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Wasn’t on the flight.” Lila leaned against the wall and stared at her with black-marble eyes. “But you already knew that, right?”
    â€œOf course not.”
    â€œLila,” said T’ai, “I believe her. I mean, look at her. She couldn’t hurt a fly.”
    You might be surprised , Nicki said to herself.
    â€œWe’ve contacted everyone he knew in the States,” added T’ai, “but he has vanished without a trace.”
    â€œHe’s from the States?” asked Nicki.
    â€œHe recently retired as a professor in the department of nuclear engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was coming to Toronto to meet someone, and to stay with us for a while.”
    â€œNow it’s time to spill the beans.” Lila moved three steps closer to Nicki. Then she turned to her grandson. “She knows something.”
    Nicki glanced through the curtains at the redhead. He was wandering around, picking things up, squeezing them, putting them back down again—as if he was in the produce section of a supermarket.
    â€œWell?” prompted Lila.
    â€œA friend of mine was sent to the hospital,” explained Nicki, “and in his pocket was a slip of paper with Robert A-G and your phone number written on it. That’s it. Really.”
    â€œWhat friend?”
    â€œWhat does it matter?” Nicki shook her head in frustration.
    Lila turned to T’ai. “I still say she’s a spy. An agent for the People’s Republic of China.”
    â€œI doubt it,” said T’ai. “I believe her. You can see she’s upset about her friend, Lila.”
    Nicki couldn’t keep her eyes off the redhead. He strolled around aimlessly, finally wending his way to the cash register.
    She couldn’t be certain, because he was slightly out of her sight line, but Nicki was pretty sure he helped himself to some money.
    â€œCome in here, Mac,” said T’ai.
    The young man’s eyes were red and puffy and his complexion pale.
    â€œMac’s a genius,” said T’ai. “Like my uncle.”
    â€œSo I’m a student at the University of Toronto in telecommunications engineering,” Mac said. “Big deal.”
    â€œI’m a history major.” T’ai pulled out a chair and sat down. The others followed suit. “To me, anyone who can do what Mac does is brilliant. What’s that you’re working on with your professor? Photonic crystals?”
    â€œPhotonic crystals?” asked Nicki.
    â€œIt’s top secret,” said T’ai. “It’s going to change the whole smartphone industry. Explain it to her, Mac. I mean, the stuff you can talk about.”
    â€œPhotonic technology uses light instead of electricity, so signals can be sent at extremely high speeds,” he answered. “There’s nothing secret about that.”
    â€œYeah, but your professor’s research is going to take the whole telecom industry by surprise,” added T’ai. “And it will be used in medicine and aviation—right, Mac?”
    Mac nodded.
    Nicki noticed Mac’s fingernails. They’d been chewed so far down, they were bleeding.
    â€œSo you’ve discovered a method of sending signals—differently? Faster?” she asked him.
    â€œMy professor has found a way to couple resonant cavities with emitters to controllably produce photons with telecommunications wavelengths.”
    Lila rolled her eyes.
    â€œI don’t know what he’s talking about half the time,” admitted T’ai, “but it’s cutting-edge stuff.”
    Nobody said anything for a minute or two, then T’ai spoke up.
    â€œMy friend here does have a name—Duncan MacDonald,” continued T’ai, pointing to his left. “You know Lila and I’m T’ai.” He scratched his chin. “So who are you?”
    â€œI’m Fu Yin.”
    â€œAnd this friend you