Tarquin Hall

by The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken

  PARANTHA

  flat Indian wheat bread pan-fried and served with yogurt and pickle. Often stuffed with spiced potatoes, cauliflower or cottage cheese and eaten for breakfast.

  PATIALA PEG

  measure of liquor equivalent to 90 ml or about 50 percent larger than a shot glass. Originated in the Punjabi city of Patiala with the purpose of getting drunk faster.

  PEDI WORKER

  a Gujarati diamond cutter and polisher.

  PEEPUL TREE

  a species of banyan fig with heart-shaped leaves native to South Asia.

  PEON

  a messenger, servant, or assistant.

  PUJA

  prayer.

  PUKKA

  Hindi word meaning “solid, well made.” Also means “definitely.”

  POORI

  puffy wheat bread deep fried in oil.

  RAJMA CHAWAL

  Punjabi dish; rajma are red kidney beans cooked with onion, garlic, ginger, tomatoes and spices. Chawal is rice, usually Basmati.

  RUDRA TANDAVA

  the violent dance performed by the Hindu god Shiva, the Destroyer.

  RUPIYA

  Indian unit of currency like the dollar or pound.

  SAALA KUTTA

  slang, along the lines of “damn dog” or “lowdown dog.” Expression of disgust.

  SAAR

  a bad pronunciation of “Sir.”

  SAFARI SUIT

  a square-cut short-sleeved jacket with a broad collar unbuttoned at the top, epaulettes and four pockets, worn with long pants; usually khaki or sky blue and popular in India until the late 1990s.

  SAHIB

  an Urdu honorific now used across South Asia as a term of respect, equivalent to the English “sir.”

  SALWAR KAMEEZ

  a salwar is a pair of baggy, pajama-like trousers; a kameez is a long shirt or tunic.

  SARDAR

  a male follower of the Sikh religion wearing a turban.

  SATTA

  Hindi word for “gambling.”

  SEHRA

  a headdress made of flower garlands used to cover the face of the groom during an Indian wedding.

  SEVPURI

  a popular Mumbai street food dish consisting of “sev,” crisp vermicelli made from gram flour, mixed with raw mango slices, yogurt, spices and tamarind chutney.

  SHAADI

  Hindi for “wedding.”

  SHIKARI

  Hindi for “hunter.”

  SUPARI

  chewable form of areca nut, a stimulant. Also refers to the payment made for a contract killing.

  SUPER-CHOR

  a high-profile or successful criminal.

  TAMASHA

  a form of theater in western India, but in colloquial Hindi, means a public spectacle.

  TANI

  a family of languages spoken in the eastern Himalayas.

  TA’WIZ

  a locket or similar ornament containing verses from the Quran or Muslim prayers worn for protection and good luck.

  TEEN PATTI

  “three cards,” also called flash, a gambling card game popular in South Asia.

  THALI

  round steel or brass platter with small bowls traditionally used to serve a large meal.

  TILAK

  red mark on forehead usually applied after aarti (see aarti).

  TOPI

  hat.

  VAISHNO DEVI

  a shrine located in northern India at the top of a mountain dedicated to the Hindu goddess Laxmi. Most northern Indian Hindus make an annual or a regular pilgrimage to the site.

  WALLAH (M.), WALLI (F.)

  generic terms in Hindi meaning “the one.” Hence “auto wallah,” “phool (flower) walli,” “chai wallah,” etc.

  YAAR

  equivalent to “pal,” “mate” or “dude.”

  Read on for an excerpt from Tarquin Hall’s latest installment in the Vish Puri series:

  THE CASE OF THE LOVE COMMANDOS

  On sale October 8, 2013.

  Prologue

  The Love Commando watched the black Range Rover pull in through the gates of the University of Agra. Laxmi—the Commando’s code name—could make out the portly profile of the driver, the one who was so fond of chicken tikka, desi sharab and the accommodating ladies of the local bazaar.

