‘Well.’ He looked cowed. His scowl alternated rapidly with a smile. He stared at his portrait on the wall behind her. He spoke in a rush. ‘Well. I could have done something. Two weeks ago. The Amnesty International. People came. You know, white men. They wanted names of. Political detainees held. Without trial. To pressure the government to release them.’

‘Well?’

‘Well.’ He still avoided her stare. His eyes touched mine and hastily passed. He picked up a pen and twirled it between his fingers. The pen slipped out of his fingers and fell to the floor.

‘I didn’t. Couldn’t. You know… I thought he was comfortable. And, he was writing the poems, for you…’ His voice was almost pleading. Surprisingly, I felt no anger towards him. He was just Man. Man in his basic, rudimentary state, easily moved by powerful emotions like love, lust, anger, greed and fear, but totally dumb to the finer, acquired emotions like pity, mercy, humour and justice.

Janice slowly picked up her bag from the table. There was enormous dignity to her movements. She clasped the bag under her left arm. Her words were slow, almost sad. ‘I see now that I’ve made a mistake. You are not really the man I thought you were…’

‘Janice.’ He stood up and started coming round to her, but a gesture stopped him.

‘No. Let me finish. I want you to contact these people. Give them his name. If you can’t do that, then forget you ever knew me.’

Her hand brushed my arm as she passed me. He started after her, then stopped halfway across the room. We stared in silence at the curtained doorway, listening to the sound of her heels on the bare floor till it finally died away. He returned slowly to his seat and slumped into it. The wood creaked audibly in the quiet office.

‘Go,’ he said, not looking at me.

The above is the last entry in Lomba’s diary. There’s no record of how far the superintendent went to help him regain his freedom, but as he told Janice, there was very little to be done for a political detainee – especially since, about a week after that meeting, a coup was attempted against the military leader, General Sani Abacha, by some officers close to him. There was an immediate crackdown on all pro-democracy activists, and the prisons all over the country swelled with political detainees. A lot of those already in detention were transferred randomly to other prisons around the country, for security reasons. Lomba was among them. He was transferred to Agodi Prison in Ibadan. From there he was moved to the far north, to a small desert town called Gashuwa. There is no record of him after that.

A lot of these political prisoners died in detention, although only the prominent ones made the headlines – people like Moshood Abiola and General Yar Adua.