The Widows of Malabar Hill

by Sujata Massey

  “The back-of-the-neck wound,” Perveen said, suppressing a brief rush of nausea as she recalled the scene. “I guessed that was the cause because of all the blood and the fact that the letter opener was still there.”

  “Ah, but the coroner didn’t say the letter opener was the weapon. He suggested a stiletto-type item was used—although none was found on the scene.”

  Perveen thought this through. “Was the letter opener placed there after the fact?”

  “No comment was made on that, but it surely must be the case.” He put down his cup heavily. “For all we know, someone other than the killer came along after the deed was done and placed the letter opener there.”

  “It would be a way to throw suspicion on Razia-begum or Amina” Perveen was unable to sit any longer and got up to look out the window. “I feel we must investigate the past relationship between Sakina-begum and Faisal Mukri.”

  “You must be very careful when you speak to her—and any other of the wives,” Jamshedji said. “Get the information, and get out.”

  Perveen hugged her father tightly at the door. He had given her his blessing to continue with the case. It was hard to express to him how happy that made her, even at a very difficult time.

  Gruffly, he said, “This is a grand farewell for an ordinary morning in court.”

  “I’m only wishing you the best of luck. You are defending Mr. Reddy’s sweetshop, which is one of my favorite places.”

  That brought a chuckle. “If we prevail, there won’t be much of a fee—but I expect a big pan of boorelu.”

  “We will celebrate with sweets tonight,” Perveen pledged, hoping that it would be a celebration of her work as well as his.

  31

  Left Hanging

  Bombay, February 1921

  “Hobson-Jones residence!” Alice answered cheerily on the second ring.

  “It’s Perveen. Are you up for work today?”

  “Certainly. I’ve watched the telephone all morning hoping you’d call.”

  Perveen wasn’t surprised that the energy that had woken her stretched all the way to Malabar Hill. “You can’t imagine what I’ve learned from my father in the last half hour. I’m starting to put together the pieces—”

  “I’d like to finish that puzzle we began at your house last night. One thousand pieces, wasn’t it?” Alice spoke brightly, and Perveen suddenly realized that the councillor’s telephone line was hardly confidential.

  “Actually, I’d like to show you the Hanging Gardens. If it gets too hot, we can come back here and finish that puzzle.”

  “I’ll come for you in the Crossley. No, it’s not an imposition. Mummy has plans with Lady Lloyd and would much rather ride with her in the Silver Ghost.”

  Alice arrived in the elegant blue car shortly after nine. As Perveen entered the car, several neighborhood boys waved at the tall fair-haired visitor. Perveen ran past Camellia, explaining that she had to show Alice the Hanging Gardens before the midday sun rose.

  “Good idea. She must not burn her skin. Take a parasol,” Camellia said.

  Perveen had not wanted to tell her mother about her visit to the Malabar Hill bungalow; while Jamshedji had authorized the trip, her mother would worry far too much.

  Because the Hobson-Joneses’ chauffeur, Sirjit, spoke excellent English, she knew not to talk about anything in the car. She did ask for a stop at the Hanging Gardens. There, the two strolled far away from the memsahibs chatting together while ayahs trundled their babies. The two went through the little paths lined by roses and topiaries. At the park’s far side, a stone wall bordered a steep drop. It was there that Perveen explained about the close relationship of Sakina and Faisal Mukri. Perveen also told Alice of her intent in exploring the passageway.

  Alice’s eyes glittered with excitement. “How shall we manage all of this? Do you think they’ll just let us look?”

  Perveen shook her head. “You shall be my decoy. What if you appeared at the door of the zenana hawking yourself as an English governess? Even if they say no, you can keep talking, and they’ll not have the nerve to send an Englishwoman away.”

  “And where will you be?” Alice said as the two of them turned to walk back to the waiting car.

  “Walking into the other side of the house and taking the exploratory route from Mr. Farid’s room—or should I say, Mukri’s lair?” she added with a grimace.

