The Tomb

“Never.”

Full of eccentricities, these Bahktis.

The Beck’s arrived, delivered by the maitre d” himself, who poured the first glassful, lingered a moment, then wandered off with obvious reluctance.

“You realize, don’t you,” Kolabati said as Jack quaffed a few ounces of his beer, “that you have made two lifelong friends in the past twenty-four hours: my brother and myself.”

“What about your grandmother?”

Kolabati blinked. “Her, too, of course. Do not take our gratitude lightly, Jack. Not mine. And especially not my brother’s—Kusum never forgets a favor or a slight.”

“Just what does your brother do at the U.N.?” It was small talk. Jack really wanted to know all about Kolabati, but didn’t want to appear too interested.

“I’m not sure. A minor post.” She must have noticed Jack’s puzzled frown. “Yes, I know—he doesn’t seem to be a man who’d be satisfied with any sort of minor post. Believe me, he isn’t. Back home his name is known in every province.”

“Why?”

“He is the leader of a new Hindu fundamentalist movement. He and many others believe that India and Hinduism have become too Westernized. He wants a return to the old ways. He’s been picking up a surprising number of followers over the years and developing considerable political clout.”

“Sounds like the Moral Majority over here. What is he—the Jerry Falwell of India?”

Kolabati’s expression became grim. “Perhaps more. His singleness of purpose can be frightening at times. Some fear he may become the Ayatolla Khomeini of India. That’s why everyone was shocked early last year when he suddenly requested diplomatic assignment at the London Embassy. It was granted immediately—no doubt the government was delighted to have him out of the country. Recently he was transferred here to the U.N.—again at his request. I’m sure his followers and adversaries back home are mystified, but I know my brother. I’ll bet he’s getting enough international experience under his belt so he can go home and become a credible candidate for a major political office. But enough of Kusum…”

Jack felt Kolabati’s hand against his chest, pushing him back against the cushions.

“Get comfortable now,” she said, her dark eyes boring into him, “and tell me all about yourself. I want to know everything, especially how you came to be Repairman Jack.”

Jack took another swallow of beer and forced himself to pause. He had a sudden urge to tell her everything, to open up his whole past to her. It frightened him. He never opened up to anyone except Abe. Why Kolabati? Perhaps it was because she already knew something about him; perhaps because she was so effusive in her gratitude for achieving the “impossible” and returning her grandmother’s necklace. Telling all was out of the question, but pieces of the truth wouldn’t hurt. The question was: what to tell, what to edit?

“It just sort of happened.”

“There had to be a first time. Start there. Tell me about it.”

He settled into the cushions, adjusting his position until the lump of the holstered Mauser .380 sat comfortably in the small of his back, and began telling her about Mr. Canelli, his first fix-it customer.

4

Summer was drawing to a close. He was seventeen, still living in Johnson, New Jersey, a small, semi-rural town in Burlington County. His father was working as a C.P.A. then, and his mother was still alive. His brother was in the New Jersey State College of Medicine and his sister was in Rutgers pre-law.

On the corner down the street from his house lived Mr. Vito Canelli, a retired widower. From the time the ground thawed until the time it froze again, he worked in his yard. Especially on his lawn. He seeded and fertilized every couple of weeks, watered it daily. Mr. Canelli had the greenest lawn in the county. It was usually flawless. The only times it wasn’t was when someone cut the corner turning right off 541 onto Jack’s street. The first few times were probably accidents, but then some of the more vandalism-prone kids in the area started making a habit of it. Driving across “the old wop’s” lawn became a Friday and Saturday night ritual. Finally, old Mr. Canelli put up a three-foot white picket fence and that seemed to put an end to it. Or so he thought.

It was early. Jack was walking up to the highway towing the family Toro behind him. For the past few summers he had made his money doing gardening chores and cutting grass around town. He liked the work and liked even better the fact that he could adjust his hours almost any way he wished.

When he came into view of Mr. Canelli’s yard he stopped and gaped.

The picket fence was down—smashed and scattered all over the lawn in countless white splinters. The small flowering ornamental trees that blossomed in varied colors each spring-dwarf crabapples, dogwoods—had been broken off a foot above the ground. Yews and junipers were flattened and ground into the dirt. The plaster pink flamingos that everybody laughed about were shattered and crushed to powder. And the lawn… there weren’t just tire tracks across it, there were long, wide gouges up to six inches deep. Whoever had done it hadn’t been satisfied with simply driving across the lawn and flattening some grass; they had skidded and slewed their car or cars around until the entire yard had been ripped to pieces.

As Jack approached for a closer look, he saw a figure standing at the corner of the house looking out at the ruins. It was Mr. Canelli. His shoulders were slumped and quaking. Sunlight glistened off the tears on his cheeks. Jack knew little about Mr. Canelli. He was a quiet man who bothered no one. He had no wife, no children or grandchildren around. All he had was his yard: his hobby, his work of art, the focus of what was left of his life. Jack knew from his own small-time landscaping jobs around town how much sweat was invested in a yard like that. No man should have to see that kind of effort wantonly destroyed. No man that age should be reduced to standing in his own yard and crying.

Mr. Canelli’s helplessness unleashed something inside Jack. He had lost his temper before, but the rage he felt within him at that moment bordered on insanity. His jaw was clamped so tightly his teeth ached; his entire body trembled as his muscles bunched into knots. He had a good idea of who had done it and could confirm his suspicions with little difficulty. He had to fight off a wild urge to find them and run the Toro over their faces a few times.

Reason won out. No sense landing himself in jail while they got to play the roles of unfortunate victims.

There was another way. It leaped full-blown into Jack’s head as he stood there.

He walked over to Mr. Canelli and said, “I can fix it for you.”

The old man blotted his face with a handkerchief and glared at him. “Fix it why? So you an’ you friends can destroy it again?”

“I’ll fix it so it never happens again.”

Mr. Canelli looked at him a long time without speaking, then said, “Come inside. You tell me how.”

Jack didn’t give him all the details, just a list of the materials he would need. He added fifty dollars for labor. Mr. Canelli agreed but said he’d hold the fifty until he saw results. They shook hands and had a small glass of barbarone to seal the deal.

Jack began the following day. He bought three dozen small spreading yews and planted them three and a half feet apart along the perimeter of the corner lot while Mr. Canelli started restorative work on his lawn. They talked while they worked. Jack learned that the damage had been done by a smallish, low-riding, light-colored car and a dark van. Mr. Canelli hadn’t been able to get the license plate numbers. He had called the police but the vandals were long gone by the time one of the local cops came by. The police had been called before, but the incidents were so random and, until now, of such little consequence, that they hadn’t taken the complaints too seriously.

The next step was to secure three dozen four-foot lengths of six-inch pipe and hide them in Mr. Canelli’s garage. They used a post-hole digger to open a three-foot hole directly behind each yew. Late one night, Jack and Mr. Canelli mixed up a couple of bags of cement in the garage and filled each of the four-foot iron pipes. Three days later, again under cover of darkness, the cement-filled pipes were inserted into the holes behind the yews and the dirt packed tight around them. Each bush now had twelve to fifteen inches of makeshift lolly column hidden within its branches.

The white picket fence was rebuilt around the yard and Mr. Canelli continued to work at getting his lawn back into shape. The only thing left for Jack to do was sit back and wait.

It took a while. August ended, Labor Day passed, school began again. By the third week of September, Mr. Canelli had the yard graded again. The new grass had sprouted and was filling in nicely.

And that, apparently, was what they had been waiting for.

The sounds of sirens awoke Jack at one-thirty a.m. on a Sunday morning. Red lights were flashing up at the corner by Mr. Canelli’s house. Jack pulled on his jeans and ran to the scene.

Two first aid rigs were pulling away as he approached the top of the block. Straight ahead a black van lay on its side by the curb. The smell of gasoline filled the air. In the wash of light from a street lamp overhead he saw that the undercarriage was damaged beyond repair: The left front lower control arm was torn loose; the floor pan was ripped open, exposing a bent drive shaft; the differential was knocked out of line, and the gas tank was leaking. A fire truck stood by, readying to hose down the area.

He walked on to the front of Mr. Canelli’s house, where a yellow Camaro was stopped nose-on to the yard. The windshield was spider-webbed with cracks and steam plumed around the edges of the sprung hood. A quick glance under the hood revealed a ruptured radiator, bent front axle, and cracked engine block.

Mr. Canelli stood on his front steps. He waved Jack over and stuck a fifty-dollar bill into his hand.

Jack stood beside him and watched until both vehicles were towed away, until the street had been hosed down, until the fire truck and police cars were gone. He was bursting inside. He felt he could leap off the steps and fly around the yard if he wished. He could not remember ever feeling so good. Nothing smokable, ingestible, or injectable would ever give him a high like this.

He was hooked.

5

One hour, three beers, and two kirs later, it dawned upon Jack that he had told much more than he had intended. He had gone on from Mr. Canelli to describe some of his more interesting fix-it jobs. Kolabati seemed to enjoy them all, especially the ones where he had taken special pains to make the punishment fit the crime.

A combination of factors had loosened his tongue. First of all was a feeling of privacy. He and Kolabati seemed to have the far end of this wing of Peacock Alley to themselves. There were dozens of conversations going on in the wing, blending into a susurrant undertone that wound around them, masking their own words and making them indistinguishable from the rest. But most of all, there was Kolabati, so interested, so intent upon what he had to say that he kept talking, saying more than he wished, saying anything to keep that fascinated look in her eyes. He talked to her as he had talked to no one else he could remember—except perhaps Abe. Abe had learned about him over a period of years and had seen much of it happen. Kolabati was getting a big helping in one sitting.

Throughout his narrative, Jack watched for her reaction, fearing she might turn away like Gia had. But Kolabati was obviously not like Gia. Her eyes fairly glowed with enthusiasm and… admiration.

It was, however, time to shut up. He had said enough. They sat for a quiet moment, toying with their empty glasses. Jack was about to ask her if she wanted a refill when she turned to him.

“You don’t pay taxes, do you.”

The statement startled him. Uneasy, he wondered how she knew.

“Why do you say that?”

“I sense you are a self-made outcast. Am I right?”

“’Self-made outcast.’ I like that.”

“Liking it is not the same as answering the question.”

“I consider myself a sort of sovereign state. I don’t recognize other governments within my borders.”

“But you’ve exiled yourself from more than the government. You live and work completely outside society. Why?”

“I’m not an intellectual. I can’t give you a carefully reasoned manifesto. It’s just the way I want to live.”

Her eyes bored into him. “I don’t accept that. Something cut you off. What was it?”

This woman was uncanny! It was as if she could look into his mind and read all his secrets. Yes—there had been an incident that had caused him to withdraw from the rest of “civilized” society. But he couldn’t tell her about it. He felt at ease with Kolabati, but he wasn’t about to confess to murder.

“I’d rather not say.”

She studied him. “Are your parents alive?”

Jack felt his insides tighten. “Only my father.”

“I see. Did your mother die of natural causes?”

She can read minds! That’s the only explanation!

“No. And I don’t want to say any more.”

“Very well. But however you came to be what you are, I’m sure it was by honorable means.”

Her confidence in him simultaneously warmed and discomfitted him. He wanted to change the subject.

“Hungry?”

“Famished!”

“Any place in particular you’d like to go? There are some Indian restaurants—”

Her eyebrows arched. “If I were Chinese, would you offer me egg rolls? Am I dressed in a sari?”

No. That clinging white dress looked like it came straight from a designer’s shop in Paris.

“French, then?”

“I lived in France a while. Please: I live in America now. I want American food. “

“Well, I like to eat where I can relax.”

“I want to go to Beefsteak Charlie’s.”

Jack burst out laughing. “There’s one near where I live! I go there all the time! Mainly because when it comes to food, I tend to be impressed more by quantity than by quality.”

“Good. Then you know the way?”

He half-rose, then sat down again. “Wait a minute. They serve ribs there. Indians don’t eat pork, do they?”

“No. You’re thinking of Pakistanis. They’re Moslems and Moslems don’t eat pork. I’m Hindu. We don’t eat beef.”

“Then why Beefsteak—?”

“I hear they have a good salad bar, with lots of shrimp. And ’all the beer, wine, or sangria you can drink.’ “

“Then let’s go,” Jack said, rising and presenting his arm.

She slipped into her shoes and was up and close beside him in a single liquid motion. Jack threw a ten and a twenty on the table and started to walk away.

“No receipt?” Kolabati asked with a sly smile. “I’m sure you can make tonight deductible.”

“I use the short form.”

She laughed. A delightful sound.

On their way toward the front of Peacock Alley, Jack was very much aware of the warm pressure of Kolabati’s hand on the inside of his arm and around his biceps, just as he was aware of the veiled attention they drew from all sides as they passed.

From Peacock Alley in the Waldorf on Park Avenue to Beefsteak Charlie’s on the West Side—culture shock. But Kolabati moved from one stratum to the other as easily as she moved from garnish to garnish at the crowded salad bar, where the attention she attracted was much more openly admiring than at the Waldorf. She seemed infinitely adaptable, and Jack found that fascinating. In fact, he found everything about her fascinating.

He had begun probing her past during the cab ride uptown, learning that she and her brother were from a wealthy family in the Bengal region of India, that Kusum had lost his arm as a boy in a train wreck that had killed both of their parents, after which they had been raised by the grandmother Jack had met the night before. That explained their devotion to her. Kolabati was currently teaching in Washington at the Georgetown University School of Linguistics and now and again consulting for the School of Foreign Service.

Jack watched her eat the cold shrimp piled before her. Her fingers were nimble, her movements delicate but sure as she peeled the carapaces, dipped the pink bodies in either cocktail sauce or the little plate of Russian dressing she had brought to the table, then popped them into her mouth. She ate with a gusto he found exciting. It was rare these days to find a woman who so relished a big meal. He was sick to death of talk about calories and pounds and waistlines. Calorie-counting was for during the week. When he was out to eat with a woman, he wanted to see her relish the food as much as he did. It became a shared vice. It linked them in the sin of enjoying a full belly and reveling in the tasting, chewing, swallowing, and washing down that led up to it. They became partners in crime. It was erotic as all hell.

The meal was over.

Kolabati leaned back in her chair and stared at him. Between them lay the remains of a number of salads, two steak bones, an empty pitcher of sangria for her, an empty beer pitcher for him, and the casings of at least a hundred shrimp.

“We have met the enemy,” Jack said, “and he is in us. Just as well you don’t like steak, though. They were on the tough side.”

“Oh, I like steak. It’s just that beef is supposed to be bad for your karma.”

As she spoke her hand crept across the table and found his. Her touch was electrifying—a shock literally ran up his arm. Jack swallowed and tried to keep the conversation going. No point in letting her see how she was getting to him.

“Karma. There’s a word you hear an awful lot. What’s it mean, really? It’s like fate, isn’t it?”

Kolabati’s eyebrows drew together. “Not exactly. It’s not easy to explain. It starts with the idea of the transmigration of the soul—what we call the atman—and how it undergoes many successive incarnations or lives.”

“Reincarnation.” Jack had heard of that—Bridey Murphy and all.

Kolabati turned his hand over and began lightly running her fingernails over his palm. Gooseflesh sprang up all over his body.

“Right,” she said. “Karma is the burden of good or evil your atman carries with it from one life to the next. It’s not fate, because you are free to determine how much good or evil you do in each of your lives, but then again, the weight of good or evil in your karma determines the kind of life you will be born into—high born or low born.”

“And that goes on forever?” He wished what she was doing to his hand would go on forever.

“No. Your atman can be liberated from the karmic wheel by achieving a state of perfection in life. This is moksha. It frees the atman from further incarnations. It is the ultimate goal of every atman. “

“And eating beef would hold you back from moksha?” It sounded silly.

Kolabati seemed to read his mind again. “Not so odd, really. Jews and Moslems have a similar sanction against pork. For us, beef pollutes the karma.”

“’Pollutes.’ “

“That’s the word.”

“Do you worry that much about your karma?”

“Not as much as I should. Certainly not as much as Kusum does.” Her eyes clouded. “He’s become obsessed with his karma… his karma and Kali.”

That struck a dissonant chord in Jack. “Kali? Wasn’t she worshipped by a bunch of stranglers?” Again, his source was Gunga Din.

Kolabati’s eyes cleared and flashed as she dug her fingernails into his palm, turning pleasure to pain. “That wasn’t Kali but a diminished avatar of her called Bhavani who was worshipped by Thugges—low-caste criminals! Kali is the Supreme Goddess!”

“Woops! Sorry.”

She smiled. “Where do you live?”

“Not far.”

“Take me there.”

Jack hesitated, knowing it was his firm personal rule to never let people know where he lived unless he had known them for a good long while. But she was stroking his palm again.

“Now?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

6

For certain is death for the born

And certain is birth for the dead;

Therefore over the inevitable

Thou shouldst not grieve.

Kusum lifted his head from his study of the Bhagavad Gita. There it was again. That sound from below. It came to him over the dull roar of the city beyond the dock, the city that never slept, over the nocturnal harbor sounds, and the creaks and rattles of the ship as the tide caressed its iron hull and stretched the ropes and cables that moored it. Kusum closed the Gita and went to his cabin door. It was too soon. The Mother could not have caught the Scent yet.

He went out and stood on the small deck that ran around the aft superstructure. The officers’ and crew’s quarters, galley, wheelhouse, and funnel were all clustered here at the stern. He looked forward along the entire length of the main deck, a flat surface broken only by the two hatches to the main cargo holds and the four cranes leaning out from the kingpost set between them. His ship. A good ship, but an old one. Small as freighters go—twenty-five hundred tons, running two hundred feet prow to stern, thirty feet across her main deck. Rusted and dented, but she rode high and true in the water. Her registry was Liberian, naturally.

Kusum had had her sailed here six months ago. No cargo at that time, only a sixty-foot enclosed barge towed three hundred feet behind the ship as it made its way across the Atlantic from London. The cable securing the barge came loose the night the ship entered New York Harbor. The next morning the barge was found drifting two miles off shore. Empty. Kusum sold it to a garbage hauling outfit. U.S. Customs inspected the two empty cargo holds and allowed the ship to dock. Kusum had secured a slip for it in the barren area above Pier 97 on the West Side, where there was little dock activity. It was moored nose first into the bulkhead. A rotting pier ran along its starboard flank. The crew had been paid and discharged. Kusum had been the only human aboard since.

The rasping sound came again. More insistent. Kusum went below. The sound grew in volume as he neared the lower decks. Opposite the engine room, he came to a watertight hatch and stopped.

The Mother wanted to get out. She had begun scraping her talons along the inner surface of the hatch and would keep it up until she was released. Kusum stood and listened for a while. He knew the sound well: long, grinding, irregular rasps in a steady, insistent rhythm. She showed all the signs of having caught the Scent. She was ready to hunt.

That puzzled him. It was too soon. The chocolates couldn’t have arrived yet. He knew precisely when they had been posted from London—a telegram had confirmed it—and knew they’d be delivered tomorrow at the very earliest.

Could it possibly be one of those specially treated bottles of cheap wine he had been handing out to the winos downtown for the past six months? The derelicts had served as a food supply and good training fodder for the nest as it matured. He doubted there could be any of the treated wine left—those untouchables usually finished off the bottle within hours of receiving it.

