Crowns and Codebreakers (2 page)

But this postcard looked nasty. Like those stories had been.

She flipped it over.

There was a scrawled message on the back:
Post in two days.
Printed in tiny letters was a description of the scene:
Boys pose at Bar Beach, Lagos, Nigeria.

She looked at the front again. The missing eyes made her think of spirit masks and monsters, and her cousins and cousins’ cousins laughing because the British girl was scared to switch off the light at night.

She should tell Dad.

She should tell Andrew! He would love this. A piece of real juju!

There was a camera on her phone. It would be wrong to take the postcard to show Andrew: it didn’t belong to her, after all. And it was creepy. But a photo was the next best thing. She snapped the front and back of the card. How long did she have to stay indoors, she wondered, before she could go and show the others?

Probably longer than she wanted.

She put the card back on the orange T-shirt and closed the lid.

Time to break the news about the missing tea to Gran. She walked slowly into the living room.

Gran was sitting in the armchair that was usually Mum’s. Mum and Dad sat across from her on the sofa. They all looked like they were posing for a portrait, with their best smiles and their awkward angles. Even the ragged terracotta walls that Mum had been so proud of doing herself looked like the pull-down backdrop of school photos.

Everyone looked her way.

‘Gran,’ she said, ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t think the black case you’ve got is your black case.’

Gran’s set smile wobbled. ‘What do you mean to say?’

‘I think … well … you’d best go and see. But there won’t be any hibiscus tea today.’

Gran got to her feet with a sigh and left the room. Dad followed behind. Then Mum raised her hands and said, ‘What now?’ before going with them.

Minnie sat on the sofa and waited.

It wasn’t long before she heard a shriek. Yup, it definitely wasn’t Gran’s case.

Gran came back first, her hands flapping like bats in front of her face. Mum was next, promising sweet tea for the shock, even though it would have to be the non-Lagos kind. Dad came last, holding his phone, promising to find the number of the airline, the airport, the pilot of the plane, the owner of the company, anyone at all who might be able to get Gran’s case back for her.

Minnie wondered if anyone would notice if she slipped out and went to find Andrew, Piotr and Flora?

‘Minnie,’ Mum said, apparently reading her mind, ‘stay with Gran. Calm her down.’

Mum left the room to fetch sugar with added tea. Dad left to make some calls.

Minnie was left with Gran.

Gran sat down heavily. Her hands, with fingers so round it wasn’t clear that they could bend, came together in a clasped prayer. ‘It’s a sign,’ she said sadly. ‘It’s a true sign.’

‘What is?’

‘The tea leaves. It’s a bad omen. Tea leaves know the future. Some people can read their whole lives in the bottom of a cup. And these leaves, oh! They didn’t survive the journey. What does that say, eh?’

Minnie was pretty certain that the tea leaves weren’t saying anything at all – except that maybe Gran needed to be more careful at airports. But she knew this wasn’t the time to say anything.

Gran’s hands were still clasped tight in her lap, the lines on her face set, like a compass needle, to Worry.

‘They’ll get it back, I’m sure,’ Minnie said.

‘No.’ Gran shook her head. ‘It has gone. For good. I can feel it.’

Maybe this was the reason why Gran had come to stay, because she was scared of random things? Minnie had overheard conversations between Mum and Dad for months now: Dad worrying about his mum, so far away; Mum not sure that being in a little flat above a shop was better for Gran than being in the city she’d always known,
with friends and neighbours. But Dad was Gran’s eldest child. ‘A river that forgets its source dries up,’ he’d said to Mum. Then, when poetry hadn’t worked, ‘She’ll be no trouble. We’ll hardly even notice she’s here.’

Despite all of Dad’s efforts, no one knew whether Gran was going to stay forever or not. They would have to see. But if she was taking advice from tea, Minnie reckoned, then Gran probably did need to stay.

‘I had dreams that this would happen,’ Gran said, interrupting Minnie’s thoughts.

‘What? You dreamed you’d pick up the wrong case?’

Gran tutted against her teeth. ‘I dreamed that I would forget my home, and it would forget me.’

That didn’t sound a lot like losing a suitcase. Still, Minnie decided it was better not to argue. But Gran must have been able to read her face, because she said, ‘You think I am foolish? I am not. You should listen to dreams. Just as you should listen to your stomach growl when you’re hungry. Dreams are your spirit growling. The king of Ife is very sensitive to dreams. He once stopped an archaeological dig because his ancestors were disturbing his sleep. They stomped through his dreams every night, clattering pans and banging drums. The king got no rest for weeks.’

