The Masala Murder: Reema Ray Mysteries

by Madhumita Bhattacharyya

  ‘But tell me, Reema,’ said Hema Masi, ‘what was so wrong with that perfectly delightful young man that you refuse to even consider him?’

  I shook my head. ‘You’ve been here for all of seven minutes and already you’ve ambushed me!’

  ‘Don’t be so dramatic. We are merely wondering why my splendidly beautiful daughter is still single.’

  I was speechless. My mother had called me beautiful. Splendidly so.

  ‘Is he married?’ asked Hema.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Gay?’

  ‘Never,’ my mother interjected.

  ‘Then? Have you thought about asking him out?’

  What could I say? That I had, but that I also thought about the fact that he may be a murderer? How pleasant that would be. Ma, meet my boyfriend. He is a venture capitalist and a murder suspect. But knowing my mother and her selective perception, my saying the word ‘boyfriend’ would render irrelevant all else.

  ‘Can you let it go, please?’ I pleaded. ‘And don’t you think he’s a little old for me?’

  ‘You are hardly a typical twenty-six-year-old, my child,’ said Hema Masi. ‘I can’t see you with one of those young, silly boys of your own age, anyway.’

  Luckily, our second round of coffee arrived just then. We sat there like the three witches, stirring and sipping, two of us hatching plans of alchemy of a human kind, the third wondering how to counter every spell cast. If I had any hope of finding a man, it would definitely require keeping my mother and all her friends away from them.

  ‘Such a nice man,’ my mother intoned.

  ‘You are women of easy virtue. Having exchanged all of a dozen words, how could you possibly know what he is like?’ I said.

  ‘But you seem to know him quite well,’ said Ma.

  ‘And you are all defensive. So that means there is something there!’ said Hema Masi, wagging her finger at me, no doubt the same finger she had wagged at her own daughters while they were growing up. They had both got married before they hit twenty-five; by the look of it, Hema Masi hadn’t left them with a chance.

  However close their maternal instincts had led them to the truth, I didn’t respond. I tended not to bandy the details of my love life about, and my mother headed the blacklist ever since the Amit wreckage. ‘In less than ten minutes, you have found a man who is absolutely perfect for me. That’s impressive, even for you guys.’

  ‘Who said anything about perfection?’ said my mother, her smooth brow creasing ever so slightly. ‘But would it kill you to date?

  Try on a couple of guys for size—you may just like it!’

  ‘Ma, I’ve had boyfriends, you know.’ No need to mention that one of them was currently living in my flat.

  ‘Well, how am I supposed to know when you don’t tell me anything?’ she sulked.

  Of course, she knew perfectly well that I had had boyfriends in the past. Shalini Ray was simply fishing for information—and grabbing every excuse she could find to pout.

  sixteen

  Home after tea with the ladies, I called Ojha in the hope that he might have some leads.

  ‘Anything new in the Aloka Mohta kidnapping case?’

  ‘Ravi Sharma told me to keep an eye out for you. Why would he do that?’

  ‘Maybe he thinks I am meddling in his business.’

  ‘I see,’ he said. He sounded like he wanted to know more but if he did, he’d have to ask.

  ‘What happened at the apartment after I left you there?’

  ‘Not much. We looked around the place, didn’t find anything. There seems to be no sign of the boy. He hasn’t even called his office. Didn’t get anything from the mother, either.’

  ‘Did you take anything as evidence?’

  ‘No,’ he said.

  So, they hadn’t been the ones to take the hairbrush or the jeans.

  ‘But Sharma did ask the forensic team to collect prints, and we found the place had been wiped clean.’

  Oops, that had been my doing. ‘Now what?’ I asked.

  ‘There isn’t enough evidence to arrest the husband as yet, but from what I’ve heard, Sharma is working on it.’

  ‘They aren’t considering any other suspects?’

  ‘Reema ji, there are no other suspects.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘If this was a professional kidnapping, why has there been no more contact after the first call? It’s been a few days, and that is quite unusual in a kidnapping, you see.’

