The Dying Day

by Vaseem Khan

  Missing. The word tolled in Persis’s mind. A priceless manuscript and a famous British scholar. Both missing. It defied the odds that the two were unconnected.

  ‘Let’s assume for a moment that John took the manuscript—’

  ‘I’m not making that accusation,’ interrupted Forrester. ‘Not yet.’

  ‘I understand. But let’s assume, for the purposes of conjecture, that he did. How would he have been able to get it out of here?’

  ‘Follow me.’ She led them to the marble counter Persis had noted earlier. A red ledger was chained to the counter.

  ‘Anyone wishing to examine one of our rarer artefacts must present an authorised requisition here. To Mr Pillai.’ Forrester indicated the nervous-looking Indian behind the counter. The small man, balding and bespectacled, nodded at her. With his liquid eyes and sad expression, he put her in mind of a depressed lemur. ‘Mr Pillai notes the request in the ledger, then goes into the strongroom behind him’ – she indicated the steel door behind the counter – ‘and returns with the artefact. The individual may then examine the work within the confines of the Crypt before returning it to Mr Pillai.’

  ‘Who authorises these requisitions?’

  ‘Two members of the board must sign a requisition. For longer-term researchers such as John – who was also a staff member – we naturally provide an ongoing approval.’

  Persis turned to Pillai. ‘I assume Healy came here the day before yesterday and took out the manuscript?’

  ‘Yes, madam.’ The short man spoke with the clipped manner of a Dravidian from the deep south.

  ‘At what time did he return it?’

  ‘At nine p.m. Our official closing time. I noted it in the register.’

  ‘And you saw it? With your own eyes?’

  Pillai’s expression became queasy. He glanced fearfully at Forrester. ‘I – I thought so.’

  ‘Please explain.’

  He stepped backwards to the steel vault door behind him, unlocked it, went inside, and returned swiftly with a carved wooden box roughly eighteen inches on a side and four in height. He set the box down on the counter, then said, ‘The Divine Comedy manuscript is kept inside this box. Each night when Professor Healy returns the box to me, I check inside.’

  He removed a key from his pocket, unlocked the box, lifted the lid, and turned the box around. Inside was a large volume, wrapped in red silk.

  ‘This is what I saw when he returned it. Naturally, I assumed it was The Divine Comedy.’

  Persis looked at Forrester. ‘May I?’

  The Englishwoman nodded.

  Persis lifted out the volume, set it down on the counter, then unwrapped it from its cape of red cloth. She had handled old volumes before – in her father’s bookshop – and was careful with her movements.

  What lay before her was a copy of the King James Bible, beautifully bound in polished black leather. She knew the book – her father sold them in the bookshop.

  She looked at Pillai. ‘I take it you didn’t check beneath the red silk?’

  He shook his head wretchedly.

  ‘Tell me, did Healy have a bag with him, or a satchel?’

  ‘Yes. He always carried a leather bag with him. It contained his notebooks.’

  ‘So, in theory, all he had to do was swap the manuscript for the Bible, put the manuscript in his bag, and walk out of the door with it.’

  ‘The whole thing wouldn’t have taken more than a few seconds,’ remarked Birla behind her. She’d almost forgotten he was there.

  ‘Was anyone else present at the time he left here?’

  ‘No,’ said Pillai.

  ‘Did anyone requisition the manuscript yesterday, when Healy was absent?’

  Forrester replied, ‘Only one other person currently has permission to view The Divine Comedy. An Italian scholar named Franco Belzoni; he wasn’t here yesterday.’

  ‘I’ll need his details.’ Persis turned back to Pillai. ‘Was anyone other than you working the counter yesterday or this morning?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Does anyone else have access to the strongroom?’

  ‘No.’ He hung his head, his misery complete.

  ‘Mr Pillai has worked here for thirty years,’ said Forrester sharply. ‘He has nothing to do with this.’

  Persis refrained from replying. She was early in her career but knew enough to know that suspicion was a democratic beast. It devoured anyone and everyone in the vicinity of a crime. ‘Why would Healy take the manuscript? Assuming it was him?’

