The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken

by Tarquin Hall

  'Anything earlier was put down on palm leaves but none have survived,' he explained.

  It took him half an hour to find the right family lineage. The entry was written in the Perso-Arabic script.

  'Here,' he said. 'Megha Ghatwal was born in 1927. Her father travelled to Haridwar in the month of Kartika in 1936 to scatter the remains of his own father. Look. Here's the updated information he provided on his immediate family and there's his thumbprint and those of the witnesses.'

  'Megha had brothers and sisters?' asked Mummy.

  'Two brothers. But seems they were both killed along with their father in 1947 - while the family was fleeing to India.'

  The Panda turned the page and found it empty. 'That's strange,' he said. 'There are no more entries. The last was made in 1949 when Megha Ghatwal's mother, Harjot, visited Haridwar on pilgrimage and reported the death of her husband and sons.'

  'There's no record of Harjot's death?'

  'None. Her daughter has never come.'

  Mummy noted down the details and paid him a couple of hundred rupees for his time.

  It appeared that Megha Dogra was who she claimed to be; her maiden name was Ghatwal and she'd arrived in Delhi with her mother. Furthermore, her native place was a good 150 miles from the village where Faheem Khan lived in 1947. But why hadn't she recorded her own mother's death?

  'Did you find what you're looking for?' asked Ritu Auntie, who was waiting in the square.

  'Just I'm making progress,' she answered.

  They climbed into their auto and started back up the hill, passing a man whom Mummy had seen earlier outside the hotel. Looking back, she watched as he mounted a scooty and followed after them.

  THIRTEEN

  THE SECURITY GUARD approached the Mercedes Benz, clipboard at the ready, as it stopped at the front gate of Full Moon's Chattarpur farmhouse.

  'Your good name, sir?' he said once the automatic window had slid down.

  'Pujji. Mahinder C. Pujji,' answered Puri. 'Sagittarius.'

  The security guard either didn't understand the reference to his assumed star sign or lacked a sense of humour. He ran his finger down the guest list with a straight face.

  'I see your name here, sir. But there's no mention of Ma'am.'

  He was referring to the woman seated next to the detective, his eyes lingering on the tantalising flash of thigh revealed by the slit of her tight black dress. She was Puri's junior by a good twenty years, and had long black hair, high cheekbones that punctuated her faultless caramel complexion and bewitching oriental eyes.

  'This is Miss Nina,' said Puri, adding in an emphatic tone, 'a friend.'

  His escort let out a childish giggle and squeezed his left knee. 'Oh come on, Pujji wooji, I'm a good friend, yaar,' she said, her tone louche.

  'Quite right, my lovely wovely.' Puri let out a hearty laugh that sounded especially sleazy. 'Better make that good friend, actually.'

  The security guard apologised with heartfelt remorse. 'Unfortunately, sir, I cannot permit anyone to enter who is not here on the list,' he said.

  'Come on, yaar,' insisted the detective. 'Just go check up, OK? No one told me anything of the sort.'

  The guard agreed to do so, retreating to his sentry post, where, through the window, he could be seen talking on a phone.

  All the while cameras mounted on the high walls surrounding the property peered into the interior of the car, their lenses opening and contracting like sea anemones.

  'Full Moon takes his security most seriously,' murmured Puri. 'Wonder if he thinks he's the next target.'

  The detective was taking no chances himself.

  Mahinder C. Pujji was a persona he had developed and honed over the past couple of years for just such an operation. He was a Ludhiana resident with a successful machine tools manufacturing business, an account with the India National Bank, a driver's licence and, for good measure, membership of the All Punjab Rotary Club.

  Mr Pujji was also armed with a number of handy gadgets. His mobile phone doubled as a voice-activated recorder. The gold medallion he was wearing as part of his disguise - he had gone for 'Indo Western', Western meaning cowboy - contained a pinhole TV camera and transmitter. And there was a location device secreted in the heel of his fake alligator boots.

  The receivers for these devices were all in the back of a battered Bajaj three-wheeler van (one of thousands that plied the streets of Delhi and transported everything from chickens to schoolchildren) parked down the street. Flush, the young electronics and computer whizz, was secreted in the back. Tubelight was also on hand. And it was his mysterious Nepali operative Facecream who was playing the part of Puri's mistress.

  No one else could have carried off the part quite as well as her, reflected Puri as they waited. The 'Pujji wooji' touch had been sheer genius.

  'Ma'am may accompany you,' said the security guard when he returned. 'But before you can proceed I would need the password.'

  'Most certainly,' said Puri. 'It's Humpty Dumpty.'

  The automatic gates parted and the Merc purred up a driveway lined with giant dahlias. In front of the 'farmhouse', a mock Rajasthani-style palace with sandstone turrets, white marble balconies and a set of solid brass doors, stood a giant rockery with a bronze statue of Shiva mounted on the summit.

