The Mayor's Abduction
Page 14
“What about Thaddeus, where is he now?”
“He has escaped, sir, it seems. There is a rumor that he has been arrested in Bombay but we don’t know for sure. I have put our most able man-hunters on his trail but we do not have any reliable information as of now.”
“And do we, by any chance, know what leverage that man had over the mayor. We might be able to use it against Norman Sinclair.”
“Unfortunately, sir, No. Our lawyer offered him a lot of money to part with that information when he met him earlier but he was adamant at not disclosing it. He did not even indicate what sort of information it was.”
“And Claude Labarthe? What about him?”
“He is currently being held in the Vasco High-Security Prison. According to the information that I have been able to get, so far he has not confessed to conspiring to kidnap the mayor. He has even refused to have any knowledge of Thaddeus. He has, however, confessed to his links to the smuggling syndicate. His political career is all but over. If they prove that he had a hand in kidnapping the mayor, which is quite likely given that it was he who helped Thaddeus come out of jail, they can even charge him with treason and that means a minimum of life imprisonment. For the other charges of smuggling and misuse of power, our lawyers say that he might get around 7 to 10 years.”
“Do we need to fear anything from his arrest?”
“No sir, though we had extensive connections with him, he has no proof to point to our organization. Fortunately, most of his involvement was with the smuggling racket and he knows nothing about our other businesses, so the impact would, at most, be limited.”
“What if we try and get him out of jail. What would it cost and is it worth it?”
“Sir, there are still some details to come out. If it is revealed that he had a hand in kidnapping the mayor, then even we might not be able to get him out. We can try and get him murdered inside the prison but I don’t think that would conform to the non-violent way that we try and run our business, we do not want any undue attention coming towards us. However, if only the smuggling charges are pressed against him we might be able to get him out by bribing the judges and the detectives handling the case. But that would be expensive. Based on other past cases, that might cost us anywhere between 750 thousand to a million Cowries. However, I don’t see any point in doing that as his political career is effectively over, he will not be able to repay our investment on him.”
“That is right. Let him be there, but if we get any whiff that he is revealing secrets which can lead to complications, we would need to take care of him.”
“I understand that fully, sir. I am getting daily updates from the Vasco Prison and would keep you updated on that as well.”
“Good. One more thing, you said that the mayor escaped with the help of a lady. Who was she? A neighbor or someone?”
“No sir. Very little detail has come out. It is not yet clear if she has claimed the 50,000 Cowries reward that was offered to get any details about the mayor. From what I know the woman is called Maya Mitchell and she works in the Bombay Detective Agency. But interestingly, she is not a detective there, she is only an administrative worker, takes care of the bills and the letters. I am still not sure if she stumbled upon the mayor by mistake or if she was actually looking for him. The former seems a more likely possibility.”
“Do we know anything about her?”
“I figured that you would be interested in that. Actually, that was the information which caused the delay today. I have put whatever I have been able to find out about her in the file. But the information is very scarce. I have seen few women as mysterious as her. We know that she works five days a week in an accountancy firm called Grington and Basse in Sophia and she works Saturday and Sunday part-time in the Bombay Detective Agency as an administrative worker. She has her lodgings in a small room in Tamarind Street which she shares with a girl called Maisie. She does not seem to have any other relatives and we don’t have any information about her past. But it seems that she does have an acquaintance with Lieutenant Ernst Wilhelm, the Peacock who had a central role to uncover Claude’s involvement in the kidnapping. It is also worth noting that Ernst Wilhelm is the same man who arrested Rattan Singh, the smuggler whose capture was the starting point for all our troubles.”
“Interesting. It seems that these two people have cost us a lot of money. We need to let them know that.”
“Do you want me to send our messengers to them, Sir. I hear the cells in the jail are empty.”
“No, no Benjamin. You have a queer penchant for violence, you need to cure that. If we can get something done without shedding blood, why not take that route. I only want you to let them know that their actions have caused us great harm. But we would be willing to forget this if they keep out of our tracks from now on. Let them know this, and I hope, for their own benefit, that we will not be troubled again by them.”
“Certainly, sir. I’ll do that today itself.”
The investor picked up the file at his feet and got up.
“Thank you,” he said, “and make sure this is the last time you have been late.”
“Yes sir.”
There was a hiss of the secret door opening and the investor turned and walked away.
Did he limp?
Benjamin was sure that he saw the silhouette of the Investor limp slightly as he exited the room. The accountant clambered up the rungs out of the sewer, arranging one more piece in the jigsaw puzzle of his master’s identity. He was not sure, though, if he would live to solve it.
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Dr. Chinew's first night in his new house is disturbed by a break-in. The intruder steals nothing but leaves behind a message - Death Comes to All.
Maya maintains she is not crazy, only different. Henry Camleman, the chief of Bombay Detective Agency, disagrees. He cannot think of any other reason why a (as far as he knew) reputable 21 year old woman would want to become a detective in his agency. Solving crimes in Cardim, a city teeming with crime and criminals, is fraught with danger and involves dealing with the kind of people he wouldn't imagine a woman mingling with in a thousand years. To humor the stubborn woman, however, he gives her a fairly harmless domestic case. A celebrated spiritualist claims that there are spirits in his house and Camleman wants Maya to prove otherwise. He hopes the case would keep Maya indulged in a puzzle of ghosts and spirits while keeping her safe from the grime of actual crimes.
Little does Camleman know the true extent of the affair.
As Maya delves deeper into the mystery, it takes her little time to uncover a web of theft, deceit, betrayal and murder which would test the skills and perseverance of the amateur detective to the fore. Will she pass the first exam of her professional career?
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Noah Alexander is a TOI Write India winner and a Juggernaut Selects author based out of Delhi. During the day he works as a consultant, helping firms realize their topline aspirations while his nights are spent buried in the same laptop trying to further his own literary ambitions.
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