Finally, as the sun was drifting down the western sky, the priest came to the north gate.
Now we’ve got him, Westphalen thought.
All pack animals were to be inspected for contraband before allowed exit from Bharangpur or any other garrisoned town. The fact that there was no known rebel activity anywhere in Bengal did not matter; it was a general order and as such had to be enforced.
Westphalen watched from a distance of about two hundred yards. He would wait until the lone British sentry had begun the inspection, then he would stroll over as if on a routine patrol of the gate and learn a little more about this svamin and his temple in the hills.
He saw the priest stop at the gate and speak to a sentry with an Enfield casually slung across his back. They seemed like old friends. After a few moments, without inspection or detention, the priest resumed his path through the gate—but not before Westphalen had seen him press something into the sentry’s palm. It was a flash of movement. If Westphalen had blinked he would have missed it.
The priest and his mules were beyond the wall and on their way toward the hills in the northwest by the time Westphalen reached the gate.
“Give me your rifle, soldier!”
The sentry saluted, then shrugged the Enfield off his shoulder and handed it to Westphalen without question. Westphalen knew him. His name was MacDougal, an enlisted man —young, red-faced, hard-fighting, hard-drinking, like most of his fellow Bengal European Fusiliers. In his three weeks as commander of the Bharangpur garrison, Westphalen had come to think of him as a good soldier.
“I’m placing you under arrest for dereliction of duty!”
MacDougal blanched. “Sir, I—”
“And for taking a bribe!”
“I tried to give it back to ’im, sir!”
Westphalen laughed. This soldier must think him blind as well as stupid!
“Of course you did! Just like you gave his mules a thorough inspection.”
“Old Jaggernath’s only bringing supplies to the temple, sir. I’ve been here two years, Captain, and ’e’s come by every month, like clockwork, every new moon. Only brings food out to the hills, ’e does, sir.”
“He must be inspected like everybody else.”
MacDougal glanced after the retreating mule train. “Jaggernath said they don’t like their food touched, sir. Only by their own kind.”
“Well, isn’t that a pity! And I suppose you let him pass uninspected out of the goodness of your heart?” Westphalen was steadily growing angrier at this soldier’s insolence. “Empty your pockets and let’s see how many pieces of silver it took to get you to betray your fellow soldiers.”
Color suddenly flooded back into MacDougal’s face. “I’d never betray me mates!”
For some reason, Westphalen believed him. But he couldn’t drop the matter now.
“Empty your pockets!”
MacDougal emptied only one: From his right-hand pocket he withdrew a small, rough stone, clear, dull red in color.
Westphalen withheld a gasp.
“Give it to me.”
He held it up to the light of the setting sun. He had seen his share of uncut stones as he had gradually turned the family valuables into cash to appease his more insistent creditors. This was an uncut ruby. A tiny thing, but polished up it could bring an easy hundred pounds. His hand trembled. If this is what the priest gave to a sentry as a casual reward for leaving his temple’s food untouched…
“Where is this temple?”
“Don’t know, sir.” MacDougal was watching him eagerly, probably looking for a way out of dereliction charges. “And I’ve never been able to find out. The locals don’t know and don’t seem to want to know. The Temple-in-the-Hills is supposed to be full of jewels but guarded by demons.”
Westphalen grunted. More heathen rubbish. But the stone in his hand was genuine enough. And the casual manner in which it had been given to MacDougal indicated that there could be many more where that came from. With the utmost reluctance, he handed the ruby back to MacDougal. He would play for bigger stakes. And to do so he had to appear completely unconcerned about money.
“I guess no harm has been done. Sell that for what you can and divide it up between the men. And divide it equally, hear?”
MacDougal appeared about to faint with surprise and relief, but he managed a sharp salute. “Yes sir!”
Westphalen tossed the Enfield back at him and walked away, knowing that in MacDougal’s eyes he was the fairest, most generous commanding officer he had ever known. Westphalen wanted the enlisted man to feel that way. He had use for MacDougal, and for any other soldier who had been in Bharangpur for a few years.
Westphalen had decided to find this Temple-in-the-Hills. It might well hold the answer to all his financial problems.
Chapter Three
manhattan
friday, august 3, 198-
1
Jack awoke shortly before ten a.m. feeling exhausted.
He had come home jubilant after last night’s success, but the glow had faded quickly. The apartment had had that empty feel to it. Worse: He felt empty. He had quickly downed two Lites, hid the second half of his fee behind the cedar plank, then crawled into bed. After a couple of hours of sleep, however, he had found himself wide awake for no good reason. An hour of twisting around in his sheets did no good, so he gave up and watched the end of The Bride of Frankenstein. As the dinky little Universal plane went around the world and said “THE END,” he had dozed off again for another couple of hours of fitful slumber.
He now pushed himself out of bed and took a wake-up shower. For breakfast he finished off the Cocoa Puffs and started on a box of Sugar Pops. As he shaved he saw that the thermometer outside his bedroom window read eighty-nine degrees—in the shade. He dressed accordingly in slacks and a short-sleeved shirt, then sat by the phone. He had two calls to make: one to Gia, and one to the hospital. He decided to save Gia for last.
The hospital switchboard told him that the phone had been disconnected in the room number he gave them; there was no longer a Mrs. Bahkti listed as a patient. His heart sank. Damn! Even though he had spoken to the old lady for only a few minutes, the news of her passing hurt. So senseless. At least he had been able to get the necklace back to her before she packed it in. He told the operator to connect him with the nursing desk on the old lady’s floor. Soon he was talking to Marta.
“When did Mrs. Bahkti die?”
“Far as I know, she didn’t.”
A flash of hope: “Transferred to another floor?”
“No. It happened during the change of shift. The grandson and granddaughter—”
“Granddaughter?”
“You wouldn’t like her, Jack—she’s not a blond. Anyway, they came to the desk at shift change this morning while we were all taking report and thanked us for the concern we’d shown their grandmother. Said they’d take care of her from now on. Then they walked out. When we went to check on her, she was gone.”
Jack took the phone away from his ear and scowled at it before replying.
“How’d they get her out? She sure as hell couldn’t walk!”
He could almost feel Marta shrug at the other end of the line. “Beats me. But they tell me the guy with one arm was acting real strange toward the end of the shift, wouldn’t let anyone in to see her for the last few hours.”
“Why’d they let him get away with that?” For no good reason, Jack was angry, feeling like a protective relative. “That old lady needed all the help she could get. You can’t let someone interfere like that, even if he is the grandson! You should have called security and had them—”