The Singhing Detective

by M. C. Dutton

  After three months, Jazz was told he could visit Sandeep and talk to her but to be careful what he said. She looked rough and if her father had seen her, he would never believe she could make a good marriage. Bam Bam had given him a picture of Sandeep and the girl before him bore no resemblance to the beautifully made-up girl with the big smile and sparkling eyes in the picture. Her face had broken out in big spots that bordered on boils, her hair was thick with grease and her eyes were dull. She wouldn’t shower and she stunk.

  The process of de-programming her was not pleasant for anyone. She hated everyone and wanted to go back to the sect. She wanted her stuff to make her feel better and she wanted to be with the people who loved her. She hated her family and she hated John and everyone in his team. She spat at Linda the nurse, she tried to kick the minder and the psychologist, who sat with her and talked to her calmly, she hated the most. One day, he sat too close and she scratched his face and would have stabbed him to death if only she had a knife. To see her so full of hate would have been frightening to anyone other than the team who had seen it all before. Jazz admired them all so much for the work that they did. They said they just wanted to make a difference. Their modesty put Jazz to shame, he wasn’t sure he could be so altruistic. Again, he thought, they earned every penny they were paid to do this.

  After three months of treatment, Jazz, having seen her for the first time, wondered where the improvement was; he couldn’t see anything good about her. All he was told was that it would take time. Sandeep saw Jazz as an outsider and she cried and pleaded with him to take her away and back to all the people who loved her in the sect. It broke Jazz’s heart to see her like this. She kept offering her body to him in return for his help to escape. She told him how she would do things to him that would make him scream with pleasure. She talked about sexual acts that no young girl should know about. He kept telling her that her mother and father loved her and were worried about her. She usually put her hands over her ears and screamed at that point. Jazz had to make up some stories to take back to a worried and waiting Bam Bam after each visit.

  Every week he visited there seemed to be more dramas and incidents but John said this was normal. She defecated in her bed and the room stunk of urine and faeces. This went on for a week. She tried to kill herself a few times but this was handled. The medication helped her craving, but crack cocaine was highly addictive and nothing would take away all the pain of coming off it. She wouldn’t eat. She wouldn’t talk. Other times she paced up and down and screamed and screamed until she was hoarse. It was torture to watch on the weekends Jazz visited. He thought she would never return to normality. She seemed to be becoming more insane every week.

  By the fifth month, he saw the first glimmer of an improvement. She was calmer and cleaner. She had showered and her hair was brushed and pinned back off her face. She didn’t talk but sat quietly as Jazz talked of her father and her mother and how they missed her and how much they loved her. He wondered if the team had got fed up and doped her to keep her quiet. John said no doping up was allowed. She had enough of that in her system and they had worked to clear it out so no popping of pills to keep her quiet. She was in the next phase, which was good. Now she was accepting and listening. Of course all the crack cocaine was out of her system but it was still there mentally. It was a powerful drug that burned bridges of hope and sanity in the brain. Poetically John said they were rebuilding bridges of hope and goodness for her.

  Sandeep looked forward to Jazz’s visits. She told John that he was her shining light in all the gloom. He was a Sikh and he accepted her and what she had been through. John warned Jazz to be careful, she was falling in love with him. It was explained that he was her knight on a white steed there to save her and take her away from all the pain and misery. Perplexed, Jazz said that the team had done everything for her, they were the ones she should respond to. With a laugh, John said they had inflicted pain and torment and made her do things she didn’t want to do. In her mind, they would always be her tormentors. Jazz brought only kindness and wanted nothing from her.

  He began to look forward to his visits every weekend. The grounds of the house were beautiful and the setting reminded him of a Capability Brown garden he had seen in a book. There were lines of beautiful oak trees and the lawns stretched on for what seemed like miles. They found a pathway that led to a pebbly beach. Sandeep would hold his arm as they walked and slipped on the wet stones. The days he was with her were bright and full of chatting and laughter. She looked forward to the weekends when he arrived. He shared a dreadful secret with her. Her family must never know what had happened to her. Jazz was the only person to know of her degradation and also her rise out of the cess pit she had fallen into. This made him very special and trusted. They developed a bond that was never to be broken. Months later, she would send him a Sikh bangle to remember her by.

