He’d had a call from Barbara Havers en route to this place. “There was no Easter Lange,” she told him. Then she corrected herself by saying, “What I mean is: there is an Easter Lange but she’s not the person got herself arrested.”
“Say wha’， then, Barb?” had been his reply.
“The real Easter Lange works at Marks and Sparks and her size thirty-eights have never darkened the doorway of the bill. She thinks it’s her niece got hauled off. Called Mercy Hart, she is. Black sheep of the family or something like. Anyway, Auntie Easter hasn’t a clue where she might be—Mercy Hart—so we’ll need to get on that.”
“The guv want me on that ’nstead of what I’m doing?” he asked.
He heard Barbara saying something to Lynley and then, “He says to carry on with this other woman. And Winnie . . .”
“Yeah?”
“We think the situation may have to do with FGM, which we also think could have been going on at the clinic where the two women got arrested. It’s closed down now, but the guv says to bear that in mind when you’re having a chat with this Monifa Bankole.”
Now he mounted the steps to a line of flats comprising the ground floor of Bronte House. Unlike the building in Streatham, no key was required to reach them. From the flat in question came the sound of voices: a woman and a man. She cried out, “I tried. I could not. I have told you. Abeo, you’re hurting me!” and his reply was “Can you not be good for something? I have told you what I want. Now you will do it.” Both of them appeared in the doorway. The man had the woman by the arm. He appeared ready to shove her from the flat. She appeared to be trying to stop him. Neither of them saw Nkata, nor did the teenager who followed them. He was shouting, “Leave her the hell alone!” And then a child, crying, “Papa!” from somewhere inside the flat.
Rapidly, Nkata mounted the steps. He had his warrant card at the ready. He said, “Police,” and he made certain his voice carried above the chaos. Neighbours had come out of the flats above, and some of them were leaning over the railing to see what the commotion was.
At this, the man shoved the woman in Nkata’s direction and turned on the teenager, shouting, “You disrespect me, your father,” to which the boy replied, “Oh jus’ try it, Pa. Punch me in the face, you—”
“Tani!” cried a little girl who’d come to the door while the woman shouted, “Abeo, Tani, do not!” as Nkata put himself between the boy and the man and said, “Police. You both think twice b’fore you make a decision results in handcuffs, got it?”
“I am the head of this family,” Abeo said.
“Whatever you declare, man. You sound jus’ a bit like a foreigner so let me make somethin’ clear ’n case you never heard. Assault i’n’t part of heading a fam’ly in this part of the world.”
Abeo thrust the teenager back inside the flat, away from the door. The little girl followed, crying, “Tani! She made me and I di’n’t want to.”
Nkata was left with the couple who, he assumed, were husband and wife. He said, “Monifa Bankole,” to the woman. When she nodded, he gave his name and rank and said, “I need a word.”
Abeo Bankole said, “I do not allow this. She speaks to no man out of my presence.”
Nkata said pleasantly, “I don’ care wha’ you allow, man. You c’n do a disappearing act for me or I c’n take your lady to the nearest police interview room, which, I ’magine, you’d not much like me to do, eh? But you c’n decide. My car’s not far. Jus’ make it quick, eh? I got a lot on my plate today.”
Abeo looked long at Nkata, who, at six feet, five inches, was ten inches taller than he was. Then he looked at his wife, who shrank from his gaze but stood her ground. He said, pointing a finger into her face, “You shame me. Look at what you have become. Fat and stink, hanging with flesh that no man of sense would—”
“Tha’s enough, that is,” Nkata said.
Abeo produced a snarl. He turned on his heel and went back inside. Nkata hated to expose the bloke’s children to him because he seemed the sort who only went after people less powerful than he was, especially when his day turned sour. But he had a sense that the boy, Tani, would protect the little girl at the same time as he would defend himself against his father if it became necessary.
Since Abeo had gone into the flat, Nkata sought a different location to speak to the man’s wife. For her part, she was trembling but doing her best to hide it. She clutched at her bright wrapper dress. She’d had a scarf of sorts on her head, but it had fallen to her shoulders.