by Vish Dhamija
Her eyes went up in desperation but she remembered Woody Allen: you can't be an atheist and look at God with imploring eyes. You can't be a deist and expect God to intervene on trivial earthly issues either. This was her battle; she had to fight it herself.
Looking for something. Anything.
Hoping for something. Anything.
She intermittently got up, walked a bit and looked out of the window, then returned to her desk. There were cables a floor below where she stood. Pigeons sat chatting or just singing, making noises. A lot of them looked alike — like two Honey Singhs, no way to discern. Pigeons, unlike pet dogs, didn't wear collars or else you could identify them by the collar colour or any number of other tags. The truth was that the only way the police had identified the two Honey Singhs was by their different coloured shirts. What else did they have to look for? Thoughts fluttered around in her brain. Thoughts are no different from a person taking a walk in a small room. They go up to a point, hit the wall and then spin around to travel back. And like that person, they notice some things they might have missed on the way. Rita's thoughts were no different and she saw something she had missed earlier.
And suddenly — like a picture that had been shot a while ago — started to develop in her eyes. Gradually, like it emerges in the dark room. Bit by bit. A vault of realisation cracked open, by reflex.
The eyes can miss a thousand details because they only get to see something once. Then there's always a question of who's seeing the subject. Perhaps, they got too engrossed in some part of the subject that they ignored the rest. There could be certain shock element that the mind could get distracted by, thereby letting the eyes lose focus. Eyes are merely a lens, it's the brain that processes and analyses what we see. Also, sometimes the spectator's mind has already decided on something so it obliterates what it doesn't want to see. But the camera is different. It captures and freezes the moment as it was. No scope for emotions. No filters whatsoever. It captures as-is. It seizes every detail. What is even better is the captured moment can be enlarged if the capturing lens' quality is good. And you had to give it to those clever folks at Samsung for the zoom they offered in their Galaxy phone that Handlebar carried. That was one decision that Handlebar had taken wisely for which he would always be applauded. The enlarged picture of the two Honey Singhs — seen and snapped only minutes apart — had one more commonality than their being replicas of one another.
The veracity of the entire drama was bewildering. How could she have missed it when she saw the photographs first time around? It jibed at her.
Both Honey Singhs wore the same watch. Rita had an eidetic memory — a blessing or curse to remember everything like a photograph once seen — she remembered having seen the same Omega Seamaster on Honey Singh's wrist; he had flashed it when she had met him at his office. The same blue dial. She took out a lens from her drawer and looked at the photographs closely. On both the watches worn by the two Honey Singhs there were identical striations from a few years of use on the visible metal strap, and a matching small dent on the case near the winder in the watch in both the pictures.
Could it be?
They had been anti-Sherlock all this while — theorising before they had the facts. She now knew she had the possible missing link.
There were never two Honey Singhs.
Honey Singh had finally made a mistake. The diamond robberies were committed with complete sangfroid because they had been planned to perfection. This outing to mislead Handlebar hadn't been so well planned. Honey Singh had donned a different shirt, but he had forgotten to take off his wristwatch.
Omega is one of the most respected watch brands in the world. It was on the wrist of Mr Armstrong when he took that giant leap for all mankind. It was the first watch in space. But when your time is bad, even an Omega cannot save your ass.
She picked up the photographs and the magnifying lens and walked to the Operations Room where the guys were working.
'They never had a tail.' Rita blurted it out
'Who didn't have a tail, ma'am?' Jatin asked.
'Our police guys who tailed Handlebar did not have a tail.'
'Then how did Handlebar's client know what he had missed reporting?'
'They weren't spotted through the windscreen; they were sighted in the rear view mirror. Honey Singh had spotted the undercover officers follow Handlebar when Handlebar had followed him to Kitty's apartment on that weekend…'
She saw confusion on the faces.
'Look at the wrist watch on both the guys, you'll see what I mean.'
Jatin, Vikram and Nene inspected the photographs under the lens. They got it instantly.
'It's the Doosra — like in cricket? The other one. It's the same delivery, but it goes the other way. It's not two separate deliveries. Cutely done.'
'You mean?' Vikram got it, but it was still a shock.
'It could be that they bought the watches together?'
Really, Jatin? Are you for real?
'No it is the same watch — look at the indentations and striations on the watch and metal strap. He didn't think anyone would spot that. There is only one Honey Singh.'
'But we've got the photographs of both only minutes apart... '
'“Minutes apart"— those are the operative words. They are not in the same frame though.'
'You mean…' Nene looked up.
'In the little time he had he only changed the shirt. Shoes and jeans, he knew wouldn't be visible as he would only be seen in the car when he travelled with Kitty Varghese. No reason to change. Watch, it either didn't occur to him or he got sloppy.'
'That's very unlike them.'
'Yes. I think they did play a ghost double but didn't plan it as meticulously as they planned their burglaries. Either that or they brought forward the sighting of the second one when we got closer than they had anticipated.'
'What do we do?'
