Dee was just settling into her desk and booting up the computer when Geordie came into the room. He was over six feet tall, muscular without an ounce of fat on him, with close-cropped dark hair. He was quite striking in his way. He had the rugged good looks that most women found appealing. He was dressed in his usual Chinos and Vastrick Polo top. Yesterday someone had asked him how he managed in the cold weather with just a polo shirt and a padded jacket. He looked at them with his piercing blue eyes and joked that he had encountered worse weather than this in the summer in Newcastle, which he then assured the London staff was just inside the Arctic Circle. He had said it with a straight face, and found it amusing that some of them actually believed it.

“We have a walk in,” he said, with an economy of words that was typical of him. Despite his appearance he was quite shy around women, something that made him even more attractive to a lot of the female clients.

“It might be a time waster who has no idea of our hourly rates, but bring them in to Conference room 1 and we’ll give them fifteen minutes,” Dee said. Geordie headed towards the reception area whilst she walked across the corridor into the conference room and switched on the lights.

Dee was still asking housekeeping to send someone up to take orders for drinks when the ‘walk in’ stepped through the doorway. The woman was around Dee’s height, but her hair was stacked on top of her head and wrapped in a colourful scarf that contrasted well with the rest of her outfit. She was accompanied by a handsome middle-aged African man dressed in a business suit and tie; her husband, perhaps. Although she was heavily built - she was probably too big for a size twenty dress - she carried herself well. Her ebony skin shone with good health and the dark colouring of her eyes did nothing to conceal the intelligence that lay behind them. There was no hint of a smile, however, and Dee could see the tell tale signs of worry that had brought her to their offices.

She was obviously a woman who believed in being direct.

“Hello, Mrs Hammond,” she said, in an accent Dee placed somewhere in central Africa.

“I am Victoria Hokobu and if you do not help me I fear I will be killed in the next seventy two hours.”

Chapter 1

Embassy of Marat, St James Square, London, Monday 9am.

Martin De Souza sat quietly in the reception area of the Marati Embassy and wondered why this poverty stricken nation enjoyed one of the most exclusive addresses for an Embassy anywhere in London.

If De Souza hadn’t been in the mining business he probably would not have had the slightest idea where Marat could be found on the map of Africa. He suspected that most of the world’s population were in the same boat. Could most Europeans go to a map of Africa and confidently point out Chad, Gabon, Guinea, Togo, the Central African Republic or Marat? He doubted it.

When the Europeans ruled Africa in the late nineteenth century most of these little countries did not exist, they had different boundaries or different names. The area that now comprises Marat and the Democratic Republic of the Congo was once considered the personal property of King Leopold II of Belgium. Even when numerous tribal wars were being fought late in the 20^th Century, in central Africa, nobody was fighting over the tiny mountainous land that was Marat.

Not until De Souza’s father and uncle discovered Tanzanite in those central African mountains in the 1990s did anyone even seek political control of the country. Until then Marat had been run as a State Administered Region of the Congo, without its own formal government or elections, without an army and without indigenous police.

The beautiful violet blue Tanzanite which was now heavily mined in Marat changed all of that. More expensive and far rarer than diamonds, Tanzanite was found in significant quantities, and suddenly fortunes were there to be made. De Souza Mining had calculated that there must be billions of dollars’ worth of Tanzanite in Marat.

Within a year the UN oversaw elections, and after an expensive and brutal campaign, Benjamin Matista was elected president. He then proceeded to place his closest advisers in the roles of chief of police and head of the tiny Marat army. There were persistent rumours that Matista was a Somali and that he was not in fact born and raised in Marat, as he had claimed in the election campaign, but no-one questions the President too harshly when he controls the army and the police.

A portrait of the President in an impressive uniform adorned the wall behind the reception desk. Also located in the reception area was a secure display of Tanzanite, which looked real to De Souza, and if so, the display would be worth over a million pounds if sold in Hatton Garden, a sum that would release tens of thousands of Maratis from poverty.

The De Souzas were not in a position to complain, however. They had made a fortune from Marat with their exclusive mining rights. Unfortunately, whilst the President and his government had more money salted away than they could ever spend, they would continually tell the people that once the army and police were funded, along with the improvements to the roads and infrastructure; there was no money left for education and welfare, unless of course, the people of Marat would agree to work ever longer hours in the mines.

Recent UN studies showed that the majority of Marat’s population were educated, fed and cared for by international aid and by humanitarian charities, an unacceptable situation for a country with great mineral wealth, but the UN had bigger problems elsewhere in Africa that demanded their urgent attention. The elected authorities who siphoned off the aid money, and, whose greed knew no bounds, whose consciences knew no shame, also sought to hinder the international community’s fight against Marati poverty.

Martin De Souza felt grubby even dealing with these people who dined in London’s finest restaurants and lived in penthouse apartments, whilst their own ethnic groups or tribes starved and lived in squalor. In the opinion of Martin De Souza, it was only the fact that most of the country belonged to the same tribe as their leaders that made a descent into civil war was unlikely.

“Hello. So good to see you again.” A giant of a man strode towards De Souza, extending his hand. He was over six feet tall, heavily built and girded in an impressively tailored suit. His hair was short; his teeth were as white as ivory and his skin was that rich dark brown hue that looks almost purple in the right light.

“Jalou, how good to see you too,” De Souza managed to say before his companion ushered him out of the door, his huge strong hand in the square of the mining executive’s back.

“Come, let us take a walk. It is such a wonderful day,” Jalou suggested. His African accent had a deep timbre that commanded respect.

The man is out of his mind, De Souza thought, but didn’t say. It was well below freezing outside. Nonetheless, he braved the cold wind and the icy streets to follow the big diplomat to a corner coffee shop, where they both ordered and then sat down in easy chairs either side of a low table.

The diplomat spoke first. “Martin, it is not good business to come into the Embassy unannounced. The Ambassador and his brother cannot be involved with our troubleshooting duties.”

The Ambassador’s brother was the President of Marat.

“I had no alternative, Jalou. The Hokobu woman has just landed at Heathrow Airport.” The Afrikaaner pronounced Hokobu as Huckooboo, just as the lady herself did.

“This is not possible,” Jalou stated, shaking his head. “You have made a mistake. My contact in the British Security Services would have informed me.”

“No mistake. I saw her for myself. She arrived from Bangui on a KLM flight, changing at Schiphol. My informant deliberately stood behind her at passport control and he overheard her say to the Border Agency Officer that her return journey was booked with KLM and that she leaves Friday evening. Luckily she is a loud woman, because my informant was obliged to eavesdrop from the yellow line five feet away from the passport desk. My opinion is that she had someone drive her across the border into the Central African Republic, so that you would not know she had travelled.”