“Eh? What’s that ringing?” one of the guests asked.
“I’ll go check,” Nimish said.
“No,” Maji said. “stay here.”
The bungalow creaked under the monsoon’s weight. Water began to flood from the hallway.
There were shouts and a general shuffling towards the door.
“Must be a burst pipe,” Maji said, turning to Jaginder.
“Bloody hell,” was all Jaginder could manage to say, peeling off his socks.
Nimish edged into the shadowy hallway, his feet splashing through icy puddles.
“The roads are going to flood!” Parvati shouted, pointing outside.
The electricity shorted out, casting the room into darkness. Everyone froze.
In the blackened hallway, Nimish stood motionless, his fingers stretching toward the bathroom door. Slowly he reached out, feeling for the bolt.
It was unlocked.
The door blew open, knocking him off his feet. An icy chill shot past him. In the parlor, someone screamed. The lights flickered on and off, alternately revealing and concealing a scene of pandemonium. Ladies dove aggressively into the pile of chappals, retrieving shoes. Men searched in vain for misplaced wives. Savita and Kuntal came rushing out of the bedroom with the twins. People jostled at the door. Somewhere in the confusion, a breast was grabbed.
Thunder ripped across the sky.
“Get out!” one of the guests yelled, joining the stampede of people racing down the driveway and out past the gates. “The roof’s caving in!”
“The children!” Maji yelled.
“Oh my God!” Savita cried out.
“Here! Over here!” Jaginder shouted, fighting his way upstream to his wife.
And then, as the last guest fled from the bungalow, the power abruptly returned.
Maji stood in the middle of a pool of rainwater, eyeing the solid roof above her.
Jaginder straightened his kurta, throwing dirty looks at his fleeing relations. “Bloody cowards! Afraid of a sprinkling of rainwater!”
“It’s just a leak,” Maji said, her chest heaving.
Sure enough, in the right light, the water appeared to be originating from a gap in the roof.
“Nimi!” Savita called out in a shrill voice, “where’s Nimish?”
“I’m here, Mummy.” He appeared, limping slightly, and regarded his mother’s pale face. “The door was bolted.” He lied for the first time to Savita’s face. “Everything’s okay, I checked.”
In the stillness of the puja room, Maji began to think. This terrible monsoon night had left her household, her beliefs, her very core battered and bruised. She did not know how much longer she could hold things together. Now all her relations would be gossiping about the bungalow’s terrible state of disrepair, making up stories about how they were almost crushed to death by a collapsing roof. And to make matters worse, Savita’s socialite parents would arrive any day from Goa, where they owned a second home on Colva Beach.
Maji pushed these thoughts aside and briefly reflected upon Jaginder. This terrible night had finally brought him to his senses. She pondered the tantrik’s cryptic words: What you have given will be given; what you have taken will be taken. Maji had implored the gods to give Pinky back. Take what you want, she had begged. The entire night, it seemed, had been like a scale, deadened with the heaviness of loss. Perhaps now with Panditji’s prayers and the tantrik’s puja, the balance might swing the other way. Certainly, Jaginder’s repentant return was an auspicious sign. Eyes closed in front of the gods, Maji indulged in a moment of gratitude.
But then she remembered: the ghost was bound within the walls of the bungalow. What once killed the ghost now sustains her life. Maji shifted painfully in front of the altar and opened her eyes. The ghost was at her mercy. As powerful as it had become, Maji was more powerful. She had the ultimate weapon.
“Water,” she said out loud.
The baby had drowned in a bucket of water. And now, Maji realized, by denying the ghost this substance, she could kill it.
FISHING VILLAGE
Pinky opened her eyes. She was lying on a sort of cot, covered by a rough blanket. Her head throbbed, her body felt as if it were on fire yet her fingertips were blue. “Maji?” she called out in fright. A sharp pain stabbed her in the side of her chest.
Immediately, a woman appeared and squatted by her side. A tattoo was etched onto her forearm. She wore a green cotton sari pulled back between her legs with a faded turquoise blouse. Her hair was pulled back in a bun encircled by a jasmine wreath. A chunky silver necklace fell across her chest. Her face was dark, like chocolate, and deeply marked with wrinkles as if by a troubled life. She was not old but her countenance was weary. Gently, she spooned water into Pinky’s mouth and replaced the cloth covering her forehead with a cool one.
