by Nev March
“Spectacles?” he asked, surprised. “No, Sahib.”
“What happened next?”
“Soon after that, two or three minutes, Sahib, the second girl fell to the ground. Twenty feet away! A horrible sound. People cried out and clustered around. I went to her. She was alive for a few seconds.”
All this was consistent. “Did anyone see them fall?”
“Yes, Sahib. Francis Enty, a clerk who comes often to the university.”
Francis Enty, the prosecution’s key witness. I resolved to question him soon. Next, I cast about for some way to place Maneck and his accomplices at the scene.
“After the second woman dropped, did you go up the tower?”
“Yes, Sahib, a few minutes later.” His head wobbled from side to side.
“Were you the first to go up?”
“We waited until the police arrived, then a few of us went up together. The bank clerk Enty, two police constables and I.”
“What did you find?”
“Nothing, Sahib! There was no one.”
I frowned. Didn’t Adi say Bacha’s purse had been found there?
“Nothing? No objects at all?”
“Oh yes. There was a cloth purse. And a shoe. Just one.”
One shoe. That suggested foul play. The other had been found near Bacha’s foot. “The gallery is not the top, is it? Did anyone go all the way up?”
Apte nodded. “The bell-room, yes, but it is always locked. The police went up.”
I’d read their report—nothing out of place. “What did you do next?”
“Sahib, I came back, na? I was terribly upset. People still crowded outside.”
Now wait. If the rogues threw the ladies from the gallery, they could not remain there, since a host of witnesses traipsed upstairs. Where would they go? The reading hall had emptied after the first fall. Had the miscreants joined the crowd from the direction of the tower? Surely someone must have seen them come down?
“You returned to the library? What did you find?”
Eyes narrowed, Apte cleaned his glasses. “Two men were seated here, a gentleman and his servant.” He gestured to a table by the window. “They asked me what the shouting was about.”
Indeed! A hullaballoo outside, and they remained indoors?
“What time was this?”
“Almost five o’clock, Sahib.”
“What did they look like?”
He couldn’t remember.
“Western clothes, or Indian?”
“Sahib, Indian, I think, I cannot be certain.”
Apte said he remembered nothing more. I probed further, to no avail. Thanking him, I turned toward the foyer, planning to climb to the gallery, the scene of the crime. Whatever drove the ladies to death, that’s where it transpired.
CHAPTER 8
THE TOWER
The librarian accompanied me out to the vestibule, where the tower rose above us on carved pillars that met in high stone arches. I said farewell, but Apte was not done with me. White hair ruffled by an unruly breeze, he asked, “Where did you say you work, friend?”
“Brown and—”
“Batliwala,” he supplied happily. Satisfied with these credentials, he motioned me to a stone step nearby. As we sat, a deep bell sounded, followed by a short melody and two urgent notes. They rang close above us, calling out, exhorting me somehow.
Glancing upward, the librarian asked, “Do you know why it is called Rajabai tower?”
“No.”
“It was donated by Premchand Roychand, whose mother, Rajabai, was blind. He built it so she would know the time. It rings every quarter hour.” Apte hesitated. “Sahib, there is something else. I did not know whom to tell. I remembered this after the trial, but it was too late, na? The young Mrs. Framji—such a pretty lady. She came here often.” To my astonishment, he mentioned an argument between Lady Bacha and an unknown man.
“An argument? Can you describe it?”
The old man scratched his head. “She sat across from a man, upset. Her voice was sharp. It drew my attention, you see. Others also noticed. She was such a kind, soft-spoken miss. The man was holding her wrist. When I went toward them, he left.”
Holding her wrist? Had she tried to strike him? “When did this happen?”
The librarian’s face wrinkled with effort. “It was in the weeks before the lady’s death.”
“What did he look like?” This was the closest I’d got to what might be behind these strange doings.
“He wore a green coat. It’s all I remember.”
Green, a color sufficiently unusual to have remained in his memory. “Had you seen him before?”
