Doing Wrong (Inspector Ghote)

by Keating, H. R. F.

  Doing Wrong

  H. R. F. Keating

  © H. R. F. Keating 1993 *

  *Indicates the year of first publication.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  1

  What have I done wrong, Inspector Ghote thought, climbing the stone stairs on his way to report to the Assistant Commissioner. Nothing. Truly nothing. I am right. Inspector Wagh is wrong.

  Once again he saw the body in his mind’s eye. Mrs Shoba Popatkar, veteran freedom fighter, former Minister, upholder of a hundred good causes. Her plain blue-check cotton sari flung out in a wide arc on the bare stone floor of her little flat. Her spectacles lying upside-down beside her. The time-sharpened old woman’s face with its unmissable faint grey moustache, and the bruises in the fleshless throat where the murderer’s thumbs had dug deep.

  No, out there at Dadar, Wagh had got it wrong. Despite the way her purse was ripped open, that half-wit servant of hers did not arrange with some goonda to come and rob his employer. Why should he have? For years he has been her faithful employee. Oh, Wagh is saying it is always the servant one must first surmise on. True enough when nothing else is looking at all likely. But he should not have ignored and ignored every word of protest the fellow was babbling out when he arrested him. Just only because he is simple-minded.

  And there are other things. Little things only. So little that Wagh made nothing of them. But there nevertheless. The small green uncollected return half of a rail ticket to Banares I was finding in that big leather handbag. No money in that, true. Something in Wagh’s favour. But then what about the fellow I was just now questioning in the bazaar there? Fellow stating a man who asked him where Mrs Popatkar stayed had a Banares accent?

  Yet not so much to set against Wagh’s quick arrest. Will ACP sahib think I am making a fool of myself only to want to go to Banares?

  What have I done wrong, H. K. Verma asked almost aloud to the dawn Banares sky as he climbed out of the wide flooded Ganges, the water from his soul-cleansing bathe streaming off his broad back.

  Yes, I killed her. But I had to do it. It was right to do it. Right. God Krishna himself is saying it. In holy Geeta when he is telling Arjuna it is his duty to fight. To kill, if need be, each and every man in the army opposite.

  Negotiating the last of the slippery, silted-over steps, nevertheless a huge groan escaped him.

  But to have killed her . . . Strangled her . . .

  When I was always wanting to do right. Always from boyhood days. Never have I so much as once thought of taking the life of any man, woman or child. But . . . But if I had not done that . . . And I was asking her not to tell the world what she had read in that confession of lost faith KK was making. I was asking and asking. I was begging her. And she would not listen. No, no, truth must come out. It is what I have always fought for. The obstinate old woman. When that truth will make so much of difference. Not to me alone, but to all I would be able to help in India. When I am, after so many years, having in my grasp one Cabinet seat. Minister for Social Upliftment. Yes, I will get that. It is all but arranged. I know it will come. I know.

  No, no. I was right to do it. Right.

  ‘Well, Inspector,’ the Assistant Commissioner said, ‘I expect, of course, when on an important case a Crime Branch officer is sent to keep an eye on the local fellows that he may find all is not up to the mark.’

  Then a look of sharp doubt flicked on to his face.

  ‘But I am well knowing Inspector Wagh out at Dadar,’ he added. ‘A first-class officer.’

  ‘Oh, yes, sir. Yes. But, sir, I am thinking this time he is going too much by the rules in arresting the servant there. Altogether correct procedure, sir, and quick work also. But, sir, that fellow, Tantya by name, is truly half-witted. I am believing Mrs Popatkar was employing him out of kindness itself. She was having that reputation. So, sir, Inspector Wagh was not listening to all the jabber the fellow was uttering.’

  ‘If it was half-witted nonsense only, Inspector, Wagh was quite right not to waste time with it.’

