A Curious Indian Cadaver

by Shamini Flint

  Suddenly, the inspector felt his veins contract with shock. He flicked through a few recent photos until there was a close-up of Ashu’s face. He held the album up until it was almost touching his nose and his eyes were crossed with concentration. He stood up and stalked over to the mantelpiece, picking up the framed picture of Ashu on her graduation. He wasn’t wrong but he couldn’t believe he was right either. The fat man was filled with unusual self-doubt and he didn’t like the feeling. It was like indigestion after a good curry. But the evidence of his eyes was difficult to contradict – there was exactly the same missing element in each of the photos of Ashu Kaur. And it undermined just about everything that he’d been led to believe about the case and the curious cadaver at the centre of it.

  Sixteen

  Singh buried his face in his hands. How could this be? The strain was starting to tell and he was hallucinating. That was the only possible explanation. He thought back to the events of the last few days commencing with their arrival at the wedding home only to discover that a girl was missing and culminating in the death of an old man in a parking lot. He looked up through bloodshot eyes at the protagonists in the room who were all staring at him with varying degrees of curiosity and fear.

  “What’s the matter?” asked his wife. “You don’t look well.”

  “It’s true – you are very pale,” agreed Jesvinder. “Can we get you something? A drink?”

  “Ate too much,” said Mrs. Singh severely. It was a statement, not a question.

  The inspector wondered whether to put his sudden suspicion to them and then changed his mind immediately. He would be laughed out of the room. His wife would probably take a swing at him with her handbag. Jesvinder would inevitably faint and Patel might decide to release everyone else and arrest the policeman from Singapore on the grounds that he was a few sticks short of a bundle and had probably killed Tara Singh because he’d heard alien voices tell him to do so. The only ones who would not be surprised were those who already knew.

  “Sameer, who do you think is responsible for Ashu’s death?”

  There was a pause while Sameer considered his answer, his eyes watchful.

  “I’ve said from the beginning that I hold the family responsible for everything that has gone wrong.”

  The plump protector of the people decided that Sameer deserved a medal for obfuscation.

  “How about you, Mahesh?”

  “Why are you asking me such a question, Sardarji?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Singh – what can the boy possibly know?” Sameer was quick to interrupt.

  “He told me once that Ashu relied on him for her work…”

  “You’re right – that should give a ten-year-old real insight into her murder.” Sameer’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Anyway, can’t you see he’s not well? You shouldn’t be upsetting him.”

  Singh nodded his great head although the boy didn’t seem particularly bothered by his line of questioning.

  “You’re right, he’s not well and I’m not feeling well either.”

  Silence greeted this admission.

  “I must go back to the hotel and lie down. My wife is right – I probably ate too much.”

  “What?” exclaimed Patel. “Now? But what about this very urgent investigation?”

  “I have to go right now. I’m leaving the investigation in your good hands.” He was as good as his word, leaping to his feet with an unexpected nimbleness and hurrying towards the door.

  A belated expression of relief crossed Patel’s face. Perhaps when he agreed to Singh being in attendance, he hadn’t expected such erratic behaviour as had been on display. Singh had reached the front door. “Make sure no one leaves the house,” said the fat man. “And confiscate their mobile phones.”

  If Patel objected to being treated like a peon, he managed to hide it.

  A few hands went to pockets protectively and Singh guessed it was where they kept their supposedly indispensable communication devices.

  A phone beeped with impeccable timing and Patel looked sheepish as he retrieved it from his pocket. He read the message, his face growing sober.

  “What is it?” asked Sameer.

  “Jama mosque judgment is out.”

  “And?” This was Tanvir.

  Singh was surprised to see that his hands were clenching and unclenching in anticipation.

  “Land awarded to Moslem parties.”

  “All of it?” asked Tanvir.

  Patel nodded curtly.

  “There will be trouble,” was the response of the young man, his eyes gleaming prophetically.

  “Do you want me to come with you?” It was Mrs. Singh, indifferent to court cases and land disputes, with the question. Belated wifely concern? More likely a determination to nag him all the way about his apparent lack of commitment to this murder inquiry.

  “Err…no. You stay here and keep your eye on things,” muttered Singh unconvincingly. He stopped at the door and turned back. “But I’ll take him,” he said and pointed at Mahesh.

  “Mahesh? Why?” demanded Sameer, taking an antagonistic step forward and placing his body between that of Singh and the boy.

  “No reason for him to be stuck indoors on a fine day like this with a bunch of murder suspects for company,” retorted. “I’ll keep him safe.”

  Mahesh shrugged and sauntered over, hands in his pockets.

  “You’ll come with me?” asked Singh.

  “If you like, Sardarji. Maybe you’ll need my help to get into the elevator,” and he blew out his cheeks in imitation of Singh’s rotundity.

  The inspector considered changing his mind and leaving the smart-mouthed kid behind but then relented. It was possible that he was going to be very useful indeed. He ushered Mahesh out ahead of him, ignoring the confused looks of his wife’s family as they watched the policeman with the reputation for tenacity go back to his hotel room for a nap while they remained incarcerated in an apartment under suspicion of murder. Singh knew his behaviour was incomprehensible. But he had no choice but to play the maverick copper. They would understand when – if, he amended reluctantly – he returned with the identity of a murderer.

