I thought it over: I could tell her about Kuwale – and ask her to swear to keep it to herself, to avoid embroiling Mosala in any more unwelcome speculation. Except that … how could I ask her to betray one confidence while begging her to respect another? It would be pure hypocrisy – and if she was willing to swap secrets with me, what would her promise be worth?

I said, “What have they got against journalists, anyway? Most cults are dying to recruit new members. What sort of ethos—?”

Lee eyed me suspiciously. “I’m not going to be tricked into any more indiscretions. It’s my fault entirely that the name slipped out – but the topic is now closed. The Anthrocosmologists are a non-subject.”

I laughed. “Oh, come on! This is absurd! You’re one of them, aren’t you? No secret handshakes; your notepad is sending out coded infrared: I am Indrani Lee, High Priestess of the Revered and Sacred Order—”

She took a swat at me with the back of her hand; I pulled back just in time. She said, “They certainly don’t have priestesses .”

“You mean they’re sexist? All male?”

She scowled. “ Or priests. And I’m not saying anything more.”

We walked on in silence. I took out my notepad and gave Sisyphus several meaningful glances. The full word had unlocked no Aladdin’s cave of data, though: every search on “Anthrocosmologists” came up blank.

I said, “I apologize. No more questions, no more provocation. What if I really do need to get in touch with them, though, but I just can’t tell you why?”

Lee was unmoved. “That sounds unlikely.”

I hesitated. “Someone called Kuwale has been trying to contact me. Ve’s been sending me cryptic messages for days. But ve failed to turn up at an arranged meeting last night – so I just want to find out what’s going on.” Almost none of this was true, but I wasn’t going to admit that I’d screwed up a perfect opportunity to discover for myself what AC was about. In any case, Lee remained impassive; if she’d heard the name before, she showed no sign of it.

I said, “Can’t you pass on the message that I want to speak to them? Give them the right to choose for themselves whether or not to turn me down?”

She stopped walking. A cultist on stilts reached down and thrust a stack of edible pamphlets in her face, MR’s own Einstein Conference Newsletter in the non-electronic edition. Lee waved the woman away irritably. “You’re asking a lot. If they take offense, and I lose five years’ work…”

I thought: You wouldn’t lose five years’ work; you’d finally be free to publish. But it didn’t seem diplomatic to put it that way.