The Avatari (4 page)

Henry Ashton put down the letter. He realized that the tea they had ordered had already been served and Duggy had poured out a cup for him. The delicate fragrance of jasmine soothed him and he slowly picked up the cup and sipped the amber liquid. He pushed the letter towards Duggy, who took out his spectacles and began reading it.

So this is what it’s all about
, Ashton thought,
those flashing images
that passed through my mind when I saw the body
.

Duggy put down the letter and looked up.

‘He’s asking for my help; what do you think?’ Ashton asked him.

‘Well,
you’re
the one who knows this man, Ru San Ko, the writer of this letter, as well as the other, the Teacher. They have asked for your help. It is for you to make the decision.’

‘They are – or were – good men, with whom I stayed when I was at the monastery in Laos,’ Ashton said. ‘But that was twenty years ago.’ He picked up the letter again and read from it. ‘I can make neither head nor tail of some parts! I mean, this
gter ma
and “Burqan Qaldun”; do
you
have any idea what they could be?’

Duggy paused, collecting his thoughts. ‘My grandmother, whom you have met, was a devout Buddhist,’ he said. ‘When I was a boy, she would tell us many tales that were beyond our wildest imagination. She would talk of these
gter ma
s – hidden treasures, apparently – that would be revealed to particular individuals at specific times as part of a preordained destiny.’

‘And this Burqan Qaldun?’

‘I don’t know, but my guess is that it’s some secret, possibly, mythical site like Camelot, the location of which, as the letter says, would be revealed by this
gter ma
.’

‘This is all quite unbelievable. It’s almost like a hoax,’ Ashton muttered, releasing his breath in a great whoosh. ‘Except that if it is, it’s a rather macabre one. We already have two people dead.’ He paused. ‘The time has come for us to go to the police,’ he said softly, glancing at Duggy for approval.

The other man shrugged. ‘
Timro saathiharule arkai bhanethyo
.’ he said. ‘That was not what your friends wanted.’

Ashton looked at him across the table. ‘You can’t be serious!’ he said testily. ‘What do you think
I
can do to help?’ He composed himself and continued in a calmer voice, ‘These people, they are monks in a remote monastery. Something valuable has been stolen from them. Logically, they have turned to me, a Westerner, for help.’ He took a sip of tea. ‘It’s not as if our going to the police means that we will give up investigating the case on our own. We’ll pursue it till the very end.’

The two men stared at each other. After a while, Duggy spoke up. His voice was soft, but his words were emphatic.

‘It is
not
a matter for the police,
huzoor
,’ he said. ‘You
know
that. And they don’t
want
the help of the police; they want
yours
. In their time of trouble, they have turned to
you
for help. You may
choose
not to respond to their plea, but then, that would be a
cowardly
thing to do.’ Duggy paused before saying slowly,
‘Kaayar hunnu bhanda marnu raamro.’

Ashton sprang to his feet and struck the table with his fist, making the crockery clatter. He was livid.

‘Timi durvyavahar gardaichau!
You are crossing the line, Sergeant!’ he shouted.

The lady at the counter looked up in alarm, but Duggy reassured her with a nonchalant wave in her direction. Ashton glared at him and stormed out of the restaurant.

Duggy had touched a nerve; he had just reminded Ashton of the Gurkha motto, ‘It is better to die than to live a coward.’ A simple motto that had won their regiment the Victoria Cross twenty-six times, almost all of them for hand-to-hand combat.

After a short interval, Ashton walked back in and sat down opposite Duggy who had, by then, ordered another pot of tea. They looked at each other calmly. Neither man uttered a word. Duggy poured out a cup for Ashton. He picked it up and took a sip.

‘You know you are being quite obdurate, don’t you?’ he told his house manager.

Duggy reached out and squeezed his forearm in response.

‘Good,’ Ashton said. ‘Just so long as you know that. Let’s go and meet this Solomon Avery. I just found out where this bank is located.’

He drained his cup and put some money on the table. Then they both got up and left.

