Before I had time to ponder on my discovery, I heard the click of the door opening. Instinctively I hid under the desk, hoping I wouldn’t be seen.
Someone walked in quietly. From my position I couldn’t see who it was. The person was looking for something—there was the sound of a drawer being opened, some papers being riffled through. With my heart in my mouth I sat huddled in my place, praying that I wouldn’t be discovered.
23
‘TARA, WHERE HAVE you been?’
‘Oh, I had a fall, so I went to fix myself up.’
‘But I received a text from you saying that you had an emergency at home?’
‘Yeah, that’s why I needed to get back home.’
‘Is everything all right?’
‘Yeah, Riya. Don’t worry.’ I tried smiling.
Thankfully, Riya was distracted so she didn’t notice the inconsistency in my story.
‘You missed the best part. Sleazy Gupta was trying to cozy up to Suzy.’
‘Really?’ I faked interest. The party atmosphere distracted Riya so she didn’t ask me any more prying questions.
‘By the way, have you seen Banner?’ I asked casually.
‘No, why?’
‘Was just wondering. Besides it would be interesting to see him in a costume.’
Just then I noticed Jay who was standing there in his pirate’s outfit. He looked sullen. I was so preoccupied with what I had just gone through that I had forgotten to acknowledge him.
‘Hey, Jay. How’s it going?’
‘I am doing fine. Can I get you a drink?’ he asked. He acted like he wanted to disappear.
‘I wouldn’t mind a glass of Pinot Grigio.’
‘Pinot Grigio it is. Anything for you?’ he said looking at Riya.
‘The same please.’ Riya looked at me excitedly. When he left, she turned around and beamed at me. ‘Isn’t he just incredible?’
‘Yes, he is. But he looks a little out of it,’ I said cautiously.
‘Really?’ she asked.
Jay came back with our drinks just then.
‘Thanks,’ I said.
‘Why are most of the men wearing pirate’s outfits?’ I asked Jay and Riya.
‘Don’t you know, dummy? Varun from the litigation department knows someone who makes costumes in Mumbai for Bollywood films. A designer he knows had recently done the costumes for some Bollywood song and all the back-up dancers were dressed as pirates, Since there wasn’t much time to prepare, Varun asked his friend to send some costumes our way.’
‘That makes sense.’ Jay had excused himself to meet someone he knew. I guess the chitter-chatter was getting to him. I noticed Varun walking towards us.
‘Hello, girls. You both look stunning as usual.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘Great jobs with the costumes, Varun.’
‘Thanks.’
‘How many people are dressed as pirates?’ I asked casually.
‘I placed an order for seven costumes. Six are being worn and one went unused.’
‘So who here are dressed as pirates?’ To make things lighter I added, ‘The whole pirate trend has caught on here after Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean.’
Before Varun could say anything further, Riya interrupted him.
‘Come on Tara, what’s with you? Stop interrogating him. Let’s enjoy the partieeee,’ she screamed into my ear.
I realized this was really not the time and place to discuss all this.
I opened my bag to check my cellphone. My eyes fell on a piece of paper, which hadn’t been there before. It reeked of the Eternity perfume and had a single line written on it:
‘You are not alone.’
My heart started palpitating. How had this note landed in my bag? With every passing minute, I was getting more and more anxious. I remember leaving my bag in the car when I got out, as I wanted my hands to be free. Did this person break into my car and place this note in my bag? Somehow that didn’t make sense; he could have left it in a far more conspicuous place than inside my bag. The only place I remember getting out of the car was the office and knowing how I was feeling, I could have very well have left the car unlocked. Riya interrupted my thoughts.
‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine. I just need to go to the restroom.’
I locked myself in the WC. I put the lid down and sat down. I started reading the note again. It had been neatly typed.
My mind went racing to try and figure out when the note might have been left in my bag. When he pushed me in the water, he must have slipped it in my bag. No, that wasn’t possible because afterwards I took out my car keys to go to the office to change. Then it dawned on me when he had had the opportunity to do it. When I was in Banner’s office I had carelessly left my bag on the table. This person hadn’t been looking for anything at the office; he had been looking for me. He knew I had been hiding there all along. I was very scared now and knew that this individual meant business.
Things were starting to get quite out of hand. What was I to do?
I went to the mirror and touched up my make-up. I looked at my watch—it was nearly midnight. Time to leave. I politely thanked AK for inviting me. Riya looked like she was deep in conversation with Jay and I felt that now was not the time to interrupt them. It was just as well because I was really in no mood to give explanations to anyone.
I took out my car keys and got into my car. I was greeted by an awful stench. I saw something crumpled up on the back seat. I was scared to see what it was so I reached for the light switch above my back seat—it was the most horrific sight! The entire seat was strewn with feathered pieces of a chicken. It was ghastly. I screamed and screamed. When I got out of the car, I had blood all over me. Thankfully, there was a couple from my office, Keshav Verma and his wife Samia, not far from my car. They came running towards me when they heard me scream.
‘Tara, are you okay? Are you in pain?’
I was hysterical by now. I was rolling on the ground crying, clenching my fists, and banging them on the ground.
