by BS Murthy
Chapter 20 A Perfect M urder
Helped by Dhruva's counseling in his ambient dwelling, as Kavya recovered from her trauma sooner than expected, she wished to go back to her place, but he said that he was not so naive as to put his client's life at risk. Radha chipped in saying that until the venom behind the poison was identified, it was better that Kavya stayed away from Spandan. As Radha added jokingly that she might deem it as a protective custody; Kavya said in half jest that she would like to earn her freedom by lending them her helping hand at catching the culprit. Bemused by their bonhomie, as he told Kavya that in the normal course she should have been senior to Radha; she said that she bore no grudge against her mate on that score. Meaning business, as Dhruva wanted Kavya to gather Ranjit's past, she said that she would have a lot of ground to cover, for her in-laws were ever on the move, until they died four years back. While he felt that probing his immediate past might save much of that bother, as the impulse of a recent hurt would have a stronger urge for revenge, Kavya said that as she has a hunch that Ranjit's premarital past might hold the key, it was as well that she delved into his distant past.
So in search of Ranjit's past, as Kavya left for Guntur, where he stayed when they got married, Radha told Dhruva that Natya feared the worst as Pravar was mad at the loss of his ladylove. She said that as the poor Natya bore the brunt of his frustration, the vengeful Pravar could be expected to avenge himself on Kavya sooner than later; what was worse, he might force Natya to be an accomplice in the crime. It's sad that Natya should have first fallen into Rajan's criminal hands only to end up in Pravar's vicious grip; how she wants that she could help her get out of the rut and put her under his care. Recalling the empathy Natya had induced in him that evening on the Tank Bund, as Dhruva told Radha that he would strive to end the Pravar menace, she said that she would love to see him effect a course correction in Natya life as he brought Kavya's derailed life back on tracks. She said as and when that happens, Natya could be a redeemed soul and he felt that it would be possible only when Pravar was booked for some foul of his, but given that Ranjit's killer was at large, as Kavya's life could be imperiled, they should address that above all else.
She wanted to know whether Ranjit's murder could be a perfect murder and he said that he was not sure about that yet, but to her poser 'what's a perfect murder', he theorized that if the combined weight of irrefutable motive for committing the crime and its inalienable fruits of gain fail to nail the suspect, circumstantial evidence notwithstanding, it's a perfect murder. As she whether it was possible, he detailed the plan and execution of a murder that was conceptually perfect.
He was the S.H.O of Saifabad police station, when young Neha came to report that M urali, her alcoholic husband, did not return home last night, and so she was worried whether something untoward had happened. He asked her whether she knew anyone could be inimical to her husband, she said sobbingly that he was his worst enemy; pressed by him further, she said that burdened by debts as he wound up his automobile business, he became a cynic, and, somehow, he convinced himself that a poor man's wife was rich men's plunder. So, suspecting her fidelity, he began alleging that she slept with all and sundry, and unable to bear the humiliation, she tried to commit suicide with an overdose of sleeping pills, but sadly for her, he only saved her in the nick of the moment. Maybe rattled by the incident, he developed self-pity and started talking in terms of ending his own life, and it was his psychological imbalance and the hazards of drunken driving that worried her. Dhruva enquired if she had brought Murali's photograph along with her and she gave one for his reference and record.
While Dhruva was on his job to locate the missing person, Neha came to inform him the next day that Murali had returned but was depressed more than ever though she had urged him to treat it all as bygones be bygones; he was harping on his past to maintain that he had no right to live. Moved by her predicament, as Dhruva sounded sympathetic, she thanked him for his empathy, and said that she would try to persuade her man to consult a psychiatrist.
A week later, at an unmanned level crossing not far from Hyderabad, Murali's body was retrieved from his Standard Ten, crushed on the railway tracks. As the graphologist confirmed that the writing of the suicide note found in M urali's shirt pocket matched his handwriting and the post-mortem report indicated a drunken death on the tracks at ten-thirty that night, there was no reason to suspect foul play. But what if Neha's visit to the police station was but a red herring, so he thought it fit to delve into her life and times, and as he heard it through the grapevine that M urali, suspecting her fidelity, was wont to ill-treat her, Dhruva wanted to probe the matter as probable murder.
