Chain of Custody (28 page)

I drove the auto to a secluded stretch alongside a railway line. I heard the train. ‘Now,' I told Daulat Ali.

We took Moina's body and left it on the railway line. The speeding train would do the rest.

There would be a newspaper report, an enquiry, and then the file would gather dust somewhere.

I got off once we entered a road with streetlights. I was a man with a plan.

I tried the woman's number from the phone I had stolen last night. She didn't pick up. I tried again. I didn't know what else to do.

Eventually, after eleven attempts, a man picked up the phone.

‘Sir,' I said.

‘Who is this?' he asked. ‘Do you realize what time it is?'

‘I know it's after midnight but listen to me …' I didn't hide my vexation. That shut him up. ‘There is a brothel where minor girls are being forced into prostitution.'

There was silence for a moment. ‘Who is this?' he asked. ‘And how did you get this number?'

‘I am Krishna,' I said. ‘Urmila madam gave me the number.'

‘What? When? And why should I believe you?' he asked. ‘How do I know you are not playing a prank? If this is true, why don't you call the child helpline? It's 10924 and it's 24/7.'

‘I am the man from the railway station. With the three boys,' I said. ‘I ran away with two of them.'

‘You have some cheek calling us then,' he snarled.

‘Which is why you should listen to what I have to say.' I gave him the brothel whereabouts. ‘Sir, if you wait too long, the girls won't be there.'

‘Why are you doing this?' he demanded. ‘And where are the two boys?'

I cut the call.

I wiped the phone and tossed it into an overgrown plot of land.

15 M
ARCH
, S
UNDAY

9.00 a.m.

G
owda raised his eyes from the newspaper as Roshan came into the living room, bleary-eyed.

‘What time did you get in?' Gowda said, taking care to curb the parental displeasure in his tone.

‘About two.' The boy yawned, raising his arms. He had giant tufts of hair in his armpits. Gowda blinked. When did that happen?

‘Party night, huh?' Gowda offered in his best buddy-daddy voice.

‘Hardly. The scene here is quite dull, Appa. After Goa, this seems like a sleepy hole.'

Gowda wondered if it was a good time to bring up the smoking paraphernalia he had found in the boy's rucksack. But Roshan was suddenly sitting across from him with a serious expression. ‘Appa, there is something I need to talk to you about.'

Gowda nodded.

‘Don't frown.' Roshan smiled. ‘It's not me. It's for my friend Suraj. His sister seems to have got into a mess and he doesn't know what to do.'

‘What sort of a mess?'

‘I don't know. He seemed reluctant to speak about it over the phone.'

‘Ask him to come by this evening,' Gowda said, rising. He was going to the station house. He had asked Gajendra to hire a TV so they could watch the rest of the footage. ‘Best if we do it here,'
he had said the night before. ‘It's a Sunday and your missus will need to watch the Sunday programmes.'

The thought of going back to that house made him want to reach for an antihistamine.

‘ACP sir called. I said you were still at home,' the station writer said as Gowda walked in.

Gowda cocked an eyebrow. ‘Is that so?'

Could this fucker be the mole, he wondered. And where had everyone else been when the ACP called?

‘I suggest that Santosh and Byrappa proceed with the interviews after we view the footage. Have we got a time of death yet?' Gowda began as soon as everyone assembled in his room for the briefing.

Gajendra nodded. ‘Between 9.30 and 10.30 p.m.'

‘Right, so let's take a look at the footage. Fast-forward, pause, you know the routine, don't you?'

For the next hour, hardly anyone spoke. The lawyer, it seemed, had just two visitors. However, ten non-residents had entered the gated community. ‘Looks like an open-and-shut case, sir,' Santosh said.

‘I wish,' Gowda said. ‘Something tells me it won't be such an easy case to crack.'

‘You do like to complicate things; or you wouldn't be Borei Gowda,' a voice said from the doorway. ACP Vidyaprasad in his Sunday best – a pale yellow linen shirt, navy blue denims, loafers, his moustache twirled and his eyebrows daubed with vaseline. He smelled expensive. ‘What's this TV doing here?' He frowned.

‘We were watching the CCTV footage,' Gowda said.

‘Now? Couldn't you have finished it last night?'

‘We were …' Santosh began.

‘Gowda sir's TV at home isn't compatible with the system and we began watching it last night at my home,' Gajendra butted in.