  ‘Yes, sir. But, sir, Tantya was saying and repeating that Mrs Popatkar had suddenly decided to visit Banares and had given him some leave. He was to come back today only, before she herself thought she would be here in Bombay again. Sir, her killer must have come just only after she had arrived back earlier than she had thought. Her suitcase itself had not been unpacked even. Tantya is claiming, as far as I was able to make it out, that when he was coming back at the time she had told he was just only finding her dead. He was after all reporting crime, sir.’

  ‘And you believe the fellow when Wagh does not?’

  ‘Sir, it is not that only. Sir, I was finding in Mrs Popatkar’s purse her rail ticket from Banares.’

  ‘So the lady did visit Banares. Well, we are all meant to do that at some time or another. Stand in the Ganges, wash away the sins and so forth. That’s no reason for her to have been murdered here in Bombay.’

  Slowly H. K. Verma picked up his dhoti from the pile of clothes he had left at his usual place on the ghat steps.

  But what if I was seen and remembered, there in Bombay, he asked himself, a quiver of fear running through the swell of his belly. What if I was seen in Dadar itself? Somewhere beside one of those decayed old houses and the shops selling everything cheap that could be wanted? Or in that bazaar with those women in greasy saris squatting there with their newspaper sheets of wilting vegetables, and with those shapeless creatures in the doorways, those cripples and lepers lying wheresoever they could? Among the bargainings, the shoutings, the quarrellings?

  Investigation must have already begun down there also. Questions already must be being asked. It will be a top-notch investigation too. Shoba Popatkar was a famed lady. Freedom fighter. Railways Minister in early Independence days. And resigning also when there was that train disaster: 200 killed. Who would do the same now?

  But I will. If there is some altogether equal disaster in my department when I am a Minister in my turn, I would . . . If I am ever made Minister now. If police inquiries are not leading to me myself . . .

  But they cannot. No inquiries can show I was there. Not howeversomuch of a first-class officer they are putting on to the case.

  ‘But, sir,’ Ghote said, aware that for some urgent inner reason he was perhaps pleading more than a self-respecting officer should. ‘Sir, there is more itself. I was asking myself out there if it was truly likely that some small-time goonda would rob a lady known to all as doing so much of right thing. And, sir, I was also wondering whether in her hundred per cent bare flat there would be very much of anything to rob.’

  ‘And where did all this wondering get you. Inspector?’

  ‘Sir, I am believing the murder may be the work of some person wishing crime to be seen as a pure and simple housebreaking which was going wrong when Mrs Popatkar unexpectedly returned back.’

  ‘And on the strength of this guess-guessing, Inspector, you are wanting to take permission to go all the way to Banares?’

  ‘But, sir, one other thing also. I was making some inquiries in the bazaar near Mrs Popatkar’s flat. Sir, to find out if any stranger had been
seen in vicinity itself. And, just only before coming to report, I was discovering one fellow who had been asked where Mrs Popatkar stayed. And, sir, this fellow was from UP-side himself, and he was recognizing the Hindi the man was speaking. Sir, it was very much of Bhojpuri, and, sir, you must be knowing that is the dialect they speak in that part of Uttar Pradesh.’

  ‘Is it, Inspector? And is this expert in regional speech prepared to identify your mysterious visitor from Banares?’

  ‘Sir, unfortunately he is not able. The man had gone before my witness had fully taken in what sort of Hindi he had been hearing. The fellow was altogether lost in the crowd in one half-minute only. You are knowing what like it is at that time of evening out in Dadar.’

  ‘Yes, Inspector, that I do know.’

  ‘But, sir, nevertheless, I may go to Banares? Sir, it is utter disgrace that a lady like Mrs Shoba Popatkar has been murdered itself.’

  The ACP heaved a sigh.

  H. K. Verma stood waiting for the new-risen sun to dry more of the wet off his body before beginning to wind his dhoti round his waist. Mother Ganga now was streaked in pink and yellow light when not ten minutes before, as he had clambered down at last into her sin-freeing water, her whole wide, floods-swollen expanse had been one mist-veiled grey sheet, the Sandbank on the far side altogether lost to sight.

