"Oh, I get it," she said, with a little smile. "Ulla always wants something."

I raised an eyebrow, returning her stare, but said nothing.

"She wanted me to arrange a passport for Modena. He's been here for years. He's an overstayer. And he's got a few problems with the Spanish police, under his own name. He needs a new passport to get back into Europe. He could pass for Italian. Or maybe Portuguese."

"Leave it to me," I said calmly, thinking that I knew the reason, at last, why she'd asked me to meet with her. "I'll get on it tomorrow. I know how to get in touch with him, for photos and whatever-although there'd be no mistaking his face at a customs check. I'll fix it."

"Thanks," she said, meeting my eyes with such fervent intensity that my heart began to beat hard against my chest. It is always a fool's mistake, Didier once said to me, to be alone with someone you shouldn't have loved. "What are you doing, Lin?"

"Sitting here with you," I replied, smiling.

"No, I mean, what are you going to do? Are you going to stay in Bombay?"

"Why?"

"I was going to ask you... if you want to come with me, to find Khaled."

I laughed, but she didn't laugh with me.

"That's the second-best offer I've had today."

"The second best?" she drawled. "What was the first?"

"Someone invited me to go to the war, in Sri Lanka."

She clamped her lips tightly around an angry response, but I held my hands up in surrender, and spoke quickly.

"I'm just kidding, Karla, just kidding. Take it easy. I mean, it's true about the invitation to go to Sri Lanka, but I'm just ... you know."

She relaxed, smiling again.

"I'm out of practice. It's been a long time, Lin."

"So... why the invitation now?"

"Why not?"

"That's not good enough, Karla, and you know it."

"Okay," she sighed, glancing at me and then looking away to follow the breeze weaving wave-patterns on the sand. "I guess I was hoping to find something like... like what we had in Goa."

"What about... Jeet?" I asked, ignoring the opening she'd given me. "How does he feel about you going off to find Khaled?"

"We lead separate lives. We do what we want. We go where we want."

"Sounds... breezy," I offered, struggling to find a word that wasn't a lie, but wouldn't offend. "Didier made it sound more serious than that-told me the guy asked you to marry him."

"He did," she said flatly.

"And?"

"And what?"

"And will you-marry him, I mean?"

"Yes. I think I will."

"Why?"

"Why not?"

"Don't start that again."

"Sorry," she said, sighing through a tired smile. "I've been running with a different crowd. Why marry Jeet? He's a nice guy, he's healthy, and he's loaded. And, hey, I think I'll do a better job of spending his money than he does."

"So what you're telling me is that you're ready to die for this love."

She laughed and then turned to me, suddenly serious again. Her eyes, pale with moonlight; her eyes, the green of water lilies after the rain; her long hair, black as forest river stones; her hair that was like holding the night itself in the wrap of my fingers; her lips, starred with incandescent light; lips of camellia-petal softness warmed with secret whispers. Beautiful.

And I loved her. I loved her still so much, so hard, but with no heat or heart at all. That falling love, that helpless, dreaming, soaring love, was gone. And I suddenly knew in those seconds of ... cold adoration, I suppose... that the power she'd once held over me was also gone. Or, more than that, her power had moved into me, and had become mine. I held all the cards. And then I wanted to know. It wasn't good enough to just accept what had happened between us. I wanted to know everything.

"Why didn't you tell me, Karla?"

She gave an anguished little sigh, and stretched her legs out to bury her bare feet in the sand. Watching the small cascades of soft sand spill over her moving feet, she spoke in a dull, flat tone, as if she was composing a letter-or recalling a letter, perhaps, that she'd written once and never sent to me. "I knew you were going to ask me, and I think that's why I've waited so long to get in touch with you. I let people know that I was around, and I asked after you, but I didn't do anything, until today, because... I knew you'd ask me."

"If it makes it any easier," I interrupted, sounding harder than I'd intended, "I know you burned down Madame Zhou's place-"

"Did Ghani tell you that?"

"Ghani? No. I figured that one out myself."

"Ghani did it for me-he arranged it. That was the last time I spoke to him."

"The last time I spoke to him was about an hour before he died."

"Did he tell you anything about her?" she asked, perhaps hoping that there were some parts of it she wouldn't have to tell me.

"About Madame Zhou? No. He didn't say a word."

"He told me... a lot," she sighed. "He filled in a few gaps. I think it was Ghani who tipped me over the edge with her. He told me she had Rajan following you, and she only pulled her strings with the cops to get you arrested when Rajan told her you made love to me. I always hated her, but that did it. I just... it was one thing too many. She couldn't let me have it, that time with you. She wouldn't let me have it. So I called in some dues with Ghani, and he arranged it. The riot. It was a great fire. I lit some of it myself."

She broke off, staring at her feet in the sand, and clamped her jaw shut. Reflected lights gleamed in her eyes. For a moment I let myself imagine how those green eyes must've blazed with firelight as she'd watched the Palace burn.

"I know about the States, too," I said after a while. "I know what happened there."

She looked at me quickly, reading my eyes.

"Lisa," she said. I didn't answer. Then, knowing instantly, as women do, what she couldn't possibly know, she smiled. "That's good-Lisa and you. You and Lisa. That's... very good."

My expression didn't change, and her smile faded as she looked down at the sand once more.

"Did you kill anyone, Lin?"

"When?" I asked, not sure if she was talking about Afghanistan or the much-smaller war against Chuha and his gang. "Ever."

"No."

"I'm glad," she breathed, sighing again. "I wish..."

She was silent again for a while. From somewhere beyond the deserted beach we heard the sounds of the festival: happy, roaring laughter rising over the blare of a brass band. Much closer, ocean music gushed onto the soft assenting shore, and the palms above us trembled in the cooling breeze.

"When I went there... when I walked into his house, into the room where he was standing, he smiled at me. He was... actually ... happy to see me. And for a split second, I changed my mind, and I thought it was... over. Then, I saw something else, right there in the middle of his smile... something dirty, and... he said... I knew you'd be back for more, one of these days... or something like that. And he... he kind of, he started looking around like he was making sure nobody was gonna bust in on us ..."

"It's okay, Karla."

"When he saw the gun, it was worse, because he started... not begging... but apologising... and it was real clear, real clear, that he knew what he did to me... he knew... every part of it, and how bad it was. And that was much worse. And then he was dead. There wasn't a lot of blood. I thought there would be.

Maybe there was later. And I don't remember the rest, until I was in the plane with Khader's arm around me."

She was quiet. I leaned over to pick up a conical shell descending in spirals to a sharp, eroded point. I pressed it into my palm until it pierced the skin, and then threw it away across the rippled sand. When I looked at her again, I found that she was staring at me and frowning hard.

"What do you want?" she asked bluntly.