GIVEN THE REMARKABLE length and diversity of Csongor, Marlon, and Yuxia’s enemies list, the five-block stroll from the hotel to the U.S. embassy was one of the more stimulating experiences of Seamus’s recent life. Not because anything actually happened—he’d have known how to behave, in that case—but because he had no way of telling whether any of the people who passed them on the sidewalk or cruised past them in cars, jeepneys, and motor scooters were gun-toting assassins bent on retribution. He reckoned he could have covered the distance in about half the time if he had simply slung Yuxia over his back in a fireman’s carry and hoofed it with the long-legged Csongor and Marlon keeping pace. Not a one of them was under six feet two, and they all seemed to get the idea that hanging around in the open was not the preferred strategy. Yuxia was a different matter, not because she was tiny (she could move as fast as any of them when she had a mind to) but because she insisted on viewing this as a fascinating exploratory junket into a new and unfamiliar world, and an opportunity to establish cross-cultural relations with as many as possible of the hundreds of people she encountered on the street. Most of these conversations were gratifyingly brief, possibly because Yuxia’s interlocutors kept stealing uneasy glances at Csongor and Seamus, who tended to bracket the girl and stand with their backs to each other and their hands in their pockets scanning the vicinity with disconcerting alertness. Meanwhile Marlon did his bit by chivvying her along, muttering to her in Mandarin, as though playing the role of a nervous, irritable boyfriend.