by Chris Ryan
Alex nodded. The regrets came flooding back. If only he’d let Hex get on with it. He took out his mobile and texted Amber: ‘FOUND TRACKS. BINA TAKEN. RV @ HSE.’
She texted back: ‘WANT ME 2 TELL M?’
Alex replied: ‘YES.’ Then he felt like a coward. If anyone broke the news, it should be him; he was responsible for the mess. Then he thought, No, Amber’s on the scene. It’ll take us a while to get back. When we do, we need to ask some questions. The sooner Mootama is able to answer them, the sooner we can go and get Bina back.
But he sent another text to Amber: ‘THANX.’
Paulo followed the tyre marks to the edge of the grass. He got on his hands and knees to look at them more closely. ‘Perhaps I can see what kind of car—’
Suddenly a cobra rose out of the grass. It spread its hood and let out a vicious sound like a high-pressure air hose.
Alex realized Paulo had stopped talking rather abruptly. He turned and saw the snake, its head swaying above Paulo’s, the hood wide open like wings. The hair stood straight up on the back of his neck. He couldn’t move.
Paulo could see every scale on the snake’s body. He didn’t even dare to breathe. He closed his eyes and moved back very, very slowly.
When he opened them again, the snake was subsiding back into the pale grass. Paulo got to his feet shakily and moved further away. Sweat was running in cold rivulets down his forehead and inside his shirt.
Alex clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I think somebody doesn’t want you to look at the tyre tracks.’
‘Well, tough, I did,’ said Paulo. ‘It was a saloon car. Rather like the taxi we saw earlier. Now, I wonder who’s been visiting here in a taxi?’
10
PRISONER
‘I’ve got her in the clinic, but I’m having to keep her doped. And we may have trouble.’ Trilok hooked the phone under his shoulder while he grappled with his breakfast, a dosa – a large crispy rice pancake – bought from a stall. He tore a piece off and put it in his mouth.
‘Trouble?’ said the voice at the other end.
Trilok swallowed. ‘When I went to see the family there were these western kids nosing about. They’re aid workers or something. You know what they can be like. They have no idea about our way of life but they think they can interfere.’ He walked across a stretch of grass, past a sign saying that the park and the white, domed building behind it had been constructed in 1913. He picked his usual bench and sat down.
‘Don’t worry, Trilok. I’ll be on the lookout.’ There was a pause. ‘Enjoy your breakfast.’
Trilok cut the call. The past twelve hours had been exhausting. Finally, things seemed to be going in the right direction. He’d spent a gruelling afternoon talking to Mootama and Naresh, patiently explaining that all was not lost. All they had to do, he said, was send someone in Mootama’s place. Did she have a sister, a brother? Another blood relative? He didn’t mention the children but the couple understood. They’d been upset; Naresh had shouted at him. But Trilok had expected that. He was used to it. He had continued, patiently, to explain how the deal could still be done, they could still earn the money; $700 – 32,000 rupees – could still be theirs, if they could send somebody who would be the same tissue type as Mootama. Think of your daughters, he told them. This will be their dowries.
Of course, the price Gopal was actually paying Trilok for the kidney was $8000 – 365,000 rupees. And today he felt like he’d earned it.
He’d almost been back in Chennai when he got the call. It was from a number he didn’t recognize. He said hello cautiously; you never knew who could be calling or why. A hesitant voice replied: young, female and nervous. Probably it had never used a phone before. ‘This is Bina from Nayla,’ it said. ‘I want to earn my dowry.’
He told her to meet him just outside the village. No point in turning up in the taxi to find the parents waiting for him with sticks.
When she turned up she’d looked so young he almost sent her back home again. She had big eyes like a frightened animal, and was wearing a dark shawl thing so she wouldn’t be seen. But the really young donors did get scared sometimes. He’d seen it before. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We’ll take you to the clinic and get your tests done.’
That was a mistake. It spooked her. He tried a different tack. ‘There’s a nice bed waiting for you – clean sheets – lots of friends, too.’ That usually worked.
That was when she said: ‘I don’t want to go right away. I just wanted to talk about it first.’