  They talked about all sorts of things. He loved the way she looked deeply into his eyes when talking to him. She was a clever girl and he still didn’t understand how she had got herself into such a mess and believed all the shit handed out by the sect. It wasn’t the time to ask her though, she was still very raw.

  What she did share with Jazz was her utter humiliation at what she had done. She didn’t think she could ever forgive herself or get over it. How could she live with such a dreadful secret? Her family and her religion would never allow her to live if she was in India. With a sombre face, she told Jazz that in the olden days her family would have stoned her to death for what she had done. Just as she looked about to cry, she was startled by what sounded like a giggle that turned into a full blown laugh. He asked her what on earth she sounded like. He told her that in the old days she would have been married to an old man and when he died she would have had to commit Sati. This was a Hindu custom where the widow was put on the funeral pyre alive with the body of her dead husband to burn to death. He said she lived in the 20th century and in England. He asked her what the hell the olden days had to do with today. Gently he reminded her that her parents loved her and that her secret was safe. No one outside of the house would ever know what had happened to her. She instinctively hugged him for his kindness.

  Still, she had blackened her family name and the dishonour she had brought on them made her think that all she could do was to kill herself. OK, he knew she had counselling but she was saying this to him and he would have none of it. He was a Sikh and he told her it was not her fault. He could see how the sect worked and how they ruin lives for their own selfish ends and greed. He emphasised again that no one would ever know. She could cut it out of her life and throw it away. It never happened. She would marry a good man and have a happy life. She looked at him intently to see if he meant the words and he did. She smiled at him and thanked him. It meant a lot to her that a Sikh could say that. She adored Jazz and wished he was the man she was to marry, but of course he wouldn’t be the chosen husband. Her father had someone in mind for her and she would comply with whatever he arranged for her.

  It was difficult for Jazz to be close to Sandeep. He had become very fond of this girl. He had seen her at her very worst and now he could see her becoming the most beautiful woman he had ever met. He could never allow himself to get emotionally involved with her. The knowledge of what had happened brought them together in a bubble of shared closeness. He could have easily fallen for her; she was beautiful, intelligent and brave and she adored him. It was the horrendous thought of Bam Bam as his father-in-law that kept his hormones focussed and distant.

  She knew what was expected of her when she got back home. The de-programming had finally got through to her and she remembered her father and her mother as loving, giving parents and she missed them. She wanted to be part of the family again. She was nearly ready to return home.

  By the seventh month, Bam Bam was getting very fidgety and wanted to know where his daughter was. He vacillated between losing his temper and crying for her. Flushed with temper, he would ask Jazz if he was being tak
en for a mug. He shouted that no one takes this long to be de-programmed. The next minute he would be near to tears, asking how she was coping, was his little girl OK and could he see her. Mrs Bam Bam was beginning to ask questions about where her daughter was. Bam Bam had told her some story about going to India to see his family but it didn’t ring true after so long. She was getting suspicious. All in all, Jazz was finding it hard to manage the situation.

  He asked John on the next visit when the hell it would all be over and she could go home. John said soon. It was agreed that in two weeks Sandeep should be ready to go home. Just a little longer to ensure she was ready to cope with life outside of the house. Jazz was allowed to take her out for a meal that evening. They found a restaurant with a small band that played light jazz all evening. They ate and danced until they were the last people in the restaurant. It was a magical evening and each knew it would be their last time together in this way. When he dropped her back at the house, she turned and gently kissed him goodnight. It made him shiver with the expectation of something he couldn’t have. She held him longer than she should have and whispered that she would always remember him and she would never forget their time together. With that, she tripped up the stairs to her room.

