The forensic man showed him the print they had taken. It was of the right foot. Obviously, the man had removed his shoes before entering the temple.
Hawa Singh noticed that the outline of one toe was missing.
Almost instantly, Ruby shouted, ‘The prints match with that of the handprint we took from Saraswati Bhawan.’
Hawa Singh looked at her, stone-faced. ‘Sudha Krishnamurthy is Manvendra Singh, the Butcher of Benares.’
CHAPTER 41
The police team inched closer and closer. It comprised SSP Neeraj Thakur, ACP Shishir Jha, Sub-Inspector Gaya Prasad Sharma and twenty other armed men—along with, of course, Hawa Singh and Ruby. The SSP signalled to his men to surround the building. The policemen slowly spread out with their rifles pointed far out in front of them, on full security alert.
Hawa Singh had warned them, ‘The killer is dangerous and will not think twice before killing you.’
Hawa Singh and Ruby checked Sudha’s office and her quarters but she was not there. Meanwhile, the entire staff of the Institute was asked to move out of the building. Hawa Singh looked in on the rooms of the patients. The patients looked scared and nervous. It seemed as if the mentally ill could sense and smell the danger. They were all quiet. A few huddled in the corners of the rooms. Only three reacted violently and started crying. Hawa Singh had to call Dr Shruti to calm them down.
Ruby and Gaya Prasad checked the offices on the ground floor.
ACP Shishir Jha and armed policemen were securing the exterior, scanning the vast environs of huge lawns and dense foliage.
The SSP stood outside, looking at his watch. It was 5.30 pm. They had managed to locate the Butcher’s den. If only he could pounce on the Butcher himself, put him in handcuffs and parade him through the streets of Benares!
It took the police personnel inside almost twenty minutes to go through each room and office—and come up with nothing. The members of the staff standing outside looking dumbstruck. They had not been told why they’d been asked to leave the building. Nor had they been informed of the true identity of their CMO, the revered Dr Sudha Krishnamurthy.
Hawa Singh came downstairs to rejoin the rest of the team. Only Ruby was missing. A danger signal lit up instantly inside his head. He ran through the circular corridor, calling out her name. As he rounded a corner he saw her, and stopped dead in his tracks.
Ruby looked horror-stricken. He saw the nose of a Colt pointing directly at him. Then he saw Sudha emerging from behind Ruby. Her face wore the maniacal ictus of a grin. ‘So you finally tracked me down,’ cackled the figure. ‘But it’s of no use. You cannot stop me.’
‘You have nowhere to run,’ warned Hawa Singh. ‘The entire place is surrounded.’
The Butcher laughed. With one hand he removed the long-haired wig, casting it contemptuously aside, and then peeled off the thin layer of latex he wore on his face.
Hawa Singh saw a lean man, about forty years old, with boyish features. Manvendra Singh.
‘So this is the real face of the Butcher?’
‘I’m not a Butcher!’ shouted Manvendra Singh.
The timbre suddenly changed but there was still something boyish about it. Hawa Singh recalled the soft husky delivery, the repeated coughing and sips of tea. They were all attempts to hide the real voice.
‘You killed your own brother,’ said Hawa Singh.
Manvendra looked at him with the Colt still pointing at Ruby’s head. Hawa Singh knew that the slightest move of his finger on the trigger could prove fatal.
‘Abhay Narayan Singh was not my brother. He was a distant cousin whom my father Vibhuti Narayan Singh adopted and gave the title of the Kashi Naresh. I was supposed to be the king but my father didn’t approve of my ways—my life with the Aghoris, my interest in the occult my turning into a cannibal. Imagine! He told me I was not fit to be the Kashi Naresh! I couldn’t take it and finally got a chance to kill that adopted son,’ cried Manvendra Singh.
‘Who was the man locked up here in the Institute?’ Hawa Singh asked warily, his eyes still on Ruby and the Colt.
Manvendra laughed delightedly. ‘He was Sushant Singh, Abhay’s brother. Abhay took away my title and I took away his brother. He got me locked up in this place but God had his own plans for me. I got to know of a new CMO at Sparrow, Sudha Krishnamurthy, coming to take charge here. So before she could reach the Institute, I killed her and her husband. And I took her place—while Sushant took mine. I myself had cut up Sushant’s face so that no one would distinguish him from me. He had a similar body structure and no one bothered to ask questions of a cannibal.’