He’d got hold of her arm by now; good thing too or she might have run away there and then. He tried reasoning with her. ‘What is there to talk about? Think of your sisters, your dowry.’
But the silly girl had panicked. She had put up quite a fight before he’d got her into the cab and given her something to calm her down.
Trilok finished his breakfast and wiped his fingers on a tissue. He’d still got her drugged, but the important thing was that he’d got her. And he wasn’t going to let her go.
11
ON THE TRAIL
Mootama sat in the big rocking chair, her knees pulled up to her chest. She looked much older than her thirty years; worry had etched lines into her face and her eyes were red with crying. But now she was calm. She felt comforted talking to the teenagers; they were not very much older than Bina, but they seemed so grown-up, so in control.
The two girls had broken the news to her – that it looked as though Bina had gone to meet the kidney man but had been taken against her will. The boy who had the little computer had said they would try to find her, as though it was the kind of thing they did all the time and it would be easy. Then the other two boys had come back and the questions started in earnest.
‘I was taken to a clinic,’ said Mootama. ‘There were lots of people there with kidney trouble – on machines, or waiting for tests, or seeing doctors. There was a house behind the clinic, through a locked door. I was taken there and told that was where I would live. There were other women there who were selling kidneys. They were very friendly. It was nice and clean, although there were bars on the windows. I was told the tests would take forty-eight hours, then the operation could be done. But as soon as they saw I’d already had a kidney removed, they threw me out.’
‘Do you know who was going to have your kidney?’ said Amber.
‘He was a rich man who’d had a transplant before. It had gone bad. He wanted another from a live donor because they last longer than transplants from dead people.’
Mootama got up. She went through to the kitchen and began to sort through the washing up in the sink. Even though her daughter had gone, there was still the rest of the family to look after.
Hex said: ‘I wonder if the client is holding her?’
Alex was shaking his head. ‘No. She’s no good to him there. She’ll be having tests. If we turn up at the clinic I bet she’ll be there.’
‘Mootama, can you tell us where the clinic was?’ asked Li.
Mootama sighed. ‘I don’t know Chennai. I’ve never been there before. They drove me in the taxi. When I left, they gave me the bus fare and I didn’t take in where I was – I just wanted to get home as soon as possible. I couldn’t find my way back there.’
‘You wouldn’t need to go there again,’ said Amber. ‘We’ll go. If you come too somebody might recognize you and hide Bina.’
Li asked, ‘Did you notice anything about the neighbourhood once you were there? The name of a shop . . . ?’
Mootama had a turquoise shawl in her hands. She looked at it for a long moment, thinking. Alex recognized it as Bina’s. That little voice spoke up inside him: You should have let Hex stop her. He forced it down and pressed Mootama gently for an answer: ‘Anything you can tell us will help us find the clinic. Anything . . .’
After a long moment, Mootama nodded. ‘Yes, I looked out of the barred window of the room I shared with the other women. There was a cinema, and next to it, a chemist’s.’
‘A cinema, gr
eat,’ said Hex. He took his palmtop out of its carrying case. ‘There can’t be many cinemas in Chennai. Let’s see where they are.’ In no time he had a list. ‘OK, there are nine cinemas in Chennai. Mootama, can you remember what film was showing?’
Mootama thought and then shook her head.
‘No worries,’ said Hex. ‘I’ve got a list here. Have a look and see if you recognize any.’ He handed her the palmtop, the screen facing towards her.
She shook her head and handed it straight back. ‘Bad eyes. You read them.’
Hex took the palmtop back from her and looked at the list. And swallowed. The first title was Kucch Rishtey Kachche Dhaagon Ke. If he tried to get his tongue around that he’d never be understood, and Mootama might be insulted by his attempt. He looked further down: Kuthu; Lakshya – they weren’t too bad. Aparichithan – getting worse. Then Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi.
Amber peered at the screen. ‘So come on, tell us what’s on.’
