Bad Day at the Vulture Club

by Vaseem Khan

  For his part the elephant seemed perfectly at home; yet Chopra recalled that when he had first arrived in the city, a despondent and underweight calf, he had been distinctly ill at ease in the boisterous crowds for which Mumbai was infamous.

  At the CBI HQ, Chopra discovered a dispirited-looking constable on reception duty who looked as if he’d been hammered into the plastic seat in which he now sat. He barely looked up from his ledger as he barked at a nearby peon to escort them to a cell-like interview room where Chopra found himself waiting an hour for his nine o’clock appointment with Assistant Commissioner of Police Suresh Rao. He had expected as much; such petty gamesmanship was part and parcel of Rao’s make-up.

  When the man finally deigned to appear, it was with a fellow officer in tow.

  He entered the room as Caesar might have entered Rome, glancing imperiously at those in attendance, expecting tribute, or at least plaudits. When neither was forthcoming, his round balding face, with its comical little moustache, compressed itself into a grimace.

  ‘Perizaad Zorabian must be desperate if she has employed you to look into her father’s death,’ he said, by way of greeting.

  ‘I can certainly do no worse than you already have,’ replied Chopra.

  Rao’s eyes fell on Ganesha. He flung out an arm. ‘Who let that elephant in here?’ he roared. ‘Is this the CBI or a petting zoo?’

  ‘He is with me,’ responded Chopra, his own temper flaring. ‘I believe Ms Zorabian informed the commissioner that she has retained my services. I understand he assured her of your full cooperation.’

  Rao’s moustache did a little fandango above his lip. ‘Cyrus Zorabian was murdered by a random attacker,’ he hissed. ‘That is all there is to it.’

  ‘We shall see,’ said Chopra, struggling to resist the urge to hurl himself across the room at his old nemesis. After all, it was only recently that Rao’s machinations had landed him inside one of the state’s blackest prisons. Only good fortune, and the assistance of friends and family, had delivered him from his ordeal. The man was incompetent, unscrupulous and thoroughly untrustworthy; a stain on the uniform he wore. That he now worked for one of the country’s most powerful police institutions was an irony at one with the malaise that lay behind much of his nation’s problems.

  The CBI – the Central Bureau of Investigation – was a federal police force, with offices in each state, only called in when a case had political ramifications. There was little doubt that Cyrus Zorabian’s murder qualified on that basis alone. As one of the most powerful Parsees in Mumbai his influence had been felt far and wide; his sudden death had left more than a few politicos sitting uneasily. No doubt Perizaad Zorabian had pressed for the CBI’s involvement.

  Well, she had got her wish, if not the officer Chopra would have assigned to the case.

  Rao opened his mouth as if to reply, then seemed to think better of it. He turned and would have swept from the room in a grand gesture, had he not walked straight into his junior colleague, the pair of them tumbling to the floor in a heap.

  Rao scrambled to his feet, as did his fellow officer.

  ‘Get out of my way, you imbecile!’

  The policeman folded swiftly out of the way, allowing Rao to finally depart the room.

  When the door had closed, he sagged, taking a handkerchief from his pocket and wiping his brow.

  ‘My name is Avinash Kelkar,’ he said. ‘I ran the investigation into Cyrus Zorabian’s murder. Under ACP Rao, of course.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ said Chopra. ‘You did all the work, while he took all the credit.’

  Kelkar’s silence was answer enough.

  He watched as the man squeezed himself into one of the reedy-looking chairs behind the room’s solitary desk. The chair creaked ominously. Kelkar was a big man, clearly the beneficiary of a generous diet; Chopra doubted that he would have passed the physical fitness test currently mandated by the Mumbai police service.

  Then again, getting around the regs had never been much of a problem in the Brihanmumbai police.

  Kelkar pulled off his peaked cap revealing a sponge of dark brown hair sitting on his otherwise shaven skull like a chocolate blancmange. He set down the cap, then pushed a thick manila folder across the desk’s scarred surface. ‘This is everything we have. Rao was right about one thing: we found nothing to suggest Cyrus’s killing was anything other than random.’

