“People judge what we do,” said Becker, “but we’re the best shot at keeping these animals alive. The bulls here are forest elephants, which means they are worth shit for ecotourism because they are hard as fuck to find. If you don’t make them commercially viable through managed hunting, there’s no way you are going to have the resources to protect them.” Becker went on to explain that they typically allowed their clients to kill only the old tuskers who were past their prime reproductive years.

Glancing around the curiously empty ranch, Davis asked if all the other guests had gone hunting. Becker informed him that there were no more guests and wouldn’t be any for the rest of the year.

According to Becker, a Russian billionaire had passed through the month before with a half-dozen Eastern European prostitutes. He had asked to see the list with the quota of animals the Adamawa trophy hunting concession was allowed to harvest each year. He then insisted he wouldn’t leave the ranch until he had killed every animal on their list. It took a month to blast his way through the quota, stalling out when only one animal remained on the list—a lion. And as it turned out, there weren’t any lions on the property, because a band of poachers had come through and wiped them all out. In a business where client satisfaction is everything, Becker’s men had to come up with a creative solution.

At first, Becker was reluctant to divulge his method, but Davis’s skills as an interrogator ultimately prevailed. Becker revealed that one of his men had gone to the edge of the reserve, which flanked a national park. There, the lodge employee had cut a hole in the chain-link fence and tied a donkey to a tree just inside the hunting concession’s border. That night, a large male lion slipped through the hole in the fence, and as it devoured the donkey, Becker’s men woke the Russian. Donning night-vision goggles and using an infrared laser scope on a military-grade sniper rifle, the Russian crossed the last animal off his list.

Davis made a point of praising their ingenuity. After all, to Becker’s earlier point, that money would finance their conservation efforts for the remainder of the year, with minimal environmental impact. Becker was proud of the work, and Davis was happy to give him that ego win to build rapport.

“The lions won’t be an issue anymore,” Becker added. “We’ve got plenty on our property, thanks to Knight.”

“What, exactly, is your relationship with Randall Knight?”

“When we asked around the hunting community about our lion predicament, we were referred to Knight. He initially helped us find the new inventory. Now he insures our entire stock.”

“Knight said I should talk to you about Boko Haram. He thought I might be able to help.”

“Who do you work for?”