The Buddha of Brewer Street

by Michael Dobbs

  Kunga rushed to the edge, expecting disaster, but found Tenzin hanging on to a rock a few feet below. Their eyes met in despair. Kunga began to reach down, but his bag was dragging him over the precipice, too. He wrenched it off then reached down once more, grasping for Tenzin’s outstretched hand, but his crippled fingers could gain no grip, he was only scratching at the other man’s thin gloves. And Tenzin’s own heavy load prevented him from climbing.

  ‘Drop the bundle!’ Kunga gasped.

  Tenzin shook his head.

  ‘Drop it!’

  ‘It has all our food inside.’

  ‘If you don’t you will die.’

  ‘If I do, we shall all die,’ Tenzin replied stubbornly.

  ‘But I cannot pull you up.’

  The guide was still trying to make his way back to them, step by deadly step across the sweating ice. He wouldn’t make it in time. Tenzin’s hold on the rock was beginning to slip.

  Tenzin wriggled. He was trying to shrug the load from his back. He’d already succeeded in unfastening one of the restraining ropes. The bundle was now swinging from just one arm.

  ‘Come closer,’ he beckoned to Kunga. ‘Let me throw the food up. Hook your arm through the rope.’

  Kunga reached down as far as he dared, every additional inch threatening to topple him forward. Tenzin heaved. Heaved once more. The rope looped over Kunga’s arm.

  The food! Their food was saved! And Tenzin might be, too.

  But the effort of saving the food had made him slip way beyond Kunga’s reach. And with every moment he was slipping further still.

  Kunga flayed the air with his free arm, reaching down, but they both knew it was hopeless. Tenzin was clinging with all his strength to the rock, but he was slipping, almost gone.

  He held on long enough for his dark eyes to give thanks. For life. For enlightenment. And to pray for the next life.

  Then, with great care, he took one of his hands away from the rock and reached towards Kunga, not in vain hope of salvation but in a wave of gratitude. Their eyes held for a moment. There was no fear; Tenzin was smiling.

  ‘I shall try to enjoy the view on the way down, master.’

  Then he was gone, into the mists, and below him Kunga could see nothing but eternity.

  ‘Hello? Elizabeth?’

  ‘Speaking.’

  ‘It’s Tom.’

  ‘Tom who?’

  ‘Try Goodfellowe.’

  She knew exactly who it was, but there was scar tissue to fight through. Keep him pedalling backwards. ‘Been a long time, Goodfellowe.’

  ‘Precisely. Too long, I was thinking.’

  ‘You’d like to make a reservation?’

  ‘Not exactly. More a date. I’d like to see you again.’

  ‘Wow.’ A pause. ‘I’m not sure that’s wise. Once bitten.’

  ‘You’ve never struck me as being the shy type.’

  ‘Nor a masochist, either.’

  ‘Look, I’ve no idea whether seeing each other again would be fun or complete folly.’ A brief pause. ‘But I’d like to find out.’

  ‘What brought this on?’

  ‘You know me. Decisive as always.’

  That brought a peal of laughter down the phone, and he could feel her melting slightly.

  ‘I saw you the other day on the Embankment. On your bike. Nearly ran you down.’

  ‘That was you? That flash Mercedes?’

  ‘What’s the point of spending forty grand on a car if it’s not flash?’

  ‘I was too busy picking myself up from the gutter to see you. Was the assault deliberate?’

  ‘You know, I’m not sure. I’d probably need to go through years of analysis to find out. Was I trying to get my own back, perhaps? Or maybe just trying to attract your attention?’

  ‘You’ve never had any trouble doing that.’

  ‘Goodfellowe, this is me, remember. I could shove a distress flare up your arse and still not get your attention.’

  Ouch. ‘Even so, splattering me all over the highway seems a little extreme.’

  ‘OK, so I owe you.’

  ‘Agreed. So how about Thursday?’

  A slight pause. ‘Can’t. Already busy. Going to the theatre.’

  May it be the worst show this side of Sevenoaks, he prayed. He couldn’t hide the trace of frustration. Or jealousy. ‘The following Tuesday?’

