by Tarquin Hall
Puri had no difficulty locating his house near Bengali Market, but he found the front door locked and barricaded from the inside. A big swastika had been painted in red on the doorstep to ward off evil.
“Go away! I don’t want to talk to anyone!” Gupta shouted from behind the door after Puri rang the bell three times.
“But it is Vish Puri this side. I’m looking into – ”
“I don’t care who you are!” interrupted the lawyer. “Those media persons have been banging on my door all day. All I want is to be left alone! I’ve got nothing to say to anyone!”
It took the detective a good ten minutes to persuade Gupta to come to the front window.
Even then he refused to put on the lights or fully pull back the curtains. He stood a couple feet from the window, his face barely visible.
“None of us is safe!” he exclaimed. Puri caught a glimpse of his wild, tormented eyes. “She will return and murder us all!”
“Most unlikely,” replied the detective soothingly. “What you saw was someone pretending to be the goddess, only.”
“How do you know? You weren’t there. I tell you that was no human being! It was the goddess herself. I looked into her eyes! She breathed fire!”
“All a trick of some sort,” said Puri.
His words were wasted; Gupta could not be persuaded. And yet the advocate retained his legal faculties and, despite his ranting, provided the detective with a remarkably intelligible account of the murder: how he had been unable to stop himself laughing and felt transfixed by ‘an invisible force’. He remembered the caws of the crows, the barks of the dogs and the mysterious mist. Kali had ‘materialized out of thin air’ and floated above the ground.
“She was absolutely hideous! Her arms writhing, the skulls around her neck clunking together. I can’t get that noise out of my head. And her voice, Mr. Puri! Her voice! Like… like the screams of murdered children!”
Gupta came closer to the window and looked left and right down the street.
“What about a severed head? You saw that, also?” asked Puri.
“Yes! Yes! It was dripping with blood!”
“You recognized his face – this gentleman who had been apparently deprived of his body, that is?”
Gupta faltered. “I… I didn’t see it clearly,” he admitted.
“There was no blood found at the scene apart from that belonging to Dr. Jha,” Puri pointed out.
Sharma grew agitated again. “I’m telling you what I saw.”
The detective asked about the sword.
Gupta said he had seen it driven through the Guru Buster’s chest. But what had become of it he could not say.
“I covered my eyes. After that I can’t remember much.”
“When were you able to move your feet?”
“Immediately after she disappeared.”
“And it is my understanding you had a headache, is it?”
“Yes, and it won’t go away, Mr. Puri! It will never go away!” He gripped his hair with his hands. “Just like her voice! It’s like she’s here now, calling my name!”
♦
Mr. Ved Karat lived in New Rajendra Nagar. A political speechwriter for the Congress Party, he was also at home trying to recover from the ordeal of the day before. He too was badly shaken. In his case, though, it was the shock of witnessing the murder that had affected him. The goddess herself had not scared him.
“In fact I found her quite magnificent to look at,” he said, sitting in his living room still wearing his pajamas and dressing gown. In one hand he held a glass of fresh nimboo pani, to which he had added a pinch of black salt. “She had an extraordinary aura about her, an emanation of raw power. In a way it was awe-inspiring.”
Karat, too, had been unable to stop himself laughing and his feet had gone ‘leaden’. He described the mysterious mist and the severed head and a ‘blinding flash’ before Kali appeared, ‘levitating high above the earth and breathing fire’. The speechwriter had also witnessed Dr. Jha’s death and seen the sword sticking out of the poor man’s chest after Kali had ‘miraculously disappeared’.
When Puri explained that it was yet to be found, he seemed surprised.
“Someone took it?”
“Murder weapons are often getting removed from the scene. Most probably some unscrupulous fellow took possession of it.”
Karat went on to explain what had happened next: how he had stopped laughing the moment Dr. Jha was killed; how he had rushed to his aid.
“There was so much blood. I felt his pulse, but he was already gone.”
“After you had any headache?”
“I felt nauseous, but no, no headache,” said Karat.
“When were you able to move your feet?”
The speechwriter had to think for a moment before answering. “I believe it was soon after she vanished,” he said.
♦
Puri reached the residence of Professor R.K. Pandey, the Laughing Club instructor and organizer, late in the afternoon. A detached four-bedroom house in West Shalimar Bagh, it was surrounded by a seven-foot wall.
“Very nice to meet you!” Pandey greeted the detective at the front door with a warm, welcoming smile. “Are those rubber soles you’re wearing? There’s a chance of an electric shock, you see.”
Puri looked down at his shoes with a quizzical expression. “They are made of natural rubber. From Kerala, I believe.”
“Excellent! Then do come in.”
Puri followed him through the front door and inside the house, which smelt of pipe tobacco. A collection of old computers, TVs, vacuum cleaners, electric razors, calculators and tangles of wires cluttered the place. Circuit boards, soldering irons and current testers lay on a workbench positioned against the far wall. In the center of the room stood an old washing machine that had been gutted of its innards; it looked like a robot that had suffered a nervous breakdown.
“I’m building a rudimentary thermoelectric generator,” explained Pandey as he knelt next to his creation, tightening a wing nut with a spanner.