“Lovely?”
The woman shook her head, “You can call me Janibai Auntie.”
“Lovely didi? Is she here too?”
“I’m sorry,” Janibai said. “Only you. Was she with you?”
“No,” Pinky lied, suddenly aware of her strange surroundings.
“Rest now,” Janibai said, standing up and looking out the door.
Pinky heard voices outside speaking in a dialect that she did not understand but recognized from her outings to Crawford Market as Konkani, the language of the fisherpeople. A youthful man dressed in a tikkona with one end tied like a rope between his thighs, revealing tight, muscular legs, and a striped T-shirt, entered the small hut and began shouting. He and Janibai exchanged heated words, all the while alternately pointing to Pinky and to some unknown object that lay outside the palm-leaf walls of the hut. Pinky looked out the open door and saw a rectangle of golden sand glittering in the morning sun. A cluster of small, dark faces peered in, chattering excitedly. The skin of Pinky’s face felt tight, her throat was parched and breathing labored. She closed her eyes, allowing sleep to finally overcome her.
Suddenly, the prattling children fell quiet and a burly man burst in, carrying a glistening black rubber raincoat over his arm, pants tucked into black rubber boots. “Janibai Chachar?”
Janibai nodded her head.
“I’m Inspector Pascal of the police and I’m looking for your daughter, Avni Chachar,” he said in a voice that demanded rather than inquired. A Smith & Wesson . 38 hung from the webbing holster at his hip.
Janibai drew back sharply and shook her head.
“No? What do you mean by no?”
The fisherman stepped forward. “Her daughter’s not here, sir.”
“Where is she?” Pascal’s brow thickened.
“She died thirteen years ago, sir.”
“And who are you?”
“Her nephew, sir,” he said, pointing at Janibai.
The inspector paused for a minute. Outside, the children began shouting again. A thin, balding man wearing khaki shorts and a matching topi was running down the sand. When he reached the open door, he tapped it halfheartedly before standing at attention in the doorway. The triangle of small faces reappeared, intently watching the action.
“Ah,” Pascal said with as much disdain as he could muster. “Assistant Police Sub-Inspector Bambarkar to the rescue, I see.”
“Yes, sir, Inspector Pascal, sir,” Bambarkar said, surreptitiously gripping the doorframe with one hand to keep from being blown over by the strong ocean winds.
Pascal refocused his attention on Janibai. “Your daughter was spotted at Malabar Hill last night.”
“How can that be possible, sir?” the nephew asked disbelievingly.
The inspector shot him a glare perfected during his years in the police service, one that immediately reminded the recipient that he could be thrashed at will. As if on cue, A. S. I. Bambarkar pulled out a long bamboo stick and, bracing himself against the door, began to slap it on the palm of his hand.
“I’m not mistaken,” Pascal stated deliberately.
Janibai crossed her arms, unfazed by the inspector�
��s implicit threat. “You did not see my daughter, I’m sure of it.”
“Where’s your proof?” Pascal demanded.
“I saw her die with my own eyes.”
“How?”
“She threw herself in front of a commuter train at Masjid Station.”
“Suicide?” Pascal said.
“She was distraught,” Janibai said. “She didn’t make sense, talked about the midwife and a sacrifice. Her sari was wet, her mouth crusted red.”
“And what were you doing there?” Pascal asked. “The fish markets are at Khar-Danda, Citylight, Dadar, and Crawford.”
“I’ve always sold at VT,” Janibai answered. Believing that Victoria Terminus Station had been built upon the ruins of Ekuira’s original shrine, she went to VT to not only sell her fish, but to pay homage to her patron goddess.
“Very suspicious,” Pascal grunted, then began to circle the small room, his eyes taking in a pile of baskets in need of repair, lingering hungrily over the savory pot of fish fried in peanut oil with tomato, onion, and kala masala, the plate of rice and curry, the hot bhakri bread.
He peered into the cot, at the small body huddled under the covers. Shouting with surprise, he dropped his raincoat and pulled back the blanket.
