Page 240 - harryDEC12_clean.iba

IT WAS BACK TO BROOKLYN
A sultry, hazy summer day. At 9.30 I had not yet received a phone call. I was sitting dressed in my room and waiting. Sweat ran under my shirt down my spine, because during the night I had switched off the cooling system. Air conditioners made me sick. Perhaps this was all just nonsense, a sort of Nigerian joke, I was thinking, when suddenly the phone rang. I lifted the phone. It was the reception.
“Dr. Weyrauch, a limousine is waiting for you.”
Well, I took my briefcase, went to the bathroom, cooled down a last time my swollen eyes with an ice cube, was shocked by my appearance, and went downstairs. There a tall black man was waiting for me, immaculately dressed in a check suit and a white shirt. Before I could say anything, the other man said,
“I’m the driver and I have instructions to take you to Prince Oghenekohwo.”
We left the hotel and the driver, who called himself Amadi and had a tough scarred face, whose chin was decorated by a well-kept three-day beard, opened for me the door of the stretch Cadillac limousine with practiced dexterity. I sat down on the back seat of the limousine, took off my jacket and felt the pleasant coolness, let myself sink back on the seat, and stretched my legs.
"Help yourself to a drink," said Amadi.
I opened the centre console between the back seat that contained an icebox with a rich assortment of alcoholic drinks and soft drinks. I decided on a Coca Cola that would be good for my circulation. There were also ice cubes.
The driver was steering in a southerly direction, first on Park Avenue, and then he changed onto another big road whose name I had not recalled until I read the signs Manhattan Bridge. We had reached the southern tip of Manhattan. From there we crossed over Hudson River.
“Where are we actually going?”
I wanted to know.
“We’re going to Brooklyn, Sir.”
Hell that again, I thought, still thinking of the traumatic experiences of the previous night.
"Don’t worry, Sir, you’ll be perfectly safe, and I’ll take you back after the meeting."
Well, then, you can’t run away from your destiny, and I poured myself a vodka tonic.
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