  With Facecream hanging on his arm, her high heels making her the taller of the two by a couple of inches, Puri walked through a grand entrance hall and on into a galleried living-room-cum-hall. Stuffed animal heads stared down from the walls - as did the grinning likenesses of three generations of Full Moon's over-fed family. All of them had posed in their most garish finery for a professional photographer with a preference for soft lighting and smoky filters.

  The match between the Goa Beachers and Mumbai Bears was being projected on to a cinema screen at the far end of the room. Some forty or so men, charged tumblers of whisky in hand, were engrossed in the live coverage. Amongst them Puri counted a minister, a couple of senior bureaucrats, a music video VJ, a high-ranking police officer and the Indian chief executive of an international bank. On the encircling chaise longues lounged leggy women of various hues.

  'You're Pujji?'

  The voice belonged to Full Moon - a deep bass that went with his black attire and ear stud. Standing face to face with him - it was uncomfortably close - Puri realised how apt the nickname he'd chosen for the bookie had been. There was not a single hair on the man's head and his scalp was riddled with squiggly bumps like those made by sand worms on a beach. His forehead, however, was smooth and shiny and sloped down to a prominent hooked nose that bespoke Central Asian ancestry - and not a little danger.

  'Welcome to my home,' he said, his deep-set eyes appraising Facecream's voluptuous figure. 'Help yourself to liquor and food. The chef is Thai. I've brought in my own paan wallah as well. You won't find better anywhere in Delhi.'

  'Wonderful,' said the detective, beaming. 'Rinku said you were a man who liked to enjoy.'

  But Full Moon's attention was still directed solely at Facecream. 'We've not been introduced,' he said. 'You are?'

  'Private property,' answered Puri, who promptly ordered Facecream to go and fetch him a drink.

  'Oh, Pujji wooji!' she said, objecting with a pout.

  'Go!' he said firmly. 'I would be joining you. We two have business to discuss.'

  He and Full Moon both watched her walk away.

  'That is a first-class hussy,' said the bookie.

  'Keeps me fit and fine.'

  'I can imagine. Tell me: she's for sharing?'

  Puri's mouth twitched into a smile. 'I've been here five minutes only and already you're wanting to steal my woman, you bugger!' he said. 'That takes balls, by God! But Miss Nina's not a library book for borrowing.'

  'Everything can be bought for a price,' said Full Moon in a dark tone. He eyed the briefcase Puri was carrying. 'You brought the deposit?'

  'Ten lakhs exactly.' Puri gave the briefcase a pat.

  'Rajesh over there w
ill keep a record of your shouts. All accounts to be settled by end of day. No exception.'

  The bookie called over his number two, who took the cash.

  'Let's make this interesting,' suggested Full Moon. 'Win and I'll double your takings. Lose and I'll hang on to Miss Nina for tonight.'

  Puri shook his head. 'No deal.'

  'Triple?'

  'Not even ten times, bhai. She's a display item, only.'

  Full Moon faced the detective square on. 'You're not understanding,' he said. 'I'm offering you excellent odds. You should take them.'

  A voice broke in: 'Sunny! Good to see you, buddy!' It was Rinku. He walked over and gave Puri a playful punch. 'Seen all these women? Like Baskin Robbins, yaar! Thirty-two flavours! I told you, Mohib bhai knows how to throw a party. Come! Let's get you a proper drink.'

  Rinku led him away to the bar.

  'You're welcome,' he said under his breath.

  'Situation was totally under control,' said the detective.

  'Like hell, Chubby. And what the hell are you wearing?'

  'I'm in disguise.'

  'Bloody joker! I could spot you a mile off. By the way, who's that girl, yaar - one with the amazing legs? Doesn't seem your type. Does Rumpi know?'

  Puri was shocked by the sums being wagered by his fellow gamblers and the flippancy with which they indulged their habit. There was not, it seemed, an aspect of the game they were not prepared to bet on - from the outcome of the toss to the score of an individual over or the number of wickets a bowler was likely to take. Sums that most Indians only dreamed of earning during their lifetime were being thrown around like change.

  The worst offender was a builder in a white linen suit. After just half an hour of play, he'd lost almost a crore and didn't seem remotely concerned. 'Easy come, easy go, yaar!' he boasted before making another shout, placing ten lakhs on the outcome of a single delivery and promptly losing. The minister, too, threw his wealth around with gay abandon. 'Without death there can be no heaven', he said in an indulgent, self-righteous manner after one of his bets paid off to the tune of two lakhs.

  It was only while watching (and indeed participating in) this macho orgy that Puri really began to appreciate how much money was involved and how 'session' betting was driving the match-fixing industry.

  For anyone with direct access to the teams - journalists, managers, umpires - there was a fortune to be made manipulating even the tiniest element of the game. And crucially such spot fixing was extremely hard to detect. Not just for the authorities but also for the spectators, fellow gamblers and fellow players. You no longer had to throw a match to make money. All you had to do was get one or two cricketers to co-operate.

  What Rinku had said about gambling being in Indians' blood was true, Puri reflected as he sat on a couch next to a young Lithuanian prostitute (who'd told him that she liked Indian men because they were 'horny'). There was no prohibition against gambling in Hinduism. On Diwali, the biggest festival of the year, most families sat around gambling on cards. How much had Mummy taken him for last year? A thousand rupees at least?

