by Jon Stock
According to the government’s own preliminary inquiry, the findings of which were shared with my father, his old IPI file had not been sent over to London when he was originally vetted for Dounreay. (Macaulay’s reports had obviously been out of favour at the time.) Ironically, Macaulay had only learnt of my father’s connection with the nuclear industry after he had contacted a Club member in MI5, presumably on the afternoon before Priyanka and I went to dinner on his island. The discovery of his sensitive career, coupled with my “penetration” of the Foreign Office and MI6, was proof enough of a major security breakdown. No wonder Macaulay had been waiting many years for someone like me, as Paul had said.
Jamie had evidently managed to slip out of the country the night that we confronted him on the Jamuna riverbank because he was given a lowly job back in London, working on the Antarctic desk. Despite considerable pressure from the Indian government, he was not sacked, after it was claimed that he had no knowledge of Macaulay’s different, more macabre, understanding of news management.
I wanted to pay him a visit when we returned to Britain, offer him an exploding coheba, but Priyanka had talked me out of it, said it wouldn’t serve any real purpose. She was right, of course, but she did promise that she would investigate dark rumours of Jamie’s preference for small boys on the beaches of Sri Lanka, and write it up in the Scotsman, which was to be her new employer in Edinburgh.
*
She was standing at my side now, looking out across the harbour as the sun set beyond the fishing nets. In front of us our fathers were chatting together, Mr Pillai’s hand occasionally touching my father’s arm as he crouched on the grass next to him in his wheelchair. Under some coconut trees by the water’s edge, Paul was talking with Dr Gopalakrishnan. Dutchie was there, too, still standing, although looking increasingly as if he were going to be the official wedding drunk. There could have been no better cure for his nightmares than seeing Macaulay being consumed by his own nightmares.
Dutchie staggered over to join Frank, who was lying back on a swing, still recovering from his journey. He had travelled with Susie and the children by train from Delhi, an epic voyage that had taken a total of four days, beginning badly at Delhi railway station when they turned up to see a sign announcing that their train had been delayed by thirty hours. Frank and Dutchie had hit it off straight away and I wondered if he saw some of his younger self in him.
As for Susie, she had bounced back from the problems of the past few months, and she was now shuttling across the lawn from one group of people to another, purring with all the pride of a bridegroom’s mother. If it hadn’t been for her, of course, I would never have met Priyanka, but in truth our relationship was not as close as it had been, although she would never have admitted it. Her joie de vivre had been dimmed, the unshakeable optimism was no longer there, which upset me. She would cope – she was that kind of woman – and she was laughing now with Sir Ian and Mrs Pillai, both fully recovered. Sir Ian had stayed in London for a month, helping the government with its inquiry, before resuming his duties in Delhi. I had promised Mrs Pillai and Dr Gopalakrishnan that I would look into courses in ayurveda when we were back in Edinburgh.
Mr Pillai had spotted his daughter and was now walking over towards us. We chatted for a few minutes and then I took the opportunity to slip away and talk with my father, who was sitting on his own, staring out across the harbour. The fishing fleet was returning, racing in with the tide and streaming between us and Mattancherry on its way up to the market.
“I think you should know something,” he began, as I sat down next to him.
“I don’t think I should,” I replied, sensing what he was about to say, my heart filling with dread. I couldn’t help thinking of Dutchie and how he had been given back his police file, most of it compiled from reports supplied by his girlfriend.
“I was asked once—”
“Dad, please.”
“Are you so afraid that you don’t want to hear the truth?” He had not spoken to me or to anyone else about Priyanka’s revelations in Seven Days. She had kept him out of the narrative, at my request, but I knew he had his own story to tell. I just wasn’t sure I was ready to hear it.
“I was asked once to report back to Delhi,” he began again, his hands fiddling with his sporran. I closed my eyes, rolled my head back onto the seat, and listened to the call of a nearby barbet. “It was just after I had started working at Dounreay, in 1965. I was the in-house doctor, bloody remote place, the only medically qualified person within a hundred miles. Now, of course, after all the scandals, it’s got its own fancy occupational health department. A man rang me up late one night at home. We were living in Melvich Bay at the time, about seven miles from the site. It was an Indian voice and he said it was too dangerous to meet in person. He told me to find out all I could about the secret supply of plutonium and highly enriched uranium that was making its way from Dounreay down to Aldermaston, where Britain’s nuclear weapons were being manufactured. China had conducted its first nuclear test the previous year and India was feeling a bit jumpy, exposed. He promised large and regular payments. Well, you can imagine I was stunned and needed time to absorb the implications.”