Hex deleted the link before she could get a good look. His fingers raced over the keys, looking for another site. ‘Aha!’ He waited for the screen to finish loading and took it to Mootama. He had found a site that included graphics of the posters for each film. ‘Just nod when you want to see the next one.’
Mootama looked at the screen over his shoulder, her brow furrowed in concentration. Hex cursored to the next poster, and the next. Then she nodded. ‘This one. Aparichithan.’
‘And that, my friends,’ said Hex, ‘is showing at the Regal in Victoria Road. Next question: how do we get there?’
Paulo looked at his watch. ‘Pradesh is going to be here any minute now with fixtures and fittings for the school, and he said he’d have to go into Chennai for more. If we help him unload in double-quick time, we can hitch a ride into town.’
Alpha Force didn’t need telling twice. In an instant, they were on their feet and heading for the door. Mootama looked a little bewildered at the sudden activity.
Li put her hand on the woman’s shoulder. ‘We’ll find her, don’t worry. We’ll bring her back safe and sound.’ Mootama nodded. Then Li followed the others outside.
They made their way towards Pradesh’s truck, which was pulling to a halt next to the building site. ‘Mootama said the tests take forty-eight hours.’
‘So that’s our deadline,’ said Paulo.
‘Probably less,’ said Alex. ‘She went in the middle of the night.’
Hex looked at Alex pointedly. ‘Did she?’
Alex met his eye. ‘Yeah. I mucked up. I should have let you catch her.’
12
CHENNAI
‘Hey, nerdboy,’ said Amber, ‘look at the real world.’
Hex looked up from his palmtop and out of the window. When they set off, it was down a rough road between the flooded paddy fields. On each side men ploughed the water with teams of black buffaloes. Small villages nestled between the meadows. Now, barely thirty kilometres away, they were on a wide tarmac carriageway. The fields had turned into a sprawl of buildings stuccoed with peeling plaster the colour of ice cream and stained from years of monsoon.
‘Yuck,’ said Hex. ‘And it’s still muddy.’ Amber gave him a look of scorn. He smiled inwardly at how easy she was to wind up. Then he retreated back into his thoughts, idly flicking through websites. But he was only half paying attention even to that. He was mulling over what Alex had said about the previous night and re-running the scene in his head. The indistinct figure in the torchlight, its outline broken up by the bushes. It hadn’t occurred to him that it might be Bina. He’d been about to catch up with her too, when Alex had stopped him.
But he couldn’t blame Alex. What they did had made sense at the time. Now they’d have to put it right.
Pradesh put the brakes on, hard. The van screeched to a halt.
‘What’s happened?’ said Li.
‘Cow in the road,’ said Pradesh, ‘so everyone has to go around it.’
The large grey cow was lying peacefully across two lanes. The orderly lines of cars, bikes and lorries became a chaotic scrum as they tried to pass it on either side. In the middle of it all the beast lay calmly, its jaw rotating thoughtfully as it chewed, unperturbed by the squealing tyres and honking horns.
‘You’d think it would be scared of the traffic,’ said Alex, ‘but it’s just sitting there.’ A bike roared past the beast, just inches from its nose. The cow didn’t budge.
‘That’s cows for you,’ chuckled Paulo. ‘You can’t move them when they get comfortable.’
‘How will its owner get it out?’ asked Amber.
‘Its owner probably set it free,’ said Pradesh. ‘Food is scarce, but the cow is holy so no one will kill one. That is why their owners let them wander into the cities.’
Hex reached into a holdall on the floor and brought out a small black pouch. He passed it to Amber. ‘Take one and pass it on.’
She reached inside. Her fingers pulled out a small silver locket on a leather thong. She smiled, recognizing it like an old friend. Li was next, and recognized hers too. They were miniature transmitters to allow Hex to track the team in the busy streets of Chennai.
Hex, Alex and Paulo had similar devices, on small rings like washers. They fitted the washers over the hooks of their belt buckles, under the leather.
‘Quick check,’ said Hex, and pressed a button on the palmtop. The display showed a map and a cluster of pulsing dots. ‘Yes, all working.’ He powered it off again.
