by Peter Heath
“Come on,” he said to Cyber. “I could eat a ton of those.” Cyber seemed as famished as Jason. Usually, the man from the future seemed to eat very little or not at all. It was as if eating was an experiment for him, a sampling of an antique custom.
But Jason was outflanked before he could reach the free food. A motley crowd of guests descended on the service and staged an elbow-swinging, cup-balancing free-for-all. Jason watched it and groaned.
Then the blare of trumpets from the corner of the garden announced the afternoon’s entertainment. A small stage had been put up and, as Jason and Cyber made their way toward it, the sound of cymbals, the tinkle of strings and the throb of a drum came forth. The crowd hushed and a voice announced in English: “Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen—for your diversion, we present the classical dances of India.”
She danced the sacred dance of Shiva, who is the creator, the destroyer, who haunts graveyards and is the lord of ghosts. She played the part of one of Shiva’s many wives, Kali—who likes human sacrifices. With the consummate grace of a great dancer, she moved her exquisitely formed body in the ritual motions of lust. Then, as Sati, she sacrificed herself to her lord by leaping into the imaginary flames, the ritual act of suttee, the centuries-old curse of Hindu widows. As she danced, Jason watched the delicate face. It never changed expression, and when she bowed low at the end of her performance, Kumindani’s eyes flickered once in the direction of the Chinese delegation, where Dr. Hsin Lau sat, his face frozen into an impenetrable mask. Kumindani’s eyes were full of hate.
After the dance Jason left Cyber to keep an eye on the doctor and worked his way through the departing audience around to the back of the stage. The musicians were packing up their instruments. There was no sign of the girl whose picture he had found in the dead CIA man’s wallet. Kumindani had disappeared.
Then he saw a sari-clad figure walking swiftly down the path leading to the palace. The lovely and sensual movement of her hips was unmistakable. He caught up with her just before she turned a corner full of old statuary. His fingers sank into a lusciously curved shoulder, his nose filled with the most exotic perfume it had ever smelled, and he said, “Kumindani, I need your help.”
“Who are you?” cried the girl as she spun around, and Jason found himself looking into a pair of startled deep brown eyes. Then his glance fell to the full red lips and the startlingly white teeth. She was the most beautiful Indian girl he had ever seen.
“Jason Starr,” he said. “A friend of Joe Blake.”
“Joey!” The brown eyes looked frightened. “What do you want? What have they done to him?”
“It’s a long story, and we both might be dead before I get the chance to finish it,” said Jason. He pulled out Blake’s picture and gave it to the girl. He could tell that she understood. Her face lost color, and a sudden shudder ran through her delicate body.
“I’ve got to talk to you,” he said.
“Very well, Mr. Starr. But not here. Follow me.” She led him swiftly through the remainder of the garden, and they slipped out a side entrance into the crowded streets of New Delhi. In a few minutes Jason was lost. He thought of Cyber. How to find him wouldn’t be a problem. They had agreed to meet at sundown in front of the parliament building, a landmark both of them could locate easily.
Kumindani led him through the usual maze of unplanned dwellings. Finally, she halted and motioned him through a heavy wooden door set in a high wall. They had entered a large courtyard, the private garden of some wealthy Hindu, Jason guessed. Huge banyan trees thrust upward, cutting off the mid-day sun.
“My family’s summer villa,” the girl explained. “We are safe here.” She sank down on a stone bench underneath one of the trees, and Jason followed suit.
“How did he die, Mr. Starr?” Kumindani asked.
“Call me Jason,” he said gently. “It isn’t the kind of death I care to describe in detail, expecially to the woman who loved him.”
“Yes, I loved him,” Kumindani’s eyes were hard. “In spite of his work.”
“We can’t all choose our jobs,” said Jason. “You dance, Blake worked for the CIA, and I get chased all over the world by a happy little group of murderers that calls itself the Brotherhood.”
“The Brotherhood!” There was a sharp intake of breath. For the first time the girl’s eyes showed fear. It was only there for an instant before she got it back under control—but it was there. “What do you know about the Brotherhood?” she whispered.
