Children of the Street - [35]

Refuge Room Hours: 0800-1700. NO SMOKING,

DRINKING, FIGHTING, OR STEALING

“Inspector Dawson?”

He turned at the sound of her voice, and his breath caught. She was only an inch shorter than he was, which made her tall for a woman. In her early thirties, she was beautifully dressed in sleek black slacks and a white silk blouse that clung possessively to her succulent breasts. Her skin was flawless molten dark chocolate. She had smooth, impossibly aligned braids and little or no makeup.

He stood up.

“Good morning,” she said, smiling. Brilliant teeth. “I’m Genevieve Kusi.”

They shook hands. Hers was soft and slim, nails short but manicured. Dawson’s eyes begged to drop to her neck and below.

“Welcome to SCOAR,” she said. “Please, come this way.”

They went a short way down the hall to her office. Genevieve offered Dawson water, which he gladly accepted. It was a small but immaculate room. He noticed two small speakers above the door, facing her desk.

She sat opposite him in one of the three chairs in the room. He caught sight of her painted nails on perfect toes and tore his eyes away.

“So, how can I help you, Inspector?” Her voice was rich and warm.

“A young man was found dead in Jamestown this morning,” Dawson said. “There was a business card on his body bearing your name, so I thought you might know him.”

He handed her a photograph of the boy-just the face.

Her hand shot to her mouth in shock. “Oh, my goodness. That’s Ebenezer Sarpong.” She looked up. “You say he’s dead? How? What happened to him?”

“He was murdered some time last night or early this morning.”

“Murdered.” She gasped. “My God.”

“Did he work here?”

“No, he was a street kid-a shoeshine boy. He hung around with a group of boys who called themselves the Brooklyn Gang. Ebenezer came to the center once or twice a week. At first it was just to get some rest in the Refuge Room, but recently he had joined our computer classes.” She shook her head. “This is the kind of nightmare we dread.”

“How so?”

“We provide a refuge for homeless children here at SCOAR during the day, but we are closed in the evening. That means they’re all on their own at night. There are thieves out there and fights over territory, possessions, and girls. We always fear that something like this might happen.”

“I noticed you have all ages of children here, from babies up to late teens. Where are they all from?”

“From the more than sixty thousand homeless street children of Accra. Some of them travel from all parts of Ghana to find work here. There are also kids who make a conscious decision to leave their homes right here in Accra to live on the street-perhaps because of abuse. And then there are the children born on the street. We call them Second Generation.”

“Sixty thousand,” Dawson echoed. “And how many kids do you deal with here?”

“We have an average of about a hundred and twenty. A drop in the sea, I know. The problem is far bigger than we are.”

“Was Ebenezer from Accra?”

“A village in the Western Region, I believe.”

“Is there anyone who might have wanted to kill him? Maybe a turf rival?”

“I don’t personally know of anyone, but we should talk to Patience, my main fieldworker. She knows so many of the street children. I’m not sure if she’s here right now-she may be out in the field.”

Genevieve put her head round the doorway and asked a teenage boy to find out where Patience was.

“Yes, madam,” he said, scampering off.

A few minutes later, a plump, bespectacled woman appeared. Her face was round, open, and accepting. Dawson liked her at once.

“Come in, Patience,” Genevieve said. “I’m glad you’re here. This is Detective Inspector Dawson. There’s some bad news.”

Dawson shook hands with Patience. She pulled a chair over from the corner.

“What’s happened?” she asked. Her voice was sweet and clear.

“I’m sorry to tell you that we found Ebenezer Sarpong murdered this morning,” Dawson said.

Patience jumped back in her chair as if prodded with a naked electric wire. “Oh, Ewurade, no. Where?”

“Jamestown.”

Patience’s face showed her anguish. “He was one of our most promising youngsters. Learning to read and write through our computer program-” She stopped as her voice caught and her eyes moistened. “I don’t even want to know how he was murdered. All I hope is that he didn’t suffer.”

“Inspector Dawson was wondering if Ebenezer had any rivals who might have wanted to harm him,” Genevieve said.

“At least one,” Patience said. “A young man called Tedamm. Basically the town bully among the kids, older and stronger than most of them. Over the years he’s maneuvered himself into a position of power. One of the things he does is make children pay him a percentage of their earnings in return for his getting them a job on the streets.”

“A one-time fee?” Dawson asked.

“Oh, no, Inspector. Every week or every month.”

Dawson raised his eyebrows. “That could be profitable.”

“And woe betide you if you don’t pay what you supposedly owe. Tedamm hurts people. There aren’t many boys who can stand up to him.”

“He had a feud with Ebenezer?”

“Ebenezer led a crew of shoeshine boys in Lartebiokorshie. Tedamm claimed they were on his turf. Ebenezer wasn’t intimidated, though. He was plucky.”