  Next to him sat the goon with the gorilla nose and droopy eyes. He looked like he’d have had trouble spelling his own name. But it would be a mistake to underestimate him, Laxmi noted. “Naga,” as he was known at his local gym, was a power-lifting champion with fists the size of sledgehammers.

  “They’re pulling up now,” she said into her mobile phone, the line open to her fellow Love Commando volunteer Shruti, who was waiting inside the gymnasium building where the examinations were about to begin.

  It was ten minutes to four.

  The driver had kept his end of the bargain. Now Laxmi would have to live up to hers. Last night’s surveillance video of his dalliance with that bar girl would not find its way into the hands of his wife after all.

  From behind the Licensed Refrigerated Water “Trolly” positioned across the road, she watched the driver alight. He looked up and down the busy street. Satisfied that the coast was clear, he opened the Range Rover’s back door.

  The revulsion Laxmi felt for the driver paled in comparison to the contempt in which she held his boss, who emerged. Vishnu Mishra personified everything the Love Commandos were attempting to change about India. In north Indian parlance, he was known as a Thakur, literally “lord”—a hereditary landowner with no qualms about exploiting the caste system that still doomed tens of millions of low caste Indians to subjugation and poverty. His immaculate appearance despite Agra city’s heat and dust owed everything to this gross imbalance. An army of servants attended to his every whim: cooks, cleaners, sweepers, even a personal barber–cum–shampoo wallah who kept his nails immaculate, buffed his skin and, rumor had it, dressed him in the morning. Managers oversaw the day-to-day running of his numerous commercial activities. His eldest son managed his political ambitions. And a mistress called “Smoothy” ensured that during many an afternoon in apartment 301d of Avalon Apartments, his carnal needs were sated.

  Mishra even had a ready vote bank of thirty thousand subjugated tenant farmers whom he maintained in a perpetual state of poverty and hunger.

  Still, there was one task he was evidently prepared to take care of himself: Vishnu Mishra was prepared to kill.

  As he climbed down from his Range Rover, Laxmi caught a flash of the semiautomatic inside his jacket.

  He stood for a few seconds, surveying the street and waiting for Naga to alight from the other side of the vehicle. Then he beckoned for his daughter to step out.

  This was the first time Laxmi had laid eyes on Tulsi. She’d been under lock and key for the past three months in the family’s Agra villa, barred from having contact with even her closest female friends. Indeed, the only visitors she’d seen in all that time were prospective grooms and their families, all of them vetted and introduced by an “upscale” marriage broker.

  “Beautiful, homely, fair and proper height,” was how Cupids Matrimonial Agency had described her. Laxmi could see that this was no exaggeration. Tulsi had mother-of-pearl skin and dark brown eyes set amidst a flurry of long black lashes. She looked to be in good health, with plenty of color in her cheeks. Indeed, if she bore her father any ill will, it certainly didn’t show in her doting smile.

  Had she buckled under the relentless pressure of parents and family? Laxmi wondered.

  She’d known it to happen before. Tulsi’s boyfriend, Ram, might have been a handsome boy with liquid brown eyes, but he was still an “untouchable,” or Dalit—a caste so low and noxious to the highborn Hindu that, until recent times, the slightest physical contact with a member had been considered personally polluting.

  Vishnu Mishra would stop at nothing to prevent his daughter from seeing Ram again. He’d blocked any communication bet
ween them and left the young man in no doubt about what would happen if he attempted to contact Tulsi again.

  “I’ll kill you at the earliest opportunity, Dalit dog,” he’d promised over the phone.

  But Ram hadn’t been scared off. He’d appealed to the Love Commandos for help. The charity helped Indian couples from disparate castes and religions to marry and settle down, often under aliases. The founders and volunteers believed that the arranged-marriage system was holding back society and that if young people were able to choose their own partners—to marry across caste lines and therefore break down the ordained divisions once and for all—then India would become a more progressive place.

  Laxmi, who’d met with Ram a fortnight ago, had taken a shine to the young Dalit and his commitment to Tulsi.

