell; paltering a little bit with the truth, “Okay,” he took a deep breath, “I don’t know which one of you is her father. Last week, I met a girl in a bus, her name I don’t know. But what I got to know was that she seemed to be running away from home. I’m here mainly because she told me that her father works here in Liberation. I just want to find the father and tell him that his daughter travelled to Lagos to search for her mother. I think she went to her grandfather first. A very rich man, she described him.
He ended his news just as abruptly has he had begun it. Much unlike a triumphant note, as if he had managed to prove out a particularly difficult mathematical theorem which he wasn’t sure of the authenticity of its rightfulness. Not in the least a show of QED.
The bearded one stared at Daniel sheepishly, he had probably not digested anything from what the ex-police officer had said. It was the clean-shaven who appeared to have heard Daniel.
“Are you trying to tell me that Remi left me for her mother?” The man’s facial expression was not bearing any trace of humour.
“It-It appears so, sir.” Daniel replied. Great!

He name is Remi.
“And she’ll be spending the Christmas with her grandfather, right?”How would I know that? “That’s what she told me.”
The man suddenly grabbed Daniel, as if he were a ream of papers, and embraced him in a bear’s hug. Daniel felt like he was hugging the slab of stone on which he initially sat.
“Oh! Thank you, Mr. Famous. Thank you.” Remi’s father eventually released Daniel, the young footballer was immensely grateful for the freedom. Goodness! This man weighs ten bags of cement.

But the man still held Daniel by the shoulders. Fearing the his shoulder bones might snap under the bear’s grasp, he politely shrugged himself free.
“There is one other thing I’ll like you to do for me, Mr. Famous.”
“Please call me Daniel.”
“Okay, you can call me Mr. Johnson. This is Mr. Lala.” he pointed to his bearded partner, who continued to stare at them.

Daniel bowed his head at Mr. Lala and forgot totally about him afterwards. The man could continue to stare till Jesus take a stroll into Liberation for all he cared. He had found the man he sought.
“What do you want me to do, sir?” he said to Mr. Johnson.
The man smiled, “It’s very simple, we’re going to Lagos together to find my daughter.”An opportunity to see her again! Daniel worshipped the idea. He couldn’t believe that he was really going to see the girl again, within such a short time. This is too good to be true. He supposed that God was answering his every prayer. Then something suddenly cut across his mind and he frowned.
“Wait a minute, Mr. Johnson,” he said, “When are we leaving for Lagos?”
“On Christmas eve.”
“Oh no! That’s impossible!”
“What are you talking about?”
“My family expects me home on Christmas eve, Mr. Johnson. I should be spending Christmas with them. I can’t afford to be somewhere else on both days.”
“Your family? Are you married?”
“No!” Daniel nearly could not believe his ears, “I mean my parents and siblings.”
“I’m sorry about that, really sorrry, but it’s very important that you travel with me to my father-in-law’s house.”
Daniel became confused, “Important? How is that important to me?”
“The transport fare from here to Lagos is exorbitant, considering the peanut I’m receiving as salary here. So, if we travel to where you said my daughter went and she is not found there, then it would be apparent that you’ve wasted my time and money, Daniel.”
Daniel could still not get the drift of what Mr Johnson was talking about.Why is this man complicating things? He thought to himself, how would I know if she was speaking the truth or lying. She could be anywhere now.
“And I don’t like having my time wasted,” Mr. Johnson continued, “I don’t like it at all.”
Daniel asked suspiciously, “So, what’s going to happen if we don’t find her there?”
“Just pray we find her there.”
“What if…”
Mr. Johnson cut him short, the next word Daniel heard made him realised that he’d just stepped his innocent neck into a hornet’s nest.
“There’s no ‘what if’, Daniel. If i can’t find my daughter, I’ll tear off your right arm and beat you to death with it. Period.”