But there was no fooling the Mother. She had caught the Scent and wanted to follow it. Although he had planned to continue training the brighter ones as crew for the ship—in the six months since their arrival in New York they had learned to handle the ropes and follow commands in the engine room— the hunt took priority. Kusum spun the wheel that retracted the lugs, then stood behind the hatch as it swung open. The Mother stepped out, an eight-foot humanoid shadow, lithe and massive in the dimness. One of the younglings, a foot shorter but almost as massive, followed on her heels. And then another. Without warning she spun and hissed and raked her talons through the air a bare inch from the second youngling’s eyes. It retreated into the hold. Kusum closed the hatch and spun the wheel. Kusum felt the Mother’s faintly glowing yellow eyes pass over him without seeing him as she turned and swiftly, silently led her adolescent offspring up the steps and into the night.

This was as it should be. The rakoshi had to be taught how to follow the Scent, how to find the intended victim and return with it to the nest so that all might share. The Mother taught them one by one. This was as it always had been. This was as it would be.

The Scent must be coming from the chocolates. He could think of no other explanation. The thought sent a thrill through him. Tonight would bring him one step closer to completing the vow. Then he could return to India.

On his way back to the upper deck, Kusum once again looked along the length of his ship, but this time his gaze lifted above and beyond to the vista spread out before him. Night was a splendid cosmetician for this city at the edge of this rich, vulgar, noisome, fulsome land. It hid the seaminess of the dock area, the filth collecting under the crumbling West Side Highway, the garbage swirling in the Hudson, the blank-faced warehouses and the human refuse that crept in and out and around them. The upper levels of Manhattan rose above all that, ignoring it, displaying a magnificent array of lights like sequins on black velvet.

It never failed to make him pause and watch. It was so unlike his India. Mother India could well use the riches in this land. Her people would put them to good use. They would certainly appreciate them more than these pitiful Americans who were so rich in material things and so poor in spirit, so lacking in inner resources. Their chrome, their dazzle, their dim-witted pursuit of “fun” and “experience” and “self.” Only a culture such as theirs could construct such an architectural marvel as this city and refer to it as a large piece of fruit. They didn’t deserve this land. They were like a horde of children given free run of the bazaar in Calcutta.

The thought of Calcutta made him ache to go home. Tonight, and then one more.

One final death after tonight’s and he would be released from his vow. Kusum returned to his cabin to read his Gita.

7

“I believe I’ve been Kama Sutra ed.”

“I don’t think that’s a verb.”

“It just became one.”

Jack lay on his back, feeling divorced from his body. He was numb from his hair down. Every fiber of nerve and muscle was being taxed just to support his vital functions.

“I think I’m going to die.”

Kolabati stirred beside him, nude but for her iron necklace. “You did. But I resuscitated you.”

“Is that what you call it in India?”

They had arrived at his apartment after an uneventful walk from Beefsteak Charlie’s. Kolabati’s eyes had widened and she staggered a bit as she entered Jack’s apartment. It was a common reaction. Some said it was the bric-a-brac and movie posters on the walls, others said it was the Victorian furniture with all the gingerbread carving and the wavy grain of the golden oak that did it.

“Your decor,” she said, leaning against him. “It’s so… interesting.”

“I collect things— things. As for the furniture, hideous is what most people call it, and they’re right. All that carving and such is out of style. But I like furniture that looks like human beings touched it at one time or another during its construction, even human beings of dubious taste.”

Jack became acutely aware of the pressure of Kolabati’s body against his flank. Her scent was unlike any perfume. He could not even be sure it was perfume. More like scented oil. She looked up at him and he wanted her. And in her eyes he could see she wanted him.

Kolabati stepped away and began to remove her dress.

In the past, Jack had always felt himself in control during lovemaking. It had not been a conscious thing, but he had always set the pace and moved into the positions. Not tonight. With Kolabati it was different. It was all very subtle, but before long they were each cast in their roles. She was by far the hungrier of the two of them, the more insistent. And although younger, she seemed to be the more experienced. She became the director, he became an actor in her play.

And it was quite a play. Passion and laughter. She was skilled, yet there was nothing mechanical about her. She reveled in sensations, giggled, even laughed at times. She was a delight. She knew where to touch him, how to touch him in ways he had never known, lifting him to heights of sensation he had never dreamed possible. And though he knew he had brought her to thrashing peaks of pleasure numerous times, she was insatiable.

He watched her now as the light from the tiny leaded glass lamp in the corner of the bedroom cast a soft chiaroscuro effect over the rich color of her skin. Her breasts were perfect, their nipples the darkest brown he had ever seen. With her eyes still closed, she smiled and stretched, a slow, languorous movement that brought her dark and downy pubic mons against his thigh. Her hand crept across his chest, then trailed down over his abdomen toward his groin. He felt his abdominal muscles tighten.

“That’s not fair to do to a dying man.”

“Where there’s life, there’s hope.”

“Is this your way of thanking me for finding the necklace?” He hoped not. He had already been paid for the necklace.

She opened her eyes. “Yes… and no. You are a unique man in this world, Repairman Jack. I’ve traveled a lot, met many people. You stand out from all of them. Once my brother was like you, but he has changed. You are alone.”

“Not at the moment.”

She shook her head. “All men of honor are alone.”

Honor. This was the second time she had spoken of honor this evening. Once at Peacock Alley, and now here in his bed. Strange for a woman to think in terms of honor. That was supposed to be men’s territory, although nowadays the word rarely passed the lips of members of either sex. But when it did, it was most apt to be spoken by a man. Sexist, perhaps, but he could think of no exceptions to refute it.

“Can a man who lies, cheats, steals, and sometimes does violence to other people be a man of honor?”

Kolabati looked into his eyes. “He can if he lies to liars, cheats cheaters, steals from thieves, and limits his violence to those who are violent.”

“You think so?”

“I know so.”

An honorable man. He liked the sound of that. He liked the meaning that went with it. As Repairman Jack he had taken an honorable course without consciously setting out to do so. Autonomy had been his driving motive—to reduce to the barest minimum all external restraints upon his life. But honor… honor was an internal restraint. He hadn’t recognized the role it had played all along in guiding him.

Kolabati’s hand started moving again and thoughts of honor sank in the waves of pleasure washing over him. It was good to be aroused again.

He had led a monkish life since Gia had left him. Not that he had consciously avoided sex—he had simply stopped thinking about it. A number of weeks had gone by before he even realized what had happened to him. He had read that that was a sign of depression. Maybe. Whatever the cause, tonight made up for any period of abstention, no matter how long.

Her hand was gently working at him now, drawing responses from what he had thought was an empty well. He was rolling toward her when he caught the first whiff of the odor.

What the hell is that?

It smelled like a pigeon had got into the air conditioner and laid a rotten egg. Or died.

Kolabati stiffened beside him. He didn’t know whether she had smelled it, too, or whether something had frightened her. He thought he heard her say something that sounded like “Rakosh!” in a tense whisper. She rolled on top of him and clung like a drowning sailor to a floating spar.

An aura of nameless fear enveloped Jack. Something was terribly wrong, but he could not say what. He listened for a foreign sound, but all that came to him were the low hums, each in a different key, of the air conditioners in each of the three rooms. He reached for the .38 S&W Chief Special he always kept under the mattress, but Kolabati hugged him tighter.

“Don’t move,” she whispered in a voice he could barely hear. “Just lie here under me and don’t say a word.”

Jack opened his mouth to speak but she covered his lips with her own. The pressure of her bare breasts against his chest, her hips on his, the tingle of her necklace as it dangled from her neck against his throat, the caresses of her hands—all worked toward blotting out the odor.

Yet there was a desperation about her that prevented Jack from completely releasing himself to the sensations. His eyes kept opening and straying to the window, to the door, to the hall that led past the tv room to the darkened front room, then back to the window. There was no good reason for it, but a small part of him expected someone or something—a person, an animal—to come through the door. He knew it was impossible—the front door was locked, the windows were three stories up. Crazy. Yet the feeling persisted.

And persisted.

He did not know how long he lay there, tense and tight under Kolabati, itching for the comfortable feel of a pistol grip in his palm. It felt like half the night.

Nothing happened. Eventually, the odor began to fade. And with it the sensation of the presence of another. Jack felt himself begin to relax and, finally, begin to respond to Kolabati.

But Kolabati suddenly had different ideas. She jumped up from the bed and padded into the front room for her clothes.

Jack followed and watched her slip into her underwear with brisk, almost frantic movements.

“What’s wrong?”

“I have to get home.”

“Back to D.C.?” His heart sank. Not yet. She intrigued him so.

“No. To my brother’s. I’m staying with him.”

“I don’t understand. Is it something I—”

Kolabati leaned over and kissed him. “Nothing you did. Something he did.”

“What’s the hurry?”

“I must speak to him immediately.”

She let the dress fall over her head and slipped her shoes on. She turned to go but the apartment door stopped her.

“How does this work?”

Jack turned the central knob that retracted the four bars, then pulled it open for her.

“Wait till I get some clothes on and I’ll find you a cab.”

“I haven’t time to wait. And I can wave my arm in the air as well as anyone.”

“You’ll be back?” The answer was very important to him at the moment. He didn’t know why. He hardly knew her.

“Yes, if I can be.” Her eyes were troubled. For an instant he thought he detected a hint of fear in them. “I hope so. I really do.”

She kissed him again, then was out the door and on her way down the stairs.

Jack closed the door, locked it, and leaned against it. If he weren’t so exhausted from lack of sleep and from the strenuous demands Kolabati had made upon him tonight, he would have tried to make some sense out of the evening’s events.

He headed for bed. This time to sleep.

But chase it as he might, sleep eluded him. The memory of the odor, Kolabati’s bizarre behavior… he couldn’t explain them. But it wasn’t what had happened tonight that bothered him so much as the gnawing, uneasy feeling that something awful had almost happened.

8

Kusum started out of his sleep, instantly alert. A sound had awakened him. His Gita slipped off his lap and onto the floor as he sprang to his feet and stepped to the cabin door. It was most likely the Mother and the young one returning, but it wouldn’t hurt to be sure. One never knew what kind of scum might be lurking about the docks. He didn’t care who came aboard in his absence—it would have to be a fairly determined thief or vandal because Kusum always kept the gangway raised. A silent beeper was needed to bring it down. But an industrious lower-caste type who climbed one of the ropes and sneaked aboard would find little of value in the superstructure. And should he venture below-decks to the cargo hold… that would mean one less untouchable prowling the streets.

But when Kusum was aboard—and he expected to be spending more time here than he wished now that Kolabati was in town—he liked to be careful. He didn’t want any unpleasant surprises.

Kolabati’s arrival had been a surprise. He had thought her safely away in Washington. She had already caused him an enormous amount of trouble this week and would undoubtedly cause him more. She knew him too well. He would have to avoid her whenever possible. And she must never learn of this ship or of its cargo.

He heard the sound again and saw two dark forms of unmistakable configuration lope along the deck. They should have been burdened with their prey, but they were not. Alarmed, Kusum ran down to the deck. He checked to make sure he was wearing his necklace, then stood in a corner and watched the rakoshi as they passed.

The youngling came first, prodded along by the Mother behind it. Both appeared agitated. If only they could talk! He had been able to teach the younglings a few words, but that was mere mimicry, not speech. He had never felt so much the need to communicate with the rakoshi as he did tonight. Yet he knew that was impossible. They were not stupid; they could learn simple tasks and follow simple commands—had he not been training them to act as crew for the ship?—but their minds did not operate on a level that permitted intelligent communication.

What had happened tonight? The Mother had never failed him before. When she caught the Scent, she invariably brought back the targeted victim. Tonight she had failed. Why?

Could there have been a mistake? Perhaps the chocolates hadn’t arrived. But how then had the Mother caught the Scent? No one but Kusum controlled the source of the Scent. None of it made sense.

He padded down the steps that led below-decks. The two rakoshi were waiting there, the Mother subdued by the knowledge that she had failed, the youngling restless, pacing about. Kusum slipped past them. The Mother raised her head, dimly aware of his presence, but the youngling only hissed and continued its pacing, oblivious to him. Kusum spun the wheel on the hatch and pulled it open. The youngling tried to retreat. It didn’t like being on the iron ship and rebelled at returning to the hold. Kusum watched patiently. They all did this after their first run through the city. They wanted to be out in the air, away from the iron hold that weakened them, out among the crowds where they could pick and choose among the fattened human cattle.

The Mother would have none of it. She gave the youngling a brutal shove that sent it stumbling into the arms of its siblings waiting inside. Then she followed.

Kusum slammed the hatch closed, secured it, then pounded his fist against it. Would he never be done with this? He had thought he would be closer to fulfilling the vow tonight. Something had gone wrong. It worried him almost as much as it angered him. Had a new variable been added, or were the rakoshi to blame?

Why was there no victim?

One thing was certain, however: There would have to be punishment. That was the way it always had been. That was the way it would be tonight.

9

Oh, Kusum! What have you done?

Kolabati’s insides writhed in terror as she sat huddled in the rear of the cab. The ride was mercifully brief—directly across Central Park to a stately building of white stone on Fifth Avenue.

The night doorman didn’t know Kolabati, so he stopped her. He was old, his face a mass of wrinkles. Kolabati detested old people. She found the thought of growing old disgusting. The doorman questioned her until she showed him her key and her Maryland driver’s license, confirming her last name to be the same as Kusum’s. She hurried through the marble lobby, past the modern low-backed couch and chairs and the uninspired abstract paintings on the walls, to the elevator. It stood open, waiting. She pressed “9,” the top floor, and stood impatiently until the door closed and the car started up.

Kolabati slumped against the rear wall and closed her eyes.

That odor! She had thought her heart would stop when she recognized it in Jack’s apartment tonight. She thought she had left it behind forever in India.

A rakosh!

One had been outside Jack’s apartment less than an hour ago. Her mind balked at the thought, yet there was no doubt in her mind. As sure as the night was dark, as sure as the number of her years—a rakosh! The knowledge nauseated her, made her weak inside and out. And the most terrifying part of it all: The only man who could be responsible—the only man in the world—was her brother.

But why Jack’s apartment?

And how? By the Black Goddess, how?

The elevator glided to a smooth halt, the doors slid open, and Kolabati headed directly for the door numbered 9B. She hesitated before inserting the key. This was not going to be easy. She loved Kusum, but there was no denying that he intimidated her. Not physically—for he would never raise his hand against her—but morally. It hadn’t always been so, but lately his righteousness had become impenetrable.

But not this time, she told herself. This time he’s wrong.

She turned the key and went in.

The apartment was dark and silent. She flipped the light switch, revealing a huge, low-ceilinged living room decorated by a hired professional. She had guessed that the first time she had walked in. There was no trace of Kusum in the decor. He hadn’t bothered to personalize it, which meant he didn’t intend to stay here very long.

“Kusum?”

She went down the two steps to the wool-carpeted living room floor and crossed to the closed door that led to her brother’s bedroom. It was dark and empty within.

She went back to the living room and called, louder now. “Kusum!”

No answer.

He had to be here! She had to find him! She was the only one who could stop him!

She walked past the door that led to the bedroom he had supplied for her and went to the picture window overlooking Central Park. The great body of the park was dark, cut at irregular intervals by lighted roads, luminescent serpents winding their way from Fifth Avenue to Central Park West.

Where are you, my brother, and what are you doing? What awfulness have you brought back to life?

10

The two propane torches on either side of him were lit and roaring blue flame straight up. Kusum made a final adjustment on the air draw to each one—he wanted to keep them noisy but didn’t want them to blow themselves out. When he was satisfied with the flames, he unclasped his necklace and laid it on the propane tank at the rear of the square platform. He had changed from his everyday clothes into his blood-red ceremonial dhoti, arranging the one-piece sarong-like garment in the traditional Maharatta style with the left end hooked beneath his leg and the bulk gathered at his right hip, leaving his legs bare. He picked up his coiled bullwhip, then stabbed the DOWN button with his middle finger.

The lift—an open elevator platform floored with wooden planks—lurched, then started a slow descent along the aft corner of the starboard wall of the main hold. It was dark below. Not completely dark, for he kept the emergency lights on at all times, but these were so scattered and of such low wattage that the illumination they provided was nominal at best.

When the lift reached the halfway point, there came a shuffling sound from below as rakoshi moved from directly beneath him, wary of the descending platform and the fire it carried. As he neared the floor of the hold and the light from the torches spread among its occupants, tiny spots of brightness began to pick up and return the glare—a few at first, then more and more until more than a hundred yellow eyes gleamed from the darkness.

A murmur rose among the rakoshi to become a whispery chant, low, throaty, guttural, one of the few words they could speak:

“Kaka-jiiiiii! Kaka-jiiiiii!”

Kusum loosed the coils of his whip and cracked it. The sound echoed like a gunshot through the hold. The chant stopped abruptly. They now knew he was angry; they would remain silent. As the platform and its roaring flames drew nearer the floor, they backed farther away. In all of heaven and earth, fire was all they feared—fire and their Kaka-ji.

He stopped the lift three or four feet above the floor, giving himself a raised platform from which to address the rakoshi assembled in a rough semi-circle just beyond the reach of the torchlight. They were barely visible except for an occasional highlight off a smooth scalp or a hulking shoulder. And the eyes. All the eyes were focused on Kusum.

He began speaking to them in the Bengali dialect, knowing they could understand little of what he was saying, but confident they would eventually get his meaning. Although he was not directly angry with them, he filled his voice with anger, for that was an integral part of what was to follow. He did not understand what had gone wrong tonight, and knew from the confusion he had sensed in the Mother upon her return that she did not understand either. Something had caused her to lose the Scent. Something extraordinary. She was a skilled hunter and he could be sure that whatever had happened had been beyond her control. That did not matter, however. A certain form must be followed. It was tradition.

He told the rakoshi that there would be no ceremony tonight, no sharing of flesh, because those who had been entrusted to bring the sacrifice had failed. Instead of the ceremony, there would be punishment.

He turned and lowered the propane feed to the torches, constricting the semi-circular pool of illumination, bringing the darkness—and the rakoshi—closer.

Then he called to the Mother. She knew what to do.

There came a scuffling and scraping from the darkness before him as the Mother brought forward the youngling that had accompanied her tonight. It came sullenly, unwillingly, but it came. For it knew it must. It was tradition.

Kusum reached back and further lowered the propane. The young rakoshi were especially afraid of fire and it would be foolish to panic this one. Discipline was imperative. If he lost his control over them, even for an instant, they might turn on him and tear him to pieces. There must be no instance of disobedience—such an act must ever remain unthinkable. But in order to bend them to his will, he must not push them too hard against their instincts.

He could barely see the creature as it slouched forward in a posture of humble submission. Kusum gestured with the whip and the Mother turned the youngling around, facing its back to him. He raised the whip and lashed it forward—one —two—three times and more, putting his body into it so that each stroke ended with the meaty slap of braided rawhide on cold, cobalt flesh.

He knew the young rakosh felt no pain from the lash, but that was of little consequence. His purpose was not to inflict pain but to assert his position of dominance. The lashing was a symbolic act, just as a rakosh’s submission to the lash was a reaffirmation of its loyalty and subservience to the will of Kusum, the Kaka-ji. The lash formed a bond between them. Both drew strength from it. With each stroke Kusum felt the power of Kali swell within him. He could almost imagine himself possessing two arms again.

