Descent from Xanadu

by Harold Robbins

  “Where do you get it?”

  “The grass is sinsemilla. We have it treated downstairs in our own laboratory.”

  “You use it?” she asked.

  “Sometimes.”

  “And the others?”

  “Also sometimes. It depends how I feel.”

  “Zabiski was always against any kind of drugs. I’m surprised she never forbade your using them. She was afraid it would negate her treatment.”

  “She told me,” Judd answered. “But I have my own ideas. Drugs have been around throughout civilization. I feel there had to be a reason for them.”

  She was silent for a moment. “Do you feel like taking anything now?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I know that we both feel slightly uncomfortable with each other. Almost as if we were fencing, not communicating with each other as we used to.”

  “Isn’t that normal?” she asked. “After all, we have been apart a long time. People don’t snap back just like that.”

  “True,” he agreed. “But sometimes doping helps.”

  “I’m not ready for anything just yet,” she said. “But I’ll take a few snorts. That should keep me up.”

  Judd nodded to Fast Eddie. “Give the doctor what she wants and give me two XTC pills. Send Amarinth to prepare them for me.”

  “Yes, sir,” Fast Eddie said.

  She waited for the door to close behind him. “What does that pill do?”

  “It’s a mood elevator developed in our lab. Something like a super Elavil or Triavil. A gentle high that blows away your inner fears.”

  “You have everything you want. What is there you still have to fear?” she asked.

  He looked at her. “You.”

  She looked into his eyes. The cobalt-blue seemed suddenly to turn to black. She didn’t speak.

  “I’m afraid of you,” he said slowly. “Your knowledge, your understanding of me. That you have the answer and I do not.”

  She let out a soft breath. “Don’t you know yet that no one has the answer? No one in the world.”

  He rose from his couch and turned to the window, his back to her. “Sofia,” he said. “I can’t believe that. You spent too many years with the old lady. You probably know it and don’t even recognize it.” He turned to her. His voice sounded harsh. “Do you know of a Maharishi Raj Naibuhr?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t go to Bangladesh to search for him?”

  “No,” she said. “I’ve never even heard of him.”

  “Zabiski did,” he said. “She has many references to him in her files.”

  “Maybe she did,” she said. “But she never mentioned him to me.”

  The door opened behind her. Soft feet came to her. Sofia turned. It was another girl, lighter in color than the two at dinner, with long brown hair and green eyes. She nodded, smiling at Sofia and then to Judd. In her arms she held a silver tray. She knelt on the floor and placed the tray on the table. She stayed on her knees looking up at Judd. “Mr. Crane,” she said in a soft almost singing clear voice. “Shall I prepare you now, sir? Or do you want me to wait?”

  “Attend our guest first,” Judd said roughly.

  The girl bowed her head. Silently she poured Starka in a glass, then held the vial to Sofia.

  Sofia looked down at her. “I, too, can wait, child,” she said gently.

  Judd came back to the couch opposite her. He looked at Sofia. “Frustration,” he said. “Every way I turn there’s frustration.”

  Sofia didn’t answer.

  Judd turned to the girl. “Stand up.”

  The girl rose to her feet. She was not dressed even as modestly as the girls at dinner. She was wearing a white silk strapless sheath that revealed the nudity of the body beneath it.

  “Amarinth is only seventeen,” Judd said. “She has one of the most beautiful bodies I have ever seen.”

  Sofia sipped slowly at her vodka.

  “Would you like to see her?” Judd asked.

  Sofia met his eyes. They showed no expression. “If you like,” she said.

  Without taking his eyes from her, he spoke to the girl. “Drop your dress to the floor, Amarinth.”

  The girl loosened the dress over her breasts. The dress fell easily from her body to the floor and her arms rose in a practiced motion, outstretched above her head, her palms pressed together.

  Sofia looked at the girl. Judd was right. The girl was beautiful, like an exquisite ivory figurine.

  “Turn around, Amarinth,” Judd said. “Let the lady see how really beautiful you are.”

  Without any self-consciousness, the girl pirouetted, looking over her shoulder toward Sofia. Her tongue licked softly across her faintly smiling lips.

  “Amarinth prefers girls,” Judd said. “Would you like to keep her for your stay here?”

  Sofia tore her eyes from the girl to Judd. “I don’t understand you, Judd.”

  “I know you,” he said. “I know the flush that covers your face when your pussy gets wet and you become excited.”

  “And you think that she has made me excited?”

  He looked at her, silently.

  Sofia met his gaze. “Of course, she’s made me excited. But not her alone. You are here, too, Judd. I could see the excitement in your expression and the sudden bulge in your slacks.” She caught her breath suddenly and replaced her glass on the table, her hand trembling slightly. She got to her feet. She raised her hand and opened the snap of the sari on her shoulder. Slowly, she unwound the silk and let it fall to the floor. Beneath it she wore the white dress, clinging to her body, her nipples jutting. She placed one hand across the faint moist spot over her pubis. She looked down at him. “I have been orgasming all the time I have been here, since the moment I heard your voice through the speakers.”

  He stared at her, still not speaking.

