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Rakhat.
    Eventually, they got to the part of the story where they found Sandoz, and the shit hit the proverbial fan. The disappearance of the original Jesuit missionaries was transformed from a tragic mystery into an ugly scandal: violence, murder and prostitution, doled out in teasing, skin-crawling doses. The initial public admiration for the scientific expertise and swift decisiveness that made the mission possible wheeled 180 degrees, the news coverage as relentless as it was vicious. Sensing blood in the water, media sharks hunted down anyone still living who might have known members of the Jesuit party. The private lives of D. W. Yarbrough, Marc Robichaux and Sofia Mendes were dragged into the light and piously tittered over by commentators whose own behavior went unexamined. Only Sandoz had survived to be reviled and so he became the focus for the outrage, despite the fact that he was generally remembered with fondness or respect by people who’d known him before the mission.
    It wouldn’t have mattered if Sandoz had been as pure as a newborn baby here, John thought. He was a whore and a murderer there. No additional scandal was required to bring the pot to a boil.
    "I have nothing to say. I shall withdraw from the Society," Sandoz still insisted, when pressed. "I just need a little time."
    Maybe he thought he could keep quiet and the interest would die; maybe he thought he could stand the hounding and pressure. John doubted it; the media would eat Sandoz alive. He was known all over the world, and those hands were like the mark of Cain. There was no safe haven left on Earth for him but the Society of Jesus and even there he was a pariah, poor bastard.
    John Candotti had once waded into a street fight simply because he thought the odds were too lopsided. He got his big nose broken for his trouble and the guy he helped wasn’t notably grateful. Still, it was the right thing to do.
    No matter how badly Sandoz stumbled on Rakhat, John thought, he needs a friend now, so what the hell? It may as well be me.

    A T THAT MOMENT, Emilio Sandoz was not thinking about being eaten alive but about eating. He was considering the toast on the breakfast tray Brother Edward had just brought into his room. Edward must have thought it was time for him to try chewing something. His remaining teeth did feel steadier in his gums. And he was ashamed of having his food pureed, of drinking everything through a straw, of being an invalid …
    Lost words came back to him, floating up like air through water, bursting into his mind. There were two meanings, two pronunciations of the word invalid. Null and void, he thought. I am invalid.
    He stiffened, bracing for the storm, but felt only an emptiness. That’s over now, he thought, and went back to the toast. Not yet trusting himself to speak without rehearsal, he worked the sentence out in advance. "Brother Edward," he said finally, "if you would be so kind as to break some bread into small pieces and then to leave me alone?"
    "Of course, sir," Edward said, fussing with the tray, making sure everything was within easy reach.
    "That was all English, yes?"
    "Yes. And very good English at that, sir."
    "If I mix things, you would tell me."
    "Of course, sir."
    It was often a sequel to torture and isolation: this disorientation, the confusion of languages. Edward Behr had a lot of experience with men like this—bodies shattered, souls reeling. Sizing up this particular situation and the man he found in it, Brother Edward had adopted a sort of British butler persona, which seemed to amuse Sandoz and which allowed him a certain dignity during his most undignified moments. Sandoz required careful handling. His physical condition was so distressing and his political position so difficult that it was easy to forget how many friends this man had lost on Rakhat, how quickly the mission had gone from promise to ruin, how recent it all was for him. A widower himself, Edward Behr