“Inspector Pascal, summoning me?” Dr. Iyer muttered to himself, beginning to sweat. “Mary, send me a message at Administration as soon as the Mittal family arrives.” Then shaking his head in disbelief, he rushed away, just missing Maji and Nimish.
“Where’s my Pinky?”
Nurse Mary pointed to one of the rooms.
Tears that had been held back all night now rolled down Maji’s face as she crossed the room and stood by her granddaughter, afraid she might collapse from relief. “Beti,” she said softly, pressing Pinky’s hand.
Pinky opened her feverish eyes. Maji slid against the cot, simultaneously thanking the gods for her safe return and imploring them for her recovery.
“Inspector Pascal said that he found you in Colaba,” Nimish said. “Is it true?”
“Let her rest,” Maji ordered sharply.
“Her dupatta,” Pinky whispered sharply, tugging at Maji’s sari, “get it back.”
“Her dupatta?” Nimish asked anxiously. “Where’s Lovely?”
“Don’t talk,” Maji said, glancing around. “Others can hear.”
Dr. Iyer walked briskly into the pediatric ward, Pascal at his heels. “She has a severe case of pneumonia.”
“Pneumonia?” Maji asked.
“We must keep her here,” the doctor said.
“For how long?”
“She’s under house arrest,” Pascal interjected.
“Please, Inspector,” Dr. Iyer said coldly, knowing that within the confines of the hospital he commanded even the inspector’s compliance, “the child’s very sick. Arresting her isn’t necessary.”
Maji stepped in front of the inspector, blocking his access to Pinky’s bed, “What’s this nonsense? Nimish, please, go find me some tea.”
Nimish hesitated but Maji’s glare sent him reluctantly out of the ward.
“Doctorji, please give us a moment,” Maji added, dispatching Dr. Iyer, on his way too.
“Now Inspector,” Maji said. “You’re not telling me that my granddaughter’s responsible for anything that happened last night?”
“I’m very sorry,” Pascal said. “But this morning she confessed to killing Lovely Lawate.”
Back at the bungalow, Jaginder sat on the sofa, restlessly scanning the newspapers. Dheer and Tufan slept in the parlor. Savita remained locked behind her bedroom door, not joining in even when she heard the telephone call and the boys’ shouts of joy that Pinky had been found. What about my daughter? she asked herself, untying the cloth that bound her chest. She had had the strangest dreams when she finally fell asleep that night after the tantrik left. She had been lying naked upon her bedspread singing the lullaby, “Soja baby, soja, lal palang per soja. Sleep baby, sleep on a red bed, mummy and papa are coming.”
And then her baby girl had reached for her, had crawled upon her chest and begun to nurse, sucking and sucking until there was nothing left. In the dream, Savita had tried to hold her but her breasts had turned into long drain pipes, the baby suckling at the very end of them. Mummy’s coming! she cried, trying to push her breasts away to reach for her child. She had woken exhausted, her nipples sore and cracked, breasts once again full of milk.
If I were to die, she reflected, I can leave all this pain behind and be with my baby girl. For a moment, she relished the thought of haunting her mother-in-law and husband from the otherworld, her vengeful spirit spiting their authority, upsetting the bolsters on Maji’s dais and lurking in Jaginder’s bottles of Royal Salut. But then she thought of her sons, her much-anticipated luncheon with the wife of a motor scooter tycoon, her jewels. How could she leave all that behind?
Kuntal arrived with a plate of food. “You must eat and drink,” she implored, attempting to put a piece of bread, slick with Polson butter, into Savita’s mouth.
Savita began to weep, placing her cheek against an open page of the latest romance novel that Kuntal had thoughtfully procured from the local library. “Why won’t she come to me? Why can’t I see her?”
Kuntal stroked Savita’s thick hair, gently wiping away her tears.
Then they heard a knock at the door. Savita sat up and blew her nose.
Jaginder entered cautiously, motioning for Kuntal to leave. “Pinky’s recovering now. You’ll be better soon, too.”
“Better?” Savita asked in a soft, menacing voice. She began to tear at the eyelets on her soaking blouse until her breasts lay exposed, still dripping white liquid. She held them in her hands. “These are not better.”