“Pardon?” asked Puri.
“It converts heat into electricity. This one creates cold air from hot! Does the job much cheaper than solar power. Think of the potential here in India. This one’s for my class, to show my students. Bright young minds!”
“It’s dangerous?” asked Puri with a frown, hovering by the door.
“You can never be too careful, can you? Not when you’re dealing with electricity. That’s why I asked about your shoes. Rubber provides insulation. Look at mine!” He lifted his right foot in the air to show Puri his boots. “See?”
“Very good, sir,” said Puri, stepping tentatively into the room.
“Are you here about Dr. Jha’s death?” said Pandey, beaming. He sounded positively excited by the prospect.
“I’m doing my own investigation,” explained the detective, puzzled by the man’s exuberant mood. “His murder should not and must not go unsolved.”
Pandey looked up from what he was doing. “Good for you,” he said, smiling. “And you’re of the opinion nothing paranormal occurred?”
“At the present time, I am concerned with your opinion, only,” he answered.
“I’d be happy to tell you what I saw,” said Pandey with an ironic smile. He stood up, put the spanner on his workbench and picked up his pipe. “Frankly, it’s baffling,” he continued, emptying the bowl of the pipe into a dustbin and then filling it with fresh tobacco. “As an electrical engineer, I deal in data, verifiable results – in proof. But what happened yesterday… well, I can’t explain it. Whatever that thing was – goddess, deity, apparition – it levitated three feet off the ground. That is not within the capabilities of mortal man.”
“Must be a trick of some sort,” suggested the detective.
“An illusion?” Pandey shook his head as he lit his pipe and the smoke wafted up over his face and hair. “I saw no wires, no stilts, no platform.”
“Surely, sir, you and othe
r members were confused, no? Something was affecting you – some narcotic or gas. Could be it had you seeing things that were not there.”
“Hallucination? It’s possible, I suppose. I did have a headache, which could have been an aftereffect.”
“Concerning the levitation,” said Puri. “What if some sort of magnetism were used?”
“An electromagnetic field? Interesting!” Pandey pondered the idea for a moment. “I suppose it would be possible for someone to levitate using such means. But nothing like that has been done before. You’d need a lot of equipment – a power supply, for example.”
“What about a projection of some sort?” asked Puri.
“Another interesting idea! But no, I’m afraid it couldn’t have been. Whatever killed Dr. Jha was definitely three-dimensional.”
Pandey went on to relate his version of events. He maintained that the ‘avatar’ had stood twenty feet high. Only after she had disappeared had he been able to move his feet again. The one major discrepancy was what had happened to the murder weapon.
“Again, I cannot explain how it happened scientifically. Metal cannot disintegrate of its own volition. That’s impossible. And yet I saw the sword turn to dust,” said Pandey, suddenly letting out a short giggle.
Puri eyed him curiously.
“Why no one else saw it happen?” he asked.
“How they missed it, I can’t imagine.”
And the ‘miraculous’ appearance and disappearance of the goddess?
“The flashes could very easily have been man-made,” the professor conceded. “They caused temporary blindness.”
“You saw any ice cream wallah after?”
“No, but then I was busy trying to save Dr. Jha’s life.”
Puri referred to his notes.
“Mr. Ved Karat tells he died right away. He searched for the pulse but found none.”
“That may be, but my first instinct was to get him to the hospital.”
Puri changed tack.
“How long you knew him – Dr. Jha, that is?” he asked.
“Two years or so. Since he joined the Laughing Club.”
“You were close, sir?”
“We became friends, yes.” Professor Pandey looked up toward heaven and raised his voice, saying, “A more courageous or generous man never walked the face of the earth.”
Again, the detective found himself flummoxed by the man’s lightheartedness.
“Why you didn’t attend the cremation?” he asked.
“But I did, Mr. Puri. Wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”
“Sir, when it comes to faces my mind is better than any camera. That is because it is never running out of film. I am one hundred and fifty percent sure you were not there.”
“All I can say is that in this instance you are mistaken,” said the professor, apparently untroubled by the detective’s assertion. “I was one of the first to offer my condolences. Perhaps you came late? I might have had my back to you.”
Puri wondered if Pandey might have been the man with the video camera but decided he was too tall.
“One thing I’m getting confusion over,” continued the detective. “Dr. Jha was your good friend. Yet you are not at all saddened by his demise. Very jolly, in fact.”
“I can assure you that I am absolutely devastated,” answered Pandey. “Suresh was a dear, dear man. But it is not in my nature to grieve. I believe in a positive outlook at all times. We only have one life and it’s my opinion that we should make the most of it every minute of every day. That is why I do laughter therapy. Laughter cures all our ills. It keeps us in a positive mental state.”
“There are times when crying is necessary also, no?”
“Perhaps. But laughter is so much better! It is the antidote to all the miseries of our planet. My answer to Suresh’s passing is to hold a Laughter Memorial for him. I am inviting everyone who knew and loved him to come to the Garden of Five Senses day after tomorrow. Together we will enjoy a good chuckle – the best thing for our grief. I do hope you can make it.”
