ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors offer grateful acknowledgment to the following people, who have greatly enriched the background authenticity of this novel by their generous contributions of time and information:

The Reverend W.C.H. Seal, for background on Phurbas and Tibetan black magic, as well as orthodox Tibetan Buddhism, and for checking the final manuscript for accuracy; any errors that have crept in are ours, not his;

Mr. Thorn McCarthy, administrator for the Holy Island Project, Samye Ling Tibetan Centre in Scotland, for his warm welcome and reams of information at Samye Ling, and for helping arrange our visit to Holy Island;

Mr. Harry Lloyd, Northern Fisheries Board, Ballyshannon, who allowed us to inspect and photograph inflatable patrol craft and survival gear used by Fisheries officers; also, Mr. Ronan Flynn, Central Fisheries Board, and Mr. Bryan Murphy, of OceanTech, Dun Laoghaire, for more specific information on the Avon inflatable boats used by the Irish Department of the Marine;

P.C. Stephen Stewart (Alexandria), Detective Sergeant Alasdair Barnett (Campbeltown), and P.C. David White, Strathclyde Police, for guidance on police procedure;

Mrs. Elaine Ennis, Scottish Department of Social Work, for insights on rehabilitation procedures for spinal injury patients;

Chief Engineer Gordon W. Whitehead, for invaluable technical expertise regarding submarine operation;

Mr. Simon Martin, for sharing his practical knowledge of marine salvage work;

Dr. Richard Oram, our resident authority on Scottish history, who was able to paint us a graphic picture of seventeenth-century Hawick;

Mr. Ken Fraser of the St. Andrews University Library, for being ever ready to find all manner of obscure books on demand.