The girl on the switchboard put me through to the foreman-manager right away.

‘Smed here,’ said a curt, thick South African accent.

‘Pieter Smed?’

‘Yes?’

‘My name is Flynn – I’m a friend of Sir Donald—’

‘Welcome to South West Africa – you have a good journey?’ His tone had changed from the curt, defensive, to the welcoming.

‘Thank you.’

‘Sir Donald telexed that you would be coming.’

‘Grand. When could we meet?’

‘I am at your disposal. I could come into town – or I could send a car for you to bring you out here to see the mine?’

‘I’d like to see the mine.’

‘I am sure you want to rest this afternoon after your journey. I’ll send a car for you at nine o’clock tomorrow – it’s only half an hour’s drive out here.’

‘Fine.’

‘Where are you staying?’

‘The Kalahari Sands. Describe the car and I’ll be waiting outside.’

‘It’ll be a white Peugeot 505.’

‘I look forward to meeting you tomorrow morning.’

‘Me too, Mr Flynn. Goodbye.’

The car arrived ten minutes early, and luckily I was already outside waiting; it could have been embarrassing if they had paged me. The car was driven by a black in a white, open shirt and white shorts, and either he wasn’t much of a conversationalist or he didn’t like white people, or, most probably, both. He also appeared to be under the impression that the maximum speed in each gear was the speed one had to reach before charging up, and I wondered, as the engine howled flat out – the worst thing for it in this searing heat – how many gearboxes and engines he got through in a year. As we left the main road and started to climb what was little more than a pot-holed mountain cart-track, with the speedometer gyrating between seventy and ninety, I wondered also how many cars and passengers he got through in a year.

The scenery that jerked up and down outside the Peugeot’s windows was dramatic; it was rocky terrain, with low hills, steep cliffs, massive boulders, and little shrubbery. We passed three wrecked cars in as many kilometres. I wondered why he didn’t take the hint, and decided it was because they were all his.

He swept right across the road, taking a racing driver’s line into a blind corner, and I gritted my teeth so tightly I thought my gums were going to collapse. ‘Do you get much traffic on these roads?’ I shouted, in the hope that getting him to talk might slow him down.