The two men walked down the street and came to the Cam, where they were greeted by a horde of undergrads offering a punt ride. Ashton smilingly waved away a pretty girl in jeans with a pronounced American accent before entering the bank and asking for Solomon Avery, the man whose name had been mentioned in the letter. They were ushered into a cabin with ‘Senior Manager’ marked on the door. A florid, silver-haired man got up from behind his desk and offered them comfortable leather-backed chairs. Introductions followed.

‘Good morning, Mr Avery. I’m Henry Ashton and this is my associate, Durga Bahadur.’

The banker narrowed his eyes for an instant, trying to place the men. Then, almost immediately, he beamed in recognition. ‘Yes, of course, Sir Ashton!’ he said. ‘Indeed, what a pleasure! I’m sorry, my secretary is new to the job and didn’t quite catch your name when you were ushered in.’

Ashton found Avery’s effusiveness puzzling. This was, after all, his first visit to the bank.

‘That’s all right,’ he said. ‘I, ah, was told to meet you.’

‘Yes, indeed, sir. Actually, it’s really a formality. Your associate, what was his name again?’ The banker tapped his temple with a finger, trying to jog his memory. ‘Ah, Mr Than. Yes, Mr Than had given all your details, along with the introductory letters from our Hong Kong branch, but we still need you to fill out some forms and will require, as the Americans call it, a mugshot, before we can authorize you to operate your joint account.’

Henry Ashton looked at him and nodded slowly. ‘Yes, of course.’

The banker paused and coughed delicately. ‘Sir, I must trouble you for some form of identification.’

Ashton responded by taking out his driving licence and putting it on the table.

Avery looked at it and rang a buzzer. When his secretary came in, he asked her to bring the relevant forms.

‘When can I operate this joint account?’ Ashton asked, keeping his voice even.

‘Oh, immediately. Just as soon as we get this formality behind us,’ the banker said smiling. ‘They keep talking about the paperless office of the future, but I don’t see it happening any time soon!’ He let out a guffaw that he obviously reserved for just such occasions.

Ashton accepted the forms from the secretary and took out his pen. Without looking up from the papers, he asked, ‘And what amount did you say Mr Than put into the account?’

The banker didn’t seem taken aback by the question. ‘Well, it was a money transfer from Hong Kong,’ he replied easily. ‘Converting the sum from the dollar rate for that day, it amounted to about £200,000. I remember it well, because as you can understand, we normally don’t get such large accounts here, sir.’ Clearing his throat, Avery asked, ‘So are you setting up business here, Sir Henry?’

‘Yes, indeed,’ Ashton replied, nodding at him.

‘You won’t regret it,’ the banker said with visible enthusiasm. ‘This place is really looking up.’

CHAPTER 3

Cadbury, England

A
UGUST 1986

Emerging from the railway station, Ashton and Duggy were back in their familiar pastoral milieu, enjoying the remains of a glorious summer day. Even at that hour, there was a mellow golden-butter glow to the green fields that edged the small gravel car park outside the station.

‘What was it you said about – what’s its name – mentioned in the letter?’ Ashton asked Duggy as they got into the car, narrowing his eyes in concentration as he tried to recollect the name. ‘The Burqan Qaldun, was it?’

‘I said I did not know anything about this Burqan Qaldun,’ Duggy answered with patient deliberation, ‘but I did say I knew something about a
gter ma
, a hidden treasure.’

He was engrossed in the process of systematically checking the rear-view mirror, fastening his seat belt, turning on the ignition and releasing the handbrake. Duggy was fastidious about the drill.

‘You guessed that this Burqan Qaldun was some secret mystical place, something like Camelot,’ Ashton interjected, finally latching on to the thought that had occurred to him and then slipped his mind. ‘To get to Camelot, we need to find Merlin.’

Busy concentrating on the road, Duggy did not answer.

Ashton too lapsed into silence; he found himself going back thirty years. He had just got back from Malaya and was still waiting for clearance from the Medical Board because of his wounded leg. ‘Rest a while,’ they had advised and, characteristically, the doctor would not commit himself to a specific date. The army had asked him if he would prefer a stint as an instructor at Salisbury. There was also the opportunity of taking a sabbatical and doing a course at Cambridge on study leave. It was the second option he had jumped at. He had gone in for political science, with a special emphasis on the Far East, hoping that his own service there would come in handy.

