By the time Vichare, Lobo and Russi got to Shree Shakti Chawl at Chunabhatti, it had just passed midnight.
Paswan had reached forty minutes before them and sealed off the area from the public. But the common courtyard of the chawl was packed with people—residents of the rooms had assembled there, talking in hushed tones that got louder as the stretcher from the second floor was brought down the staircase. Though the body on the stretcher had been covered with a white cloth, matted strands of snowy white hair and badly cracked soles protruded out from either side.
‘Found dead in his room at around 10 p.m. by one of the guys in the chawl he usually drinks with,’ said Paswan. ‘He was out for most of the day. Got back around 8 p.m. and went straight to his room. So he died somewhere in that two-hour interval. We got the call around 11 p.m.’
‘Any sign of forced entry into his room?’ asked Vichare.
‘No, sir,’ said Paswan. ‘The neighbours also didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Nothing visible on the body either. Seems like natural causes. Too much to drink, probably. Not surprising for a drunkard like him.’
A crowd had assembled at the gate of the chawl to get a better look at Vasu Langda’s corpse as it was being transferred out.
‘Move out of the way! No touching,’ yelled Paswan, clearing the way for two scrawny men to carry the stretcher towards a waiting ambulance.
‘Natural causes,’ muttered Vichare. ‘On the very day we were going to arrest the guy, and only a few hours after he ranted about knowing who Shreya’s killer was.’
Vichare realized, from Russi’s and Lobo’s astonished expressions, that he hadn’t told anyone of his last phone call with Vasu. It had been only a few hours, after all.
‘The scumbag called me when I was returning home,’ said Vichare. ‘Full-to talli he was. Started blabbering that he wasn’t the killer, someone else was. But when I asked him for the name, he refused to say anything. Asked me to meet him in person.’
‘So clearly he had no idea we had plans to arrest him,’ said Lobo.
‘Or he did have an idea—and invented some cock-and-bull story to save his skin,’ said Vichare.
‘Which he failed to do,’ said Russi. ‘I mean, he couldn’t save his skin … or his life.’
The ambulance door slammed shut and it sped away shortly thereafter.
‘Honestly, he looked like a half-dead man anyway, with all that drinking,’ said Vichare. ‘He may have just overdone it yesterday, even by his own standards, and died.’
‘Sir, what does this mean for the Shreya case? Her killer is now dead himself,’ said Lobo.
‘One thing at a time, Lobo,’ said Vichare, though precisely the same question had crossed his mind.
Russi decided that this was the right time to disclose his findings from a few hours earlier at Byculla.
‘Inspector saheb, do you remember Jayesh Acharya’s detour to Byculla after he visited Shanti Chambers to meet Shreya?’
‘Yes, that liar said he was in some bar over there. Then we found out he was talking to Vasu, of all people, on the phone,’ said Vichare.
‘There’s more to it than that,’ said Russi. ‘Jayesh was at Neeta Bar in Byculla barely an hour before Shreya’s murder. And—’
‘You know that … how?’ asked Vichare. He had stopped chewing his moustache at that instant, and both its ends were left soggily tucked into the corners of his lips.
‘From Umakant, the cashier at the bar,’ said Russi proudly.
‘Wait a minute … So you—’
‘Jayesh had told us that he was in a bar in Byculla, and I asked Gopal to scour every gullee-goochee in the area to find which bar he was in and what he was doing there,’ said Russi. ‘With such a regular-looking face, and with a few days having passed, it was a long shot. No one recalled seeing him, until Umakant at Neeta Bar did. Do you know why he remembered him?’
‘Why?’ asked Lobo, his eyes getting wider by the second.
‘Because Jayesh got into a loud argument with his companion that evening,’ said Russi. ‘He was very unhappy and even stood up and yelled at him in the middle of the restaurant. Naturally, everyone noticed. Even more so because his companion was a strange-looking man dressed in a shabby oversized coat, with thick matted hair hidden under a newsboy cap. And when he left, Umakant noticed that he walked with a noticeable limp.’
‘Tujhya nanachi taang!’ said Vichare. ‘Vasu Langda!’
‘So Jayesh and Vasu spoke on the phone that evening and later met in person at this Neeta Bar in Byculla?’ asked Lobo.
‘Correct,’ said Russi. ‘Merely an hour before Shreya’s murder.’
Paswan joined the trio just then, after seeing off the ambulance. ‘We will do a post-mortem to find the cause of death,’ he said. ‘There were several bottles of alcohol in the room, and they have been picked up for examination. He had no known relatives, so there’s no one to inform and nothing else to do.’
His expression suggested that he was torn between feeling sorry for an old drunkard dying with no family and being glad that a known criminal in his area had finally met his end.
‘Was there anything other than the liquor bottles in his room?’ asked Russi.
‘Nothing unexpected,’ said Paswan. ‘Some personal items and newspapers from the last few days strewn about.’
‘Phones?’ enquired Lobo.