  He sat downstairs with a beer thinking of her, knowing it had to end here and now. It had been a long journey for both of them. John and the team were working on closing down the house and preparing for Sandeep to return home. He toasted them with a beer and thanked them for their work. Tired, they clinked bottles and downed the beer. They would each go their own way. John was the leader and when he next needed their services he would ring them and they would start again in another house in another county. They had earned every penny they got.

  On a Friday evening, Jazz took a beautifully made-up Sandeep, wearing an emerald-green sari, to an office in Ilford that Bam Bam called his headquarters. Sandeep was very nervous and worried her father would know and disown her. Jazz asked how her father would know anything. No one would tell him. Sandeep said he would only have to look in her eyes to see what had happened. Jazz laughed and said that was just her imagination. He would be over the moon to see her again. He reminded her that every week her father had asked how she was and how he had nearly cried at the thought that she was in any pain. He shouldn’t have done it but Jazz had bought her a Sikh bangle to remind her of who she was. Perhaps he also wanted her to remember him, but he wasn’t going to admit that to himself. She said she would never take it off, no matter where she was or who she was with. The bangle would always remain on her arm as a memory of Jazz. The last look full of meaning was all he remembered of Sandeep. He was to hand her over to her father and go on his way. He didn’t realise it would hurt so much to leave her.

  A phone call the day before had alerted Bam Bam to her arrival. He opened the door expectantly and was not disappointed. Jazz left them with a promise to call Bam Bam the next day. They met in the temple two days later. Bam Bam said he wanted to spend time with his daughter and he and his wife had stayed at home to make her comfortable and welcome her back. They talked on a superficial level about how good she looked and how the de-programming had worked so well. Jazz thought Bam Bam didn’t have a clue what had really gone on.

  Then there was a look between them that said it all. No words were needed; Bam Bam hugged Jazz and his eyes told him he knew exactly what had gone on and what the team had done for his daughter. It would never be mentioned, the words would never come into the world, but Bam Bam knew and that was why their bond would never be broken.

  Jazz had saved his daughter from a public and private shame which would have encompassed the whole family. Her life would have been over, she would have been buried away somewhere in India, living with distant family, possibly married off to a lower caste. She was the cherished only child of Bam Bam and neither mother or father could cope with her life being ruined and away from them. The fact that Bam Bam had done in his lifetime some filthy, evil, tortuous and murderous deeds did not compare with the unforgiveable shame his daughter would have brought to the family. She had to marry well and now this was behind her, plans could be made.

  It was not headline news but it was reported extensively about two weeks after Sandeep’s return to Bam Bam that a house in Kent which was reported to belong to a religious sect had mysteriously burnt down. It was thought everyone had escaped from the building but the next day the fire brigade found 10 bodies in the cellar. It was thought that the boiler for the central heating, which was housed in the cellar, had exploded and unfortunately 10 members of the sect had been working there and been killed. Identification would take some time because the bodies were unrecognisable but it was hoped that with the aid of dental records this could be reported to the coroner’s office within a month. Only Bam Bam and Jazz knew this was no accident. Revenge was swift and sweet.

  PAYBACK TIME

  It was now time to call in that favour. Bam Bam knew everything that happened in East London. Jazz was on a mission to avenge Alice and get the bastards responsible. Of course no one was talking.

  The Triads were not to be messed with; their punishment was brutal and slow, which ensured no one squealed on them. The Chinese were the top of the ladder and next came the Snakeheads. The Triads covered the whole of East London, mainly from Ilford through to Central London. They dealt with huge supplies of cocaine, heroin, some cannabis and whatever was the latest recreational drug. At that moment, methylamphetamine, or crystal meth, ice, glass, Tina, Christine or Yaba as it is known on the street, was very popular and a big money earner.

  The Snakeheads, who were all Vietnamese, never spoke to anyone other than their own kind. Everything was kept in-house. No one knew how they thought or what they did. They had quite a hold on Barking and Dagenham. Their cannabis factories were slick and ran like clockwork. They earned them shed loads of money and no one interfered. More and more, cannabis factories were growing skunk. The Snakeheads dealt only in cannabis. They sat uneasily in the area with the Triads.

