“No!”

“It’s for your own good. During the voyage back home, I’m sure you’ll see the error of the life you’ve chosen to lead. We have a chance to do something for India, an unprecedented chance to cleanse our karmas. I do this for you as much as for myself.” He looked at her knowingly. “For your karma is as polluted as mine.”

“You have no right!”

“I’ve more than a right. I’ve a duty.”

He darted out of the room and shut the door behind him. Kolabati lunged forward but heard the lock click before she reached the handle. She pounded on its sturdy oak panels.

“Kusum, let me out! Please let me out!”

“When we’re at sea,” he said from the far side of the door.

She heard him walk down the hall to the steel hatch that led to the deck and felt a sense of doom settle over her. Her life was no longer her own. Trapped on this ship… weeks at sea with a madman, even if it was her brother. She had to get out of here! She became desperate.

“Jack will be looking for me!” she said on impulse, regretting it immediately. She hadn’t wanted to involve Jack in this.

“Why would he be looking for you?” Kusum said slowly, his voice faint.

“Because…” She couldn’t let him know that Jack had found the ship and knew about the rakoshi. “Because we’ve been together every day. Tomorrow he’ll want to know where lam.”

“I see.” There was a lengthy pause. “I believe I will have to talk to Jack.”

“Don’t you harm him, Kusum!” The thought of Jack falling victim to Kusum’s wrath was more than she could bear. Jack was certainly capable of taking care of himself, but she was sure he had never run up against someone like Kusum… or a rakosh.

She heard the steel door clang shut.

“Kusum?”

There was no reply. Kusum had left her alone on the ship.

No… not alone.

There were rakoshi below.

9

“SAHNKchewedday! SAHNKchewedday!”

Jack had run out of James Whale films—he had been searching unsuccessfully for a tape of Whale’s The Old Dark House for years—so he had put on the 1939 version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Charles Laughton, playing the part of the ignorant, deformed Parisian, had just saved Maureen O’Hara and was shouting in an upper class British accent from the walls of the church. Ridiculous. But Jack loved the film and had watched it nearly a hundred times. It was like an old friend, and he needed an old friend here with him now. The apartment seemed especially empty tonight.

So with the six-foot projection tv providing a sort of visual musak, he sat and pondered his next move. Gia and Vicky were all right for the time being, so he didn’t have to worry about them. He had called the Sutton Square house as soon as he had arrived home. It had been late and Gia had obviously been awakened by the phone. She had grouchily told him that no word had been received from either Grace or Nellie and assured him that everyone was fine and had been sleeping peacefully until his call.