“I think he was one of the two men left in the library that day, when the women died. I cannot be sure, I was shaken … And another thing…” Apte’s shoulders hunched against a breeze that picked up leaves and swirled them about like unhappy ghosts. “Something was left in the hall that day.”
“The day of the argument?”
“No, Sahib, the day the women died.”
“What?” I asked eagerly.
“Two pieces of black clothing,” he said, “I gave them to the ragpicker next day. It was nothing, na? Just old clothes left under a reading table.”
“Men’s clothing?”
“I did not check. The cloth was ragged and torn.”
“Where is this ragpicker? Could you find him?”
Alas, Apte had given the clothing to a roving fellow and could not say where he might be. So, no tangible evidence. Suppressing disappointment, I thanked him. The argument he’d witnessed was promising. Who was Mister Green Coat? I did not know what to make of the abandoned clothing or whether it was connected to the ladies. He waved away my thanks, huffed to his feet and took his leave.
Spotting the scrawny Havildar on a stool in drab, lumpy clothes, I pointed at the stairway, a curved set of cast-iron steps leading up into darkness, saying, “Havildar, is the gallery locked?”
He gawked, tripped over his feet and dropped his keys. Recovering, he hurried to lead me upward. I made a few remarks as we climbed, but all he said was, “Hah!” Since “hah” means yes in most local languages, it did not immediately strike me as odd.
“When did they arrive, the ladies?”
“Hah.”
“Did you take them up?”
“Hah.”
“Why didn’t you stay with them?”
“Hah.”
Puzzled, I followed him up the narrow coiled stairway, smelling the musty odor of rat droppings. Dissatisfied with our scintillating conversation, I decided to question him on the gallery.
Through two narrow windows, shafts of light broke the darkness and slanted down to us. Footsteps clanging, we passed a doorway open to the first-floor balcony where the altercation with Maneck had been reported. Finally, the latch creaked, the door swung open and we stepped into a sunlit gallery. As the guard began to go, I grabbed his arm, intending to pepper him with questions.
The change in the fellow was awful. He cowered and wailed, and I could make no sense of it.
“All right, all right.” I released the poor fool, who quaked in his baggy clothes but made no move to leave. I tried again in Hindustani. “How often did the women come here?”
Terrified, he seemed unable to speak. Did he think I was a policeman? “Hah, hah.” His head wobbled, hands joined in supplication. Did he not understand? Perhaps Adi could translate for me.
I need a Watson after all, I thought, letting the frightened fellow stumble off. My pity gave way to frustration. Here was an ideal witness, situated exactly at the time and place of the crime, but he was a bumbling idiot.
On the gallery, a warm breeze engulfed me. It was here that it happened—the ladies had stood on this very gallery against the waist-high parapet.
Resolved to explore the space with Holmes-like thoroughness, I examined the entrance carefully. The door latched from inside the tower. An iron bolt in the doorframe squeaked when I worked it. I ran m
y fingers down the wood, feeling sharp edges. Holmes would have found a dozen clues. I found only a few dark colored threads snagged low in the doorframe. Folding these into a sheet of paper, I stowed it in my pocket.
The top of the parapet wall was rounded, rather than flat, to dissuade visitors from sitting on it, I supposed. How could petite Lady Bacha have surmounted it? If she’d jumped, she’d have had to propel herself over this wall. In a saree?
I scoured the stone floor for an hour, earning a sunburn and a crick in my back. Where the parapet met the uneven floor, something caught my eye—a single white bead, so small I had to pry it out with the tip of my knife. This minute object also I stowed away.
Next, I looked down in all four directions. The flower memorials were on one side. I pored over the stones in that wall, but they revealed no secrets.
Beneath sky and clouds, the city spread below me in a motley carpet of industry. To the right, Malabar Hill swelled in a green wave that contained Framji Mansion. On the other side, dockyard cranes rose like ugly storks over ships awaiting cargo. Two hundred feet below, students wandered across the university lawn. A quiet scene.