After ten strokes, he stopped. The rakosh looked around, saw that he was finished, then slunk back into the group. Only the Mother remained. Kusum cracked the whip in the air. Yes, it seemed to say. You, too.

The Mother came forward, gave him a long look, then turned and presented her back to him. The eyes of the younger rakoshi grew brighter as they became agitated, shuffling their feet and clicking their talons together.

Kusum hesitated. The rakoshi were devoted to the Mother. They spent day after day in her presence. She guided them, gave order to their lives. They would die for her. Striking her was a perilous proposition. But a hierarchy had been established and it must be preserved. As the rakoshi were devoted to the Mother, so was the Mother devoted to Kusum. And to reaffirm the hierarchy, she must submit to the lash. For she was his lieutenant among the younglings and ultimately responsible for any failure to carry through the wishes of the Kaka-ji.

Yet despite her devotion, despite the knowledge that she would gladly die for him, despite the unspeakable bond that linked them—he had started the nest with her, nursing her, raising her from a mewing hatchling—Kusum was wary of the Mother. She was, after all, a rakosh—violence incarnate. Disciplining her was like juggling vials of high explosive. One lapse of concentration, one careless move…

Summoning his courage, Kusum let the whip fly, snapping its tip once against the floor far from where the Mother waited, and then he raised the whip no more. The hold had gone utterly still with the first stroke. All remained silent. The Mother continued to wait, and when no blow came, she turned toward the lift. Kusum had the bullwhip coiled by then, a difficult trick for a one-armed man, but he had long ago determined that there was a way to do almost anything with one hand. He held it out beside him, then dropped it onto the floor of the lift.

The Mother looked at him with shining eyes, her slit pupils dilating in worship. She had received no lashing, a public proclamation of the Kaka-ji’s respect and regard for her. Kusum knew this was a proud moment for her, one that would elevate her even higher in the eyes of her young. He had planned it this way.

He hit the UP switch and turned the torches to maximum as he rose. He was satisfied. Once more he had affirmed his position as absolute master of the nest. The Mother was more firmly in his grasp than ever before. And as he controlled her, so he controlled her young.

The field of brightly glowing eyes watched him from below, never leaving him until he reached the top of the hold. The instant they were blocked from view, Kusum reached for the necklace and clasped it around his throat.

Chapter Four

west bengal, india

friday, July 24, 1857

1

Jaggernath the svamin and his mule train were due to appear any minute.

Tension was coiled like a snake around Captain Westphalen. If he failed to net the equivalent of 50,000 pounds sterling out of this little sortie, he might have to reconsider returning to England at all. Only disgrace and poverty would await him.

He and his men huddled behind a grassy hillock approximately two miles northwest of Bharangpur. The rain had ended at midday, but more was on the way. The summer monsoon was upon Bengal, bringing a year’s rainfall in the space of a few months. Westphalen looked out along the rolling expanse of green that had been an arid wasteland only last month. An unpredictable land, this India.

As he waited beside his horse, Westphalen mentally reviewed the past four weeks. He had not been idle. Far from it. He had devoted part of each day to grilling every Englishman in Bharangpur on what he knew about the Hindu religion in general and the Temple-in-the-Hills in particular. And when he had exhausted the resources of his countrymen, he turned to local Hindus who had a decent command of English. They told him more than he wished to know about Hinduism, and almost nothing about the temple.

He did learn a lot about Kali, though. Very popular in Bengal—even the name of the region’s largest city, Calcutta, was an Anglicized form of Kalighata, the huge temple built to her there. The Black Goddess. Not a deity to take comfort in. She was called Mother Night, devouring all, slaying all, even Siva, her consort upon whose corpse she stood in many of the pictures Westphalen had seen. Blood sacrifices, usually goats and birds, were made regularly to Kali in her many temples, but there were whispers of other sacrifices… human sacrifices.

No one in Bharangpur had ever seen the Temple-in-the-Hills, nor known anyone who had. But he learned that every so often a curiosity-seeker or a pilgrim would venture off into the hills to find the temple. Some would follow Jaggernath at a discrete distance, others would seek their own path. The few who returned claimed their search had been fruitless, telling tales of shadowy beings creeping about the hills at night, always just beyond the firelight, but unmistakably there, watching. As to what happened to the rest, it was assumed that the pilgrims true of heart were accepted into the temple order, and that the adventurous and the merely curious became fodder for the rakoshi who guarded the temple and its treasure. A rakosh, he was assured by a colonel who was starting his third decade in India, was some sort of flesh-eating demon, the Bengali equivalent of the English bogeyman—used to frighten children.

Westphalen had little doubt the temple was guarded, but by human sentries, not demons. Guards would not deter him. He was not a lone traveler wandering aimlessly through the hills—he was a British officer leading six lancers armed with the new lightweight Enfield rifle.

As he stood beside his mount, Westphalen ran a finger up and down the stock of his Enfield. This simple construction of wood and steel had been the precipitating factor in the Sepoy rebellion.

All because of a tight-fitting cartridge.

Absurd, but true. The Enfield cartridge, like all other cartridges, came wrapped in glazed paper which had to be bitten open to be used. But unlike the heavier “Brown Bess” rifle the Sepoys had been using for forty years, the Enfield cartridge had to be greased to make the tight fit into the barrel. There had been no problem until rumors began circulating that the grease was a mixture of pork and bullock fat. The Moslem troops would not bite anything that might be pork, and the Hindus would not pollute themselves with cow grease. Tension between British officers and their Sepoy troops had built for months, culminating on May 10, a mere eleven weeks ago, when the Sepoys had mutinied in Meerut, perpetrating atrocities on the white populace. The mutiny had spread like a grass fire across most of northern India, and the Raj had not been the same since.

Westphalen had hated the Enfield for endangering him during what should have been a safe, peaceful tour of duty. Now he caressed it almost lovingly. If not for the rebellion he might still be far to the southeast in Fort William, unaware of the Temple-in-the-Hills and the promise of salvation it held for him and for the honor of the Westphalen name.

“I’ve spotted him, sir.” It was an enlisted man named Watts speaking.

Westphalen stepped up to where Watts lay against the rise and took the field glasses from him. After refocusing to correct for his near-sightedness, he spotted the squat little man and his mules traveling north at a brisk pace.

“We’ll wait until he’s well into the hills, then follow. Keep down until then.”

With the ground softened by monsoon rains, there would be no problem following Jaggernath and his mules. Westphalen wanted the element of surprise on his side when he entered the temple, but it wasn’t an absolute necessity. One way or another he was going to find the Temple-in-the-Hills. Some of the tales said it was made of pure gold. Westphalen did not believe that for an instant—gold was not fit for buildings. Other tales said the temple housed urns full of precious jewels. Westphalen might have laughed at that too had he not seen the ruby Jaggernath had given MacDougal last month simply for not handling the supplies on the backs of his mules.

If the temple housed anything of value, Westphalen intended to find it… and to make all or part of it his own.

He glanced around at the men he had brought with him: Tooke, Watts, Russell, Hunter, Lang, and Malleson. He had combed his records carefully for individuals with the precise blend of qualities he required. He detested aligning himself so closely with their sort. They were worse than commoners. These were the toughest men he could find, the dregs of the Bharangpur garrison, the hardest drinking, most unscrupulous soldiers under his command.

Two weeks ago he had begun dropping remarks to his lieutenant about rumors of a rebel encampment in the hills. In the past few days he had begun to refer to unspecified intelligence reports confirming the rumors, saying it was thought that the pandies were receiving assistance from a religious order in the hills. And just yesterday he had begun picking men to accompany him on “a brief reconnaissance mission.” The lieutenant had insisted on leading the patrol but Westphalen had overruled him.

During the entire time, Westphalen had grumbled incessantly about being so far from the fight, about letting all the glory of quelling the revolt go to others while he was stuck in northern Bengal battling administrative rubbish. His act had worked. It was now a common assumption among the officers and non-coms of the Bharangpur garrison that Captain Sir Albert Westphalen was not going to allow a post far from the battle lines to prevent him from earning a decoration or two. Perhaps he even had his eye on the brand new Victoria Cross.

He had also made a point of not wanting any support personnel. This would be a bare-bones scouting party, no pack animals, no bhistis—each trooper would carry his own food and water.

Westphalen went back and stood near his horse. He fervently prayed his plan would be successful, and swore to God that if things worked out the way he hoped, he would never turn another card or roll another die as long as he lived.

His plan had to work. If not, the great hall his family had called home since the eleventh century would be sold to pay his gambling debts. His profligate ways would be exposed to his peers, his reputation reduced to that of a wastrel, the Westphalen name dragged through the dirt… commoners cavorting in his ancestral home… Better to remain here on the wrong side of the world than face disgrace of that magnitude.

He walked up the rise again and took the field glasses from Watts. Jaggernath was almost into the hills. Westphalen had decided to give him a half-hour lead. It was four-fifteen. Despite the overcast sky and the late hour of the day, there was still plenty of light left.

By four-thirty-five Westphalen could wait no longer. The last twenty minutes had dragged by with sadistic slowness. He mounted his men up and led them after Jaggernath at a slow walk.

As he had expected, the trail was easy to follow. There was no traffic into the hills and the moist ground held unmistakable evidence of the passage of six mules. The trail wound a circuitous path in and around the coarse outcroppings of yellow-brown rock that typified the hills in the region. Westphalen held himself in check with difficulty, resisting the urge to spur his mount ahead. Patience… Patience must be the order of the day. When he came to fear they might be gaining too much on the Hindu, he had his men dismount and continue following on foot.

The trail led on and on, always upward. The grass died away, leaving barren rock in all directions; he saw no other travelers, no homes, no huts, no signs of human habitation. Westphalen wondered at the endurance of the old man out of sight ahead of him. He now knew why no one in Bharangpur had been able to tell him how to reach the temple: The path was a deep, rocky gully, its walls rising at times to a dozen feet or more over his head on either side, so narrow that he had to lead his men in a single defile, so tortuous and obscure, with so many branches leading off in random directions, that even with a map he doubted he would have been able to keep on course.

The light was waning when he saw the wall. He was leading his horse around one of the countless sharp twists in the path, wondering how they were going to follow the trail once night came, when he looked up and saw that the gully opened abruptly into a small canyon. He immediately jumped back and signaled his men to halt. He gave his reins to Watts and peered around the edge of an outcropping of rock.

The wall sat two hundred yards away, spanning the width of the canyon. It looked to be about ten feet high, made of black stone, with a single gate at its center. The gate stood open to the night.

“They’ve left the door open for us, sir,” Tooke said at his side. He had crept up for a look of his own.

Westphalen snapped around to glare at him. “Back with the others!”

“Aren’t we going in?”

“When I give the order and not before!”

Westphalen watched the soldier sulkily return to his proper place. Only a few hours away from the garrison and already discipline was showing signs of breaking down. Not unexpected with the likes of these. They had all heard the stories about the Temple-in-the-Hills. You couldn’t be in Bharangpur barracks for more than a week without hearing them. Westphalen was sure there was not a man among them who had not used the hope of pocketing something of value from within the temple to spur him along as they had followed the trail into the hills; now they had reached their goal and wanted to know if the stories were true. The looter within them was rising to the surface like something rotten from the bottom of a pond. He could almost smell the foul odor of their greed.

And what about me? Westphalen thought grimly. Do I reek as they do?

He looked back toward the canyon. Behind the wall, rising above it, was the dim shape of the temple itself. Details were lost in the long shadows; all he could make out was a vaguely domelike shape with a spire on top.

As he watched, the door in the wall swung closed with a crash that echoed off the rocky mountain walls, making the horses shy and causing his own heart to skip a beat.

Suddenly it was dark. Why couldn’t India have England’s lingering twilight? Night fell like a curtain here.

What to do now? He hadn’t planned on taking so long to reach the temple, hadn’t planned on darkness and a walled-off canyon. Yet why hesitate? He knew there were no rebels in the temple compound—that had been a fiction he had concocted. Most likely only a few Hindu priests. Why not scale the walls and have done with it?

No… he didn’t want to do that. He could find no rational reason to hesitate, yet something in his gut told him to wait for the sun.

“We’ll wait until morning.”

The men glanced at each other, muttering. Westphalen searched for a way to keep them in hand. He could neither shoot nor handle a lance half as well as they, and he had been in command of the garrison less than two months, nowhere near enough time to win their confidence as an officer. His only recourse was to show himself to be their superior in judgment. And that should be no problem. After all, they were only commoners.

He decided to single out the most vocal of the grumblers.

“Do you detect some flaw in my decision, Mr. Tooke? If so, please speak freely. This is no time for formality.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” the enlisted man said with a salute and exaggerated courtesy, “but we thought we’d be taking them right away. The morning’s a long way off and we’re anxious to be into the fighting. Aren’t I right, men?”

There were murmurs of approval.

Westphalen made a show of seating himself comfortably on a boulder before speaking. I hope this works.

“Very well, Mr. Tooke,” he said, keeping the mounting tension out of his voice. “You have my permission to lead an immediate assault on the temple.” As the men began to reach for their rifles, Westphalen added: “Of course, you realize that any pandies hiding within have been there for weeks and will know their way around the temple and its grounds quite well. Those of you who have never been on the other side of that wall will be lost in the dark.”

He saw the men stop in their tracks and glance at each other. Westphalen sighed with relief. Now, if he could deliver the coup de grace, he would be in command again.

“Charge, Mr. Tooke.”

After a long pause, Tooke said, “I think we’ll be waiting for morning, sir.”

Westphalen slapped his hands on his thighs and stood up. “Good! With surprise and daylight on our side, we’ll route the pandies with a minimum of fuss. If all goes well, you’ll be back in your barracks by this time tomorrow night.”

If all goes well, he thought, you will never see tomorrow night.

Chapter Five

manhattan

Saturday, august 4, 198-

1

Gia stood inside the back door and let the air-conditioned interior cool and dry the fine sheen of perspiration coating her skin. Short, slick, blond curls were plastered against the nape of her neck. She was dressed in a Danskin body suit and jogging shorts, but even that was too much clothing. The temperature was pushing into the high eighties already and it was only nine-thirty.

She had been out in the back helping Vicky put up curtains in the playhouse. Even with screens on the windows and the breeze off the East River it was like an oven in that little thing. Vicky hadn’t seemed to notice, but Gia was sure she would have passed out if she had stayed in there another minute.

Nine-thirty. It should have been noon by now. She was slowly going crazy here on Sutton Square. Nice to have a live-in maid to see to your every need, nice to have meals prepared for you, your bed made, and central air conditioning… but it was so boring. She was out of her routine and found it almost impossible to work. She needed her work to keep these hours from dragging so.

She had to get out of here!

The doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it, Eunice!” she called as she headed for the door. Here was a break in the routine—a visitor. She was glad until she realized with a stab of apprehension that it could be someone from the police with bad news about Grace. She checked through the peephole before unlocking the deadbolt.

It was the mailman. Gia pulled open the door and was handed a flat box, maybe eight by twelve inches, weighing about a pound.

“Special delivery,” he said, giving her a frank head-to-toe appraisal before returning to his truck. Gia ignored him.

The box—could it be from Grace? She checked and saw it had been mailed from England. The return address was someplace in London called “The Divine Obsession.”

“Nellie! Package for you!”

Nellie was already half way downstairs. “Is it word from Grace?”

“I don’t think so. Not unless she’s gone back to England.”

Nellie’s brow furrowed as she glanced at the return address, then she began tearing at the brown paper wrapper. As it pulled away, she gasped.

“Oh! Black Magic!”

Gia stepped around for a look at what was inside. She saw a black rectangular cardboard box with gold trim and a red rose painted on the lid. It was an assortment of dark chocolates.

“These are my favorites! Who could have—?”

“There’s a card taped to the corner.”

Nellie pulled it free and opened it. “’Don’t worry,’ “she read. “’I haven’t forgotten you.’ It’s signed, ’Your favorite nephew, Richard!’ “

Gia was aghast. “Richard?”

“Yes! What a dear sweet boy to think of me! Oh, he knows Black Magic has always been my favorite. What a thoughtful present!”

“Could I see the card, please?”

Nellie handed it over without looking at it again. She was pulling the rest of the wrapper off and lifting the lid. The strong odor of dark chocolate filled the foyer. As the older woman inhaled deeply, Gia studied the card, her anger rising.

It was written in a cutesy female hand, with round circles above the i’s and little loops all over the place. Definitely not her ex-husband’s scrawl. He’d probably called the shop, gave them the address, told them what to put on the card, then came by later and paid for it. Or better yet, sent his latest girlfriend around with the money. Yes, that would be more Richard’s style.

Gia bottled the anger that had come to a full boil within her. Her ex-husband, controller of one third of the huge Westphalen fortune, had plenty of time to flit all over the world and send his aunt expensive chocolates from London, but not a penny to spare for child support, let alone the moment it would have taken to send his own daughter a birthday card back in April.

You sure can pick ’em, Gia.

She bent and picked up the wrapper. “The Divine Obsession.” At least she knew what city Richard was living in. And probably not too far from this shop—he was never one to go out of his way for anyone, especially his aunts. They had never thought much of him and had never been reticent about letting him know it. Which raised the question: Why the candy? What was behind this thoughtful little gift out of the blue?

“Imagine!” Nellie was saying. “A gift from Richard! How lovely! Who’d have ever thought—”

They were both suddenly aware of a third person in the room with them. Gia glanced up and saw Vicky standing in the hallway in her white jersey with her bony legs sticking out of her yellow shorts and her feet squeezed sockless into her sneakers, watching them with wide blue eyes.

“Is that a present from my daddy?”

“Why, yes, love,” Nellie said.

“Did he send one for me?”

Gia felt her heart break at those words. Poor Vicky…

Nellie glanced at Gia, her face distraught, then turned back to Vicky.

“Not yet, Victoria, but I’m sure one will be coming soon. Meanwhile, he said we should all share these chocolates until—” Nellie’s hand darted to her mouth, realizing what she had just said.

“Oh, no,” Vicky said. “My daddy would never send me chocolates. He knows I can’t have any.”

With her back straight and her chin high, she turned and walked quickly down the hall toward the backyard.

Nellie’s face seemed to crumble as she turned toward Gia. “I forgot she’s allergic. I’ll go get her—”

“Let me,” Gia said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “We’ve been over this ground before and it looks like we’ll have to go over it again.”

She left Nellie standing there in the foyer, looking older than her years, unaware of the box of chocolates clutched so tightly in her spotted hands. Gia didn’t know who to feel sorrier for: Vicky or Nellie.

2

Vicky hadn’t wanted to cry in front of Aunt Nellie, who always said what a big girl she was. Mommy said it was all right to cry, but Vicky never saw Mommy cry. Well, hardly ever.

Vicky wanted to cry right now. It didn’t matter if this was one of the all right times or not, it was going to come out anyway. It was like a big balloon inside her chest, getting bigger and bigger until she either cried or exploded. She held it in until she reached the playhouse. There was one door, two windows with new curtains, and room enough inside for her to spin around with her arms spread out all the way and not touch the walls. She picked up her Ms. Jelliroll doll and hugged it to her chest. Then it began.