  ‘They’ll let you out of that Palace of Intoxication before midnight?’

  ‘Wanting to see you again must by definition make me unsound of mind. They’ll have to put me on the sick list.’

  Another pause. ‘You still living in that little apartment in Gerrard Street?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because most of the Members of Parliament I know are interested only in two things: a free meal and a lot of leg-over. In which case, perhaps I should cook for you. But I’m not parking my flash new Mercedes in the middle of Chinatown. You’d better come over here.’

  ‘To the restaurant?’

  ‘No, the house.’

  ‘For a free meal?’

  ‘Free, yes, but not exactly costless. Don’t expect an easy ride.’

  ‘Next Tuesday.’

  ‘Timing is everything with a girl, Goodfellowe.’

  ‘Well, you know me. I’m a very patient man.’

  ‘Bollocks,’ she said, then rang off.

  A free meal and a lot of leg-over. Guilty as charged, the lot of ’em. But it left Goodfellowe wondering just how many of his fellow MPs her experience was based on.

  It was Tenzin’s death that, in the end, saved them all.

  The storms had slowed their progress, as had the frostbite on Dawa’s toes. In spite of the extra ration, the food had run out after seventeen days. For the next three they had nothing but snow and dwindling hope to fill their stomachs. Had Tenzin still been alive they would all have died. Even so, they hadn’t long to live.

  Then the guide broke into a run, stumbling weakly through the snow. They had been walking downhill for a week, through barren wastelands of rock and ice; now, ahead of them, they could see the tree line marked by a thin forest of stunted and withered pines which, as they looked further down the mountain, began to grow in confidence. They also saw a small stone bridge across a tumbling stream and it was here the guide had stopped, waving his arms.

  Behind them stood Tibet. On the other side of the bridge lay the mountain kingdom of Nepal.

  Freedom. And exile.

  To one side of the bridge rose a handful of rough-hewn sticks. From these fluttered the remnants of prayer flags, wind torn and faded by the sun, but whose messages left by previous trekkers were intended to bring encouragement to those who followed.

  And beside the canes, reaching towards them, they saw a hand protruding through the snow.

  Kunga and the guide knelt to sweep away the snow. Bodies on this route were not unusual. Of the thousands who began the march into exile every year across the world’s highest mountains, many did not complete the journey, particularly the young and the old. Their bodies lay like signposts on the mountainside, marking the route away from oppression. But this was not one such body.

  As Kunga brushed the snow away from the face, he flinched and drew back in astonishment. He knew this face, knew it well. It was Osel, a young monk from his own monastery. As they scrabbled to remove the rest of the snow the story of Osel’s fate became clear. For he was stripped naked, his body encased in rock-hard ice. Tears of understanding trickled from Kunga’s eyes, freezing even as they fell.

  ‘They found me gone. So they decided others should suffer in my place.’

  They had brought Osel to this point, stripped him, and poured water over his bare body. He had struggled for a while, running around in the snow, beating his own body with his fists in an attempt to keep warm, while the soldiers laughed. And poured more water. Slowly he had sunk to his knees, his arms wrapped vainly around himself. Then he had fallen to the ground. And still they poured, even as Osel reached
out for the power of the prayer flags, until the ice formed a glass coffin around his young corpse.

  ‘This is their warning. They want me dead.’

  The guide’s single eye glanced around in anxiety, as though expecting the border guards to appear at any moment. ‘But how did they know we would use this route? There are a dozen crossing points we might have used.’

  ‘That is the point. They didn’t know,’ muttered Kunga grimly. ‘They only know the crossing points. The same message will have been left at every one.’

  In spite of the guide’s concern, Kunga and Dawa sat in the snow to recite mantras for Osel and for Tenzin, and for the others unknown whose bodies now littered the many paths to freedom.

  When they had finished, Kunga rose, a new energy and sense of urgency written upon his face. ‘We must hurry. They will not stop until they have the Lama. And neither must we.’

