Friday, Afternoon
Rhea was over the moon to have Pingu back with her. Pingu too made it quite apparent that she had missed Rhea, licking her lavishly all over her face. Rhea thanked the SMS gang profusely.
‘Can I take a selfie with you?’ Akriti asked coyly, slightly embarrassed to be asking Rhea for a favour. ‘Selfie with me!’ Rhea pretended to be surprised. ‘I should be the one taking a selfie with the three of you.’ She pulled out her phone and took a picture with the three of them and uploaded the same on her Instagram page – tagging Akriti in it!
And in no time Akriti was the most followed girl in Solan.
Once the SMS detectives had had their time with Rhea, Chief Walia walked up to her. ‘Can I borrow these three angels for a moment, Ms. Varma?’ he asked as he ushered them away.
‘How did you manage this? I was beginning to wonder if the case was beyond the SMS gang.’
‘No case is beyond us, Uncle. More so if you entrust us with it,’ Aditya said proudly.
‘Now tell me, how and when did you realize that the cat was in the hotel? You guys were quite clueless when I walked out of the hotel this morning.’
‘Well, there were multiple red flags, but we missed some on the way,’ Akriti started off.
‘The first one was Bella.’
‘Bella. You mean Lizzy’s cat?’ Chief Walia asked.
‘Yes. Bella. She was such a well-behaved cat. She allowed us to pat her, and when she had to go back home, she happily rode the private lift. However, on the day the cricketers arrived, she was very irritable and angry. She wouldn’t let us touch her. Did you notice when she went into the lift, she was very irritable and was jumping and scratching at the walls of the lift. Over the last two days, her behaviour had changed completely.’
‘So?’ Aditya was impatient.
‘You know, Aditya, cats are very possessive and territorial. Like dogs, cats too mark their territory with their scent by urine marking. But there is one more technique they use. And that is of rubbing their heads against the place they want to mark. They have scent glands and the rubbing secretes some scent and marks the place.’
‘Yes!’ Kabir jumped in. ‘You are right! Bella has gone from being happy and secure to being insecure and aggressive in just a day!’
‘Yes, and there’s only one reason I can think of which can have caused this change,’ Akriti said.
‘Bella was suddenly required to share her home with Pingu, and she was acting up because she was feeling threatened?’ Aditya asked.
‘Correct,’ Akriti replied, and Aditya felt super proud of himself. ‘Till Wednesday, before the cricketers came in, Bella was the only cat that went up through the private lift. The night Pingu was stolen, the lift had one more occupant. Pingu. And on Thursday, Bella could smell Pingu in the lift. Another cat! In Bella’s territory! Pingu had entered what was Bella’s undisputed territory and it made her go wild. That’s why she was scratching, jumping, rubbing her head against the lift walls.Remember, no other animal had EVER been in the lift. That day Bella smelt something alien, she lost it completely. She even scratched me badly,’ Akriti said and held out her hand for Chief Walia to see. ‘When we saw her behave in that manner, had our antennae been raised, the Pereiras’ game would have been up.’
‘What then made you suspect the Pereiras and rush to the penthouse?’
‘This!’ Akriti said and held up her phone to show her Instagram page. She flicked through a few screens and came to the ‘Bella The Cat’ Instagram page and showed Chief Walia an Instagram story.
‘See. This is Bella and Lizzie this morning, just before they came down.’ And she let the Instagram story play itself.
On Akriti’s screen were Lizzie and Bella. Lizzie was trying to cheer up Bella and Bella was meowing and growling. The video lasted 15-20 seconds. And then stopped. When Akriti looked up, there was a blank look on everyone’s face.
‘What!’ she said, ‘no one got it?’ And then she increased the volume and played the Instagram story again. And that’s when everyone heard it. Even as Bella was growling, in the distant background, a soft meow could be heard. The sound was heard three times in 20 seconds. ‘If Bella was the only cat there, where did this second meow come from? The first time I saw this video was when Lizzy came down into the lobby when Punit Singh was apologizing to Rhea. Because the lobby was crowded and noisy, the meow got masked. But after everyone had left, the lobby was deserted. When I saw the video again, I heard it. Loud and clear. That’s when I realized that the people who had kidnapped Pingu were Anto Uncle and Lizzy Aunty. They are the ones responsible for this chaos. However, we have no clue why they did it.’
‘Not to worry, I will figure that out. When they are put in a lock-up and questioned, they will tell us the complete story,’ Chief Walia said. ‘In my opinion, they must have bet a lot of money on India losing and hence did something like this.’ And he stepped forward and hugged Akriti first and then the boys.
‘You have made not just me proud but all of Solan too.’