There's a nice Portuguese villa where an English lady and her husband reside.  Lodger's there are suspected when the husband disappears and Drake is assigned to see what's going on.  He is brought in on a smuggling ring by the lodgers who say they are smuggling industrial diamonds.  In reality, they are smuggling missile electronics.

An agent is killed in the field and Drake is sent to the African country where it happened to investigate the generals and leaders of a small mercenary band intent on seeing the country's leader die while under the knife in a hospital so that they may take control of the country.