When I overheard Keshav tell Samia to call for an ambulance immediately, I managed to gather enough strength to whisper to them that I was okay. Keshav charged towards the car while Samia sat next to me on the ground and made an attempt to calm me down.
He was shocked by what he saw. Samia helped me stand on my feet. We were all wondering what sort of a sick joke this was.
Keshav, who was the most composed, suggested that they drop me home and his driver would come tomorrow and get the car cleaned for me and drop it off at my place. According to him, somebody was trying to play a prank to frighten me and there was nothing to really worry about.
On the way home, we were all driving in silence. I think all of us were in shock at what we had just witnessed. Mentally, I made up my mind about one thing: come what may I would meet Bahadur first thing the next day. I couldn’t wait until Monday. Thankfully, I had the good sense to get his home address from Keshav.
24
HIS SKIN WAS burning. He had used too much make-up last night but how else was he to cover the scars? These scars had marred him in more ways than one. He almost kicked himself for smashing his hands against the rearview mirror. He took some cotton wool and dipped it in cold water, cleaned the wound and pulled out a clean bandage.
But then a thought brought a smile on his face. He had loved the look of fright on Tara’s face when she had opened her car door. He was driving past a local butcher shop when an amazing thought struck him—it was time to introduce a little blood and gore to make things more exciting. More than that, what gave him even more pleasure was the fact that he had stood right next to her at the party and she had not realized who he was.
He looked around the room. This was the only place in the world that gave him the peace and sanctuary he needed—a farmhouse to house his beloved snakes. Keeping them in the apartment was too risky, especially after the last cleaning lady had accidentally gotten bitten while working too close to
a cage. And he had had to pay her a hefty sum for the hospital bills. Since then he had shifted the snakes to this farm house that his father had bought him.
He looked at his watch. He had to meet someone and if he didn’t get moving now he would most definitely be late. He quickly changed. He switched off all the lights. He stepped out, locked the door behind him, and looked around to make sure there was nobody around. He closed the creaky old gate. He walked about half a mile to where he had parked his car behind some trees. He got into it. He put on his sunglasses, backed out, and drove down the main road like nothing had happened.
Bahadur broke into a sweat. All this was getting too much for him. He had to talk to someone and he knew that person was Tara. After work hours a lot of things had been happening in the office that nobody was aware of. He had witnessed it all. Today, he had finally mustered up the courage to speak to her when he saw that all too familiar face. He had chickened out and now he was terrified.
Bahadur locked the door and tightly shut the windows of the single room in which he lived on rent in Shahpur Jat. It had a small kitchen attached to it. There was a noise in the kitchen and he turned to look: it was a mouse. Annoyed, he let out a curse, then went to his old, creaky cupboard and pulled out a bottle of rum: Old Monk, his favourite. He had got it as a gift and had saved it for a special occasion. If Anita saw him having it, she would have given him a piece of her mind, but today she was visiting her sister in another part of town.
The thought of Anita brought a smile to his face. He opened the bottle and took a couple of swigs. He could already feel himself calming down. As he was about to raise it to his mouth again, a figure stepped out from the shadows. For the first time Bahadur realized he had a visitor who had been watching his every move. The glass slipped from his hands and the amber coloured liquid spilt all over the floor.
25
THE NEXT MORNING was a Sunday. I couldn’t sleep all night and I got out of bed early. I had to meet Bahadur. Luckily, my parents slept late on Sundays, so I could sneak out before my mother stopped me with her questions. I borrowed her car keys and left a note saying that my car had been damaged in a minor accident the previous night—nothing serious, only the rearview mirror had broken and there were a few scratches so I had left it at the service station—and I was going to the sports complex a few kilometres away to make enquiries about the early morning yoga and tennis classes they had there. It would please her to think I was focusing on things other than work.
It was around 6.30 a.m. when I left home. I could see the early morning joggers and the newspaperman doing the rounds. I looked up the address. It was a twenty-five minute drive to Shahpur Jat from where I lived. I got there within twenty minutes as there was no traffic along the way.
The street in which Bahadur lived was very narrow, wide enough only for pedestrians and cyclists. I parked my car in the neighbouring upmarket Panchsheel Park and decided to walk along the narrow street. A few small shops were opening and I felt conspicuous as an outsider. His rooms were on the third floor of one of the buildings. All the buildings were in a cluster—it almost felt like if you stood in one balcony, you would know exactly what was going on in the next person’s house. The front gate was open and I made my way upstairs. There was a lock on the door. I looked around to see if there was somebody I could talk to. Through the open stairway I spotted the milkman doing the rounds on the street.
I shouted from the third floor. ‘Bhaiya!’
He looked up at me inquiringly.
‘Can I talk to you?’
‘Yes?’
‘Do you know who lives here?’
‘Yes, Bahadur, the Nepalese guy.’
‘Do you by any chance know where he is? His door is locked.’
‘He hasn’t been home for a couple of days. The shopkeeper across the street told me yesterday . . . Why?’
‘Err, never mind,’ I shouted back. ‘You carry on.’