“Did he give you a number to ring back?” I asked. I was sitting up now, leaning closer. His voice was growing tired, a little hoarse, and I passed him his whisky, which someone had placed on the grass beside his feet.
“He said he would call again. I don’t know what it was exactly, but something about the call didn’t ring true. He sounded Indian all right, but I became suspicious, made inquiries of my own. I had a friend in Whitehall, someone who had been involved with positive vetting at the site. There was never any proof, of course, but it became increasingly clear that the call had originated in Whitehall rather than New Delhi. I was being tested, or set up, whichever way you wanted to look at it. It didn’t matter to me. I was scared to death. Terrified. Everything, my job, my new life in Scotland, all that I had worked for, was suddenly in jeopardy. From then on I vowed to have nothing to do with India. I severed all contact.”
He cut one hand across the palm of the other, making me jump. I looked across at him. His eyes were clear, brighter for sharing the story, and I realised he was telling it as much for his own benefit as for mine.
“Your mother didn’t like it, of course. But we had no choice. I was being scrutinised by someone and I was determined never to give them an excuse to ring me again. In some respects, I still think I did the right thing. It wasn’t long before rumours started circulating about uranium going missing, enough for twelve nuclear bombs.”
“Did you tell Mum everything?” I glanced up at the fading sky, my lucky stars beginning to shine through.
“No. I overreacted, felt I couldn’t trust anyone. I think I told her something about the importance of blending in.” He paused. “The man never rang back.”
I wanted to ask more about my mother, but it wasn’t the time or place. As I had listened to his voice, it became clear that he was much more sick than he was letting on.
“What about before you left for Scotland?” I asked, hoping the question wouldn’t set anything off.
“What about it?”
“Were you a…”
“A young and passionate man?” He chuckled gently at the recollection. “It was a long time ago. I had always wanted to study medicine but we were all swept up by the events leading to Independence. They were heady days. It took time to remember that what I really wanted in life was to be a doctor, not some self-serving politician.”
I felt Priyanka’s hand on my shoulder.
“May I join the men?” she said, putting her other hand on my father’s shoulder.
“Of course, my dear,” my father replied, quick as a flash, putting a hand up to pat hers. He was quite taken by Priyanka.
“What were you talking about? State secrets?”
My father hadn’t heard her properly and covered himself with a neutral grunt.
“Th
at sort of thing,” I said.
“Have you told him ours?” she asked, looking around to check that no one was listening.
“Not yet. I thought it was a secret.”
“What are you two talking about?” he asked, mildly irritated.
I checked with Priyanka that it was okay – she was still smiling – and knelt down beside my father, balancing myself on the side of his wheelchair. I wasn’t sure how he was going to take it, but I desperately wanted him to know.
“You’re going to become a grandfather,” I whispered close to his ear, my hand on his.
“Ah,” he said, touching the side of his nose. “Now that’s the sort of secret I don’t mind keeping.”
*
It was then, at perhaps the happiest moment of my life, that I first began to watch my own wedding reception from afar, not from above, but at a safe distance, the man beneath the umbrella. At first I felt like an impartial witness, but then, as events unfolded, like a helpless observer smacking against the glass.
Priyanka spotted the dancer first, a young woman from Rajasthan. We hadn’t asked for any entertainment, other than a Kathakali show, which had been provided by the hotel and was not due to start for another hour. The Rajasthani dancer, hands pressed together in front of her, was stamping her splayed feet, bells jingling on her ankles. On her head was a large silver bowl of burning oil. It should have been a happy spectacle, the sort tourists pay good money to see, but her fixed smile, the aggressive stomp, those flames (should the oil be burning so fiercely?), started to ring other bells. I remember thinking Priyanka must have similar thoughts, because she glanced across at me for assurance, the first hint of fear creasing her eyes, the last look I would remember.
I left my father’s side and stood in front of him, moving a few feet towards the dancer. Instinctively, I held out my hand for Priyanka’s, which I folded into my own. The hotel manager was coming towards us – from afar (or was it with hindsight), he seemed to be slowing up, reaching the end of his day. He smiled, handing me a card.
“Is there a problem?” he asked. “She is a surprise wedding present – very costly. A performance by one of Rajasthan’s finest dancers.”