  For a moment he felt something of his old God-given morning tranquillity as his eyes followed a solitary boat in the distance, gliding in silence through the unruffled waters, the splash of its oars too far off to be heard. Then a burst of shouting brought him back to reality. A daring boy had succeeded in diving far out into the fast-flowing stream from the very top of the half-drowned temple at the foot of the next-door Dasawamedh Ghat. The triumphant yells of his friends broke clamorously into the soft murmur of prayers and early morning talk from the few worshippers at his own less frequented, semi-ruined bathing-place.

  But what if someone who knew him among those people – the noises of garglings, nose-rinsing and body-scrubbing down at the water’s edge came jarringly to him now – what if one of them was to greet him? Would it be noticed that he did not have his customary pile of fresh clothes? Be remembered? Mentioned later to some hunting panther of a police officer from Bombay-side?

  But, no. No. Now that he had shiveringly immersed himself in the dawn-chill waters of the Ganga he was freed from that sin. If sin it had been. And freed surely – he must be – from its consequences. Surely, now, all of that had been wiped away. As if it had never happened. As if it had been someone else, someone altogether different, who in a sudden blur of rage had reached out to the old woman’s scrawny neck and choked her into silence. Everlasting silence.

  And he had taken some precautions. From the moment he had realized she lay dead at his feet his brain had become ice-clear. In an instant he had reviewed everything he had done coming to the flat. He had known for certain no one had seen him go inside. He had remembered that the questions he had asked finding his way had been no more than a few quick words. Encounters that among the jammed and jostling, shouting and arguing crowds there – a mercy that the old lady had chosen to live among the poors – could not have left any recollection. And then . . .

  Then what cool, calculating voice within him had seen how easy it would be to make it all look like the work of some goonda? How easy to tear open that big, ugly handbag of hers? To snatch the few notes inside? He had even remembered fingerprints and had covered his bare hands with a corner of his dhoti. So, yes, it must look for all the world as if some good-for-nothing had killed Shoba Popatkar for what he could get.

  He began pleating the travel-stained dhoti round himself, letting it fall down his still not wholly dry legs. Then the kurta, tugged over his head in one swift movement, and last his damp feet pushed into the socks and shoes he had been wearing the day before.

  Shoes. Shoes, what a give-away they could be. Always, going down to the ghat, he slipped into a pair of chappals. Anyone who had seen him here would know it. It would be ridiculous to wear anything else going to the river. But at last the shoes were on and he could make his way back to the house.

  No. Stop. Teeth. No toothbrush. Impossible to clean them. And he had done so morning after morning, never missing, year after year here at the ghat. Would failing to do it now somehow take away from his sin-lifting holy dip? No. Nonsense.

  Nonsense. I must not give way to absurd superstitions. It is the going-down into the sacred water that washes sins away. No need for anything more than that. They even say – not that I can altogether believe it – it is enough simply to enter holy Banares for sins heaped up over a thousand lifetimes to be consumed by her fire as if they were just only tufts of cotton.

  No, teeth brushed or not, I have been freed from that sin now. I am safe. I am.

  The ACP heaved a sigh.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve little doubt that before long Inspector Wagh will get hold of the culprit that servant is in league with.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘But, Inspector, I suppose there may be something in what you are saying. So go off to Benares, if you must. Only, do not get it into your head you may air-dash there like some filmi hero. There are perfectly good trains.’

  ‘But, sir . . . Sir, by air it must be just only two-three hours, and the train is taking more than twenty-four.’

  ‘Then, you will have plenty of time to think, Inspector, yes? Time to dream up some reasonable idea of why anybody should want to come all the way from Banares just to kill a poor old former freedom fighter here in Bombay.’

  2

  H. K. Verma, approached by no friend, political client or acquaintance, plunged into the maze of narrow lanes that led from the Man Mandir Ghat to his house almost in the shadow of the gold-gleaming spires and dome of the Vishwanath Temple. By this route, at this early hour, he could count on hardly meeting a soul. Bathers going down to the Ganges or returning from it would almost all be taking the broad road to the Dasawamedh Ghat, most popular in the sacred city.