The sobs came first, like big hiccups, then the tears. She didn’t have a sleeve, so she tried to wipe them away with her arm but succeeded only in making her face and her arm wet and smeary.

Daddy doesn’t care. It made her feel sick way down in the bottom of her stomach to think that, but she knew it was true. She didn’t know why it should bother her so much. She couldn’t much remember what he looked like. Mommy threw away all his pictures a long time ago and as time went by it became harder and harder to see his face in her mind. He hadn’t been around at all in two years and Vicky didn’t remember seeing much of him even before that. So why should it hurt to say that Daddy didn’t care? Mommy was the only one who really mattered, who really cared, who was always there.

Mommy cared. And so did Jack. But now Jack didn’t come around anymore either. Except for yesterday. Thinking about Jack made her stop crying. When he had lifted her up and hugged her yesterday she’d felt so good inside. Warm. And safe. For the short while he had been in the house yesterday she hadn’t felt afraid. Vicky didn’t know what there was to be scared of, but lately she felt afraid all the time. Especially at night.

She heard the door open behind her and knew it was Mommy. That was okay. She had stopped crying now. She was all right now. But when she turned and saw that sad, pitying look on Mommy’s face, it all came out again and she burst into tears. Mommy squeezed into the little rocker and sat her on her knee and held her tight until the sobs went away. This time for good.

3

“Why doesn’t Daddy love us anymore?”

The question startled Gia. Vicky had asked her countless times why Daddy didn’t live with them anymore. But this was the first time she had mentioned love.

Answer a question with another question: “Why do you say that?”

But Vicky was not to be sidetracked.

“He doesn’t love us, does he, Mommy.” It was not a question.

No. He doesn’t. I don’t think he ever did.

That was the truth. Richard had never been a father. As far as he was concerned, Vicky had been an accident, a terrible inconvenience to him. He had never shown affection to her, had never been a presence in their home when they had lived together. He might as well have phoned in his paternal duties.

Gia sighed and hugged Vicky tighter. What an awful time that had been… the worst years of her life. Gia had been brought up a strict Catholic, and although the days had become one long siege of Gia and Vicky alone against the world, and the nights—those nights when her husband bothered to come home—had been Richard and Gia against each other, she had never considered divorce. Not until the night when Richard, in a particularly vicious mood, had told her why he’d married her. She was as good as anyone else for rutting when he was randy, he had said, but the real reason was taxes. Immediately after the death of his father, Richard had gone to work transferring his assets out of Britain and into either American or international holdings, all the while looking for an American to marry. He’d found such an American in Gia, fresh in from the Midwest looking to sell her commercial art talents to Madison Avenue. The urbane Richard Westphalen, with his refined British manners and accent, had swept her off her feet. They were married; he became an American citizen. There were other ways he could have acquired citizenship, but they were lengthy and this was more in keeping with his character. The taxes on the earnings of his portion of the Westphalen fortune would from then on be taxed at a maximum of seventy percent—which would drop to fifty percent starting in October 1981—rather than the British government’s ninety-plus percent. After that, he quickly lost interest in her.

“We might have had some fun for a while, but you had to go and become a mother.”

Those words seared themselves onto her brain. She started divorce proceedings the following day, ignoring her lawyer’s increasingly strident pleas for a whopping property settlement.

Perhaps she should have listened. She often would wonder about that later. But at the time all she wanted was out. She wanted nothing that came from his precious family fortune. She allowed her lawyer to ask for child support only because she knew she would need it until she revived her art career.

Was Richard contrite? Did the smallest mote of guilt come to rest on the featureless, diamond-hard surface of his conscience? No. Did he do anything to secure a future for the child he had fathered? No. In fact, he instructed his lawyer to fight for minimal child support.

“No, Vicky,” Gia said, “I don’t think he does.”

Gia expected tears, but Vicky fooled her by smiling up at her.

“Jack loves us.”

Not this again!

“I know he does, honey, but—”

“Then why can’t he be my daddy?”

“Because…” How was she going to say this? “… because sometimes love just isn’t enough. There have to be other things. You have to trust each other, have the same values—”

“What are values?”

“Ohhh… you have to believe in the same things, want to live the same way.”

“I like Jack.”

“I know you do, honey. But that doesn’t mean Jack is the right man to be your new father.” Vicky’s blind devotion to Jack undermined Gia’s confidence in the child’s character judgment. She was usually so astute.

She lifted Vicky off her lap and rose to a hands-on-knees crouch. The heat in the playhouse was suffocating.

“Let’s go inside and get some lemonade.”

“Not right now,” Vicky said. “I want to play with Ms. Jelliroll. She’s got to hide before Mr. Grape-grabber finds her.”

“Okay. But come in soon. It’s getting too hot.”

Vicky didn’t answer. She was already lost in a fantasy with her dolls. Gia stood outside the playhouse and wondered if Vicky might be spending too much time alone here. There were no children around Sutton Square for her to play with, just her mother, an elderly aunt, and her books and dolls. Gia wanted to get Vicky back home and into a normal routine as soon as possible.

“Miss Gia?” It was Eunice calling from the back door. “Mrs. Paton says lunch will be early today because of your trip to the dress shop.”

Gia bit down on the middle knuckle of her right index finger, a gesture of frustration she had picked up from her grandmother many years ago.

The dress shop… the reception tonight… two places she most definitely did not want to go, but would have to because she had promised. She had to get out of here!

4

Joey Diaz placed the little bottle of green liquid on the table between them.

“Where’d you get ahold of this stuff, Jack?”

Jack was buying Joey a late lunch at a midtown Burger King. They had a corner booth; each was munching on a Whopper. Joey, a Filipino with a bad case of post-adolescent acne, was a contact Jack treasured. He worked in the city Health Department lab. In the past, Jack had used him mostly for information and for suggestions on how to bring down the wrath of the Health Department upon the heads of certain targets of his fix-it work. Yesterday was the first time he had asked Joey to run an analysis for him.

“What’s wrong with it?” Jack had been finding it hard to concentrate on Joey or the food. His mind had been on Kolabati and how she had made him feel last night. From there it flowed to the odor that had crept into the apartment and her bizarre reaction to it. His thoughts kept drifting away from Joey, and so it was easy to appear laid-back about the analysis. He had been playing everything low-key for Joey. No big thing—just see if there’s anything really useful in it.

“Nothing wrong, exactly.” Joey had a bad habit of talking with his mouth full. Most people would swallow, then talk before the next bite; Joey preferred to sip his Coke between swallows, take another big bite, then talk. As he leaned forward, Jack leaned back. “But it ain’t gonna help you shit.”

“Not a laxative? What will it help me do? Sleep?”

He shook his head and filled his mouth with fries. “Not a chance.”

Jack drummed his fingers on the grease-patinaed, wood-grained Formica. Damn! It had occurred to him that the tonic might be some sort of sedative used to put Grace into a deep sleep so she wouldn’t make a fuss when her abductors—if in fact she had been abducted—came by and snatched her. So much for that possibility. He waited for Joey to go on, hoping he would finish his Whopper first. No such luck.

“I don’t think it does anything,” he said around his last mouthful. “It’s just a crazy conglomeration of odd stuff. None of it makes sense.”

“In other words, somebody just threw a lot of junk together to sell for whatever ails you. Some sort of Dr. Feelgood tonic.”

Joey shrugged. “Maybe. But if that’s the case, they could have done it a lot cheaper. Personally, I think it was put together by someone who believed in the mixture. There are crude flavorings and a twelve percent alcohol vehicle. Nothing special—I had them pegged in no time. But there was this strange alkaloid that I had the damnedest—”

“What’s an alkaloid? Sounds like poison.”

“Some of them are, like strychnine; others you take every day, like caffeine. They’re almost always derived from plants. This one came from a doozy. Wasn’t even in the computer. Took me most of the morning to track it down.” He shook his head. “What a way to spend a Saturday morning.”

Jack smiled to himself. Joey was going to ask a little extra for this job. That was okay. If it kept him happy, it was worth it.

“So where’s it from?” he asked, watching with relief as Joey washed down the last of his lunch.

“It’s from a kind of grass.”

“Dope?”

“Naw. A non-smoking kind called durba grass. And this particular alkaloid isn’t exactly a naturally occurring thing. It was cooked in some way to add an extra amine group. That’s what took me so long.”

“So it’s not a laxative, not a sedative, not a poison. What is it?”

“Beats hell out of me.”

“This is not exactly a big help to me, Joey.”

“What can I say?” Joey ran a hand through his lanky black hair, scratched at a pimple on his chin. “You wanted to know what was in it. I told you: some crude flavorings, an alcohol vehicle, and an alkaloid from an Indian grass.”

Jack felt something twist inside him. Memories of last night exploded around him. He said, “Indian? You mean American Indian, don’t you?” knowing even as he spoke that Joey had not meant that at all.

“Of course not! American Indian grass would be North American grass. No, this stuff is from India, the subcontinent. A tough compound to track down. Never would have figured it out if the department computer hadn’t referred me to the right textbook.”

India! How strange. After spending a number of delirious hours last night with Kolabati, to learn that the bottle of liquid found in a missing woman’s room was probably compounded by an Indian. Strange indeed.

Or perhaps not so strange. Grace and Nellie had close ties to the U.K. Mission and through there to the diplomatic community that centered around the U.N. Perhaps someone from the Indian Consulate had given Grace the bottle—perhaps Kusum himself. After all, wasn’t India once a British colony?

“Afraid it’s really an innocent little mixture, Jack. If you’re looking to sic the Health Department on whoever’s peddling it as a laxative, I think you’d be better off going to the Department of Consumer Affairs.”

Jack had been hoping the little bottle would yield a dazzling clue that would lead him directly to Aunt Grace, making him a hero in Gia’s eyes.

So much for hunches.

He asked Joey what he thought his unofficial analysis was worth, paid the hundred and fifty, and headed back to his apartment with the little bottle in the front pocket of his jeans. As he rode the bus uptown, he tried to figure what he should do next on the Grace Westphalen thing. He had spent much of the morning tracking down and talking to a few more of his street contacts, but there had been no leads. No one had heard a thing. There had to be other avenues, but he couldn’t think of any at the moment. Other thoughts pushed their way to the front.

Kolabati again. His mind was full of her. Why? As he tried to analyze it, he came to see that the sexual spell she had cast on him last night was only a small part of it. More important was the realization that she knew who he was, knew how he made a living, and somehow was able to accept it. No… accept wasn’t the right word. It almost seemed as if she looked on his lifestyle as a perfectly natural way of living. One that she wouldn’t mind for herself.

Jack knew he was on the rebound from Gia, knew he was vulnerable, especially to someone who appeared to be as open-minded as Kolabati. Almost against his will, he had laid himself bare for her, and she had found him… “honorable.”

She wasn’t afraid of him.

He had to call her.

But first he had to call Gia. He owed her some sort of progress report, even when there was no progress. He dialed the Paton number as soon as he reached his apartment.

“Any word on Grace?” he said after Gia was called to the other end.

“No.” Her voice didn’t seem nearly as cool as it had yesterday. Or was that just his imagination? “I hope you’ve got some good news. We could use it around here.”

“Well…” Jack grimaced. He really wished he had something encouraging to tell her. He was almost tempted to make up something, but couldn’t bring himself to do it. “You know that stuff we thought was a laxative? It isn’t.”

“What is it, then?”

“Nothing. A dead end.”

There was a pause on the other end, then, “Where do you go from here?”

“I wait.”

“Nellie’s already doing that. She doesn’t need any help waiting.”

Her sarcasm stung.

“Look, Gia. I’m not a detective—”

“I’m well aware of that.”

“—and I never promised to do a Sherlock Holmes number on this. If there’s a ransom note or something like that in the mail, I may be able to help. I’ve got people on the street keeping their ears open, but until something breaks…”

The silence on the other end of the line was nerve-wracking.

“Sorry, Gia. That’s all I can tell you now.”

“I’ll tell Nellie. Goodbye Jack.”

After a moment of deep breathing to calm himself, he dialed Kusum’s number. A now-familiar female voice answered.

“Kolabati?”

“Yes?”

“This is Jack.”

A gasp. “Jack! I can’t talk now. Kusum’s coming. I’ll call you later!”

She took his phone number and then hung up.

Jack sat and looked at the wall in bewilderment. Idly, he pressed the replay button on his answerphone. His father’s voice came out of the speaker.

“Just want to remind you about the tennis match tomorrow. Don’t forget to get here by ten. The tournament starts at noon.”

This had all the makings of a very bad weekend.

5

With trembling fingers, Kolabati pulled the jack clip from the back of the phone. Another minute or two from now and Jack’s call would have ruined everything. She wanted no interruptions when she confronted Kusum. It was taking all her courage, but she intended to face her brother and wring the truth from him. She would need time to position him for her assault… time and concentration. He was a master dissembler and she would have to be as circumspect and as devious as he if she was going to trap him into the truth.

She had even chosen her attire for maximum effect. Although she played neither well nor often, she found tennis clothes comfortable. She was dressed in a white sleeveless shirt and shorts set by Boast. And she wore her necklace, of course, exposed through the fully open collar of her shirt. Much of her skin was exposed: another weapon against Kusum.

At the sound of the elevator door opening down the hall, the tension that had been gathering within her since she had seen him step from the taxi on the street below balled itself into a tight, hard knot in the pit of her stomach.

Oh, Kusum. Why does it have to be like this? Why can’t you let it go?

As the key turned in the lock, she forced herself into an icy calm.

He opened the door, saw her, and smiled.

“Bati!” He came over as if to put his arm around her shoulders, then seemed to think better of it. Instead, he ran a finger along her cheek. Kolabati willed herself not to shrink from his touch. He spoke in Bengali. “You’re looking better everyday.”

“Where were you all night, Kusum?”

He stiffened. “I was out. Praying. I have learned to pray again. Why do you ask?”

“I was worried. After what happened—”

“Do not fear for me on that account,” he said with a tight smile. “Pity instead the one who tries to steal my necklace.”

“Still I worry.”

“Do not.” He was becoming visibly annoyed now. “As I told you when you first arrived, I have a place I go to read my Gita in peace. I see no reason to change my routines simply because you are here.”

“I wouldn’t expect such a thing. I have my life to lead, you have yours.” She brushed past him and moved toward the door. “I think I’ll go for a walk.”

“Like that?” His eyes were racing up and down her minimally clad body. “With your legs completely exposed and your blouse unbuttoned?”

“This is America.”

“But you are not an American! You are a woman of India! A Brahmin! I forbid it!”

Good—he was getting angry.

“You can’t forbid, Kusum,” she said with a smile. “You no longer tell me what to wear, what to eat, how to think. I am free of you. I’ll make my own decisions today, just as I did last night.”

“Last night? What did you do last night?”

“I had dinner with Jack.” She watched him closely for his reaction. He seemed confused for an instant, and that wasn’t what she expected.

“Jack who?” Then his eyes widened. “You don’t mean—?”

“Yes. Repairman Jack. I owe him something, don’t you think?”

“An American—!”

“Worried about my karma? Well, dear brother, my karma is already polluted, as is yours—especially yours—for reasons we both know too well.” She averted her thoughts from that. “And besides,” she said, tugging on her necklace, “what does karma mean to one who wears this?”

“A karma can be cleansed,” Kusum said in a subdued tone. “I am trying to cleanse mine.”

The sincerity of his words struck her and she grieved for him. Yes, he did want to remake his life; she could see that. But by what means was he going about it? Kusum had never shied away from extremes.

It suddenly occurred to Kolabati that this might be the moment to catch him off guard, but it passed. Besides, better to have him angry. She needed to know where he would be tonight. She did not intend to let him out of her sight.

“What are your plans for tonight, brother? More prayer?”

“Of course. But not until late. I must attend a reception hosted by the U.K. Mission at eight.”

“That sounds interesting. Would they mind if I came along?”

Kusum brightened. “You would come with me? That would be wonderful. I’m sure they would be glad to have you.”

“Good.” A perfect opportunity to keep an eye on him. Now… to anger him. “But I’ll have to find something to wear.”

“You will be expected to dress like a proper Indian woman.”

“In a sari?” She laughed in his face. “You must be joking!”

“I insist! Or I will not be seen with you!”

“Fine. Then I’ll bring my own escort: Jack.”

Kusum’s face darkened with rage. “I forbid it!”

Kolabati moved closer to him. Now was the moment. She watched his eyes carefully.

“What will you do to stop it? Send a rakosh after him as you did last night?”

“A rakosh? After Jack?” Kusum’s eyes, his face, the way the cords of his neck tightened—they all registered shock and bafflement. He was the consummate liar when he wished to be, but Kolabati knew she had caught him off guard, and everything in his reaction screamed the fact that he didn’t know. He didn’t know!

“There was one outside his apartment window last night!”

“Impossible!” His face still wore a bewildered expression. “I’m the only one who…”

“Who what?”

“Who has an egg.”

Kolabati reeled. “You have it withyou?”

“Of course. Where could it be safer?”

“In Bengal!”

Kusum shook his head. He appeared to be regaining some of his composure. “No. I feel better when I know exactly where it is at all times.”

“You had it with you when you were with the London Embassy, too?”

“Of course.”

“What if it had been stolen?”

He smiled. “Who would even know what it was?”

With an effort, Kolabati mastered her confusion. “I want to see it. Right now.”

“Certainly.”

He led her into his bedroom and pulled a small wooden crate from a corner of the closet. He lifted the lid, pushed the excelsior aside, and there it was. Kolabati recognized the egg. She knew every blue mottle on its gray surface, knew the texture of its cool, slippery surface like her own skin. She brushed her fingertips over the shell. Yes, this was it: a female rakosh egg.

Feeling weak, Kolabati backed up and sat on the bed.

“Kusum, do you know what this means? Someone has a nest of rakoshi here in New York! “

“Nonsense! This is the very last rakosh egg. It could be hatched, but without a male to fertilize the female, there could be no nest.”

“Kusum, I know there was a rakosh there!”

“Did you see it? Was it male or female?”

“I didn’t actually see it—”

“Then how can you say there are rakoshi in New York?”

“The odor!” Kolabati felt her own anger rise. “Don’t you think I know the odor?”

Kusum’s face had resolved itself into its usual mask. “You should. But perhaps you have forgotten, just as you have forgotten so many other things about our heritage.”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“The subject is closed, as far as I’m concerned.”

Kolabati rose and faced her brother. “Swear to me, Kusum. Swear that you had nothing to do with that rakoshi last night.”

“On the grave of our mother and father,” he said, looking her squarely in the eyes, “I swear that I did not send a rakosh after our friend Jack. There are people in this world I wish ill, but he is not one of them.”

Kolabati had to believe him. His tone was sincere, and there was no more solemn oath for Kusum than the one he had just spoken.

And there, intact on its bed of excelsior, was the egg. As Kusum knelt to pack it away, he said:

“Besides, if a rakosh were truly after Jack, his life wouldn’t be worth a paisa. I assume he is alive and well?”

“Yes, he’s well. I protected him.”

Kusum’s head snapped toward her. Hurt and anger raced across his features. He understood exactly what she meant.

“Please leave me,” he said in a low voice as he faced away and lowered his head. “You disgust me.”