  ‘Perhaps there has been contact but the family hasn’t mentioned it?’

  ‘But they are cooperating fully with the police. Mohta and Sharma are friends. And then there is the security consultant from Mumbai who has also been brought in.’

  ‘Security consultant?’

  ‘Yes, I haven’t met him myself, but Sharma seems to know him from some other case.’

  ‘Have the police considered the father may have a role to play?’

  ‘Kishan Mohta? Reema ji, why would he kidnap his own daughter and extort money from himself?’ I could hear the impatience in Ojha’s voice.

  ‘You’re right,’ I said quickly. ‘What about the Prakash Agarwal business? That’s Ravi Sharma’s case too?’

  ‘I am not involved in that, but I did ask around. There is no interest in pursuing the case from the side of the police.’

  ‘Do you know why?’

  ‘Lack of evidence,’ he said rather smugly.

  ‘Would it be possible to try and see the file they had opened? If I could see the doctor’s reports that might be very helpful.’

  ‘I can try.’

  As I hung up, I was hardly hopeful. But clearly my queries had inspired interest from other quarters because half an hour later, I got a call from DDG.

  ‘Hello, Reema ji.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Dutta Gupta,’ I said.

  ‘Prashant told me that you were somehow involved in the Aloka Mohta case?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘But this is a serious matter. Why didn’t you discuss it with us?’

  ‘I am still working on it. If I need any help, I will be sure to contact you all.’

  ‘Okay. But see, Reema, some of us feel that you might want to keep this to yourself because it is a high-profile case.’

  ‘You seem to forget that I do have a private investigation agency of my own. Why should I share every case with you?’

  ‘You will only come to us with hopeless cases, like that Agarwal business?’

  ‘It is in the spirit of the group that since I didn’t have an actual client in that matter that I brought it to you. Here, my services have been sought out.’

  ‘You have been hired—to find the girl?’

  ‘Yes.’ Did it matter that I wasn’t getting paid?

  ‘Oh. I assumed it was one of your extra-curricular projects.’

  ‘Well, it’s not.’

  ‘Who has hired you?’

  ‘I’m not at liberty to say.’

  ‘Okay, Reema ji, but just one request. Remember us if you ever get the chance to speak to the media. A mention on the news might do us some good.’

  ‘But what about preserving our anonymity, to help us work better, as independent agents?’

  ‘Oh, you know, hehe. Sometimes having paying cases helps also, no?’

  I mentally counted to five and reminded myself that I needed the CCC now. I recognized that a time might soon come when I would need to delegate. ‘Mr Dutta Gupta, I can assure you that your help may soon be needed, and I will not hesitate to ask for it when it is.’

  ‘Of course, Reema ji, of course.’

  It was an afternoon of phone calls but the next one, from Uncle Kumar, proved to be the most important.

  ‘I just spoke with Ravi Sharma,’ he said.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Your friend is on the verge of big trouble.’

  ‘What did he say exactly?’

  ‘It seems the family is convinced that Amit is unscrupulous enough to cause Aloka serious h
arm, and Sharma is inclined to believe them.’

  ‘Does he have any evidence to make it stick?’

  ‘I think that is the problem. They don’t seem to have much more than Kishan Mohta’s theory.’

  ‘This is exactly what Amit said would happen.’

  ‘Yes, but are you sure it is not true?’

  ‘Why would he come to me if it were?’

  ‘I’m not sure, Reema.’

  ‘Are they ready to make an arrest?’

  ‘I think they will start a manhunt. Do you know where he is?’

  ‘Uh, no.’

  ‘I’ll pretend for the moment that I believe you.’

  ‘What next?’ I said quickly.

  ‘I would say that you should tell your friend to turn himself in.’

  ‘I don’t think that is advice he would follow. He distrusts the system enough as it is. On top of that, he is convinced that his father-in-law’s influence will be enough to see him behind bars regardless of the truth.’

