Page 81 - Just Deserts

Swami Adavasi

waste time on idle chitchat: I’ve hit the jackpot, and I want to know
what it’s worth to you.”
The guru interlaced his sausage-like fingers into a pious formation
on top of his desk, visibly straining to keep his self-control. “If you
really have something as good as you say, you can have what you
want. I will transfer a few people around, send your peers to wealthy
suburbs, and take the chance that no one complains. Now, what the
hell do you have?”
“This.” She extricated a folded sheet of paper from her uniform
and threw it on Guru Vanaspati’s desk. He opened it, smoothed it
flat and squinted.
“It’s only a photocopy, but I didn’t dare remove the original from
Swami-ji’s bedside cabinet for more than a couple of minutes. As you
can see, he’s made a few notes on the drawing.”
The regional subswami pounded his fist on the desktop, rattling a
box of donated jewelry in a lower drawer. “You’d better explain this.
But already I don’t like the looks of it.”
“Well, maybe it’s not obvious, but I was in the room when that
architect sold this thing to the old man. It’s a gigantic pyramid, larger
than the largest one in Egypt. Swami-ji knows he won’t last many
more years, and he wants to build himself a suitable memorial. You
see the measurements? It will be visible for miles around. Anyway,
the guy left the blueprint with Swami-ji, who sat around gloating for
hours. Then he made some phone calls and scribbled some very
interesting bits on the margins.”
“But—but—this number he wrote down: it’s five billion dollars!
Where did he get that from?”
“Oh, I remember the architect telling him that was sort of a
ballpark estimate of the cost of constructing the pyramid.”
Guru Vanaspati blinked rapidly. “But he doesn’t have that kind of
money lying around. Not in his pocket, not in all the Swiss bank
accounts of the organization put together! Not one hundredth of it!
He can’t afford it!”
“Yeah, I know,” she said with a trace of sarcasm. “But he thought
a few New York banks might be helpful—that’s what you see jotted
down there on the left: Chase Manhattan, Chemical Bank; he can’t
spell, but that’s what he was doing. When I brought him his bedtime
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