Valley of Death

by Vickram E Diwan

  Rudolf took out his wallet and threw all the money in it on the bonnet of the taxi around where they all were standing. All of the drivers looked with surprise at the money, in excess of 20,000 rupees: in 2,000, 500 and 100 rupee notes. “All of this to the person who can tell me where I can find Bharoo,” Rudolf declared.

  All the drivers stood silently looking at the currency notes for a while and then there was utter pandemonium. Everybody tried to give his opinion as to where Bharoo could be. “Maybe he’s at Kali Temple in Kalkaji,” said one.

  “No way he’s going to be there in the middle of the night,” argued another. Turning to Rudolf he added hurriedly, “ask me he must be in a shamsan (cremation grounds).”

  “Why is the blind man crazy?” argued another, fearing that the money maybe picked up by another fellow. “He must be boozing in some cheap bar.”

  In the next five minutes, Rudolf was told of at least a dozen separate places where Bharoo could be found. The blind tantrik needed to be hopping all around the vast city to be at all those places. But Rudolf could feel in his gut that it was unlikely that Bharoo was at any of those mentioned places.

  “What’s happening here?” A driver asked after parking his taxi in the stand and walking up to them.

  None of the drivers arguing amongst themselves bothered to answer him, so heated had their arguments got that it seemed only a matter of time before they were at each other's throats and tearing each other's clothes to shreds, money or no money! Rudolf stood lost in his own thoughts; he had little interest left in the arguments of the drivers, or in the money, which he had thrown on the bonnet of the taxi.

  “What is happening sir?” the driver who had just approached asked Rudolf curiously.

  “I’m looking for tantrik Bharoo Shah Bengali,” Rudolf answered in an unenthusiastic voice. “Nobody seems to know for sure as to where he could be at this time. I tried to offer that money on the bonnet to the person who could tell me this, but -” he shrugged his shoulders in resignation.

  “But why do you need to find him so desperately Sa’ab?” Asked the driver.

  “Because it’s a matter of life and death,” replied Rudolf.

  “I might be able to help you sir; not because of that money but because of your despair.”

  “Really!” Rudolf’s voice was completely unhopeful.

  “My name is Hanumant,” the driver said, “I had brought that Twinkle – you know, the retarded man that Bharoo hangs around with, he came with me in the morning.”

  Even without Harry’s urgent whisper in his mind, Rudolf knew that the driver before him was talking truthfully about his most hunted enemies. “Where are they?” He asked shaking the driver by his shoulder.

  “Twinkle mother runs a nursery at Dhaula Kuan; she told me that she was going out of town tonight. Maybe Bharoo has gone with Twinkle there to spend the night.”

  “The money is yours!” Rudolf declared.

  “The place is a little away from the main ring-road that passes through Dhaula Kuan,” he tried to explain.

  But it was useless; for Rudolf could not stand to listen to him anymore. He had run off to his Land cruiser Prado parked nearby like a flash and by then his car was thrusting away as a shell fired from a cannon. From the link road ahead, Rudolf turned his station wagon left and put it on the upper ridge road that ran straight to the Dhaula Kuan area. His wild driving was a standard in itself in normal times, but this time it was unprecedented; the Land Cruiser was thrusting forward like a rocket fired from its launching pad, on that dark road with numerous turns. It was a strange sight, of two beams of light, lighting the dark road that split the vast Buddha Jayanti Park, as the Prado flew its way to Rudolf’s destination.

  Harry shook his head in disbelief and sitting on the seat besideRudolf said, “I should have thought of it; I knew about Twinkle, that he lived in a desolate nursery with his mother.”

  “Shut up!” Rudolf said through his clenched jaws as he continued to drive his car madly. It was almost as if he intended to die in an accident rather than at the hands of Bharoo Shah. The shadow of death was lurking on him, making him pace with imminent freight.

  Once they had reached the outskirts of Dhaula Kuan, Harry gave the direction to his master to reach the desolate nursery, plunged into darkness. Leaving the lights, engine, and door of his car open, Rudolf madly ran inside that nursery. He rushed towards the fire at a distance, trampling over the flowerbeds that came in his path. Harry whispered in his mind that Bharoo was nearing the end of his invocation. He didn’t need to prompt Rudolf, who was running so fast that his feet scarcely seemed to be touching the grass underneath.