  Hurrying between the tall old buildings with the sky now a thin strip of pale blue above, he began to feel luck must be with him. The little shops to either side still had their shutters down. At this hour there were no jostling passers-by to obscure the black, greasy marks rickshaw wallas’ hands had left on the walls as they squeezed and fought their way along the narrow crowded gallis. No one was here to take note of his stained and wrinkled kurta. No one to wonder why, coming back from his sunrise dip, he was wearing shoes. Why his every step was ringing hideously out on the time-worn paving stones.

  He came to the last corner before his house, where once on the wall some impudent jackal had painted in red Please to Vote for Communist Party (Marxist). He turned, still blessing his luck, and saw that Karim, his Pathan watchman, was standing outside the gate. His long wooden staff, as on every morning when he expected his master back, was twirling with demonstrative vigour. His face with its massive curling moustache radiated unceasing vigilance.

  For a moment H. K. Verma felt in his throat a lump of fear.

  What if today Karim has noticed I did not leave the house earlier?

  It took an upthrust of effort to bring out the jocular remark he produced almost every day. ‘Ha, Karim, I was not spotting you when I was going out. Sleeping-sleeping, is it?’

  But all was as usual. Karim gave him his leering smile and said, as always, ‘Oh, huzoor, in the darkness you were not seeing. But every moment of the night I was awake, awake like a tiger only.’

  The lump of fear dissolved altogether with the thought that now, if it should ever prove necessary, he had an alibi. Karim would have to swear after this, however contrary to the actual truth, that he had seen him leaving for his sunrise dip. If it should ever prove necessary. But it would not be necessary. It could not be. There was nothing to connect him in any way with that bare flat in that poor quarter of Bombay.

  Slipping up the stairs, with shoes removed at the door clasped in his hand, he
began finally to feel out of danger. And when he saw his fresh clothes, there on the chair just as they had been laid out the night before for him to take down to the ghat, he shook off the last clinging spider-webs of anxiety.

  Only, moments later as he stripped off his soiled kurta and pulled away the scarcely less stained dhoti, to find his new optimism seeming to descend with them to the floor at his feet. His whole desperate attempt to get to Bombay in time to persuade the old woman not to spill out that fatal secret unrolled remorselessly in his mind.

  Why did I need at the start of it all to telephone that idiot Srivastava at his library? Cannot at all remember. But what a state I found the old fool in. And, then, when he at last stammered out that Mrs Shoba Popatkar had insisted on seeing Krishnan Kalgutkar’s Recollections . . .

  ‘But, Srivastava sahib, that manuscript was deposited in your library under strict instructions it was not to be read for one hundred and one years.’

  ‘Sir, sir, I am knowing it. But, sir, perhaps you are not knowing Mrs Popatkar. Sir, she is not a person it is possible to refuse.’

  And on the old idiot had babbled. Until, in exasperation, he had cut in.

  ‘Srivastava sahib, when was Mrs Popatkar seeing? Was she having enough time to peruse the whole?’

  ‘Oh, sir. She was leaving only ten-fifteen minutes past. And, yes, sir, she had read it all, she was saying I know everything now.’

  ‘Leaving? Leaving for Bombay? Just now?’

  ‘Yes, sir, yes. Bombay she was saying also.’

  He had slammed the receiver down then, run out of the house just as he was, looked up and down the lane for an autorickshaw, a bicycle rickshaw, an ekka even with some broken-winded horse, anything. Because he knew, from all he had ever heard about Mrs Popatkar, she would be going to Bombay by train. She always made a point of travelling that way. And in lowest class. He had read it in the newspapers a hundred times.

  But it had taken him ten minutes or more to find that cycle-rickshaw walla. Then in the press of the day in galli after galli, all crammed with pilgrims, shoppers, beggars, sadhus, wandering cows, dogs, goats, not till they were nearly half-way to the Cantonment Station had the fellow been able to pedal at more than walking speed.