“It’s the missing girl!” he yelled, accusingly at Janibai and her nephew. “She looks exactly like her photo!”
Pinky’s eyes briefly fluttered opened.
“We don’t know her name,” the nephew said. “I found her on a boat at sea early this morning.”
“You found her in a boat on the ocean?” Pascal asked. “During the monsoons?”
“I don’t know how she got there, sir,” the nephew said, not revealing that he was almost certain he had seen two people in the canoe, that the boat had overturned as he approached. “I saw the boat bobbing on the waters early this morning when it was still very dark. I found the little girl in it, unconscious.”
“Very nice story, you must sell it to the picture-wallahs,” Pascal said magnanimously as he rubbed the handle of his Smith & Wesson. “Now let me tell you what really happened. Your cousin Avni paid Pinky’s neighbor to abduct her. Avni planned to hide her here until the Mittal family paid her a big sum of money. I know how your type works.”
“A big sum of money?” Janibai asked, shocked. “Why would anyone do that?”
“I told you sir, I don’t know who this little girl is,” the nephew insisted. “I never saw her before this morning.”
“Her name’s Pinky Mittal and she disappeared late last night from the home of Jaginder Mittal of Mittal Shipbreaking Enterprises, Ltd of Malabar Hill,” the inspector said, in a mixture of fury and elation.
Janibai gasped, immediately recognizing the name. My daughter’s former employer!
“Aha!” Pascal said, raising a thick finger at her. “So you were lying!” “Tell me,” he said, “was there anything else in or around the boat?”
There was a long pause. Pascal frowned. Bambarkar scowled. The children outside chattered. “Either you cooperate or I will search this place myself.”
“Get it, Auntie,” the nephew said to Janibai in their Konkani dialect.
Janibai reluctantly retrieved a small bundle wrapped in paper from the corner of the room. A damp and badly torn golden dupatta lay inside, embroidered in a pattern of cascading emerald leaves. A label at one end read Sweetie Fashions, one of the exclusive shops along the Colaba Causeway.
“You were stealing the girl’s dupatta, too?” Pascal thundered. Collecting himself and his raincoat, he barked at Bambarkar to load Pinky into his jeep. The officer lifted Pinky from the cot, his pencil-thin legs shaking with the effort.
“I’m taking her to the hospital,” Pascal announced benevolently. “Her family will be most relieved that I’ve rescued her. I myself will be back in a few hours. In the meantime, A. S. I. Bambarkar will stay here to keep an eye out for your daughter, Avni. Either she turns herself in or you will both find yourselves in jail by sunset tomorrow.”
“I will do the needful, sir,” Bambarkar said, eagerly anticipating being the sole officer in charge, commanding respect with a tap of his bamboo lathi. Pleasure dotted his sweaty face.
Waking up, Pinky began to cough.
Pascal began to interrogate her. “Tell me, little girl, what’s your full name?”
Pinky stared vacantly.
“Never mind, I know who you are.” He paused to take a deep breath and puffed his chest out with satisfaction before lifting Pinky’s face by her chin. “Can you tell me what happened last night?”
Pinky was burning with fever, her body shook with chills, but even so, she refused to speak to the burly police officer whom she instinctively mistrusted. All at once she noticed the dupatta that Pascal had tucked under his arm. “Give me that!” she said.
“Is it yours?” Pascal asked, shaking the dupatta at her. “Or, perhaps, Lovely Lawate’s?”
Pinky could not contain her surprise. What do they know? she wondered.
“She took you from your home, didn’t she? Didn’t she?” Pascal shot Bambarkar a look that seemed to say, Watch you bloody fool, watch how I solve two cases at one blow. The assistant sub-inspector tried to look impressed. “Where is she?” Pascal asked. “I have a feeling in my gut that Lovely and Avni were together last night, too.”
Pinky pressed her lips together, struggling to contain her emotions.
“Start by telling me what happened to Lovely after you both reached Colaba.”
Why did Lovely didi want to drown me? Pinky asked herself as the blurred events of the previous night unspooled in her head. All at once and with diamond-sharp clarity, she remembered Lovely’s terrifying voice, the crushing heat in her chest as if something were entering her body, and the sickening whack of the oar.
