The Foundations of Paradise - Arthur C. Clarke [9]
“According to the chronicles, nothing like it had ever been seen before. Its hair was white as milk, its eyes pink as rubies. Some thought it a good omen; others, an evil one, because white is the color of death and of mourning. And their fears, alas, were well founded. . . .
“Prince Kalidasa loved his little pet, and called it Hanuman, after the valiant monkey god of the Ramayana. The King’s jeweler constructed a small golden cart, in which Hanuman would sit solemnly while he was drawn through the court, to the amusement and delight of all who watched.
“For his part, Hanuman loved Kalidasa, and would allow no one else to handle him. He was especially jealous of Prince Malgara—almost as if he sensed the rivalry to come. And then, one unlucky day, he bit the heir to the throne. . . .
“The bite was trifling; its consequences, immense. A few days later, Hanuman was poisoned—doubtless by order of the Queen. That was the end of Kalidasa’s childhood. Thereafter, it is said, he never loved or trusted another human being. And his friendship with Malgara turned to bitter enmity.
“Nor was this the only trouble that stemmed from the death of one small monkey. By command of the King, a special tomb was built for Hanuman, in the shape of the traditional bell-shaped shrine, or dagoba.
“Now this was an extraordinary thing to do, for it aroused the instant hostility of the monks. Dagobas were reserved for relics of the Buddha, and this act appeared to be one of deliberate sacrilege.
“Indeed, that may well have been its intention, because King Paravana had come under the sway of a Hindu swami and was turning against the Buddhist faith. Although Prince Kalidasa was too young to be involved in this conflict, much of the monks’ hatred was now directed against him. So began a feud that in the years to come was to tear the kingdom apart. . . .
“Like many of the other tales recorded in the ancient chronicles of Taprobane, for almost two thousand years there was no proof that the story of Hanuman and young Prince Kalidasa was anything but a charming legend. Then, in 2015, a team of Harvard archaeologists discovered the foundations of a small shrine in the grounds of the old Ranapura Palace. The shrine appeared to have been deliberately destroyed. All the brickwork of the superstructure had vanished.
“The usual relic chamber set in the foundations was empty, apparently robbed of its contents centuries ago. But the students had tools of which the old-time treasure hunters never dreamed. Their neutrino survey disclosed a second relic chamber, much deeper. The upper one was only a decoy, and it had served its purpose well. The lower chamber still held the burden of love and hate it had carried down the centuries—to its resting place today, in the Ranapura Museum.”
Morgan had always considered himself, with justification, reasonably hardheaded and unsentimental, not prone to gusts of emotion. Yet now, to his considerable embarrassment—he hoped that his companions wouldn’t notice—he felt his eyes brim with sudden tears. How ridiculous, he told himself angrily, that some saccharine music and maudlin narration could have such an impact on a sensible man! He would never have believed that the sight of a child’s toy could have set him weeping.
And then he knew, in a lightning flash of memory that brought back a moment more than forty years in the past, why he had been so deeply moved. He saw again his beloved kite, dipping and weaving above the Sydney park where he had spent much of his childhood. He could feel the warmth of the sun, the gentle wind on his bare back—the treacherous wind that suddenly failed, so that the kite plunged earthward. It became snagged in the branches of the giant oak