by Vaseem Khan
‘I still think it is possible that the bust – and the papers – were stolen by those damned Franciscans,’ grumbled Lobo stubbornly.
‘I do not believe so, sir. Besides, this is a very complicated safe. To break into it requires specialist expertise. It is my belief that some very intelligent young minds were behind this theft.’
‘You mean students?’ Lobo shook his head in disgust. ‘So it has come to this. The reputation of St Xavier besmirched by some goondas with a computer.’
Rangwalla turned to Banarjee. ‘Is there anyone that you suspect, sir? Any particularly bright pupils with an affinity for this computing business? Any that have been acting out of character recently?’
Banarjee’s eyes narrowed behind his thick spectacles. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I believe I know exactly who is behind this.’
‘Oh, Papa, he is so sweet!’
Aarti Kanodia clasped her plump hands to her sixteen-year-old bosom and jumped up and down, the skirts of her pink frock bouncing around her. The source of her delight looked down from the stage, blinking modestly.
Ganesha had had a day to remember.
Firstly, he had gone to the circus and learned many new tricks in the company of a giant bull elephant, the first elephant he had encountered in his time in Mumbai. Then he had been gussied up in wonderful new clothes and brought to this interesting place where he had watched the circus troupe perform. Ganesha had particularly enjoyed the dwarf clowns. Even Chopra had made him laugh when he had ridden his unicycle over the edge of the stage.
But now it was Ganesha’s own turn in the spotlight.
With the seasoned swagger of a ring veteran he trotted into the centre of the makeshift stage and, by bending his front legs and dipping his head, bowed to the audience. Then he went through the repertoire of simple tricks that he had been shown by the bull elephant and its trainer.
First he sat back on his hind legs and pretended to beg. Then he leaned forward and performed a handstand, which met with wild applause. Ganesha rolled over, once, twice, three times. More applause. He walked backwards in a circle. Then he turned around and walked backwards in the other direction.
The little elephant trotted over to the dwarf clowns and took a beach ball. He threw it up in the air with his trunk, then caught it again. Delighted claps. Then he rolled onto his back, threw the ball up and bounced it between his feet.
The crowd roared him on.
Tiger Singh leaned down to whisper into the dwarf Vinod’s ears. ‘He is a very clever elephant. How did he learn so much in just one morning?’
‘I do not know,’ said Vinod. ‘We did not teach him half of those things.’
Chopra looked on in amazement from his elevated vantage point. Glued to the rear wall of the bungalow, he momentarily forgot his own predicament. He had known that Ganesha was adept at picking up tricks, but this was truly exceptional! He blinked. This was no time to think about elephants – he had to get down!
He surveyed the ground as it swam before his sweat-soaked eyes. The striped awning that extended from the rear wall of the bungalow was one storey beneath him. Could he jump into that and use it to break his fall?
No. The fabric was too flimsy; it would not hold his weight. He would go crashing through it and clatter into the trestle tables groaning with food that lay directly below.
He looked around.
Where the awning ended, just a few feet from where Chopra was perched, was the giant cake. Ten feet of solid cake base, coated in white chocolate. It was all but hidden by a water fountain from where the circus show was going on.
He made a decision.
Blinking droplets of sweat from his eyelashes he edged to the very corner of the ledge, then, with a final muttered curse, leaped from the wall.
He landed on the topmost tier of the cake, which collapsed downwards through the remaining layers. The hard sponge served to cushion his fall, and he ploughed to a halt having burrowed through to the very centre of the cake like a meteorite.
Chopra sat up and wiped cake from his eyes. He was sitting in the centre of a cake explosion, covered in cream, chocolate and icing sugar. A plastic cut-out of the number 16 had affixed itself to his groin.
He plucked it off and stood up on shaky legs.
No one had noticed him, but at any moment one of the serving staff might emerge from the bungalow and spot him. Then all hell would break loose.
He had to get out of here, even if it meant temporarily abandoning Ganesha. The thought filled him with guilt but he was certain that the circus troupe would take good care of his ward until he could pick him up later on.
