Perhaps prayers do get answered – and at least one sister was safe!
I looked forward to talking to Marian once again. Not as a victim, or as a renegade, but as someone who had managed to survive in the most extreme circumstances.
Vishnu now had a big smile on his face and I had to compliment the dexterity with which he had plotted Liza’s revenge – and Marian’s escape.
Stanley, fortunately, had made a dramatic getaway from Marian’s flat, while his friends leapt into it looking for the drugs, turning it upside down, much to the consternation of Vinay Gupta’s henchmen. He too was thinking of leaving Goa very soon. These days he was lounging in Dennis’s room, trying not to attract anyone’s attention. After learning the truth of what had happened to his daughters, he had been feeling quite disenchanted about his hippie hideout, for some time, though he had tried not to show it. Even at his anniversary celebration he said he had hidden his anguish.
He had just been waiting for Marian to leave and now that she was safe in London he was going to take a flight out very soon.
Though I had a feeling that Stanley would be homesick for Goa. After having got used to life on a sunny golden beach and under a magical banyan tree – it was unlikely he would enjoy grey city streets and underground tube stations. But first he would have to get over the trauma of losing his younger daughter – a grief he had never spoken about or discussed.
Meanwhile, much though I would have loved to acknowledge openly the real hero of this case – Vishnu – he still had to live around this beach for the rest of his life.
And so, as far as Amarjit and the world was concerned, the source of the videos would remain unknown.
He could not afford to antagonize anyone. Especially not Vinay Gupta or even Curtis. He depended on them for work and for his livelihood. And, strangely enough, for his identity.
Thus all the information and reports going to Amarjit were being routed through me and Dennis, who had turned out to be much more than a pillar of strength.
Luckily, as all of this was happening, there was a political turmoil, and the central government fell, making the persecution of corrupt ministers such as Gupta far, far easier. As elections were announced, it was a relief to think that on some file somewhere was information that would ensure that all further investment in Vinay Gupta as a leading political light would come to a halt.
But Dennis also made sure that the video of Vinay Gupta in which he had a very young-looking Liza on his lap went viral, especially in Chandigarh and the rest of his constituency. Within hours it was trending on Twitter and had a whole Facebook page dedicated to it, where people wrote and condemned it in no uncertain terms, saying it was absolutely sickening to see a senior minister behave in such an appalling fashion.
Even more humiliatingly he was slapped with a case from the National Commission for Women, and the UK government rebuked him publicly for molesting a British child. But the final reprimand came when he was taken to court for child abuse, and his passport was impounded. For a man who claimed to spend every second week in London, there couldn’t be a worse punishment. As I write this, there is little doubt that he will lose his deposit in the next elections and might even spend a few nights in jail.
He must have wondered many times how a dead girl had come back to haunt him in this fashion. And wreck his career.
Actually, he deserved worse, because he was responsible for the death of two girls. Sadly, I was not able to save Vicky.
A consequence of Vinay Gupta’s downfall was the ruthless interrogation of his casino employees, to check who had been disloyal to him.
She was said to have committed suicide – leapt from the floating casino into the Mandovi River at night, according to newspaper reports.
I had insisted on confidentiality when I had sent a recording of my conversation with her to Amarjit, as it was the only account we had on record of Gupta’s complicity in Liza’s death and the drug trade.
I had, also, asked Amarjit to give Vicky witness protection, but the lynch mob on the beaches must have turned against her very quickly. She had broken the code of silence and had to be eliminated. Gupta himself might have ferreted out information about the recording from his moles in Amarjit’s office. As she had told me, it was dangerous that she knew so much about Gupta. The only compensation was that shortly after her death, Raman and Joseph’s bodies were found in a car crash not far from Panjim. The police, for once, correctly said it was a case of accidental death. What was incorrect, however, was that they had both been drinking.
But no one lodged a complaint about that case.