On closure scrutiny, it was obvious that the suicide note was an odd tear-out from a foolscap paper and the tone and tenor of the text suggested that it could have been a part of some story, obviously penned by the deceased. That amused him for muse or no muse, these days; all are at writing, which made it difficult for the readers to separate the originals from the imitations. What if Neha got hold of some manuscript with the suicide note and all, returned by some magazine or the other and derived the idea to script M urali's end with it, so Dhruva went round the magazine houses, in one of which, an assistant editor readily recalled the queer story with that suicide pitch, whose manuscript was returned to the sender only recently. And that naturally tilted the needle of suspicion towards Neha's involvement, which made him confront her with his finding.
Owning up her guilt, Neha lamented that M urali used to treat her merely as a sexual object, that too when he could not take some whore or the other to bed and adding insult to injury, whenever he had her, he made that clear to her. How mean men can become to demean women, she lamented, and slighted thus, she seduced Mohan, Murali's friend, for sex and self-worth. As Murali got wind of it, he calibrated his responses cunningly; as his cruelty towards her sunk to the depths of depravity so as to sponge on M ohan, he showed incredulous warmth towards him. Soon, she realized that her man was scheming to avenge himself on her paramour, by estranging his wife Nalini from him; well, Mohan owed his wealth and all to the benevolence of his in-laws. Not wanting to be the cause of Mohan's ruin, she alerted him to Murali's designs, and offered to end their liaison. But afraid of M urali's potential for mischief, M ohan thought of eliminating him through a supari killing, but fearing that the foolhardy of a third party could ruin it all for them, she chartered the course of that murder as by then she had in her hands that fatal manuscript.
On that fateful day, she induced M urali to drink all day and when he was dead drunk, and as planned, for an alibi, Mohan and she purchased those first-show tickets at the Odeon Theatre, which they left as soon as the movie began. Reaching home hastily, she induced the drunken M urali to let her take him to the outskirts for fresh air, and drove him to the earmarked place in their Standard Ten, followed M ohan in his M aruti, which he had earlier parked in a lane nearby her house. Steering the Standard Ten onto the desolate railway tracks, and having helped the drunken Murali to rest on the steering wheel, she herself sat next to him until the scheduled train speeded in. Glad for the good riddance of the bad rubbish and proud of that perfect murder, they drove back to the city in Mohan's Maruti.
Radha wondered how Neha's righteousness motivated her to murder her man, Dhruva opined that it only proved that life was a bundle of contradictions and crime was
an ingredient part of it. Won't one species kill the other for self-preservation? What else was M urali's murder but a means of warding off M ohan's ill-being, and not wanting to derail her blissful future that her abused past had earned for her, he closed the matter as a case of suicide.
Admiring his empathy for the 'preys on the prowl' and sinking into his arms, Radha said that it would appear that without some divine hand to guide it, there could never be a perfect murder, and added that should things mundane ever make it imperfect, it was as if, the culprit could still count on him.
Chapter 21 Deaths in Spandan
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p; Kavya returned to Dhruva's 'think of the devil' welcome and Radha's 'what's the news' query before Raju greeted her with a cup of filter coffee. As Radha began exhorting Kavya to lead her to the leads that she might have laid her hands on, Dhruva would have none of that for he felt that, as it was not wise to mix drinks, so it was prudent that his assistants did not mix their leads in between them. What with her enthusiasm reined in thus, as Radha kept mum, Dhruva led Kavya into the study to have a first-hand account of her fact-findings.
Kavya told him that her enquiries at Guntur led her to an elderly woman, who, having recognized Ranjit from his photograph that she had carried, recalled that he lived next door with his newly wed wife, who kept aloof from all, save Shyamala, aunt of her childhood friend Rani. As Ranjit did not mix much either, all suspected that they could be an eloped couple trying to cover their tracks, and soon, as he disappeared deserting her, the neighborhood was agog with 'I told you so', but when she too left shortly thereafter, no one knows where, the grapevine only grew. Well, that was so long ago but Shyamala, who was due to return soon from the U.S, where she had been to help her daughter deliver, might be in the know of the aftermath of the elopement that went awry.