  ‘A question I cannot answer,’ replied Forrester. ‘Yes, the manuscript is incredibly valuable, but John was a scholar. To him the value of such a work cannot be measured in monetary terms.’

  Birla snorted. ‘You have a very flowery view of academics,’ he said, earning a glare from the Englishwoman.

  ‘Have you searched his home?’ asked Persis.

  ‘I don’t have a key to his residence,’ said Forrester. ‘Besides, it wouldn’t be right for me to break down his door and ransack his home.’ It was clear from her tone that this was precisely what she expected Persis to now do.

  ‘I’ll need a list of his colleagues, friends, and other acquaintances. Anyone he may have associated with.’

  ‘I shall draw one up immediately. Though his circle was very small. He was a guarded man, completely focused on his work.’

  Persis looked down at the Bible. She wondered where Healy had purchased the volume. It was a Blackletter edition – a faithful rendering of the 1611 King James Bible using the same Blackletter font and English grammar employed in the original and printed in the sixteen-inch ‘pulpit folio’ format. A collector’s item. Presumably, any number of bookshops in the city sold it.

  Her fingertips brushed over the leather binding, the gold lettering reflecting the overhead lighting. On an impulse, she lifted the cover and looked inside the flyleaf.

  She was surprised to find writing on the normally blank page.

  What’s in a name?

  Akoloutheo Aletheia

  Below this was a signature and a date: 6 February 1950.

  The day before yesterday.

  ‘Is this Healy’s signature?’

  Forrester peered at the page. ‘Yes.’ She seemed shocked. Persis guessed she hadn’t bothered to look inside the Bible.

  ‘The 6th was the last day he was here,’ continued Persis. ‘The day, presumably, that he stole the manuscript. Why would he leave this inscription behind? . . . Akoloutheo Aletheia.’ The words felt strange on her tongue. ‘Do you have any idea what this means?’

  ‘It’s ancient Greek,’ replied Forrester, still hypnotised by the page. ‘My Greek is rusty, but I believe “akoloutheo” means “to follow”, and “aletheia” means “truth”.’

  ‘Follow the truth,’ whispered Persis. It had the ring of an incantation.

  What was Healy attempting to communicate? She was certain he was trying to tell them something. But why? And what did the first sentence have to do with the second? What’s in a name? It sounded familiar, but she couldn’t place it.

  ‘I’ll need to take this,’ she said. She nodded at Birla who wrapped the Bible back in its silk covering and then tucked it under his arm.

  A thought occurred to her. ‘Do you have a photograph of Healy?’

  ‘Follow me,’ said Forrester.

  She led them back up to the Darbar Hall, to a large noticeboard propped on an easel. A collage of flyers and notices were pinned to the board. She pointed at an old newspaper cutting. The headline read: ‘Famed British academic to take up position at Bombay Asiatic Society.’ Beneath the headline was a photograph of Forrester and a cluster of elderly board members, both white and native. In the very midst of them stood a tall blond white man, wearing a tailored suit and eyeglasses. He looked frankly back at the photographer, unsmiling. There was something reserved in his gaze, Persis thought.

  ‘How old was he?’

  ‘I believe he was in his late thirties. Possibly thi
rty-eight or thirty-nine.’

  He looks older than his years, she thought. ‘Where does he live?’

  Chapter 2

  Healy’s home was a short drive away, on a leafy road not far from the Flora Fountain. Passing through the congested junction within which the fountain stood, at the top of Mile Long Road, Persis couldn’t help but notice the idle ranks of black-and-yellow taxis, their drivers milling around, smoking, chatting, a few arguing with irate passengers brandishing suitcases. The impact of Nehru’s social reforms had yet to trickle down to the lowest rungs of Indian society. The taxi drivers had decided to force the state government’s hands by waging a two-day strike, all but bringing the city to a standstill.

  An overcrowded tram rattled by as she swung the jeep around the fountain, a solid-looking structure topped by a magnificent statue of the Roman goddess Flora. Not that many Indians knew or cared. The Hindu pantheon contained a multiplicity of deities. No one had time for anyone else’s gods.

  She parked beneath the branches of a banyan tree and checked her watch. Where was he?