‘Who’s the king of Ife?’ Minnie asked.

Gran frowned. ‘Your great-grandparents were from Ife, my mother and father. It’s where I grew up. It’s an ancient city, some say the oldest in Nigeria. Hasn’t your father told you that?’

Minnie shook her head. Dad was more likely to tell her the football scores or his opinion on the latest Disney film than he was to tell her about dreams and kings and great-grandparents. Or tea. She was beginning to think that having Gran around might be more interesting than she’d bargained for.

Mum came in then, so Minnie didn’t have to reply. Which was good, as she could think of absolutely nothing to say. Mum handed a steaming mug of tea to Gran.

Gran took it with a sigh. ‘Thank you, Taiwo,’ she said. ‘Minnie was just telling me that she doesn’t listen to dreams.’

Mum’s smile was the sort of smile she used when she realised she’d accidentally cut someone’s hair too short. ‘I’ll just go and see how Dad’s getting on with the airline,’ she said.

Dad was not getting on well.

Minnie could hear him and Mum whispering in the hallway. It sounded a lot like, ‘You tell her,’ ‘No, you tell her,’ but Minnie couldn’t be sure.

Gran sipped her tea slowly.

Finally Dad came in. ‘I’m sorry, Mama,’ he said, ‘but the airline don’t know where your bag is. It isn’t at the airport. Maybe one of the other passengers took it. The one whose bag you have perhaps?’

Gran tilted her head. Her blue headwrap swayed impressively. ‘Then they must call the passenger.’

‘They have. The number on their record doesn’t connect though. I’m sorry, but they said we’ll have to wait for the passenger to get in touch.’

‘
Tsk.
My luggage was labelled properly, with my name and the address I’m staying at. Why could the other passenger not have done the same with their case, hmm? Then we could go to them, and we would not have to sit around waiting for them to call the airline. I bet it was the boy I saw travelling on his own. He was a tiny little thing, though he ate the whole flight. The air stewards made sure he had his own body weight in free peanuts. He was too young to fly alone, I thought. And see! Too young to know about labelling luggage properly.’

‘I’m sure his family will get in touch with the airline once they realise the mistake,’ Mum said.

Gran looked disgusted. ‘Do you really think someone
will return Lagos’s finest hibiscus tea for some cheap boys’ clothes and a torn postcard?’

Torn? Gran made it sound like a forgotten bit of rubbish. Was that all it was? Minnie opened her mouth to speak. Then closed it again. She’d felt something holding that postcard, a sense of menace. Whatever Gran thought, Minnie knew there was something badly wrong with that juju card.

And she was certain that whoever owned it would want it back.

The phone didn’t ring for the rest of the evening. Mum and Dad did their best to make Gran forget her missing luggage. Mum had cooked jollof rice to celebrate Gran’s arrival. Gran picked at it, pushing the grains around with her fork.

‘Is it all right?’ Mum asked.

‘Delicious,’ Gran said, without taking a mouthful. ‘Really lovely. But I can’t help thinking about my tea.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Dad said. ‘There’s an Indian shop on the high street. They might have hibiscus tea.’

‘Why would an Indian shop have Nigerian tea?’ Gran asked, baffled.

Dad shrugged. ‘It’s the way of it.’

Gran nodded. ‘I see. I thought I was ready to come here, oh. I thought I was prepared. But now, I do not know. Men make plans, but God acts.’

Gran sounded so low that Minnie reached out and rubbed her shoulder. She wanted to say, ‘It’s only tea.’ But she was beginning to see that, for Gran, it wasn’t only tea. It was a new life, a new country, new rules. If an old woman didn’t know where to buy her favourite tea, that woman might well feel lost.

The kitchen table, which had always been fine for three of them, felt overcrowded today. Everyone touching elbows and reaching for someone else’s drink.

‘You’ll feel better after a good night’s sleep,’ Mum said.

Gran smiled gratefully.

They all went to bed early. The grown-ups seemed relieved the day was over.

Minnie let Gran get ready for bed in their room. Minnie went to the bathroom and brushed her teeth slowly. She got changed into her pyjamas. Was it going to be like this forever? Stepping out of jeans while trying not to fall and crack her head on the sink? Gran was weird and interesting, but she would be three hundred times better if she had her own room. Minnie sighed and bundled up her clothes in her arms.

