CHAPTER NOTE: The poem recited within this chapter is an 11th Century poem written in Sanskrit by the poet Bilhana. In English it is translated to "Fifty Verses of a Love Thief." I pulled the translation from an Internet site which sourced it as "Bilhana: Black Marigolds translated by E. Powys Mathers (a free interpretation of the Chauraspanchasika), Houghton Mifflin Co., New York, 1919. An authorized text has recently been published in Britain: Black Marigolds and Coloured Stars, by E. Powys Mathers. Anvil Press, London, 2004; copyright © renewed 2004 Margaret Gibson and Lucy L. Painter for the Estate of E. Powys Mathers." Here's the site if you'd like to read more and the legend surrounding it: .
Mr. Dasari was an elderly man with poor eyesight. Not the best of eyewitnesses, Helen Magnus mused.
She sat inside his modest home in the middle of Mysore drinking coffee, a local custom. Not Helen's cup of tea, but when in Rome….
Watson had decided their efforts were best divided. She would accompany Rah to interview Mr. Dasari, while James would remain with Sir Fraser to examine the site of the palace attack and see if Stuart could recollect more details or locate additional witnesses.
A small man with agile, jeweler's hands, Dasari was excited to have guests in is home, particularly guests from the royal palace. But he seemed more interested in entertaining than explaining what he saw the night the tiger/creature/man...whatever it was that was killing in Mysore attacked.
Raghavendra was translating their conversation. So far, Helen had discovered three things: The name of Dasari's deceased wife, the names and occupations of his six children, and the names and occupations of his 13 grandchildren. As kind as the old man was, they were getting nowhere, and Helen was getting hot. She sat at the table with Rah and Dasari fanning herself from the heat, her blonde hair dripping with sweat.
"Rah," Helen said, "I don't mean to be rude, but…what about the murder? Shouldn't you be discussing the night of the murder?"
"Helen," Rah smiled, laying a hand on hers, sending a shiver through her. "There is an order to these things. We will get there in time. It would be rude not to inquire about his family first." He smiled at her.
"Of course, my apologies" she said, and considered it an opportunity to practice her patience.
Forty minutes and several coffees later, Mr. Dasari told his tale and Rah translated.
"It was at the end of Dasara." Rah turned to her. "That is the festival that marks the conquering of the demon god Mahishasura by the Goddess Chamundi," he explained as an aside. Helen nodded.
"I was lying in my bed asleep, happy because of the festival," Rah translated, "I had been fortunate and sold much of my jewelry." Helen saw the old man's face light up at that. "I heard a noise outside my window, like music, a flute, and then a growling of a dog or a cat. I got up to see what it was. I looked through the window and saw a tiger, a white tiger, on the street. He walked by my house into the home of my neighbor, Rahman. I knew it must be a spirit, the demon Mahishasura reborn, angry because of Dasara. I closed my eyes, hoping that I was dreaming and that I would awake. Then I heard screams, horrible sounds, and I knew it was not a dream."
The old man started crying, and Rah put his hand on Mr. Dasari's shoulder. He went on. "I opened my eyes, afraid to look, but when I did, I saw a man walk out of Rahman's home. When I looked at him, he was a spirit, a demon ghost with tiger's eyes. I ran to my bed and closed my own eyes, hoping the tiger ghost would go away and that the demon had not seen me. I was frightened."
Magnus watched as Rah squeezed Dasari's shoulder and spoke softly to him, the old man nodded, wiping his tears. The instinctive nature of the gesture tugged at Helen's heart.
"Rah, can he tell us what the man looked like? Can he describe him?" she asked softly.
Rah turned to Dasari and spoke. The old man replied. "He was naked and tall like a man, but he was white like a demon," Rah translated.
A tall, naked man that looked like a demon. Given how short Mr. Dasari was, his description could account for nearly 99 percent of the male population of Mysore.
"Is there any way he can be more specific? Hair? Eyes? Scars?" Helen probed.
"He's very upset, Helen."
"I understand, Rah. I do. But aside from Sir Fraser, he's the only eyewitness we have to these crimes."
Rah nodded and tried again.