  “She has hair that smells like raat ki raani,” he’d told her.

  Did Ram understand how hard it was for “love marriage” couples to make their way in Indian society without parental support? Did he comprehend how especially hard it would be for them given that she was from a Thakur family and he a Dalit one? Possibly not. “Without blossoms there is no spring in life,” he said, quoting from the poet Ghalib. But Laxmi was willing to risk her life for the lanky love-struck student nonetheless.

  And what better place for the Love Commandos to strike again but Agra, home of the Taj Mahal, the world’s greatest monument to love?

  Now the whole plan hung on whether Tulsi would be true to her feelings—and whether she would be brave enough.

  She would have to if she wanted to avoid an arranged marriage at the Harmony Farms wedding venue a week from today. This was her only chance of escape, her finals being the one commitment Vishnu Mishra would not allow her to miss.

  “She’s heading in now,” Laxmi reported to Shruti. “Be ready.”

  Vishnu Mishra led Tulsi inside the examination hall past clutches of students. Naga followed a few steps behind. His steroid-enhanced muscles ensured that he moved like a gunslinger in an American Western, with legs splayed and arms hanging stiffly by his sides.

  The driver, meanwhile, stepped over to the Licensed Refrigerated Water Trolly and demanded a glass of nimboo pani. He gulped it down, some of the liquid trickling onto his stubbly chin, and eyed Laxmi, who was posing as the vendor.

  “Want to be Radha to my Krishna, baby?” he said with a lecherous grin.

  She ignored him and he tossed a couple of coins onto the top of the cart before returning to the Range Rover.

  A few seconds later, her phone vibrated with an SMS. “Dad’s here!” it read.

  Laxmi cursed under her breath. Vishnu Mishra had gone inside the examination hall. He must have come to an arrangement with the adjudicator—no doubt a financial one.

  “Stick to plan,” she messaged back before donning her helmet, mounting her scootie and kick-starting the engine.

  Crossing over the road and mounting the pavement, she headed down the alleyway that ran alongside the gymnasium building. It was littered with chunks of loose concrete and dog turds. She pulled up beneath the window to the ladies’ toilets.

  A few minutes later, she received another SMS confirming that Tulsi had been slipped Ram’s note asking her to run away with him.

  All Laxmi could do now was wait—and pray.

  * * *

  Forty-five minutes passed. Laxmi was beginning to give up hope, when a set of painted fingernails appeared over the window ledge.

  A pair of anxious dark brown eyes followed. It was Tulsi.

  “Are you with Ram?” she whispered.

  “Yes, I’ll take you to him!” answered Laxmi.

  The Love Commandos had placed a bamboo ladder in the alley earlier that morning. She picked it up and leaned it against the wall.

  “I’m not sure I can do it!” said Tulsi as she looked down.

  “We’ve only got a few minutes before you’re missed. Hurry!”

  It took the young woman a couple of attempts to get one elbow up onto the windowsill. The other followed. Then a foot.

  “That’s it, you’re almost there!”

  Just then, there was a thud inside the toilets—a door slamming against the wall. A man’s voice shouted, “What the hell? Get down!”

  He grabbed Tulsi by the leg and tried to pull her back inside, but she kicked. “No, Papa! Stop! Let me go!”

  Laxmi heard another thud—Vishnu Mishra falling backwards into the toilet cubicle—and suddenly Tulsi was free and scrambling out the window.

  Within seconds, she’d reached the bottom and Laxmi sent the ladder clattering to the ground. Mishra’s curses rained down on the two women as they clambered onto the scootie and sped away down the alley, slaloming through the debris.

  They reached the front of the gymnasium to find the pavement occupied by a crowd of students demonstrating against poverty, chanting and holding up placards that read: IF I GIVE CHARITY YOU CALL ME A SAINT, IF I TALK ABOUT POVERTY YOU CALL ME A COMMUNIST!

  Honking her horn and motioning the students out of the way, Laxmi wove between them.