Ruby gathered herself together and shouted, ‘Hawa, don’t let him go. I don’t care if he kills me.’
Manvendra tittered. ‘Don’t worry, girl, I’m going to kill you both.’
‘I’m sure we can work things out,’ said Hawa Singh placatingly.
‘You are going to sort out my life? I tried that with bringing about the escape of Sushant Singh, and then was forced to kill him too.’
‘Why did you kill him?’
‘In his death was my freedom. I broke his chain and urged him to escape, and in that bid, the cannibal inside him surfaced. I had turned him into an animal. He could bite into human flesh and tear it off with his teeth like he did to Dr Pradhan.’
‘I, too, would have been forgotten after Sushant’s death but you had to botch everything up,’ Manvendra Singh told him in a high accusing tone.
Hawa Singh tried to keep him talking and threw another question at him. ‘Why did Sushant attack you in the office? What was he looking for?”
Manvendra gave a maniacal laugh, saying, ‘He wanted his file to prove his true identity. But even in the files he had become Manvendra Singh.’
‘You are the one who killed Tailanga Swami. It could have caused riots in Benares!’ Ruby shouted, trying to hide her fear.
‘Tailanga was my guru but with his own weaknesses. He had helped me dispose of the bodies of Sudha Krishnamurthy and her husband. In return, he wanted the position of the senior mahant in Benares. Till date, no Aghori has held that post and never will. I wanted him to wait but he started to blackmail me and threatened to reveal my identity to the Kashi Naresh and the police. So I had to kill him,’ Manvendra said.
There was a sound of heavy footsteps running towards them. Manvendra looked startled.
‘I told you the police have surrounded the place. Let her go, and surrender yourself,’ commanded Hawa Singh.
Manvendra tittered. ‘You want the future Kashi Naresh to surrender? That will never happen!’
The footsteps were coming closer and closer.
‘What about Kanhaiya? Did you kill him too?’ Hawa Singh asked.
‘Kanhaiya,’ Manvendra uttered the name in a sing-song voice, keeping his ears open to the sound of approaching feet. ‘He was a drug-dealer and supplied me with marijuana and opium. Once he saw me changing into the kind of person I am today, that was the end for him.’
They heard the SSP rapping out orders to police personnel.
‘You can’t run and you can’t hide,’ Hawa Singh warned.
‘You are not in a position to say that. My work is not yet over,’ said Manvendra with a leer. ‘First, I’ll kill her, and then I’ll kill you. All of Benares will get to watch the spectacle at the evening aarti.’
Manvendra pointed the revolver at Hawa Singh and began to withdraw, dragging Ruby with him. He turned into a bend in the corridor and disappeared from view. By the time the SSP and his men arrived at the scene, the Butcher was long gone.
They heard a police jeep starting outside and then speeding away.
‘Where’s the evening aarti to take place?’ shouted Hawa Singh.
‘Dashashwamedh Ghat,’ answered Neeraj Thakur.
CHAPTER 42
7 pm, Dashashwamedh Ghat, Benares
The loud blowing of conch shells broke through the greyness of the sky. The ghat was crowded to capacity by locals, devotees and Indian and foreig
n tourists.
The aarti started with a group of pandits, all draped in saffron robes, waving incense sticks in elaborate patterns around the hallowed epicentre of devotion. The ritual was termed Agni Pooja, worship of Fire, wherein a dedication is made to Lord Shiva, the Ganges, Surya (Sun), Agni (Fire itself), and the entire universe.
The heady scent of sandalwood thickly permeated the air. The pandits lit large brass lamps with many wicks, lighting up the entire ghat. The pandits began the proceedings in a well-orchestrated manner, synchronizing their movement with lamps in hand, to the rhythmic chants of hymns and the beat of cymbals.
The lamps were mirrored in the waters of the Ganges. Thousands of earthen lit diyas were placed in leaf bowls and floated downriver, causing the water to reflect the starry sky. Then came a shower of petals as if the heavens themselves showered blessings on Benares. Thousands came to witness the magic.