  In his mad rush, he ran straight into the Twinkle who had stood in his path. He fell down on the ground feeling that he hit a road roller or a tank, but Rudolf immediately got up with a unbelievable speed and tried to bypass the spastic ‘Hercules’ to reach Bharoo. He saw that blind tantrik was lost in his invocation; signal something to his assistant, with a small motion of one of his fingers.

  The next thing Rudolf knew that he was running not on the ground but throwing his feet in the air, Twinkle had raised him by the collar of his leather coat. He threw down Rudolf like a lifeless bag of sand on the ground and then got on top of him. Twinkle put his large hands on Rudolf’s neck and started to strangulate him with the sheer brute force that he possessed.

  Rudolf felt his eyes were bulging out of their sockets; his mouth lay open with his tongue coming out. He was finding it impossible to breathe as the fat man sat on him like a ‘Giant’ and tried to strangulate him to his painful death. Harry’s voice whispered in his mind, ‘You have got to break free Warlock; do it now!’

  ‘He’s killing me you idiot,’ Rudolf said to his chief of staff mentally as tears came out from his eyes.

  ‘There is a brick near your right-handWarlock; pick it up’, Harry said in his mind.

  Rudolf’s hand frantically moved all around and found the brick that lay on the ground; he threw it towards Twinkle with all the last bit of strength left in his body. The brick badly injured him beneath his left eye. He screamed painfully and his hands left Rudolf’s neck as he himself fell off on the grass beside his victim.

  Rudolf needed only those few seconds to recover from his near-death experience; he picked up that brick and once again ruthlessly and unmercifully hit the face of Twinkle who was screaming in agony and pain. ‘Bharoo! Don’t forget him Warlock!’ Harry shouted in his mind.

  Rudolf immediately turned towards Bharoo who sat before the fire, the flames of which were leaping in the air like the tongue of a giant snake. The haandi had left it place and was rising in the air revolving with a whistling sound as the invocation neared its completion. He threw the brick with violent speed towards the fire; the brick hit the iron saucer in which the fire had been built. It scattered the burning pieces of wood and thereby destroyed the sanctity of the invocation and the haandi fell down on the ground.

  The blind tantrik left his place angrily and shouted at Rudolf at the top of his voice, “You’ll pay for this Warlock!”

  “Not me Bastard but you,” Rudolf retorted, “You filthy blind bat, you thought that you could kill me, the Warlock! If killing me was so easy then I would have died a thousand times by now; if I were really such an easy prey then I would have never been able to rise so high in my life, in such a small time.”

  “It’s not you Warlock but your arrogance that’s speaking. You just got lucky; if I had a few more minutes, then it wouldn’t have been you but your corpse before me."

  “You want a second try? Go ahead, I am standing before you,” Rudolf said in a challenging voice.

  Bharoo stood in indecision hearing that; he changed his posture continually with unease. “This is not the last time you meet me Warlock,” he said, “next time you won’t be so lucky.”

  “There would not be a next time, you son of a bitch! I will finish this story right now; you think I will leave you and your mad-man alive after this?
Prepare to go to hell, you filthy little worm,” Rudolf charged towards the blind sorcerer.

  ‘No Warlock,’ Harry urgently whispered in his master’s mind. ‘We are leaving, right now. Please trust me on this one, please!’

  “Yeah, listen to Harinath, Warlock,” Bharoo said, apparently overhearing that mind-to-mind whisper, “You are fit only for chasing babies and girls, not a real tantrik.”

  “You little idiot, you are bloody no match for Warlock,” he snapped angrily. “I leave tonight, but I will come back again for you and your retarded man; you two have earned your death at my hands. Wait for my return Bharoo; Death will come flying on its black wings to get you and there will be no escape for you both, none!”

  Rudolf turned around on the heels of his long boots and walked away briskly to the gate of the nursery; his station wagon still stood there with engine and headlights on and the door open as he had left them. He climbed back inside and drove it on the ring road towards his bungalow in Vasant Vihar. After he had come far away from the nursery, he turned to his chief of staff and asked, “Why did you stop me, Harry?”