'You do the re-run. See how long it takes for you to drive out of sight from the front entrance of Honey Singh's office, then find a way into the building from the rear door and walk back out front to be seen. Time it with the time stamps on these photographs. These photographs were taken nine minutes and fifty-three seconds apart. See what's the best time you can do that in, they should be a close match. The course needs to be done sooner rather than later. Tonight itself.'
***
Rajesh Nene, still scathing about not being allowed to get Honey Singh into the police lock-up and grill him hard enough to get the truth out of his dishonest mouth, wanted to nail the exercise perfectly. He decided to carry the cross himself rather than delegate it to someone in his team or to the local constabulary. He agreed to meet Jatin at the Bandra Kurla Complex after dinner. The plan was to reconstruct Honey Singh's movement and time it.
It was 9:23 when the two met at the closed tea stall that Handlebar had mentioned in the report. The lights in the offices around looked exhausted after having burnt the long day, but some of the offices were still lit up indicating that some of them still had people working the late shifts. BKC had some offices that were back office operations for companies based abroad and, intrinsically, worked twenty-four/seven to accommodate the working hours in US or whichever country was awake at that time. Despite the time of the day there were still a few people on the roads, albeit the crowd density was far lower than in the daytime. The streetlights were alight and vehicles moved in and out of the buildings without being questioned by the building security. That was good. It meant Nene's personal car would not be unnecessarily conspicuous or challenged when it drove in and quickly drove out of Honey Singh's office building either. The car's registration number might be noted by the personnel but even if it was, so what? Honey Singh wouldn't be checking who came into the building he had his office in; it wasn't that he owned the damn building; he was just another one of the many occupants.
Nene scanned the area. One 360 and he had taken it all in. There was no sight of anyone he knew or who could possibly know him or recogn
ise him without the uniform. Some keen eyes would, undoubtedly, recognise his profession by his hair cut and mannerisms. A policeman was, above all, a policeman. The uniform was for the amateurs to identify the police; the professionals didn't need that — they would be familiar with people like Nene from a mile. The only precaution was to check that Honey Singh wasn't still in the office; they didn't want to bump into him driving in or out. That would cause suspicion. Nene pulled out his mobile, called the police control room and asked them to connect him to Honey Singh's office. The call he knew was secure even for someone like Honey Singh, since his call would get routed through the police control room's stringent encryption that could overcome any software that attempted to unmask the number or origin of the call. The desk phone at Honey Singh's office rang a few times and went to voicemail. Nene hung up. They waited another ten minutes to see if anyone came out of the building, in case someone had left only seconds back. No one. Once assured, they sprang into action.
They agreed Jatin would hang around the tea stall like Handlebar, and like Handlebar take photographs from an identical Samsung mobile phone despite the cosmic drop in the lighting conditions. The idea was not to play find-the-difference with separate photographs of Nene here; the photographs would capture the time elapsed between the sighting of Nene after he drove off and when he reappeared at the gates of the building.
Parking Jatin's car by the roadside, the two men drove away from Honey Singh's building to check which would be the closest point where Honey could have possibly got off from the car and walked his way into his own building through the rear gate. A short drive of barely two minutes — crossing the bank building where Handlebar had parked his car — the road turned left towards Kalina, and their car was indeed out of sight from where Handlebar had camped. Then there was another left turn only a few metres later into another office complex that also housed a South Indian café providing a perfect reason for a couple to drive into. The building with the South Indian café had separate entry and exit points in front and a pedestrian passage in the rear similar to the one in Honey Singh's office building. Nene steered into the building and stopped. All buildings had inter-connecting walkways between them, it seemed. Bingo!
The two policemen drove back to the start point. Jatin got out at the closed tea stall and Nene drove into Honey Singh's building, parked and walked out. Jatin spotted him and snapped a few pictures before he disappeared into the building. 10:12 PM. Jatin snapped Nene again, in the car this time, at 10:16 PM.
Nene drove the little circuit they had only just reconnoitred, found a parking space on the other side of the building with the South Indian café, briskly walked — almost ran without anyone raising eyebrows — into the neighbouring building and crossed over into Honey Singh's office premises and walked out of the main entrance for Jatin to see him again. 10:33.
The time difference between the two sightings of Honey Singhs was a fraction over nine minutes.
Nene had, even with his super-efficient driving, achieved the same in approximately fifteen minutes.
Nene and Jatin sat in Nene's car wondering how Honey Singh had shaved off approximately six minutes from his mystic act. Especially since Kitty and Honey had perceptibly done the same course in the crowded daytime. The journey should have taken longer.
Could it be that DCP Rita Ferreira had misjudged this one? Were there were actually two Honey Singhs with identical watches?
'Maybe he knows another route that we missed. Should be do another recce?' Jatin suggested.
'I guess so. Let's do it on foot. Maybe there's a foot passage that we overlooked.'
'Good idea.'
They walked the length of the road till the turn. Handlebar would have seen if the car had stopped before the turn. He would have certainly reported that Honey Singh got out if he had viewed that. The first left turn that could take anyone back was the entrance of the building with the café, there wasn't any other route.