‘Yes, a cheap, unused one, like we found last time,’ said Paswan. ‘But there was nothing on it—he had been careful to get rid of whatever device he was using. At this point, it seems like there’s no way for us to trace any calls he made or places he visited. Quick learner after his previous mistake. Now, if there’s nothing further—’
‘This drinking buddy of his,’ interjected Russi. ‘Can we speak to him?’
‘Drinking buddy?’ asked Paswan.
‘Yes, the person who found his body,’ said Russi.
‘Achha, okay,’ said Paswan. ‘Also another drunkard. Not sure if he’ll have anything useful to say, but let me get him for you.’
Two minutes later, Paswan returned with a man dressed in a white vest and a dark blue checked lungi. He had a slim frame but a big belly and a plump face. His eyes were bloodshot, with dark bags hanging under them. The resemblance to Vasu Langda did not end there: He too reeked of alcohol.
‘Francis, tell these sahebs what you saw,’ commanded Paswan.
‘What to tell, saheb? Vasu usually comes home by early evening and we meet at night to … umm … you know … discuss things,’ said Francis.
‘You can say you both drank together,’ said Vichare. ‘It’s not a crime to drink. Just tell us everything directly, okay?’
Francis flashed a crooked smile and continued. ‘Today he came back very late, around dinnertime. I saw him enter because I was near the gate. When he got off the bus, he looked like he had already had a bottle or two. He was also carrying one with him. Some good foreign stuff.’
Francis paused for a moment to wipe his nose. ‘I saw him go directly to his room. When he didn’t come out again, I went alone to our regular bar and got started. When he didn’t turn-up even after forty minutes, I decided to come and check in his kholi.’
‘Your regular bar?’ asked Russi.
‘There’s a small bar down the road,’ said Francis. ‘Not for sahebs like you but good enough for us. Vasu and I mostly got our drinks there. But yesterday, they said they hadn’t seen him at all.’
‘What did you see when you went up to his room?’ asked Lobo.
‘He was lying on the floor, saheb. On his back,’ said Francis. ‘Surrounded by empty bottles—there must have been twenty of them. His room was always like that, full of empty liquor bottles. He was always drunk but I had never seen him passed out before.’
‘Then what happened?’ asked Vichare.
‘I thought he must have had even more than usual,’ said Francis. ‘I went near him and shouted, “Ayy, Vasu, wake up, man,” and splashed some water on his face. That’s when I noticed he had some sticky yellow thing coming out of his mouth. And his eyes … his eyes … they had no eyeballs. I knew he was gone. I rushed out of the room and called some other neighbours. But it was too late.’
Francis recoiled as his mind conjured the ghastly sight of Vasu’s lifeless face.
‘Are you sure all the bottles around him were empty?’ asked Russi.
‘Yes, saheb, a good dozen were lying around,’ said Francis.
‘You just said there were more than twenty bottles,’ said Paswan.
‘Now I don’t remember exactly,’ said Francis. ‘I didn’t go around counting them. But there were a lot of bottles.’
‘In any case, we have taken all that was there into possession, and will get them examined,’ said Paswan to Vichare. ‘Any more questions for Francis?’
‘Yes, one last one, if I may,’ persisted Russi. ‘Can you remember the route number of the bus he got off?’
The three cops looked at each other, wondering what the old man was getting at.
‘Now how will I know that, saheb?’ said Francis. ‘Anyway, there are only two buses that stop outside our chawl. It would be one of them.’
‘Okay, chalo, off you go,’ said Paswan to Francis.
He then turned to the crowd that had begun assembling again and yelled, ‘What have all of you gathered around for? Does this look like some kind of cinema happening? Vasu Langda is dead. Now go back to your rooms. Picture over. The end.’
It was nearly 2 a.m. by the time Russi walked up the dimly lit stairs of Peer Manzil to Flat Number 2. His body and mind were exhausted by the day’s proceedings, and he was glad to be reaching home.
The day had begun with Kajal Banerjee’s interview at Bandra-Kurla Complex, followed by the tense meeting with Navika at the MCL event, then to Byculla to track Jayesh’s whereabouts at the time of Shreya’s murder, and then finally to Chunabhatti after the shocking news of Vasu Langda’s death.
Sherbanoo would be long asleep, thought Russi as he rummaged in his trouser pocket for the house key. But before he had located it, the door swung open and Russi was startled by Sherbanoo’s portly figure standing in the frame.
‘Why are you awake at this hour, dear?’ he asked, relieved that she was so he could stop fishing in his pockets in the corridor.
‘Russi bhai, a package was pushed through this door about an hour ago,’ said Sherbanoo. ‘Whoever did it vanished before I could see them. I know you’re all mixed up in this murder case, and I thought this might be related.’
‘A package?’ enquired Russi as he entered the house.
‘Well, it’s an envelope really,’ said Sherbanoo, switching on a table lamp.
She handed him a sealed manila envelope that was about six inches wide and eight inches long. It was thin enough to be slid under a door but was firm to grip.
‘Photographs,’ muttered Russi even before he had opened the package and seen its contents.
His guess was confirmed seconds later when four photo prints emerged from the envelope, but it was a little scribbled note along with the photos that drew his attention.
You asked who. Here’s your answer.