  A man who has had no sex for five months may begin to doubt whether he is still a man. For a man who, like Goodfellowe, hadn’t had sex for five years, that doubt begins to turn to riveting certainty. And when that man is in the middle years of his life, he begins to wonder whether he will ever be a complete man again. At the age of fifty he becomes as fifteen, where sex is not just an issue but the only issue that matters in his life. Goodfellowe was not yet fifty, but was not far off it, and dinner with Elizabeth had begun to take on proportions that overwhelmed the other parts of his life.

  He had started to take stock of himself as a man. The mirror told its own story. Those misleading photographs of himself he hated so much were not so misleading after all. While the man within was still in his early twenties, the man on the outside had begun to show that frosting at the temples which in others he found distinguished yet in himself he viewed with alarm. The deep blue eyes, always turbulent, still sparkled and the spirit was as willing as ever, but the body was not what it once was. He would never play wing forward at Twickenham, not even in his dreams.

  But to merry hell with misery. He took himself off to the traditional panelled salon of Trumpers in Curzon Street where Adam, the young hairdresser, set about his hair. That wasn’t all. While he was cutting, Adam also gave him an education, initiating him into the distinctions between heavy metal and funk. Goodfellowe probably wouldn’t like either, scarcely music at all, but he felt adventurous. Might give it a go. Perhaps Mickey would take him. And as they talked, Adam snipped away most of the frazzle and frosting and trimmed in some style. Goodfellowe was left looking elegant, feeling refreshed. Not young enough for a bash at the LSE with the Deaf Lollipops, perhaps, but at least he was still alive. He also bought a new silk tie. Clothes were not Goodfellowe’s strongest point, squeezed as he was between the twin aesthetic disasters of his bicycle and his bank balance, but the new neckpiece was colourful and fun. Suddenly it mattered once more to Goodfellowe what he looked like. And he took himself off to the House of Commons gym. For the first time in years Goodfellowe was reminded that he was a man of many parts – a spirit, a physique, a wit, an intellect – not just a machine designed for the drudgeries of duty. He enjoyed the gym, sweating away many of the years and the worries he had brought with him. So, the next day, he went back. And the next. By the time Monday arrived, the day before their dinner, the twenty-year-old that lurked deep inside had reasserted himself and he completed a full extra circuit and an additional ten minutes on the rowing machine.

  By Tuesday he could barely walk. His muscles had turned to permafrost and each step gave him agonies. As he cycled to Elizabeth’s mews house in Notting Hill he could feel every tormented muscle. This search for youth was folly, of course, but so what? Between the stabs of pain his body was pumping in anticipation.

  The moment he arrived, the high spirits he carried with him went into spasm. He had expected an intimate evening à deux, not a full-scale dinner party with half a dozen strangers who were already well awash. Colleagues of Elizabeth from the restaurant trade. Lots of in-house gossip. Croutons and cretins. He felt like a fifth wheel, being carried just for the ride.

  During the quieter corners of the pre-dinner conversation he looked around Elizabeth’s small house. It was the first time he’d seen her on home turf. Everything was immaculate, no traditional feminine frills but strong colours and individual pieces, which contradicted and argued but which were stimulating and sensual. Just like Elizabeth. There was a magnificent faceless nude on the wall, painted in exquisite detail. The suggestion of a birthmark high on magnificent legs. He wondered whether it might be Elizabeth herself. He also wondered whether anyone had paintings like that of Sam. The previous year she had taken to modelling in life classes – ‘not just for the money, Daddy, but for the experience. For an artist it’s part of growing up.’ He’d had to grow up, too. Overcome all the male hang-ups and parental concerns about his daughter baring her body to anyone with a five-pound arts club subscription and a paintbrush. She was proud of her body, he was proud of her, so it ought to have been easy for him. But it wasn’t. No point in arguing with her. She was too strong willed. Anyway, if it resulted in paintings such as this, works of art of considerable beauty, how could he object? He continued to stare at the nude.