As I stood there, anyone on the grounds or adjacent roads could certainly see me. Here, at the gallery’s edge, the girls’ plight could have been seen, but standing by the inner wall, I could neither see the ground nor hear sounds below. Nor could anyone down there see me. Could I be heard? I put it to the test.
“Hiy! Hiya!” I cried from near the door. I peered over the parapet, but no one looked up.
“Hiya!” I repeated, now at the parapet. A few surprised faces turned. The tower was not as isolated as I’d imagined. If Lady Bacha or Miss Pilloo had screamed, they would have been heard. Yet the librarian heard nothing.
So why didn’t the ladies cry out?
I sighed. What had I learned? Black threads caught in the door? No telling when they’d snagged, since the tower had opened to the public. That tiny white bead might have dropped from anything: a child’s toy or ornament.
Memory touched my skin with a cold finger. Wait—had I not recently seen something like this? Where? The sound of my breath filled the gloom as I stopped on the iron stairs. I waited, searching my memory. And found nothing. I wound back down the stairs with growing frustration. This was no game. Was I really equal to this task?
CHAPTER 9
A NEW ADDITION
Returning that evening from the clock tower, I came up Malabar Hill through Hanging Gardens. The rear lane to Adi’s home had moss-covered walls and overhanging creepers. It offered a secluded stretch, conducive to contemplation.
I’d found two pieces of evidence at the crime scene, a tiny white bead and a few black threads, but could not tie these to the ladies’ deaths. Holmes always wanted to be first at the scene. I was months behind. After the tragedy the librarian saw two men in the library, a gentleman and his servant, both nameless. Some black clothing found under a table, discarded. It was not much to go on. I kept wondering—why hadn’t the women called for help? It was imperative that I question the law clerk Francis Enty, who’d seen the women fall, and find out who was with them at the time.
Framji Mansion bustled as I passed the kitchen, the cooks all astir. Jiji-bai’s daughter hurried past with a platter.
“Salaam, Sahib,” she said, looking harried. Did the Framjis have dinner guests?
“Cheerio,” I replied, and took the rear stairway to Adi’s rooms, where I planned to stash my evidence, then go down and present myself before returning to my rental room on Forgett Street.
As I strode into my client’s chamber, a young lady turned from the window, a silhouette against the light. Sunbeams caught the hair that was swept up and piled atop her head. The glow outlined a figure I knew from the portrait of Adi’s late wife.
“Oh!” said Lady Bacha, a white-gloved hand to her lips. She wore a blue satin evening dress. A diamond flashed in her earring.
Wait—Lady Bacha was dead. Was I dreaming? My breath locked and the room darkened.
“Captain Jim!” Adi said behind me. “Here, man!” He guided me to a seat. Moments later, he pressed a brandy into my hand.
“Meet Diana,” he said, turning up the gaslight. “She arrived this afternoon on the Ocean Queen from Liverpool.”
I hardly heard anything after his first two words. So, this was his sister, Diana.
“Ah! That’s better,” he said. Resplendent in black dinner jacket, white waistcoat and tie, he smiled, which I took to indicate that I no longer resembled a dead fish.
I made a weak noise and drank. Fortified, I looked up and found her gaze upon me, surprised and curious.
“When did you last eat, Captain?” asked Adi.
I rubbed my forehead. “Breakfast, sir. I’m all right.”
He looked at Diana and a glance passed between them, a language reserved for siblings, mysterious to those like me, who had none. I watched them talk in quick snatches, completing one another’s sentences, animated in each other’s company. Sitting across from me, Diana’s skin glowed against a dark blue neckline. Slender hands rested against an impossibly narrow waist. Her face moved and flowed with her thoughts, appealing in its symmetry and charm. When she caught my glance, her gaze was as direct as Adi’s.
Courtesy demanded I make some remark. Try as I might, I found nothing to say.
Adi went to the door and tugged the bell-pull.
“Captain, who did you think I was?” she asked in a soft tone.
Perhaps I flushed. Glancing at Lady Bacha’s portrait, I shook my head.