  But this was different: Full Moon's guests were addicts, their habit fuelled by a ballooning black economy. The amounts Puri wagered were tiny by comparison. He put 25,000 on the Goan number five batsman scoring nine in the ninth over and lost. He wagered 50,000 on number six losing his wicket on the twentieth ball. And he threw away another 40,000 on the Mumbai captain scoring a four off the last ball of the seventh over, only to watch a leg drive stop short of the boundary.

  'Arrey!' Puri shouted each time he lost. He also made a show of calling a pretend astrologer to get his advice on where to place his money next.

  Secretly, however, he was pleased with the outcome. Rinku had offered him up to Full Moon as a prize sucker; it was the only way to get him in to the party at such short notice.

  'Be sure to lose all your money, buddy,' he'd said. 'Should come easy to you.'

  For good measure, the detective knocked back a few pegs and pretended to be plastered, reciting bawdy ditties to the Lithuanian prostitute, who seemed to appreciate them.

  All the while, however, he was getting the lie of the land.

  Full Moon's number two came and went from a room directly off the hall. At one point, he left the door open and Puri got a glimpse inside - a long table with a couple of laptop computers arranged on top; two men sitting in front of them wearing headsets, no doubt taking bets from punters across Delhi.

  Full Moon himself spent a good deal of time in an adjacent room and Puri decided to try to get inside and plant a listening device. First he needed a diversion. So while Facecream kept their host occupied at the bar, he went to the toilet to call Flush and ask him to arrange a brief power cut.

  Five minutes later, the lights and TV screen went off. Amid all the cries, jeers and confusion, Puri slipped unnoticed into Full Moon's room. Turning on the flashlight built into his Indian-manufactured mobile phone, he found himself in a study, furnished in keeping with the rest of the house - a desk with silver-plated legs, a chair that looked like a throne with red velvet covering. The books on the shelves were mostly about big game hunting and cricket.

  The detective had brought along a few of Flush's ingeniously designed listening devices (these ones looked like ordinary car keys and were therefore easy to smuggle through the tightest security) and attached one to the bottom of the bookie's desk. Then he checked the drawers. The top one was locked, but the mechanism was simple and Puri opened it with ease.

  Inside, on top of some pornographic magazines, he discovered a piece of paper with four rows of numbers written on it, three numbers to a row.

  This he folded and slipped into the inside pocket of his jacket. Then he sent an SMS to Flush. A moment before the electricity came back on, Puri returned to the hall.

  The match ended an hour later, a win for Mumbai. Puri had lost a grand total of 300,000 rupees, a little over $6,000. Facecream had also succeeded in keeping Full Moon distracted without having to compromise herself.

  A few of the guests wandered upstairs, accompanied by the prostitutes; others carried on eating and drinking and took to the impromptu dance floor. A young man whom Puri recognised as the son of one of the country's richest industrialists sat down with a couple of friends and started to snort lines of cocaine.

  By then, Puri had planted three bugs in various parts of the house; a signal from Facecream indicated that she had successfully placed her two as well.

  Before leaving, Puri could not resist having a paan. He went over to the spot where the paan wallah was sitting behind a table and ordered a sweet one.

  The man took a fresh lime leaf from his stock and began to open little stainless steel canisters full of ingredients. He scooped out a dollop of slaked lime paste and spread it on the leaf. Then came the areca nut, followed by dollops of fruit preserves and spices.

  Full Moon came and stood next to the detective and ordered one for himself.

  'You lost a lot of moola today,' he commented. 'Anyone would have thought you were throwing it away deliberately.'

  'Just enjoying,' said Puri with a grin. 'Next match I'll make back my losses for sure - you can bet on it actually.'

  The paan wallah wrapped the betel leaf and its contents into a snug but sticky little package and handed it to the detective. Puri inserted the paan into his mouth; his right cheek bulged outward as the juices began to fill his mouth.

  'Thanks for the party,' he said, sounding like an Indian version of Marlon Brando in The Godfather. 'I had better get a move on. We would be driving directly back to Ludhiana this evening, only.'

  'Don't you mean Khan Market?'

  Puri looked down to find a pistol pointed at his belly. Over at the bar, Full Moon's number two had Facecream and Rinku covered as well. The other guests appeared oblivious to what was going on.

  'What the hell is this, yaar?' the detective bawled, trying to bluff it out. 'You've got my deposit. Accounts are to be settled before midnig
ht as agreed.'

  The paan wallah, who couldn't see the pistol from where he was standing, handed Full Moon his order. The bookie took it with his free hand and motioned Puri towards his study.

  'Jao!' he ordered.

  The detective crossed the hall and opened the door. He could feel the muzzle of the pistol prodding into the back of his ribs as the bookie turned on the lights.

  'Sit down,' he said, closing the door with his foot.

  Puri did as he was told. Full Moon kept the pistol on him and placed the paan on his desk.

  'Now give me what you stole from me . . . Slowly.'