  “But aren’t there going to be police present?” Alice said as they passed through the garden’s gateway to the street.

  “I’m not sure because I heard Mohsen’s back on the job. In any case, if the police are present, we’ll tell them you’re paying a social call, and they will think your mother sent you. They already know I’m the family lawyer and have good reason to be at the property.”

  Outside the bungalow wall, a young man carrying a notebook was arguing with a constable guarding the gate. Perveen guessed the young man was a reporter. She tried not to catch his eye as she spoke out the car window to the constable standing on guard.

  “Are you from the Malabar Station?” Perveen asked politely in Marathi. “Thank you for coming. I’m Miss Mistry, the family’s lawyer. I’ve come with the children’s governess.”

  “You were at the station,” the constable said, nodding in recognition. “The inspector and sub-inspector are coming later this morning.”

  “I’m pleased to hear that. Thank you again,” Perveen said.

  “Who are you? What is this?” the reporter called out as the constable waved the car through.

  “Good luck to both of us,” Alice muttered after they’d both stepped out of the car. “Any new thoughts about our plan?”

  Perveen glanced at Sirjit, who had been instructed to wait in the porte cochere close to the zenana entrance. He had already opened up a newspaper and settled in for the wait. “Let’s divide and conquer as planned. You will knock on the zenana door and offer a free English lesson for the girls. It’s really too bad Amina isn’t here—she’d jump at the chance to speak with you. I will check if Mohsen’s here and then get on with my search for the passageway.”

  “Do you have the plans?” Alice asked.

  “Yes, they’re in my bag, but I’ve got the layout more or less memorized.”

  “Then might I keep them in my satchel? Just because I don’t know the bungalow at all.”

  Perveen gave them to her. “Let’s meet at the car when each of us is done.”

  After they parted, Perveen made her first stop, at the garden hut. Right in front of it, Mohsen was lying on a charpoy. He was dressed just in a vest and pajamas and fast asleep. Zeid sat next to the charpoy, gazing adoringly at his father.

  As Perveen approached, Zeid got up and ran to hug her. “You brought him back! Memsahib, thank you!”

  Smiling, she said, “The police released him, not I. But I am glad for you.”

  The exchange had woken Mohsen. He lifted his head from under a blanket, grumbling at the children to quiet themselves. Then he turned and saw Perveen. Instead of giving her the smile she expected, he looked anxious. “You!”

  “Good morning, Mohsen,” Perveen said pleasantly. “When were you released?”

  “A few hours after that telephone call they allowed to Sakina-begum. She convinced them.”

  It was hard to think she might be chatting with the man who’d abducted her. Carefully, she asked, “What is the situation with the household? Are the begums asking you to stay on?”

  “Certainly.” He looked at her with a hint of defiance. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m only resting here because the police are at the gate keeping away reporters.”

  She supposed the police wouldn’t like it known that they’d released a suspect before taking a new one into custody.

  Perveen told him she hoped he would be back on duty soon.

  Feeling his eyes on her, she
walked onward to the entrance to the main house. The front door was locked, and when she knocked, nobody came. This could only mean the police were clustered at the zenana. Alice would have to deal with them.

  Perveen crept along the side of the house until she came to a side door that she remembered from the architectural plans. This was the servants’ door, she realized after seeing a small pair of rough sandals next to it. It was unlocked. After a short walk down a hallway, she found the large, elegant reception room that she’d first visited. This time, she was well aware of the risks of being seen and heard through the pierced marble wall. Keeping her eyes on the jali panel, she slipped out of her shoes, but instead of putting them in the shoe case, she put them under a chair.

  Tiptoeing upstairs, she began preparing an excuse in case Zeid or Fatima came upon her. She would tell them she was looking for papers connected to the estate in the upstairs study. The children didn’t need to know she was looking for evidence connected to Mr. Mukri’s death before she was certain of her suspicions.

