"Guess the Dutchman must've convinc'd 'em somehow. Anyway, our story look'd square enough to get us out on bail, there bein' no evidence for the charge o' spyin' in any case. But we'd hardly took a breath of air before our old friend the Hollander comes runnin' with news the Viceroy's council just voted to ship us back to Lisbon for trial. That happens and we're dead men. No question. We had to look to it." Symmes seemed to find concentration increasingly difficult, but he extracted a long-stemmed pipe and began stuffing black strands into it with a trembling hand while he composed himself. Finally he continued. "Had to leave Goa that very night. What else could we do? So we traded what little we had for diamonds, sew'd 'em up in our clothes, and waded the river into India. By dawn we're beyond reach o' the Portugals. In India. An' then, lad, is when it began." "What happened?" "T'would take a year to tell it all. Somehow we eventually got to the Great Moghul's court. I think he was named Akman. An' we start livin' like I never thought I'd see. Should've seen his city, lad, made London look like a Shropshire village. He had a big red marble palace called Fatehpur Sekri, with jewels common as rocks, an' gold e'erywhere, an' gardens filled with fountains, an' mystical music like I'd ne'er heard, an' dancin' women that look'd like angels . . ." His voice trailed off. "Ah, lad, the women there." Symmes suddenly remembered himself and turned to examine Hawksworth with his glassy eyes. "But I fancy you're a bit young to appreciate that part o' it, lad." Then his gaze returned to the fire and he rambled on, warming to his own voice. "An' there was poets readin' Persian, and painters drawin' pictures that took days to do one the size of a book page. An' the banquets, feasts you're ne'er like to see this side o' Judgment Day." Symmes paused to draw on his pipe for a moment, his hand still shaking, and then he plunged ahead. "But it was the Drugs that did it, lad, what they call'd affion and bhang, made out o' poppy flowers and some kind of hemp. Take enough of them and the world around you starts to get lost. After a while you ne'er want to come back. It kill'd the others, lad. God only knows how I escap'd." Then Symmes took up his well-rehearsed monologue about the wealth he'd witnessed, stories of potential trade that had earned him a place at many a merchant's table. His tale expanded, becoming ever more fantastic, until it was impossible to tell where fact ended and wishful fabrication began.