Dasari grew agitated. Rah turned to Magnus. "He says he has told us all he can. It was a spirit man, a white ghost with tiger's eyes." Rah shook his head. "I'm sorry, Helen. But he has made up his mind that what he saw is a demon, and getting him to describe it in any other terms may be impossible."
Helen nodded. "All right, I don't want to upset him any more than we already have. Can you thank him and give him this?" Helen handed Rah a small bag of coins.
Rah thanked Dasari and handed him the 10 silver rupees.
"Thank you," Magnus said in Dasari's native language of Kannada as they were leaving his home. "You have been most helpful."
Dasari bowed and smiled at her. Rah looked at Helen, surprised.
'You pick up languages quickly."
"I tend to have an ear for them."
"I am impressed. Again."
"Again?" She asked.
"At every turn you have impressed me, Helen Magnus," Rah said, his golden eyes locking with hers. Helen was the first to look away, slightly embarrassed. The moment left her flustered. Raghavendra Rao was an interesting man. An very interesting man indeed.
They spent the rest of the week in and around Mysore examining crime scenes, looking for witnesses, and finding absolutely nothing. Most of the attacks had taken place months ago, so tracks, if there had been any, were gone. And the bodies of the victims had already been disposed of since Hindus cremate their dead, a final act of purification to free the soul from its attachment to the body. Consequently, Magnus and Watson had no bodies, no evidence, only two witnesses, and little if anything to report to the Maharaja and his regent.
"Let's go over it again," Watson said, as they sat in their adjoining sitting room, sipping English tea before bed.
"Go over what, James?" Helen asked, exasperated. "All we have is a white tiger with human eyes and a human man with tiger eyes. I agree that something abnormal seems to be going on here, a were-creature of some kind perhaps, but aside from those facts we have little else to go on."
"And music," Watson reminded her. "Both Mr. Dasari and Stuart distinctly remembered hearing music just before the attacks."
"True, but neither one could tell us the melody."
"But they did agree on the instrument, a flute, a venu to be precise."
"Yes, a bamboo flute which is present everywhere in Southern India."
"Helen, you are being less than optimistic."
Magnus sighed. "I know, James. My apologies. I'm just tired. Frustrated and tired"
"What we really need is another murder." Watson said, starring at his notes and chewing on his pipe.
"Really, James. How horrid!"
He looked up at her. "Horrid, Helen, but true. At least then we would have evidence to examine."
She couldn't dispute his logic. Another murder would be…helpful, she had to admit.
"Well, should such occur, please wake me. Until then, I'm going to sleep and let my subconscious mind muse on the little we do have since my conscious mind seems to be doing neither of us any good tonight."
"Sweet dreams, my dear."
"Goodnight, James."
Helen couldn't sleep.
After two hours of laying awake achieving neither rest nor revelation, she rose from her bed, grabbed her shawl (more out of sense of decorum than necessity) and walked out onto her balcony.
The night was clear and warm. The moon shone brightly over the palace gardens and cast a sensuous shadow over the tree-covered hills beyond. She could smell the sweet scent of jasmine rising from the flowers below lazily drifting on the soft, Indian breeze. She closed her eyes and inhaled. The sound of a flute, quiet at first, rose up to greet her. She leaned forward to see where the melody was coming from, her long blonde curls falling over her eyes, and saw Rah, seated on a bench near a fountain. His turban was removed. His thick brown hair gently lifted with the breeze, his golden eyes closed as he concentrated on the song. It was a sad, heart- wrenching melody. Helen wasn't a woman easily prone to tears, but the song made her eyes glisten.
"Come down," she heard in a whispered shout. The music had stopped, and Rah was smiling up at her from the terrace below, motioning her to come down to the gardens.
There were a million reasons why she shouldn't, two of the most important being that Rah was a single, Indian man, and she was a single, British, woman. But Helen Magnus had never been one for convention.
Five minutes later she was in the garden seated next to Rah listening to him play a much happier tune. It was a venu he played. A bamboo, Indian flute. The same kind that had been heard before the attacks, Helen thought. But as she herself had told Watson, such flutes were ubiquitous in Southern India. It meant nothing. But she noted it none the less. She would mention it to James in the morning, she promised herself. But tonight, tonight she would simply enjoy.