As I read the critical articles about Vicky and her lifestyle which flood the newspapers these days, I realize that no one can ever understand what Vinay Gupta did to her and how much she regretted giving up her life and her youth to a man who trapped her with unfulfilled promises. If only she had tried to go back to Chandigarh and settle down. Who knows, perhaps her parents would have accepted her back, and she might still be alive.
Ultimately, finding out about Liza’s disappearance had been complicated and exhausting. And not everyone would face the punishment they deserved. Not Vinay Gupta and certainly not Curtis D’Silva. Perhaps one day this country would finally get better policing and a better justice system. One could only hope for that.
Quite frankly, once we had sent the last report, accompanied by the relevant videos, to Amarjit, it was a relief to finally leave the beach where I had come for a relaxed holiday and ended up fighting for my own life and for the ‘life’ of a dead girl, as well.
The one positive note was that Dennis and I were still together, which was unusual, given the fact that there was much we could have disagreed on, especially about Goa – the perception and the reality; but we both chose not to. Because he promised to show me the real Goa, one which I had always felt existed, away from the beaches.
So last week Dennis and I shifted to South Goa to spend some time with his family and get over the evil that we had just confronted.
Out here, in a little Goan village, where the church bells ring with regularity, I have found myself in a different world altogether. We have spent an enchanted week together and now I wait at the railway station in Margao to catch my train back to Mumbai and then onward to Delhi, planning with Dennis to meet again soon. Very soon.
And in the last week I have also been able to tell Durga that I found Liza. She does not know what happened, and so she was delighted. I did not want to focus on the pain, right now; there has been enough of that.
It was all thanks to her, I told her. It had been a very good idea of hers that I should stay on and investigate.
What she (and my mother, who was quite disappointed that I would not be returning on Amarjit’s arm) does not know is that I have someone who will wait for me, quite impatiently, in Goa. Someone I want them to meet. Maybe something in my voice gives me away as I speak to Durga now from the station to tell her I will be home soon.
‘So let’s come back here,’ I say as casually as I can manage, aware that my face is going an unnatural red, while Dennis puts an arm around me, as he bids me farewell, ‘and have the holiday you missed out on.’
She says she hasn’t heard of a better idea in a long time. Her voice is tinged with laughter. I have a feeling she has guessed why I want to come back to Goa.
I wonder how?
Why are children so perceptive?
Acknowledgements
This has been probably the most difficult book to write in the Simran Singh series so far. Not only did my overused laptop crash three times – as a result of which I had to rewrite almost half the book – it was also a year of excessive travel and so a lot of work happened in aeroplanes and on trains. My long-suffering editor and publisher Clare Hey was no doubt somewhat bemused by my frequent disappearances – and the fact that deadlines were sometimes missed when the internet went AWOL. I thank her, as always, for her cheery patience, support and brilliant editing.
I al
so thank Hannah Corbett, Rahul Srivastava, Shireen Quadri, Jennifer Bird – and the entire team at Simon & Schuster, in the UK, India and Australia, for making the whole process of writing so very enjoyable – and for keeping Simran Singh alive and investigating new problems and issues.
I also thank Caroline Michel for her sage advice and support at all times, as well as all others at PFD.
Many thanks go out to Will Atkins for his very swift editorial judgements.
The book’s research would not have been complete without extremely crucial input from Vikram Varma and his wife Meenal, as well as others in his office. I would also like to thank Sujai Joshi and her legal team for her support and help. Indeed, I would like to specially extend a warm thanks to all friends in Goa, including Maria Couto, Shruti Pandit, Habiba Miranda, everyone who spent time in discussing this book with me.
I would also like to thank Malavika Rajkotia for her input.
And of course, my deepest gratitude is to my family, especially my husband, Meghnad Desai, who read a very early first draft and urged me on; my children, Gaurav and Mallika Ahluwalia, and my parents, Padam and Rajini Rosha, for giving me the love, encouragement and space to complete this book.
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