Chopra limped along the alley to the front of the house. The TOPS guards had congregated by the gate, smoking and drinking tea from tiny glasses. They laughed as he stumbled past.
After all, what was suspicious about a clown covered in cream and cake?
‘Checkmate!’
The boy tilted his head and fired a victorious sneer at his opponent whose shoulders crumpled with disappointment, Adam’s apple bobbing up and down in defeat. ‘Better luck next time, Rathore,’ he said imperiously before striding to the adjoining table where a second opponent was desperately scanning the board.
‘Four moves and you’re done, Bhandari.’
The seated boy’s face collapsed into panic. Tremulously he touched one of the pieces arrayed before him, then changed his mind and moved another. The standing boy smiled.
‘Make that one move,’ he said and plucked one of his own pieces from the board before setting it down again. ‘Checkmate.’
He walked over to a third table where a portly boy was examining the board through owlish spectacles. As he saw his opponent approach, he immediately knocked over his pieces. ‘I resign,’ he squeaked, and sat back in relief.
The standing boy turned and grinned imperiously at the cassocked Brother seated at the head of the class. ‘A new record, I think, sir,’ he said.
The Brother tapped the stopclock on his desk, bringing the moving hands to a halt, then frowned. ‘Do not forget your Proverbs, Wadia. “Pride comes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.”’
At that moment the door to the classroom opened and Rangwalla entered, Poppy and Banarjee crowding in close behind.
Rangwalla surveyed the members of the St Xavier chess club and then said, ‘I am looking for Raj Wadia, Anoop Joshi, George Fonseca and Rafeeq Baig.’
Rangwalla passed a severe look over the four boys seated before him. It was instantly clear to him who the leader of the group was: Raj Wadia, a tall boy with lacquered hair, bright eyes and a permanent expression of disdain on his handsome features. Joshi, in contrast, was a thick-shouldered brute with a bulbous nose and fleshy lips. His simian-like upper torso strained his uniform. He seemed forever hanging on Wadia’s words – Rangwalla instantly recognised a born lieutenant. The third member of the group, Fonseca, was a pudgy specimen who looked out at the world through thick glasses and an expression of constant alarm. Baig, in contrast, was exceedingly thin, as if he had been ill. His mop of thick brown hair was uncombed and looked as if a bird had built a nest on top of his head.
Rangwalla had gathered the four boys together in a classroom in the east wing of the school.
The former sub-inspector knew that, contrary to appearances, these four boys were highly intelligent. Mr Banarjee had said that they were informally known around the campus as the ‘Bright Bulb Club’. He had also told Rangwalla he believed them to be behind the theft of the examination papers. He had no proof, of course, merely the strongest of suspicions. The four boys were ‘as thick as thieves’, he explained, and all bona fide computer geniuses, particularly Fonseca.
Furthermore, they had raised Banarjee’s suspicions because, in the days following the arrival of the examination papers, they had each found different excuses to visit the old secretary’s office. Wadia had casually enquired about the examination papers, not once, but on three separate occasions!
‘My name
is Rangwalla,’ said Rangwalla sternly. ‘I would like to ask you a few questio—’
‘Excuse me for interrupting, sir, but who, precisely, are you? I mean, you are clearly not part of the faculty,’ said Wadia. He was slouched in his chair, legs spread-eagled insolently before him.
‘I am a detective,’ Rangwalla began.
‘Are you out of uniform?’
Rangwalla frowned. ‘I am a private detective.’
‘Then you’re not a real detective at all, are you, sir?’ Wadia sneered. Joshi sniggered.
‘I served the Mumbai police force for over twenty years,’ snapped Rangwalla irritably.
‘Were you sacked?’
Rangwalla gritted his teeth. ‘No. I was not sacked. I retired.’
‘If you are retired, why are you here?’
‘I am here because of the examination papers that went missing from the office of Mr Banarjee four nights ago.’