As they stood in the parking lot of the building with the café, it struck Jatin first.
'With so many cars still in this complex it must have taken you a while to find an empty parking slot first?' he queried.
Nene clutched on immediately. 'And Kitty Varghese, on the other hand, would have dropped Honey Singh at the gate and rushed off so...in case Handlebar had driven out behind them he would have chased the car not knowing that his target was no longer in the vehicle…'
'And Honey Singh would have jogged through this crowd, which would be quicker than you driving into this place to begin with and then the time it took for you to park.'
'Gotcha.' Nene gave a two finger mock salute. He had missed that the additional time he took to get to the front of Honey Singh's building was the time he had taken to drive into the café and find a parking slot. Those unassuming four/five minutes probably made up the crucial difference between Honey Singh's charmed manoeuvre and Nene's re-run.
'Let's do another run.'
'I'll drive this time. I'll drop you by the gate and then take a U turn and go to the tea stall, then time you again.'
'Done.'
This time they achieved the manoeuvre in ten minutes.
'Should we call ma'am or just email?' He glanced at his watch: 11:04.
'I'd say just email at this hour. Anyway, this isn't any discovery, this is only a validation of her own conjecture. If this run was to override or negate her promise then I'd have certainly called. I mean we only know what we already knew, right?'
'I guess so. I'll email her.'
The guys walked back to their parked cars talking.
'Good night. See you tomorrow then.'
'Good night.'
Nene shot off immediately. He was a married man with family and it was late. Jatin sat there scrolling his phone for the photographs he had taken of Nene in the last hour and smiled. Honey Singh was quite an item playing a double role when there wasn't a lookalike. He wondered how Honey and/or Kitty had creatively imagined the whole thing in the first place. And why?
He started his motor and drove slowly to the end of the road.
Ever noticed that once you come across a new word it suddenly appears in all the prose you read? Everywhere? It isn't that the word has been included in the Oxford dictionary only after you encountered it. It's just that you're more conscious of it. It's the same with everything else. If someone points out something new, good or bad you end up spotting it more. It wasn't that there was a sudden flood of reckless motorcyclists in Mumbai. But after Rita had pointed out one reckless rider Jatin had noticed that it was some kind of an epidemic on the streets. Engrossed in his wonderment, he totally missed a motorbike coming from his right. Then he realised he wasn't the only one. What was it with the motorcyclists in this city? Brakes screeched. Almost twenty drivers blew their horns simultaneously, even at this hour. Expletives were shot from open windows and even from shut ones. The motorcyclist didn't care, just sped past. He could have hit something, died or killed someone but he didn't stop, he just didn't care. Though Jatin couldn't take down the registration details as it was dark and it was the wrong angle for spotting the plate, but he could see that the colour of the machine was green, and not the red one he had seen when he was with Rita. And he had also received the task of finding who it was and asking the local police station to pay them a courtesy visit and some sincere advice on riding. Shit! He was late on the assignment. Today. Definitely!
He knew Rita Ferreira never forgot anything; it might have slipped in her priorities due to the urgency of the current Ron Jogani murder case. He made a mental note to pull up the vehicle registration database to search for the number he had noted previously. A letter should actually be sent to local police stations to impose a fine on such rashness. This was beginning to become a menace. With that in mind he drove off too.
***
Rita's Blackberry pinged at 11:24.
Yes, her guys had done the same circuit in almost the same time that Handlebar had recorded. However, it was
still an assumption and assumptions cannot be validated or proven or even taken to court. The trouble was, how do you prove a negative? How can you prove that Honey Singh had no lookalike in the world till you had seen and eliminated the entire world's population? You could prove a double if you saw one, not disprove if you couldn't see one.
Rita had inherited her light sleeping habit from her father. He never slept soundly and never more than six hours a night. Books and music filled up all his spare moments. He had told her of the “day the music died”, how McLean had immortalised his idol Buddy Holly on that February day in 1959. He had, in fact, given his interpretation of the entire American Pie and how Don had covered Dylan, Elvis, The Beatles, Lennon, The Rolling Stones, Leonard Cohen…
But all that was before alcohol over shadowed everything else. Addiction, he never admitted to. Talking of inheritance, he had bequeathed his music collection to his only child too. All on vinyl. Pristine. And Rita had always cherished that far more than the land and property her parents had left behind. Enough that if she didn't want to work ever again, she could live on rental income alone. However, her work now was what she lived for, especially when she was in the middle of an investigation like this, not the boring bureaucracy.
She was up, bored, sipping Jim, missing Ash. He must still be in the skies, she thought.
Before calling it a night she emailed the team calling for an emergency meeting early morning at nine.
***
'Tickets booked for the day after...' Honey Singh was on the phone again. He was in his bedroom but he spoke in undertones like he was concerned someone would overhear him.
There was a crackle on the other side.
'Yes Wednesday evening. I have your passport and all the relevant papers... no, just a small bag, please.'