  “Because I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

  “That little filthy worm, that Bharoo would have hurt me?” Rudolf asked surprised.

  “He still had some powers left with his master; his ghost could have been taken care of but we had no defence from his other powers if he had chosen to use it,” said Harry.

  “He could not have killed me with those, isn’t it?” Asked Rudolf.

  “Yes; but he could have seriously injured you. And his retarded assistant, once recovered could have killed you easily with his bare hands,” warned Harry.

  Rudolf’s hand instinctively rubbed his neck, “That retarded bastard, he’ll die very painfully Harry, you just wait and see.”

  “I know Warlock, and that is exactly what I wanted you to do, wait. Wait till your time comes. You can always settle scores with Bharoo and Twinkle, once your own powers are back with you,” said Harry.

  “Not just those two Harry, but all those people who have troubled me over these past few months terribly,” said Rudolf.

  “Definitely master; and wouldn’t it be right to do it in a better way? To make them all suffer in pain and anguish before they face their unalterable fate. You have to wait patiently for your opportune time,” said Harry.

  “I like that Harry, Rudolf said smiling pleasantly. You know, you are becoming quite like myself these days, not just being unapologetic in doing evil deeds but enjoying them,” he said approvingly.

  “Thank you, master, I am only glad that I could be of some assistance to you.”

  The conversation ended there and Rudolf drove his Toyota Land Cruiser in silence for the rest of the journey.

  He again summoned his chief of staff once he reached his estate. “Harry, today is Amavasya or the night of the new moon. I will offer another human sacrifice to Moloch before I embark on my revenge.”

  “Where will you get a human?”

  “Watch me!” He tore off his shirt, went to the glass pyramid upstairs and wearing the sacrificial robe and Golden mask came out unhurried.

  Rudolf travelled in the new toy train - a close replica of the original, which had derailed and crashed to complete destruction - restored in the intervening months. Travelling on the toy train he caught a fleeting glimpse of Bittoo in the Circus. The madman was running crazily in the Circus; leaping constantly in the air with his hands outstretched and chanting something like Baba, baba and black sheep. In the reflected light of the round beam thrown by the lamp in the front of the toy train, Rudolf could spot Bittoo, who for that particular moment happened to be near to the tracks of the train.

  But before he was able to stop the toy train, Bittoo had already been left behind. Rudolf jumped out from the carriage even before the train had come to a complete halt and went after his prey. Soon he was able to spot his victim. Bittoo had stopped leaping, seeing Rudolf in his sacrificial robe. Both men stood silently before each other; each trying to ascertain the intentions and the next move of the other person.

  Rudolf leapt forward and got hold of Bittoo; the madman hit him and got free. He ran away as fast as he could, though he was mad, his inner instinct – common to both animals and humans – had told him of the danger to his life. But he was simply no match for the determined and ruthless Warlock who soon got hold of him and dragged him to the toy train.

  Bittoo was shuddering and folding his hands as he pleaded with tearful eyes before Rudolf to let him go. “Why are you so scared boy?” Rudolf asked raising his mask and patting Bittoo’s left cheek with his right hand, in the wrist of which he wore a Tag Heuer wrist-watch. “I promise you, I will make it easy and quick; you won’t know a thing. And once you are dead, I will make you a slave of mine like Harry.”

  “But I don’t want to die!” The fear brought out Bittoo’s voice.

  “Who wants to die? And why did not you think of all this when you hid in my Prado to go to my institute and peep at young women while they stripped?”

  Rudolf threw Bittoo in the first carriage and putting his boots on top of his victim, he sat on the edge of the carriage and wearing the mask back on his face took the toy train back towards the farmhouse. Ignoring Bittoo’s pleas he took him to the glass pyramid on the terrace. Bittoo lay paralyzed with fear on the floor of the glass pyramid, while Rudolf’s erythematic chanting and dance macabre went on in the pale yellow light of thick black inverted candles.

