It was an arduous journey from Kolkata to Saundatti the next day, Buki recalled, requiring two flights each way, and the exclusive full-time service of a taxi to bring them to their destination, and to wait for them in a designated spot for a quick turnaround and getaway. But that was the least of it. It was above all the emotional wear and tear. And the truth is, it would have been far more difficult, on the face of it, almost impossible, to execute this rescue without the help of the girl, the big sister, not only because she spoke Kannada, one of the babel of languages in the Indian loony bin, but also because this was a very inside job, and she was a supreme insider, she knew the territory, its map was scored with a blade on her brain. In the future, Buki assured me, acquiring more devadasis for Rebbie-ji will be a much more routine affair. He would take along one of their Indians, Mottel Patel-Aleph or Mottel Patel-Zayin, suitably costumed for the occasion, and simply buy a devadasi when a good one went on the market in the normal course of events. Price was no object, and it made no difference to them whatsoever if the priests had fooled around with her beforehand. She only had to meet Rebbie-ji’s specifications for female spirituality insofar as they could determine this endowment from her outward appearance—and the Patel boys were true connoisseurs from their years in the motel business, sizing people up in a blink. If they found out later she wasn’t a virgin, no big deal. They would not consider themselves to have been ripped off. Even the Virgin Mary wasn’t a virgin, yet she still was good enough for the holy ghost.

When they arrived in Saundatti toward evening, the girl instructed the driver in their language to go directly to the Yellamma temple on a hill a few kilometers outside of town. Buki had offered her the opportunity to make a quick detour to say hi to her mom, but she shook off the suggestion with a shudder, as if it were a spider. It was already dark, but they could tell from a distance that some sort of ceremony was underway at the temple. Fires were burning and drums beating.

They made their way up the hill on foot. Beggars with stumps for limbs crawled around them on their bellies like worms. Women clutching naked babies turned their faces up to him, jabbing a finger into their mouths, miming hunger. Peddlers lined the path, hawking glass bangles, brass images of the goddess, peacock feathers, flower and food offerings. Every eye noted then dismissed them—a devadasi serving the goddess, leading by the hand a giant in a bizarre costume, an eccentric rich patron perhaps, or a pilgrim of no recognizable gender in a woman’s long robe afflicted with a rare disorder, coming to petition the goddess for a cure. The air was ripe with the smell of turmeric and incense. As they entered the open courtyard of the temple where the rites were being enacted by the light of the fires, to the sounds of drums and bells and conches, a creature leapt out of the dark and emptied a pail of yellow powder on them. “Hey, watch it buddy!” Buki shot out as he attempted to wipe the stuff off his best kaftan and hat, but the girl dragged him away before he could teach the perpetrator some respect.