by Anmol Batra
“Why you didn’t tell the army folks about the contents of the steel trunk?” asks Mr. Benipal.
“That’s none of their business,” growls Zaffar with a warning tone in his voice.
“I know what precious things you carry from there to here,” says Mr Benipal, looking at Zaffar, who continues to drive. “And also what you are carrying in that trunk. But let me remind you son, you must fear God. Live and let others live, and…”
“What do you think I am carrying in the steel trunk?” interjects Zaffar, interrupting the explanation of Mr Benipal and giving him a sideways look.
“You are smuggling calves to butchers,” replies Mr. Benipal confidently. “Beef is in demand these days, isn’t it?”
Zaffar turns his head back towards the traffic but doesn’t utter a word.
Maninder waits for his response but inside he presumes that his observation is correct. A few seconds later, he starts to explain again. “You know it’s not about cow or goat, it’s about every living creature on this planet. You must fear God my son; after all, these animals are also God’s creations and God will not...”
“STOP THE CAR!” the loud sound from the army jeep running parallel to the pickup truck interrupts Mr Benipal once more. The same turbaned soldier signals Zaffar to park the car on the left again.
The jeep stops in front of the pickup truck and both the armed soldiers step out of it.
“WHAT ELSE ARE YOU CARRYING AT THE BACK?” yells one of the soldiers at Zaffar.
“I told you, it’s milk.” says Zaffar.
The solder signals him to get out of the truck. “Take off the blanket and raise your hands,” orders the soldier.
He swiftly frisks him and finds three darts tucked into his belt along his waist, close to his left arm. Three shining brass darts covered with small plastic caps on the tips of the pointed arrows.
“What is this?” asks the army man.
“I play darts in my free time,” replies Zaffar with a fearless, cold stare.
“Show me what’s inside the steel trunk,” instructs the soldier, pushing Zaffar towards the rear of the truck.
“I don’t have the keys,” explains Zaffar.
The soldier cranes his neck towards the back of the truck and slides the milk containers forward to get a clear view of the steel trunk and the brass lock hanging on its latch.
“, I’m not buying it,” growls the soldier. “Stop fooling around and show me what’s inside.”
“I told you I don’t have the keys,” replies Zaffar with a poker face.
The soldier goes to the front seat and pulls out the truck keys from beneath the steering wheel. “You are not going anywhere until I see what’s inside the steel trunk!” He yells at Zaffar.
“Amarinder, get me the axe from the back,” urges the soldier to his colleague, who is standing near the jeep.
The other soldier quickly brings the axe to him and the first soldier hops on to the back of the pickup truck.
“Thak... Thak..” with the hard sound of steel on steel, he strikes the lock with force multiple times, and after a minute of effort he breaks the lock clean off.
He slides open the latch and looks inside the steel trunk.
“AMARINDER!” shouts the army man.
Hearing no reply, he calls out again. “AMARINDER, where the hell are you?!”
Curious, he raises his head to look around for his colleague near the jeep. He sees a man dressed in military green lying on the ground, with his face slumped down near the jeeps driver’s seat.
He quickly loads the barrel of his machine gun and starts pointing the gun in all directions. Along the edge of the pickup truck stands Mr Benipal with his hands up, shivering with cold, his eyes filled with fear.
“Where is the driver?” asks the army man.
Light from a passing vehicle shines on the soldier’s face and a brass dart strikes him in his neck stopping his heart at once.
Zaffar pats the back of Mr Benipal, his pyjamas wet from the reaction of fear. He smiles at him; he still has his hands up in the air.
He then swiftly hops on the back of pickup truck and pulls out the dead body of the soldier, whose face has now turned blue.
“You wanted to know what’s inside the trunk? Come over” says Zaffar aggressively, looking at Maninder while pushing the dead soldier out of the back of the truck.
Mr. Benipal now comes back to his senses. In the dim light he can see the steel trunk. The next moment, a hand with a wristwatch grabs the edge of the trunk.
