He took a breath, feeling resigned, I think. “He'll probably go to Koidu. It's near the eastern border. Kailahun's a little too hot right now, even for him. If he went over ground, that means he's trading-which means oil, or maybe gas.”

“Why Koidu?”

“Diamond mines. There's an unofficial oil-for-diamonds trading corridor between here and there. He's heavily into it, from what I hear.”

“Okay. Anything else I should know?”

He started walking again. “Yeah. You got a best buddy back home? Call him. Tell him where you keep your porn, or whatever else you don't want your family to find when you're dead. But hey, have a good trip, and nice knowing you.”

“Flaherty!” I called, but he refused to look back, and when I got outside the market, I found that he'd stranded me there.

So I wandered back inside and bought some fresh fruit-mangoes, guavas, and papayas. Delicious! Might as well live it up while I could.

Tomorrow I would be in Sierra Leone.

Chapter 53

ON A SUN-BEATEN dirt road that twisted through what used to be a forest outside Koidu, a fifteen-year-old boy was slowly choking to death.

Slowly, because that's exactly how the Tiger wanted it to happen.

Very slowly, in fact.

This was an important death for his boys to watch and learn from.

He closed his grip even tighter on the young soldier's esophagus.

“You were my number one. I trusted you. I gave you everything, including your oxygen. Do you understand? Do you?”

Of course the boy understood. He'd palmed a stone, a diamond. It was found under his tongue. He was probably going to die for it now.

But not at the Tiger's hand.

“You.” He pointed to the youngest of the other boy soldiers. “Cut your brother!”

The lad of no more than ten stepped forward and unsheathed a clip-pointed Ka-bar, a gift for him from the Tiger's trip to America. With no hesitation at all, he shoved the blade into his brother's thigh, then jumped back to avoid the spurting blood.

The Tiger kept his own hand where it was on the thief's throat; unable to even scream, the boy just gagged.

“Now you,” he said to the next youngest wild boy. “Take your time. No hurry.”

Each of them took a turn, one at a time, any strike they chose, any kind of blow, except one that would kill the diamond thief. That right belonged to the oldest-or at least the one who would now be the oldest. “Rocket,” they called him-on account of the bright red Houston Rockets basketball jersey he always wore, rain or shine.

The Tiger stepped back to let Rocket finish the murder. There was no need to hold the thief down anymore; his body was limp and broken, blood pooling in the dust around his shattered face. Black flies and puffy gnats were already settling on the wounds.