Chain of Custody (21 page)

I shook my head. ‘I don't know.'

I squashed the fugitive hope that he may have called with a solution. The thekedar wasn't given to grand gestures. He would
extract every single drop of my blood, sweat and semen too, before he let me have her. But I was prepared.

Across the city, at a watch shop in Safina Plaza, Gowda stared at the watches on display. ‘Is there something you like?' he asked Roshan, who was staring at his phone again.

‘Oh, what?' he asked, looking up. ‘Appa, I told you I don't want a watch. No one in my generation wears one.'

‘But you are studying to be a doctor. Don't you need to time the pulse rate?'

The sales clerk behind the counter suppressed a sigh. Each time a fond father wanted to buy his son a watch, the brat always wanted something else.

‘My phone is better. It has a stop clock. So if you really want to get me something, please make it a hard disk,' Roshan said. ‘Or a set of new headphones. Actually what I would like are boots.'

Gowda rubbed his forehead. ‘Why would you need to wear boots in Hassan? It's so hot there …'

‘I thought we were here to buy Thatha a gift,' Roshan said.

‘He doesn't want a watch either,' Gowda growled.

The sales clerk sighed. ‘It seems to me, sir, that neither the young nor the old perceive any value in watches. It's only us middle-aged who wear them. We have a very fine everyday wear range. Would you like to look at it?'

Gowda was tempted, but he knew he wouldn't feel right without the old HMT on his wrist. ‘I'll be back,' he said as they stepped out.

Gowda had taken the day off. It was his father's birthday, and his brother Nagendra had insisted Gowda and Roshan join the family for lunch.

Gowda had said he would drop by in the evening. But Nagendra, who seldom said much, snapped at his brother, ‘It's once a year, for heaven's sake, Borei. Do you think he is going to live forever?'

Gowda had been mortified. Urmila was right. He didn't see the forest for the trees. ‘I'll be there,' he said. ‘I'll bring Roshan along.' Even if I have to handcuff him and drag him by the scruff of his neck, he thought.

So here they were, on the way to the birthday lunch. And Gowda, who was doing his being-a-good-son bit, had tried to extend it to being-a-good-father. Except it seemed to him that he had not a clue how to be either. His father looked at the shirt Gowda gave him and grimaced. ‘Why do you waste money like this? Do you know how many shirts I have in my bureau?'

His sister-in-law Meena touched Gowda's elbow, warning him not to snap back. ‘If I had come in bearing no gifts, he would have sulked. What does he want from me?' Gowda whispered furiously to Nagendra and Meena.

Nagendra led him towards the paved frontyard where two coconut trees stood sentinel by the gate. ‘He planted these trees when we were born, one for each of us,' Nagendra said.

‘So?' Gowda mumbled.

‘Most days he talks to the tree that is supposed to be you. He misses you, Borei. So when he sees you, he doesn't know how to react. Come see him more often. After a certain age, that's all parents expect from children – their presence.'

Borei Gowda lit a cigarette. Nagendra had a gentle way of stating facts that made Gowda want to bury his head in the ground in shame. ‘I know I should,' Gowda said. ‘But work …'

‘If you think it's important, you'll make the time, Borei,' his brother said firmly. ‘We are going to get there as well, Borei, and our children will learn from us.'

His cigarette felt like ashes in his mouth.

A neighbour waved as he drove past. ‘Isn't that Shankar?' Gowda asked.

‘Yes.' Nagendra made a face. ‘He's just come back from the Sringeri mutt; that man is at some holy place or the other every week!'

Another neighbour came towards the gate. Someone Gowda hadn't met before.

Jayanagar too had changed. The property next door had been sold to a real-estate developer who was going to build a block of flats there. In time Nagendra might want to do the same. There would be nothing left of his childhood home, except the trees, perhaps, and memories. Gowda knew why he didn't find the time to come here more often. His childhood home made him maudlin; stirred up emotions he didn't like to feel. The inevitability of time going by and the certainty of the death of loved ones.

At fifty, what man can beguile himself into thinking life and its possibilities are forever? Only a fool would go on tilting at windmills and fighting shadows. In his home, in his station house, time seemed to stand still, making him feel in control of his hours if not his destiny. He stubbed out the cigarette and went back in.

Roshan was showing his grandfather how Instagram worked. The stern expression on his grandfather's face had been replaced with one of wonder. ‘You mean to say that total strangers around the world can see our photograph?'

Gowda peered at Roshan's phone. So this was the Instagram thing he had heard Santosh and Ratna refer to.

‘Let's shoot a picture of the three of us,' Gowda suggested in a voice he had heard fun-loving fathers use on TV commercials.
Soon Gowda had the app on his phone and Roshan helped him put up the photograph with appropriate tags: #FatherSonGrandfather, #HappyFamilies, #BirthdaySurprise and #LifeIsForLiving.

Was there one called #fuckingwastedtime or #joblessidiots or #neveragain or #notevenifiampaidforit? This would be his first and last Instagram, Gowda decided, trying to mask his discomfort at such blatant exhibitionism.