Frightened, Benipal pleads. “I won’t tell anyone, please let me go.”
With a cold face, Zaffar nods his head in agreement
Mr. Benipal folds his hands in front of him but he still doesn’t trust Zaffar on his word of letting him go free. He swiftly turns around and starts running towards the field instead of the road.
“Wahe Guru..Wahe Guru..Wahe Guru” he repeats to himself as he runs.
Zaffar grips the hand with the watch and pushes it inside the trunk. He gently closes it and starts looking at the fields. He spots the elderly man with a turban, running deep into the field. In complete darkness he can barely see any movement, but he maintains focus, keeping his eyes wide open. A minute of contemplation is all he needs, then he pulls out the last remaining dart and aims into the dark.
Maninder had ran close to two hundred yards in the dark when a flying dart struck him on his neck. He turned around to look back at the state highway.
From a distance, he could see Zaffar putting down the milk containers on the road before driving away. His eyes begin to lose focus and Maninder Benipal recalls Wahe Guru before puffing his final breath.
◆◆◆
Chapter 4
3 Envelopes to Go
21st December 2012 9:00 PM Green Park, New Delhi
The radiance of tube-light turns the fog into white clouds floating over the vapour coated cars, which are parked in the narrow lanes of Green Park. Swati walks down the potholed lane and enters her residence; a two-storey house with a boundary wall mounted with metal spikes. She switches on the light in the front yard and opens the door leading to her drawing room.
She has been living alone ever since she lost her parents. For the first time though, it was not the dusty untouched rooms that bothered her. It was something else. Lost in her own world, she recalls every moment of the day, trying to make sense of what happened. She urges her tired leg s to move closer to the switch panel, and turns on the wall-mounted light right above the pendulum clock.
Tunggggg… Tungggg… the clock strikes 9 PM and breaks the eerie silence.The bell toll from the clock shifts her attention to the remaining three envelopes in her handbag. She anxiously rummages in her handbag with her left hand, which is still covered in dust and blood, and pulls out all three envelopes from her bag
“Three envelopes to go,” she says to herself, as she contemplates looking at them
“Swati Sharma”
“22nd December 2012 6:00 AM”.
Nervous and scared, she decides to throw away the remaining envelopes. She hurriedly screws them up and places them along with the garbage bag lying in the front yard.
4 hours have passed; Swati restlessly tosses and turns on the soft cushioned mattress where she had been sleeping for 12 years. Tonight the bed wasn’t comfortable any more.
Her hand still aches from the scratch she got on the metro and she finds herself recalling a winter evening as a 6 year-old. A day when she wounded herself while playing on the stairs and she accidently impaled her hand on a pointed metal arc running along the stairs. She was afraid, and for hours she cuddled her mother and cried, lodging her bandaged hand in her armpit until she fell asleep in her arms.
Twenty-three years later, it was the cold bed and quilt that reminded her of the tenderness she had once felt. Swati presses her hand underneath one pillow for comfort. Sadly it was not the hand that was giving her insomnia though, it was something else. Restless, she sits up on the be
d resting against the bedhead.
“Is someone on the metro following me to the office every day Is someone in office following me daily in metro? Or is it some secret government agency trying to contact me?” she wonders.
From ghosts to aliens, her mind runs through all the movies and video games she had seen or played throughout her life, but she finds herself unable to connect the dots. The sound of water purifier breaks her scrambled thoughts. Squirming into place, she sits upright on the bed.
“Let me have some water and sleep,” she thinks.
Though she tells herself to have water, deep inside she wants to see if the envelopes are still lying outside or not. From the kitchen window, she cranes her neck to look out into the front yard. The envelopes are still there. The dilemma continues to eat away at her, but she decides to ignore them and go to sleep.
Another four hours pass by and Swati remains restless in bed. She is dwelling on things, old arguments from previous jobs. Minutes later, she starts reading her old message history on Facebook. Sadly, everything she does is in vain. She manages neither to sleep, nor think of anything else except the envelopes.
