chapter NINE

Taye returned to school sober and with an assurance to his parents that he would turn a new leaf. But rather than improve he got worse. He now devoted his time to composing love songs and poems. Bose was completely in his head. He did not stay in class any longer now. He was always queuing to put his name in the hospital book to be able to go to the General Post Office to mail his many letters and poems to Bose. He wrote to her almost daily.

Every 'open' day was an opportunity to see the face of his sweetheart. And he became a well-known visitor at Bose's School. He only needed to show appearance at the gate and the message would have reached Bose wherever she was. Whether in the hostel, classroom or as she usually did, in the library. One habit of Bose known widely by the entire school is that she's a bookworm. Although she too loves Taye dearly, she took things calmly. Even at a point, Taye became a source of concern and worry for Bose because of his frequent visits and letters.

On one occasion, Taye was not allowed to enter the school compound by the gateman and he turned round to break the fence. The gateman knew that he would pass through the cocoa plantation behind the school compound and he alerted the Housemaster in charge of the girls' hostel.

When Taye go to the Girls' hostel to check Bose, he was directed to her classroom where she was 'booking' and that was how he narrowly missed being caught by trap set by the gateman.

Taye's class attendance that term was very poor. His seat in the second row was now constantly vacant. It was so bad that Taye was only available to write three of eight subjects during the first term examination. Taye's leading position in class, he had suddenly lost when the result was out. Even if he scored the maximum marks obtainable in the three subjects, there was no possibility of his beating his archrivals or even the average students whose scores would be based upon eight subjects. Although Taye had collected first prizes in about five subjects only a few months to top the class in the promotion examination to the final year, his performance had now nose-dived terribly. 

Incredible you would say but if you knew the many extra curriculum activities Taye was involved in then you would know that it was not surprising.

He had also become a member of the notorious St. Judas; a gathering of rascals who usually assembled behind one of the hostels when the rest of the students were in the chapel. The Chaplain of Taye's College christened the 'Church' behind the hostel next to the bush, St. Judas. 

Taye and co would be there gisting and smoking. The junior ones among them were usually mandated to climb the mango trees under which the group gathered to watch out for intruders from the chapel and the school compound as a whole. The sentry was to run a commentary of happenings as his contribution to discussion and whenever any fishy movement was suspected; all would flee deeper into the bush only to regroup again.

The second term holidays came and Taye and Bose journeyed together again to Kano before he returned to Kaduna the following day, sleeping at the Kano railway station that night. When he got home he told his parents he could not arrive by the train the previous day because his transport money did not come through the post; so, he hitch-hiked all the way from the South.

"What do you mean, Taye" his father raised an alarm

"How many hundreds of kilometers from Ekiti to Kaduna by road?" Taye replied the distance by road was nearly 900 kilometres.

Kehinde smelt a rat in what her twin brother told their parents and she later asked Taye how he came about a bus ticket. He told her the truth about the journey to Kano.

Before the end of the holiday, 

Bose was becoming fed with Taye. Her love for Taye initially was deep rooted and genuine but it dawned on her that she was infatuated by the brilliance of Taye. His pestering of her life had become distasteful to her. His many visits to her school were particularly annoying and disturbing to her. It was fast giving her a name in the compound, a name that she detested.

Things at a time got to the head that Kehinde's friends started to advise Bose against Taye. One girl who Taye toasted at a function at which Bose was absent was particularly bitter. She swore to make sure she saw the end of Taye. It was this girl who supplied tissue paper on which a short sack letter to Taye was written. It was written in red. The letter came during the second week of the third term. It came in a rumple almost tattered brown official envelope. The address was in handwriting known to the Mailboy as soon he saw it. Unlike her former letters which came in blue envelopes decorated beautifully, this one was plain and ominous. Inquisitively, the mail runner turned the back of the somewhat puffy letter to confirm the sender, He could not believe his eyes. The abusive words written in red biro and in capitals. It read; "WARNING, NEVER WRITE ME AGAIN OR VISIT ME ANYWHERE. GOODBYE. MISS ABOKI". 

The Mailboy separated the letter from the others to be called out at the assembly hall by the duty prefect because he wanted to personally deliver it to Taye. The Mailboy delivered the letter to Taye with some expressions of sympathy. He had been aware of Taye's love for the girl.

Taye did not take kindly to this letter at all and he decided to retaliate. With accumulated revision to do, he vowed to battle until there was no ink left in his pen.

Taye then began to spend longer hours in the school library behind the reference shelves. He was daily turning out 'epistles' most of which contained unprintable words. Taye's longest 'stinker' written to Bose contained a whole big exercise book filled up cover to cover and mailed as a book post.

This particular 'stinker' as Taye tagged it was intercepted by the class teacher of Bose. He showed the 'book letter' to some other members of staff. The consensus in the staff room was that the girl should not be allowed to see it. The book-letter took Taye about four weeks to compose, day and night, researching and writing.