Free The Secret Chamber by Patrick Woodhead Page B

scolding her.
    ‘Come on, Bear, what you’re suggesting sounds pretty unlikely. We’re not talking about small amounts of C-4 that some terrorist group can get their hands on. To blow up that many mines, you’d need access to proper military stores, and I don’t know about other countries, but in England they don’t exactly hand out the keys.’
    Bear tapped her pen on the desk.
    ‘You said countries, right? Well, look at the only countries producing significant quantities of coltan that
haven’t
been affected. That’s the Congo and China. And somehow, I don’t think the boys in Kinshasa can afford kilos of C-4.’
    ‘Before you go gallivanting off on one of your hunches, have you stopped to suppose that maybe the Chinese are next on the list? Maybe next week you’ll have another accident report on your desk about one of their mines.’
    ‘Maybe,’ Bear conceded, one eyebrow rising. ‘But if they don’t, then we
know
the Chinese military are involved. The PLA have their fingers in all sorts of civilian organisations. Maybe they’re in bed with one of the major mining corps, trying to drive up the price.’
    There was an exasperated sigh from the other end of the line.
    ‘You know, I’d forgotten how willing you are to jump to assumptions. But listen, Bear, whatever is going on, if it does have something to do with the Chinese, then take it from me, let it drop. I know that on your assignments you can be as tenacious as a damn’ pitbull, but even you don’t want anything to do with them.’
    Bear nodded her head slowly, a gentle smile forming on her lips. Cooper was always looking out for her, even now when she was a grown woman with a job that took her to some of the most dangerous places on the planet. If only her father had been anything like as concerned.
    ‘Thanks so much for this, Coop. I owe you.’
    ‘You don’t owe me anything, except dinner with my girls when you’re next over here. They miss you like hell, you know. And, Bear, just once in your life, listen to an old bugger like me and stay out of trouble.’
    ‘I promise.
Merci beaucoup
,’ Bear said, her smile widening as she put down the phone. Glancing up at the wall clock, she quickly got up from her chair, shoving her purse and mobile phone back into her handbag. Slipping on her shoes, she was turning to leave when out of the corner of her eye she noticed an email appear in her inbox. She was about to ignore it, but then changed her mind and clicked it open. It was a message sent through the company’s secure intranet from one of their divisional branches in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
     
Beatrice
,
We need some help here. Early this morning, we obtained a small quantity of a mineral I haven’t seen before. The vendors couldn’t tell me what it was either, only that it came out of a place north of here called the Ituri Forest. Anyway, Accounts aren’t going to like this as we had to pay a small fortune for it, but it was worth the price. I think this might be something totally new
.
We’ve been running tests all day and think it might be a concentrated derivative of tantalite. Can that be possible? What’s strange is that usually tantalite is found alongside columbite , i.e. coltan, but this seems to be something else. And I can’t find any references online
.
Can you get up to Goma in the next couple of days? I want to keep this quiet and stay clear of sending anything via courier. Get Kimberly to approve and let me know your arrival times
.
Pieter
     
    Bear stared at the message, her body rigid. Someone had been systematically crippling coltan mines around the world and now this – a concentrated derivative of coltan discovered in the Congo. There had to be a connection.
    Reading the message once again, she paused on the last sentence, feeling her stomach tighten. Goma. Why did it have to be Goma? That was the one place in the world she wanted to avoid – the place where her father was. And now, after all this time,