Diana’s eyes widened with understanding. “Ah.” She smiled, the singular sweetness of her look holding me immobile. Turning to Adi, she said something about dinner.
I heard his voice at a distance, and her quick reply. She did not remark on my foolish mistake. Why? It was no secret. Yet the courtesy of her gesture, the grace of it, was not lost on me. I drew a breath and focused on their conversation.
Both young people sounded very refined. I’d grown up in the army, surrounded by British officers. My commander, Colonel Sutton, had taken a particular interest in me, often sending away for books. Yet I was at a disadvantage under the rapid-fire banter of these two.
After another quiet word with his sister, Adi asked, “Will you stay for dinner?”
“I think not, sir.” I grimaced at my trousers, my attire barely adequate for the morning room. But Adi would not have it. He sent a bearer to make arrangements.
While we waited, he told Diana of our investigation, listing my activities and our deduction about the missing spectacles. So Diana was to be part of our inner circle. She listened intently, interjecting questions that revealed a quick intellect. The siblings seemed alike in more than appearance and mannerisms. When she replied to his remarks in fluent Gujarati, I began to see her addition as a tactical advantage.
Adi’s manservant brought several garments. As he shepherded me into the anteroom to dress, I wondered whose they were. To my surprise, he followed, gesturing at me to try them on. I complied, somewhat amused, to find that the trousers were either too short or too wide. The fellow clucked and took measurements.
“Very good, Sahib, I will alter,” he said in a thick native accent. He laid a white silk shirt and a black coat aside, and bore the trousers away.
When, once dressed, I returned to the siblings and expressed my thanks, Adi waved it away. Diana too seemed to think nothing of it. The Framjis’ casual approach to these niceties puzzled me. I had a sense of being managed so deftly that I scarcely noticed it.
Dinner was a formal affair during which I said little, nor needed to, since Adi and Diana held a lively conversation. Burjor’s satisfaction in the accomplishments of his oldest daughter was evident. This evening he headed the family table in a grand blue-black tunic and turban-like hat. Adi’s mother, a fragile woman in white saree, sat at the other end. Around her clustered a boy, about ten, wearing a red jacket fashioned like an army uniform, and two curly-haired littl
e girls.
Adi’s mother shared his pointed features, the same directness. Lines of grief scored her sallow cheeks. I was presented to her simply as “Captain Jim, a friend of Adi’s.”
“Welcome, Captain,” she said, narrow face revealing little. A silver chain around her neck bore a cameo of two now-familiar faces, Lady Bacha and Miss Pilloo.
After dinner the young children were sent to bed, despite their pleas. The adults moved to a formal parlor, a posh room wallpapered in blue, with white molding. A grand piano dominated one side, by glass-fronted cabinets. Diana and her mother sat close together.
Burjor, in an expansive mood, poured sherry into sparkling crystal globes and handed me one. He clapped his son on the back, smiling.
The scene brought an odd pain to my throat. This I would never have, a sire to thump my shoulder and claim me. With Adi and his father to one side, the ladies on the other, I stiffened. I had no place amid this domestic elegance. I would take my leave.
“Why are you doing this, Adi?” His mother’s sharp voice sliced through the banter.
“Oh, Mama!” Diana winced. “We decided to tell you because, well, you should know what’s going on. Adi has a right to know the truth.”
“Will it change anything?” Her mother’s color rose with the tide of her voice. “It’s over! For God’s sake, Adi. Let her go!”
My client stood still, hands at his side, stoic, like a bust of young Lord Nelson.
“Mother,” he sighed, then turned to me, emotions in check. “What do we know, Captain?”
Reminded of my role, I marshaled my evidence.
“It’s unlikely to be suicide, sir,” I began carefully, “in part because the ladies did not, ah, drop at the same time. Had they planned to jump, for whatever reason, they would have faced it together.”
I spoke about how the eyeglasses, always on Lady Bacha’s person and now conspicuously missing, led me to believe someone wanted to conceal an altercation.
“So it was murder?” Mrs. Framji’s voice trembled. “Someone killed my children?”