A Killer Among Us

by Ushasi Sen Basu

  She couldn’t afford to be amused. Her mind jumped to yesterday again. Had Mr Talukdar seen the two of them?

  Ira stood waiting for the axe to fall.

  ‘It is nearly noon, madam,’ he boomed. ‘Do you realise your stinking garbage pail has lain here all morning? Housekeeping has cleared the garbage by 8 am, at least do your part and take your bin inside again! Is it too much to ask? There are clear rules. It is unsanitary for the rest of us; though I realise that you have not much concern about either sanitation or your neighbours. I have guests coming over and would be most obliged if they were not met with the sight of garbage pails lying around outside my home.’

  Ira released her breath, which she only realised now she had been holding all this while. He hadn’t seen anything, just his usual harassment! Well, she had quite a few accusations to make of him too! Convincing the night watchman to lie about her, writing sneaky anonymous letters to her landlady. Much worse than a bin that had lain outside a few hours too long, she dared say.

  Ira glanced over his shoulder and saw Mrs Talukdar. Sounds of a loud detergent commercial emanated from the depths of their apartment, through the open door where the older woman stood uncertainly. Her eyes seemed to tell her, ‘We know it’s not a big deal, you and I, but you know Mr Talukdar na, he’s like this only. Just humour him and he will go away, please don’t make a fuss.’

  Ira’s eyes focused back on the bully in front of her, who was still in full bellow.

  ‘I’ve been ringing and ringing your damn bell for the last half an hour, but predictably enough, it doesn’t work. So damn unsocial, and odd, whatever you do! I will be sure to inform the Association and your landlady―useless woman she is herself―about all these matters.’

  Ira picked her bin up silently and set it indoors.

  As Mr Talukdar turned away in triumph, she said, ‘Mr Talukdar, I disconnected the bell because of you, primarily. I come home at two in the morning, as you no doubt know, and disapprove of, for whatever imaginary reason of your own. I cannot have you ringing my bell when I am getting my quota of sleep. As for your informing the Association, you have my permission to do so, but unlike last time do sign your name to the letter; and drop me a copy too, if it’s not too much trouble. I would also appreciate your not getting the guards to lie to the police about me. Why don’t you apply yourself and come up with some real dirt?’

  With that challenge vibrating between them, she slammed the door hard on his slack-jawed expression. Mrs Talukdar had scuttled indoors midway through Ira’s tirade.

  Ira would pay for this later, she knew. But damn! It felt good.

  ******

  Lunch had been a pleasant interlude in a day of venom, raised voices, and slammed doors. They occasionally held hands when the waiters weren’t around, since the restaurant was almost empty on a weekday afternoon.

  Ira confided in Ayan about the exchanges with Gopal and Talukdar and laughed about how the latter looked like tutti frutti. Ayan launched into a Talukdar version of Little Richard’s ‘Tutti Frutti’ and they both doubled up with laughter, like children. She felt better, so much better. Ayan made her forget her homesickness. In fact, Ira realised with a pang of guilt, this week she had not enjoyed her conversations with her parents. Sometimes, Ira deserved to be the one to be reassured, not always the one who was reassuring, didn’t she?

  By mutual agreement, once lunch arrived, they decided to speak of more positive matters. Ayan was a good listener. She found herself telling him about her life in her small town, how their little house would shudder when the heavy goods trains sped over the tracks en route to bigger stations. Ira told him why she had taken the decision to break away from that life, her relationship with her parents, ‘They’re torn between wanting me to be like the other girls and wanting me to be happy.’ Her worry that newspapers would go obsolete in a few decades, and her plan to move on to Delhi anyway, the mother ship of all Indian journalists serious about their craft.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Ayan said, ‘there must be work there for tech support people!’

  They’d both ‘heh-heh’-ed like it was a joke, careful not to seem overeager to talk about the future.

  At the end of the meal Ira realised she’d spoken only about herself. ‘How about you, Ayan? Tell me a little more about you?’

