Satte pe satta

The goons were handed over to local police and ETF returned to the house, shivering in cold and minds filled with questions. The seniors vanished with the friend of Rathore inside a room for hours, leaving the trio behind. It was after dark hours when the men came out, by that time others were back in their rooms, exhausted by the day’s occurrence.

It’s said that a shadi wala ghar never sleeps- Riya witnessed it when she came out of her room at the dead of night and still could hear giggles of a group of women and men far away, and ever present music which surrounded them. She could not sleep- academics have always kept her up late, and unfamiliar places don’t help. Tip toeing and cautious that nobody sees the new guest at this odd hour, she walked carefully in the semi lit corridors. Once she found the bedroom of the missing old lady, she closed the door.

As she sat on the bed, both feet above the mattress, she realized the room was completely silent. Her eyes roamed around the room, in shadows except for a small bedside lamp which was on. She stared at the huge trunk situated next to dressing table and started to think- the 5 whys.

Why the lady? Why now? Why she was taken? Why it’s not revealed? Why no ransom?

There was a sound and the door opened, slowly then all at once. Riya did not move or flinched, but Arjun, not seeing her sitting in shadows at first, almost banged to the door in surprise.

“Riya.” He almost hissed. But he gave up on chastising almost immediately, peeked outside the door once before closing. Giving her a stern look, he started to look around the room better- moving this thing, looking under that desk, opening the drawers, etc. Riya’s eyes kept following him, and if he sensed that stare, he did not show. Arjun’s feet stopped near the trunk, his finger ran over the lid slowly as he sunk into deep thoughts.

“Why are you here?” He murmured after a while.

”To think.”

He turned to look at her- her eyes sparkled in the dark, “And where that got you?”

“There is a theory called 5 whys. If one comes across an obstacle, one should ask why five times. It will provide answer on its own.” Arjun nodded at it, a frown etched over his forehead. “We need to ask the five whys.”

“The correct whys.” He paused, “First is obvious- why her? Answer- she is the matriarch. The head of family, the head of business. Hurting her hurts others.”

“Why now?” Riya asked.

“She was getting threatening letters.”

“Why now?”

“There is a wedding going on.” Arjun mused, “Weddings are sensitive. People want them to go smoothly. if someone was trying to blackmail her, this is a good opportunity to pressurize her. Weddings are . . . “ His eyes were suddenly far away, a catch in his throat, “sacred.”

“You know about weddings.”

“Everyone does.” He cleared throat, making a show of looking around as he turned his back on her. Riya frowned softly at his obvious changed demeanour.

“I don’t.”

“Well, you can read in books.” His lips quirked upwards ever so slightly.

Looking back, he will blame this moment on his momentary lapse of situational awareness. His head was somewhere else, in a different time. So of course, Dr. Mukherjee sneaked up to him. By the time he whipped to look at her, she was standing right beside him, looking as if she can read his soul. Arjun was suddenly aware of how close she was- he could hear every hitch of her breath, the way her dress swished ever so slightly, even her heartbeat.

“I don’t think books can teach about relationship.” Her voice was soft, careful not to disturb the silence of this room. The intensity of her stare was gone in a few beats- leaving him almost delirious with relief and puzzlement, “Have you noticed the size of trunk? Almost as if a human can fit in.”

The abrupt turn of conversation brought ACP Rawte back to the present, “I did, actually. That’s why . . . “ There was a soft knock on the door, cutting off his words. A few moments later, Shree entered. The men spoke between themselves after a while, and filled the doctor in. Shree will take some swab of the trunk and send to lab to look for any DNA samples. If there is something, it will explain the last known location of the missing lady. In morning, they will look through the suspect lists again and search the premises, hoping for a clue. The time was short and they have a lot to cover. Arjun also decided to pay a visit to local police the next day, trying to find out about those goons and why they attacked Rathore.

When Shree got busy with work, the ACP turned towards Riya with a stern look, “Go.” She looked between the two, but knowing her stay won’t be welcomed, nodded quickly.

“Sleep.”

“Of course.” She closed the door behind her, their eyes meeting for one last time.

They both knew it was a lie.

ACP Rawte left in the early hours of morning for police station, leaving the rest of the team to work on suspect list. Shankar, Rathore sir’s friend and son of missing old lady was with them, looking pained each time any of them asked if this particular member of family can hurt his mother. After hours of work, they narrowed down 4 main suspects- his younger brother and his wife who always eyed a split of the property, a distant uncle who had business related feud with his mother, and a local mafia who wanted extortion money from a long time but the lady never paid any attention. The last one looked grim- if the goon actually took the lady, by now she is probably dead.

Before Shankar was leaving, Riya asked him suddenly, “Your Mother, she received threatening letters, is that correct?”

“Yes.” He eyed Rathore as he answered, “I showed him to Sameer actually.”

“May I see it?”

“Those are written in Gujrati, Riya.” Rathore answered, “I actually sent the letters to a translator. Shree have the pictures, can you work with that?”

She nodded, and Shree handed her over his tablet. As she dived deep into the letters, the room cleared and sun was heading west slowly. The house was bursting with energy- laughter of people, delicious smell of food, footsteps of adults and kids alike, blissfully unaware what was going on underneath it all. People had inquired about the lady, and till this time Shankar had kept it hidden under the pretense of her leaving for a business meet. But she was expected to return by tomorrow- the night of wedding. It’s a question whether she will return alive, with all limbs intact.

Riya frowned at a particular sentence of a letter, then swiped furiously at the tablet to check on other letters. By the time she was satisfied in her knowledge that what was wrong, she sprinted towards the door, looking for any of her colleague. Pausing near a corridor, she looked around- she should really pay attention of people and their words. The ETF might not be in this house at this hour.

