Man In Black - Season 1 - Episode 98

4 years ago

Man In Black - Season 1 - Episode 98

“He just ran straight to meet us. We didn’t even have to corner him. When we put handcuffs on him, he just started crying that it’s because he and his family were hungry.
“Ngozi and Danladi came after we had already caught him, with few other officers. One of them was from LIPD. The Lagos Island officers have already taken him back to their station since before five o’clock.”

Tobi looked at Kunle with pride. He hadn’t even known that Danladi and Ngozi had been there as well. True, the burglar was only one person, and somebody who sounded like he had never been in trouble with the police before. He hadn’t even gone there to steal money, self. Just food items. But a burglary was a burglary, and Kunle’s ingenuity in making up for the lack of manpower most especially impressed him.

An officer waking up by four-thirty to put on his uniform and deal with a crime deserved a round of applause. That was the kind of gra-gra that got people promoted in the force. It most certainly had gotten Tobi promotions. Multiple.

Danladi was tall, thin and dark complexioned like most Hausa people Tobi knew with a head that was rather small. Ngozi, on the other hand, was man in a woman’s body. She was tall for a woman, and slim, with a very agile physique and a voice that was as strong as that of a man.

Kunle, Danladi and Ngozi. Wazobia.The thought made Tobi smile.

“Kunle, stand up. Come here.” Kunle did as he was bid. Tobi couldn’t stand, but he could surely smile proudly and shake Kunle’s hand in front of everybody else. “Well done, Kunle. Well done. Keep it up.”

Kunle most definitely looked proud of himself. And Tobi wanted him to be.

“Ngozi, Danladi, you people tried as well,” he said when Kunle had sat down again. “But next time, try to respond more quickly to a situation, especially an emergency. Just imagine Kunle and those two officers didn’t come. Maybe the burglar would have escaped.”

Both junior detectives began at once to list excuses for not responding on time, but a pointed frown from him shut them both up.
“All of you know I don’t sugarcoat my own. All the rest of you, shame on you. You want everything to be the way you like, abi? You don’t want to inconvenience yourself. Continue like that o, and you’ll be answering “junior detective” maybe for the next ten years.”

Most of them laughed, or made noises that showed they thought he was bluffing.
“Oh, I’m joking, abi? Ten years from now, don’t say I didn’t tell you people. Kunle, prepare the paperwork on the incident. It shouldn’t be more than one page.”
“Okay sir,” Kunle said with a smile.

In the past, Tobi had given paperwork assignments many times, and each time the person in question would just smile and nod his head. Tobi didn’t understand why, but now he had caught on. It was a common joke in the department that if you wanted any paperwork done, all you had to do was to give it to any of the junior uniforms in the main hall. Those ones viewed any little work they did as very important, so you just had to make it sound important enough. Kunle wasn’t lifting a finger over any paperwork, everyone seated in the room knew that. Now, thank God, Tobi knew it as well.

“And you must do it inside here, o Kunle. I want to see it in your handwriting before you take it to print.”

That wiped the smile off his face. No, not really wiped. It just transferred it. To Tobi’s face.

Tobi was sitting at the head of the coference table, and he turned around in his wheelchair.
“Cole, you will help me do— ” His saw the photo grid on the screen of the computer the guy was facing. “Tundee. . . ” he tried to read the bold text at the top of the screen, above the photos. “Tundeednut. Tunde Ednut? Am I seeing double or is that Instagram I’m seeing on that computer screen?”

Many faces turned to look. It was Instagram, truly. Laughter broke out like a rabid cough round the room as Cole deftly minimised the page using the keyboard shortcut and then turned around to stare at his Tobi with innocent eyes.

Instagram? They were having a meeting and that was the only thing Cole knew he could do?
“Yes, Cole, what was that you were doing?” Tobi wanted him to say it with his own mouth before he said anything else.