The Ninth Buddha (13 page)

Christopher broke the silence with another question.

“Why did he kill himself?
 
Do you know?”

Cormac shook his head.

“I couldn’t tell you.
 
I think John Carpenter knows, but you can be sure he won’t tell you.
 
I have one or two notions, though.”

“Notions?”

“I think Tsewong had problems.
 
Maybe they were serious, maybe they just seemed that way to Tsewong: I can’t tell you.
 
But problems he undoubtedly had.”
 
The doctor paused briefly, then proceeded.

“For one thing, I don’t think he was a Buddhist.
 
Not any longer, that is.
 
I’d lay money on it that he was a Christian convert.”

Christopher looked at the Irishman in astonishment.

“I don’t understand.
 
He was a Tibetan.
 
There are no Tibetan Christians.
 
He was wearing the robes of a Buddhist monk.
 
And he was dead.
 
How could you tell he was a Christian?”

Cormac fortified himself with the rough whiskey before continuing.

“A couple of things.
 
I had the body taken up to the hospital for examination.
 
When I undressed him, I wanted to be sure I had all the wee bits and pieces, because I knew they’d have to be handed over to old Norbhu, along with the body.
 
That was when I found the letter and the note, in his pouch with the prayer-book, the amulet and all the rest.
 
But guess what he was wearing round his neck, well tucked away inside his clothes.
 
A cross, Mr.
 
Wylam.
 
A wee, silver cross.
 
I’ve still got it hidden away in my desk at home.

I’ll show it to you if you like.”

“Weren’t there questions about the suicide?”

“Who would ask?
 
You don’t think I’d let on to Norbhu Dzasa that one of his lamas did himself in, do you?
 
I told you I wrote the death certificate me self
 
Plenty of people die of exposure at this time of year.
 
Quite a few of them are Tibetan monks.
 
There were no questions.”

“What about Carpenter?
 
You said you thought he might know why the man killed himself.”

Cormac did not answer right away.
 
When he did, a note of caution had entered his voice.

“Did I now?
 
Yes, I think he must know something, though I can’t prove it.
 
The thing is, the dead man was staying with Carpenter before all this happened.
 
There was some story about a farmer finding Tsewong on the road and bringing him to the Homes the day before he died.
 
That’s probably what you heard yourself.
 
It’s what Carpenter told me, and it’s what I told Frazer.

But it’s a load of baloney.
 
I happen to know that Tsewong was living with Carpenter for at least a week before he killed himself.

Tsewong wasn’t some unfortunate wretch passing through Kalimpong who’d been taken in by the charitable Doctor Carpenter and who just happened to take his own life while on the premises.
 
No, whatever else he came here to do, Tsewong came to Kalimpong to see Carpenter.
 
I’d swear to it.”

“Why should he want to see Carpenter?”

“That’s a good question.
 
I wish I knew the answer to it.
 
I’ve an idea Carpenter had a hand in Tsewong’s conversion.
 
For all we know, the man wasn’t called Tsewong at all, but Gordon or Angus.”

Christopher smiled bleakly.

“Are you sure the man was a convert?
 
Isn’t it possible Carpenter just gave him the cross while he was with him?
 
Perhaps Tsewong didn’t realize the significance of it.”

Cormac looked at Christopher.

“I can see you weren’t brought up in Belfast.
 
I don’t know whether or not Tsewong understood its significance exactly, but I’d be very surprised if John Carpenter gave it to him.
 
Presbyterians aren’t given to wearing crosses, let alone crosses with wee figures of Jesus Christ on them.”

“A crucifix, you mean?”

“The very thing.
 
I fancy Tsewong got hold of the crucifix from another source.
 
But I still think he and Carpenter were involved in some fashion.”

“I don’t see what connection there could be.”

‘ Cormac stood abruptly and stepped across to the window.

Outside, moonlight and clouds had turned the sky to broken lace.

He stood there for a while, watching the patterns of the sky break and

re-form.
 
Sometimes, he thought it would go on forever, and he felt

diminished and afraid.

“What do you think you saw tonight?”
 
he asked, his voice low yet carrying.

“A man of God, maybe?
 
A man at any rate.
 
But John

Carpenter isn’t a man.
 
He’s a mask a series of masks, one inside the other, deeper and deeper until you think you’ll go crazy trying to get to the face underneath.
 
And if you ever did get to the face, you’d be sorry you’d done so.
 
Take my word for it I know.

“For one thing, he’s ambitious.
 
Not like an ordinary man he’s sick with it.
 
He’s turned fifty, and what’s he got to show for himself?
 
Here in Kalimpong, he’s a big man, but that’s like saying he’s made a name for himself collecting stamps or that he’s the Lord Mayor of Limavady.
 
One thing’s for sure he doesn’t want to live out his days in this hole with all these wee heathen shites.

No more does Mrs.
 
Carpenter who is, by the way, made of cast iron and twice as frigid.

“Carpenter knows there’s more, and he knows where he can get it.
 
It’s eating him up inside.
 
It’s been eating him up for twenty, five years and more.
 
If he wants to become the Indian Livingstone, he’ll have to pull off something big, something that’ll get him [ noticed.
 
And round here that means just one thing.”

I He paused and lifted the flask to his lips.
 
The whiskey was { working, dreaming in his veins.

i 91

“What’s that?”
 
asked Christopher.

“Tibet,” answered Cormac.

“Open up Tibet.
 
A mission there would crown anyone’s career.
 
It would even help the Pope make a name for himself.
 
