THE STERADIAN TRAIL: BOOK #0 OF THE INFINITY CYCLE (5 page)

8

H
is throat sore and the hollows of his gastric apparatus raging like an inferno, Lakshman picked up the phone. He was in no mood to talk to anyone but talking was a lot easier than the alternative, i.e. listening to Urmila at this time of the day.

‘Hello?’

‘Hi Lax, this is Joshua.’

Lakshman was rendered speechless for a moment. His friendship with Joshua went back over twenty-five years, to the time they were both grad students at Georgia Tech, and he couldn’t remember Joshua once breaching etiquette, calling so late in the night. ‘Hello Josh!’ he said once he found his voice. ‘I thought you must be at the airport now, going through security check.’

‘No, not quite. I’m back in the hotel now. Had to change my plans at the last minute. Something came up.’

‘Anything serious?’

‘Yeah . . . I have a situation . . . and need a favour from you.’

‘Come on, there’re no favours between us, Josh. What do you want me to do?’

‘I’m trying to trace a guy named Jeffrey Williams. It seems like a J. William or J. Williams was staying at the Oceanic. I’d like to check if it’s the same guy.’

‘Why don’t you just call up the front desk and ask them?’

‘No, the thing is, it’s a little . . . sensitive. I don’t want anyone thinking I’m snooping around – it’s a long story; I’ll tell you later. But suffice to say, that’s what is still keeping me here.’

Lakshman didn’t feel like probing further, in part because it was so late in the night but more because the bitterness in his mouth and burning sensation in his throat stifled his curiosity. ‘Okay, what do you want me to do exactly?’ he asked.

‘Just call up the front desk and ask them to connect you to J. Williams. If they put you through, just hang up; you don’t need to talk to him. He’s not my man.’

‘Got it,’ said Lakshman. ‘I’ll call them now and call you right back.’

‘If it’s all the same to you, why don’t I call you back myself, say, in five minutes? I don’t want you calling the front desk repeatedly like a crank caller and alarming them.’

‘All right.’

‘Thanks for doing this, Lax.’

‘No problem, Josh.’

Lakshman hung up. He helped himself to a little water and then dialled the Oceanic.

‘Can you connect me to Mr Williams, please?’

‘Do you know his room number?’

‘No.’

Lakshman could hear the muted clattering of keys.

‘May I have the full name, sir?’ the operator asked after a short pause.

‘Jeffrey Williams.’

‘He has checked out, sir.’

‘Checked out? Really?’

‘Yes sir. You want to reach the same person who came for the IIT conference, right?’

Lakshman didn’t know what to say. He mumbled, ‘Yeah,’ and waited for the operator.

‘He checked out of the hotel a few days after the conference, sir. I’m sorry.’

‘Okay. No problem. Thank you.’

Lakshman relayed the information to Joshua when he called after a few minutes.

‘Are you saying Jeffrey Williams came to attend the research conference at your campus?’ Joshua said incredulously.

‘Yeah, that’s what the operator seemed to be saying,’ Lakshman said.

‘You mean the same conference you organized and invited me to but I couldn’t make it? Are you sure?’

‘As much as I can be. No other conference was held on campus in the last few months, that much I’m sure of,’ Lakshman said. ‘We had everyone stay at the Oceanic because it’s not too far from the campus and they gave us the best deal on rooms.’

‘Do you remember meeting or seeing him, how he looked?’

‘No Josh, there were hundreds of participants at the conference – I don’t remember meeting or seeing him in particular.’

There was only a moment’s pause before Joshua spoke. But it seemed to have effected a marked change in his manner. He was breathing more heavily and his voice was intense with excitement. ‘Could you find out what exactly he was up to at the conference and get back to me? I’d like to know things like when he came, what he did, did he present any paper, what was it about, whether it’s available somewhere . . . as much detail as you can gather. Even little things that may seem unimportant. Could you dig around and get back to me?’

‘Josh,’ Lakshman sighed, ‘do you know what time it is now?’

‘Sorry, Lax,’ Joshua said. ‘I didn’t mean you have to do it right now. Could you do it tomorrow? . . . Tomorrow morning? . . . First thing tomorrow morning?’

‘Sure, shouldn’t be a problem.’

‘I also need to know what else he was up to in the city – where he went, what he did, stuff like that.’

‘I’m not sure how I can help you there,’ said Lakshman.

There was a disappointed pause from Joshua’s end.

