They kept walking at the same pace, gradually making their way around the market to where they’d started. They kept scanning from behind their sunglasses, and then Remi said, “Bad news at two o’clock.”

Sam looked in that direction and saw four men, wearing khaki pants, work shirts, boots, and baseball caps, sitting at an outdoor table, nursing tall drinks. They looked like oil riggers or heavy-equipment operators. “Who are they?”

“Some of Poliakoff’s security guys. The short one with the blond hair is one of the four people who took me to Nizhny in a barrel. He and another man helped the two women. The really tall one I saw the night we escaped from the place.”

“I suppose it was inevitable that they’d get here first,” said Sam. “Did they see us?”

“I doubt it. They didn’t show any sign, and none of them struck me as the type who would pretend not to see us. They’d be more likely to chase us.”

They took a roundabout route to their hotel, stopping now and then to see if they were followed. When they reached their room, they opened the package with Remi’s new cell phone, plugged it in to charge, waited, then called La Jolla.

A voice they hadn’t been expecting said, “Hello?”

“Hi, Albrecht. It’s us.”

“Are you at your hotel in Taraz?”

“Yes. We hired a driver who got us here, but he speaks no English.”

“What does he speak?”

“Kazakh, and a little Russian.”

“Sounds adequate. Tell me what’s happening.”

“We just came from the green market that historians think is the site of ancient Taraz. We spotted four of Poliakoff’s thugs at a café. We don’t think they saw us. We also don’t think the market looks right. It’s too low to be a fort. It’s also not on the river. Maybe there are springs or wells in town, but we haven’t seen them.”