The Empress of India by Michael Kurland Page B

his hand up for a minute until he had stopped laughing. “Indeed,” he said. “And quite possibly it’s not very funny at all. He may have been injured, or even killed, or he may be being held by his enemies for reasons unknown.”
    “Then why . . . ?”
    “Because, sir, his friends fancy that I am his greatest enemy, and they imagine that I have done away with him. I cannot tell you, sir, how amusing that is.”
    Moran removed the cigar from his mouth. “I see,” he said.
    “Do you?” Moriarty asked.
    “Actually, Professor, I confess that I do not. I assume that you did not actually do away with, er, the gentleman in question?” Moran sounded bemused, rather than alarmed, at the notion.
    “The gentleman in question is the self-styled ‘consulting detective’ named Sherlock Holmes, and, no, I had nothing whatever to do with his disappearance. I rather regret his passing, if indeed he has passed.” Moriarty waved Moran back to his seat. “Finish your story. Perhaps I will be able to help you, perhaps not; but at least you deserve a fair hearing.” He leaned forward. “Proceed. Continue.”
    Colonel Moran looked thoughtful. “Sherlock Holmes has disappeared, has he?”
    “Indeed.”
    “And you had nothing whatever to do with it?”
    “Even so.”
    Moran pursed his lips, considering. After a minute he nodded. “We’ll put that aside for now,” he said. “I have no reason to disbelieve you. Still, it is peculiar.”
    “It is,” Moriarty agreed.
    “Well,” Moran said, “back to my tale. For his son and heir’s fourteenth birthday, the maharaja ordered the construction of a great temple. These maharajas are always building temples, but this was something special in the way of a temple: four tall marble towers with a definite phallic feel to them at the corners of a vast marble dome. The walls of the dome were covered with erotic sculptures done in what I believe is called ‘bas-relief.’ ”
    “There are a number of privately printed books of erotica which contain illustrations of Indian temple carvings,” Moriarty said. “I have seen and admired a few such; if not for their artistic quality then for the imagination of the sculptor. Erotic carvings would seem to be fairly common on Hindu temples.”
    “The native sensibility on the subject of erotic art differs from that of the educated European,” Colonel Moran affirmed. “And the native women—But surely here I digress. These carvings are said to honor one of the manifestations of the god Shiva. Beyond that, I know nothing. But that, except in passing, is not what interests us.”
    “Ah!” Moriarty said.
    “Four years after the completion of the temple, the maharaja died and his son, now eighteen, ascended to the throne. The son, to honor his father and celebrate his own existence, commissioned two works of art to be placed in the temple. One was a construct in solid gold—full size—of the, ah, apparatus which had enabled his birth. The joints were set out in rubies and diamonds. The straps and belts were woven from the finest golden threads. A representation of the god Padersiyabi—I may have that wrong—lies prone upon the apparatus but with no visible indication of what he might be able to accomplish in that position. Thecasual observer is left to wonder what the function of the mechanism might be.
    “The second object was a statue, some three feet high, representing his father’s favorite houri; the woman whose exotic dancing and, ah, exertions, had enabled, or at least encouraged, the son’s conception. Pati was her name. She is depicted standing on her right leg, the left leg bent so that her left foot rests on her right knee. Her arms are in front of her, elbows out, palms facing inward, in a particularly meaningful expression. Just what it expresses, I do not know. If the statue is to be believed, she was quite beautiful. The statue itself is worth a king’s ransom, to use a hackneyed, but in this case quite accurate,