  “Is that what you want of me, Judd?” she asked. “To be still sure of the power you have over me?”

  He started to shake his head, but she interrupted him.

  “You have to be sure of that, Judd, or you’re a fool. Don’t you know that from the moment we met, I became more your slave than any of the girls you ever bought?”

  “You expect me to believe that?” he asked. “That you’ve never gone with another man?”

  “I didn’t say that,” she said angrily. “You better than anyone else know how much I need sex. But that is something else. I’m not enslaved to sex, but to the whole man. Isn’t it enough that I killed Nicky to return to you? Isn’t it enough that I came here from across the world at your request?”

  He saw the tears beginning to well in her eyes. He took her hand into his own. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  She shook her head silently.

  “Forget the cocaine,” he said. “Maybe it would be better if you got some sleep.”

  “No,” she said. “Unless I sleep with you.”

  “You might not like that,” he said. “I sleep with two girls beside me. It’s a Chinese custom, Ying and Yang, so your spirit can find balance in your body as you sleep.”

  “Can we make love first?” she asked.

  “Usually I do not,” he said. “The girls make love to each other and their energies enter and absorb mine.”

  “Then what happens?” she asked.

  “Usually I awake refreshed.”

  “And the girls?”

  “They sleep away their exhaustion all through the day,” he said.

  She laughed suddenly. “That sounds crazy.”

  “Maybe,” he said. “But nobody knows, do they?”

  “That’s true,” she said. “But then when do you fuck?”

  “Before I go to bed,” he said.

  She looked at him. “You’re not in bed now.”

  He nodded. He turned to Amarinth. “Prepare the XTC pills for us.”

  The girl nodded and knelt on the floor beside the cocktail table, then glanced up at him. “Mr. Crane,” she asked. “Please, sir, may I prepare one for
myself?”

  Judd turned to Sofia questioningly.

  Sofia looked down at the naked girl. She was beautiful. She knelt down beside the girl and glanced up at Judd. “Let her,” she said. “Maybe the two of us will discover a new kind of Ying and Yang for you.”

  6

  She must have been dozing. Suddenly her eyes were open and she sat up on the couch. A faint gray light began to fill the horizon. Amarinth stirred and moved on the floor next to the couch opposite her, then looked across at her. She raised her index finger to her lips to warn Sofia to be silent.

  Sofia nodded and looked around the room. Judd was not in the room. She looked down at the girl, then picked up her sari from the floor beside her and began to rise.

  Still holding her finger for silence, Amarinth came toward her on silent, naked feet. Softly she touched Sofia’s arm, guiding her.

  The sari still in her hand, she allowed the girl to lead her. Silently, they went around the corner of the bar and entered another room concealed behind the angle between the window and the bar. Amarinth stopped her, gesturing with her hand.

  It was a small, oblique room with the windows pyramidlike at its roof. Beneath the apex of the pyramid, Judd was seated in a lotus position on a round platform about four inches above the floor.

  Sofia looked at him. He was motionless, he seemed not even to be breathing, his eyes wide open, yet unaware of the dawn lightening the sky.

  Amarinth tugged at her arm and brought her back into the library. She led her across the library to another room and closed the door behind them without a sound. It was a dressing room with mirrored closets around it and, in the center, a round hot tub with scented water bubbling softly. A gleaming, shining, jade-colored tiled bathroom could be seen through the open door. “Come,” Amarinth whispered. “We will wash and refresh ourselves in the flowered waters.”

  Slowly, Sofia followed the girl. “And Judd, will he join us?”

  “No,” she answered. “The Master is traveling among the stars. When the sun will close his eyes, he will return to his bed and to his sleep. Ying and Yang will enter into him and express the fluids from his body and relieve his inner tensions and restore his mental balances.”

  “But we made love with him,” Sofia said. “Did it not satisfy him?”

  “Very much,” Amarinth said. “But that is not the way in which he expresses himself.”

  She looked at the girl. “Do you mean that he does not achieve orgasm?”

  The girl cast down her eyes. “Yes. That is not his way.”

  Sofia looked at her silently.

  “You do not understand,” Amarinth said earnestly. “This is the way he gains his strength and conserves his essence.”

  “Then why does he bother to make love?” Sofia asked. She was beginning to feel as if she was speaking with a child.

  “He gathers our essence to mingle with his own,” she said.

  “Was it this way with all the girls, no matter who they were?”

  “Yes,” Amarinth said. “He expresses himself only in his sleep. Then he awakes immediately, his strength returned.”

  Sofia looked at her. “He told me that you prefer girls—is that why?”

  Amarinth did not answer.

  “Do all the girls feel as you do?”

  Amarinth nodded.

  “But don’t any of you ever want more?” Sofia asked.

  “No,” Amarinth answered in a small voice. “We are only happy when we serve the Master.”

  Sofia was silent for a moment. “I would feel better if I could return to my own cottage,” she said at last.

  Amarinth looked at her. “As you wish.” She opened a closet and took out a terry-cloth bathrobe and held it out for Sofia to put on. She slipped into another silk sheath, exactly like the one she had worn before. “Come with me,” Amarinth said. “I will show you to your car.”

