The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing

Fifteen

Facecream’s second day at the ashram proved as regimented as the first. The lights came on at five. Meditation commenced at five-thirty. Breakfast consisted of papaya, apple and yogurt.

After lunch, she managed to get to a pay phone on the main road to call Puri. He brought her up to date on Flush’s efforts to hack into the Abode of Eternal Love’s computer system. Apparently, the security measures were extremely sophisticated – “Some kind of fiery wall or whatnot” – and might take days to crack. They talked about trying to access the system from the inside.

Then, late in the afternoon, Facecream made an important discovery.

The roll of donors posted on the wall in the main reception included the name of Professor Pandey.

A month ago, he had given the ashram fifty thousand rupees.

Further checking with the susceptible young man on duty at the front desk revealed that Pandey had made the donation in person and subsequently spent a week at the Abode of Eternal Love.

Facecream had not yet found an opportunity to communicate this information to Puri. From reception she had been frog-marched by Bossy to yoga and from there to an hour-long om-chanting session. Then at six Maharaj Swami had made an appearance on the balcony of his private residence, which was directly behind the darshan hall. A crowd, hundreds strong, had gathered beneath him, bowing, chanting and ringing bells with their usual enthusiasm.

Facecream forced herself to join in and play the part, while in her mind she loathed their blind obedience to the Godman. But when at eight o’clock she was summoned for her anticipated private audience, she was careful to show visible excitement and nervous anticipation.

Ushered into a grand entrance hall by senior devotees, she was told to take a seat on one of the gilded settees in the shadow of a sweeping staircase.

For a man who preaches the nobility of poverty, Maharaj Swami certainly has a taste for the kitsch, Facecream thought to herself as she waited. Velvet cushions; hand-painted images of Krishna on the walls; a tinted pink chandelier…

The atmosphere, though, was strangely forbidding. No one spoke above a whisper, as if to do so would violate some sacred tenet. The senior devotees who crisscrossed the shiny marble floor as they went about the business of court wore solemn yet self-satisfied expressions. The two thuggish priests who guarded the door to Maharaj Swami’s audience chamber observed Facecream and the two other young devotees who had been chosen to meet Swami-ji with probing stares which seemed to doubt their worthiness.

It had often struck Facecream how cults, whether of a political or religious nature, always preached equality and happiness while fostering fear. It had been the same with the Maoists, who relied so heavily on women and children to fill their ranks. Party propaganda spoke endlessly about the Communist ideal of equality, while the hierarchy maintained strict discipline and unquestioning allegiance.

Sitting there, she thought back to the time she had been summoned to meet The Leader. The setting had been very different, of course: a simple peasant’s house in a village in the rugged foothills of the Himalayas. But the sycophancy of his hangers-on and the sense of devotion they had promoted were mirrored here in the Abode of Eternal Love.

She remembered being both elated and petrified as she and her fellow cadres had filed in to meet The Leader. His presence had been overwhelming. They had hung on his every word. Yet when he had spoken to them individually, it had been as a caring father. Despite herself, Facecream had blushed.

She had gone through a lot since then, done a lot of growing up. Still, Puri’s operative was not immune to fear. The tight knot in her stomach was testament enough to that. Indeed, now that she was only minutes away from meeting Maharaj Swami face-to-face, she wondered if she wasn’t in over her head. One female devotee had already died in mysterious circumstances in the ashram and others were being drugged.

With half the politicians of India in his back pocket and the local police only too willing to play ball, he could do more or less what he wanted. Facecream focused her breath, as she often did before a potentially dangerous task.

Half an hour later, the door to the audience chamber opened and a suave, middle-aged man wearing a collarless black sher-wani emerged. It was not Maharaj Swami, but neither did he carry himself like a minion – it struck Facecream that he would be better placed amongst a gathering of businessmen and politicians. He was no visitor either: he carried a key for the door on the other side of the reception hall, which he opened before stepping into the room beyond.

Soon one of the two other devotees was summoned into Maharaj Swami’s personal chamber. He spent ten minutes inside and emerged wearing a rapturous smile and tightly clutching a silk scarf. The second one’s audience lasted only five minutes and he emerged with nothing. Facecream could read the confusion on his face. Am I not worthy? Am I being tested?

Finally, at around nine thirty, her name – Mukti – was called.