It’s never been done, at least not since some Jesuits tried in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
 
A Presbyterian church in the Forbidden City, overlooking the Potala maybe.
 
Convert the Dalai Lama, tear down the idols, proclaim the land for Christ.
 
Jesus, he could go home in triumph.
 
There’d be a statue to him on the Mound in front of New College. They’d tear down the Scott Monument and put the Carpenter Memorial in its place.
 
Ladies in tweed skirts and sensible underwear would queue up to write the story of his life.
 
A few of them would doubtless lift their skirts and let him tell his own story ‘ “Could it be done?”

“I don’t see why not, if you could find your way through the underwear.”

“I didn’t mean that.
 
Could Carpenter actually open a mission?”

Cormac grunted.

“Are you mad?
 
But that won’t stop the wee bastard trying.
 
He has his contacts, or so he lets on.
 
Before long, there’ll be a British Ambassador in Lhasa.
 
Don’t look so surprised I know a bit about what goes on round here.
 
And the Ambassador will need a chaplain.
 
That would be a start.
 
He’s got it all worked out, believe me.”

“And you think Tsewong was part of this plan?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me.”

Christopher nodded.
 
It sounded plausible.
 
Plausible but harmless. And he was convinced that whatever was going on here was far from harmless.

“Perhaps you’re right,” he said.

“But it sounds innocuous enough to me.
 
Where do I come into this?
 
And my son.
 
He wasn’t kidnapped because of some ecclesiastical plot to open a mission in Lhasa.”

Cormac shrugged.

“I wouldn’t know.
 
I’m not in that business me self
 
Something tells me that would be more in your line.
 
But you can be sure of one thing: if Carpenter’s laying the foundations for a Tibetan mission, it’s costing him plenty.
 
There’s people to buy, influence to attract, men in high places to win over.
 
That sort of thing doesn’t come cheap.
 
And there are other prices too.
 
Concessions.

Quid pro quos.
 
Favours.
 
As you know, Bibles and trade often go hand in hand.
 
And not too far behind trade come the guns.
 
Johnny Carpenter’s in deep, whatever he’s mixed up in.”

The penny I pay is not a copper one.
 
Nor silver nor gold, for that matter..
 
.

“Where does he find the money?
 
If you’re right, he must need a lot of money.
 
I’ve been at the Homes there’s no wealth there.”

Cormac gave Christopher a look so intense it made him flinch.

It was like hatred.

“Isn’t there?”
 
he snapped.
 
Then, abruptly as he had spoken, he took hold of himself.

“I’ve had too much to drink,” he said.

“You’ll have to excuse me.

We’re on dangerous ground, mister.
 
We’d better not go any further until I’m sober and you’ve had a rest.
 
Perhaps we’d best go no further at all.”
 
He took a deep breath before continuing.

“But maybe you’ve a right to know more.
 
Come and see me in the morning.
 
I’m not on duty until tomorrow afternoon.
 
I’ll be in my bungalow they’ll tell you how to find it at the hospital.
 
I’ve some things in my desk I’d like you to see.”

The doctor fell silent and glanced out through the window again.

Someone had lit a fire on the hills.
 
He could just make it out, a tiny, lonely speck in the darkness.

“Jesus,” he said, his voice low, as though he were speaking to himself.

“Sometimes I wonder why we ever came here, why we stay.
 
It’s no place for the likes of you and me: it swallows us up alive and spits us out again.
 
Have you never felt that?
 
As though you were being eaten.
 
As though a tiger had your flesh between his teeth and was chewing you.
 
A carnivore that had developed a taste for human meat.”

He shuddered at his own imagery.
 
He had treated men attacked by tigers.
 
What was left of them.

“What about the letter?”
 
Christopher asked.

“The English letter that was found on Tsewong.
 
Could Carpenter have written it?”

The doctor shook his head.

“He could have, but he didn’t.
 
It wasn’t in his handwriting.
 
It wasn’t in any handwriting I recognized.
 
But I know one thing:

whoever wrote it had been brought up speaking English.
 
Speaking it and writing it.”

“The letter said Tsewong was an emissary.”

“That’s right.”

“For someone called the Dorje Lama.
 
I’ve never heard of such a person.

Have you?”

Cormac did not answer straight away.
 
He watched the fire on the hillside.
 
Someone was out there in the snow, feeding the flames, watching.

“Yes,” he answered, in a voice so quiet Christopher was not sure he had spoken.

“They don’t talk about him often.
 
And never to foreigners.
 
But one of my patients told me a little oh, it was years ago.
 
He’s a sort of legend.
 
There’s a monastery up there somewhere, a secret place. People are frightened of it.
 
And the Dorje Lama is the abbot.
 
There’s been a Dorje Lama for hundreds of years, so they say.”

The doctor turned and faced Christopher.
 
The effects of the whiskey had vanished, to be replaced by a haunted look.

“And Tsewong was his emissary?”
 
Christopher said.

“So the letter said.”

“Do you believe it?”

Cormac hesitated.

“I think,” he said, ‘you’d better see what I have to show you.

Come in the morning.
 
We’ll talk about it then.
 
I’ll tell you

everything I know.”

Christopher woke the next morning with the worst headache he had ever known.
 
He took more of the tablets Cormac had left, but they did little good.
 
Outside the rest-home, the girl had resumed her singing.
 
She sang the same song, as though she knew no other;

but this morning her voice tore like a rusty blade through

Christopher’s head, and he cursed her as he dressed.