  Exiting from the jeep, she waited for Birla and Neve Forrester to join her.

  Forrester led them across the road to an unassuming, single-storey, whitewashed bungalow with a red mansard roof.

  No security guard at the gate, Persis noted.

  Forrester sensed her unspoken question. ‘John refused to take on any staff. No chauffeur, no cook, no cleaner, and no security guard. As I said, he is an intensely private man.’

  Madness, she thought. It was unusual for a westerner not to employ servants. It had been one of the principal comforts of empire. Indian labour was so cheap that even the poorest of Brits found themselves elevated to the status of gentry, with the arrogance and manners to match.

  The front door was locked. Persis knocked, not expecting an answer. When none came, she stepped back. ‘Go ahead,’ she said, nodding at Birla.

  The sub-inspector stepped forward, hefting the crowbar he’d taken from the jeep.

  Moments later, the door swung back like a broken jaw.

  Persis checked her watch again. She looked back at the road. She’d made the call just before leaving the Society. He should have been here by no—

  A car came churning up the path, skidding to a halt behind her jeep.

  A tall, dark-haired white man scrambled out from the vehicle, all legs and flailing arms. He spotted her and grinned broadly, the smile lighting up his handsome features. He waved vigorously with one hand – the other was weighed down by a brown leather doctor’s case.

  He crossed the road in a few long strides, the sun glinting off his spectacles.

  ‘Hello!’ he said as he came alongside, flashing green eyes at Persis. Turning to Neve Forrester, he stuck out a hand. ‘Archie Blackfinch.’

  Forrester ignored his hand and looked to Persis for an explanation.

  ‘Archie – Mr Blackfinch – is a forensic criminalist with the Metropolitan Police. He’s currently stationed in Bombay, working with our own police service. I thought his skills would be useful in examining Healy’s home.’

  Blackfinch set down his bag, opened it, and removed several pairs of white gloves. ‘Please put these on,’ he said. ‘Try not to touch anything.’

  Forrester’s expression made it clear exactly what she thought of being given orders by a man younger than her by some decades. She snatched the gloves from the Englishman and pulled them on with ill grace.

  ‘Wait outside,’ said Persis to Birla, before turning and entering the home.

  The first thing she noticed was how small and bare the place was, more a hermit’s cave than the residence of a bachelor. There were only four rooms: a living space, a kitchen, a bathroom and toilet, and a bedroom. In the kitchen was a stove and oven, a sink, and a General Electric fridge. She opened the fridge – it was empty save for a lump of hard cheese, bread, a half-eaten tin of sardines, a couple of eggs, and a bottle of milk.

  She twisted off the lid, took a sniff, then almost retched. Rancid.

  In the bathroom, she found basic male toiletries: a razor, a bar of shaving soap, towels, toothpaste, a toothbrush, toilet water. The bedroom was equally bare: a single bed – without a mosquito net – a bedside table and lamp, and a wardrobe, inside which she discovered three men’s suits in various shades of grey, three pairs of brogues, half a dozen shirts, and a selection of undergarments. The fabrics were neither cheap nor expensive.

  She searched the clothing, but found nothing, not even a scrap of paper or the wrapper of a boiled sweet.

  In a bedside drawer, she found a half-empty bottle of red-and-blue tablets. The bottle was labelled Tuinal.

  She paused for a second to look up at a wooden Cross on the wall. Christ the Redeemer. The Cross was positioned opposite the bed, Jesus looking down forlornly at the bed’s headpiece. A large, ornate ormolu dressing mirror was affixed to the wall below the Cross, scratched and spotted with age.

  She glanced again at the Cross. It seemed incongruous in the bare room. She wondered if Healy had installed it.

  ‘Is he a religious man?’ she asked Forrester, back in the living room.

  ‘Not that I’m aware of,’ replied the Englishwoman. ‘He certainly made no mention of being a churchgoer. In my experience, practising Catholics cannot stop wringing their hands about their faith.’

  ‘He’s Catholic?’

  ‘Yes. He comes from Irish stock, though he was born and raised in England.’

  ‘He lives alone?’

  ‘I would have thought that was obvious.’