Hawa Singh ran through the crowded streets to the ghat. His mind was racing in pace with his legs. What were the unfathomable depths of evil to which Manvendra would sink? He had spoken to the man at length, on more than one occasion, face to face, discussed the intricacies of mania, even sought his goddamned advice… and failed to see him for what he really was.
The Butcher had managed to keep up the act in front of even a trained FBI interrogator such as Ruby. Her mastery over kinesics and the behavioural sciences was defeated in the face of the occult, into which Manvendra Singh had delved so deeply with tantriks, sadhus and behrupiyas—those experts so good at disguise that even royalty had employed them as spies down the ages—whose company he preferred.
He had not only dressed as a woman, but also completely altered his body language and his voice. He had burnt the bodies of Sudha and her husband anonymously in the cremation grounds with the help of Tailanga Swami so that no one would ever get to learn of their existence in a town so far away from their home.
He had then assumed his female persona, and presented himself at Sparrow’s Research and Analysis Wing for the Mentally Ill as their new head. He had placed Sushant in his cell by force and went on to replace all his fingerprints with those of Sushant in the file. Thus began the good times of the Butcher of Benares. But, who knew then, that a totally unforeseen incident would occur when a pesky police duo would lay their hands on the handprints of the royal family inside Saraswati Bhawan?
The aarti continued, and some tourists commandeered a few boats in the river, wanting a ringside view. The chanting and beat of drums rose to a crescendo.
A boat came cutting through the thousands of lamps and flowers floating in the Ganges. Inside the boat, Manvendra stood with the Colt in one hand, the other holding Ruby to him. He was still wearing the saree and a large round bindi on his forehead, an incongruous sight. As he came closer to the ghat, he raised the revolver and fired in the air. The shot rang through the air, cutting across the music and chanting. At once, there was complete silence. Everyone looked in the direction of the boat and its weird occupants.
‘I am Manvendra Singh!’ shouted the Butcher, ‘heir to the royal family. Your Abhay Narayan Singh was only an adopted son who snatched my title from me. From now on, I’m your king!’
There was no reaction from the stunned and frightened crush of spectators.
Hawa Singh who hadn’t been able to find an easy passage by land through the crowds to the ghat, did the next best thing and clambered aboard a boat. This drew up now opposite the one on which Manvendra stood, posturing. ‘Stop this madness!’ Hawa Singh bellowed across the water.
‘Oh, Hawa Singh!’ Manvendra greeted him as if he was glad to see him. ‘Good to see you here. Now I can kill you both.’
‘You have already killed many innocent people!’ Hawa Singh shouted back. ‘You are a butcher!’
Manvendra’s eyes bulged as he cried out, ‘I’m not a butcher!’ He looked around at the thousands of people watching him agape. ‘Yes, I killed all those foreigners. But the real Butcher is a man who killed more than five thousand people in Benares. They were innocent men, women and children.’
‘Who the hell are you talking about?’ asked an exasperated Hawa Singh.
‘I am talking about Brigadier-General James George Smith Neill of the British East India Company,’ said Manvendra, talking at the top of his voice. ‘When all of northern India was aflame with the revolt of 1857, Neill arrived in Benares. He disbanded the local native regiment, lined up the sepoys, and shot them one by one. After that an entire regiment of Sikhs stationed here was also shot dead. General Neill then embarked upon a campaign of terror, hanging every able-bodied man he could lay his hands on.’
Ruby, deathly calm, said, ‘What does that have to do with these foreigners?’
Manvendra replied as if it was all perfectly logical. ‘Brigadier-General Neill was an orthodox Christian who served the Vatican. He was given the task of converting Indians to Christianity. And he went about the task seriously. Anyone who refused to adopt Christianity was shot dead, hanged or brutally killed in public. Many of the bodies were stabbed with the Holy Cross and left in the open as a message to others. I’m proud to say that Benares refused to convert en masse. Remember, we are the descendants of Lord Shiva and we’ll never desert Him. I took their Cross and gave it back to those Christians in their own kind.’
‘But they had nothing to do with what happened more than a century ago!’ protested Ruby.
‘They did. They were connected to the source,’ said Manvendra Singh, shortly.