Undergrad life, especially when you are ten years older than your classmates and a lifetime ahead of them in terms of psychological and emotional maturity, can be quite an experience, but Henry Ashton settled down to it with stoic good humour, even enduring without fuss the nickname ‘Uncle Ash’ which the local wag had bestowed on him. Owing to his injury, cricket and rowing were out for him, but he participated actively, if somewhat silently, in all college activities and worked hard at the books. He had a good head for liquor and it often fell to him to lead a roistering, staggering band back from a pub crawl in the wee hours. The local bobbies who were quite deferential often enquired, ‘Could we give you a hand with that lot, sir?’ It was here that he had fallen in love with Hilda, a girl from his class. They were married the same year.

Every college has its gallery of characters who live on in memory, sometimes growing larger than life with time. In Ashton’s case, it was Tim ‘Merlin’ Grahams, an exchange student from southern California. Belying the common perception about people from that region of the world, Tim was a wiry, bespectacled and bearded fellow, with a pipe perpetually stuck in his mouth. Gifted with exceptional oratorical skills, he was ardently pursued by the dramatics and debating societies, but forsook them to found his own – the Aleister Crowley Society, not very originally named after the famous occultist. The club was much in demand, its popularity stemming, in part, from the immediate appeal of devil worship to young people. What added to the attraction was Tim’s energy, along with the bevy of young women he had managed to persuade to be on the committee. The society was an erudite pastime, holding a hint of mischief and rebellion for most members. But for Tim, it was a passion into which he poured his considerable scholarly talent. There was also an underlying honesty of purpose that drew the casual observer, who expected a degree of charlatanism. Tim was a true believer. His interest in Oriental occult practices had led him to take up courses in history, where Ashton was a first-hand witness to his sharp mind and prodigious memory. Tim lapped up dates, names and events, correlating them with an astuteness which startled his tutors. He had the American openness of manner which appealed to Ashton and they were friends of a sort. Tim enjoyed talking and Ashton was a good listener. When they finished college, Tim opted to stay on in England, a decision which did not surprise many people.

When Ashton and Duggy got back home to Stiles, the colonel tried looking up Tim’s name in the directory. There were several people, similarly named. He tried three of those names, calling the numbers listed against them, only to find that his friend was not among them. He then rang Diane Trent, another college mate.

‘Hello, Diane, it’s Henry Ashton.’

There was a momentary pause. ‘Henry!’ Diane exclaimed. ‘What a pleasant surprise! We were talking about you the other day. You didn’t come for the get together, did you?’

‘I, uh, wasn’t feeling too bright.’

‘Nothing serious, I hope?’

‘No, just a touch of the flu,’ he lied awkwardly.

‘I’m sorry. Well, then, apart from your indisposition, how have you been? Still single and holed up in your castle?’

‘Just the same. And you?’ Ashton enquired.

Diane was married to a cabinet minister. According to the press, the wrong spouse was holding office.

‘Very well, thank you,’ she replied, then asked, ‘where are you calling from? Not London, I hope?’

‘No, just from home. Diane, I need a favour.’

‘For you, Ashton, anything!’ Her voice had become husky and mischievous.

Ashton smiled. She was a tall, bosomy, boisterous woman, full of fun, but with an eye forever on the main thing. Theirs had been a minor fling which ended amicably. He also remembered that she had come down from Ireland to be with him for a week when Hilda died.

‘Do you have Tim Grahams’s address?’

‘Old Merlin’s?’

‘The same.’

‘Give me a minute.’

After some time, she was back on the line and read out a number and an address to go with it. It was in Cadbury, South Somerset.

‘You don’t want a Tarot reading or something, do you?’ she asked curiously.

‘No, it’s just something else which has come up.’

‘You know about Tim’s little, um, episode, don’t you?’

That was Diane – always well up on the gossip.

‘Afraid not.’

‘I thought so. He was into some occult practice, it seems. The police raided his place. Found him in possession of and under the influence of cannabis. Quite a row it created. He spent some time in rehab and had to move from his original address.’

‘Really? I didn’t know. Well, that’s Tim. What’s he doing these days?’

‘Runs a business that deals in “finding your inner self”, if you please! Very profitable, I’m told. The American tour companies are all over him.’