  ‘I can’t say I blame him—he’s probably right. But I do also have some good news for you. My men have finally dug up some records about your man Agarwal. They stopped kissing up for long enough to express displeasure at having to wade through waist-high layers of dust to find it, but they managed to locate a few documents.’

  ‘Could you fax them to me?’

  ‘Sure. I have them here. Give me your number. I hope to have some information on Mallika Mitra soon.’

  In five minutes, I was holding the contents of the file that had been put together in 1983 — the start of an investigation. Records of the Agarwal family’s shop in New Market—Sri Krishna Cloth Merchants. Father and brother listed as partners.

  Mutation documents for a flat near Burrabazar.

  Marriage registration certificate, dated 27 April 1976.

  Complaint filed by wife’s family regarding dowry demand, 10 March 1983. Complaint subsequently dropped.

  The next year, a report indicating that police from the local thana had visited his office in response to a complaint filed by a young girl, whose name had been withheld, on an allegation that he had molested her in his garments shop.

  That’s where the paper trail on Prakash Agarwal’s life ended.

  Dowry torture? Molestation? It had all been so long ago. Could these allegations be mere coincidences, long forgotten offences the scars of which had faded? Or did that make Mrs Agarwal and this unknown victim suspects in Agarwal’s death, a quarter of a century later?

  I called Uncle Kumar.

  ‘What do you think?’ he asked.

  ‘This is very useful, Uncle Kumar. This molestation business, I still don’t know whether this has anything to do with his death.’

  ‘In my experience, my dear, everything is connected. You just need to look hard enough to see how.’

  Amit had specifically warned me off visiting Aloka’s family, but I decided that a trip to her home, just to look around, wouldn’t hurt. A big black gate stood between me and the three-storey building that was Aloka’s childhood home. It was a grey block of a building. I had never been inside it, but it didn’t look like it had a lawn or any kind of open space.

  Of course, with an eight-foot-high boundary wall, there was only so much I could see. I crossed the relatively quiet, narrow lane and watched the house. Someone who looked like a servant left, but that was about all the action I witnessed before I saw a police van approaching. I started to walk casually away from the house, till the van rounded the corner and into a narrow alleyway. I stayed there, more or less hidden. Another car approached, this time a black sedan. But the windows were tinted so dark that, in the dying light of day, I couldn’t get a view of the driver from my angle.

  My phone rang again; this time it was Devika.

  ‘Hey, how’s it going with the hubby in the love nest?’ I asked.

  She laughed a little. ‘It’s been good. Fingers crossed.’

  ‘How long is Vivek in town?’

  ‘A couple more days. Then I’m off to Delhi for couture week on Friday.’

  ‘Great. I won’t disturb you till then.’

  ‘Actually, I need to see you. Can you come to the office now?’

  ‘Can it wait? I’m a little caught up.’

  ‘I’m afraid it can’t.’

  ‘On my way.’

  It was seldom that I got called into office, and even more rarely by Devika. She was no longer my boss at Face, having been shifted to only fashion at her request some months ago. But as the senior most staff member in the Calcutta office, she was called in to troubleshoot. I knew this meeting could only mean bad news of some sort. I feared that perhaps word of my fraudulent claims to be writing a follow-up piece about Agarwal had got back to the office.

  I got in and Devika rose to give me a tight hug which did nothing to alleviate my growing feeling of dread.

  ‘How have you been?’ I asked.

  ‘Busy,’ said Devika with a smile. But I could see that she was uncomfortable.

  ‘What is it?’

  She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. ‘You know that I love the work you do for us, right?’

  ‘I think I do.’

  ‘The point being that this isn’t about you. It is about the company and its bullshit HR policies.’

  ‘Spit it out, Devika.’

  ‘Mumbai has flagged a number of local expenses at the Calcutta office during the last audit. Revenues from here are at an all-time low and, as usual, instead of putting pressure on the marketing guys to perform they are squeezing editorial to cut costs.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘They have raised questions about your fee.’

  ‘I could hardly charge less per word. If I did, I’d end up paying you guys to carry my work.’