They were sitting in the living room, making desultory conversation after an enormous birthday lunch.

Gowda had frowned, watching Roshan shovel the food into his mouth hungrily as though he hadn't eaten for a week. Was the boy stoned?

‘Why are you frowning?' his father asked. Gowda plastered a smile on his face and mouthed something inane to Meena. ‘Are beans in season now? These are very tasty.'

Nagendra had stared at him amused but said nothing.

And now Roshan lay on the sofa with headphones plugged into his ears. Why did the boy need headphones when he already had a pair? Suddenly Roshan sat up. ‘Tell you what,' Roshan said. ‘Why don't you give me the money instead?'

‘Instead of what?' Gowda asked. His face ached from all the smiling he had to subject it to.

‘Instead of the hard disk that I asked for instead of the watch,' Roshan explained patiently.

‘He was always a little slow,' the indulgent grandfather pitched in.

Gowda mumbled a noncommittal huh.

He had done all that was expected of him. Played son, brother, brother-in-law and father. Now it was time to get back to the
station house and his desk. That was one place where he knew who he really was.

Borei Gowda was ready to leave. But how was he going to get away without ruffling feathers?

When his phone rang and DCP Mirza's image popped up, Gowda grabbed it like a drowning man clutching at a straw.

Gowda and Santosh drove up in the official vehicle. For once Gowda's shoes shone and his uniform appeared to have come straight from the drycleaner's. Santosh darted secret looks at Gowda. He had never seen him so spruced up or as relaxed.

David turned onto a narrow tarred road alongside a eucalyptus grove. ‘But isn't this the way to MLA Papanna's house?' Gowda asked.

‘Yes. And the home is in the next compound,' Santosh said.

DCP Mirza had called, asking Gowda to attend the inauguration of the home. ‘Our official presence is required there. I hear the home minister for the state may come in. And the women and children's welfare minister will certainly be there.'

Gowda chewed on his lips thoughtfully. The MLA had his fingers in too many pies and connections that seemed to spread like the roots of a ficus tree. He was yet to make the appointment with the PA. He would try and fix it first thing tomorrow morning, he decided. And would let Santosh handle it. The PA would have his guard up if Gowda spoke to him. He would see him for who he was; a policeman on the prowl. Santosh was very good at weeding out details and his clear-cut boyish looks made him seem more earnest than shrewd.

‘All of this area is his,' David said. ‘He buys up all the access routes around and the small landowners are trapped within,
with no entry or exit points. He then buys them out at half the market rate.'

‘You seem very bitter,' Gowda said.

‘My cousin lost all his earnings,' David said.

The road to the girls' home was lined with cars. The building was outlined with serial light bulbs and the gate was festooned with marigold garlands. Two plantain trees were tied to the gateposts.

‘I wish he had used the money on the girls' home,' Santosh snorted.

Gajendra patted down his moustache. ‘How will the locals know about the home he has funded if he doesn't make a song and dance about it?'

Gowda smiled and then worried if his cynicism was contagious.

‘I don't know if you heard, sir, but when he had his housewarming ceremony, he had a helicopter shower rose petals on his house. That's the sort of man he is!' Gajendra added.

‘All he needed to do was have someone shine a torch on his teeth. It would have lit up the place,' Byrappa said, looking at Santosh.

Santosh grinned. He was beginning to like Byrappa more and more.

When Gowda's phone rang, he saw it was an unknown number. He wondered if he should pick it up.

Santosh called Ratna. ‘Where are you?' he asked.

‘Home. Why? Is there any news of Nandita?' she asked.

‘No, but something else has come up,' he said. ‘I'll pick you up in twenty minutes, if not earlier,' he added.

She opened the door as soon as he rang the bell. Her flatmate watched them leave. Ratna and she had planned to watch a movie. ‘Where are you going?' she asked.

‘I'll be back soon,' Ratna said.

Santosh watched her put on her helmet. ‘I'm not so sure about that.'

She swung her leg over the pillion seat. ‘What's going on?'

Santosh met her eyes in the rearview mirror. ‘Gowda sir received a piece of information. There is somebody at the place where Nandita was taken to. The room above the tyre shop.'

Santosh didn't want to reveal more than that to her. He knew it had taken all of Gowda's goodwill, built over the years, and considerable machination to set up the operation in forty-five minutes. Gowda had made sure that the rulebook had been followed to the exact clause and word.

‘The station head of that outpost, Basavappa, used to work with Gowda as a young SI and worships him. Which is probably why he is stuck in that outpost,' Gajendra had said ruefully. ‘We need to keep this very quiet. One careless word could change everything.'

Ratna was trustworthy, Santosh's heart told him. But they had known each other less than a week, his head warned him. ‘We'll know more when we get there,' he said.

Santosh rode his bike to the end of the road where the building was. Ratna and he walked towards a car parked at a little distance from the building so as to not draw attention to themselves.