“What do you know about a man named Krupt?”
She paused to let the name sink in. Then she said, “Otto Krupt is the wealthiest man in New Delhi. He’s a physician. He specializes in restoring the jaded appetites of a certain segment of our Indian leadership. The sexual appetites.”
“What else?”
“Krupt is an ex-Nazi. It’s common knowledge he was in charge of ‘human experimentation’ at one of the death camps in Poland. But his influence in high government circles is strong enough to force even the honest to leave him alone. As the saying goes, Mr. Jason Starr, ‘In India the strength in a man’s loins is more important than the strength of his character.’ ”
“Do you know Krupt personally?” So far Jason was impressed with the girl’s answers. The next one was even more honest.
“Otto Krupt raped me five years ago,” she said as if it had been a totally unimportant incident in her life. “I was nineteen years old, just back from the University of London. I met him at a diplomatic reception. He asked me to dance at one of his private parties. He seemed civilized enough . . . in spite of his physical ugliness. I accepted. The party turned into a filthy orgy . . . the Marquis de Sade would have enjoyed himself. Krupt employs a group of Chinese—I think they’re eunuchs. Krupt forced his tongue into my mouth in what he thought was a passionate kiss, and when I bit it almost in half he had them carry me upstairs and hold me down while he had his way with me.” She finished, her eyes on Jason.
“And then what?”
“Some time later I met Joe Blake. I never told him what had happened. When he asked me to report anything I could find out about Krupt’s activities, by then it was too late. Joe was in love with me. He would have tried to kill him, and I wanted Joe alive more than I wanted Otto Krupt dead.”
“Were you in love with Blake?”
“Love, Mr. Starr?” The girl smiled, and suddenly she looked old, very old. “I am an agent of the Indian government and, like yourself, I have been taught to ignore the emotion. Unfortunately, Joe Blake had not. I let him ‘love’ me. It was convenient. It established trust between us. I’m sorry he’s dead—is that enough?” she said, her eyes on him.
The girl thought he was a CIA man, and Jason decided to let her continue believing it.
“Krupt’s activities—did you uncover anything?”
“Yes. I told Krupt I’d forget the whole episode on the condition that he behaved himself in the future. Even though the man’s a beast, he has a German’s sense of honor. He agreed. He’s never touched me again. I dance at his parties. I leave early in the evening—before the real fun starts.” Kumindani shivered. “I keep my eyes open and listen. Joe needed all the help he could get.”
“Did Krupt ever mention the Brotherhood?”
“No, not directly. But, at every party he has a different group of people. Important-looking people. Big business and—what do you call it in America—the crime people . . . the Mafia.”
“One more question,” said Jason. “What does he look like?”
“He looks like a wild boar—a red-haired wild boar,” said Kumindani.
The man walking beside Dr. Hsin Lau at the garden party, the man with the pink eyes and the red bristles. Jason’s mind started working at high speed. Things were starting to fall into place.
“Do you know anything about Doctor Hsin Lau?” he asked the girl.
“Very little. Except that he is staying at Otto’s villa during the symposium.” The girl’s forehead wrinkled up in an
effort to remember. “. . . dance there tonight. And yes, the doctor has announced that he is too busy on some project or other to accept any social engagements. In fact, it is reported that a daily courier plane will leave New Delhi for China with Dr. Lau’s dispatches aboard.”
Yes, thought Jason. The CIA computer hit the nail all the way through the wall. The doctor was using his spare time to keep his staff working around the clock on the control equipment—his, Jason’s, control equipment. Meanwhile, Lau was keeping up appearances . . . playing it safe until the thought-control machine could be put to work.
“Kumindani, you can pull out of this right now.” Jason looked at the soft-skinned, delicate-featured girl. His eyes couldn’t help noticing how high the sari was riding up her voluptuous brown inner thigh. “In fact, there’s nothing more for you to prove. So thanks for the help.” Jason stood up. “Forget you ever saw me, and in the future, stay away from Otto Krupt.”
