G. Killik Klaw - Chapter 6: Delhi

Late that afternoon Ben sat in another bar in another hotel, this
time in Delhi, finally. He was drinking slowly to kill some time and
staring idly over the top of a newspaper with neither the attention
span nor inclination to read it. Every time the door opened he expected
it to be another monk but it never was. They had paid Kirsten's bill
and retrieved her stuff in Lucknow. Anselmo had advised him to leave
and let them handle the police, he had not needed much convincing.
Anselmo had also advised him that the best way to help Kirsten was to
help them, he had declined.

He would help Kirsten alright, but not with them.

When the appointed hour came he finished his drink and left to make a
phone call. Afterwards he walked out for the evening, he had to find a
different place with loud music and people having fun, hotel bars were
getting him down.

Early the following morning Ben stopped the taxi driver a block
short of the address he had been given.

'No hospitals or asylums mate.' His friend had told him. 'But if
it's obscure orders from Bhutan owning property in Delhi you want then
there's only one place it can be.'

The address was a largish house in a quiet street. Ben strolled
passed it and glanced in the windows, he saw two monks but nothing
else. The question was, what was Kirsten going to do? If she had not
been caught she should make it here late morning or early afternoon,
she would have made herself scarce in Lucknow, stayed the night
somewhere and made her way to Delhi this morning.

He continued followed the streets around behind the building, at the
rear there was a large garden surrounded by a seven foot brick wall.
There was however a tree that would allow anyone so minded to scale the
wall. Ben pulled himself up just far enough to see over into the
garden, he saw the back of the house and a woman having breakfast on
the patio in the company of a monk. She was not close enough for Ben to
see any family resemblance but she had dark hair, which was enough. He
looked down to see if there was any way back over the wall from the
other side. He saw Kirsten concealed in the bushes, looking up at
him.

'You're already here.' He said.

'Shush, get down from there.'

Carefully and mindful of anyone watching from the house, he slid
quickly over the wall.

'Not this side you idiot.' She hissed.

'Hello.' He said, once safely down and sure he had not been
noticed.

Kirsten said 'What are you doing?' and turned back to look at the
woman on the patio, not taking her eyes off her for a moment.

'Looking for you.'

'Why?'

'To help.'

'What, like last time.'

'That wasn't...'

'You sold me out.'

'I did not.'

'You led them to me.'

'It wasn't like that.'

'Oh yeah. What was it like?' She was angry but keeping her voice to
a whisper.

'I was only going to talk to you for them, they weren't meant to try
and grab you like that.'

'Oh well that makes it all better.'

'I stopped for a drink after you had gone to bed and this old guy
Anselmo talks to me, he seemed like a nice enough guy.'

'He is.'

'Well then. And you'd hardly told me anything about why they were
chasing you and he makes it out it's all for your own good and he seems
honest.'

'Well he is a monk.'

Ben could not work out if she was agreeing with him or being
sarcastic.

'Well yeah.' He said. 'And anyway what could I do, they knew where
we were, they could have kidnapped you in your sleep if they'd have
wanted. That one rushing at you was a cock up on their part. I mean
just because they're chasing you doesn't necessarily mean they want to
hurt you. You do live with them.'

'That was Peters.' She said,' He's an idiot.'

'Who.'

'The one who tried to grab me.'

Ben wondered if this information was supposed to interest him.

She said 'And now you're here to help me?'

'Someone has got to, you're not well remember.'

As if on queue she shuddered.

'How are you feeling?' He asked. 'You don't look so good.'

'I'll be okay.'

In the last few minutes the colour had drained from her cheeks and
she had started sweating.

'Are you sure?'

'I was fine till I got here, then climbing the wall kind of wore me
out.'

'Well rest a moment.'

'Will you stop fussing.' She said and immediately collapsed.

She was only unconscious for a few seconds and as Ben turned her
over she came round.

'What happened?'

'You passed out for a second there.'

'Oh.' She said, starting to sit up but thinking better of it. 'How
embarrassing.'

You're really sick aren't you.'

She nodded.

'We've got to get you to a doctor.'

At that she sat up. 'No! Not now I've come this far. I've got to see
her, I've just got to Ben. And you have to help me.'

'Lie down.' He said.

'Ben.'

'I'll help but you must rest now. Lie down.'

She moved so she could lie on her stomach and still watch the house.
The woman was still there and so was the monk.

'It's my mother.' Said Kirsten. 'I'm sure of it.'

The woman, Kirsten's mother, was sitting at a table eating
breakfast, a single monk sat next to her drinking tea but not eating.
They looked about as far away from prisoner and guard as it is possible
to be.

Ben said 'Just wait, we'll think of something.'

They waited and watched until after about five minutes the monk
disappeared into the house leaving the woman sitting alone.

'Ben we've got to go.' Said Kirsten. 'We've got to go now.'

She placed a hand on his shoulder and pulled herself upright, he
held it down with his other arm. 'You promise you'll let me take you to
a doctor after.'

'Yes.' She said, hastily pulling herself free.

Together they walked stealthily out of the bushes and onto the lawn
where the woman could see them. Kirsten walking quickly, in front of
Ben.

When the woman saw them she stood up suddenly letting her chair and
teacup fall to the ground. 'Kirsten.' She shouted and started running
towards them.

In a second two monks appeared from the house and chased the woman
onto the lawn. Kirsten also started running to her mother. One of the
monks stopped, withdrew a pistol from his pockets and fired a rapid
string of shots into the woman's back and killed her.