  ‘Haha, insert my name in any good, Bengali boy’s life. Worked hard at school, studied science and engineering because I could, and then took up a job which had no connection with the last five years of education. My mother hopes I will do an MBA so she has further bragging rights at parties, and I can “be proud” of my CV. You know the drill.’

  ‘Okay…what about your dad…tell me about him then?’

  ‘Insert HIS name….’

  Ira laughed, though she wondered why her questions had been dodged so deftly, after she had poured her heart out to him. But she’d had enough acrimony today, this was her only pleasant respite and she left that fight for another day.

  ‘Did you know,’ she began, ‘that you and your flatmate live in a haunted apartment?’

  ‘Eh?’

  They spent their remaining time together happily dissecting Aditi and Jayashree’s haunted flat story.

  ******

  Nandana sat at the dining table sipping her mid-morning coffee, thinking of the previous evening.

  She had sat ramrod straight on the ornate wooden bench by the lake; feeling exposed and self-conscious as she had watched the sun set in a blaze of pinks and oranges. It was called something, this colour…organza, was it? No, that was a kind of material.

  All her life, what she knew of herself was what she had seen mirrored in the eyes of the people looking back at her. If someone said she was pretty, she became pretty. Till the time, of course, someone going through an ‘I am brutally honest, baba’ phase told her she wasn’t. She was talented for a few days until she heard through a friend that another friend thought she wasn’t.

  And now she had abstracted herself from the larger world, and built herself a tiny cocoon instead. She sometimes felt that her existence flickered thinly, only waiting to be extinguished entirely when even the co-inhabitants of her cocoon spread their wings and had no need for her any more.

  Perhaps she would just fade into invisibility, once people started seeing through her, seeing past her. Those days were not far off, the way she was going.

  Nandana thought of her recent acting out: could it be that her tantrums had very little to do with her marriage or murder madness, or anything else external? She was scared that she had burnt all her bridges to the outside world, and every day took her closer and closer to being rendered obsolete even inside her world.

  And she’d thought: why did she sit here now, so aimless on a park bench by the lake? Most people didn’t see her at all, predictably enough, but those who did, looked amused as they passed. This was a place for lovers, not for middle-aged women who would be better served dishing up snacks to family at home.

  She saw herself through their eyes. Pathetic, homely woman; overdressed, over made up and looking around with a hopeful air. Does she expect someone to be interested in her? She imagined them sneering as they walked away, as if any decent man in his right mind would even look at her that way. She has missed the bus. Aunty, just go on home. Leave the loving to the younger, more attractive girls.

  But she didn’t even mean romantic feelings. Would any person, man or woman, be interested in the droned, humdrum things she would say?

  Stop it! You’re doing it again. They’re not thinking those things about you. They are thinking of other things entirely. Of their own lives, which they probably hate as well.

  Wouldn’t it have been fun if people could just unzip themselves and escape their bodies and lives for a while? To experience life unencumbered by personal clutter?

  Nandana sighed.

  She got up, determined not to go home so soon, but conceding defeat here at the lake at least. She’d do some window shopping, eat, and
go back home. Nandana would fit in more at a mall, and it would be something to do.

  As she stood uncertainly, wondering which way to go, she thought she saw a familiar face flash out of a yellow and black taxi window. Was that Pallabi? But surely, she would have at least waved if it were her. Oh, but they were enemies now…how could she forget?

  It was a sign that it was time to go home. She didn’t feel much like anything else. That was the only place she could call her own―her comfort zone. She looked at all the people, men and the occasional woman, walking around like they owned the ground they walked on. She felt like she was trespassing.

  At least she had cooled off. Better sense had prevailed. She was lucky to have a home and family to go back to. Why couldn’t she remember that? Why did she always want more?

  She had begun to walk, deep in thought. Nandana skirted some treaded-in poop of dubious origin, and then made up her mind.

  She turned her feet homewards, and would have run all the way, if she wasn’t worried it would attract too much attention.

  ******

  Ira dropped Ayan a few metres away from the gate at 11.00 pm. They were both playing hooky from work. She would be seen arriving in the cab alone, and he would enter the gate a measured five minutes afterwards. One would think falling in love was the worst two single people could do.

