Tarquin Hall - The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing

“Tell your boys to keep him in their sights,” instructed the detective. “This laughing professor is involved somehow. Of that much I am certain.”

Tubelight’s phone rang. It was Shashi, reporting that Pandey had left the house and was on his way to the Garden of Five Senses, where he was due to hold his Laughter Memorial for Dr. Jha.

“While he is so occupied, I will take a look round his office at Delhi University. See what all I can turn up,” said the detective.

Puri drove through Civil Lines, where the British East India Company stationed its army before the War of Independence of 1847, to Delhi University. He passed the British Viceregal Lodge Estate with its whitewashed pillars and rose garden, now home to the Faculty of Science, and soon reached the School of Electrical Engineering.

A gaggle of male and female students milled around outside, joking and flirting. The detective made his way up the steps of the building, catching strains of Hindi rap playing on a mobile phone and snippets of current Delhi jargon – “What’s the funda, dude?” “He’s one of those art frat types!” “Nice half-pants!”

Inside, the main corridor was empty save for a couple of students walking toward him. He asked them for Professor Pandey’s office and was directed to the third door on the right.

While he waited for the corridor to empty, he read the notices pinned to the board. One announced the next topic of discussion at the debating society – ‘Can India afford to be an ally of the U.S.?’; another appealed for the ‘person or persons who removed the human skeleton from the biology lab to return it forthwith’.

The detective, whose key chain contained a pick and a set of tension wrenches, had little trouble opening the lock to Professor Pandey’s office.

The room was small but orderly, the shelves crowded with reference books and binders, the in-tray brimming with uncorrected exam papers. Puri opened drawers, searched the filing cabinet and sifted through the rubbish bin.

He then spent a few minutes reading Pandey’s notes for an upcoming lecture on signal processing.

“Signals can be either analog, in which case the signal varies continuously according to the information, or digital, in which case the signal varies according to a series of discrete values representing the information. For analog signals, signal processing may involve the amplification and filtering of audio signals for audio equipment or the modulation and demodulation of signals for telecommunications. For digital signals…”

The detective could feel his eyes glazing over and placed the notes back where he had found them. He sat back in Pandey’s chair and looked up at the photographs on the wall. One had been taken at an early morning Laughing Club session. The professor was standing with head tilted back, hands on hips and stomach pushed out.

Puri cast his eyes over the other pictures: parents, picnics, young nephews looking wide-eyed at the camera.

At the top of the wall hung an old black-and-white picture of nine men standing in front of an Indian satellite. There was a small brass plaque attached to the bottom of the frame. It read: DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS, INSAT IA, 1981.

Puri took it down to get a closer look. A younger Professor Pandey stood near the middle of the group.

The detective recognized the man standing next to him as well. It was Dr. Suresh Jha.

The two men had known each other for much longer than two years.

“Why Pandey told me otherwise?” murmured Puri to himself.

Facecream didn’t wake until long after it was light. She guessed it must have been around nine. Feeling groggy and dull-headed, she lay on the bedroll in the dormitory where she was staying and went over the bizarre events of yesterday in her mind.

She remembered entering the darshan hall along with Puri and Mrs. Duggal and being served a cup of papaya juice by one of the senior devotees. It seemed to her that he had handed her one from the back of the tray, whereas the others had chosen their own.

She’d sat down in front of the stage and Maharaj Swami had entered and been hailed by his adoring followers.

It had been about then that Facecream had started to feel woozy.

At first she’d put it down to all the incense smoke and the heat and noise. But soon her legs had started to feel heavy and her senses had become strangely heightened. The background din of devotional singing and chanting had faded and Maharaj Swami’s words had boomed in her ears. One minute she’d felt chilled to the bone; the next, the temperature in the darshan hall had seemed unbearably hot.

Everything around her with bright colors – the canary yellow kurta of the woman in front of her, the saffron banners hanging on either side of the stage – had started to bleed and pulsate.

She’d realized with alarm that the papaya juice had been laced with some form of hallucinogen. But her fear had quickly given way to a pleasant weightlessness, a sense of blissful detachment. She’d imagined herself six years old again, playing in the front room of her grandfather’s big house in Kathmandu with her old Kumari doll.

Up on the stage, the circle of lights behind Maharaj Swa-mi’s head had begun to spin around faster and faster, until they seemed almost liquid. She’d felt suddenly overcome with emotion, unable to control the tears that had streamed down her face or the impulse to laugh out loud.

But gradually the effects of the hallucinogen had started to wear off. And as Facecream had regained control of her faculties, she’d had the presence of mind to turn events to her advantage.

Her dramatic exclamations and subsequent fainting had fooled even Puri, who had given her a couple of stinging slaps and called for a glass of water.

A crowd had gathered, straining, peering, and then Facecream had started babbling excitedly about how ‘a kind of awesome celestial light’ had ‘like, flooded out of Swami-ji’ and filled her with ‘such warmth and belonging’.

“I could feel this energy pulsing through me. It was like I was actually part of the cosmos.”

Maharaj Swami had invited her up onstage, where he had ‘interpreted’ her vision for his congregation.

“Queenie has been given a taste of the Universal Nectar,” he’d announced. “Through this experience she will come to understand her true potential and comprehend the ultimate reality. Her purpose, like all of your purposes, is to achieve moshka, unity with God.

“God is like the ocean,” he’d continued. “But like raindrops taken up by clouds, you have become separated from Him. For so long you have drifted through the sky. Sometimes feeling light, other times dark and angry. But always aimless, with no purpose. Never happy. Now it is time to complete your journey. It is a long, difficult one with many obstacles. You must be prepared to go through transitions and purify yourself like water falling on the mountain and passing through rock. Those who are lazy and become distracted by worldly things will get trapped in stagnant pools deep beneath the earth. Those who overcome their own egos will join tributaries and eventually great rivers. This way leads back to the all-embracing Ocean where you will experience everlasting love.”

“I had, like, no idea, Swami-ji!” Facecream had gushed. “Thank you! Thank you so much. You’ve opened my eyes!”

The devotional singing and chanting had struck up again. And then Maharaj Swami had made a final pronouncement before bringing the darshan to an end.

“From this day forth,” he’d declared, “you will be known as Mukti. It means ‘salvation’.”

Queenie had been reborn.