Recalling Radha's intriguing description of her childhood friend as 'full-soul mate and half-namesake', Dhruva thought what if Shyamala's niece happened to be Radha's childhood friend, and if it were so, won't it mean that Ranjit's deserted wife was none other than Radha herself. What a circle of love it makes if Radha's friend Rani were to be the Rani, his child bearer! Whatever, he realized that Shyamala's niece holds the key to Radha's fate but thought it was premature to share the clue with Kavya.
That evening, when Radha proposed that the apprentice should celebrate her maiden foray with three cheers over Gin with Thums Up, even Kavya said that she was a game for it, Dhruva said in half jest, that Radha might rue her move for Kavya might out drink her. M ixing the drink for Kavya, Radha said in jest that it always paid to keep the other woman high, especially when the stakes were high, and after a couple of drinks, a thrilled Kavya said that she would oblige Radha so as to make up for the lost drinking time, and, as if to make good her promise, when she wanted to have a third one, Dhruva said that she better stopped at that. While as a tipsy Kavya insisted, Radha broke the deadlock by mixing a small one for her, and when Raju came to announce dinner for them, Radha said bottoms up, Dhruva stubbed his cigar and Kavya sipped the last dreg.
Next morning, when Dhruva was at the cards table playing rummy with the women, Raju said that Inspector Simon, who replaced Shakeel at the Jubilee Hills police station, came to see him. Being privy to the fact that Simon was advised by all to avoid him for Shakeel could have bungled up the fake notes case at his behest, Dhruva sensed that Simon's was no friendly visit. Stepping into the anteroom tentatively and greeting the
cop warmly, Dhruva enquired in jest whether he came to the Castle Hills for a morning walk; but when Simon said, rather tersely, that he was there to question Kavya about a double murder in Spandan, Dhruva knew it was no joking time.
As Dhruva led him into the study, Simon said that upon receiving a late night complaint that foul smell was emanating from Spandan, the police broke open the door and found the decomposed bodies of a young man and a woman. With no traces of bodily injuries or signs of forcible entry, prima facie, it appeared that they might have died in a suicide pact. But as it transpired that the dead were not the residents of the house, the police were at a loss to understand as to how so soon after the house owner's mysterious death, these unknown characters should have met their end there in a like fashion. While it was puzzling enough that the house was locked with the landlady away for long, the assertion of a chowkidar in the locality a burka-clad woman entered the house four days back made it all the more intriguing. Since the neighbors were no wiser to Kavya's whereabouts, Simon came to know from the Jubilee Hills post office that her letters were being redirected to 9, Castle Hills, which should explain his rather unwelcome visit.
As Dhruva broke the news to Kavya, she was shocked beyond belief, and wanted to go to Spandan to see it all for herself, but Simon said that she should try to identify the dead at the Gandhi Hospital before all else. Accompanied by Dhruva and Radha, Kavya made it to the mortuary and identified the dead as Pravar and Natya, and Simon had let her off after recording her statement and obtaining her assurance of cooperation in the investigation. While Kavya kept mum in confusion, a morose Radha suggested that Dhruva better had a last look at Natya, but he preferred to retain her pallu-covered face for a memory, and so desisted from seeing her decomposed body.
Upon reaching home, saying that she was too dazed to comprehend the situation as Kavya rushed into her room, Dhruva was left alone with Radha. As Dhruva began saying that he was at a loss to comprehend the mysterious deaths, Radha told him that there were questions for Kavya to answer after all. Given that she only had the house key, who could have led the ill-starred couple into Spandan but Kavya in burka? Who else could have abetted them to commit suicide, if it were the case? Who would have benefited from their end? Was she not craving to begin life afresh, and was it possible with Pravar and Natya around? Natya had vouchsafed that Kavya had a cunning mind with criminal impulses; maybe her going to Guntur wasa meansof acquiring an alibi.
