Something to Hide by Deborah Moggach Page B

and whistles.
    It’s been known, however, that the men chew on a plant called kar to suppress their appetite on these hunting trips. It’s a succulent, only found in their area, and rich in vitamins and minerals. Apparently it mimics the effect that glucose has on the brain cells, telling people their stomachs are full. ‘It has a compound in it called P57,’ Jeremy says. ‘It acts on the hypothalamus, the part of the brain that influences appetite.’
    There’s a grove of silver birches between us and the river. Through the trees we can hear faint music from the buskers. Jeremy says: ‘So somebody at Zonac hears about this plant and five years ago they slapped a licence on it and got a patent to flog it in America.’
    â€˜Why?’
    â€˜As an appetite suppressant. Get the irony! All those fat people, all those waddling barrage balloons – they’re addicted to eating. Junk food’s got stuff in it that makes them want more and more. And suddenly, along comes a solution, a hunger-busting quick fix. A couple of capsules a day … the miracle cure. Just imagine how it sold! Zonac’s share price went through the roof.’ With his fork, he offers me the last mouthful of cake. I shake my head and he pops it in his mouth. ‘It was only then that the Kikanda got wind of what was happening. They challenged Zonac, who said sorry, we thought you were extinct. The Kikanda replied that they weren’t extinct, they were very much alive. They said that kar grows on their ancestral land, it belongs to them, and they were going to hire a shit-hot lawyer from Johannesburg to sue Zonac to kingdom come for bio-piracy. And that’s where I came in.’
    â€˜You acted for Zonac.’
    Jeremy nods.
    â€˜Against vulnerable, poverty-stricken, unique, endangered people who had absolutely nothing.’
    â€˜Yep.’
    He dabs at the crumbs on the plate. I glare at him as he sucks his finger.
    â€˜You’re such a shit.’ My face heats up. I feel strangely, exhilaratingly intimate with him. ‘Talk about David and bloody Goliath. I always suspected you did something like that but hoped I was wrong. Go on, tell me you were just doing your job.’
    â€˜Progress always has casualties,’ Jeremy says blandly, leaning back in his chair. ‘From lab rats upwards. Saving lives means losing lives.’
    â€˜That’s bollocks. You’re not saving lives, you’re peddling stuff to stupid people who eat too much.’
    â€˜Thing is, Petra my love, the Kikanda are doomed anyway. Their way of life’s doomed.’ He lights a cigarette. ‘If it’s not one thing it’s another. The Chinese are swarming over the place plundering the minerals, the poachers are slaughtering the wildlife, the Arab sheikhs are setting fire to the migration routes and nicking the land for hunting, everyone’s bribing everyone, the government’s riddled with corruption, the whole bloody area’s up for grabs.’
    Somewhere, through the trees, drummers start tum-tum-tumming with a jungle beat. I feel profoundly depressed. ‘That doesn’t excuse you.’
    â€˜No, it doesn’t. That’s why I left my job.’
    â€˜What?’
    So he tells me.
    It wasn’t a Road to Damascus moment. ‘It happened when I was shaving,’ Jeremy says. ‘Just a normal morning, couldn’t be more normal.’ He raises his eyebrows. ‘But don’t you find that huge things can happen in the most humdrum moment?’
    I nod. The wind stirs my paper napkin.
    â€˜By the time I’d finished shaving the lawyer in me had vanished, just like that,’ he says.
    â€˜So what did you do?’
    â€˜Didn’t go into work. Told them to go to hell.’
    I stare at him.
    â€˜I had some money saved up – quite a lot, over the years, we’d never bought a house or anything sensible like that, and I’d been paid