  They wouldn’t like what she was presently thinking. Although Jamshedji had told her about Mohsen’s release, she hadn’t realized he’d been freed just hours before her abduction. All the widows had the street address for Mistry House on the business cards she’d given out. He could have been dispatched to get rid of her. And Mohsen knew the pier. Razia had mentioned that Mohsen’s job, before he’d come to the house, had involved working for Farid Fabrics on the docks. Sakina might also have known.

  Mohsen had wanted to know about a jewelry shop. Perhaps it wasn’t because he intended to steal; Sakina could have promised him a portion of proceeds from selling her jewelry. Perveen caught her breath as she thought about the various things that might have been promised to the guard who performed household errands.

  But how could such a conversation between a secluded woman and male servant have taken place?

  Sakina had said she took care of the garden’s flowers early in the morning.

  In Omar Farid’s old bedroom, a shaft of midday sun fell across the space, brightening it.

  She was sure Mr. Farid would have kept the key to the locked door somewhere in the room.

  First she checked the desk, but found only papers and money. She opened the double doors of a mahogany almirah. Gently, she moved her hands through stacks of folded men’s shirts, pajama trousers, and sherwani coats. All were of average-quality cotton—the kind of clothing worn by an employee, not a boss. There was just one European suit, made from gray cotton and carrying the label of an ordinary Bombay tailor. The suit had a slight odor, as if had been put away without washing.

  All of the clothing was free of dust; it had to belong to Mr. Mukri. He probably wore the suits only to work, or for special occasions. He had died wearing another suit; there had been so much blood, she could not remember its color.

  But she did remember something else. It was a comment Sakina had made when Perveen had first asked the widows about what they’d done after hearing there was a wounded man lying on the other side of the brass jali.

  Just because the man was dressed in an English suit, it didn’t mean he was our household agent.

  Perveen had long since ruled out that Amina was the one who discovered the body because she hadn’t mentioned seeing it when Perveen questioned her. Sakina had said she didn’t look, but she’d known what he was wearing.

  A sharp lawyer would have recognized this incongruity the moment that the words had been uttered. But Perveen had been reeling with her own shock at seeing the body and the burden put on her by the police to get information from everyone. She had not registered what had been said until the moment she’d looked at the second suit in the almirah.

  Perveen reminded herself of the task at hand. She finished checking the inside of the almirah and looked underneath and behind it for a hidden key. Nothing.

  She realized ten minutes had already passed; she’d need to hurry up the search.

  A box of matches was tucked in one bedside table drawer. The other one held a lady’s hair comb, two hairpins, and a small vial of attar. She didn’t need to open it to smell the scent of sandalwood, the attar used by couples.

  Turning the hairpins over in her hand, she saw a long, lustrous black hair. Sakina had the prettiest hair of the three wives; it was very likely hers. But the hairpin gave Perveen an idea. She went to the locked door and slipped the pin inside the keyhole. She turned it this way and that until she heard a click.

  The door opened with a creak of dry hinges, revealing a narrow, dusty marble passage. The hall was stamped with many footprints and couldn’t have been more than two feet wide. It would have been horrifically claustrophobic if there hadn’t been a row of clerestory windows close to the ceiling. The windows were closed, which made the passage stifling. There was also a faint smell that brought Perveen back to the little room in the Sodawallas’ house.

  Perveen walked the passage’s length, arriving at the door on the left that she knew was Sakina’s. But the footsteps in the dust didn’t stop here; they continued around a left turn.

  Was one of the other wives involved in the death?

  Now she was in the second part of the L-shaped zenana hallway, where Razia’s and Mumtaz’s quarters lay. But her attention was no longer focused on the doors along its length. A dark bundle lay at the marble floor’s end point.

  Perveen rushed forward, the smell of old blood filling her nose, making her want to retch. As she reached the bundle, she jerked to a horrified stop. Black chiffon, stained brown with dried blood, had been wrapped all around a small body.