‘But we may be able to think of some way,’ Lakshman said. ‘First, tell me this. How do you even know that this guy was here?’

Joshua told Lakshman about the placard in the boot of the car.

‘Then you have an opening right there,’ said Lakshman.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Get hold of that driver and ask him to do some digging for you. Of course it’ll cost you a little, but it may be worth it. Who knows, he may come up with something.’

‘Not a bad idea, Lax,’ Joshua said. ‘Not bad at all.’

‘If you bring the fellow over to the campus tomorrow, I can talk to him in Tamil and tell him what to do.’

‘This fellow speaks decent English so I should probably be able to talk to him myself. But in case I have trouble convincing him, you can turn on your charm for me.’

‘I don’t think there’ll be any need for that. These guys are so poorly paid they can’t afford to turn you down,’ said Lakshman. ‘But you haven’t told me what all this all about. There’s an old saying in Tamil about getting dropped into a jungle with a blindfold on. That’s exactly how I feel right now. Utterly clueless.’

‘It’s all a long story, Lax. Can’t go over it on the phone,’ Joshua said. ‘We need to sit down some place quiet for a couple of hours. Why don’t we meet tomorrow sometime?’

‘All right.’

‘Thanks, Lax. Thanks for everything,’ Joshua said. ‘I won’t detain you any longer. I’ll let you catch up on your beauty sleep. Please apologize to Urmila for me for disturbing you folks so late in the night. But this is an emergency and you’re the only person I could turn to for help in this country.’

‘No problem, Josh.’

Joshua hung up after wishing him good night. Lakshman mounted the receiver back on the cradle, switched off the lights and sprawled out on the spare bed in his reading room, wondering what lay in store for him in the morning.

9

J
oshua was no stranger to India, a backpacker on his maiden visit enjoying his first bout of Delhi belly. He was born with a robust immuno-digestive system, in India, in Cochin, and spent a couple of years there as an infant before migrating to Israel with his parents. He did not remember those days in Cochin but he harboured a certain curiosity and interest about his country of birth. His parents, both refugees from Europe, had found a safe-haven in India and had always remembered the years they spent there with a certain fondness and affection.

Joshua grew up hoping to visit the country one day and he got his first chance in the Seventies when Lakshman invited him to his colourful wedding in Trichy. He began visiting the country more often from the Eighties, on consulting assignments or for the odd academic conference. With the advent of the IT boom in the Nineties, Indian software firms started picking his brain to speed up their snailish crawl up the value chain and his trips to India grew even more frequent. He was on one such assignment this time after taking a six-week leave of absence from MIT. It was his longest sojourn in the county so far and as much as he enjoyed it, he was
hankering to go back home. He would have been back in Boston by now if he hadn’t decided to take a detour to meet up with Lakshman. Wondering whether he had done the right thing making a pit stop in Madras, he wandered down to the lobby to look for Durai in case he was still there.

But Durai had gone home after a long day and so Joshua did the next best thing: he made a booking for a car for the whole day tomorrow. He insisted on having Durai as his driver and asked the front desk to send the fellow to his suite when he clocked in in the morning.

By the time Joshua returned to his suite, a frantic message was waiting for him from Becky. He called back and had a long chat with her to calm her down and discuss their plan of action. He managed to smooth her feathers and soothe her nerves with assuring words but his own were ruffled and frazzled under strain. He kept tossing in bed for a long time and it was close to daybreak before he could shake his mind free of thought and fall sleep.

He woke up with a start wondering if the muffled ring he seemed to have heard was coming from the telephone or the doorbell. Actually, he was in such a funk he wasn’t even sure if it was something from his dreams or for real. Dragging himself up a little, he propped himself against the headboard and looked bleary-eyed at the telephone.

The little red light flashing, the phone sprang to life.

He picked up the receiver and helloed.

‘Hello sir, good morning. This is driver Durai, sir.’

‘Yeah?’ Joshua slurred uncharacteristically. Deprived of his full forty winks, he was still in a daze.

‘The manager said you have asked me to come at ten o’clock, sir.’

‘Oh hi. Yeah, I did ask them to send you. Is it ten o’clock already? . . . Gosh.’ He looked at the clock, but he couldn’t read the time. The red digital display looked blurred, like a traffic light on a foggy day. He fumbled for his glasses on the bedside table.

