Trail of Greed: Fighting Fraud and Corruption... A Dangerous Game by John Dysart

seen or heard that’s ok with me but we do it as if you and I have no prior connection. Keep my name out of it. Tomorrow we can speak by phone and compare impressions. Then we can decide on next steps. OK ?”
    Steven listened attentively. I stressed that I didn’t want him writing about our suspicions yet. If he reported the meeting straightforwardly, that was fine, but he wasn’t to start publically surmising yet. If we thought things were not right and we started digging he would be kept informed and we could decide together whether to go public or not, and when.
    “Fine by me. Maybe I’ll get a good story out of it.” Little did he know that he was going to get several stories out of it.
    As I entered the foyer of the vast glass building, a monument to modern architecture, having laboriously ascended the twenty-five granite steps leading up to the enormous revolving doors, I was asked two or three times if I needed any help. Was I perhaps lost? Was I sure I was in the right building?
    I guess that jeans and brown leather loafers, topped off with a bright canary yellow, open-necked shirt, and covered with a light brown canvas jacket were not customary in this environment but I didn’t give a damn. I wanted the attention. I was past the age of needing to conform and I was determined to enjoy myself.
    I walked up to the reception desk manned (or womanned?) by three bright young things, all smiles and lipstick, short skirts and plunging necklines, who dutifully gave me my badge and my welcome pack – a neat little canvas bag with logos plastered all over it containing the programme and a few advertising leaflets – and I was permitted to pass through into the auditorium.
    I had procured an invitation through one of the few remaining contacts that I had in the Edinburgh financial world, so my badge carried my name but no company identification.
    The auditorium was about a quarter full which gave me plenty of scope to choose a seat in a suitably strategic position. I chose one toward the middle, about five rows back from the front, right in front of the table behind which the various presenters would be sitting. I was pretty sure I would be noticed.
    The auditorium gradually started to fill up as people straggled in, mainly in groups of two or three but with the occasional person on their own. It was a typical cross section of an audience for such an event – a couple of dozen elderly grey – or white-haired gentlemen in suits, shirts and ties – the old school, all around my age – a few little old ladies clearly there to keep an eye on what was happening to their savings, then the next generation: mostly male, most in their twenties, all texting furiously on their iPhones or consulting their iPads and ignoring everyone around them. I think if you asked them afterwards what the colour of the seats was or roughly how many people were there, they wouldn’t have a clue.
    Perhaps thirty per cent of the younger generation was female – power-dressed in black or grey business trouser suits, sporting large “designer” handbags, (what is a “designer” handbag? I would have thought that every single handbag in existence had been “designed” by someone!), tossing their hair to the side to be able to slide the mobile phone against their ear. Heads tilted, earnest conversations taking place. The occasional wave to someone who passed. It gave the definite impression that it was all for show. Why not go out into the corridor to phone?
    Two of the younger males sat down next to me – not so much as a “good morning” – and I received a full whiff of scented gel, mixed with the strong musky perfume of the girl in front. Fortunately on my other side I had a couple of guys of my generation who voiced the standard greetings and we exchanged a few normal comments about the weather, the traffic and last week’s rugby match. At least it was human contact.
    At the appointed hour the three conference presenters mounted