Chalice by Robert A. Webster - HTML preview

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Prologue



The telephone ringing brought Detective Inspector Crinigan out of his daydream. He picked up the receiver.

“Hello, Inspector Crinigan, Scotland Yard” he announced.

“Hello detective, this is Dr Timothy Clerk, I work for H.M Ambassador, David Reader from the British embassy in Cambodia and we seem to have a mystery here.”

“How can I help, Dr Clerk?” said the detective now thoughts fully focused on the conversation.

“A body was found a few weeks ago in one of the shallow dry wells in a recess in the main temple at Ta- Prohm, about 1km away from one of Cambodia’s main tourists sites, Angkor Thom. A tour guide and party of tourists found the body after the guide decided to frighten the party by taking them off the usual route and into the dark back recesses. It backfired, as he shone his torch into the well, saw the body and scared himself shitless. We are having difficulty with identifying the corpse. All we really know from the autopsy is the man had been brain dead for about a week. He wasn’t carrying any form of identification and he was dressed only in a flimsy hospital gown, but the nearest hospital is 12km away and they have had no Berang (foreigners) admitted in the last few weeks and none have been reported missing. We have kept the body on ice for about a fortnight to try and work out the puzzle and identify him, but so far we have had no success in doing either. We had a few people come forward when we put a photo in the Cambodia Daily reported seeing this individual around Phnom Penh several weeks ago,  and said  that he was an Englishman called Nick, a tourist from Brighton.” Clerk explained and then and asked “ I was wondering if I could send you blood and DNA samples taken from the body and dental x-rays, along with photographs and fingerprints to see if you could positively identify him” 

“Yes of course” said Crinigan after listening with great interest and enquired, “How did he die?”

“That’s the mystery” said Clerk. “The corpse only appears brain dead and we just don’t know how, it appears he had some kind of fright that caused a Berry aneurysm, which subsequently burst, but there are some major anomalies which we can’t fathom out and the facilities here aren’t great. We have done all we can at this stage. I will you the report and you can see what I mean, it is incredible but I don’t want to say too much on the phone”

“What do mean by only brain dead?” enquired a now confused detective.

“That’s one thing I don’t want to discuss on the phone” repeated Clerk.

“I understand,” said Crinigan, “if you send what you have to my office, I will see to it”.

“Thanks I will dispatch them immediately” and make arrangements for repatriating the body.”

“Could you send the corpse to our coroner’s office, so we can investigate further” Crinigan requested, now his Detective juices tingling with anticipation of something to get his teeth into at last.

Clerk thanked the detective then hung up the phone and wrote on the top of a small package already address to:

New Scotland Yard,

Broadway,

London

SW1H OBG:

Urgent: For the attention of: Detective Inspector Donal     Crinigan.

Head of Special projects investigation unit.


Detective Inspector Donal Crinigan was born in Dublin the son of an Irish Guarda, he had followed in his father’s footsteps and family tradition and joined the police straight from school. He then went on to join the Metropolitan police and moved to London where he became a homicide detective, and due to his fastidious nature and thorough detective work, rapidly moved up the ranks, now after 18 years with the Met, at 53 years of age, he was bored with the police force. He had two grown up sons, both in the police and an ex wife, who he still kept in contact with and still had strong feelings for, even though she had remarried. His Irish accent though still audible, had all but gone, unless he got angry then a string of Irish obscenities could be heard echoing around the corridors of New Scotland Yard, his subordinates knew they were in deep shit, when he would come out of his office point to the offending individual and with a broad Irish twang shout ‘Johnson come here you little bollix.’ Nowadays the only thing he got to investigate was dead Yardies and drug dealers, although he knew who committed the murders, he knew months of investigation and footslog, would only result in some slick city lawyer getting the accused murderer set free on some technicality. He was now ready to take a redundancy payment if offered and doing something different.

‘I am sick of these bollixes getting away with murder because we didn’t describe in detail what their fart smelt like’ he used to moan to his colleagues ‘Bloody red tape’.

Maybe this case will be different it certainly sounds intriguing he thought.

He swung around on his chair and gazed out of his office window overlooking St James Park and the pelicans, it was a warm sunny beautiful day in June.

***

In the morgue at Phnom Penh’s Royal Rattanak hospital, a corpse lay on a large metal post mortem table, around it stood bemused men from the Cambodian coroner’s office, and Dr. Timothy Clerk. Having just got off the telephone to Detective Crinigan, he stood and looked at the post mortem corpse.

‘This will baffle them in London’, he thought ‘it certainly mystified me, I will keep up to date with this strange case’.

Orderlies came in and swathed the body and Timothy signed the orders to have the corpse and all tissue and organ samples sent to England.

He left the hospital and headed to the Frog and Parrot, a small bar situated on the banks of the Tonle Sap River, for a well deserved beer and to see if the owner, Steve, could assist, as he knew most of the happenings around Phnom Penh.


***

Angkor Thom was the last and most enduring capital city of the Khmer empire. It was established in the late twelfth century by King Jayavarman VII. It covers an area of 9 km², within which are located several monuments from earlier eras as well as those established by Jayavarman and his successors. At the centre of the city is Jayavarman's state temple, the Bayon, with the other major sites clustered around the Victory Square immediately to the north

Ta Prohm is the modern name of a temple at Angkor, Cambodia, built in the Bayon style largely in the late 12th and early 13th centuries and originally called Rajavihara. Located approximately one kilometre east of Angkor Thom and on the southern edge of the East Baray near Tonle Bati, it was founded by the Khmer King Jayavarman VII as a Mahayana Buddhist monastery and university. Unlike most Angkorian temples, Ta Prohm has been left in much the same condition in which it was found: the photogenic and atmospheric combination of trees growing out of the ruins and the jungle surroundings ensures privacy and only very few brave visitors


Angkor Wat (Angkor temple) is the central feature of the Angkor UNESCO World Heritage Site containing the magnificent remains of the Khmer civilization. Angkor Wat's rising series of five towers culminates in an impressive central tower that symbolizes mythical Mount Meru. Thousands of feet of wall space are covered with intricate carving depicting scenes from mythology. Soon to be classed as one of the Seven Wonders of the World.