Before Jason could turn himself around and march himself away like the boy scout he was trying to be, two warm soft feminine arms reached out, circled his waist, and pulled.
“Mr. Jason Starr, you are—how do they say it—a ham when it comes to playing the role,” two warm lips whispered in his ear. Then the lips made a trail around to the front of his face and found a second pair waiting for them. It was a long, excitingly sweet exchange of suggestive ideas.
“We must help each other,” the girl said, kissing his neck. “What you do for yourself, I do for the memory of Joe Blake.”
In a way Jason was glad that Blake was only a memory.
The Indian girl took his hand and led him inside the cool old house. She disappeared into a marble-floored bathroom. Jason heard water running, the sound of zippers unzipping, then silence. I didn’t know saris had zippers, he reflected. Then the girl called to him.
She was splashing around a sunken tub at least as big as the one Liz Taylor had used in Cleopatra. And this one wasn’t cluttered up with cameramen and assistant directors. Kumindani floated in the milky-warm water, her breasts bobbling on the surface like ripe peaches. Her eyes said it and Jason did it.
He slipped out of his clothes and joined her in the bath.
As he stepped down into the promising steamy depths, her slippery arms stretched out to encircle his broad shoulders. They slid together and Kumindani gave a throaty expectant chuckle. Jason studied her limpid black eyes through the rising vapor and was aware of her hands discovering his submerged body.
He pulled her head back, smoothing the long dark hair into the water. Then he kissed her sinuous neck and explored her mouth, feeling her body draw taut to his touch. She clung to him and their arms and legs slowly intertwined.
“Now, American!” she cried expectantly. “Now!”
Later, after their love-making had continued on drier ground until both of them lay exhausted, Jason told her the parts of the story that she had to know in order to help him. Then he had more questions.
“Dr. Lau’s laboratories—location and defenses—it’s a tricky business—whatever you do, don’t let them think you’re overly interested,” he said.
“Don’t worry, my lover, there are ways,” Kumindani’s long, smooth thigh pressed against his own. She was a curious girl, thought Jason. A combination of English and Indian culture, lost unless she could have both.
“Krupt’s bungalow, what’s the layout? Does he do all of his work there?” he asked.
“I have heard that many strange men come and go in the night. Some have entered never to return, but nothing can be proven. It was once a Mogul king’s palace. There are many rooms where the guests are not allowed. The grounds are guarded by men with rifles day and night.” The girl trembled and pressed herself against Jason’s chest. “Be careful, you are already precious to me,” she whispered.
There was no time for care, Jason thought. Not with each second bringing the world closer to the end of civilization. He rolled over and sat up. It was time to find his Mind Brother and begin planning the night’s activities.
He arranged a meeting place with the girl for the following day and started to climb into his soiled clothes. Kumindani stopped him.
“Those who wish to remain themselves in India dress according to the blindness of others,” the girl said. Jason remembered his Kim, the story of the beggar boy who was a master of the quick change in costume and personality. He let her soft hands dress him in native garb without complaint. Then he kissed her and slipped out through the old garden :nto the late afternoon sun.
* * *
Chapter †
TWELVE
IT WAS ALMOST absurdly easy. Or perhaps breaking into CIA headquarters was ten times as hard, thought Jason.
A yellow Punjabi moon hung low on the horizon, lighting their way through the tumble-down grounds that surrounded the huge high walled old Mogul palace with its red sandstone parapets gleaming like a hundred sullen eyes in the night. They avoided the armed guards easily and, with Cyber leading, they flitted from tree to tree, using ruined ghats and deserted outbuildings for cover. They entered the palace through a deserted courtyard full of rusting garden furniture. The Mogul emperors had lasted for more than four centuries; in its death rattle, the seedy system had turned its remaining energies from war to pleasure—a typically Indian response.
Inside the palace they made their way silently through vast rooms, up great staircases and along endless corridors, in and out of banquet halls, antechambers, throne rooms and hidden gardens. The moldering smell of decay was everywhere. At last they heard sound. It was music—cymbals, drums and flutes—and wild laughter rose over its steady rhythms. They rounded a corner, and Jason gasped at the scene that lay below.