  Perveen lifted the chiffon away and found a young girl curled up with her dark hair half covering her face. It was Amina.

  Perveen felt tears starting. She should not have waited to report the disappearance. She should have carried out a house search with police assistance the moment she’d heard Amina had gone missing.

  Her hand shaking, Perveen put it on Amina’s forehead. It was still warm, although that might have been because of the heat of the passage. But as she moved the hair away from Amina’s face, it seemed as if she saw the girl’s nostrils move very slightly, as if she were taking in air. Her lips were dry and cracked.

  Swiftly, Perveen reached under the chiffon and found Amina’s arm. Sliding her fingers down to the inside of the girl’s wrist, she felt a pulse. Amina was alive but unconscious—the result of the heat? Or drugging?

  Perveen needed to get Amina to safety. Dehydration after three days was a serious matter. Cyrus’s sister, Azara, had been neglected and had died after not taking in food and water. Perveen hoped it wasn’t too late for Amina also.

  As Perveen struggled to lift Amina’s body, she thought about how only one of the widows wore black chiffon.

  Perveen heard the sharp sound of a door opening. With a feeling of dread, she turned her head. Sakina had entered the passage.

  32

  A Widow’s Lament

  Bombay, February 1921

  The veil had dropped.

  Sakina rapidly advanced toward Perveen, who had nowhere left to go.

  “Why are you here?” Sakina asked.

  “I was interested in the passage.” Perveen struggled to look composed. She thought of Alice, who was likely out at the car waiting for her. Even if Perveen screamed, Alice wouldn’t hear her. The walls were too thick. Desperately, she said, “The police also have details about this place and my plan to inspect it.”

  Her second untruth of the day. But while Camellia had believed her, Sakina shook her head. “I don’t think so. We’ve only got one constable, and he is gawking at the huge, ugly Englishwoman who would like to become our governess.”

  Perveen couldn’t tell from Sakina’s snide tone whether she believed Perveen and Alice were together. What she needed was to get Amina to safety; sorting out Sakina’s suspicions could come later. Keeping her hand on A
mina, Perveen said, “I’m amazed this girl is still alive after three days in such a stifling hot place. Will you help me carry her out?”

  “But she is sleeping,” Sakina said, sounding almost protective. “So tired, after all she drank.”

  “What do you think she drank?” Perveen almost said, Was she poisoned? but stopped herself just in time. She would not get far by accusing Sakina when there was so much she needed to learn. When Sakina didn’t answer, Perveen said, “I must make clear I am not your lawyer. I have taken on that duty for Razia-begum.”

  “Of course you would help her—she gets everything,” Sakina said, her resentment surfacing. “But her sweet-tooth daughter isn’t as lucky. She drank falooda mixed with morphine.”

  “Did Mohsen buy the morphine?”

  “No. It was left from my husband’s illness. I found it in the room some weeks ago. At that time, I was only thinking about using it to take care of Mumtaz. But sleeping powder has a much greater effect on a small child’s body.”

  Sakina had dropped two major revelations, but Perveen couldn’t react with horror. She needed to calm the woman—and that meant letting Sakina feel understood. Softening her voice, she said, “You were worried about Amina.”

  “The girl was always watching and listening. I didn’t know she had found this passage—maybe her mother told her it existed.” Closing her eyes tightly, Sakina fell into a silence. Then the eyes opened, and she looked coolly at Perveen. “We must wait for her to awaken. When she has the ability to drink again, you will give her the medicine again, mixed with water. She trusts you.”

  Perveen felt her stomach turn. “We mustn’t do that. You’ve known Amina since you married her father. She’s been like a sister to your own daughters.”

  “It will be a loss for them. Just as I lost love—twice.” As she spoke, Sakina’s lovely features seemed to sharpen.

  Perveen knew she had an opening. But how much could she say without pushing Sakina too far? Softly, she said, “Faisal lived with your family when you were young. You were so close. The best of friends.”