Frederick Ramsay_Botswana Mystery 01 Read Online Free

the daughter, and transformation of tiny Reilly Petroleum to Earth Global, now the third largest oil, gas, and mining company in the country. Its real-estate department alone rivaled Donald Trump’s. Or at least Leo believed so. Travis had his doubts.
    “No, she decided to take a pass on this one. She’s going to fly to Des Moines and visit her sister.”
    Leo Painter was not political, just eager to have a voice in the regulatory process and access to public lands, if and when it seemed they might become available for exploitation. So, he made generous political contributions to both parties and at every level. He’d learned early on that state legislators often had as much influence in the areas in which he held an interest as their better known federal counterparts, and their patronage was considerably cheaper to acquire. Charities, on the other hand, had less to do with altruism than with providing access to people and events that could prove useful in the future. Travis admired Leo who, he decided, was Hamiltonian in his belief that money, power, and prestige drove people and nations to achieve greatness. Had he known him better, he might have been surprised at how off the mark he was in this estimation.
    The State Department, at the request of the President, asked Leo to travel to Botswana to consult on the extraction of methane and any other natural resources that lay beneath Botswana’s soil. It wasn’t that Botswana had a shortage of willing companies eager to exploit its resources, but the State Department desired a more substantial hegemony in the area. Leo had agreed, less out of a spirit of expanding capitalism in Africa than to forward his ambition to assume an interest, a controlling interest preferably, in a nickel mine recently acquired by the Germans. He thought if he spread around some cash, twisted a few arms, and applied the right sort of hard-to-come by information judiciously, he might be able to convince certain people to see it his way.
    But that wasn’t the big prize. Securing or, worst case, obtaining an exclusive U.S. license for ActiVox could net the company billions and effectively put all of his competition out of business. A dozen other mining conglomerates had lost out in the bidding war for the process previously but would be back eager to secure a license as well. Travis knew about Leo’s intentions even though he’d not been told directly. A COO had a need to know, even if his boss didn’t care to share.
    Leo finally sat and turned to him. “Tell me who finally agreed to go.”
    He was not cooperating with Travis’ agenda this morning, and Travis had to remove a sheet of paper from the bottom of the stack. “You, me, Rose Hayward from the PR department, Henry Farrah, your stepson and his wife—”
    “He’s not my stepson. He is an idiot. I give him a job and he won’t take direction. Half the time he leaves at noon. He thinks no one notices. If it weren’t for my promise to his late mother, he’d be on the street with his paltry trust fund.”
    Leo had managed three wives and probably myriad lovers. The drill, however, meant Travis feigned ignorance of any and all, true or false—Reilly’s daughter, Margaret Griswold, who had died and left Leo a widower and with the responsibility for a putative stepson and Lucille. They were all anyone dared acknowledge. Travis wondered sometimes about Leo Painter and what about him so intimidated his employees. But then, he guessed he already knew.
    He completed the list, which included core staffers from the engineering and research department. The party had to be kept to twelve to match the company’s Gulfstream V seating configuration.
    Leo turned toward the window again. “You’re going to have to drop one of the engineers. I need a place for a man named Greshenko, Yuri Greshenko.” Travis lifted an eyebrow. “He’s…ah, let’s just say he’s a consultant. I contracted for his services last week.” Travis lifted the other