Puri said that, regrettably, he would be ‘otherwise engaged’.
“Very good, very good, very good,” said Pandey, beaming again as he showed Puri to the door. “The best of luck with your investigation. I sincerely hope you find whoever – or should I say whatever – did this.”
“Allow me to assure you, sir, Vish Puri never fails,” said the detective in a dry, even voice. “No amount of hocus or pocus or jugglery of words will prevent me.”
Pandey walked him out to the gate and opened it for him.
“One thing before you go,” said the professor. “Do you know any good jokes? I haven’t heard one today.”
The detective was not in the mood for jokes. At best, he found Pandey’s buoyant mood inappropriate.
“Nothing comes to mind,” he answered.
“Next time, then,” said Pandey with a grin. “Keep smiling. Remember, laughter makes the world go round! Ho ho! Ha ha ha!”
♦
Puri hurried across the street, fleeing from the sweltering heat and humidity, and called to Handbrake to get the Ambassador’s engine started. The driver, who had been trying to keep cool by the side of the road, jumped to attention and did as instructed. The car trembled into life, and within a minute or so the dashboard vents began to produce wafts of tepid but nonetheless welcome relief.
Puri sat back in his seat. His underwear was damp and was clinging to his skin. It was not the only thing making him feel uncomfortable. Something wasn’t right – about Pandey, that is.
“Number one,” Puri told Tubelight over the phone after they discussed plans to meet at Shadipur Depot at eight o’clock. “This fellow is positively merry. Like he is celebrating, in fact. Yet his friend has been viciously murdered. Second, why he said he attended Dr. Jha’s funeral when he did not?”
Puri saw no contradiction in a man of science also believing wholeheartedly in the miraculous. That was a common Indian characteristic. Still, there was something about his version of events that did not ring true – the description of the disintegrating sword being the most obvious disparity.
“Want him tailed, Boss?”
“Night and day. This fellow is up to something. Undoubtedly.”
Puri also asked Tubelight to check into Shivraj Sharma’s background. “That one has skeletons in his cupboard. No doubt there are one or two in his basement, also.”
∨ The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing ∧
Nine
Two hours later, after eating his fill of paapri chaat with lashings of tamarind chutney at a roadside stand, Puri descended underground on an escalator at Central Secretariat.
As the honking of the traffic faded and the air turned pleasantly temperate, he found himself in a cavernous, fluorescent-lit netherworld of gleaming floors and untarnished walls.
He bought a token for a few rupees at one of the efficiently run ticket counters, passed through the security check and automatic barriers, stood in an orderly line on the platform and boarded a shiny silver train.
Being whisked through tunnels more than twenty meters below the surface of the capital at fifty miles per hour was a great source of pride for the detective – as it was for most Delhiites, some of whom, he suspected, ventured underground just for the thrill of it. The construction of the Metro was a phenomenal success story. The first section had been completed to international standards within budget and ahead of schedule. The secret of the system’s success lay in the fact that it was not run by politicians and bureaucrats – as was the case with the Calcutta underground, which was a disgrace – but an autonomous, for-profit entity. It bore testimony to the capabilities of India’s private sector – “world-class beaters,” in Puri’s words.
The Metro had brought about something of a social revolution as well. Unlike on India’s trains, there was only one class of travel available. Passengers drawn from every religion and caste were forced to rub shoulders and treat one another with a
certain cordiality – a phenomenon unthinkable in Delhi until relatively recently and one that remained a rarity in much of rural India.
Still, Puri rarely used the Metro. The truth was he didn’t enjoy traveling in what could often be cramped conditions. Nor did the anonymity it imposed appeal to him.
“Equality is all very well,” he had told his friend Dr. Subhrojit Ghosh at the Gym recently when they had been reflecting upon an appeal by the chief minister for the middle classes to use public transport. “But let other people enjoy. I myself will keep my car and driver.”
He had only opted for the underground this evening because he knew his Ambassador would be too wide for the narrow lanes of the slum where the magician lived.
His plan was to get off at Shadipur, where Tubelight would be waiting for him; from there they would continue their journey in the operative’s auto rickshaw.
The Metro journey required one change at Rajiv Chowk, where a digital display correctly predicted the arrival of the next train.
En route, Puri found that he was able to use his mobile phone. He called a number programmed into his speed dial.
A woman’s drowsy voice answered.
“I woke you?” asked Puri.
“I was just getting up.”
“I’ll see you tonight?”
“What time?”
“Should be nine, ten at the latest.”
The detective hung up and then called home.
Monika, one of the maidservants, answered. ‘Madam’ was out, she explained.
Puri tried Rumpi’s mobile next.
She sounded distracted and was coy about where she was and what she was doing. He could hear Mummy’s voice in the background.
“What are you two up to?” he asked.
“This and that, Chubby.”
“More shopping, is it?”
There was a slight pause. “Yes, you caught us at it. We’re picking up a few things for the twins.”
“Well I would be reaching late. Tomorrow I would be going to Haridwar at crack of dawn, also,” explained the detective.
This was code for, “I expect to be fed when I get home,” and Rumpi knew it.