There was a sudden silence in the room. A blush overcame Fonseca’s round face and Baig’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down like a piston.
‘The examination papers are missing?’ said Wadia eventually. ‘Well, that is a shame. But what has that got to do with us, sir?’
‘Mr Banarjee believes that you might know where those papers are.’
Wadia looked around innocently. ‘Who? Us? How would we know, sir?’
‘Because you are the ones that took them.’
Fonseca let out a little whimper of alarm. It had not escaped Rangwalla that the boy was sweating profusely even though he was seated directly below the ceiling fan. Here is the weak link, he thought.
Rangwalla walked very deliberately over to Fonseca and looked down at him with a stern expression. Fonseca suddenly found something deeply interesting in the surface of his desk.
‘That is quite an accusation, sir,’ Wadia said finally. ‘I suppose we should be offended. Do you have any proof that we took those papers?’
‘Are you denying that you took them?’
‘We had absolutely nothing to do with it,’ replied Wadia promptly.
Rangwalla continued to stare down at the top of Fonseca’s head. Fonseca’s shoulders twitched. There was something mole-like about the boy, Rangwalla thought; he certainly looked as if he wished to burrow into the ground.
‘If necessary, I will find the proof.’
‘Well, when you do that, sir, why don’t you come back and talk to us? In the meantime…’ Wadia scraped back his chair and stood up. ‘We are late for our next class.’
Rangwalla watched the boys file out.
Wadia paused at the door and met the former policeman’s glare, a knowing, arrogant smile on his face.
‘Good luck catching those thieves, sir,’ he said. And then he winked.
After the door had closed Poppy rushed in from the corridor where she had been anxiously wearing a hole in the floor. Rangwalla had insisted on handling the questioning alone. He had interrogated thousands of suspects in his life; it was something that required experience and patience. It was no task for an amateur.
At least Banarjee had seen the wisdom of leaving it to a professional. The chastened martinet had retired to his office. Rangwalla suspected the old man had no desire to face those responsible for his humiliation.
‘Did they confess?’ Poppy asked breathlessly.
‘No.’
‘What about Fonseca? He is a good boy at heart. I am sure if we work on him he will blurt out the truth.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Rangwalla. ‘But I would not bet on it. Wadia is the leader of that pack. I doubt Fonseca would be willing to cross him.’
‘But then what do we do? We cannot just let them get away with it.’
Rangwalla scratched thoughtfully at his beard. He was thinking about Wadia’s supercilious expression and that parting wink. The boy was arrogant. Like many criminals Rangwalla had met Wadia believed he was smarter than everyone around him, too smart to ever get caught.
‘I may have a plan,’ he said eventually. ‘I need to see Principal Lobo. We will require his help.’
The party was well underway.
As Chopra looked on from the shadows of his office, a group of uniformed policemen stood and raised a toast to a senior officer seated in their midst. A chorus of ‘For he’s a jolly good fellow’ rose above the piped restaurant music. The man of the hour, who Chopra vaguely knew, stumbled to his feet, feigned surprise, and thanked his colleagues profusely.
The door to the kitchen swung open.
Rosie Pinto advanced on the senior officer behind a vertiginous birthday cake that wobbled enticingly atop a silver dessert trolley.
Chopra frowned. He had had enough of birthdays and birthday cakes to last him a good long while.
Following his ignominious exit from Bulbul Kanodia’s bungalow he had returned home to shower and change out of his cake-splattered clown suit. Bahadur, the apartment complex’s security guard, had almost fallen from his stool at the sight of Chopra in his outlandish get-up.
Having scrubbed himself to a high sheen, Chopra had dressed and then gone to fetch Ganesha.
At Cross Maidan he had discovered a despondent Tiger Singh.
It seemed that Bulbul Kanodia had been so displeased with the destruction of his daughter’s cake that he had cancelled the festivities there and then, and banished the troupe from his home. Aarti Kanodia had flung herself to the lawn and thumped the grass with her fists, wailing at the ruination of her grand day. Incensed by his daughter’s distress, Kanodia had refused to pay the circus performers.