  Fears of violence after the Jama mosque result had kept many people at home because the streets were strangely deserted and they maintained a good pace. Singh, cramped into the back of the taxi, gazed out of the window with unseeing eyes, his attention absorbed by his latest wild surmise.

  “Is this the way to the hotel?” asked Mahesh.

  “Nope.”

  “Then where are we going?”

  “Wait and see.”

  The boy scowled at the policeman and Singh almost smiled. He would have made the perfect Indian parent, he decided. He knew exactly how to annoy small boys with half-answers.

  “Could be trouble today,” ventured the driver, looking into his rear-view mirror and then nodding at the old dome and minaret of the Haji Ali mosque, glowing white against the turquoise sea.

  Singh met his eyes, distracted for a moment from his internal struggles.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Jama mosque judgment. They are giving everything to the Moslems. It will be causing trouble.”

  “Are you upset?” asked Singh, mildly curious.

  “I am a Moslem, saar. I am not upset because justice is being done – but I am afraid.”

  “Of the Hindus?”

  “Of the troublemakers…”

  Singh nodded brusquely but sympathetically.

  They reached the factory in less than half an hour and Singh handed over a generous fistful of rupees and was rewarded with a broad, gap-toothed smile.

  “Why are we here?” demanded Mahesh but was again ignored by the policeman.

  The guards at the main entrance to the factory recognised the inspector and immediately began raising the barrier. Singh put up a beefy hand to stop them and gestured with a pointed finger. He wasn’t visiting Bharat Chemicals despite its mercury-laden skin-whitening cream and missing
boss. He had other fish to fry.

  This time he marched over the plank into the slum without hesitation, knowing from experience that it would hold his weight, ignoring the stagnant water underneath. He picked his way quickly and quietly through the huddle of huts, largely oblivious to the curious glances of the women and the mild hostility of the men. There were no children about and he hoped it didn’t mean they had fallen ill too. He looked around to ensure that the boy who called this place home was following him.

  “Where are we going?” asked Mahesh again, panting slightly and walking with a certain wary care as befitted someone with unsteady limbs.

  “To the clinic,” said Singh, continuing to march ahead at a determined pace.

  “No, no – there is no reason to go there, Sardarji!”

  Singh smiled grimly as he recognised the note of panic in the high voice.

  “Why not?”

  “Nothing there to see. You have file already, yes? Better if you go to hotel and sleep. This slum is not right for you.”

  “I’m feeling much better, thank you.”

  Mahesh did not appear pleased by the news that the fat man had made a miraculous recovery. He accelerated until he’d scooted around the policeman and was blocking his path, a skinny immoveable object in the path of a bearded irresistible force. “You wait here, Sardarji. I’ll go ahead and check that the place is clean.”

  “It was spotless the last time I visited.”

  “You don’t understand, my mother is there.”

  “I would be delighted to meet her,” said Singh over his shoulder as he skirted around the boy and a filthy puddle as if he had all the time in the world for a social visit.

  They had reached the hut. A drape substituting for a door prevented them from seeing in.

  “She is not well. Please don’t disturb her,” shouted Mahesh, pulling on the inspector’s arm, trying with all his strength to keep the policeman from entering.

  Singh pushed the curtain aside and noticed that his hands were shaking in anticipation.

  A woman was within, sitting on a stool, surrounded by piles of paper. She looked up as they came in, her expression surprised but not fearful.

  “Who are you?” she asked, the voice husky and low.

  Singh stared at the wilful chin and the glossy hair. His eyes were drawn to the earlobes, bare and smooth. His mind flashed back to the charred corpse he had seen at the police station and he heard an echo of Tanvir Singh saying, “Yes, that’s my sister.”

  Mahesh had followed him in and now he said, “I’m sorry. I couldn’t stop him coming here.”

  “This lady looks a bit young to be your mother, Mahesh.”

  “Who are you?” asked the girl again. Singh noticed for the first time that she was wan and tired. Her eyes were bloodshot and her lips were cracked as if she’d cried herself to the point of dehydration.

  “I’m Inspector Singh of the Singapore police.”

  Her eyes betrayed a hint of nervous recognition at the name.

  “And you must be…?”

  “I’m Ashu Kaur,” she replied bluntly, shifting a pile of documents to the floor and standing up so that she was able to stare defiantly into his eyes.

  Seventeen

  “How did you know?”

  “I saw the body that your brother identified. It was charred, unrecognisable – except for a ruby earring. Earlier today, I was looking through your photo album and I noticed that you never wore earrings.”

  Singh shut his eyes tight. He and the Indian police had missed a trick. But the identification by Tanvir had been definitive – and it had thrown them all off the track. Who would have suspected the brother of lying?

  Ashu nodded and tucked a strand behind her ear so that he could confirm the accuracy of his observation that her ears hadn’t even been pierced. “Never liked them,” she explained ruefully. “It was a sort of – small – rebellion against what was expected of me as the dutiful Indian daughter.”

