The Empty Chair (32 page)

Wow—we're nearly at the end. I think all in all it's been a good experience. (I hope it has, for you!) Just to puke everything out . . . that doesn't sound so wonderful though, huh? But you know I think it really
does
help put things in order. I mean, not that there was a dire
need.
At least I don't think there was. Who knows. So often these tremendous—
things
happen in one's life, and one never stops to take their measure or look at patterns—you know, ‘the figure in the carpet.' Anyway, I just wanted to thank you, Bruce, for being such a good listener and for being so patient with my silly tangents . . .

Now of course I wasn't there for this last part I'm going to tell you so when I speak of things only Kura could have been privy to—his direct experience—I'll be channeling from
his
diaries. He bequeathed me the lot; I've been cribbing from them for much of what we've already covered. Details were taken from a notebook he kept in the last six months of his life so I guess I'll be paraphrasing more than usual.

In the moment he ran from the cave, Kura was convinced that his former teacher was stark raving mad. And yet by the time we arrived at the plush sanctuary of our Delhi hotel, he found himself in the grip of a converse
idée fixe
: What if the American was sober as a judge? Could it be that he was in the exaltedly cockamamie tradition of those legendary sadhus who attained “crazy wisdom”? Like the saints
of Mahamudra who appeared as drunks and village idiots, so might the Hermit prance about his cave talking to enlightened furniture. It was a sliver in Kura's foot that had to come out.

The entourage began its return to the village immediately after leaving me at the airport. There was no mention in his journal of any sherpa-led procession up the foothills. Still, I laughed (and my heart broke for the 4,000th time) as I pictured him with deflated hair in his fancy suit, creased and soiled by flop sweat, balancing atop a burro—stubborn mules all!—an exhausted Quixote tilting against Eternity.

As they reached the meadow, he became seized by that awful ambivalence endemic to those wounded by love. One moment, he was enthralled by the possibility that the American had annihilated the Self and ascended Mount Sumeru; the next, he gloated bitterly at the prospect of the man having lost his mind.

By the time he approached the cave he was numb . . .

He called out and received no answer. He walked to the entrance and raised his voice in greeting. He paused before moving a few feet inside the doorless door.

And there he stood, letting his eyes adjust, as before.

The elder greeted him with undimmed ardor, though his easy smile was at odds with what he soon disclosed.

“You must tell me something,” Kura beseeched, without so much as a hello. “You must tell me
now
.”

“Certainly! Yes! Of course!” he replied. The haunted look in the eye of his importunate visitor was plain to see.

“The Hermit—the American—
that man who's lived in the cave all these years . . .
you know him well, is that correct? He said that when he came here, you were the first person he met, and you showed him—what I mean is, that you
must
know him rather well . . .”

The smile on the elder's face was stuck; his jaw made involuntary movements, as if words were being roughly incubated.

“I went to see him just now at the cave but he wasn't there! Look: I need you to—I
want
you . . . I'd be very
appreciative
if you'd give me your opinion about something.
If you'd clear something up.
It's rather
urgent . . .
or seems to have become so, anyway. [
This last said more to himself
.] You
must
weigh your words carefully! I say this, because . . .
because my life may depend on it.
” He looked warily toward the ground, as if the abyss his teacher once described was soon to crack open the earth where they stood. “
Is this man—
this American
saint
, as you call him—is he—well, is he in his
right mind
? The question being: do you have
any
reason whatsoever
to believe he is a lunatic? Senile? Sir! You strike me as a man with a level head, and a fair judge of others . . . so much so, I'd think twice before asking you for a similar ruling on myself! But sir,
if you will
—I beg of you to answer my question with as much honesty and forthrightness as you can bring to bear.” A pause. “I have come to ask:
Is he insane?
”

“Yes, yes, yes!” shouted the elder in jubilation. “Without equivocation!” His smile became most natural again as it gave birth to a litter of words, the entire face assuming an expression of “all-consuming love.” (Kura's written phrase, not mine.) “The Hermit of Dashir Cave was the purest, most formidable of all the
rishis
God in His unfathomable grace has ever privileged me to honor with prayer. My friend, I have brushed up against holy men for some 50-odd years! You ask if he was in his right mind. The simplest answer I can give is that he was
beyond all notion of sanity or madness
,
and exists
14
far outside Time. When he came to our modest village to ask for a place he might lay his head, I could do nothing but rejoice!
In my greed, I took his arrival as an augur of great tidings—which it was!—a celestial sign that our humble community might
benefit
from his presence. And we did,
greatly
so. Many miracles happened while he was among us, miracles I shall never attempt to describe, at the risk of becoming conceited or even idolatrous. (There is also the fear that by giving them voice, they may come undone.) Kind friend and guest, your question has flooded me with memories . . . and unspeakable sadness as well. But I cannot afford those luxuries at this time. For now I must oversee his burial in the sky.”

The husband and wife seesawed—as he rose to leave (without adieu), she gently fell, proffering lentils. But the soliloquy rendered Kura dumb; famished as he was, he couldn't touch the bowl. “Burial in the sky”
had been plainly spoken, yet eluded comprehension. When Kura finally gathered enough wits to ask, the wife confirmed that indeed the Hermit was dead.

A whole set of new emotions washed over him, if they were emotions at all. He felt surreal, bungling, disjointed.