‘The time is 10:15, sir,’ Durai said. He had prudently decided to give Joshua a ring before knocking on the door. ‘If you’re still resting I can call you after one hour, sir.’

‘No, can’t wait till then,’ Joshua said, buzzing back to life, remembering that one hour in India often stretched much beyond sixty minutes. ‘Could you see me in my suite in half hour?’

‘Yes sir.’

With a sudden onrush of energy, Joshua bounced off the bed and made for the bathroom.

By the time Durai rang the doorbell, Joshua had not only brushed and shaved and showered, he’d also made himself a cup of coffee, the mere aroma of which was enough to boost his low spirits. He was sipping his coffee and brooding over his next move when Durai buzzed in.

‘Good morning, sir,’ said Durai, smiling pleasantly as Joshua opened the door.

‘Good morning. Come on in,’ Joshua said.

Durai let the door close behind him and stood by it.

‘Come on in,’ Joshua said again, inviting him into the suite.

Hesitantly, Durai stepped forward.

‘Would you like to have some coffee?’ Joshua asked.

Durai looked somewhat taken aback. Clearly he wasn’t used to being offered coffee by a guest. ‘No sir. Thank you,’ Durai said. ‘I just had it with my morning
tiffin.’

‘Tiffin, it’s such a quaint word,’ Joshua said and sank into a chair.

Durai looked on, puzzled.

‘The reason I sent for you is . . . I needed to ask you a favour,’ Joshua said and eyed Durai for his reaction.

Durai did not reckon until that moment that his gratuity last night was not just a windfall but also included a down payment for his future services. Not that it was a bad thing. His domestic economic engine had an evil habit of sputtering from time to time and he was on a perpetual lookout for ways and means to lubricate it. His face lit up and he said, ‘What should I do, sir?’

‘Remember the placard in your boot yesterday?’

‘Yes sir, I remember. William something.’

‘Yeah, J. Williams actually. Jeffrey Williams,’ Joshua said. ‘I need to know a few things about him. . . . When did he arrive here? How long did he stay? What did he do? Where all did he go? . . . Any information would be helpful.’

Durai stood his ground without saying anything.

‘Perhaps you can talk to the other drivers who used to take him around.’

‘I was also thinking of the same thing, sir, how to do it,’ Durai said.

‘Oh . . . okay.’

‘Should not be a problem, sir. But talking to all the drivers will take time. Only some are on duty now, waiting in the parking lot. Others have gone out with guests and some are off duty, sir.’

‘I understand. Maybe you could first talk to the drivers you can find now. You can talk to the others later. I’ve booked your car all day today, so no one should bother you.’

‘Yes sir, I will do that,’ Durai said. ‘When should I come and report to you?’

‘Anytime this afternoon. Why don’t you look for me as soon as you have some information? I should be downstairs somewhere if I’m not in the suite. Just look around the bar or the pool.’

‘Okay sir.’

‘But be careful. I don’t want anyone getting ideas that you’re doing this for me. Just make it look as if you’re asking out of your own curiosity.’

Durai wasn’t quite expecting a senior professor from America to launch a secret investigation of some kind all of a sudden. But what astonished him even more was that Joshua would repose enough faith in him to recruit him into the hunting party and send him off like a sniffer-dog on a scent trail. It sent an electric shiver down his spine. ‘Yes sir, I know. I’ll be careful,’ he said, tingling with excitement, and made for the door without further ado.

As soon as the door swung shut behind Durai, Joshua thumbed through his pocketbook and picked up the phone. He now had his other teammate to rally.

10

L
akshman got up in the morning in a foul mood which only turned stinkier as the day progressed. His neighbour Rishi’s words kept echoing in his head and pricking him with no respite.

Lakshman had woken up in two minds about going for his long morning walk in the stadium, a habit he was getting regular at after turning fifty. Though he had risen late, he had time as the semester was over and he didn’t have a lecture to rush to at eight o’clock. He decided to do at least a couple of rounds in the stadium to clear his head and perk himself up a bit. He was well on track to meeting his twin goals when he made the tactical error of catching up with Rishi Basavanna.

Rishi, a psychology professor who believed in a sound body as well as sound mind, was on his way out of the stadium after his morning routine when Lakshman hollered after him. Neighbours need not necessarily make great friends – often they end up otherwise – but not only did Rishi and Lakshman hit it off well, their families too had been tight for many years. Lakshman had been busy with Joshua over the last two days and hadn’t seen much of Rishi, and so decided to say hello when he saw him.