Kolabati spun and left the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. Would she never be free of this man? She was sick of Kusum! Sick of his self-righteousness, his inflexibility, his monomania. No matter how good she felt—and she felt good about Jack—he could always manage to make her feel dirty. They both had plenty to feel guilty about, but Kusum had become obsessed with atoning for past transgressions and cleansing his karma. Not just his own karma, but hers as well. She had thought leaving India—to Europe first, then to America—would sever their relationship. But no. After years of no contact, he had arrived on these same shores.

She had to face it: She would never escape him. For they were bound by more than blood—the necklaces they wore linked them with a bond that went beyond time, beyond reason, even beyond karma.

But there had to be a way out for her, a way to free herself from Kusum’s endless attempts to dominate her.

Kolabati went to the window and looked out across the green expanse of Central Park. Jack was over there on the other side of the Park. Perhaps he was the answer. Perhaps he could free her.

She reached for the phone.

6

Even the moon’s frightened of me—frightened to death!

The whole world’s frightened to death!

Jack was well into part three of the James Whale Festival—Claude Raines was getting ready to start his reign of terror as The Invisible Man.

The phone rang. Jack turned down the sound and picked it up before his answerphone began its routine.

“Where are you?” said Kolabati’s voice.

“Home.”

“But this is not the number on your phone.”

“So you peeked, did you?”

“I knew I’d want to call you.”

It was good to hear her say that. “I had the number changed and never bothered to change the label.” Actually, he purposely had left the old label in place.

“I have a favor to ask you,” she said.

“Anything.” Almost anything.

“The U.K. Mission is holding a reception tonight. Will you accompany me?”

Jack mulled that for a few seconds. His first impulse was to refuse. He hated parties. He hated gatherings. And a gathering of U.N. types, the most useless people in the world… it was a grim prospect.

“I don’t know… “

“Please? As a personal favor? Otherwise I shall have to go with Kusum.”

It was a choice then between seeing Kolabati and not seeing her. That wasn’t a choice.

“Okay.” Besides, it would be fun to see Burkes’ face when he showed up at the reception. He might even rent a tux for the occasion. They set a time and a meeting place—for some reason, Kolabati didn’t want to be picked up at Kusum’s apartment—and then a question occurred to Jack.

“By the way, what’s durba grass used for?”

He heard a sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line. “Where did you find durba grass?”

“I didn’t find any. As far as I know, it only grows in India. I just want to know if it’s used for anything.”

“It has many uses in traditional Indian folk medicine.” She was speaking very carefully. “But where did you even hear about it?”

“Came up in conversation this morning.” Why was she so concerned?

“Stay away from it, Jack. Whatever it is you’ve found, stay away from it. At least until you see me tonight!”

She hung up. Jack stared uneasily at his big tv screen on which an empty pair of trousers was silently chasing a terrified woman down an English country lane. There had been something strange about Kolabati’s voice at the end there. It had sounded almost as if she were afraid for him.

7

“Stunning!” said the saleswoman. Vicky looked up from her book. “You look pretty,

Mommy.”

“Smashing!” Nellie said. “Absolutely smashing!” She had brought Gia to La Chanson. Nellie had always liked this particular boutique because it didn’t look like a dress shop. From the outside, with its canopied entrance, it looked more like a chic little restaurant. But the small display windows on either side of the door left little doubt as to what was sold within.

She watched Gia standing before a mirror, examining herself in a strapless cocktail dress. It was mauve and silk, and Nellie liked it best of the four Gia had tried on. Gia was making no bones, however, about what she thought of the idea of Nellie buying her a dress. But it had been part of the deal, and Nellie had insisted that Gia hold up her end.

Such a stubborn girl. Nellie had seen her examining all four dresses for a price tag, obviously intending to buy the cheapest one. But she hadn’t found one.

Nellie smiled to herself. Keep looking, dearie. They don’t come with price tags here.

It was only money, after all. And what was money?

Nellie signed, remembering what her father had told her about money when she was a girl. Those who don’t have enough of it are only aware of what it can buy them. When you finally have enough of it you become aware—acutely aware—of all the things it can’t buy… the really important things… like youth, health, love, peace of mind.

She felt her lips quiver and tightened them into a firm line. All the Westphalen fortune could not bring her dear John back to life, nor bring Grace back from wherever she was.

Nellie glanced to her right on the sofa to where Victoria sat next to her, reading a collection of Garfield cartoons. The child had been unusually quiet, almost withdrawn since the arrival of the chocolates this morning. She hoped she hadn’t been too badly hurt. Nellie put her arm around her and squeezed. Victoria rewarded her with a smile.

Dear, dear, Victoria. How did Richard ever father you?

The thought of her nephew brought a bitter taste into her mouth. Richard Westphalen was living proof of what a curse wealth can be. Look what inheriting control of his father’s share of the fortune at such a young age had done to him. He might have been a different person—a decent person—if her brother Teddy had lived longer.

Money! Sometimes she almost wished—

The saleswoman was speaking to Gia: “Did you see anything else you’d like to try on?”

Gia laughed. “About a hundred, but this is fine.” She turned to Nellie. “What do you think?”

Nellie studied her, delighted with the choice. The dress was perfect. The lines were clean, the color went well with her blond hair, and the silk clung everywhere it was supposed to.

“You’ll be the toast of the diplomats.”

“That’s a classic, my dear,” the saleswoman said.

And it was. If Gia kept to her current perfect size six, she could probably wear this dress ten years from now and still look good. Which would probably suit Gia just fine. To Nellie’s mind, Gia’s taste in clothing left a lot to be desired. She wished Gia would dress more fashionably. She had a good figure—enough bust and the long waist and long legs that dress designers dream about. She should have designer clothes.

“Yes,” Gia said to the mirror. “This is the one.”

The dress needed no alterations, so it was boxed up and Gia walked out with it under her arm. She hailed a cab for them on Third Avenue.

“I want to ask you something,” Gia said sotto voce as they rode back to Sutton Square. “It’s been bothering me for two days now. It’s about the… inheritance you’re leaving Vicky; you mentioned something about it Thursday.”

Nellie was startled for a moment. Had she spoken of the terms of her will? Yes… yes, she had. Her mind was so foggy lately.

“What bothers you?” It wasn’t at all like Gia to bring up the subject of money.

Gia smiled sheepishly. “Don’t laugh, but you mentioned a curse that went along with the Westphalen fortune.”

“Oh, dearie,” Nellie said, relieved that that was all that concerned her, “that’s just talk!”

“You mean you made it up?”

“Not I. It was something Sir Albert was heard to mutter when he was in his dotage and in his cups.”

“Sir Albert?”

“My great-grandfather. He was the one who actually started the fortune. It’s an interesting story. Back in the middle of the last century the family was in dire financial straits of some sort—I never knew the exact nature and I guess it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that shortly after his return from India, Sir Albert found an old diagram of the cellar of Westphalen Hall, which led him to a huge cache of jewels hidden there since the Norman invasion. Westphalen Hall was saved. Most of the jewels were converted to cash, which was carefully invested and the fortune has grown steadily for a century and a quarter.”

“But what about the curse?”

“Oh, pay no attention to that! I shouldn’t even have mentioned it! Something about the Westphalen line ending ’in blood and pain,’ about ’dark things’ that would come for us. But don’t worry, my dear. So far we’ve all lived long lives and died of natural causes.”

“Gia’s face relaxed. “That’s good to know.”

“Don’t give it another thought.”

But Nellie found her own thoughts dwelling on it. The Westphalen curse… she and Grace and Teddy used to joke about it. But if some of the stories were to be believed, Sir Albert had died a frightened old man, mortally afraid of the dark. It was said he spent his last years surrounded by guard dogs, and always kept a fire going in his room, even on the hottest nights.

Nellie shivered. It had.been easy to make jokes back then when they were young and there were three of them. But Teddy was long dead of leukemia—at least he hadn’t gone “in blood and pain”; more like fading away—and Grace was who knew where? Had some “dark thing” come for her? Could there possibly be something to—

Rubbish! How can I let myself be frightened by the rantings of a crazy old man who’s been dead for a century?

Still… Grace was gone and there was no explaining that. Not yet.

As they neared Sutton Square, Nellie felt anticipation mounting within her. There had been news of Grace while she was out—she was sure of it! She hadn’t budged from the house since Tuesday for fear of missing word from Grace. But wasn’t staying in the house like watching a pot? It wouldn’t boil until you turned your back on it. Leaving the house was the same thing: Grace had probably called as soon as they left Sutton Square.

Nellie hurried up to the front door and rang the bell while Gia paid the driver. Her fists clenched of their own volition as she waited impatiently for the door to open.

Grace is back.’ I know it! I just know it!

But the hope shriveled and died when the door opened and she saw Eunice’s grim face.

“Any word?”

The question was unnecessary. The sad, slow shake of Eunice’s head told Nellie what she already knew. Suddenly she felt exhausted, as if all her energy had been drained off.

She turned to Gia as she came in the door with Victoria. “I can’t go tonight.”

“You must,” Gia said, throwing an arm around her shoulders. “What happened to that British stiff-upper-lip-and-all-that attitude? What would Sir Albert think if you just sat around and moped all night?”

Nellie appreciated what Gia was trying to do, but she truly did not give a damn about what Sir Albert might have thought.

“And what am I going to do with this dress?” Gia went on.

“The dress is yours,” Nellie said morosely. She didn’t have the will to put on a façade.

“Not if we don’t go tonight, it isn’t. I’ll take it back to La Chanson right now unless you promise me we’re going.”

“That’s not fair. I can’t go. Can’t you see that?”

“No, I can’t see that at all. What would Grace think? You know she’d want you to go. “

Would she? Nellie thought about that. Knowing Grace, she would want her to go. Grace was always one for keeping up appearances. No matter how bad you felt inside, you kept up your social obligations. And you never, never made a spectacle of your feelings.

“Do it for Grace,” Gia said.

Nellie managed a little smile. “Very well, we shall go, although I can’t guarantee how stiff my upper lip shall be.”

“You’ll do fine.” Gia gave her one last hug, then released her. Victoria was calling from the kitchen, asking her mother to cut an orange for her. Gia hurried off, leaving Nellie alone in the foyer.

How will I do this? It has always been Grace-and-Nellie, Nellie-and-Grace, the two as one, always together. How will I do it without her?

Feeling very old, Nellie started up the stairs to her room.

8

Nellie had neglected to tell her whom the reception was for, and Gia never did find out. She got the impression it was to welcome a new high-ranking official to the Mission.

The affair, while hardly exciting, was not nearly as deadly dull as Gia had expected. The Harley House where it was being held was convenient to the U.N. and a short drive from Sutton Square. Even Nellie seemed to enjoy herself after a while. Only the first fifteen minutes or so were rough on the old woman, for immediately upon her arrival she was surrounded by a score of people asking after Grace and expressing their concern. All were members of that unofficial club of wealthy British citizens living in New York, “the colony within the Colonies.”

Buoyed by the sympathy and encouragement of her fellow Britons, Nellie perked up, drank some champagne, and actually began to laugh. Gia gave herself a pat on the back for refusing to allow her to cancel out tonight. This was her good deed for the day. The year!

Not such a bad crowd after all, Gia decided after an hour or so. There were numerous nationalities, all well dressed, friendly, polite, offering a smorgasbord of accents. The new dress fit her beautifully and she felt very feminine. She was aware of the admiring glances she drew from more than a few of the guests, and she enjoyed that. She was nearly finished with her third fluted glass of champagne—she knew nothing about champagne but this was delicious—when Nellie grabbed her by the arm and pulled her toward two men standing off to the side. Gia recognized the shorter of the pair as Edward Burkes, security chief at the Mission. The taller man was dark, dressed all in white, including his turban. When he turned she noticed with a start that he had no left arm.

“Eddie, how are you?” Nellie said, extending her hand.

“Nellie! How good to see you!” Burkes took her hand and kissed it. He was a burly man of about fifty with graying hair and a moustache. He looked at Gia and then smiled. “And Miss DiLauro! What an unexpected pleasure! You look wonderful! Allow me to introduce you both to Mr. Kusum Bahkti of the Indian delegation.”

The Indian made a small bow at the waist but did not extend his hand. “A pleasure to meet you both.”

Gia took an instant dislike to him. His dark, angular face was a mask, his eyes unreadable. He seemed to be hiding something. His gaze passed over her as if she were an ordinary piece of furniture, but came to rest and remain avidly on Nellie.

A waiter came around with a tray of champagne-filled glasses. Burkes gave one each to Nellie and Gia, then offered one to Mr. Bahkti, who shook his head.

“Sorry, Kusum,” Burkes said. “Forgot you don’t drink. Can I get you anything else? A fruit punch?”

Mr. Bahkti shook his head. “Don’t trouble yourself. Perhaps I’ll examine the buffet table later and see if you’ve put out any of those good English chocolates.”

“Are you a chocolate fancier?” Nellie said. “I adore it.”

“Yes. I developed a taste for it when I was with the London embassy. I brought a small supply with me when I came to this country, but that was six months ago and it has long since been depleted.”

“Just today I received a box of Black Magic from London. Have you ever had those?”

Gia saw genuine pleasure in Mr. Bahkti’s smile. “Yes. Superior chocolates. “

“You must come by some time and have some.”

The smile widened. “Perhaps I shall do that.”

Gia began to revise her opinion of Mr. Bahkti. He seemed to have gone from aloof to quite charming. Or was it simply an effect of her fourth glass of champagne? She tingled all over, felt almost giddy.

“I heard about Grace,” Burkes said to Nellie. “If there’s anything I can do… “

“We’re doing all we can,” Nellie said with a brave smile, “but mostly it comes down to waiting.”

“Mr. Bahkti and I were just discussing a mutual acquaintance, Jack Jeffers.”

“I believe his surname is Nelson,” the Indian said.

“No, I’m sure it’s Jeffers. Isn’t it, Miss DiLauro? You know him best, I believe.”

Gia wanted to laugh. How could she tell them Jack’s last name when she wasn’t sure herself. “Jack is Jack,” she said as tactfully as she could.

“He is that!” Burkes said with a laugh. “He recently helped Mr. Bahkti with a difficult matter.”

“Oh?” Gia said, trying not to sound arch. “A security matter?” That was how Jack was first introduced to her: “a security consultant. “

“Personal,” the Indian said, and that was all.

Gia wondered about that. What had the U.K. Mission used Jack for? And Mr. Bahkti, a U.N. diplomat—why would he need Jack? These weren’t the type of men who had use for someone like him. They were respectable members of the international diplomatic community. What could they want “fixed”? To her surprise, she detected an enormous amount of respect in their voices when they spoke of him. It baffled her.

“But anyway,” Burkes said, “I was thinking perhaps he could be of use in finding your sister, Nellie.”

Gia was looking at Mr. Bahkti as Burkes was speaking and she could have sworn she saw the Indian flinch. She did not have time to confirm the impression because she turned to give Nellie a quick warning look: They had promised Jack no one would know he was working for her.

“A marvelous idea, Eddie,” Nellie said, catching Gia’s glance and not missing a beat. “But I’m sure the police are doing all that can be done. However, if it—”

“Well, speak of the devil!” Burkes said, interrupting her and staring toward the entrance.

Before Gia turned to follow his gaze, she glanced again at Mr. Bahkti, who was already looking in the direction Burkes had indicated. On his dark face she saw a look of fury so deep, so fierce, that she stepped away from him for fear that he might explode. She searched the other end of the room to see what could cause such a reaction. And then she saw him… and her.

It was Jack. He was dressed in an old fashioned tuxedo with tails, white tie, and winged collar. He looked wonderful. Against her will, her heart leaped at the sight of him— That’s only because he’s a fellow American among all these foreigners—and then crashed. For on his arm was one of the most striking women Gia had ever seen.

9

Vicky was supposed to be asleep. It was way past her bedtime. She had tried to push herself into slumber, but it just wouldn’t come. Too hot. She lay on top of the bedsheet to get cool. The air conditioning didn’t work as well up here on the third floor as it did downstairs. Despite her favorite pink shorty pajamas, her dolls, and her new Wuppet to keep her company, she still couldn’t sleep. Eunice had done all she could, from sliced oranges—Vicky loved oranges and couldn’t get enough of them—to reading her a story. Nothing worked. Finally, Vicky had faked sleep just so Eunice wouldn’t feel bad.

Usually when she couldn’t sleep it was because she was worrying about Mommy. There were times when Mommy went out at night that she had a bad feeling, a feeling that she’d never come back, that she’d been caught in an earthquake or a tornado or a car wreck. On those nights she’d pray and promise to be good forever if only Mommy got home safe. It hadn’t failed yet.

But Vicky wasn’t worried tonight. Mommy was out with Aunt Nellie and Aunt Nellie would take care of her. Worry wasn’t keeping her awake.

It was the chocolates.

Vicky could not get those chocolates out of her mind. She had never seen a box like that—black with gold trim and a big red rose on the top. All the way from England. And the name: Black Magic! The name alone was enough to keep her awake.

She had to see them. It was as simple as that. She had to go down there and look in that box and see the “Dark Assortment” promised on the lid.

With Ms. Jelliroll tucked securely under her arm, she crawled out of bed and headed for the stairs. Down to the second floor landing without a sound, and then down to the first. The slate floor of the foyer was cool under her feet. Down the hall came voices and music and flickery light from where Eunice was watching television in the library. Vicky tiptoed across the foyer to the front parlor where she had seen Aunt Nellie put the box of chocolates.

She found it on an endtable. The cellophane was off. Vicky placed Ms. Jelliroll on the little couch, seated herself beside her, then pulled the Black Magic box onto her lap. She started to lift the lid, then stopped.

Mommy would have a fit if she came in now and found her sitting here. Bad enough that she was out of bed, but to have Aunt Nellie’s chocolates, too!

Vicky felt no guilt, however. In a way, this box should be hers, even if she was allergic to chocolate. It was from her father, after all. She had hoped that when Mommy stopped home today she would find a package there just for her. But no. Nothing from Daddy.

Vicky ran her fingers over the rose on the lid. Pretty. Why couldn’t this be hers? Maybe after Aunt Nellie finished the chocolates she’d let Vicky keep the box.

How many are left?

She lifted the lid. The rich, heavy smell of dark chocolate enveloped her, and with it the subtler odors of all the different fillings. And another smell, hiding just underneath the others, a smell she wasn’t quite sure of. But that was of little concern. The chocolate overpowered everything else. Saliva poured into her mouth. She wanted one. Oh, how she wanted just one bite.

She tilted the box to better see the contents in the light from the foyer. No empty slots! None of the chocolates were missing! At this rate it would take forever before she got the empty box. But the box was really of secondary interest now. It was the chocolate she hungered for.

She picked up a piece from the middle, wondering what was inside. It was cool to the touch but within seconds the chocolate coating became soft. Jack had taught her how to poke her thumb into the bottom to see what color the middle was. But what if it was a liquid center? She had thumb-poked a chocolate-covered cherry once and wound up with a sticky mess all over her lap. No thumb-poking tonight.

She held it to her nose. It didn’t smell quite so good up close. Maybe it had something yucky inside, like raspberry goo or some such awful stuff. One bite wouldn’t hurt. Maybe just a nibble from the outer layer. That way she wouldn’t have to worry about what was inside. And maybe no one would notice.

