The Medieval Murderers - The Lost Prophecies

He met her at a café near the Octagon two days later. He was tired; it had taken his body a long time to adjust to the experience of flying over the world. Unnatural, as Rodriguez had said. He was glad to get out of the small, bare house they had assigned him. Without his statue of Shiva, he felt curiously vulnerable and edgy. He had bought a shirt and light trousers like the locals, and as he walked to the café the wind from the sea was refreshingly cool, though the sun was hot.

The street was crowded, the faces nearly all white except for a few brown-skinned Maori. About ten per cent of the people wore white-painted wooden crosses that marked them out as members of the Shining Light Movement. He noticed more of the elaborate hair designs. It seemed to be the better-dressed people who had them; perhaps it was a sign of status. But the streets were like those at home, beaten earth. Pedestrians walked at the sides; bicycles and tuc-tucs and a few electric vans drove down the centre. For a moment he thought he saw Marwood in the crowd and jerked his head around, but it was only some man who looked a little like him. He thought, That’s never happened before. I’m getting burned out. This is the last undercover case I’ll do.

Mackenzie’s Café was a small place that sold coffee and drinks and little cakes. Most of the customers were elderly. He saw Parvati Karam at once, sitting at a table facing the door, looking straight at him. She was not as attractive as he had thought from the photographs, but it was a softer face than he had expected. Her long dark hair was drawn back in a severe ponytail. She wore a white-painted wooden cross at her neck. Her expression was expectant, slightly nervous, and when she saw him she stood up.

‘Mr Moorthy?’ There was eagerness and interest in her voice. She had a slight North American accent, softer than the hard Tasman drawl.

‘Yes. Miss Karam?’ Shiva held out his hand, and she took it. Her grip was light and moist. He looked into her brown eyes. They were unreadable.

‘Can I get you a cup of tea?’ he asked. ‘Juice? A cake?’

‘Just a tea, please.’ She sat down again, and Shiva went to the counter. While he was waiting to be served and pay, he looked around. Parvati was staring back at him intently. She smiled.

When he sat down, she asked how he was adjusting after the flight.

‘Still a bit tired. There’s an insecticide they’ve told me I must wear in the evenings. Something about a new type of biting insect down here.’

‘Yes, they’re vicious and carry malaria.’

‘All the animals and insects are changing, aren’t they? Adapting, I suppose. They say that in India there are big animals no one’s ever seen. We passed over it on the flight.’

‘What did you see?’ she asked curiously.

‘Nothing, I’m afraid. It was dark. There was turbulence, big storms under the plane. A man I travelled with, a scientist going to Antarctica, said some people think there are survivors in the Himalayan foothills. But they’re not sure.’

‘Life for them would be very primitive, very hard.’ She shook her head. ‘Hardly worth living.’

‘Things seem good here.’

‘Everyone works hard. Planting is going on everywhere in the mountains. No one talks of anything but making better artificial soils. It is a materialistic place,’ she said with a sudden hardness.

Shiva looked around the shop. ‘We’re the only brown faces,’ he said.

‘Yes. There are few Indians in the Tasmans.’ She smiled wryly. ‘People take me for a Maori.’ She looked at him. ‘Thank you for getting in touch. I thought there wasn’t anybody left from my Indian forebears apart from my parents.’

‘I only did a search recently. Felt it was something I ought to do. We shouldn’t forget them, should we? Those civilizations only live on in people like us.’ He smiled. ‘Isn’t it a strange thought, those two brothers in that Indian village who went to England in – when was it? – the 1940s?’

‘They left because of the violence between Hindus and Muslims when British rule ended. The British were Christians. I think they tried to reconcile them, but they weren’t strong enough.’

‘I heard the British cut and ran, left them to it.’

‘They had to preserve themselves. They were Christians and that’s a Christian’s duty. It’s like the Great Catastrophe; it’s really only Christian nations that have survived in any numbers. It’s part of God’s plan.’ She spoke the hard words gently. ‘So my Church teaches.’

Shiva thought suddenly of the dead watchman. He looked at Parvati’s hands. Slim and delicate. Yet she had taken some blunt instrument and killed the man.

‘What about the Chinese?’ he asked. ‘They seem to be doing quite well.’

‘It can’t last. They won’t survive up there on the permafrost. And God won’t help them. Not heathens.’

‘That’s a very harsh doctrine.’ Shiva smiled to defuse the words.

Parvati smiled sadly. ‘I know. The truth is harsh. However you might wish it wasn’t.’

Shiva looked at her. He could not reconcile this rather sad, pensive woman with the killer. If it was her, and it had to be, her act was as good as Rodriguez had warned. Better than him. He thought about the dog hunting. She didn’t look as though she could have done that either, but she had.

‘If you believe India’s destruction was ordained by God,’ he asked, ‘why go back and look for ancestors? Why answer my e-mails?’ He still spoke gently, smiled again.

‘I don’t know. I’ve always had a sort of… sense of grief. I suppose I wanted to assuage it. Since my boyfriend died in a car crash. In North America.’ She frowned hard.

‘When was that?’

‘Four years ago.’

‘I’m sorry.’ A year before you joined the Church, Shiva thought.

‘Are you married?’ Parvati asked suddenly.

He looked at her, puzzled by the unexpected question. ‘No.’

‘I’m sorry.’ She smiled and nodded at his left hand. ‘I thought that might be a wedding ring.’

‘No, it’s a ring to measure radiation. It goes pink if the level is dangerous. Most people wear them in England. Because of the old flooded power stations.’

‘I see.’ She frowned again. Perhaps they hadn’t warned her to take that precaution when they sent her to Europe.

‘I just wondered if you had children,’ she said. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever marry now.’

‘I nearly did once. Maybe one day.’

‘I hope you didn’t think me impertinent.’

‘Not at all. Which Church are you in?’ he asked. ‘You didn’t say.’

‘The Shining Light. They saved my life after Steve died.’

‘You believe the end of the world is coming, don’t you?’ he asked.

‘Yes, we do. You should read the Book of Revelation, Shiva, and the Black Book.’ She sighed. ‘There was such an opportunity down here, survivors with a Christian heritage in a plentiful land. But they’ve kept the old materialism, spoiled the last chance they had to be… pure.’

‘I’m not sure what I believe,’ he said.

‘That’s the same as unbelief. Belief isn’t easy, but it’s right, it’s true. And our leader, he’s a great man, a prophet.’ She spoke with quiet certainty. Then she looked at her watch and stood up. ‘Well, it has been nice to meet you, Mr Moorthy. But I think I ought to go.’

‘Already?’

‘Yes. I’m sorry. I think coming was perhaps a mistake. My Church teaches that we should forget the past.’

He rose and followed her to the door, surprised to see how small she was. ‘Perhaps we could meet again some time?’ he asked. ‘I don’t know anyone in Dunedin…’ He heard his voice stumbling as they stepped out into the street, less crowded now as darkness fell. He turned to face her.