Outside, the landscape had changed again. The smell hit them first: a greasy mixture of drains, dung and diesel fumes. Gradually, as they reached the town centre, the buildings became closer together and taller, the advertisement hoardings more frequent. They were in the heart of the city.
‘Sure this is the one?’ Alex looked up at the massive Art Deco facade of the Regal Cinema. It was painted in red and blue and displayed a huge cutout of Marilyn Monroe. Pradesh’s truck disappeared into the traffic.
Hex pointed to the pink and yellow poster advertising the movie Aparichithan. ‘Yes, that’s it. And there’s the chemist’s shop two doors along.’
‘Then that looks like the place we want,’ said Li.
Opposite the cinema was a long, low, single-storey building painted in pale yellow. The sign said: ST THOMAS’S CLINIC. One section of the building had bars on the windows.
Li turned round and pretended to take an interest in the film poster. ‘How are we going to enquire about her?’
Amber joined her. ‘We could say her mother is ill and asking for her to come home.’
‘Risky,’ said Alex. ‘That might really worry Bina if she heard us.’
‘Suppose we say we’re her friends and we’ve come to visit her,’ said Paulo. ‘Nothing suspicious about that. And we’ll just see what they say.’
‘I’ll go in,’ said Li.
‘And me,’ said Paulo.
‘Right, that means Hex, Amber and me are backup,’ said Alex. It was their standard practice when investigating to go in twos. Then, if they had to follow up or try a different approach, there were still three who hadn’t been identified. ‘We’ll find an RV point and text you the location.’
In the clinic’s reception area, a fan rotated slowly below a yellow ceiling. A nurse holding a clipboard bustled up to the counter. ‘Yes?’
‘A friend of ours is here having treatment,’ said Paulo. ‘She asked us to bring something for her.’ He patted the small leather bag on his belt pack as though it contained the item. In reality it contained a toolkit.
The nurse frowned. ‘What’s her name?’
‘Bina Bhattacharya.’
The nurse shook her head. ‘I don’t think we’ve got anyone of that name here. What was she in for?’
Li thought quickly. The principle was always to say as little as possible, and to stay as close to the truth as possible. ‘Tests, I think.’ She deliberately made it sound vague. The less they seemed to know, the better. ‘But she definitely said it was here.’
Paulo’s phone bleeped: he had a message. He clicked to open it. It was from Amber. A photo of Bina came up on the screen; it had been taken a few days before at the building site. She was standing next to Li and Paulo, holding a trowel. ‘Look,’ said Paulo. He showed the picture to the nurse. ‘Here’s what she looks like.’
The nurse stared at the picture. Her manner changed. ‘No,’ she said sharply. ‘Your friend is not here. She has not been here.’
The same thought occurred to Li and Paulo simultaneously: Why had the nurse’s mood changed? But they were careful not to let their reaction show in their faces.
The nurse gave the phone back to Paulo, keeping it at arm’s length, as though looking at the picture was going to make her give something away. ‘You’ll have to go now,’ she said. ‘If you don’t have an appointment you can’t see anybody.’ She turned away from the desk, as though eager to escape.
Definitely trying to hide something, thought Paulo. And flustered by it; as though she doesn’t have to do it very often. But it was clear they weren’t going to get any further by asking questions.
He pulled Li’s sleeve. ‘We’d better go,’ he said. He looked at the nurse. ‘Sorry to have bothered you.’
They turned and left the clinic. Beside the entrance, a rubbish bag was propped against the wall. A rat scurried away as they approached, but it had left a hole in the black plastic. Something caught Li’s eye and she crouched down as though tying her shoelace.
She only needed a glance. In among the papers and wrappers that had been thrown away was a small red band of plaited cotton. It was Amber’s friendship bracelet – the one she had given to Bina. What was it doing there?
13
CONSPIRACY
‘Has Alex texted the RV?’ said Paulo.
Li clicked through her messages as she walked away from the building. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘South for a couple of blocks; the park with the big white building.’
The route took them back past the gaudy cinema. They walked slowly, like two friends having a chat. Someone might be watching from the clinic, so they wanted to look as casual as possible.