“Please.”

“I more or less rule the streets of London. At least, when it comes to this particular market. I know the hotels. I know the brothels. I know the shelters and rail stations and public transport where youngsters hide. I know the parks and alleys and dark corners. There is no one better at finding a missing teen than yours truly. My employees can scour the city better than any branch of law enforcement.”

He takes another sip of his tea, smacks his lips, sits the cup back down. “So I put out a code red, Mr. Lockwood. It didn’t take long for one of my contacts to find the boy. He was trying to check into a small hotel paying cash. So I sent a few of my more mature employees—you probably noticed them in camouflage pants—to apprehend him. They did so. They brought him back to the arcade.”

He takes another sip of tea.

“Patrick was alone when you found him?” I ask.

“Yes.”

I mull this over. “Did any of your people know him?”

“No.”

“Proceed,” I say.

“Please understand, Mr. Lockwood, that at this time, I believed that this American was working to disrupt and even destroy my business.”

I nod. “So you treated him as a hostile.”

Fat Gandhi’s smile is one of relief. “Yes. You understand, then?”

I give him nothing.

“I, shall we say, interrogated him.”

“He tells you who he is,” I say, putting it together. “That he was kidnapped.”

“Yes.”

“What did you do?”

“What I always do. I conduct research.”

I remember what Myron told me about Fat Gandhi’s Hindu aphorism. “Knowledge is bigger than debate,” I say.

He is unnerved by my knowledge of his quote. “Uh, yes.”

“What did you find?”

“I was able to confirm his story, which put me in something of a quandary. On the one hand, I could turn him over to the authorities. I could even end up a hero for rescuing him.”

I shake my head. “But that would put too much heat on you.”

“Precisely. Heroes put targets on their backs, even with the police.”

“So you decided to look for a payoff.”

“Honestly, I didn’t know what to do. I am not a kidnapper. I also still needed to understand the threat. Three of my men were dead, after all. So I confess to you, Mr. Lockwood, that I wasn’t quite sure what to do.”

I see it now. “And then Myron shows up.”

“Yes. He found Garth in the park. I have Garth bring him to the arcade. I figure that this is my chance. I can make money. I can get rid of Patrick. I can avenge my dead men.”

“The other boy that Myron saw in the cell,” I say. “I assume he was just a plant.”

“Yes, he was just one of the boys around that age.”

“You figured you could collect more money for two than for one.”

Fat Gandhi nods and spreads his hands. “You know the rest.”