Whim, instinct, hunch?
Call it what you like, but I was feeling increasingly sure that Kenya and Egypt held the key to what was going on. The problem with being an international crime investigator is you can’t just jump in your car and drive off down the road to check out a few things. In this business, I jump on planes. The distance is irrelevant and so is the destination. I once flew from Saudi Arabia, where it was 40°C to Helsinki, where it was minus 19°C. On that occasion, I not only bought myself a new phone but an overcoat and scarf.
The problem right now was sitting beside me. “I might need to go to Kenya,” I said, trying to break the news as calmly as I could.
“OK,” she replied. “I’ll wait here. Don’t be long.” It was if Kenya was a suburb of Bangkok. I was sure she didn’t know where Kenya was.
“On the other hand, I could get some help from someone,” I said.
“Good idea. You work too hard, travel too much. Old man must slow down. Make others do work.”
I eventually went to both Kenya and Egypt, and we’ll come to that, but old? I’d never thought of myself as old. I decided to call Colin. I’d called him earlier, and he heard a woman’s voice whispering in my ear, so I had to explain.
“Twice in a day, Jinx? What’s got into you? What sort of woman would put up with you? Might she want to say hello to your best friend? No, let’s be blunt - your only friend?”
I handed the phone to Anna. “Hello, Mr Colin,” said Anna. “I hope to meet you in London.”
I grabbed the phone back. “Right. So, that’s the introductions over and done with. What about the business part? What have you been doing?”
“I’m on the case,” Colin said. “We’re looking at that Malthus Society website as I speak.”
I’d asked him to hack the site and track down Thalmus. “Good,” I said. “But I’m not calling about that. Is Jimmy Banda in Nairobi busy right now?”
“Funny you should ask. He’s just finished a job for me in Mombasa.
Jimmy is my pet ferret. He should be back in Nairobi by now.”
***
Banda Bookkeeping Services was the business Jimmy Banda had started fifteen years ago in the Nairobi suburb of Embakasi.Jimmy was running late after his drive from Mombasa and needed a good excuse in case Louise, his secretary of ten years, asked where he’d been for two whole days.
Louise looked up from her computer as he pushed the door open. He went straight to the chair behind his own desk, collapsed into it, and expelled a lungful of air as if he’d just run a marathon. Appearing out of breath was part of his excuse.
Unusually though, Louise, the reliable mainstay of Banda Bookkeeping Services, went back to staring at her screen as if he was not there. Jimmy found this even more unnerving as he watched her fingers tapping numbers on the keyboard. “Did you finish Mr Kalinga’s accounts, Louise?” he asked.
“Yesterday.”
“Did you send them off?”
“Yesterday.”
“I’ve been to Mombasa,” Jimmy said, “looking for new clients.” It wasn’t true, of course. The job for Colin involved watching and photographing an Ethiopian selling counterfeit watches to market stall holders.
“We can barely cope with the ones we’ve got, Mr Banda,” Louise said without stopping her typing.
Jimmy pushed a pile of paper and correspondence from one side of his desk to the other, switched on his own computer, and then leaned back in his chair, with his long legs extending across the floor to Louise’s desk. Then, in this almost horizontal position, his favourite position for relaxing, he closed his eyes.
Jimmy Banda could relax because he no longer did accounts. Louise was the bookkeeper. Jimmy ran Banda Investigation Services, and one of his most lucrative jobs was as a subcontractor to Asher & Asher.
“You’re like a little ferret, Jimmy,” Colin was always telling him.
Jimmy liked that description, although he had had to look up what a ferret was. He now knew it was a fast little animal with beady eyes
and a fascination for going down dark holes. So, relaxing in the knowledge that Louise had no questions today, Jimmy dropped off to sleep.
When his mobile phone rang with a ringtone like a roll of drums, he jumped and opened his eyes. “Banda Investigation Services,” he said,
“Jimmy Banda speaking.”
“Jimmy,” I said, “It’s John Franklin. Long time. How are you?”
Anna, sitting beside me again, smiled at another new name.
“Hey, long time,” said Jimmy.
I knew Jimmy was struggling to remember who John Franklin was. I needed to jog his memory to save time. “How’s Colin? I heard he sent you to Mombasa on a job.”
“Ah, John Franklin, friend of Colin.”
“That’s me. Keeping busy?”
Jimmy shuffled paper so I could hear. “Yes,” he said, “very busy.
Thank you.”
“Could you squeeze in a job for me? I’ve spoken to Colin about it, and he suggests you invoice him direct. But, as it’s a bit complicated, Colin suggested I phone to discuss it.”
“Sure. I can squeeze,” Jimmy said, deciding to remember the word for future use.
“But you don’t yet know what the job is, Jimmy.”
“I always squeeze for Colin.”
I began as short and simple an explanation as I could. “There’s a company in Nairobi called Shah Medicals. I need someone to do some ferreting around and speak to someone who works there. His name is Luther Jasman.”
I distinctly heard a chair being pushed back. “I’ll go right now.”
Jimmy said.
“Hang on, Jimmy,” I said. “We need a strategy, The company is in Embakasi, close to your office.”
“We are conveniently located near too many businesses,” Jimmy said.
“We are an established business with a fine reputation. And we know Mr Shah. Oh yes. My mother knew old Mr Shah.”
“He’s been taken over,” I said. “I don’t want to give details over the phone. It might compromise your detective work.”
“Yes, I don’t need too much. It might compromise my—”
“Try phoning Luther Jasman first,” I said. “Tell him that Dr Michael Stevens from Malaysia recently spoke to—”
“I’ll get some paper . . . Louise! Pencil . . . OK.”
“Tell him that Dr Michael Stevens from Malaysia recently met Shah’s chief executive, a man called Mr O’Brian, about some cooperation on a student exchange for their new laboratory…”
“Mr O’Brian…students… new laboratory.”
“Get to know Luther Jasman, Jimmy. Perhaps fix a meeting with him.
Ask questions. You’re a natural.”
I gave him a bit more about Shah’s links with a company called Al Zafar and Livingstone Pharmaceuticals, and that they seemed to want laboratory technicians. It was enough for Jimmy to get on with. He had his own unique style. What’s more, Jimmy was charged by the hour like a lawyer, but he never wore a watch. His invoices were never extortionate.