  Bam Bam didn’t touch anything that the Triads and Snakeheads dealt in. He offered poppers and other types of tablets to ravers, which the Triads and Snakeheads didn’t bother with. His other interests paid him enough money and caused him enough trouble keeping the police off his back as it was.

  There had been meetings between the Triads and the Snakeheads and Bam Bam over the years but each knew each other’s area of business. They kept their distance. Each were wary of the others, they were all mindful of the police and ensuring everything was low-key enough to keep them from sniffing around. The odd cannabis factory was raided and closed down but all in all there were so many in the East End of London that it was written off as overheads when one went down. What each and every one of the gangs didn’t like were interlopers thinking they could work their areas. When this happened, they all united to get rid of them. The Triads, Snakeheads and Bam Bam were known as the Holy Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Ghost), a name given to them by the police and villains. This was an odd name because they were all either Taoists, worshippers of Chinese gods, Buddhists or Sikhs; certainly none of them were Christians.

  Jazz woke Monday morning feeling better than usual. He realised he hadn’t drunk quite as much last night. He had been tired and fallen asleep early evening. Today he had a meeting with Bam Bam but before then he had to dodge DCI Radley at the station. In actual fact, DCI Radley never moved from his office, he would send an officer to look for him. He didn’t want to get into a discussion about Mr Singh’s ashes. He couldn’t piss off DCI Radley at this stage, he might take him off the case.

  He decided to walk to the police station. It was a bright, sunny morning and the early morning warmth promised much more later in the day. He took his jacket just in case.

  As he came down the stairs, Mrs Chodda popped her head out of the kitchen and asked him to come and see her tonight when he got back. She had cooked something very special for him to have with a cup of coffee. She mentioned that she had
made some of her very special pakoras for him. He was going to make an excuse but that would have been very bad manners so he smiled and thanked her. He thought he should be back about 6 p.m. She nodded and disappeared into the kitchen. He sighed and wondered what she had got in store for him. He didn’t need any hassle at the moment, there was enough going on to keep him busy without Mrs Chodda trying to arrange meetings for him with eligible young women. He walked down the road and thought, Oh bugger it! He missed the company of Sikh society and it was good to be sociable. He spent a lot of evenings alone and sometimes company was a good thing. Plus, it had been many years since he had tasted homemade pakoras. His Mother made the finest, tastiest pakoras in the whole of England. Perhaps Mrs Chodda’s pakoras would be too. On that optimistic note, he walked with a spring in his step.

  BUSINESS AND PLEASURE

  It was 7.45 a.m. and Jazz was feeling good. As he passed The Black Stallion pub near the high road, he looked up as Tracey tripped up to him and said in the high pitched tones of a cockney tinkerbell, “Mr Mr, do you want some business?” Jazz looked at her. It was bloody early and she was wearing a top that barely covered her big breasts and a skirt that was far too short for a 35 year old overweight short woman who had seen better days.

  At 5’1” tall, the high heels still made her have to crane her neck to look up at Jazz. With a resigned look, Jazz said, “Tracey I don’t have the time and I don’t have the inclination. I am on my way to work. She looked up at him and squeaked “You know me Mr?” Of course he knew her. Five years ago and looking a lot better than she did now, Tracey was one of the well known prostitutes who worked around Ilford. He noted Carl was still her pimp and boyfriend from what he remembered. Fed up but feeling kindly Jazz said “You don’t remember who I am do you?” A light seemed to turn on in her head and she gasped “Oh gawd, you’re police ain’t you?” came the shrill response. Jazz nodded his head and Tracey gave him an apologetic smile and coyly asked, “You ain’t gonna arrest me are you sweetheart?” Jazz assured her he had better things to do at the moment and finished the conversation by moving on. As he walked past her, he heard her shout to the pimp sloppily smoking a cigarette by the pub door. “’Ear Carl, I told you ’e was the filth, didn’t I?” Jazz smiled and thought what style she had; not!