  Slowly and slowly Warlock’s chanting grew louder as his dance of death picked up speed. He dragged Bittoo and with his left hand forced his victim’s neck firmly on the altar in front of the Moloch and raised his right hand in which he held the sacrificial axe. With all the brutality and ruthlessness, which he alone had to manage, and in one single forceful stroke, he chopped off the head of the madman from his neck. A stream of blood oozed out from the chopped neck of the body; falling straight on the demonic idol and bathing it. The headless body convulsed and fluttered before it became still.

  He put some of the blood on his forehead as raktim-tilak, went out of the glass pyramid and the house and breathed deeply, the chilly air in his lungs. He was once again feeling calm and peaceful; after he had renewed the contract of Evil, rekindled the flame and reconnected himself his real nature and his real drives.

  A figure illuminated in blue light appeared before him; it was Harry, his loyal ghost. Following him all the occult powers appeared around Rudolf, all glowing in blue light. In the darkness, the blue figures looked like holographic images from a surreal world that stood around their master.

  “It gives me great pleasure to inform you Warlock,” Harry said, “that all your occult powers are back and are at your service.”

  A smile of heartfelt pleasure came on Rudolf’s lips; the smile, which can come only at the lips of a warrior who realizes that he has finally won a long drawn and impossible battle. The most difficult phase and the most trying period of his life were over. “I never heard a more pleasant thing, Harry,” Rudolf said.

  “What do you intend to do now Warlock?” Harry asked.

  “To get back at my enemies. It’s time for them to pay back; oh I will get each one of them, no one of them will escape my wrath!” Rudolf declared in a menacing voice.

  “As you wish master; but how do you want to proceed with it?”

  “The way which you can’t imagine; neither can those enemies of mine. They would beg for forgiveness, cry for mercy; but there will be none,” Rudolf ranted like a self-absorbed megalomaniac. “My revenge will be unique and unrelenting; the like of which world has never seen before.”

  “And who would be your first victim?” Asked Harry.

  “People believe in saving the best for the last, but I will proceed with the best of my revenge at the beginning itself. Because the first victim on my list deserves to get the very best of my evil capabilities, deserves it all right, has earned it!” Vociferated Rudolf.

  “Who, that
Colonel Narang?” Harry asked.

  “No, not him but Payal,” Rudolf said chewing his words, “Payal Chatterjee; this story started with her and it is but appropriate that the beginning of my revenge should also start with her alone.”

  “She is living with her husband Abhay Batra and their one and a half month baby girl in Rajouri Garden,” Harry informed his master.

  In response, the evil genius, the possessor of darkest of occult powers laughed his head off. He laughed and laughed almost like a maniac. “Oh I am feeling so exhilarated, so excited,” he said clapping his hands, “What’s more fulfilling than to inflict revenge, ruthless and evilest of revenge on your enemies? Nothing, nothing!” He declared and went back to his farmhouse, leaving Harry standing near the lake without any further instructions. The noise of loud music emanating from Rudolf’s bedroom caught his attention and Harry went outside its lighted window and carefully looked inside.

  He saw Rudolf dancing with frenzy as if overflowing with joy and energy; unable to contain in him or figure out what to do with his excessive energy and excitement. Harry saw him run out of the bedroom door before he reappeared on the porch. Drawing closer to Rudolf, while remaining invisible and at a discreet distance to him, Harry watched his actions.

  Rudolf unlocked the door of his Prado and getting inside picked up the mobile phone from the dashboard and dialled a number. When he got connected he said, “Leena? Yes, this is I, Rudolf…I know it is late…I do not care how much you had to drink at the party; I am coming over, yes right now. And I suggest that you tell whichever rabbit is hiding under your pillow to get out of there before I reach there. I don’t want to spoil my excited mood and celebrations of this day needlessly if it can be avoided.” He laughed heartily and said, “But I love you, no matter how much you hate me. I love you, the way you are; if you are not faithful so what, who said I was an Angel? I am coming love, and believe me you would remember this night for a long time; I am back and in the best of form.”

  Rudolf put back the mobile phone on the dashboard and drove away towards Leena’s apartment. He had got out of his sacrificial robe and put on a new shirt; once again it was left to Harry to close the lights of the house and put things in order. He often wondered if he was becoming more of a housekeeper for Rudolf than an assistant in supernatural or occult related activities.