“Could be. I don’t know. A friend… lent it to me for the night. Do you know what the inscriptions say?”

Abe shook his head. “I’ve seen Sanskrit before, but if my life depended on it I couldn’t translate a single word.” He looked closer. “Come to think of it, that’s not really Sanskrit. Where was it made? “

“India.”

“Really? Then it’s probably Vedic, one of the Proto-Aryan languages that was a precursor of Sanskrit.” Abe tossed off the information in a casual tone, then turned away and busied himself with gently tapping the nails halfway back into the corners of the crate of incendiary bombs.

Jack didn’t know if he was being put on or not, but he didn’t want to rob Abe of his moment. “How the hell do you know all that?”

“You think I majored in guns in college? I have a B.A. from Columbia in Languages.”

“And this is inscribed in Vedic, huh? Is that supposed to mean something?”

“It means it’s old, Jack… O-L-D.”

Jack fingered the iron links around his neck. “I figured that.”

Abe finished tapping down the crate top, then turned to Jack.

“You know I never ask, Jack, but this time I’ve got to: What are you up to? You could raze a couple of city blocks with what you’ve got here.”

Jack didn’t know what to say. How could he tell anyone, even his best friend, about the rakoshi and how the necklace he was wearing made him invisible to those rakoshi?

“Why don’t you drive me down to the docks and maybe you’ll see.”

“It’s a deal.”

Abe groaned under the weight of the case of incendiary bombs while Jack, still in harness with the flamethrower, maneuvered his way up the steps to the ground floor. After Abe had deposited the crate in the rear of the panel truck, he motioned Jack out to the street. Jack darted out from the store doorway and through the rear doors of the truck. Abe pulled the iron gate closed in front of his shop and hopped into the driver’s seat.

“Whereto?”

“Take West End down to Fifty-seventh and turn right. Find a dark spot under the highway and we’ll go on foot from there.”

As Abe put the truck into gear, Jack considered his options. Since climbing a rope with a flamethrower on his back and a crate of bombs under his arm was out of the question, he would have to go up the gangplank—his variable frequency beeper would bring it down. Events could go two ways after that: If he was able to get aboard undiscovered, he could set his bombs and run; if discovered, he would have to bring the flamethrower into service and play it by ear. If there was any chance to do it safely, he would let Abe get a look at a rakosh. Seeing would be believing—any other means of explaining what dwelled in Kusum’s ship would be futile.

Either way, he would see to it that no rakoshi were left alive in New York by sunrise. And if Kusum cared to interfere, Jack was quite willing to help his atman on its way to its next incarnation.