~ KB
‘“You asked who”?’ muttered Russi. ‘What did I ask and to whom, dear?’
‘It was a woman who dropped it off,’ said Sherbanoo. ‘I heard the faint sound of heels retreating down the stairs when I opened the door.’
Russi looked up at her instantly. ‘Of course it was. Kajal Banerjee. KB. It was only this morning that I asked her whom she had been following on Choksi’s orders. And what was her reply? “We can’t be talking here like this. If it were someone’s home, that would be different …”’
‘She came home all right,’ said Sherbanoo.
Russi excitedly turned to the photographs.
He immediately recognized the white man in the first photo. Lewis Hoverson, the Australian middle-order batter who had been a star performer at the MCL for five years—and a recent acquisition of the Surat Smashers. On this occasion he had been caught not in the outfield while attempting a six, but snorting a line of white powder from a table in what appeared to be a nightclub.
The second photograph was of Jeevan Pujari, tearaway fast bowler of the Goa Gunners. He was receiving a pair of shiny Remington guns in a dense forest, from a gangster-looking man with a handlebar moustache. Pujari had been lethal with the ball during the previous MCL season—but his off-field associations, it seemed, were far deadlier. ‘A Gunner in more ways than one,’ thought Russi. ‘Now, wouldn’t that be helpful information for Choksi to know?’
The last two photographs were of the same cricketer.
Rishi Girhotra.
What they captured was clear to Russi the instant he saw them. In one, Rishi had been snapped late at night, by a wall in an alley behind his mansion in Juhu, dressed in a black shirt and jeans. Beside him was another man, whose slim, athletic body fit snugly into a figure-hugging grey sweatshirt and leather pants. Both of them were in a close embrace, their faces and lips close together as they looked into each other’s eyes. The other photo pictured the pair again, but this one was taken through a narrowly open hotel room door. Kajal must have had only seconds to capture the sight of Rishi’s topless muscular torso before the door closed. Centimetres away from him, his male companion from the other photo lay on the bed, undressed.
‘Rishi Girhotra, the so-called debonair ladies’ man, seen making love to another man,’ muttered Russi.
He placed the photos back in their envelope, reclined in his chair and took a deep breath in. His muscles still felt tired, but his brain had been re-energized as it tried to make sense of this new information. What did all this amount to? Lewis Hoverson, Jeevan Pujari and Rishi Girhotra were top cricketers, and Choksi—through Kajal—had uncovered secrets that he could use to blackmail them into fixing. As far as Russi knew, Hoverson and Pujari had clean reputations as cricketers—finding ‘dirt’ on them, as Kajal had called it, was perhaps the only way Choksi could force them into doing his bidding. But what about Rishi? Wasn’t he already part of the fixing syndicate? Why did Choksi need to blackmail him? And having a same-sex partner was no crime—unlike Hoverson’s tryst with cocaine and Pujari’s shady gun-toting with a criminal …
Russi’s thoughts were interrupted by his phone ringing. He didn’t recognize the number but when the call connected, he knew exactly who it was.
‘You’ve seen the pictures,’ said Kajal Banerjee.
‘Are you now following me as well?’ asked Russi, only half in jest. ‘You certainly helped Choksi entrap some big names. I am still baffled by Rishi, though.’
‘That he’s gay?’ asked Kajal. ‘Or that he’s desperate to keep that hidden? I suppose he thinks that if the world finds out, his macho image will crumble—and with that so will all those fancy endorsement deals he has. So much for being in the twenty-first century!’
‘Whether the world finds out or not, thanks to you, Choksi certainly has,’ said Russi. ‘What else did you discover during all this surveillance?’
‘Nothing,’ said Kajal. ‘He asked me to follow them till I found something that would give him leverage. The minute I did and I got photo evidence, my job was done.’
Kajal paused and the line went blank.
‘Miss Banerjee?’ asked Russi.
‘There’s one more thing,’ said Kajal. ‘I found out the name of Rishi’s partner. Ishaan Raj. Not sure if you’ve come across that name before, or if it even matters.’
Ishaan Raj.
The man who had called Shreya Ved the morning before she was murdered. The man they knew as Rishi Girhotra’s ‘personal trainer’ was actually his lover.
‘Mr Batliwala, are you still there?’ asked Kajal.
‘You know a lot, Miss Banerjee,’ said Russi. ‘Are you also aware that there has been another murder, merely a few hours ago, related to Shreya’s killing?’
‘Wh-what!’ said Kajal. ‘Who? Where?’
‘That doesn’t matter at this point,’ said Russi. ‘What matters is that two people are dead and the common link between the two is Brajesh Choksi.’
‘I-I don’t know what to say,’ stuttered Kajal. ‘This can’t be related to the blackmail, could it? I had no idea this would happen. I don’t know what I can do now …’
‘Well, I do,’ said Russi, rising from his leather chair. ‘You can help us.’
‘Me? How?’ said Kajal.
‘What you can do, Miss Kajal Banerjee, is help us nab the killer of Shreya Ved,’ said Russi. ‘Now, listen very carefully. Here’s what you must do next.’