Doctor Who_ Island of Death - Barry Letts [1]
Maybe it was Tibetan, she thought. Or Sanskrit. Judging by the images displayed on the walls, it wasn’t any European language, not even Finnish or Lithuanian - or Double-Dutch for that matter, even if it sounded like it.
As the voices rose in pitch and volume, she glanced over at the slight, curly-haired figure whose presence here was the reason she had come. The pale face of Jeremy Fitzoliver (her Hooray Henry’ colleague on the Metropolitan) was ecstatic, with a wide-eyed vacancy that did it no favours at all.
Looks even more like an educationally sub-normal sheep than usual, thought Sarah, as her attention was caught by a movement.
Now what? The white-robed guru - if that’s what he was.
Where had she seen that handsome face before? - who was sitting at the front before a pair of ornate curtains, was pouring a colourless liquid from a handsome antique jug into a number of small plastic cups. These were then handed round by two helpers dressed like their master.
For a moment she was tempted to take a cup like the other couple of ‘guests’, as the newcomers like her were dubbed, but her journalistic caution prevailed. You could never be too careful. If she was going to discover what this was all about, she needed to keep her head clear.
As the chanting became more frenzied, rising in a crescendo of rapture, the guru, taking a larger cup in both hands, rose to his feet, turned his back on the gathering, and raised the chalice on high, quite obviously mirroring the actions of a Christian priest at communion.
Well really! At that moment, Sarah quite forgot all her reservations about the cosy version of faith she’d argued over in the vicar’s confirmation classes. This was a sort of blasphemy!
But worse was to come. As the voices came to a climax with a resounding shout of ‘SKANG!’, the helpers pulled back the curtains to reveal a painting of a being: an Indian or Tibetan divinity it would seem; or more likely a demon. A horrific demon in the shape of a hideous insect with a needle-pointed snout... or... what was the word? Oh yes... a proboscis.
Was this what they’d come to worship?
The silence as the faithful drained their cups was broken by shouts of joy and wild laughter. Watched with benign equanimity by the guru (and utter astonishment by Sarah), they flung their cups to the ground and their arms round each other, giggling and chattering at the tops of their voices like a crowd of ten-year-old schoolgirls let out to play.
They were clearly as high as kites.
To Sarah’s horror, Jeremy tripped his way through the swaying crowd, almost dancing, and threw his arms around her in an enveloping hug. This was a Jeremy transformed, very far from the usual reserved ex-public-school boy she’d always known.
‘Come on!’ he cried, pulling back and grabbing her hand.
‘We’re all going down to the garden. This is where the guests get to share our love-in!’
What!
‘No, no!’ said Jeremy, with a typical Jeremy chortle.
‘Nothing like that! Just dancing and singing and stuff. Come on, Sarah, this is the first day of the rest of your life!’
Trust Jeremy to latch onto a new cliché, thought Sarah, taking back her hand. She lowered her voice. ‘Jeremy, there’s something not quite right with this whole set-up. Why don’t we work together to find out what’s going on? You could be undercover while I...’
‘You’ve got it wrong, old girl! This is how life should be -
loving everybody, sharing everything... Once you let the Skang into your heart...’
Sharing?
‘You haven’t given them any money, have you?’ she asked.
He reddened slightly. ‘Look, don’t start that elder-sister sniff again. It wasn’t much. Peanuts really.’
‘Oh, Jeremy!’
‘We’re only talking about a measly twenty thou. Honestly, Sarah, you sound just like Mama sometimes.’
Twenty grand! More than four times what she earned in a year! It was no good. He was well and truly hooked.
‘Off you go,’ she said, seeing his almost panicky glance over his shoulder as he realised that his new brothers and sisters had all disappeared.
‘I want