brought Robert Mugabe to power as prime minister of the new Zimbabwe. The end of minority rule meant a new kind of status anxiety for a white community that had benefited from nearly a century of colonialism. But at least the violence had subsided. Le Roux’s parents sent him away to boarding school for sixth and seventh grade, fearing the local education wasn’t intensive enough for their precocious son. On weekends he would rotate between family members’ homes. “He was fought over, everyone wanted him,” the relative said. “Our grandparents worshipped the ground he walked on, honestly. I know this sounds like a fairy tale, but it’s true.” But Judy and Paul Sr. decided that they hadn’t had kids in order never to see them, so they decided to relocate to South Africa in search of better schools. Krugersdorp, their new home forty ki- lometers outside of Johannesburg, was also a mining town, gold instead of asbestos. Life there was different, though. Paul Sr. was no longer a manager but a newcomer looking to establish his busi- ness.

The younger Paul Le Roux had grown tall, trim, and handsome in his teenage years. A decent but unmotivated student, he de- spised the idea of learning Afrikaans, compulsory in South African schools. He was not without friends, but projected an air of supe- riority that increased as he grew older. He derided the new coun- trymen at his high school as “halfwits and morons.” In a sports-mad culture where a kid of his size was expected on the rugby pitch, he favored video games played on a console hooked up to the fam- ily TV.

According to his cousin Mathew Smith—no relation to Le Roux’s later employee Dave Smith*—Le Roux earned his first computer by washing cars. From his initial glimpse at the screen, he was captivated by his ability to create worlds in code. He be- came “completely antisocial,” Mathew remembered. “Every time we went there, he was always holed up in his room. I remember

* To avoid confusion, I will refer to Mathew Smith in most cases by his first name.