‘Well, well,’ he mutters. This is about the worst thing that can happen to a motorist in a Lagos street. To run out of fuel. Ahead of them is a Texaco filling station, but like all the other filling stations it has no fuel. A long, undulating line of cars starts from inside the station and overflows into the street. Drivers sit on their car bonnets, wiping the sweat from their brows, waiting. Some of them have been there for days.

The sky rumbles, a light, half-hearted wind shuffles the dust by the roadside, and it begins to rain. The two look at each other with incredulity written on their faces; as if such a blessing is totally undeserved by them, totally unexpected. Forgetting their marooned, hopeless situation, they begin to laugh and exclaim like children. ‘I said it, didn’t I? I said it’d rain today. Didn’t I, didn’t I?’ James shouts, slamming his palm on the wheel. Lomba pokes his open palm outside, catching the rain. ‘You did, you did!’

At the Texaco filling station, the drivers abandon their bonnet perches for their cars’ interiors, rolling up the windows, setting the wipers in motion; others lock their cars and dash for the service shop at the back of the station.

‘So, what are we going to do now?’ Lomba asks. They roll up their car windows; their euphoria has diminished. The rain is heavy, falling in fist-size drops.

‘This is going to be a heavy one. Let’s dash for that bar,’

James says, pointing to the verandahed doorway of a bar on their side of the road. ‘Ready?’

They scramble out, pelted by the rain on the short dash to the bar.

Inside, the bar is filled with people sheltering from the rain. The room is small, like someone’s parlour; iron tables and chairs cover the little space – all the tables are taken.

‘Psst!’ someone whistles at them. They turn. It is a lady, alone at a table. She beckons them over. ‘Come sit down.’ There are two empty chairs at her table. They sit down. James removes his tie and carefully folds it before putting it into his jacket pocket. The bar is against the far wall, across the room from their table, which is near the door.

‘You wan buy something? Make I buy am for you,’ the lady, a girl really, offers when she sees James looking towards the bar, trying to catch the barman’s eye.

‘Thanks,’ James says, bringing out his wallet. ‘What will you have?’ he asks Lomba.

‘Coke.’

‘I’d advise something stronger than that. I am not a drinking man myself, but I am going to have a beer. We need it. Get us two beers, and one for yourself.’

She takes the money and sashays her way past the tables to the bar. A group is standing at the counter, staring up at the tiny, black-and-white TV on the fridge behind the barman.