  I doubt even the murderer took so much care to cover his tracks, she grumbled to herself on the way to the Wing 1 entrance, taking care not to check over her shoulder if Ayan followed with that impish grin plastered all over his face.

  She met Mrs Bhattacharjee waiting for the lift as well, looking worried.

  Ira didn’t relish the prospect of Ayan catching up with them and having to get into the lift together with her landlady. Much awkwardness was bound to ensue.

  All such thoughts were driven out of her mind when Mrs Bhattacharjee turned to her abruptly and said, ‘I was coming to put this under your door.’ She indicated a letter in her hand. ‘I have been pondering upon whether to tell you, upset you, at all. I got another anonymous letter today...’ Mrs Bhattacharjee tapered off in confusion. And began again.

  ‘It says…listen, can I come to the flat and talk to you?’ She lowered her voice. The lift arrived at the ground floor with a ding.

  Ira was torn. If she got into the lift now and welcomed Mrs Bhattacharjee into her home; Ayan would only minutes later be knocking up a storm and saying something mock-romantic about her eyes (like he had done for the entire cab ride home) as he stepped in, entirely oblivious of the older woman’s presence.

  But then again, whatever Mrs Bhattacharjee had thought to convey to her at 11 pm, would bound to be of some import, Ira had no doubt. And she owed the lady that much.

  She could not say no. The only way to avert disaster was if Ayan turned up and saw them go in together. Where was that infuriating man when she needed him?

  Mrs Bhattacharjee had kept the lift door open with an outstretched arm, and finally she asked with impatience, ‘Are you coming?’

  ‘Would you mind waiting for me upstairs? I think I might have dropped my keys somewhere.’ Ira began to look around her ostentatiously.

  Alarm flashed across her landlady’s face, so she added, ‘I had it till the gate―it will be somewhere here….’

  ‘Wait, I’ll help you search….’

  Couldn’t this woman stop being so damn nice for one minute?

  Ayan jogged into the circle of brighter light near the lift. The smile drained off his face and was replaced by a look of utter confusion as he caught sight of the older woman.

  He walked straight past them and began to jog up the stairs.

  Ira kept her gaze trained on Mrs Bhattacharjee’s face, willing herself not to burst out laughing. Mrs Bhattacharjee’s eyes trailed after Ayan thoughtfully. ‘This boy lives in Wing 1, does he? I thought he was in Wing 3?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know, Mrs Bhattacharjee. Which boy?’ She asked as an afterthought. Ira pressed the lift button again. She prayed that he wasn’t waiting in front of her door. Even a patient landlady like Mrs Bhattacharjee had her limits, she was sure. Well, she would find out tonight. Hey eyes fell on the letter clutched in her landlady’s fist. What did it say? All the mirth that the farcical situation had produced in her drained away at the thought. Had the poison pen topped his earlier claims with something more?

  Before Ira knew it, the doors slid open at 2, and she held her breath while they stepped out and turned towards her door. ‘Phew!’ her exhalation of relief sounded too obvious to her ears. Ayan had made himself scarce. She wondered where he was hiding out, considering he lived in Wing 3. Probably walked a little further up, and was sitting it out on the stairs someplace.

  As Ira let herself and Mrs Bhattacharjee in with the keys that she belatedly realised she was not supposed to have ready in her bag, she felt the spot between her shoulder blades burn; like someone was watching from just beyond the pool of light in the hallway.

  She shut the door quickly and turned to her landlady, who extended the letter to her without wasting further time.

  Dear esteemed members, began the ornate letter.

  I have observed that you have taken the words of the girl and her landlady as the truth. Let me assure you, they have lied to you. Would someone who is of questionable morals and possibly a murderess too, be averse to lying? She is in cahoots with Mrs Bhattacharjee, who has turned out to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing herself.

  I have proof that she was involved in the murder. Incontrovertible proof. It is hidden in plain sight, should anyone care to open their eyes.