Then, he appeared to rethink. These stupid spectators of my much-awaited outing deserve an explanation. I’ll give it to them. I want the show to go on… for a little longer. He raised his voice again. ‘Neill came from a family in Scotland,’ he called over the wind. ‘He started a tradition among his kinsfolk which entailed lifelong service to the Vatican by each and every member of the extended family. Over the years, the family scattered but they never broke the tradition. I did some extensive global research and got in touch with the more powerful and dedicated of them. I told them that the secrets of the ground-breaking Bhrigu-Samhita, lay hidden in Benares. Being loyal to the Vatican, they resolved never to let those secrets come out. And thanks to you, Hawa Singh, the world will now know them.’
He wasn’t finished, not yet. ‘The Vatican wanted to shut us up. Its servile followers wanted to destroy us. I had to do something to counter them. It was pure revenge, too, on the family of Brigadier-General Neill. After Benares, Neill went to Kanpur and forced thousands of Brahmins to convert to Christianity and inflicted the death penalty on all those who refused. He compelled the Brahmins to collect the bloodied clothes of the victims, and wash the blood from the ground on which their lifeless bodies fell to bullets. That act itself resulted in a loss of caste for Brahmins. Their options after that were two—convert to Christianity or live on as untouchable Hindus. That original form of punishment is said to have been Brigadier-General Neill’s own invention, and brought him great credit.’ He paused to spit violently against the sides of the boat, with revulsion and hate.
Hawa Singh was keeping an eye on his every move. The knowledge that the Colt was aimed at Ruby’s head caused him to reconsider every option of his own.
Manvendra continued, clearly enjoying the awed attention he was getting for the first time in his life. ‘From Kanpur, Neill marched his army to Lucknow, where he was finally killed. But look at us, you shameless people! Do you know that a memorial was actually erected in Lucknow in the name of Neill and his troops?’
Manvendra ranted on. ‘The memorial is inscribed with the words, “Sacred to the memory of Brigadier-General J.G.S. Neill, ADC to the Queen, Col J.L. Stephenson, Major S.G.C. Renaud, Lieut N.H. Arnold, Lieut A.A. Richardson, Lieut J.A. Chisholm, Lieut F. Dobbs, the non-commissioned officers, drummers and rank and file of the First Madras Fusiliers who fell during the suppression of the rebellion in Bengal 1857–58”. We were doubly humiliated when an island in the Andamans was named after him, as a mark of honour. And you pe
ople flock to it today as happy tourists!
‘Do you even know that during the 1857 Revolt, the British pursued a murderous decade-long campaign to wipe out millions of people who dared to rise against them? There was an untold holocaust in which more than 10 million people were killed over a decade following 1857!’ Manvendra shouted over the wind.
‘From the British point of view, it was a necessary holocaust,’ he said bitterly. ‘They thought the only way to avenge the mutiny and subjugate the people with terror forever was to destroy entire populations in towns and villages. It was simple and brutal. Indians who stood in their way were killed. But its scale has been kept a secret. It was bigger than the holocaust the Jews in Europe underwent, but in India, an entire chapter has been erased from our history. What, after all, were 10 million deaths? They were just a statistic. What did it matter to our governments and politicians?’
Ruby weighed her options. Should she make a dash for it while the lunatic went on with his polemics? But no, he held her too fast.
‘Now, you tell me, am I wrong in killing those who belonged to Neill’s family?’ he snarled. ‘Haven’t many of our ancestors been mercilessly killed or humiliated by Neill? Don’t I have the right to kill his bloodline and end the lineage? Don’t you want to?’
There was total silence. His unwilling audience was too numb to react.
It took Hawa Singh to speak up. ‘No, you don’t have the right to kill them!’ he hollered.
Manvendra indicated with his eyes the pistol he was touching Ruby with. ‘I’m not yet done. There are still more of that family living around the world. One by one, each of them will have to die.’
The SSP had stationed the entire police force all around the ghat but they were in no position to negotiate with Manvendra.
A man came at a stumbling run through the crush at the ghat. Fauja Singh. He called to his son in a shaking voice, ‘You are not going to let another Kavita die.’ Hawa Singh looked towards him and gently nodded in acquiesence.
THE BUTCHER OF BENARES Page 25