  ***

  She woke in her own bed. The bright sunlight was visible around the corners of the drapes. She pressed the button beside the bed. The drapes slid open and the sun flooded into the room. She glanced at the clock. It was two-thirty in the afternoon. She reached for the telephone.

  “Yes, Doctor?” Max asked.

  “May I have some orange juice and coffee, please?”

  “Of course. Anything to eat?”

  “Not just yet.”

  “You have two messages,” he said. “Mr. Crane would like you to return his call when you awake, and Dr. Sawyer would like you to call his office at the Research Center at six o’clock.”

  “Thank you, Max,” she said. “I’ll speak with Mr. Crane as soon as I have had some coffee.”

  “Yes, Doctor,” Max said. “Mr. Crane’s call number is 1.”

  The orange juice was sweet and refreshing and the coffee hot and strong. It was good to her taste, not weak like American coffee. She half-finished the cup and dialed Judd.

  A woman’s voice answered. “Mr. Crane’s office.”

  “Dr. Ivancich returning his call.”

  “Just one moment, Doctor,” the secretary’s voice answered. “I will reach him for you.”

  A moment later there was a click on the telephone and his voice came on. “Did you rest well, Sofia?”

  “Very well,” she answered.

  “Good,” he said. “I am arranging for you to read the Zabiski files. It is completely on tape. You have your choice of any language you want as well as the original copies in her own hand.”

  “I’d prefer the original,” she said. “I would also like an English copy as well.”

  “We’ll have it for you. It will be set up on a dual screen processor so that you can read from one to the other as you like. Then we also have the notes for you to review. I have had many specialists study and interpret them.”

  “That would be very helpful.”

  “When do you think you could begin?”

  “Tomorrow morning if you like,” she said. “I would like to be fresh when I begin work.”

  “That will be arranged. An office will be set up for you.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “There’s something else I would like to ask of you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s been three years since I have examined you. And I am a doctor, if you remember. I would like to give you a physical examination so that I can make a judgment about the progress you’ve made.”

  “Would that tell you anything different from what you can make out of her notes?” he asked.

  “I don’t know yet,” she said. “Maybe nothing. But then, on the other hand, something inside you might shed some light on what she was trying to tell me.”

  “Dr. Sawyer already has all the information you might need about me on the computer.”

  “That’s the computer. With all due respect to Dr. Sawyer, the information would be secondhand to me. I’d feel more comfortable if I could see and understand for myself.”

  His voice was definite. “I don’t think it’s necessary.”

  “Sorry, Judd, but I do.”

  “No,” he said shortly. The telephone clicked off in her hand.

  She waited a moment, then called him again. The secretary’s voice came on the wire. “Mr. Crane again,” she asked.

  “I’m sorry, Doctor, but he cannot be reached.”

  “Can you give him a message for me?”

  “Of course, Doctor.”

  “Tell him that I do not think I could be helpful to him and I would like to make arrangements to return to my own work.”

  A moment later Judd called her. “You’re a bitch,” he said.

  “Maybe,” she said evenly. “But I’m a doctor and I must have my own way.”

  He was silent.

  “You can think about it,” she said. “Meanwhile, I’m calling Doc Sawyer to come over and help me.”

  “Do you think that’s all he has to do?”

  “That’s not for me to judge,” she said. “He’s your friend. And your doctor. It’s up
to you to decide.”

  Judd paused for a moment. “He’ll be here tomorrow morning.”

  “Good,” she said. “Then do you think I can see you for an hour sometime this afternoon?”

  “What for?”

  “It will be helpful if we do a blood workup and urinalysis before we begin the physical. It could save us some time.”

  “Anything else?” he asked sarcastically.

  “I can think of a few more items,” she said. “But I’ll settle for this.”

  “Thank you,” he said. “Six o’clock all right for you?”

  “Perfect,” she said.

  “Okay. At the same time I’ll show you the setup of your office.”

  “Good. Just one thing more,” she said. “That I do not have to wear another one of those white dresses.”

  “If you promise not to wear a sari.”

  “I promise,” she laughed.

  “You’re still a bitch,” he said.

  “I love you anyway,” she said and put down the phone.

  7

  Sofia turned to Sawyer. “You were right,” she said. “Physically he is perfect. Just one small thing bothers me—the electric energies reading by the EEG seems lower than the reading last year.”

  Sawyer looked at her. “But it’s infinitesimal. It could be the time of day it’s recorded.”

  “I had them run it three times at four-hour intervals. It’s not the time of the day. The energy output from his brain is consistently lower. Could we possibly persuade him to undergo a scan?”

  “I don’t think so,” Sawyer answered. “He would have to leave the island and return to Boca Raton. He told me he would not leave the island before his first year is over. That’s three months from now.”

  Sofia was silent as she pressed keys on the computer. She matched the EEG reading of last year and superimposed the new readings. She pressed another key and one part of the readings zoomed larger on the screen. “It’s the alpha readings. See, they waver over the mean line. I don’t understand it.”

  “We’ll transfer it to the computer at Med-Research and see what the neurologists think about it.”

  “Might help,” she said. “But I’d feel more secure with a scan.”