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alone enjoy an upkick in a new administration.
    It still had not really hit him that he would not be returning to Op-Center, that the responsibility of running it—and the privilege—had been taken from his shoulders. Unlike the ending of his marriage, there was no sense of relief to counterbalance the sudden, encroaching emptiness.
    Hood forced himself not to dwell on that. He had just accepted a new job. That was where his attention must go.
    Hood and the chief of staff rose. Sanders told the new special envoy that she would show him to his office and come back around three, after she had arranged for help to organize and equip the Winder Building space. He thanked her while the president was still within earshot. Hood may have come from Los Angeles, but he had good manners as well.
    As they walked down the corridor, the sense of avoidance Hood had felt earlier was gone. It had been replaced by a sense of courteous attention. Maybe it was all in his imagination, or maybe it was something palpable in his walk or his carriage, a stalwart if unconscious evidence of his new access to power.
    Whatever it was, Hood resolved to ignore it. Yesterday he was the director of Op-Center. Today he was a special envoy to the president.
    Tomorrow he could be indicted over a cheese Danish.
    As they neared the area where the vice president had his small office, Hood felt one of his two cell phones vibrate. It was the one on his right hip, the secure STU-III unit he carried for Op-Center business. He slipped it from the loop on his belt and checked the number.
    Hood replaced the phone without taking the call. He felt guilty about that, but it was the right thing to do.
    Whatever Bob Herbert had to say would probably be better spoken—and heard—when it had cooled.

SIX
    Durban, South Africa Monday, 3:10 P.M.
    The Gold Coast of Africa is no longer the gold coast of Africa.
    The honor of being one of the richest, most profitable, and fastest-growing regions on the continent has passed from western Africa along the Gulf of Guinea to the eastern coast of South Africa, with the city of Durban as the anchor. Because of the subtropical climate, with high temperatures and significant amounts of rainfall, the area has always been a perfect environment for growing. Beginning in the middle 1850s, thirty years after the British first established a major port there, significant sections of arable land were earmarked for sugarcane. The crop was easy to cultivate and export, much in demand, and produced significant profits.
    Over a century and a half later, sugar continues to play a prominent part in South Africa’s agriculture, with Durban as the biggest sugar port in the world. Tourism has grown as well, with miles of beachfront having been developed into one of the most popular and celebrated vacation spots in the world. Along the Golden Mile, where summer lasts all year, the beautiful beaches are protected by shark nets, there are swimming pools with water slides, and there is an array of markets and merry-go-rounds, shopping centers, and world-class restaurants, nightclubs, and five-star hotels, all a few steps from the ocean.
    Ever since the late nineteenth century, when a railroad was built to give inland regions access to the port, workers from the rest of the continent and from as far as India have come to work in the fields. Investors from other nations have come as well, creating an international mix unparalleled in most of Africa. Some of those individuals used the port and its resources to smuggle goods and receive cash. Men like the infamous drug lord Yakuba Balwon moved heroin through Durban, then laundered the money through the London-based Windsor Global Securities Bank. Others sold Rophy tablets, which was short for Rohypnol, an addictive relaxant that was most popularly used as a date rape drug.
    Because of Durban’s multinational nature, and because it has been an economic lifeline to blacks and whites alike, the city has been