Lords of Corruption (3 page)

A man wearing a vaguely threadbare blue blazer pulled open the door that led from the foyer to a small reception area and smiled widely. "Josh! How was the trip?"

"Good, thanks. No problem."

The man pumped Josh's hand and wen
t i
nto a cheerful diatribe about the incompetence of airlines. A small crowd gathered as he spoke, but none of the people were what Josh had expected. No Birkenstocks or tie-dyes, and not even a hint of patchouli oil. While his was the only tie, everyone was conservatively groomed, clear-eyed, and confident. It wouldn't be that much of a stretch to think he was in a successful boutique law office on casual Friday.

His research into NewAfrica hadn't been as fruitful as he'd hoped. Newspaper articles were surprisingly few, and the organization's website was longer on philosophy than on specifics. It was probably the worst-prepared he'd ever been for an interview, but so far it was going better than most. Why was a mystery.

"So are you finished with finals?" asked a woman with a foreign accent he couldn't place.

"I am. Day before yesterday."

"Can we assume you aced them all?" "I think I did okay."

The group, which had swelled to seven people, laughed politely. It was clear that they knew his history and had little doubt about his performance.

"Did you just get in, or did you come last night?"

"I just landed an hour or so ago."

"First time in New York?" the man who had opened the door for him asked.

"It is. First time."

"Shame you couldn't have done the town a little bit. There are some amazing restaurants in this neighborhood. Don't leave without getting these cheapskates to take you to lunch."

"I heard that."

The group parted and let the man who'd spoken through. He was probably in his midforties, with a tan too dark to have been earned in New York and blond streaks in his hair that looked honestly sun-bleached. When they shook hands, his skin was smooth but didn't have the softness that Josh had come to associate with the city people who had interviewed him in the past.

"I'm Stephen Trent. I ride herd over this rabble."

"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Trent. I really appreciate you inviting me up here."

"Stephen. And I appreciate you taking the time to talk to a little charity like us. We know you must have big-money offers coming in from all over the country, but I think we might be able to offer you something unique."

The crowd quietly scattered before an
y f
urther introductions could be made, and Trent led Josh through a narrow hallway toward the back of the building. The walls were lined with photographs of happy Africans in agricultural settings -- sometimes working, sometimes posed with their arms around each other, sometimes in large groups with Trent's relatively pale face hovering near the center. The last picture before they entered the door at the back depicted Trent shaking hands with a sturdy African man in a military uniform. President Umboto Mtiti, Josh knew from last night's African charity cram session.

"Have a seat," Trent said, pointing to a comfortable-looking leather chair. Josh did as he was told, and Trent took the chair next to him instead of going behind the imposing desk that dominated the room. "I assume you've done some research on us?"

"I have, but there wasn't much time, so I wouldn't say I'm an expert."

Trent nodded. "We're a small, focused charity, and we like it that way. Our donors are sophisticated enough to understand that Africa is too complicated a place to fix with strategies that can be summed up in a sound bite. How much do you know about foreign aid, Josh?"

"Only what I've read. I don't have an
y d
irect experience."

Trent didn't seem concerned. "Foreign governments and aid agencies have been pouring money and people into Africa for decades. And if you criticize them, they'll hit you with a bunch of excuses: This or that project didn't work out because of this or that extenuating circumstance. It's ridiculous if you think about it. Do you know why?"

"I'm afraid I don't."

"Of course you don't. Why would you? It's because there's always an extenuating circumstance. And if there's always an extenuating circumstance . . ." He paused, obviously wanting Josh to finish the thought.

"Then it's not an extenuating circumstance?"

"Exactly!" Trent slapped the arm of his chair loudly. "Let me give you a piece of advice, Josh. If you ever become a millionaire and someone comes to you looking for aid money for Africa, ask them to take you on a tour of their projects."

Josh tried to appear thoughtful, but mostly he was thankful that Trent was content to do most of the talking.

"But when you get there," Trent continued, warming up to his subject, "tell them you only want to see projects that are a
t l
east ten years old. Then watch them scramble."

"But the newspaper articles I could find on NewAfrica have been pretty complimentary," Josh said. "They say you've been pretty effective."

"Yes! But it's because we're different. Some people think we're hard-asses, but if we think a project isn't going to be productive in the long term, we won't touch it."

"And other agencies will?"

"Hell, yes. Look, don't get me wrong. They all have good intentions. But after they've hired a bunch of people, put infrastructure in place, and started a donation campaign built around this project or that, it gets pretty hard to just pull the plug."

"Everyone would be out of a job," Josh said. "And they'd have to tell the donors that their money had been wasted."

"Precisely." Trent leaned back in his chair and examined Josh for a moment. "Have you ever been involved in charity work?"

It was a question that Trent almost certainly already knew the answer to. Josh had thought about it from every possible angle, but he had nothing to work with. He'd never even been in the Boy Scouts.

"I haven't, Stephen. But I've been aroun
d i
t. I grew up in a pretty poor area of the South."

Trent nodded but didn't immediately respond. "Okay, then. Let me ask you this.. Have you ever been the recipient of charity?"

With his ritual of meticulous preparation, Josh had never been surprised by an interview question, and that left him with no canned reaction when it finally happened. He felt his mouth tighten, and he ran his tongue slowly over his teeth, trying to decide if he should be pissed off and what he should say.

"You don't have to answer that if you don't want, Josh."