An hour to sunrise and an hour to the next envelope. Anxiety continues to gnaw away, she finally decides to get the envelopes from the trash. But rather than heading straight past the main door she decides to first take a glance from the kitchen window.
The dense fog outside the curtains rests in the front yard and on the street light behind it. The bright CFL bulb in is of little use as she can hardly see anything beyond the curves of the black garbage bag, scarcely illuminated by the streetlight.
“Where are the envelopes?” Swati wonders, her heart beginning to race.
She opens the thick, bolted door opening to the front yard. The groaning sound of the door breaks the ghostly silence and creaks through the vaporous fog. She makes her way slowly to the garbage bag.
Gone! As she shivers in the cold morning fog she is now unable to find the envelopes besides the garbage bag. Restless, Swati opens the bag but can find nothing but rotten salad, egg shells and teabags.
Anxiety now turned into fear as she loudly screams through the fog and darkness, “Is anyone there?”
As the silence offers no response, chills start running through her veins. Terrified, Swati scuttles backwards towards her main door and hurriedly turns to get inside. She gasps and slams the door, bolting it hurriedly.
Another hour passes by and Swati can do nothing but look at the wall clock waiting for 6 AM.
“Ting”
5:59 AM – A shiver pulses down her torso as the doorbell rings.
“This isn’t the right time for the maid; perhaps she has arrived a little early,” Swati says to herself. She walks over to the entry gate and opens it, only to find a teenage boy with a rolled-up newspaper in one hand and the three envelopes in other.
“These envelopes were scattered on the road this morning. I believe they belong to you,” the boy hurriedly tells her.
Though Swati was relieved to get the envelope, she now suspects the skinny boy.
“Who told you they belonged to me?” with a condescending tone, she questions the boy, who seems in a rush to leave.
“Your name is written on all three of ....”.
“How did you know my name?” Apprehensive, Swati interrupts him.
“Because I bring the newspaper bill in your name every month, and also because your surname is written on the outside of your house,” explains the newspaper boy.
“Honestly, I have not opened these envelopes,” the boy continues after a pause.
Tunggggg… Tungggg… before the newspaper boy could finish, the clock strikes 6. Without saying anything to him, Swati walks inside while ripping open the envelope from the top edge.
In the middle of a thick drawing sheet was written - “You shouldn’t have been rude to the newspaper boy. Please unwind the newspaper roll and flip this page.”
Without unwinding the newspaper she flips the page, only to find a few words of capitalized text and numbers written with red-coloured arrows, pointing downwards alongside. The hand-written line started from the top right corner of sheet to just below the top edge of the page. Underneath was written “RTI must stop short of invading privacy: PM” , “OVER AND OUT DECAAN CHARGERS”, “50 Years on, attack choppers sought for Chinese border.”, “3 Cheap Cylinders in 6 months”
NIFTY 5676.1 -32.0, SENSEX 18.675.2 -129.6, DOW JONES 13,326 -18.6, NASDAQ 3049.4 -2.4,RUPEE/$ 52.8 -0.1 RUPEE/EURO 68.5 -0.4 GOLD/10G 31,640 -160 SILVER/K 61,000 -400
The white page from the envelope had every major detail, as if the artist knew the next 24 hours of the day.
For the first time, Swati isn’t surprised, because inside she knew what could have been in the third envelope. She gently removes the dust from the other 2 envelopes and looks for the time on the next envelope, which simply had a message on the bottom right:
“This is envelope number 4. See you on 22nd December, 12:30:25PM”
Swati is now worried again. What exactly does he want from me? And where should I go to meet him?
Despite the dilemma, she keeps coming back to the same conclusion; it’s a prank. To avoid a face-off where everyone at work would be laughing at her, she decides to take the day-Off. Without a moment's hesitation, she sends a message to her boss, Abhijeet.
“Feeling unwell, not coming to the office today.”
