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Global Risk Management. His fees would eat
up my twenty percent premium. I needed to talk to Sabine
about an expense account, but in the meantime, I hired him on
my tab.
    I went through a list of Trevor's recent contacts
without finding much of interest, until I got to Gordon Mumby.
His name had also been in the notebook. The number was to an
investment bank in London. I called and asked for Mumby by
name.
    He thought I was a potential customer. He was glib and
friendly, until I asked about Trevor. When I did, he stammered
and suddenly realized that he had more clients than he could
handle. He offered to refer me to another banker.
    "I'm not looking for a banker. I'm looking for Trevor
Jones."
    "Can't help you there, sorry. Good-bye." At least he lost
the stammer.
    I called Trevor's brother to see if I could learn anything
that Joelle hadn't. He lived in Swindon, a nondescript,
middle-class town in the southwest of England. I asked him if he knew
Mumby.
    He didn't.
    Did he know anyone at all close to Trevor?
    Yes he did. Three more names. Three dead ends.
    I was on my fifth cup of coffee, when Sabine called. "I'm
famished."
    "Me too and frustrated." My list of things to do was
down to zero.
    "Do you like oysters?"
    "Yep, fried, Rockefeller, boiled or po-boy."
    "I won't try to follow what you just said, but let's go
eat."
    We went to a restaurant that specialized in fruites
de mer . The menu had two or three dozen types and grades
of oysters and a variety of mussels, crabs and shrimp. We sat at
a circular bar inlaid with a tile mosaic. It was early in the
evening and the only other patron at the bar was a
middle-aged woman with faded blond hair and a frumpy suit.
    Sabine ordered a mix of shellfish presented on a
mound of ice that was as wide as the length of my forearm. She
identified the types of oysters for me and tried to explain why
some cost twice as much as others. A portly Frenchman with a
dapper air and a kindly smile sat down next to her and joined
her tutorial. When he found out I spoke Spanish, a bit of
Japanese and a smattering of other languages that did not
include French, he frowned and shook his head.
    "No French?" He said it without disdain or
disappointment. He simply looked puzzled that someone
would consciously deny himself one of life's great joys. He
extended one finger at a time. " Liberté , égalité , fraternité ." If nothing
else, he clearly wanted me to remember the country's motto in
its own language.
    Those attributes became increasingly abundant at our
little round bar. I entered a conversation in Spanish with a
couple who sat next to the portly gentleman, and in tortured
Japanese with a Taiwanese couple. Salute the world's language
teachers.
    Sabine nudged my arm. "Would you like coffee?"
    "Yes."
    "I have a flat near here."
    Her flat was large enough for a couple, two kids, a dog
and a maid. Despite the lack of population, it had a textured
warmth of wood and cotton and a sensual elegance of down
and silk. Soon the aroma of coffee enhanced the effect.
    "Let me guess, black?" She set a silver tray in front of
me.
    "How'd you know?"
    "I know my coffee drinkers. Besides you're a
    middle-aged American male. I played the odds. So what do you think
about your new position?"
    I chuckled.
    "What's funny?"
    "I'm an undercover business consultant. It's a bit like
infiltrating the Boy Scouts."
    " Management consultant."
    "Excuse me."
    " Business consultants advise their clients on
what kind of secret sauce to use, so consumers will eat more of
their products."
    Five, four, three...
    I started a little mental countdown, ready to launch a
smile when the punch line arrived, but Sabine looked as stern
as an executioner. She took herself and her job seriously.
    ...two, one.
    "Management consultants advise corporations on
how to eat the competition. You're an undercover management consultant."
    There it was, but I didn't smile. I wasn't sure "Sabine
the Stern" would like it. For an instant, I thought I was