  ‘I meant does he have a partner? A female companion?’

  ‘I’m afraid I’m not in the habit of keeping track of my colleagues’ personal arrangements.’

  ‘Looks like a bachelor to me,’ said Blackfinch behind her. He’d removed a camera and tripod set-up from his bag and was screwing a flashbulb to the top of the camera. ‘This place lacks a woman’s warmth.’

  He gave Persis a smile. Against her will, she found herself flushing. Her relationship with the Englishman had become complicated. They’d met on her first case, just weeks earlier, the murder of a British diplomat in the city. Blackfinch had been invaluable during the investigation.

  Something unspoken had passed between them, a mutual attraction.

  And then she’d shot him.

  She turned away, concealing her awkwardness by striding to the waist-high bookcase in the corner of the room, dropping to her haunches, and examining the half a dozen volumes. An English-to-Hindi dictionary; Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea; The Hobbit by Tolkien; a translation of selected works by Rumi, the thirteenth-century Persian poet and scholar; a torn copy of Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. What looked like a new Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking-Glass.

  She knew these books, had read them growing up in her father’s bookstore. But here, they seemed lifeless, discarded.

  She stood and took in the room. It was as empty as the rest of the home. An oxhide sofa, a claw-footed coffee table, a depressing painting of a grim foreign landscape on the wall, the bookcase, a sideboard on which stood a telephone . . . and that was it. Not even a radio or a gramophone.

  What did Healy do here? Unless he was fond of staring at the walls, there was literally nothing to do. Perhaps this explained his desire to spend every waking minute at the Society.

  ‘Monkish,’ observed Blackfinch, startling her out of her thoughts.

  ‘He’s a man of simple tastes,’ countered Forrester. ‘There’s something to be said for a restrained appetite in this age of excess.’

  ‘There’s no sign of the manuscript,’ said Persis. It had taken little time to search the place thoroughly. There was no hiding place worth the name. ‘There’s also no sign of Healy’s bag, the one Pillai mentioned.’

  ‘Do you think he’s left the city?’ asked Forrester.

  ‘Why would he leave his clothes behind?’ It was a weak argument. A man with a manuscript worth a million dollars need not
worry about taking his wardrobe with him.

  She realised what it was that was bothering her.

  There were no personal effects here.

  No family photographs to remind Healy of home, no gewgaws, none of the junk that people tended to accrete over time. He had lived here for over two years and yet, aside from a handful of worn garments hanging in his wardrobe, it was as if he’d never been here at all.

  Loneliness. That was what seeped from the walls; the scent of loneliness, as strong as Mercurochrome.

  ‘It’s not inconceivable that he borrowed the volume, then met with an accident,’ said Forrester. The explanation sounded disbelieving even as it left her mouth.

  ‘It won’t take long to check the city’s hospitals,’ replied Persis automatically. She’d already arrived at the conclusion that Healy wasn’t coming back. But if he had intended to vanish, why write that enigmatic message in the Bible he’d left behind?

  What’s in a name? Follow the truth.

  Whose truth? And follow it to what end?

  ‘What was your impression of Healy?’

  Forrester thought about the question. ‘He was – is – a reserved man. Guarded. When he spoke, it was with appropriate thought. Not the gregarious type; he preferred his own company, by and large.’

  ‘Did he engage with others at the Society?’

  ‘Not really. Our scholars tend to be solitary animals. As Curator of Manuscripts, John was, of course, consulted on all matters regarding the purchase or donation of new items to our collection. His expertise as a palaeographer was unquestioned.’

  ‘What exactly does a palaeographer do?’ asked Blackfinch, who had returned to the room after photographing the rest of the house.

  ‘How can I put this in layman’s terms?’ said Forrester, not bothering to hide her condescension. ‘Palaeography is the study and decipherment of ancient writing. Palaeographers bring old documents to life so that we might learn from them. For instance, the world’s libraries are full of medieval manuscripts, but without palaeographers, medieval history would remain a blank to us. Even Shakespeare would be an unreadable morass. Language evolves over time. Dialects, writing systems, alphabets, the meanings of individual words. Compare Beowulf to modern English.’