After he had cycled away, I stood there unsure of what to do. The door was locked from outside. I had this feeling that this house held the key to the mysteries that had been doggedly following me for the past few weeks. I needed to know what was behind that closed door.
I walked down the stairs to the floor below. I knocked on the door. There was no response. I then went down to the first floor. Thankfully, a woman was standing outside. She asked me, ‘Were you the one talking to the milkman? What’s the matter, memsahab?’
I had to quickly come up with a suitable lie, otherwise I knew she wouldn’t help me.
‘Are you the landlady?’ I asked her. ‘Is Bahadur your tenant?’
‘Yes, but what do you want?’
‘Bahadur works in our office and we want some files from him. But he has not been answering his phone, so I have come . . . I urgently need some papers . . . Do you have an extra key to his lock?’
Either she didn’t know or it did not strike her that Bahadur worked as a guard, so he couldn’t be in possession of papers. But luckily she did not question me. Her husband, however, was not happy with the proposition.
So I tried to persuade him, ‘Bhaiya, it will take me only two minutes. You just open the door . . . I have come such a long away and it’s urgent.’
After ten minutes of cajoling he agreed.
All three of us went upstairs. The lock was rusty and it took us a few minutes to open it. When we opened the door, we were greeted with a sight we never expected to see.
26
ALL THREE OF us were frozen to the spot—speechless. Sprawled on the ground lay Bahadur in a pool of blood. The house looked like it had been ransacked. The woman standing next to me started shouting hysterically and almost collapsed on the ground. Her husband tried to compose her. My eyes were fixated on Bahadur’s limp body lying sprawled on the ground. He had cuts all over his body and his head had been beaten with something heavy.
I had an instant urge to throw up but I controlled myself. After the previous night’s incident, I had grown harder. Then, bloody pieces of chicken had made me hysterical; today a dead man’s disfigured body only left me cold and empty inside. Turning my eyes away, I pulled out my cell phone and dialled the number of the police.
They arrived in record time and started interrogating the poor couple who had got into this mess because of me. I tried to take the blame for persuading them to open the door, telling them the same story that I had told the man and his wife—that Bahadur had vital papers that I needed. I knew I had got myself into big trouble—I would probably have to appear as a witness in the court for a possible murder. They would find out I was lying—but I just hoped and prayed Mr Kapoor would back me on this. He had, after all, put me on the case.
The police asked us to leave the scene of crime after first noting down our phone numbers and addresses. A crowd had started forming and asking questions. In all the commotion I had not had an opportunity to check Bahadur’s room and see if he indeed was in possession of the Project Emerald papers as I had suspected. Now it was too late.
While walking out I noticed a woman standing in a corner and crying inconsolably. The reason she caught my attention was that even though people were shocked to learn about Bahadur, nobody else was crying. Nobody appeared to be fond of him but this particular woman looked pretty distraught. I guessed she must be his girlfriend.
I went up to her and asked gently, ‘Were you close to him? I am sorry . . . Do you know how this happened?’
She looked up at me with bloodshot eyes. Then fearfully she glanced around her. It seemed like she wanted to say something but couldn’t. Then, before I could say anything further, she started walking. Without thinking I followed her. My gut feeling said she knew something vital.
We entered a narrow doorway in a building a few blocks away. She quickly shut the door and turned to me.
‘Madam, please sit down,’ she said.
I looked around. There were two red plastic chairs with a table in the centre; a photograph of the Pashupatinathji temple in Kat
hmandu hung on the wall. I sat down on a chair.
‘I don’t know . . . where to begin,’ she said.
It was heart wrenching to see the look of pain in her eyes. She looked down and started crying again.
Just then my phone rang. I picked it up. The detective branch of the police had arrived and I was to immediately report at the scene of crime. Hastily I got up.
Looking at the woman directly in the eye, I said, ‘I have to go now. The police are calling me. Here’s my phone number. Call me. We must talk.’ I handed her my business card.
She nodded.
The meeting with the crime branch lasted about an hour after which I was allowed to go.
As I was driving back my phone rang again. It was a landline number. I picked it up.
‘Hello.’ There was no response.
‘Hello,’ I repeated.
Finally I heard somebody whispering, ‘Tara Madam.’
‘Yes? Who is this?’
‘You just met me . . . my name is Anita . . . Anita Rana.’ She spoke hesitantly.
‘Of course,’ I said reassuringly. I realized Bahadur’s girlfriend must be calling me from a phone booth.
‘When can I meet you, Madam?’
‘As soon as possible. I am driving back home but I can come back to your place . . .’
‘No, Madam, this place is not safe. I don’t want anybody to hear me talking to you.’
‘Hmm okay. Then why don’t you go to the Hauz Khas market? It’s ten minutes away from your place and I will be there soon. Wait for me at the entrance where the fruit-sellers’ stands are. It’s a crowded place and no one can harm you there. Have you understood what I said?’
‘Yes, Madam, I will be there.’ Then before hanging up, she said something to me which sounded a little strange. ‘Madam, Bahadur would have wanted me to speak with you. He had a lot of respect for you and he remembered how you would send him to the paanwallas to get cigarettes for you.’
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