The dwarves, who did not take such things lightly, had turned violent.
Furniture had been broken. Guests had been abused. Threats had been made.
Eventually the police had been called.
It had taken Chopra the rest of the day to fix the mess.
He had hurried to the Bandra police station where the dwarves had been detained. By enlisting the help of an old police contact he had engineered their prompt release. He had then written out a cheque for Tiger Singh to cover the circus’s losses. Finally, he had invited the entire troupe to a complimentary meal at his restaurant, which they had declined, the dwarves having made up their mind to visit a ladies bar instead to help them recover from their bad mood.
‘You are a gentleman, Chopra,’ Tiger Singh had sighed, ‘even if you are not much of a clown.’
Chopra walked out through the restaurant’s kitchen and into the rear courtyard, where he found Ganesha hunkered down under the mango tree, investigating fallen mangoes with his trunk and picking out the best ones. He liked to line them up before popping them into his mouth one by one. It was a game, one of a number Ganesha had recently invented.
Chopra was continually amazed by how the little elephant developed in new and intriguing ways each and every day. Ganesha was still decked out in his colourful outfit, a gift from the circus troupe for his extraordinary debut.
Chopra settled into his rattan chair and considered his next course of action.
He now had in his possession what he believed to be compelling proof of Bulbul Kanodia’s involvement in the theft of the Crown of Queen Elizabeth from the Prince of Wales Museum. Chopra believed that the card he had discovered was an invitation to a gathering where Kanodia would attempt to auction the Koh-i-Noor diamond to unscrupulous buyers.
Had he still been an officer of the Brihanmumbai Police Chopra would have passed the invite – along with his suspicions – to his seniors. He would have allowed those best placed in the service to deal with the matter.
But the fact was that he was no longer part of the police service.
What’s more, he did not trust a man like Suresh Rao to give due consideration to any evidence that he, Chopra, had unearthed. ACP Rao was the sort to cut off his own nose to spite his face. And Rao had gone out on a limb with his own seniors by arresting Garewal – he would not change course now.
The only thing that could save Garewal was if Chopra produced the Koh-i-Noor and wi
th it a red-handed Kanodia. The more he thought about it the more certain he felt that this was the correct course of action.
A bucket clanked in the gathering darkness.
Chopra turned, expecting to see young Irfan. But it was Rosie Pinto who came striding across the courtyard, the steel pail swinging by her side.
‘Good evening, sir.’
‘Good evening, Rosie.’
He watched as Ganesha stirred from his well-earned rest and lumbered to his feet to greet Irfan. Ganesha froze.
His ears flapped once. He peered behind Rosie, then, not spotting Irfan, raised his trunk and sniffed the air.
Then he turned to look at Chopra, who recognised the puzzlement on the elephant’s placid features.
Chopra felt a great sadness welling inside him.
During the frenetic action of the day he had managed to avoid dwelling on Irfan’s absence, clamping down on his emotions every time his thoughts drifted in that direction, but now, as he observed the distraught elephant, the realisation that Irfan would never again bring a bucket out to Ganesha landed with a thud.
He leaned forward and patted the little elephant on the head. ‘I am sorry, Ganesha, but Irfan is gone. He has returned to his home.’
The elephant calf stared at him, confusion evident in his eyes.
‘There was nothing I could do. We must all make the best of it.’
Chopra stood and moved towards the restaurant. As he walked away he felt Ganesha’s eyes on his back. At that moment the guilt that he had suppressed ever since he had allowed Irfan to walk out of the restaurant returned with a vengeance.
Poppy was right. He had been too quick to permit the boy to leave. Children could so easily be intimidated. What if Irfan had been too afraid to tell the truth? Chopra had sensed that this man who called himself Irfan’s father was a bad egg, even before he’d found out who he was. Why had he let Irfan just walk away with him? If Irfan had been his own flesh and blood would he have allowed him to leave with a man like that?