"No, it's okay. The answer is yes. I have."

Trent jabbed a finger in his direction. "You see? That's a unique perspective that no one here -- not me, not anyone -- has. It's the kind of diversity that I believe can help make this organization even more effective. I mean, in a way, you're the model of what we want for the Africans. You started poor and disadvantaged, and you overcame that."

"I would hope that I could bring something useful to NewAfrica, Stephen. But I'm not sure I have any secrets."

Trent grinned. "I'm having a hard tim
e r
eading you, Josh. You seem a little reticent. Is it because of the way we snuck up on you or because you wouldn't take a job with a charity if someone put a gun to your head?"

Another surprise question, though it shouldn't have been. He'd been playing this interview like a politician, figuring that the less he said, the less could be held against him. But what else could he do? He sure as hell wasn't the rich goody-two-shoes that he imagined charities went for. He wasn't looking for adventure before returning to the country club and going to work for Daddy's company. He didn't need to find himself, and frankly, he'd always been so concerned with his own family that he'd never had time to worry about anyone else's.

"That brings up an interesting point, Stephen. How exactly did you find me?"

"To be perfectly honest, I don't really know. Something to do with Internet databases and search parameters. I tell a company that specializes in these kinds of things all the unusual qualities we're looking for, and on the rare occasion that we find someone who has those qualities, we pursue them."

"Unusual how?"

"Maybe 'unique' would have been a better word. Look, I won't lie to you. The realities of Africa can be a little harsh. We need people who are smart and driven, but also people who have some experience with the real world. People who are tougher than average. But most of all, we're looking for people who have common sense, because that can get lost pretty quickly in the foreign aid business." He paused for a moment, obviously considering something. "What I'm trying to say is that when you're faced with some of the things Africa can throw at you, it's easy to lose yourself in your ideology. We fight against that. You see, we look at this as a business, Josh. Our product is projects -- agricultural, medical, economi
c w
hatever. We want to manufacture a product for our customers that's effective, durable, and cheap."

"Your customers being poor Africans."

"Right. I know it's a strange philosophy, but we find that it works. You've got an MBA, so you understand how a business should run, you come from a poor, broken family, so you know what people need. You're an athlete and a hunter, so you're not soft. And you've achieved things on your own, so you understand what it takes to better yourself. That's what we need on the ground."

Josh felt his eyebrows rise, and it didn't g
o u
nnoticed.

"We know a few personal details about you, Josh. We're not trying to pry, but we also don't want to hire someone who is going to be over their head ten minutes after they land. We ask a lot, frankly."

Trent had misinterpreted Josh's surprise. It was less that he knew those few personal details than that he had missed a number of others. Or had he? Maybe he didn't care. Or was this a test of Josh's honesty?

"So this is a position outside the country?" Josh said, deciding to let it go. He could always lean on plausible deniability if the shit hit the fan later.

"Yup. You'd be knee-deep in the African mud." Trent's mouth widened into another prizewinning smile. "Well, it's really not that bad, but it's not the Upper East Side, either."

Josh nodded slowly. Africa. How many miles away was that? About the same distance as the moon, as far as he was concerned. For a million dollars, he doubted he could name five countries on the whole continent.

"Look, Josh, I know you're probably looking at a hedge-fund job or something, but I can tell you from personal experience that you should consider this. It's a differen
t c
hallenge every day, you have a lot of autonomy, you're not chained to a desk, and at the end of the day someone's life is better because of you."

Chapter
3.

Stephen Trent sat down behind his desk but immediately stood again. A quick glance at the clock confirmed that he had less than a minute. Aleksei Fedorov had told him nine P
. M
., and he was never late. Never.

Trent took a deep breath and brushed at the imaginary wrinkles in his shirt, a nervous tic that was impossible to resist but entirely pointless. Fedorov didn't care about anything that didn't involve making money, holding on to money, and keeping mone
y a
nd the power it implied from his enemies.

The lights in the hall were off, and Trent walked through the gloom taking deep, calming breaths, finally stopping in the lobby where he could watch the front door. The second hand on the receptionist's desk was almost thirty seconds past the hour when the sound of a key sliding into th
e l
ock became audible over the hum of traffic outside.

"Aleksei! It's good to see you!" Trent said, a little too loud to seem calm and a little too cheerful to sound spontaneous. If there was one positive thing about spending so much of his time in one of Africa's more godforsaken backwaters, it was that Fedorov almost never set foot on the continent.

Unfortunately, this was not true of NewAfrica's offices in New York. Despite endless hints designed to prevent these visits, Fedorov seemed to enjoy using them as proof that he was untouchable. And maybe he was. But why endanger everyone else?

Fedorov shook Trent's outstretched hand disinterestedly, his deep-set eyes taking in the surroundings more like a camera than the windows to the soul that poets imagined. They twitched back and forth over a long, straight nose that hinted at his foreign birth and an expression that suggested it hadn't been a pleasant one.

"We've had a thirteen percent drop in donations. Why?"

It seemed that his accent became more imperceptible every time they met, and that was worrying. Fedorov had relocated to the United States less than ten years ago an
d n
ow, at age fifty, was close to perfecting his fifth language. Trent had been blessed with an impressive intellect that had proven indispensable over his lifetime, but it also tended to make him uncomfortable around those rare people who were clearly smarter than he was. It was an advantage he was loath to give up.

"Let's go back to my office, Aleksei. I'll make you a drink."