We sat quietly for another minute. Harlan was thinking the whole time, staring out the window at the great Indo-Saracenic station before us. Ranjit watched me in the rearview mirror, but he wasn’t saying anything.

“You’ll get this, Dan,” said Harlan at length. “You’ve been quite slippery without him catching on, so I think you can pull this off. You know how we’ll reach you, right?”

“You’ll place a matrimonial ad in the Poona paper.”

“What’ll it say?”

“‘Twenty-eight-year-old scheduled caste divorcée with no issues seeks tall, fair lawyer, doctor, or CPA plying in America. Not pretty but good companion with vitiligo and limp.’ Who the hell is going to answer such an ad?”

“No one,” said Ranjit. “Except you. That’s the idea.”

“Aren’t we being too cute? What if they suspect something?”

“How? You’re going to check the ads every day and when you see it, you make an excuse to go to Dorabjee’s in Camp at 11:00 a.m. Birgit or I will meet you there. She’s already in Poona. Now, if the message says twenty-nine-year-old divorcée, you go to the Swiss Cheese Garden at ABC Farms in Koregaon Park at 3:30. Make sure no one follows you. Take an auto rickshaw in the opposite direction. Get out, walk, go to a shop or café. Then take another auto to your destination.”

“We’ve gone over this,” I said. “I’ll look for the crippled divorcée with the skin condition every day in the paper.”

“And how do you contact us?” asked Ranjit.

“I go to the Blue Diamond Hotel and ask for Mr. Ranjit Varma.”

“Do you phone the hotel?” he asked.

“No, I never phone the hotel,” I answered in a petulant drone. “And, yes, I know that’s not your actual family name. By the way, I don’t understand why you won’t tell me your real name.”

“The less you know, the better.”

“Right,” said Harlan. “Ranjit and Birgit can give you money if you absolutely need it. But try not to need it. Earn it from Smets. You’re supposed to be unemployed.”

“Right.”

“Then there’s nothing more. Good luck, Dan.”

I popped the door, grabbed my bag, and disappeared into the crowd of pedestrians.

I brooded over recent events as I sat on the train, watching the city rush by the window. Ranjit had finally cracked me, made me decide. He was a genius. And a bastard for showing me an evil I couldn’t ignore. For leaving it rotting in my mind until I had to do something to rid myself of its stench. And the only way to accomplish that was to take Willy down. I had no idea what that might mean for me or for Sushmita. My greatest fear was somehow I’d take her down with him. I didn’t know how I’d live with that.