  ‘Perizaad is convinced that you did not put your best foot forward. In light of her belief that Cyrus and the chief minister were not on the best of terms.’

  A pained look flashed over Kelkar’s square, clean-shaven face. ‘Yes, she has made that opinion clear. But the fact remains that we did everything we could.’

  Chopra picked up the folder and began to leaf through it.

  First, he examined the crime scene photographs.

  They depicted the body of Cyrus Zorabian lying face down inside a dakhma – more popularly known as a ‘Tower of Silence’ – located in Doongerwadi. Doongerwadi, a fifty-acre wooded plot in the very heart of Mumbai, was owned by the Zorabian family, its sole purpose to house half a dozen Towers of Silence. It was here that the Parsees sent their dead. According to Zoroastrian belief, corpses had to be left to the ministrations of birds of carrion for disposal; in Mumbai this meant the community of vultures that lived inside Doongerwadi.

  Cyrus’s body was fully clothed, lying beside a partially decomposed corpse that had been deposited in the dakhma the day before. The back of his head had been caved in by repeated blows from a blunt object; blood could be seen caked on the collar of his jacket and the silk cravat he had been wearing at the time of his death.

  Chopra next examined the autopsy report.

  There was little to go on.

  Cyrus had died as a result of the injuries sustained to his skull, three blows that had fractured the cranium in multiple places, sending blood and fragments of bone into the brain. Death had been all but instantaneous. The pathologist speculated that the killer had first struck Cyrus with his right hand, then, in an attempt to disguise his ‘handedness’, had struck him twice more with the left hand. He further speculated that the weapon in question had been heavy and blunt, a length of steel pipe, or a billy club, possibly something with a rounded head.

  Whatever it was, the attack had been brutal and swift.

  Chopra stood back from the thought in order to give it due consideration.

  On the face of it the information fitted the pattern of a random assault. A surprise attack, from behind, in an out-of-the way location.

  But why was Cyrus attacked in the first place?

  ‘Where, exactly, did the assault occur?’

  ‘Not far from the dakhma where his body was found. A hundred yards, if that. We discovered blood on a walking path inside Doongerwadi. Drag marks and a trail of droplets led from there to the tower.’

  Chopra looked at the inventory of items found on the victim’s body.

  ‘It says here his wallet was still with him, as was his gold watch.’

  Kelkar shrugged. ‘We never suggested that the motive for his attack was robbery.’

  ‘So your theory is that a complete stranger bashed his skull in for the heck of it? Then dragged his body a hundred yards and dumped it into a Tower of Silence?’ Chopra could not keep the ridicule from his voice.

  ‘There are plenty of lunatics in the city,’ countered Kelkar. ‘Maybe a stressed-out banker had a bad day at the office. Some fish seller got into a fight with his wife. Or one of those wild-eyed ascetics finally had enough of contemplating the mysteries of his own navel.’ The rotund policeman sighed. ‘Our best theory is that a homeless man climbed the wall into Doongerwadi looking for a place to get high. Apparently there’s been a recent epidemic of that sort of thing. Cyrus crossed his path, probably attempted to eject him from the premises, and got it in the neck. Or the back of the head, to be more accurate. The tower was simply the nearest convenient place to dump the body.’

  ‘Why woul
d a homeless murderer, high to the eyeballs – if we accept your theory – worry about hiding the body?’

  ‘Who knows how a madman thinks?’ replied Kelkar stubbornly.

  ‘The time of death was established as late in the evening. What was Cyrus doing in Doongerwadi then?’

  The policeman shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘We think he went for a walk.’

  ‘A walk?’

  ‘Yes. A walk. Apparently he was in the habit of doing so. Liked the solitude inside Doongerwadi. God knows there aren’t many places in this city to be alone.’

  Chopra conceded the point. ‘Do you have a last known movements timeline?’

  ‘You’ll find it in there. There’s nothing that stands out. He had a succession of meetings during the day, then went to his club in the evening. He left the club some time before he was killed. Wasn’t seen again until his body was discovered the next day.’

  ‘Who found the body?’

  ‘The head corpse-bearer. Got the shock of his life seeing the boss laid out in one of his precious towers.’