  Devika didn’t even crack a smile. ‘They are saying that for the amount you are getting paid on a monthly basis they should have a full-time employee, not a freelancer.’

  ‘But I am more productive than most of your staff here.’

  ‘Exactly what I said. But predictably, management doesn’t see it that way. They are saying that in that case there is a productivity problem in the Calcutta office.’

  ‘Jesus. So what do they want?’

  ‘For you to join full time.’

  ‘Or?’

  ‘Or scale back your contributions to no more than two small pieces a month.’

  ‘They have no problems with my work otherwise?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Great. What kind of sense does that make?’

  ‘I don’t like it any more than you do. This kind of baseless meddling makes my blood boil. The arrangement works and that should be that.’

  ‘There is no way to change their minds?’

  ‘I can’t seem to find one. But you should take the job. You know I’ve felt that you belong here for some time.’

  ‘How would it work?’

  ‘It won’t be much more than your take-home now, but you’ll get considerable savings in the form of provident fund, and don’t pretend you don’t need that. Plus, there are other perks too—outstation assignments, health benefits, office cars. Overall, you’ll be the winner.’

  ‘What about time?’

  ‘Five-day weeks. Fairly relaxed for the first fortnight after the issue’s release. More pressure the rest of the time.’

  ‘I don’t know, Devika.’

  ‘I’ll tell you how I see it. If I was getting all my money from one job, that is where my loyalties would lie.’

  ‘I know. But an inflexible work schedule will kill my practice altogether.’

  ‘You’ve been saying it is dead for a while anyway. And that voluntary stuff you do with your superhero squad can continue on weekends. And who knows, your detective skills could come in handy. You might eventually want to make a switch to hard news, maybe even investigative journalism.’

  It’s not like I hadn’t considered that option in the past. But somehow it had never appealed to me. I wanted to so
lve crime, help people in distress, make arrests. I didn’t want to conduct hidden-camera sting operations, which was all I had seen by way of ‘investigative journalism’ in the past.

  ‘How soon do they want a response?’

  ‘As soon as possible.’

  ‘What about the stuff I am working on now?’

  ‘Submit those. I’ll get the payments processed. But I need a decision soon.’

  ‘Can I have till the end of the month?’

  Devika looked at the calendar. ‘Two weeks?’

  ‘Yes. I need to think.’

  ‘Okay, I can buy you that much time. But once I’m back from Delhi, I’ll need to set things in motion.’

  I was about to leave when Devika stopped me. ‘Oh, and another thing,’ she said.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘We got a call from the PR officer of Calcutta Medical.’

  I froze. ‘What did she say?’

  ‘Dr Mitra had some unpleasant words for her after you left. He said he was thinking about filing an official complaint to the editor.’

  ‘Oh no.’

  ‘What did you do to rattle him like that?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  Devika’s brow told me she didn’t believe me. ‘The PR managed to convince him against it, but she says the piece you were working on better be good.’

  ‘I’ll send it to you ASAP.’

  Another one for my overflowing plate: an article about reversing cardiac problems through lifestyle management. If my suddenly elevated blood pressure was anything to go by, I might have to start taking some of that advice myself.

  All I wanted to do was go home, but I knew Amit would be there and I wasn’t equal to seeing him in my current state of mind. I decided to walk through the perennially open door of Santosh da’s office first. There he was in his tiny garage, steel desk and overflowing racks all around him. ‘Reema! How nice to see you!’ he said, standing up.

  Crow’s feet fanned away from his always twinkling eyes. Always curious. That must be the secret to Santosh da’s inexplicable optimism, his ability to weather hardship and disappointment with a smile on his face.

  ‘I hope I am not disturbing you,’ I said.

  ‘Of course not. Have some tea.’ Santosh da sat down and opened the flask that was always at his side. He pulled out a small white battered ceramic cup with pink flowers from a drawer and filled both it and his own cup. Then he pulled out a tin and held it towards me. ‘Have a biskut.’