‘Listen to me, Gowda,' the ACP said impatiently.

Gajendra and Santosh stood up. ‘Where are you going?' the ACP demanded. ‘Look at the time of death; look at who visited the lawyer then … and you have the assailant. Don't overthink things,' he said, giving his moustache end a tiny twirl as he left the room.

Gowda watched him leave, bemused. Was the man a born idiot or was he pretending to be one to save himself from having to actually do some work?

Santosh erupted as soon as the ACP left. ‘It's just not right,' he snarled.

Gowda raised an eyebrow.

‘All of us know about his involvement in the corporator case and here he is as if nothing ever happened. The system sucks, sir.' Santosh's voice quivered with righteous indignation.

Gowda stood up and walked towards Santosh. He poured a glass of water and offered it to the young man.

‘The system sucks but we must do what we can. Much as I hate the system, there would be anarchy without it. So we must hope for the best.'

Gajendra looked at Gowda in surprise.

‘I can't stop thinking of the children we rescued. We fail them if we give up on the system,' Gowda said.

Gajendra had never seen Gowda as affected by anything. He cleared his throat.

‘Have you got the names and details?' Gowda asked, turning towards Santosh.

The young man nodded.

Gowda glanced at his watch. It was a few minutes past two. ‘Start the interviews of the residents and check the guest register with them.'

‘But sir, each guest has to sign the gate pass when they leave,' Santosh said.

‘Have you seen the gate passes? The signatures look like crows strutting on the page.'

Gowda's phone rang. He peered at it thoughtfully. ‘I need to step out,' he said.

3.00 p.m.

Michael's face was ashen and his eyes red-rimmed when Gowda walked into the office room he had been allotted by the Sunshine Home for Children. They had decided to bring the children here rather than interview them at the shelter.

‘You look shaken, Bob,' Gowda said without any preamble.

‘The children began talking to me this morning,' Michael said and dropped his head into his hands.

‘How bad is it?' Gowda asked. Outside he could hear the children playing in the yard outside the home. They were kicking a ball and raising little puffs of dust.

‘Listen to this,' he said, switching on the voice recorder app on his phone.

The recording began with Michael coaxing the children. ‘Tina, it will help us if you tell us what happened to you.'

‘Tina, do you hear me? Do you understand what I am saying?'

‘Would you like some water or a cup of tea?'

The sound of a squirrel chirping on a tree outside punctured the silence.

Then a low voice spoke as if it were reciting a lesson by rote.

It was a Thursday. The date was 5 March. Tina stood before the mirror, adjusting her t-shirt, fluffing it out so it didn't cling to her breast buds. She wore a slip beneath the t-shirt but it didn't help. Mummy had said she would buy her a brassiere soon. Tina had been embarrassed and had dropped her gaze. Everything made her flush these days, especially when the boys looked at her. And sometimes men …

Tina picked up the purse and counted again the two hundred rupees in it. Mummy had said she would have to buy the BP tablets and other medicines as Mummy would be late that evening. The sari factory she worked in had a big order and Mummy wanted to make the most of the overtime. ‘It's more money,' Mummy had said and Tina had nodded.

Tina was a smart girl. That was what everyone said. She will go places, they said. Just you watch!

She had thought out everything. She would lock the door, leave the key with the next-door aunty, cross the road, buy the medicines, come home and chop the vegetables and prepare the dough so Mummy only had to make the rotis later. Then she would do her homework. Tina glanced at the timepiece on top of the TV. It was a quarter past four. The medical shop would open soon.

Tina wondered if life would have been different for Mummy and her if Papa was still with them. Mummy said Papa died. But Tina had heard that Papa had another woman and he lived with her in Borivali.

Tina looked at herself in the mirror, fluffed the t-shirt again and shut the door. The one-room tenement was part of an old building and Mummy had to struggle, first to get it and now to keep it. The landlord raised the rent every few years. ‘This is Mumbai. If not you, there will always be someone else,' he had said when all the tenants including Mummy had gone to plead for clemency: ‘If almost 40 per cent of our wages go to pay rent, how are we to manage?' they said.

But Mummy never complained, even if she had to work extra hours. The sari factory was in Matunga, not far from where they stayed in Wadala, and it allowed her to keep long hours. And now that Tina was twelve, she could be counted on to help with the household chores.