  ‘The boss?’

  ‘Well, technically, as the owner of Doongerwadi, Cyrus had the power to appoint – or get rid of – the corpse-bearers.’

  Chopra salted this away, then leafed through to the forensics report.

  It made sparse reading.

  Nothing untoward had been discovered on or near the industrialist’s body. No stray fibres, no viable shoeprints, no blood other than Cyrus’s own. No forensic artefacts of any kind that might give a clue as to his assailant.

  ‘What about enemies?’

  ‘We made enquiries. Business rivals, disgruntled former employees, even rumoured female acquaintances – though, according to his family and friends, he’s been single ever since his wife passed on a few years ago. We also spoke to his son – apparently, he’s estranged from his father. The truth is no one really hated him enough to bash his brains in. And if they did, they had rock-solid alibis for the time of death. His son, for instance, was at home with his wife. She says he never left the apartment.’ He sighed. ‘ACP Rao wanted a quick resolution, and that is exactly what we achieved.’

  The fact that Kelkar couldn’t meet his eyes convinced Chopra that the investigation had been a lot shoddier than the man was painting. With Rao in charge, he would expect no less. Perizaad Zorabian was convinced there was more to her father’s death than the official investigation had concluded. Chopra owed it to his client to follow the matter through as far as possible.

  He went back over the paperwork as Kelkar waited impatiently, occasionally eyeing Ganesha, who was occupying himself by snuffling his trunk into the room’s corners, no doubt investigating the various ripe scents on offer.

  ‘What’s this?’ said Chopra.

  He tapped the piece of paper he was holding, a list of personal effects discovered on the victim. ‘It says here you found a piece of paper with some indecipherable text on it.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Kelkar.

  He took the folder from Chopra, leafed through it, and pulled out a photocopy of a single much-folded sheet of A5 on which was typed:

  INDUKNAAUIKBAHNXDDLA

  ‘It’s gibberish,’ said Kelkar.

  ‘You mean you couldn’t work out what it meant,’ corrected Chopra.

  ‘No,’ admitted Kelkar, deflating somewhat.

  ‘It says here that this sheet was found inside a book of poetry that Cyrus had on him at the time. Clearly, he valued it enough to keep it close.’

  ‘We thought it might be some sort of password. But he wasn’t the type to use a computer, or online accounts. He was, however, a closet poet – probably why he was carrying around that book of poetry. Maybe this was one of those nonsense compositions you hear about.’

  ‘Can I see the poetry book?’

  Kelkar rang outside.

  Minutes later, a junior officer arrived with an evidence bag.

  Inside was a pocket book featuring works by the premier Romance poets: Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Byron and Shelley. The fact that the book had been found on Cyrus said something about the murdered man; it was too early for Chopra to say what that something meant.

  He picked up the paper inscribed with the enigmatic ‘code’, then flicked through the book of poetry in which it had been found. There seemed to be no plausible connection.

  He held up the sheet. ‘I would like to hold on to this. And the book.’

  ‘Technically, they are evidence,’ pointed out Kelkar.

  ‘Usually I would not ask,’ said Chopra. ‘But I feel there is something here that may give me an insight into Cyrus. I need time to study these items further.’

  Kelkar looked momentarily unsure, then shrugged. ‘Well, the commissioner has ordered us to give you whatever you need. You’ll have to sign for them, of course.’

  Chopra did as he was bid, then returned to the list of items found on the victim’s body. ‘You also found a small key inside Cyrus’s wallet. What was it for?’

  ‘We think it’s the key to a secure bank locker.’

  ‘You’re not sure?’

  Kelkar looked embarrassed. ‘We haven’t been able to find out which bank the locker is held at. The registration numbers have been filed off, so we couldn’t trace it through the locksmiths’ association. We tried checking with all the major banks, but no one recognised the key. But it’s hardly important, is it?’ He shook his head. ‘You’re looking at this all wrong, Chopra. These details are meaningless. The man was murdered by a random assailant. There’s no more to it than that. No complicated murder scenario; no skeletons in Cyrus’s closet. He was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. The sooner you accept this, the sooner we can all get back to our lives.’