  “And Mahesh here,” he patted the boy on the back, “not to mention the boyfriend seemed less heartbroken than when I saw them last. Despite what my wife thinks about men, I didn’t suspect either of them of being so flighty in their affections.”

  “When I slipped back here to the slum, I revealed myself to them. I needed people I could trust.” She added defiantly, “I love Sameer.”

  “And yet you agreed to marry Kirpal.”

  “I hadn’t met Sameer at the time,” she said with a small smile. “I wanted to make my grandfather happy.”

  Singh nodded his head, remembering the grief-stricken young man he had first met and the cheerful fellow earlier that day. Now he understood the transformation. He had discovered that his dead love was alive and kicking.

  “But you got cold feet in the end?”

  “Of course not. I’d agreed to go through with it and I was prepared to do so.”

  “Which explains why you’re hiding out in a slum.”

  “I have no choice,” she muttered, looking down at the dirt floor, refusing to meet his eyes.

  There was enormous guilt here, realised Singh. This girl knew full well what she had put her family through. All of them, that is, except for the brother who had purposely and carefully misled the police and the family as to the identity of that corpse. What had Tanvir been thinking?

  “How is my mother?” she asked.

  “Devastated,” he said bluntly. He was not going to give this girl an easy ride. “Why did you do it?”

  Mahesh – he’d almost forgotten that Mahesh was with them – marched over to Ashu and turned to face Singh. “Leave her alone,” he shouted.

  “It’s all right, Mahesh. He has a right to know – they all do.”

  She straightened her back and brushed the tears away with the back of her hand. “There is something poisoning the slum dwellers,” she said.

  “I know,” said Singh. “The mercury in the skin-whitening cream.”

  Her eyes – brown pools filled with light – widened at his knowledge but she did not question him as to its origins. Maybe she guessed it was Sameer.

  “I went to see Tyler Junior, the manager of the factory.”

  “The day you disappeared?”

  “That morning.” She continued, “He laughed at me – said there was no proof and anyway, my grandfather knew about it and if he wasn’t doing anything, I couldn’t either.”

  “You believed him?”

  “No, not at first. But he insisted and I started to worry…”

  “What did you do?”

  “I had an appointment with Sameer. I didn’t want to be late – I’d left my mobile charging at home when I snuck out so I couldn’t call him.”

  “On Marine Drive,” interjected Singh and she nodded.

  “Ranjit spotted me – thank goodness it was him and not Tanvir.”

  “He didn’t seem to mind about the appearance of a Moslem boyfriend?”

  “No, he was shocked at first. But when he heard my story he thought I should run away with Sameer – forget Tara Baba and the wedding. He said my happiness was more important.” She smiled, revealing small even white teeth and once again Singh remembered the burnt body on the trestle table and shuddered at the recollection. Unfortunately, he reminded himself, Ashu being alive just meant that some other poor lost soul was dead.

  “And so you ran away?”

  “Of course not – Ranjit was always a romantic. It was what most annoyed Tara Baba.” She shook her head firmly. “No, I knew my responsibilities. But I explained to him about the sickness at the slum, told him I needed to confront my grandfather – I didn’t know it was mercury at that point, of course, just that it was something. Ranjit dropped me near Tara Babas office.”

  “He didn’t come with you?”

  “He wanted to,” she said affectionately. “But I knew that if he was there, I wouldn’t be able to have a sensible conversation with Tara Baba. They really rubbed each other up the wrong way.”

  “No
ne of this explains why you’ve let your entire family think you’re dead,” said Singh irritably.

  She looked worried and the stubborn chin was thrust forward. Singh almost smiled. It was almost on the evidence of that chin alone that he’d been prepared to doubt the suicide theory. It seemed he’d been right about that, at least. Sadly, that had been the high point of this investigative episode. Since then, he’d been wandering around accusing all and sundry of the murder of this very-much-alive creature in front of him.

  “So what did Tara say?” he demanded.

  “I never saw him.”

  “What?”

  “I was walking across the parking lot when I heard the sound of a car speeding towards me. I turned around and just managed to jump out of the way. Someone was trying to run me over. I managed to duck behind a pillar and make it to the exit.” She spoke in a matter-of-fact tone which was almost convincing.

  “Did you see who it was?”

  “I only had a glimpse of the driver…”

  “And?”

  She sounded troubled, as if she’d questioned the accuracy of her fleeting memory for days. “I thought I recognised him…as one of Tara Baba’s drivers.”

  “And so you decided your grandfather was trying to kill you.”

  Singh managed to inject just the right amount of doubt to annoy Ashu.

  “Of course not, not really,” she snapped. “But Ranjit had been so sure that it was a credible story – about the cover-up by Tyler and Tara Baba, I mean. And I really did think I recognised the driver. I thought maybe Tyler had warned Tara Baba. Anyway, I panicked.”

  “And decided to run away?”

  “Just to avoid going home for a couple of days…to try and decide what to do next. Whether to go to the police about the outbreak at the slum. I didn’t have any proof and Tara Baba is a powerful man.”