  Be warned that if you do not take steps to expel this girl, I shall go straight to the police with the evidence. While I am there I might even intimate them on a number of irregularities in the running of the building itself.

  I am only doing so in the building’s better interests, and because my hand has been forced.

  I give you twenty-four hours to act upon this.

  Thanking you,

  A well-wisher.

  Mrs Bhattacharjee shook her head and folded it back up.

  ‘Someone really wants you gone.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Talukdar and I had an argument about a garbage pail.’

  Mrs Bhattacharjee looked irritated. Ira wasn’t sure who it was directed at.

  She seemed about to say something but turned away to pick up her handbag, which she had dropped to the floor in her haste to have Ira read the letter.

  ‘Anyway,’ she said with a tired frown. ‘I think let’s take the letters to the police; show them you’re innocent and that you have nothing to hide.’

  ‘No!’ Ira’s response seemed too loud to her own ears.

  Mrs Bhattacharjee frowned. ‘These allegations will reach them anyway, Ira.’

  ‘Okay, I shall call the pen’s bluff, and see if he does go. Nasty piece of shit.’

  Mrs Bhattacharjee made a face at Ira’s language and shrugged. She looked exhausted.

  ‘Do as you wish. The bulk of the accusations are against you. I only am a wolf in a sheep’s clothing, which, to the best of my knowledge, is not a punishable offence. But it is always best to tell your side of the story straight up to the police. If you don’t have anything to hide.’

  She scanned the younger woman’s face with almost maternal worry.

  ‘Goodnight, and message me your final decision tomorrow morning.’

  ******

  13

  Saturday, 15th September 2014

  Nandana couldn’t stop worrying about her conversation with Pallabi, though she tried hard to distract herself. The latter had not shown, amidst all the display of anger, much surprise at what she had said. Even her mention of Thursday in connection to Dilip had only provoked further ‘I am furious, you’re going too far’ expressions rather than shock or worry. Essentially, nothing she said had been new to Pallabi.

  What was one to do then?

  Obviously, she could tell her husband, but she wasn’t even talking to
him yet. In fact, he had decided to be huffy and suspicious about where she had gone without him, as though she had the option of going out anywhere with him.

  Kushal hadn’t asked her directly, expecting her to explain where she’d got all dressed and perfumed up for. It was so rare for her to make plans by herself, to have her own life; that it was a big occasion for questions and explanations to all the members of the family.

  She’d decided to let them all stew in it. Talking to him about this now would spoil the stew.

  The police knew and had done nothing about it. In fact, they were being curiously inert about everything. She thought of Deepa, but decided against it. Murder madness was upon Deepa too, and she was curter and ruder even by Deepa standards.

  Anyway, Nandana wanted to tell her tale to someone who was as interested in this whole business as she was.

  She turned her steps towards Ira’s flat. She knew that the journalist left for work only post lunch.

  ******

  ‘Okay, I’ll tell you why I was there. But you must promise to keep it to yourself.’ They were seated across each other at Ira’s plastic dining table. The spartanness of her bachelorette pad made Deepa’s place look positively overdone. And Pallabi’s like a microscopic palace of Versailles.

  Ira kept silent, committing nothing, but smiled in an encouraging way that Nandana, possibly in her desire to unburden herself, took as assent.

  ‘I was following someone.’

  Ira was startled. ‘Who? At two in the morning?’

  ‘It’s Dilip from 403.’

  ‘Opposite you?’ Ira hooked a thumb over her shoulder to indicate the front door. ‘Okay….’

  Nandana nodded. ‘He…um, let me explain from the beginning. I leave the door unlocked from the inside, because the kids are always walking in and out and it takes too much energy to keep answering the door.’

  You do? Not one of those who had changed over to the Yale lock system, obviously. You shouldn’t go around telling people, lady. Ira nodded, go on.

  ‘I always lock up once the kids are home at 7 pm, and sit down to their homework. But once in a rare while I forget, and it stays unlocked till I close up for the night after the kids are asleep and I’ve finished up all the housework.’