She edged her way into her room. There was nowhere to put her bundle, so she left it beside the door. Gran was
already under the Hello Kitty duvet, reading a small black book. She was wearing a nightdress that came right up under her chin. Without her headwrap, Gran’s hair was short and grey. Minnie noticed a thick black wig on a plastic head on the window sill. Gran noticed her looking and laughed. ‘I get to change my hair every day if I like!’

‘Mum’s got some pink wigs in the salon. You could have one of those.’

‘Or a Mohican, like a London punk!’ Gran laughed. ‘I think I would like that. Or maybe a head of hair beaded red and orange and bronze, like the crown of a king!’

Minnie pulled back her duvet and settled against the crisp white pillowcase. ‘Are crowns made of beads?’ she asked. ‘I thought they were gold.’

‘Not always. The queen here might have gold and jewels, but Yoruba kings have mighty headdresses fashioned from intricate beadwork. They are beautiful, but a little scary too. They have eyes that watch you, the gaze of the ancestors.’

‘The kings of Ife?’

‘Exactly,’ Gran said firmly. She lifted her book again.

‘Good book?’ Minnie asked.

‘
The
good book,’ Gran corrected. ‘The New Testament.’

Oh.

‘It tells us to be strong when we face the world,’ Gran said. ‘Though I also like to remember the old story that we were made from dirt in a snail’s shell, so I don’t feel too bad if I don’t manage to be brave all the time.’

Minnie snuggled under her own duvet. The sound of Gran turning the thin pages was like a gentle whisper, lulling her to sleep.

Breakfast on Sunday morning was weirdly, horribly early. Minnie usually liked to lounge about in her pyjamas, watching cartoons for a bit, even though she was too old for that sort of thing really. But, at half past eight, cereal was on the table. When Minnie asked why, Mum hissed that they were going to church. She also hissed that if Minnie could manage not to mention to Gran that this wasn’t a regular event, then Mum would be very grateful.

‘Grateful enough to let me have my ears pierced?’ Minnie asked hopefully.

‘No. Go and get ready. Wear a dress.’

‘Can Andrew and Piotr come?’

Mum sighed. ‘Fine. Ask them. But even if they say no, you’re coming anyway.’

Thankfully, Piotr and Andrew did want to come along. They agreed to be at the salon below the flat in thirty minutes, wearing their best clothes.

Back in her room, Minnie clawed a hand into her wardrobe and, like a bear hunting salmon, fished out a slippery pink affair. She glared at the satin dress with its lace collar and puffy sleeves, and sighed.

She pulled off her pyjamas and jammed her arms into the sleeves. It was like being gripped by a frilly vice. ‘It doesn’t fit!’ she shouted.

There was no reply from Mum in the kitchen.

‘I’m stuck!’ She wriggled and just managed to jam her head in the neck. She was pinned, forced into submission by pink froth. Her arms were stuck right up as though she were a bystander at a bank robbery.

‘I’m stuck!’ she yelled again.

‘Minnie!’ Mum’s voice was closer now, in the room.

Minnie felt Mum’s hands on the material, tugging up, then down, then up again.

‘You might have to cut me out,’ Minnie said hope- fully.

‘No way. There are at least two good wears in this dress still. Breathe in.’

Minnie took a deep lungful of air and tried to pretend
she didn’t have ribs. Mum yanked and tugged and hoicked, and finally the dress was on.

‘I won’t be able to sit down in church, you know,’ Minnie said.

‘Then you’ll just have to lean against the pew,’ Mum said. ‘Let’s go.’

Gran had obviously been ready for ages. This time with a hat on her head instead of a wrap. She stood impatiently at the door, while everyone else got shoes and coats and bags.

Piotr and Andrew were already outside the salon, Andrew in what looked a lot like his school uniform; Piotr had managed to find a dark shirt. They both stared at her dress in horror, as though she was wearing slices of meat instead of satin.

‘Yes, all right,’ she said. ‘I can wear a dress some- times.’

They weren’t the only ones to stare.

There was a bench in the street outside and some older boys were sitting on it. Minnie felt herself blush as she walked past them and heard them comment. She was basically Church Barbie. It was a nightmare.

She kept her head down all the way to St Michael’s, barely glancing at the theatre or shops as they walked.
As far as she was concerned, the ground outside Ahmed’s Cleaners could happily open up and swallow her.