The reference to the “treason” of Colonel Bobi brought Kimba out of his trance. He trembled violently, though whether from rage or fear the Russians could not make out. Then he began to talk, slowly at first, in his usual whisper, then faster, his voice rising as he glared at the Zangarans across the room. After a few sentences he lapsed back into the Vindu dialect, which only the Zangarans understood, but the Russians already knew the gist: the everpresent danger of treason and treachery that Kimba knew himself to be in, the warnings he had received from the spirits telling him of plots in all corners, his complete awareness of the identity of all those who were not loyal and who harbored evil thoughts in their minds, his intention to root them out, all of them, and what would happen to them when he did. He went on for half an hour in this vein, before calming down and reverting to a European language the Russians could understand.

When they emerged into the sunlight and climbed into the embassy car, both men were sweating, partly from the heat, for the air-conditioning in the palace was broken yet again, partly because that was the effect Kimba usually had on them.

“I’m glad that’s over,” muttered Volkov to his colleague as they drove back toward the embassy. “Anyway, we got permission. I’ll install my man tomorrow.”

“And I’ll get the mining engineers sent in as soon as possible,” said Dobrovolsky. “Let’s hope there really is something fishy about that British survey report. If there isn’t, I don’t know how I’ll explain that to the President.”

Volkov grunted. “Rather you than me,” he said.

Shannon checked into the Lowndes Hotel off Knightsbridge, as he had agreed with Walter Harris to do before he left London. The agreement was that he would be away about ten days, and each morning at nine Harris would phone that hotel and ask for Mr. Keith Brown. Shannon arrived at noon to find the first call for him had been three hours earlier that morning. The news meant he had till the next day to himself.

One of his first calls after a long bath, a change, and lunch, was to the detective agency. The head of it recognized the name of Keith Brown after a few moments’ thought, and Shannon heard him sorting out some files on his desk. Eventually he found the right one.

“Yes, Mr. Brown, I have it here. Would you like me to mail it to you?”

“Rather not,” said Shannon. “Is it long?”

“No, about a page. Shall I read it over the phone?”

“Yes, please.”

The man cleared his throat and began. “On the morning following the client’s request, my operative waited close to the entrance of the underground parking lot beneath ManCon House. He was lucky, in that the subject, whom he had noted the day before arriving back there by taxi from his interview at Sloane Avenue with our client, arrived by car. The operative got a clear view of him as he swung into the parking lot tunnel entrance. It was beyond doubt the subject. He was at the wheel of a Chevrolet Corvette. The operative took the number as the car went down the ramp. Inquiries were later made with a contact at the Licensing Department at County Hall. The vehicle is registered in the name of one Simon John Endean, resident in South Kensington.” The man paused. “Do you want the address, Mr. Brown?”

“Not necessarily,” said Shannon. “Do you know what this man Endean does at ManCon House?”

“Yes,” said the private agent. “I checked up with a friend who’s a City journalist. He is the personal aide and right hand man of Sir James Manson, chairman and managing director of Manson Consolidated.”

“Thank you,” said Shannon and put the phone down.

“Curiouser and curiouser,” he murmured as he left the hotel lobby and strolled down to Jermyn Street to cash a check and buy some shirts. It was the first of April, April Fool’s Day; the sun was shining and daffodils covered the grass around Hyde Park Corner.

Simon Endean had also been busy while Shannon was away. The results of his labors he imparted to Sir James Manson that afternoon in the penthouse over Moorgate.

“Colonel Bobi,” he told his chief as he entered the office.

The mining boss furrowed his brow. “Who?”

“Colonel Bobi. The former commander of the army of Zangaro. Now in exile, banished forever by President Jean Kimba. Who, incidentally, has sentenced him to death by presidential decree for high treason. You wanted to know where he was.”

Manson was at his desk by this time, nodding in recollection. “All right, where is he?” he asked.

“In exile in Dahomey,” said Endean. “It took a hell of a job to trace him without being too obvious about it. But he’s taken up residence in the capital of Dahomey. Place called Cotonou. He must have a little money, but probably not much, or he’d be in a walled villa outside Geneva with all the other rich exiles. He has a small rented villa and lives very quietly, probably because it is the safest way of ensuring the Dahomey government doesn’t ask him to leave. It’s believed Kimba has asked for his extradition back home, but no one has done anything about it. Besides, he’s far enough away from Kimba to assume he’ll never present a threat.”

“And Shannon, the mercenary?” asked Manson.

“Due back sometime today or tomorrow,” said En-dean. “I booked him into the Lowndes from yesterday onward to be on the safe side. He hadn’t arrived this morning at nine. I’m due to try again tomorrow at the same time.”

“Try now,” said Manson.

The hotel confirmed to Endean that Mr. Brown had indeed arrived, but that he was out. Sir James Manson listened on the extension.

“Leave a message,” he growled at Endean. “Ring him tonight at seven.”

Endean left the message, and the two men put the phones down.

“I want his report as soon as possible,” said Manson. “He should finish it at noon tomorrow. You meet him first and read the report. Make sure it covers every point I told you I wanted answered. Then bring it to me. Put Shannon on ice for two days to give me time to digest it.”

Shannon got Endean’s message just after five and was in his room to take the call at seven. He spent the rest of the evening between supper and bed making up his notes and the memorabilia he had brought back from Zangaro—a series of sketches done freehand on a pad of cartridge paper he had bought in the airport in Paris to while away the time, some scale-drawings done from measurements between fixed points in Clarence that he had paced out stride by stride, a local guidebook showing “points of interest,” of which the only interesting one was titled “the residence of His Excellency the Governor of the Colony” and dated from 1959, and an official and highly flattering portrait of Kimba, one of the few items not in short supply in the republic.

The next day he strolled down Knightsbridge just as the shops opened, bought himself a typewriter and a pad of paper, and spent the morning writing his report. It covered three subjects: a straight narrative of his visit, including the episode of the soldier he had killed; a detailed description of the capital, building by building, accompanied by the diagrams; and an equally detailed description of the military situation. He mentioned the fact that he had seen no signs of either an air force or a navy, and Gomez’ confirmation that neither existed. He did not mention his stroll down the peninsula to the native shanty towns, where he had seen the clustered shacks of the poorer Caja and beyond them the shanties of the thousands of immigrant workers and their families, who chattered to one another in their native tongue, brought with them from many miles away.

He finished the report with a summary:

The essence of the problem of toppling Kimba has been simplified by the man himself. In all respects the majority of the republic’s land area, the Vindu country beyond the river, is of nil political or economic value. If Kimba should ever lose control of the coastal plain producing the bulk of the nation’s few resources, he must lose the country. To go one step further, he and his men could not hold this plain in 4he face of the hostility and hatred of the entire Caja population, which, although muted by fear, exists beneath the surface, if he had once lost the peninsula. Again, the peninsula is untenable by Vindu forces if once the town of Clarence is lost. And lastly, he has no strength within the town of Clarence if he and his forces have lost the palace. In short, his policy of total centralization has reduced the number of targets necessary to be subdued for a take-over of the state to one—his palace complex, containing himself, his guards, the armory, treasury and radio station.