Jaginder looked away, a flush of shame in his cheeks.
“Can’t you look at me anymore?”
“Savita, please.”
“Please what?” she flopped on her back. “Go, just go.”
“I’m sorry—”
“Do you know what happened?” Savita halted and took in a long breath. Her erect nipples pointed accusingly at the clothesline above. “A ghost!”
“Ghost?”
“Our daughter!”
“Our little Chakori?” Jaginder was shocked. “You’re starting to imagine things. You need some proper rest.”
He walked over to the bed and tried to relatch her blouse.
Savita angrily pushed his hands away. “Go ask your mother if you don’t believe me. She was the one who called for a tantrik to come here last night. She knew all these years that the ayah deliberately drowned Chakori and she kept it a secret. And now that terrible witch has come back to kill our sons. Dheer almost died last night!”
“What the bloody hell are you talking about?” Jaginder asked, fear rising up, clutching at his throat. Oh God! Oh God!
“Go!” Savita shouted, throwing the romance novel at him. “Leave me alone!”
Jaginder clenched and unclenched his fists, then turned and closed the door behind him. Outside, the Ambassador was gone, Gulu had taken it to drive Maji and Nimish to the hospital. But the black Mercedes remained in the garage. Jaginder popped open the truck and reached for a bottle of Blue Label that was stashed there. He poured the liquid down his throat until he began to gag. Then he threw the bottle against the wall, splattering Gulu’s sparse room and his Cherry Blossom poster with whiskey and bits of glass. He took the broken bottle and, with steely deliberation, slashed at his arm. But the searing pain of the jagged glass was nothing, nothing compared to the anguish in his heart.
“That’s utter nonsense,” Maji said to Inspector Pascal, even as she felt the crushing weight of those words: killing Lovely Lawate.
“Apparently Miss Lawate took Pinky just before your phone call to my precinct last night. From there, they proceeded directly to Colaba. There may have been a third person, someone with a vehicle. It’s my belief that they then met up with your previous ayah, Avni Chachar. As I already told you on the phone, I found Pinky at Janibai Chachar’s home in Colaba. In my opinion, Miss Lawate was trying to run away with a boy, using Pinky to cover her tracks. Avni was in on it for the money. I’m talking blackmail of course.”
Maji was so shocked by the inspector’s theory that, for a moment, she could not speak. “Am I hearing you correctly, Mr. Inspector? I’ve known Lovely since she was a baby. She would never harm anyone, especially my Pinky.” Silently, she thought, Avni? Has she really come back?
“I’m still piecing the facts together.”
“And what facts are these?”
“Janibai Chachar’s hut. Pinky’s confession.”
“Pinky’s confession?” Maji retorted. “Is this how you operate? Forcing a gravely ill child to talk? Believing her delirious rantings? I suggest you try to find Lovely.”
“My men are fanned out all over Bombay. If she’s alive, she and her lover,” he paused to let the scandalous word sink in, “will most certainly try to leave the city.”
“And what about this Avni Chachar?”
“She must have been displeased to have lost her job, so much so that she became vengeful.”
Maji recoiled. “I want my granddaughter’s name removed from your files. If you har
m her in the slightest way, you will have me to contend with. I think you understand me, Inspector Pascal.”
Pascal ground his teeth. He knew that Maji had powerful allies in business and government who could make trouble for him if he proceeded against her granddaughter. And besides, he really did not believe Pinky’s confession and neither would any judge with half a brain. It was a cover-up for something. “Your granddaughter is involved.”
“I want her uninvolved,” Maji said, her voice like the steel her family had bought and sold for generations. “You found her ill but untouched and brought her to the hospital. That’s your new story. I’ll do whatever it takes.”
Pascal slowly raised an eyebrow, a question, a confirmation.
“Whatever it takes. And not a word of this to Lovely’s family.”
“Agreed.”
“And I’ll send my son to retrieve Lovely’s dupatta this afternoon.”
Pascal looked surprised.
“You will be paid for it, of course, and well paid,” Maji said.