As if to free himself from Radha's brainwash, Dhruva rushed to the Jubilee Hills police station to get an update from Simon, who said that prima facie Kavya remained the sole suspect and revealed that he asked his men to review the dossier on her husband's murder to bring her under the scanner. Dhruva assured him that even though Kavya was his client, if he scented her criminal hand behind the murders, he didn't intend to hold her brief. Simon said that he hoped Dhruva would not hinder his investigation, assuring him of his bona fide, Dhruva said that he better took him to Spandan for a second opinion in cracking the case. Simon said that on second thought he felt that Pravar and Natya could have died of poisoning, and as the remnants of packed food were found in the dustbin, it was apparent that the kitchen was in disuse for quite a while. As there were no signs of the deceased having moved around the house, it can be said that they died shortly after they got in, at which Dhruva wanted to know whether the door key was found in the house. Simon said that it was not traced in spite of a thorough search, for after snaring them in, Kavya would have left with it on the sly. As the Godrej lock was self-locking, Pravar and Natya too wouldn't have bothered, even if she had told them that she wanted to take away the key with her.
When they reached Spandan, as the guard opened the door for them, Simon said that, as the police had to force open the door, the Godrej lock was damaged, which he
had substituted any way. Entering the dwelling and noticing the main door bolt was missing, Dhruva asked Simon whether there was any when they broke open the door, and as the cop confirmed that there was none when the door was forced open, the detective drawn his attention to the telltale marks of its having been in place until very recently. Having scanned the damaged Godrej lock with his magnifying glass, Dhruva turned his attention to the drawing room and as he was done with it, Simon led him into the guest room, where a burka was laid on the clothesline. Picking up the garment, Dhruva looked for a tailor's label or a dhobi mark on it, and finding none he had its measure with a tape that he had brought along. Simon said there were some more in the attached toilet of the master bedroom, and realizing that burkas held the key to the murders, Dhruva tallied them all with the one found in guestroom. When Dhruva turned his attention to the empty wardrobe, Simon told him as they failed to trace the keys in the house; they broke them open, but found nothing worthwhile therein. Dhruva asked whether the absence a burka in the wardrobe was recorded in the police panchanama, Simon said though it was not done, he would make good the lapse in his case diary.
Wanting Simon to send the damaged Godrej lock for forensic examination, Dhruva entered the lawn and began scanning the ground around the guest room window with his magnifying glass. When, Sim
on suggested that it was not a case of forcible entry through the window, Dhruva said that he was looking for signs of an easy passage from there to the main door. Soon as the detective said that he had nothing more to look for there, the cop led him back to the police station, where they spent some time together.
Chapter 22 Arraigned in Remand
Closeting with a nonplussed Kavya when Dhruva asked her about her house keys, she pulled out a key from her purse, and told him that after Ranjit's death, she got the old Godrej lock replaced with a new one and kept the other two keys in the bank locker along with her jewelry and a bunch of cupboards' keys, which she volunteered to show him. Giving him possession of the key, as she led him to the Andhra Bank, he asked her what for she got the door bolt removed while replacing the door lock, and apparently surprised, she said that she had no idea about it. When he asked her what made her leave her burkas on the clothes-line in her bathroom, swearing that she never wore a burka all her life, she wondered who might have planted them there to implicate her in the murder.
When they reached the bank, greeting her warmly, the manger wondered why she became so scarce of late; as she told him the purpose of her visit, he helped her complete the formalities, and she led Dhruva to the locker, from which she retrieved two door keys with a bunch of other keys, which she entrusted to him. As she looked at him in hope, he said that if the post-mortem report were to imply foul play, Simon was sure to arrest her and press for her custodial questioning. When she lamented how her past came to haunt her, hugging her lightly as if to demonstrate his trust in her, he said that she better obtained an anticipatory bail, before he could bail her out of her predicament. She said that she better subjected herself to the due process of law to come out clean as she was confident of defending herself in the court, in all admiration, he assured her that he would get to the bottom of the crime for truth to prevail. Nonetheless, updating all the murders to help her fashion her arguments to avoid remand, he dropped her at their place and headed to the forensic laboratory with those keys.