“My husband was the last to see him. He stopped by the cave with a basket of food I'd prepared for the three of you—we had no idea your visit would be so short! You and your wife had only just left; the Hermit invited him in and began to speak . . . not at all the norm. Rarely did the holy man
chatterbox.
He preferred to meditate while his guests, mostly villagers of course, shared their hopes and loves, dreams and fears. He never gave advice nor was it solicited. Talking to him was its own reward, often resulting in great benefit. When my husband returned, he informed me of your departure and said that he'd spent a long time with the guru, just listening. I asked what was discussed but he was reticent to divulge, which wasn't like him at
all
. You've seen how garrulous he can be—my husband positively delights in chatterboxing! The only thing he divulged was that the Hermit spoke of you in a most affectionate and
animated
way,
almost breathless, as if ‘running out of time'—those were the precise words my husband used. And that he gave no indication whatsoever of feeling ill, to the contrary! My husband said that his spirit blazed brighter than ever.”

At first blush, the news was more than Kura could bear. He'd been left behind by the American before, and now it had happened all over again!
This
time, though, came the cruelest twist.
This
time, the old man tweaked Kura's nose before rubbing it in shit. He sprung to his feet, ignoring her attempts to restrain him.
No!
He
would
not stay for the freakin' burial in the sky, whatever
that
was—he just wanted
out
, to put as many miles between him and that ogre as humanly possible. As he power-walked down those wretched foothills—those glorified mounds of dirt he'd grown to fear and detest—a raw anger displaced the spurious optimism of the last handful of hours. In his fury, a hundred yards or so down the path, he almost knocked a small boy off the road. It was the elder's grandson, bent under the weight of the burden that was strapped to his back.

“What have you there?”

The frightened boy held his ground.

“I said,
what do you have there?
”

In high dudgeon, Kura brutally spun the child around. Recognizing the cargo at once, he was stung afresh—it was the chair from the cave.

“What do you mean to do with that?”

“My grandfather told me to bring it to the school.”

“Give it to me!” he commanded.

“But my grandfather said that the Hermit—”

“Devil take the Hermit!” Kura shouted. “I said give it here! Your grandfather promised it to me!” He puffed up with righteous temerity—the lie felt good and right and true. He undid the rope and pathetically wrenched the chair from the boy's back in a brief tug-of-war. “I've
earned
this damned chair,” said Kura, drawing it to his chest in full possession then handing it off to the closest sherpa.
“Now that's the end of it!”

The chair's unlikely journey ended in the Paris office, where Kura took a few mugshots with his old Land Camera.

Then he wrapped it in a mover's blanket, flung it in the closet and resolved never to see it again.

In the ensuing year, he went through the motions. He became depressed, with fleeting thoughts of suicide. They put him on lithium and Prozac—this, that and the other. Sometimes he slept on the office couch. He dreamed of the chair on the other side of the wall.

One day an unusual-looking envelope arrived in the company pouch addressed to “Sri. B. Moncrieff,” in an immodest calligraphic hand. No return address. The letter was included in the box of diaries I received a few months after he passed away. I'll give us both a break and read from it directly . . .

Queenie took the correspondence from her coat pocket with pseudo-dramatic flair. Someone poured more wine. She sniffed the glass then tasted, nodding approvingly to the server.

Dusk had fallen. She read to me by the light of a beautiful lantern; the inky message bled through the rice paper, dancing among the woven threads.

“My Dearest Kind Sir/SRI Bela Moncrieff,

“I am earnest in hoping this note does most indeed find you most well! I meant to put pen to pencil many months ago and do ask your kind forgiveness as to complete failure on my behalf in that regard. While my village is a modest one and my duties toward it simple, various pressing concerns have the habit of being horses on the runway. Hereby (and ‘thereby' too for good measure) not long after your leavetaking didst we villagers became unlucky recipients of a mighty monsoon that caused a great deal of mischief—you may be saddened to hear me declare the Dashir Cave is now no more. The threat of the Dengue,
which arrived not long after the waters seceded, thankfully turned out false in its alarum
.
Yet in my heart I must confess to terrible remorse for the delay of this most serious missive. As months passed, the greater became my understanding of the crowning importance its enquoted words would hold for you; as they were uttered by the Hermit himself, who instructed they be conveyed forthwith and straightaway, at all cost. So you see I have no excuse nor have I defence. Again, I humbly ask your forgiveness, dear Sri, adding that sometimes a procrastinated man becomes a means unto himself.

“By the way, if you are wondering how I captured your address (which would mean in fact that you are reading this, and thus providing me with the most supreme of blessings and lasting unction!), it was from the direct intercession of that most loyal and most jolly fellow Quasimodo, who arrived not long after the
jnani
's sky burial bearing the generous gifts that completed your contract with our village, a largess which has continued to make the aggregations of All Souls exceedingly grateful.

“I believe my wife did admit that after your departure I was privileged to spend a few hours in the company of the blesséd Hermit—may his memory forever be sanctified!—a time in which he shared many things pertinent to your life that have remained unbeknownst (a circumstance this note shall attempt to rectify); in fact, he discussed the very things he had planned to share with you in person, if you and your lady friend had not run off. But, all-being
mukta
that he is, the Hermit of Dashir Cave even knew you would return just as you did, to miss his death by mere hours! Alack: such was overwrought and writ by the stars. When you appeared at our door for the
second
time, unaware of his passing, you were most
fired up
and in no state to listen to anything a person might tell—nor was I in any mood to impart what I had so carefully been entrusted to pass on. (In that stage of the game, I had not even told my wife.) My plan was to relay every single one of the intimate profundities the Hermit had donated (to the best of my shabby abilities) over dinner,
immediately after attending the details of his inhumation. When I came home to find you'd again taken a powder, I said to the Missus, ‘This man is like a horse on fire!' I was deflated though not surprised, for the Hermit had just gotten through highlighting his erstwhile student's penchant for the trigger-hair—relayed with a twinkle in his eye, to be sure!—so that
I
became enamored of your willfulness Johnny-on-the-spot as well, which lessened the sting. But barely.