“Just outside Churchgate Station then,” the Inspector sighed resignedly. “There’s a restaurant, the Asiatica. Five p.m.”
After Pascal left, Nimish arrived with the tea. “Why’s she under arrest?”
“For her own safety, beta,” Maji replied. “They have not found the ayah yet.”
She didn’t add that it would be best to keep Pinky in the hospital until the baby ghost had been dealt with.
“And Lovely? Did they find her?”
“No, beta,” Maji said, struggling to contain her confusion and sorrow. “Not yet.”
Pinky kept her eyes closed during the conversation, pretending to sleep but digesting every word, every lie, every concealment. And though she was immensely grateful to Maji for keeping her out of Pascal’s clutches, she could not understand why her grandmother had sacrificed Lovely in the process. Nimish was her only hope now. He’ll find Lovely. If she’s alive, he’ll find her. He needs to know the truth. She opened her eyes, “Nimish—”
“You’re awake,” Maji said, pressing her hand gently. “Don’t talk to anyone. Pretend you’re asleep if that Pascal tries to question you again. Don’t say another word.”
“But Lovely—”
“Not another word!” Maji commanded. “It’s not safe to talk here, you never know who may be listening.”
Nimish turned to give Pinky a look that said, I’ll be back.
His eyes were resolute, his love painfully exposed.
Pinky had to return to the bungalow, to Nimish, before it was too late. Tell him to come to me, Lovely had said in the boat, I’ll wait as long as I can but I can never go back. Pinky forced herself to sit up. She had to get out of the hospital. If Nimish did not come back that night, she decided, she would find a way out on her own.
At home, Maji immediately retired to the puja room where she allowed grief to spill from her body unchecked. Pinky had been found and the divinities were duly thanked, but Lovely was still missing, maybe even dead. Had she really run away and—my God—with a boy?Had she asked Pinky to cover up for her actions?
It would be too risky to question Pinky further in the hospital, Maji decided; she’d wait she until she could bring her back to the bungalow. Alone now in her sanctuary, Maji grieved for her friend Vimla. The past can never be undone, she lamented. Vimla, poor dear Vimla, would now have to experience that same pain, the terrible penetrating void within oneself.
Death or disappearance? Maji considered. Which is worse?
If Lovely had indeed run off, nothing could repair the damage done to the family’s reputation. But what if, what if, somehow Pascal was right? What if Avni was involved? What if she had somehow persuaded Lovely and then Lovely had accidentally been hurt? Tears filled Maji’s eyes as she beseeched the holy trinity—Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva—to somehow, miraculously, return Lovely alive.
I was right to bargain with that Pascal, to save my family’s reputation, she told herself as she wiped her eyes with the end of her sari palloo. Whatever happened to Lovely, nothing could be gained by linking Pinky to her. Nothing but trouble.
After clearing her face of emotions, Maji called to Jaginder who was pacing the parlor in a sullen silence. “We need to talk.”
Closing the door behind him, Jaginder stood uncertainly, his wounded arm tucked behind his back. They stared at each other for a long moment, a look that said, We’re in this together.
“I think all this stress is starting to affect Savita,” Jaginder began to babble. “Her mind. Wasn’t her great-grandmother, mad too? Didn’t you tell me that she talked to ghosts, too? Are these thing hereditary?”
Maji cut him off. “Your wife’s stronger than you think, and smarter. You could learn something from her.”
“Ha!” Jaginder roared. “You want smart? I won’t let you put Nimish in charge of the business. I’ll bloody disinherit him first. Ha!”
“So that’s what’s on your mind?” Maji asked, unfazed. “I thought you cared more for the well-being of your family. Don’t you remember your father’s dying words to you?”
Jaginder did. Son, Omanandlal had said, shipbreaking is not just a business. It is the sacred way of fulfilling your duty, your dharma in life. Your mother has a direct phone line to God—put it to full use.
