‘But surely you can find a friend to lend it to you, someone with a rich family,’ she said, looking around offhandedly.

For a second I thought she was referring to herself, but we both know that her mother has struggled to make ends meet since her dad left ten years ago. My parents have helped out Amelia and her mum over the years, not the other way around. They’d quietly paid for her to come on this disastrous trip, for example. But on double-checking I realised that Amelia’s eyes had settled on Xander, who’d already sat up in his seat.

‘Of course,’ he said. ‘What an idiot! I should have thought of it and offered to call home myself.’

Xander’s rich. He never goes on about it, but he always seems to have access to cash. He’d brought a fair bit on this trip. Not $75,000 obviously, but might his dad be able to come up with the money? I knew he had something to do with oil fields, but I had no idea if he’d be able to lay his hands on that kind of sum at such short notice, let alone get it to us in time. Neither did Xander. He rifled his phone from his pocket and hobbled off somewhere quiet to make the call to Nigeria nonetheless.

‘I had another thought,’ said Amelia, while he was gone. ‘The ransom note says not to speak to the police again, but it doesn’t say anything about anyone else.’

‘Who else do you mean?’

‘Well, Detective Hubert said he’d be back in touch when he’d got hold of the travel-fixer guy, didn’t he?’

‘I haven’t missed a call, if that’s what you thinking,’ I said. ‘I’ve been checking five times a minute. Anyway, strictly speaking, I shouldn’t even answer him.’

Amelia cocked her head on one side, bridling at the exaggeration, but chose to let it pass. In her spelling-it-out-slowly voice, she explained, ‘My point is that the police have already given you the name of the guy they’re trying to track down. Yannick Mugalia.’

Unsurprised that she’d remembered the name, I saw where she was going with this train of thought and completed it for her: ‘And there’s nothing to stop us looking for him ourselves, you’re saying?’

‘Exactly.’

Fighting my frustration I said, ‘I have the name of a man the police haven’t yet been able to trace, who is one of eighty-two million inhabitants in a country roughly the size of western Europe. Not to mention forty-eight hours to raise 75,000 dollars!’