A senior devotee with a shaven head and a ponytail led her across the grand entrance hall, stressing that she was ‘blessed’ to have been granted a private audience.

“I bet if I turned up with a few crores in cash, I’d have as many private meetings as I wanted,” she felt like saying.

What had Professor Pandey’s fifty thousand bought him? she wondered.

The priests pushed open the tall oak doors and she found herself entering a dimly lit chamber with a desk and computer on one side and a long, ornate divan on the other. Behind the divan stood another door, half hidden behind some curtains. It was heavy, made of cast iron, and had two warded locks, she noted. Bookcases stretched along the walls.

In the middle of the room, Maharaj Swami sat in the lotus position with eyes closed, hands resting on his knees and the tips of his index fingers touching his thumb. The Godman was naked from the waist up. He had a rugged physique: hairy chest, powerfully built arms with a long scar on his right forearm. He was not especially handsome – the bushy black beard only half covered pitted cheeks, and his nose was large and crooked – but somehow this added to his powerful presence – a raw sexual energy.

Facecream stepped into the room with her hands clasped. The doors closed behind her and she stood still, not sure what to do next. The soft sigh of the air-conditioning was the only sound. There was no one else in the room.

And then his voice – a deep baritone, commanding yet somehow welcoming – broke the silence.

“Join me, Mukti,” he said without opening his eyes.

She bent down to touch his feet and then knelt on the mat in front of him.

She waited. Seconds passed. And then, without warning, he opened his eyes and Facecream found herself held in his gaze. She flinched ever so slightly, then looked down. She could feel his eyes appraising her.

He said, “I know how deeply you’ve been hurt.”

Facecream knew immediately that he was referring to her scars – that he had been told about them by the lady doctor who had examined her yesterday.

“Men never understand how deeply they are capable of hurting women,” he continued. “Often it is the people closest to us who betray us. The ones in which we place our greatest trust. Tell me, my child, who did this to you?”

Facecream held her silence. She never, ever spoke of her scars – not to herself, not to anyone. And certainly not to a man who would exploit her pain for his own advantage.

She felt cornered. But this sense of vulnerability quickly gave way to anger – mostly at herself for not having seen this coming.

Nonetheless, she managed to stay calm and maintain her composure. She was there to get a look inside his inner sanctum, she reminded herself. And no matter how hard this guru, this fraud, tried to get inside her head, he would never succeed because, unlike the others, she didn’t believe in him.

“Don’t be afraid. I will keep your secret… but if you want to be free of the sadness and fear, you must tell me who did this to you.”

Facecream looked up at him with sad, mournful eyes and told him that she was scared.

“Come, my child,” said Maharaj Swami. He reached for her hands, and when he took them into his own, she made a mock attempt to pull them away. “Let me soothe your pain.”

Girding herself, she shuffled forward, mumbling, “I’m sorry, Swami-ji.”

“It is I who am sorry for you, my child, for you are starved of trust and love. You are strong yet carry so much pain inside you. It’s going to destroy you one day. Your silence has bought you more time, but eventually you must allow yourself to reveal this pain to me so that I can heal it once and for all.”

She met his gaze again for a moment, wondering if he had really understood something about her or if they were just words, and said, “Yes, Swami-ji.”

“In the meantime you should wear this.” He made a fist with his right hand and then opened it to reveal a smooth purple crystal.

Facecream gawped in astonishment. “That’s amazing!” she exclaimed.

“Keep it on your person at all times. After waking up, press it to your forehead. It will help cleanse your ajna chakra. Return to me when you are ready.”

“Thank you, Swami-ji! But how will I know when to return?”

“You will know,” he said. “You must learn to listen to your intuition and not your mind.”

Maharaj Swami closed his eyes again. The audience was over.

Facecream backed out of the chamber with her hands pressed together. In the hall, she found Damayanti waiting with her parents. The mother and father both wanted to hear about her audience. What wisdom had Swami-ji imparted? Did he perform any miracles?

But their daughter was sullen. And when the senior devotee informed them that Swami-ji had asked to see her on her own, she avoided eye contact with Facecream.

“You’re not joining her?” Puri’s operative asked the parents.

“If Swami-ji calls us, then we will go to him with open hearts. Today Damayanti has been blessed with a private audience.”

Blankly the young woman walked toward the open doors.