colour of old amber. His gaze from the television screen was calm and direct. Then the weather forecast came on and Daniel was left with a sense of melancholy.
He had met Victor Omeru only once, five years ago, when the President had granted him an interview covering the dispute with Zaire and Uganda over the fishing rights in Lake Albert.
They had spent only an hour together, but Daniel had been impressed by the old man's eloquence and presence, and even more so by his obvious commitment to his people, to all the various tribal groupings that made up his little state, and to the preservation of the forest, savannah and lakes that were their national heritage. We see the riches of our lakes and forests as an asset that must be managed for posterity, not something that is to be devoured at a single sitting.
We look upon nature's bounty as a renewable resource which all the people of Ubomo have the right to share, even those generations as yet unborn. That is why we resist the plunder of the lakes by our neighbours, Victor Omeru had told him, and it was wisdom of a kind that Daniel had seldom heard from any other statesman. His heart had gone out to someone who shared his own love and concern for the land that had given them birth. Now Victor Omeru was gone and Africa would be a poorer, sadder place for his passing.
Daniel spent the whole of Monday in the City talking to his bank-manager and his agent. It went well and Daniel was in a far better mood when he returned to the flat at nine-thirty that evening.
There was another message from Michael on the answering machine.
God, I hate this contraption. Call me when you come in, Danny. It would be two hours later in Lusaka, but he took Michael at his word.
Did I get you out of bed, Mike? No matter, Danny.
Hadn't turned the light off yet. just one bit of news for you. The new man in Ubomo is Colonel Ephrem Taffari. Forty-two years old.
Apparently educated at London School of Economics and University of Budapest. Other than that, nobody knows much about him except that he has already changed the country's name to the People's Democratic Republic of Ubomo.
had sign. In African Socialist-speak.
'democratic' means 'tyrannical'. There have been reports of executions of members of the former government, but one expects that.
What about Omeru? Daniel demanded. it was strange how strongly his sympathies inclined towards someone he had known for such a short time so long ago.
Not specifically mentioned on the butcher's bill, but presumed to be amongst those put to the wall. Let me know if you pick up anything about my friends Chetti Singh or Ning Cheng Gong. Will do, Danny. Now Daniel put the events in Ubomo out of his mind and his world shrank down to the space enclosed by the four walls of the cutting-room at the studio in Shepherd's Bush. Day after day, he sat in the semi-darkness, concentrating his entire being on the small glowing screen of the editing console.
In the evenings, dizzy with mental exhaustion and red-eyed with strain, he staggered out into the street and caught a taxi back to the flat, stopping only at Partridge's in Sloane Street to pick up the makings of a sandwich supper. Each morning he awoke in darkness before dawn and was back at the studio long before the daily commuter invasion of the city was under way.
He was caught up in an ecstasy of creative endeavour. It heightened his emotional awareness to the point where all of his existence was in those lambent images that flashed before his eyes. The words to describe them bloomed in his mind so that he spoke into the microphone of the recorder with only occasional references to his notes.
He relived every moment of the scenes that unfolded before him to the point where he could smell the hot dusty musky perfume of Africa and hear the voices of her people and the cries of her animals ringing in his ears as he worked.
So great was Daniel's absorption in the creative process of dubbing and fine cutting his series that over the weeks that followed the recent events in Africa retreated into the mists of distance. It was only when, with a shock that started his adrenalin flowing, he saw Johnny Nzou's face looking at him out of the small screen and heard his voice speak from beyond the grave, that it all rushed back upon him and he felt his determination grow stronger.
Alone in the darkened cutting-room he replied to Johnny's image, I'm coming back. I haven't forgotten you. They haven't got away with what they did to you. I promise you that, old friend. By the end of February, three months after he had started the editing, he had a rough cut of the first four episodes of the series ready to show his agent.
Eina Markham had sold his very first production and they had been together ever since. He trusted her judgement, and stood in awe of her business acumen.
She had an uncanny ability to judge to within a dollar just how much the trade would bear, and then to squeeze that very last dollar out of the deal. She wrote a formidable contract which covered every conceivable contingency, and several that fell outside that definition.
She had once written a spin-off clause into one of his contracts. He had smiled at it when he read it, but two years later it had yielded a wholly unexpected royalty of fifty thousand dollars from Japan, a country that hadn't even entered into Daniel's original calculations.
At forty years of age, Eina was tall and willowy with dark Jewish eyes and a figure like a Vogue model. Once or twice over the years, they had almost become lovers. The closest they had come to it was three years previously, when they had shared a bottle of Dam Perignon in his flat to celebrate a particularly lucrative sale of subsidiary rights. She had drawn back from the very brink.
You are one of the most attractive men I have ever met, Danny, and I'm sure we'd make tremendous music together, but still you're more valuable to me as a client than as just another good romp. She had buttoned up her blouse and left him to the agonies of sexual frustration.
Now they spent the morning in the preview theatre at the studios watching the first four episodes straight through, back to back. Eina made no comment until the last tape was played out, then she stood up.
I'll take you to lunch, she said.
In the taxi she talked of everything but the production. She took him to Mosimann's in West Halkin Street. The club that Anton Mosimann had fashioned out of an old church was now a high cathedral of gastronomy.
Anton himself, resplendent in his whites and his tall chef's hat, rosy-complexioned as a cherub, came out of his kitchens to chat to them at their table, an honour afforded only to his more favoured members Daniel was in a fever