He had glanced toward Maji, as if to ask her to ring up the divine on the spot, to request a barter of a new body for his old soul, one at the very least destined to become a Congress Party cabinet minister or perhaps even a film star on a par with Jubilee Kumar or playback singer Kundan Lal Saigal. As if on cue, he began to hum the lullaby, “So Ja Rajkumari” from the 1940s hit Zindagi. Sleep, princess, sleep. Sleep and sweet dreams will come. In the dreams, see your beloved. Fly to Roopnagar and be encircled by maidens. The king will garland you.
The tune floated from his lips. Maji’s dark eyes glistened as she watched her husband close his for the very last time. Jaginder, for his part, never had the heart to tell his father that their phone line did not reach the gods but at best, when they were working, to the Walkesh-war Temple down the street.
“He said it was my duty, my dharma,” Jaginder said. Maji had pulled the well-being-of-your-family card. Damn, damn, damn. He quickly restrategized.
“Well there’s no need to tear apart the family that I’ve worked all my life to keep together,” Maji continued wearily. “One needs a certain cunning to survive in business now. Cunning that Nimish, unfortunately, does not possess. Tufan, perhaps, he’s like you, but he’s still too young.”
Jaginder felt his spirits lifting. “Tufan?”
“Enough of this drinking. I will no longer turn a blind eye, do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Until the day I die, I am still the head of this family, do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Now, listen carefully. You are to meet Inspector Pascal at the Asi-atica restaurant near Churchgate at five p.m. tonight.”
“Inspector Pascal!”
“He has agreed to keep Pinky’s name out of this mess, to straighten things out in the press, in exchange for some—” Maji rubbed her thumb and forefinger together.
“What! You want me to get involved in something like this?”
Maji raised her eyebrows. “You’re no stranger to illegal activities. It’s not like we’re harming anyone. He’ll give you a package. Bring it straight to my room, understand? Take the money from my cabinet.”
Jaginder hesitated; his arm throbbed with pain as the thin material of his shirt dried into the congealing wound. “What’s in the package?”
“Nothing that you need know about.”
Jaginder searched his mother’s face for clues but found none.
“A worthy man will do anything to protect his family,” Maji added, her gaze falling upon Jaginder’s hurt arm. The damn family card again. He had no choice.
Maji took her place in the parlor upon her ornamented platform and called everyone to her side. Jaginder sat a
nd began wiping the sweat from his brow. The boys arrived still munching on stuffed potato flat-bread. Savita languidly sauntered out and promptly curled up on a sofa, refusing to open her eyes. Parvati and Cook Kanj appeared with trays of cool green sherbet drinks for the adults and yogurt lassis for the boys.
Gulu settled onto the floor, eyes darting back and forth. Ever since Pinky’s disappearance, he had felt an overwhelming need to find Avni. Now that Pinky was found, he was certain that Avni was hiding somewhere nearby. This morning he had decided, come what may, he would find her. His childhood friends—Hari Bhai in Dharavi, Bam-barkar in the police force, and Yash in Kamathipura—would all be willing to do him a favor.
“A darkness has descended over our household,” Maji began, shifting uncomfortably. “Beginning last night—Dheer’s choking, Pinky’s abduction . . .”
“Lovely’s disappearance,” Nimish added.
Tufan squeezed his thighs, hoping that his bed-wetting would not be included on the list. It had happened again that morning.
“I have prayed for an answer and I have found it.”
Savita opened one eye.
“For four nights, every drop of water in the household must be eliminated.”
Jaginder had no idea what Maji’s solution might be, but her pani-hatao plan, her order to eradicate water was so far from anything he could have reasonably expected that he let out a snort. “It’s the bloody monsoon season for God’s sake.”
“I’m aware of that,” Maji replied with narrowed eyes. “But we must get rid of the ghost.”
“Ghost?” Jaginder said, letting out a long fart as if he had been pricked by a pin.
Tufan ran for cover.
“Now you believe me?” Savita shot back.
“What killed the baby now sustains the ghost,” Nimish said, remembering the tantrik’s enigmatic declaration.
“But why do we have to get rid of her?” Dheer asked, mouth full of potato.
“The tantrik gave us another choice,” Savita said, sitting up.
“Replace her pain with its cosmic counterpart,” Nimish cited once again, “and one day she’ll go on her own.”
Haunting Bombay Page 27