"You play beautifully, Rah. Where did you learn?" she asked, when he finished another song.
"My father and his father. I come from a family of musicians."
"And poets, Sir Fraser said, though I've yet to hear you recite any," Helen teased him.
"I would have thought a doctor such as you would have little time for poetry," Rah teased back.
"You would think wrong," she told him.
" Hmm…" he said, considering. "All right, then." He set his flute down and looked at her, golden brown eyes shimmering in the moonlight and began reciting a poem.
Even now
My thought is all of this gold-tinted king's daughter
With garlands tissue and golden buds,
Smoke tangles of her hair, and sleeping or waking
Feet trembling in love, full of pale languor;
My thought is clinging as to a lost learning
Slipped down out of the minds of men,
Laboring to bring her back into my soul.
Even now
If my girl with lotus eyes came to me again
Weary with the dear weight of young love,
Again I would give her to these starved twins of arms
And from her mouth drink down the heavy wine,
As a reeling pirate bee in fluttered ease
Steals up the honey from the nenuphar.
Even now
The stainless fair appearance of the moon
Rolls her gold beauty over an autumn sky
And the stiff anchorite forgets to pray;
How much the sooner I, if her wild mouth
Tasting of the taste of manna came to mine
And kept my soul at balance above a kiss.
Rah finished. The two sat in silence for a time, the warm night air moving around them like an unanswered question.
"Bilhana, Verses of a Love Thief," Helen finally said, her voice hoarse and low. She was finding it difficult to breath evenly. "If I recall correctly, that is a very old poem."
"It was written in Sanskrit nearly 1,000 years ago. Again, you impress me, Helen." Rah said softly, his golden eyes fixated on her blue ones. His hand moved to hold hers. She let him.
"And yet, curiously, the words are as stirring today as they were so long ago, don't you agree?" Helen asked, swallowing hard. Her eyes darted from his golden brown eyes to his lips and back again.
"I do," he said, and lifted his hand to stroke her cheek. Helen closed her eyes and shivered.
"The story of the love thief, does it end happily?" she asked him, eyes closed, whispering, her heart racing now.
He moved closer to her. Their thighs were touching through the thin cotton of his trousers, her gown.
"It depends upon the poet who tells it," he answered, his voice an answering whisper. "I have always thought that with such words he must have found his love. Wouldn't you agree?" His eyes scanned her face. He moved one hand to her waist, the other to her hair. His lips hovered over hers.
Helen opened her eyes and nodded. "Yes, yes I would."
They leaned into each other, their lips meeting for the first time. It started gently, new and curious. But Helen raised her hands to Rah's face and deepened the kiss. He tasted of Indian coffee and warm summers. The air was full of sweet Jasmine perfume, and Helen let herself become lost in it.
After a time they broke apart, silent and breathless. Rah reached out for Helen's hands and held them tightly.
"Helen," he said softly, their foreheads touching. "There's something I would like to show you. To tell you about my family and myself," he said, lightly trailing a finger across her cheek. "Would you come with me tomorrow to the Temple of Chamundi?"
She laid a hand to his face. He was so warm, so vibrant. "Of course," she answered him, smiling.
She could feel the heat rising inside her. Rah moved to begin the kiss again when suddenly a scream erupted from across the palace lawn.
Helen shot up, looking across the garden. "Rah?"
"I heard it. But where?"
As if in response, the scream repeated, this time in concert with a roar. Rah ran toward the sound. "Rah, no!" Helen yelled, but he was already gone.
She lifted her gown and ran as fast as she could to her room to grab her pistol. She could hear shouting in the palace, guards running across the tiled halls. A shot was fired. She burst into her room, grabbed her gun from the drawer, and moved cautiously to the window. Holding the weapon in front of her, she stepped outside the balcony and scanned the gardens. Across the lawn she saw a figure running. A naked man running toward the woods. She aimed to fire when he turned toward her, his golden tiger eyes gleaming in the moonlight. She pulled up and fired the shot into the air.
The sky was clear. The moon shone brightly over the palace gardens. There was no chance of a mistake.
It was Rah.
