But who knew, really? Laks couldn’t guess what was in Lan Lu’s mind. All he knew was what he could see. And what he saw was the Gurkhas stealing through the shadows around the barracks—which seemed deeper and darker now, in partial daylight, than by the light of the moon—right up to the building’s blank stone wall, where they were invisible to the occupants. In short order they had pulled up the iron lid of the coal hole and disappeared into it. Half a dozen of them, one after the other like fish on the same line. After which—a beautiful detail—the last of them pulled the manhole cover back into place above him.