No.

Vicky put the piece back. She remembered the last time she had sneaked a nibble of chocolate—her face swelled up like a big red balloon and her eyelids got so puffy all the kids at school had said she looked Chinese. Maybe no one would notice the nibble she took, but Mommy would sure notice her blown-up face. She took one last, longing look at the rows of dark lumps, then replaced the lid and put the box back on the table.

With Ms. Jelliroll under her arm again, she walked back to the bottom of the stairs and stood there looking up. It was dark up there. And she was scared. But she couldn’t stay down here all night. Slowly she started up, carefully watching the dark at the top. When she reached the second floor landing she clung to the newel post and peered around. Nothing moved. With her heart beating wildly, she broke into a scampering run around to the second flight and didn’t slow until she had reached the third floor, jumped into her bed, and pulled the sheet over her head.

10

“Working hard, I see.” Jack whirled at the sound of the voice, nearly spilling the two glasses of champagne he had just lifted from the tray of a passing waiter.

“Gia!” She was the last person he expected to see here. And the last person he wanted to see. He felt he should be out looking for Grace instead of hobnobbing with the diplomats. But he swallowed his guilt, smiled, and tried to say something brilliant. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“I’m here with Nellie.”

“Oh. That explains it.”

He stood there looking at her, wanting to reach out his hand and have her take it the way she used to, knowing she’d only turn away if he did. He noticed a half-empty champagne glass in her hand and a glittery look in her eyes. He wondered how many she had had. She never was much of a drinker.

“So, what’ve you been doing with yourself?” she said, breaking the uncomfortable silence between them.

Yes—definitely too much to drink. Her voice was slightly slurred.

“Shoot anybody lately?”

Oh, swell. Here we go.

He answered in a quiet, soothing voice. He wasn’t looking for an argument. “Reading a lot—”

“What? The Executioner series for the fourteenth time?”

“—and watching movies.”

“A Dirty Harry festival, I suppose.” ’You look great,” he said, refusing to let her irk him as he tried to turn the talk toward Gia. He wasn’t lying. She filled her dress nicely, and the pinkish color, whatever it was, seemed made for her blond hair and blue eyes.

“You’re not doing so bad yourself.”

“It’s my Fred Astaire suit. Always wanted to wear one of these. Like it?”

Gia nodded. “Is it as uncomfortable as it looks?”

“More so. Don’t know how anyone ever tap danced in one of these. Collar’s choking me.”

“It’s not your style, anyway.”

“You’re right.” Jack preferred to be unobtrusive. He was happiest when he could walk past with no one noticing. “But something got into me tonight. Couldn’t pass up the chance to be Fred Astaire just once.”

“You don’t dance and your date will never be mistaken for Ginger Rogers.”

“I can dream, can’t I?”

“Who is she?”

Jack studied Gia closely. Could there be just a trace of jealousy there? Was that possible?

“She’s…” He looked around the room until he spotted Kusum. “… that man’s sister.”

“Is she the ’personal matter’ you helped him out with?”

“Oh?” he said with a slow smile. “You’ve been asking about me?”

Gia’s eyes shifted away. “Burkes brought your name up. Not me.”

“You know something, Gia?” Jack said, knowing he shouldn’t but helpless to resist. “You’re beautiful when you’re jealous.”

Her eyes flashed and her cheeks turned red. “Don’t be absurd!” She turned and walked away.

Typical, Jack thought. She wanted nothing to do with him but didn’t want to see him with anybody else.

He looked around for Kolabati—not a typical woman by any standard—and found her standing beside her brother, who seemed to be doing his best to pretend she wasn’t there.

As he walked toward the silent pair, Jack marveled at the way Kolabati’s dress clung to her. It was made of a gauzy, dazzlingly white fabric that came across her right shoulder and wrapped itself around her breasts like a bandage. Her left shoulder was completely bare, exposing her dark, flawless skin for all to admire. And there were many admirers.

“Hello, Mr. Bahkti,” he said as he handed Kolabati her glass.

Kusum glanced at the champagne, at Kolabati, then turned an icy smile on Jack.

“May I compliment you on the decadence of your attire.”

“Thank you. I knew it wasn’t stylish, so I’ll settle for decadent. How’s your grandmother?”

“Physically well, but suffering from a mental aberration, I fear.”

“She’s doing fine,” Kolabati said with a scathing look at her brother. “I have the latest word and she’s doing just fine.” Then she smiled sweetly. “Oh, by the way, Kusum dear. Jack was asking about durba grass today. Anything you can tell him about it?”

Jack saw Kusum stiffen at the mention of durba grass. He knew Kolabati had been startled when he had asked her about it on the phone today. What did durba grass mean to these two?

Still smiling, Kolabati sauntered away as Kusum faced him.

“What did you wish to know?”

“Nothing in particular. Except… is it ever used as a laxative?”

Kusum’s face remained impassive. “It has many uses, but I have never heard it recommended for constipation. Why do you ask?”

“Just curious. An old lady I know said she was using a concoction with a durba grass extract in it.”

“I’m surprised. I didn’t think you could find durba grass in the Americas. Where did she buy it?”

Jack was studying Kusum’s face. Something there… something he couldn’t quite define.

“Don’t know. She’s away on a trip right now. When she comes back, I’ll ask her.”

“Throw it away if you have any, my friend,” Kusum said gravely. “Certain durba grass preparations have undesirable side-effects. Throw it away.” Before Jack could say anything, Kusum gave one of his little bows. “Excuse me. There are some people I must speak to before the night is over.”

Undesirable side-effects? What the hell did that mean?

Jack wandered around the room. He spotted Gia again, but she avoided his eyes. Finally, the inevitable happened: He ran into Nellie Paton. He saw the pain behind her smile and suddenly felt absurd in his old fashioned tuxedo. This woman had asked him to help find her missing sister and here he was dressed up like a gigolo.

“Gia tells me you’re getting nowhere,” she said in a low voice after brief amenities.

“I’m trying. If only I had more to go on. I’m doing what I—”

“I know you are, dear,” Nellie said, patting his hand. “You were fair. You made no promises, and you warned me you might not be able to do any more than the police had already done. All I need to know is that someone is still looking.”

“I am.” He spread his arms. “I may not look like it, but I am.”

“Oh, rubbish!” she said with a smile. “Everyone needs a holiday. And you certainly seem to have a beautiful companion for it.”

Jack turned in the direction Nellie was looking and saw Kolabati approaching them. He introduced the two women.

“Oh, I met your brother tonight!” Nellie said. “A charming man.”

“When he wants to be, yes,” Kolabati replied. “By the way—has either of you seen him lately?”

Nellie nodded. “I saw him leave perhaps ten minutes ago.”

Kolabati said a word under her breath. Jack didn’t know Indian, but he could recognize a curse when he heard one.

“Something wrong?”

She smiled at him with her lips only. “Not at all. I just wanted to ask him something before he left.”

“Speaking of leaving,” Nellie said. “I think that’s a good idea. Excuse me while I go find Gia.” She bustled off.

Jack looked at Kolabati. “Not a bad idea. Had enough of the diplomatic crowd for one night?”

“For more than one night.”

“Where shall we go?”

“How about your apartment? Unless you’ve got a better idea.”

Jack could not think of one.

11

Kolabati had spent most of the evening cudgeling her brain for a way to broach the subject to Jack. She had to find out about the durba grass! Where did he learn about it? Did he have any? She had to know!

She settled on the direct approach. As soon as they entered his apartment, she asked:

“Where’s the durba grass?”

“Don’t have any,” Jack said as he took off his tailed coat and hung it on a hanger.

Kolabati glanced around the front room. She didn’t see any growing in pots. “You must.”

“Really, I don’t.”

“Then why did you ask me about it on the phone today?”

“I told you—”

“Truth, Jack.” She could tell it was going to be hard getting a straight answer out of him. But she had to know. “Please. It’s important.”

Jack made her wait while he loosened his tie and unbuttoned the winged collar. He seemed glad to be out of it. He looked into her eyes. For a moment she thought he was going to tell her the truth. Instead, he answered her question with one of his own.

“Why do you want to know?”

“Just tell me, Jack.”

“Why is it so important?”

She bit her lip. She had to tell him something. “Prepared in certain ways it can be… dangerous.”

“Dangerous how?”

“Please, Jack. Just let me see what you’ve got and I’ll tell you if there’s anything to worry about.”

“Your brother warned me about it, too.”

“Did he?” She still could not believe that Kusum was uninvolved in this. Yet he had warned Jack. “What did he say?”

“He mentioned side-effects. ’Undesirable’ side-effects. Just what they might be, he didn’t say. I was hoping maybe you could—”

“Jack! Why are you playing games with me?”

She was genuinely concerned for him. Frightened for him. Perhaps that finally got through to him. He stared at her, then shrugged.

“Okay, okay.” He went to the giant Victorian breakfront, removed a bottle from a tiny drawer hidden in the carvings, and brought it over to Kolabati. Instinctively, she reached for it. Jack pulled it away and shook his head as he unscrewed the top. “Smell first.”

He held it under her nose. At the first whiff, Kolabati thought her knees would fail her. Rakoshi elixir! She snatched at it but Jack was quicker and held it out of her reach. She had to get it away from him!

“Give that to me, Jack.” Her voice was trembling with the terror she felt for him.

“Why?”

Kolabati took a deep breath and began to walk around the room. Think!

“Who gave it to you? And please don’t ask me why I want to know. Just answer me.”

“All right. Answer: no one.”

She glared at him. “I’ll rephrase the question. Where did you get it?”

“From the dressing room of an old lady who disappeared between Monday night and Tuesday morning and hasn’t been seen or heard from since.”

So the elixir was not meant for Jack! He had come by it second-hand. She began to relax.

“Did you drink any?”

“No.”

That didn’t make sense. A rakosh had come here last night. She was sure of that. The elixir must have drawn it. She shuddered at what might have happened had Jack been here alone.

“You must have.”

Jack’s brow furrowed. “Oh, yes… I tasted it. Just a drop.”

She moved closer, feeling a tightness in her chest. “When?”

“Yesterday.”

“And today?”

“Nothing. It’s not exactly a soft drink.”

Relief. “You must never let a drop of that pass your lips again—or anybody else’s for that matter.”

“Why not?”

“Flush it down the toilet! Pour it down a sewer! Anything! But don’t let any of it get into your system again!’’

“What’s wrong with it?” Jack was becoming visibly annoyed now. Kolabati knew he wanted answers and she couldn’t tell him the truth without his thinking her insane.

“It’s a deadly poison,” she said off the top of her head. “You were lucky you took only a tiny amount. Any more and you would have—”

“Not true,” he said, holding up the still unstoppered bottle. “I had it analyzed today. No toxins in here.”

Kolabati cursed herself for not realizing that he’d have it analyzed. How else could he have known it contained durba grass?

“It’s poisonous in a different way,” she said, improvising poorly, knowing she wasn’t going to be believed. If only she could lie like Kusum! She felt tears of frustration fill her eyes. “Oh, Jack, please listen to me! I don’t want to see anything happen to you! Trust me!”

“I’ll trust you if you’ll tell me what’s going on. I find this stuff among the possessions of a missing woman and you tell me it’s dangerous but you won’t say how or why. What’s going on?”

“I don’t know what’s going on! Really. All I can tell you is something awful will happen to anyone who drinks that mixture!”

“Is that so?” Jack looked at the bottle in his hand, then looked at Kolabati. Believe me! Please, believe me! Without warning, he tipped the bottle up to his mouth. “No!” Kolabati leaped at him, screaming. Too late. She saw his throat move. He had swallowed some. “You idiot!”

She raged at her own foolishness. She was the idiot! She hadn’t been thinking clearly. If she had she would have realized the inevitability of what had just happened. Next to her brother, Jack was the most relentlessly uncompromising man she had ever met. Knowing that, what could have made her think he would surrender the elixir without a full explanation as to what it was? Any fool could have foreseen that he would bring matters to a head this way. The very reasons she was attracted to Jack might just have doomed him.

And she was so attracted to him. She learned with an explosive shock the true depth of her feelings when she saw him swallow the rakoshi elixir. She had had more than her share of lovers. They had wandered in and out of her life in Bengal and Europe, and in Washington. But Jack was someone special. He made her feel complete. He had something the others didn’t have… a purity—was that the proper word?—that she wanted to make her own. She wanted to be with him, stay with him, keep him for herself.

But first she had to find a way to keep him alive through tonight.

12

The vow was made… the vow must be kept… the vow was made…

Kusum repeated the words over and over in his mind.

He sat in his cabin with his Gita spread out on his lap. He had stopped reading it. The gently rocking ship was silent but for the familiar rustlings from the main hold amidships. He didn’t hear them. Thoughts poured through his mind in a wild torrent. That woman he had met tonight, Nellie Paton. He knew her maiden name: Westphalen. A sweet, harmless old woman with a passion for chocolate, worrying about her missing sister, unaware that her sister was far beyond her concern, and that her worry should be reserved for herself. For her days were numbered on the fingers of a single hand. Perhaps a single finger.

And that blond woman, not a Westphalen herself, yet the mother of one. Mother of a child who would soon be the last Westphalen. Mother of a child who must die.

Am I sane?

When he thought of the journey he had embarked upon, the destruction he had already wrought, he shuddered. And he was only half done.

Richard Westphalen had been the first. He had been sacrificed to the rakoshi during Kusum’s stay at the London embassy. He remembered dear Richard: the fear-bulged eyes, the crying, the whimpering, the begging as he cringed before the rakoshi and answered in detail every question Kusum put to him about his aunts and daughter in the United States. He remembered how piteously Richard Westphalen had pleaded for his life, offering anything—even his current consort in his place—if only he would be allowed to live.

Richard Westphalen had not died honorably and his karma would carry that stain for many incarnations.

The pleasure Kusum had taken in delivering the screaming Richard Westphalen over to the rakoshi had dismayed him. He was performing a duty. He was not supposed to enjoy it. But he had thought at the time that if all three of the remaining Westphalens were creatures as reprehensible as Richard, fulfilling the vow would be a service to humanity.

It was not to be so, he had learned. The old woman, Grace Westphalen, had been made of sterner stuff. She had acquitted herself well before fainting. She had been unconscious when Kusum gave her over to the rakoshi.

But Richard and Grace had been strangers to Kusum. He had seen them only from afar before their sacrifices. He had investigated their personal habits and studied their routines, but he had never come close to them, never spoken to them.

Tonight he had stood not half a meter from Nellie Paton discussing English chocolates with her. He had found her pleasant and gracious and unassuming. And yet she must die by his design.

Kusum ground his only fist into his eyes, forcing himself to think about the pearls he had seen around her neck, the jewels on her fingers, the luxurious townhouse she owned, the wealth she commanded, all bought at a terrible price of death and destruction to his family. Nellie Paton’s ignorance of the source of her wealth was of no consequence.

Avow had been made…

And the road to a pure karma involved keeping that vow. Though he had fallen along the way, he could make everything right again by being true to his first vow, his vrata. The Goddess had whispered to him in the night. Kali had shown him the way.

Kusum wondered at the price others had paid—and soon would have to pay—for the purification of his karma. The soiling of that karma had been no one’s fault but his own. He had freely taken a vow of Brahmacharya and for many years had held to a life of chastity and sexual continence. Until…

His mind shied away from the days that ended his life as a Brahmachari. There were sins—patakas—that stained every life. But he had committed a mahapataka, thoroughly polluting his karma. It was a catastrophic blow to his quest for moksha, the liberation from the karmic wheel. It meant he would suffer greatly before being born again as an evil man of low caste. For he had forsaken his vow of Brahmacharya in the most abominable fashion.

But the vrata to his father he would not forsake: Although the crime was more than a century in the past, all the descendants of Sir Albert Westphalen must die for it. Only two were left.

A new noise rose from below. The Mother was scraping on the hatch. She had caught the Scent and wanted to hunt.

He rose and stepped to his cabin door, then stopped, uncertain of what to do. He knew the Paton woman had received the candies. Before leaving London he had injected each piece with a few drops of the elixir and had left the wrapped and addressed parcel in the care of an embassy secretary to hold until she received word to mail it. And now it had arrived. All would be perfect.

Except for Jack.

Jack obviously knew the Westphalens. A startling coincidence but not outlandish when one considered that both the Westphalens and Kusum knew Jack through Burkes at the U.K. Mission. And Jack had apparently come into possession of the small bottle of elixir Kusum had arranged for Grace Westphalen to receive last weekend. Had it been mere chance that he had picked that particular bottle to investigate? From what little Kusum knew of Jack, he doubted it.

For all the considerable risk Jack represented—his innate intuitive abilities and his capacity and willingness to do physical damage made him a very dangerous man—Kusum was loath to see him come to harm. He was indebted to him for returning the necklace in time. More importantly, Jack was too rare a creature in the Western world—Kusum did not want to be responsible for his extinction. And finally, there was a certain kinship he felt toward the man. He sensed Repairman Jack to be an outcast in his own land, just as Kusum had been in his until recently. True, Kusum had an ever-growing following at home and now moved in the upper circles of India’s diplomatic corps as if he belonged there, but he was still an outcast in his heart. For he would never—could never—be a part of the “new India.”

The “new India” indeed! Once he had fulfilled his vow he would return home with his rakoshi. And then he would begin the task of transforming the “new India” back into a land true to its heritage.

He had the time.

And he had the rakoshi.

The Mother’s scraping against the hatch door became more insistent. He would have to let her hunt tonight. All he could hope for was that the Paton woman had eaten a piece of the candy and that the Mother would lead her youngling there. He was quite sure Jack had the bottle of elixir, and that he had tasted it some time yesterday—a single drop was enough to draw a rakosh. It was unlikely he would taste it twice. And so it must be the Paton woman who now carried the scent.

Anticipation filled Kusum as he started below to free the Mother and her youngling.

13

They were entwined on the couch, Jack sitting, Kolabati sprawled across him, her hair a dark storm cloud across her face. It was a replay of last night, only this time they hadn’t made it to the bedroom.

After Kolabati’s initial frightened reaction to seeing him swallow the liquid, Jack had waited to see what she would say. Taking that swig had been a radical move on his part, but he had butted heads against this thing long enough. Maybe now he would get some answers.

But she had said nothing. Instead, she started undressing him. When he protested, she began doing things to him with her fingernails that drove all questions about mysterious liquids from his mind.

Questions could wait. Everything could wait.

Jack floated now on a languorous river of sensation, leading he knew not where. He had tried to take the helm but had given up, yielding to her superior knowledge of the various currents and tributaries alone the way. As far as he was concerned, Kolabati could steer him wherever she wished. They had explored new territories last night and more tonight. He was ready to push the frontiers back even further. He only hoped he could stay afloat during the ensuing excursions.

Kolabati was just beginning to guide him into the latest adventure when the odor returned. Just a trace, but enough to recognize as the same unforgettable stench as last night.

If Kolabati noticed it, too, she said nothing. But she immediately rose to her knees and swung her hips over him. As she settled astride his lap with a little sigh, she clamped her lips over his. This was the most conventional position they had used all night. Jack found her rhythm and began moving with her but, just like last night when the odor had invaded the apartment, he sensed a strange tension in her that took the edge off his ardor.