Tina walked down the steps to the paan wallah. He would let her make a call from his mobile for a rupee. She called her mother. ‘Mummy, I am going to the medical shop. The key is with Aunty. Do you want me to buy some vegetables?'

There was a grunt in response. Mummy was not allowed to use her mobile. But they had worked a system of codes. A grunt was a yes. A cough was a no.

Tina returned the mobile. The road was crowded as always. She looked both ways and stepped forward to join a group of people who were waiting to cross the road. The din of traffic hurtling this way and that filled her ears. She would buy some spinach, she thought. It was good for the blood, the science teacher at school had said.

Tina felt something or someone whizz past her. The strap of her purse snapped. ‘What?' she cried, turning and seeing a little boy dart through the traffic. Tina ran after him. Yes, Tina did that. She cut through the traffic, not bothering about the screech of tyres and the blaring of horns.

The boy ran and so did Tina. Her heart almost popped into her mouth. But Tina wouldn't stop till she got her purse back and cuffed the boy for trying to steal from her. The boy seemed to have wings for feet. Tina panted, trying not to lose sight of him. There was a little park up ahead. If he went in there, Tina knew she would catch him. The boy ran into the park. Tina followed.

A hand grabbed Tina by her waist as she stopped to catch her breath. Just as the hand snaked around her waist, she felt something smash into the side of her face, but she moved her head so only a glancing blow grazed her cheek. A man stood with a rock in one hand. He raised the rock and brought it down on her face again. She felt her cheek tear open and her mouth split. Her teeth bit down on her tongue and something rang in her ears. She felt her mouth fill with blood and an excruciating pain tore through her.

Through a haze of pain, she saw the boy come towards her. She saw the man slap the boy as he said, ‘Why did you have to run so far?'

The man and the boy took her towards a waiting taxi. Her feet had gone numb and so had her mind. She whimpered. He slapped her other cheek and said, ‘You want me to smash this side of your face too?'

The taxi drove up the short distance to Wadala station. Tina tried to cling to the seat of the taxi through the pain. But the man prised her fingers off the seat and hoisted her into his arms. The boy followed wordlessly.

As always, the Wadala station was packed. She didn't know what she could do to escape but she knew she had to try. She squirmed but the man's grip held her in place. Through the pain she saw her captor was a smooth-faced man with a full head of
hair. He could have been her papa. ‘What's wrong?' a woman asked as the man hurried towards the platform with the boy in tow.

Tina whispered, trying to speak. ‘Help,' she tried to say. ‘Help! He hit my face with a rock!'

A red-tinged bubble escaped her smashed mouth. The man looked at her and said, ‘She fell off a ladder and I can't afford a taxi to take her to the hospital!'

No one questioned why he wasn't taking her to a hospital in Wadala. No one had the time. They made sympathetic noises and made way for him to get into the crowded local train. Two men even gave up their seats so he could lay her down while he held a blood-sodden cloth to her face. No one was bothered about what didn't concern them. Tina understood that now.

They changed trains. Again someone asked: What happened?

This time he said that Tina had fallen from the train. Silly child! Wouldn't listen! And now I have to take her to the hospital, the man said.

Who wouldn't believe him? He looked like a concerned father hastening to find medical help for his daughter, with the younger child in tow. A poor man who couldn't even afford a taxi. Bechara, someone said under his breath. Tina passed out then.

When Tina was conscious, she was in a hovel and an old woman was bathing her wounds. ‘Lie still,' the woman said as she applied a salve. Tina flinched. A strong smell of antiseptic filled her nostrils. A familiar smell that she knew. Tincture of iodine. Mummy kept a bottle to apply on cuts and bruises.

‘I am going to give you an injection,' the woman said. Tina's left eye widened. The other side of her face was so swollen that she could not open the eye. Perhaps the old woman was a nurse. Perhaps she would help. ‘I,' she tried to say.

‘Shut up,' the old woman said. ‘Don't talk. Do you want the wound to open up further? What was the fool thinking of, smashing your face? The thekedar isn't going to like it. What will he say when he finds out?'

‘I,' Tina tried again.

‘Shut up, I said,' the woman snapped. ‘So you want him to teach you obedience as well? He's mangled your face already and if you are going to be headstrong, you are finished.'

Tina closed her eyes. What was the old woman garbling about? Through the half-opened tin door, she saw the arc of a street lamp. Where was she? What time was it? Mummy must be home. Would Mummy go to the police? What then?