“Listen, little girl, tell me what happened to Lovely or I’ll put your Maji in jail.”
“You can’t do that!”
Pascal began to laugh. “Oh, I can, I can. I can do whatever I want.
Imagine that, your fat grandmother rotting in an overcrowded cell, surrounded by chors and dakus, lowlife criminals.”
I won’t let him take Maji. Never-ever-ever.
“TELL ME!”
Bambarkar gave her a firm, little shake for good measure.
Pinky coughed a phlegmy mass at his face. I won’t let Maji go to jail because of me, she thought. I did it all, befriended the ghost and . . . and Lovely. She hid her face in her hands.
But her words, rang clear.
“I killed her.”
WATER-ELIMINATION PLAN
From the emergency room of Bombay Hospital, a ward boy was dispatched with a small notebook to be delivered to Dr. M. M. Iyer who was at the hospital canteen eating an onion omelet. The Goanese mess contractor hovered nearby, looking for signs of gastronomic satisfaction. The notebook contained the message, Child with high fever admitted with the additional clarification Jaginder Mittal Family.
He signed the note, marking the time as 9 a.m. The ward boy departed. Normally, the doctor would have taken the full half hour allotted before showing up at the ward, perhaps topping off the omelet with a serving of idli-sambar, perhaps even escaping outside for a quick smoke. But today, expecting that Maji or at the very least Jaginder would be impatiently waiting for him, Dr. Iyer pushed his dish aside and, grabbing his white coat, headed for the pediatric ward.
He was careful to have his coat on before entering, lest he be caught by the eagle-eyed, iron-fisted head of the hospital, Dean Bobby Bansal, and fined twenty-five rupees. Just last night, the Dean caught one of the residents smoking in the surgical ward and promptly threw him out of the hospital, refusing to accept payment from his family for his reinstatement. Dr. Iyer paused outside the door, slicking back his hair, adjusting the stethoscope around his neck, patting a percussion hammer and notebook in his bottom pocket while pulling a pen out of his top one.
Pinky had arrived before him, pushed on a trolley with small, squeaky whe
els.
“Your patient, Doctor Sa’ab,” said the head nurse, a Keralite Christian by the name of Mary. She wore a white dress uniform and an all-white cap to differentiate herself from the white-and-blue-cap-wearing junior nurses. Her dark hair was neatly clipped in a bun in the back of her head. Having never married, Mary continued to live in the nurses’ dorm behind the hospital where no men—whether boyfriends, doctors, or even family members—were allowed.
Pinky lay in the far end of a greenish room with one sole black-grilled window where entire clans of thick-bodied flies buzzed excitedly, drawn to the smell of urine and disinfectant that emanated from the opened window. An indolent ceiling fan lethargically stirred germs from one cot to its neighbor and back. Mary drew a dingy cloth curtain around Pinky.
“Ah, yes,” said Dr. M. M. Iyer, examining Pinky’s chart. Graphs indicated elevated temperature, elevated pulse, and a normal blood pressure. So far, there was no record of bowel movements or urine output. Other information such as the greenish discharge from Pinky’s coughing was noted on a separate page. “Pneumonia,” he stated, noting his diagnosis on the chart before handing it to Nurse Mary who hung it on the end of the bed. “Start her on penicillin.”
“Yes, Doctor Sa’ab.”
Then, surprised, he pushed back the curtain and looked around him as if he had misplaced something. “Where’s her family?”
“She was brought in by the police,” Mary reported in a crisp whisper.
“Police?” Dr. Iyer was intrigued. “The circumstances being?”
“Unknown.”
“Has her family been notified?”
“Yes, Doctorji.”
Dr. Iyer hesitated. He wanted to be present when Pinky’s family arrived so he busied himself checking Pinky’s heartbeat and lungs, hoping she might wake up. After checking on several of his other young patients, he took a seat at the nurse’s desk where the doctors usually retired after their rounds to write out their notes.
The ward boy reappeared with another notebook for him, paging him to the Administration Ward.
Haunting Bombay Page 26