Kirsten screamed and Ben picked her up from behind and ran back the
way they had come carrying her in front of him. At the wall he tried to
lift her over but could not without her cooperation and she was
hysterical.

'Come on.' He shouted and with a roar hauled her onto the wall and
pushed her so that she toppled over the other side.

'Run.' He shouted as he climbed over himself, and again as he was
pulled back.

'Ben!'

'Just run.'

He fought off the monk who had gotten hold of him and jumped on the
other who was scrambling over the wall. He fought with both monks,
holding them back.

'Just run!'

The monk with the pistol struggled free and pointed it at Ben who
froze and let go of the other. The other backed away and looked over
the wall.

'She's gone.'

'Then get after her.'

Kirsten ran in a frenzy without aim or strategy, she ran because it
was the only reaction she had, she ran not from her pursuers but what
they had done, she ran to escape the thing which had already taken
place and she had already seen. The stopped images of her mother
falling as the bullets broke into her back played over and over again
in her head, crowding her and forcing her downwards. In her weakness
she stumbled and fell often but in her panic and rage and fear and
horror she kept on running, forever trying to flee the spectre of her
mother's desperately reaching hand.

She collided with a parked car and fell to the ground, she tried to
pick herself up but the ground slipped away beneath her, just a blur
beyond tear sluiced eyes and the dark tunnel of a receding world. She
did not see who picked her up.

'Ben?'

'No my child.'

Ben had stopped fighting once the monks gave chase to Kirsten, what
would be the point. Both the monk and he were panting and wheezing from
the exertion, Ben sat down in the shade of the tree. The monk stood
with the gun still aimed, his blood still up Ben looked back in
contempt.

Other monks arrived in a cacophony of shouts and confusion.

'Get him out of here.' Said one and he was led back into the house
past the dead body of Kirsten's mother. Blood had soaked the back of
her shirt but seemed to flow no more, she had her face down in the dirt
like she was trying to breathe it. Ben had never seen a dead body
before, there were flies on it already.

'See this.' Said a monk, indicating the dead woman's hand. There was
a knife in it.

The monks bundled him through the house and into a car which
immediately drove him across town to a hotel where he was led through
the lobby and into one of the rooms. The man in the cream suit was
there, the one from Patna station.

He put his hand of the telephone and said 'Hello Mr Carter, please
sit down.'

Ben sat on a wicker chair and waited. The man talked on the phone
for about half an hour to several different people, rarely in English.
Eventually he finished, had a young monk fetch some cold drinks and sat
down opposite Ben. He was European and spoke English with a slight
Spanish accent.

'My name is brother Gallo.'

'You don't look like a monk.'

'It is not obligatory to do so, Mr Carter you must understand that
Mrs Suthan was killed to protect Kirsten.'

'I saw the knife.'

'You say that but do you really believe she would have murdered her
own child? Do you believe that her guards had no other choice? Do you
suspect that had Kirsten known the truth this might not have been
necessary? Does the whole curious circumstance make you suspicious? I
suspect it does.'

Ben said nothing.

'You do not know, Mr Carter, how bent on Kirsten's death the
unfortunate woman had become.'

'The old monk told me, Anselmo.'

'He may well have but you still aided Kirsten.'

'She needed the help, I thought it was wrong to keep her from her
mother.'

'And no doubt you doubted Anselmo's story.'

'A little.'

'But now you believe?'

Ben said nothing.

'Oh dear,' said the monk. 'If we had the time I could show you
recordings of clinical interviews with Mrs Suthan that demonstrate with
terrible clarity just what a danger she posed to her child's life.
Tapes which we will no doubt have to hand over to the authorities very
soon in the inevitable inquest into the shooting. And that is one of
the reason's I need to speak to you Mr Carter.

'Soon I shall have to leave and help smooth this whole mess out, by
the time I am finished I do believe I will have called in every favour
owed me in Delhi and owe several more myself.

'Mr Carter. The matter of a runaway child is easy for the police to
understand , and is quickly resolved. Your involvement on the other
hand, could prove more of a problem. A speedy resolution to this is
essential for Kirsten's health. How ill was she.'

'Pretty bad.' Said Ben. 'I had made her promise to go to a doctors
afterwards.'

'Admirable but a doctor would not have helped, we have to get her
back home as soon as possible. If I keep your name out of this whole
affair can I have your silence.'

'You would lie to the police, a monk?'

'In a matter as important as this our order allows us some leeway,
Kirsten's life could very well be at stake. Do I have your assurance,
and will you remain with us until Kirsten is safe.'

Ben thought before he spoke. 'Very well.'

A young monk ran into the room without knocking.

'It's Kirsten.' He said breathlessly.

'Is she OK?'

'We did not get her.'

'How could you not get her?' Said Gallo.

'She could barely walk.' Said Ben.

'Someone else picked her up first. We tried to reach her but they
had a car and we were on foot. By the time our car came they were
gone.'

'Who?' Said Ben.

Gallo waited.

'It was brother DeMontford.'

Gallo shouted 'Damnit!' and kicked the wicker chair sliding across
the room. Every monk in the room watched silently as he stood,
breathed, and calmed down.

'This speeds things up a little.' He said. 'Mr Carter, will you
return to Bhutan with me?'

'I guess so. Why?'

'Good, we will go as soon as the helicopter is ready.'