She had always been in Abhijeet’s good books, and knew he wouldn’t object to it. Swati yawns and walks over to the kitchen, smiling to herself. As she makes scrambled eggs, she continues to think about the three envelopes. How the hell was it so well-timed? Confused, she decides to avoid staying at home and plans to go out. ‘I should pamper myself.’
“It’s been a year since the metro connected Gurgaon to Delhi. The malls are good out there. And yes, nobody in the office would be able to imagine that I am in Gurgaon.” With a smile, she turns on the CD player and dresses herself.
22nd December 2012 9:30 AM | Green Park, New Delhi
Swati looks into the mirror while balancing a contact lens on her right index finger.
“What if it’s a stalker and he follows me to Gurgaon?”
She gets lost in her thoughts again, but the familiar sound of Whatsapp breaks through the silence, the ticking sound accompanied with the phone vibration. While she holds her purse on her right shoulder, the vibration shock disturbs her hand and she loses her contact lens.
“It’s gone,” she says to herself while she bends under the washbasin to look on the wet floor.
A minute of searching and she cries out, “Ahh…! A new pair of contact lenses and I have already lost one.”
In a rush, she puts the other one back into the plastic case and pulls out her geeky looking spectacles from her bag.
22nd December 2012 10:15 AM | Metropolitan Mall, Gurgaon
Swati continues to walk around the MGF Metropolitan mall, where most of its shops were preparing for the day.
Anxiety couldn’t keep her mind away from the envelopes. Swati takes a deep breath and continues to walk through the mall, roaming the shops, reluctantly fiddling her with clothes to avoid being idle.
Two hours pass. She had been fiddling with her wrist watch even more frequently. She wasn’t able to find a single thing to buy for herself.
Fifteen minutes to 12:30 PM. Ever since she left home, her only presumption was that someone was stalking her, and with every minute that passed, she started to look around more curiously. “Who could he or she be? A colleague, an old friend, her ex-boyfriend or just a random stranger who she saw today somewhere on the street or in the mall.” Swati remains impatient. Anxious & tired, she takes a seat in the Open Café.
“Swati, how are you now?” asks Arjun with a courteous smile on his face.
Swati now suspects him to be the stalker and looks at the time – 12.25 PM.
Suspicion continues to grip her mind and somehow she starts to suspect more of her colleagues
around her. She supresses the turbulence within while sipping her coffee. “Better now. So what bought you here?” asks Swati in a calm voice.
“It’s my territory. You assigned me it last month when Pradeep resigned,” replies Arjun.
“It’s a lucky day for me; I have got two renewals and two fresh insurance purchases since this morning. I have already completed this month’s target and there are still 8 days to go. I hope you don’t mind me taking a few days off around Christmas now. I’ll do some follow ups regarding my sister.”
Swati ignores his long sentences. Lost in her own thoughts about the envelopes, she stops suspecting him and unblinkingly stares at the half-empty coffee cup when suddenly a single sentence jerks her back to life.
“Happy to see you at 12:30 PM. Glad you didn’t open the fourth envelope.”
Her pulse starts to race and her blood starts to boil. She throws a sharp look at Arjun and sniffs angrily. “So it was you the whole time?”
Arjun smiles and replies, “Yes, it was me. But do you wonder how I did time everything in a perfect sequence?”
“You have been stalking me for a month, and then there’s coincidence too. I am less interested in how but I am more interested in why,” yells Swati, exasperated.
“Don’t bother to buy new contact lenses; the one that slipped out of your hand this morning has fallen into a mug, half full of water. It will remain moist and will be fairly usable.” explains Arjun, beaming at Swati.
Furious, Swati snaps at him; “WHAT DO YOU WANT?”
“For most of you, time is a river flowing in one direction. You have no choice but to swim along with it. But what if I tell you that for a few people it’s an infinite ocean where one can move in any direction.”
“Let’s recall the metro scene. You did notice the women looking at her phone with headphones hanging from her ears. And you also noticed a mobile phone charger hanging right above her head.”