“Who sent her?” I asked, not taking my eye off the burning bowl, or my hand from Priyanka’s. She was barely five feet from us now.
The manager shrugged his shoulders and held out an envelope, which I took from him. Why were my hands shaking as I slit it open? I pulled out the cream card and read the handwritten note: “Satya! Satya! Satya!” Did I look up at the dancer again? Did I have time to show Priyanka the card before the dancer stumbled and fell towards her? All I remember is the arcing of the flames as the bowl toppled forward, spilling its infernal fuel. And I can see Priyanka’s face, questioning, terrified, alight, as she tried to shield herself with her arms. But I can’t recall who rushed to her help first when the hem of her dress ignited and new flames danced into life.
To my everlasting shame, it wasn’t me, for I was far away on the other side of the lawn, beneath my umbrella, watching her roll on the grass. Someone braver – Frank? – tried to smother the flames with a sherwani coat, a sister desperately threw jugs of water on her, and was it Dutchie patting helplessly with his bare hands? Whoever these courageous people were, their actions were in vain, as the oil – it must have been something else – had covered her from head to toe, and her sari had been woven from the finest, most flammable silk. She had bought it with her sisters in Ernakulam, on yet another shopping trip, one of the few I had been allowed to attend. I remember being served plastic cups of sweet tea on a lonely chair in Seemati, an air-conditioned emporium at the far end of the MG Road, watching her pick up sari after sari, and thinking how lucky I was as she occasionally turned to me, holding one up against her chest, smiling.
When the flames finally abated, I knew she lay too still, half hidden beneath a mound of wet tablecloths and coats. I was there by her side, late, I know, although others were kind enough to say afterwards that nothing more could have been done. With blistered hands, I searched for a pulse, but she was too hot to hold.
*
Even then, at the end of our life together, she possessed the calmness that had drawn me to her at its beginning, back at Frank’s house on that warm evening in his courtyard. Slumped by her side, I began to realise that she would never breathe again. Our chance had come and we had grabbed it, only for her to be taken away. In one sense I could have no regrets: there had been no missed opportunities, no what-ifs. But in every other sense the numbing regret was bewildering, the loss too swift and complete to contemplate.
I thought for a moment about Macaulay, Jamie, the Club. They had managed to burn their bride in the end, shaped another story that would percolate slowly outwards, twisted perhaps into a dowry death or something more macabre.
Dutchie appeared by my side, and steered me gently towards an ambulance that had drawn up at the front of the hotel. We hugged as the tears came, tears that stung our seared cheeks: the retching sorrow, anger, futility of it all. After everything that Priyanka and I had striven to achieve together, had we actually made a difference? The thought that we hadn’t, that her death had in some way been inevitable, was almost too much to bear. The Club’s files might have been destroyed, Macaulay was dead, the department closed for a final time, but I knew now that it would always be there, its doors open, just a different name above them, waiting for the next generation, ours and theirs.
THE END
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Acknowledgements
About J.S. Monroe
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J.S. Monroe writing as Jon Stock
An Invitation from the Publisher
Acknowledgments
Thanks to C. Sujit Chandra Kumar for his considerable knowledge of Kerala and cooking; Patrick French, whose book, Liberty or Death, revealed for the first time the true extent of Indian Political Intelligence’s role in British India; Stephen Robinson for sending me to Delhi; Alec Russell for seeing beyond the headlines; Frank Hancock for listening in the early days; Mr Jonathon Bond for his encouragement and introductions; the Dominic family for their hospitality; Taiki Malhotra for the Hindi lessons; Andrea Stock and Val and Mick Goss for use of their computers; Stewart McLennan for his encyclopedic knowledge of computers; Judith Gray and Helen Simpson for their telling editorial insights; BlackAmber Books, a pioneering publisher; and, most of all, Hilary, for sharing India.
About J.S. Monroe
JON STOCK (also known as J.S. MONROE) read English at Cambridge, worked as a foreign correspondent in Delhi and was Weekend editor of the Daily Telegraph in London before becoming a full-time writer. Monroe is the author of six novels, including the international bestseller Find Me.
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First published as The Cardamom Club in 2003 by BlackAmber Books
This eBook edition first published in the UK in 2018 by Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Jon Stock (J.S. Monroe), 2003
The moral right of J.S. Monroe to be identified as the author of this
work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (E) 9781788548649
Author Photo: Hilary Stock
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