  This was a beautiful room. In particular the lighting was exquisite, creating atmosphere, bringing people together. But perhaps, he considered, it was all a little too carefully planned, too perfect. Was that Elizabeth also? Immaculate on the outside. But what lay behind the presentation? She was divorced. Had spent time in Eastern Europe. On the back of that had opened a restaurant and called it The Kremlin. With an exuberance that made people laugh and fall in love with her wherever she went, which only made her laugh all the more. Her wit was sharp, occasionally cruel, but Goodfellowe began to wonder whether she used it as a buffer. A barrier, perhaps, behind which she could study others while they were kept at a distance. It dawned on Goodfellowe that he knew very little about her and had succeeded in finding out very little about her. Perhaps he hadn’t truly tried. He’d used her selfishly, as a crutch, was still using her as a crutch. He’d been totally one-sided about their relationship. Now he gazed at her, tall, almost statuesque, hair of ripe chestnuts, dressed in silk that shimmered seductively in the candlelight. Is that all he had seen, a body, a place to rest his sorrows and insecurities? Had he touched the person within? Suddenly his great expectation had turned to doubt.

  Then the doubt turned to disillusion. He knew it was ridiculous and petty, but when he was honest with himself he recognized that he had long ago stopped educating his emotions and under pressure became woefully stubborn. And inadequate. It was inexcusable to get in a huff about the wine, but for God’s sake! She knew he wouldn’t drink wine that had been produced with a subsidy from the wretched European Union, it was one of his silly male hallmarks. But it was his hallmark, and she knew it. Or had she simply forgotten? After all, it had been so long.

  So they sat around the table and he misbehaved. Invariably on such occasions, the politician seems to be put into a metaphorical corner while the whole world lines up to tell him what a bloody awful job his Government – and by implication he himself – is doing. And the restaurateurs, by profession characteristically garrulous and opinionated, responded to his increasingly sour mood by giving him hell. Elizabeth had sat at the end of the table and simply smiled, never once coming to his relief. He was like Mafeking, surrounded, nothing to drink, waiting to be stormed.

  And she looked sensational. He didn’t want to share her. The New England lobster she served was one of his favourites – had she known? – but he gulped it in impatient mouthfuls and had no interest in tussling with the sweet tendrils.

  So he took his revenge. As the rest of the table grew increasingly informal under the influence of a splendid Ribera del Duero drawn from the dustbowl of central Spain and full of blackcurrants and vanilla, he raised the subject of adultery. It had been put to him by one of the dinner guests that the life of a backbencher was pointless, nothing but lobby fodder and lunch. The gibe happene
d to coincide with a spasm of cramp in his calf. That did it for Goodfellowe. He was irritated, in pain, and flatulent from the fizzy water he’d drunk while the others were erasing their inhibitions in the oak-aged Reserva. The time had come to fight back.

  ‘You’re wrong,’ he countered firmly. ‘I may not run the country, but I can help my constituents. Ordinary people. It’s like being a social service. Just last week, for instance, a woman came to me and said she was living in a council house. Her children had left home and her husband was away on business more often than not. She felt dreadfully neglected and lonely. She had found a friend, a man. She wanted to sleep with him, when her husband was away. But she was afraid of two things. That she might lose her council house. And she might lose her self-respect. What did I think?’

  ‘Well, what did you think?’ demanded the woman across the table, jabbing her fork in his direction in a manner that in Sloane Square might have got her arrested for threatening behaviour.

  ‘I said there was no chance of losing her council house.’

  ‘Sod the council house. What about her self-respect? What did you tell her about her self-respect?’ The prongs of the fork waved ferociously, if a little unsteadily.

  Goodfellowe put forward his most earnest expression. ‘I told her she should try to encourage her husband to come home more.’

  The feminine outrage was immediate and overwhelming. On all sides he was assailed by the women who demanded that the husband be castrated in his sleep and that the wife get the fun and romance and mind-blowingly good leg-spreading she deserved. All the women were in excitable agreement – all, that is, except for Elizabeth, who kept her silence. As did the husbands, for a while. These were all men who spent a lot of time away from home. Busy men. Working men. And, yes, probably adulterous men. None of whom cared to think that while they were away their wives were busy with anything other than coffee mornings and aerobics classes or would spend time on their backs with anyone other than their gynaecologists. Battle standards were raised on all sides, the arguments engaged. Goodfellowe, at last content, retired from the field to the spectator stands in the company of a malt whisky.