Tarquin Hall - The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing

“For this we will check all your marma points,” she explained. “There are one hundred and seven in all, and by examining them we can see what’s ailing you.”

“But I feel, like, absolutely fine,” protested Facecream.

“I’m sure,” replied the doctor with a smile, “but many of us are suffering from all kinds of conditions and don’t realize it. We are here to help. Now kindly undress and put on that smock hanging on the hook.”

“Undress? Like, get naked? No thanks.”

“Come now, there’s nothing to be afraid of. You can go behind that screen if you’d prefer.”

Facecream went silent. She genuinely didn’t want to have to undress. If she did, then the doctor would see the scars on her back. And then there would be questions – questions that pertained to her past that she had no intention of answering. Not for anyone.

“Is anything wrong?”

Puri’s operative tried to think of an excuse for not going through with the examination, but for once she faltered. “It’s just that…”

“Really, there’s nothing to worry about,” interrupted the doctor. “Now, be a good girl and do as I say. There are others waiting after you.”

Facecream slowly took off her clothes, put on the smock and then lay on the examination table.

“There we are. This won’t take long.”

The doctor poked and prodded and made notes on a clipboard. After a few minutes, she asked her patient to turn onto her front. Facecream complied, readying herself with a story about having fallen into a thorn patch at the age of seven. Even after all these years, the scars were prominent; there were four of them, and they ran in parallel lines from her right shoulder down to her left hip. The doctor said nothing about them.

“See, that wasn’t so painful, was it?” she said cheerily at the end of the examination.

Next, blood, urine and saliva samples were taken, and then Facecream was given a questionnaire to fill out. It included 150 multiple-choice questions, mostly pertaining to her relations with others and her perception of herself: “Would you say you are (a) happy; (b) sad; (c) miserable; (d) depressed?”

Facecream found herself answering honestly, curious to know how she would score. But when she returned the completed questionnaire, the doctor gave it only a cursory glance before laying it on her desk and then prescribing a number of Maharaj Swami-branded Ayurvedic ‘medicines’ to help cleanse her system of ‘bile and destructive toxins and help energy flow’.

“What about the test? When do I find out how I scored?”

“That’s not how it works – it’s not like a school examination,” answered the doctor kindly. “Be patient. Swami-ji will answer all your questions in time.”

After the appointment, Facecream found herself unchap-eroned and, despite the heat, went for a walk around the grounds. Near the hospital, she came across the outlet for a ventilation shaft half hidden behind some bushes. There was another, identical one near the darshan hall, and yet another on the far side of the residence hall. This suggested there was a network of rooms or passages underground. But where were the access points?

Before she could investigate any further, Bossy appeared and told her everyone was gathering again at the gazebo.

The rest of Facecream’s morning was spent doing yoga and repeating a mantra from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad.

“It is designed to divert the mind from basic instinctual desires or material inclinations by focusing on a spiritual idea, such as ‘I am a manifestation of divine consciousness’,” explained the senior devotee who led the session.

Om Asato ma sat gamaya Tamaso ma jyotir gamaya Mrtyorma amrtam gamaya Om shanti shanti shanti (From ignorance, lead me to truth; From darkness, lead me to light; From death, lead me to immortality Om peace, peace, peace)

At lunch, Facecream helped serve the long line of poor and needy who flocked to the ashram every day for a free meal. Her task was to ladle yellow daal onto hundreds of plates.

After she herself had eaten, she decided to try to find the spot on the river where Manika Gill had supposedly killed herself.

When no one was looking, she slipped out the back of the tent and made her way toward the rear of the grounds where there were plenty of shade trees growing. It was here that she came across Damayanti sitting on her own on a bench.

“I’m going down to the river. Come for a walk,” said Facecream.

The devotee hesitated. “I… I don’t know.”

“But I want to see the river and I don’t know the way,” she pleaded. “I… I can’t.”

“Sure you can. Come on, it will be fun.”

“What about the others?”

“Let’s just go, the two of us,” said Facecream, making it sound like an exciting, radical idea.

Damayanti glanced around her. “We’d better be quick,” she said, and the two managed to slip away together.

A gate at the back of the grounds led to a well-worn path that wound beneath a canopy of Rudraksha trees along a sheer cliff thirty feet above the Ganges.

The river was still in its infancy here, untainted by the corrupting pollutants awaiting it along its fifteen-hundred-mile journey across the baking Indo-Gangetic plain, home to more than one-seventh of all humanity. Its virginal waters crashed and plunged over boulders, swirled around fallen tree trunks and spat at the rocks strewn along its banks.

Facecream and Damayanti passed brightly feathered kingfishers and a line of village women and girls who smelt of smoke and earth and carried bundles of kindling balanced on their heads. The locals stared at them, whispering and giggling amongst themselves, before heading higher up into the woods.

Soon the valley widened and a sandy beach appeared below them on the near bank, golden in the sunshine. A steep trail led down to it. Facecream suggested they go for a swim. But Damayanti looked suddenly terrified.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t want to go down there. Can we go back?”

“Of course we can. But tell me what’s wrong.”

“It’s nothing. I just don’t like it here.”

Facecream feigned an epiphany. “This wasn’t where that girl… she drowned, didn’t she? God, that was terrible. I read about it in the papers.” Facecream realized that anyone remembering the old Queenie would have found this highly improbable – unless of course the news had found its way into the Indian edition of Hello! . “I can’t remember her name. What was it?”

“Manika,” said Damayanti.

“That’s right, Manika Gill. She was, like, so young and beautiful. I saw her picture. Did you know her?”

The younger woman nodded.

“Oh God, I’m so sorry. I had no idea. You poor sweetie.”

Facecream gave her a tender hug and the young woman began to cry on her shoulder.

“Manika didn’t even say good-bye,” she sobbed. “I don’t understand it. She didn’t say anything to anyone.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“That night. We all went to sleep. But in the morning she was gone.”

“You mean she was staying in your – our – dormitory?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God! That’s so unbelievable. So you must have really known her well. Was she unhappy? I’m just curious, guess.”

Damayanti didn’t answer. She appeared conflicted, as if there was something she wanted to say but dared not.

“I really don’t want to talk about it,” she said.

They walked back up the path for a few minutes and then sat down on a smooth rock listening to the susurrus of the river below. Facecream started tossing little stones over the cliff edge, watching them splash into the water.