run for the operation. “As Dave Smith said it, Paul Le Roux would finance a takeover by the former president,” the mercenary said. “Obviously it didn't come to fruition. I didn't put much to it, be- cause it sounded kind of fantastic. When we were there we didn't do anything for two days except sit in the hotel.”

Another story Donovan told me was about the last time he ever saw Le Roux. Donovan was sitting outside a Starbucks on Ayala Avenue, a busy thoroughfare in Manila, on a weekday afternoon. “He was coming by in an SUV, and a follow car, for his body- guards. He stopped and got out, and the bodyguards got out. He came right up to me,” Donovan said. “He didn't even say my name. He just leans over and he goes, ‘Know where to get ten thousand AKs?’ Randomly out of the fucking blue just like that.”

As it happened, Donovan did have an arms contact, someone who knew precisely where to get a lot of assault weapons. Smith, he assumed, must have passed this information on to Le Roux, prompting the question.

“I told you to fuck off,” Donovan said to Le Roux. “I don't want to deal with you.”

Le Roux seemed unfazed. He just looked at Donovan and said, “Come see me in my office.”

Donovan never did. But he heard, months later, that Le Roux had a cargo ship full of guns coming into the country. So he de- cided to make sure it got stopped. “I gave the information to somebody who I knew would give it to the right people, to get it tagged,” he said.