The Sacred Vault_ A Novel - Andy McDermott [54]
There was an odd feeling of artificiality to the place, as if she were in an Indian palace-themed hotel room rather than the genuine article. She went to a window, where bright daylight flared through the slats. Expecting it to be locked, she tried it anyway and was slightly surprised when the shutters parted to reveal an expansive sweep of immaculate lawns and gardens below. She could see other parts of the building; it was indeed a palace, domes topping the pillared white walls. Again, there was the too-clean, too-perfect sense of its being a theme park replica.
‘Dr Wilde,’ said Khoil’s voice from behind her, making her start. ‘Good morning.’
The room had changed, a section of wall silently sliding open to reveal a giant screen. The Indian’s bespectacled face, three feet high, regarded her from it. She realised she was under observation, a lens glinting below the display. ‘Mr Khoil,’ she said tartly. ‘Been watching me sleep, have you? I didn’t realise you made your fortune through webcams.’
He ignored the barb. ‘The room has a motion sensor. The house computers alerted me the moment you woke. Welcome to my home.’
‘Yeah, I’m so glad to be here.’ If her sarcasm had been any more acidic, it would have blistered the screen. ‘Where exactly am I?’
‘My estate, east of Bangalore. It combines styles of the Mysore, Kowdiar and Laxmi Niwas palaces, only updated with modern architectural elements. And integrated with the most advanced technology, of course.’
‘Well, of course. So are you just going to lecture me from your telescreen like Big Brother, or . . .’
‘You may “freshen up”, as you Americans say, then you will be driven to us.’
‘Driven?’ Nina raised an eyebrow. ‘Just how big is this place?’
‘The main building has a hundred and sixty-five rooms over five floors,’ said Khoil, taking her question literally. ‘But we are not in the palace at the moment; we are at the sanctuary.’
‘Sanctuary? For what?’
A faint smile on the blank face. ‘Tigers.’
Tandon, politely menacing, collected her from her room after she had showered. He took her to an elevator, which brought them to a large underground garage beneath the palace. Dozens of cars lined the space, from a nineteenth-century Benz Motorwagen tricycle to a brand new McLaren supercar in gleaming gold. It was an odd mix of vehicles, a little British Mini beside the rocketship bulk of a 1959 Cadillac, a record-setting Bugatti Veyron hunched next to a minuscule Tata Nano. Some facet of each vehicle’s design had apparently made them worthy of inclusion in the billionaire’s collection.
The vehicle Tandon took her to was less impressive than any of the gleaming exhibits, however: an electric golf cart. They drove up a steep ramp into the open, following a tree-lined drive. About half a mile north of the palace was a huge enclave, encircled by a high concrete wall topped with chain-link and razor wire. A runway ran along one side of the enclosure, the long black strip showing Nina just how far the boundaries of the Khoils’ estate extended. The jet sat outside a hangar, the structure’s doors partially open to reveal a small, strange-looking aircraft. Its matt charcoal-grey fuselage, a propeller at its rear, seemed too narrow to carry any people - even a pilot. Then the jet obscured it as they passed.
Abutting the wall was a two-storey building, an architectural sibling of the palace. Tandon took her to the upper floor. The sanctuary spread out before her through a glass wall. The view was dominated by a leafy tree canopy, though she could also see a more open area of grassland and bushes. Sunlight shimmered off a lake near the enclave’s centre.
‘Dr Wilde,’ said Khoil from one side of the large room. The tycoon was seated at a control station, a bank of monitor screens before him. The biggest showed a view from the upper branches of a tree. Beside him stood Vanita, bent over a control panel with her body language suggesting tension and concern - though the look she gave Nina was one of utter disdain. The tongueless giant