And the odor… it was nauseating, growing stronger and stronger, filling the air around them. It seemed to flow from the tv room. Jack raised his head from Kolabati’s throat where he had been nuzzling around her iron necklace. Over the rise and fall of her right shoulder he could look into the dark of that room. He saw nothing—

A noise.

A click, really, much like the whirring air conditioner in the tv room made from time to time. But different. Slightly louder. A little more solid. Something about it alerted Jack. He kept his eyes open…

And as he watched, two pairs of yellow eyes began to glow outside the tv room window.

It had to be a trick of the light. He squinted for a better look, but the eyes remained. They moved around, as if searching for something. One of the pair fixed on Jack for an instant. An icy fingernail scored the outer wall of his heart as he stared into those glowing yellow orbs… like looking into the very soul of evil. He felt himself wither inside Kolabati. He wanted to throw her off, run to the old oak secretary, pull out every gun behind the panel in its base and fire them out the window two at a time.

But he could not move! Fear as he had never known it gripped him in a clammy fist and pinned him to the couch. He was paralyzed by the alienness of those eyes and the sheer malevolence behind them.

Kolabati had to be aware that something was wrong—there was no way she could not be. She leaned back and looked at him.

“What do you see?” Her eyes were wide and her voice barely audible.

“Eyes,” Jack said. “Yellow eyes. Two pairs.”

She caught her breath. “In the other room?”

“Outside the window.”

“Don’t move, don’t say another word.”

“But—”

“For both our sakes. Please.”

Jack neither moved nor spoke. He stared at Kolabati’s face, trying to read it. She was afraid, but anything beyond that was closed off to him. Why hadn’t she been surprised when he told her there were eyes watching from the other side of a third-story window with no fire escape?

He glanced over her shoulder again. The eyes were still there, still searching for something. What? They appeared confused, and even when they looked directly at him, they did not seem to see him. Their gaze slid off him, slithered around him, passed through him.

This is crazy! Why am I sitting here?

He was angry with himself for yielding so easily to fear of the unknown. There was some sort of animal out there—two of them. Nothing he couldn’t deal with.

As Jack started to lift Kolabati off him, she gave a little cry. She wrapped her arms around his neck in a near stranglehold and dug her knees into his hips.

“Don’t move!” Her voice was hushed and frantic.

“Let me up.” He tried to slide out from under but she twisted around and pulled him down on top of her. It would have been comical but for her very genuine terror.

“Don’t leave me!”

“I’m going to see what’s out there.”

“No! If you value your life you’ll stay right where you are!”

This was beginning to sound like a bad movie.

“Come on! What could be out there?”

“Better you never find out.”

That did it. He gently but firmly tried to disengage himself from Kolabati. She protested all the way and would not let go of his neck. Had she gone crazy? What was wrong with her?

He finally managed to gain his feet with Kolabati still clinging to him, and had to drag her with him to the tv room door.

The eyes were gone.

Jack stumbled to the window. Nothing there. And nothing visible in the darkness of the alley below. He turned within the circle of Kolabati’s arms.

“What was out there?”

Her expression was charmingly innocent. “You saw for yourself: nothing.”

She released him and walked back into the front room, completely un-selfconscious in her nakedness. Jack watched the swaying flare of her hips silhouetted in the light as she walked away. Something had happened here tonight and Kolabati knew what it was. But Jack was at a loss as to how to make her tell him. He had failed to learn anything about Grace’s tonic—and now this.

“Why were you so afraid?” he said, following her.

“I wasn’t afraid.” She began to slip into her underwear.

He mimicked her: “’If you value your life’ and whatever else you said. You were scared! Of what?”

“Jack, I love you dearly,” she said in a voice that did not quite carry all the carefree lightness she no doubt intended it to, “but you can be so silly at times. It was just a game.”

Jack could see the pointlessness of pursuing this any further. She had no intention of telling him anything. He watched her finish dressing—it didn’t take long; she hadn’t been wearing much—with a sense of déjà-vu. Hadn’t they played this scene last night?

“You’re leaving?”

“Yes. I have to—”

“—see your brother?”

She looked at him. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess.”

Kolabati stepped up to him and put her arms around his neck. “I’m sorry to run off like this again.” She kissed him. “Can we meet tomorrow?”

“I’ll be out of town.”

“Monday, then?”

He held back from saying yes.

“I don’t know. I’m not too crazy about our routine: We come here, we make love, a stink comes into the room, you get uptight and cling to me like a second skin, the stink goes away, you take off.”

Kolabati kissed him again and Jack felt himself begin to respond. She had her ways, this Indian woman. “It won’t happen again. I promise.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I just am,” she said with a smile.

Jack let her out, then locked the door behind her. Still naked, he went back to the window in the tv room and stood there looking out at the dark. The beach scene was barely visible on the shadowed wall across the alley. Nothing moved, no eyes glowed. He wasn’t crazy and he didn’t do drugs. Something—two somethings—had been out there tonight. Two pairs of yellow eyes had been looking in. Something about those eyes was familiar but he couldn’t quite make the connection. Jack didn’t push it. It would come sooner or later.

His attention was drawn to the sill outside his window where he saw three long white scratches in the concrete. He was sure they had never been there before. He was puzzled and uneasy, angry and frustrated—and what could he do? She was gone.

He walked through the front room to get a beer. On the way, he glanced at the shelf on the big hutch where he had left the bottle of herbal mixture after taking the swallow.

It was gone.

14

Kolabati hurried toward Central Park West. This was a residential district with trees near the curb and cars lining both sides of the street. Nice in the daytime, but at night there were too many deep shadows, too many dark hiding places. It was not rakoshi she feared—not while she wore her necklace. It was humans. And with good reason: Look what had happened Wednesday night because a hoodlum thought an iron and topaz necklace looked valuable.

She relaxed when she reached Central Park West. There was plenty of traffic there despite the lateness of the hour, and the sodium lamps high over the street made the very air around her seem to glow. Empty cabs cruised by. She let them pass. There was something she had to do before she flagged one down.

Kolabati walked along the curb until she found a sewer grate. She reached into her purse and removed the bottle of rakoshi elixir. She hadn’t liked stealing it from Jack, for she would have to fabricate a convincing explanation later. But it was his safety that counted, and to assure that, she would steal from him again and again.

She unscrewed the cap and poured the green mixture down the sewer, waiting until the last drop fell.

She sighed with relief. Jack was safe. No more rakoshi would come looking for him.

She sensed someone behind her and turned. An elderly woman stood a few dozen feet away, watching her bend over the sewer grate. A nosey old biddy. Kolabati was repulsed by her wrinkles and stooped posture. She never wanted to be that old.

As Kolabati straightened up, she recapped the bottle and returned it to her purse. She would save that for Kusum.

Yes, dear brother, she thought with determination, I don’t know how, or to what end, but I know you’re involved. And soon I’ll have the answers.

15

Kusum stood in the engine room at the stern of his ship, every cell in his body vibrating in time to the diesel monstrosities on either side of him. The drone, the roar, the clatter of twin engines capable of generating a total of nearly 3,000 b.h.p. at peak battered his eardrums. A man could die screaming down here in the bowels of the ship and no one on the deck directly above would hear him; with the engines running, he wouldn’t even hear himself.

Bowels of the ship… how apt. Pipes like masses of intestines coursed through the air, along the walls, under the catwalks, vertically, horizontally, diagonally.

The engines were warm. Time to get the crew.

The dozen or so rakoshi he had been training to run the ship had been doing well, but he wanted to keep them sharp. He wanted to be able to take his ship to sea on short notice. Hopefully that necessity would not arise, but the events of the past few days had made him wary of taking anything for granted. Tonight had only compounded his unease.

His mood was grim as he left the engine room. Again the Mother and her youngling had returned empty-handed. That meant only one thing. Jack had tried the elixir again and Kolabati had been there to protect him… with her body.

The thought filled Kusum with despair. Kolabati was destroying herself. She had spent too much time among westerners. She had already absorbed too many of their habits of dress. What other foul habits had she picked up? He had to find a way to save her from herself.

But not tonight. He had his own personal concerns: His evening prayers had been said; he had made his thrice-daily offering of water and sesame… He would make an offering more to the Goddess’s taste tomorrow night. Now he was ready for work. There would be no punishment for the rakoshi tonight, only work.

Kusum picked up his whip from where he had left it on the deck and rapped the handle on the hatch that led to the main hold. The Mother and the younglings that made up the crew would be waiting on the other side. The sound of the engines was their signal to be ready. He released the rakoshi. As the dark, rangy forms swarmed up the steps to the deck, he re-locked the hatch and headed for the wheelhouse.

Kusum stood before his controls. The green-on-black CRTs with their flickering graphs and read-outs would have been more at home on a lunar lander than on this old rustbucket. But they were familiar to Kusum by now. During his stay in London he had had most of the ship’s functions computerized, including navigation and steering. Once on the open sea, he could set a destination, phase in the computer, and tend to other business. The computer would choose the best course along the standard shipping lanes and leave him sixty miles off the coast of his target destination, disturbing him during the course of the voyage only if other vessels came within a designated proximity.

And it all worked. In its test run across the Atlantic—with a full human crew as back-up and the rakoshi towed behind in a barge—there had not been a single hitch.

But the system was useful only on the open sea. No computer was going to get him out of New York Harbor. It could help, but Kusum would have to do most of the work—without the aid of a tug or a pilot. Which was illegal, of course, but he could not risk allowing anyone, even a harbor pilot, aboard his ship. He was sure if he timed his departure carefully he could reach international waters before anyone could stop him. But should the Harbor Patrol or the Coast Guard pull alongside and try to board, Kusum would have his own boarding party ready.

The drills were important to him; they gave him peace of mind. Should something go awry, should his freighter’s living cargo somehow be discovered, he needed to know he could leave on short notice. And so he ran the rakoshi through their paces regularly, lest they forget.

The river was dark and still, the wharf deserted. Kusum checked his instruments. All was ready for tonight’s drill. A single blink of the running lights and the rakoshi leaped into action, loosening and untying the mooring ropes and cables. They were agile and tireless. They could leap to the wharf from the gunwales, cast off the ropes from the pilings, and then climb up those same ropes back to the ship. If one happened to fall in, it was of little consequence. They were quite at home in the water. After all, they had swum behind the ship after their barge had been cut loose off Staten Island and had climbed aboard after it had docked and been cleared by customs.

Within minutes, the Mother scrambled to the center of the forward hatch cover. This was the signal that all ropes were clear. Kusum threw the engines into reverse. The twin screws below began to pull the prow away from the pier. The computer aided Kusum in making tiny corrections for tidal drift, but most of the burden of the task was directly on his shoulders. With a larger freighter, such a maneuver would have been impossible. But with this particular vessel, equipped as it was and with Kusum at the wheel, it could be done. It had taken Kusum many tries over the months, many crunches against the wharf and one or two nerve-shattering moments when he thought he had lost all control over the vessel, before he had become competent. Now it was routine.

The ship backed toward New Jersey until it was clear of the wharf. Leaving the starboard engine in reverse, Kusum threw the port engine into neutral, and then into forward. The ship began to turn south. Kusum had searched long and hard to find this ship—few freighters this size had twin screws. But his patience had paid off. He now had a ship that could turn three hundred and sixty degrees within its own length.

When the prow had swung ninety degrees and was pointing toward the Battery, Kusum idled the engines. Had it been time to leave, he would have thrown both into forward and headed for the Narrows and the Atlantic Ocean beyond. If only he could! If only his duty here were done! Reluctantly, he put the starboard into forward and the port into reverse. The nose swung back toward the dock. Then it was alternating forward and reverse for both until the ship eased back into its slip. Two blinks of the running lights and the rakoshi were leaping to the pier and securing the ship in place.

Kusum allowed himself a smile of satisfaction. Yes, they were ready. It wouldn’t be long before they left this obscene land forever. Kusum would see to it that the rakoshi did not return empty-handed tomorrow night.

Chapter Six

west bengal, india

saturday, July 25, 1857

1

People were going to die today. Of that Sir Albert Westphalen had no doubt.

And he might be one of them.

Here, high up on this ledge, with the morning sun on his back, with the mythical Temple-in-the-Hills and its walled courtyard spread out below him, he wondered at his ability to carry his plans through to completion. The abstract scheme that had seemed so simple and direct in his office in Bharangpur had become something quite different in these forbidding hills under the cold light of dawn.

His heart ground against his sternum as he lay on his belly and peered at the temple through his field glasses. He must have been daft to think this would work! How deep and cold was his desperation that it could lead him to this? Was he willing to risk his own death to save the family name?

Westphalen glanced down at his men, all busy checking their gear and mounts. With their stubbly faces, their rumpled uniforms caked with dirt, dried sweat, and rain, they certainly didn’t look like Her Majesty’s finest this morning. They seemed not to notice, however. And well they might not, for Westphalen knew how these men lived—like animals in cramped quarters with a score and ten of their fellows, sleeping on canvas sheets changed once a month and eating and washing out of the same tin pot. Barracks life brutalized the best of them, and when there was no enemy to fight they fought each other. The only thing they loved more than battle, was liquor, and even now, when they should have been fortifying themselves with food, they were passing a bottle of raw spirits spiked with chopped capsicum. He could find no trace of his own disquiet in their faces; only anticipation of the battle and looting to come.

Despite the growing warmth of the sun, he shivered—the after-effect of a sleepless night spent huddled away from the rain under a rocky overhang, or simple fear of what was to come? He had certainly had his fill of fear last night. While the men had slept fitfully, he had remained awake, sure that there were wild things skulking about in the darkness beyond the small fire they had built. Occasionally he had glimpsed yellow glints of light in the dark, like pairs of fireflies. The horses, too, must have sensed something, for they were skittish all night.

But now it was day, and what was he to do?

He turned back to the temple and studied it anew through his field glasses. It sat hunched in the center of its courtyard behind the wall, alone but for a compound of some sort to its left against the base of a rocky cliff. The temple’s most striking feature was its blackness—not dull and muddy, but proud and gleaming, deep and shiny, as if it were made of solid onyx. It was an oddly shaped affair, box-like with rounded corners. It seemed to have been made in layers, with each upper level dripping down over the ones below. The temple walls were ringed with friezes and studded along their length with gargoyle-like figures, but Westphalen could make out no details from his present position. And atop it all was a huge obelisk, as black as the rest of the structure, pointing defiantly skyward.

Westphalen wondered how—short of a daguerreotype—he would ever do justice to any description of the Temple-in-the-Hills. It was simply alien. It looked… it looked like someone had driven a spike through an ornate block of licorice and left it out in the sun to melt.

As he watched, the door in the wall swung open. A man, younger than Jaggernath but swathed in a similar dhoti, came out carrying a large urn on his shoulder. He walked to the far corner of the wall, emptied the liquid contents of the urn onto the ground, and returned to the compound.

The door remained open behind him.

There was no longer any reason to delay, and no way in hell or on earth to turn his men back now. Westphalen felt as if he had started a huge juggernaut on its way down an incline; he had been able to guide it at first, but now its momentum was such that it was completely out of his control.

He clambered off the ledge and faced his men.

“We shall advance at full gallop in a double column with lances at the ready. Tooke will lead one column and take it left around the temple after entering the courtyard; Russell will lead the other column and go right. If there is no immediate resistance, you will all dismount and ready your rifles. We will then search the grounds for any pandies that might be hiding within. Any questions?”

The men shook their heads. They were more than ready— they were slavering for the fight. All they needed was someone to unleash them.

“Mount up!” Westphalen said.

The approach began in an orderly enough fashion. Westphalen let the six lancers lead the way while he gladly brought up the rear. The detail trotted up the path until they were in sight of the temple, then broke into a gallop as planned.

But something happened on the road leading down to the wall. The men started to woop and yell, whipping themselves and each other into a frenzy. Soon their lances were lowered and clamped under their arms in battle position as they leaned low over the necks of their mounts, bloodying the flanks as they spurred them to greater and greater speed.

They had been told that a band of rebel Sepoys were quartered beyond that wall; the lancers had to be ready to kill as soon as they cleared the gate. Westphalen alone knew that their only resistance would come from a handful of surprised and harmless Hindu priests.

Only that knowledge allowed him to keep up with them. Nothing to worry about, he told himself as the wall drew nearer and nearer. Only a few unarmed priests in there. Nothing to worry about.

He had a glimpse of bas-relief murals on the surrounding wall as he raced toward the gate, but his mind was too full of the uncertainty of what they might find on the other side to make any sense of them. He drew his sabre and charged into the courtyard behind his howling lancers.

Westphalen saw three priests standing in front of the temple, all unarmed. They ran forward, waving their hands in the air in what appeared to be an attempt to shoo the soldiers away.

The lancers never hesitated. Three of them fanned out on the run and drove their lances through the priests. They then circled the temple and came to a halt at its front entrance, where they dismounted, dropping their lances and pulling their Enfields from their saddle boots.

Westphalen remained mounted. He was uncomfortable at making himself an easy target, but felt more secure with his horse under him, able to wheel and gallop out the gate at an instant’s notice should something go wrong.

There was a brief lull during which Westphalen directed the men toward the temple entrance. They were almost to the steps when the svamin counterattacked from two directions. With shrill cries of rage, a half-dozen or so charged out from the temple; more than twice that number rushed from the compound. The former were armed with whips and pikes, the latter with curved swords much like Sepoy talwars.

It was not a battle—it was slaughter. Westphalen almost felt sorry for the priests. The soldiers first took aim at the closer group emerging from the temple. The Enfields left only one priest standing after the first volley; he ran around their flank to join the other group, which had slowed its advance after seeing the results of the withering fire. From his saddle, Westphalen directed his men to retreat to the steps of the black temple where the light weight and rapid reloading capacity of the Enfield allowed them second and third volleys that left only two priests standing. Hunter and Malleson picked up their lances, remounted, and ran down the survivors.

And then it was over.

Westphalen sat numb and silent in his saddle as he let his gaze roam the courtyard. So easy. So final. They had all died so quickly. More than a score of bodies lay sprawled in the morning sun, their blood pooling and soaking into the sand as India’s omnipresent opportunists, the flies, began to gather. Some of the bodies were curled into limp parodies of sleep, others, still transfixed by lances, looked like insects pinned to a board.

He glanced down at his pristine blade. He had bloodied neither his hands nor his sword. Somehow, that made him feel innocent of what had just happened all around him.

“Don’t look like pandies to me,” Tooke was saying as he rolled a corpse over onto its back with his foot.

“Never mind them,” Westphalen said, dismounting at last. “Check inside and see if there’s any more hiding around.”

He ached to explore the temple, but not until it had been scouted by a few of the men. After watching Tooke and Russell disappear into the darkness within, he sheathed his sword and took a moment to inspect the temple close up. It was not made of stone as he had originally thought, but of solid ebony that had been cut and worked and polished to a gloss. There did not seem to be a square inch anywhere on its surface that had not been decorated with carvings.

The friezes were the most striking—four-foot-high belts of illustration girding each level up to the spire. He tried to follow one from the right of the temple door. The art was crudely stylized and he found whatever story it was telling impossible to follow. But the violence depicted was inescapable. Every few feet there were killings and dismemberments and demon-like creatures devouring the flesh.