She turned, and almost banged with a young man, his hands outstretched to catch her even if there was no need, “Hello, miss.” She nodded, feeling uneasy for some reason, “Looking for someone?”

“Yes, um . . . my friend.”

“Let me help you.” He took a step towards her, making her back away almost immediately, “You are one of those special guests of Shankar kaka, is not it? It’s my duty to help.”

“Not really.” He was slowly caging her into a wall and even if she was politely trying to move past, there was no way.

“Tell me, why you guys and Shankar kaka are always in his room? What are you hiding?” When Riya answered nothing, his hand rested casually near her face on the wall, “You can tell me, I can keep a secret.” His voice lowered at the last word.

“Am I interrupting something?” Just like yesterday, ACP Arjun appeared out of nowhere. Riya casually wondered about how a man can only answer to another man’s words or body language as the young man moved away a good few fees. Probably she was not clear on letting him know she was uncomfortable. For some reason, she was frozen, fingers gripping tightly Shree’s tablet. She could not even move her hand when ACP Rawte offered his own, and sensing the opportunity, the young man cleared his throat.

“Who are you?”

“Shall we?” Arjun ignored the douchebag, slightly irritated that even though the Dr. Was looking at him, she did not move in order to leave.

“I think the lady don’t want to.” He smirked.

“The man needs his wife.” Grabbing onto her hand, Arjun gave a glare to the former, “Excuse me.”

He dragged the woman away and stopped only inside his allotted room. “The hell were you doing outside?” She took a step back at the sudden turn of him, snapping out of whatever haze she was in.

“I was looking for others.”

“Why could not you move when I gave you my hand?” He clearly did not hear her answer, too agitated as his fingers ran through hair, “I had to call you my wife.”

“I did not ask you.” She frowned. ACP Rawte glared- at the point, or maybe the way she said it.

“Any other person would have said thank you.”

“Thank you.” Riya’s voice was soft, “But I did not make you tell a lie.”

Maybe sensing the Dr. Will never take accountability for the actions he took on his own, Arjun proceeded to give her silent treatment till his colleagues arrived. If the Dr. Minded, she did not show, too excited to share her findings with others. Apparently, there was something she noticed in the words, the words and way of sentences are written. Looked like he was the only one who understood this, as others looked clueless as the Dr. Went on a tangent, and apparently, she was fluent in reading and speaking in Gujrati. She understood after a while that whatever she said was going above their heads, and decided to lower her standards for mere mortals.

“We all speak in different ways, right? We write differently. Like,” She pointed at a empty glass kept on a tea table in the middle of room, “that, what’s that?”

“A glass.”Chotu said.

“Empty glass on table.” Shree looked at the glass, trying to understand it’s relevancy.

“That’s a tea table.” Rathore pointed out. Riya looked at Arjun after that, and he let out a disbelieving sigh for playing into this.

“It’s all that.”

“True, but the way of describing was different.” She showed the tablet, “These typed letters are not written by same person. They all start in same tone- Kalki devi we have had enough, if you don’t do as we say . . . but look at the last letter. We is now changed to I. First letters asked for money and last one was specific. Also did you notice the font size is different too? The tone in the last letter is more aggressive. The initial letters used ‘you will be hurt’ and the last one mentioned ‘killing’. That’s quite a turn.”

“Maybe the blackmailer had enough?” Shree asked.

“No.” Rathore shook head, “Blackmailer will threaten differently- if I don’t want to give them something, they will hurt someone close to me. Threatening or hurting me won’t give them what they want.” He looked at Arjun, “Did you get something from those goons in police station?”

“They knew Kalki devi was missing. When they saw you around, they felt you are from police.”

“The local goons knew about this!” Chotu turned to Rathore, “Is not the mafia, Silva, on the list?”

“That will explain it.” Shree nodded at his friend.

“Assuming Silva sent the first few letters,” ACP Rawte started, moving back and forth the room, “he had the motive. He also have the resources to kidnap the old lady. But will he kill her? After years of blackmailing, years of failing, he might have enough and decided to get rid of her once and for all. Killing the head of family will send a message- to this family, to many more people. He can once again rule in fear.” Suddenly wondering something, he turned to Riya who looked like she was about to protest at his chain of thoughts, “What did you say about money in those letters?”

“The first letters were along the lines of ‘hand over property to us’, but the last one was ‘10 crore rupees in cash’.”

Arjun turned to Sameer, both of their minds clicking. At the same time, there was a commotion downstairs. By the time the men and Riya ran outside, others were following a man who was apparently a ‘thief’, judging by hysterical crying of women and children around. Chotu, being the tallest and intimidating of them all, rushed ahead and got a hold of the man. His feet dangled in air and by that time Shankar arrived. The ETF shared a look with each other- he looked pale.

The crowd cleared quickly and soon it was like nothing happened at all. Shankar promised to send this thief to jail and ushered them all to Kalki devi’s room. The young man did not take much time to reveal it all, looking at Shankar with disgust.

“I am his brother. Illegitimate, of course. While these big, happy, joint family spends crores on functions and found every mithai company every month, I have to fend for streets. What was my fault when his father could not keep it in pants?” Shankar closed his eyes in pain, turning away from the man.

“You wrote the letter demanding 10 crore.” Riya said.

“Why, these fu kers can’t spend that much on me?” He looked at Shankar, “I am not living on breadcrumbs again.”

“Where is Kalki devi?” Rathore asked, arms crossed over chest. He filed away these bits later and will ask Shankar for the full picture- he don’t want to get into family melodrama, but if it hampers case he will ask.

“How would I know? Maybe in some foreign location setting up another jalebi shop.” He scoffed, looking away as his feet tapped on the floor.