Tarquin Hall - The Case of the Missing Servant

"There's anything specific you have against this boy?" asked the detective.

"He's not a man, Puri. He hasn't served his country."

The detective was developing a stitch in his left side. The direction of their conversation was also making him feel uncomfortable. Matrimonial investigations had become his bread and butter (he often dealt with several a week), but usually his clients came to him seeking reassurance about a prospective bride or groom. Brigadier Kapoor, by contrast, had it in for the boy and wanted to scupper the wedding.

Unfortunately, turning the case away was out of the question. The detective could not say no to a man of such stature; to do so would damage his own reputation.

"What else can you tell me, sir?" panted Puri, growing ever shorter of breath.

"The boy has spent a good deal of time in Dubai. God knows what he could have got up to there. The place is a hotbed of Jihadists, Pak spies, dons-every kind of shady character."

"He's here in Delhi these days, sir?"

"I believe so. Plays a lot of golf. Shoots four under par-or so they say."

Much to Puri's relief, they got stuck behind three overweight society women in Chanel sunglasses, sun visors and unflattering leggings, and had to slow down.

Brigadier Kapoor soon lost patience and barked at the women to give way. With a collective tut, they moved to one side of the path and he marched past them, muttering to himself.

"Sir, tell me," said Puri, struggling to catch up again. "Your granddaughter's what age exactly?"

"Thirty-four or thereabouts." His tone betrayed not a hint of embarrassment, but she was ancient to be getting married.

"And the boy's age, sir?"

"Three years her junior."

"Sir, it's the first time Tisca's getting engaged?"

"That's not the point, Puri," said Brigadier Kapoor sharply. "I want to know about this Gupta boy."

The two men passed Sikander Lodhi's tomb and reached the car park, where Rumpi's rajma chawal was threatening to make another appearance.

"Sir, with your permission, I'll take my leaves," said Puri somewhat sheepishly.

Brigadier Kapoor looked unimpressed. "As you like, Puri," he said. "I'll have my file on Mahinder Gupta sent over to your office tomorrow morning. Report back to me within a week. Get me all the dirt on him. I'll take care of the rest."

"Yes, sir."

"And get yourself in shape, man," chided Brigadier Kapoor, wagging his baton. "At your age I used to run five miles every day before breakfast."

"Yes, sir."

Before the detective could mention his fee and explain his usual policy of a down payment for expenses, his new client marched off with his arms pumping like pistons, as if he was charging an enemy position.

Puri waited until he was out of sight and then sat down on a wall to catch his breath and wipe his brow.

"By God, thirty-four," he said to himself, shaking his head from side to side disapprovingly. "Well past her sell-by date. Off the shelf, in fact."

At home that evening, Mummy was waiting for Puri in the sitting room.

"Chubby, I've something most important to tell you. One big development is there," she said.

"Mummy-ji, if it's about the shooting, please save your breath," he said, as he went through the motion of bending down to touch her feet but only reaching the halfway point.

"Chubby, you must listen, na. It's most important. One servant boy-"

"Sorry, Mummy-ji, but I won't listen," interrupted the detective. "I told you before, you're not to do investigation. It's not a mummy's role, actually. You'll only make things more complicated. Now please, I respectfully request you not to go sticking your nose where it doesn't belong."

"But, Chubby, I-"

"No, Mummy-ji, that is final, no discussion. Now, I'm going to wash and take rest."

Puri went upstairs, leaving Mummy on her own in the sitting room to think things over.

Chubby had inherited his father's pride and stubbornness, she reflected. Om Chander Puri, too, had always been adamant that she should stay out of his investigations. Only on a few occasions, when he'd been completely stumped by a case, had he deigned to discuss the details with her. Although, each time, she'd been able to help him unravel the clues, he'd never been able to bring himself to openly acknowledge her assistance. Similarly, when Mummy had had one of her dreams, Om Chander Puri had rarely taken heed of them.

As a wife, Mummy had always felt compelled to obey her husband. But as a mother, she did not feel constrained to ignore her natural instincts-especially now that her son was in grave danger.

Graver than he knew.

That morning, Mummy had met a young servant boy called Kishan, who worked in house number 23, a few doors down. When she'd asked him if he'd seen anything suspicious on the day of the shooting, he'd looked panicked and blurted out, "I was nowhere near the back of the house!"

"What happened at the back of the house?"

"Nothing!"

"How do you know if you weren't there?"

Eventually, after being plied with a couple of Big Feast ice creams having been assured of Mummy's trustworthiness, Kishan admitted that he had been behind the Puris' home at the time of the shooting.

"What were you doing there?" Mummy had asked.

"Um, well, Auntie I…" he'd replied, looking embarrassed.

"Let us say you went to the market to buy milk and took the long way back," Mummy had suggested helpfully.

"Yes, exactly. I'd forgotten."

"What did you see?"

"I was behind a wall waiting for…um, well…"

"You had to do toilet?"

"Yes, that's right and, well, I heard the shots. They sounded like firecrackers. Then two minutes later, I saw a man hurrying out of that building site."

Kishan had caught only a fleeting glimpse of the man's face. But there had been something distinct about him.

"He was wearing red boots."

Upon hearing this, Mummy had instructed Kishan not to mention what he'd seen to another soul. It was the kind of information that could get someone killed.

Chubby of all people would understand the significance of the red boots if only he would listen to her. But for now she would have to carry on with the investigation on her own.

"I'll show him mummies are not good for nothing," she told herself.

Few men failed to notice the young peasant woman walking down Ramgarh Road three mornings after Puri left Jaipur. Her bright cotton sari might have been of the cheapest quality and tied jauntily in the style of a laborer, but it did justice to the firm, shapely body beneath. The demure manner in which she wore her dupatta over her head-the edge gripped between her teeth and one tantalizing, kohlrimmed eye staring out from her dark features-only added to her allure.

The more lecherous of the men she passed called out lustily.

"I will be the plow and you my field!" bawled a fat-gutted tonga-wallah from the front of his horse-drawn cart.

Farther on, two laborers painting white lines on the concrete divider in the middle of the road stopped their work to stare and make lewd sucking noises. "Come and be my saddle! You will find me a perfect fit!" cried one.

The Muslim cobbler who sat on the corner surrounded by heels and soles, gooey pots of gum and a collection of hammers and needles was more discreet. But he could not take his eyes off her ample bosom or the flash of alluring midriff beneath her blouse. Thoughts passed through his head that, as a married man blessed with three healthy sons, he knew he would have to ask Allah to forgive.

Despite her coy embarrassment, the young woman understood the licentious and perfidious nature of men only too well. She ignored their comments and stares, continuing along the uneven pavement with her small bag toward the entrance to Raj Kasliwal Bhavan. There, just beyond the gate, she spotted a mali crouched on the edge of one of the flower beds, a scythe lying idle by his side. His clothes were old and tatty and he went barefoot. But his pure white hair was a biblical affair. It began like the crest of a wave, sweeping back from his forehead and cascading down around his ears in a waterfall of licks and curls, before finally breaking into a wild, plunge pool of a beard.