He felt a chill despite the growing heat of the day. What sort of a place had he invaded?

Further speculation was cut off by a cry from within the temple. It was Tooke’s voice, telling everyone that he’d found something.

Westphalen led the rest of the men inside. It was cool within, and very dark. Oil lamps set on pedestals along the ebony walls gave scant, flickering illumination. He had the impression of cyclopean sculptures rising against the black walls all around him, but could make out only an occasional highlight where pinpoints of light gleamed from a shiny surface. After seeing the friezes outside, he was quite content to let the details remain in shadow.

He turned his thoughts to other matters more immediately pressing. He wondered if Tooke and Russell had found the jewels. His mind raced over various strategies he would have to employ to keep what he needed for himself. For all he knew, he might need it all.

But the two scouts had found no jewels. Instead, they had found a man. He was seated in one of two chairs high on a dais in the center of the temple. Four oil lamps, each set on a pedestal placed every ninety degrees around the dais, lit the scene.

Rising above and behind the priest was an enormous statue made of the same black wood as the temple. It was a four-armed woman, naked but for an ornate headdress and a garland of human skulls. She was smiling, protruding her pointed tongue between her filed teeth. One hand held a sword, another a severed human head; the third and fourth hands were empty.

Westphalen had seen this deity before, but as a book-sized drawing—not as a giant. He knew her name.

Kali.

With difficulty, Westphalen tore his gaze away from the statue and brought it to bear on the priest. He had typical Indian coloring and features but was a little heavier than most of his fellow countrymen Westphalen had seen. His hairline was receding. He looked like a Buddha dressed in a white robe. And he showed no trace of fear.

“I been talking to ’im, Captain,” Tooke said, “but ’e ain’t been—”

“I was merely waiting,” the priest suddenly said in deep tones that resonated through the temple, “for someone worth speaking to. Whom am I addressing, please?”

“Captain Sir Albert Westphalen.”

“Welcome to the temple of Kali, Captain Westphalen.” There was no hint of welcome in his voice.

Westphalen’s eye was caught by the priest’s necklace—an intricate thing, silvery, inscribed with strange script, with a pair of yellow stones with black centers spaced by two links at the front.

“So, you speak English, do you?” he said for want of something better. This priest—the high priest of the temple, no doubt—unsettled him with his icy calm and penetrating gaze.

“Yes. When it appeared that the British were determined to make my country a colony, I decided it might be a useful language to know.”

Westphalen put down his anger at the smug arrogance of this heathen and concentrated on the matter at hand. He wanted to find the jewels and leave this place.

“We know you are hiding rebel Sepoys here. Where are they?”

“There are no Sepoys here. Only devotees of Kali.”

“Then what about this?” It was Tooke. He was standing by a row of waist-high urns. He had slashed through the waxy fabric that sealed the mouth of the nearest one and now held up his dripping knife. “Oil! Enough for a year. And there’s sacks of rice over there. More than any twenty ’devotees’ need!”

The high priest never looked in Tooke’s direction. It was as if the soldier didn’t exist.

“Well?” Westphalen said at last. “What about the rice and oil?”

“Merely stocking in provisions against the turmoil of the times, Captain,” the high priest said blandly. “One never knows when supplies might be cut off.”

“If you won’t reveal the whereabouts of the rebels, I shall be forced to order my men to search the temple from top to bottom. This will cause needless destruction.”

“That will not be necessary, Captain.”

Westphalen and his men jumped at the sound of the woman’s voice. As he watched, she seemed to take form out of the darkness behind the statue of Kali. She was shorter than the high priest, but well-proportioned. She too wore a robe of pure white.

The high priest rattled something in a heathen tongue as she joined him on the dais; the woman replied in kind.

“What did they say?” Westphalen said to anyone who was listening.

Tooke replied: “He asked about the children; she said they were safe.”

For the first time, the priest admitted Tooke’s existence by looking at him, nothing more.

“What you seek, Captain Westphalen,” the woman said quickly, “lies beneath our feet. The only way to it is through that grate.”

She pointed to a spot beyond the rows of oil urns and sacks of rice. Tooke hopped over them and knelt down.

“Here it is! But”—he jumped to his feet again—“whoosh! The stink!”

Westphalen pointed to the soldier nearest him. “Hunter! Watch those two. If they try to escape, shoot them!”

Hunter nodded and aimed his Enfield at the pair on the dais. Westphalen joined the rest of the men at the grate.

The grate was square, measuring perhaps ten feet on a side. It was made of heavy iron bars criss-crossing about six inches apart. Damp air, reeking of putrefaction, wafted up through the bars. The darkness below was impenetrable.

Westphalen sent Malleson for one of the lamps from the dais. When it was brought to him, he dropped it through the grate. Its copper body rang against the bare stone floor twenty feet below as it bounced and landed on its side. The flame sputtered and almost died, then wavered to life again. The brightening light flickered off the smooth stone surfaces on three sides of the well. A dark, arched opening gaped in the wall opposite them. They were looking down into what appeared to be the terminus of a subterranean passage.

And there in the two corners flanking the tunnel mouth stood small urns filled with colored stones—some green, some red, and some crystal clear.

Westphalen experienced an instant of vertigo. He had to lean forward against the grate to keep himself from collapsing. Saved!

He quickly glanced around at his men. They had seen the urns, too. Accommodations would have to be made. If those urns were full of jewels, there would be plenty for all. But first they had to get them up here.

He began barking orders: Malleson was sent out to the horses for a rope; the remaining four were told to spread out around the grate and lift it off. They bent to it, strained until their faces reddened in the light filtering up from below, but could not budge it. Westphalen was about to return to the dais and threaten the priest when he noticed simple sliding bolts securing the grate to rings in the stone floor at two of the corners; on the far side along one edge was a row of hinges. As Westphalen freed the bolts—which were chained to the floor rings—it occurred to him how odd it was to lock up a treasure with such simple devices. But his mind was too full of the sight of those jewels below to dwell for long on bolts.

The grate was raised on its hinges and propped open with an Enfield. Malleson arrived with the rope then. At Westphalen’s direction, he tied it to one of the temple’s support columns and tossed it into the opening. Westphalen was about to ask for a volunteer when Tooke squatted on the rim.

“Me father was a jeweler’s assistant,” he announced. “I’ll tell ye if there be anything down there to get excited about.”

He grasped the rope and began to slide down. Westphalen watched Tooke reach the floor and fairly leap upon the nearest urn. He grabbed a handful of stones and brought them over to the sputtering lamp. He righted it, then poured the stones from one hand to the other in the light.

“They’re real!” he shouted. “B’God, they’re real!”

Westphalen was speechless for a moment. Everything was going to be all right. He could go back to England, settle his debts, and never, never gamble again. He tapped Watts, Russell, and Lang on the shoulders and pointed below.

“Give him a hand.”

The three men slid down the rope in rapid succession. Each made a personal inspection of the jewels. Westphalen watched their long shadows interweaving in the lamplight as they scurried around below. It was all he could do to keep from screaming at them to send up the jewels. But he could not appear too eager. No, that wouldn’t do at all. He had to be calm. Finally they dragged an urn over to the side and tied the rope around its neck. Westphalen and Malleson hauled it up, lifted it over the rim, and set it on the floor.

Malleson dipped both hands into the jewels and brought up two fistfuls. Westphalen restrained himself from doing the same. He picked up a single emerald and studied it, outwardly casual, inwardly wanting to crush it against his lips and cry for joy.

“C’mon up there!” said Tooke from below. “Let’s ’ave the rope, what? There be plenty more to come up and it stinks down ’ere. Let’s ’urry it up.”

Westphalen gestured to Malleson, who untied the rope from the urn and tossed the end over the edge. He continued to study the emerald, thinking it the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, until he heard one of the men say:

“What was that?”

“What was what?”

“A noise. I thought I ’eard a noise in the tunnel there.”

“Yer daft, mate. Nothing in that black ’ole but stink.”

“I ’eard something, I tell you.”

Westphalen stepped up to the edge and looked down at the four men. He was about to tell them to stop talking and keep working when the priest and the woman broke into song. Westphalen whirled at the sound. It was like no music he had ever heard. The woman’s voice was a keening wail, grating against the man’s baritone. There were no words to the song, only disconnected notes, and none of the notes they sang seemed to belong together. There was no harmony, only discord. It set his teeth on edge.

They stopped abruptly.

And then came another sound. It rose from below, seeping from the mouth of the tunnel that terminated in the pit, growing in volume. A grumbled cacophony of moans and grunts and snarls that made each hair on the nape of his neck stand up one by one.

The sounds from the tunnel ceased, to be replaced by the dissonant singing of the priest and priestess. They stopped and the inhuman sounds from the tunnel answered, louder still. It was a litany from hell.

Suddenly the singing was joined by a scream of pain and terror from below. Westphalen looked over the edge and saw one of the men—Watts, he thought—being dragged by his legs into the black maw of the tunnel, shrieking, “It’s got me! It’s got me!”

But what had him? The tunnel mouth was a darker shadow within the shadows below. What was pulling him?

Tooke and Russell had him by the arms and were trying to hold him back, but the force drawing him into the dark was as inexorable as the tide. It seemed Watts’ arms would be pulled from their sockets at any moment when a dark shape leaped from the tunnel and grabbed Tooke around the neck. It had a lean body and towered over Tooke. Westphalen could make out no details in the poor light and dancing shadows of the pandemonium below, but what little he saw was enough to make his skin tighten and shrink against his insides, and set his heart to beating madly.

The priest and the woman sang again. He knew he should stop them, but he couldn’t speak, couldn’t move.

Russell let go of Watts, who was quickly swallowed by the tunnel, and rushed to Tooke’s aid. But as soon as he moved, another dark figure leaped from the shadows and pulled him into the tunnel. With a final convulsive heave, Tooke too was dragged off.

Westphalen had never heard grown men scream in such fear. The sound sickened him. Yet he could not react.

And still the priest and the woman sang, no longer stopping for an answering phrase from the tunnel.

Only Lang remained below. He had the rope in his fists and was halfway up the wall, his face a white mask of fear, when two dark shapes darted out of the darkness and leaped upon him, pulling him down. He screamed for help, his eyes wild as he was dragged twisting and kicking into the blackness below. Westphalen managed to break the paralysis that had gripped him since his first glimpse of the denizens of the tunnel. He pulled his pistol from its holster. Beside him, Malleson had already moved into action—he aimed his Enfield and fired at one of the creatures. Westphalen was sure he saw it take the hit, but it seemed to take no notice of the bullet. He fired three shots into the two creatures before they disappeared from sight, taking the howling Lang with them.

Behind him the ghastly song went on, playing counterpoint to the agonized screams from the tunnel below, and all around him the stench… Westphalen felt himself teetering on the edge of madness. He charged up to the dais.

“Stop it!” he screeched. “Stop it or I’ll have you shot!”

But they only smiled and continued their hellish song.

He gestured to Hunter, who had been guarding them. Hunter didn’t hesitate. He raised his Enfield to his shoulder and fired.

The shot rang like an explosion through the temple. A red splatter bloomed upon the priest’s chest as he was thrown back against his chair. Slowly he slid to the floor. His mouth worked, his glazing eyes blinked twice, and then he lay still. The woman cried out and knelt beside him.

The song had stopped. And so had the screams from below.

Once again silence ruled the temple. Westphalen drew a tremulous breath. If he could just have a moment to think, he could—

“Captain! They’re coming up!” There was an edge of hysteria to Malleson’s voice as he backed away from the pit. “They’re coming up!”

Panic clutching at him, Westphalen ran to the opening. The chamber below was filled with shadowy forms. There were no growls or barks or hissing noises from down there, only the slither of moist skin against moist skin, and the rasp of talon against stone. The lamp had been extinguished and all he could see were dark milling bodies crowded against the walls—

—and climbing the rope!

He saw a pair of yellow eyes rising toward him. One of the things was almost to the top!

Westphalen holstered his pistol and drew his sword. With shaking hands he raised it above his head and chopped down with all his strength. The heavy rope parted cleanly and the distal end whipped away into the darkness below.

Pleased with his swordplay, he peered over the edge to see what the creatures would do now. Before his disbelieving eyes they began to climb the wall. But that was impossible. Those walls were as smooth as—

Now he saw what they were doing: the things were scrambling over and upon each other, reaching higher and higher, like a wave of black, foul water filling a cistern from below. He dropped his sword and turned to run, then forced himself to hold his position. If those things got out, there would be no escape for him. And he couldn’t die here. Not now. Not with a fortune sitting in the urn at his feet.

Westphalen mustered all his courage and stepped over to where Tooke’s Enfield propped up the grate. With teeth clenched and sweat springing out along the length of his body, he gingerly extended a foot and kicked the rifle into the pit. The grate slammed down with a resounding clang as Westphalen stumbled back against a pillar, sagging with relief. He was safe now.

The grate rattled, it shook, it began to rise.

Moaning with terror and frustration, Westphalen edged back toward the grate.

The bolts had to be fastened!

As he drew nearer, Westphalen witnessed a scene of relentless, incalculable ferocity. He saw dark bodies massed beneath the grate, saw talons gripping, raking, scoring the bars, saw teeth sharp and white gnash at the iron, saw flashes of yellow eyes utterly feral, devoid of fear, of any hint of mercy, consumed by a bloodthirst beyond reason and sanity. And the stench… it was almost overpowering.

Now he understood why the grate had been fastened as it had.

Westphalen sank to his knees, then to his belly. Every fibre of his being screamed at him to run, but he would not. He had come too far! He would not be robbed of his salvation! He could order his two remaining men toward the grate, but he knew Malleson and Hunter would rebel. That would waste time and he had none to waste. He had to do it!

He began to crawl forward, inching his way toward the nearest bolt, where it lay chained to the steel eye driven into the floor. He would have to wait until the corresponding ring on the shuddering, convulsing grate became aligned with the floor ring, and then shove the bolt home through both of them. Then and only then would he feel it safe to run.

Stretching his arm to the limit, he grasped the bolt and waited. The blows against the underside of the grate were coming with greater frequency and greater force. The ring on the grate rarely touched the floor, and when it did clank down next to the floor ring, it was there for but an instant. Twice he shoved the bolt through the first and missed the second. In desperation, he rose up and placed his left hand atop the corner of the grate and threw all his weight against it. He had to lock this down!

It worked. The grate slammed against the floor and the bolt slid home, locking one corner down. But as he leaned against the grate, something snaked out between the bars and clamped on his wrist like a vise. It was a hand of sorts, three-fingered, each finger tapering to a long yellow talon; the skin was blue-black, its touch cold and wet against his skin.

Westphalen screamed in terror and loathing as his arm was pulled toward the seething mass of shadows below. He reared up and placed both boots against the edge of the grate, trying with all his strength to pull himself free. But the hand only tightened its grip. Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of his sabre on the floor where he had dropped it, not two feet from where he stood. With a desperate lunge, he grabbed it by the hilt and started hacking at the arm that held him. Blood as dark as the skin that covered it spouted from the arm. Westphalen’s tenth swing severed the arm and he fell back onto the floor. He was free—

Yet the taloned hand still gripped his wrist with a life of its own!

Westphalen dropped the sword and pried at the fingers. Malleson rushed over and helped. Together they pulled the fingers far enough apart to allow Westphalen to extricate his arm. Malleson hurled it onto the grate, where it clung to a bar until pulled loose by one of the fiends below.

As Westphalen lay gasping on the ground, trying to massage life back into the crushed and bruised tissues of his wrist, the woman’s voice rose over the clatter of the shaking grate.

“Pray to your god, Captain Westphalen. The rakoshi will not let you leave the temple alive!”

She was right. Those things—What had she called them? Rakoshi?—would rip the lone securing eye from the stone floor and have that grate up in a minute if he didn’t find some means to weigh it down. His eyes ranged the small area of the temple visible to him. There had to be a way! His gaze came to rest on the urns of lamp oil. They looked heavy enough. If he, Malleson, and Hunter could set enough of them on the grate. No… wait…

Fire! Nothing could withstand burning oil! He leapt to his feet and ran to the urn Tooke had opened with his knife.

“Malleson! Here! We’ll pour it through the grate!” He turned to Hunter and pointed to one of the lamps around the dais. “Bring that over here!”

Groaning under the weight, Westphalen and Malleson dragged the urn across the floor and upended it on the shuddering grate, pouring its contents onto the things below. Directly behind them came Hunter, who didn’t have to be told what to do with the lamp. He gave it a gentle underhand toss onto the grate.

The oil on the iron bars caught first, the flames licking along the upper surfaces to form a meshwork of fire, then dropping in a fine rain onto the creatures directly beneath. As dark, oil-splashed bodies burst into flame, a caterwauling howl arose from the pit. The thrashing below became more violent. And still the flames spread. Black, acrid smoke began to rise toward the ceiling of the temple.

“More!” Westphalen shouted above the shrieking din. He used his sabre to slice open the tops, then watched as Malleson and Hunter poured the contents of a second urn, and then a third into the pit. The howls of the creatures began to fade away as the flames leapt higher and higher.

He bent his own back to the task, pouring urn after urn through the grate, flooding the pit and sending a river of fire into the tunnel, creating an inferno that even Shadrach and his two friends would have shied from.

“Curse you, Captain Westphalen!”

It was the woman. She had risen from beside the priest’s corpse and was pointing a long, red-nailed finger at a spot between Westphalen’s eyes. “Curse you and all who spring from you!”

Westphalen took a step toward her, his sword raised. “Shut up!”

“Your line shall die in blood and pain, cursing you and the day you set your hand against this temple!”

The woman meant it, there was no denying that. She really believed she was laying a curse upon Westphalen and his progeny, and that shook him. He gestured to Hunter.

“Stop her!”

Hunter unslung his Enfield and aimed it at her. “You ’eard what ’e said.”

But the woman ignored the certain death pointed her way and kept ranting.

“You’ve slain my husband, desecrated the temple of Kali! There will be no peace for you, Captain Sir Albert Westphalen! Nor for you”—she pointed to Hunter—”or you!”— then to Malleson. “The rakoshi shall find you all!”

Hunter looked at Westphalen, who nodded. For the second time that day, a rifle shot rang out in the Temple-in-the-Hills. The woman’s face exploded as the bullet tore into her head. She fell to the floor beside her husband.

Westphalen glanced at her inert form for a moment, then turned away toward the jewel-filled urn. He was forming a plan on how to arrange a three-way split that would give him the largest share, when a shrill screech of rage and an agonized grunt swung him around again.

Hunter stood stiff and straight at the edge of the dais, his face the color of soured whey, his shoulders thrown back, eyes wide, mouth working soundlessly. His rifle clattered to the floor as blood began to trickle from a corner of his mouth. He seemed to lose substance. Slowly, like a giant festival balloon leaking hot air from all its seams, he crumbled, his knees folding beneath him as he pitched forward onto his face.

It was with a faint sense of relief that Westphalen saw the bloody hole in the center of Hunter’s back—he had died by physical means, not from a heathen woman’s curse. He was further relieved to see the dark-eyed, barefoot boy, no more than twelve years old, standing behind Hunter, staring down at the fallen British soldier. In his hand was a sword, the distal third of its blade smeared red with blood.