After a brief chat about his unavailability over the last few days and other odds and ends, Rishi asked Lakshman, ‘So how was the masala milk last night?’

It took Lakshman like a punch on his aquiline nose and he stood gaping at his neighbour who stood smiling mischievously in his tracksuit and training shoes. How the hell did he know? Was he a psychologist or a mentalist?

‘I hear there’s a lot of masala milk flowing in this campus these days, but didn’t know you too would fall for it, Professor Lakshman,’ Rishi said. ‘On the face of it, people claim it’s good for your stomach but in reality it could end up otherwise. So watch out.’

Rishi did not always discuss office politics openly with Lakshman. He sometimes took recourse to double entendres to make his point. Having satisfactorily done so this morning, he said, ‘Have a nice day,’ and trotted off for the house, swinging his arms smartly.

Lakshman could no longer focus on his exercise after that. Though he did two more laps around the stadium, his heart was no longer in it and his stride, breath and swinging arms were all out of whack with each other.

Lakshman wasn’t even sure how much Rishi knew or what he meant, but his words stung him and made him uneasy. Why did they have to choose Pomonia of all people? Why did they have to crown a crook in the first place? And why did they have to pick the Institute of all places? And worst of all, why did they have to get him involved in the dirty job?

Lakshman was not so naïve as to not understand the symbiotic nexus between politics and business. He knew very well that without such mutual back-scratching mechanisms, Pomonia would not have been able to walk scot-free with hundreds of crores of rupees in unpaid loans and dozens of cases of tax evasion and other corporate malpractices perpetually pending in the courts. But the Institute always commanded a pride of place and did not figure in the dynamics between money and power – until now. It was now distressingly clear to Lakshman that one should never underestimate the menace of the political menagerie, which, like the well-wooded campus, was seldom starved of maniacal monkeys – kapis – on the prowl; it was not without reason that the last time an Indian university boasted a Nobel laureate on its faculty was when the British were ruling the country. Having successfully wreaked havoc at the universities they were turning their attention to the Institutes now. And this, more than anything else, was what caused Lakshman so much pain. That he too was becoming a pawn in their game made him squirm in agonizing shame.

As always, all the Supreme Being said to Lakshman was, ‘Please do the needful,’ letting him work out the details himself.

Lakshman’s head went for a whirl when he tried to form a mental picture of the logistics involved. It was well into December already and his mandate was to complete the function by the end of January. Just identifying a suitable date was a mammoth task in itself. First there were the schedule clashes between all the stakeholders to resolve. Then the conflict with the Pongal holidays and the annual culfest in January. Once the date was fixed, all parties had to be invited, especially students. Students rarely took any interest in such cosmetic non-events on campus. They had to be lured somehow so there was some clapping and cheering during the ceremony. Without a cheering squad in the stands, the function would have a very solemn, funereal aura to it and a colourful personality like Pomonia would surely take umbrage. The media too had to be invited in advance and photo-ops arranged, for nothing kills an event like poor press coverage. The one hundred and seventy three members of the Senate had to be informed and their gowns properly laundered. They had to be called in for rehearsal to practise roaring ‘yea’, thrice in chorus, when the question was popped whether they, by the powers vested in them as the members of the august body, approved of the awarding of the honorary degree to the candidate in question. The very thought of senior professors turning into a bunch of buffoons for Pomonia twisted Lakshman’s stomach. So though he knew preparations for the ceremony ought to be on top of his list of priorities, he could not bring himself to taking it up. Instead he decided to get cracking on Joshua’s business the first thing.

Lakshman was marching up to his office with a frown rippling his forehead, mulling his plan of action, when he noticed a motley crowd of students and staff hanging about the corridor. When he went closer he could see that they were huddled in two clusters, one near the computer lab and the other near his office, talking in whispers as if outside a house in mourning. Even that turned mute when they saw Lakshman approaching.

Lakshman paused by the lab and asked no one in particular, ‘What happened?’

They looked at each other but no one seemed willing to say anything. Lakshman’s heart started beating faster. Something was definitely wrong somewhere.

The lab administrator Mahendran who’d been waiting in front of Lakshman’s office saw him arrive and came rushing.

‘Mahendran, what happened?’ Lakshman asked.

‘Bad news, sir. Please come and see for yourself. We have all been waiting for you.’ His diminutive form energetically cleaved through the crowd and led Lakshman into the lab.