From an inner parapet they were staring down at a huge garden. Jason guessed that it was at the center of the whole palace. The place was festooned with gaily colored lanterns which threw a shivering veil of light over the celebrants. And the celebration was in full swing. A hundred people were scattered around a central platform, lying on low divans and indulging themselves from the groaning tables filled with food and aphrodisiacs placed in front of them. Most of them were ignoring the half-naked girls who were everywhere, serving wine and food and making no attempt to avoid the lascivious hands that explored their bodies as they passed among the guests. Most of the guests were concentrating on the small stage. The reason was obvious. A man and a woman had just come out from a hidden doorway that led up from underneath. Both of them were naked.
What followed was too awful for Jason to watch. Dancing slowly to the pulsing beat of Indian drums, the naked couple approached each other. In slow motion, they assumed a variety of separate erotic postures designed to stimulate the audience. The teaser had its effect and the watching crowd applauded and called for more. The drum beat picked up, and then Jason stopped watching. The last thing he saw before he and Cyber slipped away was the couple’s single fused and writhing shadow cast on the wall of the courtyard by the flickering light. As he and Cyber slipped back into the shadows seeking a way down, he heard more laughter and then thunderous applause. This was what Kumindani had mentioned when she had explained her early departures from Krupt’s so-called “entertainments.” And it was just beginning, he suspected.
There had been no sign of the red-haired German or of Dr. Hsin Lau. Perhaps they were too preoccupied with Lau’s urgent work to indulge themselves—for this evening, anyway.
A series of open doors led them downward until Jason judged they were below the main floors of the palace. The passageway continued to slope and the air grew steadily cooler. From somewhere Jason heard the sound of dripping water.
The tunnel leveled out. They seemed to have entered a larger chamber. Jason felt through the folds of his dhoti until he found his lighter. He flicked it and, in the sudden glow, saw that they were standing in a high-ceilinged triangular chamber. At the apex of the triangle, a heavy steel bank-vault door blocked further progress. It was Krupt’s secret storehouse. A real stroke of lu
ck, thought Jason. Behind that door were the answers he needed. All he had to do was to get it open.
“Adam, have you ever heard of a combination lock?” he said to his silent companion. He explained the principles of the device, and Cyber nodded.
“It is a simple mechanical problem,” his low voice rumbled in the darkness. Jason followed his footsteps toward the safe door. He heard the dial spin and the click of tumblers. Then silence. Then one more spin and a final click.
“The device is even simpler than I thought,” said Cyber. “It is cleared. The door will open.”
Together they swung the heavy door open and entered. A musty smell rose up around them. Also another smell—a fetid odor—almost like wild animals, thought Jason. He flicked his lighter on again.
Then it happened. Actually two things. The heavy safe door rumbled shut on its rusted hinges, and a set of steel bars dropped in front of it from a hidden recess in the ceiling. It had been too simple, Jason realized. Too simple to enter the palace, too simple to find their way through the maze of corridors and to open doors, and too simple to open the safe. They had been led by the nose without a squeak, and now it was too late. They would suffer the consequences. Kumindani, he thought. What a fool I was! The girl had told Krupt. She was no Indian agent. Probably the German’s mistress all along. That would explain Blake’s death at the hands of the Brotherhood.
The consequences of his mistake were not long in coming.
Jason flashed his lighter around the vault. It was a strange-looking vault. The floor was covered with sand instead of concrete. There were no signs that it had been used for storage; and, at the far end, there was a low steel access door. As Jason approached it, it started to slide upward into the rock. As it did so, a strong pungent odor made him retreat.
It was an odor he knew. It was the smell of cats. Big cats. The kind the Indians called man-eaters. Then he saw it—the yellow eyes of Satan gleaming in the lighter’s flame, the orange and white ruff standing up to signal the kill. It was a huge Bengal tiger. With a roar of hunger it came hurtling out of the passage, all 1,500 pounds of it. Jason never finished his spring to one side. He felt a furry avalanche descend on him, and then he was flying through the darkness toward something bright which exploded inside his head.