  Lunchtime at the Vulture Club

  The Ahura Mazda Parsee Sports and Social Gymkhana had long served as one of Mumbai’s oldest bastions of fraternal enterprise. Established more than a century earlier on the bustling Swami Vivekanand Road in the affluent suburb of Bandra West, the club – known informally as the Vulture Club – was the brainchild of a group of Parsee grandees keen to establish a venue where they could meet to discuss matters of both commercial and philanthropic endeavour.

  The magnificent sandstone building, recently renovated, was fronted by enormous carved wooden gates copied from an ancient Zoroastrian fire temple and inscribed with lines of Persian text. To either side of the wooden gates stood two fifteen-foot-high pillars, atop which perched a pair of colossal stone vultures, staring, beady-eyed, down into the road. The vultures, pitted and scarred by decades of monsoon bombardment and the corrosive effect of bird droppings, gave off a distinctly minatory air. Most passers-by tended to hurry quickly on, as if the twin birds of carrion were, perhaps, measuring them up for leisurely consumption at some unspecified later date.

  Chopra was let into the compound, where he parked the van before releasing Ganesha from the rear.

  They were met there by the club’s secretary, Zubin Engineer, a decrepit-looking elderly gentleman in a billowing white shirt and black trousers who shuffled along with a cane as he squinted myopically from behind bottle-bottom spectacles.

  ‘Thank you for taking the time to meet me,’ said Chopra, as they approached the grand portico fronting the club. He had come here as a first step in retracing the police investigation into Cyrus’s death, in particular Cyrus’s last known movements.

  ‘I am happy to help in any way I can,’ responded Engineer. ‘Cyrus was the club’s president, and an old friend. We have known each other since we were boys. When Perizaad told me that it was her intention to employ a private investigator, I was delighted. The police, I am afraid, have been most ineffective. Perizaad heard about you from the owner of the Grand Raj Palace Hotel. I believe you recently took on a similar investigation for them – concluding the matter to the satisfaction of all parties.’

  Chopra remained silent.

  It was not his habit to discuss previous cases with new clients, though Engineer wa
s correct in that there were similarities between that investigation and the current one. The body of American billionaire Hollis Burbank had been found in his suite at the Grand Raj Palace, the city’s most iconic hotel. Unhappy with his senior officer’s desire to label the death a suicide, an old colleague had invited Chopra to look over the case. Chopra had uncovered a wealth of motives and suspects, and a truly shocking secret from Burbank’s past, ultimately unmasking a killer.

  He wondered if his path to the truth behind Cyrus Zorabian’s death would be similarly circuitous.

  Chopra paused before a sprawling display in the lobby, consisting of memorabilia from the club’s history. Old sepia prints of ancestral Parsees newly arrived in the metropolis; items of ceremonial clothing handed down by the club’s forefathers; a collection of personal bric-a-brac: an old pipe, a snuff box, even a stuffed vulture said to have fed on the club’s founder ‘Bawa’ Rustom Zorabian – Cyrus Zorabian’s revered ancestor.

  The centre of the display was taken up by a waxwork of the late founder, sitting on a throne-like wooden seat inside a spotlit glass case, dressed to the nines in traditional Parsee skullcap, loose silk trousers and long, white double-breasted coat, clutching the club’s ceremonial mace. Chopra found the waxwork disturbingly lifelike; the old Parsee progenitor looked ready to bounce to his feet and begin laying down the law, as he was reputed to have done in his pomp.

  ‘The Parsees of Mumbai owe the Zorabian family a great debt,’ Engineer explained. ‘Rustom Zorabian was a true pioneer. He led the way for many of our families to establish commercial activities which later flowered into thriving businesses. But he was more than that. He was a keeper of the sacred flame, a staunch supporter of our oldest traditions. He believed fervently that no matter how far from home we found ourselves, we had a duty to preserve the rituals and customs of our forebears. It was Rustom who purchased the land on which the Towers of Silence now sit; it was he who enclosed it behind a wall and brokered an agreement with the British that Doongerwadi would be classified as Parsee holy ground. Because of Rustom Zorabian we continue to be connected to our past.’