  Out of the corner of one eye, she spotted Naga bursting out of the gymnasium doors. He pushed through the crowd and knocked over three or four students. “Stop!”

  He would have caught her had it not been for Laxmi’s colleague Sanjoy, a third Love Commando volunteer, who’d been mingling with the students.

  Stepping forward, a can of pepper spray at the ready, he nailed the goon right in the face.

  Naga reared up, roaring like a wounded animal. Clasping his hands to his face, he staggered away. Sanjoy then climbed onto the back of the scootie and Laxmi sped off toward the main gate.

  Watching in her mirror, she saw Vishnu Mishra run into the middle of the street. He was wielding his revolver and gesticulating wildly to his driver. But the man was fast asleep at the wheel. The knockout pill Laxmi had slipped into his nimboo pani had done the trick.

  * * *

  The trio passed beneath the red sandstone ramparts of Agra Fort and crossed the sluggish, polluted waters of the Yamuna River. Between the iron supports of the bridge, they glimpsed the gleaming white marble of the Taj Mahal before plunging headfirst into a maze of filthy alleys and lanes as cramped and teeming as an ant colony. The shop fronts of ironmongers, jewelers, dried-fruit sellers and cigarette-paan vendors interspersed with light industry units housing ironworks, printers and cardboard recyclers all appeared in rapid succession like the frames of a cartoon viewed through a Victorian zoetrope. Motorbikes and three-wheelers bullied their way through a multitude of pedestrians, cows and goats. Children spun metal bicycle wheels along the ground with sticks. At a water pump, men wearing chuddies lathered themselves in suds.

  Tulsi bore the stench of raw sewage, diesel fumes and potholes without complaint. Only after they’d emerged into a landscape of houses dotted amongst virgin paddy fields on the edge of the city did she call out, “Where are we going? Where’s Ram?”

  The answer was a nondescript building of red brick that served as the Love Commandos safe house.

  “I can’t believe we got away!” gushed Tulsi as she dismounted from the scootie, shaking with fear and excitement. “Oh my God, I don’t know how to thank you!”

  Laxmi didn’t respond. Her attention was focused on the front door of the building. It was hanging, broken, from its hinges.

  “Is Ram inside? Can I see him?” asked Tulsi.

  “Keep her here,” Laxmi instructed Sanjoy as she stepped forward to investigate.

  Pushing the door aside, she discovered a flower pot lying shattered in the corridor beyond. In the room where Ram had been staying, there were signs of a struggle. His new pair of black shoes, purchased for his impending wedding, had been thrown at the assailants who’d broken in. There were a few spots of blood on the concrete floor as well.

  Laxmi searched the rest of the house, fearful of finding a body, but it was empty.

  Somehow—God only knew how—Vishnu Mishra’s people had finally tracked Ram down. They�
�d waited until he was alone and then grabbed him. That, surely, was the only explanation.

  Laxmi returned outside to break the bad news to Tulsi.

  Her face fell and turned pale. “Pa will kill him!” she cried. “Oh my God! I’ve got to talk to him!”

  Laxmi handed the young woman her phone.

  Tulsi’s hands shook, but she managed to dial the number. “Please pick up, Pa. Please, please, please,” she kept saying.

  Laxmi put her head close to the phone so she could eavesdrop on the conversation.

  The call was answered by a gruff, male voice. “Who is this?”

  Tulsi’s answer caught in her throat. “Paaaa . . . I’m . . . soooo . . . saaarreee,” she wept.

  “Where are you, beta?”

  “Please don’t hurt him, Pa. I’m begging you.”

  “Hurt who?”

  Tulsi let out a couple of long, hard sobs. “Raaaaam!” she wailed. “I love him sooo much!”

  “Listen, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now I’m going to come and get you. Tell me where you are. I’m not angry. Your mother and I want you home—that is all.”

  Tulsi wiped her wet cheeks and managed to compose herself. “Let me speak with Ram first,” she said. “I want to know he’s all right. Let him go and I’ll come home. Papa, I’ll never forgive you if anything happens to him.”